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Blue Promise: Health Impacts of Hurricane Harvey - Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas
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Blue Promise: Health Impacts of Hurricane Harvey
Natural disasters can pose public health problems long after the initial crisis ends. On the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Harvey, we use our data to determine how the storm impacted the health of Southeast Texas. The panel for this discussion includes Bob Morrow, MD, Southeast Texas Market President, Leanne Metcalfe, PhD, Executive Director of Planning and Research, and co-host Ross Blackstone, Director of Strategic Influence. You can listen to the complete discussion in podcast form on Apple Podcasts and SoundCloud.
Dan McCoy, MD; President, BCBSTX
Leanne Metcalfe, PhD; Exec. Dir. of Planning and Research, BCBSTX
Bob Morrow, MD, MBA, Southeast Texas Market President, BCBSTX
Ross Blackstone; Director, Strategic Influence, BCBSTX
Music In
It's been a year since Hurricane Harvey made landfall as a category 4 storm right here in Texas.
Harvey ravaged the economy as well as the health of our Southeast region. In this edition of Blue Promise, we'll use our data to look into the specific health impacts of the hurricane. Thanks for joining us, I'm Dr. Dan McCoy and I'm the President of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas. I'm here with my co-host, Ross Blackstone.
Thank You Dr. McCoy, I think Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas really is in a unique position to provide some really insightful information about the health impacts of natural disasters especially hurricane
Harvey. We have two panelists here to talk to us a little bit more about that. Dr. Leanne Metcalf is Executive Director of Planning and Research and Dr. Bob Morrow is the Southeast Texas Market
President for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas, thank you both for being here.
Happy to be here.
Okay so Dr. Morrow, you're… you are a leader in the southeast region of this state and especially in
the Houston area, most people will remember the impacts that hurricane Harvey had when it hit in
2017 but maybe if you could just remind us what was this storm all about. It packed a pretty big punch didn't it?
Yeah, you know Harvey is really interesting, Harvey started in the Gulf as a relatively weak tropical storm and then it rapidly accelerated and actually hit the mid Texas coast just north of Corpus Christi as a category four storm which is devastating in itself but the ultimate story of Harvey became the fact that it basically hung around for about four days and just sort of went back and forth across the coast pulling up moisture from the Gulf and dumping it in Southeast Texas to the tune of about 60
inches which caused devastating flooding in the whole Southeast Texas region, that flooding made it the second costliest disaster only behind Hurricane Katrina.
So 30,000 people displaced by the storm, one statistic I have is three hundred and thirty six thousand people left without electricity. I mean this storm made news right off the bat.
Absolutely and you know you think about the 30… 30 thousand people displaced, somewhere around
like 13 thousand of them actually had to be rescued, that's that's a big number so a lot I mean a lot of infrastructure and the storm was kind of an equal opportunity offenders so the more affluent areas of the city as well as less affluent areas of the city were significantly impacted and you know the effects of the storm lingers still until today. I know of people actually who even now either are just now getting back into their houses or actually are still displaced.
Okay let me ask so Bob one of the things that was interesting about this storm too was that
people were stranded so…
…there were people displaced that had to leave and I know that one of the challenges that you had to deal with was managing the care for many of our members and helping them manage that care for people that were in that were in Houston that had to come to Dallas but there were a tremendous
number of people that were just stuck in their houses.
Actually you're correct, you've probably heard of the Cajun Navy, where actually you know those
from all along the Gulf Coast including Louisiana came with their own private boats and actually helped evacuate people who needed to be evacuated. It was a very very stressful significant time
for the region.
So we knew that the impact was going to be big right away but it took a little time for us to kind
of identify some of the health impacts, the things that we had to take a look at. Before we get into some of those details that LeAnne has done with her research, Dr. Bob can you kind of give us a
high-level perspective of how a storm like this might actually impact the health of the community.
Well so first you have to sort of maybe if you can get even a mental picture you know so after the flood waters kind of recede, so you know during the flood there's a lot of obvious things high water,
you got to worry about, you know, kids drowning things like that but once the waters recede, you're left with all the damage and we had somewhere around 10 percent of homes in the area were
impacted, many of them completely destroyed, all that debris then lines the streets which creates its own hazards think about things like if it's your house and you're having to saw through sheetrock, you're having to do it that puts all kinds of molds and other dust in the air so are people who have a
propensity for respiratory difficulties that can cause respiratory problems and then those flood waters are not exactly what you would call clean I mean there's lots of things in there including bacteria and so for example people may have cuts on their legs or you know are set up to get
sometimes a pretty bad infection.
So, Leanne we took a look at some of our claims data to figure out what kind of trends were we seeing and how we might be able to take a look at what happened with hurricane Harvey and maybe predict what we might be able to expect for storms in the future. Before we get into some of the details, do you think it's fair to say that the data that we have here at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of
Texas is representative of the whole State, can we extrapolate that to say this is generally what happened across the population?
LEANNE:
Yeah, Blue Cross of Texas is in all the counties across the State so we do have representation of the members throughout the State and we do cover a good number of the people throughout the
State so what we have can be extrapolated to say this is what happened across the State. We did focus on those counties that were directly affected or that FEMA had identified as being affected by what happened and so that was around 1.2 million people and so we were able to look at the data
across those that we actually covered to see what were the health effects prior to the hurricane, after the hurricane and then look across a few years just to see, you know, did we see a certain effect at
this time of year, or is this was, if this was actually due to the hurricane itself.
So would you find?
LEEANE :
Uhm so we've found some pretty interesting things, one of the things that we wanted to look at was the mental health state of the individuals, so we did see that the number of claims that we had for PTSD actually doubled so right and we adjusted for prior years just again to make sure it wasn't a
seasonal affect something and fall at the end of the year and we did see that it did in fact double
across those years. The other thing that we saw, we did see a small increase in substance abuse claims as well for those members and one of the things that we want to be sure as we continue to look at this is to be sure that those are member, continued to get help. So those that were immediately affected, did they get the help they need and then the ones that are continuing to feel these effects how do we help them as well.
So, some of these behavioral health claims you know these are interesting because they're not just
a wound that can heal and all of a sudden you know then it's fixed. Some of these things can have a lingering impact so we're still trying to make sure that our members are taken care of.
LEEANE:
That is correct, yes, so you do have those that had more of an acute anxious episode at the time of the hurricane. We are interested in looking at the ones that are continuing… do you have mental
health effects, you know, now one year after the hurricane.
Dr. Bob had mentioned how the waters are not necessarily the cleanest following a storm like that, any insight into disease infection?
So similar thing, twice as many people in the impacted regions had claims for infectious or parasitic
diseases, something else that we had to look at and we again adjusted for since we didn't know we had a particularly high flu season so we wanted to remove those. Although when we looked at flu
they were also higher than their surrounding counties but we did have twice as many people with infectious or parasitic diseases including meningitis food poisoning cholera typhoid and then
we did see an increase as well in COPD claims.
So all those are certainly acute conditions that would occur as you can imagine from dirty water.
Were you able and I suspect it's probably not an easy thing to assess but what about the issues related to impact on chronic disease because people weren't able to get their diabetes medicines or see the doctor were there any, is there any way to study that or is that something that you might could think was probably worse and thus hard to study.
LEEANNE:
So those were things that we wanted to look at as well. They were a little bit more difficult to study especially in the case of something like CKD could somebody get to a dialysis center .
CKD meaning Chronic Kidney Disease
Chronic Kidney Disease yeah and end-stage renal disease so those are things that we are
currently studying to understand the patterns of where people went for care in terms of managing their chronic disease.
The other issue is kind of curious about, too, Bob I think you can talk about it, I know that there were some interventions that the company helped in solving some problems. I know one of the issues had to do with the fact that more and more records are stored on electronic medical records but there was no electricity and getting access to the records so even if a patient or member was able to get to
Say, Austin or Dallas, they wouldn't have access to their medical record, but you put in place some measures, talk a little bit about that.
Yeah we were actually able to get providers information about the patient's they were seeing because a lot of these for one, you had providers actually coming in to help out who were not our typical providers and you had our members who were displaced and so they were they were
sort of being forced into situation of seeing providers that they had not seen before or they were seeing their providers who had no access to their own information and so we were able to put in a program that that actually pushed the information we had on our members to the providers where they were while they were seeing the patient.
That's like a clinical snapshot of…
…conditions and drugs acts and things like that because I would assume that some of those patients probably had to start new care management plans and see new doctors and that in and of itself creates some inefficiencies in the system and also in kind of inefficiency in their care delivery.
Well and also you know with that data we're able to provide a provider with some comfort that this
medication actually is being taken by this patient and so as a physician you know you really don't want to just be prescribing things for people – "oh yes hey I take that all the time" and this proof this gave the providers some reassurance that that they were actually following a guideline that one of their colleagues had implemented.
So Bob I know that we actually have an office in Houston and we also had workers that were displaced and I know as a company we always look back on these sort of tragedies and what could
we do to change things, to make it better in the future? So that we do things differently? So Leanne based on what you're seeing,
are there lessons learned that we might need to think about because I'm going to tell you we're going to have another hurricane season.
So one of the things that we saw in the utilization data was at least we'd rolled out telemedicine last year and so we did see at least within that group those that did have access, that did have electricity access and could get to their phones, were able to also see docs in areas where those providers were
Closed. There're probably some other things that we could do in order to help patients and providers find each other, kind of educate people on which provider offices are closed but which ones are actually open in that area because some did do a very good job of opening up a day or two after.
So Bob if I remember correctly that was one of the challenges, was that phone service actually was gone but cell phone service actually worked decently well, right?
It did, cell phone service worked well. You know we had over a million members in the impacted area as has been mentioned and so there were a lot of lessons learned just to follow along on that, our response, I was very proud of our response but it was a company-wide response, it really took all
facets of this company to respond in a meaningful way to what was going on and so one of the things we've done as a result of that is we sort of put a playbook together that captured some of the things that went well and we also debriefed on some of the things that we felt like we could have improved upon so that in the event, which will be inevitable at some point, this or a similar disaster happens, we can take a lot of that learning and apply it in the future.
It seems like… did social media play a role in your education efforts?
Social media played a big role you know what I found, one of the things I think that is probably, should be I guess to some degree self-evident, you cannot over communicate. You know we used every communication avenue that we had including social media and we were sending alerts out to people on landlines, on cell phones, via email, via text, social media… all of those things, not one person ever complained that we were sending too much information.
So I guess the flip side is that telemedicine is sort of that outbound reach, right, yeah, but that works on the inbound of educating members then certainly as these storms progress in the future and that modality starts to improve. Telemedicine certainly will become a very important thing to think about in terms of a storm.
Yeah one of the otherthings that we noticed as well, especially for people who use telemedicine. It allowed for those physician offices that were open to see those more chronically ill patients that
needed to physically sit in the office so some of the infectious diseases could be handled over teleMed and then it freed up the docs to see some of the more critically ill patients and so understanding how we can continue that work as well if we do have another natural disaster.
Dr. McCoy I was actually part of Dr. Bob's Task Force during Hurricane Harvey and I can tell you that we really needed to have our customer service phone lines open for extended periods of time, our
provider service phone lines open for an extended period of time. We were the first, maybe not, I shouldn't say that for a fact, but if not the first, certainly one of the first to adopt regulations that were recommended on behalf of this state to adjust and be a little flexible with how we were review claims because we didn't know if a member that might have been coming from an impacted County might have been getting service in another County that wasn't impacted so there were a lot of a lot of moving pieces that we had to consider when trying to decide how to best take care of our members but to that end Dr. Bob, I… before we go, I would like to just also address how we've supported the
community because we've done a lot there and I think it's important that people recognize that during a time of crisis when you have economies being impacted, homes being impacted, Health's being impacted… it's really a responsibility of all of the businesses in that area to step up to the plate and to help support their community. Could you just kind of touch on a little bit about what we did?
Well sure now, you already mentioned a few like extending the call center hours. We actually did outreach I mean outreach to members in the area to proactively ask them what were their needs, well good what can we do to help them. We provide actually boots on the ground help at some of the relief centers where people could come they could recharge their cell phone they could actually watch a live stream, you know, TV. They had access to Wi-Fi and we could help answer their insurance questions, provide them with temporary ID cards and we did this both for our members and for others basically anybody at these relief centers that needed help. We also are… we have such an incredible support from our employees at Blue Cross and Blue Shield, in our customer care advocates, our think blue teams, the community affairs teams, our employee volunteers all of them came together. We donated over 10,000 items things like hand sanitizers, wipes, stuff like that for the community to use, stuff backpacks for the community to use and then we gave monetarily, we ended up given about two million dollars and we did that in a very intentional way, I mean, we did
that in stages so as we looked out to see where we felt like there was a significant need that's where we allocated those funds so we sent, we provided funding to things like the United Way, the Greater Houston Community Foundation, Feeding Texas, the Red Cross, the Urban League, Catholic Charities and food banks, things like that to make sure that we were really targeting the areas where the need was the greatest,
We've covered a lot here. I think it's safe to say that most most businesses and most communities in Texas really did step up to the plate but just to wrap things up in terms of you know this additional
information that's really unique for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas to offer to the conversation as Leeanne had mentioned PTSD claims doubled… infectious and parasitic diseases up 12% compared
to counties that weren't impacted, cases of pneumonia and COPD all went up so you know I think we have a lot to learn and a lot to work for as we head towards the next which is definitely another and
another hurricane season in the future.
And I think it's fair to say too, that the one message that we can send out is, that listen to the emergency management
They tell you to stay in stay in, if they tell you to evacuate then evacuate because these are
real problems and we saw that in our data today. Thanks for being here.
Thanks for being a part of it and thanks for joining us for this edition of Blue Promise.
Music Out


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Q: Avoid applying variable to nested Handlebars partial blocks I have a Handlebars partial called "section", defined as following:

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A: Since you are setting the data parameters (ex., title="title1") for your partial directly within your template, the simplest way to prevent the nested section partial from inheriting the class of its parent would be to explicitly set an empty value for the class parameter where the nested partial is declared:
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I have created a fiddle for reference.
A more robust - and scalable - approach might be to represent your sections in a data structure and pass that to your template. For example, you could define a root section with an array of child sections, like:
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I have created a fiddle demonstrating this alternative.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Can my dog slip out of the harness?
If the harness is fit and used correctly, it is unlikely for a dog to slip out of. We recommend a leash is attached to both the harness and a regular collar at first. This offers general safety for unexpected behaviors such as jumping and lunging.


Most manufacturing enterprises now employ compute numerical control (CNC) technology in their production chain. Improving the performance and flexibility of the computer aided design (CAD)/computer aided manufacturing (CAM)/CNC chain can therefore, have a significant effect on the competitiveness of such enterprises. Whereas hardware capabilities of these systems have increased proactively over the last few decades, the software components have been updated reactively to support the enhancements found on the newer generation of CNC machines. This passive approach has led to severe incompatibilities between the various CAD/CAM/CNC solutions. This paper presents the impediments and issues arising from such incompatibilities and proposes a new framework to overcome these barriers in achieving interoperability in the CAD/CAM/CNC chain. In the suggested framework different components of the CAD/CAM/CNC chain can exchange information with one another regardless of their native standards. The different elements comprising the framework are demonstrated by utilizing a test component in a dynamic manufacturing scenario.


David L. Bahnsen. Crisis of Responsibility: Our Cultural Addiction to Blame and How You Can Cure It. New York: Post Hill Press, 2018. 171 pp. Hardback, $22.19. ISBN: 978-7-68261-625-3.
This is the question we've all been asking ourselves the last few years since the 2016 election and the rise of Donald Trump. Political divisions seem close to rendering our union asunder. Educational prices have skyrocketed and our once stalwart universities rush headlong into a worrying state of decay. Government continues to grow ever bigger, as if it had nothing else to do. Income inequality widens, as economists and public officials wring their hands in worry. Climate change, foreign relations, trade deficits, stagnant wages, declining religious interest and attendance—you name it, America seems to be falling apart. What's going on?
With the election of Trump we have gotten used to talking about a rising tide of populism, nationalism, and tribalism. The white working class, all but forgotten and left to rot in a global economy, has struck back. These things are certainly true, but if anything, they are ephemeral cultural shifts that won't last or ultimately change our national course. What can explain not only the bizarre political atmosphere we find ourselves in but also the generally anemic state of American culture, economy, and society? Enter stage left David L. Bahnsen, the Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer of the Bahnsen Group of HighTower Advisors. Bahnsen has written a dazzling cultural analysis of the current state of America that not only explains where we find ourselves, but more importantly why. In the ethos of Thomas Sowell, Bahnsen avers that whether we're talking about financial booms and busts, the decay of the family, the troubling state of education, immigration, or free trade, what really plagues America—and what binds all the aforementioned problems together—is cultural crisis of responsibility. As a people we have failed to take responsibility for ourselves, our families, neighbors, and communities, but have instead succumbed to recklessness, greed, laziness, and above all, a degenerative spirit of victimization.
Bahnsen kicks off his book in the first two chapters by discussing our current state of affairs. In the West, two events highlighted a common sentiment among the people: the UK's exit from the European Union ("Brexit") and the election of Trump revealed a deep distrust for cultural elites and the belief that the "system was rigged." Not only was someone (or something) to blame, but these events brought to light the jagged lines of class division wherein one constituency wasn't even aware of how the other was thinking or feeling. Cultural cosmopolitanism squared off against cultural traditionalism, but the result was the same: scapegoating the other. This scapegoating, in turn, took on the form of naming your bogeyman. Many blamed Wall Street, others free trade; big business, a biased media, Mexico, NAFTA, the alt-right, and China all took their turn in the bogeyman limelight. The result was an abstracted, composite, catch-all bogeyman whose boundaries constantly shifted and into whose orbit anyone and anything could be sucked. This had the inadvertent effect of making the Left and Right look awfully similar in their form and function, and which in the case of the Trump campaign, even brought opposing sides under the same political banner. Bahnsen eschews this 'us-versus-them' approach; instead, he takes a case-by-case, evidential (and inductive) approach that looks at each issue or societal component in turn to discern to what extent it did or did not contribute to our woes. The result is that Bahnsen skillfully uses our common institutions, problems, and angst as a mirror reflecting ourselves that reveals a decadent people in confusion who have brought trouble down upon themselves.
Chapter three on the social disintegration of America society is critical for Bahnsen's project. The dominant narrative on the Right is that leftism in the form of government overreach, redistribution, and statism, and the progressive cultural agenda of redefining marriage and gender, race relations, and crushing religious liberty is the cause of all our problems. Absent such oppressive forces, Americans desire to be good, hard working, religious, and virtuous folk who would make the world a better place. While Bahnsen doesn't hold back in his abrasive critique of the Left, he essentially thinks this picture is incomplete: instead, these challenges are not the result of bad behavior by the opposition camp, but instead they are caused and enabled by a dereliction of virtue among ourselves that hinders a proper response to hard times. Bahnsen then dives into the literature and stats about the dilapidated state of marriage and the family in our society today, the sad story of unmarried men living with their parents well into their thirties, the irresponsible shunning of work by able-bodied Americans, and the dramatic but shameful rise of disability insurance claims by those who don't really need it. All of this adds up to a fraying social fabric and an atomized and isolated civil society that all too easily turns to government for deliverance. None of this will end until we confront this moral rot head on, and that requires an unequivocal rejection of moral relativism and non-judgmentalism so that we can speak tough truths to ourselves and others.
The truth is this: while Wall Street was riddled with both covetous greed and arrogant incompetence, no financial crisis of any kind could have taken place without the envious and covetous irresponsibility of the people living on good old Main Street, USA (p. 51).
Bahnsen's main point that Main Street (you and me) are just as much to blame for the financial crisis as Wall Street is a painful pill to swallow. Yet there is a ring of truth to it, and with that comes a refreshing clarity and catharsis. He divides Main Street into four kinds of actors: the Swindled, the Reckless, the Gamblers, and the Diligent. The first and fourth groups aren't directly to blame; they just got the short end of the stick. The real guilt here lies with the Reckless and Gamblers. These were financially capable persons who risked too much or who opted for strategic default. As the equity of their homes plunged, they found it more advantageous to default and walk away from their mortgage(s), even though they were perfectly capable of fulfilling their financial obligations. In this sense, it wasn't so much credit unworthiness and the sub-prime market (itself an incomplete story) that drove the crisis, as sheer financial irresponsibility and envy. What this means is the relationship between Wall Street and Main Street is inverted to what we normally think: without the Reckless and Gamblers, Wall Street would have had no mortgage investments to bet on, and there would have been no financial crisis. Thus, it turns out that in this case Wall Street is the result of our responsibility crisis, not so much the cause of it. Bahnsen has much more to say about the financial disaster, and his analysis is superb. If he does ever resurrect his detailed book analyzing the 2008 financial crash, I will be the first to read it for I know it would be a gem.
The next two chapters (five and six) cover free trade, the labor market, and crony capitalism. Here Bahnsen makes four major points. First, free trade combined with technological advances, innovation, and labor specialization has propelled American economic growth forward, as we've been able to do more with less. He pounds the last nails in the coffin of free trade antagonists, pointing out that 90% of the benefits of free trade accrue to the poor and middle classes. Second, protectionist policies in the form of singling out certain groups for special gain or tariffs to punish international trading partners is an immoral and dead-end street. Third, what America really needs is a dynamic and adaptable labor force that is able to learn new skills as the global labor market changes. This is one of the most important lessons in the book: much how agricultural labor in the mid-to-late eighteenth century had to adapt or die in the face of the industrial revolution, so today industrial labor must adapt or die in the face of the technological, digital, and financial revolutions. Many hard-working families won't like to hear this, but it is our reality, and we must vigorously pursue retraining and reeducation (vocational school anyone?) paths to labor dynamism. Fourth, Bahnsen tackles the fact that a breakdown in self-government and self-restraint inevitably tempts a people to call for a king to rule over them (cf. 1 Sam. 8) who will aid them through economic and political cronyism. In this sense, our crisis of responsibility led first to crony capitalism, which in turn yielded statism. Bahnsen calls for a pro-business environment with lower tax and regulatory burdens, opportunity for all, and equal treatment under the law; double standards practiced by both sides have got to go.
Education and education choice are the topic of chapter seven. Bahnsen rightly calls the lack of educational choice and academic freedom the "civil rights issue of our day," for many are being denied a basic and necessary education for the sake of a cute ideology or adult power plays. He draws attention to a false educational philosophy, channeling R. J. Rushdoony to condemn a "messianic vision" of American education that places all the burdens of a coherent and prosperous civil society on educational outcomes. This ignores the fact that education plays a supplementary role alongside family, religious life, and community engagement. Such myopia results in education becoming the sine qua non of the liberal order, the laboratory of political and ideological formation where future citizens are foundationally shaped to carry on the modern project (often in unhealthy or nefarious ways). Bahnsen excoriates this approach, emphasizing the importance of moral and character development in education alongside the acquisition of basic knowledge and skills. For this to occur, we need healthy competition and school choice in order to give parents the flexibility to place their children in schools that best suit them. Bahnsen's not against public education; he even contends that school choice would have a positive ripple effect for public schools as it would weed out underperforming institutions and force the public sector to compete to survive.
It is no secret that education is a (but not the only) critical factor in the success of individuals and families; it is also no secret that the U.S. spends an inordinate amount of money per pupil on K-12 education (~$12,000), and yet we perform dismally on international test results. Overcoming these handicaps is difficult, however, for there are powerful and wealthy teacher unions that selfishly keep American education under their thumb. This is combined with an elitism that discriminates against the middle- and lower-income classes as well as ethnic minorities who too often lack the resources to escape the sinkhole of public education. In the end Bahnsen calls for a local, subsidiarity approach that places responsibility back in the hands of parents and the community, and that rightly views education as one building block that is necessary for us to begin rehabilitating our culture.
In chapter eight Bahnsen tackles the thorny issue of immigration, a topic that not only splits Left and Right, but divides conservatives as well. He rightly states that America has long been pro-immigration, and his overall position is sympathetic to that of the immigrant even though he emphasizes the importance of the rule of law, national security, and sensible cultural assimilation. Bahnsen targets two concerns, one from the Right and the other from the Left: first, the lie that illegal immigrants are destroying our economy or taking American jobs and wages; and second, the scourge of multiculturalism that has infected the immigration debate and inflicted untold damage. Regarding the first, Bahnsen aptly contends that "the notion that hardworking American citizens are being denied a chance to make an honest wage by illegal immigrants is economic mythology" (pp. 101-102). America has absorbed millions of immigrants over her history, and our labor force and economic health has not only adjusted for this fact, but prospered. Immigrants have more often than not brought ingenuity, work ethic, innovation, and entrepreneurship that has enriched our heritage. The problem is not immigrants; the problem is a culture in decline marked by a massive welfare state that attracts immigrants as moths to a light. Regarding the second, a noxious multicultural worldview has hampered honest national discussions about immigration and hamstrung wise and effective policy solutions. This approach most notably affects practices of assimilation, since in the name of tolerance, diversity, and equality immigrants are no longer required to learn the English language, know our history, and appreciate American civic life. Yet being American was never incompatible with being multiethnic, precisely because America from the beginning was an idea, not a bloodline or ancestral pedigree. Multiculturalism not only lies about American history and culture, but it hurts needy and desperate immigrants in the process.
Two additions could have strengthened this chapter. First, in a book about a responsibility crisis, what responsibility do both legal and illegal immigrants bear for the state of immigration in our country? Would Bahnsen argue that immigrants seeking entrance into the U.S. shun the illegal option and wait their turn in line, even if this means hardship in the short-term such as having to wait years (if not decades) and separation from family and loved ones? What are immigrants supposed to do in the face of unjust laws that tear families apart or impose economic ruin? Do legal immigrants have duties to assimilate themselves to American culture—even if not required—and not retreat to ethnic enclaves, and if so, to what extent? Bahnsen hints that immigrants (no matter their status) shouldn't take advantage of our welfare benefits, but I'd love to hear a more robust account of the nature and justification of immigrant responsibility in general and sans citizenship in particular. Second, while rightly targeting multiculturalism as a plague upon our nation, the concept is never defined or developed at any length in the book. This won't be a problem for conservatives who are familiar with this seven-headed hydra, but progressives and leftists won't be convinced. After all, the definition of multiculturalism is rather benign. No one is against distinct cultural or ethnic groups, and Bahnsen himself sings the praises of multinational immigration. Rather, I think Bahnsen has in mind what's termed "ethnorelativism," which is the view that all cultures are essentially equal, and which requires that we maintain neutrality and withhold judgment toward cultures different than our own. (To be fair, multiculturalism is usually used in the ethnorelative sense, but we should seek precision here so as to not give liberal-progressives an excuse to call us bigots.) We both believe ethnorelativism is demonstrably false; but what about it makes it so? And how do we go about judging one culture better or worse than another in an honest and non-pejorative way, and how would such an evaluation affect the immigration debate (i.e., should we favor immigrants from healthier cultures?). Addressing both of these issues would have made this chapter richer.
inherit insane debt and receive little preparation for adult responsibilities, while being indoctrinated with propositions that undermine the foundational values of Western civilization. That's right. One can now go broke being taught to think incorrectly (p. 112).
The result is a higher education system that spits out fragile twenty-somethings with massive negative equity who have no practical experience and know virtually nothing about real life.
Big government is the topic of chapter ten, where Bahnsen makes the basic argument that government grows in proportion to the people's desire and willingness to let it grow. He rightly explains the limited constitutional strictures originally placed upon our government (i.e., checks and balances, enumerated powers, and delegation of powers), and the fact that such a political system could only work with a moral and virtuous citizenry. Bahnsen then walks us through some of the sickening statistics about the unsustainable size of the federal government, and how the very nature of government growth and spending is inimical to economic progress since the government is a consumer, not producer, of resources. The core of Bahnsen's argument in this chapter boils down to the fact that America's mediating institutions—those aspects of civil society like the family, church, fraternal societies, local clubs, etc.—have collapsed, and that government has now filled the void. Who is responsible for this societal collapse? We the people. I completely agree with Bahnsen's point in this chapter, and it is a point that needs to be made because it is so often neglected; however, I do think that once government grows large enough it becomes its own self-sustaining, consuming, and usurping beast, which results in a destructive dialectic of the people abdicating their responsibilities and the government imposing its will against the people (or at least a sizable minority of the people). We can and should blame an out-of-control government for many abuses—I doubt Bahnsen would disagree—even while admitting our own complicity.
The last two chapters in the book (eleven and twelve) are Bahnsen's answer to our culture of blame and our responsibility crisis. In keeping with a book about a people's crisis, Bahnsen sets forth some concrete suggestions on what you and I can do starting today. He lists ten things, such as repudiating victimhood, rethinking education, getting your own fiscal house in order, and the like (I won't list them all so as to not give away all the goodies—you'll have to buy the book!). One of my favorites was his clarion call to "reengage the lost world of local politics." Bahnsen repeatedly makes a point throughout the book that local politics are often just a mirror of federal politics, with all the same corruption and insider deals and blackmail that we're used to seeing at the national scale. Unless virtuous citizens get involved locally in their city councils and state governments, the most vicious and unscrupulous among us will fill these positions and then rise to the top in federal elections. In one sense, we are now at the national level bearing the rotton fruit of decades of corrupt local politics. Bahnsen is a realist about all this as well. Transformation won't happen overnight; it took us decades (half a century or more) to get into this mess, and it's going to take an incremental and persistent approach over the years to come to get us out. Bahnsen ends his book by striking a humble tone, in his hope that his message has the modest impact of changing the national narrative and causing an irresponsible people to critically examine themselves and their communities anew.
I have three brief recommendations on how this excellent book could possibly be even better. All of them fall under the umbrella of what was missing, as opposed to criticism of what was said. Of course, this might be unfair to Bahnsen, as anyone of his intellectual and epistemic capacity is never short of ideas or words. I'm sure many good things were cut out of the book, as we all have to draw the line somewhere and hit the publish button. Still, here's a few suggestions.
First, Bahnsen is absolutely correct about the decline of a virtuous citizenry in our nation, and that addressing the political, economic, and cultural crises that beset us will require first introspectively examining ourselves and reforming our own vices—at the individual, family, and community levels. However, this brings up two additional questions that aren't addressed: first, where does virtue come from and how is it that we become virtuous people in the first place, and second, what did the American founders believe about the role of virtue in the life of a republican nation? The answers to these questions dovetail, for both point toward the integral relationship between virtue and sincere religious belief and practice. In his many writings (esp. A Free People's Suicide), philosopher and social critic Os Guinness has discussed what he calls the founders' "Golden Triangle of Freedom," wherein freedom in the personal and political spheres relies upon virtue, and virtue upon religion, and religion upon freedom, creating a dynamic and mutually dependent circular dialectic between these concepts. We can and should call for people to return to the good life (eudaimonia) marked by virtue (arête), but understanding what the virtues are, how we become virtuous, and the relationship of virtue to freedom and religion, must also be addressed.
Second, and related to the first, there was no chapter in the book on religion. This seems like a significant oversight given the decline in religious devotion in America over the past few decades, especially within Christianity. The rise of the 'Nones'—millennials who have left the church and claim no particular religious allegiance—has been extensively studied and bemoaned. Coinciding with this is a new, militant atheism that has aggressively attacked all religious faiths and decried them as inimical to modern, enlightened civilization. Combined with secular humanism that has marched through our universities, our civic institutions, and now our political structures, America is facing a religious crisis: will we maintain and rejuvenate our Judeo-Christian foundation, or will we slowly slide the way of a secular, social-Democratic Europe? Given that Europe faces its own crisis of responsibility that is far more advanced than America's, it is critical that we understand the forces that reduced a once-proud civilization to such a humiliating and embarrassing state—with the abandonment of religious faith being a central factor.
Additionally, I'm curious how Bahnsen would relate his thesis to Protestant Christianity in particular. What role does the gospel of Jesus Christ play in becoming a virtuous, responsible, and contributing citizen of a secular country? Bahnsen speaks repeatedly and highly of a healthy individuality and self-reliance, but these concepts are routinely rejected by many Christian scholars and pastors as being anti-Christian and secular impositions that have polluted authentic Christian faith and discipleship (e.g., the rugged individualism of the western frontiersman). Although Bahnsen does note the distinction between individual responsibility and individualism (p. 159), a more sustained examination of the relationship between these two—and between the concepts of self-reliance and biblical community—would have been helpful. Of course, since his target audience is much broader than Christian or evangelical subcultures, it is understandable that Bahnsen doesn't delve into these tribal debates. Still, I can guarantee you that many Christians will reject Bahnsen's thesis outright as an example of a pseudo-Christian civil religion or self-help gospel that supposedly fails to grasp the radical message of the New Testament. I don't believe this, and I know Bahnsen doesn't either, but a defense of his book on this front will likely be necessary.
An existentialism (à la Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Jean-Paul Sartre) that has prioritized existence over essence and thus yielded a neo-Gnosticism that subverts physical reality to the hedonistic desires of the immaterial self.
A scientific materialism that reduces every discipline to a math (à la Immanuel Kant) and every human to an evolving, material robot that must conquer the external world or go extinct.
A modern liberalism—what some have called "liquid modernity"—that is a faux liberalism and a rejection of classical liberalism (built upon a natural law ethic), and which carries the seeds of its own demise and masks a silent but deadly tyranny.
A neo-Marxist critical theory that rejects the foundations of the Western political and legal order, and manifests itself in legal, racial, gender, and various other educational studies; and which has given us the notions of white privilege, structural racism, intersectionality, social justice, identity politics, storytelling, microaggressions, safe spaces, and the like.
Finally, a deeply entrenched anti-American, 1960s countercultural ethos that pervades Hollywood, elite culture, political institutions, and the academy (e.g., America as an imperialist, colonializing, white-supremacist, misogynistic patriarchy).
These are just some of the reasons America has fallen off the character cliff and is facing a crisis of responsibility, and until they are elucidated and rebuffed, I'm not sure we will make any progress. A chapter tackling theoretical concepts in the philosophy of ideas and sociology of knowledge would help make sense of so much else the book discusses—as well as ploughing fertile ground for multifarious and trenchant solutions.
Overall, this is an outstanding book. Bahnsen should be praised for writing an accessible, short, and clear work on the very real and deadly problem of an American culture bereft of personal responsibility and addicted to blame and victimization. He deftly uncovers the systemic and pernicious presence of this ailment in chapter after chapter, highlighting the ways in which character flaws in the American people are the cause of recent policy failures that have aroused so much national angst. He combines policy and financial prowess with a keen understanding of character, culture, and the habits of the heart to give us a balanced analysis that not only rings true, but excites and inspires. For if all our problems are due to external bogeyman, not much can be done except gnash our teeth, emote outrage, and eternally stir the pot of proletarian revolution. Yet if our troubles lie closer to home—and especially if overcoming genuine disadvantages depends upon our own resolve—then there is something we can do that will affect real and lasting change. This is the hope and promise Bahnsen holds out to us, and it is a message we desperately need to hear and heed. Get the book and read it—you won't be disappointed.


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This product smells wonderful and does not feel greasy feel on the skin. The company claims that it can reduce the appearance of any kind of scar and we found that it did appear to make stretch marks softer and smoother. Anyone using Mederma for around 3 times a day for close to 3 months you should see a very impressive reduction in their scars.
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Most women are happiest with the results of Trilastin. This stretch mark cream took only days to reduce scars and showed great results. Some stretch marks actually seem to disappear and are no longer be visible.
So if you are looking for that beach-ready body, Trilastin may be a better bet.


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« last night i talked to my old best friend from high school. bob.
if you havent seen this fight turn on espn Immediately »
because the link in the last post wasnt workin
Rev. Tony Meets the Joke Man
Interview by tony pierce · Oct. 16, 1998 · Tabloid.net
Editor's note: To inform his unique gospel, the Rev. Tony Pierce is a faithful — perhaps even fanatical — listener to the Howard Stern radio show. Some have even said that he has read two separate books about Mr. Stern. The following is Rev. Tony's e-mail interview with Stern's star joke-writer, Jackie Martling, who started the discussion off by saying: "First of all, anywhere you put my name, 'The Joke Man' has to be three separate words … Jackie 'The Joke Man' Martling." He also gave typography recommendations, and an average of one plug per paragraph. If you're looking for a foul-mouthed catalog behind-the-scenes trivia from the Howard Stern show, you've found it. If you're not, well, here it is anyway.
Q. The Howard Stern Show appears to be a laid-back, spontaneous comedy show where a group of close friends tease each other and joke about celebrities. Other than the pre-taped bits, what do your duties as the "Head Writer" entail?
A. I'm on "The Howard Stern Show" for the entire duration every day, spontaneously writing notes that Howard sees on a television monitor, that he can either work into his conversation or not. The notes are punchlines that fit in with what he's talking about, suggestions for a direction to take, questions for guests or callers, insults aimed at anyone in the room or in the newspaper or wherever … basically, whatever it takes to keep the show rolling and keep it funny.
Howard is absolutely brilliant alone. With me and Fred Norris both contributing, he's the funniest and fastest thing that ever hit the airwaves.
Q. Now that you guys are in the new studio it looks like that it isn't physically possible for you to pass your on-the-fly jokes to Howard by hand. Are you still sending him jokes? Is it done by computer?
A. In the old studio, for years I tossed the notes on the easel-like thing that holds the commercial copy and other crap. Now I place it under a television camera, and that is fed to a television monitor in front of Howard.
Q. Robin once said that you guys have meetings after the show. Is this true? How long do they last usually? What goes on in them usually?
A. After the show, we'll usually stand around a few minutes and finish fucking with each other. Most days after the mikes are shut off I'll say "Great show," and they'll all do my voice for a few minutes until they burn out. Once a week we have meetings with all of us, including the interns, to flush out ideas, but for the most part we communicate via IBM's Lotus Notes program.
Q. Do you guys plan out a general sketch of the morning's show the day before, or is it all pretty spontaneous?
A. We know who is coming in approximately when, or approximately when someone is going to call in, and Howard has a list of the zillion things we could get to. But what winds around all of that when is anybody's guess on any day.
Q. Why is it that when E! shows your ad for your CD "Sgt. Pecker," they censor out the "Pecker"? Since when is pecker a dirty word on TV, though it's not on the radio?
A. That is the question of the decade. E! has a very strange morality, or whatever you'd call it. Personally, I think they look like idiots bleeping and covering an innocent word like "pecker." That word is actually many people's last name, look in any phone book. And in the dictionary, "pecker" is a chicken's beak. But I got smart … I named my new CD "Hot Dogs & Donuts." If they see the double entendre of that being too obvious and want to censor it, they can [**censored**].
Q. In no particular order, who are your top five comedians?
A. Red Skelton, The Marx Brothers, Redd Foxx, Rodney Dangerfield, Sam Kinison … and anybody who has the balls to do it.
Q. They always say that comedians are unhappy people, but it seems to me that between you, Fred, Gary, Robin and Howard, you lead the most happy, comfortable life, and you're the only real comedian. How do you explain this?
A. I've got a beautiful wife, I drink like a bastard, and I love to smoke pot. Plus, I put up the best phony front. Fuck you and everyone you know.
Q. Do you think that pot will be legal in the next 25 years in America?
A. Yeah, I honestly do. The pot laws are ridiculous. But changing them takes so much effort, and potheads like to sit around and get stoned, not run around getting out the vote. You know, maybe it will be exactly like it is today in 25 years. I'll still smoke pot, illegal or not. It grows. Fuck anybody who thinks it's wrong.
Q. When Billy West was a regular on the show, were you ever intimidated by his humor? Did you feel like he was competition? Do you think he'll ever be back as a regular?
A. I loved Billy, and I of course was never intimidated by his humor, because I wrote so much of what he was saying (as did Fred). Was I intimidated by his talent? Absolutely. The guy plays the guitar so well it's uncomfortable for me to be in the same room as him when he plays. His fucking impressions are so dead-on it never failed to amaze me.
On the show, he was in no way competition in any form … he was simply another terrific piece to the puzzle. He added lots to the great whole of the show, and I have fond memories of when he was with us. Whether he'll ever return, I have no idea, but I would welcome him with open arms. His "Jackie Puppet" riffs and his endless "haws" and other "Jackie" shots probably did as much for my popularity as it did for his and the show's.
Jakie Martling's new CD, "Hot Dogs and Donuts," is published by Oglio. Ordering information can be found on Martling's Web site, www.jokeland.com.
stern show on E! schedule + howard gives away 100s of sat boom boxes + king of all media.com
posted on November 19, 2004 at 4:19 pm | permalink
last night i talked to my old best friend from high school. bob.
nominations are now being accepted
tomorrow is marc brown's 64th birthday
dear big brother,
Wednesday, November 17th, 2004 at 10:06 pm
fcc chairman michael powell
Wednesday, November 17th, 2004 at 2:11 pm

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Extraordinary decors liven up space, and so it is essential to grab something like that which makes your abode neat and candid. This tabletop decoration with green stems and a butterfly meets your necessities and make your space alive. Just stunning, this floral décor is a must buy element for a clear manifestation.


One user means you log in to the Magento server as the same user that also runs the web server. This type of setup is common in shared hosting environments.
Two users means you typically cannot log in as, or switch to, the web server user. You typically log in as one user and run the web server as a different user. This is typical in private hosting or if you have your own server.
If you do not have command-line access, use an FTP client or a file manager application provided by your hosting provider to set permissions.


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Home/Tech/The Information Develops Its Model Focused On Digital Subscriptions!
The Information Develops Its Model Focused On Digital Subscriptions!
This Silicon Valley-focused News Site Embodies A New Generation of Editorial Staff.
Bryon S. ParsonsNovember 23, 2021
In Silicon Valley, even the hunt for information can give you wings. The Information, a Californian website focused on tech news, is thus becoming a model of new media built on digital subscriptions.
Created in 2013 by a former journalist for the "Wall Street Journal", The Information embodies a new generation of editorial staff who want to distinguish themselves from traditional press players by producing value-added information for a highly targeted audience. In his case, it is Silicon Valley and its ecosystem of startuppers, venture capitalists, headhunters, senior executives of tech groups, etc.
225,000 Active Users:-
The Information has made itself known through its scoops, analyzes, and insights. But in order to stick even more closely to the interests of his audience, he decided to expand his offer by launching a weekend edition. For The Information and its editorial staff of around thirty journalists, the challenge is not to be limited to covering the purely business aspects of tech but also to open up to "lifestyle" subjects and trends.
According to the Financial Times, this site founded and managed by Jessica Lessin has approximately 225,000 active users, a figure that includes both paid subscribers and individuals signed up to receive a free newsletter. The growth in the number of subscribers has been "very solid", she said, without giving more details. Jessica Lessin says she thought about launching new content in Hollywood before finally opting to expand the line with a weekend edition.
The Silicon Valley Ecosystem Is In Full Swing:-
The basic subscription to The Information costs $ 400 per year. But the site also has a $ 200 offer for those under thirty and a $ 750 offer targeting senior executives. Reserved for year-round subscribers, access to organizational charts and networks of decision-makers around big names in tech like Amazon, Shopify, or Facebook is one of the flagship services. But to attract subscribers, this site has also relied for several years on webinars and dinners with speakers, as well as on a series of newsletters.
Driven by a glut of liquidity and the breakthrough of technologies in the post-Covid economy, the tech planet is experiencing an unprecedented boost. In the first half of the year, nearly 150 unicorns were born in the United States. Even if the risks of a bubble raise concerns, the frenzied pace of Silicon Valley seems far from running out of steam.
It is quite a symbol. Zoom, one of the big winners of the Covid economy, celebrated its tenth anniversary in April by creating its own fund to finance other start-ups. The Californian group is joining the elite of new tech stars, determined to stand up to Google or Apple by playing a propelling role for the ecosystem that feeds them. And it's not just Zoom.
Traditional firms like Toyota or United Airlines are also launching tech funds with all their speed. A slew of investors with very different profiles (hedge funds, pension funds, sovereign funds) are rushing towards start-ups in the United States. "The venture capital industry is changing scale. This reflects a cycle of innovation that is accelerating sharply and which the Nasdaq at the top, the enormous liquidity available in the financial circuits is pouring into the unlisted and in particular into start-ups
Axios, Against The Tide Of The American Press:-
After the Trump era that put it in orbit, the young digital medium promises quality and free information. It bans opinion pieces prized by its major competitors and invests in local news, a sector in crisis in the United States. A model that would arouse the interest of the German giant Axel Springer.
A 10,000-character article like the one you are (maybe) about to read: Axios would never do that. To win "the war for attention" in a world bombarded with information, the young American digital media has made a vow of brevity, of "intelligent conciseness" to use its trademark – "Smart patent.
We all get a lot of information, and it's sometimes hard to know what's true. Our goal is to eliminate noise and respect people's time.
Bryon S. Parsons
Astronomers attribute a fireball in Earth's sky to a space object that travelled to Earth.
Brightest supermoon since 1948
Elon Musk temporarily suspends his takeover bid for Twitter
Both Hubble and JWST observed the results of the DART asteroid mission.
What parents should know about the VR gear kids want


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Q: Как вывести содержимое из файла *.txt на страницу html с возможностью редактированияфайла? Подскажите какими способами можно реализовать следующую задачу. Есть .txt файл с несколькими столбцами допустим 4 столбца и 40 строк. Для удобства работы нужно отобразить .txt файл в формате .html (или *.php) и преобразовать в таблицу (сама структура *.txt файла разбита на таблицу уже) как только все ячейки будут заполнены то в этой таблице нужно дописать еще столбец и добавить на каждую строку select option , (Да , нет) как только будут выполнены какие то действия нужно будет сохранить изменения на странице и в *.txt файле. теперь подскажите в какую сторону копать, столкнулся с работой файлов впервые.

A: Основная идея состоит в том, чтобы прочитать файл, разбить строки на массив столбцов, из которых сгенерировать таблицу, а в конец каждой строки добавить необходимую опцию. В данном случае select лучше заменить на checkbox, я думаю.
Примерно это должно выглядеть вот так:
$columns = array("Column1", "Column2", "Column3", "Column4");
$file = "some.txt";
$separator = "\t";
$lines = 0;

if ($_SERVER["REQUEST_METHOD"] === "POST") {
    $fh = fopen(str_replace(".txt", ".new.txt", $file), "w+");

    while (isset($_POST[$columns[0]][$lines]) {
        $tmp = array();

        foreach ($columns as $column) {
            $tmp[] = $_POST[$column][$lines];
        }

        $tmp[] = empty($_POST["opt"][$lines]) ? "Нет" : $_POST["opt"][$lines];

        fwrite($fh, implode($separator, $tmp) . "\n");

        $lines++;
    }

    fclose($fh);
} else {
    echo "<form action="myform.php" method="post">;
    echo "
";

    echo "#	";
    foreach ($columns as $column) {
        printf("%s	", $column);
    }
    echo "Да / Нет		";

    foreach (file($file) as $line) {
        $tds = preg_split("#" . preg_quote($separator) . "+#", trim($line));

        printf("
%d	", $lines + 1);

        foreach (array_combine($columns, $tds) as $column => $td) {
            printf('<input type="text" name="%s[%d]" value="%s">	', $column, $lines, htmlentities($td));
        }

        printf('<input type="checkbox" name="opt[%d]" value="Да">
', $lines++);
    }

    echo '
<input type="submit" value="Submit"></form>';
}


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text:
Attorney Chad Moody outside his downtown Oklahoma City office.
Logan Layden / StateImpact Oklahoma
April 11, 2013 | 6:00 am
Oklahoma's Crime-Funded Court System
Logan Layden
Logan Layden was a reporter for StateImpact Oklahoma from 2011-2017. He is a native of McAlester, Oklahoma. He graduated from the University of Oklahoma in 2009 and spent three years as a state capitol reporter and local host of All Things Considered for NPR member station KGOU in Norman.
Defense Attorney Chad Moody stands outside his downtown Oklahoma City office.
Oklahoma doesn't like to raise taxes, and in 1992 voters passed a state question that required massive legislative majorities to do so.
But rising costs in the justice system still have to be paid for, somehow. Since then, the courts have turned to fees for funding more and more.
There's a $50 fee for summary judgements, a $349 jury fee in civil cases, a $20 court reporter fee. If you get a DUI, there's a $400 fee. In fact, the DUI fee is higher than the fee for a murder conviction, which is only about $100.
It's the users of the court system, and more specifically the losers, who pay most of those fees, and many question the wisdom of that trend.
Oklahoma Supreme Court


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Kim Kardashian Was Accused Of Booing Tristan Thompson At A Lakers Game And Tweeted Her Response
Stephen LaConte
So...Kim Kardashian and Kanye West went to a Lakers game in Los Angeles last night. The Lakers were playing the Cleveland Cavaliers, and you know what that means: Tristan Thompson was playing in the game.
Allen Berezovsky / Getty Images
Now, historically speaking, Kim and Tristan have had a ROCKY relationship.
Sean M. Haffey / Getty Images
First, there was the whole drama where he was caught cheating on Khloé Kardashian while she was pregnant with their daughter, True.
And then there was that OTHER whole drama, less than a year later, where he allegedly cheated again — this time with Kylie's best friend, Jordyn Woods.
After the first cheating scandal broke, Kim was understandably angry on behalf of her sister and she did not hold back her feelings about it. She appeared on Ellen, where she called his actions "fucked up."
Things got even more heated after Tristan blocked Kim on Instagram. Kim responded by calling him a "fucking loser" and threatening to spit on him the next time she saw him.
And when they both found themselves in Khloé's hospital room together after she gave birth to True, Kim refused to acknowledge Tristan and made throat-slitting gestures behind his back.
I could go on, but...you get the point! The two have had lots of beef over the past couple of years. Which brings us to last night, when Kim and Kanye found themselves sitting courtside at Tristan's game.
The next morning, a Twitter user uploaded a (now deleted) video of Kim standing up during the game, along with the caption: "KIM STOOD UP TO BOO TRISTAN AT THE LINE LMFAO."
Although it was hard to tell if Kim was ACTUALLY booing Tristan in the video, the internet ran wild with the story, and multiple media outlets reported on it:
Well, Kim just took to Twitter to set the record straight and let her followers know that it was all a big misunderstanding:
Kim Kardashian West @KimKardashian
I was there to support him! And was cheering screaming LETS GO TRISTAN!!!!! I would never go boo anyone. I don't go to hate, only to cheer! https://t.co/EgaqiepH2z
10:42 PM - 14 Jan 2020
"I was there to support him!" she tweeted. "And was cheering screaming LETS GO TRISTAN!!!!!"
"I would never go boo anyone," she added. "I don't go to hate, only to cheer!"
Welp, there you have it. Kim did not boo Tristan at last night's game. On to the next drama. Bye!


The exact origin of the contemporary powwow is difficult to pinpoint but has its roots in traditional gatherings and tribal dances for particular situations. As American Indians were moved onto reservations, their dancing was curtailed by government regulations and so became a powerful symbol of Indian identity. Since the turn of the twentieth century, the intertribal powwow has rapidly developed into a form of expression recognizable to American Indians throughout the continent. The dance and dress styles characteristic of the contemporary powwow owe much to the Northern and Southern Plains peoples, but have spread and adapted to the changes within Indian cultures, powerfully symbolizing both tribally specific and American Indian identity.
The contemporary powwow is a social event, like a big family reunion where everyone comes to renew acquaintances and to dance. It is a time for people to come together in song and dance, a time to put aside tribal differences and help bridge the gap between the American Indian and the non-Indian worlds. However, powwows are not simply secular opportunities for fun; they are a prayer to the Creator, a celebration of spirituality, and a connection with Indianness of past, present and future.
There are two types of powwows: the traditional or honoring powwow, and the non-traditional or contest powwow. Honorings are an important part of the traditional powwow like ours.
Several units at Penn State help sponsor the Penn State Powwow. They are: Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications, College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, College of Education, Outreach and Online Education, Penn State Alumni Associaiton, Schreyer Honors College, Student Affairs, Office of Undergraduate Admissions, University Libraries and Scholarly Communications, and the Office of the Vice Provost for Educational Equity.
*-All drums and vendors for the powwow participate on an invitation-only basis.


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Q: Distance function made continuous Consider an outer semicontinuous set-valued mapping $S: \mathbb{R}^n \rightrightarrows \mathbb{R}^m$.
(Namely the sets $S(x) \subseteq \mathbb{R}^m$ do not "change continuously" as a function of $x$)
1) Find a continuous function $f: \mathbb{R}^n \times \mathbb{R}^m \rightarrow \mathbb{R}_{\geq 0}$ such that
$$f(x,y) = 0 \Longleftrightarrow y \in S(x) $$
2) Can we make $f$ such that $\lim_{|(x,u)| \rightarrow \infty} f(x,y) = \infty$?
For instance the Euclidean distance of $y$ to the set $S(x)$, i.e. $f(x,y) = |y|_{S(x)}$, satisfies the property but it is not continuous.
Note: definition of outer semicontinuity for a set-valued map:
A set-valued mapping $S: \mathbb{R}^n \rightrightarrows \mathbb{R}^m $ is outer semicontinuous at $\bar x$ if
$$ \limsup_{x \rightarrow \bar x} S(x) \subset S(\bar x) $$
or equivalently $\limsup_{x \rightarrow \bar x} S(x) = S(\bar x)$.

A: Your idea was almost right – the Euclidean distance of $(x,y)$ from $T=\{(a,b)\mid b\in S(a)\}$ works.
Clearly, if $y\in S(x)$, then $(x,y)\in T$, and $|(x,y)|_T=0$. Conversely, if $|(x,y)|_T=0$, then there is a sequence of points $(x_n,y_n)$ with $y_n\in S(x_n)$ and $\lim_{n\to\infty}(x_n,y_n)=(x,y)$, thus $\lim_{n\to\infty}x_n=x$ and $\lim_{n\to\infty}y_n=y$, and hence $y\in\limsup_{x'\to x}S(x')=S(x)$.
Another way of saying the same thing is that $S$ is outer semicontinuous iff $T$ is closed. See also this.


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Feminine hygiene assortment in a Walmart in the US, June 14, 2016. Photo credit: Stilfehler / Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Toxic 'Forever Chemicals' Found in Period Products
Grace Spiegel 08/31/22
During the national tampon shortage earlier this summer, people who menstruate worried about where to find period products. As tampons come back to shelves, that worry has subsided; but few consumers are worried about what is in these products. They should be.
People who menstruate bleed for approximately 1,800 days over the course of their lives. That means for the equivalent of five years, they are using chemically coated pads, tampons, and period underwear. And while the shortage has brought period products into the media, these toxins are still not being highlighted.
Tampons, pads, and period underwear contain dangerous materials ranging from pesticides to PFAS, a family of dangerous "forever chemicals" that lurk in the body for years.
The reason why it is so dangerous for pads and tampons to contain these chemicals is because they come into contact with the most sensitive and absorptive skin on the body. These toxic substances can then transfer directly into the bloodstream.
A user may not ever know that these products are dangerous. Pads and tampons are regulated as "medical devices," meaning there is no government requirement to list ingredients. The only way to know that products are safe is to buy organic.
Non-organic tampons contain parabens, chemicals that disrupt the hormones in the body and harm fertility and reproductive organs. They can also contain pesticide residue, plastics, and other cancerous chemicals.
The same is true for non-organic pads. A 2019 study found that pads contain higher amounts of toxic chemicals than commercial plastic products, which means they can be detrimental to reproductive organs and affect birth outcomes.
The national tampon shortage continues… CVS is now limiting purchases to 2 boxes MAX per customer 😫 pic.twitter.com/ZCAH7aVqY2
— Jennie Taer (@JennieSTaer) July 17, 2022
Publications from The New York Times to Good Housekeeping suggest women switch to period underwear in response to the tampon shortage. These look just like regular underwear but contain an extra layer of material that absorbs fluid and prevents leakage. Many sustainability blogs are praising these products as an alternative to wasteful tampons, and many menstruators prefer reusable underwear because they don't require constant changing like pads and tampons and come in multiple styles.
But popular period underwear brands such as Thinx and Knix Wear have been found to contain high levels of PFAS. This family of forever chemicals is linked with cancer and liver damage.
Jessian Choy, who ran an independent study for Sierra, the Sierra Club's magazine, sent Thinx menstrual underwear to Graham Peaslee, a scientist at the University of Notre Dame who previously found PFAS in food chemical wrappers, to test for PFAS. Thinx briefs contained PFAS levels of 3,264 parts per million (ppm), which is high enough to suggest the chemicals were added intentionally.
Another independent study found similar results. Mamavation, a blog committed to finding toxins in common products, commissioned tests of period underwear at an independent laboratory looking for fluorine, the chemical that unites all PFAS chemicals. Out of the 14 pairs of period underwear brands tested, eight had detectable fluorine present while six were PFAS-free. Three of these brands contained levels high enough to suggest that PFAS were intentionally added.
When asked to comment, Knix Wear insisted that their products are safe, denying the accusations of PFAS contamination. The company began testing their products in February of 2020, posting all results on their website.
Thinx also denied the accusations, saying in a statement to WhoWhatWhy: "While we cannot comment on legal matters, at Thinx Inc., we take customer health and product safety very seriously. PFAS have never been part of our product design. In fact, we require all of our suppliers to guarantee that they do not use PFAS chemicals in our products." Still, the company has not followed up with testing to prove their claim.
"These results add to the growing body of evidence reaffirming that we need to know more, not less, about the ingredients in period products," said Alexandra Scranton, director of science and research at Women's Voices for the Earth, in a statement to Mamavation. "Millions use menstrual products monthly. It is unacceptable that there are so many unknowns about the ingredients, safety, and health impacts of products that come into contact with one of the most sensitive and absorbent parts of the body."
Period underwear contains an extra layer of material that absorbs blood and prevents leakage. Photo credit: Vulvani / Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
And little is being done to combat these unknowns. New York, in 2019, was the first state to pass legislation that requires lists of ingredients on menstrual product packages. California soon followed, passing a similar law that will take effect in 2023.
Two women are suing Knix Wear in California, claiming the brand's marketing is misleading. Knix Wear states that their underwear is "PFAS free" and "designed to be both safe and effective."
Because period product manufacturers are primarily focused on keeping up with demand, they spend little time finding solutions to the toxin problem.
Procter & Gamble, the makers of brands including Tampax and Always, stated to Bloomberg in June that the company was "working hard to ramp up production to meet the increased demand for our products," but said nothing about changing the makeup of these products.
Edgewell, the company behind Playtex, promised the same, anticipating a return to normal in June or July. Again, there was no acknowledgement of the harmful materials coming into contact with menstruators.
Historically it has been up to the media to force any societal change. Without increased and open coverage of menstruation issues, adequate change will take longer.
"We have these societal stigmas into menstruation that stifle discussion and investigation," said Chris Bobel, president of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research, to Time. "There's a 'just shut up and clean it up' approach."
In fact, this is probably the first piece on the tampon shortage you've even read in a month.
Grace Spiegel
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Another successful year for our superb students.
As ever we are immensely proud of our students and their summer results have exemplified the hard work that our students and teachers have put in. We are particularly pleased that the cohort have yet again achieved 60% A*-B in their A levels or equivalents.
A special mention goes to 8 of our students who achieved at least straight A's in their final results, 6 of whom achieved A*s: Ellie , Christa , Harry , Natalie , Alex , Lucy , John and Piotr . This has meant that we have had over 90% of our students going to the university of their choice and almost 40% of those are going to Russell Group institutions.
Our AS level students have raised the bar this year and have achieved record results for St Peter's year 12s. Special mention goes to 13 of our students who achieved straight A's: Carlos, Leone, Lucy, Beth, Joe, Oliver, Georgina, James, Nathanael, Finola, James M, James P and Jonas.