text:
Posts Tagged 'Eric Cantor'
Required Pre-Election Day Reading: Obama's Imperial Presidency
Just in time for Election Day, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor has released a report entitled "The Imperial Presidency," which serves as an exhaustive chronicle of all the ways in which President Obama has undermined — or outright ignored — the rule of law. It covers everything from regulatory overreach to ignoring the traditional "advise and consent" process to abusing the waiver process, and it's well worth a read.
As we approach November 6, it's important to remember that these offenses aren't just abstract violations of the constitutional order — they're also ingredients for economic decline. As Conn Carroll notes today in the Washington Examiner:
Conservatives are not the only ones who have documented Obama's assault on the rule of law and its impact on the U.S. economy. Every year, the World Economic Forum issues a Global Competitiveness Report, ranking more than 100 countries on a number of key economic indicators. When Obama was sworn into office, the United States was ranked as the best country in the world to do business. After just four years under Obama, the U.S. has dropped to seventh. The report specifically cites the collapse in the rule of law in explaining this decline.
Before Obama was president, the U.S. ranked 40th in "favoritism in decisions of government officials." Today, the U.S. ranks 59th, a fall of 19 places. Before Obama was president, the U.S. ranked 50th for lowest "burden of government regulation." Today, the U.S. ranks 76th, a fall of 26 places. Before Obama was president, the U.S. ranked 28th in "transparency of government policy making." Today, the U.S. ranks 56th, a fall of 28 places.
Care to venture a guess as to where those rankings would be after another four years of Obama?
Tags: Barack Obama, Competititveness, Constitution, Economics, Eric Cantor, Imperial Presidency, rule of law
Young Guns Now in Charge
Posted by Quin Hillyer Print Email
Fred Barnes has a great article in The Weekly Standard about how the trio of Republican House members his magazine first dubbed "Young Guns" back in 2007 is now perhaps the single weightiest force in Washington Republican politics. The three are Eric Cantor, Kevin McCarthy and Paul Ryan. "Cantor is majority leader, McCarthy is Republican whip, and Ryan is chairman of the House Budget Committee and the leading Republican voice on domestic policy," Barnes wrote. " [….] They knew Republicans had lost their way, ideologically and politically. And they were eager to promote House candidates from diverse backgrounds, with little or no political experience but a zeal for bold conservative reforms. 'We focused our effort," Cantor says, "on recruitment of people who wanted to run for the right reasons'."
Now I haven't always liked what Cantor, McCarthy or even Ryan have done or said, but for the most part, they (especially Ryan) have been tremendous forces for a revitalization of the GOP as a party of new ideas and bold, serious proposals. But the key, bigger point emerges from this Barnes explanation: "[T]heir political skills were complementary: Cantor the party leader, McCarthy the strategist, and Ryan the policy thinker." One of my biggest complaints through the years has been that far too few conservatives married practical politics well with policy expertise, and that fewer still knew how to breed those two skills together to produce something that looks good and will sell well in the public arena.
The next best thing to having one person able to do all three is to have one person who is really good at one or two of them and also wise enough to affiliate himself with the right person or people to do whichever of the other three functions at which he might be lacking.
Alas, it has been decades since we have seen a Republican presidential nominee even come close. Hence the clamor earlier this year for Ryan himself to enter the fray.
The search continues. But Barnes' article well identifies not just the players but the troika of required skills. It's well worth a close read.
Tags: Eric Cantor, Fred Barnes, Kevin McCarthy, Paul Ryan, Young Guns
"Occupiers" Quiet on Biden, Protest Cantor
Three days, two speeches, one important difference.
When Vice President Joe Biden spoke at the University of Pennsylvania on Wednesday, he said that opponents of the president's jobs bill were okay that, as a result of blocking the bill, "murder will continue to rise, rape will continue to rise, all crimes will continue to rise." Nary a peep was heard from the Occupy Philadelphia crowd.
By contrast, just the mere mention that House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) would speak at Penn today brought on threats from Occupy Philadelphia to disrupt his speech. Cantor rightly canceled his appearance at the last minute in order to avoid the kind of heckling for which liberal activists are notorious.
Biden argued that federal spending on state union members would somehow reduce murders and rapes. Cantor was expected to speak on how to ease income inequalities. If anyone needed more proof who these hooligans support and why, here it is.
Tags: Eric Cantor, Joe Biden, Occupy, Pennsylvania
House GOP Leaders Losing on Two Fronts
There's a confrontation brewing between fiscal conservatives in the House GOP caucus and their leadership over how best to handle the budget crisis. House leadership wants to keep negotiating while passing short-term spending bills to avoid a shutdown. Fiscal conservatives like Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) are voting No and getting killed for it.
Pence is fighting back.
"I have no doubt that Speaker John Boehner and Republican Leader Eric Cantor and the rest of our leadership will privately, and if needs be, publicly denounce any effort to essentially bad mouth the intentions of Republicans that are simply fighting for fiscal responsibility," the former GOP conference chair said Thursday morning on "The Hugh Hewitt Show."
It's funny to hear that the House leadership is fuming at fiscal conservatives for voting their principles when those same leaders say that the latest budget extension is the last one. With House leadership moving towards the fiscal conservatives' position, maybe leadership is just ticked that they're losing negotiations with both Democrats and Republicans.
Tags: budget, deficit, Democrat Party, Eric Cantor, fiscal conservative, government shutdown, House GOP, John Boehner, Mike Pence, Republican Party
House GOP Fires First Shot in ObamaCare Repeal Strategy
Well, that didn't take long. Speaker-elect John Boehner (R-OH) and incoming Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) announced today that the new Republican leadership will make good on its campaign promise to repeal ObamaCare. Next Monday the bill hits the Rules Committee, followed by a Friday floor session deciding the rule for debate. With 242 members, the House GOP is virtually assured of a favorable pro-repeal vote.
But since Democrats still hold the Senate hostage, no actual repeal is happening anytime soon. Right now, though, that isn't the point. As Politico reports:
The repeal effort is not expected to succeed, given that Democrats maintain control of the Senate and the president can veto the legislation. But Republicans could embarrass the White House if they persuade a number of Democrats to vote with them, and over the long term, plan to try to chip away at pieces of the law.
That yeoman work will begin quickly under new House Government Reform and Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA). His sights are set on investigating just about every consequential action by the Obama Administration. Ladies and gentlemen, set your DVRs!
Tags: Darrell Issa, Eric Cantor, House Republicans, John Boehner, Obamacare, repeal
Re: House GOP Leadership Team Taking Shape
Ashton makes a good point about the geographic diversity of the GOP House leadership in comparison to its Democratic predecessor. Another interesting addition may be Kristi Noem, the incoming freshman who will serve as the At-Large Representative for South Dakota and who looks to be in line to fill a new position being created to give some leadership representation to the burgeoning ranks of Tea Party-affiliated conservatives. Noem is attractive, articulate, and has a compelling biography. She looks to be a definite rising star in the party.
I think the mix of the two parties may be reflective of what caused the Democrats to go astray in the past few years. Looking at the new Republican leadership, only Texan Jeb Hensarling comes from a state where Republicans are reliably strong in both federal and state elections. Democrats, on the other hand, populated their leadership ranks with figures from the deepest of the deep blue states. They governed that way too. And in so doing, they forgot all the lessons that gave them control of the Congress.
In the 2006 and 2008 election cycles, Rahm Emanuel in the House and Chuck Schumer in the Senate gave considerable flexibility to their recruited candidates, allowing them to run with conservative positions on a host of issues that allowed them to escape being tarred as liberals in the Midwest, the South, and the Mountain West. While they succeeded in getting a large percentage of those candidates elected, the Obama-Pelosi-Reid agenda then lurched so heavily to the left that the new members had to run for reelection in the shadow of a record that undermined all their pretensions of moderation.
The facile interpretation of this trend is that a party always has to govern from the center to keep its majority. That's also the rationale for liberals like E.J. Dionne, who hope that the new conservative majority's stand on principle will alienate them from the electorate. In his most recent column, Dionne writes:
Give Republicans credit for this: They don't chase the center, they try to move it. Democrats can play a loser's game of scrambling after a center being pushed ever rightward. Or they can stand their ground and show how far their opponents are from moderate, problem-solving governance. Why should Democrats take Republican advice that Republicans themselves would never be foolish enough to follow?
This is what happens when a static mind attempts to comprehend a dynamic landscape. The problem with Dionne's analysis is that he assumes the left and the right are equidistant from the center. This is false. When Gallup polled the question in June, 42 percent of Americans identified as conservative, 35 percent said they were moderate, and 20 percent said they were liberal. That means the self-identified center-right represents an astonishing 77 percent of the country. By contrast, the center-left at its theoretical apex is only a slight majority of Americans. When you then factor in that 56 percent of independents broke for Republicans this year — and that that represented a 36 point swing from 2006 — you see how steep the hill is for Democrats.
Dionne and his counterparts in Congress need to learn the lesson: in a center-right country, it's more important for Democrats to moderate than Republicans. If you doubt that, ask Bill Clinton — he might remind you that he's the only Democratic president to be elected twice since FDR.
Tags: Bill Clinton, blue dog, Congress, E.J. Dionne, Eric Cantor, House of Representatives, Jeb Hersarling, Jim Clyburn, John Boehner, John Larson, Kevin McCarthy, Kristi Noem, Michele Bachmann, Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer
House GOP Leadership Team Taking Shape
With Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) announcing the end of her campaign to be Republican Conference Chairman, the likely top four House GOP leadership spots look like this:
(1) Speaker – Rep. John Boehner (R-OH)
(2) Majority Leader – Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA)
(3) Majority Whip – Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA)
(4) Conference Chairman – Rep. Jeb Hersarling (R-TX)
It's always interesting to see where leadership team members are from because it indicates where the strength of the party lies. Since leadership positions are sought and won by members with multiple terms in office, it's intriguing to see four Republicans representing each corner of the country.
Contrast this with the locations represented by the outgoing top four House Democrat leaders:
(1) Speaker – Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)
(2) Majority Leader – Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD)
(3) Majority Whip – Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC)
(4) Caucus Chairman – Rep. John Larson (D-CT)
Aside from Clyburn, all the Democrat leaders come from deep blue coastal states (e.g. California, Maryland, and Connecticut). Counting Clyburn, the Democrats' claim to a "southern" voice is tied to a gerrymandered district designed to elect a liberal African-American. If Hoyer beats Clyburn for the Minority Whip post, even that fig leaf of regional diversity will blow away.
The House Democratic caucus lost 29 of 57 "blue dog" members last Tuesday, making the remaining chamber membership much more liberal. It also wiped out the Democrats' claims to represent regions other than the high-tax, morally bankrupt coasts. That, combined with Nancy Pelosi's likely retention as caucus leader, will make it substantially more difficult for the party to recruit viable candidates in 2012.
Conservatives shouldn't count on gifts like this forever, but for now, we'll gladly take them.
Tags: blue dog, Congress, Eric Cantor, House of Representatives, Jeb Hersarling, Jim Clyburn, John Boehner, John Larson, Kevin McCarthy, Michele Bachmann, Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer


Saturday Feb 13th Valentine's Entertainment – Dave's Not Here!
Home / Events / Saturday Feb 13th Valentine's Entertainment – Dave's Not Here!
The Gibsons Legion Branch #109 is pleased to help you celebrate Valentine's Day early with some fun live entertainment on Saturday Feb. 13th.
Dave's Not Here! returns with that special Rock, Rhythm & Blues sound, singin' and playin' all your favourite hits.
Join us for appies, awesome music and a ton of fun.


Send Luggage to Slovenia|| Luggage courier service to Slovenia|| Luggage First to Slovenia|| Luggage sending to Slovenia|| Luggage Sending & delivery Company to Slovenia|| Send Luggage ahead to Slovenia|| Luggage Sending Services to Slovenia.
More choices: You can send for less using Excess Luggage UK European Road silver service to send your luggage to Slovenia, Send Luggage to Europe via our Express BaggageFirst service which is a lot faster to your residential address, your home, a hotel. Excess Luggage European road (euro road bronze) service is Ideal for saving money by bringing your Luggage, freight, cargo, documents, parcel, package, bag, bags, boxes, case, cases, carton, and cartons a few days before your travel time pre ship the goods before you travel. Transit Times vary from 2 to 5 working days subject to your final destination, for more information please contact excess luggage customer service for sending luggage to Slovenia.
Excess Luggage company send luggage worldwide and have been sending to Slovenia; Europe for over 10 years. Luggage Send service to Sloveniafrom the UK is made easy with us. We send worldwide daily from our Hounslow Depot near Heathrow airport UK. Luggage Sending Services to Slovenia. Luggage Moving Services to Slovenia.
Send your Luggage ahead with Excess Luggage delivery company service to Slovenia.
Excess Luggage Send company based in London can send urgent Luggage, Freight, cargo, Documents, parcel, package, bag, bags, boxes, case, cases, carton, and cartons from UK to Slovenia. Send Your Luggage to Sloveniafrom London, Send My Luggage from Uk, Luggage Service to Slovenia, Luggage Delivery, Sending Luggage Ahead service to Slovenia, Pre Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Send Overweight Luggage to Slovenia, International Luggage Send service to Sloveniafrom the UK. You can send your Luggage from the UK to Sloveniaand Sloveniato the UK via our European luggage Sending service. Excess Luggage removals & relocation service to Slovenia(Madrid, Valencia, Barcelona, Malaga, Sevilla, Zaragoza, Murcia).
Send Luggage to Sloveniafrom Uk / London/ Manchester / Birmingham with luggage concierge service to Slovenia.
Send Student Luggage to Slovenia: Ship Student Luggage to Slovenia.
We understand that to ship /send /move your Luggage, Excess Luggage & Excess Baggage, personal effects, Personal belonging you need a reliable and a trusted company well we have been sending / moving Students and their books and clothing for over 10 years from the uk to Slovenia. Send, Moving services for Student luggage mini moves to Slovenia; EU from Uk.
When sending luggage to Slovenia it is important that all luggage being shipped is correctly labeled to the arrival Address, and all Send documents are provided in good time and ideally before collection of your goods thus enabling our collection staff and agents to collect your luggage for sending to Slovenia.
Send Luggage to Sloveniafrom UK. Ship Luggage to Sloveniafrom London. England, Scotland & Wales.
Ship Luggage & baggage to Sloveniafrom the UK with Excess Luggage shipping Company.
Due to Health and safety we request that all luggage, Baggage, Bags, Boxes and cartons are no heavier than 30kilos when you ship,send to Slovenia. If you are in a building or house without any lift facilities we request that you bring your luggage to the ground floor. If you are unable to bring the luggage, baggage, bag, bags and cartons then please request for a secondary person* when you book your luggage collection for sending to Slovenia.
Hundreds of people are choosing to send their holiday suitcases and excess luggage to and from UK from the Sloveniaand elsewhere and then Send the suitcases back and travelling only with hand luggage. At Excess Luggage Send company we offer low prices, it is often cheaper to courier your luggage than to pay airline excess baggage fees.
Send luggage from UK Mainland, England, Wales, Scotland and Scottish Highlands to Slovenia. Send Luggage from Aberdeen to Sloveniato / from Slovenia; send luggage from Bath to Slovenia; send luggage from Belfast to SloveniaBelfast to Slovenia; send luggage from Birmingham to Sloveniato Slovenia; send luggage from Blackburn to Sloveniato Slovenia; send luggage from Blackpool to SloveniaBlackpool to Slovenia; send luggage from Bolton to Slovenia; Bournemouth to Slovenia; send luggage from Bradford to Slovenia; send luggage from Brighton to Slovenia; send luggage from Bristol to Slovenia; send luggage from Cardiff to Slovenia; send luggage from Cambridge to Slovenia; send luggage from Central London to Slovenia; send luggage from City Of London to Slovenia; send luggage from Greater London to Slovenia; send luggage from London to Slovenia; send luggage from Colchester to Slovenia; send luggage from Coventry to Slovenia; send luggage from Crawley to Slovenia; send luggage from Derby to Slovenia; send luggage from Dudley to Slovenia; send luggage from Dundee to Slovenia; send luggage from East London to Slovenia; send luggage from Edinburgh to Slovenia; send luggage from Eastbourne to Slovenia; send luggage from Exeter to Slovenia; send luggage from Glasgow to Slovenia; send luggage from Gloucester to Slovenia; send luggage from Huddersfield to Slovenia; send luggage from Ipswich to Slovenia; Kingston upon Hull to Slovenia; send luggage from Leeds to Slovenia; send luggage from Leicester to Slovenia; send luggage from Liverpool to Slovenia; send luggage from London to Slovenia; send luggage from Luton to Slovenia; send luggage from Manchester to Slovenia; send luggage from Middlesbrough to Slovenia; send luggage from Milton Keynes to Slovenia; send luggage from Newcastle upon Tyne to Slovenia; send luggage from North London to Slovenia; send luggage from Northampton to Slovenia; send luggage from Norwich to Slovenia; Nottingham to Slovenia; send luggage from Oldham to Slovenia; send luggage from Oxford to Slovenia; send luggage from Peterborough to Slovenia; send luggage from Plymouth to Slovenia; send luggage from Poole to Slovenia; send luggage from Portsmouth to Slovenia; send luggage from Preston to Slovenia; send luggage from Reading to Slovenia; send luggage from Rotherham to Slovenia; send luggage from Sheffield to Slovenia; send luggage from Slough to Slovenia; send luggage from South London to Slovenia; send luggage from Southampton to Slovenia; send luggage from Southend-on-Sea to Slovenia; send luggage from St Helens to Slovenia; send luggage from Stockport to Slovenia; Stoke-on-Trent to Slovenia; send luggage from Sunderland to Slovenia; send luggage from Sutton Coldfield to Slovenia; send luggage from Swindon to Slovenia; send luggage from Telford to Slovenia; send luggage from Walsall to Slovenia; send luggage from Watford to Slovenia; send luggage from West Bromwich to Slovenia; send luggage from West London to Slovenia; send luggage from Wolverhampton to Slovenia; send luggage from York, Ship luggage from Uk to Slovenia.
Best way too send luggage overseas from Uk to Sloveniais with Excess Luggage company, we send excess Baggage overseas, worldwide via our air road and sea Send services. Excess luggage and excess baggage worldwide Send to Slovenia is made easy with us.
Send luggage from Aberdeenshire Anglesey Bedfordshire Berkshire Bristol Buckinghamshire Cambridgeshire Cheshire Cleveland Clwyd Cornwall County Antrim County Durham Derbyshire Devon Dorset Dundee East Riding East Sussex East Yorkshire Edinburgh Essex Falkirk Fife Glasgow Gloucestershire Greater London Greater,Manchester Gwent Hampshire Herefordshire Hertfordshire Highland Humberside Inner Hebrides Isle of Man Jersey Kent Lanarkshire Lancashire Leicestershire Lincolnshire Merseyside Mid Glamorgan Midlothian Norfolk North West North Yorkshire Northamptonshire Northumberland Nottinghamshire Oxfordshire Perth and Kinross Shropshire Somerset South Glamorgan South Yorkshire Staffordshire Stirling Suffolk Surrey Sussex Tyne and Wear Warwickshire West Lothian West Midlands West Sussex West Yorkshire Wiltshire Worcestershire to Slovenia.
Send Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Send Baggage to Slovenia, Ship baggage to Sloveniafrom UK. Move baggage & luggage to Slovenia; Ship, send Student Luggage & baggage, Suitcases, backpacks, boxes and bags from the Uk including England, Wales and Scotland. Student Shipping and Moving services London. North London, East London, South London, West London and Greater London to Slovenia; Europe.
Bought too much stuff on your European Vacation in the UK and don't know what to do with your excess baggage, excess Bags? You can send unaccompanied Luggage. We offer luggage sending courier services that are generally less expensive than the excess baggage charges your airline might levy on you. A cheap and simple way to send your Luggage, bag, bags, Excess Bags, freight parcels or excess baggage & Excess Luggage to Slovenia. Send unaccompanied Luggage with Excess Luggage a premier luggage courier sending company to Slovenia. We are specialist luggage Sending, Moving and shipping agents; we provide a Luggage sending service from the Uk to Slovenia; Europe.
Send your Luggage to Slovenia. Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Eire, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Slovenia, Ship Luggage to Spain, Ship Luggage to Sweden, Ship Luggage to Switzerland.


There will be no post done on Good Friday and Easter Monday, any orders made over Easter will be dispatched on Tuesday 23rd April.
OMG, gluten free pie and chips, as well as fish, sausage, gravy, curry, fishcakes...HEAVEN!
With it's gluten free wrap and few cakes, we take a visit to Costa and take a look at their Christmas offerings.
Eteaket, amazing herbal teas and fabulous gluten free afternoon teas!
For fab cake and sandwiches, Lounge2 in Tenby is certainly a place worth trying.
With a Gluten Free menu offering burgers and hotdogs, Ed's Easy Diner makes Coeliacs feel normal!


text:
Q: API to read smart card certificate in Java I want to read certificates available in my smart card.
I have PIV card inject in my machine card reader. I want to read the data from the card and use it.
Do we have any ways in Java ? I am fine with any other programming languages too.
Just to add : I have found javax.smartCard API smart Card API and WinSCard.dll API. Still I am not sure weather that will be helpful to me or not.

A: The most common way to use a smartcard with Java is to use the PKCS#11 API. Usually the smart card software components contain a PKCS#11 library (.dll/.so file(s)) which can be loaded by Java and used.
In the end you can access the smart card from Java side using the KeyStore interface (via the sun.security.pkcs11.SunPKCS11 provider).
See also:

*

*JDK 8 PKCS#11 Reference Guide

*SO questions tagged Java and PKCS#11

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Budai, is always shown smiling, hence his nickname in Chinese: the Laughing Buddha. Budai is always depicted as an obese, bald, smiling man. He's poor but content. He is admired for his Happiness, Generosity and Wisdom. Zen Buddha would like to share his Wisdom with you.
Share your Buddha quote on social media!
Zen Buddha is happy for the opportunity to share this inspirational quote with you. Show your Generosity towards your friends. Inspire them as well! When sharing your Buddha quote on social media you can also select a different background if you wish.
It is possible to live happily in the here and the now. So many conditions of happiness are available - more than enough for you to be happy right now. You don't have to run into the future in order to get more.


text:
Streetlights may interfere with a bug's most important job
Beetle on the cabbage thistle ( Cirsium oleraceum ) at night. (Eva Knop, University of Bern.)
By Jenna Gallegos
August 2, 2017 at 1:00 PM EDT
At twilight, a moth takes flight in a thistle patch. It distinguishes the purple bristles of a flower from the thorny vegetation using specialized reflectors like those that make a cat's eyes glow green in the darkness. The flower entices it with nectar and dusts its feathery wings with pollen.
Suddenly, a streetlight buzzes and cracks on overhead. The moth instinctively changes course toward the light. A nearby bat salivates at the swarm of nocturnal insects in their trance-like ascension and makes an easy dinner of the pollen-coated moth. When the birds break into their morning songs — earlier than usual thanks to all the artificial light — the flowers below remain barren.
A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature suggests that light pollution, which has already been shown to disrupt the activities of birds and animals, including humans, also interferes with pollination. The study showed for the first time that illuminated flowers were visited by fewer insects, resulting in fewer fruits.
Eric Warrant, who studies nocturnal insects at Lund University in Sweden and was not involved with the study, called this discovery "alarming and a bit depressing at the same time."
Eva Knop, the first author of the publication, studies the effect of urbanization on ecosystems at the University of Bern in Switzerland. She watched moths flapping around a streetlight and wondered if the distraction might intrude on their nightly rendezvous with flowers.
To find out, she and her collaborators set up mobile streetlamps in seven rural meadows. Sporting night-vision goggles, they visited the meadows and collected insects from flower tops with a net.
"This was a huge undertaking," said Thomas Davies, who studies the ecological effects of light pollution at Exeter University and was not involved with the study. They had to capture, freeze, pin and analyze thousands of specimens.
Compared with fields where there were no lights, 60 percent fewer nocturnal pollinators were found on illuminated flowers. There were also 30 percent fewer species, suggesting that light pollution decreases the diversity of pollinators.
Ecologists have long suspected that artificial lights at night might interfere with pollination. Now they have evidence. "This lets us put forward recommendations to people that are, this very minute, designing future lighting systems," said Travis Longcore, an urban ecologist at the University of Southern California.
"Artificial lights are attractive to insects for reasons we don't fully understand," Warrant said. It's thought that they might navigate by moonlight or fly toward light to escape the canopy of a dark forest.
Lights can also affect insect reproduction, for example, by distracting male moths from the pheromones emitted by females. Predators like bats and geckos have been shown to adjust their feeding habits to forage around lights, an added threat to nocturnal insects. Whatever the cause, more lights probably mean less pollinators visit flowers.
To determine whether fewer visits by nocturnal insects meant less pollination, Knop's group surveyed the number of fruits produced by plants in their experimental meadows. They analyzed 100 cabbage thistle plants. The buds of these thistles before they flower resemble their cousin the artichoke. After pollination, they produce tiny fruits called achenes, which are similar to what we think of as the seeds in a strawberry.
These flowers were common to all sites and a favorite among pollinators, especially nocturnal ones. Thistles from sites with street lamps produced about 10 percent fewer fruits. That means pollination during the day did not make up for the deficit at night caused by the lamps. It could also mean that the lights influence the physiology of the plants directly.
Even plants at the periphery of the glow, 15 to 20 yards from the lamps, produced fewer fruits. Longcore predicts that plants outside of the direct beam of streetlights could also be affected by the "sky glow" that occurs in urban areas.
Streetlights could reduce fruit production in at least two ways, Longcore said: indirectly, by misdirecting pollinators, and directly, by influencing the plants' sense of time. Like humans (and birds and insects), plants have circadian rhythms. Plants use shifting light spectra as signals for where to grow and when to flower.
He shared a story about a soybean field on the outskirts of Lincoln, Neb., where the plants surrounding streetlights failed to set seeds. These soybeans were waiting for shorter days to signal "winter is coming," but under the artificial glow, that signal never came. Soybeans, which are self-pollinated, do not rely on insect pollinators, so the effect must have occurred from the lights directly.
Plants and insects also differ in how they respond to certain wavelengths of light. The ratio of red to far-red light tells a plant that it's in the shade and needs to grow its way toward the sun. Blue light signals to plants that they are in the sun and should open their pores, take up carbon dioxide and start photosynthesizing.
"Insects are very sensitive to blue light and even more sensitive to ultraviolet light," Longcore said. One potential solution would be to light streets with LEDs in the yellow or green spectrum, although Warrant cautioned that these lights might still draw insects. More research is needed to determine the effect that certain wavelengths of lights may have on insects and plants.
There's evidence to suggest that dimming lights in the late hours and then switching them off after a certain time may help, Davies said. Lights activated by motion sensors are also a better option than constant illumination.
Pollinators and pollinator decline have gotten a lot of attention lately, but mostly in terms of how farming practices disrupt the environment during the day. "If we don't look at nocturnal ecological communities," Longcore said, "we're only getting half of the environmental story."
Controversial pesticides may threaten queen bees. Alternatives could be worse.
What a year of working the graveyard shift taught me about sleep
Are birds cut out for city living?

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


In keeping with the vulgarities of the Women's March, a pro-abortion group projected "Abortion is freedom" and profanities on Trump Tower on Saturday in New York City.
The Shout Your Abortion campaign was responsible for the publicity stunt, which it coordinated to coincide with the annual Women's March, according to the pro-abortion blog Dazed Digital. The group used a projector to display "Abortion is Freedom" and "F— Your Wall" onto Trump Tower and another building in Union Square.
It also projected the questionable statistics "71 percent of Americans support Roe" and "1 in 4 women has an abortion" onto the buildings.
"This disconnect between public opinion and policy is a direct result of the prevailing expectation that those who have abortions remain silent, and this silence has allowed the anti-choice movement to dominate the conversation, unchallenged," the group said in a statement.
Abortion activists cite polls indicating strong support for Roe v. Wade, but these statistics are misleading. Research indicates many Americans don't actually know what Roe did, and when asked more specific questions about abortion, a majority of Americans favor strong restrictions on the killing of the unborn.
A new national poll conducted by Marist University found an overwhelming majority of Americans support restrictions on abortion.
The strong support for restrictions came despite the fact that a majority of Americans identify as pro-choice (55 percent) — making it clear that the terms pro-choice and pro-life are not accurate in determining or representing the actual views of Americans on abortion.
A 2018 Gallup poll similarly found strong opposition to abortion on demand, the goal of the Shout Your Abortion campaign.
The abortion activists have been trying to sway public opinion through women's magazines, celebrities like Oprah and even stunts targeting impressionable young children. The Shout Your Abortion people also are writing a pro-abortion children's book to indoctrinate children with their propaganda.
But the truth continues to prevail. Despite more than 40 years of abortion on demand, Americans have not been swayed to accept the killing of the unborn. Millions continue to reject the notion that killing unborn babies is a freedom and fight daily to restore rights to the unborn.


Thursday 8 December from 7pm throughout the night!
Hémicycle, Palais d'Iéna and other venues in Paris (TBC).
Is democracy in danger? What should we be preserve, improve, reinvente? Which innovations and which actors are making a change, contributing worldwide to empowering citizens, improving the functioning of political life and public action? How to get involved ?
Designed to be a night of sharing, debate and collective thought, Democracy Night strives to place the renewal of democracy at the heart of the OGP Summit.
You are invited to participate in an event structured around an innovative format of sharing and collaboration. The schedule includes a series of presentations of concrete initiatives, discussions between experts and project leaders, debates and collaborative writing!
1 – At the Palais d'Iéna : The tribunal for future generations: is the algorithm democratic?
Salle Ventejol, Palais d'Iéna, from 7 PM to 8.20 PM.
This Tribunal is part of a group of conferences proposed by Usbek & Rica, the magazine that aims at narrating the present and exploring the futur.
To try to understand the multiple revolutions we are witnessing and the future that they are shaping, the Tribunal devotes each edition to a crucial theme for the future. With the presence of an accused, a witnesses, a lawyer, a prosecutor and a jury drawn from among the public. A playful format that takes up the codes of a tribunal and allows to tackle the future problems from a philosophical and very concrete angle and will let us be precise, curious and committed witnesses of our time, and prepare the coming one.
2 – At the Palais d'Iéna : the democratic innovation in acts !
Hémicycle, Palais d'Iéna from 8PM to midnight.
Which are the challenges we collectively face in the context of the digital revolution? The future is in our hands; we are part of the multitude that partakes in the renewal of democracy, but where to start?
How can we organize the scalability of existing initiatives addressing the renewal of democracy? Plenty of projects are being developed worldwide, creating the roadmap for change, but it is not always simple to grasp the extent of this massive outreach. We can transition from being a passive citizen to a maker of change, but we need to act, develop concrete solutions and seize control of our future.
How can we establish the renewal of democracy in the long run, especially in the field of education and knowledge building? To renew our democracy we will need more than one day, for real change happens over a long period of time and we need to invest in future generations to create sustainable action and change.
The results of these debates and the interactions will shape the collective thinking of the Summit's participants and raise new challenges to consider for open government initiatives around the world.
In addition to pitches and overlapping dialogues, there will be online participatory tools. At the end of the night, we hope to come up with a co-written list of new priorities to be presented to the open government community.
Access to the slides of the event.
Democracy Night will be hostedby Julien Letailleur, an avatar of citizen's participation.
– Come debate on reweing democracy and interact with the audience and speakers! You will be able to propose actions that Julien Letailleur should carry within the open gov movement.
Digital democracy can be both dangerous and helpful, and it can become an utopia if we move towards a technocratic and technical democracy and no voice is really given to the citizens.
Today, change makers are already reinventing civic participation and proposing solutions to renew democracy and adapt it to the XXIst century, are you ready to join the movement and become an active citizen?
In the transition we are living, education is key to success, not just academic education to leverage equal opportunities and access to knowledge but civic education to create more active citizens and ensure the scalability and sustainability of the democratic renewal.
Participation, transparency, the fight against corruption, open data, public accountability, modernization of public services … all are key components for revitalizing democracy that have been reinvented by many public and private players. In hosting the Open Government Partnership Summit, Paris highlights and shares these values.
Whether hailing from the other side of the world or from just around the corner, come meet and discuss with actors committed to advancing open government, which seeks to put citizens at the heart of public decision-making. If you dream of hearing about the experiences of Sao Paulo in Brazil or Bojonegoro in Indonesia, or if you want to interact with a participant of the Parisian participatory budget or a board member of the Parisian Youth Council, then walk the streets of Paris and converse with Parisians in informal places that will be open to everyone.
All over Paris, democratic and social innovation hubs have decided to open their doors to welcome you and make you feel, for one night, the pulse of a more inclusive democracy.
Coming soon : more informations about debates at Kiwanda (50, rue de Montreuil, 11e, Métro Faidherbe Chaligny) and more event to come..