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China Hackers Strike Again
Deadly New Killer Flu
Evacuation of Expats From Eurozone
The Twit Candidate
Whitewashing Campaign
As Paul Stockton, assistant defense secretary for homeland defense, was busy answering questions in a joint Senate-House committee hearing last week, and refusing to acknowledge that we are fighting a radical ideology that has anything to do with Islam, Hillary Clinton was busy with her friends from the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), working to stifle speech offensive to Muslims (see below).
OIC secretary general Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu said, "no one has the right to insult another for their beliefs or to incite hatred and prejudice." Unless, of course, those beliefs are Judaism, Christianity, or for that matter, anything other than Islam, something which seems to elude Ms. Clinton and her buddies at the OIC.
One session at the Washington DC conference (which was closed to the public) consisted of a review by U.S. Department of Homeland officials regarding the training the department delivers to federal, state, and local law enforcement on "Countering Violent Extremism." Our law enforcement folk were taught how to avoid offending delicate Islamist sensibilities.
Which brings to mind something we used to hear in grade school, about those who can dish it out, but can't take it themselves. Someone oughta tell Ms. Clinton et al, that when Islamists stop calling Jews and Christians "apes & pigs" and telling their followers to kill apes & pigs, then maybe, just maybe they'll get the tolerance and respect they think they so richly deserve.
Canada Free Press | December 22, 2011
The Obama Administration's Islamist Whitewashing Campaign
The Obama administration is helping the OIC to immunize Islamist ideology and law from critical scrutiny, under the banner of combating "Islamophobia"
By Joseph A. Klein
Courtesy: horowitzfreedomcenter.org
The Obama administration continues to deny that we are at war with Islamist jihadists. Indeed, the word "jihad" itself is forbidden in Obama-land if used to describe the Islamist warriors. At its highest levels, the Obama administration insists on using bland euphemisms rather than accurate language describing the Islamist ideology we are fighting.
As far as the Obama administration is concerned, the global war against Islamist killers is an "Overseas Contingency Operation." The Fort Hood massacre, in which thirteen people were killed and dozens more wounded by an Islamist jihadist, is described by Obama officials as "workplace violence."
In one of the most recent examples of political correctness gone amok, Paul Stockton, assistant defense secretary for homeland defense, refused to acknowledge that we are fighting a radical ideology that has anything to do with Islam. Asked during a joint Senate-House committee hearing last week, conducted by Rep. Peter King (R-NY) and Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-CT), whether "we are at war with violent Islamist extremism," Stockton said "No sir. We are at war with al-Qaeda, its affiliates." Stockton was then asked to at least concede that al-Qaeda is acting out violent Islamist extremism. Refusing to answer the question directly, he stuck to his talking point that "We are not at war with Islam."
Stockton was spewing his nonsense at the same time as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's State Department hosted a three-day international conference in Washington, D.C., which included her friends from the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), representatives from the Office of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and representatives from countries and international organizations "selected on the basis of their geographic, religious, and political diversity." It turns out that more than a third of the countries selected were Muslim. The Arab League was represented in addition to the OIC. Religious diversity was not enough, however, to secure the Jewish state of Israel an invitation.
The purpose of the D.C. conference was to discuss ways to implement the provisions of a new United Nations resolution, the product of a deal reached between the OIC and the Obama administration, entitled "Combating Intolerance, Negative Stereotyping and Stigmatization of, and Discrimination, Incitement to Violence and Violence Against, Persons Based on Religion or Belief."
The deal was for the OIC to at least temporarily put on hold its annual campaign to have the United Nations pass its "defamation of religions" resolutions, in favor of the "compromise" resolution passed by the UN Human Rights Council in March of this year and then passed by the UN General Assembly in November.
The title of the new "compromise" resolution may be different from the OIC's "Combating defamation of religions" resolutions that the OIC has successfully steered through the UN over the last ten years or so. However, the net effect is that with the new UN resolution in hand and the full cooperation of the Obama administration, the OIC will actually be closer to achieving its objective, which to stamp out speech deemed offensive to Muslims.
Continuing the Obama administration's submission to the OIC's wishes, Clinton met with OIC officials in Istanbul last July, at a conference she co-hosted, to embark on what has become known as the "Istanbul Process." The ostensible purpose of the Istanbul Process is to work with Muslim majority countries, the OIC and other interested nations on exploring specific steps to combat intolerance, negative stereotyping, discrimination and violence on the basis of religion or belief.
Clinton, in full spin mode, insisted that the new UN resolution was totally consistent with the free speech protections of the First Amendment, as opposed to the "defamation of religions" resolutions that the OIC was willing to have replaced. At the same time, Clinton assured the OIC that she was perfectly on board with using "some old-fashioned techniques of peer pressure and shaming, so that people don't feel that they have the support to do what we abhor." She also invited OIC representatives to Washington, D.C. to begin implementing the Istanbul Process, which culminated in last week's three-day closed door conference.
The OIC, meanwhile, is engaging in a bait and switch game. Reporting after the meeting in Istanbul on what it expected to happen next, the OIC stated: "The upcoming [Washington] meetings . . . [will] help in enacting domestic laws for the countries involved in the issue, as well as formulating international laws preventing inciting hatred resulting from the continued defamation of religions." In other words, banning "defamation of religions" was still on the OIC's agenda, even if it had to be achieved through indirection.
About a month after the Istanbul meeting, OIC secretary general Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu insisted that "no one has the right to insult another for their beliefs or to incite hatred and prejudice."
Is Hillary Clinton so obtuse that she fails to understand the OIC's true intentions? Alternatively, is she trying to publicly assure American citizens that their First Amendment rights to freedom of speech and press are safe, while working behind the scenes with her OIC partners to find acceptable ways to stifle speech offensive to Muslims? I think the latter is the case, as the Obama administration examines employing legal mechanisms such as hate speech laws and vigorous enforcement of very broadly interpreted anti-discrimination laws, as well as using the "shaming" campaign Clinton talked up in Istanbul. Her actions are right in line with Barack Obama's vow to the Muslim world in his June 2009 Cairo speech: "I consider it part of my responsibility as President of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam whenever they appear."
Nina Shea, director of the Hudson Institute's Center for Religious Freedom and serving as a commissioner on the official but independent U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, was invited to attend just the opening and closing sessions of last week's conference. That was bad enough.
Shea was very concerned about the conference after it was first announced last July, seeing right through the OIC's maneuvering. She came away even more concerned after she heard what was being said at the conference, beyond Hillary Clinton's platitudes about the importance of free expression and religious tolerance. "It is a scandal that the US is partnering on an issue regarding free speech with an organization like the OIC that is committed to undermining free speech," Shea concluded.
Here, in Shea's own words, are some of the things she heard:
[L]egal and security officials of a delegation which will remain unnamed gave a sweeping overview of American founding principles on religious freedom and how they have been breached time and again in American history by attacks against a broad variety of religious minority groups — including now against Muslims. A raft of current cases was mentioned; America's relative exemplary and distinctive achievement in upholding religious freedom in an emphatically pluralistic society was not. That same speaker reassured the audience, which was packed with diplomats from around the world, that the Obama administration is working diligently to prosecute American Islamophobes and is transforming the U.S. Justice Department into the conscience of the nation, though it could no doubt learn a thing or two from the assembled delegates on other ways to stop persistent religious intolerance in America.
As mentioned above, the three-day Washington, D.C. conference was closed to the public, with very little reporting on what went on – particularly on what transpired between the opening and closing sessions that Nina Shea attended. However, I did manage to learn of one illustrative closed break-out session that confirms Ms. Shea's concerns. The session consisted of a review by U.S. Department of Homeland officials regarding the training that the department delivers to federal, state, and local law enforcement on "Countering Violent Extremism," together with a mock training session. It was an exercise in multi-cultural and diversity training. Ignoring the Islamist source of the most dangerous acts of "violent extremism" today, the session showcased the kind of misleading, politically correct training that the Obama administration is pushing, including community outreach programs, guides for community interaction and discussion of purported stereotypes of religious communities.
The Obama administration is helping the OIC to immunize Islamist ideology and law from critical scrutiny, under the banner of combating "Islamophobia." As a result, our First Amendment right of free expression – starting with expression that the Obama administration and the Islamists "abhor" – are in jeopardy.


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IATA welcomes reopening of Qatar airspace by Saudi, allies
Written by:AsimPosted on: January 10, 2021 January 11, 2021
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has welcomed the signing of the "solidarity and stability" agreement that will see Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the UAE and Egypt open their air, land and sea borders with Qatar. The agreement paves the way for commercial airlines to resume regional connectivity—which will shorten flight times and provide essential air links to families and businesses across the region, IATA said. "The reopening of airspace with Qatar by Saudi Arabia, Bahrain,…
"IATA welcomes reopening of Qatar airspace by Saudi, allies "
MOI Publishes New Issue of the "Strategic Security Studies" Magazine
The Ministry of Interior (MOI), represented by the Center of Strategic Security Studies, has launched the third issue of the "Strategic Security Studies" magazine (a periodic, bi-annual, and peer-reviewed) magazine. The magazine focused on the Corona pandemic (COVID-19) and its impact on national security, the latest developments related to it, and the strategies used to confront it, through the issue sections represented in studies, research, scientific articles and follow-ups that dealt with conferences, seminars and…
"MOI Publishes New Issue of the "Strategic Security Studies" Magazine"
Public Prosecution Organizes Second Training Session on Cybersecurity
The Institute of Criminal Studies and the Information Technology Department at the Public Prosecution office, in collaboration with the National Information Security Committee (NISC), organized the second training session on cybersecurity. A number of judges from the Supreme Judicial Council and members of the Public Prosecution are participating in the one-week session that started yesterday. Experts from the Ministry of Interior and academics from Lusail University will deliver lectures. This session aims at enhancing and…
"Public Prosecution Organizes Second Training Session on Cybersecurity"
Trans Seas USA: Nightingale Chairs Wins City of New York Seating Contract
SCOTTSDALE, Arizona, Jan. 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — As the Nightingale Exclusive Sales Representative for the Middle East & North Africa (MENA) region, Trans Seas USA is proud to announce that Nightingale has won the City of New York contract for seating for all city agencies for the next 5 years. Unlike many manufacturers, Nightingale oversees the […]
"Trans Seas USA: Nightingale Chairs Wins City of New York Seating Contract"
Arabic Press Releases
ترانس سيز يو أس أيه: شركة نايتنغيل تشيرز تفوز بعقد لتوفير المقاعد لمدينة نيويورك
سكوتسديل، أريزونا، 10 كانون الثاني/يناير / بي آر نيوزواير / — بصفتها ممثلة المبيعات الحصرية لشركة نايتنغيل لمنطقة الشرق الأوسط وشمال إفريقيا، تفخر شركة ترانس سيز يو أس أيه بالإعلان عن فوز شركة نايتنغيل بعقد مدينة نيويورك لتوفير المقاعد لجميع وكالات المدينة على مدار السنوات الخمس المقبلة. على عكس العديد من الشركات المصنعة، تشرف نايتنغيل على […]
"ترانس سيز يو أس أيه: شركة نايتنغيل تشيرز تفوز بعقد لتوفير المقاعد لمدينة نيويورك"

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Millions in stringent new UK lockdown amid coronavirus variant surge
Aditi Khanna
London, Dec 20 (PTI) A surge in the infection rate caused by a new variant of coronavirus has led to millions entering a stringent new stay-at-home lockdown in the UK from Sunday, with non-essential shops and businesses now closed.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the new rules at a briefing from 10 Downing Street on Saturday evening, which means a planned five-day "Christmas bubble" of relaxed rules has been cancelled in favour of a new Tier 4 level to the current three-tier lockdown system to try and control the surge in infections being caused by the new mutation of the deadly virus.
'It seems that the spread is now being driven by the new variant of the virus," Johnson said.
"We have alerted the World Health Organisation and are continuing to analyse the available data to improve our understanding," said Professor Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer for England.
"There is no current evidence to suggest the new strain causes a higher mortality rate or that it affects vaccines and treatments although urgent work is underway to confirm this," he said.
The state-funded National Health Service (NHS) is set to vaccinate people against the coronavirus on Christmas Day as part of a drive to accelerate the number of inoculations nationally, according to 'The Sunday Times'. More than 100,000 Pfizer jabs have been booked at general practitioner (GP) surgeries and hospital hubs across the country for the coming week.
Under the new Tier 4, people would be banned from mixing with anyone outside of their household, including on Christmas Day, and for the other tiers, Christmas rules allowing up to three households will now be limited to Christmas Day of December 25 only, rather than five days. The changes will last for two weeks with the first review now due on December 30.
The new restrictions – similar to the second national lockdown which ended in November – applies to all areas in the South East which were in tier three, covering Kent, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Surrey (excluding Waverley), Gosport, Havant, Portsmouth, Rother and Hastings.
It also applies in London and the East of England – Bedford, Central Bedford, Milton Keynes, Luton, Peterborough, Hertfordshire and Essex. In Wales, the restrictions were brought forward pre-Christmas to also begin right away.
'We are sacrificing the chance to see our loved ones this Christmas so we have a better chance of protecting their lives so that we can see them at future Christmases,' he said, adding that he "bitterly regretted" have to make these changes.
The UK PM said there is no evidence to suggest vaccines would be any less effective against the new variant but that it was required to act fast to try and control its acceleration.
'Our advisers on the New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group (Nervtag) have spent the last few days analysing this new variant – there's no evidence that it causes more severe illness or higher mortality but it does appear to be passed on significantly more quickly," he said.
Non-essential shops, gyms, cinemas, hairdressers and bowling alleys will be forced to close for two weeks, while people will be restricted to meeting one other person from another household in an outdoor public space.
Johnson added: 'I know how much emotion people invest in this time of year, and how important it is, for instance, for grandparents to see their grandchildren, for families to be together.
'So I know how disappointing this will be. But we have said throughout this pandemic that we must and we will be guided by the science. When the science changes, we must change our response.' The Opposition Labour Party of causing "heartbreak" for millions by not acting in time.
"I think the Prime Minister should apologise. This is not just one mistake when he has otherwise got things right. It is the same mistake over and over again," said Sir Keir Starmer, the Leader of the Opposition.
"At the heart of the problem here is a Prime Minister who simply doesn't want to be unpopular and therefore won't take the tough decisions that are necessary, until he is forced into them at the 11th hour. We can't go on like that," he said. PTI AK PMS PMS


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I'm a 39-year-old man who has struggled with my weight for a decade. It's an odd time to start getting thin.
by Nate Brown
Nate Brown
I was one of Kathy's Deli's first employees. When it closed forever during the pandemic, I wondered if I'd lost my teenage self.
In our sliver of Los Angeles, we used to ignore our neighbors. When Covid-19 struck, food exchanges built community.
I can't cook, but it's the only way to connect to my last living parent—who I can't visit.
See full series
"I noticed that the weight came off faster merely for the fact that I wasn't eating in restaurants or blindly grabbing a snack between classes."
Aside from one season on a recreational swimming team and barely organized games of soccer and kickball during elementary school recess, I've never played sports. In my twenties, I started lifting weights and running, and while I was neither cut nor skinny, I maintained a healthy weight. More to the point: I felt good. Then after graduate school and a few years tending bar, I got chubby, then something more than chubby, and I've been solidly 50 pounds overweight for nearly all of my thirties.
Now that I'm 39, I'm facing the prospect of having spent an entire decade at a dangerously unhealthy weight, with all of the attendant complications that come with it (fatigue, sleeping problems, high blood pressure).
It's obvious to most of us that if you're buying, preparing, and consuming healthier meals, your body will likely respond in kind.
Along with those physiological problems, weight gain has, for me, engendered shame and led to some wild justifications about how I eat (I'm already fat, so why not have another margarita, cookie, one more bite of cake?). After enough time spent being heavy, even the photos of myself that once shocked me—the ones taken innocently by friends at weddings or holidays, the pictures that once made me ask How did I get so big?—stopped bothering me. This resignation was worse than the initial shock of shame—at least shame took the effort of cognition. I had to look at the picture, think about it, and examine how it made me feel.
But resignation? That takes little more than diverting your attention from the complicated and crappy feelings that come from ordering a dessert. Add to this a sincere hatred of fat-shaming and a fear of alienating or embarrassing others when speaking (or writing) about my body, and you end up with a recipe for denial and avoidance. Avoidance of thinking or talking about nutrition. Avoidance of mirrors and cameras. Avoidance of my annual physical, which I postponed twice in 2020, partly because of Covid, but also because I wanted to lose more weight before stepping on the scale in my doctor's office.
Last Thanksgiving, after weighing in at my heaviest ever, I downloaded a food-logging app whose ads have been ubiquitous on public radio and Instagram. Between last December and March of this year, I lost a little over 20 pounds. I'm happy about that, but one thing I struggled with under lockdown has been eating enough healthy foods—the fiber-rich greens and vegetables, whole grains, and unprocessed foods that we've long been told are the staples of a nutritious diet.
A tomato patch in the author's backyard garden.
In March and April, as stay-at-home orders were put into place in cities and towns across the country, I noticed that the weight came off faster merely for the fact that I wasn't eating in restaurants or blindly grabbing a snack between classes (I teach creative writing). This is not an epiphany, of course. It's obvious to most of us that if you're buying, preparing, and consuming healthier meals, your body will likely respond in kind.
What is a revelation, though, is this: You can read articles about inequalities in the food system; you can understand that lower-income households are more likely to suffer the results of rising food costs and poor nutrition; you can even talk about these disparities, rail against them, and address the subject in your personal life and in your teaching, and still not fully understand that our bodies require more than quick calories, convenience foods, and snacks that fail to really nourish. It takes the eating itself (and the attendant privilege of having a car that I can drive to a big grocery store with a well-stocked hippie section). To say that maintaining good nutrition and a good attitude about eating well are socially, personally, and politically complex is to state the obvious.
Red zebra and Shenghuang cherry tomatoes from the author's garden.
This summer, the heirloom tomatoes my wife and I planted this spring alongside zucchini, peppers, and a dozen herbs, have played some role in nearly every meal we've prepared. As the hottest days of July progressed, the tomatoes began to ripen in the yard. It's hard, perhaps even impossible, not to think about the implications of how we eat when you harvest a three-pound Yellowstone tomato that you've babied for eight weeks. It's hard, when washing a bouquet of purple basil, mint, oregano, chives, and lavender under the nozzle of your garden hose, not to be a little thrilled at the abundance in your hands. And it's wildly heartening to hand that bouquet over to a masked friend who, in return, hands you two pots of perennial greens, things you've never heard of, Turkish Rocket and Good King Henry, and says unironically: "Eat these in good health."
nutrition,
Nate Brown is a Baltimore-based writer and editor whose work has appeared in the Iowa Review, Mississippi Review, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Publisher's Weekly, and LitHub. He is managing editor of American Short Fiction magazine, and he teaches creative writing at Johns Hopkins University and George Washington University.
Living with an eating disorder as America unravels means navigating dual identity crises
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Maybe it's time to ban "healthy"
I'm a science journalist covering Covid-19. Cooking felt grounding and manageable—until it wasn't.
by Yasmin tayag
During the Covid-19 crisis, it is not comfort I seek from my meals. It's a sense of control.
by Paolo española
To stay healthy, I had to stop my roommate from going to the deli all the time. So I taught him how to cook.
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In the middle of two pandemics, cooking soul food has become my labor of love
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by Sylvia grove
Birthdays are for sharing homemade cake. I was not about to let a pandemic get in the way of my celebration. Sort of.
by Samantha weber
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Pained as Protagonist: How Reel life is becoming Real in Kashmir
By Hirra Sultan
The movie opens her closets and rips off bandaids. Bringing forth a lot of pain—the pain which she tried hard to ignore and the pain she kept hiding through a lot of pretenses.
She was not an ardent fan of Bollywood. Very few are. After all how long can one delve in the same sort of stories and expect to be entertained? With the current level of availability and diversity, it keeps getting more difficult to be entertained—to laugh when you want to and dispel that stress—to watch a horror movie and feel the need to crawl underneath a quilt.
We've consumed enough content to predict what happens next and what to expect. Even the most spicy things seem bland. It was this sheer boredom, discontentment and the feeling that she had consumed all good content on OTT platforms that she opted for Bollywood: Dear Zindagi. Whether she was discontented with entertainment industry or her life, that was a different question to ponder about.
The movie starred celebrated actors. Upcoming and the best. Heartthrobs. As such the movie appealed to a wide audience and made a lot of people watch this in a theatre. Of course this was pre-Covid. By the revenue it grossed and the ratings on idbm, one can consider it a big hit. Maybe a little unconventional but popular.
When she started watching it, she was expecting regular Bollywood romance and a couple of hours spinning some fairytale. It was a fairytale alright but it came with a twist.
The story revolves around a young lady, too mature and skilled for her age, who struggles from commitment issues and lack of opportunities when it comes to career. Somehow she couldn't find herself the job opportunity she kept looking for. She comes across a psychologist and decides to pay a visit. For her insomnia. Xanax and the like didn't work for her and it just made her life miserable since she wanted to believe she was perfectly okay and did not need any kind of help and that nothing was wrong.
As the story proceeds, she keeps thinking hard about things and incidents. The movie opens her closets and rips off bandaids. Bringing forth a lot of pain—the pain which she tried hard to ignore and the pain she kept hiding through a lot of pretenses.
In our culture as well as religion, we keep saying and emphasizing on the fact that parents are the authority and they're correct and everything for a child. Their world, their paradise, their solace and whatever else one can think of. Somehow though, her paradise had hurt her a lot which turned her into a mature child sooner than she should have been.
As adult life keeps unfolding, she discovers more ways she was traumatized in. She understands the reason things had happened the way they did and that nobody had deliberately been trying to harm her, but couldn't they have been more empathetic? Was neglect necessary?
Childhood is a time when the brain is highly impressionable. So whatever that child goes through in that phase is how s/he is going to perceive the world. The grown up world is an effort to make it less difficult for your child.
The movie had her thinking. Temper, tantrums and being grumpy was not the only way a child showcased his trauma. And trauma is not only linked to childhood. Some people grow up well and happy in childhood, but they get stuck in abusive relationships later on. And then we tell them that since they are adults, they shouldn't get hurt or shouldn't be crying, or have sabr, or things like that. As if we lose our emotions once we grow up.
Half the time she was crying while watching the movie. Unable to hold back. It was as if she could see her own hurt, her own pain in Kiara, the protagonist. Everyone calling her shy and messy and anti-social, but nobody trying to see what she's trying to cope with or try to help her out.
Her parents (or probably all parents in our society) thought they knew what she should do next and what's best for her without even consulting her and trying to understand what she wants. What her aspirations for her life are. Where does she want to see herself and how they can be helpful in achieving that goal.
Instead parents think they know the goals their kids should target. Things she should do and read and get involved with. Sometimes it feels like care but mostly it suffocated her. It suffocated her to think that she probably couldn't even chose the brand of shampoo she wanted to use.
Things had gone worse for her after she got married. To the love of her life. They had known each other for a good while. Met each other in college and hit it off. They had many promises and visions for their life together but post marriage, things took a turn probably neither of them had anticipated.
They lived with the boy's parents. Even though his mother was the love of his life, she turned into the villain of his wife's life. Dictating everything. Probably afraid that if she left the couple alone without any meddling, she would lose her grip on him. The fear of her daughter-in-law living in her son's heart.
So she would complain about every small thing and make everything into an issue. Quarrel over nothings and tell her son that his wife was good for nothing. Everyone told the lady to hold her horses and to have patience, things change gradually and usually mothers-in-law take a while to acknowledge the presence of another lady in her house. But what about the hurt?
As days went by, things did get better. At a slow pace, sure, but better. Her anxiety went away and she could relax a bit. She could do things in her way and not stir up a storm. A part of her died in the process, sure, but she was not getting confronted with a new conflict everyday. Her peace had a huge cost. And a part of her was happy that things were sorted.
But there was this another part of her, hidden in her deepest closets and not uttering a word, which could not forgive her mother-in-law or her husband for what they had put her through.
Views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author's and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position and policy of Free Press Kashmir. Feedback and counter-views are welcome at [email protected]
Related Items:Alia Bhatt, Dear Zindagi, Film, Kashmir, Review, SRK
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Home » Publications » Making Clean Energy Clean, Just & Equitable: Earthworks Position Statement
Making Clean Energy Clean, Just & Equitable: Earthworks Position Statement
Payal Sampat
Clean Energy, Not Dirty Mining
Earthworks supports the transition to a 100% renewable energy economy, an essential shift in order to keep global temperature rise below 1.5 degrees and avert the most disastrous impacts of climate change. Already, global investment in new renewable energy infrastructure has been double that of new energy from fossil fuels and nuclear. But the lifecycle of these technologies begins with mining for minerals like copper, nickel, lithium and cobalt, whose extraction generates toxic waste, violates human rights, pollutes freshwater, and threatens ocean health through the risky practice of mine waste dumping and deep-sea mining.
Dirty Metals
Metals mining is one of the world's dirtiest industries, responsible for 10% of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, according to the UN Environment Programme. In the United States, metals mining is the leading industrial polluter of air, land and water.
Earlier this year in Brazil, the collapse of two tailings dams at Vale's Brumadinho iron ore mine killed hundreds of workers and local residents. Independent research that analyzes decades of data on mine waste dam failures reveals that these catastrophic failures are occurring more frequently and are predicted to continue to increase in frequency. Mining is linked to severe human rights abuses, violent conflict and unsafe working conditions in some parts of the world. Most of the world's cobalt, used in rechargeable batteries for electric vehicles, is mined in the Democratic Republic of Congo, too often by children working in dangerous conditions. Mining for copper, silver and nickel threatens indigenous community rights and livelihoods in regions as diverse as Alaska's Bristol Bay, Sámi lands in Norway, in Papua New Guinea, and in many other areas around the world. Looming on the horizon is the threat of deep seabed mining for cobalt and manganese–with unknown, potentially disastrous consequences for marine species and deep-sea ecosystems.
Making Clean Energy Clean, Just & Equitable
As an organization dedicated to protecting communities and the environment from the adverse impacts of fossil fuels and minerals extraction, Earthworks has been proactively working to grapple with the implications of this dual need: to dramatically accelerate the transition to clean, renewable energy sources while simultaneously ensuring that people and the environment are not put at risk through destructive mining. Earthworks' newly-launched "Making Clean Energy Clean, Just & Equitable" initiative aims to ensure that the transition to renewable energy sources is powered by responsibly and equitably sourced minerals that minimizes the need for new extraction and moves the mining industry toward more responsible practices.
Research that we commissioned from the University of Technology, Sydney's Institute for Sustainable Futures (UTS), "Responsible Minerals Sourcing for Renewable Energy," shows that as demand for these scarce minerals skyrockets, the associated environmental and human impacts are likely to rise steeply as well. The metals of highest concern considering projected future demand, supply risks, and environmental and social impacts are cobalt and lithium, followed by nickel, silver and rare earths. Batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) require the largest volumes of these metals—and thus the EV and battery sectors have the most urgent need to take steps to avoid negative impacts.
We have a timely opportunity to scale up our dependence on clean, renewable energy sources, while scaling back our dependence on dirty mining. Doing so will require a concerted commitment from businesses and governments and consumers to:
Boost Recycling and Minimize Toxicity: Manufacturers of electric vehicles, renewable energy (RE) and battery technologies must dramatically scale up their use of recycled minerals. Policymakers must create incentives for minerals recycling and requirements for companies to take back their products at the end of their useful lives. R&D innovators must design batteries and RE technologies for disassembly and efficient recycling of all the minerals they contain. Materials used in manufacturing should avoid toxicity. Health, safety and protection for workers and communities must be the top priority at recycling operations.
Ensure Responsible Minerals Sourcing: Utilities, purchasers and manufacturers of RE technologies, batteries, and electric vehicles must trace the minerals in their products back to the source. Where sourcing from mining operations is absolutely necessary, purchasers must insist that those operations adhere to stringent environmental and human rights standards (such as those developed by the multi-stakeholder Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance) with independent, third-party assurance of compliance.
Shift Consumption and Transportation: The UTS research underscores the need to fundamentally rethink how societies (particularly wealthy ones) consume energy and products, and transport goods and people. It will take more than technological fixes to wean ourselves off fossil fuels and ensure equity in access to the benefits of clean energy. Policy makers should prioritize investments in electric-powered public transit, support bike and pedestrian-friendly policies, and expand access to public transit to those who are not currently gaining the benefits of today's car-centric transportation system.
This is a moment for civil society allies to come together. As we pursue our necessarily ambitious climate goals, we must collectively ensure that human rights, community health, water, and ecosystems are protected against dirty mining. We have a historic opportunity as renewable energy campaigners, mining activists, frontline communities, sustainable transportation advocates, labor representatives and environmental NGOs to collaboratively ensure that our fossil-fuel-free future is truly clean, just and equitable.
The UTS-ISF report Responsible Minerals Sourcing for Renewable Energy:
Earthworks' Making Clean Energy Clean, Just & Equitable:
Project home page
Categories: Mining


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Q: Crash after call DetachCurrentThread I have a private lib that developed by my company. It allowed me to set a callback function, so after the long time operation completes, the callback will be called in sub thread.
I should operate JVM in the callback. This is my main code in the call back function:
JNIEnv *pEnv = NULL;
glJniContext.pJvm->AttachCurrentThread(&pEnv, NULL);
UiInkeyMsInternal(pEnv, 10000000);
glJniContext.pJvm->DetachCurrentThread();

The AttachCurrentThread is to attach the sub thread to the JVM, the UiInkeyMsInternal is to call a Java Method, and the DetachCurrentThread is to detach the sub thread to JVM, and glJniContext.pJvm is stored in the native method method like this:
JavaVM* gs_jvm;
pEnv->GetJavaVM(&gs_jvm);
glJniContext.pJvm = gs_jvm;

With the line glJniContext.pJvm->DetachCurrentThread(); , The program will crash. But without the line, it's normal. How to analyse the phenomenon?
Another question, I can get JNIEnv variable by AttachCurrentThread method normally, but the findClass method doesn't execute normally. Whatever I pass, like "java/lang/Thread", it will return 0x00. Is this normal or can I ignore it?

A: Don't call JNI handler function from main thread. Calling JNI handler function from main thread will make crash.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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Reports and Maps
River and Stream Reports
Delta Reports
Salt and Bay Reports
Nimbus Hatchery Steelhead Numbers Rebound From Last Year
by Dan Bacher | posted in: Reports | 0
(Rancho Cordova) The number of steelhead showing now at Nimbus Fish Hatchery has improved greatly from last season, in spite of continuing low releases of 500 cfs from Nimbus Dam.
This year is much different from last season, when a total of only 154 steelhead were trapped from December through mid-March.
In contrast, the hatchery has trapped over 148 steelhead to date as of December 22. Last season only10 steelhead had been trapped by December 29.
"There are lots of steelhead in the hatchery now," said Gary Novak, Nimbus Fish Hatchery manager. "I'm floored."
The hatchery has spawned a total of 27 pairs to date compared with only 31 pairs all of the last season.
"The males are above average size and the females are also large," he said, leading to speculation that some of the steelhead may have stayed out in the ocean for an extra year and have come up the river as 4-year-olds.
We won't know for sure until scale samples of the steelhead are analyzed. Most steelhead return to spawn as three-year-olds on the American River.
The number of eggs taken from the fish to date is 198,278. That's more than total for the entire season last year, 192,278 eggs.
"We averaged about 6,000 eggs per female last season," he said. "This year we're seeing over 7,000 eggs per fish."
However, to put the current steelhead run in perspective, banner years for steelhead on the American have seen up to 2,000 adult steelhead counted by this time of year.
The numbers of fall-run Chinook salmon, including jacks and jills (two-year—old fish) showing at the hatchery are now also above those trapped last year. The facility has trapped 9,716 salmon, including 7,326 adults and 2390 jacks and jills this season.
Last year hatchery staff counted a total of 8,343 salmon, including 7,048 adults and 1,295 jacks and jills.
The hatchery has taken 8 million eyed salmon eggs. "Overall, the numbers of salmon are typical of those we've seen here in recent years," said Novak.
"The water at the hatchery was warm in the beginning, but the cold snap we got cooled the water down and brought up fresh fish from the Sacramento," he said.
He noted that they have already sent 2 million eggs to the Mokelumne River Fish Hatchery; in addition to the eggs they have on hand at Nimbus, as insurance against any unforeseen disaster.
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Big Catfish and Stripers Highlight Los Vaqueros Reservoir Reopening October 23, 2020
Sacramento Area Kings Challenge Anglers September 29, 2020
Lake Camanche Trophy Trout, Bass Lurk Above Ruins of Lancha Plana September 23, 2020
The Fish Sniffer
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Music's biggest names all came together under one roof for the 61st annual Grammy Awards!
Hosted by Alicia Keys, the show was held at the Staples Center in Los Angeles and includes performances from Dolly Parton, Shawn Mendes, Lady Gaga and Post Malone and many others. Cardi B became the first woman to win Best Rap Album as a solo arist, Ariana Grande won her very first Grammy and Diana Ross celebrated her birthday — it was a big night for the ladies!
Below is the list of nominees and winners, which will be updated throughout the night.


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Real Madrid extends head coach Laso
Oct 25, 2017 by Euroleague.net Print
Turkish Airlines Euroleague powerhouse and nine-time continental champion Real Madrid announced an agreement with head coach Pablo Laso that will keep two sides together for two more years. A former Alexander Gomelskiy Coach of the Year and the man who guided Madrid to the 2015 EuroLeague crown, Laso will now stay on the club's bench until June of 2020. The current season is the seventh together for Madrid and Laso, who took over as the head coach in the summer of 2011 and since then has also led the team to 13 trophies: the 2015 EuroLeague, three Spanish League titles, five Spanish Cups, three Spanish Supercups and one Intercontinental Cup. Laso and Madrid have made a total of four EuroLeague Final Four appearances, including three championship games. Laso, who turned 50 years of age this month, has a 123-49 EuroLeague record since taking over Los Blancos, and his team has averaged 84.3 points in those 169 games, first among EuroLeague teams. Laso's 2014-15 Madrid squad holds the EuroLeague record for the highest single-season assist average with 21.47, while in December of 2015 Madrid set the all-time record for assists in a game with 36. Before Madrid, Laso coached Leoni Castellona, Valencia Basket, Cantabria Lobos and Gipuzkoa, all in his native Spain. After Lolo Sainz (14) and Pedro Ferrandiz (10), Laso has now spent the third-most time at the head of the bench of Real Madrid.
Returning Randolph and Thompkins bolstering Real
Real Madrid dominated the battle inside the paint against Baskonia by showing phenomenal frontcourt depth – in large part thanks to the return of two established stars who...
Real, Yabusele pen extension through 2025
Real Madrid and big man Guerschon Yabusele have agreed to a contract extension that will keep them together through the end of the 2024-25 season.
Despite foul trouble, Tavares made impact and reached milestone
Real Madrid center Walter Tavares reached a major milestone on Thursday night, joining a very select company of players who blocked at least 250 shots in the Turkish Airlines...


Check back for links to volunteer.
Clinics are on Sunday unless otherwise noted.
Our clinic is located at 207 Allegheny Street, Tarentum, PA 15084.
At this time, we treat only cats at our clinics.
You must call to register prior to any clinic. See instructions below.
1. By Phone: call 412-321-4060 and leave a message. Please include your name and phone number in your message. Ssomeone will return your call and complete your pre-registration. HCMT is all volunteer and this may take some time. Clinics fill up quickly and it's best to call at least two weeks in advance of the clinic you want to attend.
2. By Email : Email cathomeless@gmail.com with your name, number of spots you need and which date you are registering for. You will receive a confirmation email ONLY if you are registered.
HCMT treats both feral cats and rescue cats.
A FERAL is a cat that will be returned to the outdoor location where it was trapped after surgery.
A RESCUE is a cat that either has been or will be adopted as a pet after surgery.
ONLY FERAL cats are eligible for No-Charge clinics.
Both feral and rescue cats can be treated at Fast Track Clinics.
Please bring your cat to the clinic in a humane trap if it is a feral cat.
Please have only ONE cat per trap. We cannot accept feral cats in carriers or homemade traps.
Please bring your cat to the clinic in a cat-sized carrier if it is a rescue cat.
When you arrive at the clinic you will fill out forms and we will admit your cat.
PLEASE NOTE - NEW forms at the clinic starting on SUNDAY, JUNE 26.
Cats go into surgery in the order they are admitted to the clinic.
We will call you when your cat is ready to be picked up after surgery.
You must be available at the phone number you give us, while we have your cat.
If there is a concern about your cat or it needs medication, we will call you.
Payment for surgery, vaccines, medications or other treatments is required when you pick up your cat.
We do not have space in the clinic for you to wait for your cat, however, there are local restaurants and shops where you can wait if you choose. It usually takes between 4 and 5 hours for your cat to be ready to go home.


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http://youtube.com/profile?user=elobservadorenlinea
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070601-the-counter-revolution-wont-be-televised-but-it-will-be-on-youtube.html
Venezuela's counter-revolution won't be televised… but it will be on YouTube
BY Nate Anderson / June 01, 2007
When YouTube CEO Chad Hurley told a Congressional committee that his company "advances democracy," perhaps this was the sort of thing he had in mind. An opposition Venezuelan television station whose broadcast license has not been renewed by the government is now turning to YouTube to get its message out after its transmitter was taken over by a state-run channel. Hugo Chavez's "Bolivarian Revolution" has no time for media groups that criticize his government; Radio Caracas Televisión (RCTV) is now off the air, and another channel, Globovision, could be next, according to CNN.
RCTV journalists and producers have not been arrested or stopped from working, but their main link to the public has been removed. Rather than giving up, the station has turned to YouTube, where it now has its own channel for the show El Observador. A Colombian channel is also broadcasting RCTV content into Venezuela. El Observador clips have been seen 175,000 times since May 28, and the channel is currently the most-subscribed channel of the week. While putting the station's shows on YouTube is an excellent idea, YouTube still lacks anything near the reach of over-the-air broadcasts. But the use of the site to avoid censorship is growing, and it's not hard to imagine a day in the near future when the site (or sites like it) becomes as essential as local TV stations. As that happens, YouTube will come into even more conflicts with governments that have an interest in controlling what their citizens see, It's already happening-Thailand's king, for instance, has a thing for iPods but isn't too keen on YouTube. Will Hugo Chavez show more tolerance?
Update: Some readers are concerned that Chavez is getting a bad rap here; RCTV has been accused of supported the earlier coup against him and of calling for the overthrow of the current government. It's a complicated situation, but the fact remains that RCTV was a main opposition outlet and that its replacement is a state-run channel. Given Chavez's long history of attacks on the press and his current ability to rule by decree, he doesn't look like a man interested in a robust and critical press, though he has not instituted mass arrests or official censorship of journalists. Chavez's concern for government stability and threats against the state are a recent development, too; Chavez participated in a coup attempt of his own back in 1992.
CURRENT PROTESTS
http://www.noticias24.com/actualidad/?p=5291
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmHMdzPlBgA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adMl5lGh45k
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9fLrOF8jzM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPi4dhanyZw
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_2007_RCTV_protests
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A5755-2005Mar27.html
"Article 147: "Anyone who offends with his words or in writing or in any other way disrespects the President of the Republic or whomever is fulfilling his duties will be punished with prison of 6 to 30 months if the offense is serious and half of that if it is light." That sanction, the code implies, applies to those who "disrespect" the president or his functionaries in private; "the term will be increased by a third if the offense is made publicly."
There's more: Article 444 says that comments that "expose another person to contempt or public hatred" can bring a prison sentence of one to three years; Article 297a says that someone who "causes public panic or anxiety" with inaccurate reports can receive five years. Prosecutors are authorized to track down allegedly criminal inaccuracies not only in newspapers and electronic media, but also in e-mail and telephone communications.
The new code reserves the toughest sanctions for journalists or others who receive foreign funding, such as the election monitoring group Sumate, which has been funded in part by the National Endowment for Democracy. Venezuelans or foreigners living in the country can be punished with a 10- to 15-year sentence for receiving foreign support that "can prejudice the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela . . . or destabilize the social order," whatever that means. Persons accused of conspiring against the government with a foreign country can get 20 to 30 years in prison. The new code specifies that anyone charged with these crimes will not be entitled to legal due process. In other words, should Izarra determine that my Caracas-based colleagues continue to collude with the State Department against Venezuela, they could be summarily jailed.
Chavez and his propaganda apparatus don't feel compelled to live by their own rules. The president has directed crude epithets at President Bush and even more vulgar sexual innuendo at Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. His government has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund Americans in the United States who write articles and letters glorifying Chavez and attacking the Bush administration."
CHAVEZ HAS A SHOW EVERY SUNDAY CALLED "ALO PRESIDENTE"
THAT GOES FOR HOURS AND HOURS
SOMETIMES HE SINGS SONGS HE WROTE
http://youtube.com/watch?v=kLf08O3D_f0
http://youtube.com/results?search_query=alo+presidente
'MR. DANGER' IS A REFERENCE TO A COLONIALIST CHARACTER
IN AN OLD VENEZUELAN BOOK (WRITTEN BY A FORMER PRESIDENT)
WHO TREATED THE NATIVES THE SAME AS THE FARM ANIMALS
http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/05/31/venezuela-dispatch-from-a-surrealist-autocracy/
Venezuela: Dispatch from a Surrealist Autocracy
By Rodrigo Arcaya / May 31st, 2007
Hugo Chavez was once Venezuela's media darling. The love affair has taken increasingly bad turns. Now, he is the media.
As the world now knows, Chavez shut down Venezuela's respected 53-year-old TV station RCTV, accusing it of "subversive activities." Out in the streets of Caracas, and in many other cities, people have been taking to the street – particularly the high school and college students. This has caused incredible traffic jams here in Caracas, as the most common form of protest is to close the streets, leaving only one lane for the cars. Many of the drivers that have been trapped in these traffic jams show their support for the dissenters by keeping their emergency lights on, shouting slogans against the government and even stopping their own cars on the only open lane.
But why are people here so upset? Because Chavez is clearly making a play to control the national TV media as a mouthpiece for his government. He is doing this using a little-known law that resembles the U.S.'s Emergency Broadcast System. Some background on the relationship between Chavez and the Venezuelan TV media is needed. In Venezuela, we have four TV channels that have national coverage, and about twelve local ones. Of the four national channels, we have RCTV (whose license was just revoked), Venevision and Televen, which are privately owned, and VTV, which is owned by the government. At the local level, the most important is Globovision (which Chavez is threatening), a 24 hour news channel. It has coverage in all major cities (it's pretty spotty in rural areas). It's also worth mentioning the Asamblea Nacional channel (think C-Span, owned by the government), and TeleSur, a 24 hour news channel that is co-owned by the governments of Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina and other Latin American countries. We don't really have many local cable channels. Most cable channels are Spanish language versions of U.S. networks (FOX – the entertainment channel, and MTV. We also get the U.S. versions of Fox News and CNN in English) or channels oriented toward Latin America as a whole.
Venezuela has an odd little law that most international analysts don't comment on. But the law plays an important role in this narrative. It allows the president to order all TV (including local stations going through cable) and radio station to transmit the same signal that is being transmitted through the government channel. The idea is that the president can have a way to talk to all the country in an emergency. In theory, it is not much different from the U.S. Emergency Broadcast System, but it's centralized through the presidency. We call it a "chain" – as all the signals are chained to one. However, the idea is not the same as the application, as we will see in a moment.
Hugo Chavez is truly a Media Phenomenon. He entered Venezuela's collective psyche when he led an unsuccessful coup against Carlos Andres Perez in the year '92, while he was an active officer in the Venezuelan army. After he was captured, some of his army accomplices did not put down arms, so the government put him on camera to prove that they actually had him in custody. He was shoved in front of live news cameras, and he said, "Comrades, I assume all the blame for the failure of our operation. We have been defeated. For now…" With those words, people fell in love with him. Not only had he assumed responsibility for his failure (an uncommon trait among political leaders everywhere), but even in his defeat, he had the courage to see a future where he would be victorious.
And if the people fell for him, the private TV channels positively swooned. The private TV networks were instrumental in getting the idea out that Chavez and his people were not actually traitors to their oath to protect Venezuela. In fact, they were young idealists who – by following that oath to its last consequence – had to rid Venezuela of its corrupt ruling government. In that climate, Chavez and his co-conspirators were pardoned by then President Caldera. The love affair was not surprising. Since the end of the '80, most of the private media had turned really critical of the government. Fueled by this media frenzy, Chavez created his party MVR, and against all prognostics, managed to win the '99 election. For the first two years, the relationship between private media and Chavez can only be described as a honeymoon. The happy marriage started to fray when, after having a new constitution approved, Chavez started to demand "legislative powers." The idea was that the presidency could draft up new laws and get them approved, bypassing congress. Private media was critical of the move, but Chavez had a convenient way to retaliate. Every time he wanted to tell his side of the story, he just ordered a "chain" and started talking through all the TV and radio channels.
Things quickly became quite surreal. One time, I was driving to work and turned on the radio. The only thing I could hear was a "thump-thump-thump" noise. I flipped to the next station, and the next one, and the next one. "Thump-thump-thump." Was my radio broken? Had aliens attacked, jamming all the radio waves? I got to my office, turned on the TV, and found that the president had decided to "chain" a live broadcast about the inauguration of the construction of a tunnel where Chavez worked on a hydraulic hammer for about half an hour. "Thump-thump-thump."
REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED
LLAGUNO BRIDGE: KEYS TO A MASSACRE (PARTS 1-8)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=u9wU0OIIEmY
http://youtube.com/watch?v=g3odv8Ix4so
http://youtube.com/watch?v=npdy4zSzB1k
http://youtube.com/watch?v=GGEjb01y3KE
http://youtube.com/watch?v=8cghs6-vJEM
http://youtube.com/watch?v=YQoOrYRDd3A
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Q3kN8yhZTgQ
http://youtube.com/watch?v=gwbXyylKQmw
This brings to mind the strangeness of the April 11, 2002 "coup." I'm not even going to try to explain that Gordian knot of surrealism in this dispatch – but let me introduce a few basic facts. On that morning, quite a few people in Caracas took to the streets (the numbers range from the Government estimate of 20,000 to over a million claimed by the opposition – judge for yourself from this picture or this one.)
http://www.el-nacional.com/Upload/GaleriaImagenes/55marcha.jpg
http://ianasagasti.blogs.com/mi_blog/images/opositores_a_chavez_6.jpg
This throng of dissenters had decided to march to Miraflores (think the White House) to show the President that they were real. (You see, Chavez' government had claimed that there were only a few people at previous protest marches. They claimed that the TV channels were using special effects and most of the protesters were actually "virtual
people.") The crowd on April 11 got a little out of hand. In fact, it was a bit of a riot, but the demonstrators were essentially unarmed. (Venezuela is a bit like Texas, so we have to assume that some folks may have had guns).
Just as the march was approaching Miraflores, Chavez "chained" the broadcast, and started giving a speech. He told the people that the situation, which people had been watching on their TVs, had been calmed. He appealed to the few "misguided people" that were coming to Miraflores to think twice. At the same time, open warfare had come to the streets of Caracas. People on both sides were dying. A group of Chavez supporters that were "guarding" Miraflores opened fire on the march. The police and some people on the march started firing back. Or, maybe the government narrative was correct and the marchers started shooting the government supporters first. Either way, el Presidente was on live TV saying everything was under control while, less than 6 blocks away, people were firing guns at other people.
At this point, all the TV stations came to a decision: They would respect the spirit of the law, and keep the president's feed, including the audio. But they split the screen, so that people could see what was actually going on at the same time. This is the main reason the government now says that RCTV was behind the coup. You see, if those images hadn't been broadcast, people would not have started rioting all over the country. Of course, RCTV, Venevision, Televen and Globovision all did this. So why did Chavez single out RCTV? This one is a no brainer: over the last two years, there has been talk about the end of the concession to RCTV, Televen and Venevision. And in these last two years, both Televen and Venevision have been letting go of their hard-hitting journalists. They have stopped reporting things that the government doesn't like. This self-censorship hasn't been at all covert. Everybody here knows. It is telling that the ratings of Televen and Venevision have dropped, while RCTV's ratings climbed to over 40%. It is also telling that cable subscriptions have jumped to 60% in urban areas and is rapidly increasing. The concessions for Televen and Venevision have been renewed for five years. And, as everyone now knows, RCTV – Venezuaela's first network – stopped broadcasting this Sunday, May 27.
Many naïve, foreign "Chavistas" seem to believe that the government "only" stopped a concession, and that they did not interfere with a private, independent media company. That is false. This is particularly illustrated by what followed. On Thursday, May 24, a group of "concerned citizens" entered a plea with the Supreme Court. They claimed that shutting down the RCTV signal was unconstitutional, because RCTV was the channel with the greatest coverage in the country. The litigants claimed that if their signal was to disappear, a lot of people were going to be left without TV. The intention of this suit was devious. On Friday (less than 24 hours later – it usually takes a year to get a case before the court) the Supreme Court ruled that, in defense of the citizen's rights, RCTV had to give, without payment of any kind, all their broadcast equipment to the new government channel that was to operate in their old frequency.
So the government has a brand new channel. This is not about a concession. This is about a Government taking control of a private media company. They claim they're doing this to "increase the free speech in the country." Here's the logic: before Sunday, we had two strongly critical networks (RCTV and Globovision, which is local), two uncritical but indifferent networks (Televen and Venevision), and one strong Chavez supporter (VTV). With RCTV out of the picture, the number of strong opposition messages are reduced. According to government spokespeople, these voices are somehow replaced by something they call community messages: "Messages produced by The People, for The People", as they say. Thus, of course, there will be more free speech. (I'm not making this stuff up. These are actual arguments used by government spokespeople.). Of course, when you realize that one of the principal party slogans of the government is "Chavez is The People," this message turns even more sinister.
As of today, there are still people who refuse to give up. They are willing to keep the protest going for as long as it takes to bring RCTV back. Meanwhile, a YouTube channel, created by the news crew of RCTV, continues to post news content, including footage of protests that no other TV channel here is showing. It has had more than 71,000 views in just two days – an enormous number when you consider that Internet penetration here is below 15%. As of this writing, it is number two on YouTube's "Channels" listing for new subscribers. It looks like things will get worse. The President is talking about shutting down Globovision for – and I swear that I'm not making this up – "subliminal association." His evidence: during a talk show with the head of RCTV last Friday, every time that they cut to commercials they showed a little clip of the most important news events that have been covered by their news department: the first landing on the moon, the return of democracy to Venezuela in 1958, and so on. During one of these segments they showed the Pope's assassination attempt, while playing Ruben Blades song that says, "Everything comes to an end" as music background. The regime claims that they were subliminally inciting people to kill President Chavez. Yesterday the General Attorney announced that both the General Director of Globovision, and the anchor of the talk show have been summoned to be "interviewed" regarding this "plot".
Hugo Chavez is a world-class authoritarian. Those of us who are anti-authoritarian and who have seen it up close, tend to know more than those beyond our borders, about what he has done and how he has done it in his almost 8 years of government. It seems that there is a sort of racism underlying some of the sympathies and excuses made by American and European dissidents (who should know better) for the Chavez regime. They imagine that Latin American people are backwards and need an authoritarian government. In fact, most educated Latin Americans are quite accustomed to free speech and basic human rights. We don't really need the paternalism… but thanks anyway. Of course, this regime is no ordinary Autocracy. If it were, probably most of the people in Venezuela (and in the rest of the world) would have wised up and recognized it as one. What we are living now down here can only be described as a Surreal Autocracy.
Frankly, I've kind of enjoyed this government. Its comedic moves have provided daily amusements. If I wasn't aware of the really terrible consequences of continuing down this road, I'd be trying to prop up this regime and find it an agent in the entertainment industry. If people outside the country really knew what is going on here, they could make an astounding reality show and sell it on pay-per-view. We have members of the Congress who claim they have discovered that the DirectTV set-top boxes have bi-directional communication capabilities and that they had cameras and microphones that transmit, by satellite, to the central headquarters of the CIA. (Actually, I guess some American conspiracy freaks wouldn't find this claim the least bit nutty.) Then there was the very serious announcement from Chavez about how the government managed to stop a plot to kill the president. You see, they found this bazooka in an empty lot that lies kind of near the flight path of Venezuela's biggest commercial airport. And – ohmygod! – it's the very same airport that the presidential plane uses. They also found a picture of Chavez. Aha! This was a plan to hit the presidential plane – the picture of the president was for "obvious identification purposes." No one was ever arrested for this clever and devious plot. These sorts of things happen here at least on a weekly basis. Indeed, I've developed a morbid obsession with the entertainment value of this government. But now, I think it's time for a new show.
LA LISTA (THE LIST)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8187459075291793700
http://www.vcrisis.com/index.php?content=videos
http://vcrisis.com/index.php?content=letters/200509152101
Irrefutable Proof of the Existence of Political Prosecution in Venezuela
By Aleksander Boyd / London / 15.09.05
The existence of systematic political prosecution in Venezuela, as established in article 7 of the Rome Statute, has been been argued for some time now. Apologists of Hugo Chavez maintain that it is nonsense, just another cry wolf allegation against the 'democratically elected' leader. Many people have complained about the existence of a list, compiled by chavista assemblyman Luis Tascon with a group of collaborators, that is widely utilised by government officials at all institutional levels to deny passports, contracts, IDs, employments, benefits, etc. The creation of said database was ordered by Hugo Chavez himself, who in a memo dated January 30th 2004 and addressed to former National Electoral Council's director Francisco Carrasquero,
stated: "It is a pleasure to salute you in this opportunity whilst notifying you that I fully authorize Mr. Luis Tascón Gutierréz, ID No 9.239.964, to collect the certified copies of the forms utilized during the 2-A event, which took place between 28/11/03 and 01/12/03, whereby a group of citizens petitioned to activate a Recall Referendum on my mandate, as established in article 72 of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela."
Not only did Hugo Chavez order and knew about the existence of the database, the president concludes the memo by asking that his request be given full legal consideration (la presente se hace a los fines legales consiguientes). Thus Tascon put together, with the assistance and leniency of Venezuela's National Electoral Council's (CNE) director, this Venezuelan version of McCarthyism that could be consulted by the public from March 2004 on the website of Assemblyman Tascon; a revised version was distributed on July 6th of the same year. Hugo Chavez admitted in live television that the list had fulfilled its purposes -he also praised Jorge Verstrynge's book 1 hour and 25 min. into his dominical charade of Sunday 10th of April- expressing that civil servants ought to stop using it against those who signed to petition for a recall referendum on his mandate. What is more, the database was a key element of the official effort mounted by Chavez with tax payer's money to win the recall referendum known as "Misión Florentino". The software programme that comes with the list is called MaiSanta, probably borrowing its name from Comando Maisanta, which was the chavista political campaign prior to the recall referendum. Also with the package there is a rather long power point presentation geared at electoral officials supportive of Chavez.
Researching a bit about this topic I was able to find, download the list via emule (just search for "lista de tascon") and install the software in my PC. It contains details of 12.394.109 citizens, that is to say Venezuela's entire electoral register up until July 6 2004. The images speak for themselves. The questions: what would happen should any of the leaders of the democratic nations of the world be caught ordering the construction of such database? What would happen to the electoral institutions of any European country and its officials should they be caught passing critical information with respect to the political tendencies of the electorate to politicians of a given ruling party?
By pressing "Seleccionar" access to the entire electoral roll of a given voting centre can be gained. At the top of the window ID number, full name, DOB, age, against opposition, opponent, abstention, valid signature, rejected signature, Rivas mision, Vuelvan Caras (another social plan), other missions and address details can be observed. The system has been designed to be capable of showing how many supporters of Hugo Chavez there are per voting centre at a national level. By pressing "Patriotas" a list appears, however in the specific case of polling station number 64350, located in Antonio Diaz municipality of Amacuro state, no voter met whatever criteria was set to determine whether a Venezuelan is patriot or not.
PRIESTS TO PURIFY SITE AFTER BUSH VISIT
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text:
Cal Taurons és una masia de Navars (Bages) inclosa a l'Inventari del Patrimoni Arquitectònic de Catalunya.

Descripció
Edifici civil. Masia orientada al sud-est. Tipus II de la classificació de J. Danés. Construccions annexes. Material de construcció és pedra i fang. Porta adovellada. Arc de mig punt tapat. Estat general ruïnós.

Història
L'edifici fou construït el 1851 per Pco. Masolivas (sobre un finestral consta aquesta dada).

Referències

Patrimoni monumental de Navars
Taurons

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Röbäcks kapell är ett begravningskapell som ligger på Röbäcks kyrkogård i Umeå. Det tillhör Tegs församling i Luleå stift. Kapellet har plats för 100 personer.

Kapellet
Kapellet uppfördes 1975 efter ritningar av arkitekt Carl Hampus Bergman. Ytterväggarna är klädda med vitt tegel och taket är klätt med plåt. Kyrkorummet har vita tegelväggar, golv belagt med kalksten och tak klätt med obehandlad träpanel. Bänkinredningen är fast.

Söder om byggnaden finns en fristående klockstapel.

Källor
 Begravningskapell - Svenska kyrkan - Umeå

Kyrkobyggnader i Luleå stift
Kyrkobyggnader i Umeå
Kyrkobyggnader invigda 1975
Kapell i Sverige
1975 i Sverige


text:
Opinion: See the Best Theatre in London (Members Only)
Pay up, pay up! For the greatest show in London!
Benedict Cumberbatch has sold out. I'm not talking artistically; I'm talking about the fact that, in less than a day, the Barbican's production of Hamlet has been absolutely booked-up. Tickets to see Cumberbatch's last London foray at the National Theatre in Danny Boyle's Frankenstein were also rather difficult to get hold of. But the story of tickets selling quicker than a flash of summer lightning is not a new one. Gillian Anderson is also currently cramming in the punters at the Young Vic, contributing to what has been the fastest selling show in London's theatre history, David Tennant caused a booking frenzy when he visited the capital with his interpretation of Hamlet, and James McAvoy in Macbeth meant you had to possibly commit regicide yourself to get in on the show.
So how does one go about procuring some of London's hottest tickets? The answer: pay up!
Many theatres have membership schemes. These are where you make a yearly "gift" to get a certain amount of extras as a thank you for financially supporting the venue. The most valuable of these benefits is priority booking. This is when these exclusive members get the chance to book seats before the rest of the plebs fight it out.
And it's not just theatre that offer this priority perk either. The British Film Institute (BFI) also has a membership scheme which really comes into its own for the London Film and Flare (formerly London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival) festivals, where being a member is really the only way you'll be a good shot at tickets for almost all their showings. Even mobile carrier O2 offers priority ticket allocations for its customers for events at its music/entertainment venues, meaning free mobile-to-mobile calls between pretty much everyone at Kate Bush's upcoming tour.
A Costly Relationship
So if you really want to be sure to get tickets, committing yourself to a theatre is probably the best way to go. But how much will it cost you?
Well, that really depends on the theatre and how good a "friend" you want to be. The National Theatre has the cheapest basic membership that offers priority booking, at a mere £15 per year. But then, membership fees for higher tiers and other theatres can go for £100 or more. More philanthropic members of the public can even purchase packages for up to £50,000 (Almeida)!
But it's worth it to be able to get those hot "tiks", right?
"La membri teatro è mobile!"
Membership only gives you a better chance of getting seats by offering this priority period. Despite being part of an exclusive crowd that has first dibs, there are still stories of members having to fight for tickets among themselves, with servers and booking lines become so overload that they go down even when it's just the presumably exclusive few who are able to book. Members who have been unable to get tickets during these priority periods, due to the theatre or member priority allocation selling out, then have battle it out with the rest of the public during the general booking period: sometimes ending up with no tickets at all.
Therefore, some theatres, like the Barbican, Donmar Warehouse, and Old Vic, have extra priority booking periods for members who are able to buy into a higher tier of membership, from £65 (Old Vic) upwards to £350 (Donmar Warehouse). So if you really want to get those seats, you're looking at paying an additional up to two, three, or nearly ten times more per year than the actual ticket price itself for that extra level of chance.
James McAvoy and Claire Foy as Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. Photograph: Courtesy of the Ambassador Theatre Group.
I'm A Celebrity, Get Me Off The Stage
Part of the problem is that theatres and productions keep pulling in big acting names and causing massive box-office pandemoniums. It's a marketing ploy and one that works. Create a hype, get someone involved that everyone's going to want to see, and the show is a sell-out success even before the critics can get a sniff at the actual quality of direction, production, or in some cases, the play itself. The reliance on having a renowned star in a show is becoming a bit of a bore and a cynical exercise. A production doesn't need a celebrity to be brilliant. Shakespeare in Love currently on in the West End is getting rave reviews despite no big-name brands appearing in it. Famously, when Tennant was unable to make several performances for Hamlet, his understudy, Edward Bennett, did a fantastic job receiving standing ovations, and was arguably a bigger smash than the Dr. Who actor himself.
But to suggest that the resolution to this problem is to keep the stars off the stage is an unfair one. Many of them can offer just as nuanced and interesting an interpretation of a character as any other professional actor, and should be free to do so. To disallow them to play these roles would be a loss to theatre, especially as many of today's TV and film stars steeled their craft on the stage to begin with, and in many cases have really added something to a show that is unique and incredible. Whilst they should be allowed to appear on London's stages, their presence really isn't helping the situation.
A Costly Compromise
Memberships to artistic ventures and venues are nothing new, and have been around for decades as a way of supporting theatres and the work they do. These days, with sweeping funding cuts to the arts, theatres are having to rely more on the kindness of strangers (well, "Friends") to enable them to continue putting our some rather marvellous shows. Theatres like the Old Vic have even taken to auctioning props on eBay to make up the funds they need. It might seem greedy on the surface, especially given the number of critical and sell-out hits they've had, but there are huge costs involved in putting on shows. For all the success and money the public see being poured into the theatre from ticket sales, there's a lot more going out of it then you'd realise.
But what this creates is a very sad and uneasy compromise. The most anticipated and sought after theatre is becoming a thing that only those who can afford membership, particular the higher tears, can get a decent change of accessing. With London theatre officially having a bigger audience than the Premier League, you begin to realise the potential amount of theatre goers who will end up being priced out of seeing some great shows, especially if they don't have they the tenacity and sheer luck needed during the general booking period.
Whilst the fringe still, and always will, offer some brilliant shows for much more reasonable prices, actors like Cumberbatch, Anderson, Tennant, and McAvoy shouldn't be kept merely at the pleasure of those who can cough up the cash. They should be able to be seen by everyone.
Smiley happy members having fun. Photograph: Courtesy of Ambassador Theatre Group.
It's difficult situation to come up with a solution to. Limit the number of membership priority seats and/or stymie the priority booking period and you get a lot of disgruntled people who have paid-up for nought, causing theatres to lose that level of commitment and funding. Without the reliance on those who can act as such mini-philanthropists, we would probably lose some of our best theatres and wouldn't be able to even have imagined productions such as Frankenstein, A Streetcar Named Desire, Hamlet, or Macbeth. Celebrity stars are unfortunately a key ingredient to ensure a production actually makes money rather than run at a loss and/or close prematurely (usually), so getting rid of those won't solve things either. But without trying to give the general public more and fairer opportunities to get to see these shows, theatre may well become the playground for the relatively wealthy, enjoying an elitism that has stereotypically been seen as the reserve of opera.
But that's not to say theatres are at all giving up on the general more cash-strapped public. Many still offer discount and low-cost tickets for shows. But these seem to be getting fewer, not because their allocation is shrinking but because their demand is growing. You just need to get up early enough to see the lengthy queues forming as early as 7am for returns and day tickets for some productions. Even broadcasting theatre to cinemas, another well-meaning and noble way of opening up the accessibility and increasing an audience outside of auditoriums, feels like a cheap consolation prize. In reality, you're pretty much seeing a film and not a theatre show: it's just not the same. It's great that theatres are still looking to cater to those on lower budgets, but the truth is that, for want of trying, the provisions are becoming rather inadequate.
It's a tricky conundrum, but one that should probably be seriously considered in order to keep theatre for everyone, even if there isn't an immediate answer. This is made more pertinent when theatre groups, such as the Ambassador Theatre Group (ATG), have come under intense scrutiny about how they make their money recently.
But ultimately, there are a lot of people who would have liked to have seen Cumberbatch play the Prince of Denmark but lost out because they couldn't pay for priority booking: not just because of a lack of availability. Theatre shouldn't be proud of this.
Leave a comment	| tags: Barbican, Benedict Cumberbatch, Benedict Cumberbatch Barbican, Benedict Cumberbatch Hamlet, friends, Halmet, Hamlet Barbican, Hamlet London, members only, National Theatre, Opinion, The Barbican, theatre membership, William Shakespeare	| posted in Anthology of Opinionated Witterings


Victoria is having its moment. Thanks to a landmark new property development, this leafy neighborhood of palaces, parks, and theaters is rapidly becoming the coolest, most cutting-edge destination in London.
The $2.8 billion Nova complex, which was completed this year after four years in development, is bringing new life to Victoria. Comprising five striking buildings, this "urban village" offers 85,000 square feet of inventive and inspirational restaurants, bars and shops.
The Rubens at the Palace, one of the most luxurious and distinguished hotels in London, sits right opposite Nova, in the heart of Victoria. With the splashy new landmark on one side and Buckingham Palace on the other, the hotel literally bridges the gap between old and new London.
Like Victoria, The Rubens has also just completed an upgrade: a multi-million dollar renovation has resulted in the full or partial refurbishment of all bedrooms and public areas, and has added additional luster to a historic hotel that was already sumptuously appointed and magnificently designed.
Each of the 163 rooms at The Rubens is dressed in regal colors, plush fabrics and personal thoughtful touches. Though the timelessly elegant design harkens back to the Edwardian era, modern innovations such as Wi-Fi and interactive TV are seamlessly blended throughout. Some of the rooms overlook the Royal Mews at Buckingham Palace, where guests can catch a glimpse of the royal carriages. In fact, in the early 1900s, the hotel's location adjacent to the palace made it a popular spot for visiting nobility and international VIPs.
In addition to its incomparable accommodation, The Rubens boasts several cutting-edge eateries. Try British classics at the new brasserie-style English Grill, which opens September 1st; sip innovative new cocktails and hear live music at the Cavalry Bar; or feast on South African-inspired fare at the adjacent bbar & Restaurant. The new Curry Room restaurant will soon be opening as well, serving the finest Indian cuisine from around the world in relaxed and convivial surroundings. And no visit to London would be complete without a traditional British tea, which can be taken at the hotel's Palace Lounge while watching the carriages come and go from the Royal Mews.
The Rubens' commitment to sustainability is evident in the Living Wall, which covers 350 meters of the hotel's exterior. Its carpet of 10,000 herbaceous plants improve both the air quality and aesthetic of the neighborhood and provides an urban home for countless bees, butterflies and birds.
During your next visit to London, stay at The Rubens at the Palace, a classic hotel at the epicenter of a neighborhood undergoing a stunning transformation.
For more information and reservations at The Rubens at the Palace, call +44 20 7834 6600, visit www.rubenshotel.com, or email bookrb@rchmail.com.


text:
module Finitio
  module Syntax
    module MetadataAttr
      include Node

      capture_str :attribute_name
      capture :literal

      def value
        [ attribute_name.to_sym, literal.value ]
      end

    end # module MetadataAttr
  end # module Syntax
end # module Metadata

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Rarely does a professor have a "blink" moment in class, a sudden revelation that seems completely obvious once it enters your consciousness. This happened to me last year in the museum's galleries while teaching a seminar on appropriation for Case Western Reserve University's art history majors. We were looking at the Flemish master Peter Paul Rubens's immense painting Diana and Her Nymphs Departing for the Hunt, which hangs prominently on the far wall of gallery 212, and discussing its relationship to another nearly identical version in the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles.
For a long time I had been perplexed by its main figure, Diana (Artemis in Greek), the goddess of the hunt, who is identifiable by the crescent moon on her forehead. She stares boldly out at the viewer, and is considerably larger than the nymphs that accompany her. Rubens's version of this classical goddess is not the svelte, athletic, fetching girl that we are accustomed to seeing, but rather a fleshy (one might say Rubenesque), muscular, imposing woman. She holds a distinctive pose with her right leg thrust forward and her left arm akimbo behind her back. Her dangling right arm seems especially prominent, and I knew I recognized it from some other work of art. As I stared at the painting—while my students waited patiently—it suddenly dawned on me that Rubens had chosen a very unlikely model for his monumental Diana.
Rubens's Diana is none other than a transposed, and transgendered, copy of one of the most famous marble statues from classical antiquity, the Farnese Hercules. Now housed in the Naples Archaeological Museum, this colossal (over 10 feet tall) statue of the Greek hero resting after his labors was found in the Baths of Caracalla in Rome in 1547. Until 1787 it was on display in the Palazzo Farnese, hence its nickname. The statue was a favorite of Mannerist and Baroque-era artists visiting Rome, and drawings and prints depicting it are numerous; one of the best known is the Dutch artist Hendrick Goltzius's engraving of 1589, The Great Hercules. That Rubens studied this classical work, along with many others, during his 1601–8 sojourn in Rome is proved by his drawings. His enlivened version of the statue is beautifully rendered in a red chalk sketch in the British Museum's collection. There was also a life-size plaster cast of the statue in Antwerp in the 17th century, and Rubens himself owned a small-scale replica.
Besides the relaxed pose, the addition of the tiger skin to Diana's garb recalls the ancient statue. Its head over her left shoulder, in particular, is reminiscent of Hercules's lion. Rubens has also added hunting dogs and a backdrop of two couples. On the right are a pair of smiling nymphs, one of whom bears the features of the painter's wife, Isabella Brant (as seen in the museum's portrait of Brant hanging to the right of the painting in the gallery). A third nymph at the left is not so happy as she struggles to escape the amorous embrace of a randy Pan. One could speculate that in the contrast Rubens is deliberately recalling a famous myth of the youthful Hercules. While tending cattle on a mountain Hercules was visited by two allegorical figures, Vice and Virtue, who offered him respectively a luxurious or a difficult life. To his everlasting glory he chose the latter. The story was depicted in Italian Baroque painter Annibale Carracci's well-known masterpiece executed for the ceiling of the Farnese Palace in 1596. Rubens surely knew this work as well as the story, and alluded to it in the background of our painting. By choosing the hero's statue as the prototype for Diana, he may have been reminded of this heroic tale.
The painting is dated circa 1615. A few years later Rubens composed another image of Diana with her nymphs, now in the Prado in Madrid. Known as the Diana Cazadora, she bears little resemblance to the Farnese Hercules, except for the left arm. Clearly Rubens rejected this earlier robust model and opted for a more appealing and lithesome goddess of the hunt.
Artists' fascination with ancient statues like the Farnese Hercules has not abated. In 2013 Jeff Koons made a life-size white plaster version of the famous statue to which he added a blue glass spherical garden ornament. Entitled Gazing Ball (Farnese Hercules), Koons's appropriation is not nearly as subtle as that of Rubens, which went unnoticed until my blink moment.
Haskell, Francis, and Nicholas Penny. Taste and the Antique: The Lure of Classical Sculpture 1500–1900. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981.
Jaffé, Michael. Rubens and Italy. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1977.


The apartment is located in an excellent area to live all year round, for holiday or even for rent. The surroundings are superb, 200 m from the beach, 9 km from the beaches of Guardamar del Segura, 7 km from the Natural Park of La Mata and Torrevieja, 11,5 km from the most popular and important golf courses on the Costa Blanca South, 4.5 km from the Torrevieja Hospital. Close to restaurants, shops and leisure zones. All necessary amenities are close at hand, medical centers, shopping centers bus station/bus stops and supermarkets.