Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):633-634, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):635-636, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):636-638, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):638-639, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):640-641, October 2007.
Are Clinical Symptoms More Predictive Than Laboratory Parameters for Adverse Maternal Outcome in HELLP Syndrome?
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):641-643, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):643-644, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):645-646, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):647-648, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):648-649, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):650-651, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):651-653, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):653-654, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):654-656, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):656-658, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):658-659, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):660-661, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):662-663, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):664-665, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):666-667, October 2007.
Olsen, Tandy G.; Barnes, Amy A.; King, Jeremy A.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):669-674, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):675-679, October 2007.
Rashid, Mumtaz; Rashid, Mohammed H.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):680-688, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):691, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):692, October 2007.
Obstetrical & Gynecological Survey. 62(10):690, October 2007.


In the industrial and protective coatings industry, metal surfaces are blasted not only to remove corrosion or old coatings, but to generate a surface profile prior to re-painting.
In some industries a surface profile is achieved through chemical etching or mechanical abrasion. But, regardless of the method, the surface profile increases the surface area of the metal - and it is this increased surface area which provides a key for the coating to adhere or stick to.
If the surface profile is not within specification, and is either too large or too small, this can lead to costly premature coating failures and corrosion. So that's why it is important to measure surface profile.


text:
Everything About Disney and ABC's 'Pink Slime' Settlement Should Scare the Hell Out of You
David Uberti
Filed to:Pink Slime
Illustration by Sam Woolley
News of perhaps the largest defamation settlement in U.S. history came and went with a whimper last week. In two footnotes in its third-quarter earnings report, The Walt Disney Company whispered that it spent a cool $177 million—not including additional cash from insurers—"in connection with the settlement of litigation." A lawyer for Beef Products Inc., a food processing company that sued Disney-owned ABC News after damning coverage of so-called "pink slime" in 2012, later confirmed it was the recipient of the massive payout.
What's striking isn't just the size of the sum, or that ABC agreed to it before its lawyers started making their case at trial. It's that the network continues to stand by its reporting (no retraction, no corrections, nada), which remains on its site. In a world where the free press is under attack from politicians, the public, and billionaire Silicon Valley vampires, one of the few companies with the resources to mount a legal defense of journalism instead chose to pay its assailants to shut up and go away.
"The settlement suggests that news organizations will cave under the pressure of litigation, even in cases in which they have good defenses," Jonathan Peters, a media law professor at the University of Georgia and press freedom correspondent for the Columbia Journalism Review, told Splinter. "And no matter how many times ABC says that it stands by its reporting, the settlement itself undermines that message. ABC had a good chance of winning the case on the merits—at least on appeal, if not before the [South Dakota] jury."
Peters pointed to recent lawsuits filed by Fox News host Eric Bolling against Huffington Post freelancer Yashar Ali, and coal magnate Robert Murray against HBO's John Oliver. The rich are leveraging legal means to silence journalism, Peters added, and ABC's settlement "sends the message that filing flimsy claims against the press is a worthwhile enterprise."
Indeed, the $177 million figure would be the largest payout for a libel claim against a media company that the Media Law Resource Center has recorded, according to Michael A. Norwick, a staff attorney at the New York nonprofit. "It's chilling to think there would be liability in this amount," he added.
When the settlement was first announced in late June, ABC explained in a statement that "continued litigation of this case is not in the company's interest." But, it added, "we remain committed to the vigorous pursuit of truth and the consumer's right to know about the products they purchase." Representatives for ABC and Disney did not respond to requests for comment for this piece.
So let's examine ABC's "vigorous pursuit of truth"—and how the company's financial calculations appear to have ultimately prevailed over it. The saga showcases how the food and agriculture industries have erected a legal framework to bend the First Amendment to their will and shield themselves from accountability. Journalism is at threat in that environment, and the story of ABC's massive settlement holds the potential to embolden others who want to prevent you from learning what's in your food.
South Dakota-based BPI first came under national media scrutiny in 2009, when a Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times exposé questioned the safety of the processed meat it sold to many of the nation's grocery stores, fast food chains, and school lunch programs. Department of Agriculture emails cited in the reports surfaced the nickname "pink slime" for the ammonia-treated beef product, which BPI markets as "lean finely textured beef." It quickly became a target for food activists, and McDonald's, Taco Bell, and Burger King stopped buying it.
Enter ABC News. The network launched a multi-part investigation into BPI in March 2012. The first installment, embedded below, was a standard investigative package for a broadcast news show, attributing criticisms of BPI's processing method to expert sources and raising questions over how "lean finely textured beef" got USDA approval.
Open abcnews.go.com
A follow-up that included the beef industry's response came two nights later, with a BPI lawyer defending the product as "USDA approved beef," safe, and nutritious. ABC itself didn't explicitly say "pink slime" was unsafe to eat, but it quoted retailers who wouldn't carry it and questioned why the USDA didn't require additional labeling for the ammonia-treated product. Again, it was standard fare for TV news:
Further installments followed over the next month, with ABC hammering home the "pink slime" moniker in something of a consumer advocate crusade against this "cheap filler" made from "low-grade beef trimmings." The not particularly surprising upshot: This type of processed meat was gross. The public backlash to the product that began before ABC's reporting continued, and BPI closed multiple plants and let go of hundreds of workers amid plummeting sales.
Put aside, for a moment, the sensationalism with which ABC sold this particular story and that TV news employs in general. It was a fairly good example of how journalism is supposed to work: A news organization accurately surfaced information about a subject; the public responded; and the subject of that reporting faced consequences.
Yet BPI quickly brought a defamation suit against ABC and its sources for what it described as "a month-long vicious, concerted disinformation campaign" that suggested its product was neither beef nor fit for human consumption. BPI alleged "fake news" before fake news was a thing, seeking damages up to $1.9 billion.
Image via screengrab
ABC News brass responded at the time that the suit was without merit and the company would contest it "vigorously." Legal experts gave BPI's case little chance of success, as plaintiffs in defamation suits must prove that a publisher knowingly put out false information with the intent to harm—what's called "actual malice"—or recklessly disregarded the truth.
But South Dakota is one of 13 states with food disparagement or "veggie libel" laws, which generally lower the bar food or agriculture companies must meet to prove defamation by their critics. Industry lobbying groups pushed the statutes in the 1990s, after Washington apple farmers unsuccessfully sued CBS News for reporting that they used a carcinogenic chemical on their crops, igniting a national health scare. The most famous test of such laws came in 1998, when Texas cattle companies sued Oprah Winfrey after she ran a segment on beef safety. The ranchers eventually lost at trial.
"It's kind of a local industry protection statute," Lucy Dalglish, dean of the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland, told Splinter. "It makes it extremely risky for the media and anyone else to go in and cover that industry."
In South Dakota, the law defines disparagement as "dissemination in any manner to the public of any information that the disseminator knows to be false and that states or implies that an agricultural food product is not safe for consumption by the public." It also allows triple the damages awarded to plaintiffs.
There are small pivot points on which the outcome of any legal proceeding can hinge, and this case was no exception. BPI lawyers in 2013 prevailed in getting the case kicked from a federal to state court, and then, in March 2017, a judge in South Dakota's Union County Circuit Court denied ABC's motion to dismiss the suit. Trying the case in state court forced the network's lawyers to prove that repeatedly referring to a processed meat product as "pink slime" didn't imply that it was unsafe. And they'd have to do so before a jury selected from BPI's home turf of South Dakota, where Federal Election Commission records indicate more than 61 percent of voters last year supported a presidential candidate who made "fake news" central to his campaign rhetoric. After just three and a half weeks at trial in June, ABC decided to settle before its lawyers presented their case.
"Through this process, we have again established what we all know to be true about Lean Finely Textured Beef," BPI owners Eldon and Regina Roth said in a statement following the settlement. "It is beef, and is safe, wholesome, and nutritious."
There are numerous reasons why ABC or Disney, which posted a $2.37 billion profit in the third fiscal quarter alone, would prefer this outcome. But from the vantage point of a bloodless multinational entertainment company, it's not hard to see how $177 million—and likely much more paid by insurers—is a more appealing financial hit than the $5.7 billion in damages possible under South Dakota law. Such a liability would certainly hang a cloud over the oft-repeated speculation that Disney might one day spin off ABC and its costly news division.
"All libel settlements are some kind of a calculation," said Dalglish, who was formerly the executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. That calculation, she added, likely took into account the anti-press vitriol that's not only more intense in red states, but also aimed primarily at New York-based national media, like ABC.
The decision not to try to win the case on its merits—and then appeal the outcome if necessary—may have a thin, if hypothetical, silver lining. "Let's say a jury awards millions to BPI," Bill Marler, a food safety lawyer who represented two former USDA scientists who were named in and then removed from BPI's lawsuit, told Splinter. "If that's what happens, and it went up to appeal and it got affirmed, then you've got this case law out there that you only have to prove a lesser standard. Then, everybody is going to be shooting at you."
Still, added Marler, who's also publisher of the site Food Safety News, "any time there's litigation and a perception that there's a win, you do run the risk of some copy-cat folks."
Which is why the whole situation stinks like rancid, finely textured beef, particularly in the age of Peter Thiel. Public resentment for media institutions is seeping into the U.S. legal system.
"In talking with industry colleagues across the country, it feels like the media doesn't always get the benefit of the doubt that it used to get from judges," David Vigilante, CNN's senior vice president of legal, told Splinter. "The way the media, as a whole, is seen, has changed dramatically over the past 20 years."
And such legal threats toward journalists are particularly glaring in states, such as South Dakota, with "veggie libel" laws. Local newspapers and TV stations with much smaller legal war chests are likely taking note of ABC's settlement.
"I don't know if we can quantify the chilling effect, but any rational individual or news outlet would have to think twice before speaking out in a state with one of these laws on its books," Bettina Elias Siegel, a writer and activist who helped spearhead the short-lived push to remove "pink slime" from school lunches, told Splinter. "A major corporation like ABC can bear the costs of this kind of legal action but smaller outlets certainly can't, nor can individual citizen journalists and bloggers."
After the initial announcement of the settlement in late June, ABC News correspondent Jim Avila, who led the "pink slime" investigation and was named in BPI's suit, reportedly said outside the courthouse that "it's important to note that we are not retracting anything and we are not apologizing for anything."
It was only business, he added. And for a well-heeled company that produces journalism, the cost of doing it is paying hundreds of millions of dollars for calling an icky meat product icky. While ABC is trying to have it both ways, the rest of us cannot.
I write about media for Splinter. I have redeeming qualities, too.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Child lead poisoning bill gets boost
NJ's depleted fund for preventing kids' lead poisoning would get $10 million under bill
Child lead poisoning bill gets boost NJ's depleted fund for preventing kids' lead poisoning would get $10 million under bill Check out this story on app.com: http://on.app.com/1BZ6V0A
Todd B. Bates, @ToddBBatesAPP Published 1:26 p.m. ET March 9, 2015 | Updated 6:09 p.m. ET March 9, 2015
Alex Lopez Garcia of Long Branch, seen here with his mom, Rubi Garcia Santiago, has lead poisoning.(Photo: Bob Bielk/Staff photographer)Buy Photo
TRENTON – New Jersey's depleted fund for preventing child lead poisoning would get a $10 million infusion under a bill approved by a state Senate panel Monday.
The Senate Community and Urban Affairs Committee voted 4-0-1, with one abstention, to pass the measure (S-1279). It now heads to the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee for consideration.
Monday's vote follows an Asbury Park Press investigation on lead poisoning that found the state diverted more than $50 million — earmarked for the Lead Hazard Control Assistance Fund — to pay its bills since 2004. That's despite the fact that doctors and health care providers find high lead levels in thousands of mostly poor, minority kids in primarily older urban areas each year.
The money is supposed to finance a loan and grant program to remove lead paint from homes and rental units, relocate lead-poisoned children and other public health efforts.
"Going to sleep at night, knowing that there's a definite, definitive medical reason that children are getting sick and that we are not dealing with it effectively enough and aggressively enough is unacceptable," said Sen. Jeff Van Drew, D-Cape May, committee chairman and bill co-sponsor.
Sen. Jennifer Beck, R-Monmouth, who abstained from voting on the lead fund bill, said "I'm very conflicted about this issue. Obviously, sick children is … something that is not possible to live with if we know we can prevent it."
"We've seen declining numbers of lead poisoning cases over the last two decades, despite the fluctuations in funding that comes from this particular program," she said. She wondered if there's a solid link between the effectiveness of the state's programs and the declining numbers or if the declines happened despite the funding.
"I'm going to abstain today and seek additional information," she said.
Related: Kids' lead poisoning called 'institutional racism'
Monday's vote is only the latest installment in the long-running Lead Hazard Control Assistance Fund saga. In 2012, the state Senate voted (24-9) to approve a previous bill (S-2128) that would have placed $10 million in the fund. But the bill did not make it out of the Assembly Environment and Solid Waste Committee.
5,000 children a year
Lead poisoning, which is entirely preventable, damages the brain and can lead to learning, behavioral and health problems. It can be caused by lead paint dust and chips, lead-tainted soil, toys and toy jewelry, folk remedies, cosmetics and imported Mexican candies. New Jersey officials call lead poisoning the state's leading environmental health threat to children, which afflicts more than 5,000 additional children each year.
The 2004 law that created the lead fund tapped tax revenue from the sale of every container of paint or other type of surface coating. Through June 30, 2015, the lead fund was supposed to get at least $7 million and up to $14 million a year — or a total of $77 million to $154 million — in sales tax revenue. To date, the fund received only $23.3 million of that revenue, and none since 2011, according to the state Legislature's Office of Legislative Services. State budgets can trump laws requiring funding for wide-ranging programs, and Gov. Chris Christie's budgets have provided no sales tax money to the lead fund since 2011.
Last month, the Mercer County Board of Chosen Freeholders approved a resolution urging the state to pass S-1279. The resolution also calls for the state to fully restore the lead fund by putting at least $7 million a year into it.
Van Drew, Sen. Ronald L. Rice, D-Essex, the bill's sponsor, Sen. Christopher J. Connors, R-Ocean, and Sen. Brian P. Stack, D-Hudson, voted to approve the bill. The measure was amended to provide $10 million in the fiscal year that ends on June 30.
"This is for children," Rice said.
When the lead fund was created, officials recognized that about $80 million was needed to clean up all the lead-contaminated houses in every community, he said.
"We're not increasing taxes," he noted. "In fact, the money (has) always been in place for this."
Van Drew said diverting money from the lead fund is "extraordinarily bad policy, not only fiscally, but it's extraordinarily bad health policy because children are getting sick."
Beck said "I guess I'm very conflicted because as a member of the Senate budget committee, despite the fact that statutorily this money was set aside, this does create a hole in our budget."
Todd B. Bates; 732-643-4237; tbates@app.com
HISTORY OF LEAD
•6500 BC: Lead is discovered in Turkey.
•3000 BC: First significant production of lead.
•400 BC: Hippocrates diagnosed lead poisoning in metal workers.
•100 BC: Greek physicians give clinical description of lead poisoning.
•1854: Tetraethyl lead (TEL) is discovered by a German chemist. A deadly compound, it was known to cause difficulty in breathing, spasms, asphyxiation and death.
•1923: Leaded gasoline goes on sale in selected markets.
•1923 First TEL poisoning deaths occur at the DuPont Co. plant in Deepwater, New Jersey.
•1924: Standard Oil suspends sale of leaded gasoline in New Jersey.
•1925: Yale professor warns of the danger of breathing lead dust from auto emissions.
•1926: TEL is back and leaded gasoline continues on the market.
•1936: 90 percent of gasoline sold in the U.S. contains TEL.
•1943: Reports conclude eating lead paint chips causes physical and neurological disorders, and behavior, learning and intelligence problems in children.
•1970: Federal Clean Air Act is passed.
•1971: Lead-Based Paint Poisoning Prevention Act is passed.
•1971: Lead-based paint is banned in New Jersey for residential use.
•1972: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency gives notice of proposed phase out of lead in gasoline.
•1978: Consumer uses of lead-based paint banned nationwide.
•1980: National Academy of Sciences calls leaded gasoline the greatest source of atmospheric pollution.
•1986: Primary phase out of lead in the U.S. is completed.
Source: Strategic Plan of the New Jersey Interagency Task Force on the Prevention of Lead Poisoning; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Read or Share this story: http://on.app.com/1BZ6V0A


text:
Generic! x Local — Game Day Promo
- GENERIC! BRANDED MINI-FRIDGE
- $100 LITTLE BROWN JUG GIFT CARD
- $100 LOCAL GIFT CARD
GAME DAY PRIZE
- 2x FREE PINTS at Little Brown Jug Taproom
- 2x LITTLE BROWN JUG TULIP GLASSES
To Enter: Fill out the contact form below
1 entry per person per Game Day Prize
1 entry per person per Grand Prize
(entry into any Game Day Prize enters the person into the Grand Prize)
*Filling out form acts as agreement to receive communications about prize winnings for this contest, and for product information, brand communications, offers, and promotional material from Little Brown Jug Brewing Company in the future.
You may unsubscribe from communications at any time.
Generic! x Local Game Day Promo
Birthday (18+ Only) *
Proof of Valid government ID required to claim prize.
Contest terms and conditions.
Little Brown Jug Brewing Company – Generic! x Local — Game Day Promo (" Contest ") is sponsored and administrated by Little Brown Jug Brewing Company located at 336 William Avenue, Winnipeg, MB R3A 0H7 (the "Sponsor") and Local Public Eatery located at 274 Garry St, Winnipeg, MB R3C 1H3. All inquiries should be directed to the Sponsor.
2. Contest Period
The Grand Prize Contest begins 12:00 a.m. CT on January 26, 2023 and ends at 11:59 p.m. CT on June 30, 2023 (the "Contest Period").
The Game Day Prize Contest will occur a minimum of 18 times on the following dates: Thu, Jan 26, Sat, Jan 28, Mon, Jan 30, Sat, Feb 11, Tue, Feb 14, Fri, Feb 24, Sun, Feb 26, Tue, Feb 28, Sat, Mar 4, Mon, Mar 6, Wed, Mar 8, Thu, Mar 16, Tue, Mar 21, Fri, Mar 31, Sun, Apr 2, Wed, Apr 5, Sat, Apr 8, Mon, Apr 10 of 2023. Each contest will start 12:00 a.m. CT and end 12:00 a.m. CT 48 hours later (the "Game Day Promo Contest Period").
3. Draw Date
The date of the 'Grand Prize' contest draw will be in July, 2023 (the "Draw Date"). For greater clarity, the draw date for this contest period will between July 1-31, 2023.
The dates of the 'Game Day Prize' contest draw will occur 48 hours following each of the 'Game Day Promo' at Local Public Eatery (the "Draw Dates"). To be clear Jan 28, Jan 30, Feb 1,Feb 13, Feb 16, Feb 26, Feb 28, Mar 2, Mar 6, Mar 8, Mar 10, Mar 18, Mar 23, Apr 2, Apr 4, Apr 7, Apr 10, Apr 12 of the year 2023.
4. Eligibility to Enter
To enter the Contest and be eligible to win, an individual must: (i) be 18 of years or older, (ii) be a legal resident of Manitoba, and (iii) complete the entry set out in section 5 – How to Enter (an " Entrant " or " Entrants ").
Specifically excluded from entering the Contest are: (a) employees, officers, directors, agents, representatives, and advertising and promotional agencies of the Sponsors, and its respective subsidiaries and affiliates, as applicable; and (b) any immediate family members (regardless of where they live) of a person excluded under (a) or persons with whom a person excluded under (a) is domiciled (whether related to that person or not). In these Contest Rules, "immediate family" includes mother, father, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, partners or spouse.
5. How to Enter
No purchase necessary. To enter, an Entrant must: (i) Complete the entry form from the Sponsor; (ii) check the box confirming he/she accepts the terms and conditions; and (iii) submit the completed form by clicking the "Enter" button (one " Entry ").
6. Entry Limit
Limit one (1) Entry per person for each Game Day prize, during the Game Day Promo Contest Period, and one (1) Entry per person for the Grand Prize. An Entry into each 'Game Day Contest' automatically includes person into the 'Grand Prize'.
7. Random Draw and Winner Selection
At the end of each Contest Period, one (1) Entrant will be selected by the Sponsor from a random drawing from all eligible Entries received during the Contest Period (" Selected Entrant (s) "). Sponsor will contact the Selected Entrant by the e-mail and/or phone number provided in their Entry before 10:00 a.m. CT on the 31st of the applicable draw date month for the 'Grand Prize' and 48 hours following each of the 'Game Day Prize' promotions.
Selected Entrant will have two (2) days to: (i) correctly answer a mathematical skill-testing question and (ii) sign and return to Sponsors a Declaration and Release that contains, but not limited to (a) an acceptance of prize (b) a release of Sponsors from liability and (c) an acknowledgment of compliance with the Contest Rules. Upon satisfying such eligibility requirements during the prescribed time periods, the Selected Entrants will be awarded the Prizes.
In the event a Selected Entrant is found to be ineligible, or if he/she cannot or does not comply with these Contest Rules, the Selected Entrant may be disqualified and an alternate winner may be selected. To the extent applicable, if the Selected Entrant fails to respond within the prescribed time, such will result in disqualification. Sponsor is not responsible for communication problems of any kind. Sponsor is under no obligation to select an alternate winner.
8. Prizes
There is one (1) grand prize available to be won, consisting of one (1) prize of a Little Brown Jug - Generic! fridge (1) $100 Little Brown Jug gift card, and (1) $100 Local Public Eatery gift card. Total retail value of the Prize is CAD $600.00 (the "Prize(s)").
There are a minimum of eighteen (18) confirmed 'Game Day Prizes' awarded within 48 hours of promotional material being displayed at Local Public Eatery 'Game Day Contest(s)'. If Parties involved 'run' the promotion for longer, more prizes may be awarded at the discretion of the Sponsor.
Game Day Prize consisting of two (2) coupons for a 'Free Pint' at Little Brown Jug Taproom and two (2) Little Brown Jug branded tulip glasses.
9. Prize Substitution and Conditions
Prize must be accepted as awarded without substitution and is non-transferable. The Prize has no cash-surrender value. The Sponsors reserves the right, in its sole discretion, in the event that the Prize or any component of any Prize cannot be awarded as described for any reason, to substitute and/or modify the Prize or component of Prize with (a) prize(s) of equal or greater value, without liability. Winners are solely responsible for all other expenses related to the Prizes, including travel to and from the Prize (pick up at Little Brown Jug Taproom at 336 William Avenue, Winnipeg MB), accommodations, and so forth, as applicable.
10. Odds of Winning
The odds of winning the Prize will depend upon and will vary according to the total number of eligible entries received during the Contest Period.
11. Entry Verification
All Entries are subject to verification. Sponsors may require Entrant provide proof of identity and legal age.
Proof of submission does not constitute proof of receipt. All Entries that are incomplete, illegible, damaged, irregular, have been submitted through illicit means, or do not conform to or satisfy any condition of the Contest Rules may be disqualified by the Sponsors. Sponsors takes no responsibility for lost, stolen, delayed, damaged, misdirected, late or destroyed Entries, typographical or other production errors, or any errors or omissions in printing or advertising related to this Contest.
If the identity of an Entrant is disputed, the authorized account holder associated with the e-mail address or cell phone number (as decided by Sponsors) of the Entry, during the Contest Period, will be deemed to be the Entrant. An Entrant may be required to provide proof that he/she is the authorized account holder associated with the Entry.
Any attempt by any Entrant, to obtain more than the stated maximum number of Entries by using multiple/different names, email addresses, accounts, identities, registrations and logins, or any other methods, or has entered or participated in any fashion not sanctioned by these Contest Rules will void that individual's Entry and eligibility to win the Prize and that individual will be disqualified from the Contest and, at the sole discretion of the Sponsors, any of the Sponsors' other promotions.
12. Contest Release
By entering the Contest, Entrants agree to forever release, discharge and hold harmless Little Brown Jug Brewing Company, and their respective officers, directors, employees, partners, representatives, successors, assigns and agents (the " Releasees "), from any and all damages, injuries, death, loss, or liability to person or property, due in whole or in part, whether directly or indirectly, without limiting, by (a) entering and participating in the Contest, including any part related to the Contest and (b) the acceptance, possession, participation, use or misuse of the Prize, including travel to and from any Contest-related activity. By participating, Entrants agree to be bound by these Contest Rules, including all eligibility requirements, and to the decisions of the Sponsors, whose decisions are final and binding in all respects. Failure to comply with these Contest Rules may result in disqualification from the Contest.
13. Prize Release
If an Entrant wins and accepts the Prize, such acceptance shall mean full satisfaction of the entitlement as an Entrant and as a winner in the Contest and the Entrant fully discharges and forever releases the Releasees, of and from any and all claims, demands, losses, damages, actions or causes of action whatsoever, whether known or unknown, whether at law or in equity which they or their heirs, executors, administrators, successors or assigns may now or hereafter have against any of the Releasees in connection with the Prizes.
The Entrant also acknowledges, without limiting the generality of the foregoing, that the Releasees will not be responsible for any injury, accident, death or dismemberment, or any other loss, damage or expense in connection with the participation in the Prize. The Entrant also acknowledges that none of the Releasees has offered any warranty or guarantee respecting the Prizes. Further, the Entrant assumes all responsibility and liability for any loss, injury or damage to any persons or property, which results from the Entrants actions or omissions, whether negligent or otherwise, in connection with the Prizes.
The Sponsors accepts no responsibility for loss, damage or claims caused by or resulting from the Contest or acceptance of the Prize. The Sponsors will not be responsible for late, lost, illegible, incomplete, falsified or destroyed Entries and all such Entries are void. Entries that have been falsified, tampered with or altered are void. The Sponsors does not assume any responsibility for incorrect or inaccurate capture of entry information, technical malfunctions, human or technical error, printing errors, lost, delayed or garbled data or transmissions, omission, interruption, deletion, defect or failures of any telephone or computer lines or networks, computer equipment, software or any combination thereof.
The Sponsors will not be responsible for mail, telephone, technical, network, online, electronic, computer hardware or software interruptions or failures of any kind, misdirected, stolen, incomplete, incomprehensible or delayed Internet/e-mail computer transmissions on account of technical problems or traffic congestion on the Internet or at any website, or any combination thereof, including any injury or damage to a participant's or any other person's computer relating to or resulting from visiting, participating or downloading any materials related to this Contest.
The Sponsors extends absolutely no representations or warranties in respect of any Prizes and accepts no liability arising in respect of such Prizes or in the use thereof.
15. Right to Modify or Terminate Contest
The Sponsors reserve the right to terminate or suspend this Contest or to amend the Contest Rules at any time and in any way, without prior notice. Without limiting the foregoing, if, for any reason, the Contest is not capable of running as planned or if the administration, security, fairness, integrity, or proper conduct of the Contest is corrupted or adversely affected, including without limitation by reason of infection by computer virus, bugs, tampering, unauthorized intervention, fraud, technical failures, or any other causes, the Sponsors reserves the right to cancel, terminate, modify or suspend the Contest, including without limitation the cancellation of any method of entry or the extension or modification of the Contest start and end dates. In such circumstances, the Sponsors reserves the right to randomly select a winner from previously received eligible Entries by the end of the Contest Period. The Sponsors shall not be held responsible for any problems, errors or negligence that may arise or occur in connection with the Contest.
The invalidity or unenforceability of any provision of these Contest Rules shall not affect the validity or enforceability of any other provision. If any provision is determined to be invalid or otherwise unenforceable, these Contest Rules shall be construed in accordance with their terms as if the invalid or unenforceable provision was not contained therein.
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Palestinian Citizens Wearily Eye Israeli Elections
Polls suggest that on 22 January, Israel's Jewish majority will elect the most right-wing Knesset in Israel's history, returning prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to power in a coalition packed with ultra-nationalists. For Israel's Palestinian citizens, comprising nearly a fifth of the total population, the dilemma has been how to respond to this all- but- inevitable outcome.
January 20, 2013 Jonathan Cook Electronic Intifada
"Who are you leaving it to?" asks a billboard erected by a Palestinian party in Israel., Atef Safadi / EPA/Newscom
As Nazareth, the capital of Israel's Palestinian minority, gears up for the country's general election next week, the most common poster in the city features three far-right leaders noted for their virulently anti-Arab views.
The posters, paid for by one of the largest Palestinian parties, are intended to mobilize the country's Palestinian citizens to vote.
The most prominent of the faces staring down from billboards is that of Avigdor Lieberman, the recently departed foreign minister who is under police investigation for fraud but still heads Yisrael Beiteinu. His party wants to strip some of Israel's 1.4 million Palestinians of their citizenship by redrawing the boundary with the West Bank, while the rest would be forced to take a loyalty test.
Alongside him, wearing his trademark grin, is Michael Ben Ari, a former leader of the outlawed Kach movement, which demands the expulsion of Palestinians from both the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip and Israel. He won a parliamentary seat at the last election for the similarly racist Strong Israel party (Otzma LeYisrael).
Between them is the bearded Baruch Marzel, also a former Kach official who leads the extremist settlers occupying the center of the Palestinian city of Hebron in the West Bank. He has repeatedly made headlines by organizing provocative far-right marches through Palestinian towns inside Israel. (He staged a special election one this week in the village of Musmus, close to Umm al-Fahm.) Marzel is expected to enter Israel's parliament, the Knesset, for the first time, joining Ben Ari in Strong Israel.
The posters around Nazareth pose a blunt question in Arabic: "Who are you leaving it [the Israeli parliament] to?"
Lieberman, Ben Ari and Marzel are part of ever- widening circle of right-wing politicians who want an "Arab-free" Knesset.
The share of the Palestinian electorate prepared to cast a ballot for one of the Zionist parties has shrunk dramatically over the past 15 years. In 1999, 31 percent still voted for a Zionist party; by 2009 the figure had fallen to 17 percent, with more than half that number accounted for by Druze and Bedouin communities that serve in the army.
Instead, the overwhelming majority vote for one of three Arab or Arab-dominated parties (two other Arab parties are not expected to pass the threshold). Over the past 15 years these Palestinian parties, though without influence in the political system, have grown increasingly noisy in demanding equal rights for their constituents. They may not be able to effect change, but they have shown a talent for embarrassing their Jewish colleagues by using the Knesset - and platforms outside it - to express truths Israeli Jews would prefer remained unspoken.
The continuing presence of Palestinian representatives in the Knesset is threatened by two related developments: a consensus among the dominant right-wing parties that the Arab factions are a "fifth column"; and an internal debate among the Palestinian electorate about the value of taking part in national politics given the current climate.
Silencing
The Zionist parties, especially on the right, have been formulating ways to silence the Arab parties, along with human rights groups and what is seen as the too-liberal Israeli high court. On the issue of the Arab parties, they have found support from Israel's domestic intelligence service, the Shin Bet, which has warned that the Palestinian minority's demands for equal rights - encapsulated in its program for a "state of all its citizens" - constitutes subversion and that Israel should act in accordance with the principle of a "democracy defending itself" ("Democracy for Jews only," Haaretz, 30 May 2007).
The three main parties vying for Palestinian votes can be described as loosely representing the communist, nationalist and Islamist streams, with each party historically winning three or four seats in the 120-member Knesset.
All have faced attacks from the Zionist parties and more widely from the media for what is seen as their "treasonous" behavior in supporting the rights of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
But even in pursuing their domestic agenda - the campaign for equal rights - they have found themselves accused of acting as a "Trojan horse": that is, seeking to undermine Israel as a Jewish state on behalf of the Palestinian leadership in the West Bank and Gaza. It has been this paranoid perception by the security establishment that has increasingly fueled demands from the Israeli government that the Palestine Liberation Organization leadership recognize Israel as a Jewish state as a precondition for peace talks.
In the increasingly hostile climate in Israel, the Communist Front has fared best, even though its leader Mohammed Barakeh has been subjected to a series of dubious legal actions by the state and is currently on trial for allegedly assaulting a soldier during a West Bank demonstration.
The Communists have gained some protection from their status as a joint Jewish-Arab party, one that includes a Jew among its current four Knesset members. However, in line with the long-term collapse of the Israeli Jewish left, the overwhelming majority of the Front's members are Palestinian; the rump Jewish caucus almost operates as a party within the party.
The Islamist stream, known as the United Arab List, includes, in practice, not only the southern wing of the Islamic Movement but socially conservative factions and the one-man Taal party of Ahmed Tibi, long vilified by Israel for his close connections to the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
But the focus of Israeli politicians' outrage has been the National Democratic Assembly party, which was established in 1995, in the wake of the signing of the Oslo accords. Its original leader, Azmi Bishara, who popularized the slogan of a "state of all its citizens," treated the Knesset principally as "an arena of confrontation," using it to expose the limits of Israel's democracy.
Bishara has been living in exile since 2007, when the Shin Bet accused him, improbably, of having helped Hizballah target sites in Israel with its rockets during the Israeli attack on Lebanon a year earlier.
His place as Zionism's public enemy number one has been usurped unexpectedly by Haneen Zoabi, who was elected to the Knesset on the NDA ticket at the last election, in 2009. She is the first Palestinian woman to sit in the Knesset for a Palestinian party.
Her main crime in the eyes of the Jewish parties was her participation in the aid flotilla that tried to break the siege of Gaza in May 2010. The lead ship, the Mavi Marmara, on which Zoabi sailed, was attacked by the Israeli navy in international waters, and nine humanitarian activists were killed.
Zoabi returned to Israel with an eye-witness account of Israeli brutality aboard the ship that gave the lie to Israel's account of what took place and helped stoke international criticism of Israel's action. As a result, she has been relentlessly hounded in the Knesset chamber; demonized by politicians and the media; and subjected to a wave of death threats from the Israeli public.
Questioning the right of the Palestinian parties, especially the NDA, to contest national elections has become an established feature of each campaign of the past decade. But the Zionist parties have been able to move beyond mere threats into concerted efforts to disqualify the parties and individual candidates.
This has been possible because a highly partisan body called the Central Elections Committee is charged with overseeing how the campaign is conducted. The committee, dominated by representatives from the main Zionist parties, is given a facade of legitimacy by having a high court judge sit as chairman.
In the 2003 and 2009 elections, the committee tried to ban the NDA, both times with the open support of the Shin Bet, and also targeted elements of the United Arab List. The committee's decisions have always been overturned on appeal to the high court. But it is widely assumed that, were one of the Arab parties to be disqualified, the others would pull out of the running too.
It looked as though this election would run according to the same script. But while several motions from the right were proposed to ban the NDA and the United Arab List, they were ultimately rejected by the committee, narrowly in the case of the NDA.
Instead, the committee singled out the NDA's Haneen Zoabi, barring her from running again for the Knesset. The decision was reached despite an advisory opinion from the attorney- general, Yehuda Weinstein, that there was "no sufficient, exceptional critical mass of evidence" to disqualify her.
The Basic Law on the Knesset makes disqualification of a party or individual candidate possible if they have: incited racism; denied Israel's Jewish and democratic character; or supported armed struggle or terrorism against Israel.
The committee pointed both to Zoabi's participation in the 2010 aid flotilla to Gaza, declaring it "support for terrorism," and to her rejection of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.
The case against Zoabi was so insubstantial that few observers doubted it would be overturned by the high court.
NDA officials pointed out that she had not personally chosen to take part on the Mavi Marmara. The High Follow-Up Committee, a body representing the whole community, had decided that the Palestinian minority should be represented, and her party had selected her. Similarly, her ideological positions about Israel's character simply reflected the NDA platform.
The party vowed to boycott the election should she be banned.
There were other obvious problems with the case. The attorney- general had closed the investigation into her participation on the Mavi Marmara in 2011, having found no evidence she broke any law. Furthermore, Israel had not declared the IHH, the Turkish group behind the Mavi Marmara, a "terrorist" organization at the time of the flotilla. In fact, one of her lawyers, Hassan Jabareen of the human rights group Adalah, surprised the court by revealing that the IHH had not been designated as such until a few weeks before the court hearing.
But as a Haaretz editorial noted, evidence was beside the point: "what we're dealing with is a political crusade against all the Arab political parties" ("The Zuabi test," 30 December 2012). An opinion poll in December showed 55 percent of Israeli Jews thought a ban on Zoabi would be justified.
The high court overturned Zoabi's disqualification and did so unanimously. Following the decision, Zoabi observed that "this ruling does little to erase the threats, delegitimization and physical and verbal abuse that I have endured - in and outside the Knesset - over the past three years" ("Supreme Court: MK Zoabi can run for Knesset," Ynet, 30 December 2012).
For dramatic effect, she had hoped to make her statement to the waiting media as she left the courtroom. But instead she had to be ushered out of a back door to safety as more than two dozen right- wing extremists, led by Michael Ben Ari, blocked her path and started shoving and threatening her escorts. Ben Ari and his Strong Israel party activists were left in charge of the courtroom to denounce the judges' decision.
Legislators from other right-wing parties criticised the decision too. Yariv Levine of Netanyahu's Likud party said: "Unless MK Zoabi blows herself up in the Knesset, the high court justices won't understand that she has no place there" ("Right lambasts court after Israeli Arab MK cleared to run," Israel Hayom, 30 December 2012).
The joint Likud-Yisrael Beiteinu party issued a statement saying it would introduce yet more legislation to restrict the rights of the country's Palestinian citizens and their representatives: "any expression of support for terror should be grounds for disqualification for running for election in the Israeli Knesset. Likud-Yisrael Beiteinu will immediately act during the next Knesset to fix the existing laws" ("Supreme Court allows MK Zoabi to run for election," +972, 30 December 2012).
Center-left's flip
The Central Elections Committee's decision not to ban the whole NDA list came as a surprise to observers, especially given the dominance of the right. Tel Aviv law professor Aeyal Gross suggested that committee members realized from their previous efforts that they were doomed to failure ("The Supreme Court has again rescued the shards of Israeli democracy," Haaretz, 30 December 2012).
However, it is fairly difficult to believe that most of the committee members were capable of thinking so dispassionately. In any case, disqualifying Arab parties, whether ultimately futile, has other benefits for the right: it reinforces the message to Jewish voters that the Palestinian public is a fifth column, and it reminds them that the high court needs to be radically overhauled to make it more accountable to public opinion.
Awad Abdel Fattah, secretary-general of the NDA, offered a different reading of the committee's behavior. He noted that the right-wing parties voted as feverishly for a ban of his party as ever. It was saved by a switch of positions among what has been termed the "center-left" bloc.
The so-called "center-left" - a term the bloc has embraced to signify its ability to become a genuine alternative to Netanyahu and the right - might in countries other than Israel be described as the "center-right." Its three principal parties - Shelley Yacimovich's Labor, Tzipi Livni's Hatnuah, and former TV anchorman Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid - are still heavily influenced by neoliberal economic doctrine; they have not challenged the ballooning defense budget or proposed a way to plug the resulting record deficit; and they have kept the Israeli-Palestinian conflict well in the background of their platforms.
In this case, the parties' claim to left-wing or centrist credentials derive from their emphasis on reducing the tensions that Netanyahu has allowed to escalate between Israel and its sponsors, the US and the European Union. The center- left is concerned about Israel's image abroad and making the necessary concessions - including reviving an endless peace process with the Palestinians - to prevent a further deterioration in Israel's strategic position.
According to Abdel Fattah, the "center-left" is starting to panic, fearing that the momentum of the shift rightwards may soon prove unstoppable. Without concerted action to shore up a credible opposition to Netanyahu, Israel is hurtling towards full-blown fascism at home and pariah status abroad.
Far-right coup
The lurch to the right is discernible in two key developments during the election campaign.
The first was an effective coup by the far-right in the Likud's recent primaries. The party's last few "moderates" have now been replaced by ultra- nationalists, including religious settlers. Moshe Feiglin, this latter group's controversial figurehead, won the 23rd slot on the joint list with Yisrael Beiteinu, ensuring his place in the parliament for the first time.
The second is the rapid rise during the campaign of the Jewish Home party, under its new leader Naftali Bennett, Netanyahu's former chief of staff. Bennett has reinvented the faction, shedding its image as simply a settlers' party. A hi-tech entrepreneur, Bennett has injected political glamour and won converts from the center by emphasising a "return to Jewish values."
According to recent polls, Jewish Home, which has been plundering votes from Likud, could become the second or third largest party, after Likud-Beiteinu. Unlike the deceitful equivocation of Netanyahu on Palestinian statehood, Bennett is plain-speaking: "I want the world to understand that a Palestinian state means no Israeli state. That's the equation." He demands that Israel immediately annex most of the West Bank. ("Naftali Bennett interview: `There won't be a Palestinian state within Israel'," Guardian, 7 January 2013).
Faced with these trends, the so-called "center-left bloc" appears to have wavered. In the 2003 and 2009 elections, it voted with the right in the Central Elections Committee to ban the NDA. This time it switched to opposing disqualification. Rather than wanting a Knesset empty of Palestinian representatives, the "center-left" appears to have decided that a Palestinian presence may be in their interests.
This possibly explains the unorthodox, and patronizing, editorial in the liberal Haaretz newspaper this week that urged Palestinian citizens to participate in the election - and did so in Arabic. Its headline ordered them to: "Get out and vote!" ("Get out and vote!", 15 January 2013).
Boycott calls
The cause for the concern expressed by Haaretz has been a steady decline in the Palestinian minority's turnout at each election over the past decade. In 1999, amid the greater optimism of the Oslo period, three-quarters of the Palestinian electorate voted; 10 years later, in 2009, that figure had fallen to 53 percent, the lowest in the community's history.
Surveys taken by Asad Ghanem of Haifa University indicate a likely scenario in which, for the first time, less than half the Palestinian electorate vote in a Knesset election ("What's the point?" The Economist, 12 January 2013).
The falling interest in voting reflects various developments within the Palestinian minority.
Some of it can be attributed to a formal boycott movement initiated in 2006 by the small secular Palestinian nationalist movement the Sons of the Village (Abna al-Balad). The Popular Committee for Boycotting Knesset Elections has attracted backing from academics and intellectuals.
This weekend boycott activists were due to lead a day-long motorcade spreading their message through dozens of Palestinian villages and towns, starting in the central Galilee, passing through Nazareth and then ending in the Triangle area south of Umm al-Fahm.
A boycott has also been the default position of the northern Islamic Movement, led by the popular figure of Sheikh Raed Salah, since the movement split in 1996. The southern wing contested the election in the belief that an Oslo-inspired two-state solution was at hand. Salah has been the chief beneficiary of the gradual discrediting of the Oslo process.
But according to Mohammed Zeidan, director of the Arab Association for Human Rights in Nazareth, more significant than the boycott movement has been the much wider assumption in popular discourse that voting is a pointless activity and that the Arab parties are ineffective.
The alienation of Palestinian citizens from the political system was highlighted in a survey presented at Haifa University in December. It showed 79 percent had little or no faith in state institutions, including the Knesset, and 67 percent lacked confidence in the Arab parties ("On my mind: Arab voters," The Jerusalem Post, 24 December 2012).
Zeidan pointed to a lack of campaigning in Palestinian communities, apart from the billboards. "It's almost as if the [Palestinian] parties themselves are too embarrassed to show their faces by electioneering."
He also noted a frankness among people stating that they would not be voting. "Among the youth this trend is especially strong. They are clear that the Knesset and the [Palestinian] parties do not represent them."
This is an assessment even the parties themselves are prepared to concede. Jamal Zahalka, head of the NDA's Knesset faction, said: "We're trying to encourage Arabs to vote because it's important, but you can't blame them when they see how little power we have in parliament" ("Israeli Arabs unenthusiastic about Jan 22 vote," The Huffington Post, 19 December 2012).
Mostly out of view, the parties have been deliberating how to deal with the rapid decline in turnout. The posters featuring Lieberman, Ben Ari and Marzel - part of the NDA's campaign - were intended to play on the community's fears of the far- right.
But according to surveys, the most likely way to increase voting would be for the parties to present a joint list for the Knesset. Back in October, when the election was announced, a campaign on social media was launched urging the parties to cooperate more closely so that they could win a larger number of seats and have a greater influence.
However, the Communist Front is reported to have vetoed the move, apparently worried that a union with the two other Arab parties would drive away Jewish support and end its tradition of being a Arab-Jewish party.
A more radical solution, again opposed by the Communist Front, would be to abandon the Knesset and set up an Arab parliament with direct elections. One of its first acts would be to demand cultural and educational autonomy.
The idea of a separate parliament has been under discussion, so far fruitlessly, for more than a decade. But a very low turnout this time may push it higher up the Palestinian parties' agenda.
Center-left's anxiety
It is not only the Arab parties that are anxious about the expected low rate of participation. The Jewish "center-left" appears to have realised that it may harm them too, even though few Palestinian citizens now vote for Zionist parties. The damage is possible in two ways - one strategic, the other pragmatic - according to Amal Jamal, a politics professor at Tel Aviv University.
The first is that, if the Knesset no longer represents Palestinian citizens, either through a successful boycott or because of a ban by the right, Israel's rule over its Palestinian minority will look increasingly illegitimate, and more like a variety of apartheid. In such circumstances, the center-left's role in defending Israel's standing abroad - its chief selling-point to its shrinking constituency at home - is in danger of becoming irrelevant. The center- left could quickly find itself in vicious spiral of political and diplomatic marginalization.
The second, deeper concern for the center-left is one of "cold political calculation," says Jamal. A low turnout by Palestinian voters will be reflected in a low number of seats. And that in turn will make the chances of building a credible Knesset bloc to challenge Netanyahu and the right even more hopeless.
Without a strong showing by the Palestinian parties, the center-left has no hope of tasting power. Instead they are more likely to end up squabbling with each other to be allowed to sit meekly on the margins of his coalition.
Jamal said: "Plenty of the members of the center-left parties have no real love of the Arab parties but still they understand that they need these parties strong to reduce Netanyahu's power."
Two weeks before polling day, the center-left parties made what looked suspiciously like a desperate, last-minute gesture towards Palestinian citizens to encourage them to vote. They signed a covenant committing to end inequality between Jews and Arabs within 10 years. Of the Arab parties, only the Communist Front attended.
The meeting received little coverage in the local Arab media. Of the few in the minority who were aware of it, most expected the covenant would become another quickly forgotten promise.
Ramez Jeraisi, Nazareth's mayor and a member of the Communist Front that signed the document, summed up the mood: "We have experienced talk and declarations that were never implemented, and I don't expect a change in reality."
[Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East (Pluto Press) and Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair (Zed Books). His new website is jonathan-cook.net ]
Israeli election
Israeli Knesset
A Loss for Netanyahu
Cutting The Military Budget, 2013 Anniversaries, Palestinian Prisoners
Obama in Israel
Sightseeing in the Apartheid State: From Ben Gurion to the West Bank
Letter from a West Bank Refugee Camp


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5 People Stabbed In Tallahassee, Suspect In Custody
BOBBY CAINA CALVAN, Associated Press
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A man suspected of stabbing five people at a construction supplies business in Florida's capital city had gotten into an argument with co-workers shortly after starting his Wednesday shift and was ordered by a supervisor to leave work, authorities said.
Investigators were still trying to understand what specifically set off the suspect, identified by Tallahassee police as Antwann Brown, 41, to pull out a pocket knife and begin stabbing co-workers.
"It appeared that he actually sought out certain victims," interim Police Chief Steven Outlaw said during a news conference yards from the business where the stabbings took place.
The five victims were taken to an area hospital.
One victim was in serious condition, two were in fair condition and another two were in good condition, said Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare spokeswoman Danielle Buchanan.
Brown was apprehended not far from Dyke Industries, which supplies doors and windows to residential and commercial customers, where police said Brown had worked for just over three months.
Outlaw said there was no indication of any pending employment actions against Brown. A company representative didn't immediately return a request for comment.
Police said Brown clocked in at about 8 a.m. as he normally should. Minutes later, "he was engaged in some kind of dispute at work," Outlaw said, "and clocked out at 8:20."
Outlaw wouldn't elaborate on what the dispute was about. The dispute remained a verbal one until the suspect returned and began attacking co-workers with a small knife.
Other co-workers fended Brown off with sticks and whatever they could grab. They pinned him down, but he escaped. Officers arrested him outside the facility, the chief said.
Outlaw called the employees' actions, "heroic."


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Carolina Strawberry Festival
Date: May 05, 2023 6:00 pm - May 06, 2023 11:45 pm
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A festival celebrating the rich agricultural history of Wallace, North Carolina. Featuring craft and food vendors, a beer and wine garden, a new and antique fire truck show, antique tractors, a BBQ contest, rides, dinosaurs, bands, a beauty queen contest, and of course strawberries!!
The Strawberry Festival is successful because of its volunteers. Please consider giving an hour or two, maybe more, to help make our festival awesome.
Applicants will be notified upon approval. Volunteers will check-in with the volunteer coordinator upon arrival to the festival.
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June Newsletter 2019
"There are many types of insider threats – disgruntled employees, determined saboteurs, good-natured bozos…"
– Jonathan Care, Senior Director, Gartner
This month we were a sponsor and exhibitor at the Gartner Security and Risk Management (SRM) Summit. As always, it was a great opportunity to meet with leading cybersecurity experts and discuss the challenges they face in the daily battle against ever more sophisticated cyberattacks. It was also a chance to hear from Gartner analysts themselves on their perspectives of trending cybersecurity issues and where the industry is headed.
During his detailed session, "Building Incident Response Scenarios for Insider Threats", Mr. Care delved into how complex of a problem the insider threat really is. Presenting with fellow analyst Brian Reed, Mr. Care described how there is no universal type of insider threat. Instead, there are many different insider threat personas. And each persona presents unique challenges to those charged with finding and stopping insider threats.
What's the Scope of the Insider Threat Problem?
According to Verizon's 2019 Data Breach Investigations Report, more than one third (34%) of all data breaches last year were by internal actors. Our own industry research reflects this data. According to a survey we conducted at RSA Conference this year, 40% of organizations report that they either cannot detect insider threats or can only detect them after stolen data has left the organization.
Clearly, it's a prevalent problem. It's also a costly problem. Research from the Ponemon Institute reveals that the average cost of a cybersecurity incident involving employees or other insiders is now a staggering $8.7 million.
Insiders are a particular problem in the realm of cybersecurity. External attackers must first breach an organization's perimeter and then search the network for valuable data before being detected. But insiders already know where that proverbial gold resides – and how to access it.
Who Are These Insider Threats?
When most people think of the "insider threat" there are usually some common stereotypes that spring to mind. Often people conjure up an image of the nefarious insider threat as being some malevolent super villain straight out of a 1960s James Bond film.
In reality, the insider threat is more complex than that. It could be the employee who received a poor performance review and is now itching to "get even" with the company he thinks mistreated him. Or it could be the rogue IT admin who uses his unmonitored elevated access to snoop out confidential data on the network. How about the former employee who still retains access into key systems, even years after leaving the company? For just one example of this type of insider threat, consider the recent case of a fired employee who pilfered the data of 2.9 million members of the largest credit union in Canada. And this was just last week…
While these insider threat personas exist, the totality of the problem is far greater. Certainly, some insiders truly are malicious. But, in reality, any employee in your organization with access to critical systems and sensitive data might be an up-and-coming insider threat.
Many data breaches originating from within an organization are simply due to the carelessness of employees. These unintentional insider threats (like users clicking on phishing email links) account for 25% of all data breaches. Saying that humans are the weakest link in security may sound like a cliché. But there's truth to the adage. After all, humans operate most of the computers and devices in your organization – and humans make mistakes.
Thwarting the Insider Threat
Conventional cybersecurity tools offer little when it comes to defending against insider threats. In each of the different types of insider threat personas above, there's a common factor of having access to "the goods" on the network. Of course, employees and contractors need access to certain systems and applications to do their jobs. Intentional or accidental misuse of these privileges is the price paid for such access.
Cybersecurity teams are stretched too thin to manually monitor every action taken by every employee in their organizations. However, modern machine learning algorithms can automatically track and analyze the employee behavior to identify anomalous and suspicious activities. These activities could range from an accountant who downloads a confidential file he never looked at before, to a salesman who suddenly starts emailing large volumes of customer data to his personal account.
Machine learning allows organizations to compare current user behavior to baselined "normal" behavior. From there, they can identify suspicious trends and spot outliers to remediate threats. The behavior is the "tell". And, in the two potential insider threat cases stated above, the user's behavior would be suspicious and flagged as risky and anomalous.
Detecting high-risk users with abnormal behaviors through machine learning and statistical analysis is a force multiplier. It exposes anomalies among enormous volumes of data that humans or traditional security tools could never identify.
Uncover Insider Threats with Gurucul Risk Analytics
Our customers are predicting, detecting and stopping insider threats with Gurucul Risk Analytics (GRA). GRA creates a contextual linked view and behavior baseline from various systems – HR records, accounts, activity, events, access repositories, security alerts and more. It identifies out-of-norm behaviors, provides risk prioritized alerts and helps organizations spot high-risk profiles in real-time. As new activities are consumed, those activities are compared to the baseline behaviors. Behavior that deviates from the baseline norm is classified as an outlier to be dealt with.
Want to learn more? Download our whitepaper Uncover Insider Threats Through Predictive Security Analytics.
You can also request a demo to learn how Gurucul can help you detect and defeat insider threats in your organization.
Gurucul is Named a Vendor to Watch for Insider Threat Defense in Gartner Market Trends Report
Comprehensive User Behavior Monitoring for Insider Threat Detection Provides Value to Both Security and Non-Security Stakeholders.
Gurucul, a leader in security and fraud analytics technology, today announced it was included as a Vendor to Watch in Gartner's May 2019 Market Trends: UEBA Providers Must Embrace Specialization report. Gurucul is cited as a Vendor to Watch for insider threat defense.
According to Gartner, "Monitoring a user's behavior, as the user interacts with data, network resources and applications, has proved to be incredibly useful to a broad range of security domains. In fact, it has been so effective in helping other technologies be better that the market for a general purpose user behavioral monitoring tool (UEBA) is threatened to move forward in its current form. Information about users is good when it stands alone, but it is great when combined with threat-related (or other program-related) data."
How Will AI Impact Society In The Next Decade?
11 Tech Pros Weigh In.
In five to 10 years, artificial intelligence (AI) will have found its way into nearly every segment of our lives, both personal and professional. While the technology has many benefits—ranging from improved business operations and services to an enhanced quality of life—if employed unwisely, it also has the potential to be detrimental in terms of privacy issues, loss of jobs and more.
"Increased Cybersecurity. History has already proven that AI has drastically changed the face of so many industries for the better. For example, the application of AI in cybersecurity, using analytics powered by machine learning, can predict and stop insider threats and fraud before it happens. Future AI applications are going to be more innovative and vastly superior. We're just getting started!" – Saryu Nayyar, CEO, Gurucul.
Zero-Trust Security Model Means More than Freedom from Doubt
A zero-trust security model has a catchy name, but the methodology means more than not trusting any person or device on the network. What you need to know.
Unless you've been living under a rock, chances are you've heard about the zero-trust security model. The name is enticing. It implies all devices, resources, systems, data, users and applications are to be treated as untrusted. Cybersecurity professionals don't want to think of themselves as overly trusting, so zero trust seems like the right way to approach enterprise cybersecurity. But the moniker, while catchy, is somewhat misleading. The zero-trust security model actually refers to an architecture that features a highly distributed, granular and dynamic trust network. Each one of those terms is important. Let's see why.
11 Tips For Teaching Your Company's Employees Good Cybersecurity Habits
While investing in solid hardware and software is important, even the best systems have a common point of vulnerability: the users. It's vital for companies to train their employees in good cybersecurity habits, and that's a task that often falls to the tech department.
So how can companies encourage good cybersecurity habits? We asked 11 Forbes Technology Council experts to share their best suggestions.
"Give Them Ownership. Employees often believe that securing information is the IT department's job, so they often do not take ownership of the process. Establishing a sense of ownership and collaboration toward information protection among the employee population—essentially deputizing them into the information security program—will encourage and empower them to contribute to the protection of company assets." – Saryu Nayyar, CEO, Gurucul.
What's New On Our Blog
ABCs of UEBA: H is for Hijacking. Account hijacking is when your email address gets hijacked by a criminal. The hacker then uses your compromised email account to impersonate you, the account owner and wreak havoc. UEBA is the most effective method for detecting and preventing account hijacking attempts in real-time Read More.
Travel Tips to Keep You Safe from Cybercrime, Fraud & Identity Theft. You might be on vacation, but the malicious hackers and cybercriminals are not. They are always looking to take advantage and often target travelers lacking in cyber-awareness. Through strategic hacking and careful planning, they can easily access a person's personal devices and steal sensitive information like credit card numbers and personal data. Read More.
What is Big Data? Coined in 2001, Gartner's Big Data definition refers to "high-volume, high-velocity and/or high-variety information assets that demand cost-effective, innovative forms of information processing that enable enhanced insight, decision making and process automation". In other words, Big Data is made up of structured, semi-structured and unstructured data sets. Read More.
FS-ISAC 2019 Asia Pacific Summit.July 10-11, 2019. Singapore. Join Gurucul at FS-ISAC and attend our Infosys customer presentation on Thursday, July 11 at 9:30am "Overcoming Legacy Limitations with Machine Learning and Behavioral Analytics".
RSA APAC & Japan. July 16-18, 2019. Singapore. Gurucul is pleased to present a session on "Behavior Analytics and Model Driven Security" Tuesday, July 16 from 12:30-12:50 in the Demo Theatre, Exhibition Hall, Level 5. Please join us!
Black Hat USA. August 7-8, 2019. Las Vegas, NV. Visit Gurucul at Booth #1100 for a demo of our Behavior Based Security Analytics platform. We predict, detect and stop Insider Threats! Let us show you how.


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12,8 cm PaK 44 ( — 12,8-см противотанковая пушка образца 1944 года) — тяжёлая противотанковая пушка, использовавшаяся сухопутными войсками Германии на завершающем этапе Второй мировой войны. В момент своего появления и до конца войны не имела аналогов по дальности стрельбы и бронепробиваемости, однако чрезмерная масса и габариты орудия сводили на нет эти достоинства.

История создания

Создав в 1928 году 88-мм зенитную пушку FlaK 18/36/37, с началом Второй мировой войны немцы достаточно быстро обратили внимание на её превосходные противотанковые возможности. В частности, в 1940 году в операции «Динамо» по эвакуации англо-французских войск из Дюнкерка, когда английский командующий лорд Джон Горт бросил в контратаку под Аррасом несколько десятков танков «Матильда», именно эти пушки оказались единственным оружием, способным пробить их 60-мм лобовую броню, неуязвимую для штатной противотанковой артиллерии калибров 37 и 50 мм. Благодаря этому контратака, первоначально развивавшаяся успешно, была сорвана.

Все дальнейшие образцы зенитных орудий создавались немецкими конструкторами как универсальные, с закладкой в них возможности по поражению бронетехники противника. Развитием пушки FlaK 18/36/37 стала пушка FlaK 41, которая отличалась увеличенной до 71 калибра длиной ствола. Также до 1941 года на вооружение люфтваффе было принято 105-мм орудие FlaK 38.

Однако к концу 1940 года мощность и досягаемость по высоте ни 88-мм, ни 105-мм орудия немецких военных уже не устраивали. Поэтому в 1940 году было принято на вооружение орудие калибра 128 мм, получившее индекс . Оно и по сей день остаётся самым тяжёлым и дальнобойным орудием ПВО среди классических ствольных зениток ВМВ — его досягаемость по высоте удалось довести до 12,8 км.

С началом войны с Советским Союзом, «универсальные» зенитки оказались единственными орудиями немцев, способными уверенно поражать советские танки КВ и Т-34 с расстояния в 1,5 км и более. Однако конструктивные особенности зенитных орудий, такие как высокий профиль, делали их малопригодными для маскировки на местности и противотанковой обороны. Тем не менее, немецкая армия до 1943 года не имела специализированных противотанковых пушек, баллистика которых приближалась бы к баллистике собственных зенитных орудий, и в 1942 году было принято решение о проектировании тяжёлых противотанковых пушек с баллистикой зенитных орудий.

Первой такой пушкой стала принятая на вооружение в 1943 году PaK 43, построенная с использованием ствола от 88-мм зенитной пушки FlaK 41. Дебют этой пушки состоялся в 1943 году. Она гарантированно  поражала любой танк союзников в лобовую проекцию на всех разумных дистанциях боя. Её показатели бронепробиваемости оказались настолько впечатляющими, что ствол впоследствии использовали для создания сразу трёх мощных противотанковых САУ — «Насхорн», «Фердинанд» и «Ягдпантера». В качестве вооружения противотанковых САУ пушка получила индекс Stu.K. 43, позже заменённый на Pak. 43 в трёх модификациях, соответственно: ''Pak. 43/1 (ранее Stu.K. 43/1), Pak. 43/2 и Pak. 43/3.

Однако с конца 1944 года немцев перестаёт удовлетворять уже и это орудие. И тогда принимается решение создать сверхмощное противотанковое орудие с баллистикой 128-мм зенитной пушки FlaK 40 с длиной ствола в 55 калибров. Новое орудие получило индекс PaK 44 L/55. Поскольку на лафет обычной противотанковой пушки такой гигантский ствол установить возможным не представлялось, фирма «Мейланд», которая специализировалась на производстве трейлеров, сконструировала для пушки особый трёхосный лафет с двумя парами колёс впереди и одной сзади. При этом высокий профиль орудия пришлось сохранить, что делало пушку крайне заметной на местности.

Однако бронепробиваемость орудия оказалась чрезвычайно высокой — по некоторым оценкам как минимум до 1948 года в мире не было танка, способного выдержать попадание её 28-кг снаряда.

По методике определения бронепробиваемости, принятой в странах Оси, под углом в 30 градусов бронебойный-подкалиберный снаряд 12.8-cm Pz.Gr.40/43 c дистанции 2000 метров пробивал 173 мм брони, с 1500 метров — 187 мм, с 1000 метров — 200 мм, с 500 метров — 210 мм.

Низкая защищённость и мобильность орудия, вес которого перевалил за 9 тонн, заставило немцев проработать вариант установки его на самоходное шасси. Такая машина была создана в 1944 году на базе тяжёлого танка «Королевский тигр» и получила название «Ягдтигр». С пушкой PaK 44, сменившей индекс на StuK 44, он стал самой мощной противотанковой САУ Второй мировой войны — в частности, получены свидетельства о поражении танков «Шерман» с расстояния свыше 3500 м в лобовой проекции.

Прорабатывались также варианты использования орудия в танках. В частности, знаменитый опытный танк «Маус» имел на вооружении именно PaK 44 в дуплексе с 75-мм орудием (в танковом варианте пушка именовалась KwK 44). Также планировалось установить пушку и на опытный сверхтяжёлый танк E-100.

Примечания

Противотанковая артиллерия
Артиллерия Германии периода Второй мировой войны
Артиллерия калибра 128 мм
Военная продукция Krupp

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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Best Smart Bulbs / Tools for Circadian Lighting
kaitlinsmith last edited by
Is there a particular stack of smart bulbs / tools that are best for creating an automated, Flu.x-like indoor lighting experience? I don't currently have an Alexa and am very reticent to have a device "listening" to me at all hours.
W M 2 Replies Last reply
Dominic638 last edited by
Philips Hue bulbs come with a hub that connects to your router. Smart light bulbs come in many shapes, sizes, colors, and configurations. With smart bulbs, you can smarten any existing light fixture like a kitchen pendant light or a bedside lamp.
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WhiteOleander last edited by @kaitlinsmith
@kaitlinsmith I won't have a 'smart anything' in my home!
I think the extra EMF "smart bulbs" would create would totally negate any positive benefit (changing the color) is that it?
I think blue light, light color could be an issue, but it pales in comparison to the amount of microwave radiation that is being blasted at us more and more (anything smart). If you are already sensitive to visible light, you are more likely to be sensitive to EMF effects, so I would use caution.
WhiteOleander last edited by @Dominic638
@Dominic638 Sounds like an awful idea. You can now expose yourself to more EMF radiation, making whatever these bulbs are supposed to do moot.
If one is sensitive to visible light frequencies, your likelihood of being sensitive to the invisible ones, particularly the EMFs is higher.
You at least wouldn't want anything 'smart' by your bed.
The EMFs are so destructive to so many of our biological functions that now adding EMF to regular AC (which even can affect some people is a recipe for disaster IMO
Mr Ethernet last edited by Mr Ethernet @kaitlinsmith
@kaitlinsmith said in Best Smart Bulbs / Tools for Circadian Lighting:
I don't currently have an Alexa and am very reticent to have a device "listening" to me at all hours.
Philips Hue has no microphone in its control device, called the "Hue Bridge" (unlike Alexa/Google Home), so it has no way to listen to you. That should hopefully allay your privacy concerns, at least for one option.
Out of the box, Hue doesn't have a feature that allows similar gradual changes in brightness throughout the day, but it can be done using the iconnecthue app - although I've never tried it.
@WhiteOleander said in Best Smart Bulbs / Tools for Circadian Lighting:
That's not how it works.
In terms of EMF radiation: cellular data > 5 GHz WiFi > 2.4 GHz WiFi > Bluetooth > ZigBee
As it happens, smart bulbs use a 2.4 GHz frequency with an extraordinarily low power output - making them both more energy efficient and the safest of the lot. This is why it takes about an HOUR to perform a tiny little firmware update on these smart bulbs. The data transfer protocol they use is optimized for low power consumption, with slow data transfer as a side effect.
My Bluetooth keyboard only needs to be charged less than once per YEAR, which gives you an idea how little radiation is involved with Bluetooth, so you can only imagine how low the energy consumption by the ZigBee protocol used by smart bulbs must be.
You probably have more Watts of energy being emitted by your little toe than the EMF energy emitted from a whole house of smart bulbs. Try to keep things in perspective.
The human brain uses around 20 Watts of energy. Smart bulbs use less than 1 Watt each when not emitting visible light (so their RF output is a fraction of 1 Watt). You're getting much more RF radiation from your neighbor's cellphones, tablets and router than any ZigBee-enabled bulbs in your own house.
Sounds like an awful idea. You can now expose yourself to more EMF radiation, making whatever these bulbs are supposed to do moot.
The thing is that not emitting EMF radiation isn't the point of smart bulbs - it's increased flexibility. They were never touted as a "healthier alternative" to regular LED bulbs.
This is untrue. What does "sensitive" even mean? Psychosomatic? Physiological?
Let's suppose someone is sensitive to visible light (such as people with blue eyes) or they may have photophobia. This is certainly possible; however, such people are affected due to the effect of visible light on their EYES! Human eyes are unable to detect invisible frequencies of EMF radiation (such as WiFi), so their being sensitive to visible light actually has no bearing whatsoever on their sensitivity to invisible light.
Some people get sunburn more easily. Those people are certainly more sensitive to invisible (UV) light - but it's quite separate from photophobia or light sensitivity. People with cataracts are much more sensitive to bright lights as their cataracts cause scattering of light from their lens across their retina - but those people are NO MORE LIKELY than anyone else to be "sensitive" to invisible EMF radiation.
People with brown eyes are 2.5x MORE likely to develop cataracts than people with other eye colors (possibly as the iris absorbs more light from the sun, it causes slightly higher temperatures within the eye and, therefore, a greater risk of the lens developing a cataract). Technically, people with brown eyes are more "sensitive" to UV light in one respect, but it has no bearing on their susceptibility to getting sunburn (which is related to how much melanin is in a person's skin).
Red heads with freckles and fair skin have an equivalent skin-cancer risk of 21 years in the sun, so red heads are technically more "sensitive" to light than other people in one respect - but again, this has absolutely no bearing on their susceptibility to health problems due to WiFi or other kinds of EMF (which occur through entirely different mechanisms).
I think it's important to always back up opinions with facts and sources, rather than just framing opinion as fact (and risking misleading people).
Why not? If you put your cell phone in airplane mode, all the transmitters shut off and the EMF drops to zero. Just because something is "smart", doesn't mean it necessarily emits harmful amounts of EMF radiation. You should try to take a more nuanced approach in your appraisal of technology - rather than throwing everything into the same risk category.
Smart devices things aren't mysterious or radioactive. If you turn them off completely (or turn off their communication systems selectivity, such as with airplane mode), they stop broadcasting EMF frequencies.
In my experience, people tend to be more fearful of things (even irrationally so) when they don't really understand them. People who grew up when there was no such thing as smart devices are usually the most wary of them!
I get it. It took me a few weeks to persuade a friend of mine that he didn't need to unplug his modem every night to "protect himself from hackers". Some people have an irrational fear of newer technologies.


The 18-to-34-year-old demo turns to the Web for entertainment. In fact, 30 percent visit entertainment sites daily, compared to 32 percent who read newspaper entertainment sections and 19 percent who read entertainment magazines.
I just make it into this demographic (turning 34 in October) and it isn't unusual for me to spend 18-20 hours a day in front of a PC (and therefore the web), so of course it's going to be an integral part of how I live, work and play but I guess this is still big news for some baby-boomers who didn't grow up with a PC in front of them (come to think of it, neither did I).


Photography by Moonlight - Scenes in a Different Light.
"Scenes in a Different Light"
Photography by moonlight can give images a mystical effect which you are unlikely to capture under any other lighting conditions.
I have just found your site tonight. Do you have anything on taking moonlight photos. Not necessarily pictures of the moon but nice moonlight scenes?
I do not have a section on night photography yet but I'll add it to the list of "things to do".
Meanwhile, in my experience I have found that the most difficult thing to get right is exposure - it's usually down to trial and error although the number of trials reduce with experience.
Set your camera up on a tripod or at least on a very firm base - the longer shutter speeds involved in night photography rule "hand held" out of the question.
Switch your camera to flash "off", manual exposure and manual focus - this is very important as any "automatic" exposure setting will give you a very light image and the camera will have difficulty focusing itself in the dark. If you are using a digital camera - switch noise reduction "on" if you are using a camera which has this function and unless you are shooting in RAW, set the white balance to "daylight" (or "tungsten" if you want a "bluer" result).
Once you have positioned the camera for the composition you want, try setting the exposure to 2 seconds at f5.6. (vary these according to the depth of field you want to achieve - I am assuming you are knowledgeable about depth of field although there is an explanation on the Focus page.
Focus the camera manually - 10 metres will give a good depth of field at f5.6 for a 50mm lens (35 mm format equivalent).
When you have taken the image, preview it and adjust the shutter speed for your next "trial" - longer exposure if the trial image is too dark, shorter if too light. If your camera enables you to study the histogram for the shot, most of the pixels for a "good" moonlit shot will be towards the left hand end of the scale but not too many at complete black.
Let me know if any of this is unclear or if you need more information - I'll help if I can.
Thanks for taking the time to give me such a detailed reply. I have just tried getting these kinda shots.
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