text:
Rutgers Preparatory School
CoEd - School for both genders
Program Length Available
Fall Year
Rutgers Preparatory School (RPS), in Somerset, New Jersey, is a coeducational day school. The school enrolls students from diverse geographic, economic, social, and ethnic backgrounds. RPS's faculty are selected for deep knowledge of their subjects and excellence in teaching. Of the 87 members of the full-time faculty, 61% have post graduate degrees. Rutgers Preparatory School offers a full college preparatory and Advanced Placement curriculum. Virtually all graduates go on to four-year colleges immediately upon graduation.
The Facilities include an art studio, a traditional photography room, a digital photography room, 12 sets of turntable for ceramics, the library, computer rooms, 6 science labs, a music building. The athletic facilities include 2 gyms, a track field, a multi-functional sports field, soccer/hockey fields, a baseball field, and a croquet field.
The school fields 33 sports teams with approximately 80 percent of students participating in some form of organized athletics on the junior varsity or varsity level. A broad arts program is offered with courses in visual arts, choral and instrumental music, and drama. Students participate in several performances each year.
The safe community of Somerset offers students an opportunity to visit historical sights, enjoy parks and recreational areas and shopping. The metropolitan area of Central New Jersey, near Rutgers University, and accessibility to New York City offer students additional educational and cultural experiences.
Educatius PDF: Rutgers Preparatory School Profile PDF
Visit School Site: Rutgers Preparatory School
Visit County Site: Somerset County, New Jersey
Pre-K, K, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 Grades at School
44 acres Campus Size
12% Percentage of International Students
Academic Stats
Classes, Sports and Arts
Academic Stats Classes, Sports and Arts Admission Requirements
Diploma Year Offered?
Teacher/Student Ratio
SAT Average
ACT Average
English as Second Language (ESL) Support Available
Speciality Programs
American College Bridge Program, Boarding School Bridge Program, Waksman Research project
Baseball, Basketball, Cross Country Running, Football, Golf, Lacrosse, Softball, Swimming, Tennis, Volleyball, Wrestling
Acting, Architecture, Ceramics, Ceramics and Sculpture, Critique and Production, Dance Ensemble, Drawing and Design, Drawing and Painting, Improvisation, Madrigals Ensemble, Photography
Band, Band - Concert, Brass Ensemble, Choir, Music Theory, Orchestra, Publications, Publications, Saxophone Ensemble, String Ensemble, Vocal Chamber Ensemble
Advanced Courses (AP, A-Levels)
Biology, Calculus AB, Calculus BC, Chemistry, Chinese Language and Culture, Computer Programming, Computer Science, Data Management, Economics, English Language and Composition, English Literature and Composition, Environmental Science, European History, French Literature, Physics 1, Psychology, Spanish Language and Culture, Statistics, US Government and Politics, US History, World History
Arabic, French, French Language and Culture, Japanese, Latin, Spanish
Clubs and Extracurricular
App Development Club, Career and Community Leaders of America, Entrepreneur Club, Japanese Club, Junior State of America, Model United Nations (Model UN), Newspaper Club
Accepting Students in Grades
TOEFL Minimum
85-90 (varies by grade)
TOEFL Junior Required
Grades 7-8: 780
Other - Eligibility Requirements?
Provide Educatius with TOEFL results and also send test results to Rutgers (code 7658). School requires students applying to grades 9-12 to provide SSAT results directly to the school (school code 6202). Must fill Rutgers online application for grade 7th-11th. Grade 12 applicants are typically considered for the American College Bridge Program.
More School Photos!
Blogs and News!
by Educatius Group
AP Courses vs IB program
What is the most important factor for international students when selecting a US high school to apply to?
06/02/2019 | USA
from Educatius Group
Committed to Excellence: Educatius North America is ISO 9001 certified!
Educatius Group's North American head office has been certified by ISO 9001:2015's globally respected quality standards.
Educatius Group F-1 Inbound High School Program is CSIET Listed
Educatius Group's USA F-1 Inbound High School Program Listed by CSIET for 5th year in a Row
Educatius is the Largest CSIET F-1 Organization in 2017-2018
Educatius Group received the largest number of international high school students on CSIET F-1 high school programs in 2017-2018!
by Hairou from China
MY Four Tips for Living with an American Host Family
It's a great challenge for international students to leave their home and comfort zone. But living with an American host family will leave you with a lot of good memories. Today let me share with you my tips from living with host families for three years in American high schools!
Getting the Edge - Dr. Sharon Tan, Academic Director, Featured in US News & World Report
"International students who study at a US high school have an inside-track to attend a US University," according to Educatius Group's Academic Director Dr. Sharon Tan.
Similar Schools (3)
DePaul Catholic High School
SCHOOL PROFILE DePaul Catholic High School is a co-educational college preparatory high school where the low student to teacher ratio allows for a more individualized education. At DePaul, international high school students from grades 9 to 12 have many offerings including three foreign languages, over 12 AP courses, and over 30 extracurricular activities. FACILITIES Since 2013, DePaul Catholic expanded facilities to include a new student information commons as well as a new admissions and advancement Suite. Furthermore, there is wireless internet available throughout the school campus. SPORTS AND ARTS Since 2012, DePaul Catholic has won 33 Championships in League, County and Conference level competitions. The school's outstanding wrestling team won five consecutive district championships. In addition, ten student-athletes were awarded All-American status in their sport. Most impressively, 150 DePaul Catholic student-athletes, in the past 4 years, have gone on to play collegiate leve
Thornton Academy
Founded in 1811, Thornton Academy is one of New England's oldest college preparatory schools. Its comprehensive curriculum consists of 200 courses, including seven foreign languages, 30 arts classes, and more than 60 AP, dual enrollment, and honors courses. The school's collaborations with both the University of New England and the University of Maine School of Engineering allows students to bypass freshman year at both schools.

 FACILITIES Campus facilities feature a STEM Center with brand new laboratories, an engineering lab, a foreign language building, an art center, an observatory, and a 500-person theater. Athletic facilities include sports fields, an outdoor track, basketball courts, tennis courts, and four large multi-purp
Nauset Regional High School
School and Academics The award winning Nauset Regional High School is located in the New England region of the United States. The school has been recognized as a Massachusetts Compass School, a Massachusetts Vanguard School of Excellence and a National Blue Ribbon High School. Faculty and staff are extremely proud of its National Merit Finalists and Advanced Placement Students of the Year. Nauset Regional High School is a leader in providing local and international students the highest quality of education. Facilities Nauset Regional High School is one of the only high schools located within a National Park; the unique campus has nine buildings that surround an open courtyard. Recent renovations have included state of the art artificial turf field, new cardio and free weight equipment in the fitness center, and new post tension tennis courts. Sports and Arts Students are encouraged to participate in unique activities like the sailing team and oth- er open water activities due to the


text:
import json
import re
import subprocess

from netaddr import IPAddress, IPNetwork
from nose_parameterized import parameterized
from tests.st.test_base import TestBase
from tests.st.utils.docker_host import DockerHost, CLUSTER_STORE_DOCKER_OPTIONS
from tests.st.utils.constants import DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR
from tests.st.utils.route_reflector import RouteReflectorCluster
from tests.st.utils.utils import check_bird_status, retry_until_success
from time import sleep

from .peer import create_bgp_peer

"""
Test calico IPIP behaviour.
"""

class TestIPIP(TestBase):
    def tearDown(self):
        self.remove_tunl_ip()

    @parameterized.expand([
        ('bird',),
        ('gobgp',),
    ])
    def test_ipip(self, backend):
        """
        Test IPIP routing with the different IPIP modes.

        This test modifies the working IPIP mode of the pool and monitors the
        traffic flow to ensure it either is or is not going over the IPIP
        tunnel as expected.
        """
        with DockerHost('host1',
                        additional_docker_options=CLUSTER_STORE_DOCKER_OPTIONS,
                        start_calico=False) as host1, \
             DockerHost('host2',
                        additional_docker_options=CLUSTER_STORE_DOCKER_OPTIONS,
                        start_calico=False) as host2:

            # Before starting the node, create the default IP pool using the
            # v1.0.2 calicoctl.  For calicoctl v1.1.0+, a new IPIP mode field
            # is introduced - by testing with an older pool version validates
            # the IPAM BIRD templates function correctly without the mode field.
            self.pool_action(host1, "create", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, False,
                           calicoctl_version="v1.0.2")

            # Autodetect the IP addresses - this should ensure the subnet is
            # correctly configured.
            host1.start_calico_node("--ip=autodetect --backend={0}".format(backend))
            host2.start_calico_node("--ip=autodetect --backend={0}".format(backend))

            # Create a network and a workload on each host.
            network1 = host1.create_network("subnet1")
            workload_host1 = host1.create_workload("workload1",
                                                   network=network1)
            workload_host2 = host2.create_workload("workload2",
                                                   network=network1)

            # Allow network to converge.
            self.assert_true(
                workload_host1.check_can_ping(workload_host2.ip, retries=10))

            # Check connectivity in both directions
            self.assert_ip_connectivity(workload_list=[workload_host1,
                                                       workload_host2],
                                        ip_pass_list=[workload_host1.ip,
                                                      workload_host2.ip])

            # Note in the following we are making a number of configuration
            # changes and testing whether or not IPIP is being used.
            # The order of tests is deliberately chosen to flip between IPIP
            # and no IPIP because it is easier to look for a change of state
            # than to look for state remaining the same.

            # Turn on IPIP with a v1.0.2 calicoctl and check that the
            # IPIP tunnel is being used.
            self.pool_action(host1, "replace", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, True,
                             calicoctl_version="v1.0.2")
            self.assert_ipip_routing(host1, workload_host1, workload_host2,
                                     True)

            # Turn off IPIP using the latest version of calicoctl and check that
            # IPIP tunnel is not being used.  We'll use the latest version of
            # calicoctl for the remaining tests.
            self.pool_action(host1, "replace", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, False)
            self.assert_ipip_routing(host1, workload_host1, workload_host2,
                                     False)

            # Turn on IPIP, default mode (which is always use IPIP), and check
            # IPIP tunnel is being used.
            self.pool_action(host1, "replace", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, True)
            self.assert_ipip_routing(host1, workload_host1, workload_host2,
                                     True)

            # Turn off IPIP and check IPIP tunnel is not being used.
            self.pool_action(host1, "replace", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, False)
            self.assert_ipip_routing(host1, workload_host1, workload_host2,
                                     False)

            # Turn on IPIP mode "always", and check IPIP tunnel is being used.
            self.pool_action(host1, "replace", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, True,
                             ipip_mode="always")
            self.assert_ipip_routing(host1, workload_host1, workload_host2,
                                     True)

            # Turn on IPIP mode "cross-subnet", since both hosts will be on the
            # same subnet, IPIP should not be used.
            self.pool_action(host1, "replace", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, True,
                             ipip_mode="cross-subnet")
            self.assert_ipip_routing(host1, workload_host1, workload_host2,
                                     False)

            # Set the BGP subnet on both node resources to be a /32.  This will
            # fool Calico into thinking they are on different subnets.  IPIP
            # routing should be used.
            self.pool_action(host1, "replace", DEFAULT_IPV4_POOL_CIDR, True,
                             ipip_mode="cross-subnet")
            self.modify_subnet(host1, 32)
            self.modify_subnet(host2, 32)
            self.assert_ipip_routing(host1, workload_host1, workload_host2,
                                     True)

    def test_ipip_addr_assigned(self):
        with DockerHost('host', dind=False, start_calico=False) as host:
            # Set up first pool before Node is started, to ensure we get tunl IP on boot
            ipv4_pool = IPNetwork("10.0.1.0/24")
            self.pool_action(host, "create", ipv4_pool, True)
            host.start_calico_node()
            self.assert_tunl_ip(host, ipv4_pool, expect=True)

            # Disable the IP Pool, and make sure the tunl IP is not from this IP pool anymore.
            self.pool_action(host, "apply", ipv4_pool, True, disabled=True)
            self.assert_tunl_ip(host, ipv4_pool, expect=False)

            # Re-enable the IP pool and make sure the tunl IP is assigned from that IP pool again.
            self.pool_action(host, "apply", ipv4_pool, True)
            self.assert_tunl_ip(host, ipv4_pool, expect=True)

            # Test that removing pool removes the tunl IP.
            self.pool_action(host, "delete", ipv4_pool, True)
            self.assert_tunl_ip(host, ipv4_pool, expect=False)

            # Test that re-adding the pool triggers the confd watch and we get an IP
            self.pool_action(host, "create", ipv4_pool, True)
            self.assert_tunl_ip(host, ipv4_pool, expect=True)

            # Test that by adding another pool, then deleting the first,
            # we remove the original IP, and allocate a new one from the new pool
            new_ipv4_pool = IPNetwork("192.168.0.0/16")
            self.pool_action(host, "create", new_ipv4_pool, True)
            self.pool_action(host, "delete", ipv4_pool, True)
            self.assert_tunl_ip(host, new_ipv4_pool)

    def pool_action(self, host, action, cidr, ipip, disabled=False, ipip_mode="", calicoctl_version=None):
        """
        Perform an ipPool action.
        """
        testdata = {
            'apiVersion': 'v1',
            'kind': 'ipPool',
            'metadata': {
                'cidr': str(cidr)
            },
            'spec': {
                'ipip': {
                    'enabled': ipip
                },
                'disabled': disabled
            }
        }

        # Only add the mode field is a value is specified.  Note that
        # the mode field will not be valid on pre-v1.1.0 versions of calicoctl.
        if ipip_mode:
            testdata['spec']['ipip']['mode'] = ipip_mode

        host.writefile("testfile.yaml", testdata)
        host.calicoctl("%s -f testfile.yaml" % action, version=calicoctl_version)

    def assert_tunl_ip(self, host, ip_network, expect=True):
        """
        Helper function to make assertions on whether or not the tunl interface
        on the Host has been assigned an IP or not. This function will retry
        7 times, ensuring that our 5 second confd watch will trigger.

        :param host: DockerHost object
        :param ip_network: IPNetwork object which describes the ip-range we do (or do not)
        expect to see an IP from on the tunl interface.
        :param expect: Whether or not we are expecting to see an IP from IPNetwork on the tunl interface.
        :return:
        """
        retries = 7
        for retry in range(retries + 1):
            try:
                output = host.execute("ip addr show tunl0")
                match = re.search(r'inet ([\d]{1,3}\.[\d]{1,3}\.[\d]{1,3}\.[\d]{1,3})', output)
                if match:
                    ip_address = IPAddress(match.group(1))
                    if expect:
                        self.assertIn(ip_address, ip_network)
                    else:
                        self.assertNotIn(ip_address, ip_network)
                else:
                    self.assertFalse(expect, "No IP address assigned to tunl interface.")
            except Exception as e:
                if retry < retries:
                    sleep(1)
                else:
                    raise e
            else:
                return

    def remove_tunl_ip(self):
        """
        Remove the host tunl IP address if assigned.
        """
        try:
            output = subprocess.check_output(["ip", "addr", "show", "tunl0"])
        except subprocess.CalledProcessError:
            return

        match = re.search(r'inet ([\d]{1,3}\.[\d]{1,3}\.[\d]{1,3}\.[\d]{1,3})', output)
        if not match:
            return

        ipnet = str(IPNetwork(match.group(1)))

        try:
            output = subprocess.check_output(["ip", "addr", "del", ipnet, "dev", "tunl0"])
        except subprocess.CalledProcessError:
            return

    def modify_subnet(self, host, prefixlen):
        """
        Update the calico node resource to use the specified prefix length.

        Returns the current mask size.
        """
        node = json.loads(host.calicoctl(
            "get node %s --output=json" % host.get_hostname()))
        assert len(node) == 1

        # Get the current network and prefix len
        ipnet = IPNetwork(node[0]["spec"]["bgp"]["ipv4Address"])
        current_prefix_len = ipnet.prefixlen

        # Update the prefix length
        ipnet.prefixlen = prefixlen
        node[0]["spec"]["bgp"]["ipv4Address"] = str(ipnet)

        # Write the data back again.
        host.writejson("new_data", node)
        host.calicoctl("apply -f new_data")
        return current_prefix_len

    def assert_ipip_routing(self, host1, workload_host1, workload_host2, expect_ipip):
        """
        Test whether IPIP is being used as expected on host1 when pinging workload_host2
        from workload_host1.
        """
        def check():
            orig_tx = self.get_tunl_tx(host1)
            workload_host1.execute("ping -c 2 -W 1 %s" % workload_host2.ip)
            if expect_ipip:
                assert self.get_tunl_tx(host1) == orig_tx + 2
            else:
                assert self.get_tunl_tx(host1) == orig_tx
        retry_until_success(check, retries=10)

    def get_tunl_tx(self, host):
        """
        Get the tunl TX count
        """
        try:
            output = host.execute("ifconfig tunl0")
        except subprocess.CalledProcessError:
            return

        match = re.search(r'RX packets:(\d+) ',
                          output)
        return int(match.group(1))

    @parameterized.expand([
        (False,),
        (True,),
        (False,'gobgp',),
        (True,'gobgp',),
    ])
    def test_gce(self, with_ipip, backend='bird'):
        """Test with and without IP-in-IP routing on simulated GCE instances.

        In this test we simulate GCE instance routing, where there is a router
        between the instances, and each instance has a /32 address that appears
        not to be directly connected to any subnet.  With that setup,
        connectivity between workloads on different hosts _should_ require
        IP-in-IP to be enabled.  We test that we do get connectivity _with_
        IP-in-IP, that we don't get connectivity _without_ IP-in-IP, and that
        the situation updates dynamically if we toggle IP-in-IP with workloads
        already existing.

        Note that this test targets the BGP implementation, to check that it
        does IP-in-IP routing correctly, and handles the underlying GCE
        routing, and switches dynamically between IP-in-IP and normal routing
        as directed by calicoctl.  (In the BIRD case, these are all points for
        which we've patched the upstream BIRD code.)  But naturally it also
        involves calicoctl and confd, so it isn't _only_ about the BGP code.
        """
        with DockerHost('host1',
                        additional_docker_options=CLUSTER_STORE_DOCKER_OPTIONS,
                        simulate_gce_routing=True,
                        start_calico=False) as host1, \
             DockerHost('host2',
                        additional_docker_options=CLUSTER_STORE_DOCKER_OPTIONS,
                        simulate_gce_routing=True,
                        start_calico=False) as host2:

            self._test_gce_int(with_ipip, backend, host1, host2, False)

    @parameterized.expand([
        (False,),
        (True,),
    ])
    def test_gce_rr(self, with_ipip):
        """As test_gce except with a route reflector instead of mesh config."""
        with DockerHost('host1',
                        additional_docker_options=CLUSTER_STORE_DOCKER_OPTIONS,
                        simulate_gce_routing=True,
                        start_calico=False) as host1, \
             DockerHost('host2',
                        additional_docker_options=CLUSTER_STORE_DOCKER_OPTIONS,
                        simulate_gce_routing=True,
                        start_calico=False) as host2, \
             RouteReflectorCluster(1, 1) as rrc:

            self._test_gce_int(with_ipip, 'bird', host1, host2, rrc)

    def _test_gce_int(self, with_ipip, backend, host1, host2, rrc):

        host1.start_calico_node("--backend={0}".format(backend))
        host2.start_calico_node("--backend={0}".format(backend))

        # Before creating any workloads, set the initial IP-in-IP state.
        host1.set_ipip_enabled(with_ipip)

        if rrc:
            # Set the default AS number - as this is used by the RR mesh,
            # and turn off the node-to-node mesh (do this from any host).
            host1.calicoctl("config set asNumber 64513")
            host1.calicoctl("config set nodeToNodeMesh off")
            # Peer from each host to the route reflector.
            for host in [host1, host2]:
                for rr in rrc.get_redundancy_group():
                    create_bgp_peer(host, "node", rr.ip, 64513)

        # Create a network and a workload on each host.
        network1 = host1.create_network("subnet1")
        workload_host1 = host1.create_workload("workload1",
                                               network=network1)
        workload_host2 = host2.create_workload("workload2",
                                               network=network1)

        for _ in [1, 2]:
            # Check we do or don't have connectivity between the workloads,
            # according to the IP-in-IP setting.
            if with_ipip:
                # Allow network to converge.
                self.assert_true(
                    workload_host1.check_can_ping(workload_host2.ip, retries=10))

                # Check connectivity in both directions
                self.assert_ip_connectivity(workload_list=[workload_host1,
                                                           workload_host2],
                                            ip_pass_list=[workload_host1.ip,
                                                          workload_host2.ip])

                # Check that we are using IP-in-IP for some routes.
                assert "tunl0" in host1.execute("ip r")
                assert "tunl0" in host2.execute("ip r")

                # Check that routes are not flapping: the following shell
                # script checks that there is no output for 10s from 'ip
                # monitor', on either host.  The "-le 1" is to allow for
                # something (either 'timeout' or 'ip monitor', not sure) saying
                # 'Terminated' when the 10s are up.  (Note that all commands
                # here are Busybox variants; I tried 'grep -v' to eliminate the
                # Terminated line, but for some reason it didn't work.)
                for host in [host1, host2]:
                    host.execute("changes=`timeout -t 10 ip -t monitor 2>&1`; " +
                                 "echo \"$changes\"; " +
                                 "test `echo \"$changes\" | wc -l` -le 1")
            else:
                # Expect non-connectivity between workloads on different hosts.
                self.assert_false(
                    workload_host1.check_can_ping(workload_host2.ip, retries=10))

            if not rrc:
                # Check the BGP status on each host.
                check_bird_status(host1, [("node-to-node mesh", host2.ip, "Established")])
                check_bird_status(host2, [("node-to-node mesh", host1.ip, "Established")])

            # Flip the IP-in-IP state for the next iteration.
            with_ipip = not with_ipip
            host1.set_ipip_enabled(with_ipip)

TestIPIP.batchnumber = 4  # Add batch label to these tests for parallel running

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


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The US Army may acquire up to 100,000 HoloLens AR headsets from Microsoft for combat and training purposes.
Microsoft won a bidding process against companies like Magic Leap to secure the deal.
The contracted headsets will be different from the commercial units with thermal sensing and night vision included.
After months of bidding, Microsoft has been awarded a contract that will see the tech giant supplying as many as 100,000 HoloLens to the US Army. HoloLens is an augmented reality headset that is commercially available, and the US Army seeks to take advantage of the technology for training and combat. The bidding process began in September and Microsoft managed to beat competitors like Magic Leap to secure the contract.
The HoloLens units that will be supplied to the US Army by Microsoft will be quite different from what you can pick up from the consumer market. They will come packed with thermal sensors and night vision technology embedded for combat usage. The military units will not be available commercially for citizens.
Relationships between tech companies and the US military has been shaky as of late with employees from companies like Google and Amazon objecting to military and government deals. Amazon employees appealed against the company's decision to supply facial recognition software to the government while Google recently pulled out of a $10 billion contract bidding process for the Pentagon, while Microsoft is still competing for the deal.
What do you think about Microsoft's contract with the US army? Let us know in the comments below. Also, join us on our TechNadu's Twitter handle and Facebook page for instant updates.


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text:
Giovanni Iacobucci
Retrospective | How 'The Last Jedi' Became a Battleground In Our Culture War
Dec 6, 2019·18 min read
Last year, I watched all 33-and-counting Godzilla feature films ahead of the release of Godzilla: King of the Monsters. This year, I've undertaken a programming schedule that is much more manageable in scope, but even closer to my heart. This is The Road to 'Rise of Skywalker' Rewatch!
Previously: What 'The Force Awakens' Remembered — and What It Forgot
Strap yourselves in, this one's gonna be a doozy.
By the time of The Last Jedi's release in December 2017, I was accustomed to the new reality of a crushing, unending news cycle which had transformed daily life into the sweeps week from hell. At some point, my iPhone's News app had begun interrupting my day, multiple times a day, with headlines that were like little cortisol hits designed to drive engagement with their publishers' content through prurience, irritation, and fear. And I was unwilling to turn the notifications off, because it seemed (and continues to seem) irrationally important that I pay attention every time a new garbage fire ignites somewhere on our melting planet.
I know I'm far from alone in indulging this addiction. For millions of people, every revolution of the Earth is another opportunity to immerse oneself fully in a flattened data stream in which all news, from celebrity gossip to constitutional crises, is presented as a single overlapping cacophony of competing information and opinion that our brains were never evolved to properly handle.
In this setting, it's vital that we find bastions of psychological refuge. Palliative shelter. Simple joys that can remind us to occasionally live life for ourselves, rather than in a constant state of low-level anxiety about forces too big for any of us to solve alone. Over the last few years, one such happy place for me has been the second Renaissance of Star Wars and the opportunity to engage in exercises, like this essay series, which it has presented.
When The Force Awakens debuted in 2015, the idea of resurgent fascism successfully lashing out at a pillar of ineffectual, polite democracy and catching the state off guard had seemed a whole lot more hypothetical. But by late 2017, a bunch of manicured, petulant young jackboots working themselves up into a red-faced lather about reclaiming their fathers' lost cause had J.J. Abrams' reboot appearing strangely prescient.
Meanwhile, I had been excited for Episode VIII ever since Lucasfilm announced that Rian Johnson would be helming it. In contrast to J.J. Abrams' glossy, easy-going populist sensibility, Johnson was hardcore, deep-cut film nerd through-and-through. His first movie, Brick (2005), was a neo-noir set in a version of contemporary suburbia in which every high schooler talks like they're a character in a Dashiell Hammett novel. His biggest project prior to landing the Star Wars gig was Looper (2012), a time-travel actioner in which Joseph Gordon-Levitt wears facial prosthetics to play a young Bruce Willis tasked with killing his future self.
What I'm saying is that Rian Johnson is every bit the geeky, unpredictable eccentric that George Lucas is. His movies are off-kilter and mischievous. This makes him perfectly suited to a trilogy's middle picture, which is a chance to explore character flaws and to twist the proverbial knife in ways a first film is too busy setting up plot points to manage. Besides, Disney and Lucasfilm seemed to had gotten the message that many fans had felt The Force Awakens played it too safe. Virtually every behind-the-scenes reel and interview pushed the angle that this time, fans and audiences would be surprised by the choices the story would take.
My optimism was only buoyed when early word of mouth and the first reviews started trickling in, with the consensus seeming to be that it was a surprising, thoughtful examination of themes that ran throughout the series, and which happened to be gorgeous, to boot.
My girlfriend and I left for the theater on opening Thursday night to meet up with a group of fan friends who've made an event out of seeing new Star Wars together since the prequels. Arriving at the theater, I took note of the makeshift red carpet experience that management had set up out front. Someone had contributed a life-size, remote-controlled R2-D2 that was beeping and interacting with the crowd. A little girl dressed as Rey was marvelling at Artoo. Her parents snapped a photo.
It struck me that she'll have that photo years from now, just as I have a videotaped news segment somewhere of myself and my dad at the 1997 Los Angeles Special Edition premiere of A New Hope. This was what the experience of Star Wars could be about — those memories, me with my friends here at the theater, part of a community in kindred spirit.
At showtime, the lights dimmed, the Lucasfilm logo came up and a hush settled over the crowd. It's a ritual— the collective silence during the epigraph "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…." unites the audience's attention, and delivers a sensory palette cleanser before John Williams' initial orchestral blast.
For the next two and a half hours, I was swept up in an encyclopedic assessment of the sights, sounds, and thematic motifs of Star Wars. Things that had felt for years like loose threads dangling in this shaggy-dog saga were sutured together, just as others were yanked apart with diabolical glee.
Thirty-five years after Luke suggested in Return of the Jedi that Leia would, in time, learn to use the Force — and in a final send-off to the recently deceased Carrie Fisher — the princess-general at last tapped into her latent powers onscreen.
Yoda's final, touching lesson for the aged Luke encapsulated what these movies are all about.
The opulence of Canto Bight laid bare the connections between wealthy industry and decades of galactic conflict, lending this movie some of Star Wars' most pointed commentary.
The throne room sequence wisely discarded of dead-weight villain Snoke, and gave us one of the most visually arresting sequences in the franchise.
The "Holdo Maneuver" sent a wave of audible gasps through the house.
Luke found a way to win the day without betraying the pacifist ideals he had embraced by the end of Return of the Jedi.
Every few minutes provided another potent image or line that I knew would go down as a memorable part of the cinematic Star Wars canon in my book.
I've said before that Star Wars is at its best when it's weird, and boy howdy, was there weirdness aplenty to be had.
Come on, Hasbro, give us the at-home green milk tiddy dispenser already.
I was relieved to see a Disney-era Star Wars movie stay so true to Lucas' sensibilities, while pairing them with a more consistent execution of craft than his own installments had managed to deliver.
Unlike The Force Awakens, which had been so preoccupied with trying to be Star Wars that it had forgotten to bring its own unique genre influences to the table, this movie bore the clear mark of its auteur's own inspirations. The meticulous composition and exaggerated kinetic motion of classic 1980s and '90s anime made their presence felt throughout The Last Jedi, a natural extension of the visual palette of Star Wars' homages. Now here was a movie that was moving Star Wars forward the right way, I thought.
Like some kind of space opera Vertigo, it took a familiar genre setup and then eschewed slick narrative economy for an unusual, unpredictable structure (four acts, in this case), happy to throw a wrench in how these kinds of movies are supposed to work. But for all its film-school high-mindedness, it didn't forget the need, at its heart, for core emotional accessibility. This was still a fairy tale.
In short, it exceeded nearly every one my expectations, bundling up the totality of Star Wars' themes and tones across forty years into one climactic statement which also swept the chessboard clean for something new. (Whether Episode IX follows through on that promise to break the cycle and re-imagine the future remains to be seen — though I have my doubts. The Rise of Skywalker certainly looks to be more of a greatest-hits curtain call reprise than any kind of conceptual successor to this movie. Whatever; I'll always have TLJ's mic drop.)
The following day, I was still replaying the movie's best moments in my mind. But online, something was souring. Plenty of my fellow Criterion-collecting, Dissolve expat peers seemed to agree that they'd just watched the best Star Wars since The Empire Strikes Back, yet across social media, a maelstrom of nerd fury was only beginning to ignite.
The complaints were numerous — that this movie ruined Luke Skywalker, turning him from hero to depressive zero; that its script was an example of leftist, feminist propaganda; that the Canto Bight sequence served no purpose; that Admiral Holdo's hyperspace kamikaze broke the logic of the rest of Star Wars; that Leia's flight through the vacuum of space looked silly; that dispensing of Snoke left a giant plot-hole and wrecked the delicate narrative arc of a trilogy. The list of grievances was long. Very, very long, and very loud.
Had we even watched the same movie?
Now, before I go any further, let me make clear that I'm not accusing everyone with a different opinion about The Last Jedi of being an antifeminist Nazi. And yes, it's a natural tendency to get defensive about something you love. But whether someone likes this movie, or any Star Wars movie, is truly beside the point for me. It made a billion dollars and certainly doesn't need me sticking up for it.
The issue, however, is that the loudest voices within this crusade had in common socially-regressive axes to grind, and they seemed to show up in every thread across the internet to disrupt the conversation and pick a fight. This went on not for days, not for weeks. It has now gone on for years. And it was personal: with social media making it easier than ever to send hate mail, they hurled insults at Rian Johnson, Lucasfilm head Kathleen Kennedy, and Daisy Ridley. Like Ridley, freshman cast member Kelly Marie Tran was chased off social media by the angry mob. Esquire neatly summarized the Year of Star Wars Fandom Hell in a piece penned in time for the one-year anniversary of The Last Jedi's release, when the maelstrom showed few signs of cooling.
This fight was only nominally about Star Wars, up until the point where it ceased to be about Star Wars. Inevitably, the veil would drop and the underlying grievance would make itself known. The discourse around Star Wars had, at some point between 2015 and 2017, become totally enmeshed within the highly polarized battle that we used to call the "culture wars." Ten years earlier, the so-called culture wars were mostly dredged up by stories about inadequately religious greetings on coffee cups, or whenever television acknowledged the existence of gay people. But eventually the term "culture wars" seemed to fall out of common usage, because imperceptibly, everything became a part of the culture war: that was now just popular culture, which itself had become a theater of unending ideological warfare.
A few months after The Last Jedi's release, vitriol seemed only to be ratcheting up, as part of a broader conversation over the representation of women and minorities in genre fare, which itself was just a part of a larger fight over what American culture is, and who it is for.
And that fight was like a fever that had spread throughout the body politic, all but impossible to avoid. The summer after the movie's release, an old friend I hadn't seen in years visited me at my home. We were both film students, having met as studio interns during our college years. We'd worked on shoots together and swapped screenplays for story notes. I had always respected his judgement and taste; he was no anonymous internet troll. We went out for dinner, and the conversation turned to The Last Jedi. He had so much disdain for the movie that he said it had turned him off to the whole franchise. I was surprised, but wanted to hear his take — if anyone could stake a reasonable case for why it was no good, I figured it would be him. To my disappointment, it didn't take long for him to issue his distaste for the outsized role of Laura Dern's Admiral Holdo. He parroted the line that Disney was trying to push a feminist agenda with many of the movie's moments. I pushed back, and I'll admit, I got pretty snippy.
I was a little embarrassed for letting myself get so worked up about one dumb fantasy movie, a thing that's arguably supposed to be an escapist retreat from the fraught world we live in. But then again, I knew damn well enough that this argument wasn't really about the movie with the space birds in it.
I still think a lot about that interaction. I've never seen any actively misogynistic behavior from him. But every one of us has fundamental, latent assumptions about the world which in turn form our own blind spots. We all have more growing to do.
In retrospect, we'd been talking across one another, engaging in a dialogue using the same words but with those words meaning something different to each of us. I wondered, had I just become too wrapped up in the semiotics of The Discourse?
Was I the one guilty of dragging Twitter garbage fire baggage into the real world, or was I just standing up for what I saw as the basic fairness needed for a democratic society to function healthily?
The fallout of all this made me want to step away from fandom, from the internet, and frankly, from Star Wars — for a little while, at least. I needed to reset. How had it all turned so ugly so fast?
Of course, in truth, nothing had soured overnight. The Last Jedi was a proxy war in a larger cultural conflict across the Anglosphere. The same dynamics that were at work here were present in the ascension of a sexual predator to the highest office in the land. They were present in the horror stories coming out of #MeToo. By 2017, it was as if the nation had turned over a stone and discovered a hive of bugs underneath, scurrying back into the shadows.
In retrospect, the online pop culture/popular arts space was one of the earliest arenas for the modern culture war. It finally reached its current tenor with the "Gamergate" controversy, a harassment campaign in the middle of the decade levied against women in the video game industry. Deadspin's Emma Carmichael wrote an article in October 2014 presciently titled, "The Future Of The Culture Wars Is Here, And It's Gamergate":
What we have in Gamergate is a glimpse of how these skirmishes will unfold in the future — all the rhetorical weaponry and siegecraft of an internet comment section brought to bear on our culture, not just at the fringes but at the center. What we're seeing now is a rehearsal, where the mechanisms of a toxic and inhumane politics are being tested and improved. Tomorrow's Lee Atwater will work through sock puppets on IRC. Tomorrow's Sister Souljah will get shouted down with rape threats. Tomorrow's Tipper Gore will make an inexplicably popular YouTube video. Tomorrow's Willie Horton ad will be an image macro, tomorrow's Borking a doxing, tomorrow's Moral Majority a loose coalition of DoSers and robo-petitioners and scat-GIF trolls — all of them working feverishly in service of the old idea that nothing should ever really change.
Gamergate soon spawned Comicsgate, which applied the same tactics of targeted intimidation to the comics publishing space. Both movements were magnets for regressive activism, providing a pipeline for reactionaries wielding social media like a cudgel and generating new audiences and sales for aggrieved fringe artists and commentators.
Two years earlier, The Force Awakens had garnered a preview of coming attractions, with complaints of Rey's character being a "Mary Sue," a fandom term whose original meaning had become corrupted to denote any female character with a degree of competency deemed implausible. The complaint was popularized by Hollywood enfant terrible Max Landis on Twitter. (Landis would later be accused of emotional and sexual abuse by eight women.)
By late 2016, the world had become fast acquainted with the Extremely Online fanboy, an archetypical node in a hive-mind of scum and villainy which stretched from the darkest corners of 4chan to the most visible trending topics on Twitter. (A Fast Company piece published last week, written by someone who was indoctrinated into the online alt-right at the age of 13, illustrates what was in the air at the time and the role social media has played in all this.)
By December 2017, when The Last Jedi was released, this was the new normal. The infrastructures for outrage generation, disinformation, and targeted abuse had been cemented. The companies controlling these platforms were unwilling or unable to do much about them.
Not parody, I promise.
Perhaps, then, it wasn't the content of The Last Jedi itself that left it open to this phenomenon. It was targeted for its prime real-estate within popular culture. There's always been money and attention to be had in generating outrage, and the Age of the Algorithm has turned this into a free-for-all for craven content mills and the idiots with nothing better to do than get swept up in their campaigns.
YouTube's discovery engine, in particular, seems aligned with perverse incentives that inevitably reward the most outrageous, offensive clickbait. Because Google knows I've watched video content about Star Wars, it consistently recommends Star Wars-based videos to me. Here, then, I present to you a selection of just some of what YouTube helpfully serves up to me every time I log on these days:
Uhhh, thanks, YouTube. I'll get right on watching all of those. (As an aside, check out the runtimes on some of those videos!)
YouTube in the post-TLJ era is fanning the flames of tabloid-style outrage agitprop with distressing political subtext. It's a real problem, and I'd be curious to know what discussions Lucasfilm is having about it internally. Anecdotally, I've heard from friends and Redditors who are teachers say that their students — mind you, kids in some cases eight, nine years old — are parroting the stuff they hear on these channels about "SJWs" ("Social Justice Warriors"), their brains already being pickled with a skewed anti-equality worldview. (Speaking of Reddit, the fandom became so divided that the platform has spawned the channels /r/SaltierThanCrait for those who wish to discuss their disapproval of the state of Star Wars without pesky SJWs spoiling the party, and /r/StarWarsCantina, a "fun, positive place to discuss, speculate, and talk about all things Star Wars" without every thread getting crashed by the haters.)
Note that, again, I'm not saying you can't legitimately take issue with this movie — I've had a fair number of people make reasonable arguments about things they don't like about it. I surmise that for some people, they prefer how a movie like The Force Awakens has a high degree of narrative "flow" — Abrams' movie is more lean-back: from scene to scene, it is structured to maximize an emotional and conceptual through-line which makes it easy to get swept up in and carried away by. By contrast, The Last Jedi operates more like modern serialized prestige television.
Think of how HBO hits like Game of Thrones and Westworld, or Showtime's incredible, vexing Twin Peaks limited series, require the viewer to lean forward and interrogate the work as it cross-cuts between disparate characters and plot threads and plays meta-games with audiences' expectations and understandings of theme and symbol. I suspect that a lot of Star Wars fans just don't want that in this series — they don't think it "feels" Star Warsy enough. But I bristle against how that puts the series in a box. If I wanted a movie that felt like A New Hope, I'd just watch A New Hope. The Star Wars galaxy is so big, so ripe with storytelling potential, I don't want to see it cut off at the knees just to follow the conventions that made sense nearly a half-century earlier when this thing was just getting started.
And if I'm sounding like some pro-TLJ militant who will brook no dissent, let me make clear that I've got a few nits of my own to pick with this turducken of a movie. I cringe at the scene late in the movie where Rose kisses Finn and tells him they're gonna win this thing by saving what they love. I think it's played too hokey, even for Star Wars. I always loathe nonsensical visual shorthands, like the diagram of Snoke's capital ship that shows exactly where the Supremacy's hyperspace tracker is — there's no reason the Resistance would have access to that kind of information. I also think the assault on Crait is too derivative of the Battle of Hoth in Empire: I don't understand why the First Order has to begin their walker assault on the Crait base from so far away, when the Resistance base doesn't appear to have the same kind of giant anti-spacecraft artillery the Hoth base did. And I could really do without the battering ram tank and its "miniaturized Death Star tech." I continue to have misgivings about the overall uninspired production design of the Sequel Trilogy, but a lot of that is just Johnson's film being boxed in by the choices The Force Awakens already made.
However, these are small (and tedious) complaints, in the face of so much that's sharp and true to the spirit of this enterprise. More importantly, even if I thought The Last Jedi really, really sucked, I wouldn't throw my hat in with a bunch of neo-Nazis, trolls, and woman-haters to prove it.
This whole affair has been symptomatic of a deeply unreasonable strain of thought that's nothing new to American politics and culture, one that's suspicious of any degree of introspection and opposed to social progress.
Old hat though it may be, it has flared up in new and menacing ways in recent years, as the promulgators of clickbait have learned how to push and pull our reptilian levers more effectively than ever. Today, it's clear we ought to turn to the true lessons and values that Star Wars has been meditating on for the better part of a half-century— patience, democratic egalitarianism, and above all else, love for one another. And we're definitely not gonna find any of those at the bottom of a YouTube playlist calculated to generate maximum emotional arousal and cortisol production.
So my advice, at the conclusion of this ten-week retrospective, is that when we all go out and pack the theaters for the presumptive finale of the Skywalker Saga next week, just let go. Find your inner Jedi and allow a damn experience to enter you for a change, rather than having to rush head-long to the nearest keyboard to be the first one with the hottest take. Let's log off and sit with our own feelings for a few days, before jumping back into the fray of our maddening, never-ending global cultural discourse. I promise you, it'll be worth it.
[UPDATE 3/29/2020: I've written a Rise of Skywalker end cap to this series, so go read it!]
Well, that's it! The retrospective series has reached it conclusion ahead of next week's release of Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker. In advance of it, here's a recap supercut I put together, summarizing the story so far across each of the Star Wars theatrical releases to date:
And if you liked this, check out my video essay on the Galaxy Far, Far Away, Let's Get Drunk and Talk About 'Star Wars':
I'm Giovanni Iacobucci, a filmmaker and author based in Los Angeles. Visit www.modmythmedia.com for more information on my novel trilogy, Bridgetown, and my feature film, West Coast Gothic.
Media producer, director of the movie "West Coast Gothic," and author of the Bridgetown series. Sans-serif fonts have ruined my last name.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


New initiatives involving the use and implementation of technology are being put into place in many school systems across the country to help students acquire needed 21st century skills (Grady, 2011). The purpose of this study of the implementation of one-to-one devices was to examine school leaders' perceptions of changes in their leadership practices, teachers' instructional practices, and student engagement. A member of the central office staff and five elementary principals were asked to provide perceptions on the implementation process with their staff. School leaders also provided perceptions on how teachers were led to facilitate instruction while using devices. This study consisted of an interview with five elementary principals as well as a member of the central office staff who oversaw implementation. The school leaders' individual interview responses were analyzed and the data, based on their perspectives, were examined. The results of this study indicated that student collaboration, student-centered learning, diverse learning needs of students, and students' familiarity with technology were factors that influence students in a one-to-one device environment. Finding the right digital tool, instructional planning, teacher as facilitator, professional development, and parallel modeling and learning on behalf of the principal to all be important factors to consider for one-to-one device implementation. The results may influence the implementation of one-to-one technology programs for this and other school divisions as well as school leaders.


The clash between Texas Central Partners and landowners touch upon the state's urban vs. rural debate.
A high-speed train in Japan.
If you started in Houston and headed northwest, all the way to Dallas, you wouldn't find too many physical obstacles – the 240 miles between them is almost empty country.
Texas Central Partners wants to build a high-speed rail line connecting the two. For them, the rights of private property owners along the route constitute thousands of potential invisible barriers. The company has already sued more than a dozen property owners in order to get access to their land.
Tuesday, Texas Central Partners announced that it was dropping many of these lawsuits and instead preferred an "open dialogue" approach.
Brandon Formby, reporter for the Texas Tribune, says that the announcement marks an effort to remove some of the controversy surrounding the project.
The group Texans Against High-Speed Rail, however, believes Texas Central Partners is pursuing a new strategy because the company doesn't think it would receive a favorable outcome in court.
Railroads within the state can claim eminent domain in order to seize private property for public use. Although it's a private company, Texas Central Partners has asserted that it could use this power as a last resort measure.
The clash between Texas Central Partners and property owners also touches upon a larger issue: the urban versus rural divide in the state.
Farmers and ranchers along the route fear that the train will make it harder to move cattle and livestock and that it could interrupt local transportation.


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City of Davenport looking to update flood plan after historic flooding
Posted 9:40 pm, June 4, 2019, by Katherine Bauer, Updated at 09:48PM, June 4, 2019
DAVENPORT, Iowa-- The Davenport mayor, aldermen and other leaders say it's time to start updating the city's flood plan as the Mississippi River recedes. The first step is creating a new task force.
"There is a discussion on what we protect, how we protect moving forward," Alderman Mike Matson says. "We need to have the discussion with a lot of partners as soon as we can so we don't let this get away from us. We need to do this now."
The task force will include people who live, work and visit the riverfront in downtown Davenport.
"We realize that we're gonna live with the river," Alderman Rich Clewell says. "We don't want big floodwalls here. We're gonna live with the river."
During a city meeting Tuesday, May 4, elected and city officials discussed the options for flood mitigation, including green spaces, barriers, and wetlands.
"I have ideas," Maton says. "You probably have ideas. You can walk down the street. Let's hear those ideas. Let's get those people together."
Part of updating the city's comprehensive flood plan includes assessing the breached floodwall on Pershing Avenue. The Army Corps of Engineers will finish assessing the flood wall breach once the Mississippi has receded more.
"We will come back stronger and be better because of this 2019 flood," Alderman Kyle Gripp says. "It's just kind of hard to see that right now because we're in the thick of it."
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Two Security Companies Rebrand; Ditch, Change Names
Archived ArticlesBy Aimee Rhodes January 8, 2014 Leave a comment
Two publicly traded technology companies have separately announced name changes this week. On Monday, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich said that McAfee Security, which Intel acquired for $7.6 Billion in 2010, will become Intel Security, but will retain the familiar red shield. "The complexity of keeping digital identities safe grows as mobile applications and devices become…
Beyond Microsoft Active Directory
Archived ArticlesBy Bob Tarzey January 8, 2014 Leave a comment
Embedded in all Microsoft Windows server operating systems and in its Azure platform as a service offering is Active Directory; a store of information about all the objects and their attributes that are active within a given Windows network domain. This includes printers, network devices, hardware servers and, most importantly, users. This storage of user…
Thoughts on Boycotting the RSA Conference
Archived ArticlesBy Richard Stiennon January 7, 2014 Leave a comment
[Full disclosure: As an industry analyst I conduct business with RSA, the security division of EMC, including white papers and recording videos of key executives and customers.] Update Jan 12, 2014: The Guardian reports that privacy rights groups are petitioning Stephan Colbert to boycott the RSA Conference. My reaction to the several calls that have been made by well-respected security researchers, most notably…
Schneier Joins Co3 Systems as CTO
Security incident handling software company, Co3 Systems, announced today that Bruce Schneier had joined the company as CTO. Schneier is a highly regarded author and cryptographer who writes frequently on topics of privacy and security. Recently he was called on to help interpret documents revealed by Edward Snowden that uncovered the NSA's subversion of a NIST…
Will FireEye's Acquisition Strategy Work?
Most of the press and preliminary analysis of the FireEye acquisition of Mandiant has been exuberant. The New York Times got to break the news just after the first of the New Year although the deal closed December 30, 2013. Of course the coverage contained the usual predictions of industry consolidation. This is not a consolidation play,…
Growing Boycott of RSA Conference 2014
[Full disclosure: As an industry analyst I conduct business with RSA, the security division of EMC, including white papers and recording videos of key executives and customers.] It began with a Reuters story from Joe Menn: Exclusive: Secret contract tied NSA and security industry pioneer in which it was disclosed that RSA, the crypto pioneer and security…
FireEye Acquires Mandiant in $1.05 Billion Deal
Threat protection vendor FireEye announced on Thursday that it had acquired security incident response provider Mandiant in a cash and stock deal worth more than $1 billion based on the current value of FireEye shares. The acquisition, which closed on Monday but only was publicly announced after the markets closed on Thursday, was one of the biggest…
The Increasing Mobility Threat to IT Security
Any organization that has not already started to think about the impact mobility has on IT security should start doing so this year. 63% of businesses provide formal access to some of their business applications to mobile users, a Quocirca research report "Digital Identities and the Open Business," showed. Furthermore, the sheer ubiquity of mobile devices and…
The Role of Emotion in the Target Breach
Archived ArticlesBy Mike Saurbaugh January 1, 2014 Leave a comment
"It's the most emotional tiiiimmme of the yeeeaaar"… The holidays, filled with emotion. There's so much going on – from travel, to shopping, to family gatherings, and of course the mad rush to finish out the year's office workload. For many, it's super stressful, which can bring on a wave of holiday-time emotion. One thing often…
IT Security Industry Has a New Adversary
Archived ArticlesBy Richard Stiennon December 30, 2013 Leave a comment
My coverage of the NSA's massive data gathering and attacks on fundamental security technology has been focused on the expected impact on the IT security industry. I was one of the first to publish trepidation a day after the first Snowden report (NSA Surveillance Threatens US Competitiveness, June 7, 2013) and again a week later…


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Travel bloggers killed in 800-foot fall at Yosemite
YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK -- Yosemite National Park Rangers have identified two people who died after falling from Taft Point.
National Park Service officials say 29-year old Vishnu Viswanath and 30-year old Meenakshi Moorthy died on Wed., Oct. 24.
Both were citizens of India who had been living in the United States.
RELATED: 2 die after falling from overlook in Yosemite National Park
Officials say the two fell approximately 800 feet in an area with steep terrain. Their bodies were recovered the next afternoon by Park Rangers, who had to use technical climbing and rappelling techniques to reach the location.
A California Highway Patrol helicopter was also called in for assistance.
The couple has an Instagram account where they have been posting pictures of their travels across the United States. In one image, Moorthy can be seen sitting on the edge of the Grand Canyon and in the caption mentions the danger of standing so close to the side to capture the image.
It's not clear yet how the couple fell from Taft Point in Yosemite.
A male and female visitor died in an apparent fall from Taft Point in Yosemite National Park. Park rangers are recovering the bodies this morning. This incident is under investigation and no further details are available. https://t.co/wTm1IadB79
— Yosemite National Park (@YosemiteNPS) October 25, 2018
SEE ALSO: Couple found in viral engagement photo at Yosemite
yosemite national parkyosemite national parkfatal fallblogu.s. & world
10-year-old is youngest to ever climb Yosemite's El Capitan
Teen fell to death in Yosemite trying to take photo
Yosemite's famous 'firefall' returns
Couple killed in Yosemite fall was intoxicated, autopsy says


Invited guests can enjoy first opportunity to view, and purchase, works of art on exhibit at the fair, while supporting a good cause.
The beneficiaries for this first edition of ICAFair will be Hait arts non-profits. The selected organizations will be announced in the fall.
Thursday, December 6, 2012, 6 - 9 p.m.
ICAFair has invited a local band to play for your pleasure and entertainment.
If you would like to receive an invitation to the Preview Night Benefit, please send us a message.


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NextIsabel Huggan London 1966
first West London Air Terminal
Isabel Huggan's piece (Footloose) about living in London in 1966 and travelling around the Continent mentioned the West London Air Terminal. Because no rail connection to Heathrow was built until 1977, the air terminal on Cromwell Road was the point of departure for passengers leaving from London on British European Airways, unless they were flying out of Croyden. The terminal was built over the period from 1955 to 1963, beginning with a concrete platform over rails and a short-life prefab building clad with mahogany panels. This two-storey building was later (1962-1963) either joined or replaced by a ten-storey one, built on stilts over London Transport's Gloucester Road Underground junction. The new building was also the headquarters of British European Airways. Officially opened on 6 November 1963, it was the main London terminal until 1973. Before it was finished, however, the West London Air Terminal had up to 25,000 passengers passing through daily by 1960.
2nd West London Air Terminal under construction — note rails bottom right
I gleaned this information from a heavy book at the local history section of my library: Survey of London Volume XLII, pages 337-338. The author went on to talk about tourism and hotels. South Kensington had had an increase in private boarding houses and residential hotels during the period between the world wars. At least one of these was demolished for the construction of the air terminal. But the rest benefitted from the presence of all those tourists passing through. According to the Survey, the Development of Tourism Act of 1969 gave hoteliers a subsidy per bedroom for new accommodations. So old hotels were revived and new ones built. The London Tara hotel and the London International hotel were built on railway land; the latter was completed in 1972 with room for 850.
Are you wondering how the air passengers got from Cromwell Road to Heathrow? By bus. Coaches with 37 seats were replaced in 1965 by double deckers that sat 57 and had trailers behind for the luggage. And what else did this wave of tourism require? A new road. The M4 motorway was completed at the end of 1964.
The terminal was terminated (not sure of the exact date it was closed completely). British European Airways was absorbed by British Airways in 1974. British Airways occupied the upper floors of the terminal building until 1985. In 1983 the grocery store chain Sainsbury's opened in the western half of the terminal building. There is still a Sainsbury's at the corner of Cromwell Road and Gloucester Road.
Today, those departing from central London can get to Heathrow by the London Underground, by the Express train from Paddington, or by the National Express coach from Victoria station.
I am not mad keen on transport hubs or architectural history. But for this I make an exception, wondering how many Canadian writers came and went this way. Did Richler and Laurence come into central London to depart or did they find other ways to the airport? How many other young writers arrived via the Cromwell Road and stayed in cheap digs nearby? And before air travel, which dock did our Canadian writers sail from?
I couldn't find a picture of the cafe mentioned by Huggan, but I found this poor quality photo of the terminal restaurant with long tables, in the library's ephemera file.
West London Air Terminal restaurant
A much better article than mine: Forgotten Buildings: the West London Air Terminal by Dave Walker of the RBKC library (rbkclocalstudies)
Air Travel in the 60s (retrowow)
And now for your listening pleasure, the British Airways theme tune Lakme (once on the Howard Blake page, click on LakmeFull to listen)
Posted in: London
Tagged in: air travel, Isabel Huggan, West London Air Terminal
2018 – Canadian Writers Abroad December 31, 2017 at 08:58
[…] West London Air Terminal […]
Finstrum Nairobi March 12, 2014 at 13:10
I remember leaving London from that terminal in 1977
Isabel Huggan London 1966


"In the 1860s, western alienation began at Yonge Street, and George Brown was the Preston Manning of the day." So begins Christopher Moore's fascinating 1990s look at the messy, dramatic, crisis-ridden process that brought Canada into being - and at the politicians, no more lovable or united than our own, who, against all odds, managed to forge a deal that worked.
From the first chapter, he turns a fresh, perceptive, and lucid eye on the people, the issues, and the political theories of Confederation - from John A. Macdonald's canny handling of leadership to the invention of federalism and the Senate, from the Quebec question to the influence of political philosophers Edmund Burke and Walter Bagehot.
This is a book for all Canadians who love their country - and fear for it after the failure of the constitution-making of the 1990s. Here is a clear, entertaining reintroduction to the ideas and processes that forged the nation.
View other Christopher Moore titles like "1867: How the Fathers Made a Deal"
Write a customer review of 1867: How the Fathers Made a Deal.


text:
Why Should Anyone Care About The UN? The UN Forum 2014
Natasha Holcroft-Emmess - 15th July 2014
It may not feel like the UN has an impact on your daily life, but it certainly has a part to play in your future.
The UN Forum 2014, orchestrated by the United Nations Association-UK on 28 June, was the largest public event on the United Nations in recent decades. UN representatives explained to the public how the international organisation attempts to grapple with the most formidable challenges of our time.
The first debate asked: why should anyone care about the UN? Empirical data provided by YouGov has recently indicated that the UK public is not engaged with foreign affairs: many considered foreign aid ineffective or a luxury that we simply cannot afford. A lack of efficient communication about the benefits of the UN's work added to this general indifference.
But why should we care? Here's one reason: global problems affect everyone locally to some extent. Floods on the other side of the world mean crops fail, and the price of everything goes up. People flee oppression in their own state and immigration rises elsewhere. People are too busy lamenting the symptoms and forget to look at the cause. These are transnational issues, requiring a transnational response.
Another trend revealed that the general public believes UK spending on foreign aid is too great, especially during a period of austerity. Many thought we spend too much, but few knew the statistics. The UK recently hit the Millennium Development Goal of spending 0.7% of the Gross National Income on foreign aid. But this achievement was kept quiet, lest it fuel the anger of introspective backbench politicians. We need to stop thinking about international aid as a luxury or a moral choice, but as a legal duty on wealthy countries and a good investment in the world's future.
The puzzle of human rights universality was also briefly addressed. Some consider the UN's global goals to be unattainable in the face of such diversity in norms and customs around the world. The argument that human rights standards do and ought to differ geographically, however tempting and easy it would be to accept, should not be our approach. The value which the UN brings to the problem of achieving universality is the collective global weight which it can lend to address a particular problem. Take a few examples: child marriage, child soldiers, forced labour – the UN is uniquely placed to set minimum international standards of human rights.
The three other debates varied in focus. One asked whether nuclear weapons keep us safe, or whether the catastrophic consequences of detonation around the world justify nuclear disarmament. There is no doubt that these weapons have the potential to decimate the planet. But the only real hope for disarmament is for the most powerful countries to disband their nuclear weapons programmes.
Another debate asked whether the responsibility to protect (R2P) is an appropriate means of response to humanitarian crises. All international uses of force, even those for ostensibly humanitarian purposes, must be viewed with deep suspicion and only ever justified in circumstances of the utmost necessity. The value of the R2P is that it is narrowly constructed and ought to remain so. It is submitted that the Permanent Members' (P5) power of veto is also nowadays difficult to justify, and the P5 ought to reserve its application to the most fundamental questions of military intervention.
The final debate asked whether our approach to development is flawed. The majority of those present believed that the goal of addressing global poverty ought to be granted the highest priority. It must be borne in mind that by our inaction we condemn millions of people around the world to malnutrition, disease and death. We can remedy these dire straits by supporting the work of the UN and its associates, the World Heath Organisation and UNICEF. They provide famine relief, refugee aid and respond to health epidemics, most recently the Ebola virus outbreak in Africa. We are the first generation which could see an end to global poverty. It is a choice we make to allow it to continue, and that fact is difficult to live with.
It may not feel like the UN has an impact on your daily life, but it certainly has a part to play in your future, and the future of our planet. Let us reconsider our localised way of thinking and unite again in the common cause of enhancing conditions for all within our international community.
Natasha Holcroft-Emmess is currently studying for the LPC. She has recently completed the BCL with distinction and is a frequent contributor to the Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog.
Natasha Holcroft-Emmess, "Why Should Anyone Care About The UN? The UN Forum 2014," (OxHRH Blog, 15 July 2014) <http://humanrights.dev3.oneltd.eu/?p=12097> [date of access].


Affirmations of Love when contacting us.
An Affirmations of Love, also known as a Commitment Ceremony, is an alternative to the traditional marriage in which a couple is living together in a free relationship. Every aspect of the ceremony can be identical to a typical wedding … only difference is you do not have to obtain a marriage license nor is any documentation filed within the courts.
There are many different reasons, (legal or personal) that a couple may choose to have this type of ceremony performed.
You may choose from any one of our packages to express your devotion for each other. This ceremony is saying to everyone ... "we love each other, we are committed, but don't need a piece of paper to prove it!"


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Massive, Decades-Long Study Reveals Once Again That There Is No Link Between Vaccines And Autism
March 06 | 2019
Artyom Geodakyan\TASS via Getty Images
Get ready, everyone. Here's the validation that you anticipated.
A study of more than 650,000 people in Denmark found no link between being vaccinated against measles, mumps, and rubella and developing autism. The study is the largest of its kind and discounts a tiny study "published more than 20 years ago that has since been expunged from the medical literature," according to one report.
This is a comprehensive study which shows the MMR vaccine does not cause autism. How about we make this go viral? https://t.co/tYoGKYv8mc
— Sheera Frenkel (@Sheera Frenkel)1551762327.0
The results, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, was conducted by researchers at the Statens Serum Institut in Copenhagen, give us insight into the scope of this study, which involved 657,461 Danish children born between 1999 and 2010. Some of the researchers involved in this study published an earlier article on this same topic in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2002. That study based its data from 537,303 Danish children born between 1991 and 1998.
According to Anders Hviid, one of the researchers involved in the study, conducting similar research was important because the concerns from a very vocal minority that there could be a link between vaccines and autism is as present as ever.
"The idea that vaccines cause autism is still going around. And the anti-vaxx movement, if anything, has perhaps only grown stronger over the last 15 years. The trend that we're seeing is worrying."
Hviid notes that the size of the study allowed researchers to investigate other claims that are made about MMR vaccine, such as a rather common one: That children already considered "at risk" for developing autism could develop the condition by receiving the vaccine. The same argument has also been made in cases of children who have autistic siblings.
Guess what? No connection. At all.
As Hviid and his co-authors wrote:
"We found no support for the hypothesis of increased risk for autism after MMR vaccination in … Danish children; no support for the hypothesis of MMR vaccination triggering autism in susceptible subgroups characterized by environmental and familial risk factors; and no support for a clustering of autism cases in specific time periods after MMR vaccination."
If you're wondering how such nonsense began, you have Andrew Wakefield to thank.
Wakefield is a discredited former British gastroenterologist who was the lead author of a fraudulent research paper claiming that there was a link between MMR vaccine and autism and bowel disease.
In fact, this latest study found that MMR vaccine decreases the risk of autism in certain subgroups, dealing yet another blow to Wakefield's "work."
media3.giphy.com
That's a relief, right? You bet.
My favorite thing about the new autism/vaccine study was that it actually found that in many subgroups vaccination… https://t.co/RIoW0mHPuw
— Health Nerd (@Health Nerd)1551820511.0
🚨A massive study of 657,461 children, in which 6,517 kids were diagnosed with #autism, shows that kids who received… https://t.co/OU6oHDl2Lr
— Dr. Dena Grayson (@Dr. Dena Grayson)1551794038.0
Again: MMR Vaccines Don't Cause Autism Now confirmed by biggest study of 657,461 Danish children. Remarkably, MMR v… https://t.co/5IJyDGQd4F
— Bjorn Lomborg (@Bjorn Lomborg)1551777438.0
A major decade-long study has found there is no link between the Measles-Mumps-Rubella vaccine and autism. Examined… https://t.co/9lOpRyVbpK
— C. S. Prakash (@C. S. Prakash)1551749809.0
This news comes as reports of the consequences of anti-vaccination rhetoric continue to roll in. At this very moment, the United States is grappling with six separate measles outbreaks. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention noted that there were 206 cases reported in January and February. That amount is higher than all of the measles cases reported during 2017.
Get out there and vaccinate your kids, people! Science has spoken!


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Osiedle Jagiellońskie – osiedle mieszkaniowe leżące w dwóch jednostkach obszarowych Systemu Informacji Miejskiej (SIM) Osiedle Jagiellońskie i Osiedle Powstań Narodowych, należących do większej jednostki obszarowej SIM Rataje, na terenie jednostki pomocniczej miasta Osiedle Rataje.

Struktura i historia
Zabudowę osiedla stanowią dwadzieścia cztery budynki wielorodzinne pięciokondygnacyjne posiadającymi dwie, pięć, sześć lub siediem klatek schodowych i jeden wysokościowiec osiemnastokondygnacyjny. Na osiedlu przy ulicy Piłsudskiego 2 stoi również bamberski dom Rothów. Pierwsze budynki mieszkalne osiedla oddano do użytku w 1969. Osiedle graniczy z osiedlami: Oświecenia, Powstań Narodowych, Rzeczypospolitej i Piastowskim.

Ulice
Granice osiedla wyznaczają następujące ulice:
 ul. Bolesława Krzywoustego
 ul. Ludwika Zamenhofa
 ul. Dolska

Na obszarze osiedla mieszczą się ulice:
 ul. Obrzyca (częściowo)
 ul. Wyzwolenia (częściowo)
 ul. Piłsudskiego (częściowo) (dawna nazwa: Wioślarska od ul. Zamenhofa do ul. Śremskiej i Ostrowska od ul. Śremskiej do ul. Jedności Słowiańskiej (obecna nazwa: Żegrze))

Handel i usługi

 zespół pawilonów handlowo-usługowych
 targowisko "Rynek Jagielloński"

Gastronomia
Na osiedlu działają dwa lokale gastronomiczne (bar i pizzeria).

Oświata
 Szkoła podstawowa nr 2 im. "Szarych Szeregów", os. Jagiellońskie nr 128
 Przedszkole nr 9 "Zbyszka i Jagienki", os. Jagiellońskie nr 9

Kultura
Dom Kultury "Jagiellonka", os. Jagiellońskie nr 120, w którym istniało do początku lat dziewięćdziesiątych kino o tej samej nazwie.

Sztuka

Na osiedlu znajduje się pomnik stulecia Polskiego Związku Wędkarskiego i dwie rzeźby plenerowe. Pierwsza z nich, "Pokój", stoi blisko bloku o nr 35-41 i wyrzeźbiona została przez Czesława Woźniaka w roku 1974. Druga z nich, "W przestrzeni", autorstwa Anny Krzymańskiej znajduje się przed blokiem o nr 62-66.

Komunikacja
Osiedle Jagiellońskie posiada połączenie komunikacyjne MPK autobusowe: 152, 162, 166, 181, 196 i 212 oraz 222 (przystanek Piłsudskiego na ulicy Piłsudskiego), 174, 184, 211, 212, 221, 222 (przystanek Rondo Rataje na ulicy Zamenhofa), 174, 184, 211, 221 (przystanek Wioślarska na tej samej ulicy),  174, 184, 211, 221 (przystanek Osiedle Piastowskie również na tej samej ulicy), 220, 231 (przystanek Osiedle Jagiellońskie na ulicy Bolesława Krzywoustego) oraz tramwajowe linii: 7, 9, 12, 13, (przystanki Rondo Rataje, Wioślarska i Osiedle Piastowskie).

Zobacz też
 wieżowce w Poznaniu

Przypisy

Bibliografia
 Maria Paradowska, Poznań. Zabytki bamberskie, Wydawnictwo Miejskie, Poznań, 2008, ss.28-36,

Linki zewnętrzne
 Osiedle Jagiellońskie na stronie osiedlemlodych.pl
 Mapy osiedla Jagiellońskiego
 Galeria rzeźb plenerowych na Osiedlu Rzeczypospolitej i Osiedlu Jagiellońskim na stronie fotopoznan.blogspot.com

Rataje (Poznań)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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ADAMS PLEASED TO RETURN TO TRAINING FIELD AFTER BUSY FIXTURE PERIOD
Derek Adams is pleased to "get the group back together" on the training field after a busy period of fixtures last week.
The Shrimps host Mansfield Town on Saturday afternoon after back to back away fixtures at Walsall and Cheltenham on Tuesday and Saturday respectively.
With the absence of a Tuesday evening fixture and Adams' side at home on the coming weekend, the Shrimps boss can enjoy a rare full week on the training pitch.
"We had a busy week last week," Adams said.
"We had a good victory at Walsall midweek and then travelled to Cheltenham at the weekend.
"This week on the training field allows us to get the group back together.
"When you're playing games all the time it's about recovery more than anything else, but this week it's about getting the players prepared for Mansfield on Saturday.
We're topping up the ones that need extra fitness work and fine-tuning the ones who've been in the team.
"John O'Sullivan has come back into the group after being off for a little while and Ryan Cooney will hopefully be back in training by the end of this week.
"We also have Harvey Bradbury who obviously came with us to Cheltenham. It's his first week of full training so it's good for him to see how we work and get to know the boys a bit better."
Derek Adams


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By Hadley Reynolds Principal Analyst of NextEra Research
What happens when AI meets a pandemic?
In an opinion piece in The New York Times written just as the novel coronavirus pandemic was taking off in New York City, author David Brooks used the phrase "plague eyes" to describe the radically new perspective that had begun to inject itself into the consciousness of everyone facing the unprecedented health threat.
One of the things worth turning those eyes toward is the challenge of accessing trustworthy information at a time when new problems call for fast and far-reaching decisions from government politicians and bureaucrats, enterprise executives, healthcare leaders, small business owners, and individual families. At the time Brooks' column was written, there was confusing and contradictory information coming out of the healthcare agencies, the Trump administration, the Chinese government, the mainstream media, the European media, and the media of the right, to name a few sources of real and alternative fact.
What is clear
This is what we can see clearly after some months of reading, watching, and listening to the pronouncements on the crisis from around the globe: Content challenges continue to dog AI. For example, should AI be able to create its own channel of authoritative information so that both fake-news people and alternative-facts people can access "unvarnished" truths? There has been more than enough time to realize that even the most sophisticated AI simply can't offer the kind of discrimination that would make such an automatic and authoritative channel possible. This, of course, is partly because AI is challenged to self-regulate its algorithms' operations over time. And it is also because it has no ability to anticipate novel facts and events such as those posed by this virus and weave them into a coherent narrative context.
One of the prominent stories illustrating the AI content problem involves Facebook. The story highlights the fraught balance that internet giants face between the limited but proven abilities of humans in the world of digital content and the impressive but wild capabilities of machine learning programs designed to support or back up the human workers.
Human judgment
In the information-poor early days of the spread of the virus in the U.S., Facebook decided to send hundreds of its content monitors—those humans whose job it is to review the posts and pictures on its site for objectionable content—home to shelter in place for safety reasons. Wired magazine estimates that human content monitors amount to some 15,000 people at Facebook and its third-party contractors, and that many of their key functions cannot be accomplished in a working-from-home environment for security and other reasons.
From an operations strategy point of view, Facebook had decided that it would rely on its machine learning-based content-reviewing algorithms to take up the slack for the dramatic reduction in human resources—and is this not the kind of future that many AI proponents have been embracing? We shouldn't need so many humans making routine decisions that can be carried out by machines, should we? Shouldn't machine learning be as quick and accurate as humans in reading posts and comments?


Address: 125 East 7th St.
Spawned from the popular dessert truck that originally hit the streets back in '09, the Big Gay Ice Cream Shop has truly come into its own, offering classic soft serve with creative toppings served by fun, good people.
I ordered the very popular Bea Arthur. The inner cone is lined with dulce de leche then filled with the vanilla soft serve, which is then injected with dulce de leche and covered all over with 'nilla wafers.
Every single bite of the top portion of the ice cream insures you taste the creamy but dense soft serve and carefully implanted dulce de leche. The wafer provides great texture and crunch. There's a pleasant surprise at the bottom of the cone, but that's for you to find out. The pinch of salt in the dulce de leche is phenomenal.
The humongous serving size is great for the price point, too.


Ok I had to put up post up of our little "mauzy" puppy! When I was applying for college I applied everywhere but BYU. Since both my parents went there they were really bummed out I hadn't applied. So my mom came to me with a proposition. If I applied to BYU and got in she would get me a puppy!!
It is pretty obvious that I got into BYU and the bonus of that was Snicker's!! At first my mom did not want a dog but you should see these two now!! They are the best of buddies!! We love our Snickies!!


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Home / Our news and views / The three Baltic states can't confront the Russian bear on their own
The three Baltic states can't confront the Russian bear on their own
Security: Baltic Air Defence
By AVA KHAVARI, with BROOKS TIGNER
BRUSSELS – Military mobility, budgetary burden-sharing and deterrence led allied talks in the months leading up to NATO's 11-12 July Summit here in Brussels, with the budget issue dominating the Summit once again. Yet a more tangible security matter has been inching closer to the allies, requiring their close attention and a workable large-scale solution.
Since NATO's 2016 decision to lay down enhance forward presence (eFP) along its eastern flank as a reaction to the Russian annexation of Crimea, the Baltics states have emerged as the frontline for detecting and deterring a potential Russian threat.
Lying at the interface between the alliance and Russia, the Baltic states' geography also thrusts them into the unwanted frontline position of being the first to identify and react to a Russian attack. Not only is tighter coordination among the three small states needed, they also lack the capacity to react to Russian threats, particularly in the crucial domain of air defence.
This is all the more worrisome in view of Russia's steady build-up of its Western Military District's offences which no doubt would exploit the Baltics' weak points, such as using the Suwalki Corridor and Russia's strongholds in Kaliningrad and Belarus to isolate the region in the case of an offensive manoeuver.
In a report published in July 2018 by the Washington DC-based Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), the latter underlines the importance of securing the Suwalki Corridor. It typifies the corridor as a "box" that connects allies Poland and Lithuania to Russia's client state Belarus and its enclave at Kaliningrad – a strategic military artery exploited since Napoleonic times.
Russia's militarisation of its western district is a clear indication of Moscow's appreciation of the Suwalki factor. According to CEPA, Russia will have stationed close to 15,000 soldiers near the corridor, in Kaliningrad, by 2020.
While the Kremlin will argue that Russia's growing military presence in the district and Kaliningrad is simply a reaction to NATO's eFP, it resembles more a new "stab, grab and hold" strategy that Russia perfected during its contemporary operations in Georgia, Syria and Crimea, observes the CEPA report.
"This operational approach is calibrated to evade the traditional mechanisms that undergird NATO's strategy of collective defence. And while hybrid war is not new, Russia's evolving way of war is radically different from the all-out conflict that allied planners had previously prepared," it observes.
The CEPA report also addresses the consistent Russian pattern of violating Baltic airspace, further demonstrating the need for the Baltic states to fill the gaps in their air defence capabilities.
Those gaps are laid out in detail in another report, published in May 2018, by the International Centre for Defence and Security (ICDS) in Tallinn. According to the latter, Baltic air defence lacks adequate command, control, computer and communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (C4ISR) capabilities and suffers deficiencies in ground-based air defence and radar systems.
This is acutely the case in regard to comprehensive and integrated layered air defence of long, medium, short and very short range missile assets for the three nations – a capability firmly entrenched within Russia's arsenal.
Estonia and Lithuania each have very short-range air defence systems, while the British Army operates a short-range missile defence system as a part of NATO's eFP measures for Estonia. In addition, Lithuania is actively operating and acquiring medium-range air defence systems.
But long-range air defence is completely missing. Without it, they don't have a strategically effective air defence system.
"In the event of a crisis or war, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania would be unable to support a shift from peacetime operations to a robust NATO air defence posture, and would themselves be able to protect just a handful of critical assets from attack from the air – and then only for a short period of time," notes the ICDS report.
This inability to transition to an offensive posture is due to their weak C4ISR capability. According to ICDS, the Baltics' lack: connectivity (not all their control and reporting centres or control and reporting posts are connected or stable), certain command and control capabilities, interoperability between Baltic and NATO surveillance systems, trained personnel and, finally, situational awareness in Finnish and Swedish airspace.
Both the ICDS and CEPA recommend that the three countries immediately fill these gaps to deter any destabilisation attempts by Russia. Their reports differ in that they place the onus of responsibility on different parties. IDCS argues that the Baltic states are largely responsible on their own for bringing their air defences up to scratch and should only rely on NATO when those shortfalls cannot be effectively addressed. CEPA suggests that the U.S. Army can fill some gaps in short-range air defence by deploying highly mobile assets to serve as "mobile tripwires" that would greatly strengthen the deterrent effect against Russia.
Both agree that NATO's eastern flank would benefit from more frequent military exercises comparable to Russia's grand-scale Zapad exercise in autumn 2017.
Regardless of who takes charge, far more effort is in order to encourage and help the Baltics fill their gaps in air defence as Russia continues to strengthen its Western Military District. Unfortunately, as history shows, overwhelmingly imbalanced military force along a frontier too often tempts the holder of that force to use it.
THE UPSHOT:
Expecting the three Baltic countries to rapidly pay for and install a complete layered air defence capability on their own is unrealistic. Their economies and military budgets are too small and they lack sufficient connectivity among themselves, across the Baltic Sea and with NATO.
More bilateral assistance is needed from other allies and a more creative use of NATO's common fund, known as the Security Investment Programme (SIP). Its rules could be loosened to help pay for things that the Baltics cannot afford.
While critics within NATO will pedantically argue that the SIP cannot pay for purely national military expenditure, the Baltics sit on the frontline of a hostile neighbour where their vulnerability exceeds that of any other ally in terms of conventional threats from Russia. Facing Russia across the Black Sea, Turkey has a huge army and a will to use it. Norway has a strong navy and sophisticated weaponry. The Baltics have none of these. NATO investment in the Baltics is an investment in all the allies' security.
akhavari11@gmail.com
bt@securityeurope.info
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