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The BlogPoliticsDonald Trump
How Progressives Can Stop Trump And Win The Next Decade
Progressives across the United States are confronting a terrifying reality this week: Donald Trump has won the presidency, and he will lead this country with a majority in the House and the Senate. The next four years will force progressives into an intensely defensive posture from which millions of people will be fighting for their families, and, for many, their lives.
Center for Community Change Action, Contributor
Social justice organization
Nov 21, 2016, 01:27 PM EST | Updated Dec 6, 2017
By Javier H. Valdés and Daniel Altschuler
The attacks from Washington and Trump's alt-right supporters across the country will be dramatic and swift. They will include attacks on the rights of immigrants and Muslims to remain in this country, efforts to destroy labor unions and undo economic justice victories like the expansion of overtime pay to working-class people, attempts to defund public schools, an onslaught against women's reproductive rights and LGBTQ rights, further criminalization of and violence against black bodies, campaigns to undo the modest progress we have made to mitigate climate change, and much more.
It is hard to over-state the danger we are confronting: whole communities will be faced with imminent threats to their safety, and virtually every national public policy that progressives care about will be threatened. This includes matters of economic justice--as a President who rose to power through inchoate economic populist appeals will move quickly to transform the economy by taking rights and power away from workers and serving his wealthy cronies.
How, then, should progressives conceive of the path forward? And, more specifically, how can we wage a strategic movement of resistance to block President-elect Trump's agenda while also building momentum towards a more promising post-Trump America. The latter piece is critical. Now is surely a moment for intense resistance. But this resistance must build momentum and power to wrest back control of our democracy.
Here are five key elements of the concerted effort we must undertake to stop President-elect Trump from wreaking havoc on our communities, while building the alternative economic vision and power we need to win in the future.
First, we must wage sustained collective action. Within 24 hours of Trump's victory, thousands of protestors had taken to the streets. Their statement was powerful and immediate. And it should be clear to every progressive that the next four years will require sustained collective action--and, often, action that means putting our bodies on the line to defend ourselves and others. Social movements from the abolitionists to the suffragettes to the civil rights movement to the immigrant rights movement have time and again changed the course of American history. Now we are called to come together again to demonstrate the moral dimension of the imminent attacks on immigrants, Muslims, women, LGBTQ people, indigenous people, and more.
This collective action will, and should, be led primarily by those who are directly affected by the dangerous rhetoric and proposals of Donald Trump, Paul Ryan, and Mitch McConnell. But it will also require solidarity and engagement from all progressives--when called upon to stand with, and sometimes get arrested with, our brothers and sisters, those with privileges like whiteness, US citizenship, maleness, and economic security must be willing to put ourselves on the line. Hashtag solidarity will not suffice--nor will simply coming to a protest every few months after a particularly horrific event. Progressives need to show up--in person, and with regularity.
Those with financial resources will also need to open their wallets to help support grassroots efforts--whether it be philanthropists writing checks or middle- and working-class people giving monthly contributions to organizations that are building strong memberships to wage strategic campaigns.
Mass action should also be channeled out of, and into, existing social movement organizations as much as possible. Spontaneous "movement moments" like this week are inspiring and important. But to be effective in the medium and long term, they must build engagement and membership in grassroots organizations that can sustain mass action.
Second, we will need expert legislative maneuvering. The scariest ideas of Donald Trump and his alt-right idea factory will quickly become legislative proposals. Progressives will need to ensure that their champions, as well as courageous moderates, are prepared to use every tool at their disposal to prevent these reckless bills from becoming law. Many are rightly pointing to the tool of the filibuster in the Senate, which will be a critical tool for blocking legislation that will put communities in danger. And surely, there is no Democratic figure more critical than Charles Schumer, the leader of the Senate Democrats, right now. But there are myriad other parliamentary procedures at legislators' disposal to slow down the legislative process--both to provide more time for public scrutiny and debate and to simply block dangerous ideas.
And progressive legislators and progressive organizations must use whatever openings they have to invite our communities into the process. This will, no doubt, include efforts to have constituents make phone calls and send emails to their legislators. But it needs to go further. Resistance on Capitol Hill must be rooted in the lived experiences of the people who Mr. Trump and his acolytes will attack. Progressive organizations and legislators must invite these people to be at the forefront of hearings and targeted actions.
And, where Republicans try to prevent these fora from emerging within the halls of Congress, progressives must create alternative fora outside formal committee hearings to elevate people's stories. To re-frame the debate on issues like immigration from the toxic terms that Mr. Trump will seek to deploy, progressives must elevate the moving stories of our communities--and let our resistance emanate from there. Similarly, in response to the anti-worker agenda that is surely coming, progressives must put working-class and low-income people's faces and experiences at the forefront of legislative resistance.
Third, progressives will need to flex our legal muscles and undertake aggressive litigation. The next four years will bring a torrent of attacks on civil liberties and basic rights that progressives hold dear. While mass action will be critical for changing the public conversation on policy debates and confronting lawmakers with the consequences of their votes, and legislative maneuvers (particularly in the Senate) will be critical for blocking the worst of Trump's agenda, it will not be sufficient to prevent all of his bad ideas from becoming law.
Here, legal tools will be critical. Progressives must use all the tools at our disposal to challenge the legality of clearly unconstitutional proposals that will emerge from President-elect Trump's White House, including the expansion of the surveillance and national security state that he will seek to deploy. Already, Anthony Romero of the American Civil Liberties Union has made this strategy clear, posting a statement titled, "If Donald Trump Implements His Proposed Policies, We'll See Him in Court." Other prominent progressive legal organizations are similarly girding themselves up for the fights ahead.
The legal path will, of course, be made more difficult by a Supreme Court that will almost certainly tilt conservative next year. But that does not make litigation less important. In recent years, progressives fought back successfully against the worst attempts by legislatures across the country to attack immigrants, women, and labor unions. Our side has some of the best legal minds in the country, and we need them now more than ever.
Fourth, progressives must play offense at the state and local level. We must avoid being on permanent defense. Particularly in states, cities, and counties controlled by Democrats, progressives must assert ourselves and show the promise of our ideals and the policies that stem from them. Part one of this strategy must be to protect those who are most vulnerable to the effects of Trump's domestic policy agenda--immigrants, Muslims, women, and the poor. The litmus test of a truly progressive city, county, or state will be whether it develops a comprehensive strategy for protecting its people from an out-of-control immigration and law enforcement infrastructure and attacks on the social safety net that keeps millions of Americans alive.
But, to win the next decade, progressives must also articulate an alternative vision for our country. While we hold the line against an agenda framed as economic populism. This cannot be a Clintonian pitch to the "middle class," which embraced much of neoliberal ideology and trusted technocrats to solve our economic problems. Instead, it must be rooted in a radical critique of power, a commitment to working-class and low-income people, and the dedication to use government as a vehicle for grassroots democracy.
In practice, that means policies that, for instance, rein in corporate power and the stranglehold of large corporations and the wealthy on our politics while empowering workers to assert their rights and police and criminal justice reform that protects the constitutional rights of all people while dismantling the school-to-prison pipeline. And it also means bold policy experimentation that deepens democracy by inviting residents into new participatory spaces with real decision-making that incentivize engagement. In the next four years, our municipalities and states must be vibrant laboratories for democracy and spaces from which we can begin to imagine a more inclusive economy--one that prioritizes the rights and needs of working-class people and offers a strengthened safety net that protects us all.
Fifth, we must build grassroots political power. As we take to the streets and organize, progressives must also plot a path forward to channel all of the incredible grassroots spirit of resistance into actual political power building. Part of that will be achieved through the work of building larger bases of membership in grassroots organizations across the country--particularly those with political arms that can endorse and support candidates who share our values. But it must also include a concerted effort to build the ranks of truly progressive candidates and elected officials--and more progressive party institutions.
Some have reflected in recent days about the need for the Democratic Party to reinvent itself. Surely, the Democrats must learn that part of the enthusiasm gap that plagued the Clinton candidacy stemmed from the failure to articulate a vision that highlighted how our system has failed working people, how we must take on the role of big money, how we must invite people back to democracy at every level instead of relying on a neoliberal technocracy, and how black lives must be at the center of our politics.
Others are reflecting on the need to challenge the two-party system in this country. On this front, the best source of hope is the Working Families Party (WFP), which now operates across ten states and the District of Columbia and lent considerable grassroots muscle to the remarkable candidacy of Bernie Sanders. In states like New York, the WFP has identified, cultivated, and bolstered progressive stars running for office at every level of government--from town councilmembers to county legislators to the Mayor of our nation's largest city. Growth in the geographic reach, membership, and resources of the WFP will be critical for continuing to build this leadership pipeline and holding Democrats accountable to the truly progressive vision that we need to win the next decade.
One key battleground for this political fight will be the issue of voting rights. On the national level and in red states, we will see concerted efforts to restrict access to the ballot for communities of color, immigrants, and low-income people. We must defend against this wherever it occurs--through all of the tactics mentioned above. But progressives must also go on offense where we can to expand suffrage and make registering to vote and casting a ballot as easy as possible. This is intrinsically the right thing to do. It will also prove instrumentally valuable, as we seek to build progressive political power.
Finally, it bears mention that some of these tactics may bear a resemblance to those that conservatives have deployed over the past decade--after all, litigation and legislative obstructionism have been the hallmark of efforts to block President Obama's agenda since 2009. But there is a key difference: our way forward will, and must, be rooted in radical empathy--that is, a commitment to try to put ourselves in the shoes of others who are under attack. Put differently, radical empathy in this context means that we understand attacks on the lives and livelihoods of others as attacks on ourselves. It means that we will put our bodies and our professional lives on the line to protect our neighbors and their families.
Such empathy also means listening to and understanding the pain and alienation in communities across the country that tilted towards Donald Trump--especially white working-class people who voted for him because they have seen their livelihoods crumble and come to conclude that the system is rigged against them. Progressives must, of course, forcefully call out hatred and the attacks on our communities that will become a fixture of the next four years, and there is a moral imperative to prioritize the safety and well-being of those communities under imminent threat of attack. But we must also seek to understand those whose votes have endangered us--and, where possible, both listen actively to, and articulate a vision that can build bridges to them.
There are no shortcuts to diffusing the worst of what a Trump presidency could become. The next four years will undoubtedly bring intense fear and pain for people around this country. Many progressives feel right now like they are in the wilderness, and that we may be there for some time. But if we can respond strategically to this moment--and harness our capacity for collective action, legislative maneuvering, and aggressive litigation to block as much of the Trump agenda possible, while identifying opportunities to make local and state progress and building our political muscle--then we can still win the next decade.
Javier H. Valdés and Daniel Altschuler are, respectively, the Co-Executive Director and Managing Director of Make the Road Action, a grassroots immigrant organization. Follow their work: @MakeTheRoadAct @Javierhvaldes @altochulo
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So hard to believe that fall is here, and summer is over! Not to mention most of 2017 already! Just crazy! I know that I say that every year, but every year it gets crazier how fast time goes! That may have to do with age. Anyways, back to fall, to the beauty that it encompasses. The changing seasons mean the changing of colours from lush green to the yellows, oranges, reds and tans, the crispness in the air and the feeling of slowing down somewhat with the setting of the sun earlier and earlier. The desire to cuddle up by the fire. Routines all back in order. Every season truly has it's beauty for different reasons, isn't it just such a perfect design?
Back in January I offered a Season of Giving Special, sort of an after Christmas offer for family photos. The idea was for you to gift yourself or someone you love with a session that was not only affordable, but offered all of the digital images included. A session like this was offered in 2016 as well, same idea and pricing, but was in the later summer and it was called Simple Summer Sessions. Both were a big hit, which lead to some investment and structure changes with regards to my session pricing. I am so happy and excited to know that I can reach more of a market and fit more of a budget, all the while still valuing the quality of portraiture that means so much to me and reflects many years of experience, education and equipment investment! Unfortunately the pricing here on the site doesn't reflect the change, but I am working on it, and it will hopefully all be updated within the next month or so.
This special proved pretty successful, leading not only to pricing structure changes, but also to lessons learned! I was so excited with all that I was booking, I didn't consider the time needed to schedule them, leading to an overly busy work schedule this summer! I am catching up and feeling so good about everything and just thankful for the people I met and the previous clients I was able to catch up with!
However now that there is only 1 week left in September, I am realizing that not all I had hoped will be reality this year. I had stopped taking any more family sessions for the rest of the year, as I continue to shoot 2-3 times a week, plus the full time office work, not to mention my first priority of my family and their lives all in there too! So sadly, my hope for offering FALL Mini-Sessions has to be put on hold for a year. I will be announcing a Christmas Mini-Shoot in the next couple of weeks though, so look out for info on that!
Since my blog has been neglected and 90% of my sessions go unseen, I decided to go back to fall last year. To feel the beauty that fall offers. Back to when this family was 3. Since then, they have added 1 more, who I had the honour to photograph as a newborn and will be photographing again as a family this fall! For now, enjoy the love this family shares and the innocent busyness of a toddler all captured!


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US basketball player gets nine years in prison for drug offenses
The US announces monkeypox as a public health emergency
Brittney Griner, a great basketball player for the United States, was given a nine-year prison term in Russia for drug offenses. "I love my family," Griner, 31, was heard saying as she was led out of the courtroom in handcuffs. The two-time Olympian admitted to having cannabis oil, but she called it an honest mistake in court. She was found guilty of drug trafficking and possession by a court in Khimki, close to Moscow. The prosecution asked for a nine-and-a-half-year sentence.
The American had already spent a significant amount of time in detention, the presiding judge stated in reading the verdict on Thursday. Maria Blagovolina, the defense attorney for Griner, claimed that her client was extremely angry and very anxious. She barely speaks. She's going through a difficult moment. The defense team declared that they will challenge the judgment.
A vape cartridge containing cannabis oil was discovered in Griner's luggage in February at an airport close to Moscow, leading to her detention. Griner is regarded as one of the best players in the world. For the US off-season, she had traveled to Russia to play club basketball. Soon after, Russia invaded Ukraine, and since then, her case has been the focus of prominent US-Russian diplomacy.
The sentence was labeled "unacceptable" by US President Joe Biden. "Russia, and any country engaging in wrongful detention, represents a threat to the safety of everyone traveling, working, and living abroad," stated US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Given that the US and Russia have been talking about a prospective prisoner swap that could include the basketball player, it is uncertain how long she will be imprisoned.
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Griner added that she was forced to use translation software on her phone to communicate and that she had not been given access to a lawyer or a description of her rights during the first few hours of her imprisonment.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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'Move to Earn' Token STEPN (GMT) Can't Move Up in Price, Investors Ditch for Orbeon Protocol (ORBN)
Place/Date: - December 15th, 2022 at 7:47 am UTC · 3 min read
It seems the move-to-earn token STEPN (GMT) can't move up in price anymore, as it has dropped from its all-time high of nearly $0,38 to a mere $0,07. On the other hand, savvy cryptocurrency investors are ditching the token and investing in Orbeon Protocol (ORBN) instead. But what actually is Orbeon Protocol, a token that is still in the 3rd phase of its pre-sale, of which analysts expect it will surge by over 6,000% to $0,24 per token?
What is Orbeon Protocol (ORBN)?
Orbeon Protocol (ORBN) is a new cryptocurrency project that is destined to take over the current crowdfunding and venture capital markets. It will do this through the use of fractionalized NFTs or FNTFs in short. Let's say a start-up wants to raise $100k from the general public. Traditionally, the start-up would have to find angel investors through crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter or via venture capital firms. With Orbeon Protocol (ORBN), Orbeon will mint 10,000 equity-backed NFTs, each valued at $10. These NFTs will then be available on the Orbeon Exchange, where users of the Orbeon Protocol ecosystem can buy, sell, and stake them.
This not only allows retail investors to reap the benefits of early seed funding, but it also enables start-up companies to raise capital way more easy and with less friction compared to traditional crowdfunding methods.
Orbeon Protocol (ORBN) will make use of a Fill-or-Kill mechanism. This mechanism ensures investors that they will be refunded if the start-up doesn't meet its funding requirements within a pre-agreed timeframe. Because of this, Orbeon Protocol users only invest in successful start-ups, without having to manually select these.
Developer's tokens are locked for a year. Moreso, the liquidity pool of the project is locked for 10 years via a smart contract that is audited by Solid Proof. This ensures no rug pull can take place and that investors can safely invest in ORBN. At the moment Orbeon Protocol is being sold for $0,0302 per token but analysts and experts predict the token will surge 6000 percent more, to over $0,24 per coin.
Why STEPN (GMT) is Falling Behind
STEPN is the move-to-earn giant that took 2022 by storm however at the moment, it looks like the move-to-earn token STEPN (GMT) is on its last legs. Currently, the STEPN is trading for just under $0,07, whilst STEPN was once worth nearly $0,38 per token. With PoS becoming increasingly more popular than PoW, which STEPN (GMT) uses, and the environmental-friendly investors in STEPN having problems with this, on-chain analytics show that these STEPN holders are moving their funds into projects like Orbeon Protocol (ORBN) instead, in search for higher gains.


In late August of 1957, my father took me on a trip to visit his home town of Nanaimo in British Columbia. We stayed in the Plaza Hotel, where, almost a half century earlier, he'd been a bellhop, before going to work in the coal mines.
On our first morning, just after breakfast, my father took me on a walking tour of Nanaimo Harbor. We stopped at the Bastion, a fortress constructed in 1853 by the Hudson Bay Company to protect their coal mining interests on Vancouver Island. My father pointed out that there were no nails used, and the lumber was hand hewn with broad axes and adzes.
Too much work, I thought.
About a half block past the Bastion, an old man in a tan windbreaker, worn, black Frisco jeans, and a ball cap sat hunched on a rickety wooden bench with his back to the harbor, staring blankly at the building across the street. As we approached, he turned his face toward us, and the first thing I noticed was a broad tobacco stain on the gray stubble of his pointy chin.
Withered, age-spotted hands rested atop the brass handle of a mahogany cane planted on the sidewalk between his ratty sneakers. Large, hairy ears supported the temples of his heavy framed glasses, but behind the thick lenses were keen, pale blue eyes. My father slowed, his back stiffened, and I could tell there was an instant recognition.
The man nodded, turned toward me, and spat a long stream of brown juice onto the already heavily stained sidewalk that circled his feet.
"That your son?" he asked.
"He's a nice-looking kid." His snarling lip eased into a flat line. "Well, take care," he said and dismissed us with a flick of his wrist, turning his attention back to the building across the street.
I hesitated, feeling awkward about such an abrupt dismissal by that gruff old geezer. I thought that after calling my father an S.O.B., more needed to be said, but my father gave me a wink and a quick jerk of his head, so we walked away.
Dad smiled and began telling a tale of his youth when he'd played baseball for a team with the unimaginative name of the Nanaimo Miners — young coal miners from the town of Nanaimo.
He explained how much the pride of the coal mining communities rode on the won-lost record of the previous season. If the town of Duncan had a better record than Ladysmith, it was a victory for all Duncanites, even if they didn't win the island championship. After the season, the cry of "wait till next year" would echo up and down the island.
But even with the fierce competition, the play on the field was always fun and friendly, except when it came to the Victoria Vipers. Beating them had become an obsession, too often ending in failure.
The Victoria Vipers was always the top team. Most players were barrel-chested, bearded men with arms big as tree trunks. Their roster consisted of the best players on the island laced with some players from the US. The average age of the team was 26.
Their sponsor, Timber Management of British Columbia Ltd, had plenty of money and hired the best players to work at good paying, menial jobs in their sawmill. The players had to be physically in the employment of their sponsor. This was part of the league rules.
Their manager, Adolph Bronco, was a swarthy, round, little, cigar-smoking, loudmouth prick, whose claim to fame was that he had been called up to play for the Cincinnati Red Legs. He was a third-string catcher but acted as if he were the legendary catcher Roger "The Duke of Tralee" Bresnhan.
The joke around the league was that Adolph was more of a horse's arse than a bronco. But the underhanded tactics and style of play which he employed allowed him to keep his job year in and year out. And he did know how to win. His strong suit was intimidation. He argued, red-faced, every call that went against his team and chided other managers if they did the same.
At the end of each season, Bronco would go to the other teams and approach their star players, offering them good paying jobs with Timber Management and positions with the Vipers. On the island, playing for the Vipers was like playing for the Yankees.
But those who traded their hometown loyalty for the prestige of playing for the Vipers would be soundly booed when they returned to play against their previous team and would often be forced to leave their hometown and take up residence in Victoria, just to avoid the off-season harassing.
Attitude was a major ingredient if a player was to become a Viper. They had to be physically better and know how to psychologically get and maintain an edge on the opposing players. They employed a style of play that was beyond hardnosed, it was dirty — cheap shot dirty. Injuring a rival player brought a cheer from their bench. The opposing infielders knew if a Viper came in sliding, he'd try to rip your hand open with sharpened steel spikes.
But generally no fight occurred. While the other team sent out a couple of players to carry their injured teammate back to the safety of the dugout, the umpires would stand clear waiting and watching for something to happen.
However, loyalty was not a trait among the Vipers management. With the Vipers, winning was everything. There was no room for batting slumps or errors. If a player had a bad season and a replacement could be pirated from another team, he would be dropped unceremoniously from the team, pulled from his cushy job and sent to the woods to be a choke setter or lumberjack.
Most ex-Vipers quit but had a hard time readjusting to life post-Vipers. They would humbly crawl back to their hometown, hoping that people would forgive, and maybe they could get their old job back.
John C. Williams was born in Oakland, California, and raised in a family that was low on income but high on love. After an adventurous journey through early adulthood that took him from the colorful world of Teamsters to odd jobs here and there, he and his wife settled down and started their own small business in Fort Bragg, California. Several years later they decided to give paradise a try and moved to the Big Island of Hawaii. There he worked as a program director for Parks and Recreation, interacting with kids through sports. During this period he spent off hours experimenting with film and producing several shorts that were aired on the free public channel. He also performed in two different acting groups and wrote one of the plays that they performed. He did stand-up comedy for awhile before discovering a real passion for writing. This is the point where his writing began in earnest. To date he has written a series of Samuel Wilde adventure stories: "Lucifer's Trumpet," "Gather the Children," "Alongside Evil", and "His Mother's Gift." These stories were based loosely on the stories that his father had told him growing up in Oakland. John's first novel, Lucifer's Trumpet, received honorable mention in the UK Telegraph's first novel contest as well as earning Notable Entry in The Write Helper's Novel Beginnings Contest. He has attended the Maui Writers Conference and many other seminars as he works toward perfecting his craft.
I knew you could bring it!!! The details of a game was life itself. Good job!


What is my Orlando, Clermont, Winter Garden FL Home Worth?
If you would like to know the current value of your home, condo or property, feel free to fill out this form and I will get back to you right away.
**Your information will NOT be shared or sold to anyone.


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liberatenz
Act Party Fails to Increase Off-License Purchase Age
Liberty Conference 2012
Warming to Labour?
Time to Call in the Commissioners?
Finally….Big Tobacco Fights Back!
Removing Treaty Clause Not Enough
Posted: January 31, 2012 in Uncategorized
Prime Minister John Key has proposed removing a treaty clause in the State Owned Enterprises Act 1986 that stipulates "the Crown cannot act in a manner that is inconsistent with the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi." This was foolish window-dressing added by a Labour Government eager to kiss up to the Ratana church and keep Maori as a natural constituency when Government departments were being reformed as state owned businesses. The Maori party is using this as an opportunity to show their voting base that they are committed to Maori interests while still being able to enjoy the baubles of power. I highly doubt they will go far enough to bring about a cut in their own salaries.
Maori party co-leader Tariana Turia says that her party is prepared to split with National to ensure the Treaty clause still exists. No doubt National will enter into some compromise negotiations to keep the Maori party on side for reasons I don't understand. National has a working majority. National isn't going to lose any votes from a break with the Maori party. Act and United Future aren't going to go into opposition. When the Maori party leadership changes I doubt they will be as supportive of National as they are now, whatever the outcome of this current debacle.
I support National's proposal to remove the Treaty clause from the State Owned Enterprises legislation. While it has been largely a collection of balloons and streamers for Maori up until now, there is no doubt that the clause could be cause for concern for a potential buyer of the assets and would have a serious impact on what sort of price the Government could attract from privatisation.
However, in my opinion, the simple removal of a Treaty clause from one piece of legislation is not enough. I think the entire Treaty of Waitangi should be removed from all areas of law and from its current pedestal as a 'constitutional' document of New Zealand. New Zealand has never had a true constitution; I think it is time that changed.
A constitution of New Zealand should be based on the principles of freedom, like the US constitution, instead of the pirnciples of racial division like we currently have. It should restrain the power of the Government, instead of turning it into a gravy train. A consititutionally limited Government should restrict itself to the protection of individual liberty, instead of granting privledges to racial interest groups.
Unfortunately, the National party doesn't even have the mettle to abolish the disgustingly racist Maori seats, and therefore solve te problem of the Maori party, so there is no chance they will take this radically necessary step. Act New Zealand is more interested in tagging along behind "Brand Key" like a stray dog than properly standing on the principles they claim to espouse. Currently there is no credible political force willing to trash the 170 year old aparthied rag and fight for a founding document based on individual rights and liberty.
Hopefully someone reading this post agrees that it is time for our current perilous condition to change…
Here is a fantastic example of what I think could be a consititution of New Zealand: http://freeradical.co.nz/content/constitution/preamble.php
Key Dampens Surplus Expectations
Here is something that not only does not surprise me, but I actually said would happen before the election. The Government's ridiculously optimistic plans to return the books to surplus by 2014/15 have received a dampening by the Prime Minister in his latest 'state of the nation' speech. While at this stage National still expects us to return to surplus by 2014/15, their projections have been slashed by $1 billion. The surplus is now expected to be around $500 million and the European crisis is to blame.
On November 4, I issued a press release on the deficit ( http://www.solopassion.com/node/8709 ) saying that we will most certainly not return to surplus by the time of the Government's target. I said, "The Labour and National parties both lack rely on notoriously optimistic Treasury figures to justify maintaining their unsustainable levels of spending while claiming we will be back to surplus in three years. By the time three years is up, whoever is in power, the Government will have another excuse for failing to rein in the deficit and voters will allow themselves to be duped again." This is exactly what is now happenning. The Government, instead of making the radical reforms necessary to get the book back in shape, it continuing with business as usual and using foreign excuses to justify their failure to manage their books properly. I confidently predict again, that as we get closer to the target date, surplus projections will become more pessimistic, to the point of an expectation of further deficits.
The problem is that our Government still believes that the state can sustain its current functions and that with a bit of careful management we can continue to do what we have always done. I completely disagree. Government as we have always dfone it is completely unsustainable and we need to totally reform the way it works. The role of the state must change from one of taxer, regulator and welfarist to a state that protects the liberty of the individual and nothing more. In November I proposed that the only way to return to budget surplus and kickstart the economy would be through cuts in taxation,much bigger cuts in spending and a total reassessment of what it is the Government does. It would seem that the National government is determined to prove me right.
Told you so doesn't feel so great when the future of the country is at stake.
Sell Crafar Farms to Whoever You Want
The sale of 16 Crafar farms has been a long, drawn out controversial issue for some time now. China's Shanghai Pengxin has made the highest bid for the purchase of the farms but for some reason, this isn't enough. A consortium lead by Michael Fay has made a bid $30 million less than what the Chinese offered and may end up being successful because of the xenophobic restrictions on land sales currently in place.
Because the owner of the farms wishes to sell them to a foreigner, he must first get permission from a couple of National Government leeches to engage in a willing exchange between two parties. Why? Well, I really can't tell you why because it makes no sense to me. One party wants to sell the land. Another party wants to buy the land. What is the problem? Why is it the Government's business? Why is a phobia of foreign ownership so common in this country?
Those who are anti-foreign ownership should go an experience the prosperity of countries which have none, like North Korea. I think that, far more dangerous than the idea ofmillions of dollars of capital being invested, is the idea of crawling to the Government for permission to sell your land. What is dangerous is having to accept a $30 million lower bid because the Government won't permit you to enter into a consenting trade with another party.
I say that the restrictions on foreign ownership should be eliminated. The rewards of new investment will rain down upon us, especially if enticed by a slashing of goverbnment spending and taxation.
Labour Opposes Affordable Housing…
The Labour party has today issued a press release demanding that housing be more affordable. That's it though. No ideas. No proposals. Just an attack on Hugh Pavletich, co-author of a survey on housing affordability, with no alternatives suggested. What else can we expect from the dying party of socialism? Their methods have artificially inflated housing prices and the only options left run counter to their intellectually bankrupt philosophy.
The very simple proposal made by Pavletich, and attacked by Labour, is that the Auckland urban/rural boundary be eliminated. Instead of using the force of the state to restrict the building of homes within an artificial boundary, private property owners be left to regain their sovereignty over their own land and build what they wish. It is clear that the house pricing bubble is caused by Government regulation and the solution is the free market. Labour has no solutions to offer because they cannot stomach the ideas of freedom.
Labour's Auckland Issues "Spokesperson" however is right on the money when he suggests interest rates have something to do with the speculation in housing that drives up the price. However he doesn't suggest any options for addressing this problem. If he had a couple of brass balls the solution would be obvious. We should take away the power of the Reserve Bank to determine interest rates. It is a rare politician these days who would suggest price controls, but what the Reserve Bank does with interest rates is exactly that! The Reserve Bank uses its powers to set a floor for the level of interest charged by lenders and this in turn distorts the economy. When interest rates are artificially low, borrowing to invest in housing becomes more affordable and drives up the price of houses. If Twyford is economically literate to realise this then he is typically dishonest for not saying it.
When I stood for Parliament in Tamaki in 2011, I put forward four simple proposals to fix the problem of unaffordable housing.
1) Abolish the Resource Management Act and Council regulatory practices. Having to jump through hurdles, crawl for permission and fight heritage activists through court to make simple alterations or subdivide your own land can cost tens of thousands of dollars. Developers take this into account when they calculate housing investments. They pass the costs on to purchasers. Politicians and blood sucking bereaucrats get a power induced jolly; you get screwed in the wallet. An artificial limit on development enforced by a council reduces the amount of land available for development. Demand vs. forcibly reduced supply is a simple equation for high school economics students: the price goes up!
2) Make all forms of investment tax neutral. Labour sought to do this with their 2011 capital gains tax policy. Unfortunately, in usual big government fashion, they did it the wrong way. They claimed, probably correctly, that one of the reasons investment was attracted to housing and driving up the price, is because most forms of investment are taxed while housing isn't. So their proposal was to tax income made from housing sales too. Of course adding a new tax wouldn't work because it would increase the price a seller would need to get to make a sale worthwhile. Adding a capital gains tax would actually drive housing prices up further! I proposed the opposite concept – abolish taxation on all other forms of investment. There is absolutely no doubt what sort of effect this would have on housing prices and the economy in general. Not only would investment move away from the housing sector, causing prices to drop, but as investing in any area became more profitibale it would be done more often. We would be the prosperous exception to the economic stagnation that affects countries all around the world.
3) Slash the functions of local government. The crippling rates Auckland City Council charges its 'tenants' don't even cover the activities of the council, which recently voted itself another increase in its debt ceiling for the second time in twelve months. The council debates declaring itself a city of peace, funds public libraries, public parks, unpopular forms of music such as the Auckland Philharmonic, unprofitable transport and a myriad of other activities that the spinning of the world doesn't really depend upon. Council should get back to the basics. Make sure the rubbish gets taken away; ensure our sewerage is treated and any other essentials the functioning of the city really depends upon. Thats it! Council debt would come down, rates would come down and the cost of owning your home would drop in turn.
4) Sell the Housing New Zealand state house system. Figures I obtained from Housing NZ show that the total value of all homes owned by the government department is $15.1 billion. That is huge! That amount would cover the government's deficit for one year without any spending cuts at all (though I'm not suggesting for a second that we don't cut spending). Basic economics tells us what would happen if the housing market suddenly had a supply of $15.1 billion worth of houses on the market. The sudden increase in supply would dramatically drop housing prices across the board, allowing young couples and families the opportunity to truly afford their own home instead of being tenants of the state. This final proposal however, would only have temporary benefit without following the other three as well.
Following the general election, I came to realise the voters of Tamaki aren't ready for this message, but that doesn't make it any less right. The basic fundamentals are clear. More freedom and less government means a drop in housing prices. More of the same means nothing will change.
Cameron Brewer's Attack on Property Rights!
Orakei councillor Cameron Brewer has launched a blistering attack on property rights with his demand that Auckland City Council adopt "urgent" regulations on small owner operated brothels. Brewer says, "If we can put the squeeze on outdoor smoking, surely we can gett tougher on suburban brothels?" Clearly Mr. Brewer you have already thrown in the towel against George Wood's oppression of smokers and are using that as a justification for your attack on property rights.
Brewer states in his press release, "Currently small brothels just need to prove there's no brothel keeper and that they're independent operators retaining full control of their earnings. So basically four prostitutes under one roof can do what they want day and night and there's no real regulation or need for a licence. It's quite outrageous, given SOOBs are the ones causing the greatest problems for many communities." What I think is outrageous is that Cameron Brewer thinks it is actually his business what people do under their own roof. Whether it be four prostitutes earning a living or one couple having sex for free is none of his business whatsoever! This desire to regulate small owner operated brothels out of existence is just the tip of the iceberg. It reveals a sinister desire on the part of the councillor to make the government the supreme decider on what you do in your home, not the owner of the property themselves.
We should count ourselves fortunate that the actions of this council are currently restricted by central government legislation as Councillor Brewer makes quite clear that he would like to force brothels out of residential areas were he able to. Instead he has to satisfy himself with attempts to restrict the locations of brothels away from such places a churches. I cannot understand why he feels that those with irrational beliefs deserve protection from property rights and liberty. Why can't I have an exclusion zone that keeps churches away from my house? Like brothels, churches make noise at annoying times of the day (i.e. Sunday morning) and the activities that go on inside them are most certainly offensive.
Other restrictions that Brewer would like to introduce would ensure that brothels cannot be "incompatible with an area's character." This is the same sort of tynrannical collectivist reasoning that results in dictatorial heritage restrictions and allow interfering community minded busy bodies to ramp up thousands of dollars in legal bills so people can make alterations to their own home.
One of the fundamental concepts that guarantee the rights of the individual are property rights. The right to do what you wish with your own body without violating the rights of others is inextricably linked with the right to do what you wish on your own property with the same proviso. Such concepts are completely foreign to Brewer who chooses to keep his advocacy to ideas such as corporate welfare and general populist wowserism.
In 2013 the Auckland City Council needs candidates standing for election who do understand what liberty really is and will advance policies which minimise the Council's relentless writing of regulations. Cameron Brewer is not that person. I wonder who will be?
Brewer's press release: http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1201/S00080/residential-brothels-need-urgent-regulation.htm
Vice Under Attack!
The insidious intrusion into our personal habits at the behest of the Auckland City Council is being joined by the evil Catholic church and freedom hating health experts. All have one thing in common; a desire to use the state to regulate our lives and a genuine hatred of individual liberty. I say it is time for free individuals to stand up and fight back while you can. The suffocating blob of ignorance is demanding more chains and more fascism.
Following calls by failed Mayor George Wood, a NZ Herald poll shows a majority of internet participants support a ban on smoking outdoors in the central city. It isn't enough for the sheeple that totalitarians prohibit the right of property owners to set their own policies in their bars and work vehicles; now the willingly enslaved want government to stop what we do outside on the street. The march of Government over our rights is insatiable! No regulation is ever enough! Once one law against cigarettes gets passed the victims of state dependency demand more and more. They will not stop until tobacco becomes a banned substance with the crime and bloodshed that inevitably follows.
I started smoking at 14 and accept it is addictive. Even though I quit 6 months ago I fail the resist the lure of a social puff over a drink. During my day to day activities however, I would even go as far as to say that I find the smell of other people smoking *offensive*. What I will never do however, is demand restrictions by the Government. My position is quite the opposite. I think smoking in bars is a decision for the property owner. I think smoking in the workplace is a decision for the employer. I advocate the complete eradication of excise tax on cigarettes in conjunction with the privatisation of the health system. I support personal freedom and responsibility. Trough feeding pigs like George Wood should be banned; not public smoking.
How ironic it is to see the Catholic Man Boy Love Association speaking out against the building of a high rise brothel where consenting adults can choose to exchange cash for sex while for decades their organisation covered up the rape of unconsenting children by its members. Bishop Pat Dunn considers the application for the building of a 15 story brothel as "the development of a decidedly tacky culture and the encouragement of activities which will harm the lives of large numbers of people." I don't think the prostitute making a good income or the customer purchasing pleasure feel like their lives have been particuarly harmed. I think when one compares the 'harm' of prostitution to the harm of intellectual poison, centuries of primitive oppression and widespread child molestation perpetuated by the Catholic Church, prostitution is positively tame.
It is a sign of the oppressive nature of our Government that legitimate businessmen like the Chow brothers have to go crawling to a Council that forcibly demolished their previous building to gain permission to build a new one. Unfortunately, the average voting slave doesn't see an issue with this. The average voter actually supports politicians using the power of force to control their neighbours. A politician who doesn't use this power is viewed as being weak and ineffectual by the public. As a result they are punished at the polls in favour of power hungry leeches. Worse than the average, and otherwise disinterested voter, are those that take part in the political process and believe themselves virtuous for doing so. These are the low lives who make submissions on draft plans to demand height restrictions and heritage protections over other people's property. It is people such as they who represent the greatest danger to our liberty.
Equally worthy of disdain are the mob of self-appointed experts on social issues using their bullshit qualifications and a scandal hungry media to spread their message of control to a gullible public. Public health researcher and Associate Professor Nick Wilson has attacked the National government as being "pathetically weak" on alcohol. What would one expect from a personal who has dedicated their life to making an earning from a publicly funded university studying publicly funded health systems? The government has chosen to adopt over 120 new regulations recommended by the Law Commission but has not yet put them into law. If this 'academic' thinks 120 new regulations is pathetically weak then I'd be disgusted to see what he thinks is an appropriate government action to take over alcohol.
Individuals are the rightful owners of their bodies and their lives. They should be free to exercise total sovereignty over their bodies and lives as long as their actions do not violate the liberty of others. Alcohol should be tax free, deregulated and not a part of the government's sphere of control. With a privatised health system, professional whingers such as the associate professor would be, quite rightly, out of a job.
In the twenty first century, it is easy to think that as 'society' becomes more permissive, it becomes more free. However this is only an illusion. The near universal trend for governments is for them to become larger and freedom to reduce. Government's put all their efforts into writing more laws but rarely repeal existing ones. First they will come for vice – then they'll come for you…
Council Should Ditch Business Districts Plan
Control freaks of the Auckland City Council have plans to force business owners into Business Improvement Districts. This exercise in forced collectivistaion will see businesses charged a levy by the council in exchange for being provided with marketing, cleaning and security services. Insanely the council also plans to extend this concept to shopping malls. Last time I looked, malls such as Sylvia Park and Westfield Shoppping Centres are already doing a bloody good job of marketing, cleaning their malls and maintaining security. So why does the council have to get involved?
I think the Council is attempting to simply squeeze big business further in order to fund its illegitimate activities. Council will get extra revenue from malls through the targeted levy and then spend nothing on the malls who will continue to take care of these activities themselves. I cannot imagine even this control freak leftist council would advocate paying the marketing costs for Westfield Malls, levied or not. Essentially it is a double dipping rip off and it must be resisted.
What's more, malls included in the Business Improvement Districts will have only as much say as a corner dairy in the management of thiose districts despite paying far higher levies than any other members. It's the usual problem with unfettered democracy – those who fund it have only as much say as those who bludge from it.
Councillor Arthur Anae claims that it is necessary to include malls within the Business Improvement Districts because he feels everyone should be treated equally. I say that this isn't the carving up of a bloody birthday cake at a five year olds birthday party. It is the further theft of businesses money to fund services for them that they already provide for themselves. Anae claims if malls are excluded it will make the BID scheme an "administrative nightmare." Here's a newsflash for you councillor; any Council bereaucracy is a nightmare. Just try being a property owner who wishes to exercise sovereignty over their own property and make an alteration to their house!
Unsurprisingly, cheif commie Mayor Len Brown is a big supporter of the BID scheme. He says, "This signals we're serious about building our local townships and getting funding behind them." No it doesn't Len. It signals you want to further rip off those who have been most successful in business to subsidise the commercial operations of others.
I accept that it makes sense for the council to ensure the streets and footpathsare cleaned on a regular basis, paid for from general rates. That is all I accept. Marketing and security costs for businesses are most definitely not a function of the council. They should be paid for the buesinesses that choose to use them.
Auckland City Council should not be further increasing its debt ceiling for corporate welfare!


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Yes, Riverdale is now known as a beautiful, wonderful place to live and raise a family. We are proud of our neighborhood that comprises more than 130 co-operatives and condominiums, and is also famously home to a private residential community known as Fieldston.
But, Riverdale has a long a rich history that is today little known or appreciated by its residents, and virtually unknown to outsiders. The following information is excerpted from the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission report on the Riverdale Historic District:
The region was developed with very special intention, and part of Riverdale was officially designated as The Riverdale Historic District on October 16, 1990. The area located along Independence and Sycamore Avenues and extending from West 252nd Street to West 254th Street, encompasses about fifteen acres of steeply sloping land overlooking the Hudson River with views to the Palisades in New Jersey. The district contains thirty-four buildings of several types situated on landscaped lots, once comprising larger estate properties, that are linked and defined by landscaping and original estate features including stone border and retaining walls; terraces; steps, paths, and driveways; cobbled street gutters; and individual specimen trees and rows of trees and hedges. View a Riverdale Historic District map
The historic district is the nucleus of a 100-acre parcel, purchased in 1852 from William Ackerman for a suburban development, which was given the name "Riverdale." This nucleus, including the first portion to be immediately developed, is also the most visually cohesive part of the original Riverdale development which survives.
The founders of Riverdale, five wealthy and influential businessmen—William W. Woodworth of Yonkers, and Charles W. Foster, Henry L. Atherton, William D. Cromwell, and Samuel D. Babcock of New York City — planned Riverdale as a suburban summer community beside what became at the time the only stop on the Hudson River Railroad between Spuyten Duyvil and Yonkers.
Riverdale is the earliest known railroad suburb in New York City, and it has most of the features commonly associated with the American romantic suburb of the mid-nineteenth century: genesis by a group of businessmen; an appropriate name associated with natural features; picturesque site, landscaping, and architecture; connection to the city by accessible transportation; and a layout adapted to the topography, in this case incorporating an existing road (Ackerman's farm road).
From the outset Riverdale was intended to have larger estates, each with a freestanding house of the sort known as a "villa" and related outbuildings, surrounding a core of smaller estate lots, which were also developed with freestanding houses and related outbuildings. The area of the Riverdale Historic District corresponds to seven original estates linked by a carriage alley (now Sycamore Avenue) and one parcel later subdivided from the adjacent Wave Hill Estate. The core of five lots (corresponding to the present-day block bounded by West 254th Street an the north, West 252nd
Street on the south, Independence Avenue on the east, and Sycamore Avenue on the west) comprised the first portion of Riverdale to be developed. Each lot received a freestanding villa (at least one of which was designed by Thomas S. Wall) facing Independence Avenue, which was completed by the end of 1853, as well as stables and carriage houses. The two larger estates (the Cromwell Estate [later Stonehurst], and the Stone Estate) between the carriage alley (Sycamore Avenue) and the Hudson River were developed by the end of the 1850s. The Cromwell (Stonehurst) residence is little changed from its original Italianate villa style appearance. The configuration of these seven parcels of property remained intact until 1935, even though the villas were altered to accommodate new living. This may be seen in the four surviving villas on Independence Avenue. In the case of the house at 5291 Independence Avenue, it was thoroughly remodeled in 1886 by the distinguished American architect, Frederick Clarke Withers. Along the carriage alley (Sycamore Avenue), carriage houses, stables, and a cottage were built and/or altered in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. As automobiles began to replace horse-drawn carriages, garages were constructed. The picturesque, physical interrelationship among the outbuildings and continuous stone walls and wrought-iron fence along the carriage alley, as well as the interrelationship of these buildings to the houses either up or down the sloping sites, is unique in New York City. In some cases, these outbuildings were designed to relate stylistically to the villas, such as the carriage house on the Cromwell (Stonehurst) Estate (5253 Sycamore Avenue) and that designed by Frederick Clarke Withers at 5286 Sycamore Avenue in conjunction with his work on the house at 5291 Independence Avenue. The carriage house at 5255 Sycamore, designed by the architectural firm of Brite & Bacon, also related architecturally to the mansion it served (later destroyed by fire and demolished). In other cases, these buildings have a more vernacular character, but still incorporate picturesque features and relate to the landscape.
Beginning in 1935 with the Charles Foster Estate and the Cromwell (Stonehurst) Estate, the original parcels were subdivided for development. With one exception (the house at 5200 Sycamore Avenue, architect Dwight James Baum, 1923-24), the twentieth-century houses within the district were traditional architectural styles, such as the neo-Colonial and neo-Federal, use natural materials, and are sited in such a way that they relate to the overall landscape and topography of the seven original estates. Many of them are also oriented to the north and south private roads leading from Sycamore Avenue, which were created from the approximate position of the Cromwell (Stonehurst) carriage drive. The carriage houses and stables were subsequently converted for residential use.
Today the Riverdale Historic District is characterized by several building types — villas of the 1850s with later alterations, stables and carriage houses of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (later converted for residential use), and houses mostly from the second and third quarters of the twentieth century — which reflect the changing nature of suburbanization from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. Equally characteristic of the district are landscaping and estate features, including stone border and retaining walls; terraces; steps, paths, and driveways; cobbled street gutters; and rows of trees and hedges, which survive throughout the district.
The historical significance of the Riverdale Historic District also comes in part because of its prominent residents over several generations, many of them related by the close ties of business and family, who have sought to preserve its character as a distinct suburban development.


Beginning Monday September 21, 2015, Colornet Press has moved to our new location where all of our operations will be under one roof! There's lots to look forward to. We are now just over the hill from our previous location and away from West LA's traffic, where the 405 and the 101 freeways meet. We are a few minutes walk to the Balboa Orange Line Station, Encino. Expect the same great and timely service!


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ABUSE AND NEGLECT: ADULT, ELDER & CHILD
(SCROLL DOWN TO SEE CHILD ABUSE)
What is Adult Abuse?
What Is Elder or Dependent Adult Abuse? Abuse of an elder or a dependent adult is abuse of: Someone 65 years old or older; or. A dependent adult, who is someone between 18 and 64 that has certain mental or physical disabilities that keep him or her from being able to do normal activities or protect himself or herself.
The law says elder or dependent adult abuse is: Physical abuse, neglect, financial abuse, abandonment, isolation, abduction (taking the person out of the state against his or her will), or other behavior that causes physical harm, pain, or mental suffering
World Patients: 6%
Sex Ratio: M:2W
Symptoms: Poor Physical or Mental Condition or Lack of Self-Care
Progression: Declining Coping Skills or Death; One study of financial abuse showed an average of $186,000 stolen.
Causes: Abused by families or caregivers; Poverty was a major factor.
Youtube Video: Elder abuse can happen to anyone, even your parents.
Rejected, Shamed Blamed
Adult Children of Abusive Parents
Click the book to Link and/or Order from Amazon.
Support Groups: States Differ. In Iowa use "Dependent Adult Services" 1-800-362-2718.
If the person is in danger, dial "911.")
Contact your own state's Department of Human Services for possible support groups.
Federal law definitions of child abuse and neglect
"Any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker, which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation"; or. "An act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm."
Youtube Video: How to Recognize Child Abuse and Neglect
Please Tell
Adverse Childhood Experiences Recovery Workbook
Support Group: childhelp.org;800-422-4453 (ChildHelp USA; National Child Abuse Hotline)
The association between adverse childhood experiences and depression trajectories in the Add Health study
by Jill Desch on January 27, 2023
CONCLUSIONS: ACEs can have a lasting impact on depression through adulthood, highlighting the need to mitigate their impact to prevent depression-associated morbidity and mortality.
Widening epidemiological data on the prevalence of child maltreatment: Validation of the German ICAST-R in a student sample and national household survey
by Marion Jarczok on January 27, 2023
CONCLUSION: The German version of the ICAST-R both widens the possibility of international CM prevalence comparison and provides novel epidemiological data for Germany on subjective severity of CM and CM perpetrators. Even in the presence of a marked selection bias, the ICAST-R had similarly good psychometric properties in the student and nationally representative household sample. Except for issues with two items, equivalence testing was comparable across age groups.
Do insecure adult attachment styles mediate the relationship between childhood maltreatment and violent behavior?
by Nina Papalia on January 26, 2023
Attachment theory has played an important role in attempts to understand the "cycle of violence," where maltreated children are at increased risk for perpetrating violence later in life. However, little is known empirically about whether adult attachment insecurity in close relationships may partly explain the link between childhood maltreatment and violent behavior. This study aimed to address this gap using data from a prospective longitudinal study of documented childhood abuse and neglect...
Measuring Violence Against Children: A COSMIN Systematic Review of the Psychometric and Administrative Properties of Adult Retrospective Self-report Instruments on Child Abuse and Neglect
by Bridget Steele on January 25, 2023
Valid, meaningful, and reliable adult retrospective measures of violence against children (VAC) are essential for establishing the prevalence, risk factors, and long-term effects of VAC. We aim to summarize the available evidence on the psychometric properties of adult retrospective VAC measures and to provide evidence-based recommendations for appropriate measure selection. We searched six electronic databases and gray literature for studies that report on the development, content validity, or...


Ballet 5:8's Revive Retreat is a powerful weekend of refreshment, relationship and revival for professional dancers! The three-day event is designed to provide rest, revitalization and renewed passion amid the physically and emotionally demanding lifestyle of a professional performer. The retreat is designed to provide time and space for dancers of all backgrounds to experience spiritual and emotional refreshment through prayer, meditation, spiritual mentorship, and group seminars.


Holidays | Christmas · Paternity Leave · Sparklet · Washington D.C.
Holidays | Christmas · Paternity Leave · The Mighty Quinn · Washington D.C.
Outings · Paternity Leave · Sparklet · Washington D.C.
for the third consecutive time, i took the mighty quinn to the pediatrician (alone) and it turns out nothing was wrong.
i'm pretty sure that's a life lesson — if my wife thinks the baby is actually sick, she makes time so that she can visit the doctor herself. if she sends me alone, i think we can safely say it's not life threatening.
Outings · Paternity Leave · Sparklet · The D.C. Parkers · The Mighty Quinn · Washington D.C.


My forthcoming manuscript Before the Utopia: A Cultural History ofthe Black Cooperative Movement, 1890-The Present uncovers how four generations of African American artists—W. E. B. Du Bois, George Schuyler, Ella Baker, Fannie Lou Hamer, and their circles—established local cooperatives as alternatives to global capital. I argue that these artists used cooperatives to experiment with innovative ways of forming a social movement without investing in progress. One question inspired almost unthinkable forms of activism: where do you move to when you're not trying to move to a better tomorrow?
"Unco-Opted: Cooperative Economics as Counter Surveillance." African American Literature: In Transition, 1940-50. Cambridge UP, 2019. 30,000 words.
"'There Wont Be Inny Show Tonite': Humoring the Returns of Scopic Violence in Suzan-Lori Parks's Venus." History and Humor: British and American Perspectives. Ed. Barbara Korte and Doris Lechner. Bielfeld, Germany: Transcript Press, 2013. 171-92.
"Capital, Credit, and American Literary History." American Literary History (2019): 4,000 words.
"The Ethics of Reading Poverty: Charles Wright, Empathy, and the US Welfare." Contemporary Literature (revise and resubmit) (2019): 11,000 words.
"The Hesitations of Speculative History." Post 45 (2019): 1500 words. <http://post45.research.yale.edu/2019/01/the-style-of-speculative-history/>.
"The Humor We Fear Most." Post 45 (2019): 1500 words. <http://post45.research.yale.edu/2019/02/the-humor-we-fear-most-a-response-to-sarah-wasserman/>.
"Not an Invitation, But a Warning (Roundtable on Get Out with Glenda Carpio & Namwali Serpell)." Public Books. 23 May 2017.
"Everybody's Protest Play?." Public Books. 1 Jun. 2014.
"Saints on the Dollar." Public Books. 1 Jul. 2014.
""Ava Duvernay"." Public Books. 1 Jan. 2016.
"The Demos of Democracy ." Rev. of The Ethics of Swagger & The Time Is Always Now | American Literature | (2015): 622-24.


If you've ever read an ingredient label you probably noticed that it is nearly impossible to figure out just what is really in your food. Once you get past the items you recognize like salt, spices, and flavorings you end up in an area that you practically need a chemistry degree to understand or identify.
This is how sugar hides in your diet. Though you try hard to eat healthy and to buy healthy snacks for your kids, how can you make a valid decision if you don't know what's in the food? Fortunately, there are easy ways to identify sugar in your food and here is how.
What Names Does Sugar Go By?
In some ingredient lists you actually see the word sugar. It may be cane sugar or refined sugar, but the word sugar is there. You can identify this as a snack with sugar. Another fact that will help you is that ingredients are listed in the order of most to least.
So, if beef is the first ingredient it is mostly beef, but if water is first it is mostly water. You can start there. If sugar is near the top of the list, move on to the next potential food.
Sugar comes in many forms, but the easiest way to identify them is from the ending of the word. Sugars end in "ose." So, when you see glucose, sucrose, maltose, fructose, and lactose. These words can all be translated as sugar. Sadly, they are found in fruit bars, yogurts, dried fruit and basically anything sweetened. Even cough medicine.
Change your habits. Try to avoid processed food. Make your own snacks or choose crunchy fruits and vegetables instead. Crackers and cheese make good snacks and cheese helps neutralize the acid in your mouth that causes tooth decay.
Please contact our office if you have any questions about sugars effects on your oral health.


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Q: Jekyll adding unwanted space before and after links I'm learning Jekyll. I finished the step by step tutorial: https://jekyllrb.com/docs/step-by-step/01-setup/
Variables seem to generate spaces before and after. Eg. item.name is now outputting the following:

 Home
 Blog
 About
 Staff

Which visually puts a space after each link. Ugly and potential for styling mishaps.
Do I have to make it, not do that? Am I OCD? Or am I doing it wrong?
Reference:
_includes/nav.html

  {% for item in site.data.nav %}

    {{ item.name }}

  {% endfor %}

that .current class
.current {
  color: green;
}

_data/nav.yml
- name: Home
  link: /
- name: About
  link: /about.html
- name: Blog
  link: /blog.html
- name: Staff
  link: /staff.html

A: It doesn't happen to me, but this can be fixed by adding | strip after item.name like so:
_includes/nav.html

  {% for item in site.data.nav %}

    {{ item.name | strip }}

  {% endfor %}

EDIT:
Seems like in OP's case, it's caused by indentation's spacings. To fix this,  you must replace any occurrence of {{ with {{-, }} with -}}, {% with {%-, and %} with -%}. Here's the reference.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
DIRECTV in Dodge City, Kansas - Satellite Packages
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DIRECTV For Business DIRECTV For Multi Dwelling Units
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A shameless plug for the most versatile member of our multi-talented English Department : Ronan Swift performs at Bewley's Cafe Theatre on Wednesday next, December 5th, from 8.30pm. Tickets €10 at the door.
Swifty is an Autumn man. But by now it is Winter and although past his very best he is still worth a flutter. Leaf fall is general across Ireland. Breezes push and shove flimsy birds to distant parishes. As they are buffeted they sing, so does Swifty.


Please click on a product tour option below to find out what benefits our software will provide you and your users!
PLEASE NOTE. Product demonstrations are Macromedia Shockwave presentations. If you are prompted to Open or Save the demonstrations, you must download and install the Macromedia Shockwave Flash Player.
Note: we are currently working on updating these tours to the new Knowledgeone v1.5 look and feel. The product version that the tour is based on is noted beside each demonstration.
Note: the following movies will start when the Screen cast loader reaches 10%. If you experience problems downloading the following two presentations please contact Marketing.
Knowledgeone Corporation's CEO, Frank McKenna, explains the architecture behind K1, its standard products and its optional 'add-ons'. He details the main benefits of K1 and then takes you on a short tour.
Knowledgeone is much more than just a single source of knowledge. It is a multi-tasking application solution, a single product that can process multiple applications simultaneously. Learn how you can solve all of your business needs with one application. Also see how Knowledgeone K1's powerful security system handles access to tables, fields and methods.
The following introductory tours provide a quick, informative preview of Knowledgeone and it's various components - the DRM module (K1's Administrator tool), GEM (K1's new email management and archiving solution), Tacit (K1's solution for managing tacit knowledge) and RecCapture (K1's automatic electronic document management system).
The following tours introduce the power of the Knowledgeone's user interface, showing its user sensitivity and multilingualism. We also demonstrate some of the common functions in Knowledgeone, such as cloning and scanning.
The following tours show the numerous ways in which you can search on information within the Knowledgeone repository.
The workflow tours provide a basic introduction to Knowledgeone's Workflow capabilities. Learn how to add Workflows/Tasks and to search and report on workflows.


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Bazin and Adorno on Cinema and Realism
Bazin and Adorno on Cinema and Realism Analytical Essay by Top Papers
An analysis of the perspectives of Andre Bazin and Theodore Adorno on cinema and realism in terms of the industrial mass production of contemporary film.
# 134338 | 2,250 words | 5 sources | MLA | 2007 |
Published on Dec 01, 2007 in Film (General) , Art (General)
The paper looks at how Andre Bazin, in his discussion of how the cinematic and photographic media relate to the crisis of realism in Western art in the 19th and 20th centuries, argues that the popular belief that these media objectively reproduce reality gives these media a "credibility" among the general public that transcends that of the other arts. The paper explains the opposing views of Theodore Adorno, who argued that the origins of cinema in industrial production is of prime concern in analyzing the products and effects of this medium, Bazin contends that the "ideal" of the cinematic medium takes precedence over the incidental fact that it was developed by industrialists and business interests. The paper argues that while it is undeniable that film is created in the context of a cultural industry, Bazin's insights regarding the origins of its psychological power over the mass audience are critical to our appreciation of how film can function as a vehicle of both commercial and popular interests. The paper shows, however, how the theoretical perspectives of both Bazin and Adorno are flawed in not considering the complex relationship between cinema and "realism" in terms of style, aesthetics and the role of the author.
"This production by automatic means has radically affected our psychology of the image. The objective nature of photography confers on it a quality of credibility absent all other picture making. . . . (Bazin "Ontology" 13) Andre Bazin, in his discussion of how the cinematic and photographic media relate to the crisis of realism in Western art in the 19th and 20th centuries, argues that the popular belief that these media objectively..."
Cite this Analytical Essay:
Bazin and Adorno on Cinema and Realism (2007, December 01) Retrieved January 16, 2021, from https://www.academon.com/analytical-essay/bazin-and-adorno-on-cinema-and-realism-134338/
"Bazin and Adorno on Cinema and Realism" 01 December 2007. Web. 16 January. 2021. <https://www.academon.com/analytical-essay/bazin-and-adorno-on-cinema-and-realism-134338/>
Realism in "Citizen Kane."
A discussion of the use of realism in "Citizen Kane."
Cobalt-based Hard Magnetic Films
A highly technical paper that reviews literature on the operating procedure and magnetic properties of electrochemical deposited Co-based magnetic films.
International Relations: Liberalism and Realism
A discussion about liberalism and realism and how they relate to international relations, especially with the current terrorist threat.


Devil May Cry 5: Will Capcom Make Trish, Lady, And Nico Playable?
Devil May Cry 5 director has hinted that Capcom might make Trish, Lady, and Nico playable if there is enough demand.
Reported by Gamingbolt, Devil May Cry 5 director Hideaki Itsuno recently participated in a Q&A session for the press in Seoul. Instead of spoiling the entire game, Itsuno confirmed the campaign's length and teased the possibility for even more playable characters.
Asked about how long the game is, Itsuno stated internal playtests suggest the fifth instalment will be the longest Devil May Cry game at roughly 15 hours long. Although a lot of games nowadays are extravaganzas that demand 50 hours or more of your life, fans and potential newcomers shouldn't be upset about Capcom's predicted length. Rather than padding the game out by travelling at a snail's pace, Devil May Cry 5 promises to be a rollercoaster ride from beginning to end.
If a 15 hour campaign isn't good news for fans, then perhaps Itsuno's confirmation about the possibility for even more playable characters is better. While Devil May Cry 5 already stars Dante, Nero, and newcomer V, the possibility of a fourth playable character is no doubt exciting. It probably wouldn't be anything more than replaying the campaign in different skins, but it would be nice to control the sassy uber-geek Nicollete Goldstein, as well as the returning Trish and Lady.
Although the possibility of being able to play as Nico, Trish and Lady is exciting, fans should still be cautious about Devil May Cry 5's microtransactions. Some gamers will no doubt defend the inclusion by insisting that they are plague that can be avoided, but microtransactions shouldn't be a part of single-player titles regardless.
A second Devil May Cry 5 demo will be made available for the PS4 and Xbox One on February 7. Meanwhile, the full game launches on March 8 for the Xbox One, PS4, and PC.


Episode 616 Does retirement call for a dermatologist?
Last week my wife and I went to a dermatologist for a skin scan. A friend of ours who has had skin cancers removed for over thirty years insisted that we do this. He claimed that it went with retirement.
The dermatologist found us cancer free, but at the same time opened the lid to a vat of liquid nitrogen and dipped a cotton swab into it. Without a word he started pressing this super cold swab against our faces: a dot here and a dot there. He must have hit a dozen spots. He said they were "precancerous colorations" and he was just being cautious. He said they would turn red, perhaps blister and then peal off in a couple of weeks. It doesn't make one look like a model. Years ago it would have been of real concern. But, retired and older, it doesn't seem to matter. It is just another step in the process of life. I like to think of them as "beauty marks".
Basing life on physical beauty has its own built-in flaw. The more one values and cherishes their youthful appearance, the more disappointing the later days of life must become. Age is a great equalizer: the wrinkles come; the posture changes – gravity wins; the hair thins; skin loses elasticity. Other physical changes are impossible to halt. Oh, some people try with cosmetic surgery, toupees, injections, etc. They may help some – for a short time. But for most of us – we accept age and the 'look' that comes with it.
Back to seeing a dermatologist; I think it is a good thing to visit one. I know of several people who have avoided serious cancer by regular visits. We are now on a yearly checkup schedule.


LE KLINT Model 236 with 50 cm in diameter and aluminium details.
These beautiful designs are ideal for hallways, dining table settings and even the limited areas near staircases, entrances and exits.
LAMELLA lighting series is an inspiration from the ribbed underside of mushrooms, which are actually called lamellas.


text:
Sonia Furtado Neves
EMBL Press Office
Meyerhofstraße 1, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany
media@embl.org
Drugging bacteria
Commonly used diabetes drug impacts gut bacteria more than the disease itself, EMBL scientists have found.
Gut bacteria are more affected by metformin than by the type-2 diabetes it is prescribed to treat. IMAGE: Courtesy of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (BY-NC-SA)
Metformin, the drug most often used to treat type 2 diabetes, has a greater effect on gut microbes than the disease itself. The finding, by the Bork group and colleagues in the MetaHIT consortium, has implications for studies searching for links between our microbiomes and disease. Published today in Nature, the study points to new approaches for understanding how metformin works, and minimising the side effects of a drug that patients take in high doses for many years.
"It's surprising that this single drug triggers such a noticeable change in our microbes," says Peer Bork, who led the work at EMBL. "Now think how many drugs are out there, and how many people take several drugs daily: even if only a fraction of drugs have this big an impact, they could still be dramatically shaping people's gut."
Metformin is a drug commonly used to treat type 2 diabetes, to help control blood sugar levels. It is typically administered in relatively high doses. And, as type 2 diabetes is a chronic disease, patients usually take the drug for years. But exactly how it acts inside patients' bodies is not yet entirely clear.
anyone trying to minimise side effects could think about acting on the microbes
The scientists compared stool samples from over 700 people, including patients with type 2 diabetes and healthy people. The team found that, based on the communities of microbes present in a person's stool, they couldn't reliably tell if the person had diabetes or not – unless the person took metformin. Patients who took the drug had considerably more E.coli and fewer I. bartletti bacteria than healthy people and patients who did not take metformin.
"The differences we observed in microbial communities could explain some of metformin's side effects, which means anyone trying to minimise those side effects could think about acting on the microbes in the gut," says Kristoffer Forslund, from Bork's lab.
Some day, a person taking metformin might conceivably also get a yoghurt or dietary supplement to help maintain the balance of their inner microbial community, the scientists postulate.
The findings also explain the contradictory results of previous studies trying to establish how the community of microbe species in the gut differs between healthy people and people with type 2 diabetes. The fact that different studies found different microbial communities associated with diabetes was probably because more patients took metformin in one study than in another.
we're not alone: the medicines we swallow don't just affect us directly
For scientists searching for bacterial 'fingerprints' that could be used to diagnose or treat diseases such as diabetes, the current study highlights the importance of considering whether treatments are influencing – and potentially confounding – the results.
"Our study sets a new standard for exploring the impact of various disorders on the human gut microbiota," says Oluf Pedersen, who led the study at Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Metabolic research at University of Copenhagen. "Ideally, future studies should be run in treatment-naïve patients to avoid confounding effects of medications on disease-specific imbalances of intestinal microbes."
"This work really highlights the importance of the gut microbiome, not just in keeping us healthy but also in influencing how we react to treatments," says Dusko Ehrlich, from the French Institute for Agricultural Research (INRA), in France, who led the MetaHIT consortium.
"These findings really show we're not alone: the medicines we swallow don't just affect us directly. They can have a profound impact on our microbial 'inhabitants', too," Bork concludes.
This study stems from earlier work by – and draws data from – the MetaHIT consortium, an EU-funded project which ran from 2008 to 2012 and which aimed to establish associations between the genes of microbes in the human gut and our health and disease.
Source articles
Forslund K, Hildebrand F, Nielsen T, Falony G, Le Chatelier E et al. Nature, 2 December 2015. DOI: 10.1038/nature15766
Tags: Bioinformatics, Genomics, Health, Heidelberg, press release
The SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1.7 lineage
By Guest author(s)
Monitoring dangerous bacteria in freshwater
By Oana Stroe
Toadlet peptide transforms into a deadly weapon against bacteria
By Dorota Badowska