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Our Converging Crises V: Weak Democrats and their Governing Boards Feed Austerity Budgets
Where are university budgets near the end of our bad policy summer? In a bad place — a worse place than seemed likely during the weeks of activist government from mid-March to mid-May. In this post, I'll discuss the national issue, describe a flawed university budget discourse that makes universities more vulnerable, and link this to the failure of today's mainstream Democrats to accept the economic role of government.
The federal CARES Act was signed on March 27th, and sent universities $14 billion of the $46.6 billion they'd requested (with half of that going directly to students). Having gotten 1/6th of their stated need, higher ed advocates placed their hopes in a follow-up HEROES Act passed the House on May 15th, which Mitch McConnell, Senate Majority Leader, sat on throughout the summer. Thus the nation's schools and colleges planned for fall in a state of deep uncertainty and growing dread.
This past weekend, POTUS signed executive orders (mostly "memoranda") mandating supplemental unemployment benefits at $300 rather than CARES's $600 per week, with another $100 to come from the states. He extended student loan forbearance from September 30 to the end of the year. Even if these orders go into effect, there are no provisions for supplemental funding for education at any level, including nothing for the K-12 systems that POTUS and his Department of Education secretary have been trying to bully into opening. If the states are forced to pay part of the federal unemployment supplement, which some say they can't, that will mean even bigger state cuts to education.
There are technically three bills under discussion in the COVID-19
emergency aid negotiations. The first bill is the HEROES Act written by
House Democrats and approved by the full House two months ago. The
second is the HEALS Act, which represents the ideas of Senate
Republicans and the White House. Finally, the Coronavirus Childcare and
Education Relief Act (CCCERA) is legislation introduced by Sens. Chuck
Schumer (D-NY) and Patty Murray (D-WA) that reflects Senate Democrats'
ideas about education spending in response to the pandemic. . . . The bills all include
emergency aid for students and institutions, but the levels of funding
proposed differ greatly. ACE has estimated that institutions have a
total of $46.6 billion in increased student financial need and lost
revenues, and will spend at least $73.8 billion on new expenditures to
reopen in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. While CCCERA provides a total
of $132 billion to meet these needs, the $37 billion provided for higher
education in HEROES and the $29 billion provided in HEALS fall far
short.
The federal bill that comes closest to meeting actual higher ed need–at $132 billion–has no chance of passing McCullough's Senate.
Republican control of key governing bodies has artificially induced massive state failure in suppressing SARS-CoV-2. The U.S. has the worst Covid-19 suppression record in the wealthy world, and, by failing to build public health infrastructure (see Jeneen Interlandi's superb overview), will continue to inflict massive suffering, disparately along lines of race and class, in all of the areas where common life should offer equal treatment, including education. The failure of public infrastructure is damaging the private economy that Republican-driven premature opening was trying to protect. Republican opposition to a new stimulus increases the odds of a new depression (see Hiltzik and Krugman for summaries).
Operating on this familiar political landscape, it's hard for people to maintain transformative ambition. I sketched one version at the end of April ("Our Converging Crises III"), which involved massive public spending for full Covid-19 suppression, full employment, and educational experimentation. The American self-conception is of a nation that leads the world into a better future. The reality, given our decrepit social infrastructure, is a vast majority focused entirely on getting by.
The Real Covid Budget Crisis
The same is true in higher education. There's been no follow-up on the early burst of federal effort, and higher ed is engaged in a new round of austerity, translated as operations cuts, layoffs, and program downsizing. The Cal State system threw in the towel early, announcing on May 12th that it would be all-online. This was at a time when most administrations assumed Covid-19 would be well in hand by fall; Cal State's Chancellor Timothy White could see pretty clearly that they didn't have the extra billion they needed for testing, tracing, isolating, cleaning, tent classrooms, and the rest. Since then, reopening plans have gone into full reverse, including at wealthy private institutions like Princeton and Johns Hopkins whose core value is small-scale face-to-face learning.
University of California campuses are quietly joining Cal State's closures on a case-by-case basis. Berkeley announced all-online on July 21st. The other semester campus, UC Merced, will open August 26th with an unspecified ratio of remote and in-person. Among quarter campuses, which start a month later, UCLA has dropped its in-person proportion from the 15-20% announced in June to 8%. UCSB hasn't officially updated its mid-June description of fall quarter as "some face-to-face," but is heading toward basically closed. UC Irvine is keeping its students in the "most classes will start remotely" twilight zone. All sorts of intensive planning is going on behind the scenes. And so are planning for budget cuts when UC needs that same extra billion that Cal State needed to open safely.
Although dominated by liberal Democrats, the California state legislature put stable CSU and UC funding in the hands of Mitch McConnell at at time when he was already holding it hostage. In the final state budget, UC will get a 5% increase over 2019-20 if and only if California gets $14 billion in federal stimulus. If there's no stimulus, UC gets what UCOP calls an 8% cut from 2019-20.
In addition, the permanent state budget is cut either way: the federal stimulus money will be treated as a one-time backfill on the state cut. Even that was a bizarre combination of "augmentations totaling $212.9 million and reductions totaling $471.6 million." Rather than offering higher ed affirmation and stability during the pandemic, the legislature provided a changing combination of cuts and increases that, without an unlikely Senate backfill, gives UC and CSU a major cut.
How big a cut, actually? The legislature reduced the state allocation for UC from $3.938 billion in 2019-20 to $3.466 billion in 2020-21. This is a year-on-year reduction of 12.2%. Its a Covid cut of a size that a red-state legislature could brag about.
It's worth remembering all the way back to November 2019, when The Regents requested an increase of $422.1M in overall state funding, which would have brought state general funding to $4.360B (see the slide here minus $25M for the Riverside School of Medicine). Annual base cost increases at UC are a bit more than 5%, and since that's 5% on less than half the revenues of the core budget, which comes mostly from (long-frozen) tuition, 5% state increases put core funding further behind. Campuses have tirelessly tried all sorts of revenue workarounds, mostly involving overenrollment coupled with non-resident student growth, but it hasn't worked. (For the resulting long-term austerity, see "Three Essential Charts"). On top of its rather brutalist history, the California legislature now proposes to cut UC by $903.5M from its November request–barring a McConnell conversion like Saul's on the road to Damascus. The is a cut of 20.7% from the Regents's November request.
Remember too that even had that $903.5 million November increase been enacted, many campuses were projecting deficits in 2020-21 or the following year. That was not a luxury budget. To repeat: becasue of prior cuts by Govs. Schwarzenegger and Brown, years of tuition freezes, and sub-inflation state growth, the non-miracle state budget cut that now looks likely is a 20.7% cut from pre-Covid's home for UC semi-solvency.
This would be a disaster for UC (and CSU). And it's likely enough to be treated explicitly in plans for both budgeting and the University's political engagements.
Budget Idealism at the UC Regents
This brings is to the July 30th UC Regents meeting. The Regents have absolute authority over budgeting, revenue strategies like borrowing, as well as political advocacy. If alerted to a budgetary emergency, the Regents might be expected to instruct UCOP to mount a massive siege of Sacramento and Washington D.C., pulling in their contacts in the tech community as well as in national politics. But UCOP's budget presentation (see the July 30 afternoon session at the bottom of this page), rather than rallying the Regents, kept the real dangers behind the curtain. And Regental behavior encouraged this concealment.
UCOP presented the budget as in basically good shape. Medical losses for March-June 2020 are $1.7 billon rather than the earlier projection of $2.8 billion. UC Health VP Carrie Byington had already suggested that the med centers have learned so much about Covid treatment that they won't repeat spring's revenue losses during the current and future infection spikes.
Undergrad enrollments are "looking very strong," in the words of associate budget VP David Alcocer (11'47"). He said the same was true of international enrollments, in spite of a very turbulent policy picture on top of Covid travel problems. He basically claimed that enrollment targets would be hit no matter what. I'm also a bit of an optimist on enrollments because I'm a pessimist on the economy: even remote-college looks good compared to a nonexistent job market. Polling data suggest we're both wrong, and that colleges should expect a growing enrollment melt.
The presentation noted that housing and dining revenues will be down, but UCOP did not quantify or tie these to different durations of Covid-related reductions. A bit later, UCLA chancellor Block offered some campus numbers, and in later questions a couple of Regents clarified that only single rooms will be offered in the fall, though without revenue numbers for system losses. New VP for Research and Innovation, Teresa Maldonado, gave a candid appraisal of major disruption to research, UC's distinguishing educational activity. She was particularly direct on the damage to women and early-career researchers. But this remained a matter of delayed research progress more than a fiscal crisis.
The presentation of the state budget was a delicate matter (starting around 7'40"; I'm not following UCOP slide order). Alcocer explained the numbers in the slide below (they are different from my calculations above). He noted that the final July budget has a better upside than the May Revise and a smaller potential downside.
He then went on to explain his right-hand column. He noted that "there's a lot of uncertainty here" because the range of outcomes is nearly half a billion dollars, or 5% of the core budget (9'20"). I can attest that the uncertainty has created in campus planning a somewhat toxic mixture of paralysis, wishful thinking, gloom, and fatalism about cuts. Uncertainty is actually encouraging austerity by making the early stages seem very mild.
But Alcocer's statement about uncertainty incurred an interruption from Chair John Pérez, who said,
I just want to push back on the way we characterize this uncertainty. And here's why. The way this reads to me, in simple terms, is "uncertainty is bad, and smaller uncertainty is better than greater uncertainty." When in fact the final budget, in both the worst-case scenario and the best-case scenario, are better for the University, than the May Revise. . . "Uncertainty" is inherently a bad term, so if we want to look at "range"–some other way to characterize it–because we don't want a negative connotation to the spread we see in the final budget, when in fact it serves us better than the May Revise does."
This intervention forced Alcocer to repeat what he had said two minutes before, which was that the upside was better in July than in May. It suggested to me that Pérez has no idea how uncertainty is weakening the campuses. It also suggested that he would not tolerate university officials criticizing the state legislature in even a polite and indirect way. Any campaign to get a reliably flat budget from the state (not conditioned on McColloughs's conversion to St. Mitch), or an increased budget that could cover Covid costs, would never get off the drawing board under Pérez.
The misty aura of fiscal stability was punctured only by Berkeley chancellor Carol Christ, who projected a $340M deficit through fiscal 2021 (or more than ten percent of the campus's $3 billion or so in annual revenues). She read a version of her administration's July 15th statement, and stressed the dependence of the campus on tuition and state revenues. She stated that the latter were $100M below their 2008 level even though the campus enrolls 8200 more students today.
If the Regents had paused to take that in, they'd get a glimpse of the system's deep structural woes. Berkeley is historically wealthier per student than any campus except UCLA, so a responsible Board might wonder what its woes say about the rest of the system. This was the only time in living memory that a Berkeley chancellor has said point blank that privatization doesn't work and thus we need good state support. Actually Christ didn't say that, but she came closer than ever before to noting that the problem isn't just Covid but a flawed business model in which the University has let state funding massively decline.
Later, as Alcocer was about to move to UCLA chancellor Block for a campus view of losses in auxiliaries, Board chair Pérez interrupted to complain about how long the budget presentations were taking. "This was identified as a thirty minute discussion. . . . when an item is 30 minutes, the presentation is no more than half of that. We've now exceeded 35 minutes, before we've gotten a single Regent engaged in discussion." (32'30"). The obvious remedy would be to allocate more than a half-hour to analyzing what may be most important fiscal crisis in the University's history. The time overrun was entirely due to letting three chancellors say a few words about their campus finances outside of the UCOP PowerPoint story. Things got even more rushed after that–and even more superficial.
In questions, terribly delayed to minute 38, Regent Makarichian performed his solo role of asking for budget numbers, and guessed at overall losses by adding some numbers in his head. Pérez instructed CFO Brostrom to have those figures in the September meeting. I know Brostrom had versions he could have produced then, but who would dare try the Pérezian patience by pulling up another slide?
In the meantime, UC is covering its losses with borrowing. It floated a bond for $2.8 billion in July, with $1.5 billion in "working capital" and the rest for capital projects. (UC debt has doubled in a decade from around $10 billion in 2009-10 to $24.6 billion in 2018-19). The budget discussion ended with a hopeful wait-and-see good-case scenario which, as I've said, is translated on the campuses as cuts.
A Plausible Scenario for 2020-21
The Office of the President and the campuses are all doing projections, so I'm going to adjust some internal UC numbers to draft a plausible negative scenario. This is not a good case, but it's not a worst-case: for example, I optimistically assume that students who can enroll do enroll, and that all are willing to pay full tuition for mostly remote instruction. The nicer scenarios assume a return to mostly-normal after the fall term. Based on our country's failed-state approach to Covid suppression, I assume that full fall impacts last through the end of Spring 2021. I use the governor's January budget as a base for state funding, which was $220M less than the Regents' November budget.
The assumptions:
Tuition: full undergraduate enrollment. Though 75% of admitted international students do not enroll, many are replaced by domestic non-resident and resident students. Waitlists and "appeal" lists are liberally used, maintaining overall totals.
Housing is converted to singles, and dining does not return to normal, costing campuses 70% of normal revenues.
Grad student enrollment. This falls 15%, slowing research, but it has little impact on revenues as campuses simply eliminate sections as necessary in remote courses, while canceled grad seminars free up some faculty to teach more undergraduates.
Research continues to be affected by outbreaks made worse by shortages of tracing and isolation programs.
Philanthropy is reduced by renewed turbulence in the markets, as is UC investment income.
Medical center and clinical revenues recover from spring 2020 levels but don't get back to normal.
The Republicans block higher ed stimulus funding in the Senate. Although the Democrats win back the Senate in November, President Biden wishes to govern from the center, and decides not to antagonize the 48 remaining Republicans by giving too much help to education. Like public universities everywhere,UC goes to its lower permanent state funding base.
Here's a rough estimate of what this would look like by standard budget category.
Scenario B
Budget Category
Decline $Millions
Negative % Change
2020-21 Base
Student Tuition and Fees
Auxiliary Enterprises
Research Contracts & Grants
Philanthropy & Investment Income
Educational Activities (esp Clinical Rev)
State General Fund Appropriation
Total Losses
Projected 2020-21 UC Revenues
Scenario B is a decent guess at one possible program for 2020-21: 17% revenue declines for the UC system overall, and 12% or so for the educational core. Cuts like these would cause major damage to teaching and research, and of course prevent meaningful Covid-19 suppression. If two things happen, first, Covid illness persists for several years, as some medical officials predict, and second, U.S. politics allows economic decline, then UC, like other universities, will be permanently downgraded.
The Governance Problem
The Republicans are obviously the biggest problem, but so are Democrats and their governing boards. The Republican donor base sees government as a potentially victorious competitor to business and finance in economic management (through equitable tax policy and regulation but also better social infrastructure and more productive investment). Weak government has enabled today's "plutonomy." Republican politicians logically oppose programs that will make government useful, effective, and popular and thus empower their direct rival.
But Democrats are also a problem when they reject both strong and weak Keynesianism. In the strong version, public agencies spend massively to reconstruct society on the principle of equal treatment. This would fund a Green New Deal in which, for example, some of our tens of millions of unemployed people would be paid by the government to insulate the country's housing stock, starting with those owned by low-income people. I pointed towards this kind of spending in an April post. Let's call it democratic-socialist Keynesianism, Sanders and AOC-style.
There's also weak Keynesianism, a very useful combination of FDR and LBJ, in which public agencies spend massive amounts to keep an unjust and unequal status quo economy from imploding. That would include the common-sense goal of keeping the education sector from shedding employees into a non-functional economy by giving schools and colleges stable funding. It would include the UK policy–enacted by the Conservative government–of covering 80% of the salary of laid-off employees so they can be furloughed rather than fired.
Mainstream Democrats don't exactly oppose this kind of thing. But they don't promote it as their bread and butter. They also don't clearly expose the urgent need for it, or encourage others to expose it. At times, liberal Democrats like John Pérez actively block the creation of a budgetary need for weak Keynesian spending by preventing the open declaration of a budgetary problem.
The current UC Board of Regents is chaired by the former Democrat Speaker of the Assembly. It includes the Democrat Lt.Governor, the husband of California's senior U.S. senator, and several former or current members of two Democratic governors' immediate office. It also boasts several wealthy and prominent Hollywood liberals. There is really no reason for this group not to activate itself in centrist Keynesian fashion. They would then create an urgent obligation on the part of the state to sustain its educational workforce, infrastructure, and student population, whose lives are currently set to be permanently damaged by the Covid depression.
I don't understand the complacency that demands the current UC budgetary vagueness in which nothing is true and everything is possible, until the only possibility becomes austerity. It feels like proleptic excuse making–"we didn't fail to act, because we didn't know." I don't understand the lack of ambition, even the bare ambition to keep the rising generation whole. We can obviously do that, but it will take much clearer budget work at the level of senior management and governing boards. It will take boards willing to support unprecedented mobilizations of political will for higher education, or at least willing not to block them,
higher-education
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Horse Island
Spring comes early this year – on the 20th of March instead of the 21st. It's all to do with the precession of the equinoxes. But you might follow the old tradition (and why wouldn't you?) that Spring begins on St Brigid's Day – the 1st of February. We have been having many good, clear – and warm – days of sunshine since then, to balance out all the cool and wet ones, and the days are 'drawing out'.
Ireland's green landscapes presented using the panorama technology of a phone camera! Top – the two lakes at Dunlough, above Three Castle Head, Mizen Peninsula; centre – view across Roaringwater Bay from the top of Mount Gabriel; lower – Peekeen ridge, Sheep's Head Peninsula
It's the abundance of weather – in all its varieties – that makes Ireland's landscapes so green, and so beautiful: as we are not so far from St Patrick's Day (last week, when everything turned green!) today's post is a celebration of the special colour as we find it around us. Finola mentions it today, but in a different context.
…When Erin first rose from the dark swelling flood,
God bless'd the green island and saw it was good;
The em'rald of Europe, it sparkled and shone,
In the ring of the world the most precious stone…
(William Drennan 1754 – 1820)
Where Ireland's most westerly land mass dips into the Atlantic: looking east from Brow Head towards Crookhaven
…Ireland, it's the one place on earth that heaven has kissed with melody, mirth, and meadow and mist…
(Old Irish Blessing)
Rossbrin Cove – with its ancient castle lost in the mist – seen from the green fields of Cappaghglass
In our own townland of Cappaghglass we have vivid green pastures but also, up on the old mine road, colours that constantly change with the seasons. It's too early yet for the abundance of wild blooms that will transform the hedgerows and verges – we'll watch out for those.
Cappaghglass: upper – a kaleidoscope of colours along the mine road, waiting for the Spring; lower – the colour green proliferates when the wildflowers appear
…When I come out on the road of a morning, when I have had a night's sleep and perhaps a breakfast, and the sun lights a hill on the distance, a hill I know I shall walk across an hour or two thence, and it is green and silken to my eye, and the clouds have begun their slow, fat rolling journey across the sky, no land in the world can inspire such love in a common man…
(Frank Delaney)
One of Ireland's spectacular roads makes its way through the Kerry mountains
Her eyes were like two sparkling diamonds
Or the stars of a bright frosty night
Her cheeks were like two blooming roses
And her teeth of the ivory so white
She resembled the Goddess of Freedom
And green was the mantle she wore
Bound round with the shamrock and roses
As she strayed along Erin´s green shore
(Mick Moloney)
Erin's green shore: upper – our own Roaringwater Bay: Horse Island just off the coast and Cape Clear beyond. Lower – the tide is out below Brow Head, Crookhaven, exposing an ancient stone row which has been drowned by rising sea levels
…The gorse was in bloom, the fuchsia hedges were already budding; wild green hills, mounds of peat; yes, Ireland is green, very green, but its green is not only the green of meadows, it is the green of moss – and moss is the plant of resignation, of forsakenenness. The country is forsaken, it is being slowly but steadily depopulated…
(Heinrich Böll – 1957)
…There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet
As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet;
Oh! the last rays of feeling and life must depart,
Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my heart…
(Thomas Moore)
The meeting of several waters here at Donemark Falls, just north of Bantry
…Sure a little bit of Heaven fell from out the sky one day and it nestled on the ocean in a spot so far away. When the angels found it, sure it looked so sweet and fair, they said, "Suppose we leave it for it looks so peaceful there."
So they sprinkled it with stardust just to make the shamrocks grow. 'Tis the only place you'll find them no matter where you go. Then they dotted it with silver to make its lakes so grand and when they had it finished, sure they called it Ireland…
(Linda Weaver Clarke)
The Lakes of Killarney, Co Kerry
The seas in which Ireland floats are as variegated in colour and texture as the landscape itself. Should our last words on this go to James Joyce…?
…The sea, the snotgreen sea, the scrotumtightening sea…
(James Joyce – Ulysees)
Ancient fields on Brow Head, Mizen Peninsula, looking towards Barleycove
All beauty is in the fine detail, we are told. The panoramas, the wide views, the seascapes are unbeatable – but, sometimes, it's just the simplicity of a gateway that invites you in to explore this verdant island…
Posted in Cape Clear, Cappaghglass, Crookhaven, Donemark, Horse Island, Irish Culture, Irish Landscape, Irish Weather, Kerry, Nature, Photography, Roaringwater Bay, Rossbrin Cove, The Mizen Peninsula, The Sheep's Head, West Cork, West Cork Blog, Wild Atlantic Way, Wild Flowers Tagged Frank Delaney, Heinrich Böll, Ireland's Green Landscapes, Irish Literature, Irish Poetry, James Joyce, Linda Weaver Clarke, Mick Moloney, St Brigit's Day, Thomas Moore, William Drennan
Up here in Nead an Iolair, in the townland of Cappaghglass, we luxuriate in the nature all around us. Our house was built in the 1980s on a piece of land which had belonged to the successors of the mining company – the copper mines were active for a few generations in the 19th century both here and on Horse Island, just across the water. The post-industrial landscape which surrounds us is alive: small, stone-enclosed fields are grazed by cattle, ponies and a few goats while in equal measure are large tracts of gorse, heather and rock. Here and there are the remains of the mine workings – a stump of a chimney, fenced-off and walled shafts, quarries, ruined workshops and cottages: the architecture of abandonment.
It seems to me that our house interrupts nature, with our lawns, our haggard, stone terrace, hedges and fences, but nature is well able to adapt and cope. Of course, we encourage this: we enthusiastically nurture all the little birds that visit our feeders – and the big ones: rooks, pheasants, magpies: they all get their share. And there are those that don't come to the feeders but nevertheless forage the land – choughs (which perch on our roof and shout out their names – cheough – cheough… before flying off to give us an endless and entertaining display of dizzying acrobatics), starlings, blackbirds, thrushes and – always on a Sunday – Spiro the sparrowhawk who unsuccessfully dive-bombs the feeder, scattering – but never catching – the small birds. After the effort he rests on one leg on the low terrace wall and stares thoughtfully out to the Cove.
Michael, whose family has farmed the fields around us for generations, tells us that the land above us is known as The Galleries – possibly because there is such a spectacular view to be had from these fields to Rossbrin below us and to the islands of Roaringwater Bay beyond. The Cove itself is a paradise for the waders, especially at low tide, and for crustaceous life in the rock pools.
All around are the hedgerows that, in the spring, summer and autumn, support a wealth of wildflowers. In turn these are the haunt of nectar-seeking insects, especially bees and butterflies.
We are visited by four-legged mammals in all shapes and sizes: I'm pleased to see some of the decimated rabbit population returning after a recurrence of myxomatosis these past couple of years. We don't get hares in the immediate neighbourhood: they seldom mix with the smaller Leporidae, but we sometimes catch a glimpse of them from the road that goes down to the village. Rats, mice and shrews are never far away, but are kept under control by our larger visitors – feral cats and foxes. Our own Ferdia has gone from us during this past year – he was an ancient fox who had made a pact with the human world: I'll sit picturesquely on your terrace and entertain you provided you keep the food scraps coming – we did, of course. His descendants make fleeting visits, passing through but, as yet, never pausing to make our acquaintance.
When it comes to observation of the natural world there's never a dull moment here. We are fortunate that some globally threatened species seem to thrive around us – curlews can always be seen by the water, for example. The small birds crowd in, especially when I refill the feeders: sometimes we have to fight our way through the melee when we want to go out. It's a great way to live, and a great place to live in. Thank you, Mother Nature.
Photographs (from the top down): Tortoiseshell butterfly; Cappaghglass field; Nick's goat; Nead an Iolair with starlings; greenfinches; chough on our gatepost; Spiro the sparrowhawk; view across Roaringwater Bay from The Galleries; muddy shanks; curlew in the Cove; 2 x bees; Ferdia the fox; rabbit; Nead bird feeder with goldfinches, greenfinch, bluetits and great tit – and pheasant; Robert and friends; heron hairdo. Grateful thanks to Finola for many of these pics
Posted in Bees, Bugs and Butterflies, Cappaghglass, Horse Island, Irish Landscape, Nature, Photography, Roaringwater Bay, Rossbrin Cove, West Cork Blog, Wild Flowers Tagged Bees, Choughs, Curlew, Donkey, Fox, Goats, Greenfinches, Heron, Nature, Pheasant, Rabbits, Shanks, Sparrowhawk, Wildlife
Words on Roaring Water
…Anyone who has glanced even cursorily at the map of Ireland, will have noticed how the south-west corner of it has suffered from being the furthest outpost of European resistance to the Atlantic. Winter after winter the fight between sea and rock has raged on, and now, after all these centuries of warfare, the ragged fringe of points and headlands, with long, winding inlets between them, look as though some hungry monster's sharp teeth had torn the soft, green land away, gnawing it out from between the uncompromising lines of rock that stand firm, indigestible and undefeated…
Naboth's Vineyard, Somerville and Ross, Spencer Blackett, 1891
So constantly entranced am I by the character of this remote corner in which we have chosen to settle (in my own experience – admittedly somewhat geographically limited – it is the most beautiful landscape in the world) that I am always excited when I discover that others have shared the same feelings. Consequently I am forever looking out for references to the coastline and country around Roaringwater Bay – particularly descriptive writing – in the wealth of books on West Cork that are harboured by local bookshops, libraries, and our own shelves here at Nead an Iolair: we are most fortunate that some of these books, especially the now out-of-print ones, came with the house! I have sifted through a few of the words: essays, extracts from novels, historical treatise and guidebooks that support my own feelings about the place. All are taken from writers I admire and thoroughly recommend. I present them here for you to take in, together with some hopefully seductive illustrations from the locality, in support of my thesis that there is no better place to be alive.
…I believe that in West Cork water runs uphill. There is a small lake on the very summit of Mount Gabriel, nearly fourteen hundred steep feet above the Atlantic level. Small it is, but so deep that when, once upon a time, a heifer was lost in it, she came out in Schull harbour, on her way to America! (Or that is what the people tell you.)…
'Happy Days!' – Essays of Sorts, Somerville and Ross, Longmans, green and Co, 1946
…There was a line of tables up the middle of the pier, each with its paraffin lamp smoking and flaring in the partial shelter of a fish-box, and each with its wild, Rembrandtish group of women splitting the innumerable mackerel, and rubbing lavish fistfuls of coarse gray salt into each, before it was flung to the men to be packed into barrels. The lamps shone fantastically on the double row of intent faces, on the quickly moving arms of the women, crimsoned to the elbows, on the tables, varnished with the same colour, and on the cold silvery heaps of fish…
…Think of a wandering road in – let me say West Cork… The way is rough and stony, and (most probably) muddy, but it can claim compensating charms, even though it can hardly fulfil any of the functions proper to respectable roads. And in its favour I would claim the broken varying lines of the hills against the sky. The untidy fences, with their flaming furze bushes, or crimson fuchsia hedges; their throngs of vagabond wild flowers, that can challenge the smug respectability of a well-kept garden. And the inevitable creatures, the donkeys, the pigs, the coupled goats, the geese, that regard the highroad as their lounge and playground. No doubt they exasperate the motorist in a hurry (as are all motorists) but for more tranquil wayfarers they can offer entertainment, almost charm…
(Ireland) …is a land of surprises. She has the gift of unexpectedness, of uncertainty: her people, like her looks, and her weather, can be sometimes charming, often exasperating, but seldom commonplace. Is there another country, reasonably civilised, in which, in the course of a casual idle stroll, records of pre-history can be met with in any field, unconsidered, or found (as I have known) an immense cup-marked stone, built into the wall of a cow-house, ignored by the descendants of those who were once its worshippers? And yet, in characteristic contrariety – as is our way in Eire – in the field next to that cow-house, you can see that the plough has turned aside from its rightful course in respect for a little old deformity of a thorn-tree, which has asserted, for possibly a thousand years, its right to be reverenced and feared…
…In the mirror that memory will sometimes hold for us, I can see Rahyne Glen at four o'clock on a silver autumn morning before the sun has reached it. Opposite, just below the rim of the steep western side of the glen, there is one of the memorials of an older race and its religion. This is a broad slab of pale stone, leaning sideways against the hill, having, somehow slipped off the stones on which it had been supported. The sunlight falls full on it; it catches the eye and holds it. It is a dolmen, and the pale slab was its cap-stone. It marks the grave of a chief. He might have been content with his resting-place, had beauty of scene appealed to him (which seems improbable). Whether contented or no, he has lain there (if the archaeologists may be believed) undisturbed, through all the long centuries. If he were to look out now on those familiar hills he would see no change. His hills have defied civilization. All would look as it might have looked on any fair September morning during past thousands of years. And, I suppose, the pink ling, and the purple heather and the gold of the low-growing autumn furze, would then have spread the same carpet of colour over the hills… The wild stream comes storming through the thorn-bushes of the glen as fiercely as ever it did when the Chieftain and his warriors washed their spears in it… Beyond the glen the country rises, in long swathes of dim green, and purple, and misty blue, to a curving line of hills, and farther and higher still – for the viewpoint is a high one – a narrow flashing line tells of the silver plain below, which is the Western Ocean…
…The indented contours of Raring Water Bay enclose a maze of minute inlets and islands. The name derives from a stream which flows down the side of Mount Kidd amidst a landscape of bracken and boulders. The torrent roars in the narrow gaps and gullies as it rushes towards the sea. The little inlets penetrate the land like miniature fjords and create a sense of safe haven from dangerous seas. Their piers, long abandoned except for the occasional fisherman's or tourist's boat, are overgrown and tumbled-down romantic ruins, quiet spots for sighting a lone heron at low tide, grey against grey water. In the narrow defile where the roaring water debouches into the bay nature has done much to reclaim the territory usurped by human purpose. Perhaps, like the closing of a wound, this former embarcation point, which saw many thousands flee a country unable to support them, is being bound in ivy and decorated with wild fuchsia to heal the scar…
West of West – An Artist's Encounter with West Cork – Brian Lalor, Brandon Book Publishers, 1990
…The islands of the West Cork coast are rather grandly referred to as Carbery's Hundred Islands, but only Clear Island and Sherkin now sustain a viable population – though, like the other islands off the west coast, there is a steady draining of young people to the cities on the mainland for education and employment. Horse Island off Schull is evocative of the vanished communities of these islands. Silhouetted against the skyline, this piece of low-lying land appears like an old-fashioned, gap-toothed saw; a dark bulk of rock with triangular projections – the gable ends of a row of roofless cottages – biting into the clouds…
…Three or more centuries ago, before the landscape of West Cork became bound by a web of roads and fences, its contours would have been best understood when seen from above, from the heights of Mount Kidd or Mount Gabriel. Parallel ribs of rocks and hills, dividing up the pasture land, extended from the base of the mountains to the coast, where long fingers of rocky promontories projected out into the sea. There was a natural order to everything…
… Beyond Whitehall I rode out to the point at Cunamore where the road ended at a small pier which was the nearest point to Hare Island, also known as Inishdricoll. There was no regular ferry across, but the post boat went over several days a week, and the schoolmistress crossed daily to teach the dozen remaining children. It is a much less dramatic island than Cape or Sherkin, a low-lying slab of land with golden beaches. One road leads to a little village nicknamed Paris – probably a derivation of 'pallace' – once the centre of a fleet of lobster boats. Now I listened to an old man lamenting the terrible decline.
"John has gone and Dennis has died, and we'll die too, and then the foreigners can have it all." Already half a dozen of the houses had been bought up by strangers.
One by one the smaller islands became deserted. It is a long time since they were densely populated, but until quite recently they supported a certain number of families. Only a few years ago I visited Horse Island, just opposite Ballydehob. The last people there, an elderly couple, were living all alone. It was summer, and the old man was sitting in a chair outside his house, his feet in a basin of water. His wife, behind him, fed hens. Next year they were gone. The house, still intact and comfortable, stood empty, the linoleum in place, last year's calendar on the wall. Down by the pier a plough had been thrown into the water where it looked like a gesture of despair…
The Coast of West Cork – Peter Somerville-Large, Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1974
…West of Ballydehob the laneways ran into each other like the veins of a leaf. Many of them were untapped; they seemed empty, with little life except for cattle or a white horse browsing in watery fields beside them. Most seemed to end up at the sea, and each little turn had its own alignment to the bay. One looked across the islands with Kilcoe standing squat and menacing on its headland; the next inlet had a view across to Horse Island; another lane climbed to a hill to where one could see the sweep from Baltimore Beacon and the Gascanane to the shattered tower of Rosbrin castle…
…May Day in Schull was the day for 'bringing in the green'. But the ancient custom is dying out. Only a few branches of green leaves were tied on doors, and a twig of fuchsia dangled from the handle of a bike. "Old pishoges," an old man muttered as he carefully arranged sycamore round a drainpipe…
…Colla harbour and pier is the nearest point to embark for Long Island. Horse Island, Castle Island and Long Island lie in a line just outside Schull harbour. A tradition, quoted by Smith, claims that they were once all one island. "In the latter end of March, AD 830, Hugh Domdighe being monarch of Ireland, there happened . . . terrible shocks of thunder and lightning . . . at the same time the sea broke through the banks in a most violent manner. The island, then called Innisfadda, on the west coast of this country was forced asunder and divided into three parts"…
…From the vicinity off Dunanore, we obtain a view of the coast and the surrounding open, which is one of surpassing beauty, when the summer sun is setting in the far west. Towards the south, as far as the eye can reach, the broad expanse of the Atlantic is stretched before our gaze, the distant horizon dotted here and there by some white sail, or the dark hull of one of those leviathan steamers which ply their busy trades between the Old World and the New. Cape Clear is the first land which greets the American tourist or the returning emigrant on his approach to the old country, and the last cherished spot of his 'own dear isle' which bids adieu to the Irish peasant, when he parts, perhaps for ever, from his native country…
Sketches in Carbery, County Cork: its antiquities, history, legends, and topography – Daniel Donovan, McGlashan & Gill, 1876
Posted in Cape Clear, Horse Island, Irish Culture, Irish Writers, Photography, Roaringwater Bay, Rossbrin Cove, West Cork, West Cork Blog Tagged "Happy Days" - Essays of Sorts, Brian Lalor, Daniel Donovan, Naboth's Vineyard, Peter Somerville-Large, Sketches in Carbery, Somerville and Ross, The Coast of West Cork, West of West - An Artist's Encounter with West Cork
Priests and Poets, Part 2
Last week we concentrated on Father James Barry and the poetry he could well have inspired. But there's a lot more to Stouke graveyard and this post will cover some of the other history revealed by a wander round this atmospheric place.
This graveyard is the traditional burial site of many from the islands of Roaringwater Bay. There's a poignancy to the place names on the headstones – many of these islands are now uninhabited, so these are the last headstones that will bear such inscriptions. As with many West Cork graveyards, much of the ground is scattered with rough, uninscribed, stones, while other graves have modern memorials with full inscriptions. It is customary to visit graves on anniversaries, or at certain times of the year, and always you will find that a few graves still have fresh flowers or other evidence of recent visits.
The old Irish name for this place is Cillín Stuaice, or Little Church of the Height. There is a suggestion that somewhere in the graveyard is the site of an early church, but if it is here, there is no evidence of it. Except for one thing – a bullaun stone. Robert has written before about the folklore and beliefs associated with bullaun stones, but what exactly are they? Bullaun is an Irish word for bowl – these are bowl shaped depressions in rocks, sometimes portable, sometimes carved into rock outcrops. Although some may date to prehistoric times, many are believed to have originated in the medieval period for the purpose of grinding (acorns, for example) or for crushing ore. Whatever their origin, they are often found in association with medieval churches or other sacred sites such as holy wells, and have assumed their own sacred mantle of meaning. The water that collects in them is often believed to be curative.
The bullaun stone in Stouke graveyard is known, according to the Historic Graves account, as the Bishop's Head. The informative plaque erected by the Fastnet Trails folk tells us that an older name for the townland is Kilaspick Oen, meaning Church of Bishop John. Perhaps this was the Bishop for whom the bullaun stone is named. The story goes that during the time of the penal laws the Bishop was confirming children nearby when the redcoats got wind of his activities and came to arrest him. He was beheaded. The bullaun stone commemorates this act and has been a focus of devotion locally, with people leaving coins and tokens to pay respect and perhaps ask for consideration for special intentions. Additionally, rounds were performed here on St John's Night – although I am not sure if this tradition has persisted.
But last week I promised you more poetry! Inside the gate is a grave of the McGrath family, including the ashes of Liam McGrath who emigrated to Australia but never forgot growing up in Skeaghanore, near Ballydehob.
Although he was active on a number of fronts, his delight was to remember the old times and to capture his memories in verse. He was a true 'folk poet' – recalling the past with nostalgia and trying to capture what he saw as the golden scenes of his young life in rural West Cork. Over the years, several of his poems were published in the Southern Star. Local historian Teresa Hickey generously shared with me those she has collected over the years – a real treasure since they are not available online.
Teresa's personal favourite is Three Bells. It describes the sound of the bells on Sunday morning from Ballydehob's three churches – Catholic, Church of Ireland and Methodist. Sounds, of course, trigger deep memories, and this poem captures Liam's recollections of traditional Sunday mornings in the village. Sadly, the Methodist Church has fallen into ruin, so those bells will never again peal over Ballydehob.
Above: The Catholic Church dominates the skyline of Ballydehob. Middle: St Matthias Church of Ireland. Below: The Ballydehob Methodist Church, gradually falling into dereliction
The one I've decided to reproduce here is called One more Score and it's about the unique West Cork pastime of Road Bowling (rhyme bow with cow). For Liam, it was a precious memory, made all the sweeter by a recitation of the roads and locations where the game was played.
The sport of Road Bowling – the object is to get the bowl down the road to the target in as few throws as possible
No doubt I will drop by Stouke Graveyard many more times in the future. I wonder what further history lessons will be revealed…
Posted in Ballydehob, Fastnet Trails, Folklore, Horse Island, Irish History, Religion, Roaringwater Bay, Rossbrin, Walks, West Cork, West Cork Blog Tagged bullaun stones, Historic Graves Project, Liam McGrath, Skeaghanore, Stouke, Stouke Graveyard
Copper Country
Gortavallig Copper Mine, Sheep's Head: Cornish mineworkers' cottages
We live in the townland of Cappaghglass. I would love to say that the name derives from the metal that makes up much of its geology – copper, but Finola tells me that way of looking at it comes from my English accent: the Irish word for copper is Copair, while Cappa actually means meadow. Glas or glass means green so – prosaically speaking – we live in 'Green Meadow'. However, as in so many cases, the history of this little bit of Ireland is writ clearly on the landscape and Cappaghglass is very much 'copper country'.
Stub of 9th century Irish round tower? – No: 19th century copper mine workings in Cappaghglass. In front is the head of a shaft, behind is the remains of the mine chimney that fell in 2002; to the right are the old mine cottages
Our own house, Nead an Iolair, is built on territory that was once owned by a nineteenth century copper mine, and legend has it that our Calor gas tank is placed over an old mine shaft! We look out to Horse Island – one of Carbery's Hundred Islands in Roaringwater Bay: it once supported a copper mine of the same period. Look at the photograph of the number of workers employed there at this time. Now there are merely a few holiday homes on the island.
Mineworkers on Horse Island: 19th century
Among the quiet fields and peaceful boreens our townland is strewn with evidence of the industry that once was here: old spoil heaps, barbed-wire protected shafts, supports for overhead ropeways and the base of a famous local landmark: the 20m tall Cappagh Mine chimney which came down in a lightning strike in 2002 which also severely damaged the Mine Captain's House adjacent to it. Mining here commenced in 1820 and works ceased in 1874. Its best years were the decade 1863 to 1873, when 877 tons of bornite copper ore were produced.
Cappagh Mine: cross section, mine chimney (pre 2002) and our own mine shaft!
We went off to the Sheep's Head last week – in idyllic weather – and were shown the Copper Trail by friends Peter and Amanda. It feels so remote out there, yet the place was a hive of industry when mining was at its height during the Victorian age. I was fascinated by the row of Cornish miners' cottages there, and the similarity between this site and the cliff-edge setting of some of the mines in West Cornwall, Botallack in particular. When exploring these pieces of industrial archaeology in Cornwall I was always struck by the incongruity of the incredibly beauty of the places – set against the blue background of the Atlantic – with the hardship and danger of the working conditions that must have prevailed. Here in West Cork, as there in Cornwall, shafts and galleries extended out under the sea bed and the men toiled away in cramped and perilous conditions with the sound of the booming waters above them, while on the surface women (bal maidens) and children worked equally hard preparing the ore for crushing and smelting.
Botallack Tin Mine, West Cornwall – a romantic site now, but less benign in earlier days
Far longer ago than the nineteenth century, West Cork was being worked for copper ore. On the steep sides of our local Mount Gabriel there is evidence of copper mining dating back 3500 years to the Bronze Age. UCC Professor of Archaeology William O'Brien carried out research and excavations during the 1980s and traced a number of mine workings from this time. The extraction was a well organised process: a supply of good roundwood had to be stockpiled and fires were lit against the rock face where traces of ore were apparent. A hot fire was kept burning for several hours followed by dousing in cold water (of which a good supply was also needed), causing the rock surface to fracture, and this disturbed face was hacked off with stone mauls allowing the accumulation of small quantities of malachite. Constant working on good seams led to excavation into the mountain side, and some shafts have been found extending to several metres. Water ingress was a problem and it seems likely that a system of bailing or pumping was necessary. Eventually the drowned shafts were abandoned and, over time, they became filled with a type of blanket bog. This helped to preserve some of the wooden implements used and – presumably – discarded in them: hammer handles, wedges, picks and shovels as well as planks and ladders; also pine chips apparently used for illumination.
Copper Country: Mount Gabriel – once the haunt of Wolves and miners
There's a whole lot more to be said – about why metal was so important in the Bronze Age (wealth, in one word) and the whole context of distribution, trade and the technology of bronze itself: bronze production is only possible by combining copper ore with tin, and this was not available locally. In all probability our Cornish and Iberian cousins were making contact with Ireland's metallurgists thousands of years ago. Interesting that the Rock Art we find in these same hillsides – and which could date from the same period – also has parallels in Britain, Brittany and Iberia.
Bronze Age industrial landscape?
Posted in Archaeology, Ballydehob, Cappaghglass, Horse Island, Industrial Archaeology, Roaringwater Bay, The Mizen Peninsula Tagged Botallack, Bronze Age, Bronze Age Copper Mine, Cappa Mine Chimney, Cappaghglass, Cappaghglass Copper Mine, Copper, Copper mining, Cornish Miners, Horse Island, Horse Island Mine, Mount Gabriel, Sheep's Head Copper Trail

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Turf meets surf: Del Mar gives Breeders' Cup a new look
Arizona State welcomes needed influx of frontcourt size
FANTASY PLAYS: Waiver pickups for W9 include Lee, Richardson
For the second straight week we will have six teams on bye -- the Bears, Browns, Vikings, Steelers, Patriots and Chargers all have the week off.
It won't be easy finding replacements on the waiver wire for players like Jordan Howard, Adam Thielen, Antonio Brown, Le'Veon Bell, Rob Gronkowski, Brandin Cooks, Keenan Allen and Melvin Gordon.
In general, it's easier to find wide receivers on waivers than running backs. Also, with six more teams on bye last week, you still want to take a look to see what players are available even if you don't need a bye week replacement. One of your opponents may have been forced to drop a good player at one position for help at another in order to fill out a complete lineup last week. We are all forced to make tough decisions as the fantasy season wears on and even if you can field a full lineup and are happy with your roster, there are still opportunities to improve.
MARQUISE LEE, WR, Jacksonville Jaguars (46 percent owned): He is likely on this list because the Jaguars were on bye in Week 8 and fantasy owners decided to release him in order to pick up a replacement who could fill out their lineup. He is not a must start week in and week out, but in his last two games he does have nine receptions for 155 yards and with opposing defenses stacking the line of scrimmage in order to slow down Leonard Fournette, Lee will almost always see single coverage.
PAUL RICHARDSON, WR, Seattle Seahawks (46 percent): The Seahawks have their issues with the offensive line, but quarterback Russell Wilson is a master at making something out of nothing. Richardson and Wilson seem to have a solid deep ball connection and with teams paying more attention to Doug Baldwin and Jimmy Graham in the passing game, it leaves Richardson as an afterthought for the defense. He may be the definition of riding the hot guy, but with three touchdowns in his last two games (a fourth was called back via penalty) he deserves to be started.
JAMISON CROWDER, WR, Washington Redskins (39 percent): The Washington passing game has been an enigma all season. It lost DeSean Jackson and Pierre Garcon via free agency. Terrelle Pryor has possibly been the biggest free agent bust this season and shouldn't be rostered. Jordan Reed can't stay healthy and Crowder has been battling minor injuries all season. With the offensive line in shambles due to injury, the game plan versus Dallas on Sunday was to attack via the short passing game with Crowder. It worked, as Crowder had by far his best game of the season with nine receptions for 123 yards on 13 targets. The OL is not likely to get much better in the short term. You may want to add Crowder as a backup. Kirk Cousins may be forced to sling the ball 40-plus times a game to keep Washington competitive.
TRAVIS BENJAMIN, WR, Los Angeles Chargers (8 percent): Benjamin is as inconsistent at they come, but he is a touchdown waiting to happen whenever he gets his hands on the ball. While the Chargers are on bye this week, if you need WR help in Weeks 10 or 11, you can probably get Benjamin cheaply because owners won't be looking to grab a player who isn't playing this weekend.
ALEX COLLINS, RB, Baltimore Ravens (49 percent): If you watched the game Thursday, you can see why fantasy owners are intrigued about Collins. He's quick, elusive, and can make big plays. The reason he hasn't started all season for Baltimore is because unfortunately, he has a tendency to put the rock on the ground. Nothing will get you benched quicker than fumbling the football. He's not a goal line threat either, as he is far from the biggest RB, but as a flex play, he could get8-10 points each week.
GREG OLSEN, TE, Carolina Panthers (49 percent): If you're looking for a long term or playoff player, Olsen could be your man. In leagues that don't have a IR slot, he is starting to be released, as owners need a healthy body in that slot. If you're not in this situation and could use a TE around Week 12, then Olsen could be your guy. He has shed the walking boot and could begin practicing as early as next week. Cam Newton and the Panthers have a very good fantasy schedule. The only top pass defense they face for the rest of the season are the Vikings in Week 14. Olsen could be a boon for your fantasy team during your playoff run.
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Elevational abundance data for oribatid mite species from a western Lesser Caucasus (Georgia)
Published: 2 July 2015| Version 1 | DOI: 10.17632/v2gn7dkj4m.1
levan mumladze
The data set represents oribatid mite species abundance data for Sairme gorge (Lesser Caucasus, Georgia). In 2013, mites were sampled from 600 m a.s.l. up to 2200 m with constant distance (200 m) between elevational bands (9 in total). At each elevation 3 replicate were made with 50 m minimum distances between replicates. Data set also contains some environmental variables (in a second sheet) such as pH, slope etc, and calculated diversity indexes. The data was used in an article published in Experimental and Applied Acarology (DOI 10.1007/s10493-015-9893-4).


The Potomac Valley Audubon Society was organized in 1982. We are a chapter of the National Audubon Society and draw our members from Jefferson, Berkeley, and Morgan counties in West Virginia and Washington County, Maryland.
PVAS offers a wide variety of programs for children, adults, and families. Our goal is to get people of all ages outside to explore and learn about the natural world.
To help accomplish this goal, PVAS manages four nature preserves featuring a variety of habitats in the Eastern Panhandle of WV to hike and explore.
We also work closely with a variety of partners to conserve natural areas for habitat protection and for people's enjoyment.
The variety of activities and programs we offer is extensive. Check out the calendar section of our website.
Become a member of PVAS today! We hope you'll participate in programs and events as often as you can!


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https://apnews.com/article/nhl-sports-darcy-kuemper-colorado-avalanche-hockey-29d08c75e452ec281448f450e7cdd3d5
Darcy Kuemper
Jesper Bratt
Damon Severson
Jack Hughes
Yegor Sharangovich
Ty Smith
Nathan Bastian
Nico Daws
Ovechkin nets 2, ties Jagr for 3rd on NHL career goals list
By The Associated PressMarch 9, 2022 GMT
Washington Capitals goalie Vitek Vanecek celebrates the team's 5-3 victory over Calgary Flames in an NHL hockey game Tuesday, March 8, 2022, in Calgary, Alberta. (Larry MacDougal/The Canadian Press via AP)
CALGARY, Alberta (AP) — Alex Ovechkin scored twice and moved into a tie for third place on the NHL's career goals list, and Nic Dowd scored the go-ahead goal as the Washington Capitals rallied in the third period and beat the Calgary Flames 5-4 on Tuesday night.
Ovechkin's second goal, into an empty net at 18:12 of the third that gave Washington a 5-3 lead, was his 766th career goal, tying him with Jaromir Jagr for third place in NHL history. Wayne Gretzky leads the list with 894 goals, and Gordie Howe is second with 801.
Connor Sheary and Anthony Mantha also scored for Washington (31-18-9), which won its third straight. Vitek Vanecek made 31 saves and improved to 13-7-5.
Adam Ruzicka, Oliver Kylington and Elias Lindholm scored for Calgary (34-15-7), which had its 13-game unbeaten streak snapped on home ice. Dan Vladar had 22 saves and fell to 8-4-1.
DEVILS 5, AVALANCHE 3
NEWARK, N.J (AP) — Nathan Bastian scored a power-play goal with 6:56 left to put New Jersey on top as the Devils rallied from a three-goal deficit to beat Colorado.
Tomas Tatar, Ty Smith and Damon Severson also scored for the Devils. Nico Daws made 23 saves for New Jersey, which had its biggest comeback win of the season over the NHL-leading Avs.
Blue Jackets take on the Kraken following Marchenko's 2-goal game
Yegor Sharangovich iced the game with a short-handed, empty-net goal. Jesper Bratt added three assists and Jack Hughes had two, with both helping out on the game-winner.
Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen and Cale Makar scored for the Avalanche, who were 23-0 this season when leading after the first period. Darcy Kuemper had 38 saves.
Playing their second game in as many nights, the Avalanche seemed to run out of gas after taking a 3-0 lead on Makar's 21st goal of the season early in the second period.
COYOTES 9, RED WINGS 2
DETROIT (AP) — Nick Schmaltz followed his franchise-record seven-point game with two goals and two assists, and Arizona overwhelmed Detroit.
Schmaltz had two goals and five assists in an 8-5 victory over Ottawa on Saturday. His 11 points in two games is also a franchise record.
Jakob Chychrun and Nick Ritchie each had two goals and an assist and Barrett Hayton notched four assists for the Coyotes, who have won three straight for the first time this season.
Travis Boyd, Christian Fischer and Clayton Keller also scored for Arizona, while Karel Vejmelka made 26 saves.
Jakub Vrana scored in his season debut for the Red Wings. He'd been sidelined since training camp recovering from shoulder surgery. Robby Fabbri also scored for Detroit, which has lost five of its last six.
WILD 5, RANGERS 2
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Kevin Fiala scored twice in the second period, Marcus Foligno added a goal and two assists, and Minnesota beat New York.
Ryan Hartman and Joel Eriksson Ek also scored for the Wild, who broke a three-game home losing streak and won for only the third time in their last 11 games. All-Star Cam Talbot stopped 23 shots for his third win at home in more than three months.
Dryden Hunt and Mika Zibanejad scored for the Rangers, whose three-game winning streak was stopped. They're still 8-3-1 in their last 12 games, but with backup Alexander Georgiev in the net they gave up more than two goals for only the fourth time over that span.
PREDATORS 2, STARS 1
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Roman Josi scored with 1:22 remaining to give Nashville the win over Dallas.
Ryan Johansen also scored and Juuse Saros made 22 saves for Nashville, which as won two straight.
John Klingberg scored and Jake Oettinger made 29 saves for Dallas, which had its four-game winning streak snapped.
With time winding down in the third, Josi fired a one-timer from the left point past Oettinger.
PANTHERS 4, PENGUINS 3
PITTSBURGH (AP) — Anthony Duclair scored the tiebreaking goal in the second period and Carter Verhaeghe added an insurance score in the third as Florida beat Pittsburgh.
Duclair and Verhaeghe matched career highs in goals. Duclair scored his 23rd of the season and Verhaeghe his 18th as Florida won its fourth straight overall and fifth straight on the road. Sam Reinhart and Aaron Ekblad also scored for the Panthers, and Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 32 shots.
Sidney Crosby, Jake Guentzel and Bryan Rust scored for the Penguins and Tristan Jarry made 25 saves.
SENATORS 4, BLUES 1
ST. LOUIS (AP) — Tim Stutzle and Josh Norris each scored a power-play goal and Ottawa beat St. Louis.
St. Louis native Brady Tkachuk and Alex Formenton also scored for the Senators, whose five-game skid ended. Anton Forsberg stopped 20 shots.
David Perron scored for St. Louis, which is 0-3-1 in the last four games — its longest skid of the season. Jordan Binnington made 24 saves but left the ice with 3:35 remaining.
FLYERS 2, GOLDEN KNIGHTS 1
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Carter Hart made a career-high 47 saves, Oskar Lindblom and Justin Braun scored, and Philadelphia won consecutive games for the first time in a month.
Scott Laughton added two assists for Philadelphia, which last won two in a row on Jan. 29 and Feb. 1.
Evgenii Dadonov scored for Vegas, which was playing the first of an eight-day, five-game trip. The Knights generated lots of good chances among their shots, but Hart stood tall.
MAPLE LEAFS 6, KRAKEN 4
TORONTO (AP) — Auston Matthews had his third hat trick of the season to raise his NHL-leading goal total to 43 as Toronto rallied to beat Seattle.
Mitch Marner scored the tiebreaking goal midway through the third period, and William Nylander and John Tavares each added a goal and an assist for Toronto, which got 26 saves from Jack Campbell.
T.J. Brodie and Michael Bunting had two assists apiece and Marner, who also had an assist, extended his point streak to eight games.
Colin Blackwell had a goal and an assist and Carson Soucy, Alex Wennberg and Jaden Schwartz also scored for Seattle. Philipp Grubauer stopped 25 shots for the expansion Kraken, who fell to 1-9-1 in their last 11 games.
JETS 7, LIGHTNING 4
WINNIPEG, Manitoba (AP) — Paul Statstny scored twice to lead Winnipeg past Tampa Bay.
Mark Scheifele had a goal and three assists, and Josh Morrissey, Pierre-Luc Dubois and Adam Lowry also scored for Winnipeg, which improved to 25-22-10. Stastny and Kyle Connor scored into empty nets late. Connor Hellebuyck stopped 20 of 24 shots.
Russ Colton, Victor Hedman, Alex Killorn and Ryan McDonagh scored for Tampa Bay. Andrei Vasilevskiy made 28 saves on 33 shots.
BLACKHAWKS 8, DUCKS 3
CHICAGO (AP) — Patrick Kane had a goal and five primary assists for a career-high six points, and Chicago beat banged-up Anaheim.
Playing on the same line as Kane, Dylan Strome had three goals and an assist and Alex DeBrincat finished with a goal and three assists. Jonathan Toews, Brandon Hagel and Ryan Carpenter also scored as the Blackhawks won for the third time in nine games.
Trevor Zegras scored a power-play goal for Anaheim, which was coming off a 3-3 homestand. Jakob Silfverberg and Adam Henrique also scored, and Sam Steel had two assists.
More AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports


text:
Roche pleads guilty to Adolfo Bruno murder
Frankie A. Roche, 35, of Westfield MA, pleaded guilty yesterday to the 2003 murder of Springfield MA underworld figure Adolfo Bruno, according to published reports by Martin Finucane of the Boston Globe and Stephanie Barry of the Springfield Republican.
According to a statement by federal prosecutors, the "hit" was an effort by the Genovese Crime Family to bring to heel the Springfield branch of their organization:
"Members of the Genovese LCN family hierarchy in New York became upset with Adolfo Bruno because he was not sending sufficient tribute payments to New York. Thereafter, a member of the Springfield Crew sought authority from the hierarchy of the Genovese LCN family in New York, pursuant to the rules of La Cosa Nostra, to murder Adolfo Bruno."
On Nov. 23, 2003, Roche (left) greeted Bruno (right), 57, in the parking lot of the Our Lady of Mount Carmel Society in the South End of Springfield and then shot him six times with a .45-caliber handgun. Bruno was the ranking member of the Springfield Crew at that time. A document from the U.S. Attorney's Office in Boston named Bruno's alleged successor, Anthony J. Arillotta, as the crew member who requested approval from Genovese higher-ups Pasquale "Scop" Deluca and Arthur "Artie" Nigro for the Bruno murder. The Genovese Crime Family was functioning without a formal boss, as Vincent "the Chin" Gigante was in federal prison. Arillotta is currently serving a three-year sentence in a Massachusetts prison for illegal gaming and loansharking. He could be released as early as next week.
Roche, an associate of the crime family, was reportedly paid $10,000 to assassinate Bruno. He could have received the death penalty, but prosecutors will recommend life in prison as part of a plea deal. His sentence could be further reduced if he aids law enforcement in resolving other cases.
In 2005, authorities charged Roche with murder in aid of racketeering and aiding and abetting. At the state level, he was charged along with two co-defendants, Fotios "Freddy" Geas, 40, and Brandon D. Croteau, 29, who have not been brought to trial. The original state case was indefinitely postponed. U.S. Attorneys would not comment on what is in store for Geas and Croteau.
Posted by Thomas Hunt at 4/18/2008 03:05:00 PM No comments:
Keywords: arillotta, bruno, genovese, gigante, massachusetts, murder, roche, springfield


text:
Humanities for the Professions
applied humanities: teaching Humanities for the Professions
Bernie Cantens, "Applied Humanities A 21st Century Solution" Academic Leader, September 15, 2019.
Why Virtue Ethics?
Applied Humanities Courses
Generously funded by the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, the Humanities for the Professions project is developing a model for creating interdisciplinary programs that embed an essential component of the humanities into professional curricula. Our model will focus on virtue ethics, an important part of classical Greek philosophy, and on three professional programs at Moravian College: Business and Economics, Nursing, and Rehabilitation Sciences.
Why do we need a project of this nature? Many humanities programs across the country have been either downsized or eliminated. The ones that continue to exist are feeling financial pressure, experiencing significant cuts in resources, and finding the need to justify their existence. At the same time, many leaders of higher education have argued that today more than ever we need the humanities in professional education to help students understand problems and resolve them within the broader context of human experience.
The purpose of this project is to bring together these two important insights and create an innovative and sustainable model in which the humanities can be imbedded directly into professional programs. The project is intended to be a prototype for other departments and institutions around the country to emulate, making the humanities explicitly relevant to practical disciplines such as business, nursing, athletic training, occupational therapy, and physical therapy. While our project focuses on virtue ethics, we can envision many other humanities-based proposals such as music, art, history, religion, or critical thinking for the professions.
Project Director: Prof. Bernardo Cantens
Unlike other ethical theories, virtue ethics focuses on developing good character traits, attitudes, and habits. Ethical codes of conduct within the professions closely resemble virtue ethics insofar as they exhibit standards that also encompass more than just acting (or refraining from acting) in certain ways.
Using a virtue ethics model for ethical decision making correlates well with professional codes of ethics that emphasize values such as objectivity, fairness, integrity, respect, truthfulness, prudence, confidentiality, and freedom, just to name a few.
Virtue ethics argues for a purposeful and meaningful human existence grounded in the notion of eudaimonia or human flourishing. Therefore, virtue ethics takes into consideration the overall well-being and happiness of a person within a person's historical, social-political, economic, and personal context. This sort of ample perspective is complementary to professional ethics.
Virtue ethics is the most ancient of the ethical traditions. Its origin can be traced to ancient Greek philosophy, and thus it is embedded in the rich history and foundation of philosophy and the humanities.
PHIL281A Topics in Ethics: Virtue Ethics and Social Political Justice in Bio-Ethics (Cross-listed as AFST281A)
Prof. Carol Moeller, Fall 2019, Tues/Thurs 10:20-11:30 a.m.
A study of health, and how it relates to social justice issues from a virtue ethics perspective. We will focus on issues of disability, race, sexuality, sex, gender identity, religion, national status as documented or not, global issues, and other issues related to injustice, and virtue ethics as an approach to social justice.
PHIL281B Topics in Ethics: Business and Virtue Ethics (Cross-listed as MGMT281B)
Prof. Arash Naraghi, Fall 2019, Tues/Thurs 1:10-2:20 p.m.
Business and Virtue Ethics will explore the moral aspects of business and management from a virtue ethics perspective.
PHIL281A Topics in Ethics: Virtue Ethics and Nursing (Cross-listed as NURS281A)
Prof. Bernardo Cantens, Spring 2020, Online
This course will explore the moral aspects of the nursing profession from a virtue ethics perspective. A substantial part of the course will entail applying virtue ethics to actual cases within the nursing profession.
PHIL281 OL Topics in Ethics: Virtue Ethics
Prof. Bernardo Cantens, Summer 2020, Online
This course addresses a variety of topics that change by semester in the areas of normative ethics, applied ethics and meta-ethics.
Our first speaker will be Professor Miguel Alzola, Associate Professor, Law and Ethics, at Fordham University.
Date and Time: Tuesday, October 22, 2019, 4:00 PM
Location: Snyder Room in the HUB
The Ethics of Reproach: Blamers, Moral Standing, and Moral Luck
It is widely acknowledged that if a person is blameworthy for having done something wrong, then each and every one of us can blame her for that action. According to the received view, anyone can blame every wrongdoer for every wrong. But our moral practices do not work that way. Even if a wrongdoer is blameworthy, I submit, a person may be disabled to blaming the wrongdoer either because of the would-be blamer's position, prior misconduct, and/or character. Things get more complicated when playing institutional roles. This paper is concerned with the question of whether, to what extent, and under what conditions a person may lose (or retain) her standing to blame. In the course of this paper, I shall examine four possible ways to undermine one's moral standing to blame in the context of the recent Wells Fargo's fraud scandal.
Professor Alzola specializes in ethical theory, particularly virtue ethics, as well as applied ethics. His current research focuses on virtue ethics and moral psychology. He is interested in the nature and psychological status of the virtues and the role of character in normative ethics and organizational behavior. He is also pursuing research on collective agency and the moral responsibility of groups. Within the field, his topics include human-rights obligations, corporate political activities, transnational bribery, and corporate and civilian responsibilities in war time.
Professor Alzola held a Fulbright fellowship from 2004 through 2006 and received doctoral scholarships from the Prudential Foundation and Johnson & Johnson. In 2005, he received the Ethics and Social Responsibility Award from the Instituto Argentino de Responsibilidad Social Empresaria, and won the Founder's Award from the Society for Business Ethics in 2005, 2006 and 2007. He received the Young Scholar in Philosophy Ward from the Society for Analytic Philosophy.
Selected Recent Publications
"The Empirics of Virtue Theory: What Can Psychology Tell Us About Moral Character?" published in Handbook of Philosophical Foundations for Business Ethics.
"The Possibility of Virtue Theory" published in Business Ethics Quarterly.
"Character and Environment: The Status of Virtues in Organizations" published in Business Ethics Quarterly.
"Virtue Ethics in Positive Organizational Scholarship: An Integrative Approach" published in Canadian Journal for Administrative Sciences.
View more information about Professor Miguel Alzola.
Our second speaker will be Justin Oakley, BA, PhD (Philosophy), Deputy Director of the Monash Bioethics Centre at Monash University in Australia.
Date and Time: Tuesday, March 31, 2020, 4:00 PM
Location: UBC Room in the HUB
"A Social Remit for Professional Virtue: Practitioner Responsibilities in Virtue-Conducive Institutional and Regulatory Environments"
Some recent accounts of virtue ethics in professional contexts seek to develop less individualistic forms of this approach than earlier versions, by demonstrating how hitting the targets of the relevant virtues often requires support from better institutional and regulatory environments, as much as efforts by individual practitioners to strengthen their own dispositions involved in the virtues in question. But while the creation and maintenance of such virtue-conducive environments are undoubtedly important for virtuous professional practice, there is a concern that these moves might sometimes be counterproductive, if, for example, they reduce individual initiative to develop and act on the relevant role virtues. In this talk I present an analysis of how certain institutional and regulatory environments can be plausibly understood as being conducive to professional role virtues. I then outline and defend an account of virtuous practitioner responsibilities in circumstances where such environments are being (or have been) created, focusing particularly on the professions of medicine and nursing. I argue that professionals have a social remit to develop and act on the role virtues of their profession. This social remit for professional virtue, I argue, includes a core practitioner responsibility to remain alert to, and to highlight, when certain professional practices and particular directives in the relevant professional codes (even if widely followed) evidently fail to serve well the proper goals of the profession. I illustrate this in the context of medical and nursing practice in end-of-life care, among other areas.
Dr. Oakley has published articles in international journals on the ethics of clinical trials, informed consent, surrogate motherhood, surgeon report cards, whistleblowing, reproductive cloning, and various topics in ethical theory. He is also co-editor of the quarterly refereed journal Monash Bioethics Review, and teaches clinicians and other professionals in the Master of Bioethics course at Monash, along with an undergraduate philosophy subject on the moral psychology of evil. He is currently working on a project on virtue ethics and medical conflicts of interest, and a project on the moral significance of genetic parenthood and the regulation of assisted reproduction.
Morality and the Emotions (Routledge, 1993).
Virtue Ethics and Professional Roles (with Dean Cocking) (Cambridge University Press, 2001).
Editor of Informed Consent and Clinician Accountability: The ethics of report cards on surgeon performance (with Steve Clarke) (Cambridge University Press, 2007).
Bioethics (Ashgate, International Library of Essays in Public and Professional Ethics, 2009).
View more information about Dr. Oakley.


Everything posted by Allison S.
I just asked my APQS rep about this. I have a Millie and noticed that it sews better in one direction. She told me that sewing from left to right results in better stitches and less breakage.
I'm working on a QOV quilt with a white backing..of course, right?....and I noticed that my granny smith apple green thread has areas that is black. It's the bobbin thread only. Before starting this quilt I removed and cleaned the bobbin, wiped out the bobbin case, and made sure everything was working great since EVERYTHING would show on the back of this quilt. I didn't expect to have the problem I'm having, and not sure what's causing it. I'm NOT technical at all. Cleaning the bobbin itself is about as techie as I get. It's not the entire thread. It shows up randomly. Any ideas on where the trouble is and what I can do about it?
Thank you Lisa. That's a helpful video.
I'd charge .30 per linear inch. Hand sewing is time consuming, but looks so nice when completed.
Hi When facing the front of my machine (the panto side is the back) the motor is on the right hand side. I learned to quilt starting at the motor end, so when I'm on the back of the machine doing pantos the motor is on my left and I go from left to right. When I'm on the front of my machine the motor is on my right, so I should then go from right to left. My brain doesn't want to work that way. It wants to work from left to right. Can the motor be placed on either side, or can I work from left to right when I'm on the front?
Love the pressing table. My wheels are spinning now!
You've got a serious thread collection. I don't know that I'll ever be as organized at that! Thanks for sharing pictures. It's quite a transformation.
I love before and after pictures, as well as peeking into people's spaces. Can't wait to see it completed!
Oh Wow! What a fantastic idea!! Thanks for sharing.


text:
Q: Access data of child template class of parent class #include <iostream>
#include <vector>
#include <memory>
#include <unordered_map>

using namespace std;

struct A { void what_type() { cout<<"A"<<endl; }};
struct B { void what_type() { cout<<"B"<<endl; }};

class MyCommonAncestor {

};

template <class T>
class MyTemplateClass : public MyCommonAncestor {

   public:
       std::unordered_map<int, T> myx;
};

int main() {
    vector<shared_ptr<MyCommonAncestor>> myVector;
    myVector.push_back(make_shared<MyTemplateClass<A>>());
    myVector.push_back(make_shared<MyTemplateClass<B>>());

   for (auto& x: myVector)
       x->myx; // just for the shake of this example
 return 0;
}

How can I find a way to actually access the myx member variable from MyTemplateClass maintaining the use of template because I need it.
I receive the following error:
error: 'class MyCommonAncestor' has no member named 'myx'

A: You can dynamically cast the pointer to your template class. But the point of inheritance to put commonality into your base class otherwise what's the point of their existence.

A: Try to place this member (an abstraction of it, independent of T) and its access to your base class if possible. In doubt it depends on what exactly you want to achieve with this access. For a lot of problem classes of this type, the actual type T is not really necessary at all for the public access. If that's not possible, take a look at the coercion by member template scheme! The base principles of this pattern might be useful for some special problems of this category.
Keep in mind, that templates and polymorphism are (quite) orthogonal aspects in C++.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Google's Privacy Chief Backs T-Shirts, Not Ties
By Sumner Lemon
Google Inc.'s global privacy counsel, Peter Fleischer, wants to see t-shirts replace the tie as standard business attire, saying the tie "constricts circulation to the brain."
In addition, the tie "acts as decorative camouflage for the business suit, designed to shield the middle-aged male physique, with its shrinking shoulders and protruding paunch, from feeling sufficiently self-conscious to hit the gym," Fleischer wrote in a recent letter to The Financial Times.
The letter, written in response to an article that praised the tie as appropriate business attire, was signed using Fleischer's Google job title.
Fleischer suggested replacing the tie with t-shirts, which he said do less to hide the shape of a man's body. "Wouldn't you like to know whether your business partners are fit? Why should you trust a man in business if he abuses his own body?," Fleischer wrote, saying casual attire may also result in greater creativity.
"If your fashion editor can hardly imagine a better garment for men to exhibit their personality, power and masculinity than wearing ties, well ... I work at Google. Our unofficial motto is, 'Be serious without a suit,'" Fleischer wrote.
Google, like many other technology companies, allows employees to dress casually for work. A company recruitment video posted on YouTube shows the range of attire, including t-shirts and dress shirts, worn by employees. None of the employees are shown wearing ties.
However, several of Google's senior managers are shown wearing ties in their official photographs, including Omid Kordestani, senior vice president of global sales and business development; Elliot Schrage, vice president of global communications and public affairs; and Vint Cerf, vice president and chief Internet evangelist.


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Here is fundamental knowledge on map downtown portland maine hotels. We have the prime assets for map downtown portland maine hotels. Check it out for yourself! You can get Downtown Portland Map Portland Maps Portland Oregon Map Travel Portland guide and read the latest Downtown Portland Map in here.


text:
The Vepr-12 is a multipurpose semi-automatic detachable-magazine shotgun, produced by Molot-Oruzhie Ltd. It is patterned after the original Kalashnikov rifle and built on the heavier RPK light machine gun receiver.

History
Early versions of the Vepr-12 were produced by Izhmash, with production moving to the Molot factory where the shotgun was redesigned and mass-produced. The Vepr-12 is intended to be a direct competitor to the widely popular Saiga-12 shotgun already produced by Izhmash. Like the Saiga, the Vepr-12 was designed to be a versatile weapons platform, capable of being used by hunters and professional shooters alike. With these considerations in mind, Molot introduced unique features, such as the ambidextrous safety selector, the bolt hold-open mechanism and a simplified magazine feeding mechanism. See .

Features
Due to the large difference in size between the 7.62×39mm cartridge and 12-gauge shells, the extractor port has been lengthened, allowing the shotgun to eject spent shells without risk of causing a stovepipe malfunction.
Like all firearms with the Vepr designation, the Vepr-12 receiver is patterned after that of the RPK light machine gun. The stamped steel receiver is reinforced, thicker (1.5 mm instead of 1 mm), and more heavily constructed than a standard Kalashnikov-pattern rifle.
The Vepr-12 also incorporates a unique safety catch and bolt release mechanism. A side folding stock is present on most models; however, Vepr-12 shotguns are offered with fixed stocks as well.

Instead of the standard AK safety selector, some Vepr-12 shotguns have an ambidextrous safety that can be manipulated from either side of the receiver.
An unusual feature among firearms in the Kalashnikov family, the Vepr-12 sports a last round bolt hold-open mechanism. That is, the bolt locks to the rear of the receiver after the last round has been ejected. To facilitate rapid reloading of the shotgun, a bolt release lever is located inside the trigger guard, allowing the user to release the bolt without breaking grip.

The addition of a magazine well, another unusual feature for a Kalashnikov-pattern firearm, allows for "straight in" magazine insertion, as opposed to the "rock and lock" procedure required on standard AK rifles and the Saiga-12 shotgun.

The Vepr-12 is also chrome lined throughout,  including the gas block, barrel, and chamber, affording the shotgun excellent corrosion resistance.

Unlike the IZ-109 manually adjustable gas regulator system used on the Saiga-12, the gas system on the Vepr-12 is a clone of the IZ-433 unregulated fixed open port tappet system, allowing the Vepr-12 to cycle most commercially available 12-gauge loads, from 3.25 dram equivalent and up, without risking damage to the shotgun and without requiring any manual adjustment by the user. This versatile system is often erroneously characterized as a "self-regulating" gas system. However, no variable regulating mechanism is present. Also, like the IZ-433, the gas block lacks a screw in gas adjuster. Instead, the piston is accessed in a manner familiar to users of traditional Kalashnikov rifles, by removal of the gas tube. A notch on the operating rod allows the user to hook the piston and pull it out to the rear for cleaning.

The Vepr-12 lacks the standard AK side mounting rail, instead using a Picatinny rail incorporated into the dust cover for optic mounting. The dust cover is hinged to the shotgun, allowing the user to open and close the cover without losing the zeroing of a mounted optic.

Purpose
The Vepr-12 was conceived for the Russian military and law enforcement market, with civilian applications ranging from hunting to self-defense and competition use.
In particular, the shotgun has carved out a niche among IPSC competition shooters, one of the Vepr-12's target audiences.
With its fixed open port gas system, the Vepr-12 can effectively cycle a multitude of 12-gauge loads, making it a highly versatile semi-automatic shotgun.
Much like its cousin the Saiga-12, the Vepr-12 is ideal for clay shooting, with appropriate optics.

Variants
The Vepr-12 is manufactured in numerous variations, each with a unique designation.

The Vepr-12 can use the same magazines as the Saiga-12 with modifications, but the Saiga-12 cannot use Vepr-12 magazines and drums.

ВПО-205 (VPO-205)
The VPO-205 series is chambered for 12 Gauge [18.5x70mmR] and 12 Gauge Magnum [18.5x76mmR] shells. It has a side-folding two-strut folding stock with a buttpad and reversible cheekpad.
ВПО-205-00 - Stock model with a 16.92-inch [430mm] barrel with detachable muzzle brake. It weighs 8.59 lbs. [3.9 kg].
ВПО-205-01 - Sporting model with a 20.4-inch [520mm] barrel. Includes a permanently fixed muzzle-brake and can be fired with the stock folded. It weighs 8.81 lbs. [4.0 kg].
ВПО-205-02 - Competition model, includes a 26.77-inch [680mm] barrel with interchangeable chokes. It weighs 9.25 lbs. [4.2 kg].
ВПО-205-03 - Compact model, includes a 12-inch [305 mm] barrel with detachable muzzle brake. It is 34.13 inches [867 mm] overall in length with the stock fixed and 23.66 inches [601 mm] long with the stock folded. It has short Picatinny rails on the sides of the forend and under the end of the barrel and long Picatinny rails on the top of the receiver and the bottom of the forend. It weighs 9.25 lbs. [4.2 kg].
ВПО-205-00-СП - Sporting model for IPSC.

ВПО-206 (VPO-206)
The VPO-206 series is chambered for 12 Gauge [18.5x70mmR] shells. It has a collapsible Colt M4-style Magpul sliding stock.
ВПО-206-00 - Stock model with a 16.92-inch [430mm] barrel with detachable muzzle brake. Weighs 9.47 lbs. [4.3 kg].
ВПО-206-01 - Sporting model with a 20.4-inch [520mm] barrel with a fixed muzzle brake. Weighs 9.7 lbs. [4.4 kg].
ВПО-206-02 - Competition model with a 26.77-inch [680mm] barrel with interchangeable chokes. Weighs 10 lbs. [4.55 kg].

Export and legal status
The Vepr-12 is exported worldwide. Ownership in Russia requires only a smoothbore-gun license.
Due to Russian law, domestic and many export versions of the shotgun are equipped with a disconnector that will render the gun unable to fire while the stock is folded (only if the length of the weapon gets less than 800 mm).

The shotgun is also imported into the United States. Early American export models have no muzzle brake and have a fixed stock rather than a folding stock.  Later models included a fully functional folding stock.

See also
Saiga-12
Akdal MKA 1919
Origin-12

References

External links
The Vepr 12 "Molot" old official page snapshot
"Army News" NATO putting Vepr-12 "Molot" in service
Legion USA Vepr 12 History
VPO-205-00 "Molot" official page
VPO-205-01 "Molot" official page
VPO-205-02 "Molot" official page
VPO-205-03 "Molot" official page

Semi-automatic shotguns of Russia
Vyatskiye Polyany Machine-Building Plant products

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Not sure it is what you were thinking, but I want this for a specific Language. How can that be done?
I'd approach this by downloading all the tasks (approximately: all the rosetta wiki links from http://rosettacode.org/wiki/Category:Programming_Tasks which do not have a ':' in the url's path), and then clip them off starting at the line which contains "mw-headline"). That should get you close enough?
Change perl's -i option to -i.bak if you feel like you might want to save the originals.
I feel this task should be a builtin task for the website. Could someone please add it to the Main Menu? The essential code is above.
Here's a SlimerJS solution. Not perfect but seems to work reasonably well (it's funny watching all the little windows open and close.) A little annoyingly, SlimerJS doesn't implement innerText, so there are the odd occasions where there's markup in the file. Also, occasionally there's a TABLE that's not the contents before the contents, thus truncating the description.
This page was last modified on 30 January 2019, at 16:43.


It may not be the first time that you spend an entire night trying to fall asleep, but all your efforts end up in vain. Then you start counting sheep, or just finding numerous reasons for your misfortune of being awake at the time when all other people sleep tightly tucked in their warm beds.
You may blame the moon phase or accuse stress of being responsible for the lack of your sleep at night, but one thing you did not take into consideration is that there might be several little reasons that contribute to your insomnia.
However, you are not alone. Research has shown that more than 50% of people living in America have the same issue. Of course, sleeping habits have an enormous impact on your health. For instance, if you sleep well, your brain remains sharp, your immune system strong, and your skin looks youthful.
That is why sleeping regularly is of great importance for all people.
Apart from everyday issues at work or your stressful surrounding, your lifestyle and eating habits may also significantly contribute to spending the whole night tumbling on the bed and thinking about everything that comes to your mind.
And indeed, research has shown that eating certain foods will help you sleep better. Many foods that improve sleep, but here is the list of the three foods that are said to be best in making you fall asleep.
There are many benefits of eating fish, but you might just add one more. According to research, fish like tuna and salmon are rich in vitamin B6.
The importance of the B6 vitamin lies, in the fact, that it is used to make melatonin – a hormone used to induce sleep. Thus, if you enter fish in your diet, your sleep can improve significantly. However, not only salmon and tuna improve sleep.
All other fishes are good for inducing sleep. Therefore, if you want to sleep tight, salmon and tuna are to be your meals more often.
Eating white rice may substantially contribute to falling asleep faster than eating other foods. Namely, several studies have come to a conclusion that easily digested carbohydrates found in Jasmine rice, potatoes and cereal are responsible for shutting your eyes faster.
However, when it comes to rice, studies have shown that Jasmine rice has higher glycemic index than an ordinary long-grain rice.
Hence, should you change your eating habits and thus improve your sleep, rice should be among your first choices. But be careful to choose Jasmine rice instead of long-grain one.
Nutritionists advise eating foods rich in carbohydrates, at least, four hours before you go to sleep.
Just like salmon and tuna, cherries have proven to be rich in vitamins that boost the levels of the hormone melatonin. It is said that tart cherries are responsible for increasing the possibilities to fall asleep faster, so you may start eating tart cherries to sleep better.
Some experts propose tart cherry juice in your diet every day. Therefore, a glass of sour cherry juice can help you prevent insomnia and reduce the sleepless nights in your bed.
Many studies today focus on eating habits and their benefits to the overall health. Having in mind that the lack of sleep is a very common issue, nutritionists propose foods rich in carbohydrates and vitamins that boost levels of melatonin.
There are many other foods like nuts, kale, or bananas that can improve your sleep. Hence, eating all of this may greatly contribute your eyes to shut faster.


text:
1490 Hwy 83 ● Elgin, AZ, 85611
Whisper's Sanctuary
Cavalry Room
No arrival and departure date specified yet.
The Cavalry Room, dedicated to Ft. Huachuca's "B-Troop" commemorates the history of the U.S. Army's participation in the Indian Wars in the Southwest. Established at nearby Fort Huachuca, Arizona on July 4, 1973, B Troop dresses in authentic uniforms of the U.S. Army in the 1880s. The group participates in military ceremonies, parades, and mounted cavalry demonstrations across Arizona and the nation. Whisper's Sanctuary is a retirement home for these Army horses.
This room features two plush twin-size beds and decor to give an authentic sense of "sleeping under the stars" like a true Cavalry soldier. Decor includes antique gas-style lamps, a McClelland saddle, canteens, split-rail bedframes, glow stars on the ceiling, and the B-Troop flag. Rate: $100.
Maximum Occupancy:
(Double occupancy)
Cavalry Room Calendar
Booking room on date
For how many nights?
Equine Assisted Therapy & Learning Retreats
Partner with our amazing herd of horses to facilitate growth and learning. We are now offering retreats for individual/couple therapeutic work or leadership/learning for groups. Contact us for more information.
The Ranch Suite
Racing Room
Rodeo Room
Cavalry / Native American Suite
Native American Room
Elgin, AZ, 85611, USA
Email: whispersranch@gmail.com
Copyright © 2022Whisper's Ranch Bed & Breakfast. All Rights Reserved
Web site & Online Reservation System by Innkeeper's Advantage