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Grundy County Auction ShirtRegular price $32.00 Sale price $26.99
This shirt is available in a t-shirt, long sleeve t-shirt, sweatshirt or hoodie.
The photo above shows the color in a black bleached t-shirt.
All of our items are made with love in the USA
We make all of our products at our shop in Eden, North Carolina. All products are inspected by us prior to packaging and we ship them out directly to you.
Handmade using Sublimation
For our colorful tees, hoodies and sweatshirts we use a sublimation process that uses heat (the sun) to transfer the dye onto our garments. This makes for a fun and unique look that we're sure you will love!
About our Clothing
All of our shirts are unisex and are true to unisex sizing. You can take a look at our shirt and size charts to help you find the perfect size for you.
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subset: commoncrawl


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Impact: Homebuyers, tourists get hit quickly
Air travel
WASHINGTON (AP) - A government shutdown is having far-reaching consequences for some, but minimal impact on others.
Mail is being delivered. Social Security and Medicare benefits continue to flow.
But vacationers are being turned away from national parks and Smithsonian museums, and that's having a ripple effect on those businesses and communities that rely on tourism. Borrowers applying for a mortgage can expect delays, particularly many low-to-moderate income borrowers and first-time homebuyers.
Air travel
Federal air traffic controllers remain on the job and airport screeners continue to funnel passengers through security checkpoints. But safety inspections of planes, pilots and aircraft repair stations by government workers have ceased because federal inspectors have been furloughed.
Benefit payments
Social Security and Medicare benefits continue to be paid out, but there could be delays in processing new disability applications. Unemployment benefits are also still going out.
Americans would still have to pay their taxes and file federal tax returns, but the Internal Revenue Service suspended all audits. The IRS also will not be processing any tax refunds during the shutdown. Got questions? Sorry, IRS call centers will not be staffed, though automated lines are still running.
Deliveries continue as usual because the U.S. Postal Service receives no tax dollars for day-to-day operations. It relies on income from stamps and other postal fees to keep running.
New patients are not being accepted into clinical research at the National Institutes of Health, but current patients continue to receive care. Medical research at the NIH has been disrupted as some studies have been delayed. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been severely limited in spotting or investigating disease outbreaks such as the flu or that mysterious MERS virus from the Middle East.
Food safety
The Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say they could handle recalls and high-risk foodborne outbreaks, but they are less likely to discover them because most of the people who investigate outbreaks have been furloughed.
Routine food safety inspections conducted by FDA are suspended, so most food manufacturers won't have to worry about periodic visits from government inspectors to make sure their facilities are clean. U.S. food inspections abroad have also been halted.
The Education Department has said a shutdown beyond a week would "severely" curtail the cash flow to school districts, colleges and universities and vocational rehabilitation agencies that depend on department funds. For example, colleges rely on department funds to pay ongoing expenses for staff in programs for disadvantaged students. The department would not make additional details available on Friday about the number of districts, colleges and universities and vocational rehabilitation agencies that could more immediately feel the impact of a shutdown.
All national parks are closed. Grand National Canyon National Park was shut down for only the second time since it was created in 1919. The Grand Canyon averages 18,000 tourists per day in October, which has left hotels, concessionaires and tour operators losing money by the hour.
In Washington, monuments along the National Mall have been closed, as have the Smithsonian museums, including the National Zoo. Among the visitor centers that have closed: the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in New York, Independence Hall in Philadelphia and Alcatraz Island near San Francisco.
Food assistance
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, known as WIC, has enough money to operate through the end of October, according to USDA. The department distributed almost $400 million in federal unexpended and contingency dollars this week to states to cover any shortfalls. The program provides supplemental food, health care referrals and nutrition education for pregnant women, mothers and their children.
School lunches and breakfasts should have enough funding to be served, USDA says, and food stamps will continue to be distributed through October. But both programs could face shortfalls if the shutdown continues into November.
Borrowers applying for a mortgage can expect delays, especially if the shutdown is prolonged. That's because many lenders need government confirmation of applicants' income tax returns and Social Security data. Mortgage industry officials say they expect bottlenecks on closing loans if the shutdown stretches on for more than a few days.
The delays will particularly hit low- to moderate-income borrowers and first-time homebuyers who are seeking government-insured mortgages for single-family homes from the Federal Housing Administration.
Multifamily FHA mortgage approvals are suspended. Action on government-backed loans to small businesses is also suspended.
It's business as usual for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans, which are not impacted by the shutdown.
NASA continues to keep workers at Mission Control in Houston and elsewhere to support the International Space station, where two Americans and four others are deployed. It also exempted a robotic probe to Mars from the shutdown because time is tight to be ready for a once-every-two-year launch opportunity.
The National Weather Service is forecasting weather and issuing warnings while the National Hurricane Center continues to track storms. The scientific work of the U.S. Geological Survey has been halted.
Homeland Security
The majority of the Department of Homeland Security's employees have stayed on the job, including uniformed agents and officers at the country's borders and ports of entry, members of the Coast Guard, Transportation Security Administration officers, Secret Service personnel and other law enforcement agents and officers. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services employees continue to process green card applications. However, the four Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers, run by DHS, have shuttered training operations for federal agents. The closure of those services could delay when newer employees with the Border Patrol, Customs and Border Protection and Capitol Police can go on the job.
Law enforcement
The FBI estimates that in all, about 80 percent of its employees are working around the country. The FBI has about 34,000 employees. All FBI field offices around the country and the legal attache offices around the world are staffed and are prepared to meet any immediate threats and are protecting life and property. However, activities are suspended for other, longer-term types of investigations of crimes that don't involve an immediate threat. Training and other support functions have been slashed.
The military's 1.4 million active duty personnel remain on duty. About half of the Defense Department's civilian employees were furloughed. National Guard and Reserve training has been cancelled for many units around the country.
All 116 federal prisons remain open and criminal litigation proceeds.
Veterans services
Most services offered through the Department of Veterans Affairs continue because lawmakers approved money one year in advance for the VA's health programs. Veterans are still visiting hospitals for inpatient care and getting mental health counseling at vet centers at outpatient clinics. Operators are also staffing the crisis hotline, but regional offices are not taking calls.
The VA continues to process payments providing veterans compensation for disabilities and pensions. However, claims processors are no longer being required to work 20 hours of overtime per month, which VA officials say is stalling progress in reducing the disability claims backlog, which stood at 418,500 at the end of September.
If the shutdown continues into late October, the VA warns that compensation and pension payments to veterans will be halted.
Federal occupational safety and health inspectors have stopped workplace inspections except in cases of imminent danger.


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Superinsulating My Old House
Aging office worker tackles challenging superinsulated retrofit and lives to tell about it.
January 03, 2009
A version of this article appears in the January/February 2009 issue of Home Energy Magazine.
The tall and narrow west wall was the only remaining uninsulated wall of my old home. The renovation plan was to insulate the wall and replace the original brick façade with an exterior insulation and finish system (EIFS). The old double-hung windows and the front door would also go. I'm superinsulating the remaining already-insulated walls of the house using methods other than those described here.
The decision to undertake this project resulted from several problems that guided me toward specific solutions.
The project was urgent—because:
- our natural gas costs were increasing;
- the façade looked shabby and the old windows no longer held paint;
- the wall's low thermal resistance was both an energy and comfort problem;
- the wall's sound transmittance let in noise from the street; and
- the brick veneer had no structural integrity (earthquakes happen here in Helena, Montana).
To solve these problems, I decided to
- insulate the walls to R-30 or beyond;
- air seal the façade;
- replace the old windows with triple-pane windows;
- create a façade that looked like the old historic façade; and
- reinforce the façade structurally.
The main house, and the addition, built at the turn of the century, originally had brick veneer on all four walls. However, the brick on the north, east, and south walls came crashing down during the Helena earthquake of 1935. The brick veneer on the front (west) wall survived because it was reinforced by the two-story bay window.
Old brick veneer is difficult to retrofit. You can't insulate through brick or over it. My brick veneer was structurally weak, due to inadequate ties into the building and weak mortar from decades of moisture migration through the joints. The best option was to demolish the brick, which is what we did.
Driving flat bars into every second horizontal mortar joint, we pried the bricks apart, removing as many as we could in one piece. This big-chunk method is limited, of course, by how big a piece you can lift and throw into the dump truck. These bricks were crumbly and not worth salvaging. Steel-toed boots are a must for this type of work. Using a man lift and a dump truck, it took my work partner, Joel Repnak, and me only two days to remove all of the brick veneer from the west wall.
Next we removed the tarpaper and pried the full 1-inch plank sheathing off the studs. The original builders had installed the tarpaper, which was held loosely in place by the same ancient 16d nails that held the brick veneer precariously to the wall. The nails were driven about 1/2 inch into the planks, and the nail heads were buried in mortar joints on a spacing of about 2 feet in all directions. That tarpaper protected the wood sheathing from water leaking through the brick veneer, performing the same function as today's house wrap.
After hauling the demolished brick veneer to the dump, we figured we were finished dealing with brick. However, when we removed the plank sheathing from the west wall, we found more bricks and mortar installed inside the stud cavities, from the floor joists all the way to the eaves. Don't ask me what those wily old tradesmen were thinking when they laid this brick and mortar.
After we removed the confounded brick and mortar inside the wall cavities, we could see the giant air leaks from outdoors. The second-floor rim joist (or lack thereof) had holes you could reach your whole arm into. Since there had been spaces between the sheathing planks, and brick isn't a good air barrier, this wall had been leaking a whole lot of air into our home.
We chose to use polyurethane insulation to fill all those voids and insulate the stud cavities. Even though low-density polyurethane isn't a perfect air barrier, it does reduce air leakage, and it provides thermal resistance (R-3.8 per inch).
After the insulators filled the wall cavities with foam, and I installed a near-perfect air barrier—1/2-inch of CDX plywood glued and stapled to the studs. The CDX plywood also reinforced the flawed framing in the old frame wall. Years ago, I waited out an earthquake, standing in my bedroom doorway upstairs. The narrow house had a lot of sway from side to side. Hopefully this glued plywood will decrease that dangerous sway in the event of another earthquake.
Now that the wall was insulated and air sealed, the windows and front door were next on the list. Because of Helena's cold climate we ordered Duxton triple-pane, argon-filled windows with two low-e coatings (U-0.17). The frames of our new windows are insulated with polystyrene foam. There are only a few manufacturers of insulated window frames in North America. (Compare that to more than 40 in Germany and Austria.) Thermal bridging through structural materials around windows and doors causes major heat loss, and insulated window frames reduce thermal bridging. Exterior insulation covers the window's structural framing and reduces thermal bridging still further. Because the windows face west, they heat the house during the summer, and we don't have air conditioning. Therefore, we also chose spectrally selective low-e glass with a low solar heat gain coefficient (SHGC = 0.25).
We installed the windows from the inside for practical reasons. Triple-pane windows are heavy, and my house is tall. We installed the new windows in the old double-hung window frame. The interior trim is attractive, and I didn't want to make a mess indoors, so we left the interior finish intact. The usual problem with installing a new window in the old double-hung window frame is insulating the weight pockets—the vertical cavities next to the windows that hold the sash weights. The weight pockets weren't a problem for us, since we stripped the exterior sheathing off and sprayed foam insulation into the cavities.
I knew the existing frames were out of square, but I underestimated how far out of square they were. Nor did I know how narrow the face of the new window frame was, and that created additional fitting problems. I added a little more than 1/2 inch to the absolute width and height of the window when measuring. This was the minimum clearance space between the old window frame and new window, given the out-of-square openings.
Installing the windows was difficult and time consuming. We installed the window from inside against 3/4 inch x 3/4 inch fir stops. We had to rip the stops into long wedges to accommodate the square window in the out-of-square window frame.
Exterior Insulation
My hockey buddy Ken Robbins developed a unique EIFS system he calls R-Tech, which is similar to other proprietary EIFS systems, including Dryvit. EIFS has suffered some notable failures when moisture has gotten trapped behind the foam, mostly in rainy climates. However, our climate is arid, and R-Tech's workers are moisture control evangelists. R-Tech's flashing details and perfect caulking, along with our careful window detailing, won't allow any moisture to penetrate the foam, or the Tyvek weather barrier underneath.
EIFS is usually installed over an inch or two of polystyrene foam board. Ken balked when I told him I wanted 4 inches; he told me that this wouldn't be cost-effective. After Joel and I demolished the brick, I discovered that the ledge left by the brick veneer would accommodate 6 inches of foam. Ken rolled his eyes when I requested 6 inches, repeated his cost-effectiveness argument, and prepared a new higher estimate.
The EIFS installation, including the exacting 6-inch polystyrene foam application and the 3/16-inch two-color latex-stucco finish, cost me a total of almost $11,000. Considering that there is less than 500 square feet of wall space on that façade, that's more than $22 per square foot!
I chose EIFS because I needed a beautiful façade to face a major street in a historic neighborhood. The face-lift, comfort benefits, noise reduction, and energy savings together made the expensive EIFS worth it to my family and me.
Planning and Intangible Benefits
We've found the exterior retrofit to be the most effective strategy for achieving superinsulation and superior airtightness in a retrofit. Also, retrofitting from the exterior minimizes the indoor mess—preventing the domestic tranquility index from plummeting into the red zone.
This project involved a million details. I haven't even mentioned the double-decker porch we built to replace the decrepit old one.
Planning is the key to our success so far. The city building department wanted drawings and cost estimates before issuing the building permit.
I've made dozens of drawings, materials lists, and work plans.
Retrofitting work is physically challenging for a late-fifties office worker like me. Luckily, I exercise a lot. In the ten weeks Joel and I worked on this project, I've acquired a farmer's tan, lost 15 lb, and reconnected with my inner carpenter. I should do this every summer!
Phase 2 on the north wall is well under way. We're removing steel siding, applying 4 inches of foam, and reinstalling the same siding. I'll tell you about that challenging project another time. Our energy bills give 13 months of historical consumption, so monitoring the success of the project will be easy.
John Krigger is the coauthor of The Homeowner's Handbook to Energy Efficiency and a teacher at the Web-based training institute Saturn Online.
For more information:
For questions about his retrofit project, contact the author at firstname.lastname@example.com.
Visit www.homeownershandbook.biz to learn more about and purchase The Homeowner's Handbook to Energy Efficiency. The book is also available for purchase from the Products section of Home Energy's Web site, http://www.homeenergy.org/homeownerhandbk.php.
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Why Budget Blinds?
We're In Your Neighborhood
At Budget Blinds, we truly care about you and the community we service. Our entire consultative process is designed around caring for you and your needs. Our personalized approach to everything that we do allows us to get to know you better so that we can deliver the perfect solution for your home. Plus, we're backed by the #1 provider of custom window coverings in North America.
We Do it With You
As the local design experts in your neighborhood, we bring our extensive assortment of stylish custom window coverings options and accents right to your door. We get to know you, the way you live, and what's important to you--and then deliver peace of mind backed by the best warranty.
We Believe in Product Excellence
We're focused on bringing you the best when it comes to window coverings. Only at Budget Blinds can you get such an extensive assortment of product options. Choose from the finest of fabrics and quality materials, automated window treatments, or our exclusive designer drapery collections,
Why Do it For Me?
Don't risk DIY when you can rely on your local window covering professional to take care of it for you.
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We bring the showroom to you in your home.
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Convenience and high quality, personalized service.
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The comfort in knowing that you've partnered with the industry leader to deliver a look you'll love.
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We're the local window covering expert in your neighborhood and we're here to stay.
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You have peace of mind as we offer the best warranty and are also backed by the #1 provider of custom window coverings in North America.


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"a" artists
Learn more about the artists whose work is featured on this site by clicking on the first letter of their last name and selecting their name from that list. These pages offer short biographies of the artists whose works are found in the galleries of this website, as well as artists whose works we have offered in the past or currently have in our extensive inventory. Many of the artists listed here have had long and prolific careers, participated in numerous exhibitions and have produced works that are desired by many collectors. However, some of the artists whose works are shown here are not listed in the big, heavy reference books of the accomplished and well-schooled. In fact, some of the artists were simply creative people with a passion for art who lived and worked in small towns or quiet neighborhoods of cities, acclaimed only by family and friends, but left a body of work that is only now becoming appreciated by a wider audience. If you recognize a name or the work of an artist you know about, but our biography is incomplete or incorrect, please contact us so that we can begin to accurately tell this person's story and share it with a new generation of collectors who cherish that artist's work in their home.
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David Spade
Soul Urge (Heart Desire) Number 7
David Spade is an American stand-up comedian, actor, writer, musician, and television personality who has became known in the 1990s as a cast member on Saturday Night Live, followed by a successful acting career in both film and television.
He was born on Wednesday July 22nd 1964, in Birmingham, Michigan, United States.
David Spade loves knowledge, study, and insight. He values the gifts of his mind, which he uses to great advantage to penetrate the mysteries of life. David studies things in-depth. He searches beneath the surface of things, and abhors shallow judgments or opinions.
Spade has a natural gift for analysis and research. Once David Spade has grasped the facts of a subject, his creativity and abstract approach lifts his thinking beyond the rudimentary to the philosophical. David has a theoretical mind, but rather than indulge in fantasies or idle thought, he prefers to base his theories upon scientific facts.
He enjoys mental and physical puzzles - figuring them out, taking them apart, and putting them back together.
Some people may perceive David as cool or aloof. He is somewhat introverted; Spade may feel slightly removed and even a little different. The fantasy of the hermit or monk engaged in a life of study and meditation appeals to him.
In relationships, David Spade tends to keep things business-like and impersonal. He prefers to talk about the facts of a given situation, rather than the cloudier issues of emotions and personal feelings. David distrusts feelings - both his own and those of others. The whole emotional realm strikes him as unreliable, and a bit unnecessary.
David Spade's inability to fully understand the emotional aspect of life is his Achilles heel. David is so rational that the unpredictability of the heart frightens and surprises him.
His challenge is to trust. David Spade needs to share his heart with someone. This is a courageous step for him, but one that results in enormous growth and satisfaction.
The advice here to Spade is to make a true connection with another human being. Without it, David may marry out of convenience or to fulfill social expectations, but it will not lead him out of loneliness. The more removed he is from people, the more David Spade risks isolation, bitterness, and a cynical attitude toward life.
This choice represents a true crossroads in David's development. By sharing himself with others (without compromising his independence and need for privacy) David can cultivate his enormous charm and share his understanding of life. David Spade is a natural teacher and advisor. And the wealth of knowledge he will accumulate in life is meant to be shared with others.
This is not to say that Spade must compromise on his need for privacy or time spent alone to contemplate life. These are natural aspects of Spade's personality, which are essential to his growth. These characteristics should not be threatening to David's spouse, but must be understood as fundamental to his being.
David Spade is blessed with a great reserve of intuition, which can be cultivated by regular meditation and contemplation. His "inner voice" is his greatest guide and friend.
David is idealistic and has high expectations for himself. Spade must learn to balance his serious nature with regular doses of fun.
His intelligence and cultivation make David Spade charming and distinguished in appearance. As he gets older and more comfortable with his identity, people are naturally attracted to him. They see David's wisdom, his deep understanding of life, and the refinement Spade radiates.
You and David
About David's Soul Urge (Heart's Desire) number
David Spade's Soul Urge number represents his inner self. The Soul Urge number, also called Heart's Desire, shows David's underlying urge - his true motivation.
It reveals the general intention behind many of Spade's actions. Consequently, it dramatically influences the choices David Spade makes in life.
Read more about our interpretation of David Spade's soul urge (heart's desire)


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Displaying 1 - 10 of over 26 results for "B2B payments"
November 5, 2019
Nacha's Payments Innovation Alliance and the U.S. Faster Payments Council Launch the Faster Payments Playbook
The inaugural version of the online educational and decisioning platform is designed to help banks and credit unions develop a faster payments strategy MIAMI, Nov. 5, 2019 – Today, Nacha and its Payments Innovation Alliance, jointly with the U.S. Faster Payments Council (FPC), launched the…
Faster Payments
February 5, 2020
See the Payments Innovation Alliance in Action Feb. 19-21 in Las Vegas In less than two weeks, nearly 200 movers and shakers in the payments industry will gather at the Park MGM Hotel in Las Vegas to discuss the hot topics that impact the business of payments. Check out the agenda. …
Products and Solutions
September 17, 2020
Nacha's Payments Innovation Alliance Releases Two New Resources Focused on Voice Payments and Pandemic-Related Cybersecurity Best Practices
The Alliance's Project Teams continue to play a crucial role in providing thought leadership on topics impacting the payments space and financial services HERNDON, Va., Sept. 17, 2020 – In its continued efforts to shape the future of the payments industry and to develop thought leadership…
Membership, Products and Solutions
March 17, 2021
The Payments Innovation Alliance has launched the ACH Guide for Developers, an online resource created to assist developers who need to code to the Nacha Operating Rules and Guidelines format, but are not Rules experts. The guide will help familiarize developers with the basics of the ACH…
ACH, Products and Solutions
April 7, 2020
Nacha Announces BlueSnap as a Preferred Partner for Digital Commerce and Business-to-Business Payments
BlueSnap is now a Nacha Preferred Partner for Digital Commerce and Business-to-Business Payments. In becoming a Preferred Partner, BlueSnap joins a select group of innovators that Nacha recognizes for offering products and services that increase or enhance the use of secure ACH payments,…
Products and Solutions
December 21, 2020
Nacha's Payments Innovation Alliance Expands ACH Quick Start Tool for Small and Medium-Sized Businesses
The online educational tool has been updated to help businesses adopt ACH as their preferred payment method for B2B and B2C payments Nacha and its Payments Innovation Alliance have expanded the ACH Quick Start Tool, an online educational resource designed to help small and medium-sized…
ACH, Products and Solutions
December 18, 2019
Trustly (formerly known as PayWithMyBank in the U.S.) is now a Nacha Preferred Partner for Online Banking Payment & Verification. In becoming a Nacha Preferred Partner, Trustly joins a select group of innovators contributing to Nacha's strategic efforts in support of the ACH payments…
Products and Solutions
August 19, 2020
Despite Concerns Over Mail Delivery, Overwhelming Majority of Federal Government Payments Continue to be Made On Time
More than 97% of Recipients of Social Security and Veterans Benefits Rely on Direct Deposit HERNDON, Va., August 19, 2020 – In recent days, significant concerns have been raised over the delivery of payments from the Social Security Administration and the Veterans Benefits Administration…
ACH, Advocacy, Direct Deposit, Government Relations News
September 17, 2019
Nacha to Recognize Over 360 New Accredited Payments Risk Professionals During the First-Ever National APRP Recognition Day on Sept. 17
HERNDON, Va., Sept. 17, 2019 – In honor of the first-ever National APRP Recognition Day, which will be commemorated annually on the third Tuesday of September, Nacha will recognize over 360 credentialed Accredited Payments Risk Professionals. The total includes professionals who passed the APRP…
Accreditation, ACH, Other Payments Channels, Risk Management
June 23, 2014
Nacha Recognized for Work that Resulted in the Publishing of New ISO 20022 Remittance Messages during Recent EBAday 2014 Forum
Nacha Recognized for Work that Resulted in the Publishing of New ISO 20022 Remittance Messages during Recent EBAday 2014 Forum Nacha Collaborated with IFX Forum and Other IFX Members to Develop ISO 20022 Standalone Remittance Messages, Which Are Supported by the ACH Network Today, to…
ACH, International/Cross Border, Opt-in Programs, Products and Solutions


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The makers of LibreOffice are teaming up with AMD so that the open source office suite can take greater advantage of graphics processing units (GPUs). The partnership is geared toward optimization for AMD's upcoming Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA), but LibreOffice developers say their work will make spreadsheets go faster for users of just about any type of computer.
The news, announced today, was spurred by AMD joining the Document Foundation board—the group behind LibreOffice—and providing financial assistance. "We traditionally had a big performance problem in Calc [the LibreOffice spreadsheet application] for large data sets," Michael Meeks, LibreOffice developer and distinguished engineer for Attachmate's SUSE business unit, told Ars. "My hope is we not only eliminate that problem but that we do significantly better."
LibreOffice has not generally been able to take advantage of the horsepower in GPUs, Meeks said; AMD's HSA helps address this problem. "HSA is an innovative computing architecture that enables CPU, GPU, and other processors to work together in harmony on a single piece of silicon by seamlessly moving the right tasks to the best suited processing element," the Document Foundation said in an announcement. "This makes it possible for larger, more complex applications to take advantage of the power that has traditionally been reserved for more focused tasks."
LibreOffice's development team is refactoring the core of Calc to take advantage of HSA in AMD's GPUs and APUs (accelerated processing units). LibreOffice's spreadsheet calculations have generally been "done in a very unfortunate way, with huge amounts of redundant and repetitive work done right inside the most time critical piece," Meeks said. In the new setup, LibreOffice will change the order of calculations to make them more efficient and will convert tasks into OpenCL so they can be run on GPUs.
When asked if systems with Intel or Nvidia graphics would benefit, Meeks said that "if a vendor has a good OpenCL implementation we'll use that, and that should be fine." Because Calc's code will ultimately be more efficient, even people who own computers without GPUs—"if you can find such a person," Meeks said—should see performance improvements.
The first of these code changes will show up in LibreOffice 4.1 in about a month, but it will take about six months to get substantial benefits to users. Although Meeks is expecting "very significant performance improvements for spreadsheet users," he said it's too early to provide an estimate of just how much speedier spreadsheets will become.
A faster LibreOffice, he joked, will help users "find a business reason to buy the very fastest 3D graphics card you can for your computer. I think that's an important value add to many business users of technology. When your boss comes and says, 'Why have you got this graphics card that's the size of a fridge?' you can say, 'My spreadsheet has got to get faster.'"


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Stop the Tragedy of Minimal Run Support Today!: Another Very Special Post from TIAVSG
It's a tragic, growing problem witnessed at ballparks across America. Starting pitchers in their prime, wasting away with dwindling win percentages due to lack of run support. Minimal run support may not seem like a problem in the beginning. It's true, the average ace pitcher can survive on a mere run or two per game for several starts in a row, when necessary, and even seem to thrive. But make no mistake, a team's chronic lack of run support will strike hard at the records of even the most unbeatable pitchers eventually.
Angels baseball players, don't let this heartbreaking affliction continue to harm your favorite starting rotation. You might think the solution to such a huge problem is beyond your means but all it takes is a few quality at bats. You don't have to hit homeruns, though we wouldn't turn them down. Triples, doubles, even several singles a game with runners in scoring position will provide your starting pitcher with ample run support through good starts and bad.
That's right, all it takes to return that wicked little smile to the face of a nasty pitcher in your clubhouse is a few more hits with runners in scoring position. And remember, when you give the gift of run support, you're not only helping a deserving pitcher but you're giving yourself the heartwarming satisfaction that only comes from knowing you made a difference…and from knowing you helped beat the visiting team into submission, of course.
So Angels, this evening, the rest of the week and on through the rest of the season, please open up your stance, swing from the heart (Stop hitting the ball anywhere near Coco Crisp!) and bring those runners home! Your pitchers are counting on you for support.
Angels fans are standing by.


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Windows 7 is getting closer to its October 22 launch date. With improved security, better compatibility, and a slick new look, the OS should please owners of both powerful and underpowered machines alike. Microsoft has already offered hot pre-order deals, but now it has announced its sweetest deal of them all.
Students with a valid student email address are eligible to get a copy of Windows 7 Home Premium or Professional, 32-bit or 64-bit (your choice, presumably some might pick the lighter Home Premium for netbooks) for a mere $30. And with one announcement, Microsoft has essentially matched Apple's OS price point for one of its most pivotal demographics -- students.
Apple beat Windows 7 to the market and has been loudly trumpeting that its Snow Leopard -- priced at $29 per license -- beats Windows 7 in prices. However, students in the U.S., U.K, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Korea and Mexico will now have their pick between the two competitors at virtually identical prices.
With Snow Leopard, students will get several key improvements (virtually all of Apple's core software was fine-tuned and sped up), but the release falls somewhere between a full Windows OS release and a Windows Service Pack. For an equivalent price they can get Windows 7, a full OS release packing many features that have drawn rave reviews from early adopters. The deal is sweet for users of traditional PC hardware and Macs alike, as even Mac users can take advantage of it to equip their Boot Camp Macs with Windows 7 for gaming and Windows-favored activities.
The deal is found on the win741.com site, a recently launched site from Microsoft, which calls the offer "too sweet to pass up." The site proclaims, "For a limited time, eligible college students can get the sweetest deal on Windows 7 - for only $29.99 USD. That's less than most of your textbooks! Hurry -- offer ends January 3, 2010 and 12 a.m. CST."
One major appeal of the deal is that with Windows 7 and a netbook, students get about the most portable and affordable bundle possible for a fully functional computer.
The move seems a smart one, given that Apple does have Microsoft beat on standard prices, with a copy of Home Premium (upgrade) retailing for $120 and $200 for a Professional upgrade (versus $29 for Snow Leopard). With the price bar set nearly four times as high as Apple's, the pressure is on Microsoft to deliver a dynamite product -- which indications show it will.
Still, Snow Leopard's aggressive pricing has caused it to double the initial sales of its predecessor, Leopard, and quadruple the sales of Tiger. Apple has also been much more aggressive in targeting school children, with programs such as "Field Trip to the Apple Store" in the U.S. and Canada. Many schools continue to use Mac computers primarily. All of this bodes well for Apple's long term success. However, Microsoft is at last making a legitimate bid to seize this important demographic from Apple.
Source: DailyTech


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Passengers finally leaving disabled cruise ship
MOBILE, Ala. — A cruise ship disabled for five nightmarish days in the Gulf finally docked with some 4,200 people aboard late Thursday, passengers raucously cheering the end to an ocean odyssey they say was marked by overflowing toilets, food shortages and foul odors.
"Sweet Home Alabama!" read one of the homemade signs passengers affixed alongside the 14-story ship as many celebrated at deck rails lining several levels of the stricken ship Triumph. The ship's horn loudly blasted several times on its final docking approach as some gave a thumbs-up sign and flashes from cameras and cellphones lit the night.
About an hour after the ship pulled up at 9:15 p.m. Central, a steady stream of passengers began making their way down the glass-enclosed gang plank, some in wheelchairs and others pulling carry-on luggage. One man gave the thumbs up.
An ambulance pulled up to a gate at the bottom of the gang plank and then its lights went on and it pulled away.
For 24-year-old Brittany Ferguson of Texas, not knowing how long passengers had to endure their time aboard was the worst part.
"I'm feeling awesome just to see land and buildings," said Ferguson, who was in a white robe given to her aboard. "The scariest part was just not knowing when we'd get back"
As the ship pulled up, some aboard shouted, "Hello, Mobile!" Some danced in celebration on one of the balconies. "Happy V-Day" read one of the homemade signs made for the Valentine's Day arrival and another, more starkly: "The ship's afloat, so is the sewage."
A few dozen relatives on the top floor of the parking deck of the terminal were waving lights at the ship as it carefully made its way alongside. Those about were screaming, whistling and taking pictures.
Hundreds gawked from dockside at the arrival at the Alabama cruise terminal in Mobile, the state's only seaport, as the Triumph docked.
Taxis were lined up waiting for people, and motorists on Interstate 10 stopped to watch the exodus of passengers from the cruise ship.
Some still aboard chanted, "Let me off, let me off!"
It took six grueling hours navigating the 30-odd-mile ship channel to dock, guided by at least four towboats. Nearly 900 feet in length, it was the largest cruise ship ever to dock at Mobile.
It will take up to five hours for all the 3,000 passengers to be off, Carnival has said.
In texts and flitting cellphone calls, the ship's passengers described miserable conditions while at sea, many anxious to walk on solid ground.
Carnival said all passengers have the option of a seven-hour bus ride to the Texas cities of Galveston or Houston or a two-hour trip to New Orleans. Some also can stay in Mobile.
"I can't imagine being on that ship this morning and then getting on a bus," said Kirk Hill, whose 30-year-old daughter, Kalin Christine Hill, is on the cruise. "If I hit land in Mobile, you'd have a hard time getting me on a bus."
Up to 100 buses are standing by to take the passengers to their next stop. Galveston is the home port of the ill-fated ship, which lost power in an engine-room fire Sunday some 150 miles off Mexico's Yucatan peninsula.
It was the end of a cruise that wasn't anything like what a brochure might describe.
Carnival CEO Gerry Cahill apologized at a news conference and later on the public address system as people were disembarking.
"I appreciate the patience of our guests and their ability to cope with the situation. And I'd like to reiterate the apology I made earlier. I know the conditions on board were very poor," he said. "We pride ourselves on providing our guests with a great vacation experience, and clearly we failed in this particular case."
While the passengers are headed home, Triumph will head to a Mobile shipyard for assessment, Thornton said.
Earlier Thursday — four days after the 893-foot ship was crippled in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico — the passengers and crew suffered another setback with towline issues that brought the vessel to a dead stop for about an hour just when it was getting close to port.
As the vessel drew within cellphone range Thursday, passengers vented their anger.
Renee Shanar of Houston was on board with her husband, who she said has heart trouble. They were told they will be among the first to disembark, she said.
"I don't believe them; they've been lying to us from the beginning," Shanar said.
Disgusted by the foul air and heat on the lower decks, many passengers hauled mattresses and bed sheets onto the top deck and slept there, even staying put in a soaking rain. As the ship approached the coast, a slew of Carnival workers removed the bedding and took it downstairs.
"Today they cleaned the ship, they're serving better food, covering up basically, but at least they're making it more bearable," said Kalin Hill, of Houston, who boarded the Triumph as part of a bachelorette party.
In a text message, though, she described deplorable conditions over the past few days.
"The lower floors had it the worst, the floors 'squish' when you walk and lots of the lower rooms have flooding from above floors," Hill wrote. "Half the bachelorette party was on two; the smell down there literally chokes you and hurts your eyes."
She said "there's poop and urine all along the floor. The floor is flooded with sewer water ... and we had to poop in bags."
The company disputed the accounts of passengers who described the ship as filthy, saying employees were doing everything to ensure people were comfortable.
Some travel agents said cruise prices and bookings have not been affected by the disabled Carnival ship, but others in the industry say it's too early to tell.
Thelbert Lanier was waiting at the Mobile port for his wife, who texted him early Thursday.
"Room smells like an outhouse. Cold water only, toilets haven't work in 3 1/2 days. Happy Valentines Day!!! I love u & wish I was there," she said in the text message, which was viewed by The Associated Press. "It's 4:00 am. Can't sleep ... it's cold & I'm starting to get sick."
Carnival said the original plan was to tow the ship to Progreso, Mexico, because it was the closest port, but by the time tugboats arrived, the ship had drifted about 90 miles north due to strong currents, putting it nearly equidistant to Mobile. It was also logistically easier for the company, which said costs were not a factor.
Carnival has canceled a dozen more planned voyages aboard the Triumph and acknowledged the crippled ship had been plagued by other mechanical problems in the weeks before the engine-room blaze. The National Transportation Safety Board has opened an investigation.
Passengers were supposed to get a full refund and discounts on future cruises, and Carnival announced Wednesday they would each get an additional $500 in compensation.
Here are key moments in the Triumph's ill-fated voyage: — Feb. 7, 2013 — The Triumph departs Galveston for a four-day Caribbean cruise. — Feb. 10, 2013 — A fire erupts in the ship's engine room, disabling the vessel's propulsion system and knocking out most of its power. It is set adrift 150 miles off the Yucatan Peninsula. — Feb. 11, 2013 — Carnival officials say the ship has drifted so far north it will be towed to Mobile, Ala. instead of Progreso, Mexico. Tugboats arrive. — Feb. 12, 2013 — National Transportation Safety Board announces it has opened an investigation into the engine-room fire. — Feb. 13, 2013 — Carnival officials announce they have canceled a dozen more scheduled voyages for the Triumph. — Feb. 14, 2013 — When the ship is within sight of Alabama, the tow gear of one of the tugboats breaks. A new tugboat is secured but once the towing begins, the towline breaks. The line is repaired and the Triumph resumes its journey to Mobile.


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The RidicuList finds a brilliantly simple solution to the texting-while-walking problem: bears.
Post by: Anderson Cooper
Filed under: The RidicuList
Hi Anderson
....got another solution to the problem of TWW (txting while walking!)...make it illegal! Like the DRASTIC reduction in the number of car drivers who text...we are sure to see a lot more conscientious walkers!...all we need is a something like a quadrupeling of police forces nationwide! Wow we could get success like the drug war...
Anderson Cooper goes beyond the headlines to tell stories from many points of view, so you can make up your own mind about the news. Tune in weeknights at 8 and 10 ET on CNN.
Questions or comments? Send an email
Want to know more? Go behind the scenes with AC361°


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From PsychCentral:
"A History of Cognitive Neuroscience…in Three Minutes." Set to the melody of Billy Joel's classic song "We Didn't Start the Fire," new lyrics highlight significant scientists and advances in the field over the years, interspersed with comedy bits reminiscent of silent films. A lively and fun history lesson, this student video won the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience Brains on Film Competition 2012 at University College London. Full lyrics are available here in the video's description.
Sample of related Situationist posts:
- A Neuroscience Perspective on the Financial Crises
- David Eagleman on the Brain and the Law
- The Neuro-Situation of Shopping Choices
- Interview with Professor Joshua Greene


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The Talker: 'Orange Is the New Black' Season 2 trailer released
Staff Writer
Something to talk about
Netflix today released the first trailer for Season 2 of "Orange Is the New Black." The surprise hit only available on Netflix has developed a huge following, and there's a good reason for it - the show is fantastic. Check out the trailer here.
Trending on Twitter
In a '90s classic revisited, Robin Williams is set to strap on his Scottish nanny bodysuit again for "Mrs. Doubtfire 2." #MrsDoubtfire.
Hot video: Kate Upton loves her body, every part of it
Kate Upton has shot down the comments she supposedly made about wishing she had a smaller chest by saying that she loves her body, every part of it.
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BULLS BLACKED OUT: Nets crush Bulls in first playoff game in Brooklyn
Deron Williams, Brook Lopez and the Nets turned the Brooklyn blackout into a blowout, beating the Chicago Bulls 106-89 on Saturday night in Game 1 of their playoff series.
Williams scored 22 points, Lopez had 21 and the Nets ripped apart the Bulls' vaunted defense with a spectacular second quarter, when they made 16 of 20 shots.
Joe Johnson finished with 16 for the Nets, who made their successful first season in Brooklyn even better with a victory in their first playoff appearance since 2007. They will host Game 2 on Monday night.
The Nets wore their road black uniforms and fans were encouraged to wear black as well to make it a "blackout" for the first major postseason game in Brooklyn since Oct. 10, 1956, when the Yankees beat the Dodgers in Game 7 of the World Series at Ebbets Field.
The Nets then came out white-hot, shooting nearly 56 percent and putting six players in double figures.
Carlos Boozer had 25 points and eight rebounds for the Bulls, who had Joakim Noah in the starting lineup despite foot pain. But he was clearly limited, and there was no reason to play him more than the 14 minutes he got with the game never in doubt after halftime.
The sellout crowd of 17,732 was roaring long before Nets reserve Jerry Stackhouse, who wears the No. 42 that Jackie Robinson once sported in Brooklyn, sang the national anthem.
Owner Mikhail Prokhorov, who spent hundreds of millions on player contracts last summer expecting a longtime loser in New Jersey to win big in Brooklyn, came on the court to thank fans for their passion and support, telling them that this playoff appearance was only the beginning.
And what a beginning it was.
Williams even had a reverse dunk in the third quarter, showing how much better he feels after ankle pain had him playing well below his usual level before the All-Star break, when he could barely jump.
Gerald Wallace and C.J. Watson each scored 14 for the Nets, while Andray Blatche had 12.
Noah has battled plantar fasciitis in his right foot and coach Tom Thibodeau said he didn't want his All-Star center playing if he was injured. But Noah, who grew up in New York, wanted to give it a try. He finished with four points.
The Bulls are still without Derrick Rose, who tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee in last year's playoff opener. Thibodeau hasn't ruled out the former MVP returning in this series, noting the end would be two weeks from Saturday if it went the distance.
That looked unlikely after Game 1.
Chicago won three of four during the regular season, holding the Nets to 87.5 points per game, but Brooklynhad 89 after the third quarter of this one.
Fans chanted "Brooklyn! Brooklyn!" before the tip and chanted Wallace's name during it, recognizing his strong performance after a difficult regular season.
The Nets jumped out to an 11-point lead after one quarter, getting 12 points from Lopez. It was 38-26 midway through the second before the Nets blew it open. Lopez made two straight baskets, the latter a dunk after Williams juked Marco Belinelli so badly that Jay-Z practically jumped out of his nearby courtside seat.
Former Bulls backup Watson followed with a 3-pointer to make it a 20-point game for the first time, and it was 60-35 at halftime after the Nets scored the final six points.
Noah started the second half, clearly not running well, but was back on the bench before long.
NOTES: Nets interim coach P.J. Carlesimo got his first playoff victory since April 30, 1997, when he coached Portland. … The Bulls reached the conference semifinals the previous three times they were a No. 5 seed. … Jay-Z was in his usual seat near the Nets' bench even though the rap mogul is selling his small portion of the team, as required, to focus on his player agency business.
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Here is the answer for: ___ the line (was obedient) crossword clue answers, solutions for the popular game USA Today Crossword. If you are looking for other crossword clue solutions simply use the search functionality in the sidebar. Please keep in mind that similar clues can have different answers that is why we always recommend to check the number of letters.
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Microsoft Thursday revealed the Intel architecture-based Surface with Windows 8 Pro. It will be available in January.
The Surface Pro looks like the already-shipping Surface running Windows RT, but will be slightly thicker and heavier. It will be available with 64 GB and 128 GB of flash storage for $899 and $999, respectively. Microsoft's Touch Cover or Type Cover keyboards are add-ons costing $120 and $130, respectively.
The major difference in the Surface Pro compared to the Surface RT, and what might justify the $400 price premium over the RT version, is that this version runs existing Windows software written for earlier versions of the OS, and not just apps in the Windows Store.
The Surface Pro screen is 10.6" ClearType with full HD and 1920 by 1080 resolution. In addition to 10-point multi-touch support, the Surface Pro also comes with a digitizing pen with ink support, so users can take handwritten notes. Other key specs include a full-size USB 3.0 port, and a Mini DisplayPort, which can drive an external display with up to 2560 x 1440 resolution.
A major downside with the Surface Pro is that the processor/graphics chip set is a third-generation Ivy Bridge, an Intel Core i5 processor with Intel HD Graphics 4000. Battery life should be on the order of Windows notebooks, not mobile devices based on ARM processors. The next generation of Intel chip sets, Clover Trail, will have ARM-level performance.


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Stay up to date on the latest of Best of Draw Something
Enter your scrambled letters below, and we will look them up against the entire list of Draw Something and Draw Something 2 words! Once you find the word, you can click on the result to see the very best drawings of it we have!
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Dear ACE Family,
Have you ever met someone who earned a fitness certification and then gave up because they failed to attract clients? Of course you have. We all have. Unfortunately, the highly competitive nature of our business has made that a reality. In the past year, we have thought long and hard about what those people needed to succeed. And what we've come up with a solution that will change the way personal trainers, group fitness instructors and health coaches market themselves.
In an industry where word-of-mouth can be the difference between success and failure, we want your expertise to do the talking. That's why we've introduced ACE Specialty Certifications in sports conditioning, weight management, functional training, group exercise leadership and a host of other topics.
According to data in the IBISWorld Industry Report, fitness professionals differentiate themselves from competition by focusing on niche markets. Whether you base your niche on a personal interest, the demographics in your area or earning potential, we want to offer you the tools to develop it.
We want to offer what you need to become the go-to expert in your market. And we want you to do it your way.
Become an expert in fat loss and muscle gain as a Weight Management Specialist. Develop yourself as a resource for athletes as a Sports Conditioning Specialist. Learn to help clients hindered by muscle imbalances as an Orthopedic Exercise Specialist. Restore efficient movement, prevent injury and improve flexibility as a Functional Training Specialist.
Deliver holistic wellness as a Mind Body Specialist. Develop exercise programs that prevent bone deterioration and boost longevity as a Senior Fitness Specialist. Deliver the ultimate classes as a Group Exercise Leadership Specialist. And treat conditions like arthritis, tendinitis and musculoskeletal disorders as a Therapeutic Exercise Specialist.
The choice is yours, and in the coming months, we'll be introducing even more Specialty Certifications for you to consider.
Let us know your thoughts by emailing email@example.com, or find out more at ACEfitness.org/ContinuingEducation.


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Street Address:
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WASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama is asking Congress for a short-term deficit reduction package of spending cuts and tax revenue that will delay the effective date of steeper automatic cuts now scheduled to kick in on March 1. Obama said the looming cuts would be economically damaging and must be avoided.
The president reiterated his insistence on long-term deficit reduction that combines taxes and cuts, a blend that faces stiff resistance from anti-tax Republicans in Congress.
Obama made his case Tuesday afternoon in the White House briefing room, just minutes after the Congressional Budget Office released revised budget projections that showed the deficit will drop to $845 billion this year, the first time during Obama's presidency that the red ink would fall below $1 trillion. The budget office also said the economy will grow slowly in 2013, hindered by a tax increase enacted in January and by the automatic spending cuts scheduled to take effect this spring.
It is those cuts that Obama is seeking to put off with less onerous measures. Neither the president nor White House aides specified what those measures should be.
"There's no reason that the jobs of thousands of American who work in national security or education or clean energy, not to mention the growth of the entire economy, should be put in jeopardy just because folks in Washington couldn't come together to eliminate a few special interest tax loopholes or government programs that we agree need some reform," he said.
Obama said Congress needs more time to work out a 10-year plan worth more than $1 trillion in deficit reduction. Obama did not place a time span or a dollar amount on the short-term plan. Officials said he will leave that to Congress.
His request comes as some congressional Republicans were signaling that they might allow the automatic cuts to kick in as the only viable means of achieving deficit reduction, even though it cut into programs they support, such as defense.
The president's request would continue what has become a common practice in Washington – dealing with fiscal issues in small steps in hopes that over time Congress and the administration are able to agree on broader and more lasting policies. In his remarks, Obama alluded to the incremental nature of the work ahead.
"Let's keep on chipping away at this problem together, as Democrats and Republicans, to give our workers and our businesses the support that they need to thrive in the weeks and months ahead," Obama said.
Finding deficit reductions of up to $85 billion would put off the automatic cuts, known as a "sequester" in government budget language, until the start of the new fiscal year.
Obama has insisted that any efforts to reduce the deficit be "balanced" between spending cuts and new tax revenue. Obama already won about $600 billion in higher taxes at the start of the year and congressional Republicans say they are not about to approve more tax revenue. While the Senate has a Democratic majority, the House is controlled by the GOP.
In a statement earlier in the day, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said that additional tax hikes were out of the question.
"President Obama first proposed the sequester and insisted it become law," Boehner said. "Republicans have twice voted to replace these arbitrary cuts with common sense cuts and reforms that protect our national defense. We believe there is a better way to reduce the deficit, but Americans do not support sacrificing real spending cuts for more tax hikes. The president's sequester should be replaced with spending cuts and reforms that will start us on the path to balancing the budget in 10 years."
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has said that a deficit reduction package could include revenue from closing tax loopholes. He has specifically mentioned ending tax breaks for corporate jets and breaks for the oil and gas industry. Such measures, however, would result in modest amounts of revenue. The oil and gas subsidies total about $4 billion a year; the subsidies for purchasers of corporate jets is about $300 million a year.
The automatic cuts are part of a 10-year, $1 trillion deficit reduction plan that was supposed to spur Congress and the administration to act on long-term fiscal policies that would stabilize the nation's debt. Though Congress and the White House have agreed on about $2.6 trillion in cuts and higher taxes since the beginning of 2011, they have been unable to close the deal on their ultimate goal of reducing deficits by about $4 trillion over a decade.
If the automatic cuts are allowed to kick in, they would reduce Pentagon spending by 7.9 percent and domestic programs by 5.3 percent. Food stamps and Medicaid would be exempt, but Medicare could take up to a 2 percent reduction, under the plan.
The automatic cuts were supposed to take effect Jan. 1. But Obama and congressional Republicans struck a New Year's deal that extended Bush era tax rates for all but the wealthiest Americans and put in place about $24 billion in deficit reduction. That delay effectively postponed the automatic reductions to March 1.
Obama and White House aides say the president's plan for long-term deficit reduction would increase tax revenue by about $600 billion to $700 billion over 10 years as well as reduce mandatory health care spending, primarily in Medicare, by about $400 billion over the next decade. It would also change an inflation formula that would reduce cost-of-living adjustments for beneficiaries of government programs, including Social Security.
Republicans have called for a more comprehensive overhaul of government entitlement programs.
Tuesday's Congressional Budget Office report predicted the deficit would dip to $430 billion by 2015, the lowest since the government posted a $459 billion deficit is former President George W. Bush's last year in office.
That would be a relatively low 2.4 percent when measured against the size of the economy. But deficits would move higher after that and again reach near $1 trillion in the latter portion of the 10-year window – despite the recently enacted tax increase on family income exceeding $450,000 and automatic spending cuts of about $100 billion a year. The package of spending cuts and tax increases are punishment for Washington's failure to strike a long-term budget pact.
"We need to continue working to cut spending responsibly, protect and strengthen programs like Medicare, and raise revenue by closing tax loopholes that the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations take advantage of," said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Patty Murray, D-Wash.
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If you're up to no good in this pocket of northeast Ohio, especially in a witless way, you're risking not only jail time or a fine but a swifter repercussion with a much larger audience: You're in for a social media scolding from police Chief David Oliver and some of his small department's 49,000 Facebook fans.
And Oliver does not mince words.
In postings interspersed with community messages and rants, the Brimfield Township chief takes to task criminals and other ne'er-do-wells — his preferred term is "mopes," appropriated from police TV shows and an old colleague who used it — for the stupid, the lazy and the outright unlawful. Even an ill-considered parking choice can spur a Facebook flogging.
"If you use a handicapped space and you jump out of the vehicle, all healthy-like, as if someone is dangling free cheeseburgers on a stick, expect people to stare at you and get angry," Oliver wrote last year. "You are milking the system and it aggravates those of us who play by the rules. Ignoring us does not make you invisible. We see you, loser."
His humor, sarcasm and blunt opinion fueled a tenfold increase in the Facebook page's likes in the past year, bringing the total to more than four times the 10,300 residents the department serves. It's among the most-liked local law enforcement pages in the country, trailing only New York, Boston and Philadelphia police, according to the International Association of Chiefs of Police Center for Social Media.
Not bad for a guy who initially hoped maybe 500 locals would pay attention when he noticed other businesses' pages and decided to start his own three years ago.
Facebook posting, May 16, 2013: "I call criminals mopes. I do not comment on them being ugly, smelly or otherwise beauty impaired ... even though some are. I do not comment on their education, social status, color, sex, origin or who they marry. I care about crime and character. If you come to Brimfield and commit a crime we are all going to talk about it. The easiest way to not be called a criminal is to not be one. It is not calculus."
The chief loves justice, Westerns and dogs. John Wayne and Abraham Lincoln peer out from frames on the gray walls of Oliver's office, where the 45-year-old chats with anyone who stops by.
His Facebook messages extend that open-door policy online for conversations about road closures, charity events, lost pets and whatever else crosses his mind. Some are serious, such as salutes to slain officers and updates during school threat investigations. Others are light-hearted, like the attempt to find an escaped swine's owner with an unusual APB — an "All-Pig Bulletin" — or his promise to "ticket" child bicyclists with coupons for free ice cream if they wear helmets.
And, of course, there's crime. One posting berates a man accused of physically assaulting a woman and two children. In another, Oliver suggests that hiding near an occupied police K-9 vehicle wasn't a shoplifting suspect's smartest move.
Resident Mark Mosley, a daily reader, said he likes such "humorous arrest stories" best.
"It's one of those things, like you can't fix stupid," Mosley said.
His officers and others say the online character of the chief, a big, beefy guy, matches real life.
"He is definitely a very large personality. It kind of goes with his size," local fire Chief Robert Keller said.
Oliver's 15-person department handles more than 13,000 calls for service annually and deals largely with arrests for driving violations, thefts and drug crimes by out-of-towners. Arrests in those crime categories dropped last year but are trending upward again, and Oliver says it would take more time to determine whether the Facebook messages are having an impact.
Occasionally, his rants cover topics far outside his jurisdiction, among them the Boston Marathon bombings and the high-profile rape case from Steubenville in eastern Ohio. He rarely mentions names but doesn't shy from addressing specific suspects or brands of criminals.
July 31, 2012: "Dear Father or Mother Meth Cooks,"You have lost your mind. What in hell are you thinking when you make the decision to cook meth with your child in the house? You have violated the very basic principle of being a parent, which is the safety of your child. I am fed up with watching it and also with being concerned with the long-term effects of what you have exposed YOUR child to."
The word is out even among mopes, a few of whom have told Oliver they read his updates. During a March traffic stop with several drug-related arrests, one suspect overheard Oliver being called "Chief" and, after connecting the dots, requested not to be mentioned on the page, police said. Oliver didn't oblige.
His postings, also republished to the department's Twitter account, spur dozens or hundreds of comments from as far away as Australia or Germany. Some praise the department. Others say Oliver uses work time inappropriately for Facebook or criticize him for discussing suspects in a public forum. (His response: It's public record.)
Oliver welcomes the discussion and deletes comments only if they use profanity or refer to police in highly offensive language.
"He totally connects with our community, except the people that he arrests," said Mike Kostensky, one of the trustees who picked Oliver as chief in 2004.
Departments like Brimfield that engage readers and reply tend to see more activity on their police pages compared with those that don't, said Nancy Kolb, who runs the IACP Center for Social Media. The center tracks the popularity of law enforcement on Facebook and Twitter.
Oliver says his updates provide accountability and transparency about police work. He's also a believer that people can change.
He says that he had a "very thin" line between good and bad when he was younger and that he might have become a mope if not for grandparents who let him watch only "The Waltons," "Gunsmoke" and "The Andy Griffith Show" on TV.
He said the latter was the biggest influence on his career because he admires the respectful, plain-spoken sheriff played by Griffith.
"I just always thought, you know, that's a good way to handle things," Oliver says.
Jan. 28, 2013: "It is the opinion of this chief, located in a small corner of a great big world, that we need to, as a society, become a little more intolerant of people who commit crimes for a living. When we start yelling about it being unacceptable ... people will take notice and the practice will shift; either by putting people in jail, funding drug treatment or behavioral changes by the criminals."
Oliver, a father of four who starts many days hugging and high-fiving elementary school students, turned his popularity into a sort of local brand, pitching mugs and T-shirts with "no mopes" logos and his other catchphrases — such as "anywhere but here" or, in reference to a jail breakfast, "enjoy the oatmeal" — to raise money for school security improvements. Purchases and donations have brought in more than $14,000, enough to install panic buttons connecting the five local schools to police. Cameras and intercoms are next.
"How could you not love that guy?" said Tammy Ralston, the graphic designer at Young's Screenprinting and Embroidery in Cuyahoga Falls, which came up with the "mopes" gear and receives orders from across the country.
Oliver's supporters include retiree Dennis Kerr of Sherwood, Ark., who bought a T-shirt for his wife while visiting family in nearby Stow.
"The guy really has a load of common sense, and I appreciated him, so we started following him," Kerr said.
Kerr hopes to meet Oliver and said he considered planning his next Ohio visit to coincide with Brimfield's parade. Oliver is turning the September event into a walk honoring military veterans and has invited all his Facebook fans.
Everyone, that is, except the mopes.
Follow Kantele Franko on Twitter.


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HSBC - www.hsbc.co.in/1/2/miscellaneous/careers
In India a lot of MNC's started offices and creating huge number of jobs for freshers. So be the first, register to their career portal to get the right opportunity. Please don't roam entire city for job, always mind it some spam companies present in every city to earn money from you.
A multinational Company is an organization that runs production units or services in one or more countries other than their home country. These corporate multinational companies may be IT companies, Importing and exporting goods and services, Making investments in a foreign country, Opening manufacturing units or manufacturing operations in foreign countries and selling electronics and software products in foreign countries. Some of the companies running logistic companies in foreign countries. Multinational companies mainly creates a huge amount of employment opportunities and also these companies paying a lot tax to the foreign countries.


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Backdrafting Appliances: Causes and Fixes
Homeowners and contractors need to know that when they replace 70%- or 80%-efficient furnaces with 90%-efficient furnaces and leave standard atmospheric draft water heaters orphaned, old atmospheric water heaters may backdraft, creating CO problems for the occupants.
Non-fire-related CO poisoning is responsible for approximately 15,000 emergency department visits and nearly 500 deaths per year in the United States, according to CDC data from the National Poison Data System, 2011. My organization, Therma-View Infrared and Energy Consultants, conducted research on data provided by a third-party quality control inspection firm that inspected more than 5,000 homes that received energy retrofit measures through energy efficiency programs and found that
- 60% of houses with 80% or lower-efficiency gas furnaces and natural-draft water heaters had inadequate draft pressure,
- 50% of orphaned water heaters spilled flue gasses for longer than one minute upon completion of energy retrofit work to the building; and
- 10% of the combustion appliances had dangerous levels of CO.
Let's look at a few of the problems that, alone or in combination, can result in CO poisoning. First we need to understand how 70%, 80%, and 90% combustion appliances vent flue gases to the outside.
Many older homes with atmospherically vented appliances or existing 80% efficient (also known as mid-efficiency) gas appliances use the same chimney to vent their combined combustion gases out of the building. These chimneys were originally designed and sized to handle the combined by-products of combustion, namely, water vapor (H2O), carbon monoxide, (CO) carbon dioxide (C02) nitrogen oxides (NOx), other particulates, and the heat of the flue gases.
What makes 70% and 80% appliances draft, or remove these by-products, is the heat of the flue gases. This heat creates a negative pressure, or suction, inside the chimney, pulling the flue gases out of the building.
This suction is sometimes referred to as draft pressure. The draft pressure in the vent and chimney has to be more negative than the air pressure in the combustion appliance zone (CAZ). The CAZ is the area where the appliance is located, usually in the basement, but can be in the main body of the home if the home has no basement. If the CAZ is under more negative pressure, or suction, than the chimney, the combustion by-products will come back down the chimney, into the CAZ, and then into the building. When combustion gases come back down the chimney and into the building, it's called backdrafting. If backdrafting continues and there is CO present in the flue gases, the occupants can get sick or even die.
High-efficiency or 90+% combustion furnaces and boilers do not vent flue gases through a standard chimney. Since these gases are relatively cool—about 100°F—they are vented through a sealed plastic vent pipe. All 90% appliances have built-in combustion blowers that draw air from the outside into the combustion chamber and then push the flue gases to the outside. The vent pressure in 90% furnaces would be positively pressurized with reference to the CAZ. Since there is a fan pushing the combustion gases out of the building, there is no chance that these appliances will backdraft. These appliances have pressure-sensing controls that shut down the unit if there is a loss of pressure in the vent, which, for example, may be caused when snow covers the vent pipe outside.
Why CAZs Are Depressurized
There are a few reasons why the CAZ may be under more negative pressure than the chimney and pull flue gases down the chimney and into the home.
Builders and remodeling and home performance contractors are making buildings tighter than ever before. This air sealing is a good thing. However, if done improperly, it can lead to serious problems with some types of combustion equipment.
Warm air, such as air in the CAZ during the winter, moves naturally to a colder area, such as unheated attic spaces, and then through the attic vents to the outside. This is called the stack effect. This air movement from the CAZ to the attic can cause suction on the CAZ, placing it under more negative pressure with reference to the rest of the building and the outside. This air from the CAZ moves through plumbing chases, electrical chases, HVAC duct chases, and unsealed building cavities. If air sealing of the CAZ is done at the perimeter of the CAZ (that is, at the exterior walls, rim joists, and band joists), which is usually easier than air sealing the top of the building, the CAZ often does not have enough air to create a draft in the chimney.
Other reasons the CAZ may experience a negative or suction pressure causing back drafting of appliances are:
- Leaky return ductwork in the CAZ sucks air from the CAZ area and can suck flue gases down the chimney. This also makes homes heat and cool unevenly.
- Grilles are sometimes installed in return ductwork to reduce a high heat rise across the appliance heat exchanger. This usually happens when the ductwork hasn't been sized properly. The easiest way for the contractor to remedy the problem is to install a register grille into the return in the CAZ. This will provide all the air the appliance needs to reduce the high heat rise, and will prevent the combustion chamber and the heat exchanger from burning out early. Installing grilles in return ducts usually creates a big negative CAZ pressure in the CAZ.
- Leaky filter slots at the furnace pulls air from the CAZ causing depressurization.
- Clothes dryers pull air out of the building at the rate of approximately 150–200 CFM. This air must be replaced by makeup air. If the clothes dryer is located in the CAZ, the dryer can get the makeup air from down the chimney.
- When homeowners or contractors replace 70% or 80% furnaces with 90+% furnaces, which no longer use the chimney, the water heater is left venting into the chimney alone. This is known as an orphaned water heater. The chimney is now sized too large for the flue gases. The draft temperature is so low in the water heater that it often can't overcome the slug of cold air inside the chimney, and the flue gasses can't escape so they come back into the CAZ.
- When homeowners use their bathroom exhaust fans, kitchen range hoods, dryers, attic fans, or anything else that pushes or pulls air out of the house, they are pulling air from the inside and exhausting it to the outside. If the building is closed up in the winter, or if the A/C is on and the house windows are closed in the summer, the replacement air will come from the easiest and closest hole in the building, which is usually the chimney. If the water heater comes on, this will cause it to backdraft.
How to be Safe: Conduct a Worst-Case CAZ Depressurization Test
Technicians need to create worst-case depressurization conditions in the CAZ and then measure the air pressure in the CAZ relative to the outside, using a pressure gauge. This means that the technician must configure the worst conditions in the building that the homeowner might create—conditions that would put the CAZ under the most negative pressure. In other words, how can the technician create the conditions in the home so that the most air is sucked out of the CAZ? This is done by turning on all of the exhaust devices and positioning interior doors. If the home has a forced-air heating system, the furnace fan will be part of the test. The furnace fan is needed to check for return duct leakage and unsealed furnace filter slot openings, and to measure their impact on the pressure in the CAZ. In all homes with forced-air systems, and especially in homes with a central return and supply registers in other rooms, closing the doors to the rooms with supply registers will increase air pressure in those rooms relative to the main body of the house. The main body of the house will be under more negative air pressure than the rooms with closed doors. When this happens, the connections in the building to the CAZ will cause more suction on the CAZ, causing it to be under more negative pressure with reference to the outside. It is very important to check the CAZ under summertime conditions, because water heaters draft poorly when outdoor temperatures are warm, and there is less stack effect in the chimney to help with the drafting of combustion appliances.
Unless HVAC, remodeling, and plumbing contractors who install and service atmospheric draft gas water heaters completely understand the house as a system, and learn how to conduct the worst-case CAZ depressurization test, they will be facing a huge liability. These tests can be a matter of life and death. The ACCA has identified this issue and has included guidance on how to conduct the depressurization test in its Standard 12.
The solution would be to train contractors to conduct the worst-case CAZ depressurization test at a minimum when starting a job and when finishing a job, and when replacing an 80% gas furnace with a 90% gas furnace.
The simplest test for homeowners to conduct on the CAZ can be done as follows. Close up the house to simulate winter conditions (all windows and exterior doors closed); turn on all appliances that suck air out of the building (range hoods, bath exhaust fans, dryers); and turn up the thermostat on the water heater until it comes on. Then hold a blown-out match or other smoke device at the draft hood to see if the smoke goes up the vent or back toward you. The smoke should go up the vent after a minute or two. If it doesn't, open a window or door to the outdoors in the CAZ. If the smoke goes up the vent, you have a CAZ depressurization problem, which may be caused by a chimney chase open to the attic or another cause as mentioned above.
learn more
The depressurization test for the CAZ is described in ACCA Standard 12, "Existing Home Evaluation and Performance Improvement for Residential One- and Two-Family Dwellings and Townhouses Not More Than Three Stories Above Grade."
Therma-View Energy and Pure Energy Coach LLC have a series of short videos showing the issues, tests, and solutions described in this article. For a list of these videos, go to www.pureenergycoach.com and click on "Watch and Learn."
How to Solve the Problem
There are a couple of solutions to this problem.
- Replace the atmospheric draft water heater with a power draft water heater or a tankless water heater. Or change the gas water heater to an electric water heater. The downside of this solution is that these options can be expensive.
- Add makeup air to the CAZ. This is simply done by installing a duct or grille from the outside to the CAZ. Another option is to add a so-called fan in a can. On call for heat, these devices energize the fan that draws outdoor air into the CAZ to aid in drafting flue gasses.
Homeowners and contractors need to be aware that when replacing 70% and 80% efficient combustion appliances, and when allowing atmospheric draft water heaters to remain, there is a chance of the water heater combustion gasses to coming back into the CAZ and home. The only way to be safe is to do the worst case depresssurization combustion appliance zone test or replace the atmospheric draft water heater at the same time.
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