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Tales of Sickness: Pro Climbing is Neither
This article appeared in Rock and Ice issue 144.
Sponsorship: the Holy Grail of the climbing world, the crowning achievement that announces, "Hey, I'm a climber of dubious talent who has so insistently whored myself out that Company X gave me a free pair of shoes just so I'd go away." Or, in the case of truly gifted climbers, a great way to get much-merited free gear and stay on the road, visiting new cliffs.
Since most of us fall into that middling- to no-talent category, it's critical that we, in approaching manufacturers for free swag, present ourselves in the best light possible. This may or may not involve telling the truth. Usually it's best just to embellish or lie. This is accomplished by "fluffing the rez," aka "padding the résumé," a time-honored technique for airbrushing your (non-) achievements and generating buzz.
Tip #1
Lie. Congrats—you toprope-beta-flashed The Shocker (5.13a) at the Enormodrome using a quickdraw as an intermediate, but, really, if it hadn't been smarmy that day, or the chipped jug below the crux wasn't seeping, or your left shoe wasn't slathered in yak urine, you would have on-sighted. Give credit where credit isn't due and upgrade your ascent to an on-sight. No one besides you, or a few basement-dwelling sociopaths prone to verbal ejaculation on climbing message boards, will care anyway. With your on-sight now established, post it to your website (yourname.com, or your name+climbing.com if some douchebag already owns the domain), your 8a.nu scorecard (where you're ranked 20,957th in the world), and to any magazine editor who will listen ("Sure, we'll publish it in next issue's Small Wires … what did you say your name was again?").
Tip #2
Retro-upgrade. This will save the pesky, time-consuming task of getting your lardbutt in shape and redpointing any new hard routes; it works especially well if you're a has-been with a semi-credible ticklist. Simply round up the grades of your hardest sends. The difference between 5.13c/d and 5.14a is negligible at best, a quantitative splitting of hairs best left to climbers with integrity. (You don't want to be one of them, do you?) Also, any boulder problem you've done is now V15, the sexy V-grade du jour. If you had to dyno a little, it was probably V16.
If you're worried about being revealed as a self-promoting charlatan, then only retro-upgrade obscure routes at local pile crags that no real climber would ever visit. No one will bother to confirm or deny your claims. Southern California, with its multitude of raggy-ass mud cliffs sliding into the Pacific, is a perfect venue, as is western Colorado, where the limestone is more shattered than Princess Di's windshield and cattle outnumber climbers. If you live in the Midwest, sorry, but you're f—ked: 5.8 at South Dakota's Needles equates to about 5.11 X anywhere else, and that's one of the least sandbagged crags in the region.
Now, post your résumé at your website and "accidentally" leave copies in the johns at your local rock gym or coffee shop.
Tip #3
Minister the information. As in, become your own one-man or one-woman Ministry of Information, disgorging a tidal wave of propaganda, like Goebbels on a coke binge. You'll need minions, field operatives and well-placed allies who can preach the Gospel of You. Have these lackeys send occasional postcards or emails about "this rad new climber I keep hearing about … [You]" to gear companies and magazines. Then, strategically post these toadies at the base of each crag you plan to visit and have them whisper, "Isn't that You, the best climber of his generation?" when you ruck up with your hardboy scowl, kneepads, finger condoms and sticker-spattered stick clip. To keep your followers loyal, promise that you'll hook them up with pro deals once you're sponsored. Should they show any signs of disloyalty or attraction to another aspirant, shoot them where they stand.
Now that you've jump-started the rumor mill, it's time to start begging, er, contacting, gear manufacturers. Consider the following real-life sponsorship requests sent to major companies. The names have been changed to protect the overly earnest and/or blatantly dumb.
Exhibit A
Using the Lord's name in vain. This youngster, unable to afford the equipment to join his local volunteer fire brigade, wrote one company requesting some basic safety equipment.
"Hi, God bless you. My name is Julio. I am 17 years old. I passed to the twelfth grade of the Marcelino Rodriguez Román High School. Since a child I have been a servant of God. I attend to the Pentecostal M.I. Church … for the glory of God I am vice-president of the young society of the church. …
"Equipment needed: Rescue Gloves (small), Helmet, Safety Glasses, Headlamp, Uniform Belt …
"P.S. I will be very grateful for your help, and I will be praying for you that God will continue blessing your lives and company."
Unfortunately, poor Julio didn't know that goat-sacrificing Satanists ran the company. His request for sponsorship was denied. As of press time, he had hired on as Richard Ashcroft's pool boy and was reportedly seen handling snakes and speaking in tongues at an End of Days church-cum-Tuff-Shed outside Dwarf, Kentucky.
Exhibit B
Stinkin' Linkage. Recalls the coordinator of one major manufacturer's sponsorship program, "About 10 years ago this guy Magic Al—I think he's from New York—asked to be sponsored by us, and on his résumé it was just a bunch of linkage he had done on routes but no routes he had redpointed. He would say, 'I linked between the second and fifth bolt of Scarface,' 'I have done White Wedding with four falls,' etc. I think it was one of the funniest résumés I had ever seen."
Do not be disheartened by this jaded coordinator's callous cruelty. Linkage is totally key, the first step (well, second, after doing all the moves) in any important send. By letting your prospective sponsor know you're piecing the route together, you're showing your dedication, nay, passion, for the high art of redpointing. After all, you could have just lied (see Tip #1) and said you'd climbed the stupid thing already. Sadly, Magic Al's soul focus failed to get him the hook-up.
Exhibit C
Uze Bad Grammer. To let potential sponsors know you won't be wasting time on such frivolities as education or proper use of the English language, and will focus solely on climbing, pepper your request with Pidgin English and rampant misspellings. Take the following request, for example:
"I am a rising stare in the climbing comunity and I belive I can increase sales of your products. Please consider sponsoring me. My resume is attached.
"Resume:5.12c 8th try etc. [elided]
"PERSONAL INFO: As a result of my rapid progress and achieves in my short climbing career (only 1.5 years), my quest is to become a professional climber. I am climbing with nationally known climbers and … my objective is to climb my fist 5.14 in only my second year of climbing and compete in USAC Nationals!"
The kid, unfortunately, did not stay in the picture.
Exhibit D
Group grope. School groups, church groups, climbing clubs, etc. often seek sponsorship for their members, appealing to a target company's public-service side to home in on freebies. It's worth a try, as these following two queries to an industry leader show:
"I am the Resident Camp and Challenge Course Director for the Girl Scouts of Magic Empire Council and I am sending this letter to inquire about the possibility of receiving a donation of headlamps from your company.
"During our summer resident camp, we put on an outdoor adventure program for 16 girls, ages 13-17. … In this session, almost all program activities take place in the nighttime hours. The girls who attend this program will be participating in various night climbing activities and making their way through three separate high challenge courses in the dark. … I have had personal experience with [your] headlamps on several occasions."
Sixteen Girl Scouts, eh, running around all on their own in the woods in the dark … you don't say. The director should be panhandling for TASERs, not headlamps.
This same industry leader also received a request for funding to the tune of $1,000 to $10,000 to help a prominent mountain club in their bid to bag Ama Dablam via cutting-edge 5.6 and AI 3 climbing. In return, they'd receive media and other coverage, and complimentary registration for two (value $295 per person) to the Basic Climbing School. Wow. Athlete bios included such tidbits as the fact that one climber had summited Pike's Peak at age 11 (there's a road to the top); another, when asked why he likes to climb, " … replies by a quote whose author he can't quite remember: 'There are three true sports: bullfighting, car racing and mountain climbing. Everything else is mere entertainment.'" (The author was likely one Ernest Hemingway, who said, famously, "There are only three true sports: bullfighting, mountain climbing, and auto-racing. Everything else is just a game.") This request, for entertainment reasons, was denied.
If any of these half-assed, psychotic tactics have succeeded in landing you a sponsor, you can now call yourself a "pro" athlete. Being a professional rock climber is like being handed the key to the city … of Sodom. Run wild with your newfound status. When someone is in your way on the warm-up, demand that he "defer to the greater climber." If a magazine fails to include your name and/or photo in every issue, express your displeasure by penning a diatribe to the editors addressing each perceived "slight." (Choice phrases include: "Blackballing high profile cutting edge climbers, who are supported by major advertisers, seems like a pretty silly thing to do," and "By the way, I have also climbed 5.11 at Eldo, and even some 5.12s!!")
If a route is giving you trouble, kick the rock and drop the F-bomb. Announce future successes and upcoming climbs via press releases, keep your blog up to date, never miss an opportunity to diss your fellow climbers—whether around the campfire or via letters to their sponsors complaining about their lack of performance. And, above all, scam tough: You will be replaced next year by some V-13'ing "phenom" from a rock gym in Omaha, Nebraska.
Matt Samet, dying of Mad Cow Disease, is living out his final days in Barrow, Alaska.


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Memorial Day has passed this year, but it's never too late to honor those who have sacrificed their lives for our country. The Arlington National Cemetery app for iPad guides you on several one-mile tours of the cemetery and helps you discover the stories behind the grave markers. Each stop on the tours has high-resolution photos, with GPS designations. You can also compare photos taken between 1890-1945 to a photo taken at the same spot and angle taken in June 2010. The app will be updated every other month to include nominations from family members and friends. The app is $6.99 in the iTunes app store.
Arlington National Cemetery App for iPad
August 20, 2011, 4:54 pm
I have this App and it is a wonderful tribute to our fallen heroes. I hope the developer continues to write about the less known at Arlington
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subset: commoncrawl


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You guys are classic! I dont know who the TNA guy is fooling though, the last episode of TNA i tried to stomach, about 4-5 months ago, was LOADED with terrible backstage segments and in ring promos. Saw 1 match in an entire hour. Im an ROH guy, which means, im better than all of you!.
Anyways, I think a leader on the Sheild would hurt all of those guys, theyre on such a roll right now without one, perhaps more toward summerslam, someone on the wwe roster can turn and join but for now, anyone like Orton or Cena (pffffft ya right) joining would derail all three of these guys. Bray Wyatt tho, interesting....
Isn't Orton going to be heel after mania?
The leader has to be someone unknown to us. Who ever wins between Rock and Cena (boring) get pummeled by the Shield, Punk comes in the ring to congratulate them for the beat down, they turn on him beating him to a bloody pulp, as Punk is laying on the mat Colt Cabana comes out from the crowd into the ring and raises the hand of the Shield as WM ends.
Leave my wife out of this and I'll leave it out of your wife.
Why does the shield even need a "leader"? They are doing great as is. A leader would essentially be the beginning of the end. They are already being billed as the most well oiled trio in WWE history. There's really no reason for them to have a leader. Mercenaries for hire or a trio acting on their own is far more interesting.
Originally Posted by 3countdcg
First off. I've forgot more about wrestling then you will ever know.
2nd. I truly don't follow TNA. They are a poor man's WCW in the wrong era. I've been watching the WWE be on top for 30 years now and they are uncomparable..obviously.
3rd. Geek? what is this 1981. That's your throwback derrogary verbage? C'mon be man..use A-Hole, d-bag, F-fart, pussy..something with more bite man....
Sorry, tough guy. Please, enlighten me on your vast illuminous rasslin' knowledge!
You should use that so called 30 year knowledge to realize that fans like you are a part of the problem. "I DURRE DURR WATCHED WWE DURR DURR BE ON TOP FOR 30 YEARS!!" No. That's your wife. Pull your head out of your ass and learn how to support the business itself.
© 2011 eWrestlingNews, All Rights Reserved.


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Circleville Man Indicted On 6 Counts For Allegedly Raping Child
CIRCLEVILLE, Ohio
A Circleville man has been indicted on six felony counts of rape.
The Newark Advocate reports Joseph E. Yates, 26, is accused of engaging in sexual conduct with a female victim who is less than 13 years old.
The conduct is alleged to have occurred between May 4, 2012 and May 1 of this year.
Police issued a warrant for his arrest Thursday along with the indictment.
Yates is scheduled to appear in court Tuesday morning.
Watch 10TV and refresh 10TV.com for the latest information.
©2017 by 10TV.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


text: Embrace the classic 20's where prohibition was alive and everyone was ready to jive! Grab the bad boy in your life and have him dress in an a gangster costume that will have everyone showing respect. Then get ready for fringe and feathers when you pump up the speakeasy wearing a flapper costume. If you really want to take over, get your entire "family" together and show everyone not to mess with your crew in these awesome group Halloween costumes. This year is perfect for showing your love for history's roaring twenties with a costume with dancing to jazz to.


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The recipe yield is:
4 servings
Preheat the grill. In a sauce pan, combine the olive oil, peppers, crushed red pepper, salt, and black pepper. Bring the liquid up to a boil and reduce the heat. Simmer the sauce for 4 minutes and remove from the heat. Stir in the garlic. With a hand held mixer, puree the sauce until smooth. At this point, allow the sauce to sit for 1 week under refrigeration before serving. Stir in the cilantro and kosher salt. Marinate the sliced beef in the piri piri for 3 to 4 hours, under refrigeration. Remove the beef and make several slits in the beef about 1/4-inch apart, save the excess sauce for basting. Thread the meat through the swizzle sticks. Place the skewers on the grill. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes on each side, basting often with the piri piri. Place any remaining piri piri in a saucepan and bring up to a boil. Remove from the heat and serve with the beef. Place the skewers on a platter and drizzle with the piri piri. Garnish with chopped cilantro and Essence. Yield: 4 servings EMERIL LIVE SHOW #EMIA31


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Product Details
Technical trekking shorts in stretch and G-1000. Optimal cut and reinforcements make them comfortable and durable.
Technical trekking shorts with optimal fit, made with stretch and G-1000 for high mobility and durability. Intended for trekking and climbing when nothing should hinder your progress. The waist is a bit lower in the front and higher in the back to sit comfortably when carrying a backpack. An extra piece of fabric in the crotch and the placement of the inseams decrease the risk for rubbing. The zippered hand pockets are placed for easy access even when wearing a hip belt. Large leg pocket with flap and a smaller mesh inner pocket on the right leg, a small pocket for a mobile telephone or GPS on the left leg. Stretch in the lower back and G-1000 reinforcement in the rear.
Sizes and details
Sizes: 44-60
Fit: Regular
Waist: Lower
Consumer Material: G-1000
Material: G-1000® Original: 65% polyester, 35% cotton, Stretch: 98% polyamide (nylon 6.6), 2% elastane
Environment and production
Environmental-info: Infused with Greenland Wax for eco-friendly wind and water resistance


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PRZOOM - /newswire/ -
Paris, France, 2013/02/19 - The Victorian Desalination Project, 130 km southeast of Melbourne, runs on low- and medium-voltage drives and medium-voltage motors supplied by GE (NYSE: GE). NYSE: GE
Victorian Desalination Project Can Supply 150 Billion Liters of Fresh Water Every Year;
Complete Set of Low-Voltage and Medium-Voltage Variable Frequency Drives, Medium-Voltage Electrical Motors and Harmonic Filters from GE;
GE Intends to Expand Its Presence in the Water Industry.
GEs Power Conversion business was instrumental in bringing Australias largest seawater desalination plant into operation by providing technology that provides a rainfall independent water supply to complement catchments and storages in the area around Melbourne.
The Victorian Desalination Project, 130 km southeast of Melbourne, runs on low- and medium-voltage drives and medium-voltage motors supplied by GE. The plant is among the largest reverse osmosis plants in the world. It was brought online in November 2012, completed successfully the required 30-day continuous production test and reached full operation in December, three years after construction began.
The expertise of Degrémont in reverse osmosis technology and operations is illustrated through achieving such a rapid, incident-free commissioning phase for a project of this scale, with the milestone marking the beginning of the operational phase. We take great pride in our ability to operate such critical water infrastructure assets around the world. Our operation team, involved in the project since the beginning of the construction phase, is now ready to manage this world-class desalination plant for decades to come, explained Rémi Lantier, CEO of Degrémont.
The plant can supply up to 150 billion liters of drinking water per year to Melbourne and regional communities, providing a rainfall independent supply, and is a resource that will be valued particularly in times of future drought.
GEs success on the Victorian Desalination Project stems from its outstanding experience in design and build of motors and drives and expertise in the overall grid system study and filter design, says Pascal Cros, GM General Industry. The project enhances the companys reputation as a worldwide leader in the design and manufacture of low- and medium-voltage electrical systems for the fast-growing desalination industry. It brings another reference to GE in the water industry, where it intends to further develop its presence across a range of industry applications including wastewater, water treatment and transport.
The AquaSure consortium, which led the project, contracted Thiess Degrémont Joint Venture to design, construct and operate the desalination plant valued at AU$3.5 billion together with marine structures, a 1.9 m in diameter water transfer pipeline stretching over 84 km and an 87-km underground power line (the longest 220kV HVAC underground power cable of its type in the world) to connect the plant with the electricity grid. The plant incorporates reverse osmosis desalination technology used by Degrémont, a subsidiary of Suez Environment and a world leader in the field.
The Victorian desalination plant is one of the largest and most complex infrastructure projects undertaken in Australia in recent years and in just over 36 months, a very great deal has been achieved, says Chris Herbert, CEO of AquaSure.
AquaSure has gone to great lengths to minimize the environmental impact of the desalination plant. Reverse osmosis is the most energy-efficient method of desalinating water, and the plant includes energy recovery devices to reduce power consumption. Its underground power supply is co-located with the pipeline and all operational energy is 100 percent offset by renewable energy certificates. The plant is covered by Australias largest living green roof and there is a 225 hectare revegetated coastal park for public use. Long intake and outlet tunnels help protect the coast and marine environment.
GEs Power Conversion business designed and supplied a complete set of medium-voltage motors and low- and medium-voltage variable frequency drives, including associated filters and transformers for use in both the reverse osmosis plant and the associated pipeline network. The use of variable speed drives rather than fixed speed motors enables the plant operator to smooth start and stop of the pumps, prevent the water hammer effect, improve control of the water flow and make energy savings. GE furthermore provided on-site supervision and commissioning.
GE acquired Power Conversion (then known as Converteam) in September 2011. GEs Power Conversion business applies the science and systems of power conversion to help drive the electric transformation of the worlds energy infrastructure. Designing and delivering advanced motor, drive and control technologies that evolve todays industrial processes for a cleaner, more productive future, it serves specialized sectors such as energy, marine, industry and all related services. To learn more, please visit ge-energy.com/electrifyingchange/.
About GE
GE (ge.com) works on things that matter. The best people and the best technologies taking on the toughest challenges. Finding solutions in energy, health and home, transportation and finance. Building, powering, moving and curing the world. Not just imagining. Doing. GE works.
GE news, Masto Public Relations - E: information[.]mastopr.com.
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P: + 49 (0) 307 622 3173 - E: carsten.ritter[.]ge.com.
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P: +1 518 786 6488 - E: Gina.derossi[.]mastopr.com.
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A 75-year-old from Gravesend has cycled almost 15 miles to raise funds for a children's charity.
Cyclists of all ages and abilities from across Kent took part in the sponsored bike ride at Brands Hatch Race Circuit on July 4 in aid of Action for Children.
The eldest participant, Mike Foxwell, aged 75, completed 12 laps of the 1.2 mile course in two hours Participants had to complete as many 1.2-mile laps of the circuits within two hours. 30 was the most laps that were completed on the evening by Chris Angell from Greenwich completed the most laps in the set time period - cycling around the course 30 times.
Selena Goldsmith, partnership fundraiser for Kent at Action for Children, said: "The Brands Hatch Bike Ride was a great family evening out, and I would like to thank everyone who took part. The funds raised will make a life-changing difference to vulnerable children, young people and their families."


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ATLANTA -- When big, bad Miami joined the Atlantic Coast Conference, everyone wondered how middle-of-the-pack schools such as Georgia Tech would fare against the Hurricanes.
It took only two years for the Yellow Jackets to answer that question: Just fine.
No. 21 Georgia Tech will be going for its second straight win over Miami when the teams meet in a crucial division game tomorrow at Bobby Dodd Stadium. Even coming off a discouraging loss to Clemson, the Yellow Jackets (5-2, 3-1 ACC) can claim a commanding position for a spot in the Dec. 2 conference championship game at Jacksonville, Fla.
All they have to do is repeat last year's stunning upset at the Orange Bowl. Georgia Tech knocked off the nation's No. 3 team with seven sacks, seven pass breakups, and a game-saving interception by Dennis Davis just short of the end zone. The Hurricanes were held to 30 yards rushing on 30 carries.
"We kept fighting, we kept pushing," tight end Michael Matthews recalled. "When the opportunity was there, when we needed a first down, we got the first down. When we needed to score, we got the score. I remember just the perseverance throughout the game."
Linebacker Philip Wheeler couldn't stop jumping around after that game, in which Miami became the highest-ranked opponent to lose to Georgia Tech since 1990.
"The emotion was just taking over my body," Wheeler said. "We had a lot of support after the game. Not much support before the game, because a lot of people didn't think we could do it, but after the game those people were giving us pats on the back."
The roles are reversed this year. Georgia Tech is actually a 5-point favorite, another sign of Miami's fallen stature. The Hurricanes slipped from the rankings with a 24-point loss at Louisville and didn't help their reputation with a bench-clearing brawl against Florida International a couple of weeks ago, which led to the suspension of 13 players.
Georgia Tech isn't worried about a repeat of that fiasco. Gailey addressed it with his players before last week's game and expects both teams to be on their best behavior. Twelve of Miami's suspended players are eligible to return after sitting out a 20-15 victory over Duke.
"I don't think I have to talk about it again," Gailey said. "I don't think it'll be an issue, because they've addressed it again as well. I think we'll have a very clean game."
In two previous ACC meetings against Miami, the Yellow Jackets haven't noticed anything unusual about this supposedly outlaw program. The trash-talking levels are about normal. Cheap shots have been kept to a minimum. No helmet-swinging fights have broken out.
"I don't think they are anything out of the norm," Matthews said.
Georgia Tech leads the Coastal Division by a half-game over Miami (5-2, 2-1). If the Yellow Jackets win tomorrow, they would have to lose at least two of their final three ACC games to spoil a potential rematch with Clemson, which played Virginia Tech last night, in the title game.
They are eager for another shot at the Tigers after losing, 31-7, at Death Valley.


text: I also have some Wave invites, 10 I think? So if there is more interest than Jen can handle, let me know. I plan on coming to the meeting this week, they are always fun, especially the off-topic parts. Keely On Sun, Dec 13, 2009 at 5:00 PM, Jennifer Moore <jemoore3@xxxxxxxx> wrote: > So I've got eight Google Wave invites sitting here, and not enough people > to hand them out to. Anybody want one? E-mail me off list and I'll see what > I can do. > > Now that I've got your attention...the last LITA meeting of the semester is > scheduled for next week, Friday, December 18th at 4:30 in the Rathskeller. > I'd be happy to see you guys, but I don't want to trudge out in the snow if > everyone's expecting to be home for Christmas by that time, so I thought I'd > poll the list. Anyone up for a last meeting of the semester? We'd be talking > about what we want to do next semester, maybe playing with Google Wave, > certainly getting ridiculously off-track like we usually do. I promise it'll > be fun. > > Jen Moore > Co-Chair, SLIS LITA student group > jemoore3@xxxxxxxx > > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > This message was sent through the SLIS LITA mailing list. > o Subscribe: mail slislita-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word "subscribe" > in the subject > o Unsubscribe: mail slislita-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word > "unsubscribe" in the subject >


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GSG MP5 22lr
Anyone have some personal trigger time on one of these? I hear a lot of mixed opinions on them but they are the only 22lr mp5 clone I have found. Should I move on to another 22 or jump all over one?
I've subscribed to this thread because I want to hear some info too. I've been seeing these around quite a bit, and they look cool as hell. I've heard they're fairly decent, but I want to hear it from people I trust.
I picked up a GSG510 with 110 rd drum and two 22rd stick mags. The only changes I've made was going to a side folder stock and replaced the takedown screws with HK pins and a recoil buffer. I added an older Tasco Accudot red dot scope I had laying around. Prior to adding the scope(haven't sighted it in yet) I have about 1200 rds of Blazer through it with only one ftf about half way through the first drum.That was the only ftf I've had. It is a fun gun to shoot and I do not regret buying it. I also have a GSG 1911 and have about 1500 rds with NO ftf. They are great fun guns and don't break the bank. Best regards:D
Much apreciated sir. When I first heard of them being made by an airsoft company I was skeptical. But it seems the bad reviews are the older ones. Maybe they've worked some bugs out. H&k opened a lawsuit against them, that may have had something to do with it.
I'd heard rumor that they are actually made under license by HK now, although I don't believe it myself.
Changed my mind. I think I'm just gonna get a 10/22. Can't got wrong, right?
I have one. I've shot a few thousand rounds through it and haven't cleaned it yet. :D Still works good, still accurate. I like it, not practical though, just a real fun plinker. If I didn't have the cash to spend, I would get a 10/22, simply because you can hunt more with it (IMO). But if you like shooting hundreds of rounds, the GSG really fills that void. I see it as a money saver. Hope that helps.
Yep, have one and have a little over 1000 rounds through it with no problems except the occasional dud round. I have a Leapers scope on mine and it is deadly accurate with sub 1" groups at 25 yards and one hole groups at 50 yards. A definate joy to shoot.
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On any given weekday, hundreds of large trucks move through the streets of Northeast Ohio communities picking up household trash and, in many cases, recyclable materials and yard waste.
The ways these services are secured and paid for reflect the governmental forms used by area communities and the prevailing attitudes of their residents.
Of the 16 cities and villages contacted for this survey, 14 have contracts with trash-hauling companies. Residents are billed for those services on a monthly or quarterly basis.
Monthly charges range from $6.80 in Mentor to $18.47 in Willoughby Hills.
Quarterly charges range from $40.47 in Eastlake to $58 in Painesville.
Residents of Perry Village are free to make their own deal for trash hauling. However, the vast majority of residents take advantage of an arrangement with Universal Disposal that provides trash hauling for an $11 monthly fee.
Chardon is the only city in the survey that does not have a contract for trash hauling. Residents there cut their own deals.
The decentralized philosophy at the heart of township government is reflected in the fact that residents of the five townships contacted for this survey also make their own deals for trash hauling.
Fees for trash hauling in communities without service contracts range from $40 to $90 per month, much higher than in those communities with contracts.
Breaking it down -- cities and villages
With tax revenues declining and budgets tightening for area cities and villages, the days when residents didn't pay out-of-pocket for trash hauling are an increasingly distant memory.
There is no fee for trash hauling in Kirtland Hills, Wickliffe and Willowick.
It figures to stay that way in Kirtland Hills and Wickliffe, where budgets are not so crunched.
"We have just a few residents, but they pay a lot of property tax and expect a high level of service," said Kirtland Hills Clerk-Treasurer Carol Lorek.
In Wickliffe, a healthy bottom line fed by income tax revenue from Lubrizol, ABB, Parker Hannifin, PCC Airfoils and other businesses accounts for the continuation of the city picking up the tab for trash hauling.
Wickliffe Finance Director Martin J. Germ said the city this year will pay an estimated $800,000 to Kimble Refuse in the first year of a multi-year deal.
"We're very fortunate to have those companies a major part of our tax base," Germ said. "Also, our mayor and council are extremely budget-conscious."
Germ was asked if it's his impression Wickliffe residents appreciate the fact the city is paying for trash hauling.
"The feedback I get is, people here are very aware of that," he replied.
In Willowick, the days of residents not being charged for trash hauling are numbered. By a vote of 3,533 to 3,212 in the November election, Willowick residents decided to repeal a charter provision that compelled the city to pay for trash hauling.
Willowick Mayor Richard Bonde said that in 2013, the city will pay an estimated $1.1 million to Republic Services while seeking bids for its trash hauling contract. In 2014, Bonde said, residents will begin to pay an estimated $18 monthly for trash hauling.
The mayor credited residents for understanding that it made sense to pay for trash collection in lieu of forcing City Council to undertake budget cuts that would have a negative impact on the police department and other city services.
Euclid Service Director Lee Bock said his city went down a similar path in 2009 when it was determined there was no choice but to end the practice of paying for 100 percent of trash hauling out of the general fund.
"There was some pretty good venting by residents back then, but I believe most of them approve of the way it's being handled now," Bock said.
Under terms of a five-year deal with Kimble Refuse, costs are shared by residents and the city. Bock said in 2012, residents' fees will cover $1.5 million of the $2.5 million charge.
Euclid further defrays the cost for trash hauling by its participation in a consortium of 12 eastern suburbs receiving payments for recycled materials.
Fairport Harbor's arrangement for trash hauling stands out because its contract wasn't awarded to Republic Services, Kimble Refuse or Waste Management, the area's other major service provider.
Instead, the contract has been held for nine years by a hauling company owned by village resident Tony Scheiber.
Scheiber said he owns two trucks but only needs one to complete the rounds in Fairport Harbor over two days.
Breaking it down -- townships
There is no indication that boards of trustees in the five townships surveyed for this story are inclined to change the status quo of having their residents deal with trash hauling.
"There's never been a consensus here for changing that arrangement," Concord Township Trustee Christopher A. Galloway said.
"It's been talked about in the past," Chester Township Trustee Michael J. Joyce said. "But the feedback we've gotten from residents is, 'We'll take care of our own garbage.'"
Northeast Ohio trash collection fees


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5 pounds all-purpose flour
1 1/2 ounces salt
4 ounces granulated sugar
2 ounces nonfat dry milk
1 1/2 ounces active dry yeast (see notes)
1 1/2 quarts warm water (110°F)
4 ounces shortening
12 ounces chopped onions
1 ounce shortening or oil
2 quarts tomato juice
1 quart tomato paste
2 ounces granulated sugar
1 tablespoon dried oregano, crumbled
2 tablespoons dried basil, crumbled
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon black pepper
3 bay leaves
9 pounds ground beef
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon fennel seed
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 teaspoon dried oregano, crumbled
1 tablespoon dried basil, crumbled
Servings: 48
1. DOUGH: Place flour, salt, sugar, and dry milk in mixer bowl. Mix on low speed, using dough hook.
2. Soften yeast in warm water.
3. Add softened yeast and shortening to dry ingredients. Mix on low speed to form dough. Continue kneading until smooth and elastic. Cover and let rise until double in bulk, about 2 hours.
4. Punch down dough and let rest 45 minutes.
5. PIZZA SAUCE: Cook onions in fat until transparent. Add tomatoes, sugar, and seasonings. Heat to boiling. Reduce heat and simmer 30-45 minutes. Cool. Remove bay leaves. Spread sauce over dough, 1 qt per 18x26-inch pan or 1-1 1/4 cups per 14-inch round pan.
6. SEASONED BEEF: Brown beef in steam-jacketed kettle or pan until internal temperature reads 155°F for 15 seconds. Drain well. Add seasonings, stirring to distribute. Sprinkle evenly over tomato sauce, approximately 1 lb 8 oz per 18x26x1-inch pan, 8 oz per 14-inch round pan.
pepperoni (arranged evenly over the top), and 3 oz mozzarella cheese.
Triple Cheese Pizza. Layer in the following order: 10 oz sauce, 8 oz shredded mozzarella cheese, 4 oz shredded Monterey Jack cheese, and 4 oz shredded cheddar cheese.
Garden Pizza. Layer in the following order: 10 oz sauce; 6 oz shredded mozzarella cheese; 2 oz shredded cheddar cheese; 1 oz each of diced green peppers, sliced canned mushrooms, diced onion, and sliced ripe olives.
2. Spread 1 qt sauce over dough.
3. Sprinkle 1 lb 8 oz seasoned beef over sauce.
4. Top each pan with 1 lb 4 oz mozzarella cheese.
5. Bake at 475°F for 10-20 minutes in a conventional oven.
6. Cut each pan 2x4 and then each of the 8 pieces diagonally, yielding 16 pie-shaped portions per pan (48 slices).
If using 14-inch round pans:
1. Prepare six 14-inch pans by spraying lightly with vegetable spray.
2. Press 1 lb 6 oz dough into pans, allowing 1 inch to extend up sides.
3. Perforate dough with fork or dough docker.
4. Choose pizza topping from Variations and layer in the order given.
5. Bake until crust is browned, sauce is bubbly and cheese is melted.
6. Cut each pizza into 8 slices, yielding 8 portions per pan (48 slices).


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Charleston Children's Theatre Presents WILLY WONKA 4/19-22
Charleston Children's Theatre presents WILLY WONKA Junior April 19-22 with school performances April 19, 20 at 9:15am at the Charleston Civic Center Little Theater. General performance times have not yet been announced.
Roald Dahl's timeless story of the world famous candy man and his quest to find an heir comes to life in this stage adaptation of Charlie and The Chocolate Factory, which features the songs from the classic family film Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. The memorable score features "The Candy Man", "Pure Imagination", "Oompa Loompa" and "I Want it Now" by Academy® and Grammy® award winners Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley, neatly fitted into a new script adapted under the auspices of the Dahl Estate. With a flexible cast size, featuring roles for children and a tour-de-force role in the title character.
Tickets are $10 for students (age 4-17), $12 for adults and are available at the Civic Center Box Office or at the door.
Visit http://www.ctoc.org/schedule/default.html or call 304-346-0164 for more information and tickets.


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A Reply to the International Socialist Organization (Part 2)
D'Amato claims that Marxism aims at a stateless society in the future, and this is a fair statement of Marx's view.
But the disagreement between Leninism and social anarchism isn't over some statement about a far-off state of society but about the means to social change, and in particular the means to liberation of the mass of the people from oppression and exploitation.
The state, as Engels wrote, is a territorial power, "standing above society", equipped with an armed "public force" that is not simply "a self-acting armed organization of the people". Engels viewed the state as an institution of a dominating class: "As the state arose from the need to keep class antagonisms in check, but also arose in the thick of the fight between the classes, it is normally the state of the most powerful, economically dominant class, which by its means becomes also the politically dominant class and so acquires new means of holding down and exploiting the oppressed class."(1)
Thus far, the social anarchist current in the late 19th century who emerged out of the First International agreed with Engels on this view of the state. Thus Bakunin wrote:
"The State has always been the patrimony of some privileged class: the priesthood, the nobility, the bourgeoisie, and finally, after every other class has been exhausted, the bureaucratic class."
But if a state is separated from effective control of the mass of the people, how could there be a "proletarian state", as Leninists maintain?
Although extreme individualists also oppose the state, they do so far different reasons than social anarchists. Both Bakunin and Kropotkin were scornful of the opposition to the state by 19th century free market capitalist ideologues. They saw this as simply expressing the wish of the capitalist to avoid social constraints on profit making. Their talk of "freedom" was about the freedom of the capitalists to exploit the working class.
Social anarchists oppose the state for two main reasons: because it is an institution of class domination, and because it is a structure of hierarchical power, a structure of domination in its own right.
The characteristic feature of the modern state is its separation from effective control by the mass of the people. The state is built on hierarchical chain of command structures, similar to the private corporations, with a concentration of expertise and decision-making authority into a minority.
In corporate capitalism there is a social layer that is the systems' control bureaucracy. Their class position isn't based on capital ownership but on relative monopoly of decision-making authority and expertise in managing state agencies or corporations. If we wish to use Bakunin's language, We could call this the bureaucratic class, or, following Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel, the coordinator class.
The state is an important locus of power for this class, as Bakunin pointed out.
Libertarian socialism historically has been open to a different conception of class from Marxism. Marx operated with a simple bipolar division of capitalist society into the capitalist class and working class, based on his analysis of exploitation in terms of the labor theory of value. Thus the capitalists are the class who pump their private wealth out of the labor of the working class.
But there are more forms of monopolization of economic resources than just ownership of means of production or money power in a context of a society where there are propertyless people to be exploited. The bureaucratic control layer in the system is based on a relative monopolization of decision-making authority and forms of expertise important to management, in both the private and public sectors.
(Nonetheless, not all social anarchists accept the three-class analysis of capitalism into capitalist, coordinator/bureaucratic and working classes. Some hold that the bureaucratic control layer are a part of the capitalist class. But this agrees with the majority social anarchist view that private ownership of wealth isn't the only basis of class domination and exploitation.)
Although defending the interests of dominating classes is an essential feature of the state, this isn't all there is to the state. Because the state acts to hold the existing social arrangement together, it also tends to support the various structures of inequality and oppression in the prevailing society. Here we can think of the ways the American state has supported forms of structural racism such as southern segregation or pursued the marginalization and expropriation of the native American Indian population. Or the race as well as class bias inherent in the current "War on Drugs" or the history of racist immigration policies.
Because the state must be able to govern and maintain social peace, it has also been the means through which popular protest and class struggle have gained concessions. This includes various limitations or restraints on private economic power such as the Pure Food and Drug Act, environmental protection, OSHA, etc. This also includes various systems of benefits…free public education, comprehensive health insurance (in affluent capitalist countries other than the USA), and other components of the "social wage"…affordable housing, public transit subsidies, welfare rights, and so on. The existence of systems of civil liberties and popular election… gains from previous eras of struggle…also place limits on capitalist control.
From a social anarchist point of view, the social wage and social services and civil liberties…as gains of past struggles…are things to be defended, through social movements independent of the state and political parties.
The Marxist bipolar class analysis tends to favor the view that class oppression is done away with if the means of production are made public property. Thus in The Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels advocated concentration of the means of production, distribution, communications and finance in the hands of the state.
But this view ignores the internal class structure of the state itself. In the Russian revolution the Bolsheviks adopted the rather Orwellian term "workers state" for the hierarchical Soviet state that emerged under Bolshevik Party auspices. The empirical reality was that ordinary workers lacked any effective means to control what that state did. The Bolsheviks described the Soviet state as a "workers state" on the basis of an apriori argument: Because the state was controlled by the Bolshevik party and the Bolshevik party represents the true interests of the working class, it is a "workers state."
D'Amato quotes Lenin to the effect that "temporary use must be made of the instruments, means and methods of the state power against the exploiters." Social anarchists disagree with this Leninist advocacy of a "proletarian state" — an "authoritarian state" as D'Amato calls it — during a period of transition to socialism. No such "state power" will have any tendency to "wither away" as Leninists assume.
However, it doesn't follow that social anarchism is opposed to political power. Here it is necessary to distinguish the state and government or political governance.
We can think of the polity or governance system of a society as the institution that sets the basic rules and enforces those rules, and holds the society together as the ultimate arbiter of disputes.
From the social anarchist point of view, the state is only one type of polity or governance system. As Kropotkin wrote:
"The State has…been confused with government. As there can be no State without government, it is sometimes said that it is the absence of government, and not the abolition of the State, that should be the aim….However, the State implies quite a different idea to that of government. It…includes the existence of a power placed above society but also a territorial concentration and a concentration of many functions of the life of society in the hands of a few…"(2)
Most libertarian socialists agree that some sort of polity or system of self-government is necessary in society. Libertarian socialists believe it is possible for institutions of popular power — a form of polity built up from the direct democracy of assemblies in workplaces and neighborhoods — to replace the hierarchical state in a self-managed socialist society, or such a society in the process of being built, without the hierarchical state apparatus.
Marxists sometimes argue that if the working class creates a new polity to replace the state and uses this polity to engage in coercion, such as against armed attacks on the new social arrangement, this makes the new governance system necessarily a "state." But any polity or governance system enforces its rules, and needs to be able to use coercion, if necessary, against anti-social criminality. Even tribal societies in ancient times could some times use coercion against wayward individuals. The ability of a society to defend itself does not require a hierarchical state apparatus rather than a form of democratic self-governance under direct popular control.
A Tale of Two Soviets
To defend the view that the October 1917 revolution in Russia ushered in a period of "working class power," groups like the ISO often refer to the worker democracy expressed through the soviets, and the fact that government authority was transferred to the Congress of Soviets in the Russian revolution.
But the main soviets in St. Petersburg (Petrograd) and Moscow were not effectively controlled by workers. The key St. Petersburg soviet was formed in February 1917 by a group of social-democratic intellectuals, including three members of the Duma (Russia's parliament), such as Alexander Kerensky, a lawyer. The soviet was formed top-down when these members of the "intelligentsia" constituted themselves as the soviet's executive committee and sent out a call for election of delegates. Power in the key big city soviets was concentrated in the executive committee where the real decisions were made. Some decisions were submitted to the assembled delegates for ratification, but the executive quickly came to treat the plenaries of delegates as just a rubber stamp. The meetings of the delegates tended to be just an open space for making speeches, not the real decision-making body.
As Pete Rachleff explains in "Soviets and Factory Committees in the Russian Revolution" (written from a libertarian Marxist point of view), the development of a strong independent shop committee movement in the Russian revolution arose partly due to the inability of workers to control either the soviets or the highly centralized Russian trade unions. The shop committees were elected by mass assemblies of workers in the workplaces, and the various workplace takeovers that happened in the 1917 revolution and into early 1918 were the product of this shop committee movement, not the soviets.(3)
The soviets set up in this highly top-down manner were established mainly by the Mensheviks, a social-democratic Marxist party. But when the Bolsheviks gained majorities in these soviets in the fall of 1917, they simply took over the same top-down structure. They didn't try to democratize these soviets. They were concerned about the use of the soviets as a base of party power…a trampoline to jump themselves into control of the state…not as centers of decision-making by the working class. Various steps taken by the Bolsheviks in the early months of their government power further weakened rank and file worker control. For example, a peasant based populist party, the Left Social Revolutionaries (Left SRs), emerged as the main political tendency supported by the peasantry. The Russian peasantry were 80 percent of the population. To prevent the Left SRs from gaining a majority in the Congress of Soviets, the Bolsheviks "packed" the congress with scores of representatives of union bureaucracies and other officials…thus violating the soviet principle of direct election of delegates by the rank and file.
Not all soviets were set up in the highly top-down fashion of the St. Petersburg soviet. Another key soviet in the Russian revolution was created in early March 1917 in Kronstadt, located on an island about 20 miles west of St. Petersburg. Kronstadt was (and still is) the home base of the Russian navy's Baltic fleet.
The Kronstadt soviet differed from the one in St. Petersburg in that the rank and file delegates were firmly in control. The deliberation in the plenaries of delegates was real as this was where the real decisions were made. Power was not centralized in the executive committee, which was there to ensure decisions of the soviet were carried out.
The Kronstadt soviet was grounded in a system of assemblies in all the workplaces and military units and warships in Kronstadt. The assemblies met weekly, and elected their own administrative committees. Workplace assemblies also directly managed their work…the running of the drydock, a sawmill, the island's electric power plant, factories making torpedos and dive equipment and so on. Unlike in St. Petersburg, there was no split between a shop committee movement, rooted in workplace meetings, and the soviet. Although they controlled their own work, the assemblies had to adhere to the rules decided by the soviet, but the assemblies also followed debates in the soviet and controlled their delegates, who were kept on a tight leash…they were elected for only 3-month terms.
In January 1918 the soviet dissolved the old city council in Kronstadt, took over all municipal functions, and also expropriated all buildings and businesses in Kronstadt….a move that was opposed by the Bolsheviks, who voted "no." The Bolsheviks lost this vote because they were a minority in Kronstadt throughout 1917 and into 1918.
The grassroots democracy in Kronstadt was protected by the political dominance of an alliance of two libertarian socialist tendencies… the Union of Social Revolutionaries-Maximalists (called "maximalists") and the Russian anarchosyndicalists. The maximalists and syndicalists generally worked together in an alliance in the Russian revolution…for example the syndicalist/ maximalist alliance was dominant in much of the Russian baker's union.
The libertarian socialists in Kronstadt viewed their form of grassroots government as a model for Russia…a model of governance they called a "Toiler's Republic." Because this was clearly a form of government and worker power, it thus refutes the Leninist claim that libertarian socialists are "against the working class taking political power."(4)
A variety of conservative and liberal historians say the October 1917 revolution was merely a "Bolshevik coup d'etat". This is not accurate. Kerensky's "provisional government" was never elected and was very unpopular by October 1917. The transfer of power to the Congress of Soviets was supported by the Left SRs, Left Mensheviks, syndicalists, maximalists, and most anarchists, as well as the Bolsheviks. The majority of the Russian population supported this move. Although the libertarian Left had criticisms of the top down soviets and trade unions, they supported the October revolution because they believed they would be able to continue to organize for their viewpoint within the workplaces, unions and soviets. They didn't anticipate the authoritarian direction of the regime that would begin to gather force in the spring of 1918.
The top down structure of the soviets reflected the fact that both the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks tended to understand democracy as election of representatives to make decisions for you…a view they took over from pre-World War 1 social-democracy. The Bolsheviks never advocated for direct, participatory democracy as a means of working class social empowerment. This is closely related to the unwillingness of the Bolsheviks to advocate or support workers' self-management of industry.
Lenin's November 1917 decree for "workers control" did not advocate workers' management. The word "kontrol" in Russian has a weaker meaning that "control" in English. Lenin's "worker control" decree merely legalized practices of worker surveillance and restraint on management…vetos on hiring and firing, forcing management to "open the books" and so on. These were things the workers had already achieved through direct action.
After Lenin's decree was published, a regional organization of factory committees in St. Petersburg did advocate formation of a national congress of the factory committee movement to take over coordination and planning for the whole national economy. Isaac Deutscher explains what then happened:
"The Factory Committees attempted to form their own national organization, which was to secure their virtual economic dictatorship. The Bolsheviks now called upon the trade unions to render a special service to the nascent Soviet State and to discipline the Factory Committees. The unions came out firmly against the attempt of the Factory Committees to form a national organization of their own. They prevented the convocation of the planned All-Russian Congress of Factory Committees and demanded total subordination on the part of the Committees."(5)
This question was fought out at the first All-Russian Congress of Trade Unions in January 1918. Only the syndicalist/maximalist alliance defended the idea of using the factory committee movement as a basis for worker management of the economy. They were defeated by the Bolshevik majority, who were supported on this point by the Mensheviks.
I have run into members of the ISO who insist that Lenin and Trotsky were advocates of workers' self-management. In fact the evidence says otherwise. The Bolshevik leaders worked consistently against direct worker management from October 1917 on. This whole story is laid out in well-researched detail in Maurice Brinton's book The Bolsheviks and Workers Control.
Lenin famously wrote in The State and Revolution that "every cook can govern" but that book has very little information about institutions that would enable the cooks to govern. He says little about economic management but points to the German post office as a model for socialism. Thus it seems that the all the cooks and other food service workers are not expected to govern their workplaces… not if the German post office is the model.
Marxist sociologist Sam Farber writes:
"After October…Lenin's perspective for the growing self-management movement in Russian factories never went beyond his…usual emphasis on accounting and inspection ["worker's control"]…The underlying cause here was not, as some have claimed that Lenin and the Bolsheviks were cynically manipulating the factory committees and that once the party leaders 'got power' they had no more use for them…The key problem was that Lenin and the mainstream of the Bolshevik Party, or for that matter the Mensheviks, paid little if any attention to the need for a transformation and democratization of the daily life of the working class on the shopfloor and community…For Lenin the central problem and concern continued to be the revolutionary transformation of the central state."(6)
What was innovative about the Bolshevik party's role in the Russian revolution is that through their capture of the state their followed a series of institutional moves and practices that led inexorably to the consolidation of a coordinator or bureaucratic class, and the continued oppression and exploitation of the working population.
Centralized state planning for the Soviet economy was begun in November 1917 with the creation of the Supreme Council of National Economy, which became the Soviet planning agency Gosplan in the late '20s. The people on this council were various Bolshevik party members and trade union officials and experts, all appointed from above.
By 1918 Lenin and Trotsky were beating the drum for the adoption of Taylorist methods in industry and "one-man management"…appointment of bosses from above. Appointment of bosses from above is consistent with the logic of central planning. The central planners will want to have people on site in workplaces that can ensure adherence to the plans handed down from above.
Even election of industry management boards by workers was intensely opposed by Lenin and Trotsky. A large faction of rank and file Bolshevik trade union members had proposed election of management boards in early 1921, after the end of the Russian civil war, and this was fought out at the March 1921 party congress. Trotsky argued against it, saying "the party's birth right to rule takes precedence over the passing whims of the worker democracy."
If the party's "right to rule" isn't based on the "worker democracy" where does it come from? I think here the concept of the "vanguard party" comes into play. If you view control by the "vanguard party" as essential for constructing socialism, then this can become a rationalization for abrogating worker democracy.
From the libertarian socialist view, what is essential for constructing authentic socialism is the direct social empowerment of the oppressed and exploited population. This falls directly out of the idea that the "emancipation of the working class is the work of the workers themselves." How can this social empowerment happen if workers are still subordinate to a hierarchical managerial regime?
The idea of the "vanguard party" is that it concentrates certain key kinds of expertise…such as a correct Marxist theoretical understanding…and is to act as the manager of the process of change. This concept is a kind of meritocratic ideology, and seems quite consistent with the kind of concentration of decision-making authority and expertise characteristic of a coordinator class.
The activists in the mainstream of the Bolshevik Party may have been well-intended but often human actions have unintended consequences. The point here is to see the consequences of the institutional moves and decisions that fell out of of Bolshevik politics in that situation. This helps us to understand the real meaning of that politics.
I think an empowered coordinator elite is prefigured by various features of Leninism…hierarchical state authority, nationalization of the economy, centralized state planning, the ideology of the "vanguard party." The consolidation of dominant coordinator class through the Russian revolutionary process is best explained as the result of these assumptions in Leninist politics.
In The Case for Socialism, Alan Maass — an ISO writer — advocates "democratic planning." This is a vague phrase. Most libertarian socialists also advocate something that could be called "democratic planning." But is this to be a planning process that is controlled from below, starting in the workplace and neighborhood assemblies, or is to be central planning, planning through a statist hierarchy? Maass doesn't say, but his highlighting Bolshevik practice in the Russian revolution as a model suggests that "democratic planning" is a euphemism for statist central planning. Perhaps he would say this would be planning through a "democratic state." But what is "democratic"? Do working class people in the USA feel we're empowered because we can vote every few years for politicians who ignore our concerns? Democracy is a contested concept and the kind of "democracy" one has in mind is crucial.
Leninists seem to imagine that you can consolidate decision-making power in a state administrative layer and then expect that they will easily give up power later. But any group that acquires the position of a dominating class is likely to work to keep their power and privilege and to also develop an ideology to justify their position…and they can easily call it "socialism". We have the former Communist regimes to remind us of this.
Leninist Myths About the Spanish Revolution
D'Amato repeats the usual Trotskyist myth-making about the Friends of Durruti Group in the Spanish revolution who he describes as follows: "They were a group of revolutionary anarchists who became critical of the main anarchist trade union group, the CNT, for refusing to take state power even though they had control in the streets of some of Spain's biggest cities after a workers' uprising in 1936 had successfully thwarted a fascist coup, leaving the bourgeois government still clinging to power." Of course, the Spanish anarchosyndicalists would say they were not for "state power." But, again, this comes back to the point I made earlier, about how libertarian socialists advocate a form of political power that isn't a state.
The CNT (National Confederation of Labor) was Spain's largest union federation, a massive anarchosyndicalist organization with more than 2 million members.
Usually Trotskyists say that the anarchosyndicalists didn't believe in the working class acquiring political power at all. Thus Geoff Bailey, in the ISO's journal International Socialist Review, writes: "If the government were overthrown, however, it would have to be replaced by a workers' government led by the CNT-FAI. The anarchists believed such a state would be a dictatorship, a mortal blow to their antistatist principles."(7)
In fact the CNT did propose the creation of a working class government (as I will describe shortly). Moreover, as CNT historian Jose Peirats points out, it was always the view of the Spanish anarchosyndicalists that "all social power should be in the hands of the proletariat." The Friends of Durruti Group advocated the formation of a workers government, a "Revolutionary Junta." Trotskyists see this as a break from the position of the CNT.
This is quite wrong. In fact the Friends of Durruti Group were advocating within the rank and file for a return to the official position of the CNT before it joined the Popular Front government in November 1936. From the time of the initial defeat of the army in July of 1936 through August there was an intense debate inside the CNT's unions in Catalonia on the way forward.
By August the Spanish Communist Party was beating the drum for the construction of a conventional hierarchical army…the sort of army Trotsky had put together in the spring of 1918 during the Russian revolution. The Communists had a two-stage strategy of revolution: first gain control of a rebuilt hierarchical army and police, and later use that to seize power and create a nationalized economy. In late August revolutionaries in the CNT unions in Catalonia developed a counter-strategy to head off the Communist Party plan. They got the CNT national union to agree to their plan at a national conference on September 3, 1936. So what was the September program of the anarchosyndicalists? They had been calling for a "revolutionary workers alliance" with the UGT for some time. In September the CNT's program consisted of essentially three pieces:
- Replacement of the separate party and union militias with a unified people's militia controlled through a National Defense Council made up of CNT and UGT union delegates. This would replace the Republican central government. The parliament would be replaced by national and regional worker congresses. The Defense Council would not have power over the economy but would be limited to military, police and judicial functions.(8)
- Direct management of all industries by the workers in a socialized economy. Seizure of the banks. Coordinated planning through the worker congresses.
- Replacement of hierarchical municipal governments by "free municipalities", based on neighborhood and village assemblies, and delegate councils elected from the assemblies for larger towns and cities.
The CNT proposal for a National Defense Council is the origin of the Friends of Durruti Group proposal which they sometimes called a "revolutionary junta." Junta is just the Spanish word meaning "council" — it doesn't have any authoritarian connotations in Spanish. The executive committees of CNT unions were called juntas.
The CNT's program for a self-managed socialist structure is based on what I would call the "dual governance" model. This is the idea that decision-making and popular self-management should be rooted in both the workplace and the community. The "free municipalities" were intended to be both the local governance body as well as the channel for consumer input, particularly around public goods like housing, education and health care. At the same time, there would also be worker assemblies in the workplaces and self-management of industries by the people who work in them.
The anarchists in Catalonia had also entered into negotiations with the Moroccan Action Committee…a national liberation group. The anarchists proposed that they would work to get Spain to declare Spanish Morocco free and provide arms if the Moroccans would send native speakers to Spain to do propaganda directed at the fascist army's Moroccan troops.
Now it should be obvious that a structure that can make rules for the society and has enforcement powers is a polity or government. From the Spanish anarchist point of view, this would not be a state because of the direct control over the armed militia — the main armed body in society — by the organized working class, and also because of the transfer of legislative power to the grassroots congresses and the direct worker management of the economy. The people's militia would be close to what Engels called a "self-acting armed body of the population."
A leading advocate of the National Defense Council program was Buenaventura Durruti, the most popular elected militia leader in Aragon. Durruti and others in the CNT had been advocating a "revolutionary workers alliance" with the UGT unions for several years. Geoff Bailey quotes Durruti on the workers' alliance this way:
"The alliance, to be revolutionary, must be genuinely working class. It must be the result of an agreement between the workers' organizations, and those alone. No party, however socialist it may be, can belong to the workers' alliance."
Then, Bailey interprets this as follows:
"Essentially the CNT's message was, 'We refuse to unite in struggle with workers who have yet to march under our banner."
Now, in fact this is the opposite of what the "workers alliance" proposal was about. It was, after all, a proposal for an alliance with the socialist UGT unions. And it's also true that the CNT proposal for a national defense council was a proposal for representation only of worker organizations, not political parties.
The character of the government they were proposing is clear if you look at what happened in Aragon, the one region where they did carry this out. In September of 1936 more than 400 collectivized villages formed a regional federation and held a congress where they elected an Aragon Regional Defense Council…essentially a workers' government. Initially all the elected representatives were members of the CNT, which had 80 percent of the union members in that region, but later some UGT members were added to the Council. Although the CNT was dominant in most of the collectivized villages, there were some villages where the UGT was the majority.
A prominent supporter of the CNT National Defense Council proposal at the time was Eduardo de Guzman, editor of the CNT's daily newspaper in Madrid, Castilla Libre. De Guzman described the proposal as
"a proletarian government — total working-class democracy in which all sectors of the proletariat — but of the proletariat alone – would be represented."(9)
By excluding the Basque Nationalist Party and the Republican parties, the parties representing Spanish small business and the professional/managerial classes would be excluded from the government. The various Marxist parties would be represented through their working class members in the UGT union.
Another prominent supporter of the National Defense Council proposal was Liberto Callejas, managing editor of the CNT's big daily paper in Barcelona, Solidaridad Obrera. Most of the journalists on that paper supported this program, including a disabled journalist named Jaime Balius. Throughout September and October the writers at Solidaridad Obrera carried out a vigorous campaign in support of the National Defense Council proposal.
The main group the anarchosyndicalists were hoping to ally with were the left wing of the Socialist Party — the largest Marxist tendency in Spain to the left of the Communist Party. In the summer of 1936 the Left Socialists were in the leadership of the massive UGT farm workers union and controlled the national executive committee of the UGT union federation. In months leading up to the onset of the revolution in Spain in 1936, the Left Socialists had called for a "proletarian revolution" and a "workers' government."
There was already a strong alliance in the countryside between UGT and CNT farm worker unions. The UGT and CNT railway and public utility unions had jointly seized and expropriated the country's railway and utility systems.
At the beginning of September the leading figure among the Left Socialists, Largo Caballero, had just been made Prime Minister. The UGT union federation incorporated only slightly less than half the organized working class in Spain. Agreement of the UGT and the Prime Minister to the CNT proposal would have added greatly to its legitimacy. Knowing that Caballero was something of a prima donna, the CNT proposed that Caballero be made President of the proposed revolutionary government.
But Caballero and the Left Socialist leadership of the UGT refused the CNT proposal. Caballero described the CNT proposal as a "leap outside the constitution." Caballero had been strongly warned against the proposal by the Soviet ambassador in Spain.
This created an internal crisis for the CNT in Catalonia. What would be their solution? According to Durruti's biographer, Abel Paz, Durruti proposed a strategy of the CNT unions taking power in the regions where the CNT was the majority — Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia, Murcia (the east coast region of Spain). By creating "facts on the ground," Durruti believed it was possible to force Caballero and the UGT to go along.
Many of the FAI activists among the rank and file leadership level of the CNT in Catalonia apparently began to waver. Perhaps some thought Durruti's strategy was too risky. Perhaps others thought being in control of the industries gave them enough power to pressure the government. Others were worried about being frozen out of government decisions that would affect their militias and expropriated industries.
Thus, the CNT union finally joined the Popular Front government in November. Because the CNT journalists, Liberto Callejas and Jaime Balius, were totally opposed to joining the Popular Front government, they were fired.
Callejas and Balius then decided on a strategy of appealing to the rank and file of the CNT, to re-assert the original anarcho-syndicalist program. This led them to help organize the Friends of Durruti Group in March 1937. Balius was the main theorist and writer for the Friends of Durruti.
Thus the Friends of Durruti group was not formed to abandon or break with the anarchosyndicalist program of the CNT, but to organize for its revival among the ranks of the union. The Friends' program had three planks:
- A National Defense Junta to run a unified militia.
- Worker self-management of industry
- Control of local governance by the "free municipalities."(10)
All of these planks were part of the national CNT program in September 1936.
It's worth noting that the CNT resisted going along with the strategy of uniting through the Popular Front government longer than any other Left tendency in Spain. The POUM — another Left Marxist group — was already part of the Popular Front government in Catalonia in July of 1936, the Communist Party were the strongest advocates for the Popular Front strategy, and the various Socialist Party factions were onboard the Popular Front by August 1936 at least. Thus the Marxist groups were actually the main backers of exactly the strategy that the ISO criticizes. If mistakes by anarchists in the Spanish revolution is an argument against anarchosyndicalism, why aren't mistakes of Marxists an argument against Marxism? In fact I would suggest that the orientation of Marxism to the politics of parties and elections best explains their agreement to a Popular Front alliance that favored retaining hierarchical state power and protection for the privileges and position of the Spanish "middle classes."
But my main point here is to show that the ISO is simply wrong when they say the anarchosyndicalists were not for working class political power in the Spanish revolution. Again, it's a question of what working class empowerment means. For libertarian socialists it does't mean a political party capturing control of a state, and then building up an administrative apparatus controlling the economy.
Bailey claims that anarchosyndicalist "apoliticism" meant they abandoned "political struggle." The word "apolitical" was used by some syndicalists to refer to the opposition to electoral politics and the politics of parties and states. It doesn't mean opposition to direct social governance by the people themselves or popular politicization or the politics of mass struggle. The revolutionary politics of the CNT was also a form of politics. Thus the label "apolitical" is misleading…and this is why social anarchists and anarchosyndicalists no longer use it.
The CNT unions were run through the direct democracy of worker assemblies, and elected committees of delegados (shop stewards). But the Spanish anarchists also emphasized capacitacion — building among ordinary people the skills and knowledge needed to participate effectively. Thus the Spanish anarchists also built a network of neighborhood social centers where a variety of activities took place — study groups, debates, cultural events, Mujeres Libres (the anarchist women's organizzation) groups, and so on. The Spanish anarchists were oriented to organizing in the community and around areas of consumption as well as in the workplace — as shown by the huge rent strike in Barcelona in 1931. The CNT's program of empowering residents of communities through the "free municipalities" falls out of this aspect of Spanish anarchosyndicalism.
If the anarchosyndicalists had merely organized the unions, various conservative or authoritarian or bureaucratic tendencies in the working class would tend to gain dominance in the unions over time. The libertarian socialists could only sustain their influence through popular education and politicization.
Bailey's article quotes various anarchists about "not wanting to create an anarchist dictatorship" as the explanation for not overthrowing the government. But this was a justification that was concocted later, after they had joined the Popular Front government. As a result of that action the CNT was criticized by anarchosyndicalists in other countries. It was only at this time that the CNT started talking about "not wanting to create a dictatorship". It was an after-the-fact justification tailored to appeal to anarchist sentiments.
Now, it's true that the CNT in Catalonia could have destroyed the regional Generalitat government of Catalonia in July, at the time of the defeat of the army takeover attempt. And in his memoir Joan Garcia Oliver…who argued in July 1936 for overthrowing the Generalitat…mentions that Federica Montseny argued that trying to carry out the CNT's libertarian socialist program right then would require an "anarchist dictatorship."
First of all, it should be pointed out that Montseny was a Stirnerite individualist whcih would be likely to prejudice her against any proposal of constructing a social governing power. Secondly, Garcia Oliver responded to her in the union debate at the time that a takeover of authority in the region by highly democratic mass union organizations with the backing of a majority of the working class cannot reasonably be called a "dictatorship." This debate took place before the widespread seizures of industry by Spain's workers, which strengthened the working class sense of potential power.
The debate was argued in front of a union regional plenary of over 500 delegates. At that moment the outcome of the initial struggle with the army was unclear. And anarchists opposed to overthrowing the Genreralitat appealed to fear and uncertainty. Friends of Durruti argued later that the success of these appeals to fear and doubt show insufficient preparation within the CNT movement in thinking about how to respond to this situation as well as lack of appreciation of the importance of taking advantage of opportunities. This may be true, but it doesn't show that their anarchosyndicalist ideology was the explanation of the failure. Nor did Friends of Durruti believe that it was even though they were critical of confusions in the thinking of some anarchists.
Moreover, by August Garcia Oliver and other revolutionaries in the CNT had worked out the National Defense Council proposal, which answered the "anarchist dictatorship" charge by proposing a government of the entire organized working class, not just the CNT.
Like most libertarian socialists nowadays, I think the CNT's failure to overthrow the Generalitat when it had the opportunity was a mistake. And it's quite possible that a number of the Spanish anarchosyndicalists were unclear in their thinking, or swayed by fears and risks. Thus the Friends of Durruti later criticized the CNT for being unable to work up the audacity to make the most of the opportunities. But, again, this doesn't show that anarchosyndicalism or libertarian socialism are opposed to political power, as the ISO maintains. The real issue is about the nature of political power, the state, and mass empowerment.
Nowadays there are those like John Holloway — a libertarian Marxist writer — who argue it is possible "to change the world without taking power." I think this is best understood as a reaction against the failure of various forms of statist socialism — both social-democracy and Leninism. But as long as power remains in the hands of the dominating classes, the majority of the population won't be free, but will continue to be dominated and exploited. It's hard to see how the self-emanicpation of the oppressed and exploited can take place except through gaining control over the decisions that affect them. And this needs to happen not only in workplaces but through figuring out a way to evolve goverance of public affairs from the hierarchical state to a form of popular power, directly controlled by the population. But precisely because liberation requires social empowerment of the majority, capturing the state isn't a plausible route as the state is the wrong kind of institution for popular self-management of public affairs. A different form of polity is needed.
comments to: firstname.lastname@example.com
(1) Frederick Engels, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, 229-230.
(2) Quoted in Bertrand Russell, Roads to Freedom, 97.
(3) http://www.geocities.com/~johngray/raclef.htm
(4) Israel Getzler's book Kronstadt, 1917-21 provides a detailed and concrete history of the Kronstadt soviet.
(5) Quoted in Maurice Brinton, The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control, 320.
(6) Samuel Farber, Before Stalinism: The Rise and Fall of Soviet Democracy, 72.
(7) Geoff Bailey, "Anarchists in the Spanish Civil War", International Socialist Review, July-August 2002. Bailey's article contains many distortions and errors other than those I mention.
(8) The September 3 Defense Council proposal is discussed in Cesar M. Lorenzo, Los anarquistas y el poder.
(9) Interview with Eduardo de Guzmán, early 1970s, in Ronald Fraser, Blood of Spain, 186 and 335-336.
(10) Hacia una revolucion nueva


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Readers devoted to Nancy Mitford's sparkling, acerbic novels will recognize a moment of sheer hilarity on ''Masterpiece Theater'' when Linda Radlett asks the nurse to take her newborn daughter from the room. ''Oh do take it away, darling. Poor thing must have caught sight of itself in the glass,'' our heroine Linda says of the howling, unattractive infant, to whom she has taken an instant dislike.
And anyone who does not know Mitford's fiction may wonder why she has such an adoring cult. Based on Mitford's best-known works, ''The Pursuit of Love'' and ''Love in a Cold Climate,'' this dramatization offers a tepidly charming vision of an upper-class English family in the 1930's. Weaving in and out of both novels, the film turns Mitford's biting social comedies into a breezily amusing but uninspired film. Alan Bates and Anthony Andrews give deliciously witty performances, yet the film lacks the wry tone that lets Mitford get away with the most caustic observations, and her characters remain likable despite much cold-blooded behavior.
As in the books, the narrator is Fanny, Linda's cousin and a frequent guest to the Radletts' country house, Alconleigh. The Radletts are based on the famously eccentric Mitfords. But the film spends so little time on their childhood that the eccentricities seem confusing instead of endearing. The opening credits show the father, Uncle Matthew, racing through the countryside as his hounds track not a fox but two of his little girls; child-hunting was a game the six Mitford girls enjoyed. Mr. Bates has some of the film's funniest scenes as the blustery Uncle Matthew, also known as Fa, who calls his daughters' suitors ''sewers'' but whose harsh demeanor masks a huge streak of emotion.
The story quickly focuses on Fanny and Linda's coming out into society. Fanny is the sensible one, who longs for a stable life to set her apart from her mother, who has left so many men in the dust she is known as the Bolter. Rosamund Pike captures all of Fanny's good-natured grace.
Linda is a great beauty and desperately romantic. She marries young and soon leaves her rich, dull husband and unloved daughter for a handsome Communist. Elisabeth Dermot-Walsh brings humanity to a character who might easily have been unsympathetic. Linda exudes sincerity as she stands in Hyde Park in a fur coat giving a Communist speech about workers.Continue reading the main story
Too much of the film, though, leaves ''The Pursuit of Love'' and the Radletts to focus on characters from ''Love in a Cold Climate.'' Fanny's friend Polly is colorless, and while her monstrously self-absorbed mother, Lady Montdore, can be outrageously funny, the characters work best in smaller doses than we get here. The exception is Mr. Andrews, who has all but disappeared from the American screen since his long-ago days as Sebastian in ''Brideshead Revisited.'' He gives a wickedly caricatured performance as Polly's uncle, an aging roué with waved hair, a penchant for groping young girls' knees under the dining table, and the increasingly inappropriate nickname Boy.
The fictional Linda combines elements of several infamous Mitfords. She is partly Diana, a renowned beauty now 91, who married the heir to the Guinness brewing fortune and left him for Sir Oswald Mosley, the British Fascist leader. It was Jessica who ran off with a Communist. (Unity Mitford has no role here; she fell in love with Hitler.)
And near the end of the story, as World War II approaches, Nancy Mitford borrows from her own life when Linda falls passionately in love with a handsome French duke, Fabrice de Sauveterre. Gaston Palewski, the great love of Nancy's life, was not a duke, but like Fabrice he was a Resistance fighter and a valued aide to Charles de Gaulle. For decades he loved Nancy, though not as much as he loved womanizing. Russell Baker's commentary after the final episode gives a peculiar gloss to this story. When Mitford died in 1973, he says, Palewski ''was at her bedside''; the coda doesn't mention that he had married another women a few years before.
Decades before that, Mitford had created a different bittersweet ending for Linda. With the story of Fabrice and Linda the film becomes unexpectedly moving, but too late. This ''Love in a Cold Climate'' is a lost opportunity; Nancy Mitford deserves to be known for more than her sisters' bad taste in men.
Love in a Cold Climate
On most PBS stations tonight and
Feb. 18
(check local listings)
A BBC/WGBH Boston co-production; based on the novels ''The Pursuit of Love'' and ''Love in a Cold Climate'' by Nancy Mitford, and adapted by Deborah Moggach; producer, Kate Harwood; director, Tom Hooper; executive producers, Pippa Harris and Jane Tranter for the BBC and Rebecca Eaton for WGBH Boston.
WITH: Rosamund Pike (Fanny), Alan Bates (Uncle Matthew Radlett), Celia Imrie (Aunt Sadie), Elisabeth Dermot-Walsh (Linda), Megan Dodds (Polly), John Standing (Lord Montdore), Sheila Gish (Lady Montdore), Anthony Andrews (Boy Dougdale) and Daniel Evans (Cedric Hampton).Continue reading the main story


text:
EC: Poverty Level in Bulgaria Is Alarming
The European Commission has defined poverty levels and increasing social unrest in Bulgaria as alarming.
Due to the above, EC has dedicated a special section analyzing the situation in the country in its EU Employment and Social Situation Quarterly Review, released Tuesday.
The report notes that the intense economic austerity measures in Bulgaria during the recession led to a marked improvement in the budget position (the deficit was cut from almost 4 % of GDP in 2010 to 1 % in 2012).
It however, stresses that this has come at the cost of increasing social unrest.
The report further states the following:
"Mass protests, which turned violent, burst out at the end of January 2013 and are still continuing, one month after, in over 30 cities. The protests were spurred by abnormally high electricity bills, on average two times higher than the previous month. After the tension escalated, the center-right government of Boyko Borisov resigned on 20 February 2013.
Electricity costs are one of the main expenditures for Bulgarian citizens. Local analysts estimate that 85 % of household monthly incomes are spent on basic necessities. Almost half of the Bulgarian people (44 %) experienced severe material deprivation in 2011, the highest percentage in the EU, which is 5 times higher than the EU average.
The other social indicators also highlight that Bulgaria was the poorest MS in 2011: 49 % of the total population and 52 % of the children were at risk of poverty or social exclusion compared to 24 % and 27 % on average in the EU15. Chart 32 compares Bulgaria's performance with that of other EU MS. The situation is even worse for pensioners aged over 65, some 61 % of whom are at risk of poverty or social exclusion.
The average salary in Bulgaria is the lowest among MS at BGN 768 (EUR 393 ) for September 2012. Twenty-two per cent of the labor force are employed on the minimum wage, amounting to BGN 310 (EUR 159), the second lowest in the EU."
- » ''Information Services'' Will Develop the Website of the Bulgarian Presidency of the Council of the EU
- » The Brussels Report on Bulgaria will be Released in November
- » By December 20 Bulgaria Will Have Exact Program of Its Presidency of the Council of EU
- » 250 000 BGN Will Cost the Office Equipment for the Bulgarian Presidency of the Council of EU
- » Netherlands is also Against Bulgaria Entering Schengen
- » The German Interior Minister is Skeptical About Bulgaria's Accession to Schengen
Focus on material production (and exports). Focus on the type of employment - production, not services -, that will provide the children of Bulgaria a sustainable future. Increase the budget for Education. Let the criminal banks that financed the malls and business parks fail. Good riddance.
Build with the BRICS and focus on the emerging markets, it's your only hope! (A suggestion not only valid for Bulgaria but also for the entire EU)
"The report notes that the intense economic austerity measures in Bulgaria during the recession led to a marked improvement in the budget position (the deficit was cut from almost 4 % of GDP in 2010 to 1 % in 2012).
It however, stresses that this has come at the cost of increasing social unrest."
Yeah the three stooges (or shall I say scrooges…) Boyko, Simeon and Tsvetan got carried away abit……..
Stubborn, narrow-minded, inappropriate, incapable, incompetent etc… governments kept on ruling the country for quite some time already…....
Austerity is ok when needed! Deficit of 4 % was NOTHING! No need to keep on going and run the economy into the ground!
Fine BALANCE and STIMULUS is needed for the fastest possible return to growth and prosperity! (Realistically way too late for any substantial positive improvement in the nearest future)
Austerities usually have negative effect on the economy.


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Today is time to tidy up this house.
Time to put the clothes away.
At least the lid is down.
Please clean the grout.
In the second bathroom, the newer vanity is smaller than the original vanity. Mind the gap.
Getting an early start on Christmas.
Staging assistance needed here.
At least there's only one pan hanging from the pot rack.


text:
Bob Bell: The result in Monza showed the potential of the car.
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Bob Bell, Renault F1's technical director looks ahead to this weekend's Singapore Grand Prix, round 14 in the 2009 FIA F1 World Championship...
Bob, Fernando [Alonso] scored four points in Monza. How did you view his performance?
Bob Bell:
I think the result showed the potential of the car and Fernando certainly got 100 per cent out of it. We were fortunate to gain a few places in the race but overall I think that fifth place was a fair reflection of our competitiveness and brought us the sort of points that we should have scored in the last few races.
Romain [Grosjean] has done three races now. How is he progressing?
He has settled in very well and all of the engineers that have worked with him have been very impressed. He's clearly quick and over the Monza weekend he was just two or three tenths off Fernando, which is what we would hope to see. He has been unfortunate that he hasn't really had a clean race so we're yet to judge his true race pace, but he's clearly got a lot of potential.
We go from low downforce in Monza to high downforce in Singapore. Will the R29 adapt easily?
As I've said previously, the R29 doesn't have any specific weak points and delivers a similar level of performance with both high and low downforce. Its weakness is that it needs more overall performance in terms of grip through downforce and mechanical set-up. This weekend we will use a similar package to the one we used in Monaco, although we will incorporate the evolutions made since that race.
What challenges does the unusual schedule present to the team?
Based on our experience last year, I would say that night racing has not caused too many difficulties for the team and the facilities and lighting in Singapore are excellent. We're effectively working nightshifts in Singapore, but as a team we remain on UK time so it works quite well. The team keeps to the same schedule as at any other race, except that everything is shifted a few hours later in the day.
How is the team approaching the final four races of the season?
We do have developments planned for some of the remaining races and they will come along in due course. There's nothing major but they are sensible upgrades that are already in the production process. Our main development focus is now completely on the R30 and getting ready for 2010.


text:
In our efforts to save money, we still gotta eat, right? And while many of us are dutifully brown-bagging our lunch to work, some days we just want to get out of the office and stretch our legs.
Despite popular belief, eating out doesn't have to gobble your paycheck. It also doesn't have to involve miles of $5 footlong subs.
Here are a bunch of places in downtown Tampa where you can get lunch for $5, including a drink (because we're all tired of drinking just water).
Cafe Perera
Take your pick of thrifty meals at this family-run coffee shop, including rice and beans with bread, butter and a can of soda for $3.84, tax included. Choose from red beans, black or Spanish in a 16-ounce bowl. Feeling like meat? The cafe has a broiled breast of chicken with bread, butter and a can of soda for $4.05. 601 N Morgan St., (813) 223-6740.
Cappuccino on the Go
Located on the third floor of the Bank of America building, this coffee shop and deli is a favorite haunt of busy downtown workers. Many of its half-sandwiches — filling enough for a meal — are priced at $3.25 or less, plus tax. Choose from tuna salad, egg salad, BLT, turkey, ham and swiss or veggie. Sixteen-ounce Coke, Diet Coke and iced tea are $1.25 plus tax. Or go for a heavy soup of the day; a cup is $2.94 including tax. It comes with crackers and a slice of bread, which are sure to fill your belly. 101 E Kennedy Blvd., (813) 221-7570.
Carmen's Sandwich Shop
After 39 years in the restaurant business, Carmen Kingsley must know something about keeping customers happy. These days, she's fully aware that price matters and has priced her fare accordingly. Get any sandwich, from egg salad to turkey, on your choice of bread with home-brewed iced tea for $5. Before 1 p.m., can you also get $5 breakfast specials served with iced tea: two eggs, grits, bacon and toast or Cuban cheese toast with egg and bacon. 408 E Zack St.; (813) 229-1318.
The Family Downtown Cafe
At high noon you'll be hard-pressed to find much for less than $5 in this cafeteria-style restaurant on the ground level of the TECO building. But wait until 2 p.m., and the cafe sells any remaining salads for half-price. That comes out to $3 for a large cobb salad. Fountain drinks are $1.25. 702 N Franklin St., (813) 228-4263.
Rio Cafe
Get your fill of Tampa's favorite sandwich with a Cuban from this Colombian-owned restaurant next to the bus station. Rio Cafe sells a "Cuban Real Deal'' with ham, salami, pulled pork, cheese, mayo, mustard and pickle on Cuban bread for $3.95. You can also get the same version on semi-sweet egg bread, "Media Noche Midnight.'' Cans of soda or bottled water are $1. 602 E Polk St.; (813) 436-9659.
Susan's Cafe & Deli
Susan Owens probably took a risk by opening a cafe a few months ago in these tight economic times. So to get people through the door, she's offering great deals: $5 footlong sandwiches with chips and a fountain drink, lemonade or iced tea. Sandwiches include meatball, pork rib, philly cheese steak and chicken breast on Cuban bread. Bring a fellow cheapskate, because they are actually big enough for two. 510 N Franklin St., (813) 514-6739.
Westshore Pizza
The tried-and-tested two-slices-and-a-drink lunch is actually hard to find for five bucks downtown. Westshore almost gets there at $5.50, plus tax, but that doesn't quite make our cut. If you're not famished, Westshore sells a slice and a fountain drink with free refills for $4.37, out the door. The slice doesn't have to be cheese, either. You pick from whatever they have on hand, including meat lovers, mushroom and pepperoni slices. 505 N Franklin St., (813) 549-5626.
Contributing: Dalia Colón