text:
What is his problem? There is a guy I kinda like. But he is always with a girl a new one every week. I don't want to be his next flavor of the week. Plus he talks to like 6 girls at once. I just want to know if he is confused or just messing around.
Have you actually read what you wrote? Why would you like someone who is a player? Have more self-respect and find someone who is interested in YOU and not just another pretty face.


text:
- Share:
Employment lands play an important role in supporting jobs growth. Jobs are important for individuals, communities and the economy. Therefore it is important that there is enough land, located in the right places, for jobs to be created.
The aim of the Employment Lands Development Monitor (ELDM) is to provide the data and evidence needed to inform planning decisions that enable job creation.
The ELDM contains information on:
The ELDM is a research tool for developers and investors in the industrial property and business park markets. It is also a source of information for Government agencies, utilities and councils involved in the planning and servicing of lands designated for employment‐related activities.
The ELDM was previously known as the Employment Lands Development Program (ELDP). It has been renamed to the ELDM to recognise that its primary role is to present current and historical data on the use of land for employment generating activities across the Sydney Metropolitan Area and Central Coast region. The renaming also coincides with a shift from a hard copy/PDF publication to a digital publication, and the inclusion of new data to recognise changes in the economy and the growing role of commercial and retail industries as employment generators.
Page last updated: 01/08/2017

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Intermediate Cecchetti Ballet
Cecchetti syllabus is an outstanding system of training founded by the inspiration Italian dancer Enrico Cecchetti. It is rich in heritage and taught internationally. For children and young people up to age 15.
PLEASE NOTE: THIS CLASS IS A HIRE. These classes are taught in our studios but all enquiries are handled by the tutors that run them rather than by Dancexchange.
For spring dates and price enquiries, please contact Olivia at firstname.lastname@example.com
Fridays / 5pm
I'm aged 16-18. Can I attend adult classes?
We've extended adult classes to welcome 16 and 17 year olds working at advanced levels. This is subject to agreement with the class tutor.
What's the 15 minute rule? : You won't be allowed to join a class if you're more than 15 minutes late. This is because you'll have missed the warm-up, which increases your chance of injury.
What should I wear? Anything comfortable that lets you move freely. You can wear tracksuit bottoms, leggings, t-shirts, and vests to most classes
What concessions are there? You can get a concession if you're over 60, on income support, or in full time education. Please note, you will need proof of ID.
What about accessibility? We work hard to make our classes accessible for all abilities. Please get in touch to discuss how we can best offer assistance for your needs.
First Timer? If you'd like to attend one of our classes, just turn up on the day. You don't need to book a place, or let us know you're coming.
How can I get in touch with DanceXchange? We're on hand six days a week. Got a question? Then please call 0121 689 3170 or firstname.lastname@example.com


text:
This Way For The Gas, Ladies And Gentlemen Paperback
by Tadeusz Borowski
Part of the Penguin Modern Classics series
Tadeusz Borowski's concentration camp stories were based on his own experiences surviving Auschwitz and Dachau.
In spare, brutal prose he describes a world where where the will to survive overrides compassion and prisoners eat, work and sleep a few yards from where others are murdered; where the difference between human beings is reduced to a second bowl of soup, an extra blanket or the luxury of a pair of shoes with thick soles; and where the line between normality and abnormality vanishes.
Published in Poland after the Second World War, these stories constitute a masterwork of world literature.
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 192 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
- Publication Date: 01/08/1992
- Category: Biography: general
Free Home Delivery
on all orders
Pick up orders
from local bookshops
Showing 1 - 5 of 15 reviews.
Previous | Next
Review by heidilove
I read this in 1989 and loved it. It inspired me to read other works, and fits well in the existential catagory.
Review by pdebolt
This collection of short stories by an Auschwitz survivor is a glimpse into the horrors of the concentration camp where people do whatever is necessary to survive. Although classified as fiction, it is clearly a chronicle of all that Borowksi participated in and observed. The arrival of the transports that brought thousands of people to a camp where they were then immediately dispatched to the gas chambers is just one of the horrific, unimaginable events that was a routine part of everyday life. The monstrous inhumanity of the Nazis is beyond comprehension to a sane mind.
Review by Lonsing
The introduction to this book says it gives no comfort, no pity and no hope. That pretty much sums it up. The first essay is the best. It is not enjoyable to read, rather it is sickening to the core, but I believe, it is a book that should be read.
Review by denniswilliams
This is another book that narates man's proclivity to cruelty. The Nazi party came to power in a country that represented the best of western culture and proceeded to destroy this culture. Yet, it is not the Third Reich alone that stains mankind. Genocide in Armenia, the barbarities of Stalin and Mao and recently in the Balkans, are but examples. There is a stain on man's nature, on his soul. Our behavior comes from our soul.
Review by arubabookwoman
These are a series of interconnected stories/vignettes inspired by the author's experiences in Auschwitz and Dachau. He was an intellectual, radical activist when he was arrested and sent to Auschwitz, where he arrived only a few short weeks after the Nazis instituted the policy to spare Aryans from the gas chambers. Taudeusz wrote that when a writer writes of his camp experiences, "the reader will unfailingly ask, But how did it happen that you survived? Tell then, how you bought places in the hospital, easy posts, how you moved the 'Moslems' {prisoners who had lost the will to live} into the oven, how you bought women, men, what you did in the barracks, unloading the transports, at the gypsy camp; tell about the daily life of the camp, about the hierarchy of fear, about the loneliness of every man. But write that you, you were the ones who did this, that a portion of the sad shame of Auschwitz belongs to you as well."And this is the perspective that Taudeusz brings to the story of the Holocaust--the "in-between": one who perpetrates evil, even as evil is perpetrated upon him, one who is imprisoned, even as he imprisons others. The stories, all narrated in the first person, are told in a matter-of-fact, detached way, in which the worst evils are simply "routine." One of the most chilling stories for me was the description of a soccer game among the prisoners in which the goalie, noticing first the line of people at the chambers, and then its disappearance, notes: "Between two throw-ins a soccer game, right behind my back, three thousand people had been put to death."Tadeusz committed suicide in 1951, before he was 30, and three days after the birth of his daughter.
Previous | Next
Also in the Penguin Modern Classics series | View all


text:
Tonight we will be rocking out to a #LeslieKnope inspired @songza playlist to celebrate women! Women pay 77% of their tabs! #feminism #wages
Need water? We have some! It's frozen and surrounded by whiskey.
Dear @Americanexpress, don't say you appreciate my business then refuse my application for a card that you invited me to apply for. #thanks
Soup of the day: Whiskey.


text:
Why Shop with Us
Customers also Bought:
This ForEverlast Varmint Cage will keep varmints from getting into the feeder area. This cage will keep your feeder components from damage. It is made out of solid steel frame with a hinged door. Easy to attach hardware is included with this cage.
|Shipping Weight:
|3.60 lbs
|Manufactured By:
|ForEverlast, Inc (Mfg. Number: vc)
There are no reviews for this product yet. Be the first.
Have a question about this product?
Ask our product experts...
Ask a Question
There aren't any questions for this product yet. Be the first.


text:
Just a few months after burying the hatchet on a years long feud Billy Corgan and Marilyn Manson have announced a co-headlining tour.
The End Times Tour will be in support of Manson's latest album The Pale Emperor and the Smashing Pumpkin's 2014 album Monuments to an Elegy.
Click here for my Pale Emperor review and click here for my Monuments review.
The 23 city jaunt will cover a wide swath of the U.S. And if fans are lucky, expect some joint performances, such as recent team-ups in London and Australia.
This announcement comes a few days after Corgan mentioned the Pumpkins may be coming to an end in a radio interview. The frontman feels disillusioned that fans are more invested in vintage hits then new material: I'm the type of artist that I don't wanna sort of exist in something that is sort of fading like an iceberg. More and more of the audience is fixated on the past.
Whether this is just a PR tactic to keep band interest alive, or a harbinger that the set may not be as 90's heavy as fan's would like, is up to conjecture.
Tour Dates for The End Times Tour are listed below. Tickets go on sale April 3rd.
07/07 – Concord, CA @ Concord Pavilion
07/09 – Irvine, CA @ Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre
07/10 – Las Vegas, NV @ The Joint at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino
07/11 – Phoenix, AZ @ Comerica Theatre
07/13 – Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre
07/15 – Dallas, TX @ Gexa Energy Pavilion
07/16 – Houston, TX @ NRG Arena
07/18 – San Antonio, TX @ Freeman Coliseum
07/19 – Austin, TX @ Austin City Limits Live
07/20 – New Orleans, LA @ Bold Sphere Music at Champions Square
07/22 – Miami, FL @ Bayfront Park Amphitheatre
07/24 – Tampa, FL @ MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Amphitheatre at the FL State Fairgrounds
07/25 – Atlanta, GA @ Aaron's Amphitheatre at Lakewood
07/26 – Raleigh, NC @ Red Hat Amphitheater
07/28 – Boston, MA @ Blue Hills Bank Pavilion
07/29 – Holmdel, NJ @ PNC Bank Arts Center
07/31 – Wantagh, NY @ Nikon at Jones Beach Theater
08/01 – Mashantucket, CT @ Foxwoods Resort Casino
08/02 – Camden, NJ @ Susquehanna Bank Center
08/04 – Toronto, ON @ Molson Canadian Amphitheatre
08/05 – Clarkston, MI @ DTE Energy Music Theatre
08/07 – Chicago, IL @ FirstMerit Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island
08/08 – Cincinnati, OH @ Riverbend Music Center


text:
Iraq's fugitive Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi said his bodyguards and other employees are being held in secret prisons and subjected to torture, in an interview broadcast on Monday.
Authorities have charged Hashemi, a Sunni, with running a death squad. He has been hiding out since December in the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, where the authorities have so far declined to hand him over.
However, members of his bodyguard and employees of his office have been detained in connection with the case.
"All the arrested people from my bodyguards and the employees of my office are being held in secret prisons over which the ministry of justice has no authority, and confessions are being taken from them through torture," Hashemi said in the speech, which was broadcast on various Iraqi channels.
We're on a mission to show you the real Middle East.
Signup to our newsletter and follow us on Facebook and Twitter!
"We have pictures and evidence proving that the bodyguards were tortured, physically and psychologically," Hashemi said.
Alleged confessions by Hashemi's guards have been broadcast on television.
Hashemi also called on Iraqis "not to believe what the spokesman of the Higher Judicial Council said regarding the accusations."
The Higher Judicial Council "became a partner in influencing public opinion" over a case that should be investigated in secret, he charged.
Hashemi said he wants "to appear in front of a fair judicial system, and in circumstances that can lead to the truth."
The judicial council's spokesman, Abdelsattar Birakdar, has said "there are more than 150 crimes mentioned in the confessions of Hashemi's bodyguards" and called on Kurdistan authorities "to move to hand over the vice president."


text:
Amid a global financial crisis and intense efforts to prepare for the introduction of the European Union common currency (the euro) and the computer problem caused by the year 2000 date change, industrywide consolidation both within and across national borders continued to reshape the financial services landscape in 1998. At the same time, 1998 was marked by ongoing efforts in the United States and other countries to modernize laws governing the affiliation of banks with other financial institutions.
In response to these pressures, consolidation within the American banking industry continued apace with the merger of major institutions such as NationsBank and BankAmerica. The merger of Citicorp and the Travelers Group--creating Citigroup--combined for the first time in the U.S. a major banking organization and an insurance company. Indicative of the extent to which the Depression-era barriers against combining banking and securities activities had been eroded by regulatory interpretations made by the Federal Reserve System during the past 10 years, the Citicorp-Travelers merger included one of the largest American investment banks, Salomon Smith Barney Inc. Without passage of financial modernization legislation, under existing law Citigroup would have to divest its insurance-underwriting activities within two years of the merger (under certain circumstances this divestiture period could be extended for up to an additional three years). Interestingly, no such requirement applies to its securities business.
Elsewhere around the world, Swiss Bank and Union Bank of Switzerland combined to form UBS AG, Fortis won the bidding to buy Generale de Banque of Belgium, Credito Italiano bought Unicredito Italiano, and Bayerische Vereinsbank AG merged with Bayerische Hypobank, to name but a few of the more notable transactions completed during 1998. Banks in several Latin-American countries were acquired by Spanish and other European banks, but proposed mergers among four of the largest Canadian banks were blocked by the government, which was concerned about their impact. As the year drew to a close, Deutsche Bank and Bankers Trust reached a merger agreement valued at approximately $10 billion, signaling that global competition in financial services was intensifying and that industry consolidation, including across borders, would continue in 1999.
Against this backdrop of market activity, legislative efforts in the U.S. Congress to lift the legal restrictions on the formation of financial conglomerates once again fell short. In May the House of Representatives passed financial-modernization legislation that would permit banks to affiliate with securities and insurance underwriters without limitation and expand merchant banking opportunities for their securities affiliates. Despite extensive efforts to secure the bill's enactment, the legislation failed to reach the floor of the Senate for a vote prior to Congress's adjournment late in the year. The legislation was to be reintroduced when the new 106th Congress convened in January 1999 and was expected to receive serious consideration, though significant policy differences, particularly between the Department of the Treasury and the Federal Reserve Board, remained to be resolved.
As the operations of financial institutions throughout the world became more complex and multifaceted, the functions and responsibilities of the supervisory authorities of financial services were being restructured, and increasing attention was being devoted to the exercise of "umbrella" supervision of financial institutions. In the wake of the Asian financial crisis, the default on Russian debt, and the repercussions those events had throughout the emerging markets, increasing attention also was being devoted to strengthening the organization of the international financial system as a whole.
At the national level Japan, South Korea, and the United Kingdom created new authorities and vested them with the responsibility for oversight of the financial system as a whole. Australia began implementing a comprehensive restructuring of its financial supervisory authorities that shifted supervisory responsibilities from the central bank to the new Prudential Regulation Authority. China was considering significant reform of its financial system, including restructuring the central bank along the lines of the U.S. Federal Reserve System. Questions about which governmental authority would exercise "umbrella" supervision of financial holding companies became a central part of the financial modernization debates in the U.S. Other countries, including Finland, Panama, South Africa, and Turkey, were either implementing or considering measures to enhance the effectiveness of their financial supervisory authorities without undertaking a wholesale restructuring of their financial systems.
Measures were also taken in 1998 to enhance the safety and soundness of financial institutions. Countries such as Belgium, China, Colombia, Latvia, and Uruguay strengthened the effectiveness of internal control and audit procedures, whereas Indonesia, Peru, Philippines, Turkey, and Venezuela adopted stricter rules relating to loan loss reserves and the classification of loans.
Preparations for the introduction of the euro in January 1999, meanwhile, extended well beyond the 11 countries that initially would constitute the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). The magnitude of converting to a common currency was truly daunting, as the shift to a single currency necessitated the extensive reformulation of the systems used to conduct the myriad of transactions that occurred each day in the financial markets.
The year 2000 date change presented even greater technological and managerial challenges in 1998, and efforts to prepare for the new millennium were expected to intensify in 1999. It was clear that addressing the year 2000 issues was among the highest priorities within the international banking community and that it was being addressed through the concerted efforts of the regulators, banks, and banking associations. (See COMPUTERS AND INFORMATION SYSTEMS: Sidebar.)
Throughout 1998 many countries continued to bolster their efforts to combat money laundering. These actions included imposing "know your customer" (KYC) requirements (in the U.S., for example, federal bank regulators in December published for comment proposed KYC regulations), expanding the types of institutions that would be subject to reporting requirements, creating special governmental agencies to investigate suspected money-laundering activities, and increasing penalties for money-laundering offenses.
The economic malaise in much of East Asia and in Russia continued in 1998, but for the economies of most Western industrial countries it was a modestly successful year. The unemployment situation, however, remained disappointing in many nations. For the world as a whole, the International Labour Organization (ILO) expected that the number of jobless would reach 150 million by the end of the year. Among the industrialized countries of the West, more than 10% of the workforce was unemployed in Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain.
Controversy continued as to whether observance of minimum labour standards should be made a condition of international trade agreements, with the United States and France among those arguing in favour of the proposition and others holding either that it was unnecessary or, particularly in the less-developed countries, that it was a protectionist device on the part of the advanced industrialized nations. In June the annual Conference of the ILO arrived at a declaration on fundamental labour standards, pledging member countries to uphold seven of the organization's key labour standards dealing with freedom to organize and bargain collectively and banning forced labour, child labour, and discrimination in the workplace. Juan Somavia of Chile was elected to be the next director-general of the ILO.
Of the 15 member countries of the European Union (EU), 11 were approved for membership in the European Monetary Union, requiring fixed rates of exchange to come into effect on Jan. 1, 1999, as a step toward the replacement of national currencies by the euro in 2002. Denmark, Sweden, and the United Kingdom did not request membership, and Greece did not satisfy the economic criteria needed for entry. While the present moves were not likely to produce Europe-wide collective bargaining, at least not in the short term, the expected economic transparency and the fact that control of economic levers was increasingly moving from national governments to the EU were bound to strengthen the international links in industrial relations, as was evidenced in September when trade unions from Germany, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, and Belgium met to discuss a common approach to collective bargaining.
The European Commission invited the European employers' organizations and trade unions to prepare a European-level agreement requiring each country to enact rules giving workers rights to information and consultation within enterprises. Opposition to the idea arose, especially among employers, on the ground that such matters should be left to the individual countries to determine. The European employers' organization refused to engage in negotiations with the unions on the subject. At a meeting in October the employers confirmed their stance, and the Commission seemed likely to prepare its own draft legislation.
In the U.K. the government moved to fulfill its election promises on low pay and union recognition. In May the Commission on Low Pay recommended that there should be a national minimum wage of £3.60 an hour from April 1999 (£1 = $1.65). The government adopted this rate for workers 22 years old and over, coupling it with a rate of £3.00 an hour for those aged 18 to 22, subsequently to be increased to £3.20; no rate was fixed for those under 18. On May 22 the government announced its proposals on employment rights in a White Paper entitled "Fairness at Work." The most important proposal concerned an obligation for employers to recognize trade unions in cases when at least 40% of eligible employees voted in favour of having a union, with automatic recognition taking place when more than half of the relevant workforce belonged to a union. In disputed cases an existing body, the Central Arbitration Committee, could grant recognition. The recognition procedure would apply to firms employing more than 20 workers. Other noteworthy proposals in the White Paper concerned reducing the qualifying length of service for claims alleging unfair dismissal from two years to one year, giving an employee a statutory right to be accompanied by a fellow employee or trade union representative during grievance and disciplinary procedures, and introducing a right for time off for urgent family reasons. Statutory maternity leave would be increased from 14 to 18 weeks. Subsequent debate about the White Paper suggested that while its main provisions would go into the bill, expected in January 1999, there would be some modifications.
Unemployment continued to be particularly worrisome in Germany, but there the most significant event of the year was the election, in September, of a left-of-centre coalition government. It was announced that the new government would reverse the cuts in pensions and sick pay decided upon by its predecessor. It intended to work with the unions and employers in an alliance on jobs and training to attack unemployment. Strong voices among the unions quickly expressed the view that after years of union moderation in collective bargaining and acceptance of labour market flexibility, and in a buoyant economy, the time had come for workers to receive substantial improvements--the huge metalworkers' union spoke of a wage increase of 6.5% in the coming round of wage negotiations.
In France the centre of attention was the government's intention to ensure that the workweek be reduced to 35 hours by 2000 (2002 for firms employing fewer than 20 workers). A law to that effect was promulgated on June 14. Employers continued to deplore the measure and began trying to mitigate its damaging effects. Thus, in July the important metal employers' federation, covering employers of about 1.8 million workers, reached agreement with some--though not all--of its union counterparts, providing an actual working year of 1,645 hours for full-time workers (for some firms 1,610 hours). The agreement increased annual permitted overtime per worker from 94 to 180 hours (in some cases 150 hours), those limits being extendable by 25 hours for the first two years of the life of the agreement. A possibility was provided for workers to offset overtime by extra days of leave. Companies introducing annualized working hours would have a daily limit per employee of 10 or 12 hours (for some workers) and a weekly limit of 48 hours or 42 hours, averaged over 12 weeks. These limits could be increased by negotiation within companies. The minister responsible for the law was angered by the agreement, which she considered did little to further the law's intention of reducing unemployment.
In Italy the government submitted its bill to reduce working hours to 35 a week, which had earlier been hotly contested but had led to an employer-union joint declaration on wider issues to the effect that the two parties should discuss new rules concerning concerted action, the government should discuss the operation of the 1993 inter-confederal agreement with them, and unions and employers should try to promote employment creation in southern Italy, where unemployment had long been high. It was agreed that collective bargaining should continue on a normal basis. It appeared at the year's end that the unions and employers had ensured that they would be fully involved in the discussions on the reduction of working hours in the wider context of Italian industrial relations.
Usually notable for industrial peace rather than conflict, Denmark in April, for the first time since 1985, suffered a major stoppage of work. Negotiations on a new two-year agreement had ended with the approval of a joint mediation proposal, which was put to a vote--regarded in advance as a formality. Voters, however, rejected the proposal, and a strike by more than 500,000 workers began on April 27. After 10 days of the strike and no progress in employer-union negotiations, parliament imposed a settlement based on the original mediation proposal but added some concessions, including an additional day's leave and extra leave after six months of service for workers with children under 14. Employers were given some tax concessions.
United States
A long-standing and often bitter period of difficult management-union relations at Caterpillar Inc., the world's largest maker of earth-moving equipment, appeared to have ended in March, when the company and the United Automobile Workers union (UAW) arrived at a six-year agreement. The settlement was facilitated by the firm's undertaking to reinstate 160 workers dismissed for action related to strikes; the union, for its part, agreed to readmit to membership workers who had continued to work for the company and to drop unfair labour practice claims against the firm. The agreement allowed the company to engage new labour at lower wages, and changes were made in incentive arrangements, linking pay more closely to the performance of specific units. Caterpillar conceded pay raises and undertook to improve job security and pension entitlements. The UAW was also involved in a major dispute at General Motors Corp. (GM), which started in June with strikes in two parts plants in Flint, Mich., related to the firm's desire to improve productivity and make changes in workplace rules. The union was concerned about job security, fearing that the firm would move jobs to cheaper labour markets, and also about health and safety. The firm filed suit asking for arbitration, arguing that the strikes were illegal as they did not involve strikeable national issues. The dispute shut down the great majority of GM's facilities in North America, and settlement was only reached on July 29, when the company pledged not to sell its Delphi plant in Flint before the end of 1999 and withdrew its legal suit and the parties agreed to work together on improving negotiating procedures.
In Australia the operation of the docks has long been regarded as one of the least efficient in any industrialized country, the unions exercising a stranglehold on working practices. In April, Patrick Stevedoring, one of the two largest stevedoring firms, withdrew financial support from its subsidiary labour-hire companies, resulting in their bankruptcy and the laying off of 1,400 dockworkers. Patrick then opened up dock work to nonunion labour. The union reacted strongly, receiving support from the International Transport Workers Federation, which said that it would boycott shippers using nonunion labour. A federal court required Patrick to reinstate the dockers. A deal was then struck, with Patrick undertaking to reinstate the dismissed workers and not use nonunion labour and the union agreeing not to proceed with further legal action and also to accept changes in working practices.
South Korea
In the summer South Korea's biggest car maker, Hyundai, was hit by strikes, and its production complex in Ulsan was occupied in protest against job cuts. A deal was reached on August 24, however, with the company agreeing to cut the number of workers dismissed to 277. Other workers the company had wanted to dismiss would have 18 months of unpaid leave and would receive training in the last six months of that period.
Food concerns, world economic turmoil, and trade issues loomed large on the consumer agenda in 1998. As genetically modified (GM) food products reached supermarket shelves around the world, consumer organizations were concerned that consumers were being told far too little about the ethical and health implications of these products. Many foods made with GM organisms were not even required to be labeled as such. In May a committee of the Codex Alimentarius Commission--the UN body responsible for setting international food standards--held a meeting to discuss food labeling. At the meeting consumer groups and other nongovernmental organizations urged the Codex committee to require compulsory labeling of all GM food. Consumers International (CI), a federation of some 235 consumer organizations in more than 100 countries, ran a campaign exhorting people to fax the Codex committee directly and urge mandatory labeling. Hundreds of such faxes were sent, but the Codex committee, under heavy pressure from industry, rejected the call for mandatory labeling. Instead, it decided to seek further expert scientific opinion and take up the issue again in 1999.
Consumer issues became increasingly entangled with trade issues, due to the liberalization of global trade through such agreements as the 1994 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO). Consumer groups grew increasingly concerned that such trade agreements, which in theory could mean lower prices and more products, could also mean lower standards in a variety of areas, from food to product safety.
Consumer organizations and other nongovernmental groups were also active in discussion on international trade and economic agreements. One of the successes exposed a little-known but potentially powerful trade deal called the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI). The MAI was generated by the 29 member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Many organizations feared the MAI could give free rein to multinational companies in the area of foreign investment by weakening and perhaps overriding local and national consumer and environmental regulations. Progress toward passage of the MAI--scheduled for 1998--stalled under public opposition. In May, during the WTO's ministerial conference in Geneva, consumer organizations joined with other groups to demand greater transparency and accountability at the WTO.
Transatlantic trade between the European Union (EU) and the U.S. was a major issue for consumer organizations, which feared such relations were too heavily influenced by business and industry. In response, consumer organizations from the 15 EU countries and the U.S. met in September to discuss the launch of a transatlantic consumer dialogue to offset an already existing transatlantic business dialogue.
The Euro-Mediterranean Forum on Consumer Policy, held in October, included 12 Mediterranean countries or territories that were not part of the EU--Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, the Palestinian Authority, Malta, Cyprus, Turkey, and Israel. The goal of the meeting was to promote the development of effective consumer policy in those places and to provide a forum for consumer organizations from the EU and the Mediterranean partner countries to exchange experiences and ideas.
Eastern and Central European consumer organizations and government consumer departments were involved in the process of harmonizing their laws with EU legislation in order to accelerate accession to membership in the EU. This included the regulation of marketing practices; consumer credit, guarantees, and after-sales services; and the regulation of package travel and time-share property. Consumer organizations also were campaigning to improve standards of health care and public utilities, which continued to deteriorate in many parts of the region. Economic turmoil in Russia brought the work of consumer groups to the forefront. Consumer organizations, through the media and other outlets, highlighted the critical need for consumer protection, particularly in the banking sector.
In Latin America the privatization of public utilities continued to be an important area of activity. The First Regional Conference on Consumers and Public Utilities, held in January, was the culmination of two years of research and lobbying work in Brazil, Peru, Chile, Mexico, and Colombia. Consumer groups in all five countries took important first steps to monitor the provision of basic services, such as electricity, water, and telecommunications, and in participating in national regulatory agencies. Consumers in El Salvador and Guyana began organizing to press for more participation in the regulation of basic services. CI's office for Latin America and the Caribbean published seven reports on the state of consumer participation in public-utility regulation. Argentina launched new Consumer Defense Courts (three-member arbitration boards with consumer representation) for the settlement of consumer complaints and enacted reforms to its Consumer Defense Law. In Ecuador the new constitution adopted in 1998 included several articles devoted to consumer protection. In Brazil authorities decreed that consumer education be included in the national school curriculum for grades 5 through 8.
The ongoing economic crisis in Asia dominated the lives of consumers there. In Hong Kong the Consumer Council lobbied for legislative reforms on behalf of thousands of people who had lost millions of dollars on popular discounted prepaid coupons, which normally would be redeemed at a later date. Many consumers were left holding hundreds of useless coupons, however, when the businesses that had sold the coupons suffered financial troubles.
The most vulnerable consumers in Asia were the poor, who bore the brunt of the financial crisis. That was one of the reasons why the theme of 1998's World Consumer Rights Day was "Poverty: Rallying for Change." The day was commemorated on March 15 around the world in a variety of innovative ways, including a speech dedicated to the topic by Russian Pres. Boris Yeltsin. In Africa the consumer movement also was heavily involved with poverty issues, such as access to and quality of food, health services, and shelter. About 89 consumer organizations existed in 45 of Africa's 56 countries. The movement was gaining a foothold in the region, however, and the CI regional office had undertaken an ambitious three-year program called "Consolidating and Strengthening the Consumer Movement in Africa."
United States
Consumer affairs at the federal level in 1998 involved the continuing efforts to address information, safety, and fraud--with some attendant controversy. The Department of Agriculture delayed setting long-anticipated national organic-food standards; an extraordinary deluge of some 200,000 responses to its proposed regulations, issued in mid-December 1997, prompted the agency to make fundamental revisions. The standards were intended to govern the National Organic Program called for in the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990, which aimed to resolve the confusion created by a patchwork of private and state rules regulating organic-food production and labeling. The majority of the comments received opposed the proposal's inclusion of biotechnology-derived products as organic foods and the use of biosolids (municipal sludge) in their production and irradiation in their processing. One consumer group, however, warned that such concerns could backfire, with standards made too restrictive for the organic-food industry to expand into large-scale production.
With expansion of a new food-safety system called Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) underway at the beginning of the year, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in April called for retail food businesses to test the feasibility of the system in restaurants, grocery stores, and institutional food services. The FDA also proposed requiring food processors of packaged fruit and vegetable juices to implement HAACP. Following an outbreak of food-borne illness from apple cider the previous year, the agency issued final rules in July regarding warning labels on unpasteurized juices. The White House, meanwhile, established a President's Council on Food Safety to coordinate the various food-safety activities of the separate federal agencies into a comprehensive, strategic, federal food-safety plan. The General Accounting Office and National Research Council weighed in with reports suggesting coordination could entail streamlining safety laws and oversight in a single agency, rather than the existing 12 agencies and 35 different statutes.
Concerns about the risk that large vehicles, particularly sport utility vehicles, posed to people in smaller cars were highlighted when the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) began crash testing light trucks and vans with passenger cars. The NHTSA reported on incompatibilities or mismatches in vehicle design, such as bumper heights, that might increase the consequences of crashes. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety provided helpful perspective with its report, based on real-world crash data, that showed the relative importance of vehicle size in safety, but it also showed that other factors mattered, such as design, use patterns, and where and how vehicles were driven. The NHTSA proposed to increase the prominence of mandatory rollover warning labels in sport utility vehicles.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reported a relatively new consumer problem known as cramming, in which unscrupulous billing firms added charges for unwanted products or services to consumers' local telephone bills without their knowledge. Sparked in part by the confusing complexity of local phone bills, cramming generated about 9,000 complaints to the FTC over a 12-month period and led to calls for federal or state intervention. Opponents of anticramming legislation wanted consumer safeguards for phone bills similar to those for credit card bills, which were developed successfully and voluntarily by the industry.
Stating that fraud could slow the growth of consumer business over the Internet, the FTC launched Consumer Sentinel, a secure consumer fraud and complaint database for use by law enforcement organizations in the U.S. and Canada. Following its report to Congress on Internet privacy, the FTC also suggested that legislative measures should be taken to protect consumer financial information, which prompted concern that overly rigid rules would hamper commerce.
As states cracked down on misleading and fraudulent sweepstakes pitches, 32 states and the District of Columbia reached a settlement with American Family Publishers, one of the largest sweepstakes outfits, over alleged misleading offers. The National Association of Attorneys General began to study whether additional specific laws were needed to protect consumers from abusive and deceptive sweepstakes activities.


text:
Step Daddy Stables. Home of the Finest Tennessee Walking Horses in SouthEast Texas. I Buy, Train, and Sell Tennessee Walking Horses.
16.3 h TB geld. 18 yrs old.. in excellent shape.. junior jumper champion, has done the young riders, and upper level grand prix...honest as they come…
black and white paint quarter horse gelding
Small farm with a passion for Arabs.
Barrel and Ranch Horses-Prospects to the finished


text:
Eagle River Golf Course - Golf Package
Eagle River/Trout Lake - Black Bear Lodge Package
1 Night 1 Round ~ $299 per couple
Dates: Now - 12/31/17
Enjoy a 2-night stay at the Black Bear Lodge and 18 holes of golf at Eagle River Golf Course and Trout Lake Golf Course for as low as $299 per couple!
Inquiry For More Details
Prices are subject to change without notice. GolfWisconsin.com is not responsible for errors posted in the golf package.
Want More Golf Deals? Like Us On Facebook For Weekly Savings
Like Us For Local News and Specials


text:
Second Release Candidate for Open Office 3.0
The OpenOffice project has taken the next step toward version 3.0 of its free office package by publishing release candidate 2 (RC 2)
In a telephone interview, marketing manager Florian Effenberger told Linux Magazine the project was well within schedule, and the two week delay compared with the original timeline was normal, considering the extensive changes being made for major release 3.0. The project still hopes to release the finished openOffice version in the last days of September.
OpenOffice 3.0 RC2 is in Windows, Mac OS X and various Linux formats ready to download, although the project tells us some mirror servers are not yet up to date.
Issue 205/2017
Buy this issue as a PDF
Linux Kernel 4.14 Released
Torvalds lashes out at a Canonical developer who introduced a regression.
Fedora 27 Is Released
Developers can now access Red Hat Enterprise Linux Developer subscriptions on Fedora 27 at no cost.
Samsung to Bring Linux to the Galaxy Phone
Samsung is testing Linux desktop for its DeX experience.
System76 Releases Pop!_OS
An Ubuntu-based operating system designed for professionals.
News and views on the GPU revolution in HPC and Big Data:
HIP: CUDA Integration with ROCm
Exploring AMD's Ambitious ROCm Initiative
Crypto-Currency Mining Drives a Surge in GPU Sales
New Platform for GPU-Enabled HPC and Ultra-Scale Computing
Radeon Instinct: Evolving, Adapting & Learning Evolving, Adapting & Learning
Linux Comes to Windows
Run multiple Linux distributions in Windows 10.
Docker Embraces Kubernetes
Docker is now offering Kubernetes as an orchestration platform.
Kubernetes 1.8 Announced
The new release comes with two new features for better security.
Final Ubuntu Desktop 17.10 Beta Arrives
Ubuntu completes the cycle of life and goes back to letter A and Gnome.
Linus Torvalds Invites Attackers to Join the Kernel Community
He wants attackers to join the community instead of attacking the code.