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Excessive use of force, torture and other ill-treatment
The security services, and in particular the police and Local Defence Forces (LDF), reportedly used unlawful and excessive force when arresting suspects. The LDF are an armed civilian force working alongside the national police.
- In May, it was reported that François Rukeba, who had recently been extradited from Uganda to Rwanda, had been tortured. According to reports, he was severely beaten during the first days of his detention by the Rwandan security forces. In November, it was reported that the government would shortly submit the issue of ratification of the UN Convention against Torture to Parliament.
Freedom of expression
Press freedom
In 2007, Rwanda was ranked 181 out of 195 countries in terms of respect for press freedom by the USA-based organization, Freedom House. Harassment, threats, intimidation and violent attacks against journalists, in particular those working for non-state media, continued. The authorities failed to protect and uphold the rights of these journalists.
- On 9 February, Jean Bosco Gasasira, the editor of Umuvigizi newspaper, was assaulted with iron bars by three unidentified men in the capital, Kigali. Jean Bosco Gasasira was rushed to hospital where he remained in intensive care for several days. He had published several articles in Umuvigizi newspaper that were critical of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), the ruling political party. One article alleged nepotism within the RPF.
- Also on 9 February, the government-controlled radio station, Radio Rwanda, reportedly broadcast remarks by the Director of Radio Rwanda and the President of the High Press Council threatening the independent newspaper Umuco. Accusing the newspaper of fomenting ethnic hatred, they compared it to the defunct newspaper Kangura, which incited hatred of Tutsi people before and during the 1994 genocide. Following this radio broadcast, Bonaventure Bizumureymi, the editor of Umuco, received telephone calls threatening him. The press is still viewed by some with fear since it played such an instrumental role in whipping up the genocide in 1994. In 2007, the government continued to accuse journalists critical of the authorities of inciting ethnic hatred in order to silence them.
- In September, four government ministers, including the Ministers of Interior and of Communication, and two members of the security forces threatened independent journalists during a programme broadcast by Radio Rwanda and Télévision rwandaise (TVR) if they carried on criticizing the government. The Interior Minister allegedly said that the police should arrest any journalist who published a leaked official document and that the journalist should remain in detention until he revealed the source of the leak. In addition, these journalists were branded as "enemies" of the country. Journalists working for the newspaper Umuseso were particularly targeted. The government increasingly used criminal laws and sanctions to stifle free expression of opinion. Two draft laws, one related to the Press Law and one to the Criminal Code, which were being considered by Parliament at the end of 2007, contained provisions which would unduly restrict freedom of expression.
Human rights defenders
The work of human rights defenders was under intense scrutiny by the authorities.
- In February, Congolese law professor Idesbald Byabuze Katabaruka was arrested and charged with "threatening state security" and "discrimination and sectarianism". He was in Kigali to teach a university law course. The public prosecutor issued the charges in relation to several public documents which Idesbald Byabuze Katabaruka had allegedly written or co-authored. They included an article, Alerte Rwanda (Rwanda Warning), which was highly critical of the RPF. About one month later, after international pressure, the charges against him were dropped and he was released from Kigali Central Prison.
Death penalty
In July, Rwanda abolished the death penalty, the first country in the Great Lakes region to do so. The retention of the death penalty constituted one of the main obstacles preventing the transfer of detainees held by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), and indicted genocide suspects living abroad, to Rwanda's national jurisdiction.
Gacaca trials
Trials continued under the gacaca system - a community-based system of tribunals established in 2002 to try people suspected of crimes during the 1994 genocide. In March, a new gacaca law was enacted which substantially changed the previous 2004 law. Under the new law, the jurisdiction of gacaca tribunals was extended so that they could try categories of people, such as "notorious killers", who previously came under the jurisdiction of the national courts. The gacaca tribunals were also empowered to hand down life sentences. In addition, the number of judges (Inyangamugayo) required to sit on a gacaca tribunal was reduced from nine to seven in order to increase the number of sessions. Although the government's stated intention was to close down the gacaca courts as soon as possible, in early December the Secretary General of the gacaca jurisdictions announced that the gacaca tribunals would be extended into 2008. While the provisions of the 2007 law speeded up the gacaca trials, this was at the expense of the fairness and quality of the rulings. There were regular reports that fair trial guarantees were not being applied in the gacaca process, leading to miscarriages of justice.
- François-Xavier Byuma, a prominent human rights defender, was sentenced to 19 years' imprisonment in May for participating in weapons training during the 1994 genocide, after an unfair trial by the gacaca community court in Bilyogo, Kigali. The judge who presided over the trial had been under investigation by François-Xavier Byuma's NGO, Turengere Abana (Rwandan Association for the Protection and Promotion of the Child, l'Association Rwandaise pour la Protection et la Promotion de l'Enfant) for the alleged rape of a 17-year-old girl. The judge's conflict of interest denied François-Xavier Byuma his right to a fair trial before an independent and impartial tribunal. Poorly qualified, ill-trained and corrupt gacaca judges in certain districts fuelled widespread distrust of the gacaca system. In December, the League for Human Rights in the Great Lakes Region (LDGL) reported that seven judges of the gacaca court of the Kibirizi sector, South Province, had been arrested in November for tampering with evidence. Rwandans continued to flee the gacaca system to neighbouring countries. Some were afraid that the tribunals would expose their involvement in the genocide. Others fled out of fear of false accusations.
- Teachers and other staff from the University of Butare reportedly fled the country out of fear of being wrongly accused of involvement in the genocide. Rwandan sources also reported throughout the year that gacaca judges and witnesses (for the prosecution and the defence alike) had been threatened and in some cases killed.
Detention without trial
In October, during a parliamentary session, Rwandan senators raised concerns about illegal detentions. Several thousand detainees remained incarcerated on a long-term basis without trial.
- Dominique Makeli, a former journalist for Radio Rwanda, remained in detention without trial after almost 13 years. The charges against him repeatedly changed. The authorities' latest accusation was that he had incited genocide in a programme for Radio Rwanda in 1994.
- Two Catholic nuns, Sisters Bénédicte Mukanyangezi and Bernadette Mukarusine, were finally tried in July 2007 after more than 12 years in detention without trial. The gacaca court that took up their cases released them for lack of evidence.
- Tatiana Mukakibibi, a former presenter and producer with Radio Rwanda, was acquitted of genocide charges by a gacaca court in the southern district of Ruhango on 6 November after 11 years in detention without trial.
Prison conditions
In early 2007, the government announced the provisional release of 8,000 detainees, many of whom had reportedly confessed to participation in the genocide. This was the third wave of mass releases since 2003 in an attempt to address prison overcrowding. Despite these releases, the prisons remain overcrowded. By July, there were 97,000 prison inmates. This figure dropped to 70,000 in September following an official instruction which allowed some detainees to carry out work of benefit to local communities, known as TIG (work of general interest), in camps outside the prisons. Prison conditions remained extremely harsh and amounted to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.
Political prisoners
In April, Pasteur Bizimungu was transferred from prison to house arrest. Pasteur Bizimungu and Charles Ntakirutinka had been sentenced in 2005 to 15 and 10 years' imprisonment respectively on charges of inciting civil disobedience, associating with criminal elements and embezzlement of state funds. Both men had, prior to their arrest, launched a new political party, the Democratic Party for Renewal (Parti Démocratique de Renouveau, PDR-Ubuyanja). Many human rights observers considered that their prosecution was an attempt to eliminate political opposition. Charles Ntakiruntinka remained in Kigali's Central Prison.
Investigations of genocide and war crimes
In October, the Rwandan commission of inquiry to investigate the role of the French military in the genocide presented its report to President Kagame. The Spanish judicial authorities continued to investigate the murder of Spanish nationals and other crimes committed between 1990 and 2002 in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The investigation focused on the alleged direct involvement of 69 members of the RPF, some of whom were high-ranking figures in the military. Foreign governments, such as those of the UK, France, Canada and the Netherlands initiated judicial proceedings against alleged Rwandan genocide suspects residing, sometimes under false identities, in their countries.
International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda
Trials of prominent genocide suspects continued before the ICTR, which held 61 detainees at the end of 2007. Twenty-eight trials, involving multiple and single defendants, were ongoing. Eighteen suspects indicted by the ICTR were still at large. Since opening in 1996, the ICTR has rendered 32 definitive judgments. The ICTR was mandated by the UN Security Council to complete all trials by the end of 2008. In accordance with its completion strategy, the prosecutor proposed the transfer of three cases to European jurisdictions and five to Rwandan jurisdiction. Since its inception, the ICTR has tried only members and supporters of the government in place in April 1994. It did not fully implement its mandate by investigating all war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in 1994, notably those committed by the RPF.
Enforced disappearances
- Augustin Cyiza, a prominent member of civil society, and Léonard Hitimana, a member of the Transitional National Assembly, were reportedly victims of enforced disappearance in 2003. Since then, officials have denied knowledge of their whereabouts, and have carried out no rigorous investigations into their disappearances.
Amnesty International reports
- Rwanda: Freedom of expression under attack (AFR 47/002/2007)
- Rwanda: Give Dominique Makeli a trial or let him go (postcard) (AFR 47/006/2007)
- Rwanda: Fear for safety/Legal concern: François Xavier Byuma (AFR 47/007/2007)
- Rwanda: Abolition of the death penalty (AFR 47/010/2007)
- Rwanda: Suspects must not be transferred to Rwandan courts for trial until it is demonstrated that trials will comply with international standards of justice (AFR 47/013/2007)
- Rwanda: Genocide suspects must not be transferred until fair trial conditions met (AFR 47/014/2007)


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Happy Birthday, Emma Watson!
Digital Fashion Writer
Emma Watson turns twenty-three today. It's a bit of a blah birthday relative to twenty-one and twenty-five, but then again, if you're Emma Watson you don't need a nice milestone number as an excuse to throw a party. You can just do it, because you have other major things to celebrate (last night's MTV Movie Award; the upcoming The Bling Ring, out June 14). And you will probably wear something awesome to do so, because if you're Emma Watson, you always, always do. (See proof above.)

subset: commoncrawl


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"Manuel supports us -- I don't know what we'd do without his help. But there's a lot more to life than material things." Sonia's eyes well with tears each time she struggles with the contradictions that now shape her thoughts: She's married but she isn't; she still loves him but can't keep loving him; maybe they'll end up back together with their child but they probably won't. "I don't know what to think any more; I don't know any more whether he sends us so much out of love or out of obligation. But after a while, you have to stop wondering. You just have to get on with your life as best as you can." So to get on with her life and head off any damage to her career, she filed for divorce in November.
Sonia isn't one of those Cubans with fe. (A saying circulating for the past few years goes: If you're Cuban, you've got to have fe, which is the Spanish word for faith, but also an acronym for familia extranjera -- relatives on the outside). Other than Manuel, that is, soon to be her ex-husband. Her job is going well, but other young professionals, also with good jobs, say it's almost an exercise in futility to work hard because they can't advance, either financially or professionally. She works hard anyway, leaving her with little time to think about anything but caring for Sonia Maria. Sometimes she'll go to a restaurant with co-workers, and she always attends the ferias, or international business expositions, that come to Havana. People suggest that she begin to date, but she gets an indecipherable look on her face, shrugs her shoulders. Sometimes she cries.
Even at three in the morning the day of the mass in Havana, the sounds of shuffling sandals and sporadic conversations drift through the predawn quiet outside Edificio Elena. As the next hours pass and the sky fades from black to gray, scattered groups of walkers grow into two thin streams flowing south on either side of Calle 60. The customary street noises begin a gradual crescendo, the tinny ringing of bicycle bells occasionally sounding through the roar of unmuffled, smoke-spewing engines. Buses are waiting nearby to take early risers the five miles to the plaza. They will be among the first arrivals at the site of the 9:30 mass, the ones who will crowd closest to the stage overarched by a white canopy shaped like the wings of a dove.
Few of the residents of Edificio Elena, though, will go to the plaza this chilly, overcast morning to hear John Paul talk about justice, faith, and reconciliation among Cubans and unification with the rest of the world. Most will elect to watch the event on television, as they did the pope's previous masses. They'll never see or read about the sporadic anti-government chants and yells from a small number of protesters, or the subsequent removal of a few of them, which U.S. media outlets will make much of. Sonia and Argelia have more immediate concerns.
They've had a rough night, kept up by Sonia Maria, who was suffering from asthma and crying for hours. She'd also wet the double bed she shares with her mother, and all the bedclothes had to be washed by hand in the deep utility sink that stands in an open-air passageway outside the kitchen door.
Then one of the water tanks springs a leak, leaving the apartment without running water. Yolanda and her husband Daniel rush downstairs to help Sonia fix the tank. But in the kitchen, thick black water begins to bubble up through the drain in the middle of the linoleum floor. The sewage spreads across the kitchen and into a hallway leading to the bathroom and bedrooms. It's coming up through the kitchen sink, too. Yolanda finds a plunger and works on the sink drain, while Argelia gets down on her hands and knees and digs up globs of food and muck from inside the drain.
Everyone is working silently as if they're a hospital emergency room team, and even Sonia Maria resists the temptation to step in the sewage. But the black water keeps bubbling, and finally Sonia calls a plumber. She can't afford the several dollars he is sure to charge, but there's no other remedy. Soon he arrives on a bicycle, a toolbox strapped behind the seat. He shouts up from the street, and Yolanda runs down to let him in.
That evening Argelia -- her tattered canvas shoes still damp -- stands in front of the television to watch the ceremonies at Jose Marti International Airport. The pope is leaving Cuba, saying a long goodbye to Fidel and other government and church officials. He shambles along a red carpet to the plane, surrounded by his entourage. After several minutes the aircraft begins to taxi away, and from his window, John Paul waves slowly. Fidel waves back. He looks almost wistful.
"When Fidel goes to bed tonight," Argelia muses, "he's going to feel so proud! I never imagined this could happen." Sonia is drying off Sonia Maria after a quick bath, which the child hates. Her hair dripping in the cold, damp air, she tries to slip free and grabs for her new Barbie doll, a present from her father. Sonia glances up at the TV screen. Argelia still stands gazing as the plane takes off and the camera zooms back to show Fidel, the ministers and priests standing on the red carpet watching the lights of the jet fade into the thick dark clouds. Sonia rolls her eyes, smiles slightly, and sighs. "No es facil," she says.


text: 100989218 By Adam Porter June 20, 2012 Share on Facebook Share on Twitter At the bar Category: Share on Facebook Share on Twitter More Leave a comment Send to a friend! Print this page Pin it! Reddit This! Share on Tumblr! More From K99 Arrowhead Mountain Lodge Present First Ever Snowmobile Poker Run Colorado Bikers Ride to the Wild Animal Sanctuary in April Traffic Fatality North of Fort Collins Thursday Afternoon GoDaddy Super Bowl Gaff–Not Their First Animal Infraction [VIDEO] Best of the Web


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Jody Alexander Rhiannon Alpers Alicia Bailey Bay Park Press Marla Brill Inge Bruggeman Squeak Carnwath Julie Chen Will Cloughley Cathy DeForest Marie Dern Guy Diehl Adam Donegan Daniel Essig Foolscap Press Amy Franceschini Alisa Golden Granden Press Art Hazelwood Caren Heft Michael Henninger Helen Hiebert Charles Hobson Kathryn Kain Daniel Kelm Lisa Kokin Roberta Lavadour Shanna Leino Emily Marks Mary V. Marsh Emily Martin Lin Max Katya McCulloch Howard Munson Emily Payne Nawakum Press Ninja Press Jeanmarie Nutt Sara Press Lisa Rappoport Roslyn Ritter Elizabeth Sher Brian Singer Claudia Smelser Helen Stanley Erin Sweeney Richard Wagener Vita Wells William T. Wiley
more work by Helen Stanley
Helen Stanley's individual style, keen sense of observation and love of process have long distinguished her work. She has been widely exhibited in many galleries including the prestigious Paula Anglim Gallery and William Sawyer Gallery in San Francisco and the Susan Cummins Gallery in Mill Valley. She received a Life Work award by the Marin Arts council and was given a retrospective show at the Falkirk Cultural Center, San Rafael, California.
Egypt In December - January of this year, Helen Stanley and her husband Rodger Jacobsen made an extensive trip to Egypt, traveling down the Nile by boat and visiting all the historic sites. They had no inkling of the unrest that was to come in a matter of a week after their departure. Helen kept with her a llittle drawing book wrapped in leather and made drawings of their adventures in beautiful walnut inks. The original journal will be on display along with a limited edition book of the drawings bound in papyrus. Stay tuned for images of the new book.


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Just when you thought the Magic Johnson Theaters were safe to occupy again the Goat Whisperer has signed on to a new film project.
Rihanna, photographed above in the streets of London wearing a shirt adorned with the phrase cunt life (which is coincidentally the sitekey password for Al Reynold's Bank of America online account) last night, will make her animation debut in DreamWorks' movie 'Happy Smekday!' as one of the lead voices of the film, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Do you think RiRi has what it takes to lend her personality to an animated character?
Like A Boy
The "Where Have You Been" singer will be joined by Jim Parsons, known best for his Emmy-winning role as nerdy Sheldon Cooper in the CBS comedy 'Big Bang Theory', in the kiddie-friendly flick loosely based off Adam Rex's acclaimed children's book 'The True Meaning of Smekday.'
But the grind doesn't come to stop there. Refusing to take a day off, Rihanna reportedly booked three studio days with British producers ahead of her headlining spot at Radio 1′s Hackney Weekend scheduled for Sunday (June 24).


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Echinacea hybrids
Perennials, Flowers
ECHINACEAThese are tough, colorful perennials from central and eastern North America. Daisylike flowers, usually with narrow, arching rays, have brownish orange, dome-shaped centers and are held on straight stems above clumps of bristly foliage. Flowers are often lightly fragrant. Generally bloom over a long period in summer (may start in spring in mildwinter climates). Flowering may continue until frost.
Use on the outskirts of gardens or in wide borders with other robust perennials. They are also excellent in containers. Generally do not need staking. They perform well in summer heat (though not in the hottest desert areas, where they are mainly spring blooming). Good cut flowers.
Clumps spread slowly, become crowded after 3 or 4 years. Fleshy rootstocks can be difficult to separate; divide carefully, making sure each division has a shoot and roots. Plantings can also be increased by taking root cuttings, seeding, or transplanting self-sown seedlings.
Complex crosses have produced hybrid coneflowers that are popular for their vigor and extended color range. 'Green Envy' has fragrant, lime green blooms that pick up magenta-purple near the cone as they age. The green cone also fades to purple. It grows 2–3 ft. high. 'Tomato Soup' has bright red flowers up to 6 in. wide on 2-ft.-high plants. 'Tiki Torch' has bright orange to rose blooms on a 2–2 1/2-ft.-tall plant.
Native from Europe to western Asia, these clumping or trailing perennials are vigorous growers with op...
Betula pendula 'Laciniata' ('Dalecarlica')
Graceful, open tree with strongly weeping branches, deeply cut leaves. Sunburns in hot, dry weather.
Ribes aureum
Deciduous shrub. Native to inland regions of the West. Erect growth to 3–6 ft. tall and wide. Li...


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After just participating in the junk train on the Garden Junk forum I want to do it again. I posted to see if there was interest in posting a list of what you were looking for. Then wandering over here thought that I would see if there was any interest in doing a swap with a junky theme. Post here if you are interested in joining. Send me a email with your snail mail/GW name/real name. Also post what you are looking for. Included in the swap can be stuff to make garden junk, seeds, bulbs, and what ever goodies you want to share with you partner. Let's hope that this can get going. Looking forewad to doing this, my 2 yr old loves me getting packages and puts her claims on things:)
Follow-Up Postings:
- Posted by mikeyjoe Zone 6b, Indiana (email@example.com) on Fri, Mar 3, 06 at 23:17
Hello "Gw/B", I might be interested, but need more info. You've got mail. "MJ" |
- Posted by gardeningwithbaby zone 4 NE (My Page) on Fri, Mar 3, 06 at 23:32
Okay I will start with what I am looking for. Stuff for the fairy garden: Shiny things for danglies Kitchen garden stuff I have 2 little girls that love to help in the garden, so any things to add to their fairy garden or my kitchen garden. My girls are 2 and a half and 7 months old so both will be active this summer in digging and working outside. They like shiny things and pretty things, just like the fairies:) Any kind of junk to use in garden:) Here is the rules, send me your info and I will match you with a swap partner. Post a list or email me a list of what you are looking for to use in the garden. When you get your partner the fun begins:) You can include in the swap box things that they are looking for, seeds, bulbs, plants, what ever you want to include or think that they can use. It can be related to gardening or garden junk |
- Posted by skohler 5 (email@example.com) on Sat, Mar 4, 06 at 8:08
Hi gw/b you can sign me up to this I love garden junk. anything that can make noise :)) |
hello this sounds like fun. to trade I have small brass ships bell 12" round wire hanging basket 14" hafe round wire basket bag of glass beads round metal horse spinner hanging string of blue and gold ceramic fish what I'm looking for is old weather vans(is that how you spell it) and daylilys any kind thanks michelle |
I would be interested LMK. Ann |
- Posted by amybabyboy3 Georgia (My Page) on Sat, Mar 4, 06 at 17:12
Im interested too. Sounds like lots of fun. Amy |
bump |
- Posted by amybabyboy3 Georgia (My Page) on Fri, Mar 10, 06 at 8:17
this sounds like so much fun I wanted to bump it up |
- Posted by gardeningwitch 6 (My Page) on Fri, Mar 10, 06 at 15:35
So I have a question...Is it a round robin, that you add to a box and send out, or do we send the stuff to you like a seed swap, or are you going to pair people up? I'm sorry, I'm a little confused..(Which is easy to do! lol!) I have a lot of neat stuff that I know only garden lovers would appreciate! :) |
I'm interested in joining! More details please! |
Been looking for the information on this. Not much happening.No posts since the 10th. |
- Posted by gardeningwithbaby zone 4 NE (My Page) on Mon, Mar 27, 06 at 23:45
I have information from Sue, Ann and Michele. Please post your list of wanted and make sure I have your real addresses. I will match up by Friday, so look for an email from Me:) Stacie |
- Posted by skohler 5 (firstname.lastname@example.com) on Sat, Apr 8, 06 at 21:13
Hi stacy : just like to know the box arrived ok conf # says it was delivered . Label/Receipt Number: 0305 1720 0002 5542 3018 Your item was delivered at 8:46 am on April 05, 2006 in ANSLEY, NE 68814. hope it arrived safly . plmk |
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Saturday, December 8, 2012 11:47 PM EST
Despite pain, Daniels dazzles in UConn victory
By Ed Daigneault Republican-American
STORRS — He hobbled into the postgame interview area, moving gingerly while chomping on a bag of gummy worms. DeAndre Daniels looked like an old man and a little kid at the same time.
His game Friday night brought him somewhere into the middle. The UConn sophomore, struck with back spasms that pale in comparison to the confidence issues that have marked his brief career, grew up a bit in front of a crowd of 9,113 at Gampel Pavilion.
Here is what Kevin Ollie had to say after the game
Daniels poured in a career-best 23 points to lead the Huskies to a 57-49 victory against Harvard to send his team into exam break feeling good with an unexpected 7-2 record. He sent himself to the training room afterward, electrical stimulation and muscle relaxers the required treatment for the lower-back issues.
"If I keep playing like that," Daniels smiled, "I hope it keeps nagging me."
The spasms first cropped up during Tuesday night's loss to North Carolina State in New York. Daniels fought through them as best he could that night and then during the ensuing practices. Between grimaces Friday night, Daniels kept putting the ball in the bucket.
He scored 15 of his team's first 29 points, keeping the Huskies moving after they blew a 15-2 lead to start the game. Through the first 29 minutes of the game, Daniels, Ryan Boatright and Enosch Wolf, who started for the first time in his career, were the only Huskies to score.
That wasn't the optimal situation, but it might just have shown Daniels how important he is as a third scoring option. He is, after all, the most likely candidate to occupy that role.
"We try to get to him most of the time because we know he can score," said point guard Shabazz Napier, who had a rough scoring night but tallied nine assists, seven rebounds and four steals. "It's up to him to believe he can score. His confidence level is kind of low. After today, it should be high. When the Big East comes, we have to have that slot for anoth-
See UCONN, Page 6C
er scorer.
"We need DeAndre to score. We need to find that third scoring option and we believe it's DeAndre."
On Friday night, he was option Nos. 1, 2 and 3 for a long period of time. Napier, the team's leading scorer, finished with just six points, all in the final seven-plus minutes. Boatright was the only other Husky in double figures with 16 points.
Both were reduced to unfamiliar roles as complementary players. Harvard coach Tommy Amaker focused his attentions on limiting Napier and Boatright. It's an approach that will be successful if nobody else steps in to take advantage of the tunnel vision.
Daniels did that.
"We were concerned about the peripheral players," said Amaker, whose team fell to 4-4. "As fate would have it, Daniels stepped up and had a solid game. We've been reading and hearing that they wanted to get more from him. He certainly looked like he delivered."
Somebody had to.
Harvard's defense on Napier limited him to seven shots. Boatright got off 11 shots, hitting seven of them, but not one of them was easy. Daniels took his athleticism and height inside, hitting nine of the 12 shots he took and adding four rebounds to the night.
It's just one game so there's no true evidence that it was a breakthrough, that some light bulb has clicked on over Daniels' head. But it is a dose of confidence for a player who was highly regarded coming out of high school but wilted under Jim Calhoun's relentless pressure last year as a freshman.
"We're going to keep feeding him basketballs," UConn coach Kevin Ollie said. "We're going to keep putting him in positions to succeed. Hopefully this is a stepping stone for him. Hopefully he feels good about himself, but not too good that he stops working.
"We want to keep him in his comfort zone. For us to be good, we need him to shine."


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Jul 2, 2014 8:52 PM by Connie Tran, KSBY News
The drought continues to dry up lakes and reservoirs across California. It's so bad, some water levels are now at a record levels. With the Fourth of July holiday just around the corner, KSBY wanted to see if the lack of water will affect recreation businesses.
Santa Margarita Lake, for example, is currently at 30% capacity. And the water levels are catching the attention of visitors and businesses nearby.
Neil Karwath is camping at the KOA Kampground at Santa Margarita Lake. He said he was shocked to see where the line of water used to be at the lake.
"And the docks that were floating are now dry docks, and I think people see that on the mass media and that makes them very concerned," said Karwath.
But, the lack of water is not stopping Karwath from seeking the camp adventure.
Meghan Egli with KOA Kampground said people like Karwath are buying camp spots and fishing licenses because you can still fish and boat at the lake.
San Luis Obispo County Parks reports solid numbers for this summer. It said it still has a good amount of camping reservations for all its lakes, despite low water levels.
Egli said, "We have a lot of, I think very faithful people that come that come here."
However, Egli said business has been down for the past two years.
"It's very dramatic, I mean, and you know, when you're running a business like this, there's definite impact to the business side of things," said Egli.
Karwath said he had heard about families cancelling trips because of the drought.
Karwath said, "I think it absolutely impacts their decision to come to California or vacation, whether it's the parks like Yosemite, or also just KOA's or whatever they're doing in the mountains and the camping areas."
Egli said they are booked for this upcoming holiday weekend, but once it passes, they may have to go back to their old adage, "Pray for rain!"
Just to give you an idea of the water levels at other lakes around the Central Coast. As of Wednesday, July 2, Lake Lopez was at 51.2% capacity, Lake Nacimiento was at 19%, Lake Cachuma was at 34.8%, and Lake San Antonio is at an alarming 4% capacity.
Cal Fire said visitors at KOA Kampgrounds at Santa Margarita Lake can still have campfires, as of now.
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Tournaments :: news
FLW College Fishing - Southeastern
Santee Cooper (May 2, 2009)
University of Florida wins on Santee Cooper
MANNING, S.C. — The University of Florida team of Jake Gipson of Niceville, Fla., and Matthew Wercinski of Gainesville, Fla., won the National Guard FLW College Fishing Southeast Division tournament on Santee Cooper Saturday with four bass weighing 12 pounds, 7 ounces. The victory earned the team $10,000 to be split evenly between the school and the school's bass-fishing club.
"This is great," Gipson said. "At the Lake Okeechobee event, our school's other team finished in fourth place and really put the pressure on us to do well here and qualify to fish the Southeast Regional Championship at Lake Monroe, which is in our back yard. So we're both really excited to be going to the regional."
"We started off and the wind was howling," Wercinski said. "We had a pretty slow ride there. We could only go about 30 miles per hour. We stopped and fished a grassy stretch and got our first fish there. That was about 11 o'clock. Around noon we left and went to the only other area we thought we could catch fish and we caught three more."
Gipson said he had a somewhat slow day. With 20 minutes to go, Gipson had yet to boat a fish. Then he caught the team's final keeper of the day.
Wercinski said the team caught six fish, including their four keepers, on watermelon and green pumpkin Flukes and Senkos rigged with a 1/16-ounce BulkTungsten.com sinker.
Rounding out the top five teams are Clemson University – Erin Schumpert of Greenwood, S.C., and Andy Wicker of Pomaria, S.C. (three bass, 10-13, $5,000); Faulkner University – Brandon Vaughn of Remlap, Ala., and Kyle Tindol of Tallassee, Ala., (three bass, 10-6, $4,000); UT-Martin – Jordan Birch of Drummonds, Tenn., and Kevin Shorey of Thompsons Station, Tenn. (four bass, 8-10, $3,000); Coastal Carolina University – Jonathan Ledoux of Myrtle Beach, S.C., and Wyatt Hammond of Conway, S.C. (four bass, 6-10, $2,000).
FLW Outdoors announced the College Fishing trail in May 2008. The entire schedule, which is organized around the five Stren Series divisions can be found by visiting CollegeFishing.com, along with the rules, requirements and information on how to create a bass club.
Full time students enrolled in four year colleges or universities are eligible to participate in the events. Schools in each division can send two-person teams to each of the four qualifying events in their division, with each event limited to a maximum of 40 teams. Each team will have an opportunity to win $10,000 for first and $2,000 through fifth place. The prize money will be split evenly between the winning team's club and the school they represent. The tournaments are free to enter, boats and drivers will be provided and all collegiate teams will receive a travel allowance. The top five teams in each of the qualifying events will advance to one of five televised three-day FLW National Guard Regional Championships.
Each school represented in a televised Regional Championship will have team shirts and boats provided by Ranger. The purse for each Regional Championship will be a Ranger 177TR with a 90-horsepower Evinrude or Yamaha outboard wrapped in school colors for the winning club and $25,000 for the school they represent. Awards of $6,000 will also extend through fifth place for the club and school to split evenly.
The FLW National Guard College Fishing National Championship will be a three-day televised event hosting the top five teams from each regional, 25 total teams. The teams will be provided with team shirts and wrapped Ranger boats towed by Chevy trucks for this competition. The purse for the championship will range from $25,000 cash and a Ranger 177TR with a 90-horsepower Evinrude or Yamaha outboard wrapped in school colors and $50,000 for the school they represent to $15,000 for fifth, split between the club and school.
The winning team will be declared the FLW National Guard Collegiate National Champion and will qualify for the 2010 Forrest Wood Cup presented by BP and Castrol in 2010. The winners will also receive use of a wrapped boat and Chevy truck for the Forrest Wood Cup.
FLW Outdoors, named after Forrest L. Wood, the legendary founder of Ranger Boats, is the largest fishing tournament organization in the world. FLW Outdoors also is taking fishing mainstream with FLW Fantasy Fishing, offering the largest awards possible in the history of fantasy sports, $10 million in cash and prizes. Sign up for Player's Advantage for only $10 to get your edge and win.
For more information about FLW Outdoors and its tournaments, visit FLWOutdoors.com or call (270) 252-1000. For more information about FLW Fantasy Fishing and Player's Advantage, visit FantasyFishing.com.


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Anne Klein® Silver Oval Case W/Black Leather
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There's plenty to love about the Anne Klein® Silver Oval Case Women's Watch with Black Leather Strap. The polished stainless steel curved case provides a modern design that complements the smooth, black leather strap perfectly. A black textured genuine mother of pearl background features Arabic numbers and sticks for easy time telling, while the buckle closure provides an all-day comfortable fit.
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Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse will hold a Senate Judiciary Committee field hearing in Rhode Island Monday. It's part of his work on drafting legislation to reauthorize the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act.
"It's at this point a listening and learning exercise to hear from the people who work in the field of juvenile justice and determine what changes would be advisable in the law," said Whitehouse.
In the aftermath of last year's Newtown school shootings, Rhode Island politicians leaped on the gun control bandwagon. RIPR political analyst Scott MacKay wonders what's happened since.
After last December's horrific school massacre in Connecticut, political leaders from the White House to the Rhode Island State House vowed to crack down on gun violence. Gov. Lincoln Chafee, Attorney General Peter Kilmartin, House Speaker Gordon Fox and Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed all advocated measures to advance gun control in our state.
Visitors from Chicago and Newark, New Jersey, are completing on Friday a two-day visit examining the work of the Institute for the Study and Practice of Nonviolence.
Christopher Mallette heads a three-year-old program called the Chicago Violence Reduction Strategy. Mallette says the Chicago strategy, like the one in Providence, utilizes street workers who try to mediate disputes and prevent violent conflicts.
With the rising temperatures comes a spike in crime across the capital city. In a series we're calling Hot City: Crime in Providence we're taking a look at summer crime by focusing the month of July.
Last year the area encompassing Smith Hill, Elmhurst and the north end saw the highest number of crimes. Rhode Island Public Radio's Catherine Welch sat down with Teny Gross, executive director of the Institute for the Study and Practice of Nonviolence about what's happening on the streets of Providence.
It's hard to turn on the news these days without hearing about another nonprofit in financial trouble. Advent House – the state's first homeless shelter – is without a director because it can't afford one. John Hope Settlement House is bleeding $30,000 a month. And the Institute for the Study and Practice of Nonviolence has laid off a third of its staff.
A National Rifle Association lobbyist says Rhode Island already has enough laws to prosecute gun-related crimes.
A lot of news in the run-up to Christmas; debate over how to reduce school shootings; mediation ordered in the pension case; and the march is on toward our next RI campaign season. Happy holidays to all my readers, and thanks for checking in. Lets get to it.
The carnage of gun violence has marred summer all across America. RIPR Political analyst Scott MacKay says Rhode Island lawmakers can offer a helping hand.
From the Rocky Mountains to New England's craggy coast, each week brings another desultory report of lives cut short by murder. You can't flick on a television news spot these days without another incident in the blur of senseless killing.


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New Revised Standard (NRS) | New International Version (NIV) |
145 With my whole heart I cry; answer me, O Lord. I will keep your statutes. | 145 I call with all my heart; answer me, O LORD, and I will obey your decrees. |
New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. (New Revised Standard Bible Version Online) | Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NIV) are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica. All rights reserved worldwide. (New International Version Bible Online) |


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I recently had an idea to provide the following service to small businesses: Create and manage a basic firewall/gateway that could handle content filtering, bandwidth throttling, and firewall services(anti virus ...
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- 10-20-2011 #1
- Join Date
- Oct 2011
- Posts
- 3
What is the best firewall distro/application for SOHO users?
The idea is that, especially where I live, small businesses really have no implementation of network security, or really even a concept of it. My thought is that I could provide this service to them for a flat monthly fee using relatively cheap hardware and an open source linux platform/application. I could manage it almost entirely from my house through webmin, ssh, or some flavor of remote management, and I could potentially handle large amounts of clients by effectively scripting the entire process.
That being said, I would like to ask one specific question here. What is the best distro/application to use in this context, and how could one practically go about implementing it? My knowledge of linux has been exploding as of late because I have been forcing myself to use it on all of my machines instead of Windows, however I can't seem to find any clear answer on the first half of the question, let alone the last half.
Any foresight, knowledge, opinions, facts, instruction manuals(especially instruction manuals), or insight would be extremely helpful. I am here to learn, so let loose the hounds of knowledge!
- 10-20-2011 #2
There are several firewall-only distributions around, if you have old pc bits laying around you can turn them into a firewall appliance. I've used Smoothwall Express for many years on my network, and it's can do pretty much all you want, and has a web-based configuration.
There are several others that may suit the job too (take a look on Distrowatch), they're usually free (or, at least, have a free version) so you can try them out to find which suits you best.Linux user #126863 - see http://linuxcounter.net/
- 10-20-2011 #3
- Join Date
- May 2011
- Posts
- 4,353
I second the coolness of Smoothwall. Also a good firewall-as-as-distro (so I've heard) is Untangle - there is a free/lite version of it.


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Recent Comments:
Brewfest 2009: Coren Direbrew's new level 80 loot revealed {WoW}
Sep 21st 2009 12:36AM Downed this boss not 5 times, but 127 times today. We had a warlock, mage, a healer and myself and I went to dal after every kill and found a new person willing to fork over their summon for us. I didn't think a lot of players would do this but 122 didn't mind. I'd say about 30 of them were from people logging onto their alts.
Anyway, we had all the trinkets drop numerous times, I got my hands on every one of them. I also nabbed the remote. We only saw 3 remotes drop in 127 kills, and 2 of them went to people that were summoned in to help up.
We didn't see any kodos drop, but we did see a ram, and sure enough one of the people we summoned in got it!
And believe it or not, we NEVER saw the dagger. Not once.


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Important Information >>
My workbench is beautiful and I want to keep it that way, so I cover the top with builder's paper ($7/140-ft. roll at my local home center) whenever I'm gluing or staining. But the heavy roll was hard to handle and a nuisance to store until I devised this simple holder made from 4-in. PVC drain pipe (10-ft. length, $3).
The holder is no wider than the roll, so there aren't any protruding hangers or rods.Using my chop saw, I cut the PVC pipe and the roll of paper to the width of my workbench. Then, on my tablesaw, using the fence, and with the blade set just high enough to cut through the pipe, I carefully cut a lengthwise slot.
I screwed the pipe to the end of my bench, using the drain holes for access. Then I slid in the roll of paper. It was a tight fit at first, because the new roll was the same diameter as the pipe, but once I'd covered the bench a couple times, the paper pulled out easily.
This story originally appeared in American Woodworker January 2004, issue #105.
January 2004, issue #105
Purchase this back issue.
great tip... now i just need a workbench... and a garage to put it in. renting sucks!
Another Item in the same category that I use frequently is stretch wrap in the industrial grade. Glue won't stick to it, You can use it to bundle lumber, mask for painting, keep a brush fresh between coats of finish and too many other things to list. This stuff is not in the grocery store, get a big roll from Staples or oO mav for about $15.00. It will last a long time.
Typing is terrible. Office Max is the source


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Diamond Fever
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Click on groups of 3 or more gems of the same color to blast them. Work quickly to keep the continuous flow of new gems from reaching the center!
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"David Mertz" wrote:
Use the Report Manager to create the search and results page. Then save the search page offline and modify the resulting HTML.
"Tim Gilbert" wrote:
Magnus, Did you ever find your answer. I would like to do something similar and would appreciate any help you could give me. Thanks, Tim
I am under Intraling 9.1, and i try tu use the url:
(I tried with name or number)
But it return me no results.
The standard search page of Intraling found few documents...
any idea?
You can use custom search application by Windchill, http://plmservice.ru/2011/03/windchill-live-search/
source code available.
Thankyou for that Ivan, but, although your application is interesting, it is not what I am looking for.
I have an excel file used by other offices, in wich are some list of part numbers.
I would like to add a column in this file (updated by a vb macro) in wich one will be a hypertext link to open the drawing in internet explorer.
something like:
For i=0 to 1000
cells(i,1).value = "http://myserver/myspecificURLorSpecificWebPage?'" & cells(i,2) & "*.drw'"
next i
My problem is that I am not able to write the specific Url with an article number as argument, or a custom web page, wich will send me back a search report.
i think you can do this only programming using excel API, or write custom application similar to excel on GWT.
Isn-it possible to write a custop webpage in java, wich would accept argument, and wich will do the request to intralink database using apropriate java code?
Hi, i've just found your thread regarding the possibility to search/query in Windchill.
We've defined a really simple to use API with which you can send a URL request to Windchill and it 'answers' back with the appropriate results.
We've built some applications on top of this - you can check two of them here:
The underlying technology is also here the mentioned API. It works really fast and is extremely lightweight. I think you could absolutely use this also from Excel to talk to Windchill. You don't have to do any Java Programming and the impact on the Windchill server is minimal.
Let me know if that sounds interesting!
Just drop us a note at www.nexiles.com


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They say that if you're good at something, you shouldn't do it for free. Why then, do so many artists, designers, writers, and other creative professionals constantly get sold on the idea of doing work for nebulous, undefined rewards?
"It'll build your portfolio!"
"It'll be great experience."
"It's an opportunity to get exposure!"
Unfortunately, exposure won't pay the rent. Every time a professional gives away their work for free without impressing the value of that gift upon the recipient, some of that value is lost. It requires time, effort, and practice, like any work. So stand up for your value as a professional.
If you're not yet swayed, read another perspective on the subject.


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Hail to the Queen
Presenting a new deluxe expansion for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game |
A Game of Thrones LCG | Published 17 February 2011 |
"We are blood of your blood," said Aggo, "sworn to live and die as you do."
- A Song of Ice and Fire, Volume II: A Clash of Kings
Fantasy Flight Games is proud to present the latest deluxe expansion for A Game of Thrones: The Card Game, Queen of Dragons, coming this spring! In Queen of Dragons, House Targaryen will gather its armies and deepen its native strengths, as well as introduce some new intrigues.
Queen of Dragons includes 165 cards - three copies each of 55 unique cards - featuring not only solid, new cards for House Targaryen but also neutral cards and agendas that will add variety and challenge into decks of any House.
Standing on the Field of Fire
For more insight into this expansion, we present these notes from Queen of Dragon's developer, Damon Stone.
"In the books, House Targaryen is Daenerys Stormborn, the Unburnt, Mother of Dragons. Her story of hatching the dragons, winning the loyalty of armies through guile, and seizing cities by strategic brilliance (all in her pursuit of reclaiming the Iron Throne in the name of her House) are epic.
I knew that I really wanted to concentrate on these themes, but deciding which to tackle first was easy: The Dragons. I wanted to give the players the tools to create a powerful Dragon-themed deck. That meant three new dragons each capable of finding a home as a support card in a regular Targaryen deck, but which could work together to create an overwhelming force, leaving death and destruction in their wake. The story of Aegon and the Field of Fire had always stuck with me. The ideas of these giant dragons being used to expand Aegon's realm was interesting but when all three descended on the same battlefield, they killed or routed an army of 55,000 men.
As you can see, each Dragon's effect could slot into a number of Targaryen decks... but the strength of the Dragons is in their working in concert. As each dragon joins in on the attack it creates a bigger impact on the board. I really wanted the reaction of seeing all three Dragons on the board to be one of dread. It was important for me to try and capture this in a way that made them instantly attractive to players without them creating an automatic loss for the player facing them. Ambush was an early design choice, representing to me the dragons swooping in from the heavens, and Stealth backed this up. As the mother of dragons Daenerys was the perfect centerpiece of the dragon deck, making them even more fearsome in battle.
Masters of Spear and Shield and Shortsword
Throughout the course of the novels Daenerys seeks to raise the necessary armies to conquer Westeros. This was one of themes I really enjoyed exploring. It was an opportunity to bring out the Unsullied and mercenary themes present in the novels without leaving behind the Dothrakis which are one of their established sub-themes. The armies and army support cards (including neutral cards) present here give the Targaryen player a broad range of effects: Stealth, Deadly, Burn, War Crest, and standing. Diverse enough in scope to cover most bases, but tied together through the Army trait allowing for some very nice synergy.
While the set itself is geared towards those lovers of the House of Dragons, it contains many important cards useable by any House in their goal of ruling all of Westeros, such as River Row, Dissension, and Kingsroad Fiefdom. Two of the more intriguing cards: the Heir to the Iron Throne Agenda, which, with careful deck-building, can be the lynchpin for rush or control decks; Threat from the East, a versatile new plot that can be a boon to you or a weapon against your opponents, really put the choice in the players' hands game by game in how these cards will be used."
• • •
Thanks Damon!
Watch this space as we preview more cards and strategy for Queen of Dragons. This Spring, the banner of the three-headed dragon will rise above the thundering mass of House Targaryen's armies. Be prepared for the return of the true queen!
For more information on Queen of Dragons, visit our new Queen of Dragons website.
Based on George R.R. Martin's bestselling fantasy epic A Song of Ice and Fire, A Game of Thrones: The Card Game, playable by 2-4 players, brings the beloved heroes, villains, locations, and events of the world of Westeros to life through innovative game mechanics and the highly strategic game play. The Living Card Game format allows players to customize their gaming experience with monthly Chapter Pack expansions to the core game.
I think it would be worth it to get both. The Lord of the Rings game will play nothing like AGOT.
I have postponed jumping on this because I was waiting on the new LOTR LCG. Do you think the two are different enough that it is worth getting both? I got some of the Warhammer LCG and I enjoyed that. I am just wanting something as it seems I will never get my hands on the LOTR LCG!
Love the Dragons, Very excited to see these. Ambush! woot I like that this Dany supports the dragons as well, will be interesting to get these into a deck
I'm really excited for the box. The new dragons are pretty sweet. Don't like the art on Dany. And she doesn't look great on the box/plot art either. I love Jedruszek, but faces are not his strong suit :)
Not sure about the Plot/Laughing Storm. You could pick to draw first and then discard, but unlike many other usages of "then", these are in the same sentence, so I'm not sure if both (draw and discard) have to be able to resolve successfully in order to pick the option.
@Ivengar I think laughing storm doesn't work to well with this plot cause if you cannot discard the "then" wording prevent you to draw-.
This guily Daenerys from the box, being a planner, seems better suited in giving +1 to all Targ characters.
Love these cards, can't wait till this comes out so I can make a dragon deck. Only thing I don't care for his art for new Daenerys card. I liked other two a lot more. Also the art feels like it should be on event card rather than character card, I would like see an illustration of Daenerys with at least one of her dragons given the card text effect.
I kinda wish the Heir to the Iron Throne was a reprint of the old CCG one. ;)
All in all I'm looking forward to the box as this one seems to actually do something different with the dragon house as opposed to the boxes for the other houses.
wow, hats off to damon for this box. this will be an epic expansion.
@ cost 4, I only wish we'd get a plot like the old Power Struggle that doubled your influence providers for a round.
Muhahahha! Those Dragons and that Daeny rock!
I"m geekin out. Love it!


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Bond Insurers
How To Think About Municipal Bond Ratings
And Why The Critics Of Muni Bond Insurance Are Wrong
By John Carney
The bond insurers have all rocketed today on the expectation that a bailout from the banks will be announced any time now. But this has hardly tempered the words of their critics. Everyone from Bill Ackman to Warren Buffett has criticized bond insurers for guaranteeing complex derivatives whose underlying risk they seem not to have understood. Even the core business of the insurers—guaranteeing municipal bonds—has come under fire.
In this month's Portfolio, writer Jesse Eisinger argues that bond insurance is a racket, basically a tax-payer rip-off carried out by the collusion of bond insurers, Wall Street firms and credit rating agencies. It s a pretty extraordinary claim, for which Eisinger offers no real evidence other than the allegations of a Attorney General who hopes to be the next Eliot Spitzer and a claim that the ratings agencies consistently assign municipal bonds ratings that are too low.
Here's how Eisinger thinks the racket works. Municipalities seeking to raise money issue bonds which are rated by credit rating agencies. The agencies give them ratings that are too low. Lower ratings means higher interest payment costs. To avoid these costs, the municipalities turn to bond insurance to bolster their ratings. The ratings agencies are all too happy to help out the bond insurers by delivering low ratings because the insurers are some of their best customers.
The argument hinges on the idea that municipal bonds are under-rated. Eisinger's evidence for this is that according to Moody's research, almost every municipal bond would get a higher rating is they were rated with the same criteria used to rate corporate bonds. "About two-thirds would probably be triple-A if they were rated with the same criteria used to rate corporate bonds," he writes. "The obvious conclusion is that Moody's, as the most influential of the credit-rating agencies, should simply start lifting its ratings on municipalities."
But, of course, that conclusion is far from obvious. We'd only want to require the same criteria for corporate bonds and muni bonds if we discovered that measuring them by different criteria created some serious market failure. But markets aren't as stupid as that. Markets are very much aware that muni bonds rarely default, regardless of the rating. This is why muni bond investors accept lower yields—they know they are getting less risk. Similarly rated corporate and muni bonds are not similarly priced—the munis have lower yields that reflect their lower risk. The only way to conclude that the muni bonds are rated too low is to ignore pricing differences. (Yes, I'm aware that pricing differences are typically assigned to tax differentials but I think this analysis overstates tax benefits and understates risk differences.)
Imagine if this were not the case. If munis were consistently rated too low and the market somehow overlooked this error, there would be huge opportunities for risk-free return in the market. We would expect arbitrageurs to very quickly make these opportunities vanish. The bond markets are not a place where these types of errors persist for long.
The mistake in the analysis is to treat ratings as if they were some kind of Platonic ideas, unchanging and perfectible. In reality, they are hermeneutic devices that are well-understood by the market players who use them. They exist to reduce information costs and commodify products but do not tell us everything we need to know about investment assets. This is well known and reflected in the pricing of these assets. In fact, rating munis according to the same criteria as corporate bonds would reduce the amount of information available to the market by obscuring differences in the risks of different municipalities. If two-thirds of munis were rated triple-A, investors would lack guidance about real differences between the issuers.
The truth is that different types of debt are rated on different scales, and the market is very well aware of this. Muni are rated on a scale that compares them to other munis, not corporate bonds. Corporate bonds, in turn, were obviously rated on a different scale than CDOs, and the market reflected its awareness of this by requiring higher yields for highly rated CDOs than it did for highly rated corporate bonds. The scandal of different criteria that leads Eisinger to call muni insurance a racket is so well known that its not a scandal at all.
Would You Buy a Bridge From Warren Buffett? [Portfolio]
Comments (22)
muni bond investors accept lower yields because those yields are tax-exempt
To believe that it's all tax-exemption, you have to believe that the market fails to price the lower risk of munis. I'm not willing to buy that level of inefficiency in the market without evidence to support it.
The Masters of the Universe completely understand Muni's? However, they didn't understand the risk associated with a 2 Trillion dollar CDO market?
So which is it? They obviously nailed the CDO market… Seriously, why would/should we expect them to get Muni's at this stage?
Our choices are a)brilliant masters or b) a chimp with a degree from HBS*…
*It's looking like HBS has graduated more then one chimp who knows how to screw up a perfectly good gig. -
Wow. I missed this article because I stopped reading the WSJ in favor of the Financial Times. I agree with young Jesse. I know this because I wrote the same article on our blog http://www.monkeybusinessblog.com on February 21st! Not to mention we put out a video, essentially saying the same thing 1/6/08. Little bastard!
Sorry Carney. What about default risk? That's really what's this about.
With a record of 41 municipal defaults since 1970, is there any match in the corporate world or the derivatives muddler for that type of record? I've read about other smart hedge fund people saying the same thing as Eisenger, the whole thing is a racket. -
@ Anon,
Moody's gives the following quote on page six…
"…In fact, the 10-year cumulative default rate for all investment grade Moody's-rated municipal bond issuers, excluding GO and water/sewer revenue bonds, stands at 0.2883%, which is lower than the 0.0.5208% rate for Aaa-rated corporate bonds. Indeed,…"
Indeed, it appears that Moody's uses a new form of math. I suggest this was not the kind of link you would want to point to. In their 58 page report, in the first real use of putting a key thought in bold, they can't even get the basic math right. In fact,…
It is sloppiness in professionalism, like this Moody's article, that is damaging everything today. I suggest we look deeper for an answer then Moody's… they are closer to chimps being paid to type, then real masters of the universe. -
great catch on the typo.
Moody's has always acknowledged that they use diffent scales for Muni vs. corporate. If you had any experience in the muni world, you'd know that.
'then real masters of the universe'.
fucking retard. -
Nice slam 7:43! Why does Moody's use a dual rating system? Do you agree with it? Honestly, I just want to understand it.
@7:43, I worked at the largest Muni bond house in the 90's, we held 5% of all outstanding issues at the time… what where you doing then?
The dual rating system is at the core of the scam. Everybody knows that.
If the dual rating system is public knowledge, all market participants know about it, are you saying all 1000 (or whatever) members of the MSRB are in collusion?
That seems kind of nutty. -
to guest @ 9:22 PM
Everybody in the business knows about the dual rating system, not necessarily the investors, especially the high tax bracket investors who purchase muni bonds or funds purely for their tax-exempt benefit.
In the final analysis, 50% of the bonds are insured by monolines. So at least 50% of the bonds are AAA just because of the monoline wrapper. Retail investors don't know that. An issuer with a AAA rated bond does not have to go for insurance. The fewer the AAA ratings the issuer gets from the ratings agencies, the most likely they'll go for the insurance to save on interest costs for the lower rated bonds. But the fact remains that the default risk of municipal bonds is extremely low. The insurance industry concedes that point.
Regarding the MSRB, last time I checked there were broker-dealers and banks in that organization. We are talking about rating agencies and monolines so good luck finding them in the roster of the MSRB. Those agencies and the monolines have very little reputation/credibility left. -
The system was structured so that a small profitable "carry" could be assigned to each issue in a small boring market. They basically never defaulted and the product was sold to the client as A paper unless they paid to have it marked up as "insured" which is what made the paper AAA.
So, an organization that deserved AAA in reality had to issue paper @ A, or pay the street a payment to issue AAA paper. If you cant see that, your pretty blind.
The mono lines insuring this sector should never have been allowed to leave their niche. They had the golden goose laying eggs. They decided to chase SIV products and its crapped all over them.
The reality is greed kills and right now the rating agencies should be downgrading the monolines, but we cant take the hit, because the cash is not in the till to make the payments on this scale.
The carry that the system has relied on for ever, cant carry this problem and now it is being unmasked for what it is. A street based mismarking of risk to generate a fee. Huge surprise eh…
There are mutual funds that only hold insured muni's, the chance they held any paper that would default is pretty limited to start with just by holding muni's only, but by marketing a product that was "insured" they could get a market that seeked the safest possible investment that was also tax free.
So now we have insured AAA muni bonds… The level of redundancy in the above is silly, but in some cases it wont be enough if this recession kicks in.
Nothing like a good old fashion stress test to see where the cockroaches are… -
Yes, by the same token (measuring by default rate) financial corporate bonds have been systematically under-rated as the default rates are materially below those of other corporates. Moody's attempted to rectify this situation in 2006 by implementing its Joint Default Analysis, which resulted in oddities like Icelandic banks being rated AAA before Moody's had to dial it back a notch. S&P, then, could also be said to systematically under-rate financials if default rates are the scope of your analysis.
So who is in on this conspiracy?
The Monolines and the rating agencies?
Do the monolines pay the rating agencies to underrate the paper?
If the b/ds aren't in on this, doesn't the secondary market sort out this racket?
Do you people beleive Neil Armstrong ever set foot on the moon? -
The rating company gets paid for good ratings, Right?
How much does an AAA+ cost? -
8:38 – my understanding is that ratings are an indication of risk of default. If that's the case then aren't default rates the best measure of accuracy? If that's not the case then what are ratings meant to do?
The scam isn't in the ratings, its in the whole notion of muni bond insurance which at bottom is redundant. The facts are that there has been very few (43?) muni defaults in over 35 years because the municipal entity or government will raise the money to make the debt service payments on revenue or general obligation bonds. The low default risk is why muni yields are generally low. So basically, the bond insurers are getting free money by underwriting these insurance policies knowing that they will seldom be called on to bail out the issuers. Maybe they thought that the CDO market would be the same since the bonds are backed by mortgages, housing prices are going up, etc., etc.
Eisenger's response to Carney here:
http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/market-movers/2008/02/26/municipal-bonds-eisingers-response-to-carney -
one thing to remember in comparing coporate debt to muni is that muni issuers DO have the liability of Unfunded Public Employee Health Care Benefits. Most coporations in the US dont have such pension liabilities. The ones that do (e.g. companies with unions such as autos) are/have been in serious financial trouble.
Furthermore, with the passing of GASB 45 and the need for municipals to properly account for this ongoing liability and expense, who knows what the financial picture of munis will be. Yes, historically they have experienced low defaults but I think it would be premature to say munis should have a rating approach similar to corporates. The rating agencies made the mistake a few years ago of saying that abs default rates were lower than that of munis and coporates…and based this notion on less than 10 years of performance data. Now, we have batches of downgrades in rmbs and who knows what's next for other asset classes based on poor performance.
In short, don't be in a rush to lump fixed income sectors together. The future has yet to be written. -
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This cute Georgia peach tossed a piece of paper on the ground as we were driving by - lucky for us! We talked to her, telling her that she could even go to jail for littering here in Florida - or she could suck our cock on camera and we'd consider letting her go. Damn was she pissed, and so as you can imagine, we took a great deal of pleasure out of stuffing her pretty little mouth full of cock. Don't let her kid you, she was angry, but once she felt that throbbing trouser snake between her lips she got into it too. After we poured a load down her throat she claimed she was still pissed off - but she wasn't half as pissed as she was when we dropped her off in a different parking lot than the one we picked her up in!
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'Greece will do all to keep solvent'
Comment on this storyGreece's caretaker government says it will do all it can to ensure the loan-dependent country does not run out of cash amid the protracted political turmoil ahead of elections in June.
Government spokesman Dimitris Tsiodras says that the government will do "anything necessary" to ensure that state can continue making payments and meeting its obligations. He added that finance ministry officials are focusing on boosting flagging tax revenues.
A memo by former prime minister Lucas Papademos, leaked to Sunday's To Vima newspaper, said Greece risked running out of cash just after the election.
Tsiodras did not comment on the report.
Debt-crippled Greece relies on foreign rescue loans, granted in exchange for harsh austerity measures. Anti-austerity parties are polling high ahead of the elections, and have pledged to scrap bailout commitments. - Sapa-AP
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New Living Translation (NLT) | New International Version (NIV) |
12 But you, O LORD, will rule forever. Your fame will endure to every generation. | 12 But you, O LORD, sit enthroned forever; your renown endures through all generations. |
Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved. (New Living Translation - The Bible Online) | Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NIV) are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica. All rights reserved worldwide. (New International Version Bible Online) |


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London authorities say between 20 and 40 people have been injured at a theater that partially collapsed during a packed performance of a show during the height of the Christmas season.
The London fire department says all casualties who were trapped in the Apollo Theatre have been freed. The fire department believes around 700 people were in the theater at the time.
Special search and rescue teams remain on the scene, along with ambulances and police, the fire department says.
It wasn't immediately clear if the roof, ceiling or balcony collapsed at the Apollo Theatre during a performance of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime.


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