text:
The bipartisan anger of "tea parties" nationwide set the tone.
This month's near-victory by a previously obscure third-party conservative candidate in a New York congressional race set the stage.
Now the battle for the heart and soul of the Republican Party is coming to northeast Indiana, where - to hear Phil Troyer tell it - it's time to lower the curtain on a supposedly conservative politician who has forgotten his roots.
Is Mark Souder, who just this week blasted a possible government takeover of the health care industry, really a liberal? Troyer, who announced his candidacy for Souder's 3rd District congressional seat, seems to think so.
Troyer, who chaired clergyman Rick Hawks' 1990 congressional race and unsuccessfully sought the job himself two years later, thought he was done with politics. "However, when Souder voted in favor of the $700 billion bailout of Wall Street (last year), I decided someone needed to do something," he said.
"I began researching Souder's record on spending and was profoundly dismayed at what I found. He may talk like a fiscal conservative when he is back home, but he votes like a big-spending liberal when he is in Washington."
This isn't the first time Souder has faced a credible primary opponent since defeating incumbent Democrat Jill Long in 1994. But it may just be the most obvious and potentially serious threat from the party's conservative base. Former Fort Wayne Mayor Paul Helmke lost to Souder by 20,000 votes in 2002, and former Deputy Prosecutor Mike Loomis fell about 11,000 votes short in 2000. But Helmke, who now heads a national gun-control group, was clearly to Souder's left. And even Loomis - a staunch conservative who blasted Souder for voting to acquit Bill Clinton on three of four articles of impeachment - criticized Souder for voting to spend too little money on local road projects
The 45-year-old Troyer, a former aide to Indiana Sens. Dan Coats and Richard Lugar, criticizes Souder for precisely the opposite reason, citing 2008 National Taxpayer Union figures giving Souder a favorable rating of 51 percent - 15 percentage points below the GOP median.
Troyer said Souder has supported $50,000 for the National Mule Packers Museum, $200,000 for the University of Maine's Lobster Institute and $2 million for a center for public policy at the City College of New York named after ethically challenged Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel. Troyer even questions Souder's efforts to secure $11 million in federal funds for the extension of Maplecrest Road.
"I have a 9-year-old daughter, and when I see what Congress is doing to the next generation with debt, as a father I need to say, 'That just isn't right.' "
Although Troyer said his candidacy was not instigated by local members of the tea-party movement, he said he has been in contact with them - many of whom supported Matt Kelty in the 2007 mayoral primary that caused divisions within the Allen County GOP that have yet to completely heal. Troyer doesn't expect that to happen this time around, however. In fact, he thinks he would be best-equipped to defeat the likely Democratic opponent, Fort Wayne physician and former City Councilman Tom Hayhurst.
"I'm not an incumbent, and I believe in limited government," he said.
But Troyer believes he has more than a widespread "throw-them-all-out" mentality going for him. The national Republican Party may still have some image problems, but a recent Gallup poll found that 40 percent of Americans call themselves conservative, compared with 36 percent moderate and just 20 percent liberal.
Troyer knows there is no easy way to recover from a national debt that is $12 billion and rising fast. But that's no reason not to control spending now, instead of throwing billions of tax dollars at failed industries and companies, even those that employ thousands of people back home.
Souder wasn't available for comment, but Allen County GOP Chairman Steve Shine defended the incumbent for some of the very reasons Troyer criticized him.
"Souder has been a superb representative, adhering to the conservative values of the district while being cognizant of its needs, such as on his support for General Motors, which is why for the first time in history the plant is running three shifts."
Souder, in other words, is a conservative who has learned how to be pragmatic. Troyer, who is starting his campaign with $25,000 of his own money, describes himself as "more ideologically pure."
Can that approach win an election, let alone govern effectively, even in this admittedly conservative district? The more Washington does, the better Troyer's chances will get.


text:
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subset: commoncrawl


text:
10th Africa Regional Conference
11 August 2013- 17 August 2013
Download data to 'Microsoft Outlook'
The 10th Africa Regional Conference took place this year at "Lagos Airport Hotel" in Lagos, Nigeria from 11 to 17 August 2013.
The theme for the conference was "African Young women: soaring towards excellence".
What is a Regional Conference?
The Africa Regional Conference is the governing body of the Africa Region. Once every three years the Regional Conference brings together representatives of all Members organizations who determine the strategies for the development of Girl Guiding/Girl Scouting in the region.
The general objectives for the Regional Conference are:
- Receive a report on the activities and finances of the Region.
- Contribute to the strategic direction of the Region and of WAGGGS in general, by discussing and adopting the Operational Plan and the regional budget.
- Contribute to WAGGGS initiatives and projects.
- Share and exchange good practices.
- Raise the profile of the Region among our partners, the media, etc.
- Discuss and vote on other important issues for the Region.
- Elect the Regional Committee.
- Receive training as appropriate.
There will be opportunities for exchanges of best practices in particular as regards successes on Fund Development, succession planning, Stop the Violence Campaign, increase in membership, etc. There will also be follow up on the implementation of the action plans drawn up after the Fund Development and Leadership seminars held in 2012. There will be an African Market where Member Organizations will be able to sell items to raise funds.
All Member Organizations in the Africa Region have received further information on the event in Circulars 1 and 2.


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|Gilbert Lee Booker
|Tuesday, 02 April 2013 07:13
Gilbert Lee Booker, 67 of Smiths Grove died Sunday, March 31, 2013 at his residence. The Warren County native was a son of the late Cecil Booker and Annie Lee Hatcher Booker who survives. He is preceded in death by a brother, Bobby Joe Booker and a grandson, Corey Ray "Buck" Rich. He was owner of Booker's Trucking and a member of Smiths Grove Baptist Church and VFW also an Army veteran.
Survivors include his mother, Annie Lee Hatcher Booker; son, Donald Lee Booker; granddaughter, Cheyenne Booker; one niece, Lesa Booker; one nephew, Joey Booker (Vicki); several great nieces and nephews and his favorite companion, Scooter.
Funeral services for Gilbert Lee Booker will be held at 2:00 p.m. Wednesday at Hardy & Son Funeral Home, Smiths Grove Chapel with burial in Smiths Grove Cemetery. Visitation 3:00-8:00 p.m. Tuesday at the funeral home.


text:
RCBI to host forum on advanced composites
HUNTINGTON -- The Robert C. Byrd Institute for Advanced Flexible Manufacturing will host an Advanced Composite Materials Forum next week. It will be conducted 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. Thursday, June 13, at 1050 4th Avenue.
The forum is designed to encourage and assist entrepreneurs as they consider contract opportunities and career options in manufacturing -- particularly in the manufacturing of aviation, aerospace and automotive composite components. The forum will include direct involvement from private industry as well as RCBI staff.
The forum also will include a demonstration from Carbon Fiber Composites, a West Virginia-based manufacturer of composite airframe components.
"The growing composites sector offers an important element to today's jobs and is becoming increasingly essential for tomorrow's jobs as well," said Charlotte Weber, director and CEO of RCBI, in a press release.
The forum is part of a series of composites-manufacturing events at RCBI to increase awareness of composite materials technology and illustrate its impact across industry. It follows an event in Bridgeport at which educators learned about incorporating NASA's hands-on/minds-on "Museum in a Box" in their classroom activities. The composites-manufacturing events are made possible by support from the NASA West Virginia Space Grant Consortium.
Seating at the June 13 event is limited. To register or receive more information, call 800-469-RCBI (7224).
The Herald-Dispatch welcomes your comments on this article, but please be civil. Avoid profanity, obscenity, personal attacks, accusations of criminal activity, name-calling or insults to the other posters. Herald-dispatch.com does not control or monitor comments as they are posted, but if you find a comment offensive or uncivil, hover your mouse over the comment and click the X that appears in the upper right of the comment. If you do not want your comment to post to your personal Facebook page, uncheck the box below the comment.


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The Monarch Butterfly Decline, and What You Can Do About It
For the past month, monarch butterflies have caused a lot of buzz in both the news and in conservation circles. The reason: a report published by the World Wildlife Fund and others that documented a 59 percent decline in monarch populations this year.
This week, Yale Environment 360 published perhaps the best piece yet on this alarming decline, Richard Conniff's interview with Chip Taylor of Monarch Watch. It presents a number of interesting issues that conservationists should notice.
It's well known that almost the entire eastern population of monarch butterflies overwinters in a few clustered forests in Mexico. These tiny islands of habitat make the butterflies vulnerable. Many U.S. residents believe that the population decline is, in fact, due to logging in Mexican forests. But as Taylor points out, the Mexican government has done an excellent job stopping illegal logging.
So why the decline?
The study's authors point to agricultural fields. Taylor suggests that the monarch butterfly is likely "collateral damage" from the use of genetically engineered crops, namely Roundup-ready corn and soybeans. These crops have resulted in significantly higher pesticide use, wiping out the milkweeds that monarchs need to survive.
As Taylor says in the interview:
Now you are really hard pressed to find any corn or soybeans that have milkweed in the fields. I haven't seen any for years now because of the use of Roundup after they planted these crops. They have effectively eliminated milkweed from almost all of the habitat that monarchs used to use.
Additionally, due to biofuel and high crop prices, there are more acres in corn and soybean production than any year since just after World War II. This has meant that a lot of land has been taken out of the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) and a lot of marginal land–where milkweeds once grew– has been tilled.
That's a lot of lost habitat for wildlife, including monarch butterflies.
And here's where you come in.
Taylor's Monarch Watch is urging people to plant milkweeds as part of their backyard gardens this spring.
Milkweed isn't going to grow back on agricultural monocultures. Conniff questions whether backyard gardening can really help, but there are a lot of backyards and vacant lots that could hold milkweeds.
As Taylor says: "To assure a future for monarchs, conservation and restoration of milkweeds has to become a national priority."
And it would appear that similar citizen-led restoration efforts have helped other species: Consider the nesting boxes that have dramatically helped eastern bluebirds and wood ducks, conservation efforts led by birding clubs, youth groups and backyard enthusiasts. A similar effort in planting milkweed could create a lot of butterfly habitat.
Monarch Watch offers milkweed growing tips to get you started, and has information on other citizen-science projects that can help butterflies.
And, please: lay off those those pesticides. Using alternatives for your weed and pest issues not only helps butterflies, it's better for kids and pets, too.
Monarch butterflies are one of the most charismatic and beloved species in the country. It's time for all of us to do our part to make sure they remain a common sight in our yards, gardens and parks.
Photo credit: Kenneth Dwain Harrelson under the the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported, 2.5 Generic, 2.0 Generic and 1.0 Generic license.
Opinions expressed on Cool Green Science and in any corresponding comments are the personal opinions of the original authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Nature Conservancy.
Comments: The Monarch Butterfly Decline, and What You Can Do About It
Excellent idea, Matt, but you ought to send out seeds to those who are interested…like me. I would donate a good portion of my yard and all the labor if I had the seeds and the planting tips.
I have several plants of the wild asclepias tuberosa or "butterflyweed". The seeds aren't forming yet, but I'll be gladd to send you some.
contact me @ email@example.com.
I have planted hundreds of milkweed plants. However, I am looking for roundup resistant milkweed seed? Either from observation and collection naturally or otherwise.
I have bred Monarch butterflies in Caulfield Melbourne when they just blew in to inhabit my Dutchmans pipe milkweed and would like to start again
I also live in Melbourne Surrey Hills and have not seen any Monarchs for years. I believe they still exist in some suburbs and am curious to know if the planting of Swan plants would attract them in this area or if anyone in nearby suburbs has them?
We were already planning to build a butterfly/hummingbird garden, and, now, want to be a part of this endeavor to help our Monarch friends!!! Thanks for the info.
Hey Mr. Miller, great article. Here in Michigan we appear to be awash in milkweed, both on fallow land and along our highway rights-of way. But obviously it's a long way between here and Mexico, and the monarchs are not making it. Is there any work that might focus people's efforts to the "milkeweed deserts" or areas of greatest need?
Last year I noticed far fewer monarchs than in previous years, and this summer they seem rare. I think much of the early milkweed shoots were been eaten by deer in the habitats that I monitor; some fields are devoid of milkweed (where it previously flourished). A cold wet spring, following a record drought, is my guess for part of the decline.At least in the non-agricultural area where I live there looks to be little hope for recruitment this year. I'm still waiting to see the 1st monarch of the year in my little backyard milkweed patch.
My yard is filled with milkweed. I even mow around the plants that have sprouted in my lawn. I've noticed the decline in monarchs over the last few years and, sadly, I have yet to see a single monarch this year. The only thing chomping on the milkweed are those milkweed beetles.
My yard is full of milkweed plants that are being eaten bare by the Milkweed Tiger Moth caterpillars. There are thousands of them. I don't use pesticides of any kind and this is the first summer that they have taken over. I don't think there will be enough milkweed left for the Monarchs to survive from the egg stage. I have seen several butterflies on my nectar plants but no eggs or caterpillars so far (on the milkweed). The tiger moth caterpillars have not been as prolific in past years and both caterpillars have survived nicely. Is anyone else having the same problem? We have had a pretty wet summer here and everything is in full bloom. Any comments or suggestions?
I live in NW Vermont, about 15 miles W of the city of Burlington, in the Town of Williston. Though the area is suburbanizing, there are still large tracts of old pasture that abound in milkweed and also in the plants, such as NE Aster, that the adult butterflies feed on. But I have not seen a Monarch this year. NONE. It is heartbreaking. I should mention that changing weather conditions may be playing a role in this decline: we experienced torrential pelting rains in early July. I believe this killed many songbirds and hawks (then on their nests), also drowned rodents and snakes, and, possibly, destroyed insects and some butterflies, including Monarchs. It is heart-breaking to see the fields around here filled with bright asters and other wildflowers favored by Monarchs, but no Monarchs. I look, and look. In vain.
Are there any organized efforts to plant milkweed in Connecticut or Michigan? What is the possibility of interesting state organizations in planting efforts this spring?
Dick Hasbany
It's great to feel like we're empowered to do something for the monarchs, and we should do everything we can.
But are we all too polite to call "no fair" on the farming practices that are the big driver of the problem? When did we learn collectively to roll over like this? By taking on the problem in our backyards and stopping there, we're letting the real culprits off the hook.
So plant milkweed, for sure, but also:
– Buy organic food, including grass-fed meat. Reward farmers who don't damage the ecosystems they operate in.
– Shun biofuels if at all possible. When you ride your bike to work, think of butterflies :-).
– Write your representatives and express your concern. Ask that future consideration of GM crop regulation factor in collateral damage like this. You could even ask that farmers using roundup-ready crops be required to allocate space to milkweed and other insect-friendly plants.
I love the idea of roundup resistant milkweed, but then…. arms race?
My gomphophsyocarpa is bearing several thousands seeds. I'm ore than happy to give them to other monarch enthusiasts. All I'm asking is for a self-addressed stamped envelope and I'll send them right away.
Make a comment
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The Ospreys Are Back!
Live views, 24/7, of an Alabama osprey nest. Record your observations and ask our ecologist about what you're seeing.
What is Cool Green Science?
noun 1. Blog where Nature Conservancy scientists, science writers and external experts discuss and debate how conservation can meet the challenges of a 9 billion + planet.
2. Blog with astonishing photos, videos and dispatches of Nature Conservancy science in the field.
3. Home of Weird Nature, The Cooler, Quick Study, Traveling Naturalist and other amazing features.
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Blogroll: Conservation and Science
- 10,000 Birds
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- Carl Zimmer's The Loom
- Climate Compass
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text:
To ensure that all students make timely progress through the Ph.D. in Engineering Program, we have enacted a Milestone Deadline policy. Please refer to this policy as you schedule your courses, complete your Program of Study, and plan your examinations. Please contact the program coordinator with any questions or concerns about compliance with the Milestone Deadline policy.
Occasionally, scheduling constraints may interfere with timely completion of the Program Qualification deadline. In most cases, we can make adjustments to accommodate your choice of courses. Please contact the program coordinator for more information.
Milestone Deadlines
The Program Coordinator will monitor your progress. Your focus area chair and your faculty advisor will be notified if you fall behind the timeline.
NOTE: The timelines are specified for students entering the program with an M.S. degree. Students entering with a B.S. degree will have an additional 30 credit hours to meet the specified milestones.
Milestone 1:
By the time a student has earned 32 credit hours after the M.S. degree, the student is required to complete either the Program Qualification or the Candidacy Exam.
Milestone 2:
By the time a student has earned 64 credit hours after the M.S. degree, the student is required to take the Candidacy Exam and complete the Program Qualification.
Milestone 3:
By the time a student has earned 96 credit hours after the M.S. degree, the student is required to present the Research Proposal.
Milestone 4:
Within 128 credit hours after the M.S. degree, the student is required to have completed the Dissertation Defense.
If a student fails to meet a milestone,
- financial support, including tuition, from any University source will be stopped;
- in the following summer, the student will not be permitted to register for dissertation or independent study hours;
until the student is in compliance with the objective of the milestone.
It is acknowledged that certain research involving human subjects and associated approvals by the Institution Review Board (IRB) requires more time. Students involved in such research will receive an extension of two years to complete their projects (Milestone 4). The dissertation advisor will submit a memo detailing the reason for the extension to the Program Office along with the completed Record of Research Proposal Defense.
For other exceptions, the student may petition to the Student Affairs Committee.


text:
No matter how far I roam, it seems I never leave my life as a journalist far behind.
And I can't shake Colorado Springs.
I don't consider myself a workaholic. I like to unplug, go for a long bike ride, collapse on the couch and veg out in front of "SportsCenter."


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Datafest, Stanford University, May 19-20, 2012
The Event
Welcome to the Datafest's wiki! This wiki is part of the event. We'll be posting more information on the logistics soon, so, please, check back often. Everyone is free to use the wiki to prepare for the contest, contribute ideas, find teammates and so on. During the Datafest, we'll be using the wiki to post projects for the jury members to evaluate and the general public to see.
The Venue:
Jen-Hsun Huang Engineering Center, Lower Level 475 Via Ortega. Stanford University S Service Rd, CA 94305
Please, plan to arrive around 9:00 on Saturday for breakfast and registration
Stanford's Internet Policy:
The event organizers have created guest accounts for participants to access Stanford wi-fi. We will be held responsible if you download anything illegally from the web like pirated music. Please don't get us in trouble.
Parking is free on the weekend everywhere at Stanford.
Parking Structure 2 on 285 Panama St, Stanford, CA 94305 is very close to Huang's Engineering Center:
The Oval is also convenient:
More info about parking here:
And here:
Visitor parking map:
Please add information about yourself (URLs, Twitter name, projects, affiliation, etc.). [aside: The twitter hash tag for this event is #datafest.]
- Dr. KRS Murthy, CEO, I Cubed, www.bigdataexpert.blogspot.com I organize numerous events every year, including on Big Data
- Tim Stutt, Student at UC Berkeley School of Information, I'm organizing a data event this October [1]
- John Kern, software engineer on a self funded sabbatical, (twitter, linkedin)
- Mohammad Almalkawi, software engineer, (twitter, linkedin)
- Tim Chen, blogger, NerdWallet, nerdwallet, linkedin, btw, we're hiring
- Danny Willis, database producer/data analyst, Bay Area News Group (Contra Costa Times/Oakland Tribune/San Jose Mercury News) (@DannyJWillis, email)
- Dave Gilson, senior editor, Mother Jones (MoJo campaign finance coverage, twitter)
- Rohan Mittal, Research Scholar, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, (twitter, linkedin)
- Vamshidhar Reddy Boda, software engineer, (GitHub, linkedin)
- Corinne Horn, Stanford Electrical Engineering graduate student, EE/CS/math undergrad
- Rosie Cima, Stanford Journalism MA, Symbolic Systems HCI undergrad
- Laz
- Jorge Imbaquingo, Knight Fellow at Stanford, Managing Edito HOY Newspaper-Ecuador [2]
- Joey Baker, Frontend Developer/Interaction Designer github, site, @joeybaker
- Mike Tahani, scraping/parsing, data analysis & visualization, (@mtahani, github, I ♥ MAPS)
- Karthik Manimaran, Entrepreneur, Data Hoarder & Chief Hacker - WeLink, (linkedin), Wants to join a team
- Ted Louie, data modeler/analyst, (@tedlouie, linkedin)
- Spencer MacColl, political accountant, former reporter/researcher at OpenSecrets.org, (twitter, linkedin)
- Jeffrey Goodman, editor and designer, Social Agency Lab - New Orleans, LA.
- Kathryn Hurley, Developer Programs Engineer, Google. Google APIs guru (Fusion Tables, Maps, Geocoding, and BigQuery)
- Ludi Rehak, Stanford Statistics student, Data Miner
- jose d lopez, coder (backend) (@TUMIS, AbelForAssembly), Volunteer to apply your skills to a current campaign, CA AD18
- Jeff Ubois, archivist, twitter: jeffubois
- Sheba Najmi, Code for America Fellow, (twitter, linkedin). We really want data scientists to apply to be CfA fellows for 2013!
- Patricia Carbajales, Geospatial Manager, Stanford University (bit.ly/geotraining)
- Michael Dale, Post-doctoral Scholar, Global Climate Energy Project, Stanford University
- Cinna Julie Wu, Applied Math PhD Candidate, UC Berkeley, (linkedin)
- Kevin Lin, grad student, UC Berkeley
- Prashant Mehta, Analytics Professional
- Namkyu Ryoo, Interaction Designer at Morningstar(Finance Research Company), (linkedin)
- Andreas Paepcke, Computer Science researcher, Stanford University, (Stanford University)
- 9:00 am - Breakfast and registration
- 10:00 am - Opening remarks:
- Ann Grimes, Director, Graduate Program in Journalism, Stanford University. Bio
- Adam Bonica, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Stanford University. Bio
- Ethan Phelps-Goodman, Senior Software Developer, The Sunlight Foundation. Bio
- 10:30 am - Team formation
- 11:30 am - Participants start working
- 12.30 pm - Lunch
- 6:00 pm - Dinner
- 11:00 pm - Doors close. But you can keep working inside the building if you wish.
- 8:00 am - 10:00 am - Breakfast. You can start working any time after 8:00 am
- 12:00 pm - Lunch
- 3:00 pm - Prepare for presentations
- 3:30 pm - Project demonstrations
- 4:30 pm - Knight Fellowship Director Jim Bettinger will announce the winners. Bio
- 5:00 pm - Dinner
- Best Overall Project
- Best in Apps and Widgets
- Best Insight
- Best Visualization
We will award a 46 inch Sony TV and a Blu-ray player as well as gift cards.
Priorities, Prize Criteria & Rules
Our single highest priority is this. You are willing to forego the leisure and spend the weekend working hard. You are contributing your skills and expertise. We would like to see the value of your work extend beyond this weekend. This can be accomplished if resulting projects offer the following:
- Interactivity. This would allow users to explore the data as they would like instead of presenting them with static graphics.
- Easy updates. This year's election season will be generating more data as it moves towards November 4. Then there is next year and new data available in the longer term. Your work should be able to automatically update the underlying dataset as new information is available.
- Simple manipulation. Widgets and apps that allow users to manipulate and mash data.
It is wonderful to share your data and we would love it if you open-source it
Prize Criteria
- Innovation: How innovative is the product you have developed.
- Potential: Even if your prototype is not finished, what is the potential moving forward.
- Design: We will look at the interactivity, easy updates and simple manipulation described above.
- For the Best Insight Category we will look at:
- Impact of your discovery
- Complexity of the analysis
- Scope of your discovery
Prize Rules
Along with your work (an analysis result, visualization, widget or app), you are expected to submit a brief summary of tools and methods used. Please also read Project Submission Guidelines section below.
We have some wonderful news. Google is donating to us unlimited access to their App Engine service. They have also effectively lifted per user and file size limits on Fusion Tables specially for the Datafest participants. (Please, note that query performance for tables above 100 MB does start to deteriorate so it is advisable to stay below that level. However, there are tables in regular use that are much larger than that.) Please, see Teresa Bouza if you need these extra resources. Also, Kathryn Hurley from Google's Developer Relations team is attending the event. A final note: the Google Fusion Table team has just launched a new UI ("View experimental") that has a bunch of nice data exploration features (facets + multiple tabs). The link will only appear with tables.
R users may run into a memory limit. R does not natively handle datasets larger than main memory. The solution is a package from Revolution Analytics called Revolution R Enterprise. It's free to academic users. Its component called RevoScaleR eliminates the memory barrier. Overall, Revolution R Enterprise is a powerful tool, capable of handling terabyte-class data sets.
But, generally, everyone is welcome to use any tools and methods: from basic functions in a spreadsheet to the latest machine learning algorithms.
If possible, please download the data you need onto your laptop before the actual event. We'll make an effort to have data available on USB thumb drives and CDs to meet contingencies. Still, the more people pre-download it, the better prepared we all are in case users aren't able to download it during the event, for whatever reason (network congestion, server failure, user error, etc).
Feel free to add more links to the list of relevant data sources below.
- Campaign finance data is available for the last 33 years, going back to 1979. The files and their descriptions are available on FEC's website (Note, however, that the raw data is quite difficult to parse. See Influence Explorer, below, for the same data in more accessible formats.)
- Influence Explorer contains a wide variety of influence-related datasets, including federal and state campaign finance, lobbying, federal spending, various enforcement datasets and more. Raw data can be searched and downloaded in Excel format from data.influenceexplorer.com or downloaded in bulk CSVs from data.influenceexplorer.com/bulk/.
- Fech, by the New York Times, is an API for parsing electronic candidate, PAC and party campaign filings from the Federal Election Commission.
- Redistricting data is available from the 2010 Census Redistricting Data Program
- Census Bureau
- Census Historical Files
- Follow the Money.org National Institute on Money in State Politics
- Bureau of Labor Statistics
- Data.gov
- OpenSecrets.org
- Data for project on state government in Louisiana
- Contributions to Super PACs
- Spending by Super PACs
- StateIntegrity.org In particular, see the corruption index. State Integrity has also given us the raw data behind their investigation. Please ask a staff member for more details.
Work on Data Done by Others Previously
Feel free to add more links to the list below.
- The New York Times Developer Network
A Campaign Finance API, with which you can retrieve data from FEC filings. To use the Campaign Finance API, you must sign up for an API key. Usage is limited to 5000 requests per day (rate limits are subject to change). Also see their FEC parser (ruby) fech and Ruby API wrapper Campaign Cash.
- The Computational Legal Studies Blog
Run by three scholars from the U. of Michigan and Princeton, the blog has several data visualizations like this: The Senate Campaign Contribution Network: A Visualization
- OffensivePolitics.net
This site has several examples of data analysis and visualization, some of them using R (in the blog section of the site). There is also a list of several open-source tools that can be used with campaign finance data (in the projects section); one example is Fechell, a ruby library for parsing FEC reports.
- O'Reilly
A free, 60-minute webcast titled "Using Social Network Analysis to Understand Campaign Finance"
- Sunlight Labs
Provides a data api of FEC data (and more). TransparencyData (now part of InfluenceExplorer) makes it easier to access FEC data. SuperPAC and Independent Expenditure data is also available via follow the unlimited money file downloads.
- ProPublica
Campaign finance data stories
- MapLight.org
The Origins of SuperPAC Money visualizations.
- The New York Times
2012 campaign finance graphics 2008 contributions to Presidential campaigns
- The Oklahoman
The DataWatch blog of Oklahoma's largest newspaper has some analysis of the 2010 data
Some data visualizations
- The Wall Street Journal
Some graphics on the 2012 campaign finance.
- The National Institute on Money in State Politics
Research and a database focused on influence of campaign money on state-level elections and public policy in all 50 states.
- Forum One Communications
The Alexandria, Va-based web strategy and development firm's Datamasher.org allows you to create mash ups and visualizations of government data. The datasets include campaign finance data.
Project Ideas
Feel free to suggest ideas for the participants to work on.
- Geocoding campaign contributions
- Associating campaign contributions by the district they are from (address) and the district they are going to (candidate)
- Comparing contributions per and post redistricting
- Comparing socio-economic data (census, BLS data) with campaign contributions (How much of the funds come from the poorest neighborhoods)
- Analyzing campaign contributions by high-tech companies or their board members. Comparing this with 2008, and perhaps contrasting the apparent rise in funding from high-tech contributors with that from Wall Street contributors
- Looking at campaign finance figures mapped over voter turnout and results and see how predictive that can be.
- Analyzing Louisiana data to show a political machine in action, Cajun style. Jeffrey Goodman, Editor at Social Agency Lab in New Orleans, has promised special prizes.
- Looking at super PAC donors by location, industry, past giving records
- Looking at major individual donors' giving over time: Have super PACs created a new group of megadonors and/or simply empowered existing donors?
- Are candidates with more super PAC support more likely to win elections/primaries? (Conversely, are candidates targeted by super PACs more likely to lose?)
- Compare money spent vs. polling data. It would be great to add in a counter of potential money left to spend (combo of campaign funds, like PAC funds, etc…). It could also be fun to add in a division of how money was spent (campaign staff vs. tv ad spend vs. mailers, etc…)
- Try to ascertain the flow of contributions from public donations to PACs over the timeline of available data ( adjusted for inflation, demographics, purchasing power and excluding outliers)
- Ratio of public to PAC donations over the the timeline of the data ( adjusted for inflation, demographics, purchasing power and excluding outliers)
- Bundling is very interesting (bundlers have outsized influence), but in general not disclosed. Two exceptions are: required disclosure when registered lobbyist bundle and the voluntary disclosure of many presidential candidates. Could this data be used to identify recognizable patterns of bundling, and then detect other non-disclosed bundlers?
- Related to the above idea, could we automatically detect groups of aligned donors, based on things like location, employer, timing of donation and recipient? Could we make guesses that a group of people attended a fundraiser together? Or identify the social network of large donors?
- Two big weaknesses of the FEC data are that donors are identified by name only--not a unique ID--and that employer companies aren't reported in a standardized way. The Center for Responsive Politics addresses these with manual standardization of the data, but that process is slow and labor intensive. Could automated methods tell when two donor records with similar names are actually the same person? Or when two employer names written slightly differently are actually the same company?
- Map visualizations: there are tons of different visualizations that could be made if someone has the technical skills to geocode and map data.
- Campaign finance can tell you what politicians a company is interested in. Lobbying reports can tell you what issues and bills they're interested in. Combine the two, and you may be able to see *why* a company gave to a particular politician.
- How is state-level different from national-level? When do big national orgs give at the local level? Are there orgs that give locally but not nationally? Are there interesting instances of local giving though subsidiaries that aren't obviously related to parent company? Does the party breakdown change by locality--that is, will companies give heavily to Democrats in one locality while giving heavily to Republicans in another?
- Charities and advocacy (not specifically campaign finance): can we correlate charitable giving by companies with advocacy by the charity that aligns with the companies' positions? Inspired by AT&T and net neutrality debate: AT&T gave to various grassroots groups, who then lobbied against net neutrality rules.
- Tea party: how does tea-party candidates' fundraising differ from other Republicans? Does it change once they're incumbents?
- Investigate SuperPACs: Who's the treasurer and staff? Where else do they work? What's their giving? Do other orgs/PACs share an address? A building? Who are the donors? Can we trace the anonymous-sounding corporate donors to actual people?
- Independent Expenditures: What was the effect on the 2010 races? When did outside spending sway the race? Under what conditions is there heavy outside spending? Are there typical strategies as far as timing? What about independent expenditures during primary races? Primaries are interesting because it's spending against members of the own party.
- Geocoding data for all 33 years onto a single interactive map.
- Text Mining: Politicians' voting records, speeches and their offices' press releases are online. The full text of news reports and transcripts of TV talk shows are available online and to anyone with access to Lexis-Nexis. Could analyzing these texts shed more light on the direction, size, influence and effect of money flows in campaign finance?
- Can software developers produce widgets or apps that make it easy to update the data visualizations produced at the Datafest? This would help extend the value of the event beyond May 19 weekend and onto the rest of the election season.
- What data is available about financing of city or county elections? Some cities (try NY, LA and Chicago) collect and release political contribution information. A survey of what local governments have this information would be very interesting. Or pick one local government and see what you can find in the data.
- Campaign spending is often overlooked. It would be great to have a method for comparing spending across committee types (PAC, House, Senate), identify the outliers and figure out why their spending is so different or how it changed over time. The FEC electronic filings are available online and have expenditure information. Tools like [FEC-Scraper][3] and [FECH][4] can harvest the data.
- Team Awesome
- Team Gophers
- Team Z
- Team KeyStoners
- Team Donkey Versus Elephant$
- Team G8tor
- Team Black Cobra
- Team Most Excellent
- Team Frienemies
- Team Eagle
- Team Oatmeal: no presentation.
Project Submission Guidelines
By midnight Saturday, May 19:
Please create a page for your project or team in "Projects & Teams" section of this page. Include the following information:
- Your project or team name.
- A brief description of what you are working on.
- A list of people on the team.
- What prize category you think your project fits in.
- What you are starting with: existing codebase, libraries, etc.
By 3:00 pm Sunday, May 20:
Please add to your page the following information:
- A brief summary of your work.
- A step-by-step explanation of how you reached the result(s). Screenshots will be much appreciated.
- Any links such as to a code repository, Google docs, etc.
Comments & Questions
- I think a lot of the questions above can be (broadly) answered with good maps. Unfortunately, that requires a good deal of geocoding. Does anyone have access to a free, quality geocoder w/out rate limits for use this weekend? -- @mtahani
- Re: geocoding limits. We have great news. Google is being very generous. They have lifted Table Fusion limits specially for the Datafest. Details are in "Tools" section above.


text:
Main News Page
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
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Coating Materials
Strong gains in Global Finishes, rebounding retail paint sales, and price increases powered the Sherwin-Williams Co. to a better-than-expected fourth quarter and year-end report.
Compared to the same periods in 2009, consolidated net sales increased $296.8 million, or 18.6%, to $1.90 billion for the fourth quarter and $682.2 million, or 9.6%, to $7.78 billion for the year ending Dec. 31, due primarily to higher paint sales volume, acquisitions, and selling price increases, the company said Tuesday (Jan. 25).
'Bounced Off of the Bottom'
CEO Christopher M. Connor was pleased with the results but expressed caution about the future, saying the "strength and sustainability" of the U.S. recession remained "in question."
"I think we're going to look back on 2010 as a positive transition year for our company and the domestic paints and coatings industry as we bounced off of the bottom," Connor said in a conference call discussion of the report.
He added: "All three of our reportable segments grew sales organically in the year. Volume growth was modest but also positive across all segments—the first time in several years I've been able to say that."
Acquisitions, Share Income
Acquisitions increased consolidated net sales 8.7% in the quarter and 3.4% in the year, the company reported. Currency translation rate changes increased consolidated net sales 0.4% in the quarter and 1.2% in the year.
Diluted net income per common share in the quarter increased to $.67 per share from $.58 per share in the fourth quarter 2009 and increased 11.4% to $4.21 per share in the year from $3.78 per share in 2009.
For the fourth quarter and year 2010, trademark and long-lived asset impairment charges related to a foreign operation reduced diluted net income per common share $.04 per share. Charges relating to costs to repurchase long-term debt reduced diluted net income per common share approximately $.04 per share in the quarter and $.12 per share in the year.
These charges were partially offset by the favorable impact related to the disposition of closed manufacturing sites during the fourth quarter of $.04 per share.
Global Finishes Group
The Global Finishes Group's net sales (stated in U.S. dollars) increased 46.4% to $640.1 million in the quarter due primarily to acquisitions, higher paint sales volume, and selling price increases. Net sales increased 26.5% to $2.09 billion for the year, due primarily to acquisitions, higher paint sales volume, and favorable currency translation rate changes.
Segment profit in the quarter increased to $28.8 million from a loss of $1.1 million last year, due primarily to reduced asset impairment charges, increased paint sales volume, and selling price increases, partially offset by dilution from acquisitions. Segment profit increased in the year to $123.7 million from $65.0 million last year.
The Global Finishes Group includes Protective and Marine, Automotive and Chemical Coatings, as well as the Latin American market. The company does not release numbers for each division. The group distributes a wide range of products in more than 70 countries.
"In the Global Finishes Group, we continue to be pleased with the growth in architectural, OEM and automotive finishes sales volume," Connor said. The acquisitions of Sayerlack and Acroma "had a negative impact" on the year's financial results, but the acquisitions themselves "are performing to expectations," he said.
Paint Stores Group
Net sales in the Paint Stores Group increased 8.6% to $999.3 million in the quarter and increased 4.1% to $4.38 billion in the year, due primarily to selling price increases and improving domestic architectural paint sales. Segment profit increased to $134.8 million in the quarter from $119.9 million last year and to $619.6 million for the year from $600.2 million last year.
Segment profit as a percent to net sales increased in the quarter to 13.5% from 13.0% last year and decreased in the year to 14.1% from 14.3% in 2009.
In 2010, the company added 49 new stores and closed 13 redundant stores, finishing the year with 3,390 stores in operation.
Consumer Group
Net sales of the Consumer Group increased 6.2% to $255.0 million for the quarter and 5.9% to $1.30 billion for the year, due primarily to improving demand by some retail, industrial and institutional customers. Segment profit increased to $26.1 million in the quarter from $4.6 million last year and to $204.0 million in the year from $157.4 million last year.
The company acquired 1.53 million shares of its common stock through open-market purchases in the quarter, bringing the year's total purchase to 5 million shares. The company had remaining authorization on Dec. 31 to purchase 5.75 million shares.
Cautious Optimism
O'Connor said the company was "cautiously optimistic about the stability of end market demand" and was "working hard to mitigate the effect of rising raw material costs."
He added: "If 2010 did mark the end of the four-year slide in domestic coatings industry volume, we believe that recovery from here is likely to be slow and erratic."
Founded in 1866, The Sherwin-Williams Company manufactures, develops, distributes and sells coatings and related products to professional, industrial, commercial, and retail customers. The company's brands include Sherwin-Williams, Dutch Boy, Krylon, Minwax and Thompson's Water Seal.
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