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Existence and Pre-existence
The first three words of the first item of Donald Trump's healthcare plan are "Completely repeal Obamacare".
I was surprised to see this stated so starkly and unambiguously. Because if this were to happen, along with everything else, the pre-existing condition ban would go away. This could cause several million people, including people in mid-treatment, to lose their insurance. And many of these people are people paying their own premiums with no subsidy from the government.
Most people think they know what "pre-existing condition" meant. But it was far worse and more complicated than most people know. The pre-existing condition problem was part of an overall underwriting philosophy that covered both individual policies and small groups (defined as 2 to 50 employees). The Affordable Care Act not only eliminated pre-existing conditions as a means to deny coverage, it eliminated the underwriting of small groups, which had been underwritten in a way that carried the pre-existing condition philosophy into the commercial group market itself. To explain how this worked, and what it would mean to go back to the way things were until only recently, I'd like to tell you a story about how I think I saw the old system kill someone once.Read more
Hillary Attempts to Add Alka-Seltzer to the Healthcare Stew
Hillary Clinton has now updated her health care proposal. In addition to the usual promises to improve quality and cut costs and prices blah, blah, blah that all the politicians are making, there are two possibly substantive proposals. The first is that people might be allowed to go on Medicare from age 55. The second is a mysterious thing called the "public option".
The lowering of the eligibility age for Medicare (ironic in a climate of raising the Social Security eligibility age) seems pretty straightforward in that she didn't specify that this new age group would get anything other than standard Medicare. But the "public option" could change the rules of the healthcare game, depending on what it really is. And she left some clues. Let's take a closer look.Read more
Death Wish: The Politics of American Healthcare
Bernie wanted a single payer system: Medicare for All. Hillary wants to tinker with Obamacare in a slow transition to God knows what. Trump wants voters, but has no plan. But Ryan does and his plan is to keep alive the part of Obamacare that everyone likes (no pre-existing conditions), but to separate the sick voters who want things he doesn't think they deserve from those young healthy voters who might go Red in the future.
As for the electorate, like the American girls in the Rolling Stones song, they "want everything in the world that you can possibly imagine". Some for just themselves and some for everybody.
Sorry. Nobody is going anywhere. Bernie was right about single payer, but it's not enough to just get elected. One must also rule. President Bernie would never have been able to lift that rock, for reasons I shall go into. Hillary knows she has to rule, so in her usual cunning fashion she is setting the bar as low as possible for herself right at the start. And Trump/Ryan are looking for a neutron bomb that will kill all the really sick people and leave a core of friendly voters and all the businesses standing.
What would we need to do to fix things and why can't we do it? Read below. And weep. I'll try to keep this one simple.
Read more
Rushkoff: The Popes Have the Operating System for the New Economy
The best reason for Commonweal readers to go out and purchase Douglas Rushkoff's new book, Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus, is that the heroes at the end of the book turn out to be… the popes! The "new operating system" Rushkoff recommends turns out to be a variation on the fundamental vision of distributism – the wide, dispersed ownership and exchange of productive assets. He is quick to reassure his readers that "we don't need to convert to Catholicism or even approve of Vatican doctrine" in order to appropriate their insights. Rather, the value in the papal social encyclicals is that "they remember"; that is, they retain "a memory of the wheels of commerce that preceded the engines of the industrial age." Rushkoff's book is particularly important for two reasons: first, he does not simply equate distributism with a back-to-the-land agrarianism, and second, he offers a way beyond the disturbing polarities that have emerged with Sanders, Trump, and Brexit.
This is because Rushkoff's book, while accessible, is not simple. Too often, debates about any topic get forced into a simple pro- and anti- polarity, focused on a single magic bullet (and often enough, a single demon to be expelled). Worse, such debates too often "fight the last war" – and so Sanders's solutions look like a Scandinavian playbook, while Trump's yearn for a rebuilt manufacturing economy via protectionism and immigrant exclusion. These solutions are not all wrong, especially in their diagnoses of what has happened – the Sanders/Trump alliance against trade deals evidences this. There is a "tell it like it is" attraction here.
Rushkoff's book, by contrast, insists on grappling with the present situation, which above all is one of massive technological change – higher minimum wages and barriers to foreign goods won't create jobs if robots can do them. But this is not an anti-technology book; to borrow Pope Francis's phrase from Laudato Si', it's an anti-technocratic-paradigm book. In his encyclical, Francis insists that technology itself is not bad, but that it becomes problematic when it becomes an end in itself – which, as he goes on to say, means an end for those who stand to profit from it. When Francis claims that "technology is not neutral," he means that technological choices are in fact choices about "the kind of society we want."
Rushkoff's book is invaluable for fleshing out the technocratic paradigm problem, from the place of one who is extremely knowledgeable about technology. In essence, the book's thesis can be boiled down into two key points. First, digital technologies can either promote wide, dispersed sharing or contribute to even more centralized power. The key is whether they are designed as "platform monopolies" or as peer-to-peer resources. And his second insight is that the digital economy has become more and more oriented to the development of platform monopolies because these are the form of businesses demanded by the returns needed to satisfy the "old operating system" of the existing economic system. Platform monopolies ultimately squeeze out small producers, first by casualizing their labor, and then by dispensing with it altogether. Uber is just a bridge, Rushkoff insists, to Google's driverless cars. There is a kind of double reinforcing effect here, in narrowing ever more the labor market to those with highly-specialized operating skills, and then in narrowing capital return to fewer and fewer "winners." In essence, he is summarizing what an economy looks like when labor ultimately serves capital, rather than capital serving labor. The goal is "removing humans from the equation."Read more
Is Business an Ethics-Free Zone?
For many if not most, the idea of a "moral economy" is a contradiction. I was reminded of this when reading some of the comments on my last blog post. The logic is straightforward: the "business of business is business", which is to maximize profits, and as long as corporations don't break any laws, they are not doing anything wrong. To claim otherwise would be seek perfection in a fallen world.
In my own field of economics, this perspective is pervasive. One of the first things you learn in elementary microeconomics is that consumers maximize utility and firms maximize profits. That's just how things are. This view is summed by nicely by Branko Milanovic:
"I am thus intellectually sympathetic to the view that personal morality exists only outside economics or capitalism. I might like the guys who are nice and ethical, but when it comes to economics I really do not expect them to be so. I even very much doubt when they claim they are. I tend to see them as hypocritical. This is not in their job description."
Milanovic makes a comparison with bobsledding—you can go as fast as you like, but you should not hit the fence. In other words, do whatever you can to maximize profits, but don't break the law. So Milanovic refuses to condemn the behavior of the financial sector in the run-up to the crisis, because they were doing what they are supposed to do and (for the most part) not breaking the law.Read more
Should a Catholic University take Koch Funding?
Can a Catholic university legitimately take money from the likes of the Koch Brothers? This is not a hypothetical question. Many Catholic universities are implicated. But none more so than Catholic University of America, which—in the face of much criticism—has just doubled down with another $10 million donation from the Koch Foundation.
The original partnership with the Kochs, and the subsequent criticism, predates Pope Francis and Laudato si'. If the university's arguments were weak back then, they are paper-thin now.
Just consider how the philosophy and business practices of the Koch Brothers goes directly against the authoritative teaching of Pope Francis. I will make three points in this regard.
First, the Kochs are avid libertarians, defenders of the unconstrained free market as the best route to prosperity. This ideology is simply not compatible with Catholic social teaching. In full continuity with his predecessors, Pope Francis condemns the notion of a "deified market" or a "magical conception of the market." His point is that an economic system underpinned by self-interest and oriented toward profit maximization is simply incapable of delivering integral and sustainable development. It leads instead to an economy of exclusion, and is deaf to the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor. Pope Francis stresses that working for a just distribution of the fruits of the earth and human labor is a moral obligation—and for Christians, a commandment. "It is about giving to the poor and to peoples what is theirs by right," he says. In other words, the universal destination of goods is a reality prior to private property. I have a feeling the Kochs would strenuously disagree with this. And this is no mere prudential disagreement. It is foundational and anthropological.
Second, the Kochs are among the leading funders and promoters of climate-change denialism. In Laudato si', Pope Francis castigates those who are focused on "masking the problems or concealing their symptoms." "There are too many special interests," he says, "and economic interests easily end up trumping the common good and manipulating information so that their own plans will not be affected." It almost seems like the pope is addressing the Kochs directly! Today, the stakes are especially high after the signing of the Paris Agreement by 196 nations last December. This agreement, which aims to phase out carbon emissions, was a major priority of Pope Francis. It explains the timing of the encyclical's release, and Laudato si' served as a moral charter for the agreement. But, almost alone in the world, the Paris agreement is being opposed by key U.S. political interests—because they are beholden to those very same vested interests condemned by Pope Francis.
Third, the business activities of the Kochs cannot be deemed ethical. In terms of assessing ethics in business, the best starting point is "The Vocation of the Business Leader," put out by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. This document is currently being updated to encompass the wisdom of Laudato si'. And Pope Francis makes a compelling point about business ethics that bears repeating in this context. He notes that businesses profit from not paying the true costs of their activities. "Only when the economic and social costs of using up shared environmental resources are recognized with transparency and fully borne by those who incur them, not by other peoples or future generations," he says, "can those actions be considered ethical." It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the business model of the Koch Brothers is simply unethical, period.Read more
An Heir to the Sanders 'Revolution'?
Supporters and pundits will in Bernie Sanders's Michigan primary victory seek signs of new life in his bid for the Democratic nomination. But whether or not he bests Hillary Clinton in 2016, his campaign has given the nation a glimpse of what the future of the Democratic Party might look like – and who might be among its leaders.
U.S. Representative Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii was probably little known outside her district or party circles until a few weeks ago. But then the thirty-four-year-old congresswoman resigned her position as Democratic National Committee vice chair to endorse Sanders. It was probably the highest profile endorsement of his campaign, and it came from a politician many consider to be a rising star.
Gabbard has an impressive resume: She was elected to the Hawaii House of Representatives at twenty-one, served two tours of duty in Iraq, and won her current House seat in 2013. While conventional wisdom suggests her DNC resignation appears to be a needless sacrifice of present prominence, her endorsement might instead be read as an initial effort to spearhead and lead the Democratic coalition of tomorrow.
Sanders's campaign has been defined by a particular calling card: his absolute control of the millennial vote. Voters aged eighteen to thirty-four prefer Sanders over Clinton by an eleven-point margin and enthusiastically support the public spending programs he espouses. The tally from Iowa was especially stark:
In the Iowa entrance poll… Sanders amassed astounding margins among young people. He crushed Clinton by an almost unimaginable six to one—84 percent to 14 percent—among voters younger than 30. For those tempted to dismiss that as just a campus craze, he also routed her by 58 percent to 37 percent among those aged 30 to 44.
One state does not a nation make, of course. But the evidence strongly suggests that the future Democratic voter base is interested in policies farther to left than what the current party leadership is offering.Read more
What Do You Want in a Health Care System?
I am find a lot of articles about people wanting "single payer" or a continuation/improvement of Obamacare or the destruction of Obamacare and its replacement by something else. Most of these talk about financing, with some lip service about improved quality. But I am not finding any description from anyone about exactly what a post Obama health care system needs to have.
When we do corporate strategic planning in the private sector, this is the first question we ask. What do people want? Without answering that question, we have no idea where to get to, much less how much it should cost.
Judging from people's complaints and working backwards (which is not the same as starting with a model and working forwards), people want access to all available providers (which is to say that all providers are in-network), they want zero out of pocket expense, and they want some sort of quantitive clarity about how good a provider really is before they receive services. This pretty much covers everything. Is there anything else? And more importantly, for any system, if you had to settle for less than this, what would you tolerate?
Capitalism Without Tears
Here is a tiny but very interesting article, especially considering its source.
With capitalism,
...profit margins should naturally mean-revert and oscillate. The existence of fat margins should encourage new competitors and pricing cycles that cause those margins to erode; conversely, at the bottom of the cycle, low margins should lead to weaker players exiting the business and giving stronger companies more breathing space. If that cycle doesn't continue, something strange is taking place.
We can discuss this. Regarding the articles I recently wrote about the Obamacare Co-Ops, one of the problems here may be that there has now been so much monopolization in capitalism that new players can simply not afford the costs of entering the market to compete. And what this would mean, of course, is that the "free market" is both disappearing and incapable of being recovered by anything other than political (as opposed to economic) activity.
On a related note, the head of Goldman Sachs has been watching Bernie Sanders and he doesn't like what he sees.
For many, this will count as a ringing endorsement.
On the subject of a President Hillary Clinton, Mr. Blankfein is coy.
In the Borough of Former Churches
Walk down almost any block in the part of Brooklyn where I live and it's possible to see a building that once had a religious connection now being used for something else. Arches and spires are obvious indications of former houses of worship, but sometimes a Latin inscription above the lintel or a stone cross on the roof are the only evidence of original purpose. One statistic says twenty Brooklyn churches have been converted into condominiums over the past twenty years, but the scope and pace of redevelopment makes that count seem conservative, or outdated. In the few square blocks around me there are at least five such conversions, of varying degrees of luxury. Some years ago an acquaintance of mine, much bolder than I, confronted a resident leaving one of these buildings. "So how does it feel living in a deconsecrated church?" she demanded. No response was forthcoming—an exhibit of self-restraint, I think now.
I've officially lived just over half my life in what is still called the borough of churches, and, full disclosure, my wife and I even once looked at an apartment cantilevered into the sanctuary of a stately stone structure on what realtors still call "a lovely tree-lined street." We'd just had our first child; we liked the neighborhood; we didn't want to move to New Jersey. If the place was overpriced then, there's no way to describe it now. And anyway, how would it have felt to live in a deconsecrated church?
Conversion and reuse is nothing new, obviously, and it's not just churches—the structure too expensive to maintain, the lot too valuable to hold onto—that have come to function as something else. Parish schools and rectories, convents and hospitals: these also succumb to prevailing demographic and economic pressures, or, depending on your outlook, are made monetizable. People with ties to the community once defined by such places will naturally feel different about this than those who are seeking a home in a coveted neighborhood with good schools; both see it differently from the developer who's swooped in to tap the financial exponentialities.
Novelist Colm Tóibín has said it was the very sense of the Irish having disappeared from these streets that helped him render so indelibly the environs of 2009's Brooklyn (the film version of which was released last year)—that and having made himself a regular at a nearby church's 9 a.m. Sunday Mass. Just over a century ago the immediate neighborhood held the largest single concentration of Italians in the country, but by 1998, in the phrasing of the official history of the local parish, "many had left the railroad apartments of South Brooklyn for the lawns and pitched roofs in Long Island, Staten Island, [and] New Jersey."Read more
Obamacare in Flames - Part Three - The Plague on All Our Houses
The Attacks on both Obamacare in particular and our healthcare system in general are fragmented and hard to talk about in a very systematic manner. People have specific things that they think are great and that they think are terrible. They focus on these to criticize or glorify the whole. I find this infuriating. To fix things, we have to know exactly how things work, and what and what doesn't work well. My response, then, will be broken into parts which I hope will make sense when you put them all together.
The questions are whether Obamacare has been worth it, can it survive, should it be replaced, and what should replace it. To answer these questions, I think we have to go back to some basic concepts. Hold on. It's going to get ugly.Read more
Obamacare in Flames - Part Two - Mama Don't Want No Market Playing 'Round Here
"We can't really subsidize a marketplace that doesn't appear at the moment to be sustaining itself" —Stephen Hemsley, CEO, United Healthcare
It's a commonplace in American business that the difference between a brilliant statement and a stupid one usually depends on who is saying it. When Steve Hemsley asked his C-Suite crew why it looked like United Healthcare would be losing half a billion dollars on Obamacare in two years, I doubt anybody said "Gee, boss. I guess the marketplace must not be sustaining itself." Or if someone did, they're certainly not working there anymore.Read more
Obamacare in Flames - Part One - The Strange Life and Sudden Death of the Co-Ops
"As the camel falls to its knees, more knives are drawn" —Bedouin Proverb.
Despite the fact that the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) has significantly reduced the number of uninsured in the United States, it has also failed to live up to its promises and has seen a great number of failures. The number of uninsured is still high, premiums are growing, networks are narrowing, insurers are losing money, and the Co-Ops, set up as a significant innovation of the program, are failing and will continue to fail everywhere.
In this hot election season, this has brought out enemies on the Left and the Right. The Left wants Obamacare dumped and replaced with a single payer system. The Right just wants it dumped. Both sides attack the program with cherry picked examples that are nonsense and half truths. It's like watching a mud wrestling match where you know you hate one of the wrestlers, but you can't tell them apart anymore.
I am going to post three articles where I try to get to the bottom of what is really happening. I find the sniping on the Right and the Left mostly useless, but also infuriating. The system is broken and Obamacare has revealed all of the cracks. In the first article, I will talk about the Co-Ops and why they had to fail given the structure of the current insurance system. In the second, I will discuss what's going on with market risk and how the big insurance players, despite their massive resources and sophistication, also found themselves sucked into the whirlpool. In the third article I will talk about what we can and can't do about it.
The Affordable Care Act contained a provision to establish and fund the creation of 50 statewide non-profit insurance Co-Ops. There were several reasons for this. First, there was the concern that the current commercial insurers would not enter the ACA marketplace in large enough numbers to support millions of newly insured. Second, it was rightly believed that insurance markets in the United States tend to be dominated by one main insurer and the Co-Ops would add badly needed competition. Third, the Co-Ops were a compromise meant to forestall a government run "Medicare" option that might have a potential to move the entire country towards single payer insurance. And last, many people unclear of the concept of not-for-profit and citizen boards of directors in the United States thought that the Co-Ops would be less greedy and more consumer friendly.
Because the funding for this program was prematurely and summarily cut during one of our GOP manufactured budget crises coupled with Red State resistance to the idea itself, only 23 Co-Ops were eventually established. Of these, half have failed outright. Most of the rest are very weak and a significant number of these have been quietly put under some form of direct regulatory control. With the sole exception of the Maine Co-Op, the Co-Op program will fail unless radical measures are taken (which I will outline in article three).
The provision of all that sweet, sweet government money ($1.6 billion) drew into it two kinds of speculators. The first were the normal kind who wanted a crack at The Big Federal Pie. The second consisted of people who wanted the program to succeed for various political and occupational reasons. Most, but not all, were blinded by the fact that the mass establishment of these Co-Ops was probably the riskiest start- up venture in American history. While the insurance risk factors played a part in this (and the risk factors are what people focused on) I will argue that structural factors played a bigger role in creating risk here and I will try to outline these as briefly as I can.
A. Creating a Network
One of the main things that insurance companies do in the United States is obtain discounted rates from providers. These rates and their terms are set by individual private contracts. Insurance companies and providers are always recontracting with each other, hoping to gain an advantage. Any insurance company's contracting staff will be large and well funded with the latest complex modeling software and contract language software. And this will be true of any insurance company that already has a well developed network.
The insurance company will try to get the best terms and steepest discounts and then will aggregate these discounts to find an average discount so that it can begin to design its different benefit packages and price them. (It is also necessary to know in what way its member population uses the providers, but I will discuss this later).
The Co-Ops started out with no networks at all, no contracting staff or infrastructure, and a mandate as THE state Co-Op to be prepared to cover any member in the entire state.
What most Co-Ops did was to create "instant networks" by using what is called a "rental network." A rental network is a broad, usually multi-state network that has a very shallow discount with a large number of providers. They are usually used in cases where a business (typically a hospital) will want to create a quasi-network for its own employees, where these workers will get a steep discount for using their own hospital and hospital owned doctors, but will also get some sort of small discount should they go somewhere else. Rental networks are not meant to be used as full networks by insurance companies, because their discounts are so small that they can't compete with regular insurance companies with their own sets of contracts.
The Co-Ops plan was to start with the rental network in order to establish an "adequate" network per the state regulatory rules of wherever they were located, and then as quickly as possible, recontract the providers within it with their own more deeply discounted contracts on their own terms. If they did this quickly enough, they would have a network that would cover everyone, but they would also be able to eliminate the main rental contracts with their own competitive ones.
In practice, given the magnitude of the task and the fact that they were literally starting with nothing, they had no idea how long it would really take or what Co-Op contracts would actually be in place when the Co-Ops "went live" and actually started taking on new members. So in their business planning, they worked backwards from what they knew to be the average discount in the state to the average discount of the rental network. From this they created a fairy tale business plan and sent this to the regulators for approval. No one at either end of this chain believed the plan, which is why the Co-Ops were expected to lose money for the first one to three years of their existence until they could get a real network together. The vast majority of Co-Ops lost money in the first two years, even those that did not fail, because (in part) they simply could not build the network they needed. They had no market clout and their contracting infrastructure was mostly immature.
B. Building an Infrastructure
Modern health insurance companies have massive expensive IT infrastructures. It is commonly said in the insurance business that insurance companies are now basically IT companies with insurance companies attached to them.
The core of the infrastructure is the claims payment system. This system has to be able to adjudicate electronically all claims per all the various separate provider contracts that an insurance company has. The claims system also has to be integrated with the member enrollment system, the billing and payment system, the banking system, the accounting system, the hospital contracting system, and the member services system. All of these are separate things. The work of the large insurance companies is to have all of these systems "in house" and seamlessly integrated with each other. For the Co-Ops, all of these separate systems had to be rented from separate vendors. It was the integration of these systems, which were generally not designed to be integrated, that was usually done in house. For many of the Co-Ops, some of the systems weren't even designed to do what the Co-Ops needed them to do, either in their basic functioning or in the volume of transactions that were required. And in some cases, multiple versions of a system were needed. For example, there were cases where a Co-Op needed one enrollment system for individual members and another for employer group members. Both needed to be integrated with the rest of the system. Against this, the Co-Ops generally had inadequate staffs and had to rely on consultants who themselves were often inadequate, although terribly expensive.
To add to this, the Federal government was building its own enrollment and claims system from scratch (the latter not to pay claims but to do member level claims risk calculations) and required the Co-Ops and anyone else participating in Obamacare to able to integrate with their systems.
As you can imagine, there were massive, expensive, service affecting integration problems within the Co-Ops, within the government (which hit the news), and between the Co-Ops and the government. The Co-Ops did not figure these costs in their start up planning, and why should they have? No one had ever done this before.
C. Building a Staff
The Co-Ops had several staffing problems right from the beginning. The first was the acquisition of qualified management. Co-Ops were, by definition, start up companies and risky ones at that. The best executives and managers in the insurance industry could tell how risky they were, if only by listening to their own senior managers panicking about Obamacare. Not many people were willing to leave safe well developed jobs late in their careers to join a Co-Op at any price. This was not only true of the executives but also the middle managers. And even those seasoned executives and managers who did come over had little experience starting an insurance company from scratch. Nor did they have the "turnaround" experience they would need to fix the inevitable mistakes. And there was another problem with capital. While the Co-Ops were relatively well funded, with a Federal capital development fund that was separate from the claims guarantee fund, the manager found problems with how to spend the money. Aside from the fact that at the beginning there did not exist such things as purchasing departments, which meant that that the Co-Ops (having to build up quickly) were screwed by almost everyone they did business with, they had trouble figuring out how to staff up. They couldn't take their time, which caused hiring standards to slip. But they also didn't know if they should staff up quickly against the possibility of small enrollments (and therefore risk spending to much right off the bat) or staff up slowly against the possibility of high enrollments and therefore risk being understaffed and having basic service issues). What usually happened was the worst of all worlds. They didn't anticipate the integration problems, so they didn't staff for them. They tried to forestall permanent staffing, so they outsourced a lot of things they should have taken in-house right away. In some cases, especially in the second year of Obamacare, their membership increased dramatically over the course of a month or two and they found themselves very understaffed against the volume of membership. The IT integration problems, the staffing quality and quantity problems, the in-sourcing of activities and the inevitable initial mistakes all had to be addressed in "real time" as the Co-Ops were providing health services to actual people. And they had to do this while painting rosy pictures to the Boards of Directors (who being appointed from the membership often had no idea how insurance companies worked to begin with) and regulators who were often hostile towards them.
The impossibility (there, I've said it) of constructing an adequate and competitive provider network in the face of major insurance companies, creating a fully integrated claims, enrollment, and financial structure, and a well trained, well organized experienced staff made working conditions at the Co-Ops stressful as they lurched from one catastrophe into another. The level headed leaders who actually thrive in this kind of environment turned out to be rare. So the lights began to go out to a chorus of "I told you so" from politically motivated groups who had their own reasons to want the Co-Ops to fail.
But what about the major established insurance companies with solid networks, infrastructures, and stable well trained staffs? When they entered the Obamacare market, what happened to them?
Here the question of risk enters the picture. With the Co-Ops' basic structural problems, we can look at the questions of pure insurance risk as the coup de grace. But how did the sophisticated risk experts at places like Blue Cross and United Healthcare manage to also shoot themselves in the face?
Why Ted Cruz is Dangerous: Econ Edition
It's obvious that our presidential campaigns too often focus on non-substantive issues. It is amazing that so little attention is paid to the explicit tax plans offered by the candidates, particularly the Republican candidates, since if they were to be elected, they would presumably have some chance of actually passing something.
In this regard, there is no doubt that Ted Cruz is an exceptional candidate. The conservative-leaning Tax Foundation has excellent and detailed account for all of the major Republican contenders' plans. And all of them amount largely to the same thing: a flat or two-tiered income tax rate, significant changes in corporate and capital taxation, a larger initial exemption, and (of course) abolition of the estate tax. There are minor differences, of course. But the Tax Foundation agrees on one thing: they'd all add massively to the deficit. For example, they estimate Donald Trump's tax plan would cut revenues by over $10 trillion – yes, that's over a $1 trillion deficit every year.
All of them, that is, except Ted Cruz's. Cruz's plan, with the generous assumptions about economic growth that the Tax Foundation gives to all the plans, only reduce revenues by $768 billion over 10 years. And yet at the center of Cruz's proposal is a flat 10 percent income tax, abolishing all deductions except charity and home mortgage interest, and providing for an expansion of the exemption and child tax credits. Thus, Cruz is prepared to campaign on a 10-percent flat tax, and to promise that he is not going to explode the deficit doing it.Read more
Is Bernie Sanders Anti-Immigrant?
When Bernie Sanders released the details of his "Medicare for All" single-payer healthcare proposal ahead of the Democratic debate last week, the plan was widely panned by journalists and pundits as an unserious, pie-in-the-sky idea that could never possibly see the light of day. But it was perhaps even more audacious than many of its critics realized: in contrast to the Affordable Care Act, whose drafters deliberately excluded undocumented immigrants from being eligible for coverage in order to avoid stepping into an even bigger political minefield than the one they were already in, Sanders' policy advisor Warren Gunnels confirmed to reporters that the senator envisions an expanded Medicare being open to at least some of those living in the country illegally.
This is almost certainly one of the boldest pro-immigrant positions espoused by a major party candidate in recent history. A casual observer might reasonably infer from his willingness to take such a stand that Sanders must be the clear favorite of those who lobby on behalf of immigrant rights. Yet throughout the campaign, he has been dogged by criticism of his immigration record – from the left.Read more
George Rutler and David Bowie
When I think of New York priest Fr. George Rutler, three things come to mind. First, he is impressively erudite with an impressive breadth and depth of knowledge. Second, his previous church—Church of our Savior—is by far the most beautiful church in New York, and I believe he deserves some credit for that. And third, he is a holdover from an alliance between an influential circle of American Catholics and the arch-liberals of the Reagan era—a "deal with devil" that went disastrously wrong, causing Catholic intellectuals to cheerlead both the Iraq war and economic policies antithetical to Catholic social teaching.
But I digress. What prompts me to write this post is Rutler's sniffling disgust that the Vatican had some nice things to say about David Bowie upon his death. Rutler was having none if it, even though he admits that he had never even heard of Bowie before this. But this kind of music does not find favor with a self-described aesthete who prefers Mozart and Chopin to Jackson and Bowie. (By the way, didn't Alasdair MacIntyre list "aesthete" as one of the signature professions of an emotivist culture? And aren't there shades of Mill's version of higher-order utilitarianism here?).Read more
In Hoc Anno Domini
Every Christmas Eve since 1949 the Wall Street Journal has been publishing the same editorial. (The Journal doesn't publish on December 25, the stock exchange being closed.) Obviously the editors must be pretty proud of it. It's also one of my favorites. From year to year the words are the same but the meaning changes with the times. In the last few years its message has been clear: Jesus came to save us from government regulation.
That was probably not the major point at the moment of intensifying Cold War when the editorial first appeared. The dangerous allure of Friedrich Hayek's "road to serfdom" was merely implied. But the Journal readers of 1949, who would have spontaneously understood Caesar to be operating out of the Kremlin, have been replaced by the readers of 2015, daily instructed that today's Caesar operates from the White House and the federal bureaucracies.
Entitled "In Hoc Anno Domini," the editorial describes the world at the moment of Saul of Tarsus's conversion: a world "in bondage," with but one state and one master, his oppressive power maintained through legions and executioners, persecution of free thought, and enslavement of nations. "Then, of a sudden, there was a light in the world, and a man from Galilee saying, Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's and unto God the things that are God's."
Having begun with Saul, the editorial ends with Paul: "Stand fast therefore in the liberty where with Christ has made us free and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage."
There are a number of historical and scriptural oddities about "In Hoc Anno Domini."Read more
Follow the (Really Big) Money
Something I've never quite been able to figure out about the powerful individual financial interests behind charter schools is just why those backers are so keen on charters and, correspondingly, so supportive of massive cuts in the funding of public education. One theory is that they stand to profit from the adoption, purchase, and licensing by charter schools of various educational products and services in which they have a stake. And yet that doesn't seem to fully explain the fervor they exhibit for their cause; something is missing from the equation, no matter the stated desire to address (contestable) claims about an educational system in "crisis."
Evidently, it's also a mystery to Michael Massing. Why, the former executive editor of the Columbia Journalism Review asks in The New York Review of Books, "have so many billionaires concluded that charter schools are the best way to fix the system?" And, just as importantly: "What are the implications of having such a small group with so little expertise in the field of education exercising such influence in it?" Because he doesn't have the answer, he proposes a way to work toward one: harness digital technology for a new form of journalism that would "lift the veil off the super-rich and lay bare their power."
Billionaires, as Massing doesn't need to remind us, are "shaping policy, influencing opinion, promoting favorite causes," and not just when it comes to education. More than ever before the super-rich are pouring their money into national and state political races, and funding targeted campaigns on discrete issues like regulatory and tax "reform," climate science, and even foreign diplomacy—all as they manage to shield themselves from scrutiny. Yet journalists, Massing states, "have largely let them get away with it." His proposal: "[B]roadly based [websites] dedicated to covering the power elite," at which data on spending by billionaires is collected, collated, and tracked, the information presented in regularly updated tables and charts, and linked to the latest news about which member of the 1 percent is contributing money (and how much) to which cause or politician.
Massing distinguishes his envisioned operation from social-media-enabled grassroots reporting and well-intentioned but undersized watchdogs like Muckety and SourceWatch. He calls for sufficiently funded, nonpartisan organizations with dedicated staff committed not just to breaking the story but also to pursuing it, so that the nexus of wealth and policy is fully exposed as the danger it is to American democracy. There necessarily remain questions about implementation and effectiveness, but for now it represents as good a plan as there is for publicizing information that urgently needs to be publicized.
How urgent is illustrated by one recent example: a New York Times article this week on the influence of billionaires in the 2014 election of Illinois governor Bruce Rauner and the policies he's pursued since.Read more
Black Millennials & the Racial Wealth Gap
Mel Jones writes in the Washington Monthly about an issue I and many of my peers are familiar with: how to pay off student debt and other bills in a not-so-great economy, yet somehow build a financial foundation for the future. Her experience, however, is fundamentally different from mine, in that as a person of color she must also contend with what's come to be known as the "second" racial wealth gap—the second phase in a "financial disparity that stems from continuous shortfalls in parents' net worth and low homeownership rates among blacks," which, Jones explains, "works to create an unlevel playing field."
Since owning a home accounts for over 50 percent of wealth for blacks (compared with 39 percent for whites) and since black Americans are five times less likely to inherit wealth than white Americans generally (7 percent to 36 percent), low homeownership rates among black Americans, which often are the result of discriminatory lending practices, are a large contributing factor to the racial wealth gap. In addition, Jones points out, "[T]he most recent housing bust is estimated to have wiped out half of the collective wealth of black families—a setback of two generations," resulting in essentially an exponential setback for millennials of color.
Jones cites a recent study published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives on the dynamics of wealth accumulation that found an estimated 20 percent of personal wealth can be attributed to formal and informal gifts from family members, especially parents. But blacks and Hispanics starting their careers are not likely to get such a boost. Moreover, they're already starting at a disadvantage, given that they take on higher levels of student debt than their white peers, "often to pay for routine expenses, like textbooks, that their parents are less likely to subsidize," Jones writes. They also often have to work while in college, thus missing out on opportunities to connect with classmates and forge the professional ties that might help them later.
I know I wouldn't be where I am without "formal and informal gifts from family members," before, during, and after college. I wouldn't have been able to make decisions toward furthering my professional career if I couldn't, for example, stay on my family's cell phone plan or receive help covering the cost of an apartment security deposit. Understanding that there are inherent long-term benefits in being able to choose career development over routine expenses is one part of understanding what in current discourse is called "privilege." As Jones puts it simply: "If you have to decide between paying for a professional networking event or a cell phone bill, the latter is likely to win out":
Read more
When this happens once or twice on a small scale, it's not a big deal. It's the collective impact of a series of decisions that matters, the result of which is displayed among ethnic and class lines and grounded in historical privilege.
Catholic University's Business School Again
The problems at Catholic University's business school run even deeper than I thought. Remember what is at stake: the business school has taken large sums of money from the unvirtuous Koch Brothers and other libertarian interests. The worry is that tainted money taints.
Now, CUA could try to deflect this criticism. They could argue that they need the money, and they will never waver in their commitment to traditional, orthodox, Catholic social teaching—the great legacy of people like John A. Ryan, whom Cardinal Turkson has been praising in recent speeches.
But CUA doesn't take this approach. Quite the opposite, in fact. It actually attacks its critics and brags about these attacks. Look at the attached image. It is a photograph of a poster on public display at CUA's business school. It boasts about taking large sums of money from the Kochs and the Busch Foundation. And it prominently displays an op-ed written by president John Garvey and then-dean (now provost) Andrew Abela for the Wall Street Journal, displaying the subtitle: "This Catholic university won't cave to demands made by the liberal social justice movement."Read more
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1409 N Mount Vernon Ave B Street View
Helpu Fire Life Safety 1409 N Mount Vernon Ave B, Williamsburg Virginia 23185 (VA)
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The Only Way to Reform the Farm Bill
September 10, 2013
In this post at the Foundry, Daren Bakst writes that the best option before Congress is an extension of the 2008 farm bill. The existing farm bills passed by the House and Senate are flawed, so a compromise with these bills would only lead to bad policy for the American people. Extending the existing law would give Congress time to identify the best ways to keep the food stamp program and farm programs separated from each other.
To read the full article go to http://blog.heritage.org/2013/09/10/the-only-way-to-reform-the-farm-bill/


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Try this Honey- Greens with Honey Mint Vinaigrette recipe, or contribute your own.
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[Dressing makes enough for 2 salads, refrigerate for future use.] Dressing: In small bowl, whisk together vinegar, mint, honey, poppy seeds, salt and pepper; gradually whisk in oil. [If using dried mint, let stand for 1 hour.] Refrigerate half of the dressing in covered jar for up to 1 week. In salad bowl, toss greens with remaining dressing to coat evenly. Scatter carrot over top; sprinkle with sesame seeds. 6 servings for $2.88 CDN [Feb/95] Per serving: about 150 calories, 2 g protein, 13 g fat, 7 g carbohydrate Source: Canadian Living magazine, Feb 95 Presented in article by Donna Paris "Easy Recipes: Its a Honey of a Country" [-=PAM=-] email@example.com
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I am trying to display
'topic_id' where an
'id' may have two specific values from column two, in one table.
however, some id's have multiple values.
id topic_id
1 red
2 blue
1 blue
4 purple
if i want to display the id's where topic_id is BOTH red and blue, what is the query?
select id, topic_id
from db
where topic_id='red, blue';
the result set is "1,2" instead of just 1, which has BOTH red and blue.


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I have a Google Chrome software install group policy object that works perfectly except when logging into the the Terminal (Remote Desktop) Services Server.
It's configured under "User Configuration" in Group Policy.
The group policy is linked to both my Employee OU, which contains the user account that is logging into the RDS server, and directly under the Domain, but it refuses to be acknowledged. Why?


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Taylor Tabbed Academic All-Conference USA
Bradley Tabbed Conference USA All-Freshman
Soccer Ends Season on High Note with Win
Southern Miss soccer finished the 2015 season with a 3-2 road win.
Soccer Concludes 2015 at UAB.
Southern Miss plays its final game of the season on Friday night in Birmingham.
Soccer Concludes Home Slate with North Texas
Southern Miss soccer concludes the home schedule against North Texas.
Soccer vs Louisiana Lafayette
Soccer vs Louisiana Lafayette
Soccer vs LA Tech
Soccer vs LA Tech
Soccer vs Middle Tennessee
Soccer vs Middle Tennessee
Southern Miss Soccer Gets Overtime Win
Golden Eagles best Southeastern Louisiana in dramatic fashion.
2013 (Freshman): Played in 18 of the 20 games on the year, making 14 starts at goalkeeper ... Logged 1514:55 minutes between the posts in rookie campaign ... Recorded 128 saves while allowing just 26 goals for a 1.54 goals against average ... Posted four victories and earned four ties ... Earned wins against Southeastern Louisiana (W, 1-0), Mississippi State (W, 3-0), Jackson State (W, 4-0) and Old Dominion (W, 4-3) ... Finished the year with a pair of shutouts, while combining for three others ... Recorded double-digit saves in seven games on the year ... Had a season-best 13 stops against Old Dominion and Colorado College ... Also posted double-digit saves against North Texas (12), UTSA (11), Mississippi State (10), Tulsa (10) and East Carolina (10) ... Allowed one or fewer goals in 12 of 18 appearances (.667) ... Earned first collegiate start against Mississippi State and started the final 14 games of the season.
High School: Attended Ernest Manning High School in Calgary, Alberta ... Named 2008 and 2009 Athlete of the Year ... Played club soccer for Blizzard Juventus for coach Paul Lombardo ... Also played basketball and volleyball ... Helped lead Griffins to Championship in basketball in 2012 and 2013 ... Named team captain and Team MVP in basketball ... Played in basketball All-Star Game as a senior ... Recipient of Ruthersford Scholarship.
Personal: Full name is Brittany Leigh Taylor ... Daughter of Joey Taylor and Jeff Taylor ... Has an older sister, Brooke ... Born on April 23 in Calgary, Alberta, Canada ... Majoring in finance.
|Follow Southern Miss Women's Soccer:
|Follow @SouthernMissSoc


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It's telling how quiet the Council can get after they float a stupid idea.
"Links to external content should open in a new window: Hyperlinks to external content should open a new tab, or 'spawned' browser window. Visitors should be advised that pop-up blockers may interfere with this action."
Annoying and lame. Let me decide for myself if I want to open a new browser window.
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Henderson County
Published: Sunday, April 11, 2010 at 4:30 a.m.
Last Modified: Friday, April 9, 2010 at 12:10 a.m.
April Film Society films
The Hendersonville Film Society will show these films at 2 p.m. Sundays at the Smoky Mountain Theater, Lake Pointe Landing, 333 Thompson St.:
u Today -- "Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?"
u Sunday -- "She" and HFS annual meeting.
u April 25 -- "Beau Brummel."
Donations accepted. Info: 697-7310.
'Soul Masters' showing
Connie Shoemaker will present the documentary film "Soul Masters" at 7 p.m. Wednesday, at the Unity Center, 2041 Old Fanning Bridge Road, Mills River. This 83-minute film chronicles the Soul Healing work as witnessed by an American filmmaker. In China, it is said that Dr. Guo can cure the incurable. When his representative in the West, Dr. Sha, heals her ailing father, an American filmmaker follows his return to China to visit his mentor. At Dr. Guo's clinic, she captures first-ever footage of breakthrough medical practices involving herbal medicine, fire massage and self-healing techniques.
Following the film screening, Shoemaker, a Soul Healing teacher, will answer questions about the film, as well as offer a short teaching on Soul Healing and a Soul Healing blessing to participants.
April events with Team ECCO
Team ECCO, 318 N. Main St., will offer these events in April:
u Wednesday -- Pre-K Day. Bring a picnic lunch and learn about fish, read a story and color your own fish to take home. Cost: $5. Limit: six children, ages 3 to 6.
u Saturday -- Creature Feature with Steve O'Neil, wildlife specialist from Earth Shine Lodge in Brevard.
u April 24, 10 to 11:30 a.m. -- Team ECCO Turtle at Earth Day celebration at Blue Ridge Community College and Mermaid Art with Denise Purcell. Cost: $15. Ages 6 to 12 will create a mermaid sculpture on a painted canvas.
u April 28, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. -- Decompression lunch. Open for business owners and staff.
For info and registration, visit www.team-ecco.com or e-mail email@example.com.
'In Sunshine' exhibit
"In Sunshine or in Shadow: A Residency and the WNC Students Who Were There" exhibit will be on display Thursday through Aug. 13, at the Center for Craft, Creativity & Design, 1181 Broyles Road. The exhibit features works by 19 students from the University of North Carolina at Asheville, Western Carolina University, Appalachian State University and Haywood Community College who worked with Tasmanian artist Patrick Hall during an international artist residency.
An opening reception will be from 4 to 6 p.m. Thursday. Info: www.craftcreativitydesign.org.
Adams poetry reading at library
Martha O. Adams returns to perform her poems at 7 p.m. April 21, in the Kaplan Auditorium of the Henderson County Public Library, 301 N. Washington St. Adams' poetry appeals to all ages and backgrounds. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. Info: 697-4725.
Qigong workshop at library
Qigong Master Instructors Bob and Fran German will teach a workshop at 4 p.m. April 22, in the Kaplan Auditorium of the Henderson County Public Library, 301 N. Washington St. Qigong ("chi Kung") is an ancient Chinese system of health and wellness. This workshop will focus on increasing energy levels and reducing stress. Info: 697-4725.
Film Society's Great Artist Series
The Hendersonville Film Society will host the sixth film in its series of films about great artists. "Coco Chanel," directed by Christian Duguay, will be shown at 11 a.m. April 22, in the Smoky Mountain Theater, Lake Pointe Landing, 333 Thompson St. Lunch will also be served. Cost is $18. Info: 697-7310.
'Opening Night' benefit
"Opening Night on Broadway," a benefit for Four Seasons will be at 6 p.m. April 30, at the Kenmure Country Club, 100 Club House Road. Sit-down dinner, auction and entertainment. Order your tickets today. Cost is $150 a couple or $100 per person. Info: 828-233-0319 or www.fourseasonscfl.org.
Call for artists
The Arts Council of Henderson County announces a call for artists for the juried and judged exhibition "Wood!" that runs from June 4 through July 3, in the D. Sam Neill Gallery at the Arts Council, upstairs at 538 N. Main St. There is a non-refundable, $20 entry fee for each piece. The fee for the first entry is waived for Arts Council members, who also are eligible for discounted fees on all subsequent entries. Artists may enter up to three pieces of work per category. Art, applications, entry fees and artist's statements are due May 27 and 28. Info: 693-8504 or www.acofhc.org.
PMC classes
Precious Metal Clay classes will be offered during April and May at Transition Glass, 2760 Greenville Highway, Flat Rock. Info: call Barbara Stock at 336-510-0502 or e-mail firstname.lastname@example.com.
Transylvania County Sain to speak at Transylvania Library
Local author Leanna Sain will speak at the Transylvania County Public Library at 2 p.m. Thursday. 212 S. Gaston St., Brevard. She will sign copies of her books from noon to 3 p.m. Saturday at Walden Books in the Blue Ridge Mall.
Info: www.LeannaSain.com.
Brevard's Fourth Friday Gallery Walks
Downtown Brevard's Fourth Friday Gallery walks will resume April 23. Brevard art galleries, art spots and restaurants will stay open from 5 to 9 p.m. on the fourth Fridays of the month through December.
A brochure for the gallery walks can be found at any of the participating galleries and at the Chamber of Commerce or go to www.artsofbrevard.org and click on Art Tours. Info: 884-2787.
Polk County New exhibits at Upstairs Artspace
The Upstairs Artspace, 49 S. Trade St., Tryon, presents new exhibits "Equine Expressions" and "Seduction: Layered Interpretation" opening Friday and continuing through May 29. "Equine" celebrates the noble horse with paintings, prints and ceramic vessels executed in realistic and impressionist styles. "Seduction" combines figurative, abstract and assemblage painting -- along with an installation -- to suggest different objects of temptation and allure.
A walk and tour, conducted by the artists, will be at 2 p.m. April 25. Info: 828-859-2828.
Irish soprano returns for FENCE concert
Dublin-born soprano Donna Gallagher will perform at 4 p.m. April 18, at the Foothills Equestrian Nature Center, 3381 Hunting Country Road, Tryon. Gallagher is a well-known performer in her native Ireland and has appeared in concert in Britain, Italy, Portugal and Germany. She will be accompanied by pianist Mildred Roche.
Buncombe County Multimedia Arts and Sciences student show
The University of North Carolina at Asheville's ninth annual Multimedia Arts and Sciences Juried Student Exhibition will be on view through April 26, at UNCA's Highsmith University Union Gallery. UNCA students will present original new media works, including 2D and 3D animation, interactive art, web applications and video.
Info: 828-350-4567.
Lewis exhibit at Blowers Gallery
Selected drawings by Asheville artist Heather Lewis will be on display through April 28, at the University of North Carolina at Asheville's Blowers Gallery. The exhibition includes 12 works Lewis calls "drawings," created using various media such as brake grindings, roofing felt and DVDs, as well as natural phenomena such as light and gravity. Info: 251-6436.
Emily Warn poetry reading
The University of North Carolina at Asheville's Center for Jewish Studies will host a reading and talk by poet Emily Warn at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in UNCA's Laurel Forum, Karpen Hall. Warn will read and discuss her latest poetry collection, "The Shadow Architect."
Info: 232-5027 or www.unca.edu/cjs.
Opera Guild recital
The Opera Guild Recital Series will feature soprano Holly Wengenroth at noon Tuesday at First Baptist Church of Asheville, 5 Oak St. Wengenroth, a performance intern with the Asheville Lyric Opera, helped to lead an arts workshop series with Under One Sky's summer youth camp. She also guest-starred as one of two female chorus members in Asheville Lyric Opera's "Don Giovanni." She has performed with the Victorian Carolers Professional Holiday Quartet and sung various professional outreach recitals. The recital will include works by Claude Debussy, Libby Larsen and Jules Massenet.
Art and Chocolate
The Asheville Art Museum's ARTmob will host Art and Chocolate with artist Any Farkas and French Broad Chocolate Lounge owners Jael and Dan Rattigan at 6 p.m. Thursday on the second floor of French Broad Chocolate Lounge, 10 S. Lexington Ave., Asheville.
Cost is $5 and includes a glass of wine and a free pass to the museum.
Farkas will demonstrate and talk about his process and inspiration. A full display of his work will be on the walls.
Chocolatiers Dan and Jael Rattigan will do a chocolate screen print project, resulting in an edible piece of chocolate art to be enjoyed by attendees. To register, call 253-3227, Ext. 114.
Black Mountain College exhibit at UNCA
The University of North Carolina at Asheville will host an exhibit of photos from the Historic Black Mountain College.
The exhibit, on view in Ramsey Library, features 19 images of Black Mountain College from 1933-1957. It portrays some of the central figures including Josef Albers, Buckminster Fuller and many others. An opening reception is scheduled from 4:30 to 6 p.m. Thursday on the main floor of the Library.
Info: 251-6645.
UNCA senior pastels exhibit
"Alter Ego: Illustrations of the Inner Self," an exhibition of eight works in soft pastel by University of North Carolina at Asheville senior Theresa Burden, will be on view in UNCA's Owen Hall second floor gallery beginning Friday and continuing through April 27. There will be an opening reception at 6 p.m. Friday. Info: 251-6559.
Spring Family Art pARTy
The Asheville Art Museum will host its Spring Family Art pARTy from 2 to 4 p.m. on April 18. Join the museum for storytime inside the exhibition "Nouns: Children's Book Artists Look at People, Places and Things," and art making in the museum's studio.
The Asheville Art Museum is at 2 S. Pack Square in Asheville. Info: 253-3227.
Art reception at the Hilton
The Asheville Area Arts Council will sponsor an artists' reception from 5 to 8 p.m. Friday at the Hilton, 43 Town Square Boulevard, Asheville.
Artists include Suzanne Shaffer from Arden, a signature member of the Watercolor Society of North Carolina, whose watercolor paintings have been exhibited in Asheville, Boone, Hendersonville and Winston-Salem. Artwork, including landscape images by Brevard photographer Bruce Siulinsk, will be on display through May 17, at the Echo Gallery, Biltmore Park. Info: 258-0710.
Echo Gallery presents 'Threads'
Echo Gallery at Biltmore Park will host a reception for its Spring exhibition, "Threads," from 5 to 8 p.m. Friday. The show will feature new work by fiber artists Jen Swearington, Libby and Jim Mijanovich ("Mija") and Barbara Zaretsky and ceramic pieces by Emily Reason.
In addition to these guest artists, new work from member artists including painters Genie Maples, Barbara Fisher, Susan Finer and Cindy Walton; ceramic artist Lori Theriault, photo artist Laurie McCarriar, textile artist Susan Webb Lee and ceramic sculptor Anna Koloseike willl be on display. The show runs through May 30.
Info: 687-7761 or www.echoasheville.com.
Asheville Theatre auditions
Asheville Theatre auditions for "Noises Off" are from 7 to 9 p.m. April 18 and 19, at Asheville Community Theatre, 35 E. Walnut St., Asheville. Production dates are July 2 to 18.
There will also be auditions for "The Trip to Bountiful" by the Autumn Players from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. April 19. Production dates will be May 7 to 9. Info: 253-4931 or www.ashevilletheatre.org.
Reader comments posted to this article may be published in our print edition. All rights reserved. This copyrighted material may not be re-published without permission. Links are encouraged.


text:
This item from Under the Sea is now in the Shop Backroom
More from Under the Sea
Corocraft 3D Green Stone Crown-Torch Brooch
This 1960's modernist abstract design brooch, signed by Corocraft, is like part of a king's crown, a torch or perhaps a flower pod, set with a large, square, rounded edge stone in brilliant jewel tone emerald green.
The huge 1" inch (25mm) across stone is set to look like it is floating inside its setting. The setting is textured, brushed gold tone, slightly shiny and matte finish at the same time. It has a beautiful curve to it and the four sections around the stone are adorned with ball tips for a regal effect.
It measures 2 1/2" inches tall X 1 1/4" inches at its widest point. It is hallmarked "Corocraft" in script lettering with the copyright symbol on a raised, rectangular cartouche on the back. It is in excellent condition, with only one wear spot to the gold tone, near one of the ball tips.
NOTE: I also have this same Corocraft brooch in my shop with a sapphire blue stone, in perfect condition (RL-3056).
FASHION NOTE: Pantone 2013 fall color report: Emerald "Multifaceted Emerald continues to sparkle and fascinate, bringing luxury and elegance to the palette." Today, the PANTONE Name is known worldwide as the standard language for accurate color communication, from designer to manufacturer to retailer to customer, across a variety of industries. The PANTONE VIEW Colour Planner is a biannual trend forecasting tool that offers seasonal color direction and inspiration 24 months in advance for multiple usages, including menswear, women's wear, activewear, cosmetics and industrial design.
Gender: Female, Age Group: Adult, Color: gold, emerald green, Size: M
If you were the pending buyer of this item, go to My Account to view, track and check payment for this item.
Under the Sea
Gay Sherman Weintz, Ivoryton, CT
An Ocean of Vintage Jewels ~ Rare and Designer-signed
Tune in online iCRVradio for my show, "If This Brooch Could Talk" - Next up, Providence Jewelry Museum!


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Radius: ... miles
Fri 30th Nov at 8:15pm
Paul F Taylor
@ The Africa Centre, London
Also appearing: Benny Boot, David Whitney
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Never miss another 'Paul F Taylor' show
Paul F Taylor
Paul F Taylor is a one of a kind comedian. An instantly watchable performer, whilst onstage he exhibits a lost playful vulnerability. This coupled with his hilarious and surreal observations never fails to leave audiences crying with laughter, gasping for air and wondering "What the F?... It's Paul F. Taylor!". Paul is a superb writer with a keen eye for the absurd in everyday life, he creates wickedly funny and astute observational comedy which is totally captivating and utterly hilarious. Certainly one for the future!
'Beautifully crafted one liners...astute observational comedy' (GQ Magazine)
Paul F Taylor tour dates
Benny Boot
Benny Boot has been performing on the UK stand-up comedy circuit for 6 years. He is considered by many comedians as a wonderful stand-up artist to watch. Boot delivers his jokes in a unique style on a variety of strange topics. His engaging persona and material keeps the laughter rolling through the entire show and is guaranteed to bring any audience undone.
'He's got a keen instinct for the joke, an imaginative turn of phrase and an ability to find an offbeat angle to whatever he chooses to talk about' (Chortle)
'... an arsenal of consistently brilliant gags' (The Guardian).
Benny Boot tour dates
David Whitney
Winner of the 2007 Hackney Empire new act of the year and BAFTA winner for Fonejacker. David Whitney's material is a fine blend of political satire and pure filth, making him the thinking person's comic. So long as that person is thinking of something satirically filthy at the time. His posh-accented delivery comes dunked in a tongue-in-cheek laddishness.
'... you can't stop him, you can only hope to contain him' (Reg D Hunter)
'His trajectory is perfect. He squeezes the laughter out of audiences. He is the squeeze person' (Eddie Izzard)
'David Whitney, a stand-up comedian with sharp cavalier observations, his CV reads: actor involved in the BAFTA wining comedy Fonejaker and bagpipe player, who has piped at many events including the Royal Tournament and Gwen Stefani's wedding, a very witty man of many talents' (Funhouse Comedy).
David Whitney tour dates
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Venue Facts
Venue: The Africa Centre
38 King Street
Covent Garden
Website: africacentre.org.uk
Phone: 020 7836 1973
→ Charing Cross 7 min walk
→ Covent Garden 2 min walk


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text: Aveley vs Chatham Town Last updated: Matt Abbott, Chief Reporter @GazetteMatt Aveley 2 - 1 Chatham Town Live from Millfield Ryman Division One North Ade Yussuf gave Town a 31st minute lead, but second half goals from Elbi and Elliot seal three points for Millers. Promoted stories Most popular See more stories Comments are closed on this article. Next Up


text:
Media pools
Updated: January 21, 2005
Applies To: Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2003 with SP1, Windows Server 2003 with SP2
Media pools
A media pool is a collection of tapes or disks to which the same management properties apply. All media in a Removable Storage system belong to a media pool, and each media pool holds only one type of media. Data management programs use media pools to gain access to specific tapes or disks within a library.
Using media pools, you can define properties that apply to a set of media. This is useful because Removable Storage allows multiple programs to share the same media within a single library. A library can include media from different media pools, each with different properties. A single media pool can span multiple libraries. You can also create hierarchies of media pools, or media pools that contain other media pools. For example, you can create a media pool for each specific media type required by a program, and then create another media pool that contains this collection of media pools. Media pools can contain either media or other media pools, but not both.
A Removable Storage system provides two classes of media pools: system and application.
System media pools include free media pools, unrecognized media pools, and import media pools. Removable Storage creates one free, one unrecognized, and one import media pool for each media type in your Removable Storage system. The system media pools are used to hold media that are not currently being used by an application.
Application media pools are created by data management programs such as Backup and Remote Storage, the latter for computers running Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition; Windows Server 2003, Datacenter Edition; the 64-bit versions of Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition; or the 64-bit versions of Windows Server 2003, Datacenter Edition.
The different media pools are defined as follows:
Unrecognized media pools contain blank (new) media and media that Removable Storage does not recognize. You should immediately move a new tape or disk from an unrecognized media pool to a free media pool so that the tape or disk can be used by applications, or remove it from the library.
Unrecognized media are automatically deleted from the Removable Storage database when they are ejected from a library.
Import media pools contain media that Removable Storage recognizes in the database but that have not been used before in a particular Removable Storage system. For example, media in an import media pool could be media from one office location that are introduced into a Removable Storage system at another office location.
You can move media from import media pools to free media pools or application media pools so applications can use them.
Free media pools contain media that are not currently in use by applications and do not contain useful data. Media in free media pools are available for use by applications.
Application media pools can be configured to automatically draw media from free media pools when there are not sufficient media available in a particular application media pool. If this configuration is not implemented, you must manually move media from a free media pool when needed.
Application media pools, created by data management applications (and by you), determine what media can be accessed by which applications.
Media in an application media pool are controlled by that application or by an administrator. An application can use more than one media pool, and more than one application can share a single media pool. For example, Backup might use one media pool for full-backup and another media pool for incremental backup, each containing a different media type.
There can be any number of application media pools in a Removable Storage system. Media that are currently reserved for use by an application, called allocated media, cannot be moved between media pools. Allocation controls how the media are used by applications.
The following illustration shows how media can move from one media pool to another.


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The Ink Stained Quill Vol. VJournal Entry: Sat Jul 19, 2014, 12:00 PM
Hello everyone! It's Kelsy, aka SpriteBlayde here. Welcome to the fifth volume of The Ink Stained Quill. This series focuses on the amazing writers we have here on deviantART. Each installment will feature a deviant who you may, or may not know, who is willing to answer some of my questions! Whether you are a long time writer, or a newbie, there is something for everyone in the series who is looking to improve their craft or for some light reading.
Today's guest is a special one, as a celebration for having posted five of these interviews now. He is also one of the most important people in my life, second only to my family. Without further ado, please welcome chromeantennae!
Before we start, is there anything you would like to share with our audience? Little known facts about you, words of wisdom, information on upcoming projects, etc.?
Seeing as how the World Cup just recently ended a few days ago I guess I can share that I've played soccer for about 13 years before stopping a couple years ago. I'm a huge fan of the sport and I watch it whenever I can. Other than that you guys know a ton about me (probably 'cause I share too much, ha!) and uuuhh...really, I'm just trying to get back into the swing of things here. It's been an up-and-down summer so I'm tryin' to really get back involved like I was in the beginning of summer. I also want to point out Echolalic-Ellie's book she's getting together. I just know it'll be absolutely wonderful and I hope people check it out once it's finished.
Can you tell us a little bit about your writing habits? Perhaps about how frequently you write, or if you only write when inspiration strikes?
My writing habits are fairly simple. I try to write everyday. No matter if I'm going through a block or not—simply because it's good to get different phrases, words, etc. in as often as you can. And whenever a block strikes, I tend not to focus on it. I don't focus on writing. Like I tell everyone, I let the writing come to me when this happens. I step away from writing poetry. Close dA for a while, play video games. Hang with my family, just take my mind completely off of it. And whenever a sliver an idea comes to pass, I'll jot it down as soon as I can. It's never good to "force" writing, y'know? I honestly just try to write ideas as they come. Whenever they may come. And if they don't, I'll find a word to store away and its definition to save for a later date. Perhaps that helps with some of the words I use in my poems? Haha.
Can you please step us through your writing process?
My writing process? Just get in my room. My room is my safe have to just get away from any distractions or noise. And just put on some good, background music (particularly instrumentals) and just let the words do their thing. It's quite therapeutic, really.
How did you first start writing? (I know the answer to this question, as do some others, but it's always nice to hear how people get started.)
Well (and I've practically memorized this story with how much I've told it), you were smack dab in the middle of it. Without you and my grandmother, I probably wouldn't be writing poetry in the first place.
The story goes like this: I started writing in late 2012. Right after my 16th birthday. (I can't believe I'm gonna be 18 in three months. Gosh.) But during that time (And you can attest to this), I was in a bit of a funk during this stretch and my grandmother (Whom I affectionately call Grandbomb, but that is another story for another day.) asked me if I "wrote lyrics." I asked her if she meant in a musical sense, and she replied with, "Yes. I think you'd be good at it. You're very poetic." I didn't do much with the comment at the time (Of course I thanked her for her kind words.), but I realized after my 16th birthday, maybe I could do something with it. Call it an epiphany, if you will. Haha.
It just so happened that your birthday was coming up in a few short months and I wanted my first poem to be substantial, even if I didn't really know "how" to write poetry. Ever since then, with the way you reacted, I've been addicted to writing ever since.
I know that you received a DD on your piece, "Chrysanthemum". Can you share some insight on how this felt? And what this poem was about/ what inspired it?
It felt…shocking, really. I wasn't expecting it. It was just a big bundle of emotions. All positive really 'cause I saw congratulations messages from hypermagical, Lady-Yume, ithaswhatitisnt, and so many others I just didn't know what to say 'cause I was actually away from dA that entire day so when I saw it; I was stunned. But elated. And the piece was about a dream I had. About someone being gone from my life at the time. I was proud of the piece, definitely, but I was shocked it got a Daily Deviation. To a degree, I still somewhat am.
I actually have two Daily Deviations but the other is in storage for personal reasons.
Do you have any advice for aspiring or longtime writers that you would like to share?
Never force writing and experiment. Experiment is a writer's exercise and it helps you grow as a writer. And I often saying to never force writing because that tends to get me deeper into slumps, personally. Obviously everyone's different but if you guys are like me, don't force it. Get away it from it and clear your head. And besides those two things, write because you want to. Create because that's
what you want to do. Your art will be a lot better because of it. I promise everyone reading this, that.
You're an admin along with myself over at DailyLitRecognition. Can you tell us how you found them and what made you want to be a part of this wonderful group?
I found them through DLD. DailyLitDeviation was the group before them and I've been an avid follower of them since last year or so. I also really want to be involved with the community and I felt as though the next step was to attempt to be an admin for this group. Maybe it'll groom me for bigger things. Who knows, that's a bit down the road, but I do love doing it. It's a great family of lit lovers. Love to everyone on board, of course! In particular TwilightPoetess for being SO amazing in helping me get started and SilverInkblot for the opportunity to be a part of this great team.
Could you please share 2-3 of your own deviations and tell us why you picked them?
Froth And WingsFroth And Wings- I feel this showed my ability to really play with words as well as still maintain that emotional edge to my pieces.
i reside in the corners
of white-tiled floors,
knees pressed to my chest
like a covetous courtship
brought together by taken lovers.
steam rising from the water
that's sliding down tub walls,
overflowing as the hot liquid
seeps under my worn toes.
ravaged by the road i've taken
and refuse to exit off of.
i nestle my forehead
against the top of my kneecap,
and tighten my arms
around my calves
as if curling into a ball
will help me roll around
this depression
that bounces
from corner to corner,
hitting every insecurity i own
with no way to dodge it.
i pull myself closer together,
tighter and tighter
like a gymnast
and my shoulder blades
stretch my skin,
until the marrow
spreads like wings
across my broken back.
the scapulae
out wide,
as my eyes shut
like a venus flytrap
wrapping around its meal.
and i sit there,
my frame distorting
and contorting itself
around the withering heart
and sorrow left
like a dying rose.
and the water holds my ankles
I'm In Debt (Broken Wealth)I'm In Debt (Broken Wealth)- This piece really means a lot to me because of the message, quite simply. I feel it's something a lot of people forget because NOTHING in life is free. Not even love. Not time. Nothing. Because in a blink of an eye, it can all fade away.
the best things in life are expensive.
they cost so much.
but money is a crutch.
for broken spirits
and disintegrating hearts
falling into palms
of skin-lined pockets
holding the loose change
of broken watches.
cracked eyes.
you're not empty
unless your pockets are filled.
but you're empty,
if they are not.
because money is reliable,
it buys memories
stamped onto cliche hallmark cards,
and makes smiles cheap.
but oddly expensive.
money show ivory pearls
as well as buy them.
revenue is the residue
of things that cannot be returned
but was manufactured in a shoe shop.
in the factories of china,
and slaved away in the dust of india,
money is safe.
money is easy.
euros and sterling,
and Benjamin Franklin,
make it so.
money is a crutch
that helps us walk,
helps us talk,
helps the feds,
helps us wed,
helps the dead.
because a dead clock,
is right twice a day.
and you have to make sure,
the last time you see
the fallen,
time respects the corpse.
and on
Ghost Threads (Kaidan)Ghost Threads (Kaidan)- I also feel this shows my ability to utilize space and timing in my poetry. Like I always say, "Wordplay, space, and structure are my calling cards in writing," and this is one of my better pieces showcasing just that, I believe.
spaghetti strings, marinara red
sit in my metacarpal plates.
i wrap my bony digits
around the threads tight,
my knuckles white
around my blush mane.
i always had this bad habit,
of pulling my hair w-w-when--
whenever I got anxious.
and when I was younger,
I had a stuttering problem
and it'll sh-show up
every n-n-now and again.
every time i lay in my bed,
i feel the shadow of your fingerprints,
ghost across my skin.
so i strangle my tresses in stress,
to get you out of my head.
i never expected your cologne
to override perfume cloaked sheets.
the only code you ever had
was written by armani,
and i fell for it,
like when i close my eyes at night.
mornings are always hard.
i try not to roll over,
but i always end up
right back in the bruises
of a shattered accord.
like someone cut a cord.
we were a f-f-false knot
and our baby had no-no-no more b-b-breath.
i hate this d-d-damn pillowc-c-c-case.
but i can't bring myself to throw it out.
i need
Please pick 2-5 deviations from other people and share why you picked them.
Mature Content
BabydollPropping my daughter against the towel on my shoulder, I rhythmically pat her back. Nevaeh's just had her second bottle of the day, and try as I might, I still can't get her to burp. Today is no different, and in the end I give up, wipe her small round mouth, and pop her in the bouncer for a while. It's the electric kind, with a soft lullaby and swinging motion, so I know she'll be entertained while I get on with the mountain of washing that needs to be folded.by camelopardalisinblue: This piece is just amazing. I really don't have the words for it. Just read it, everyone. It's phenomenal.
You wouldn't think just two people could make so much washing, but ever since her dad had left me, it seemed like the washing pile had grown larger instead of smaller. Despite the lullaby, I make conversation with her as I fold - it seems to me that it's the best way to develop her speech, for her to hear it. She's such a good, quiet baby, I often wonder how long until she starts making more noise.
By the time I've reduced "mount fold-me" to a mere foothill, she's asleep, so I leave her in the bouncer and dash out to check the m
day teni. alpha i. omegaby Lissomer: Despite the format kicking her butt (Hehe), the formation of it is gorgeous and of course, the writing itself is phenomenal. I adore this piece to pieces.
i am not ready to grow up, i am not ready to grow up,
but dissonant chords, memento mori, but the promise of independence, autonomy,
and the date of my birth and of making something of myself
clamour sharply at my senses keeps me moving along the path,
abusive, aggressive, morose - terrified, uncertain, hopeful -
i wonder how other people i wonder if i
we always duel in redi used toby haphazardmelody: So real. Gorgeous. Striking. I love this piece so, so, so much.
butterfly hope
into wrists
[they always
duel in red]
always careful
to keep a portion of it
within your chest
i press your ribs
in your sleep
bleaching your lungs
from the inside out
with my
tattered lullaby
you carefully
drown the sun
in dust
at noontime
:thumb463830018: by introverted-ghost: This is just a near perfect piece on this subject. Instant fave on this piece.
I know that some people have one or more favorite quotes that stick with them or inspire them. Care to share any?
Um, just one in particular honestly. "Trust your senses, only our judgement fails us." My dad first told me that and it always sticks with me. Always, always.
Do you have any favorite books, authors, poets, writers, deviants, etc., that you would like to share with us?
introverted-ghost, imaginative-lioness, HugQueen, Lissomer, ithaswhatitisnt, BleedingProphecies, LadyLincoln, ieatrosepetals, Lady-Yume, cality,momo-madness, solis-ortus, haphazardmelody, Tales-of-Tao, betwixtthepages, Regal-Pinion, LadyBrookeCelebwen, GuinevereToGwen, callerofcrows, hopeburnsblue, ohellohara, Viidith22, shrines, carmennge toxic--sunrise, amour-raven, FuzzyHoser, TheGalleryOfEve, seth-ravenclaw, Naktarra, Joe-Maccer, ladyshadowrage, tuiskulumi, jungle-slang, SleentheBeast, SpiralingSpontaneity, X3beyondthesunx3, ArwynRie, 91816119, ghostinafog, BlackBowfin, singagainsoon, learningtobefree, SilverInkblot, LiliWrites,crooked-clockwork, IntelligentZombie, RoseScarlet, littleblueraccoon, hypnicjerks, Medoriko, PoetryOD,Medoriko, CupofCharlie, SereneCyrene, Aerode, hypermagical,BlueDiamondSnow, WhitePlumFragrance, Story-of-a-Mind, nightshade-keyblade, half-pixieman Nullibicity SpiderwebWisher, rociobelindamendez, A-Lovely-Anxiety, ssensory, camelopardalisinblue, Moonbeam13, RiseandbeStronger, Batgirl2013, Icedendritic, voidmemes, shehrozeameen, TheImpossibleWriter, calliopen, TheEmptyChest, Sammur-amat, forestmeetwildfire, inknalcohol, LivingDreamer97, ave-dottore, Gingersanps, A-Shadow-Rose, notCindyChen, peaseblossoms, Riorlyne, puffuroo, Waffles-Of-Gondolyn, analillithbar, Loftydreams101, ScarletNalick, saltwaterlungs, littlemoonboots, Nichrysalis, WhiteHeartFlame,Ghostjay55, anobrain, Eevee1999, AyeAye12, adeline-renee, lethologic-luna, rainylake, UntamedUnwanted, Riemea, shep4life, wolves-rockk, Nekothebro, lion-essrampant,Ashes-Mari3, MangaKidArt, Calexy, and just so, so, so many more. I love all of these people, plus more. Far too many to name.
Oh, and of course: You, Kelsy. (Thank you. )
Any thing else you would like to say to our audience before we conclude this interview?
Thank you SpriteBlayde, for the opportunity to talk to you about myself a little bit. I truly am honored.
And of course, I love you all and you're all beautiful, amazing, and incredible. Yes, YOU.
And that's a wrap! Thanks so much for joining us today. Be sure to go give Ricky's work lots of love! He's an affable person who likes to make friends.
And thank you to my audience, it's been a pleasure having you for the fifth edition of The Ink Stained Quill! If you know of anyone you think would be a great literary guest, please feel free to comment or note me with their username and why they should be interviewed. Thanks guys!
Signing off,
The Ink Stained Quill Vol. V by SpriteBlaydeWatch
©2014-2016 SpriteBlayde
I'm so incredibly late, but thank you as always for the mention and feature, Ricky.
Thank you for mentioning me, chromeantennae! It makes me happy to know I'm among your favourites here.
chromeantennae Thank you for the mention! (That is a WALL of artists)
And SpriteBlayde, I am really enjoying this interview series.
And SpriteBlayde, I am really enjoying this interview series.
Thank you! I'm so glad to hear you're enjoying it.
You deserve it, sis!
It's always so lovely to read interviews with Ricky
Thank you for mentioning me my wonderful Wisdom Boy chromeantennae
Thank you for mentioning me my wonderful Wisdom Boy chromeantennae
Thanks so much for the mention :3
Thank you for the mention, chromeantennae...I don't even know what to say.
This is a great interview. Really lets us get to know more about Ricky; I feel like that can be hard to achieve in mediums like this.
This is a great interview. Really lets us get to know more about Ricky; I feel like that can be hard to achieve in mediums like this.
Thank you, I'm so happy to know that one of my goals for this series is being accomplished.
You deserve all of the love in the world, V.
chromeantennae, I loved reading about your process. I have the same exact approach to writer's block. I'm also honored to be one of your favorite Deviants ... how sweet you are. Also also, I wouldn't know you've only been writing poetry for under two years. Jeez, you got good really fast!


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Oct 26
Aug 30
Jul 19
ImFromCleveland.com and the KushNERDS present the 3rd annual "Summer Roc" music event on July 19th 2014 at McCarthys downtown, west back of the flats. DJ's and hip hop performances from some of the best hip hop artists Cleveland has to offer. ALL DAY MUSIC EVENT!
Jul 18
Mar 15
Sounds Like: Sublime, 311, Atmosphere, Sage Francis
Label: Thats Whats Zup Ent
Manager: CleMusicCity
Bio: I started writing music back when I was in 7th grade but that's all it was. When I got to High School I learned how to record myself and started releasing mixtapes over industry beats. I wanted to do original music so I began making beats for me to rap over. I fell in love with producing so I foc...See Full Bio


text:
by nathanhoffman01
Fonts identified so far
Lots of discussion about the new logo Interbrand designed for AT&T. Most certainly custom, or is it?
I work for AT&T. The official corporate font is Clearview which is also used in the logo.
This is clearly not Clearview. To be correct the official corporate typeface for all AT&T materials is AT&T Clearview. They have modified slightly the new US highways typeface by Terminal Design.
Cellman - I deleted the site - because that was not an "official" site but just a file sharing site that someone had loaded an illegal copy of the corporate font on.
Meanwhile - if you want to read about the new at&t (or not so new anymore) you can at the official site and a few other places too.
Hi, I know this post is old but you can download the typefaces free here:
[link removed for the reasons already stated above]
I work on at&t artwork on a daily basis and closely with at&t brand.
The official font used for all at&t 2.0 branded material is called ClearviewATT (a proprietary version of clearview) HOWEVER the logo is NOT this font.
The & is different and there may be a little mod on the a tail.


text:
We check the "made in" labels
Says Trump shirts are made in Bangladesh, Trump suits in Mexico, Trump Vodka in the Netherlands, Trump crystal barware in Slovenia and his cufflinks and ties in China.
— PunditFact
on Monday, July 25th, 2016
Maybe, but no solid data
In 2016, Dallas, Texas, has fewer "police officer-related shootings than any large city in America."
— PolitiFact National
on Tuesday, July 12th, 2016
UPDATED: Counting all prisoners
Harris County, Texas has "some of the highest jailing and incarceration rates in the U.S. and the world."
— PolitiFact Texas
on Friday, July 8th, 2016
UPDATED: Contradicted by the FBI
Says she "never received nor sent any material that was marked classified" on her private email server while secretary of state.
— PolitiFact National
on Wednesday, July 6th, 2016
No evidence of pay-to-play
Says Hillary Clinton's State Department "approved the transfer of 20 percent of America's uranium holdings to Russia, while nine investors in the deal funneled $145 million to the Clinton Foundation."
— PolitiFact National
on Thursday, June 30th, 2016
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text:
July 26, 2016, 6:44 pm
Mark Cook from PewterReport.com joined Ron and JP to get you ready for Bucs training camp. He talked about the offensive line, and if a guy like J. R. Sweezy isn't ready to go, there is a guy there...
Read More »
July 26, 2016, 6:39 pm
Bill Shaikin, LA Times Dodgers Insider, joined Ron and JP to talk about the trade talks before the deadline from the Dodgers' perspective. He says they really do need to add a really good arm to...
July 26, 2016, 6:35 pm
It's back after a two-week hiatus. Mark Cook from PewterReport.com joined in on the game.
July 26, 2016, 3:37 pm
Jonathan Jones, Panthers Beat Reporter from The Charlotte Observer, joined Ron and JP to talk a little Panthers football and NFC South preview. He says Carolina's biggest question going in to camp...
July 26, 2016, 3:23 pm
Tim Kurkjian, MLB analyst from ESPN, joined Ron and JP to talk about what the Rays are going to do before the trade deadline. Many of the rumors have been that Chris Archer will be traded and...
July 26, 2016, 12:41 pm
Melo on MJ statement: 'Brilliant and about time'
NBA Your teams on the go or at home. Personalize SI with our new App. Install on iOS or Android. Carmelo Anthony applauded Hornets owner...
July 26, 2016, 12:37 pm
WATCH: 'Camp Day' ends in dusty brawl at Marlins-Reds minor league game
Punches were thrown after a player was hit with a pitch with two outs in the ninth
July 26, 2016, 12:25 pm
July 26, 2016, 12:23 pm


text:
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Remington Wet 2 Straight Flat Iron + Free Shipping
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Alan Wake's American Nightmare launches on XBLA
Alan Wake's American Nightmare has launched on Xbox Live Arcade this morning following the successful launch of the PC version of the original last week.
The grindhouse action spin-off from Wake 1, which is widely assumed to be a small stopgap ahead of a much-expected Alan Wake 2, sees the writer in Arizona in an episode of Night Springs written by him, as he goes up against main enemy Mr Scratch.
Get it queued to your 360here for 1200 MS points.
Read our interview with Remedy franchise boss Oskari Hakkinen on American Nightmare here.
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