text: Explore Northland The Matakana Coast to Bream Bay Whangarei Around Whangarei North of Whangarei to the Bay of Islands The Bay of Islands Matauri Bay to the Karikari Peninsula Kaitaia and around Ninety Mile Beach and Cape Reinga Hokianga Harbour The kauri forests and around The northern Kaipara Harbour Share The kauri (agathis australis) ranks alongside the sequoias of California as one of the largest trees in existence. Unlike the sequoias, which are useless as furniture timber, kauri produce beautiful wood, a fact that hastened its demise and spawned the industries that dominated New Zealand's economy in the latter half of the nineteenth century. The kauri is a type of pine that now grows only in New Zealand, though it once also grew in Australia and Southeast Asia, where it still has close relations. Identifiable remains of kauri forests are found all over New Zealand, but by the time humans arrived on the scene its range had contracted to Northland, Auckland, the Coromandel Peninsula and northern Waikato. Individual trees can live over 2000 years, reaching 50m in height and 20m in girth, finally toppling over as the rotting core becomes too weak to support its immense weight. Kauri loggers Maori have long used mature kauri for dugout canoes, but it was the "rickers" (young trees) that first drew the attention of European loggers since they formed perfect spars for sailing ships. The bigger trees soon earned an unmatched reputation for their durable, easy-to-work and blemish-free wood, with its straight, fine grain. Loggers' ingenuity was taxed to the limit by the difficulty of getting such huge logs out of the bush. On easier terrain, bullock wagons with up to twelve teams were lashed together to haul the logs onto primitive roads or tramways. Horse-turned winches were used on steeper ground and, where water could be deployed to transport the timber, dams were constructed from hewn logs. In narrow valleys and gullies all over Northland and the Coromandel, loggers constructed kauri dams up to 20m high and 60m across, with trapdoors at the base. Trees along the sides of the valley were felled while the dam was filling, then the dam was opened to flush the floating trunks down the valley to inlets where the logs were rafted up and towed to the mills. Gum diggers Once an area had been logged, the gum diggers typically moved in. Like most pines, kauri exudes a thick resin to cover any scars inflicted on it, and huge accretions form on the sides of trunks and in globules around the base. Maori chewed the gum, made torches from it to attract fish at night and burned the powdered resin to form a pigment used for moko (traditional tattoos). Once Pakeha got in on the act, it was exported as a raw material for furniture varnishes, linoleum, denture moulds and the "gilt" edging on books. When it could no longer be found on the ground, diggers – mostly Dalmatian, but also Maori, Chinese and Malaysian – thrust long poles into the earth and hooked out pieces with bent rods; elsewhere, the ground was dug up and sluiced to recover the gum. Almost all New Zealand gum was exported, but by the early twentieth century synthetic resins had captured the gum market. Kauri gum is still considered one of the finest varnishes for musical instruments, and occasional accidental finds supply such specialist needs. The future In recent years the kauri have been further threatened by a new disease known as PTA or kauri dieback (w kauridieback.co.nz) with symptoms including yellowed leaves, dead branches and resinous lesions close to the ground, eventually leading to the tree's death. The disease is transmitted through soil and water, so always keep to the tracks and boardwalks and clean your footwear after visiting a kauri forest. Read More


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Member since Dec 11, 2008
- Profile: /members/2505-phil.htm
- URL: http://www.connectionsmedia.com
- Comments: 1
Recent Blog Comments By Phil
ColdFusion CFMailParam's New "Content" Attribute Is Awesome
Posted on May 22, 2008 at 4:49 PM
I think it is correctly spelled "reckoned," as in "I reckon you right about that." In the email generation that we have done from Coldfusion server, we have more routinely relied on <img> tags that call back to our server, rather than sending the image content in the actual email. But, I gues... read more »

subset: commoncrawl


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NFL Team Report: Minnesota Vikings - NOTES, QUOTES
--Vikings first-round draft pick Anthony Barr isn't a big fan of the NFL rule that prevents rookies from participating in any team activities other than the rookie minicamp until their class graduates from college.
"I was real bored," said Barr, the ninth overall draft pick who missed all of the team's organized team activities (OTAs) because UCLA is on the quarters system.
"It was the longest four weeks, really. But it was a good time for me to kind of decompress a little bit and get my mind right for this."
Vikings linebackers coach Adam Zimmer flew out to Los Angeles to tutor the ninth overall draft pick in the team's new defense. But there's only so much book work and individual drills that a man can do before he needs to actually see how his 6-foot-5, 255-pound frame will be put to good use.
Finally able to participate during this week's mandatory three-day minicamp, Barr's versatility was put into play immediately. He played strong-side linebacker in both the base and nickel packages.
He also did something he's never done since moving from running back to linebacker just two years ago: Put his hand in the dirt as a pass-rushing defensive end.
"Right now, we're kind of just working at different skill sets, different positions and where his skill sets go," defensive coordinator George Edwards said. "So, systematically, we are flexible enough that we can take his skill set and put him in positions where hopefully it helps us, most advantageous, whether rushing the passer, whether it's dropping in coverage."
Barr's skills are vast, but his lack of experience caused coach Mike Zimmer to refer to him as a "fawn" on draft day. Well, the so-called fawn knew that if he was going to fall down this week, he was going to do it full bore.
"There's a little bit of a learning curve missing OTAs, but it kind of is what it is," Barr said. "I knew I was going to make mistakes.
"I just had to make sure I did those at full speed. Not many nerves, just a lot of excitement, and I'm just happy to be here."
--Vikings special teams coordinator Mike Priefer says he is not worried about the soon-to-be-released independent investigation into charges that he used anti-gay remarks in team meetings and discriminated against former punter Chris Kluwe because of Kluwe's support of gay marriage rights.
"It's been one of those things where I come to work every morning and I'm excited about the direction of this football team," Priefer said Wednesday during Day 2 of the Vikings' three-day minicamp. "I really like our coaching staff and I'm excited about our new players and excited about the guys we retained and came back. So my focus has been totally on football."
In early January, Kluwe blasted Priefer, general manager Rick Spielman and former head coach Leslie Frazier in an article for Deadspin. Most of the venom was directed at Priefer, whom Kluwe called a bigot.
Kluwe, who was released before the 2013 season, also accused Priefer of using anti-gay remarks during the 2012 season and pushing for Kluwe's release because of Kluwe's highly-visible support of Minnesota's gay marriage rights. That caused the Vikings to launch an investigation headed by former Minnesota chief justice Eric Magnuson and former U.S. Department of Justice attorney Chris Madel.
Results of the investigation could come as early as this weekend, although they've been expected for a couple of months.
Priefer deflected questions about Kluwe's accusations on Wednesday, preferring to keep the focus on football. However, shortly after Kluwe's article appeared, Priefer did deny the charges. In a released statement, he said:
"I vehemently deny today's allegations made by Chris Kluwe. I want to be clear that I do not tolerate discrimination of any type and am respectful of all individuals. I personally have gay family members who I love and support just as I do any family member.
"The primary reason I entered coaching was to affect people in a positive way. As a coach, I have always created an accepting environment for my players, including Chris, and have looked to support them both on and off the field.
"The comments today have not only attacked my character and insulted my professionalism, but they have also impacted my family. While my career focus is to be a great professional football coach, my number one priority has always been to be a protective husband and father to my wife and children.
"I will continue to work hard for the Minnesota Vikings, the Wilf family and all of our loyal fans."
--There is no area in which the team's new coaching regime didn't look to improve when it took over in January. And that includes what the players eat while at team headquarters or in next month's training camp.
For instance, the Vikings have removed bacon, fried items, mayonnaise and creamy-based sauces from their menu.
Coach Mike Zimmer said the approach is helping the team. He claims the team has lost a combined 170 pounds of fat and gained 70 pounds of muscle.
"It's a collective effort," Zimmer said. "The strength coaches and trainers brought it to my attention. So, heck, I think even (general manager) Rick (Spielman) said he's lost some weight.
"I think I've actually lost weight too, but I think that's from stress. I'm eating fish every day for lunch. That's a change for me too."


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MD Sports Competition Series 4 Piece Table Tennis Table Set
4 Piece Table Tennis Table Set Allows You To Have Fun During Breaks At Home, Work And School Buying a tennis table set is a great way to add some fun to your home or office. If you are running a school, allowing students to play table tennis at school can be a great incentive for the kids to do well. If you are running a business, allowing employees and clients to play table tennis during the work day can help employees be more creative and get more done during the day. Using a 4 Piece Table Tennis Table Set is great because it is easy to assemble and get set up as soon as you get home or back to the office. Since it is so easy to put up or take down, it will be easier to move should you ever want to take it someplace with you. It is easy to store when you decide that you are done with it.
- Table Tennis Set can be set up in a manner that allows you to play without a human when you use the return setting
- You can take the table outside if you are interested in playing at the beach, by the pool or wherever else you want to play some table tennis
- Its lightweight design allows you to easily move it without injuring yourself or damaging the set
- Take a minute to look at all the items being offered by Medal Sports
Specifications & Dimensions
Product Documentation


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BEREA, Ohio – Don't tell David Nelson the last NFL preseason game is meaningless. Or that a veteran's place is on the sidelines, safe from the chaos of bubble players hammering each other to secure a final roster spot.
The Browns wide receiver is ready to risk a surgically-repaired limb for the chance to play the Bears Thursday night in Chicago.
Nelson is expected to make his Browns debut and play in his first game since tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee on Sept. 9, 2012 in a regular-season opener as a member of the Buffalo Bills.
To earn the opportunity he's endured months of rehab, questions from reporters concerning his commitment to the game and a bone bruise sustained in training camp.
"I've got a lot of emotions," Nelson said. "I think I'll be a little choked up running out there, just because I know how hard I've worked to get back here. I know a lot of the things that were thrown at me the past year, the things I've had to overcome to get back to this position and be able to play in the National Football League again."
Nelson, 26, called the past 12 months "the most frustrating, disappointing, hardest year of my life." He went from being one the game's more sure-handed slot receivers to a veteran who couldn't catch a break.
After rehabbing his knee in time for training camp he hyper-extended it on Aug. 1 and suffered a bone bruise that sidelined him for the first three exhibition games. Nelson emphasized he's completely healthy and could have played in Saturday's 27-6 loss to Indianapolis.
"Man, it's been a crazy ride, it's been a crazy year for me," he said.
The Browns signed Nelson to a one-year deal in April after the Bills elected not to extend a $1.3 million qualifying offer that would have made him a restricted free agent.
In two-plus seasons with Buffalo he registered 94 catches for 1,042 yards and eight touchdowns. He's had just six drops while being targeted 146 times, according to ProFootballFocus.com.
"Obviously he's a big target on the outside," quarterback Brandon Weeden said of the 6-5, 215-pounder. "He allows you to do a lot of different things. I'm glad to see him healthy. He's been battling that injury bug so it's nice to have him back out there. He's a veteran guy in this league and he knows how to play the position. The more the merrier."
It was assumed Nelson would make the team provided he could return to the lineup and demonstrate his fitness. Playing time is hardly guaranteed, however. The Browns acquired veteran slot receiver Davone Bess from Miami in a trade, and Nelson enters the final exhibition game low on the depth chart.
The University of Florida product acknowledges he's behind due to the injuries and has worked sparingly with Weeden.
"It's just one of those things where I just got to continue to push," he said. "I made it this far and I'm excited for the opportunity this weekend ...
"It's just one of those things where as an athlete, stuff like that comes up -- adversity in your life, adversity on the field comes up and you just got to handle it the best way you know how."
Nelson is happy to rejoin his teammates in practice and talk football again. In the spring, he had to answer questions from reporters as to why he chose to rehab in Dallas with his own trainer rather than in Berea with the Browns.
He explained his rationale to his new team, Nelson said. He also assured coaches that his humanitarian efforts in Haiti – he's helping to build orphanages in the impoverished Caribbean nation – were not diverting his focus on football.
His long road to recovery almost complete, Nelson was asked Monday about the importance of playing a preseason game.
"You can't put words on that, you just can't put a value on how it is," he said. "Even though you practice as hard as you can, in practice it's still considered a controlled environment. They're not hitting full speed, you're going against the same guys you see every day. So, it's great to go out there and react in an NFL game and be able to kind of adjust to the speed ... and get that feel again and just get back into the groove and feel smooth about it."


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The Language Authority of Imagined Texts: Original Translations
Brigitte Rath, Fung Global Fellow/Universität Innsbruck, Austria. Discussant: Sandra Bermann, Princeton University.
Note that this particular event is on a Monday.
Audience: For the pre-circulated paper, please contact Beate Witzler at email@example.com. Open to the public.
Location: 216 Aaron Burr Hall
Date/Time: 05/05/14 at 4:30 pm - 05/05/14 at 6:00 pm


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A Jersey Shore man faces charges after allegedly stealing another man's bank card, using it to make two transactions, and then returning the card, according to police.
Gregory A Lowell II, 19, of 1078 Fifth Avenue, Apt. 201, has been charged with misdemeanor counts of access device fraud and theft.
According to court records, Tiadaghton Valley Regional Police were contacted by Cody McClosky on Aug. 29. McClosky reported that he recently had checked his bank balance and noticed two unauthorized transactions, which had caused the account to become overdrawn, according to court records.
The purchases were made on Aug. 29 at a gas station along Allegheny Street in Jersey Shore.
Police contacted the business and retrieved copies of the receipts from the unauthorized purchases - one for $30 of gasoline and another, totaling $10.36, for motor oil and cigarettes, according to court records.
Police also reviewed surveillance footage that showed a male, later identified as Lowell, making the purchases.
Police later interviewed Lowell, who admitted he had taken the card, used it for two transactions at the gas station, and returned it. According to police, Lowell confessed that he did not have permission from McClosky to use the bank card.
Lowell was arraigned before District Judge Jerry C. Lepley. He is out on $1,500 bail.
Lowell will face a preliminary hearing Sept. 19 before Lepley.


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Media Relations
Press Release:
MEDIA CONTACT: Terry Gearing
561-799-8026, email@example.com
FAU Jupiter Hosts FemArt: The State of Womanhood Invitational Art Show
"FemArt: The State of Womanhood Invitational Art Show,"
a collection
of artwork by 10 local female artists
WHEN: Monday, March 2 – Friday, March 20
FAU's John D. MacArthur Campus
Student Resources (SR) Atrium
5353 Parkside Drive, Jupiter
COST: Free and open to the public
CONTACT: Margaret Allen at 561-799-8105 or firstname.lastname@example.com
"FemArt: The State of Womanhood Invitational Art Show" is presented by Diversity Student Services as part of the Art in the Atrium series. Ten local female artists have contributed artwork in a variety of media, including ceramics, photography, paintings and drawings.
The Student Resources (SR) Atrium is open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.


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Our forum volunteers noticed that the "hot topic" section of the Japanese forum top page is now filled with spammy tags.
From bb-admin, I can see a bunch of posts from bozo users with such tags. The posts themselves are no longer appearing, but looks like the hot topic section is ignoring the bozo status.
The same issue with other local forums, e.g. http://de.forums.wordpress.org and http://nl.forums.wordpress.org


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on March 3, 2013 - 11:24 PM
The University at Buffalo women's basketball team allowed just nine points in the opening half, its fewest since joining the Mid-American Conference, and scored a season-high 81 points as it led wire-to-wire in defeating Kent State, 81-45, Sunday afternoon on Senior Day at Alumni Arena.
In Olean, St. Bonaventure (10-19, 3-11 Atlantic 10) completed its women's season with a 71-58 victory over La Salle (8-21, 4-10 A-10) in the Reilly Center.
The win moved UB (10-18, 8-7 MAC) past its overall victory total from last season and doubled its number of conference victories. Also, the Bulls locked up the No. 7 seed in the MAC playoffs and guaranteed themselves a home game next Sunday against an opponent to be determined.
The Bulls opened the game on a 17-0 run as the Golden Flashes did not score until the 11:54 mark of the first half. Senior Nicki Hopkins recorded three of her career-high seven assists during the opening burst. UB took a 31-9 lead into the break.
The Bulls did a lot of their damage from behind the arc as they shot 7 of 11 from three-point range in the second half.
"We were really talking and communicating out there defensively and that is where it all starts, on the defensive end of the floor," said UB coach Felisha Legette-Jack.
The Bulls finished with a balanced scoring effort with four players in double figures. Freshman Mackenzie Loesing led all scorers with 17 points in just 20 minutes.
Starter Margeaux Gupilan joined a pair of players off the bench — Karin Moss and Cherridy Thornton — with 11 points.
Kent State (3-25, 1-14 MAC) shot just 25.5 percent (14-55) from the floor while UB shot 49.2 (29-59). The Bulls will conclude the regular season Wednesday night when they host MAC East champion Akron at 7 p.m.
Alaina Walker and Doris Ortega each netted 18 points in St. Bonaventure's victory. In her final game, Walker also registered the 600th rebound of her career.


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BRACEVILLE - Stanley Owens, 39, of Warren, is dead and his passenger, Deborah McCabe, 36, of Leavittsburg, is in critical condition following a one-vehicle crash around 9 p.m. Wednesday on Eagle Creek Road, according to an Ohio Highway Patrol report.
Troopers say alcohol was a factor when McCabe drove his pickup off the side of the road, striking several trees. McCabe, who was not wearing a seat belt, was flown to St. Elizabeth Health Center.


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Patient Satisfaction and Its Discontents
Johnston C.
JAMA Intern Med. 2013;173(22):2025-2026.
Published online December 9, 2013
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It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
It was April, but it was already hot out. In a few months drought would grip much of the nation, and the National Weather Service would ultimately declare it the 9th hottest summer on record. But across America what really had people steamed was an out-of-control federal agency that had been conducting heavy-handed searches of US citizens.
Law-abiding Americans who had done nothing wrong were being branded as criminals. Sen. Frank Murkowski (R-AK) called the agency's actions "Gestapo-like." Sen. Don Nickles (R-OK) decried, "police state tactics." Citing privacy concerns, the head of the agency refused to discuss the allegations with a Senate committee. But his agency investigated itself and decided that all of the complaints against it were "unfounded."
It was 1998, and the agency was the Internal Revenue Service.
Those were heady days for IRS employees. There was a "war on drugs," which the agency was determined to win by ferreting out money launderers and tax cheats. Agents were permitted to place harassing phone calls at almost any hour. They could slap liens on property with little or no supervisory approval. Homes could be seized to satisfy a liability of as little as $5,000. Divorced taxpayers were liable for filing mistakes, even innocent ones, of their former spouses. Once accused of cheating, the taxpayer bore the burden of proof, not the government. (For reference, see the analysis by tax attorney Tony Mankus.)
As taxpayers seethed, horror stories abounded. The LA Times reported:
John Colaprete, a Virginia restaurant owner, said that his home and two of his restaurants were raided by dozens of armed IRS agents because of phony allegations from a bookkeeper who was later convicted of cheating his business.
W.A. "Tex" Moncrief Jr., a Texas oil millionaire, testified that 64 armed IRS agents–two for each of his employees–stormed through the door of his Fort Worth oil firm shouting "IRS! This business is under criminal investigation. Remove your hands from the keyboard and back away from the computers!"
Moncrief said that he eventually paid the IRS $23 million to end the harassment of his family, despite the fact that the IRS never established that he owed back taxes.
IRS agents were, perhaps, more feared than respected, but the distinction mattered little to the agency, which seemed to have unlimited reach and power. There was an Ombudsman, but he could do little to curb the abuse, and a timid Congress could only muster enough votes for a toothless Taxpayer Bill of Rights, which tax attorney Mankus remembers as ineffectual.
Many of [the] provisions were weak versions of what could have been bold reforms, watered down by the influential managers of IRS who warned Congress of massive non-compliance and reduction in tax collections if the proposed provisions were implemented.
Does any of this sound familiar?
Flash forward 14 years. It's another hot summer, and there's another overreaching federal agency using another faceless "war" to justify its heavy-handed approach. This time we're fighting a "war on terror" and the agency is the TSA.
Americans are no longer subject to fiscal inspections; now theyr're physical. The TSA doesn't raid businesses, it raids suitcases and human bodies, looking for whatever it wants, all of it justified by unspecified threats of a terrorist attack. Another pusillanimous Congress, afraid of being called "soft on terror," looks the other way or toys with the idea of a toothless "Traveler's Bill of Rights" instead of actual reform.
Americans are angered by agency bungling and abuse. When the clamor grows too loud, the TSA investigates itself and gives itself the all-clear, or else the agency's head, like the leader of the IRS before him, simply declines to answer questions, even from the Congress that provides his funding.
I could go on, but you get the idea: while the analogy isn't exact, there are disturbing parallels between the IRS of 1998 and the TSA of today. But that's not the story. The story is what the IRS has done since then.
In the estimation of current Commissioner Douglas H. Shulman, in 1998 "the IRS had hit rock bottom." Today the agency's approval rating has bounced back to 73% – the highest score since 1994. The workforce is more professional than ever, and taxpayers generally view the IRS as far more fair and easier to work with than it has been in nearly 20 years. To be sure, there are places where the IRS can still improve, highlighted this summer in a GAO report, but the agency has become more responsible without the fiscal Armageddon that its former leadership predicted. The TSA could use such an image boost. They might learn a few lessons from the recovery and redemption of the IRS.
Lesson #1: Et Tu, Underpaid Underling? In the years before 1998 there were plenty of complaints about the IRS, but it wasn't until the agency's own employees spoke out that the tide started to turn. One of the first to testify before Congress was a 25-year veteran of the agency's Collection Division, who told Senators, "If the true number of incidences of taxpayer abuse were ever known, the public would be appalled. If the public also ever knew the number of abuses covered up by the IRS, there could be a tax revolt."
Other employees followed suit, testifying under oath that managers pressured them to fabricate evidence against taxpayers. After years of complaints, finally no one could deny that the IRS had lost its way. Within months, Congress passed the Internal Revenue Service Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998, the RRA. President Bill Clinton, halfway through his second term with no more elections ahead of him, signed the Act into law on July 22, 1998.
In this election year a polarized Congress shows little interest in reforming the TSA, but political winds can shift quickly after an election. Pressure and the list of complaints continues to grow, and this month a group of the TSA's own employees blew the whistle on illegal instructions given to them by supervisors in Boston.
Memo from the IRS: when your own team starts to turn on you, it's time to get concerned.
Lesson #2: Do Your Spinning at the Gym. Last month TSA Deputy Administrator John Halinksi told a House Committee that "overall, most travelers have a positive experience at the airport." Pressed by Mike Rogers (R-AL), a member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, Halinski added, "I haven't seen a lot of statistics about criticism." Incredulous, Rogers shot back, "Have you been out in public lately?"
Here again, the TSA could learn a little something from the IRS. Faced with criticism in 1998, the agency investigated itself but did not find "areas of concern." Congress didn't buy it, and was arguably more angry at the dissembling. TSA head John Pistole might disarm some critics if he would simply stand up and say, "We have some real problems and we've made some serious mistakes. This agency is still relatively young and the threats are constantly evolving but, to be honest, we haven't managed as well as we should. I'm committed to fixing that."
Instead, he grasps at straws. This week a man breached the $100 million security system at JFK international airport and Pistole was silent. When he spoke up in USA Today it was to argue that TSA officers in Florida had disrupted a kidnapping through their "Behavior Detection" skills. Talk about a weak argument: the bruised and beaten woman the TSA screeners supposedly "spotted" actually asked for help.
Like Pistole, TSA's "Blogger Bob" Burns regularly ignores criticism of the agency and spins the news like a political pro. Burns has been dubbed "Bloghdad Bob" after the former Iraqi Information Minister who insisted on the invincibility of Saddam Hussein's army, even as coalition troops were marching into Baghdad. (Take a look a Bob's cheerful mid-year pep-talk. He begins, "It's been a busy year so far with 375,432,402 passengers traveling through TSA checkpoints since January! That is approximately 1.8 million passengers screened per day!"
Commenters on the blog ignored the happy talk and hammered home the agency's failed record: "Bob, will you address the allegations of discrimination by Boston's screeners?" and "Why do you continue to ignore the REAL performance problems your agency has? You post nothing of substance, ever" and "What about the racial profiling and quota system to catch drugs . . . ?")
Even Pistole's predecessor, Kip Hawley, said bluntly this spring, "Airport security in America is broken. I should know." Of course, Hawley didn't speak up until he had a book to sell, but at least he's being honest now.
John Pistole, your sponsor called. He said to remind you that recovery can't begin until you admit that you have a problem.
Lesson #3: R-E-S-P-E-C-T. There's something else about Bob Burns. The TSA's most prominent spokesman is often downright contemptuous of the traveling public. I don't see a lot of IRS news releases touting "The Dumbest Things People Have Tried to Deduct," but Hey-Look-at-the-Idiot-Traveler postings are Bob's stock-in-trade. Yes, people often try to bring unusual things onto airplanes, but affecting an air of superiority as you rub the traveling public's nose in their collective mistakes is not endearing, Bob. Just sayin'.
In a posting entitled "How Not to Use a Blog and Facebook for PR," Visual Media took Bob to task for his response to allegations that an eight-year-old boy had been added to the terrorist "no fly" list. Here's what Bob said about the issue:
It's inevitable that every several months or so, some cute kid gets their [sic] mug posted on a major news publication with a headline reading something like: 'Does this look like a terrorist to you?' Anything involving kids and cats gets tons of mileage and everybody starts tweeting and retweeting that there's an 8-year-old on the no fly list.
Yup, Bob dismissively compared the pat-down of someone's son to a YouTube kitten video. Visual Media rightly criticized him for pouring fuel on a fire.
Allegations of disrespectful behavior by TSA employees abound: the alleged mishandling of human remains, the alleged mocking of a deaf traveler, and the allegations that attractive women are targeted for extra scrutiny. And that's just in the last few months.
Lesson #4: Be Yourself. IRS agents must give their name and ID number at the start of any contact with a taxpayer. It sounds pretty basic, but it wasn't always that way; the change is a welcome one. A conversation that begins, "Thank you for calling, my name is ____ and my ID number is ____" sends a signal that the person on the other end of the line is willing to be accountable for his or her actions. By the same logic, all TSA screeners are required to wear nametags, but this week Southwest Airlines pilot John Mcghie alleges that a supervisor in Manchester, NH — a supervisor — refused to give his name during an altercation. Mcghie isn't the first person to have this experience.
If it's unacceptable for a TSA employee to withhold his name, imagine if he pretended to be someone else. Critics charge that by wearing official badges TSA employees do just that. Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) declares, "The least we can do is end this impersonation, which is an insult to real cops."
TSA issues a badge to every screener after 180 hours of training. Police training requirements vary widely, but in most large cities it takes 6 months of academy training to earn a badge. Still, TSA defends its practice:
As part of the organization's continued efforts to transition the workforce to a cadre of well-trained, professional transportation security officers, TSA introduced uniforms more reflective of the critical nature of their work and of the high standards they uphold. [T]this new uniform represents the highly skilled and tested nature of TSA's frontline workforce.
Newsflash: clothes do not make the man, nor does a uniform make screeners highly skilled. Training, experience, and expertise make screeners highly skilled. See Lesson #2.
Lesson #5: Be Above Reproach. I got a letter from the IRS a couple of years ago. The agency thought they had found an error in my tax return. With great trepidation, I called the number provided. At the start of the conversation I told the IRS agent that I had been dreading the call. After she gave her name and ID number (see Lesson #4) she said "Oh, you shouldn't dread talking to us!" I replied, "That's easy for you to say — you don't owe back taxes!" She laughed and said, "Well that's true. I work for The Agency; we're professional, we're not allowed to owe back taxes. We follow the rules, and even the appearance of impropriety will not be tolerated."
Now let's not be Pollyanna. There are almost certainly some crooks among the 100,000 employees of the IRS, but I'd wager that the percentage is far lower than among the 60,000 people who work at TSA. At the same Congressional hearing where he said that he knew of no complaints, John Halinksi "shrugged off critiques of TSA," saying Americans shouldn't expect airport screeners to be any more accountable than the average guy on the street.
If you have an organization of 60,000 people, that's like a city. You're always going to have crime in a city. You're always going to have people who don't do things that are proper and make mistakes. I'm not saying we are different from any other group of Americans; I'm saying we are exactly like every group of Americans.
I think most of us do expect more from people in authority. I think we have a right to expect more. But even if you agree with Halinski, no one can condone an agency that employs an acknowledged pedophile in a position where he could pat down children. I'm speaking of former priest Thomas Harkin, who is still employed at Philadelphia airport after the diocese of Camden, New Jersey defrocked him for sexually abusing two young girls.
I'm sorry, Mr. Harkin. You may be a decent man with just one foible. Maybe you've even overcome this failing. I don't want to deny you a chance to earn a living; but given your history, there is no place for you at the TSA, not in any capacity. If John Pistole had any integrity whatsoever, he'd have you terminated. Work out a separation agreement; I wouldn't complain if you were paid to go away. You shouldn't have applied for the job in the first place, but it's the TSA's fault for offering it to you. Whatever way you do it, you need to go. There is Simply No Excuse to do otherwise.
Lesson #6: Give the benefit of the doubt. Now, I don't mean to give the impression that the IRS can't get nasty. They still place liens, garnish wages, and put people in jail. But for the most part, the agency first attempts to work with taxpayers collaboratively to resolve problems. (That's common sense; anyone sitting in a jail cell isn't going to be able to earn money to satisfy his tax debts.) More importantly, they begin with the assumption that you have filed honestly and accurately. Sure, every return is subject to some rudimentary computer analysis, but a paltry 1% of all returns get audited. The TSA won't say how many people it body-searches each year, but you can count the next time you're in line: it'll almost certainly be more than 1 in 100. And the moment a traveler is pulled out of line, he's guilty-until-proven-innocent.
For evidence, look no further than the case of four-year-old Isabella Brademeyer. Isabella was terrorized by the TSA last year when she hugged her grandmother at the checkpoint. Her mother wrote in a Facebook post, "The Transportation Security Officers who were present responded to this very simple action in the worst way imaginable." A screener began yelling at her daughter, would not permit her to pass through the scanner again and said that a pat-down was necessary. Isabella, according to her mother, was wearing Mary Jane shoes, a short-sleeve shirt, and leggings that didn't have pockets.
"It was implied, several times, that my mother, in their brief two-second embrace, had passed a handgun to my daughter," Brademeyer said. In addition, the TSA actually wanted to take the little girl to a private room, alone, to be searched.
The TSA, of course, defended its actions.
If that's how the TSA approaches a four-year-old, how do they view you? And don't try to say that this was one rogue agent. Other TSA clerks saw it; no one stopped it; and the details are remarkably consistent when the TSA has screened other kids.
At every opportunity the TSA insists that it's "working to reduce the number of pat-downs." But that doesn't seem to be happening. Even travelers in the TSA Pre-Check program, who have already submitted to a more invasive background check, can't be trusted. On any given flight, Program participants never know until they arrive at the airport if they'll be able to take the fast lane. And while the Pre-Check program is being rolled out at more and more airports, the criteria remain the same: you have to be a frequent flier of a handful of airlines, you have to fly from certain designated airports, you have to pay to participate, and even then you aren't guaranteed expedited or grope-free screening.
It's time for TSA to acknowledge that the vast majority of screeners will never encounter a terrorist. It's time for the agency to begin with the assumption that every traveler is innocent. Pre-Check should be open to anyone, it should be free, and once cleared the traveler should be allowed to skip screening every time. Re-screen periodically or do spot-checks if you must, but let's stop pretending that the nation's traveling sales force is the biggest threat to security and that you have to screen the same frequent fliers week after week.
But, you say, this isn't a matter of cheating on taxes, this could be life or death! If the TSA misses a terrorist, what then? As Sommer Gentry beautifully illustrates in her article on the base rate fallacy, the more travelers screened, the greater the odds that an actual terrorist will simply be regarded as a false positive. TSA's ongoing Easter-egg-hunt for scissors and oversize toothpaste tubes detracts from the actual job of keeping airports secure. NPR's Peter Sagal quipped of the jet skier who breached security at JFK: How did he manage to cross two runways in a bright yellow life vest without anyone noticing? Security was busy taking down a woman in the adjoining terminal who had five ounces of shampoo.
Most people are not security risks. Whisking them through after a simple x-ray of their bags (like in the old days) isn't just good PR, it reduces the likelihood of missing an actual terrorist, because you're not spending your time and attention on innocent people. As Gentry points out, "the only counterterrorism successes we've ever seen are those where intelligence and police resources are focused on finding extremists and targeting their plots at the planning stages." In other words, long before they get to the airport.
Lesson #7: Provide Real Customer Advocates. When there are allegations of impropriety, what options does a traveler have? In many cases he can't sue, he can only appeal TSA abuse to the TSA itself. In contrast, the RRA, passed at the height of America's disgust with the IRS, established an oversight board for the IRS as well as the Taxpayer Advocate Service. While a part of the IRS, the TAS has the power to intercede to help assist taxpayers in disputes with the agency. It's far from perfect, but TAS is an independent voice advocating on behalf of taxpayers.
Beginning last year, U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer and state Sen. Michael Gianaris of Queens started calling for similar customer advocates at American airports. Not surprisingly, the TSA has vigorously resisted these efforts. Instead, the agency installed a phone line. Compare what IRS advocates can do (from the IRS website and from the TAS's own detailed website) with the help you can get if you think you've been assaulted by a TSA agent: "[The] hotline will give passengers direct access to guidance and information." No advocacy, no help; just advice and information. After that, you're on your own.
Is it any wonder so many Americans despise the TSA?
(Photo: Flickr Creative Commons: Ben Popken)


text:
CONSUMERS are confused about what constitutes a balanced diet, according to the official food watchdog.
Conflicting messages from various weight-loss diets might be one reason for this, according to the Food Standards Agency (FSA).
Many people do not realise it is important to eat lots of starchy foods such as bread, rice, potatoes and pasta. There is also confusion over which products count towards the target "five a day" intake of fruit and vegetables. Only 11 per cent of people said it was important to eat lots of starchy foods, a survey of 2,094 people found, while 45 per cent realised that tinned fruit and vegetables counted towards the "five a day".
A balanced diet consists of about one-third fruit and vegetables; one-third bread, rice, potatoes, pasta and other starchy foods; 15 per cent milk and dairy foods; 12 per cent meat, fish, eggs, beans and other non-dairy sources of protein and just 8 per cent food and drink high in fat or sugar.


text:
Making the big move also gives virginal Aaron a chance to learn about the opposite sex, and he'll soon get a 500-level course in the intricacies of the female heart from two women, both of whom are far out of Aaron's league, for various reasons.
"Cherry" opens on a lively, if all too familiar note, as the brainy but socially awkward Aaron meets his Lothario of a roommate, "Wild Bill" (D.C. Pierson), and engages in a very freshman-like flirtation with Darcy (Zosia Mamet), the designated Cute Girl Down The Hall. Crude contests, late-night conquests and crazy dorm parties are all part of the picture.
But thankfully, writer-director Jeffrey Fine isn't interested in making a raunchy romp: Once the action moves off-campus, "Cherry" blossoms into a character-driven piece that's both classier and more substantial than you might expect.
FILM REVIEW'Cherry' *** (out of four stars)
Rating: Not rated, but would certainly get an R for language and sexual content
Cast: Kyle Gallner, Laura Allen, Britt Robertson, D.C. Pierson, Esai Morales
Director: Jeffrey Fine
Run time: 100 minutes
See it: Friday through at least Oct. 14 at Celebration! Crossroads, 6600 Ring Road, Portage
Contact: 269-323-0447
Aaron, who laments that he's the latest in "a long line of nerds" in his family, catches the experienced eye of Linda (Laura Allen), a 30-ish classmate who, like Aaron, feels slightly out of place in academia. Linda's 14-year-old daughter, Beth (Britt Robertson), greets Aaron with a salty tongue and a hostile posture, telling clues that Beth has been introduced to an assortment of Aarons before.
"You're sexy between the ears," Linda coos to Aaron, who isn't sure if that's a compliment or not. Whatever it means, it's unlikely she's ever said it to her boyfriend (Esai Morales), a cop who tends to be heavy-handed in every way.
In its best moments, "Cherry" recalls "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" and "Risky Business," two of the very few 1980s teen sex comedies that don't choke you with cheesiness. As in those films, there's an undercurrent of danger and darkness in "Cherry" that raises the stakes in Aaron's situation. Fine puts Aaron in moral quicksand: Not only is he attracted to both Linda and Beth, he also wants to be a sort of counselor who can help them come to terms with the past. Aaron is idealistic, altruistic and more than a little lovesick.
Admittedly, a couple of Fine's plot twists seem more convenient than convincing. But the cast is uniformly strong, with Gallner bringing a credible combination of naivete and youthful awe to Aaron, and Robertson investing a lot of sass and sensitivity in Beth, a kid who's been forced into adulthood before she was ready for the role.
As Linda wavers between determination and painful insecurity, Allen draws a vivid portrait of a woman with a rather unsteady grip on "normal life"; Linda has taken a few spins through the Tunnel of Love and has usually emerged with emotional or physical bruises.
In addition, "Cherry" does a sensational job of making its Kalamazoo College locations shine. Martini's Pizza, Taco Bob's, Bagel Beanery and Fourth Coast Café are also easy to spot, and never before has South Westnedge Avenue looked so romantic.


text:
Declarative Device Driver
For over a year now, I've had rattling around in my head the idea that
- in particular,
or a strict form of
, would make for some very interesting implementation of
s for computer
and bare-metal programming. This idea turns on its head the accepted 'fact' that low-level driver code ought to be written in low-level programming language.
is an instance of
The basic approach, given
as the basis (since its use has been proven) is to:
create a database describing the
system hardware that
receive interactions.
This database essentially constitutes the working hardware set for the
, and is continuously refined in a global community sense (or possibly usurped by the hardware makers).
This database ought to be extensible, such that new hardware specifications can easily be added to it.
Hardware specifications include interfaces, capabilities, timing information, heat and energy costs, probabilities of error or failure, et cetera.
Hardware specifications include semantics - in this case the
of acting in a certain way, et cetera.
This database happens to include the CPUs and GPUs, L1 and L2 caches, Network Cards, and everything else.
Create a database describing the
system hardware and circumstances in terms of references to the 'global' hardware database.
This database should be much, MUCH smaller than the first. It corresponds to selecting the drivers for a kernel for one machine (or one family of cloned machines).
This database can also specify potentials for removal or addition of hardware (or even the destruction of hardware, dealing with military-spec or redundant systems) at runtime, between boots, et cetera.
Create a mostly independent database describing the
for hardware utilization.
This database corresponds to the 'kernel' itself.
It includes facts about how driver services need to interact with the rest of the system:
what interfaces they need to provide,
what actions they need to perform in response to certain messages,
whether drivers need to be registered
whether the kernel itself is to be 'modular' and replaceable
and related concerns and constraints: statements of fact regarding the time to deal with certain hardware interrupts, or the amount of memory into which the resulting
(or at least the core services) must fit, or the amount of time to boot.
It includes policies for handling hardware discovery, error, or loss.
It includes detailed policies for scheduling, memory distribution, conservation of powe resource distribution and redaction, capability requirements and what it takes to prove them, et cetera.
At this point, one could choose to be 'modular' where each piece of hardware or category of hardware is a different service, or create one monolithic mega-kernel design where all drivers know about one another, or choose something in-between.
Optimization decisions go here, as do concerns about
, conservation of batteries, reducing heat, et cetera.
Finally, contains tons of strategies related to these policies: ideas on how one might go about implementing things so that the compiler gets a head start. These might join some common strategies in the hardware database (e.g. mechanisms and costs when using different ways of ensuring atomic operations, variation-strategies between single-processor-shared-memory and multi-processor-shared-memory, et cetera.).
Mechanism: Using
, the basic 'mechanism' is to attempt to unify these databases (mostly the latter two - mechanism and policy - but the second has references to the first) and produce a value that describes resource allocations, procedures for achieving these, procedures that implement the required interfaces, and so on. This will probably take a very long time to do, unfortunately, so a lesser form is to do it on a per-hardware-component rather than on the 'whole' system, and also to improve strategies and heuristics for getting stuff into a 'good enough' state fast (before optimization). Oh, and plus the general idea of an
helper-agent that can at least reduce the cost of a edit-compile-test cycle by remembering critical branches when it came to previous proofs.
If one opted for the non-modular approach, the consequence is one gigantic value describing the system and its internal state and its interactions.
After building the initial kernel, parts of the kernel and hardware specifications continue to be used by the compiler and optimizer for
services. This allows the optimizer to (depending on modularity policy) possibly penetrate abstraction layers for extra optimizations, to eliminate security checks where capability can be proven, et cetera. Also, the same database about the processor is required for optimizations anyway.
Declarative programming would offer some
nice properties in this field:
Proof of correctness, not only for the individual drivers but for the emergent system, is built right into the driver-construction.
Hardware Database is always available (and is valuable in its own right)
It gives free reign to the optimizer, and makes it much easier to use strategies to 'suggest' optimizations that you're unlikely do (or even to think of) in normal cases... for example, using the GPU to do certain types of fast, vector, floating-point operations in parallel with the CPU when it isn't being used for other things. When writing low-level Linux-driver code, this idea would be such a huge hassle that even thinking about doing it could give a systems programmer migraines, would require a great deal of thought about the lack of synchronous operation and state-management, and so on. With declarative code, one merely suggests it (e.g. as a service or optimization), indicates that it can't happen when that part of the GPU is being used for graphics and that graphics have priority (a statement of resource distribution, but also of the fact that the service needs to keep a bit of state regarding the -current- usage of the resource), specifies (in general terms) facts and requirements involving ALL asynchronous operations, and then allows the compiler to get the migraine while the programmer grabs a beer (and doesn't plan on returning before morning, given the likely compile-time).
The disadvantage is also obvious:
can be fast, but needs to be properly designed to take advantage of strategies and heuristics, and even then it is likely to waste a lot of time thinking about bad solutions... solutions we would
are bad based on our own
(aka 'experience'). Thinking about bad solutions takes a while. Without a highly developed
helper-agent that can provide 'learned' heuristics and strategies to the prover across edit-compile-test cycles, it is unlikely that the time required for this operation would ever reduce to a small enough period that tinkerers would join the crowd (running it on their home machines).
As a note, I have listed in my Nov/Dec 2006 composition books that I'm planning to attempt this path when building 'EiraOs
' - it's been a while, and I expect another five years before I'm even ready to really think about Eira seriously, but I suppose that if I'm going to have a
I might as well have one with ALL the nice features and cool ideas (like the built-in
as the primary
;-). Of course, I don't see much purpose in attempting to clone Linux's efforts, either - if I'm going to go for something new, I want something
new rather than another 'improved' clone of a bad OS.
See Also:
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April 29, 2014
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- Start of Business
- Early Years Quality Fund Special Account Bill 2013
- Defence Legislation Amendment (Woomera Prohibited Area) Bill 2013
- Australian Citizenship Amendment (Special Residence Requirements) Bill 2013
- Migration Amendment (Offshore Resources Activity) Bill 2013
- African Development Bank Bill 2013
- Intellectual Property Laws Amendment Bill 2013
- Australian Capital Territory Water Management Legislation Amendment Bill 2013
- Voice for Animals (Independent Office of Animal Welfare) Bill 2013, Marine Engineers Qualifications Bill 2013
- Sex Discrimination Amendment (Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Intersex Status) Bill 2013
- Private Health Insurance Amendment (Lifetime Health Cover Loading and Other Measures) Bill 2012, Private Health Insurance Legislation Amendment (Base Premium) Bill 2013
- Fadden Electorate: Rosie Malone
- Robertson Electorate: National Day of Thanksgiving
- Wright Electorate: National Volunteer Week
- Powis, Richard
- Blue Mountains Crossing Bicentenary
- Bass Electorate: Training and Employment
- Wright Electorate: Dairy Industry
- Australian Labor Party: Port Kembla Branch
- National Walk Safely to School Day
- Canberra Electorate: Australian Public Service
(Abbott, Tony, MP, Gillard, Julia, MP)
National Plan for School Improvement
(Symon, Mike, MP, Gillard, Julia, MP)
(Hockey, Joe, MP, Swan, Wayne, MP)
Education Funding
(Saffin, Janelle, MP, Swan, Wayne, MP)
Economic Competitiveness
(Truss, Warren, MP, Gillard, Julia, MP)
Work and Family
(Bandt, Adam, MP, Shorten, Bill, MP)
- Economy
National Plan for School Improvement
(Champion, Nick, MP, Garrett, Peter, MP)
Australian Federal Police
(Keenan, Michael, MP, Gillard, Julia, MP)
(Marles, Richard, MP, Albanese, Anthony, MP)
Asylum Seekers
(Morrison, Scott, MP, Gillard, Julia, MP)
Retirement Savings
(Murphy, John, MP, Shorten, Bill, MP)
National Security
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(Mitchell, Rob, MP, Macklin, Jenny, MP)
National Broadband Network
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(Lyons, Geoff, MP, Bradbury, David, MP)
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Clean Energy Finance Corporation
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- National Plan for School Improvement
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- Ballarat Electorate: Cancer Care
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- Melbourne Ports Electorate: Port Melbourne
- Sex Discrimination Amendment (Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Intersex Status) Bill 2013
Appropriation Bill (No. 1) 2013-2014, Appropriation Bill (No. 2) 2013-2014, Appropriation (Parliamentary Departments) Bill (No. 1) 2013-2014
Second Reading
- Mirabella, Sophie, MP
- Hall, Jill, MP
- Hartsuyker, Luke, MP
- Van Manen, Bert, MP
- Windsor, Tony, MP
- Morrison, Scott, MP
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- Andrews, Karen, MP
- Coulton, Mark, MP
- Frydenberg, Josh, MP
- Oakeshott, Robert, MP
- Ripoll, Bernie, MP
- Consideration in Detail
- Second Reading
Content Window
Thursday, 30 May 2013
Page: 4614
Page: 4614
Dr MIKE KELLY (Eden-Monaro—Minister for Defence Materiel) (15:38): Gee, how disappointing was that. I saw this question today on the Notice Paper and I thought, notwithstanding the second part of it not recognising the actual economic challenges and what will achieve competitiveness in this economy, that the first part seemed to indicate to me that maybe, just maybe, Mr Eleventy Billion, the shadow Treasurer, may have finally identified that we need to have consistency through this electoral period in terms of the sovereign risk that has been presented by the coalition on the key platforms that business are keeping their eye on. Let us examine the Clean Energy Future package that businesses have made their adjustments on and that we have done all the hard yards of getting in place. There is $19 billion sitting out there waiting to be deployed in investment but, because of the uncertainty that the coalition have created, that money has been held up. Much more could have been achieved under this package if we had had the sort of unity that the member for Wentworth demonstrated in the national interest, but he was undermined and sabotaged in the execution of that. That is the sort of consistency I was looking for.
Instead, what did I see? I saw the sort of consistency that leads us down the rearguard route to shackles on our economy, shackles on our imagination, retrograde steps on the economy—the sort of stuff we saw during the Howard years, in fact. Just to reflect on how we got here, in those 12 Howard years the coalition sought to address issues of fiscal management by selling off the farm. Whatever government asset there was they wanted to sell it, and that is presenting grave concerns for us now as we see the same sort of framework actions being taken to look at things like the selling-off of the Snowy Hydro scheme, which the shadow Treasurer flagged was in their sights.
The mining boom delivered the rivers of gold that also greatly assisted them and they were fortunate in that. But in those times economic management suggests that you need to also manage your surplus situation carefully. It requires investment in things like skills, innovation and infrastructure and education. We did not see that during those Howard years. We saw in those years, the Rip Van Winkle years of sitting back fat, dumb and happy, a low-quality spend. Instead of adding value to the economy, instead of diversifying it, instead of positioning us for inevitable downturns in economic situations, inevitable coming off of commodity prices, what did they do? They set us up for 10 interest rate rises in a row because of that poor fiscal management and low-quality spend. That was the RBA telling the country, telling the coalition, 'You weren't getting it right.' So those Rip Van Winkle years saw a decline in skills, a decline in investment in infrastructure, a decline in innovation.
We were determined to address those issues but we were presented with massive challenges. There was the worst financial crisis in international history since the Great Depression. We had the worst fires and the worst floods in our history. We were presented with the collapse of ABC Learning, with swine flu and equine flu, and we inherited two wars from the coalition, one of which was completely unnecessary and saw the waste of billions of dollars. In my own portfolio of Defence materiel we inherited some other wasteful measures like the $1.4 billion that was wasted on the Seaspray helicopter which never gave us one minute of flying time, or the $40 million that was wasted on the landing craft that did not fit any vessel we had or any vessel we were going to acquire. We addressed all that, put projects on the list of projects of concern and managed the implementation of new procurement processes.
We also managed all of these other massive economic challenges at the same time. For the first time in the nation's history we navigated an international recession without going into recession ourselves. No coalition government or conservative government had ever managed that before in our history. At the same time we preserved 200,000 jobs. During our period in office we have created something like 960,000 jobs in this context of uncertain economic times and challenging situations with the high state of the dollar. We have managed that at the same time as having an inflation rate of only 2.5 per cent, interest rates now at 2.75 per cent and growth of over three per cent. We have seen the situation of unemployment at only 5.5 per cent. No coalition government has ever achieved an alignment of macroeconomic indicators like that. No coalition government has ever achieved the country being at a AAA credit rating of the three major agencies—Standard & Poor's, Moody's and Fitch—never achieved in our history. This government did that, and all of the major economic commentators, all of the major economic organisations, have universally praised this government for its fiscal prudence, its fiscal policy and its achievements in the face of the international circumstances we have faced. All of them have praised our management of the situation.
It is not about simple consistency here, consistency following the same path as the coalition does of wanting to always rely on digging things up and selling them and let someone else value-add them, and then suffering the consequences when there is the inevitable mining downturn. That sort of consistency is not what the country needs. The country needs effective economic management, agile management, responsive management—management that addresses the challenges that are staring us in the face of the competition we face in this region and the world. That competition cannot be faced in the way the coalition want to do it. I mean, it could be: you could look at the sorts of lazy approaches they take to productivity, for example. In the coalition, you always deal with workers as if they were widgets—just some component of the production process. You make them suffer and make them pay the price of delivering productivity by always looking to squeeze more work out of them and cut their wages. That is the coalition's approach: to push down the labour market and engage in a race to the bottom with China and India on wages.
That is not the Labor way. The Labor way is to seek productivity gains in innovation, in sound business management and in a team approach in an enterprise with the workers and management working together to improve work practices and design new processes and new products. That is the Labor way. We want to grow the pie, as the former minister for resources said, not reduce the pie that the low- and middle-income earners would otherwise have to eat. And it is working. Certainly you see stories emerge of job losses, but this economy is in transformation. No-one is reporting, in those major journals of record, the job growth that is occurring in those sectors where we need it. That is why the investment in a clean energy future was so important, and I will come back to that.
Obviously we have seen a theme develop in the coalition's commentary about debt, and obviously they want to ignore, again, the facts of the world, the economic circumstances and the historical situation of management of debt and surplus. They live in a parallel universe where these sorts of facts do not exist. Well, this is a graph of the history of Australian government public debt. Over that time, you will see, we are at one of the lowest points of the apexes in those debt experiences.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Hon. BC Scott ): Order! The minister will desist from using props.
Dr MIKE KELLY: Some of them, of course, have been much higher. We experienced a debt-to-GDP ratio of close to 130 per cent during the Second World War, and during economic emergencies and recessions you always respond with suitable economic strategies to make sure that you keep growth going, promote growth or try to restore growth. The coalition's approach would be to introduce savage austerity, which would send this country into recession without question. Instead, the government has created and navigated a course of prudent, responsible fiscal management that gets the balance right. In other words, we do not seek to come back to surplus at a rate that would send this country into a recession. We create a steady course back to surplus but maintain certain levels of stimulus that are necessary to keep the economy ticking over in a growth track that will then restore the sorts of revenue that the budget has been missing these last few years. That lack of revenue has, in fact, been the sole source of the debt, because with every initiative the government has introduced we have introduced offsetting savings to fund it. So the entire story of the debt, in fact, relates to that revenue situation.
I would also like to address the fact that the coalition has no plan for the future—no plan whatsoever to meet those massive challenges out there in a dynamic region that we cannot afford to fall behind. Where are the key investments that need to occur there? Let us start with the NBN. A Korean company has invested in a $200 million project in my region, a timber precinct in Bombala. This South Korean company is coming into our region and creating jobs and exciting new opportunities. The first thing it said to us was, 'We won't do that unless you confirm you're going ahead with the NBN.' Why? Because South Korean companies are already out there, linked with high-speed broadband and fibre throughout their economy. The company said it would not set the precinct up without the NBN, because it operates its business in terms of the state-of-the-art machinery that is needed in industry these days to avoid the impacts of labour and dollar costs. That plant operates on remote diagnostics and engineering solutions connected to the company's global operations. That is the sort of opportunity that exists for rural and regional Australia out of the NBN rollout, notwithstanding all of the other massive benefits in education and health as well. There is a company in Cooma—a bold new venture by a young woman named Jane Cay, who has set up a company called Birdsnest, which is now one of Australia's largest online companies. It has 90 employees in the town of Cooma, a great boost for a regional town. Those sorts of opportunities can be amplified, magnified and spread around this country by a proper investment in the NBN.
What do the coalition want to do? They want to buy the old copper network from Telstra, including, as we heard today, some of those pits and pipes that contain asbestos. So they have gone down the privatisation road but they want to go back to the situation where you get all of the downside and none of the upside. How crazy is that—a copper system that is breaking down, that would cost them $1 billion a year to try and keep on life support and that Telstra said in 2003 could not last another 15 years. They want to try and keep it going and shackle us to a capacity that will deny our people with imagination—our entrepreneurs—the opportunity to innovate and take this country ahead.
In addition to that, the ADSL system, as we know now, absorbs something like two per cent of the nation's power. The VDSL system they are proposing would require something like four per cent of the nation's power to pump that power through the copper system and create the 60,000 cabinets that there would have to be on street corners. Instead of achieving the energy efficiencies that we are all driving towards, that would send us backwards massively. I have seen estimates that you might have to build something like three to five more power stations to power this VDSL system. What an insane approach, when we know that fibre to the node achieves massive energy savings.
The Clean Energy Future initiative also is delivering fantastic results. Of course, there are the lower emissions, as we have seen—8.3 per cent in the electricity sector. We are seeing the 30 per cent rise in renewable energy. Coal-fired power is now dropping down from 80 to 75 per cent, which in itself is a great outcome just for the health burden on our economy. I have seen it estimated that fossil fuels generate about $6 billion worth of health costs to this economy. So, through the renewable energy package, we are seeing the transformation to the new economy—an investment in energy security for the future and ultimately cheaper power, because renewable energy will ultimately deliver that.
It is certainly creating a base for start-up companies all over Australia as well. In my own region, there is a wonderful company with a great idea—a local invention by Joe Ruiz-Avila, who created a system that he took to Pambula Engineering. Based on the incentive schemes and support provided by the Clean Energy Future package, they are now exporting their product all over the world, expanding rapidly. They are now going to set up their international research and development hub in Pambula.
These are great results that are occurring in my own region from that package. The most important element to that is the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. How the opposition cannot see the importance of this as a venture capital base is beyond me. It is a party that is supposed to be supportive of new industry, new business, small business, but all they want to do is choke off the availability of venture capital, which we have had a marked absence of in this country.
We have also, of course, introduced Venture Australia and our innovation precincts. Within my own portfolio of Defence, there is a new $120 million package for our Priority Industry Capability Development Fund and our Defence Innovation Realisation Fund. Our investment in the defence industry will generate great investments in industry and manufacturing and great leveraging opportunities across the board for us.
These are great opportunities—great potential that is being realised under our very noses that this coalition would take away from us. They would take away the investment in skills—over $8 billion that has now seen national records of apprenticeships and trainees at half a million and extensions of funding to vocational training through the expansion of the HECS concept. These are great initiatives that arm our kids with the skills they will need for the future.
We have seen the coalition ignore those things but impose their great big new tax in their plan for the future with this paid parental leave monstrosity, which half of their party room rejects. They pose a real risk of consistency down the wrong track—a lack of vision, imagination and courage. We stand for a bright future for Australia that leads and stands in the winner's circle. The contrast could not be clearer; the choice could not be simpler.


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Anheuser-Busch To Purchase Blue Point Brewing
Published: 03/04/2014
ST. LOUIS (PRNewswire) — Anheuser-Busch recently announced it is purchasing Blue Point Brewing Co. in Patchogue, N.Y.
Founded 15 years ago by Mark Burford and Peter Cotter, Blue Point is one of the nation's top craft brewers with more than 40 beers and sales concentrated along the East Coast.
Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
According to Anheuser-Busch, Blue Point will continue to operate in Patchogue. It also plans to invest in the brewery to grow its operational capabilities and enhance the consumer experience over the next few years.


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Org intends to file later today
The Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. is seeking to appeal a federal judge's ruling in favor of Dick Clark Prods. over the rights to the Golden Globes, but there's a new dispute over the timing of when that should happen.
U.S. District Judge Howard Matz ruled last month that Dick Clark Prods. is entitled to potentially unlimited options to produce the Golden Globes as long as it lands a broadcast deal with NBC. But Matz's ruling was only the first phase of the case, with a further dispute over DCP's accounting, digital rights, pre-show rights and other issues yet to be resolved.
In a filing with the court on Monday, the HFPA said it would like to put the second phase on hold and instead pursue an appeal, arguing that it would "streamline and minimize further proceedings." The HFPA also "will be required to incur significant expense to litigate" the second phase, something that will be "obviated if the appeal is successful." They also argue that if the appeal is pursued after the second phase, "it will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for the appeal to be concluded prior to the 2014 Golden Globes Award Show." They also suggested that an immediate appeal "will advance the possiblity of settlement of this case," something that Matz urged the parties to do just days before the initial trial concluded in February.
But DCP objects to putting a stay on the second phase, calling it "inappropriate." They noted that the HFPA's claims that DCP underpaid or took too hefty expenses for production costs would "need to be resolved" irrespective of the outcome of the appeal. They said that "both sides would benefit from the clarity that a prompt judicial decision will provide."


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[QUOTE=Derpamix;1151458]It should be voluntary. If a person decides to follow someone else, then it is their choice. If they choose to create a "government inc", a business which acts a government, but has other "government inc" competition, it is still better than a forced state controlling everything. A hierarchy does not need to exist. [B]Free economy has been shown to be substantially more beneficial.[/B]
ie; anarcho capitalism[/QUOTE]
Beneficial to whom?
This anarchy stuff is fantasy. Where would human kind be if we never got past tribal living? We'd still be living tribally. I guess that sounds sweet to all you primal-eating folk, but you don't realize the implications.
[LIST][*]If you live in a tribe in which you eat human brains, that is what you will do. [*]If you live in a tribe that has a bitter rival nearby, you will physically fight them your entire life. No, you don't get to pay soldiers to fight for you.[*]If there is a big tiger hiding in the bushes, you will be his prey when you walk by. If you manage to escape with just one arm missing, you could easily die from infection or bleeding out.[/LIST]
The fact is that primal living is tough. It has its aspects of freedom that are nice of course. Society and government were built to prevent anarchy and hopefully protect these freedoms.
If we stayed in tribal living, we would be totally submitted to nature until nature eventually does its bidding with the human race. That means an asteroid, an ice age, a volcanic explosion, and eventually the sun will make life impossible on the Earth's surface in 500 million to 1 billion years. That's the end game for tribes.
With technology, our society has hope for expansion into other planetary systems. That is the ultimate goal of humankind right now, I believe. I want that. I also think, while our government and society produces controls on us that are annoying, they are no different than controls that nature would have put on us anyways. In fact, you could say they're less by definition when you compare life expectancy among tribes vs our modern society. This means only a small fraction of the tribal population would ever even survive long enough to really experience this "freedom" you speak of.
Pining for the "freedom" of anarchy is pure fantasy born out of thinking: thinking that one's mind is totally independent from one's body.
[LIST][*]If one realizes one's mind is dependent upon one's body, one realizes even without any outside government, one is a slave to the survival needs one's body.[*]If one realizes that other people will collaborate, conspire, and seek to gain power NO MATTER what you say or do or outlaw or eliminate, one realizes that government is inevitable, even in an "anarchy" scenario. Warlords rise up during anarchy, just like you see in the ancient history of humankind.[/LIST]
Let's get past this notion of 100% freedom because it's just not possible, and it's never existed before, ever, for any species of life. It's a romantic thought to throw next to soulmates, heavenly gods, karma, fairies, and pixie dust.


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Single Article Purchase:
High or Low Doses of PPIs for Patients With Peptic Ulcer Bleeding?—Reply
Wang C, Ma M, Fang C, Chen S, Yen Z.
Arch Intern Med. 2010;170(18):1699-1700.
Published online October 11, 2010
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Johnson & Johnson said William Weldon, chief executive officer during a long stretch of unprecedented business troubles for the healthcare giant, will step down later this year.
Weldon will be succeeded as CEO by Alex Gorsky, 51, who joined the company in 2008. He was appointed vice chairman in 2011. He has had responsibility for overseeing the company's medical devices and diagnostics business.
Gorsky is expected to succeed Weldon, who is 63, at the company's annual meeting in April. Weldon will continue as chairman of the board, the company said.


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The names of 20 prominent people are hidden in the maze of letters. How many can you find by consulting the brief clues? The names read forward, backward, up, down or diagonally, are always in a straight line and never skip letters. We have started you off by circling PEARL, the answer to 1 in the diagram. The names may overlap and letters may be used more than once, but not all of the letters will be used. Super PEOPLE sleuths should be able to identify 15 or more names. Answers in next week's issue.
1. Nashville's "Howdy" lady
2. Salvadoran rebel
3. Series' valuable Tiger
4. J.R.'s real ma
5. He's The Boss?
6. New Hill Street sarge
7. TV Aurora...
8. ...and son
9. Say it ain't so, Joe
10. Nobel bishop
11. Shuttling Senator
12. Recalling his Israeli Heritage
13. King of chess
14. Little Drummer Girl is she
15. Love and War chronicler
16. Ron's right hand
17. Moscow on the Hudson gal
18. Jerusalem top man
19. Happy birthday, sweet 45
20. Teachers' pregnant pet
updated 12/17/1984 AT 01:00 AM EST
•originally published 12/17/1984 AT 01:00 AM EST


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An updated guideline for the prevention of falls in older patients urges primary care physicians to screen their patients yearly and to implement tailored, multifaceted interventions for patients at risk.
A new guideline recommends that physicians annually screen older patients for factors that may increase their risk of falling.
The guideline, which was produced by the American Geriatrics Society and the British Geriatrics Society, replaces one issued in 2001 by the 2 societies and the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons. It emphasizes that primary care physicians should annually screen all of their older patients for risk factors that can lead to falls.
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text: The Institute of Caribbean Studies, Univ of Puerto Rico, invites the academic community and general public to the opening lecture of its Conferencias Caribeñas 15 entltled "La epidemia de la chikungunya en el Caribe" (The outbreak of chickungunya in the Caribbean) by Dr. Brenda Rivera, government epidemiologist and professor at UPR School of Medicine. The event will be held on 21 August, from 1-330pm, at CRA 108 at the Rio Piedras Campus of the Univ of Puerto Rico. Online transmission available at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/cc71


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Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers said they arrested a man Thursday after his car spun across a metro interstate.
Officials say the driver was under the influence of alcohol. One lane of Interstate 40 near Garth Brooks Boulevard was shut down for a short time.
No other cars were involved.
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• The present study was designed to determine which of the memory tasks included in the CERAD (Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's Disease) neuropsychological battery best differentiate patients with early Alzheimer's disease from cognitively normal elderly control subjects and also best distinguish between the various levels of severity of the dementia process. A sample of CERAD patients with Alzheimer's disease was stratified by disease severity into those with mild, moderate, or severe dementia and matched with control subjects for sex, age, and education. Using multivariate procedures and cutting scores, the efficacy of each memory measure in distinguishing between these groups and control subjects was determined. The test for delayed recall was found to be the best overall discriminatory measure. The other tests of memory, ie, immediate recall, intrusion errors, and recognition memory, had poor overall discriminability. None of the CERAD memory measures were found to be particularly powerful in staging the severity of dementia. These findings suggest that tests for delayed recall may be particularly useful in the early detection of Alzheimer's disease and should be considered in screening batteries for dementia in community surveys.
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Dwight Howard held some of the championship trophies in the Lakers' facility Friday, the first act of the next phase of his career.
"Making some wishes," Howard said.
One of his has finally come true. At long last, he's out of Orlando.
It took four teams, 11 other players, five draft picks and countless rounds of talks over many months, but the Magic decided the time was right to start over without the NBA's best center.
Howard is off to play alongside Kobe Bryant in Los Angeles after a megadeal involving the Lakers, Magic, Philadelphia and Denver was completed Friday.
"It was just a very tough situation for everybody to let go," Howard, 26, said. "I'm finally glad that it's over with. Myself and the Magic organization, we can all start over and begin a new career."
As far as the other headliners involved, center Andrew Bynum leaves the Lakers for Philadelphia, and guard/forward Andre Iguodala is heading to Denver.
"Are we taking a step back? Absolutely, we are," Magic general manager Rob Hennigan said. "But we're taking a step back with a vision."
Even while otherwise busy at the Olympics, Bryant quickly proclaimed the Lakers are "locked and loaded to bring back the title." He spoke with Howard on Friday morning to talk about how the Lakers look very much like a major contender for another NBA title.
"I'll probably play two or three more years. Then the team is his," Bryant said. "I'm excited for the franchise because now they have a player that can carry the franchise well after I'm gone. This should be his, and he should want to accept that challenge."
Howard, who may not be ready for the start of the season while recovering from back surgery, plans to become a free agent in July.
"You talk about all the great centers this team has had," Bryant said. "Now he's the next in line."
After an offseason in which the Magic fired coach Stan Van Gundy and GM Otis Smith, it is beginning anew. In 1996 the Magic watched Shaquille O'Neal sign as a free agent with the Lakers. At least this time when they lost someone with the "Superman" nickname, they got something back.
"Next season, and really subsequent seasons, are going to be about getting better every day," Hennigan said.
"The pressure that (Howard) has been feeling in Orlando has just multiplied by three now," O'Neal said. "If he thinks the Orlando Sentinel was on his case when he didn't perform, guys like (Los Angeles Times columnist) Bill Plaschke, they don't play."
Orlando got guard Arron Afflalo and forward Al Harrington from Denver, forward Moe Harkless and center Nikola Vucevic from Philadelphia, and forward Josh McRoberts and guard Christian Eyenga from the Lakers. The Lakers acquired Howard, guard Chris Duhon and forward Earl Clark from Orlando. The Magic also traded guard Jason Richardson to Philadelphia.
Orlando also gets five draft picks over five years.
"It makes the NBA that much more exciting," Knicks forward and U.S. Olympian Carmelo Anthony said.
Not everyone shared that sentiment. "I really don't care," Thunder star Kevin Durant said.
The starting lineup for the Lakers, who traded for point guard Steve Nash last month, now includes five former All-Stars with three MVP awards and four defensive player of the year awards.
"Unreal!" Bryant said.


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Annual Meetings
Our 2017 Annual Meeting will be held June 29-July 2, 2017 in Edinburgh, Scotland at the Royal College of Surgeons. The Presidential Address and Welcome Reception will be held the afternoon/evening of 29 June.Conference Theme: ISPP AT 40: REVISITING CORE THEMES OF TYRANNY, INTERGROUP RELATIONS AND LEADERSHIP President: Kate Reynolds (Australian National University, Australia) Program Co-chairs: Dr. Anca Minescu (University of Limerick, Ireland) & Prof. Peter Gries (University of Oklahoma, USA). CALL FOR PAPERS
Our Call for Papers can be viewed HERE.
The submission process for the 2017 Annual Meeting is expected to open in early October 2016. The link for the submission site will be posted on this page when available.
Please be sure to note any scheduling requests when you submit your proposal (ex., do not schedule on first day). We will consider all requests, but cannot guarantee that we will be able to accommodate everyone.PROGRAM SCHEDULE
The program is typically finalized in late April/early May, shortly before the conference. Please check this page to view the PDF when available.COPYRIGHTED MATERIALS NOTICE
All presenters at ISPP's 2017 Annual Meeting will be provided notification regarding the use of copyrighted materials within their presentations. That notice can be viewed HERE as well.AUDIO/VISUAL DETAILS & POSTER DIMENSIONS
ISPP will provide laptops, projectors, screens, carts, cabling, electrical outlets/strips, and necessary microphones/speakers in each meeting room. Presenters are responsible for providing their materials on portable media to transfer to the provided laptops.
Poster boards will be provided for the poster sessions. Each accepted poster will have ONE surface of a board for materials. The dimensions of each display surface will be provided and posted here well in advance of the conference. ISPP will provide Velcro (hook and loop) dots or strips for mounting posters. Presenters should make certain to print their posters PRIOR TO ARRIVAL at the conference.
As this will be ISPP's 40th Annual Meeting, we are planning some special features during the event. Please check back here often for more details as they are confirmed!HOTEL INFORMATION
Hotel information will be posted on this page when available. Please check back.
PLEASE NOTE: ISPP has NOT contracted with any third-party companies for hotel reservations. All information and links for reservations will be provided in e-mails directly from ISPP and on this web page. Beware if you are contacted by someone stating that they are working with ISPP for discounted room rates; such communications are not legitimate.TRAVEL & VISA INFORMATION
Please see THIS SITE for information about travel to Scotland and visa requirements. Accepted presenters will be able to download a letter for visa application from the submission web site in 2017.2017 REGISTRATION
Registration is expected to open in the first part of 2017. Please check back after February 2017 for updates.
All conference attendees are required to accept a liability release waiver when registering. The waiver will be available via the registration web site, and also on this page.
2017 conference pricing will be made available soon. Please check this page often.FLYERS/BOOK DISPLAYS For publishers and authors interested in having display copies, samples, or flyers at the conference, please contact ISPP's Executive Director, Sev Bennett, for more information. EDINBURGH VISITOR INFORMATION & RESOURCES
View information on Edinburgh HERE
*Please note that photographs and video are taken during the course of the conference. These images may be used in ISPP marketing materials, on the ISPP web site, and other products relating to ISPP. By attending, you consent to your image being used in ISPP-related materials.
*ISPP reserves the right to deny registration or to remove an ISPP conference attendee at any time, for reasons, in its sole discretion, it deems sufficient.


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Community Forums › Forums › General Discussion › Set web server handle 404 errors for some file types using .htaccess
This topic contains 1 reply, has 2 voices, and was last updated by Susan 2 years, 6 months ago.
January 17, 2014 at 3:24 am #85597
I had learned a lot from answers here and now I have very specific question, which I couldn't find on the Internet (is this possible?)...
The goal is to set custom ErrorDocument 404, that handles not existing chosen static files like: /notfound.jpg and in a subdirectory (for any directory): /dir/notfound.jpg, for sites running under WordPress with pretty permalinks enabled. It will avoid high load on the server when some chosen static files are missing or linked incorrectly!
I'm using a slightly modified code from the W3 Total cache plugin in my .htaccess file:
ErrorDocument 404 /_code_404.html # BEGIN (modified) W3TC Skip 404 error handling by WordPress for static files <IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !(robots\.txt|sitemap\.xml(\.gz)?) RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} \.(css|js|bmp|gif|ico|jpg|jpeg|jpe|png|swf)$ [NC] RewriteRule .* - [L] </IfModule> # END (modified) W3TC Skip 404 error handling by WordPress for static files # BEGIN WordPress <IfModule mod_rewrite.c> RewriteEngine On RewriteBase / RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L] RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d RewriteRule . /index.php [L] </IfModule> # END WordPress
I'm trying it on 2 different servers with Cpanel, on shared plans, both have WordPress with pretty permalinks and the result is the same:
Works just as expected for requests like http://mydomain.com/notfound.jpg
Doesn't work for not found file in a subdirectory like this http://mydomain.com/dir/notfound.jpg. In this case the WP handles the request and shows 404 page, which I want to avoid for certain file types, i.e. for static files like: css, js, jpg and a few more...
Any answers and comments are welcome, thanks! I can try any suggestions you may have (even untested).
April 1, 2014 at 9:38 am #97898
As you posted this more than 2 months ago, I hope you were able to get your issue resolved. If not, please report back here, and I will escalate for you.
If it has been resolved, please update the thread, and I will close it.
Susan @ One Happy Studio I offer theme customizations I tweet!
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About Me
I'm an Italian fine art photographer based in Berlin.
My work mainly focuses on conceptual, documentary and reportage photography.
10 September – 2 October 2016
Participation in the 2 TAGE WEDDING 2016 KULTURFESTIVAL with the project "IO ABITO A MATRIMONIO", a transits/portraits series of people living in Wedding district realised specifically for the event – From 10 September to 2 October 2016 – Neontoaster – Seestraße 106 – 13353 Berlin-Wedding (Germany) – For further info: firstname.lastname@example.com
19 November – 20 December 2015
Exhibition for the Photissima Art Prize Turon 2015 as one of the award's finalists with the photo High hopes of Immigration – Spazio MRF (capannone ex DAI) – Corso Settembrini 164 – 10135 Torino (Italy) – For further info: email@example.com
20 September 2015
Participation in the BERLINER LISTE 2015, fair for contemporary art, with a broad selection of artworks from my photo projects. Kraftwerk Berlin – Köpenicker Straße 70, 10179 Berlin
20 June 2015
Participation in the Biennale of Italian Photography (EXPO 2015) curated by Vittorio Sgarbi with photos from the projects One, No One and One Hundred Thousand and White Walls. – Centrale Taccani | Via Bernabò Visconti, 14 – 20056 Trezzo sull'Adda – Milan (Italy)
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