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Tuesday, 27 November 2012
Can anyone stop Cameron's personal booze crusade?
It's not exactly news that David Cameron's desire to impose a minimum unit price, which will supposedly curb excessive drinking, hasn't found much favour among his colleagues. The former health secretary Andrew Lansley was said to have been particularly firm in his opposition, though his successor Jeremy Hunt may be more amenable to Cameron's way of thinking. What's remarkable is the timing. The announcement of a Home Office "consultation" on a MUP is due, after several delays, to be made tomorrow. The Telegraph report, along with a flurry of others in recent days, looks like a determined attempt by someone within the government, possibly even within the Cabinet, to sabotage the proposal at the last minute.
This comes after a report for the Adam Smith Institute by Chris Snowdon picked apart the computer modelling that led the government to claim that a 50p per unit price would save thousands of lives, concluding that the assessment was based on assumptions which "range from the questionable to the demonstrably false." In Scotland, the proposal has already been driven through by the SNP administration, but faces a strong legal challenge on the basis of EU competition law. Why the urgency in England? Scotland has a worse drink "problem" than England. If a minimum price is the answer, and is not in fact illegal, then the effect of the policy will soon become evident. If it doesn't work, then adopting a wait-and-see approach in England would spare the government from an embarrassing (and no-doubt unpopular) failure.
The Minimum Price, while long demanded by the health lobby (which seems to believe that reducing the chance of early death is the only goal worth striving for in life) is only being forced on England because it is Cameron's personal obsession. Cameron has a regrettable tendency - it's the most irritating thing about him - to go off on moral crusades. He likes to ride a high horse, even though it usually turns out to have been lent to him by the husband of Rebekah Brooks. We've seen it over "sexualisation" and now we're seeing it over alcohol. His alcohol policy is of course inherently illiberal and unConservative (if people want to drink themselves to death, that's their right in a free society), but it's also bad, stupid and unnecessary. Even were it to work, it would do so by increasing the profits of drinks retailers. If the aim is to increase the price of alcohol, that could be achieved much more simply through higher duty, which would be entirely legal and would also benefit the Treasury. Banning multi-buy deals will mostly hit people who are catering for parties or weddings.
It's not even as though England and Wales have, by European standards, a particularly serious drink problem. Consumption has been falling steadily for the best part of a decade, and has fallen most rapidly among the young - about whose supposed tendency to "binge drink" most of this moral panic revolves. Extraordinarily, according to the most recent NHS statistics fewer than half of those aged 16-24 report having more than one alcoholic drink per week. Among under-16s, the proportion had fallen over the decade from more than a quarter to a mere 13%. A mere 5% of adult women and 9% of adult men reported drinking alcohol every day. While it's in the interests of health campaigners to scare-monger about an increasing alcohol problem, the facts tell a different story. Drinking will probably continue to fall in the years ahead, whatever the government decides to do. If Cameron gets his way, no doubt he will want to give his MUP the credit for any reduction that occurs, but he will have no statistical justification for doing so.
Despite claims that the policy is aimed only at cheap booze and loss-leaders, MUP will push up the price of alcohol for all consumers. It will hit the poor hardest, but the already-squeezed middle will be affected as well: the "hard-working families" who will be punished for wanting to relax over a bottle of wine at the end of a hard-working week; the pensioners who have few other pleasures in life. And, of course, most members of the government know this only too well. The policy may be popular with the killjoy BMA (or perhaps not: they want a Minimum Price of at least 50p a unit), it will go down badly with ordinary voters (and, to judge by Conservative Home, is already hated by grassroots Tories). It will do next to nothing to tackle hardened drinking and won't even result in increased tax revenues. Oh, and it will also be devastating for the Cornish cider industry.
So why is it happening? How is Cameron able to drive through a policy no-one in his Cabinet wants, is unlikely to achieve its aims, targets a "problem" that is in fact diminishing with every passing year, will be stunningly unpopular and is probably illegal anyway? Britain is not supposed to be an autocracy, in which one man's personal obsession makes law. The business reminds me of the poll tax fiasco, which was Mrs Thatcher's personal project, imposed on an unwilling Cabinet and against much backbench opposition, which rightly saw it as an impending disaster. Reports like today's in the Telegraph show that opposition to Cameron's scheme is, if anything, growing within government. That should be enough to call a halt.
I don't think that Cameron's stupid, however high-handed and pig-headed he is at times. I think he knows that minimum unit pricing is a bad idea. The trouble is that he is personally and publicly committed to it. Not only has he announced his support for it, he has made great claims for what it will achieve. A climbdown now would be seen as a failure of leadership, just it would have been a failure of leadership for Mrs Thatcher to have abandoned the poll tax. If he abandoned the policy he would seem to be abandoning the goals that the policy is supposed to realise. To demonstrate both his personal commitment to ending "binge drinking" and his authority as a leader, he feels bound to drive through a bad policy. This is something that happens all too often in our political system. Read the rest of this article
Sunday, 25 November 2012
Britain and Europe: is it different this time?
It's said that Blair "still hankers after a prominent role in European politics," following his (let's face it, humiliating) failure to become EU president a few years ago. But whatever ambitions he continues to harbour, he must feel highly frustrated that he needs to make yet again the basic case that Britain is better off inside the EU. Blair's grand ambition since before he became prime minister was to have the UK fulfil what he once described as its "destiny" as a fully signed-up and enthusiastic member of the European integrationist project. Instead, during the ten years of his leadership this most Euro-enthusiast of British prime ministers (except possibly for Ted Heath) did more or less what Thatcher and Major had done before him, and what Brown and Cameron have done after him: followed the rest of Europe with a cultivated air of foot-dragging reluctance. He did, it's true, achieve one grand pro-European gesture by giving up a hefty proportion of the British rebate. But he was not thanked for it, at home or abroad.
Blair's Euro-vision was always the stuff of fantasy: apart from the facts of geography, history and language that make Britain look to the oceans at least as much as to the nearby continent, there's the inescapable reality that fervent pro-Europeans like him and Nick Clegg have always been a minority in this country. The mainstream view of the political and governing classes has been pragmatic, resigned, accepting that a European future was vaguely inevitable (and, indeed, provided tremendous gravy-train opportunities for the lucky few) but not dreaming the dream. It's completely different on the continent. Completely. In virtually every other EU member state, there has long been an unshakeable belief among the official classes, for all their nationalistic manoeuvrings and public differences of emphasis in the moral imperative of an ever-deeper union. Full-blooded Euroscepticsm, if it even exists, really is confined to loonies, fruitcakes and not-so-closet racists. That is the big difference.
There has always been a strong anti-EU current in British opinion, one that has never been reconciled to our membership and has opposed every step of further integration. Usually a minority view, it has never been a negligible one. Respectable politicians have argued for it, and governments have seen political value in feigning reluctance in all matter European. So the question of Britain's membership has never quite been settled. Or, rather, it has never quite seemed settled. A feeling of semi-detachment has infused the British relationship with the rest of the EU from the beginning. The general atmosphere, I would say, has been one of "We could leave, if we wanted to, but on balance we probably won't". Such sentiments make "Brixit" at least conceptually possible. And what can be imagined might just happen.
Nevertheless, it does feel different this time. Andrew Rawnsley, also in the Observer, thinks that this is an illusion: that the basic facts haven't changed. He suggests that Euroscepticism might be peaking, or have peaked. He notes the familiar quality of the debate in Britain - the Euro-sceptics are still, after all, making the same arguments in much the same way. He argues that when forced to take a firm position the British people have tended, however reluctantly, to accept that it's better to be in than out. "The most important point about the outists is that they have always lost." The troubles afflicting the Euro may have put wind into Euro-sceptic sails for the time being, but that (thinks Rawnsley) might well start getting better and probably isn't going to get much worse. At least, Euro-sceptics can't rely on it getting a lot worse. Rawnsley also thinks it highly unlikely that Ed Miliband would want to wreck his (possible) premiership by committing to hold an in-out referendum.
So on the fundamental question, in or out, here is the line-up of forces. On the side of remaining in the European Union: the Lib Dems, the Labour party, an important number of senior Conservatives, the vast majority of business and the vast majority of trades unions. On the side of leaving: a lot of Tories, a few noisy newspapers, hardly any businesses and hardly any trades unionists. That is why I say the outists are unwise to toast victory before the battle has even been properly joined.
What's most striking about Rawnsley's analysis is its Little Englandism. His article is entirely about the balance of pro- and anti- European forces within the UK. Britain's membership or not of the EU is, for him, entirely a domestic political debate. It's about what David Cameron thinks, what Nick Clegg thinks, what Ed Miliband thinks, what the CBI thinks. This inward-facing view of the politics is what really hasn't changed: even for pro-Europeans, it's all about Britain. For Blair, too:
Friends of Blair say he believes that the EU still lacks effective leadership and too often fails to promote a "big vision". Instead it too often gives the impression that it is obsessed with arcane, if important, institutional reform. Referring to moves to reform Europe's institutions to end the euro crisis, a source said: "He will say that of course you have to get the politics and economics aligned but this has to be part of a grand plan not a series of incremental changes."
So Blair is passionately in favour of the European Union. But not, it seems, the EU that actually exists; rather, the EU that adopts his own big vision. His own British vision, which while at odds with other British visions is still clearly British.
Actually, whether the UK stays in the EU or leaves is scarcely a matter for British politicians at all, any more. The EU is changing radically as a result of the crisis in the Eurozone: it is changing in the direction of further integration, and further integration, moreover, on German terms. Britain is scarcely part of this debate at all. The new EU that emerges will not be one shaped by or for Britain, and it will not be one that Britain can belong to, whatever political will there may still be among British politicians. The seeds for this were laid twenty years ago. It was because John Major had a small majority that he felt the need, for purely tactical reasons, to negotiate an opt-out from the single currency in 1992, and later to promise a referendum. And, later, because of Brown's feud with Blair, the referendum was not held at the opportune moment in 1997 even though joining the Euro was Tony's dearest wish. The British opt-out was never intended or expected to become permanent. But that's what happened; and because the Euro is the key building-block of the new EU infrastructure, the UK has in a vital sense already left.
It doesn't feel like that, which is why the debate here (Will there be an in-out referendum? What treaty changes will Cameron veto? Too many Brussels regulations) seems so familiar. And its familiar outcome (in the EU but grumpy) also looks assured. But don't be fooled. In Germany, preparations to deal with British departure are already far advanced. When Angela Merkel declared the other week that she "couldn't imagine an EU without the United Kingdom," she meant precisely the opposite. It is because British exit suddenly looks plausible, even likely, that she feels the need to forestall it, in public at least.
It may still, on balance, be in Britain's interests to remain in the EU. And it may still, on balance, be in the rest of the EU member states' interests for Britain to remain a member. But it's a finer balance now than it has ever been; and it's no longer enough. The real question that is left is this: in the end, will we jump or will we be pushed? Read the rest of this article
Wednesday, 21 November 2012
Ratzinger: the grinch who stole Christmas
With just under 34 days until Christmas the Pope has put a dampener on the festive period by rubbishing the idea that donkeys or any other animal have a place in the traditional Nativity scene. Benedict XVI also claims angels never sang to the shepherds to proclaim Christ birth's - trashing the much-loved carol 'Hark! The herald angels sing' in the process. From this falsehood the tradition of singing carols was born, the Pope says.
Oh dear. Is the pontiff channelling his inner Richard Dawkins? It seems so. In a desperate attempt to shift the million copies of the last instalment of his three-volume study of Jesus (which focuses, for reasons best known to his publisher, on the beginning of the story) Ratzinger has looked at the relevant passages in the Gospel of Luke and discovered, presumably not for the first time, that they contain no mention of the ox and ass so familiar from the Christmas crib. This is news!
If Rowan Williams had said it, the Mail could happily have put it down to trendy Anglican liberalism. But we don't expect to hear such tradition-busting language from the Pope.
It is, it seems, an especially radical departure because the Pope's own Rome headquarters "regularly has a giant scene at Christmas and has displayed an array of animals at the heart of the Vatican, but the Pontiff is certain that is wrong." There's no suggestion that a new, purified, donkey-free crib will be introduced this year, however, despite the Pope "debunking the theory". This is clearly scandalous. Ratzinger should have the courage of his convictions and tear down the misleading Vatican crib. Or else, follow his own logic and include a sack-bearing Santa along with the Three Wise Men, a character hitherto inexplicably missed out of Nativity scenes. The original Santa Claus was a saint, after all, so there would be ample religious justification, at least as much as for the wholly fictional animals.
The horrified tone of the report suggests that, like some liberal Anglican bishop of decades past, Ratzinger has cast doubt on basic Christian doctrines. Which, of course, he hasn't. The books insists, as one would expect, on the historicity of the Virgin Birth, which many would consider strains plausibility rather more than the apocryphal presence of an ox and an ass in the stable. He even, it seems, accepts the story of the Star of Bethlehem, adopting the currently fashionable rationalising explanation that it was a conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn.
I haven't read the book, but it strikes me that in sticking so closely to the text of the Gospel narratives Ratzinger is being a bit, well, Protestant. The familiar Nativity story, with its choirs of angels, lowing animals, three kings and all the rest is a quintessentially Catholic one: a delightful hodgepodge combining the accounts in Luke and Matthew with details plucked from other parts the Bible (the ox and the ass, for example, are mentioned in Isaiah), stuff from apocryphal gospels that never made it into the official Bible and centuries of storytelling and art. The elements were brought together by St Francis of Assisi, who assembled the first nativity scene (featuring live animals) in 1223.
The Nativity story is rooted in the Bible but much of its emotional engagement and narrative depth come from the later elaborations. Nor are they illogical. Luke doesn't mention a stable, but he does say that Jesus was "laid in a manger." A manger implies, if it doesn't necessitate, a stable; a stable implies animals; the heavily-pregnant Mary had presumably not walked all the way from Nazareth, so there must have been a donkey. There were "shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks by night"; hence sheep. Three gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh imply three gift-bringers; the costliness of the gifts imply that they must have been rich; and so on.
The result was part theology, part fairy-tale. But the whole beautiful structure began to unravel when the Reformation put an emphasis on the words of the Bible and to downplay the story in favour of the theology. What was left was a children's story. But without the supporting cast of shepherds, innkeepers, donkeys and camel-riding kings the few basic Biblical "facts", which the Pope prefers to concentrate on, look rather exposed.
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Tuesday, 20 November 2012
Why does Cameron want to destroy customer choice in the energy market?
After Cameron's bizarre promise to put gas and electricity customers on the "lowest" tariff automatically, apparently whether they wanted it or not, Energy Secretary Ed Davey has decided to reduce the number of tariffs offered by each supplier to just four, and will "require that the companies put consumers on the lowest tariff available to them." Customers who prefer a different arrangement, such as a fixed price deal, will have to go out of their way to request it, and it's not clear if there will be enough tariffs available to allow a choice between tariffs that have a standing charge and those charging merely be consumption. Depending on one's energy use, the difference here can be as much as £300 a year.
The inevitable result of this patronising proposal will be the disappearance of the best deals, which have always been unusual, eye-catching offers designed to tempt canny shoppers-around away from the competition. It was worthwhile for supply companies to make such offers because, human inertia being what it is, customers who can be bothered to swap suppliers on a regular basis will always be in a minority. And the special tariffs are still profitable, because energy profits are enormous. If everyone was on a special deal, profits would still be tangible, but would be considerably lower. It would of course be nice if all customers were on a special deal, but that would require action to limit the profits of energy companies, and that isn't going to happen under this government or (probably) under any other.
Many poorer, less tech-savvy customers are on deals that are lower than they could get by shopping around; but so are many better-off customers who have enough spare cash not to worry about cost. The real losers will be people on tight budgets who can be bothered to undergo the fairly minimal hassle involved in logging onto one of the "switching" websites to find the best deal. If everyone is forced onto the same "low" tariff, it will self-evidently be a higher one than is currently available. People currently on the best-value deals will, therefore, face an avoidable hike in their gas and electricity bills. The principal result of this idiotic policy will be enhanced profits for energy companies. A market that is perceived to be failing will be replaced by one that isn't any longer a market at all, but a mere cartel.
It is a myth that there is no effective competition in the energy market. It's just that only people who make the effort to shop around take advantage of the lowest tariffs. This is not a bad thing. People who make an effort to shop around should be rewarded with cheaper prices. People who care more about continuity of supply and who are less price-sensitive should pay more. It's called the free market. The government doesn't insist that Sainsbury's only offer four different varieties of bread, or ban them from offering special offers on one type of fruit but not another. Some shoppers have hours to spend chasing down the best prices. They will save money compared to people who want to get the shopping over with as quickly as possible; but they will almost always be poorer to start with. The energy market is not that different.
If poorer pensioners and others unable to access the internet are, at present, paying over the odds, there are ways in which they could be offered targeted help to find a better deal. For example, the energy suppliers could be required to identify such customers and offer them a better deal. This would be considerably cheaper and less intrusive than the anti-competitive, paternalistic and statist measures that are being set in motion.
Another stupid policy from an increasingly stupid government.
UPDATE I see it all now.
Asked if the government would regard the policy as a failure if it led to some people's fuel costs rising, Cameron's official spokesman told a regular media briefing in Westminster: "Our objective has been to work to help hard-working families who often struggle to pay their energy bills.
The government is obviously concerned that too many of those currently taking advantage of tariff-switching are on benefits, or lack the distracting presence of children, or are otherwise insufficiently hard-working or insufficiently families. So if they end up paying more, good. Not so stupid after all?
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Thursday, 15 November 2012
Abu Qatada is even worse than gay marriage
There is a moral issue facing Britain that should be of major concern to voters, and it is not gay marriage.
As a passionate opponent of the redefinition of the God-created institution of heterosexual marriage, I can understand the principled passion of those who, like the Chancellor George Osborne, support it ardently for reasons of fairness and equality. Mr Osborne also believes, according to his analysis of President Obama's election victory, that gay marriage is a vote winner, particularly among young people, and I would have to concede that he is probably right.
But gay marriage, important an issue though it is, at this juncture pales into insignificance compared with the legal shambles over Abu Qatada.
It is a travesty of justice that he cannot face trial in an overseas nation that had reasonable grounds to charge him with plotting a terrorist atrocity against its people. The responsibility for this disgrace lies with the European Court of Human Rights. That is why Britain's relationship with Strasbourg must now become a matter not of hand-wringing but of robust political action.
I will not conceal the Christian spiritual agenda bound up with my concern about the threat to social stability that Islamist terrorism represents in the country I love. Because Christianity spreads by persuasion not by coercion peaceable social conditions are vital for its dissemination. It is wonderful that social conditions in the United Kingdom currently allow for the proclamation of God's love in Jesus Christ. The privilege of living in a democracy also allows Christians to articulate views on a range of social and political issues for the public good, though it should be acknowledged that the threat to free speech once gay marriage is enacted, particularly for public sector employees such as military chaplains, is a very real one.
With the potential for Islamist terrorism now deeply entrenched in British society, our government has both a symbolic and practical moral responsiblity to deport Abu Qatada to Jordan in defiance of Strasbourg. It would not be difficult under the very public circumstances of this deportation for British monitors to ensure that he is not tortured in Jordan. But, as well as opposing the obtaining of evidence by torture, does not the British government also have a moral responsibility to assist the Jordanian authorities in getting as much information as they legitimately can out of Abu Qatada and to help wipe the smile off the face of evil?
Julian Mann is vicar of the Parish Church of the Ascension, Oughtibridge, South Yorkshire Read the rest of this article
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Monday, 12 November 2012
Newsnight's two victims
The Mail on Sunday was wrong yesterday to pursue him with unfeeling spite (though it was not wrong to point out the inconsistencies in his evidence; they matter, because truth and justice matter, especially where a crime as emotive as child abuse is concerned). It was disgraceful of David Mellor to brand him a "weirdo" on a politics TV show yesterday. But the Newsnight team who disinterred his ancient stories, forced him to relive his nightmares, showed his face and name on camera, failed to do the basic journalistic work of checking his story against the mountain of publicly-available information (or even to show him a photograph of his alleged abuser) and then abandoned him after the claims imploded, did him worse damage than either. They used him. He is as much the victim of the BBC's journalistic collapse as is Lord McAlpine.
As for the idea that concentrating on the crisis at the BBC distracts attention from the real and serious matter of child abuse: so, too, does sensationalism of the type exemplified by the Newsnight report. Seeking out highly-placed paedophile rings and top Tory abusers makes for good horror-show entertainment; but it bears very little relationship to the mundane reality of institutional abuse, such as was laid out in exhaustive detail by Mr Justice Waterhouse in his unfairly maligned report. It's well worth reading if you want the facts, rather than the fantasy, about Bryn Estyn. Far from being any sort of whitewash, it is detailed and damning about the failures of oversight and culture of neglect that allowed the terrible abuse there to continue and go unpunished for many years.
Pity, too, Lord McAlpine. As Boris Johnson rightly says, to accuse someone of being a paedophile "is to consign them to the lowest circle of hell – and while they are still alive." McAlpine has lived with this horrendous smear for years, at least since he was named by the defunct gossip magazine Scallywag around twenty years ago. (Scallywag, sued out of existence after it accused a blameless woman of having an affair with John Major, was the pre-internet equivalent of certain well-known websites.) The allegations, based (as the Guardian demonstrated convincingly on Friday) at best on a case of mistaken identity, have been disproved several times before. But they have never gone away. They have continued to circulate on the internet, besides being contained in David Icke's classic of conspiratorial literature, The Biggest Secret, which remains in print.
It was not new evidence that led to Newsnight disinterring this old, long discredited slur. Indeed, the BBC broadcast questionable claims about Bryn Estyn way back in 1999. Rather, it was the media and political feeding frenzy that, having sucked dry the malodorous corpse of Jimmy Savile was looking round for a new object of its righteous indignation. Tom Watson's histrionic claims in the House of Commons of a paedophile network at the heart of the Thatcher government gave permission (at the very least) for this new inquisition. Inspiration presumably came from the bowels of the Internet. Members of David Icke's Forum, for example, had been naming McAlpine and other alleged Tory paedophiles for weeks before Newsnight broke the story not-quite-naming him. So had various conspiracy-minded blogs. These people were crowing in vindication and expectation before the claims began to unravel, since when they have been bemoaning yet another establishment cover-up.
From David Icke to the right-on Twitter crowd falling gleefully on claims of Tory paedophile rings may not be such a long road. I'm struck, for example, by the tone of George Monbiot's abject apology to Lord McAlpine for having, perhaps libellously, named him on Twitter. Monbiot describes his tweet, as well he might, as "the worst mistake of my life."
The tweets I sent which hinted – as I assumed to be the case – that Lord McAlpine was the person the child abuse victim Steve Messham was talking about were so idiotic that, looking back on them today, I cannot believe that I wrote them.
So what possessed him? Why did he "assume it to be the case" that McAlpine was a paedophile, which was always a frankly preposterous notion?
I knew that Steve Messham had been treated appallingly, and I believed that the terrible things done to him had been compounded by a denial of recognition and a denial of the recourse to the law which was his due. When I saw his interview on Newsnight I was very upset. I trusted his account unquestioningly. I was horrified by what he said, and by the fact that the identity of the man he was talking about appeared to have been kept secret for so long.
Monbiot says that he allowed himself "to be carried away by a sense of moral outrage." But what he was actually carried away by was his own cognitive biases. I don't just mean that some people find the idea of a Tory paedophile ring at the heart of the Thatcher government plausible and even appealing. (Terrible crimes, yes, and one feels for the victims, but it just goes to show what those bastards were capable of.) It's also that people of Monbiot's predisposition (and Watson's) are drawn to the idea of establishment cover-ups, of rich and powerful manipulators denying justice to little people they have betrayed. Because Messham was an abuse victim (which no-one denies) Monbiot will believe "unquestioningly" anything he says; because McAlpine was a wealthy Thatcherite Monbiot will assume the worst of him, even that he raped children, without evidence.
Jimmy Savile exploited the "halo effect" he gained from being a popular entertainer and charity fundraiser to bat away the rumours about his abuse of under-age girls, rumours that we now know were well-founded. He also exploited the halo effect that surrounded the institutions which employed him and with which he was associated: the BBC, Stoke Mandeville hospital, the royal family and the Catholic Church (that last being especially ironic, or rather telling). But Lord McAlpine, and the other former politicians still being smeared all over the internet, have no such cover. Tories and Thatcherites don't get the benefit of the doubt. Not from the likes of George Monbiot, anyway. Read the rest of this article
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Thursday, 8 November 2012
Archbishop Welby: Just don't mention the rock badgers
Speaking in Liverpool Cathedral in October last year, shortly before he left the deanery for the more exalted role of Bishop of Durham, he raised an eyebrow at the "very strange" investiture ceremony, which involved "judges in tights and wigs, and much proclamation, and a great deal of prorection." It was, he said, "like Gilbert and Sullivan". He went on to refer to clerics like himself as "strange men dressed in ornate curtain material"; although on this occasion he resembled nothing so much as "a middle aged, balding man looking like a tour guide.
He clearly has a sense of the ridiculous, though being quite so up-front about the absurdity of ecclesiatical garb surely runs the risk of letting daylight in on magic. Here he was on Maundy Thursday:
Oh, the trouble is I quite like all this episcopal bling. As long as I don't see photos of myself of course. Then I see my ears stick out, and in a mitre, lacking Bishop's Michael's stature, I slightly resemble a self‐propelled tulip. Only slightly. I hope.
There was an unfortunate incident in February last year when the then Dean of Liverpool corpsed during evensong. The Old Testament lesson, which it was his turn to read, was taken from Leviticus. It was a long passage enumerating various non-kosher animals,
And then suddenly something happened which I warmly advise you against. As I read, I could see in my mind's eye what this looked like to the casual visitors who were wandering in and out of the cathedral and stopping to observe the service, even in some cases to take part. Many of them were clearly foreigners, and they came into this extraordinary building and found a middle aged man reading about not eating rock badgers, various types of owl and reptile, and not even eating camels. And a statement that God really didn't like any of that. Moreover, this same middle aged man is wearing what to the initiated looked like a dressing gown and nightie, the wrong way with the nightie over the dressing gown. As I thought about it the absurdity struck me more and more forcefully and as I got to the three types of owl or vulture that you are not meant to eat, I began to laugh and was incapable of stopping myself. I could hear the choir stalls rattling as the men and and boys of the choir themselves collapsed in helpless laughter. Eventually I had to stop the lesson before it got to its end, gasp out "God doesn't like you eating any of these things," and stagger back to my seat.
So, if you want to knock the next Archbishop of Canterbury off his stride at some important moment (not that you would, of course), you know what to do. Just sidle up to him and whisper "rock badger" in his ear.
There's a good chance that Archbishop Welby will preside over the next coronation, a ceremony more ridiculously Ruritanian than anything he has yet had to face. Should be fun. Read the rest of this article
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Wednesday, 7 November 2012
A prophetess named Janet
Time to stop being a wuss. I will take my chances and say it straight out: I think Romney is going to win – not just the popular vote but the electoral college as well.
Not that this was just a wild stab in the dark, you understand. And certainly not just "Republican wishful thinking". Most of the major polling organisations, she thought, were "over-sampling Democrats deliberately in states where they believe that this corresponds to actual voter numbers", but their assumptions were out-of-date and wrong. Worst of all, they didn't take into account the indefinable X-factor: enthusiasm. Romney supporters were fired up and determined to boot out the hated president, whereas disappointed Democrats were simply going through the motions.
It is something far more indefinable: something which those of us who have been engaged with politics for half a century or so are inclined to trust. As that brilliantly perceptive commentator Peggy Noonan has said, Obama's campaign does not look or feel like it is winning – and Mitt Romney's does. The turnouts and atmosphere at Obama events are rather pitiful by comparison to the tremendous, ecstatic receptions that are greeting Romney and they are notably pitiful by comparison to the thunderous Obama pre-victory march across the country in 2008.
The same could, of course, have been said about Clinton's re-election campaign in 1996, or indeed about most re-election campaigns with the possible exception of Reagan's. No incumbent can ever match the irrational promises of hope and change on which all first-time candidates base their pitch. That is especially true of Obama, who inevitably failed to live up to the hype of 2008. But incumbency remains a trump card. Americans, history shows, are inclined to give their presidents a second term unless they screw up really badly or their rival is insanely charismatic. Reagan beat Carter; Clinton beat George Bush senior. It's possible that Obama might have beaten Romney, but Romney always had an uphill task. He might just have done it if Obama had continued to perform as badly as he did in the first debate, though the demographics were always on his side.
Daley went on to compare enthusiasm for Obama with that short-lived British political phenomenon of Cleggmania: "That too depended on the noisy support of young voters who proclaimed their passionate commitment to their hero – and then didn't bother to turn up and vote." Whereas Romney's "enormous crowds" were composed of "grown-ups." Does she include the Birthers and the Creationists in the category of grown-ups, I wonder? Or does the concept of "grown-up", in her mind, consist overwhelmingly of white people and disproportionately of men? I suspect that may in fact be the case, actually, which isn't to suggest that Daley is in any sense a racist or unenthusiastic about her own sex: it's just that power in the United States remains overwhelming in the hands of people who look like Mitt Romney, and that people who wield power are more likely to be
The polls were close enough to mean that a Romney victory wouldn't have been astonishing, at least not mathematically or psephologically astonishing. Yet Janet Daley was at least right to note that she was going against the grain in her prediction. As I pointed out before, whatever the polls said, most of the world was assuming an Obama walkover until very recently. A Romney victory would have seemed like a thunderbolt - although a few people at the Telegraph would have been pleased. It would have been especially tough for David Cameron having to pretend to be on the same page as a genuine conservative. That said, Tony Blair managed it with George W Bush, and Romney was a in most ways a more moderate proposition than Dubya.
Anyway, back to Daley, for whom at one point things seemed to be looking up. At one in the morning our time she noted the "massive crowds"; one of her friends had queued for two hours yesterday morning before giving up and going home. Given her earlier thoughts, this must have seemed an optimistic sign. A couple of hours later, it was "breathtakingly, unbelievably close", "so close that virtually all of the battleground states still defy prediction." By four o'clock she had more-or-less given up on a Romney victory, but still hoped to claim a moral victory at least:
Although Mitt Romney could possibly get the electoral college votes he needs – the crucial states of Ohio, Virginia and Florida are still too close to call – the maths are getting harder. But what he has got, at least at this moment, is a majority of the popular vote. So even if the final numbers show that more American voters want him to be president than Barack Obama, he could lose the election in the end. Which means that both camps were right – those of us who believed intuitively that there was a popular groundswell for Romney, and those who bored for the nation with endless reams of statistical data.
At least she didn't do a Donald Trump and demand a revolution. When even that small crumb of comfort was snatched from her, Janet changed tack, seeing in Obama's victory "a warning for Labour", largely on the basis that voters still blamed George Bush (who was, after all, in power) for the financial crisis of 2008 and all that has ensued. Unfair, of course, given Obama's general uselessness with the economy.
But if this proves anything, it is that the parties which held power when their national economies tanked are going to take a very long timeto recover from that ignominy. People who have lost their jobs, seen the value of their homes collapse under them, and had their savings debauched will not forget who was in charge when the ship went down. Ed Miliband and Ed Balls beware: your fingerprints are indelibly printed on the scene of the crime.
It's a good thought. Shame it didn't occur to her yesterday. She has after all been engaged with politics for half a century or so.
More comfort for Janet Daley, though, might come from the fact that she wasn't alone. Steve Forbes told almost exactly the same story yesterday. After confidently predicting that Romney would "win big" he gazed into the crystal:
One of the big Wednesday morning stories will be why most of the polls didn't have this right. The basic answer is their model. Incredibly, in the face of contrary evidence, a number of polls used the 2008 model for this election although there was little objective evidence that those turnouts would hold for this contest. This time – and early voting confirms this – the relative Democrat/Republican split is almost even. In 2008, Democrats outnumbered Republicans by a good margin. Moreover Romney is well ahead among independents, which Obama carried four years before. That's why his popular vote margin will be 3 points or more.
The enthusiasm factor can be seen in the crowds – Romney is attracting bigger ones than Obama and the upbeat mood at these GOP rallies is palpable. A few months ago a number of GOP voters were tepid towards Romney. They have since become fully committed.
Perhaps they were. But there were never enough of them. Read the rest of this article
Posted by
4:11 pm
Tuesday, 6 November 2012
Tom Watson and child abuse: the return of the Paedoph Isles?
"Why is it that we can no longer think of the British Isles, without the word 'paedoph' in front of them?" - Chris Morris, Brass Eye
The scandals arising out of the revelations about Jimmy Savile are now well into their second month and getting frankly ridiculous. On the day that Theresa May announced new inquiries into previous inquiries about a Welsh children's home that was the centre of an abuse scandal more than twenty years ago, the Sun speculated openly that Savile was not just a paedophile and/or necrophile but possibly a murderer as well.
After "exclusively" revealing that the Yorkshire Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe (whom Savile visited in Broadmoor, rather as the late Lord Longford used to visit Myra Hindley) had described some of the allegations against Savile as "a load of crap", the paper drew attention to the fact that one of Sutcliffe's victims was found murdered "yards" from the DJ's flat in Leeds. They then spoke to two of Savile's victims, one of whom suggested that "the police now need to seriously investigate the possibility that Jimmy Savile was a child killer." The other was "seriously wondering now if Savile could also have been a killer," on the grounds that "if he didn't get what he wanted who's to say he wouldn't have killed to get it?" The Sun also roped in a forensic psychologist, Dr Ian Stephen, who said (or was induced to say) that Savile might have been capable of murder: "It is possible that he upped the game."
I suppose anything is possible. He liked under-age girls, so why shouldn't he have been a serial killer as well? But there are many people who lived in the vicinity of at least one of Sutcliffe's murders; and if the mere fact that Savile spoke to Sutcliffe in Broadmoor suggests that he was the Ripper's accomplice or fellow murderer, maybe we should start worrying about Lord Longford as well. As for the comments by Savile's victims, it reads to me as though the Sun has been feeding them lines. Savile's reputation is so thoroughly trashed (as it deserves to be, of course) that almost anything that can be said or believed about him, from necrophilia to murder. The merest hint of an accusation is enough. Evidence is not required, and anything that a victim, or an alleged victim, says will be automatically believed.
The same seems to be true about events in North Wales. Ever since Tom Watson stood up in the House of Commons and spoke darkly about a "paedophile ring in Downing Street", implicating a senior political figure with a link to the Thatcher government, a torrent of claims and speculations has ensued. This morning a former inmate of Bryn Estyn children's home in Wrexham went on Five Live to tell Nicky Campbell how abusers, including "two MPs, judges, senior serving police officers, market traders and business people from all over Britain" would select children to abuse at a nearby motel. Their names were taken off statements given to the earlier inquiry presided over by Mr Justice Waterhouse, said Keith Gregory, adding for good measure that most of them were Freemasons.
Tom Watson's latest intervention in the House of Commons was almost as baroque. He stressed, of course, that his concern was only for the victims, "thousands and thousands of children, whose lives have been ground into nothing, who prefer to kill themselves than carry on, who have nowhere to turn, to whom nobody listens, whom nobody helps." But he seemed just a little too keen to rub the government's nose in it, suggesting that the type of inquiry now being set up - an inquiry into the actual allegations that have been made, that is, rather than a no-holds barred witch-hunt - would constitute the "basic building block of a cover-up" and be a" dereliction of the Home Secretary's duty". He didn't abuse Parliamentary Privilege to name the Tory at the centre of the Wrexham allegations. He did something possibly even worse, talking of "the spectre of a paedophile cabinet minster" that had apparently "transfixed" the media.
Let's just say that the name most often rumoured to be the Downing Street aide associated with Wrexham - which may turn out to be the wrong name, if it ever comes to be officially confirmed - is not and never was a cabinet minister. So Watson is presumably alluding to other, even wilder rumours that have indeed been flying around the loopier corners of the Internet (the David Icke Forum, for example).
To what end? Watson says that limiting the inquiries to North Wales and Savile "would guarantee that many sickening crimes will remain uninvestigated and some of the most despicable paedophiles will remain protected by the establishment that has shielded them for 30 years." Which sounds fine and compassionate but in fact suggests that he is in the grip of a profoundly dangerous obsession. The cases of Savile and the North Wales childrens' home are prominent because victims have come forward to tell their stories. They have, in other words, some evidential basis that can be investigated. Watson seems to want a virtually unlimited inquiry into alleged establishment paedophile networks that he has already decided must exist, and into a shadowy establishment cover-up that he is also presupposing.
If such an inquiry were to be set up, premised on the assumption of some vast paedophile conspiracy at the heart of the British state and establishment, who knows where it might lead. The very fact that it had been established would give credence to what are, as yet, unsubstantiated and somewhat overwrought claims. If it eventually concluded that there was no basis to the broader claims, this would itself be seen as evidence that the cover-up continued. Alternatively, dozens or even hundreds of people might find themselves under police investigation or else be seen as guilty by association. A broad-based inquiry process could well lead to a full-blown moral panic, as the battier claims of conspiracy theorists received a polite hearing from Lord Justice Cocklecarrot.
You may remember the Satanic Ritual Abuse panic of around twenty years ago. In Rochdale and Orkney, families were broken up on the say-so of social workers advised by cultish self-appointed "experts". Innocent people were convicted in what in retrospect seem like show-trials. Meanwhile, respected media outlets gave air-time to claims of child-sacrifice and highly-placed Satanic networks. Here we go again, it seems. (One of the things David Icke's followers insist upon is that the establishment paedophiles are also Satanists, and quite possibly blood-drinking pan-dimensional lizards as well.) On the pretext of listening to victims, the most bizarre claims and allegations will be treated as Gospel, and the net will be cast ever-wider. With his "thousands and thousands" of victims of elite paedophile rings, Tom Watson is already sailing into deep Ickean waters, where Jimmy Savile and the Kray twins rub shoulders with Ted Heath and members of the royal family in a great big Satanist/secret service/necrophile vortex.
One Jimmy Savile is bad enough. That he was able to get away for so long with a string sex offences against vulnerable girls is reason enough - and work enough - for an inquiry. If serious, credible allegations have been made against a known, politically-prominent individual, then they too need to be investigated thoroughly. But beyond that, what are most needed are caution and a sense of perspective. Tom Watson, and his fellow Witch-Finders, have shown too little of either. Read the rest of this article
Posted by
7:09 pm
Sunday, 4 November 2012
Papal Balls
The scene in Cairo's main cathedral, and indeed the atmosphere, was incongruously like the National Lottery draw. The three names were placed in clear balls, which in turn were placed in a glass urn and swizzled around before the chosen boy was led up to the altar. Loud cheers erupted when the name of the lucky winner was read out. But was all entirely as it seemed? Watch closely:
It looks to me as though the officiating bishop is guiding the boys hand in a suspiciously firm manner. I've watched the earlier part of the proceedings (the video is over 4 hours long, so I'm not putting it up here, but it's on YouTube) and it strikes me as being quite vulnerable to influence. The same man was responsible for folding up the pieces of paper, putting them inside the glass balls, putting the balls inside the urn, sealing up the urn with ribbons and wax (a process that took several minutes and which any magician would recognise as being a classic piece of misdirection) and, later, briefly shuffling the balls. The shuffling was so perfunctory, the officiant - who was not blindfolded - could easily have kept track of which ball was which.
I'm not saying that the choice of the new Pope of Alexandria was rigged. But the whole thing does look decidedly iffy. Read the rest of this article
Posted by
4:36 pm


text:
How To Build A Tube Bender
by Terry Tasky
I would like to thank the good people at
Blind Chicken Racing for supplying
the basics to make this bender. I have taken their project a step further and
have included a drawing for the sides, and will show you how the cross braces
are installed.
This may look complex, but it's not. Once I had my sides made, it went together quickly. Here you see a picture of a completed unit. This one has dies for 1" tube fitted, but it will take dies for up to 2" tube.
After a few minor adjustments, this bender has worked very well for me. The body is made of 1/4" steel plate, except for the jack platform which is 3/8 " steel plate. The jack is a 12 ton variety, A short jack with a screw extension on top is what you want.
You can easily make changes to this unit, I'm showing you how I made mine, but feel free to change things if you like. Whatever works for you.
So, the list of the materials you will need
For the sides - either 2 pieces of steel plate, 35" x24"x 1/4", or, (4 pieces of steel plate), 2 pieces at 6" x 24" x 1/4", plus 2 pieces at 4" x 29" x 1/4".
For the top cross brace - 1 pc, 1/4" steel, 6" x 4"
A pair of return springs - I used tension springs with an approx. 8" free length, and 1" dia. They work well.
For the lower cross braces - 2 pc, 1/4" steel, 6" x 6"
For the jack platform and die yoke - 1 pc 1/2" steel, or 3/8" steel, 5" to 5 1/4" square, 2 pcs 1/2" steel, 3" to 4" x 6".
For the return spring anchor points - 2 bolts, 1/2" x 3" with 4 nuts.
For the lower roller pin - 1" x 8" steel rod,
To fit the die yoke - 6" long 1 1/2" dia x .25" wall dom tubing. Note: the picture below shows a piece of dom approx 3" long. I changed this length to extend the full width of the inside of the bender - 6" long. This is not carved in stone. Use whatever works best for you. Get your dies first.
To center the roller - 2 pieces of pipe or tubing that will sleeve over the lower pin, each approx 3" long.
For the lower roller pin support - 1 pc of steel angle,
1/8" x 2" x 2" x 6" long.
(this part is not visible in the above picture).
For the upper anchor pin - 1" x 8" steel rod (the stronger this part is the better). Use a high strength steel here, or maybe stainless, if its available. In mine, I used a mild steel pin that bent, then I went to a non heat treated pc of tool steel, which also bent. I then ended using a piece of high strength steel rod, which I suspect may have been heat treated. This does the job.
To sleeve over the upper anchor pin - a pc of 1" pipe, approx 1/8" wall, 6" long.
The Bend Die, Follower Die, Roller and Pin are available from Pro Tools. The pin I'm referring to is the part that passes through the yoke and the bend die. The roller is not visible in the above picture, but it sleeves over the lower pin, and is what the Follower Die rests on/rolls on.
The die set that I ordered was for 1" tube, 3 1/2" bend radius, 120 degree type, used to fit their model HMP200 bender. This die set will work on tube up to a 0.134" wall. Their price is (as of the time of this writing), $155 US. You will also need a roller w/Teflon impregnated bushings, and a 1" diameter pivot shaft, that they sell. I suggest when you call them that you make sure you order a die set that will fit their HMP 200 unit. They have different size dies, for different tube sizes and bend radii, so it depends what you need. Click on this thumbnail for a shot of their bend die and mating pivot shaft.
(Click for larger image)
This is a drawing that you would use if you wanted to have these sides lasered or plasma cut from one piece. I made mine by using two pieces for each side, and welded them together at the point where the base meets the upright section. It worked well and allowed me to use two smaller pieces of steel rather than one large one for each side. I apologize for the lack of definition. The drawing lost some of its detail during the process of converting from a cad file and shrinking down to fit this page.
Bender Sides
If you have your material for the sides, go ahead and weld them together (if you are going the 2 pc route). Or you could have your sides lasered to the same dimensions as this drawing (if you are going to use 1 piece sides). If you are making these sides yourself, lay them out and cut the holes with a hole saw. It might be a good idea to tack weld the two sides together when drilling these holes, so that both sides come out identical. On mine, I omitted the 15" notch, and moved the row of holes 1/2" closer to the edge, instead of centered on the upper part, as you see here (the purpose of the notch is to allow clearance for the jack handle when you are pumping the jack). The slot can either be made by joining up a bunch of 1" holes, or by having someone mill the space between the two holes. Whatever works for you. I had mine milled because the slot works best if the sides are clean and straight. Also, I would add a small radius to all of those outside corners (except for the top corners) if I were having these cut.
When your dies have arrived, you can begin welding the cross braces in, and use the bend die to assemble/space out the die yoke, and to check the size of the holes in the die yoke. I'll start with the main body of the bender first. Make sure all of your cross braces are the same width. I used 6" x 1/4" bar for all of my braces, so that all the cross braces were 6". The location of the top brace is obvious. It is located flush with the tops of the columns. Weld it in.
Install the lower roller
(the roller that supports the follower die), then position the lower aft brace
so that the follower die is sitting level when resting on the brace and the
lower roller.
Click on this thumbnail for a visual of what I'm talking about.
Forward/aft location of the brace is not critical, you want this brace to support the follower die as it moves along under the bend die. Mark the location of the brace, and weld it in at this point.
The last thing you will need to do is to make an angle to fit between the sides of the bender, that will fit under the roller for the follower die. Because there is so much load on the roller, the lower pin will deflect and bend if there is no support. If you can find heat treated high strength rod to use as the lower pin, you may not need support under the roller. If you are using ordinary steel rod, then you should include this support. With the lower roller in place, it is time to weld in the support for the lower pin. This should be welded in so that there is about 1/32" of clearance between it and the roller pin. Click on the thumbnail to see how I did mine -
The die yoke supports the jack, and holds the bend die. It is made like this:
The legs are spaced to fit the bend die. Allow slight clearance between the die and these legs. The legs will want to suck inward when welded, so make sure you leave a generous space (maybe 1/8 - 3/16 ") to allow the bend die to swing freely inside the yoke.
Weld the top of the jack to the tube that sleeves over the top pin when you have it all together, and you're done. One last comment - When I tried mine out, I found that the jack lever that came with the jack was too short. It wouldn't work until I got a longer lever. Keep this in mind when you are doing your first bends. Also, make sure that the fronts of the follower die and bend die are lined up whenever you start a bend. I believe Pro Tools includes a how-to/additional info on this topic when they send their dies.
The above information furnished by: Terry Tasky Favorite Projects Visit Terry's site for more information.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
The plan, whose tweaks to zoning law and modest subsidies might have been quietly approved in another place and time, instead became the center of a raging debate in which usually civil neighbors slung personal insults, community newsletters warned about a coming wave of sex offenders and the village council attempted to issue itself a gag order. The vote was the final nail in the coffin for an ambitious campaign, nearly a decade in the making, to open Winnetka's housing stock to teachers, nurses, retirees, and students–among other working and middle-class people–who might want to settle among the CEOs and investment bankers who currently populate a community with a median household income of $167,000 a year.
This is not a benign enemy.
This is the 'class' I have always known, and now revile.


text:
Separate names with a comma.
Discussion in 'Slot Racing & Clubs' started by donald g, May 2, 2008.
Could someone send me a link or give me step by step?Thanks
there is alot of info also at www.hobbytalk.com in the slot cars section.
Good luck!!
If you google that, you will find several places to help. My son has a huge track set up in his basement and they race about every week.
Try www.hobbytalk.com they may have information on it there


text:
Sponsored Products
|MP3 & Audio Software
|Karaoke Software
Publisher's Description+
Walaoke is a karaoke player with video background display. You can use your own video or a live camera for use as background. It supports all types of video with direct show filter codecs. You can replace original music video with your own while playing music. It also has a reserved to prevent accidentally disrupt video or music playing. Plays MKV, VOB, DAT, MPG, MP3+G, MP3+LRC, KAR, and FLV.
What's new in this version:
- Some bug fixes. Lyrics having overlap problem, and memory leak issue when runnning video file.


text:
BimmerFest Shirts!
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Location: Mesa, Az
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 13
Mein Auto: 318Is
View My Garage
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I was one of the people that helped run the Polizei/Bimmerfest shirt booth. While you may have not liked the design, there were hundreds of other people that did. And I can say that clearly based on our sales. You have to understand that when something is mass produced such as this, there will always be someone who's tastes differ. But I would like to see anyone that has been ragging on the design to come up with a shirt that will be unanimously accepted by close to a thousand people.
I know the time and effort that Tom puts into producing these shirts each year, and it is no easy task. But I for one, like the new design. It's simple, classy, and to the point. It also avoids the clutter of having a front, back, and sleeve designs everywhere. Sure there are things that could have been changed, but all in all it was a good design.
My favorite comment of the day from someone heard complaining about the design was, "oh it just has a stupid m6 on the front"
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text:
Tomorrow (Friday, 07/10/2011) and up until Sunday, I'm taking part in the Doodles exhibition of the ART FOR MORE event (@ the HUB, Alkminis 5, Gazi, see the fb event here). Below, you can also see the program of the event (text in Greek, click on the images for full view):
I'm participating in the exhibition with a large-scale piece (almost 4 square meters) made out of 300+ doodles on various papers that I drew over the last 10 years.
Here are some photos of the preparation of the piece (took me 2,5 hours to complete the synthesis, with some help from Maritina, Dora & Nikos):
And here is a detail of the final piece and also a photo of me in front of it, by Mr. Haris Hararis of Radial:
See you there!!!
EDIT >>> The piece I did for the event, was featured in Computer Arts blog's post "07 October". That's nice!!!


text:
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Histone deubiquitinating component of the transcription regulatory histone acetylation (HAT) complex SAGA. Additionally we are shipping USP22 Antibodies (87) and USP22 Proteins (2) and many more products for this protein.
Loss of Ataxin-7 (show ATXN7 ELISA Kits) results in a toxic gain of activity of the Non-stop deubiquitinase.
Data establish that Nonstop actually functions as an ubiquitin (show UBA52 ELISA Kits) protease to control the levels of ubiquitinated histone H2B in flies. We further establish that Nonstop is the functional homolog of yeast Ubp8
3 additional subunits of TFTC/STAGA (dSgf11, non-stop, & en(y)2) help form the deubiquitination module. This module is an enhancer of position effect variegation in Drosophila.
that nuclear GSK3beta- and USP22-mediated KDM1A (show KDM1A ELISA Kits) stabilization is essential for glioblastoma tumorigenesis
findings suggest that USP22 may be involved in hepatocellular carcinoma progression in cooperation with survivin (show BIRC5 ELISA Kits).
These findings provide evidence that high USP22 expression might be important in tumor progression and serves as an independent molecular marker for poor hepatocellular carcinoma prognosis
USP22 attenuated the invasion capacity of colon cancer cells by inhibiting the STAT3 (show STAT3 ELISA Kits)/MMP9 (show MMP9 ELISA Kits) signaling pathway.
Our data indicated that USP22 may promote lung adenocarcinoma cell invasion by the induction of EMT (show ITK ELISA Kits).
Data show that the aggregates formed by polyQ-expanded ataxin 7 (show ATXN7 ELISA Kits) sequester ubiquitin-specific protease (USP22) through specific interactions.
the deubiquitinating enzyme activity of USP22 is necessary for regulating HeLa cell growth, and it promotes cell proliferation via the c-Myc (show MYC ELISA Kits)/cyclin D2 (show CCND2 ELISA Kits), BMI-1 (show BMI1 ELISA Kits) and p53 (show TP53 ELISA Kits) pathways in HeLa cells
ShRNA-mediated silencing of the ubiquitin-specific protease 22 gene restrained cell progression and affected the Akt (show AKT1 ELISA Kits) pathway in nasopharyngeal carcinoma.
Data indicate that ubiquitin specific peptidase 22 (USP22)-mediated sirtuin 1 (SIRT1 (show SIRT1 ELISA Kits)) deubiquitination inhibits STAT3 (show STAT3 ELISA Kits) transcription factor acetylation and its transcriptional activation.
USP22 is overexpressed in human NSCLC tissues and cell lines. USP22 silencing downregulates MDMX protein (show MDM4 ELISA Kits) expression and activates the p53 (show TP53 ELISA Kits) pathway.
Usp22 deficiency impairs intestinal epithelial lineage specification.
USP22 is a transcriptional repressor of the locus encoding the core pluripotency factor sex-determining region Y-box 2 (SOX2 (show SOX2 ELISA Kits)) in embryonic stem cells.
Genetic deletion of the usp22 gene results in Sirt1 (show SIRT1 ELISA Kits) instability, elevated p53 (show TP53 ELISA Kits) transcriptional activity and early embryonic lethality.
Histone deubiquitinating component of the transcription regulatory histone acetylation (HAT) complex SAGA. Catalyzes the deubiquitination of both histones H2A and H2B, thereby acting as a coactivator. Recruited to specific gene promoters by activators, where it is required for transcription (By similarity).
ubiquitin specific peptidase 22
, ubiquitin thiolesterase 22
, ubiquitin carboxyl-terminal hydrolase 22-like
, nonstop
, not-PB
, ubiquitin specific protease 22
, universal stress protein
, deubiquitinating enzyme 22
, ubiquitin carboxyl-terminal hydrolase 22
, ubiquitin thioesterase 22
, ubiquitin-specific processing protease 22
, ubiquitin-specific-processing protease 22


text:
Geoff Hutchison (email@example.com)
Mon, 09 Aug 1999 11:22:54 -0400
John Ray wrote:
> I need to index the content of .shtml files on out site. There is no
> need for the SSI tags to be processed prior to indexing since their
If you're indexing via HTTP, there is no need to worry about indexing
shtml files--they should be indexed as regular .html files.
If you're talking about indexing using local_urls, then you'll need to
hack Document.cc, as you noted. If this is what you wish to do, please
post the changes you made and any other notes that might be helpful to
the developer list at (we'd prefer to keep this list free of comments
about the source code itself):
-- -Geoff Hutchison Williams Students Online http://wso.williams.edu/
------------------------------------ To unsubscribe from the htdig mailing list, send a message to email@example.com containing the single word unsubscribe in the SUBJECT of the message.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b3 on Mon Aug 09 1999 - 08:23:39 PDT


text: Hi All This is already covered in another thread but I thought I would just make things clear. audi-sport.net will be providing free food and drink for all. We have enough for I think everyone that will come to the show. If you are camping we hope that we will be able to start breakfast as soon as we are setup around 8am. All are welcome for the food etc you just need to get a wrist band when you park on the stand or turn up. Thank you all for the offers to bring something for the BBQ but unless you have a food requirment that isn't normal BBQ food we have plenty for everyone. If you need Veggie or the like then please feel free to bring something and we help you out. View attachment 5968 Many thanks A


text:
Operation Stand-Up Shows Early Results
Progress is being made in the Chillicothe Police Departments crack-down on illegal drug activity.
Operation Stand-Up started last November.
Police Chief Roger Moore says the first phase is identifying troubled neighborhoods, phase 2 gets 24/7 patrolling and enforcement, then getting the community more involved in phase three.
Thus far, Operation Stand-Up has resulted in more than three-dozen arrests, with 14 being people from larger cities like Columbus and Cincinnati, who are shuttling their drugs to Chillicothe.


text:
Do you think the teacher will mind if we take a break from reading?(27 Posts)
wigglywoowoo Wed 21-Nov-12 21:40:54
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text:
I wrote a feature for Lifehacker about when it makes sense to buy music and movies from Amazon. To summate, the answer was "Yes, it makes sense, and for some people it makes more sense than buying from Apple or Google." Which goes to show you how hard Amazon has worked to sell music, movies, and even app on devices where it's competing against the device-makers themselves.
Amazon's MP3 store is impressive, both for its selection and for its pricing. There are timed, themed sales and ridiculously deep cuts on brand-new albums. I picked up Frank Ocean's acclaimed Channel Orange for $3 on one such sale, though it's still only $5. Currently, Channel Orange costs $12 on iTunes, and $11.50 in Google's Play Store.
Android and iPhone devices, naturally, offer means of downloading and playing your purchases from their makers' stores. Amazon created its own Cloud Player service and apps for each platform, so one can stream their purchased music over a network, or save tracks for later offline listening. Now they've done the same thing with their Instant Video store, which offers similar one-off and regular discounts as the music store. It's a bit trickier with video, though, because no movie or TV studio is going to allow DRM-free downloads. So Amazon, again, has created its own web-based streaming service, and a just-released iPad app for Instant Video that has the awkward handicap of not including any links or suggestions about where you actually buy those videos you see there (in a browser, away from the app, per Apple's rules). Still, you can watch what you've bought or rented, online or offline.
Which brings us to the strangest quirk of all: Amazon not offering a video app for Android devices. Amazon must have put some serious effort into getting a video app created, working smoothly, and approved for the iTunes App Store. Yet not only is Google's Play Store more permissive and open to third-party stores and commerce, but Amazon already has a pretty good handle on Android development and video delivery on Android, having created, you know, their own Android-based tablet, the Kindle Fire. Does Amazon see the Android ecosystem as a place where their devices can claim some market, with their own Appstore, books, videos, music, and so on? If so, is the Apple device market something else entirely, a realm in which it's better to just play ball? It would seem to run against what I believe to be their unofficial slogan of "Frictionless selling: whatever, wherever, as soon as possible."
But even if Amazon is holding out for a likely ill-advised run at dominating the Android tablet market, I can't help but cheer for them a little. They're forcing the device makers to improve their offerings and stand by their marketplace principles. They're not the underdog, by any means, but a nice little slice of lime in the soda.


text:
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Oconee County South Carolina, home to Long Creek, Mountain Rest, Salem, Seneca, Walhalla and West Union offers some of the best real estate value in the country. We offer outstanding recreational opportunities as well as an excellent central location, just 1.5 hours to Atlanta, GA and 2 hours to Charlotte NC or 1 hour to the airport in Greenville, SC.
Located in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the Golden Corner offers 10 private lakes as well as Hartwell, Jocassee and Keowee, three large, public power company-maintained lakes. Sitting just off I-85 we have easy access north or south, plus we are just an hour from Highlands NC and Cashiers NC. Clemson has all the charm of a small southern college town and is less than a half an hour away.
Our area's property prices and taxes remain lower than our more, well known neighbors in North Carolina and North East Georgia. We still have acreage tracts and the Golden Corner is very desirable for retirees, investors or anyone looking for a peaceful second or weekend home. Many will also enjoy the four- season climate.
One third of Oconee County is part of the Sumter National Forest so will never have the crowded feeling that is driving down property values in other areas. Thanks to the National Forest and our State Parks, 60 of our most beautiful waterfalls will always be accessible to the public, this also ensures plenty of well maintained hiking trails, horse trails, hunting and fishing. The state run fish hatchery, just off Highway 107, is open to the public and they make sure the lakes and rivers are stocked. They also host the annual kids fishing tournament. There are ample opportunities for golfers since we have over fifty golf courses within an hour and for rafting enthusiasts there are guided excursions down the famous Wild and Scenic Chattooga River.
Gwen Fowler has been selling real estate in the Golden Corner since 1987 and has lived here her entire life. She has the experience and knowledge to guide you through the area and to match you with your dream property. If you are ready to take the step to make your dream a reality, contact Gwen at 1-800-248-8950 or send us an email. I know about real estate that your mouse can't find. Call me today!!


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Luke - MeldaProduction
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text:
Join as a member. There's a certificate with your name on it.
It is currently not possible to translate the title and/or display title of the added flat rate shipping services. Ideally this is done with i18n string since this is dynamic data.
|720 bytes
Comment #2husumiao CreditAttribution: husumiao commented
The patch commerce_flat_rate_i18n.patch on #1 is perfect worked. But you need reload the shipping services flat rat page on Chinese version.
Comment #3thierry.beeckmans CreditAttribution: thierry.beeckmans commented
|» bug
|» Critical
After applying the patch I had an error, preventing it to use i18n.
A little change to the patch is required, adding a title to the object info
function commerce_flat_rate_i18n_object_info() {
$info['commerce_flat_rate'] = array(
'title' => t('Commerce flat rate'),
return $info;
Comment #4Daniel Kulbe CreditAttribution: Daniel Kulbe commented
The #3 worked perfectly. But I would extend it by the description-field:
function commerce_flat_rate_i18n_object_info() {
$info['commerce_flat_rate'] = array(
'title' => t('Commerce flat rate'),
'key' => 'name',
'class' => 'i18n_string_object_wrapper',
'string translation' => array(
'textgroup' => 'commerce_flat_rate',
'type' => 'name',
'properties' => array(
'title' => t('Title'),
'display_title' => t('Display title'),
'description' => t('Description'),
return $info;
Hope to see this in beta2 !!!
Comment #5cspitzlay CreditAttribution: cspitzlay at bio.logis Genetic Information Management GmbH commented
I took the patch from #1 and implemented the following changes on top:
- implement the two suggestions from #3 and #4 to add a title and to make the description translatable
- add a guard so translation only happens if i18n_string is active (I got a fatal error when i18n_string was not there, the existing guard (in the saving function) did not catch the case when the shipping data was *used*)
- add context to display title (disambiguation, there was a translation error on the German version of the edit form)
- implement hook_i18n_string_objects so refreshing of strings will work
(admin/config/regional/translate/i18n_string); before it would just report that the strings could not be refreshed.
- make sure the edit mode only uses the untranslated strings; this is important if you are using the shipping method edit form in a non-default language. Saving the translated values would overwrite your original ones.
Comment #6rszrama CreditAttribution: rszrama commented
|» feature
|» Normal
Comment #7Cottser CreditAttribution: Cottser commented
Here's a revised patch and interdiff.
+++ b/commerce_flat_rate.i18n.incundefined
@@ -12,7 +13,8 @@ function commerce_flat_rate_i18n_object_info() {
- 'display_title' => t('Display title'),
+ 'display_title' => t('Display title', array(), array('context' => 'title for display purposes')),
I'm not sure why the context was added here. Can you explain, @cspitzlay? I've left this for now.
Summary of changes:
- commerce_flat_rate.i18n.inc: Added @file docblock and newline at EOF.
- Updated capitalization to "Commerce Flat Rate" where appropriate.
- Updated the description of the textgroup to indicate that it now contains description strings.
- Cleaned up the call to i18n_string_object_update() in commerce_flat_rate_service_form_submit(). I don't see the need for creating a new object here, and now the string will only get updated if the flat rate service saved successfully. The string update still lags a bit here (same as the patch from #5), it seems like you either need to save the shipping service twice or manually refresh the strings to get the new values. Haven't had a chance to debug that yet.
I'm not quite happy with the whole untranslated_strings bit that fixes the admin UI bug, but I'm not sure how else to implement that unless there's an i18n function we can use to get the untranslated string.
Comment #8cspitzlay CreditAttribution: cspitzlay at bio.logis Genetic Information Management GmbH commented
I added the context so this string can be translated independently from other uses of that source string.
"Display title" can either mean "to display a title" or "the title to be displayed".
In German, for example, these two would translate to "Titel anzeigen" and "Anzeige-Titel", respectively.
The former is Drupal's standard translation (the German one, at least), the latter meaning is what we need here.
Comment #9Cottser CreditAttribution: Cottser commented
@cspitzlay - Thanks.
See http://drupal.org/node/1534468 for more information about why the double encoding is happening. Internationalization's i18n_string() API changed in i18n 1.5.
Comment #10fago CreditAttribution: fago commented
Comment #11radimklaska CreditAttribution: radimklaska commented
Patch in #7 works fine. Thanks!
Comment #12inventlogic CreditAttribution: inventlogic commented
|Needs review
|» Reviewed & tested by the community
I have applied the patch in #7 and it appears to do what is required regarding translating the flat rate displayed title.
I think it should be committed.
Comment #13iKb CreditAttribution: iKb commented
#7 + fix for Notice: Undefined index: untranslated_strings
Comment #14iKb CreditAttribution: iKb commented
Sorry this one will work
Comment #15maxplus CreditAttribution: maxplus commented
thanks for patch #14, it works for me.
I had to edit and save every shipping method to get the strings available at admin/config/regional/translate/translate
Comment #16weri CreditAttribution: weri commented
Thanks for the patch #14. This one works for me.
Comment #17mhotby CreditAttribution: mhotby commented
Thanks! This should be updated to dev version.
Comment #18kaido24 CreditAttribution: kaido24 commented
#14 worked for me too.
Comment #19MURANJO CreditAttribution: MURANJO commented
Many thanks, #14 worked for me too with commerce kickstart.
Comment #20leonardo.pampalon CreditAttribution: leonardo.pampalon commented
Really thanks, #14 worked fine also for me.
Comment #21caco13 CreditAttribution: caco13 commented
I applied #14, but now the entries in /admin/commerce/config/shipping are
- Express Shipping (Machine name: express_shipping)
An express shipping service with additional fee.
- Express Shipping (Machine name: free_shipping)
An express shipping service with additional fee.
- Express Shipping (Machine name: standard_shipping)
An express shipping service with additional fee.
When you "edit" the options above, the Title, Display title, Description, and Base rate are ok, with correct past values.
I couldn't find the expressions above in /admin/config/regional/translate/translate either.
Should I ran update.php maybe?
Comment #22kaido24 CreditAttribution: kaido24 commented
You should go to admin/config/regional/translate/i18n_string and refresh flat rate textgroup strings.
Comment #23caco13 CreditAttribution: caco13 commented
Thanks kaido24. I think it was a cash issue. Someway the entries now are showed correctly. Probably when I cleared the cash, the problem was solved.
Comment #24Marko B CreditAttribution: Marko B commented
Seems this patch works, had some errors with it until I refreshed cache. Hope this part goes into dev soon as it is very needed on any i18n site.
Comment #25sketman CreditAttribution: sketman commented
Works for me too, can this patch be commited please?
Comment #26iampuma CreditAttribution: iampuma commented
#14 tested and works. Thanks.
Comment #27ShaneOnABike CreditAttribution: ShaneOnABike commented
This works really great! Can we not place this in the latest dev release??
Comment #28ShaneOnABike CreditAttribution: ShaneOnABike commented
I just updated the attachments to only include the one that officially works right now!
Comment #29nbourdial CreditAttribution: nbourdial commented
Patch works for me as well. Please let us know when it will be committed and released.
Comment #30gonssal CreditAttribution: gonssal commented
Confirming it works.
Maybe commit and get the module out of beta already?
Comment #31sanderjp CreditAttribution: sanderjp commented
The only problem I have with #8 is that I have a lot of different shipping methods setup with rules for my country, within EU and outside of EU, that mostly have the same titles. Now that the context is added, I have to translate the same title and description for multiple shipping methods. Meaning if my client wants the title changed, I have to edit all of them, not sure if that is ideal.
Other than that, thanks for the work! (#14 works for me too, after saving all my shipping methods again)
Comment #32Aambro CreditAttribution: Aambro as a volunteer commented
Thanks for the patch #14. Works for me after upgrading the module to dev version.
Comment #33Arne Slabbinck CreditAttribution: Arne Slabbinck commented
#14 tested and works, thanks!
Comment #34MURANJO CreditAttribution: MURANJO commented
#14 patch worked for me too after editing and saving flat rate services. Then appereared new strings in translate.
Many thanks!!
Comment #35czigor CreditAttribution: czigor at Liip for FREITAG lab. AG commented
Works for me too, thanks!
Comment #36kpatsali CreditAttribution: kpatsali commented
Hi to everyone...
I am sorry for the ignorance, but where and how do i have to insert #14 patch in order to translate flat rate?
Thank you in advance...
Comment #37FMB CreditAttribution: FMB commented
Comment #38kpatsali CreditAttribution: kpatsali commented
thank you for the replay, but at the end i didn't use this patch at all....
I created two shipping rates, each for every language (title and information)...
Then, i created two different rules, each for every shipping rate and added a condition for the language...
Finally, shipping module shows the title and the information a have committed for each shipping rate and i didn't need to translate them, because they appear depending on the site's interface language.
Thank you anyway..
Comment #39thePanz CreditAttribution: thePanz as a volunteer commented
The patch is introducing a noticeable overhead, mostly related to the
i18n_object('commerce_flat_rate', $service)->translate($language->language); invocation.
I will try to provide a patch soon by using cache_get/cache_set mechanisms, in a first try some benefits are noticeable if Redis is used.
Comment #40thePanz CreditAttribution: thePanz as a volunteer commented
Added patch, I extended the previous one with a caching level to reduce the overhead introduced by i18n_string.
I analyzed the two approaches (with and without caching) with Blackfire.io and a reduction of 25% loading time in Checkout pages is shown.
Comment #41thePanz CreditAttribution: thePanz as a volunteer commented
Updated patch, added interdiff.
Comment #42thePanz CreditAttribution: thePanz as a volunteer commented
Updated patch, fixed unrecognized function.
Comment #43thePanz CreditAttribution: thePanz as a volunteer commented
Updated patch
Comment #44facine CreditAttribution: facine as a volunteer commented
Hello, patch 43 works fine!
Comment #45Anybody CreditAttribution: Anybody commented
+1 for RTBC
Comment #46czigor CreditAttribution: czigor at Liip for FREITAG lab. AG commented
We've been using #43 for 3 months now in production without a problem. Can't be more RTBC.
Comment #email@example.com CreditAttribution: firstname.lastname@example.com commented
#14 works !!
Sometimes it doesn't work because you didn't triggered the t(''); translate function of Drupal.
Before going to /admin/config/regional/translate/translate
You must enter into the page that contains the sentence you want to translate, here it gonna be (fr/checkout/410/shipping) for example
410 = the number of the order for example
After that you will be able to find the flat rate available for translation into /admin/config/regional/translate/translate
Comment #48aumcara CreditAttribution: aumcara commented
Great job thePanz thanks!
#43 worked for me also !
Shame these little kind of details are not native :-/ I am facing the same situaiton with the Discount module ... no i18 integration native in module either.
Comment #49maxplus CreditAttribution: maxplus commented
#43 is working for me on a production site.
After applying the patch, I edited and saved the flat rate shipping service and then the "Commerce Flat Rate" category appeared in the translate interface where I could successfully translate it.
Comment #50Anybody CreditAttribution: Anybody commented
Great! Confirming RTBC.
@Maintainer: Can we have a new dev and stable release including this patch?
Comment #51Tavorick CreditAttribution: Tavorick commented
I can also confirm that patch #43 works perfect. A commit to at least the dev version would be very nice.
Comment #52shi99 CreditAttribution: shi99 commented
#43 worked well for me too
Comment #53smurfxx CreditAttribution: smurfxx commented
Was patch #43 committed to latest dev?


text:
Nathan James Ridler, 17, was attacked outside the Subway outlet in Holdenhurst Road, Bournemouth, at about 0200 GMT on Sunday.
The Bournemouth teenager died at Poole Hospital, police said.
An 18-year-old man has been arrested in connection with his death and is helping police with their inquiries.
Police are appealing for witnesses to contact them.
What are these?
Most Popular Now | 56,514 people are reading stories on the site right now.";


text:
June 6, 2013
Flood seen from the air
Photos by Greg Gremminger
STE. GENEVIEVE ¢ The Mississippi River was nearing its crest when Greg Gremminger flew over the flood area Wednesday.
Bridge to Kaskaskia Island
Road to abandoned Marina de Gabouri.
The Valle Catholic football team and others fill sandbags for the FarmerÆs Levee
Highway 61 is completely submerged in St. Mary


text:
Mr. KELLY of Pennsylvania. I thank the chairman.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the Preventing Greater Uncertainty in Labor-Management Relations Act.
If you're sick of government, spend a couple of years here.
We talk about the American people. Please tell me that these debates have anything to do with getting people back to work. This is about a constitutional process that we're supposed to follow. This is about unconstitutional appointments to the National Labor Relations Board. That Board, by the way, protects employers, management, and labor--it's not just labor--so let's make sure we understand that.
As we come here and do this posturing, no wonder the American people are losing faith in the way this body works. If we're really concerned about getting people back to work, if we're really concerned about letting this Nation rise again, this is not a Republican issue or a Democrat issue. This is not a Board that's supposed to be made up of all Republicans or all Democrats, but it's supposed to be constitutionally appointed. My Lord, what are we talking about today? These are unconstitutional appointments.
You know what the certainty of this is? Here's the certainty. And this is a President that always talks about if you play by the rules, if you follow the rules and you work really hard in this country, you have a chance to make it. But the footnote is: unless you don't agree with me, I'll go ahead and do it the way I want to do it. Even though I'm a professor of constitutional law, put that aside. I know an end run on this.
Now, I would tell my colleagues, please, this is a process that we have to protect. This is not a political football to go back and forth with. My goodness. This is about fairness. Fairness is not a Republican issue or a Democrat issue. It's an American issue. It doesn't matter who struck John or what did past Presidents do. This has been found unconstitutional.
The only certainty of what's going on here are three things regarding the Board's current decisions: those decisions cannot be relied upon; every losing party will be justified in filing an appeal; and no prevailing party can be assured that they will ever benefit from any Board-ordered remedy.
How do you fix it?
Mr. KELLY of Pennsylvania. Take it to the Senate; run it through the process it's supposed to run through; get them appointed the right way; and then to go forward. Isn't that the American way? I'm not talking about a Republican way. I'm not talking about a Democrat way. It's what's best for the country.
This political posturing is ridiculous. We know what the law is here; we know what the process is; we know what the Constitution says; and we're here today making it something else. This is not about class warfare. This is about denying the process.
Source: http://thomas.loc.gov


text:
SPORTS >> Jackrabbits enjoy run
Michael Nelsons targets
against Malvern.
Leader sportswriter
At one point this season, it was questionable if Lonoke would even reach the postseason, let alone win a playoff game. The Jackrabbits dropped their first two 2-4A Conference games, fell to 2-3 overall and were scrapping just to keep themselves viable in the chase for a playoff berth. But winning seven straight games has a way of changing things. After beating Warren on Friday, the Jackrabbits have a chance to advance to the semifinals of the 4A state playoffs, but a powerful Malvern Leopards team stands in the way. The Leopards play host to the Rabbits in the quarterfinals this Friday at Claude Mann Stadium. Lonoke (9-3) advanced with its 28-26 victory at Warren last week in a game that was not decided until the final horn, when the Lumberjacks came up short on a 46-yard field goal attempt. The Leopards (8-4) had a close call of their own last week against Booneville, but pulled out a 24-23, second-round victory in overtime after cruising through the first round with a 38-0 victory over McGehee. Their huge defensive line is what sticks out to me, Lonoke coach Doug Bost said of Malvern. That line is huge, and they have two linebackers that run to the football thats what sticks out in my head. Offensively, they spread it out, but they want to run the football. The Leopards have a pair of shifty running backs in Dontrell Henson and Mario Jameson, but they also have balance in their passing game featuring versatile receiver James King, who can also take snaps in the wildcat formation. Malvern is aggressive defensively in its 3-5 base formation. The linebacker-strong set is effective against the run and the pass, which is necessary when taking on the well-balanced Jackrabbits. Thats what were trying to do, Bost said. If theyre stacking the box, we will go to the pass, which will open up the running game. We sure hope we can keep that up. Offensive balance aided the Jackrabbits last week against Warren. Senior quarterback Michael Nelson went 17 of 28 for one touchdown and one interception, and carried 14 times for 56 yards. Brandon Smith carried 34 times for 148 yards and three touchdowns, and MorganLinton had five catches for 100 yards and a touchdown. Lonoke began the playoffs at home with a 48-21 victory over Clarksville, but it was the only game the Jackrabbits were seeded high enough to host, and they play their second straight playoff game on the road Friday. With four of the victories in their seven-game streak coming on the road, Bost said it is not where the Jackrabbits play that matters but that his team is still in the thick of things. At this point were just glad to be playing, Bost said. It doesnt matter how hard the drive is as long as were still playing. Were just taking it week by week and preaching about hanging on to the football. Defensively, were just preparing them. We havent looked ahead to any other opponents. Smith had 10 carries against Clarksville, but got much busier last Friday in the Warren game. His 34 rushes made for a physical night for the NCAA prospect. They really hit us, Bost said. A couple of guys were walking around with ice packs on their shoulders, so were going to have to take it easy in our practices and not hit too hard. You pretty much know already who can hit, so rest is as important as anything else at this point.


text:
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