text:
Oral History Interview
COL Michael G. Snell
Commander, 193d Infantry Brigade
Commander, Task Force BAYONET
Interview Conducted 1 January 1990 at Building 200, Fort Clayton, Panama
Interviewer: MAJ Robert K. Wright, Jr.
20 December 1989 - 12 January 1990
Oral History Interview JCIT 007
MAJ WRIGHT: This is an [Operation JUST CAUSE] interview being conducted at the headquarters of the 193d Infantry Brigade. The interviewing officer is MAJ [Robert K.] Wright, the [XVIII Airborne] Corps historian. It's 1 January [1990]; the time is 0820[R] hours. And I'd like to proceed, sir, and begin. If you would give us full name, rank, serial number and your duty position, sir?
COL SNELL: Snell, Michael G.; colonel; Commander, 193d Infantry Brigade; ***-**-****.
MAJ WRIGHT: And, sir, if you would, sort of kick off by giving your perspective of Operation JUST CAUSE, beginning with the build-up phase and just take it down the road the way you see it going, sir.
COL SNELL: Okay, well, let me talk about five distinct phases; two of them pre-assault and three of them after we've started the fighting.
Back in the summer, in July and August and into the beginning of September, the main emphasis of actions here in Panama revolved around freedom of movement and [Panama Canal] Treaty implementation. So the main thrust of our activities was movements to various locations; small-scale unit exercises; and some large-scale unit exercises. All designed to show the PDF [Panamanian Defense Force] that we were aware of our treaty rights and that we were going to emphasize our treaty rights. Consequently, during that period of time, small unit training was de-emphasized for the sake of these operations.
With the change in the CinC1 and the 3 October [1989] coup, the thrust of what we were doing down here began to change. And intervention became more likely. The thrust of our preparations began to change. We began to put a lot of emphasis on small unit training, especially small unit live-fire training. And of course, LTG [Carl W.] Stiner2 came down as the JTF commander and we began the planning process for the operation. That became more and more intense as we went through the latter stages of October and November, really culminating in the 'great bomb scare' after Thanksgiving when we thought that some narco[tics] terrorists had maybe targeted some US forces down here because of the interruption of the Medelin cartel drug trade.
In December: December was supposed to be a personnel maintenance month and we were supposed to kind of stand-down from some very, very heavy op[erational] tempo that we had and kind of kick back. And we were all looking forward to the beginning of the new year with the treaty calling for a new administrator in the PCC [Panama Canal Commission]. And we thought there would be a lot of civil unrest, civil disorders over the fact that the United States had rejected the Panamanian nominee to head up the PCC. Of course, the death of the Marine lieutenant3 on the Saturday4 night preceding the invasion changed all that.
As combat operations begin, I'm going to divide them into really three phases, the assault phases, which lasted the first and second day. What I'll call a mop-up phase, which was on Days 3 and 4. And then a nation-building effort that began on about the fifth day and which we're still involved in and I anticipate will go on for some months.
In preparation for the plan, we had developed a task force plan utilizing four maneuver elements. 1st [Battalion (Airborne)] of the 508th Infantry; 5[th Battalion (Light)], 87[th] Infantry--those are the two organic infantry battalions to the 193d. The 4th Battalion, 6th Infantry, a mechanized infantry task force down here OPCON [under 193d Infantry Brigade operational control] from the 5th I[nfantry] D[ivision]. The 519th M[ilitary] P[olice] Battalion: that was a battalion headquarters and one MP company from Fort Meade, [Maryland], as part of the rotation--augmentation--that had been coming in here. And he also had four other MP companies OPCON to his control. Of course, the 59th Engineers [Company] and the battery, [Battery] D of the 320th Field Artillery. So that comprised the Task Force BAYONET in the planning stages.
Our main thrust was to address those PDF forces which were in the old canal operating area.5 And to assist SOF [Special Operations Forces] forces in a rescue mission in the [La] Comandancia prior to seizing the Comandancia. So we began the operation with seven distinct targets. They were: the PDF dog compound, the place where PDF trained and maintained their sentry dogs, dope-smelling dogs, etc.; two DENI6 stations, that is, police stations; the DNTT,7 the highway patrol, if you will, of Panama (the headquarters); the Comandancia, of course, the Pentagon of the PDF; the 5th Company, the 5th Infantry Company,8 which is stationed at Fort Amador, a post that is half Panamanian and half US; and any patrol cars that we found in the area who normally sat out at strategic points to watch and report on US movements. Those were the objectives we were assigned.
We developed a brigade plan. Of course the battalions developed battalion plans; and carried the process through to the development of company battle books. Brought our company commanders in, got them interim T[op] S[ecret] clearances and brought them in fairly early in the process. As we developed the plans we conducted TEWTs (tactical exercises without troops), we walked the ground. We could, of course, look at all of our objectives. We ran some command post exercises and some things we called 'Jeep-Exs,' which were moving vehicles around, testing communication nodes. And then in the guise of the freedom-of-movement operations, we did some timings, some small operations that tried to rehearse little parts of the plan in order to assure that the timings all fell according to the time schedule.
Our main goal was to fix all the PDF forces in their current locations, to give them an opportunity to surrender, because we felt a large portion of them would not fight for [Manuel Antonio] Noriega, and then if they would not surrender, to go ahead and attack and seize. Now, that was true for every objective but the Comandancia. The objective of the Comandancia, of course, was to rescue Mr. [Kurt] Muse, a U.S. national who had been held there for some time; and to cordon off the Comandancia; and to attack and seize the Comandancia.
Besides the planning effort, which included having all the company commanders develop a detail plan and then they'd back-brief me--every one in the presence of all the other company commanders. So everybody had a very thorough understanding of the plan. One of the battalions even ran a Janus war game a couple times, testing out various drills.
Our training all was focused on specific company objectives. So each company knew exactly what it had to do and it tailored its training program, its live-fire exercises especially, to exactly what it is it had to do on its target. And the platoon leaders and most of the NCOs [noncommissioned officers] and the soldiers weren't aware that they were training for a specific target; but the company commanders, as they set up their problems, were.
Of course, like everyone else, we got the decision to go, I knew about it on Monday. Monday night at 1800--let me get my--when was the 20th? The 20th was -- we attacked Wednesday morning, didn't we?
MAJ WRIGHT: Wednesday morning, sir.
COL SNELL: Tuesday night at 1800 we brought in the platoon leaders and briefed the platoon leaders on the operation. Now they sat down for about two or three hours with the company commanders going very thoroughly through all the battle books we'd prepared. And at 2100 hours we brought the soldiers in and issued orders. The plan was to launch--LD [line of departure] time was at 0100. A decision was made at the JTF level to commence the Comandancia portion of the operation 15 minutes early so that kicked off at 0045. The rest of the operation for my brigade forces kicked off of at 0100.
It may be pompous and a little dangerous to say that it went like clockwork. Everybody moved where they were supposed to move, got into position. We had absolutely no problems. The fight went on at the Comandancia, which was rather spectacular if you got a chance to sit on the hill and watch it. Mr. Muse was rescued and about 4:15 in the morning or 4:30, Task Force 4/6 was chopped back to my control as the assault forces that rescued Mr. Muse were withdrawn.
So the position we found ourselves in at first light was, we had all of our objectives fixed and we'd been trying to talk out the PDF at several of the objectives. We had scarfed up all of the watchers that were out at PDF cars; they were either dead, wounded or in our control. The cordon around the Comandancia was very incomplete because when the SOF forces pulled out, they pulled out seven tracks--APCs [M-113 armored personnel carriers]
--to assist them in follow-on missions and that was something that was decided at the last minute. So our first order of business was to attack again and reestablish the cordon around the Comandancia. We did that with the brigade reserve at first light.
MAJ WRIGHT: Who was your brigade reserve, sir?
COL SNELL: I had a mech[anized] infantry company (minus); a company headquarters and two mech platoons. It was designed primarily to block any forces coming in from the Panama City side of town if the other forces did not address them in time. I was particularly concerned about the PDF force at Panama Viejo, which reacted very quickly to the 3 October coup and the fact that they were not going to be addressed until an air assault by the 82d [Airborne Division], which was going to take place sometime around H+2 hours. So if they wanted to react, there was time for them to react and influence the fighting down here. It turned out that they did not react and the 82d fixed them, so I was able to use the brigade reserve at the Comandancia.
The remainder of Day 2 [i.e., 20 December] was seizing all the objectives. PDF did not come out, although we subsequently found that many of the soldiers would have come out but they were afraid of some of their leaders. In each place there was a small, hard core of people who decided to fight us. One of the big surprises that we had in the operation. And we systematically reduced all the objectives during the course of the day. By about 1730 or 1800 hours we had all the objectives secured and we could reconsolidate. That really ended Phase 1, which I'm going to call the assault phase.
We did have a large firefight on Day 2 [21 December] down in the vicinity of DNTT when Mr. [Ricardo] Arias [Calderon], the First Vice President, was talking to former members of the PDF who he was enticing to change their loyalties and join the new government. They were fired on by what we estimated was maybe a ten- or twelve-man element. We had to attack again to eliminate that element. And that really ended, there on the second day, by the evening of the second day, the major fighting that went on in the task force area.
Days 3 and 4 I'll call the mop-up operations. We had several sniping incidents. We had what's come to be known down here as drive-by, that's cars driving by shooting at US soldiers. We also received several mission downtown in Panama City to either block entrance into three embassies (the Cuban, Nicaraguan and Libyan embassies) to prevent Noriega from seeking political asylum there. We guarded various governmental buildings downtown: the Foreign Ministry, the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Health. We also had what was the strangest mission we were given, which was to secure a suitable location for the swearing in of a president, to orchestrate the ceremony (and don't screw it up, I think, was the guidance). So we ...
MAJ WRIGHT: Which day? Was that Day 3, sir?
COL SNELL: That was the night of Day 2, morning of Day 3, as I recall. So we went down and seized the Legislative Building about midnight and went in with the protocol people and vacuum sweepers and PA [public address] systems and got the place set up. Got security established; got some MPs out of the field and cleaned up in guyaveras with handguns; and orchestrated the ceremony that Mr. [Guillermo] Endara who proclaimed himself president.
Days 3 and 4 saw us primarily dealing with trying to reestablish a climate of law and order downtown and to insure that no renegade elements of the PDF got into our housing areas or the rear area. As the reinforcements began to flow in, we lost a large area of downtown to the 82d, who assigned it to 1st Brigade of the 7th Infantry Division (which is actually the 9th Regiment). And we ended up in the old former canal operating area and the Chorrillo-Santa Ana-San Felipe area--as our areas to secure and do the nation-building effort.
And that's where we've been really since Day 5, in the nation-building effort. Our activities primarily have been trying to stand up the police force or assist in standing up the police force; trying to assist them in getting back out in the area. Ensuring that public utilities are there and functioning--a huge effort in trash collection because there was a lot of looting on Days 2 and 3. Ensuring that the medical and health services are standing back up again. And (hopefully) in the next two or three days, as they get a magistrate and there's some due process brought into the area that we're in, we'll be able to withdraw the infantry from down there and turn that area back over to the Panamanian authorities. It's my hope--today's the 1st--it's my hope that by the 3d or 4th of January that that will be effective.
What's going to happen in the future, well, they did a tremendous job here in rebuilding the institutions, the military and police institutions here. I assume we'll play a major role in that. As the forces start to pull out of here that came in from the contingency forces, somebody's going to have to be ready to go out and get the renegade elements if there are any. I assume that that's a role that we will assume. It is my fervent hope that the main effort downtown, as the fighting stops and we get the guns off the street, it will be a military police effort, and that I will be able to keep the infantry in and go back to infantry training in stand-by operational reaction missions. As opposed to remaining downtown as part of the essentially police function.
I guess the only other thing I want to mention right up front is while all this was going down--going on--we were implementing the CinC's guidance on family draw-downs. So in the last two months, we have returned to the States early over 100 brigade families. And, indeed, during the fighting we were still shipping families out who were scheduled to leave during December. So there were a lot of balls in the air at one time.
MAJ WRIGHT: It strikes me, sir, that it was an incredibly complex operation and yet one, apparently, that the planning gave you enough flexibility so that you were able to adjust to time sequencing. So that you weren't locked in totally tight--that, you know, if so-and-so wasn't on Corner X at 001, then the whole plan doesn't go down the tubes.
COL SNELL: Well, it was very complicated but we enjoyed two or three great benefits. We were on the terrain where we were going to fight. So there was a great amount of leader knowledge about how to get from Point A to Point B. As I mentioned, we had rehearsed all those movements, so we knew exactly how long it took. And the distances involved are not great. So if you were a minute or two minutes missing an LD time, all you did was speed up a little bit to get down to your objective area in time.
The trickiest part of the operation in my mind was ... our defensive plans called for the mech battalion to secure the Quarry Heights-Balboa area. Of course, our offensive plans, when we executed it, called for them to launch out and seize the Comandancia. They had to hand off the area around Quarry Heights and Balboa to 5/87 while the infantry battalion was coming in behind them. And that handoff--of insuring that we didn't uncover the US population that was there, but yet we didn't impede the attack--was the trickiest part of the operation. And was one that we had talked about in great length, all the leaders. And as I said, my role was to sit up on the hill and watch this. I really didn't have to do very much, it went very, very well.
MAJ WRIGHT: Overall assessments, sir, of the quality of your troops?
COL SNELL: The soldiers here did an exceptionally good job. Just to give you an indicator, we were shipping all these families back and we went down and voluntarily asked officers and NCOs to extend, ship their families back and remain in Panama. We had over 30 senior non-commissioned officers who voluntarily did that, which are your platoon sergeants (your bread-and-butter), first sergeants, some of our squad leaders, some of our staff NCOs. It speaks volumes about their dedication. I don't think that we have a cross-section of the Army significantly different than any other unit in the Army. They're good kids and they did a good job.
MAJ WRIGHT: NCOs given a lot of responsibility under this plan in the individual assaults on objectives?
COL SNELL: Well, any time you fight the NCO is given a lot of responsibility because that's his job. I mean, you can't function with officers trying to lead squads. So the answer is yes. But again, the train-up program, I think, gave them the confidence that they knew exactly what they were doing. Their familiarity with the area made them comfortable with it. And so we had no problems with NCOs doing what they were supposed to do, showing initiative in doing it, doing it smart.
If I had to make one critical comment overall, I think in some cases our company commanders, as anybody in combat the first time, has to be assisted in making that final assault. What they want to do is pound the objective, use firepower. I was the same way as a kid in Vietnam. That's the first, I think, natural instinct. And they had to be prodded a bit to get on with it. We had given them the opportunity to surrender, they're not going to surrender, so let's get on with the assaults.
MAJ WRIGHT: Speaking of the Vietnam experience, sir, did you have much in the way (across the brigade) of combat experience or was it almost nonexistent?
COL SNELL: Very, very thin. Most of the first sergeants; a smattering of other people that had been maybe to Grenada. But by and large I would say we didn't have more than 30 or 35 combat vets in the entire task force.
MAJ WRIGHT: When you worked up your team, sir, to seize each objective, did you ... how did you use your engineer assets, your MP assets? Did you cross-attach extensively or did you try to keep them centralized?
COL SNELL: No, we extensively cross-attached. We've got this sapper company9 here that consists of two platoons. Well, we gave each of them ... one of the platoons to each of my assigned light infantry battalions. The 4/6 came down with an engineer slice from the 5th Division, so they had theirs.
The MPs, each battalion had MPs OPCON to it in different roles. Some of them had roadblocks and indeed, one of the heaviest areas of fighting was one of the MP platoons that set up a roadblock down around the Comandancia. They also had MPs to try to secure US personnel in housing areas, to evacuate some houses that we knew were likely to receive fire. And then in the rear area I assigned the 519th, an MP battalion, an AO [area of operations] and made him an area commander with the bulk of his MP forces, which is a non-traditional, non-doctrinal role. But it was something we felt we had to do given the objectives we had and the size area we had. And it worked out well. The MPs performed magnificently.
MAJ WRIGHT: Communications go well?
COL SNELL: We are familiar with this area. Communications in major cities is a problem. There are three or four major hills around here, we have to put out additional radio relays. We had no problem with commo, but it was something that a unit coming in not knowing the area could have had problems. Again, an advantage of being here.
MAJ WRIGHT: Any logistics problems?
COL SNELL: The in-place forces here are not set up to function like a division, there's no DISCOM [division support command]. There's an area support group10 which has both a theater function and a tactical support function. It is in the process of organizing; it's very heavily manned by civilians. We had identified most of the problems ahead of time and worked through them. There are a lot of innovative, non-doctrinal solutions.
But the fight just didn't go on long enough to really stretch the logistical tail. We didn't fire up any basic loads. And, indeed, I think about 30 or 35 percent of a basic load was the most any task force expended in the first two days. So, no, we had no problems; but I'm not sure it was a fair test.
MAJ WRIGHT: To what extent did you have on-call tac[tical] air or Army aviation?
COL SNELL: We were well down the pecking order in priorities for fire support. During the initial assaults we had none. 4-6 had some that the SOF had that they were able to utilize. And then in the second day [i.e., morning of 20 December] as we went back into the Comandancia to actually seize it, we did get some fire support in the form of an AC-130 [Spectre] and some AH-64s [Apaches] with some Hellfire missiles. But we used fire support as sparingly, because of the collateral damage, the criteria the CinC had established.
MAJ WRIGHT: Your people pretty much were comfortable with the rules of the engagement?
COL SNELL: Yes, we had been operating down here, as I mentioned, for months under a very tense situation. We had several face-offs with the PDF where everybody was locked and loaded. We had firing incidents with them. That's one of the things that we've been beating into the soldier for a long time now, so we were very comfortable with the rules of the engagement.
MAJ WRIGHT: Spanish speakers pretty much across the board?
COL SNELL: Yeah, I would guess conservatively maybe 20 or 25 percent of the soldiers here in the brigade speak Spanish. So having Spanish speakers was not a problem.
MAJ WRIGHT: You didn't have to go through any of that prior cross-leveling that the 82d did to ensure that they had somebody in every platoon?
COL SNELL: No, every platoon has a half a dozen or a dozen Spanish speakers.
MAJ WRIGHT: Trying to think through on some of the lesser issues. What about intel[ligence] support? Did you rely primarily on in-house assets here in country?
COL SNELL: Although there was a great amount of intel support from CONUS [Continental United States], tactical intelligence was primarily developed by in-house assets. We did learn a couple things in the IPB [intelligence preparation of the battlefield] process.
As a result of the 3 October [1989] coup, Noriega was conducting a major shake up of the PDF. And we found out that personalities are very important. By following those leaders who had been very loyal and quick-reactive during the 3 October coup, we could make some conclusions about what forces would fight, what forces Noriega considered important. For example, as you probably know, the 7th Infantry Company,11 the Macho de Monte, was the force that primarily put down the 3 October coup.
Well, by watching where that company commander (who got promoted to major) went, it gave you a real indicator where Noriega considered a very important unit or a very important function. Something that the IPB process does not emphasize is personalities. And in this type of an environment, personalities became our greatest indicator.
Some other things that we did, I think, greatly assisted us. In late November we got 90mm recoilless rifles back down here. That was the infantry's mobile artillery, the direct fire weapon, into these heavily-constructed buildings that are 50 years old. Probably the most valuable weapon at the platoon level that we had. It was the final arbitrator in all the little fights that went on. And then we used a 105[mm M-102] howitzer in a direct fire role down at 5th Company at Fort Amador. And it was the final arbitrator there. In combat in cities, our AT weapons systems with their shaped charges, just have marginal utility. And the old 90 is a great weapons system and indeed, if I could have got my hands on some of the old 106[mm recoilless rifle]s, I would have brought them down here too.
MAJ WRIGHT: You had pretty good support then during the final build-up, say the last two months? If you identified a requirement that had to come from out of theater, you were getting it?
COL SNELL: We had great support, the best I've ever seen in my days in the Army. While we were adjusting all of these DEROSs [date eligible to return from overseas] for all the soldiers and we accelerated family departures--which also included accelerated DEROSs for all the soldiers--we were able to maintain a C-2 strength at about ... one battalion was at 83 and when we started the battle the other was at 86 percent. And we had projections that showed us going as low as 60 percent in 11Bs.12 So I know that was a tremendous effort by the personnel community.
The log[istical] community: if we asked for it, we got it. We got it quickly. I'll give you some examples. I wanted the little American flags13 that you see that we put on. I wanted to do that because some of the PDF forces are equipped with the same clothing, the same Kevlar helmets that we are. And a block away you can't tell friend from foe. Ten days later after we asked for a couple thousands of those, they were here. The 90s. Ammunition: I shot up 70 percent of my annual training allocation in 16 days in November. I was told don't worry about it, if you need more ammo, we'll ship more ammo in. So a tremendous logistical effort. As I said, the best I've ever seen.
MAJ WRIGHT: Marksmanship training: because of the collateral damage issue, did you go into a lot of one-shot-one-kill stress or ... ?
COL SNELL: We stressed at our marksmanship training, first of all, we went back to the book. I have a ... one of my battalion sergeant majors was in the SOF organizations for a number of years, he was a sniper there. He's forgotten more about marksmanship than most of us will ever know. And so we took his expertise along with two NCOs that are down here in USARSO [United States Army South] from the Army Marksmanship Unit. We went back to the ... F[ield] M[anual] 23-9 and laid out a very systematic program to insure soldiers had the confidence that they could hit what they aimed at. So that was Item 1.
And then Item 2 was the selective use of firepower. Because we felt that a large portion of the PDF would not fight; or, if given the opportunity, would surrender. We did not want to use firepower indiscriminately and kill a lot of people who didn't want to fight us. With all that that entails--creating families that are going to hate the United States because their son, husband, father was killed, knowing that he was not going to fight for Noriega. So we worked on fire discipline during all of our live fire. To return fire from where it was being received and not to hose down an entire building. We had surrender targets. For example, on all our target arrays and if a unit went through training and put a bullet hole in a surrender target, then they were no go and they had to go back and do it again.
We had no fire areas. At Fort Amador General Omar Torrijos' tomb is there. A lot of people in this country still view him as the George Washington of Panama. We wanted to make sure as we assaulted 5th Company that we didn't damage his tomb because that would create a cause for dissident elements to rally around.
MAJ WRIGHT: Anything you think maybe we need to go back and look at in the way of our LIC [low intensity conflict] or MOUT [military operations on urbanized terrain] doctrines?
COL SNELL: Well, I would say that from all that we've been able to read, we don't have LIC doctrine. Certainly not at the tactical level. We searched out the books. To give you an idea, we talked a little bit about how to change the IPB. There's no doctrinal publication that we could find that really helps you get into applying the IPB process in this environment. And it's the same thing across the border. A lot of people are working on it, we've had a lot of groups come down here and talk to us about it, but when you want to go to a manual to help you put all this together, you find that there isn't any. It's a great void, in my opinion, in the Army right now. So you kind of have to make this up as you go. I would hope out of this experience here that lessons-learned and some of the manuals are going to be produced. But we always hear from TRADOC14 action officers, that "well, that one's going to be published in '91 or that one's going to be published in '92."
MAJ WRIGHT: The fact that you were on the ground and you've had a lot of people across the brigade with local community contacts: did that give you a lot of low-level collection ... intelligence asset?
COL SNELL: Yes. And it's been especially valuable in what I'll call the nation-building efforts. People calling in to the brigade because they know us, saying that so-and-so has weapons, this is a bad guy, come police him up. I had a large number of noncommissioned officers who lived out in town and officers that lived out in town for a number of months, developed friendships in the communities. That has paid dividends for us as far as phone calls coming back in from former neighbors with information that is almost always reliable when it comes in. My S-3 sergeant major has been responsible for two or three major weapons cache seizures in the 82d's area because he owns a house downtown, he's lived down there for a number of years, intends to retire here. And his neighbors and his personal knowledge of what was going on down there assisted greatly in identifying those.
MAJ WRIGHT: Did you get into any situations where you felt somebody was trying to feed you a false report to set you up for anything? I'm thinking here particularly like Day 3, Day 4?
COL SNELL: No, I don't think so. Of all the leads we had, I would guess that less than five percent proved to be accurate. But I don't think there was a deliberate attempt to set us up. I think it was just the confusion, the misinformation, and some element of people getting even with other people.
We did have one incident on Day 3 after we had seized the legislature where we had a guy come up wanting to give us five truckloads of ammunition and two armored cars. He wanted us to go with him into then what was a totally unsecured part of town. So we told him to bring back one truckload as an act of good faith and then we'd follow him down there. Of course, he never showed up again. That could have been a set-up or it could have been he just couldn't produce what he thought he could. But no, I don't think that the PDF was that organized nor the Dignity Battalion was that organized to actually attempt to lead us into ambushes.
MAJ WRIGHT: Can you give me an assessment of the different ... what you feel now (after everything has gone down) with the relative strong elements within the Panamanian forces and which ones were sort of less combat-capable and more just, you know, armed thugs?
COL SNELL: Well, in our objectives, all of our initial objectives addressed the PDF. So they were all forces, organized forces. They were not the Dignity Battalion types. I guess two facts stand out.
Number one is that the leadership booked before the battle. We've proven conclusively that people like CPT Cortizo, the 5th Company commander, left Amador at about 11:00 (2300 hours) the night before the battle; that he had some either advance warning or indication that something was going to happen. We only captured one officer in all the fighting that we did; and he was a medical officer who told us that he was given the opportunity to leave at about 11:30, quarter of 12, but felt it was his responsibility to stay with his soldiers.
Some of the NCOs forced some of the soldiers to fight. And that surprised us. We thought if the officers were gone, that the vast majority would just walk out and surrender. The numbers weren't large but they were large enough to preclude any mass surrenders. So the intensity with which they fought initially surprised us. And the fact that we had to go in and root out people out of buildings who would not surrender and who were killed in buildings surprised us. I did not foresee that that was that kind of dedication even on an individual level--not within the PDF.
MAJ WRIGHT: The PSYOPS [psychological operations] loudspeaker teams that went in with your columns, any feelings on whether that worked?
COL SNELL: Yeah, the HB [heavy broadcast] teams, we had been using them down here for some time. So we were comfortable with them, a great asset. They didn't ... they were not successful in talking them out, but in the subsequent phases, in the mop-up and in the nation-building, for example, the buying arms program, the food distribution program, the get-the-bad-guys-off-the-street program have proven to be invaluable. Because you can cruise up and down the streets, get your message out; you know it's getting out. They're much, much more effective than a bullhorn. So it's been a very good asset and an asset that's been heavily used.
MAJ WRIGHT: [M]-113 better than a [M-2] Bradley for the type of operation that we had to go down with here?
COL SNELL: Surprisingly enough, yes. For only one reason though. You would think that an assault of a built-up area would be a horizontal battle, in that you're fighting down streets. But given the nature of the construction around the Comandancia, a high-rise, a lot of three-story buildings, several very large multi-story buildings, the PDF chose to defend the Comandancia not by fighting from the Comandancia but occupying the buildings that surrounded the Comandancia. So they were in the upper stories firing down on the APCs. So as the mech column rolled in to establish the cordon the fight was PDF shooting down; the
[M-2] .50-cal[aliber machine gun]s and the soldiers shooting up. Well, the .50-cal. was on a free-swinging pivot, very easy to shoot up in the air. Now I'm told that the Bradley, that there's a manual manipulation much like a machine gun T&E [training and elevation] mechanism, to get the ...
MAJ WRIGHT: [25mm] Bushmaster.
COL SNELL: ... the weapons system up and down. So the fact that it was a free-wheeling gun, it allowed them to address the targets vertically faster than the Bradley would have done. And for that reason, and this is the mech battalion guys would know, telling me that they were very glad they had the 113 and not the Bradley.
MAJ WRIGHT: What about the Hummer [M-998-series High Mobility Multi-Wheeled Vehicle]? How did it stand up?
COL SNELL: We only had, I think, two incidents that I'm aware of where it actually came under intense fire. And they were MP vehicles both times. The bullets penetrated in some cases; in some cases did not. The flak jacket and the helmet had proven invaluable. We had a young MP who was standing up in the turret of an MP gun jeep, was hit with a round about one inch below ... or one inch above the rim in the back of the Kevlar helmet. Lifted him entirely out of the vehicle and sprawled him all over the hood. Took a big chunk out of the helmet and that was all. He was not wounded in any way. The doctors, as I visited the hospital every night, told me that there was a very low percentage of chest wounds. And we're talking less than four percent of chest wounds ... was attributed to the flak jackets. So those two pieces of equipment, everybody in this brigade is a believer in it.
MAJ WRIGHT: Did you use any of the AT-4s [84mm anti-tank weapons]?
COL SNELL: Yes, we used the AT-4s primarily to put a round in a window; as a suppressive weapon as we were conducting assaults. It kept their heads down and that's really all we wanted it to do.
MAJ WRIGHT: You had alluded to the 50-year-old buildings and that they were very difficult construction. I know from talking to others that some of our MOUT doctrine developed for Europe caused problems out in the outlying areas where the buildings weren't constructed that way and people took casualties by throwing the grenade in and flattening against the wall and forgetting that we're not talking about a thick wall.
COL SNELL: Well, you have to remember that I was G-3 in Berlin so we had been through combat in cities, which is a sub-set of MOUT, quite a bit. But you got to remember, if you're dealing with modern construction and you throw a hand grenade in a room that's only got plasterboard there, you're likely to receive some of your own fragments back through the wall.
MAJ WRIGHT: But for most of the key target buildings, we're talking about solid construction. So that wasn't a tremendous issue?
COL SNELL: It was an issue. Most of these buildings, as you mention, are old, they're two or three foot thick walls, exterior but they've been renovated on the inside. So you had to watch as you got inside. The old walls are thick concrete; the new walls where they'd been partitioned, we had the same problem everybody else did. And we had a lot of people with minor little fragment wounds in the legs and I'm sure that some of that was caused by the way we teach--or the way we taught soldiers to clear rooms.
MAJ WRIGHT: What about the ... your overall assessment of the morale? You had pointed out for the last three years the brigade's been taking a lot of guff. I would assume initial reaction was a very, very positive one on the part of the troops that we finally get to give some back. But then in the sustainment phase, the nation-building phase, thinking back to our time in Vietnam, that's real hard-to-sustain morale.
COL SNELL: Well, we tried to do some things early on. You're right. The soldier had been frustrated down here, he has stood in a riot-control formation while people have spit on him, while people have thrown balloons full of urine on him. He stood out there in the sun day in and day out. He's been abused downtown. So they were glad when it finally went down, they were finally doing something and they were anxious to do it.
One of my major concerns was to insure that the soldier understood that our fight was not with the Panamanian people. This was not World War II, the invasion of Germany. And we took some very overt acts very early on to do that. I think that Task Force BAYONET ... we were the first ones to come out of helmets as a signal that once we concluded the mop-up phase, that we were not making war on the Panamanian populous; that we were into the law and order, the police functions. We came out of flak jackets for the same reason, for the psychological message. We only did that after three or four days of absolutely no fighting at all. But we were still, I think, on the leading edge of doing that.
Also starting on the fourth day, I started taking a platoon out of every battalion for twelve hours. We'd bring them back to the barracks, give them a couple beers, let them wash their clothes and get eight hours sleep. And we have continued that. Today is the ... will be ... every unit will have rotated out of where they're located, got back into their cantonment area and had an opportunity to do that. I think that contributed to it.
On Day 5 I took the rounds out of the chambers. I did not want an isolated sniping or firing incident to cause a unit to overreact in a very heavily populated area and needlessly harm a bunch of civilians. So we have tried to deliver messages to the soldier and psychological messages to the populace to preclude an overreaction of kids who get keyed up. And I shouldn't say just kids get keyed up; we all get keyed up. If there's not an element of apprehension of everybody as we do this, then I think people are lying to you. It's there, it doesn't matter how old you are or how much you've done it.
MAJ WRIGHT: Basic impressions of how the Panamanian people reacted?
COL SNELL: In our area the reaction was overwhelmingly positive. They were very forthcoming with information immediately. All they wanted to do was to assure that you were in an area to stay, that you weren't coming in and leaving again. Because they ... but once you were there 18 or 24 hours, they came out and gave us a complete run down of the area: where to go, where not to go, who was a bad guy, where weapons were stored.
Of course, after the looting and the trash build up, we started with soldiers cleaning up trash as an example to try to get them out on the streets to help us. They did that. We began to run MEDCAPs15 in that area that we're in. It's a slum area. It has not received adequate medical care for a long time. So that was a very positive thing. Little things like Tylenol for the baby and the sick call types of things.
People are smiling, they'll try to hand you a beer. I've been invited into these little hovels for dinner two or three times. The kids come up to you on the street, like kids everywhere, and want to sit down and talk to you. There was some apprehension as we began to put the new PSF [Panamanian Security Force], police forces, back on the streets. We occasionally get, you know, the sullen glance again because these were essentially the same people we pulled off the streets to start with. I've had old ladies come up to me crying, saying thank you, it's the best Christmas present we could have. So it was a very, very positive reaction.
MAJ WRIGHT: You talked about your MEDCAPs, it raises an issue I probably should have brought up earlier. How was your medical support during all of this?
COL SNELL: Well, again, distances were very short. We were concerned at the beginning of the operation, because the number of surgeons assigned to Panama is three. And had casualties been very heavy, then we could have had a problem with the number of surgeons. I know that the JTF brought in a very heavy medical package. It was across the Bridge [of the Americas]. Medevac would have been time-consuming for us. Of course, we operated right around Gorgas Hospital. I don't think any unit was more than a mile from the hospital.
We had five killed in the brigade and they were all instantaneous deaths. I think we had 54 wounded, of which 28 were medevac'd to CONUS. Four or five serious injuries. We had one kid I'm not sure he's going to keep his leg. But the medical support, all the fears we had did not pan out. It has been very good. The hospital staff worked long, long hours. The triage at battalion aid stations was good. The more serious wounded we could take directly from the battlefield to the hospital.
MAJ WRIGHT: I think that pretty much covers just about everything, sir, other than to sort of tell you that from what I've seen, I mean, this was one heck of an operation. Just ... it was so good it's going to take me a long time to talk to everybody. And I'll keep you posted, I'll keep your XO [executive officer] up to speed on what I'm doing, where I'm going. Do you have any recommendations on who I need to talk to first?
COL SNELL: Given the way that we put the plan together, you need to recognize that if you want to talk about the planning effort, you're talking to company commanders, selected battalion staff officers and battalion commanders. If you want to talk execution, of course, you can talk to anybody. All the kids were out there executing.
The nature of the battle was that some units saw very heavy fighting; some units saw virtually no fighting. So as you go around, you need to be aware that perceptions are going to be 180 out. Some people are going to say, well, hell, we didn't do anything. Others are going to say, boy, it was really bad here. I think that's the only thing I would give you advice is, probably start with the company commanders up, if you want to talk about the planning and the training, train op.
MAJ WRIGHT: Okay, COL Snell, I thank you very much for your time and you'll be on the distribution of all the stuff that we start pulling together, sir.
COL SNELL: Thank you very much.
.GEN Maxwell Thurman succeeding GEN Frederick Warner as Commander-in-Chief, US Southern Command [CinC, SOUTHCOM].
2. Commanding General, XVIII Airborne Corps, and Commanding General, Joint Task Force SOUTH [JTF SOUTH].
3. 1LT (USMC) Robert Paz.
4. 16 December 1989.
5. Pacific end of the former Panama Canal Zone.
6. Departamento Nacional de Investigaciones.
7. Direccion Nacional de Transito Terrestre.
8. Quintal Compania de Infanteria 'Victoriano Lorenzo.' Actually a military police company rather than an infantry rifle company.
9. The brigade's 59th Engineer Company was organized under the light engineer or sapper configuration.
10. 41st Support Group (Area).
11. Septima Compania de Infanteria 'Macho de Monte'. The Macho de Monte is a fierce wild boar native to Panama.
12. Military Occupational Specialty 11B is infantryman.
13. American flag shoulder patches were one of the identification measures adopted during the operation.
14. US Army Training and Doctrine Command.
15. Medical civic action patrols, a Vietnam-era term.


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(CNSNews.com) - Only days after losing the Democratic nomination for another term in the U.S. House, Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney is already said to be considering a run for the U.S. Senate in 2004.
If she did run for the Senate, McKinney would presumably challenge Democratic incumbent Zell Miller, who earlier this year called McKinney's comments about the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks "loony."
McKinney last week lost the Democratic primary in Georgia's 4th District to state court judge Denise Majette. McKinney drew heavy support from the Muslim community, but could not overcome a determined Republican bid to oust her. Thousands of Republicans crossed over and voted for Majette in the Democratic primary, adding to Majette's considerable support from Jewish voters.
A statement on McKinney's website indicates that, "Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney is going through all the letters and e-mails asking her to continue the struggle, to run again, to run for the U.S. Senate." The website promises that McKinney will soon announce her future plans.
McKinney drew criticism after she suggested the Bush administration ignored warnings about Sept. 11 in order for the president's big business friends to benefit from the war against terrorism.
She also said she would have accepted a $10 million check from a Saudi prince for the Sept. 11 victims. New York officials rejected that check after the prince suggested that U.S. policies toward the Middle East were partly to blame for the September attacks.
In 1992, McKinney became the first African-American woman from Georgia to be elected to the House. She had previously served two terms in the Georgia state legislature.
In her concession speech last week, McKinney said she is not leaving politics or the public arena completely.
"I have lost an election, but I maintain my spirit, my courage, my dignity and my commitment to the truth, to peace and to the future. There is still work to be done, God had a plan and God is not finished with me yet," she said.
But she also said she would finish her dissertation for her doctorate in international affairs and devote more time to her teenage son.
Her father, Georgia Democratic State Representative Billy McKinney, told an Atlanta television station, the reason his daughter lost her seat was because of "J-E-W-S."
The elder McKinney did not return phone calls on Monday seeking comment on a possible Senate race for his daughter.
E-mail a news tip to Jim Burns.
Send a Letter to the Editor about this article.

subset: commoncrawl


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The last of the three basic photography principles is ISO and that's what we'll be going over today. And the good news is that it's super easy to understand. And to make it even better, besides just applying to DSLRs, a lot of point and shoot cameras have adjustable ISO settings too!
Your ISO setting determines how fast your digital sensor "picks up" the light coming into the camera, and works in combination with aperture and shutter speed to determine your exposure. It's a carry-over from the pre-digital days of film speed. The lowest setting is almost always 100 and can go all the way up to 6400 or more. A lower ISO number (100 for example) produces a clearer, smoother, cleaner image but requires more light to do so. So you will need to be in a very brightly lit area. A high ISO number (1600 for example) needs less light to capture the image, but the image will be grainier the higher you go. So you can be in a dark area and will still be able to capture your image, but it will have some amount of grain.
This first photo was taken outdoors with plenty of light, so I used a low setting of ISO 100 so I could get the clearest picture.
The second photo was taken indoors and at night (no flash) so there was very little light and I had to use a much higher ISO of 1600. You can see that there is some graininess to the image.
The newer your digital camera, the higher ISO settings it's likely to have, and the less graininess as well.
A very easy way to understand ISO is the "worker bees" analogy. Think of your ISO number as your number of worker bees, and those bees' only job is to buzz around gathering light for your photo! If you are in a dark area, you'll need a lot of bees to help you get enough light for your picture, so you need a high ISO number. If you are in a very well lit area, you won't need much help getting light, so a small number of worker bees will do the job and you just need the lowest ISO number (100).
So, that's it! Totally easy! So once you have your aperture and shutter speed set the way you want, just try to keep you ISO set at 100. But if your photo is too dark you'll need more worker bees gathering that light in for you, so increase your ISO until you can get the correct exposure!
Being able to adjust your ISO is awesome because it allows you to avoid flash use in low light conditions! I avoid using a flash whenever possible because it creates yucky harsh light and sharp shadows. You will get much better images by increasing your ISO instead, even if it does add a little grain. Most of the time in the newer, nicer DSLRs, the grain is almost unnoticeable!


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Chris Umiastowski is the growth investor for Globe Investor's Strategy Lab. Follow his contributions here and view his model portfolio here.
Last week, Facebook Inc. reported its latest financial results. While I'm not a buyer of the stock yet, I have to admit I'm warming up to the social media giant. The company has become an impressive force in the mobile business. Its growth is indisputable and its execution has been solid.
In fact, had I chosen Facebook instead of Google Inc. when I initially constructed my Strategy Lab portfolio, I'd be a bit further ahead. While Google is up about 20 per cent since the portfolio launch in September, 2012, Facebook is up almost double that amount.
But as my readers should know by now, I don't focus on short-term movements. I focus on the big picture. I care about how a landscape is changing over many years, and how public companies can profit from the change (or be hurt by the change, leading to a short-selling opportunity).
I don't want to run through all of Facebook's financials from last quarter, but I do think one number is highly meaningful. The company now generates 30 per cent of its advertising revenue from mobile viewers. Any guesses as to what that number was one year ago? I'll tell you. It was zero. Facebook has unquestionably proven that mobile traffic can be monetized. And this doesn't seem like some flash-in-the-pan experiment by big brands, either. Judging from the effort Facebook is placing on analyzing return on investment for its advertising customers, it's real.
Facebook has about 751 million mobile monthly users, according to its latest results. That's up from 488 million a year ago, which is a 54-per-cent rise. Advertising revenue is up 43 per cent year over year. With so many users, you might think the law of large numbers will start to slow these guys down, right? I'm not so sure.
As mobile usage skyrockets, Facebook will likely benefit. Last week, Marc Andreessen, who is famous for co-founding Netscape Communications, predicted that 2013 will be the year when $50 Android smartphones take the rest of the world by storm. "Smartphones are about to be put in the hands of another three billion people who don't have them," he said in an interview with Bloomberg TV.
Three billion people! That's not a prediction for the next quarter or even next year. It's a multiyear growth trajectory he's talking about. But it underscores why I believe you should be invested in this industry. Perhaps Facebook is the right investment. It's certainly generating impressive growth and I think it can continue for another few years.
Analysts think Facebook will earn 78 cents (U.S.) per share in 2014, putting the forward-year P/E ratio at about 35 right now. I don't think that's an absurd price to pay for a dominant leader in a fast-growing market. But I'd still rather own Google (and I do, both in my Strategy Lab portfolio and personally).
If Mr. Andreessen's next "three billion" users prediction comes true, Google directly benefits. The Web search giant controls the operating system that will be running on the majority of these phones. Google can monetize this just as well as Facebook, if not better, in my opinion.
I also prefer Google's diversity; I think it gives Google even more growth opportunity. Facebook is still primarily an advertising company. So is Google. But the Mountain View, Calif.-based search giant is also expanding into wearable computing (Google Glass), and perhaps even subscription content, which I find fascinating.
To give you a taste of what I'm looking forward to, let's look at YouTube. Last week, Google chairman Eric Schmidt revealed that its YouTube unit has now grown to the point where it gets one billion unique viewers per month. I challenge you to find a TV network with that kind of reach. YouTube has surpassed TV. This week the tech blogosphere is ripe with discussion about the expectation of an imminent launch of paid subscriptions on YouTube.
Think about the possibility of specialty video creators selling their content directly to consumers via YouTube. It's the video equivalent of publishers selling books directly to consumers via the Kindle platform. You're an expert in makeup or hairstyles? Sell a subscription to your premium content. You're awesome at teaching people how to restore old cars or renovate a kitchen? People will pay for the content. YouTube has a huge audience, and just like Amazon, people will trust handing a payment over to Google versus an unknown independent vendor.
Google stock trades at 16 times next year's EPS estimates, according to S&P Capital IQ. Yes, I'm warming up to Facebook. But I still see better value (and incredible growth) in Google.Report Typo/Error
Follow us on Twitter: @GlobeInvestor
- Facebook Inc$170.44+4.83(+2.92%)
- Alphabet Inc$934.09-13.71(-1.45%)
- Updated July 27 4:00 PM EDT. Delayed by at least 15 minutes.


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I play a 58* 8 bounce and it feels as good as any wedge around the green. Great groove cuts have allowed me to stop the ball even during tough shots.
Nice wedge, feels really good
Club in good shape-price reasonable
Great wedge....forged gives the feeling to help improve.....well designed bounce....Very good out of the bunker. Adds to the game.
ths wedge puts quite a bit of spin on the ball and feels great, my issue is full shot distance control. Maybe it is something I've developed in my swing.. not sure why but it has been frustrating while using this wedge.


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Who Steve Capus
New gig Executive editor, CBS News;executive producer, CBS Evening News
Old gig President, NBC News;executive producer, NBC Nightly News
Age 50
Twitter @SteveCapus
What insider knowledge are your bringing to your new role?
I'm coming in with a little bit of a different perspective than most people have who just perhaps only had to produce for broadcast. It doesn't get any better than being able to say, "This is a great piece of reporting at 60 Minutes, and we can showcase that on the Evening News," and we can work together to make it that much better. It's not an individual pursuit: it's a group pursuit.
How are you positioning the Evening News for the future?
The Evening News is going to have a long run, both as a broadcast and as a presence online and on cellphones. It is a franchise with a very rich tradition. What I think is terrific is the Evening News is positioned in a different way than our competitors. It has charted its own path with the right kind of editorial direction, and the audience is responding well. Our ratings have grown year over year and continue to do so. I don't take that kind of thing as an automatic. We have to make the editorial decisions that make us relevant, no matter what age the audience is. We have to do all the right things to say that we're open for business.
You don't seem to be afraid of synergy and being online.
The days are long gone where an organization is siloed. Any one of these news organizations has to be multiplatform to be relevant to the audience. If the audience wants to consume news on their cellphones, we have to produce for that. If they want to watch the broadcast on DVR, we need to make it simple for them. If somebody wants to check in on what's happening on the iPads or desktops while they eat lunch at their desk, then we have to be there in an aggressive way, too.
You pushed NBC Learn when you were there. Is education a priority for you at CBS News?
Putting an emphasis on education was the right thing at NBC News. I think it's too soon to say if we'll do something at CBS. What I've spent my first few weeks on the job doing is assessing the strength of the organization, and in all honesty, I'm incredibly impressed by the talent this news division has all around the world. Right now, I want to make sure we do a broadcast that's reflective of that talent.
What do you think of CBS' upcoming livestreamed network?
I'm not going to have oversight of that, but in my mind, it's part of the collective strength of CBS News overall. I think [CBS News president] David [Rhodes] had a brilliant idea to expand the reach of CBS News. I think in this era, it's the kind of idea that you have to explore with gusto. Everybody at CBS News will contribute in one way or another.
Besides the Evening News, what do you watch?
I'll go on binges where I watch all these different shows. I went through a phase where I watched years of Breaking Bad. I'm a Philadelphia sports fanatic. I still watch Phillies games on my iPad, which is basically admitting to having daily torture sessions.
What else do you do in your spare time?
The bass guitar is my other real passion. Every weekend I go to the guitar bar in Hoboken and do a jam session. One of the things I did during my gap year between NBC and CBS was get to know the band Yes and I was involved in an effort to get them into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I drive my family nuts because when I watch something on TV, I'm likely to watch it with a bass guitar. But I don't plug it in!


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June 21, 2012
US Youth Soccer adds U13, more 15-17 boys
FRISCO, Texas - Beginning in 2013, the US Youth Soccer National Championships will feature the Under-13 age group for boys and girls and see a heavier representation from the US Youth Soccer National League in the Under-15 through Under-17 age groups.
The addition of the Under-13 age group marks the first time that US Youth Soccer has increased its age range at the National Championships since 2001, when the Under-14 and Under-15 groups were added. Previously, the farthest an Under-13 team could advance was its respective Regional Championship. All four of the US Youth Soccer Regional Championships include Under-13 teams, with Region III (South) adding in the age group in 2012.
Another major change to the 2013 US Youth Soccer National Championships, which will be held in Overland Park, Kan., will be the addition of two more US Youth Soccer National League qualifying spots for the Under-15 through Under-17 age groups. Previously, only two spots in the National Championships were available to National League teams that did not qualify for the National Championships through their respective regional tournaments.
Teams in the Under-15, Under-16, Under-17 and Under-18 age group have to apply to participate in the National League, with only the top four teams receiving a guaranteed spot for the next year. The National League recently completed its fifth season, and during the first four years, National League teams have claimed 13 of a possible 22 National Championship titles. The 2012 National Championship begin July 24 in Rock Hill, S.C. at Manchester Meadows.


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Posted on December 16, 2015 by: acid stag
UK newcomer Two Legs has just released a very impressive debut EP that you really need to check out
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Dear Science,
Tunde Adebimpe-Vocals Kyp Malone- Vocals, Guitars, Bass, Synths David Andrew Sitek-Programming, Guitars, Samples, Bass, Synths Gerard A Smith- Bass, Organ, Synths, Samples, Rhodes Jaleel Bunton-Drums, Guitars, Rhodes, Organ, Synths, Bass, Programming
"A lot of bands have something to say," explains TV On The Radio producer/multi-instrumentalist David Sitek. "We have something to ask."
Indeed. Good luck finding easy answers in TVOTR's ever-evolving soundscapes, though, whether we're talking about their new disc, Dear Science (DGC/Interscope) or the band's early days. When guitarist/vocalist Kyp Malone joined, he didn't even get what Sitek and vocalist Tunde Adebimpe were going for on their self-released 2002 debut, OK Calculator.
"Aspects of OK Calculator are genius," says Malone, "but it isn't as laser-focused as Young Liars." Neither were Adebimpe and Sitek's early live sets, boundless and brash bits of performance art that Malone remembers as "an open mic/karaoke night gone awry. I could hear songs peeking through it all but it wasn't really my thing."
Boy did that change in 2003, as Young Liars became Malone's favorite CD-R (he'd often play it for the latte sippers at a local coffee shop) and the group's first Touch & Go release. An immediate favorite among critics, the EP nailed Sitek's goal of sounding like a "grand four-track thing," from the epic, evocative balladry of "Blind" to the spectral pop trails of "Staring At the Sun." To make things even more interesting, Malone dropped his skepticism and joined the group full-time before Young Liars' official release, with drummer Jaleel Bunton and bassist Gerard Smith rounding out the band's rhythm section soon after.
"We had a gig in Iceland where we needed a full band so we asked the two best guitar players we knew, Gerard and Jaleel, to play drums and bass," explains Sitek, laughing. "It's absurd that Kyp and I are even holding a guitar when Jaleel and Gerard are f**king bananas at playing it."
While that may be true, TV On The Radio's loose approach to songwriting, recording and performing leaves an incredible amount of room for instrument-swapping and role reversals. Rather than rely on a stringent and stale guitars/bass/drums/vocals setup, the quintet often brings home-demoed sketches to the studio along with the attitude that a track needs to go through everyone's filter before it becomes a fully formed song.
"Music is the most flexible medium in the world for me," explains Sitek, the beat conductor responsible for distilling the band's tracks down to a living, breathing composition that's never cloying or cumbersome. "There is no shortage of ideas; the hard part is not following each whim."
As much as he tries to keep a record sounding lean, Sitek is quick to admit, "It takes most bands an album to get to a high track count. I can go from 4 to 96 in a day, without question. I'm track hungry, really. A lot of stuff isn't even an instrument."
The densest a TVOTR disc ever got was their third LP, 2006's Return to Cookie Mountain, a collection of songs you need to scale with hi-def headphones to truly appreciate. Sitek went a little lighter on the multi-tracking with this Dear Science, but not by much. The album's opener, "Halfway Home," is vintage TVOTR, for instance--a rich, speaker-swallowing canvas of careening beats, buzzing riffs (or are those synths?) and bloodletting vocals. Things get strange from that point on, however, as mirror balls spin (a dare-we-say-danceable "Crying," the helicopter hook of "Golden Age") and Adebimpe attacks "Dancing Choose" like a mic-wielding battle rapper.
And then there are the glimmers of drum & bass ("Shout Me Out"), drunken horn sections ("Red Dress," one of several songs to feature members of Antibalas), and carefully-plucked film score strings ("Stork & Owl") that spice up what's clearly TVOTR's most challenging effort yet. Not challenging in the sense of being a rough listen--challenging in terms of rewriting the group's supposed gloomy, stormy aesthetics.
"You know how people always say that comedians are some of the saddest people in the world?" asks Adebimpe. "Well, the opposite is true, too. As heavy as some of the songs get, the joking around that goes around between the five of us gets out of control sometimes."
"If people are listening to us because we're dark and brooding, great," adds Sitek, "But I think there's a greater percentage looking for us to do something different with every album. Some of the darkest songs on Dear Science are the more upbeat ones. Like 'Crying' is f**king heavy, dude."
If you' still toss on such beautifully-damaged tracks as "Dreams" and "Ambulance" when times get tough, don't worry--TV On The Radio still goes for the jugular in the melancholic and moody department. In fact, some of Dear Science sounds downright menacing. Take "DLZ": a fang-baring "f**k you" to the idea of death being "your last chance to do anything" according to Adebimpe, it's some of most frightening, and affecting, music in the TVOTR canon. "Stork & Owl" is much more muted in its mix of skittering beats, wilting strings and gorgeous, multi-tracked harmonies but good luck putting on a happy face after succumbing to its postmodern soul soundtrack.
"It's like Bukowski once said, 'I write all of this stuff to get away from it,'" explains Adebimpe, who struggled with the deaths of a friend and family member during the making of Dear Science. "Writing is a meditation, an exercise to put away all these painful things.'"
And that's ultimately what TV On The Radio still hopes to do with its music--they're still looking to connect, to make people feel something, anything no matter how up or down a song's arrangement is.
"I grew up listening to Joy Division, New Order, Echo & the Bunnymen, the Cure, the Smiths and the Swans," says Malone. "Some of that qualifies as 'goth' but it didn't make me depressed to listen to that music despite what my parents assumed. It didn't add to my 'angst' as a teenager. I simply identitfied with something in the music.
"It made me feel less alone, you know?" he continues. "If I could be that for someone else, that would make me happy. It'd be a real form of success for me."


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Richardson Introduces the Next Evolution in Strategic Account Management Methodology, Strategy, and Training
PHILADELPHIA, June 14, 2012 — Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company, today announced the launch of Collaborative Account Development™, a custom-tailored sales training and performance improvement solution and methodology. Richardson's Collaborative Account Development™ ensures sales teams have a consistent and repeatable account development process combined with winning strategies and superior dialogue skills to help increase the amount of time spent on shaping and creating opportunities, not just responding to existing opportunities.
Richardson's Collaborative Account Development™ was created for key account managers who not only want to manage their most important accounts effectively, but seek to develop relevant and flexible plans in partnership with their largest customers in order to expand and grow their business by bringing unexpected value and creating opportunities to more fully align with the customer's organization. The methodology focuses on both account planning and execution, blending three key components:
"The launch of our Collaborative Account Development™ ("CAD") solution reflects our continued commitment to provide our clients with innovative and powerful solutions that change behavior and drive business outcomes. There is no other sales performance solution like CAD in the market today," says David DiStefano, President and CEO of Richardson. "Account planning is certainly not new and also not particularly effective when practiced as an annual exercise where the customer is the object of the exercise, not part of the process. Collaborative Account Development™ marks the next phase of strategic account management. It helps account managers turn account planning into a competitive advantage by making your clients an integral part of the process, co-creating value with client stakeholders, and improving alignment between your team and their clients' organizations."
To learn more about Richardson, please contact us at email@example.com.
About Richardson
Richardson (http://www.richardson.com) is a global sales performance company that helps leading organizations improve sales results. We do this in three ways. We analyze the structure and talent of your sales force, we train and develop your sales team, and we continue that development through coaching and reinforcement. We equip your sales leaders and sales force with the skills and strategies they need to win in today's complex selling environment. What is unique about Richardson is how we create truly customized solutions that change behavior and provide measurable results.


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Author Richard Dawkins spoke to a capacity crowd at HPU's 'Aloha Shaka Con'
October 05, 2012
Internationally recognized author and evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins spoke to a capacity crowd of more than 400 on Wednesday at Aloha Tower Marketplace as part of the HPU Secular Student Alliance's "Aloha Shaka Con."
Pictured here, Dawkins (left) speaks with reporters at a pre-talk media availability with Dawkins Foundation Policy Director Sean Faircloth.
Speaking on the evening of the first presidential debate between President Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney, the outspoken atheist and critic of such education policy matters as advocacy for inclusion of "intelligent design" in science curriculum didn't mince words in voicing his opinion on the role of media in querying candidates on their religious affiliation. "I don't think journalists should hold back," said Dawkins, author of the bestseller, "The God Delusion."
|Noted author Richard Dawkins speaks at HPU Secular Student Alliance's "Aloha Shaka Con"


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Steve Wilson to Return to NYC's 'Village Vanguard'
Jazz saxophonist Steve Wilson has confirmed his return to New York's Village Vanguard for August 6-11. At the upcoming shows, Wilson intends to bring his quartet Wilsonian's Grain (featuring Orrin Evans, Ugonna Okegwo and Bill Stewart) into the spotlight, using these concerts as a 'launching point' as he establishes the band as his current working quartet.
In January, the band played at the University of FL in Gainesville, it was this gig that cemented this idea for Wilson. "The band's performance was exactly as I had envisioned for this quartet, employing the comprovisational element -- improvisation and composition, i.e., the group's spontaneous composition and improvisation elements. This enables the group to explore any of the tunes from different perspectives with every performance so that the music is in effect a sketch that we can paint a different image of with each performance. This is the band - Orrin, Ugonna and Bill - with whom I want to explore this territory."
Wilson, one of the most most respected and acclaimed musicians in the business, recently spoke with ALL ABOUT JAZZ regarding what he perceives as a crisis in Music Education. Read the engaging article, here: http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=44834&pg=1#.Udw88zlblUQ <http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/article.php?id=44834&pg=1#.Udw88zlblUQ>
Here's a new WBGO interview with Gary Walker:
Wilson's 12/12 visit to the Village Vanguard yielded a live concert broadcast on NPR, a full-page feature in the NY Daily News(written by Greg Thomas,) a stellar Time Out NY Photo Preview Pick, and more. Time Out NY praised: "Whether he's the leader or a sideman in a given situation, seeing Steve Wilson's name on a jazz bill is as close to a guarantee of quality as you'll ever find."
As always, Wilson's busy schedule of touring, collaboration and guest appearances continues, and a full itinerary follows below.
July 16-20: with Billy Childs Quartet, Birdland, NYC
July 23: Jazz in July at the 92nd St. Y - The Mad Hatter: Music of Chick Corea


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Information for Healthcare Professionals: Propofol (marketed as Diprivan and as generic products)
[For additional information about this product, see Propofol Information.]
FDA ALERT [6/2007]: FDA is issuing this alert to inform healthcare professionals about several clusters of patients who have experienced chills, fever, and body aches shortly after receiving propofol for sedation or general anesthesia. FDA has tested multiple units of propofol vials and lots used in patients who have experienced these symptoms and to date, these tests have not identified any vials contaminated with bacteria or endotoxins.
FDA recommends that healthcare professionals who administer propofol for sedation or general anesthesia carefully follow the recommendations for handling and use found in the current product labeling.
In addition, please report to the MedWatch program patients who have received propofol for sedation or general anesthesia and subsequently experienced fever, chills, and body aches or other symptoms of an acute febrile reaction (see MedWatch reporting information at the bottom of this page). Patients who develop these symptoms shortly after receiving propofol should be evaluated for bacterial sepsis.
The FDA is working closely with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCP) to investigate possible reasons for the patients' illnesses following propofol administration. The FDA will provide more information as it becomes available.
This information reflects FDA's current analysis of available data concerning this drug. Posting this information does not mean that FDA has concluded there is a causal relationship between the drug product and the emerging drug safety issue. Nor does it mean that FDA is advising practitioners to discontinue prescribing the product. FDA is considering, but has not reached a conclusion about, whether this information warrants any regulatory action. FDA intends to provide updated information when it becomes available.
To report any serious adverse events associated with the use of this drug, please contact the
FDA MedWatch program using the contact information at the bottom of this page.
Recommendations and Considerations
- Propofol is an intravenous sedative-hypnotic agent for use in the induction and maintenance of anesthesia or sedation. Although propofol vials and prefilled syringes contain an ingredient that retards the growth of microorganisms, propofol products can still support the growth of microorganisms. To minimize the potential for bacterial contamination when using propofol for general anesthesia or procedural sedation:
- both the vial and prefilled syringe formulations must be used on only one patient;
- administration must commence immediately after the vial or syringe has been opened; and
- administration from a single vial or syringe must be completed within six hours of opening.
- ICU sedation with propofol administered directly from a vial must be limited to only one patient, must commence immediately on opening the vial, and must be completed within 12 hours of opening the vial to minimize the risk of product contamination. Carefully follow the handling procedures including the guidelines for aseptic technique that are included in the current prescribing information for propofol.
- Patients who develop fever, chills, body aches or other symptoms of acute febrile reactions shortly after receiving propofol should be evaluated for bacterial sepsis. Consider evaluating and treating patients for bacterial sepsis by obtaining blood cultures followed by beginning appropriate antimicrobial therapy.
- The FDA urges both healthcare providers and patients to report adverse events from the use of propofol to the FDA's MedWatch Adverse Event Reporting program either online, by regular mail or by fax, using the contact information at the bottom of this page.
Background Information and Data
In the past several months the FDA has received reports of several clusters of patients who have developed fever, chills, and body aches shortly after receiving propofol. To date, the reports have come from Pennsylvania (2 facilities), New Jersey (1 facility), New York (2 facilities), and Tennessee (2 facilities). The symptoms began six to 18 hours following the anesthetic and persisted for up to three days. Several patients have been hospitalized and one patient had seizures. All have recovered without apparent sequelae.
To date, all affected patients received propofol for sedation in gastrointestinal suites. Some facilities where the propofol was administered used propofol vials, intended only for single-patient use, for more than one patient.
To date, there is no evidence that these patients had bacterial sepsis or that the propofol vials and prefilled syringes used were contaminated with bacteria or endotoxins.
The illnesses experienced by patients in the current clusters are similar to illness reports FDA received when propofol was first introduced to the United States market and was manufactured without preservatives or antimicrobial additives. At that time, there were numerous reports of patients who developed reactions that were consistent with possible product contamination including fever, infection and sepsis. The frequency of these reports declined substantially after an agent to retard microbial growth was added to propofol vials and pre-filled syringes and warnings were added to the product label. These warnings advised to use strict aseptic technique, adhere to the single-use requirement, and discard unused product within the specified time limits.
What the FDA is Doing
The FDA is working with the CDCP on an evaluation of these reports. The CDC is conducting an outbreak investigation by visiting sites of these patient clusters and evaluating affected patients for factors that may explain their illnesses.
The FDA has conducted bacterial contamination testing of multiple units of propofol vials and lots that have been associated with the adverse events experienced by patients; however, to date, these tests have not identified any vials contaminated with bacterial or endotoxins. Similarly, testing of other potential sources, e.g., lidocaine coadministered with propofol and instrumentation sterilization systems, has not identified any potentially causative agents at this time.


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The new GM has a new swagger, and it shows in the theme of its new ad campaign: "Let the best car win."
And to back up the challenge, GM says that starting Monday, if buyers of its new cars and trucks aren't satisfied they can bring them back for a refund within 60 days, no questions asked.
The program, to run through November and maybe longer, aims to erase doubts among buyers not wedded to foreign-brand cars, but afraid to try the new GM because of its past.
GM marketing boss Bob Lutz says a similar program tried years ago by GM's Vauxhall brand in the U.K. resulted in just 2% to 3% of buyers coming back for refunds. He expects about the same in the U.S. plan.
The offer will get a "full-court press" of advertising, says Lutz, starting with Sunday's morning talk shows and NFL games. The kick-off ad will feature new GM Chairman Ed Whitacre.
There will be conditions, of course: The buyer has to be current on payments and return the vehicle in 31 to 60 days with fewer than 4,000 miles on it.
There is some fine print, but the ad will keep it simple, says Lutz, 77. "We're not going to have a screen full of warnings like in those drug ads where you see the happy geriatric couple and a guy tells you, 'Taking this medication while eating grapefruit can result in loss of eyesight, erectile dysfunction and vaginal bleeding.' "
Details will be posted at gm.com/guarantee beginning Sunday.
Photo from new ad with Chairman Ed Whitacre in design studio by GM
Chris Woodyard is an auto writer for USA TODAY who covers all aspects of motoring. He revels in the exhaust note of a Maserati and the sharp creases of a Cadillac CTS. Chris strives to live a Porsche life on a Scion budget. More about Chris


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Freida Pinto Stars in Short Film for Free People Called Rangeen
Posted on April 6, 2014
Actress Freida Pinto stars in a new campaign for Free People. Freida is pictured riding on the back of motorcycle with male model Thomas Bull in the above photograph. Freida plays Maya in the short film called Rangeen. She and her friend Maritza (played by model Maritza Veer) are attending a family wedding celebration in Rajasthan, India. Maritza has brought her brother Tom (Thomas Bull) and there is a love connection between Maya and Maritza's brother. The five minute film was directed by photographer Guy Aroch and and Carlos Veron. Makeup is by Deanna Hagan and hair is by Tania Travers. Take a look:
Photo: Free People
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Megha Jacob, Music Education/Pre-Physical Therapy
The Incorporation of Music Therapy into Physical Therapy Sessions for Physically Disabled Children
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Airi Yoshioka
This research will assess the effects of introducing music therapy (MT) into physical therapy (PT) sessions. Physical illness due to genetic and/or environmental factors (such as Down syndrome or car accident injuries, respectively) can be traumatizing. This is especially true with children because they are expected to cope with so much at a young age. Therapy sessions can be intense and draining for patients and can take a toll on their psychological state. MT, which promotes wellness in individuals by offering therapeutic benefits to the mind through the use of musical involvements, can help offset the psychological fatigue associated with PT. I plan on researching the specific types of physical disabilities for the children at the schools/institutions, so I can better understand the limitations and hazards of each disability. I also plan on attending educational workshops based on music, education, and therapy so that I may work under licensed therapists with both clinical and work experience. I wish to create innovative therapy techniques to incorporate music into therapy sessions by utilizing kinesthetic techniques to respond to sounds, creating group exercises to heighten social skills, and encouraging patients to compose and perform songs to help relieve stress and stimulate their minds. The goal of my research is to examine whether or not the combined use of PT and MT in therapy sessions is positively correlated with the patient's mental and physical well-being.
1. How did you find your mentor for this project?
I thought Dr. Yoshioka would be the best person to be my mentor because she is in charge of the education emphasis in the music department at UMBC. I have had the opportunity to sit in her classes and hear of her teaching from other students. She uses a variety of innovative teaching techniques in classroom settings and any help from her will be valuable.
2. How did you know this was the project you wanted to do?
Since my undergraduate career at UMBC, I have always wanted to pursue my passion in the sciences and arts. Upon completing two internships at Kennedy Krieger, I wanted to incorporate music therapy and physical therapy in a clinical setting. After hearing about the URA program, I realized that this was a best time to begin my exploration of these two fields of study.
3. Do you get course credit for this work?
I do not earn credits that go towards my graduation, however this research offers opportunity for me to earn credits in graduate school.
4. How much time do you put into it?
I have only started the first phase of my research which involves attending workshops, reading books related to physical therapy and music therapy. So far I am spending about four to six hours a week. Once I begin the clinical research in the fall, I am certain I will spend more than double the hours.
5. How did you hear about the Undergraduate Research Award program?
I have attended the URCAD presentations for the past few years, and I met a few student presenters who were also in the URA program and they introduced me to it.
6. What academic background did you have before you started?
I am majoring in Music Education and Pre-physical therapy and minoring in Biology and Psychology. My academic background in each of these subjects allows me to combine not only biology and music but also psychology and education.
7. Was the application difficult to do?
Not at all.
8. How much did your mentor help you with this?
Very much. She has mentored other URA applicants in the past so she knew what to expect in the application process. Whenever I needed help with any aspect of the research, she would always make time to answer my questions and guide me.
9. What is your advice to other students about getting involved in research?
My advice to other students is that if you have any creative ideas, you should definitely get involved in research. Although the URA program is a well-known and acclaimed program, it should not intimidate anyone from sharing his/her ideas. It is a remarkable opportunity for the students to have their research funded by the school. This program is a great way to begin and/or continue one's research and I say if you have an idea or plan . . . work towards making that dream a reality.
10. What are your career goals?
Upon completing my undergraduate studies, I plan on attending graduate school for the doctoral program in physical therapy. Then, I want to pursue my masters in music therapy. After attaining my education in physical and music therapy, I want to open a clinic in which innovative therapeutic techniques are offered to patients. I wish to use a combination of music, physical, and various other therapies for the patients.
11. What has been the hardest part about your research?
So far, the hardest part has been trying to understand different disabilities and create various therapies which involve both music and exercise. I think one of the hardest parts will be assessing the effects of each therapy session and improving it to yield better results.
12. What was the most unexpected thing?
So far I have not been faced with any surprises. Part of the excitement is that I do not exactly know what to expect.
13. How does your research relate to your work in other classes?
My research will be very much related to my music education classes, because I am taught to make lesson plans and also improvise in a classroom setting. During clinical research, I know that therapies may not work the way I imagined or planned it. And when that time comes, I will have to improvise on the spot and find a more effective technique. I will use my knowledge from my human anatomy classes to plan the exercise therapies accordingly with the physical disabilities in mind.


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Get an overview of this hotel3.5-star Rome hotel in Nomentano with free breakfast
Popular property highlights
Located in Nomentano, this hotel is 2 mi (3.2 km) from Villa Torlonia and 3 mi (4.8 km) from Borghese Gallery. Piazza Bologna and Villa Ada are also within 3 mi (5 km).
Hotel Features
A bar/lounge, concierge services, and dry cleaning are available at this smoke-free hotel. Free buffet breakfast and free WiFi in public areas are also provided. Additionally, laundry facilities, a 24-hour front desk, and limo/town car service are onsite.
Room Amenities
All 34 soundproofed rooms feature free WiFi and minibars. For a bit of entertainment, LCD TVs come with digital channels, and guests will also find room service and hair dryers.
Guest Highlights
- Proximity to public transit
- Breakfast
- Helpful staff
- Clean guestrooms
- Overall room comfort
Hotel Aniene
Hotel Amenities
Hotel Amenities
A bar/lounge is on site where guests can unwind with a drink. A complimentary breakfast is offered each morning. Wireless Internet access is complimentary.
This Rome hotel also offers multilingual staff, concierge services, and laundry facilities. For a surcharge, the property provides a roundtrip airport shuttle (available 24 hours) and an area shuttle.
Hotel Aniene is a smoke-free property.
- 24-hour front desk
- Airport transportation (surcharge)
- Total number of rooms - 34
- Bar/lounge
- Free breakfast
- Dry cleaning/laundry service
- Elevator/lift
- Express check-in
- Express check-out
- Area shuttle (surcharge)
- Luggage storage
- Laundry facilities
- Number of floors - 5
- Multilingual staff
- Smoke-free property
- Concierge services
- Free WiFi
- Limo or Town Car service available
- Year Built 2008
Family Friendly Amenities
- Family Hotel
- Free Wi-Fi
- Soundproofed rooms
- Laundry facilities
- Cribs/infant beds (complimentary)
Available in all rooms: Free WiFi
Available in some public areas: Free WiFi
Room Amenities
- Air conditioning
- Phone
- Minibar
- Daily housekeeping
- Private bathroom
- Free toiletries
- Hair dryer
- Bidet
- Shower only
- In-room safe
- Desk
- In-room climate control (air conditioning)
- Soundproofed rooms
- Room service (limited hours)
- Free cribs/infant beds
- Digital TV service
- Free WiFi
Where to Eat
Guests are offered a complimentary buffet breakfast each morning.
Room service (during limited hours) is available.
If you have requests for specific accessibility needs, please note them at check-out when you book your room.
- Accessible bathroom
Hotel Policies
Minimum check-in age is 18
Check-in time starts at 2 PM
Special check-in instructions:
Check-out time is noon
Payment types
Children and extra beds
- Children are welcome.
- Kids stay free! One child 2 years old or younger stays free when using existing bedding.
- Rollaway/extra beds are not available.
- Free cribs (infant beds)!
- Pets not allowed (service animals welcome)
You need to know
Extra-person charges may apply and vary depending on property policy.
Government-issued photo identification and a credit card or cash deposit are required at check-in for incidental charges.
Special requests are subject to availability upon check-in and may incur additional charges. Special requests cannot be guaranteed.
Only service animals are allowed
No rollaway/extra beds available
- A tax is imposed by the city: EUR 4.00 per person, per night, up to 10 nights. This tax does not apply to children under 10 years of age.
Optional extras
- Airport shuttle fee: EUR 55 per vehicle (one way)
Hotel Name
- Aniene
- Aniene Rome
- Hotel Aniene
- Hotel Aniene Rome
- Aniene Hotel Rome
We should mention
All guests, including children, must be present at check-in and show their government-issued photo ID card or passport. Cash transactions at this property cannot exceed EUR 2999.99, due to national regulations. For further details, please contact the property using information in the booking confirmation. This property offers transfers from the airport (surcharges may apply). Guests must contact the property with arrival details before travel, using the contact information on the booking confirmation. One child 2 years old or younger stays free when occupying the parent or guardian's room, using existing bedding. Only registered guests are allowed in the guestrooms.


text: So I just got my first shirt from MT, and maybe black was a mistake since it is a bit harder to see in the photos. I believe, however, that the measurements are pretty close to where I need them. For reference, I am 6ft tall, 160lbs, and I like my shirts to fit tight around the waist and have as little material in the back to "balloon." I feel that this shirt fits pretty well, although it pulls a bit around the armpits. I'm not sure if lowering them an inch is the solution, or if something needs to be changed in the yoke or chest. That's where you all with a bit more experience come in... Otherwise I think that I can take the waist in another inch to lose some of the extra fabric in the back while leaving the hips the same. Additionally, the shoulders look great with my arms at my sides, but there is a bit of extra material on the back of the shoulder when I raise my arms, and perhaps this is not fixable without making the shirt horribly uncomfortable. If you need more pics I can take some more. Thanks for any help you can offer! -Will