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Two Henrico officers earn Valor Awards
By Patty Kruszewski, Citizen Managing Editor 10/22/12
Two Henrico County police officers were among seven area first responders honored for heroism Oct. 5 at the Retail Merchants Association's 23rd Annual Valor Awards.
Held annually at the the Greater Richmond Convention Center, the event drew approximately 500 business leaders, law enforcement officers, firefighters and EMS personnel and featured keynote speaker William "Bill" G. Haneke, an author and decorated veteran of the Vietnam War.
Haneke, a 1966 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, was a U.S. Army ranger and paratrooper awarded three Bronze Stars, a Purple Heart, the Combat Infantry Badge, and the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry for his service. He is also a co-founder of The Families of the Wounded Fund, Inc., which provides assistance to family members and caregivers of wounded military veterans.
Having barely survived the horrendous wounds he suffered from an exploding Viet Cong land mine, Haneke told the crowd, he has a particular fondness for first responders.
Despite the extent of his injuries and the decades that have passed since, Haneke was able to describe the moment of impact in vivid detail, and the sensation of being hurled 80 feet through the air.
"I landed on barbed wire," Haneke recalled. "My leg was hanging by a tendon, and my carotid artery was severed. I could feel the blood bouncing off my shoulder with every beat of my heart."
Because Haneke's dog tags were blown off by the blast, medical personnel had no way to know his religion or blood type. Taken to five field hospitals before reaching a surgical hospital, he was given last rites multiple times.
"But the medics took great care of me," he said. "They managed to keep me alive." Using a two-and-a-half-inch section of intact artery from his severed leg, medics were able to graft a repair onto the carotid artery.
"I'm the first person they tried this on that lived," said Haneke. "And I'm here to tell you, 43 years later, it's still working."
Moving from battlefield stories to an account of his career at the Medical College of Virginia, Haneke described emergency room incidents involving everything from drug overdoses, severe burns, and children abandoned at the hospital door to gang violence and accidents involving explosive and chemical transports.
Regarding the nights when street crimes spiked and knifing and shooting victims would arrive at the ER in clusters, Haneke noted that the violence didn't stop there.
"There were several occasions," he said, "when [the offenders] would come in the ER and try to finish what they started on the streets.
"My hat is off to the first responders that respond to these situations," Haneke summed up. "You just don't know what you're going to encounter."
Bronze Award recipients
Officer Michael A. Moore and Officer Edward L. Wigley of the Henrico Division of Police earned the Bronze Award for their actions during an armed confrontation Sept. 8, 2011.
The incident began when a citizen called police and requested a police escort to her residence because of a protective order against her husband.
Learning that the husband had called a friend, crying and threatening suicide, officers formulated a plan and organized an entry team a few blocks from the caller's residence. As officers approached the apartment, the woman's husband arrived in a taxi. Wigley recognized the suspect, alerted other officers, and ordered the suspect to show his hands.
Pulling out a handgun, the suspect shot himself and pointed the gun in the direction of Moore, who was standing beside the taxi. Wigley then positioned himself between the suspect and the taxi driver, trying to get the driver out of the vehicle, while Moore fired several shots at the suspect in the cab. Officials later learned that the suspect had been arrested earlier in the year for shooting into an occupied vehicle and reckless use of a weapon.
Also honored with Valor Awards were four members of the Chesterfield Fire and EMS Scuba Rescue Team who assisted Westmoreland County authorities with rescues from flooding caused by Tropical Storm Lee, and a Hanover County firefighter who pulled a woman from a burning car using his bare hands.
Retired fire chief also honored
In addition to the awards ceremony, the event also included performances by the Greater Richmond Pipes & Drums and two special tributes.
Bill Selden of The 100 Club presented the tributes, honoring the late Ruby Turner, a local community law enforcement advocate, and Edwin Smith, the recently retired chief of Henrico County Division of Fire.
Noting that it was at least his twelfth visit to the Valor Awards, Smith echoed Haneke's remark that all first responders are heroes. "There are countless other stories not being told here today," he said. "But it's every day that [first responders] wake up and do these things."
And while he has missed seeing many friends and co-workers since retiring, said Smith, they are never far from his mind.
"I don't miss the work," he said, amid laughter, "but I miss you.
"And I do still pray for you every day."
Mother, son work to raise funds for Make-A-Wish
By Kyla Coleman, Special to the Citizen 07/23/2017 FeaturesGeneral News
A mother and son duo raising money for the Make-A-Wish Foundation.
Betsy Owen, Goochland County native, and her five year old son Israel have been making a difference in the Henrico community for two years. Owen works at Maggiano's Little Italy in Short Pump. Betsy and her fellow co-workers have split into teams to raise a total of $15,000 for Make-A-Wish. > Read more.
Eyes in the sky
By Patty Kruszewski, Citizen Managing Editor 07/21/2017 General NewsGovernment
Members of the Henrico Citizens Police Academy Alumni (pictured) got a rare peek at the "high" side of law enforcement recently, with a trip to the Metro Aviation Hangar adjacent to Richmond International Airport.
About 25 academy alumni gathered at the hangar July 11 to hear Officer Shaun McCarthy describe a typical day aloft - and some not so typical – in a Cessna owned by the Metro Aviation Unit. > Read more.
Rock on!
By Patty Kruszewski, Citizen Managing Editor 07/21/2017 FeaturesGeneral News
The painted rocks craze is thriving in Henrico, as a walk around the grounds of local libraries and parks will demonstrate. This rock was spotted near Libbie Mill Library, and there's a slideshow of many more uniquely-painted stones on the RVA Rocks Facebook page (https://facebook.com/groups/RVARocks/).
Painting and hiding rocks is a family activity appropriate for all ages, and parents especially like the way it fosters creativity and gets kids outdoors. > Read more.
Goochland man arrested at RIC with gun
Citizen Staff Reports 07/20/2017 General NewsPublic Safety
A Goochland County man was arrested at Richmond International Airport July 19 after Transportation Security Administration officers found a loaded semi-automatic handgun in the traveler's carry-on bag.
A TSA officer detected the 9 mm caliber handgun inside the man's carry-on bag as it entered the security checkpoint X-ray machine. The handgun was loaded with 12 bullets. > Read more.
Kansas man struck, killed while crossing West Broad Street
Citizen Staff Reports 07/20/2017 General NewsPublic Safety
A 54-year-old Kansas man was struck and killed by a car while attempting to cross West Broad Street near Bethlehem Road in the Near West End at about 10:30 p.m., July 19.
Julius A. McBride of Overland Park, Kansas, was struck by a car traveling east on West Broad Street. > Read more.
Julius A. McBride of Overland Park, Kansas, was struck by a car traveling east on West Broad Street. > Read more.
Kansas man struck, killed while crossing West Broad Street
Henrico Police warn citizens to 'Take it, Lock it or Lose it'
Glover to be inducted posthumously into Babe Ruth Hall of Fame
Rolls-Royce supplier lands in Henrico
New Walmart opens in Eastern Henrico
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Jul. 20, 2017Current edition | Archive
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'Five Flights' opens July 20 at CAT Theatre
Henrico actress lands role in Christian TV series
All's fair in food and fun
Restaurant Watch
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Obituary – Hoyle S. "Chick" Walters
Obituary – Janet Sue Vest
Obituary – Barbara Jean (Chilton) Crider
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Glen Allen woman raising companion dog
Guided tour of Malvern Hill planned as part of 'History at Sunset' series
Anthem LemonAid registration now open
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Growing a grown-up: Part II
How to grow an adult
Make 'em take the pledge: no more snuff boxes!
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Code Lacrosse joins Richmond Strikers
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RIR to host playoff race in 2018
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|July 2017
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CalendarSouthern soul and rock group Ray Pittman Duo will perform from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. at The Lilly Pad Café, 9680 Osborne Tnpk. in Varina. For details, call 507-1997. Full text


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2 Recommendations
AGD's recommendation
The harlequin look was seen a lot on runways lately (Miu Miu, Prada too I think?), this bag is a great way to sport the look without going overboard.
My Collections:
QtheStylist's recommendation
TN School of Style. The perfect accessory when you are dancing to Poker Face.

subset: commoncrawl


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Being a keen employer of school leavers and bright young graduates, Guru is taking an interest in the debate surrounding education. He's noticed that it doesn't appear to be a particularly popular view, but he finds himself of one mind with education secretary Michael Gove who's reforming education back towards a more information- and memory-based approach.
Over the years Guru has met many bright young things with high marks and glittering records, and repeatedly been surprised that in all that education they don't seem to have acquired any actual knowledge. The mantra to justify this state of affairs seems to be that children are taught "how to think", but is being "taught how to think" necessary, and is it not possible to teach somebody how to think while teaching them some useful things to think about? Guru would suggest the answers are no and yes. Furthermore – particularly at degree-level, which is still largely the preserve of the middle-class – it is pretty insulting to suggest that young adults should be subsidised to spend three years "learning how to think" while everybody else learns how to think while providing useful services to society (like working their way up the HR ladder).
So Guru supports Gove's measures and looks forward to interviewing a new generation of HR candidates who can remember some actual information they've garnered from the hundreds of exams they've sat through.


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Butler Specialty Artifacts Accent Cabinet
$ 539.00
The muted, antiqued color tones of greens, browns and whitewash imbue this cabinet with rustic elegance. Crafted from acacia wood solids and wood products in the Water Colors finish with complementary, brass-finished hardware, the cabinet features abundant storage on three shelves behind closed doors separated by a deep drawer.
- Collection: Artifacts
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- Color: Assorted
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- Material: Acacia wood solids, MDF
- Dimensions: 19.75" w x 15.75" d x 55" h
- Cubes: 15.91
- Weight: 63 pounds


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Cat Scratches Feature: The smiling soccer star
Sept. 10, 2009
When he took the pitch Friday night at the UK Soccer Complex for the Kentucky men's soccer season opener against IUPUI, freshman forward Cameron Wilder could not stop smiling.
Registering a start in his first collegiate game, the native of Kennesaw, Ga., stood stoic for the national anthem, alongside his Kentucky teammates at midfield. Just a few seconds later, Wilder was standing in front of the stands, pumping up the crowd of 1,412 fans and boasting a contagious smile that is becoming his trademark.


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AFCO 24150CR 14 Inch Extreme Chrome Coil Over Spring - 150 Rate
Click image to enlarge
Reviews (1)
What's in the Box
Whether you are building a purpose-built drag strip machine or a beautiful show car, Extreme Chrome coilover springs will provide the strength, durability and show stopping good looks you desire. These Mirror Finish springs have all the great looks of a chrome spring with no damaging side-effects associated with chemical plating.
- Industry exclusive 360° polished wire
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- 2-5/8" inside diameter
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All Afcoils carry a lifetime warranty to remain within 2% of the original nominal free height.
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AFCO will replace any Afcoil spring that ever exceeds the maximum allowable 2% loss of free height from original nominal specification. One way freight is included.
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Both are ways to include *columns* from multiple tables into one resulting (wider) table. The main difference is *where* the two tables are combined. Traditional database joins are performed by the data source (the server). Blending is performed by Tableau (the client).
You specify how to join tables by editing the data source, selecting the multiple tables option and then defining the join keys -- or by providing custom SQL. You specify how to blend query results by using the edit relationships menu item on the data menu. Server side joins are more efficient in general.
One useful aspect of data blending is that you can combine data from different data sources even if they reside on different servers. So blends can be a good solution if you need to combine columns from a spreadsheet with columns from a database table that has some key in common. The alternative would be to import your spreadsheet into a table on your database server so that you can join the two tables. Sometimes that is difficult to arrange.
Neither approach is designed to append rows from multiple tables, such as appending the May data to the (identically formatted) April data to make a table with rows from both April and May. For that you need a SQL UNION ALL clause (or need to append to a Tableau extract)
One other tip is that you can join on calculated fields, not just native fields. I use this all the time when the fields I want to join on don't line up cleanly (e.g. in one connection APAC and China are separate values, whereas in the other connection they are combined into a value called "APAC+China"). So I can create a calculated field in the first connection to combine APAC and China into a new values (e.g. "APAC+China") and then blend on that new calculated field.
Ramu, one way to think of the difference between joins and blends is that joining is done from within a single data source (joining two tables from the same database, or two sheets from the same Excel file). Blending is done across sources (a table from a database with a sheet from an Excel file).
I am definitely a fan of data blending. One piece of advice though.....extract. When connecting to certain data sources, the only way to get data blending to correctly work is to extract both data sources and then data blend the extracts. Trust me, this will save a lot of time and heartache.
I've tried everything I could to use combine datasets (stored in txt or csv) from different years into a single one, but no luck so far. I'm using Tableau 8,2 Professional Edition!
Thank you so much
Is it necessary to include the linking column in the report? I'd like to link two data sources by a common field but I want to group the data at a higher level. Any time I remove the linking column, I receive an error.
Here's a simple example of what I'm trying. I have a spreadsheet with a list of hospitals and doctors that work there. Another that has doctors and their patients. I blend the data on doctor but I want to show total number of patients that have been to a hospital. Right now I have to include Hospital -> Doctor -> Patient Count and I want Hospital -> Patient Count.
In response to Laurent's question (#7) blending isn't used to add more rows to a result set, but to add more columns. You can't UNION result sets with blending. See response #3.
Why can't we do full outer join? This is a big limitation for us.


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Safety and Effectiveness of Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy With Defibrillation
This study has been completed.
Boston Scientific Corporation
Information provided by:
Boston Scientific Corporation
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
First received: October 11, 2006
Last updated: January 23, 2007
Last verified: January 2007
- Full Text View
- Tabular View
- No Study Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
Detailed Description:
The purpose of this study was to determine if cardiac resynchronization therapy when combined with defibrillation is safe and effective in the treatment of symptomatic heart failure.
|Heart Failure, Congestive Ventricular Fibrillation Tachycardia, Ventricular
|Device: Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy with Defibrillation
|Phase 2 Phase 3
|Study Type:
|Study Design:
|Allocation: Randomized
Intervention Model: Parallel Assignment
Masking: Double-Blind
Primary Purpose: Treatment
|Official Title:
|VENTAK CHF/CONTAK CD Biventricular Pacing Study
Resource links provided by NLM:
MedlinePlus related topics: Heart FailureU.S. FDA Resources
Further study details as provided by Boston Scientific Corporation:
Primary Outcome Measures:
- Composite of all-cause mortality, heart failure hospitalization, and ventricular tachyarrhythmia
Secondary Outcome Measures:
- Peak VO2
- NYHA Class
- Six minute walk distance
- Quality of life
- Echocardiographic measures
|Estimated Enrollment:
|Study Start Date:
|February 1998
|Estimated Study Completion Date:
|August 2001
Patients enrolled received a device with cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT) and defibrillation. Patients were randomized to CRT on or off for up to six months and evaluated for mortality, hospitalization, and functional outcomes including exercise capacity, quality of life, symptomatic status, and echocardiographic analysis.
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|Child, Adult, Senior
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
Inclusion Criteria:
- Symptomatic heart failure
- Left ventricular ejection fraction <= 35%
- QRS width >= 120 ms
- Indicated for an implantable cardioverter defibrillator
Exclusion Criteria:
- Indicated for a pacemaker
- Atrial tachyarrhythmias
Contacts and Locations
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the Contacts provided below. For general information, see Learn About Clinical Studies.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00387803
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00387803
|United States, Minnesota
|Multiple locations
|Saint Paul, Minnesota, United States, 55112
Sponsors and Collaborators
Boston Scientific Corporation
|Principal Investigator:
|Steven Higgins, MD
|Scripps Memorial Hospital
|Principal Investigator:
|Leslie A Saxon, MD
|University of California San Francisco Medical Center
|Principal Investigator:
|John Boehmer, MD
|Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
|Principal Investigator:
|Teresa De Marco, MD
|University of California San Francisco Medical Center
More Information
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on July 28, 2017
Higgins SL, Hummel JD, Niazi IK, Giudici MC, Worley SJ, Saxon LA, Boehmer JP, Higginbotham MB, De Marco T, Foster E, Yong PG. Cardiac resynchronization therapy for the treatment of heart failure in patients with intraventricular conduction delay and malignant ventricular tachyarrhythmias. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2003 Oct 15;42(8):1454-9.
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|NCT00387803 History of Changes
|Other Study ID Numbers:
|Study First Received:
|October 11, 2006
|Last Updated:
|January 23, 2007
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
Heart Failure
Ventricular Fibrillation
Tachycardia, Ventricular
Heart Diseases
Cardiovascular Diseases
Arrhythmias, Cardiac
Pathologic Processes
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on July 28, 2017


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The Manchester City revolution under way at Melbourne Heart has inspired and liberated players as they focus purely on climbing the A-League table.
The feel-good factor brought by City's purchase of the struggling club and drought-ending win against Newcastle Jets in successive days has masked Heart's position at the foot of the table.
Heart, it seems, are playing without the burden of expectation.
Without finals to play for - they sit 12 points behind Adelaide who are sixth with 11 games left - the remaining weeks in Heart's season are all about preparing for the future.
Even if Heart do lose the majority of their matches, the optimism that surrounds City's acquisition of Melbourne's second club is likely to be carried through until season's end in April.
Ahead of the Heart's first home game after the announcement of their new owners, defender Aziz Behich said the players felt that positivity.
"It's a great thing. What better club would you want? One of the biggest clubs in the world to be a part of Melbourne Heart," he said.
"Every player thinks it's a positive move for the club."
That sentiment was echoed by defender Patrick Kisnorbo, who said it was exciting times.
"It is great, not only for the club but for Australian football in general, to have a club like Manchester City invest in our club," he said.
Behich, who is loan from Turkish side Bursaspor, said the uncertainty generated by imminent changes - like name or shirt - weren't on players' minds.
"We're focused on the game - those are just little things for us," he said.
"We've got a job to do and that's to get results on the park like we have the last two weeks and keep the confidence flowing."
Behich might miss the any fruit borne by the revolution as his loan deal expires at the end of the season.
He didn't rule out a longer stay at the Heart but said, as a contracted Bursaspor player, he would sit down with his management group at the end of the season and assess.
The continuation of his good form in Friday night's match against Sydney FC will go a long way to giving him improved options.
Behich said he thought he was "improving with every game" and there was no doubt in his mind the Heart could beat Sydney FC on Friday night, extending their mini-revival.


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The Life and Thought of Lemuel Haynes
Thabiti Anyabwile, Senior Pastor of First Baptist Church of Grand Cayman joins the panel to discuss Lemuel Haynes and black theology. Anyabwile has edited May We Meet in the Heavenly World, a book of Haynes writings which includes a helpful biography. Haynes (1753–1833) was an influential African-American pastor during the American Revolution. He was a devoted Calvinist who argued against slavery through the lens of God's providence. Haynes was a well-known preacher and writer during his lifetime, but unfortunately, many have forgotten him in recent years. Join us for an interesting discussion of the life and thought of Lemuel Haynes.
Anyabwile, Thabiti. The Decline of African American Theology: From Biblical Faith to Cultural Captivity. Downers Grove Ill.: IVP Academic, 2007.
—. The Faithful Preacher: Recapturing the Vision of Three Pioneering African-American Pastors. Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 2006.
Haynes, Lemuel. Black Preacher to White America: The Collected Writings of Lemuel Haynes, 1774–1833. Brooklyn N.Y.: Carlson Pub., 1990.
—. May We Meet in the Heavenly World: The Piety of Lemuel Haynes. Grand Rapids Mich.: Reformation Heritage Books, 2009.
Saillant, John,. Black Puritan, Black Republican the Life and Thought of Lemuel Haynes, 1753–1833. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2003.
Other FormatsCamden Bucey, Jeff Waddington, Josh Walker, Nick Batzig, Thabiti Anyabwile
Christ the Center focuses on Reformed Christian theology. In each episode a group of informed panelists discusses important issues in order to encourage critical thinking and a better understanding of Reformed doctrine with a view toward godly living. Browse more episodes from this program and learn how to subscribe.
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Have a Tax Question? Ask a Tax Expert
The mortgage payment was paid through my own separate account. If I give him all the information and he then files claiming 1/2 of mortgage interest etc, he will get rejected again...correct? There should be no reprecussion with regard to me and the IRS...correct? (I understand he may ask for half of the refund via divorce agreement). My main concern is that I am not in trouble with the IRS.


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MCKEE-L ArchivesArchiver > MCKEE > 2004-08 > 1093308430
Subject: Re: James McKee of Fleming Co., Ky.
Date: 23 Aug 2004 18:47:10 -0600
This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list.
Classification: Query
Message Board URL:
Message Board Post:
John I might have misled you. The photo I have is of William McKee 1783-1872. He was the brother of John O. McKee 1780-1864, not the brother of Andrew McKee.
Do you have the middle name of John O. McKee as being Owings? For two generations plus I have found his descendants continuing the middle name as Owings. This continuation is still going on today. At a McKee family reunion in Fleming Co.,Ky. I encountered a John Owings McKee who gave his son the same middle name. He didn't know why except that his father who had the Owings name said it was very important to perpetuate that middle name.
My e-mail address is . I find it difficult to find the messages on the message board sometimes.
This thread:


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America still needs a free market, pro-life party
Re: "Republicans must part with the religious right," From Readers, Nov. 19
The last thing our vibrant, passionate democracy needs is two liberal parties, with a minimal -- and eventually nonexistent -- contest of ideas. But this is what would happen if the Republican Party took Doug Delmont's advice in the aftermath of the recent presidential election.
The Republican Party must guard against the temptation to indulge in a panicked knee-jerk reaction by jettisoning its noble principles, such as safeguarding free-market economics, religious liberty, traditional marriage, self-reliance and the right to life. Demographic changes or not, these are five crucial principles that lead to a stronger society and ultimately a stronger country.
However, one thing must change as the GOP embarks on the road to 2016: the presidential nomination process. The current practice of very public internecine warfare, with all the party's dirty linen being washed in public, did critical damage in 2012, giving the average swing voter an image of a party at war within itself. It also gave the media and the Obama campaign a large opening to demonize those who forgot Ronald Reagan's maxim that Republicans should not attack fellow Republicans.
The solution is to bring back the proverbial "smoke-filled room" where the party's senior figures can pick a candidate who not only can explain their principles to the general electorate, but who also has the crucial likeability factor so important in a modern democracy where image tends to carry more weight than substance.
John B. Reid
County Dublin, Ireland
Dumping religious right would be certain death for GOP
Re: "Republicans must part with the religious right," From Readers, Nov. 19
Doug Delmont insists that those of us whose religious faith influences our voting choices "[cost] the GOP votes." Yet Evangelical Christians make up a substantial portion of the GOP. To eschew what Delmont and his fellow secularists call the "religious right" would cost the GOP the votes of hundreds of thousands of evangelical Christians, thus ensuring the party's demise.
Delmont claims that "spending and liberty are all that matters now" while simultaneously denying human babies the right to life and the chance to enjoy liberty and the pursuit of happiness. He insists that Christians are "fanatics" who threaten individual rights. Yet our own Founding Fathers recognized the fact that our rights are given to us by our Creator. To deny Him is to deny the very concept of "inalienable" rights.
Secularists who attack God and His just laws view individual rights the same way they view marriage: as mere societal constructs that must be abolished in the false name of progress.
Joe Garber
Keynesian economics is a fairy tale
While there are many idiotic political theories bouncing around Washington like unmanned bumper cars, Keynesian economics -- the belief that making government bigger will subsequently make the overall economy bigger -- is the worst.
Keynesian economics is the most absurd theory every devised by rational man. If it were true, then by merely making one variable common to all others larger, one could cause all other dependent variables to grow larger in unison.
That doesn't happen in real life, which is why Keynesian economics is nothing more than a fairy tale.
Matthew R. Powenski
Buffalo, N.Y.


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by Staff Writers
Pasadena CA (JPL) Oct 05, 2010
After completing its primary mission to map the infrared sky, NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, has reached the expected end of its onboard supply of frozen coolant. Although WISE has 'warmed up,' NASA has decided the mission will still continue.
WISE will now focus on our nearest neighbors - the asteroids and comets traveling together with our solar system's planets around the sun.
"Two of our four infrared detectors still work even at warmer temperatures, so we can use those bands to continue our hunt for asteroids and comets," said Amy Mainzer of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
Mainzer is the principal investigator of the new phase of the mission, now known as the NEOWISE Post-Cryogenic Mission. It takes its name from the acronym for a near-Earth object, NEO, and WISE. A cryogen is a coolant used to make the detectors more sensitive. In the case of WISE, the cryogen was frozen hydrogen.
WISE launched Dec. 14, 2009, from Vandenberg Air Force Station in California aboard a Delta II launch vehicle. Its 40-centimeter (16-inch) infrared telescope scans the skies from an Earth-circling orbit crossing the poles. It has already snapped more than 1.8 million pictures at four infrared wavelengths.
Currently, the survey has covered the sky about one-and-one-half times, producing a vast catalogue containing hundreds of millions of objects, from near-Earth asteroids to cool stars called "brown dwarfs," to distant, luminous galaxies.
To date, WISE has discovered 19 comets and more than 33,500 asteroids, including 120 near-Earth objects, which are those bodies with orbits that pass relatively close to Earth's path around the sun. More discoveries regarding objects outside our solar system, such as the brown dwarfs and luminous galaxies, are expected.
"The science data collected by WISE will be used by the scientific community for decades," said Jaya Bajpayee, the WISE program executive in the Astrophysics Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate, at the agency's headquarters in Washington.
"It will also provide a sky map for future observatories like NASA's James Webb Space Telescope."
The NEOWISE Post-Cryogenic Mission is designed to complete the survey of the solar system and finish the second survey of the rest of the sky at its new warmer temperature of about minus 203 degrees Celsius (minus 334 degrees Fahrenheit) using its two shortest-wavelength detectors. The survey extension will last one to four months, depending on early results.
NEOWISE will also keep observing other targets, such as the closest brown dwarfs to the sun. In addition, data from the second sky scan will help identify objects that have moved in the sky since they were first detected by WISE.
This allows astronomers to pick out the brown dwarfs closest to our sun. The closer the object is, the more it will appear to move from our point of view.
The WISE science team now is analyzing millions of objects captured in the images, including many never seen before. A first batch of WISE data, covering more than half the sky, will be released to the astronomical community in spring 2011, with the rest to follow about one year later.
"WISE has provided a guidebook to the universe with thousands of targets worth viewing with a large telescope," said Edward (Ned) Wright, WISE principal investigator from UCLA. "We're working on figuring out just how far away the brown dwarfs are, and how luminous the galaxies are."
Related Links
Space Telescope News and Technology at Skynightly.com
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Bay Area - Borla Now Available
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Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: Bay Area
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My Ride: 2004 M3 CAB
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Bay Area - Borla Now Available
I bought a new Borla exhaust and used it for 30 days. Its now for sale as I went back to stock.
I love the looks of the Borla but prefer the quieter sound of the stock (I just spent a fortune upgrading my stereo system to have a perfect sound and I don't want any exhaust noises inside my car).
The Borla was installed and removed by professionals. It's in perfect condition and I'm selling it for $650 (first come-first serve)
I'm leaving the exhaust at the car shop that replaced it back with the stock unit, for a week. If you are interested you can stop by the store to check it out or buy it (cash only). They can install it in your car in less that a couple hours.
The contact name and address of the shop is:
W.S. Auto Consulting and Repairs
2875-D South Winchester Blvd
Campbell, CA 95008
408-871-1778 (ask for William)
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John McCain's heroism during the Vietnam War and his efforts in Congress on behalf of Vietnamese refugees is being repaid in a small office wedged between a taekwondo studio and stock trading firm in the back of a strip mall.
The modest setting in the heart of the country's largest Vietnamese immigrant community is ground zero for efforts by Vietnamese-Americans to elect the Republican presidential candidate and, at the same time, increase their political influence.
The Little Saigon Outreach Center is the first presidential campaign office the California Republican Party has funded in this immigrant hub, state party spokesman Hector Barajas said.
It's reflective of the reverence many in the Vietnamese community feel toward McCain.
Joan Le, 25, is a McCain volunteer who has been going door to door for the GOP nominee. The daughter of a South Vietnamese veteran who fought alongside Americans, Le left the communist nation with her family when she was 11. She's now a college student.
"He is the one who helped Vietnamese veterans come to America with their children and wives," Le said. "He made a big difference to our lives."
Truong Quang Si, a veteran of the Vietnam War and Republican loyalist, keeps a 1981 photograph of himself and McCain on his desk.
"This is our duty. This is our chance to pay back our dues to him," he said. "The Vietnamese, when we owe someone a favor, we keep it for our whole life."
A Navy fighter pilot, McCain was shot down in 1967 during a bombing mission over North Vietnam. He suffered serious injuries when his plane crashed and was repeatedly tortured during more than five years as a prisoner of war.
After returning home and gaining election to the U.S. House and then the Senate from Arizona, McCain became a leading voice for Vietnamese-Americans while pushing for normalized U.S. relations with the communist Vietnamese government. He also spearheaded efforts to help refugees' relatives reunite with their families in the United States.
"I came here under his amendment," said Thuy-Nha Tran, 52, who is eager to vote for McCain in her first presidential election since becoming a U.S. citizen last year. "I think he understands our families."
Vietnamese are the sixth-largest immigrant group in the United States. There are 1.1 million Vietnamese-born Americans and one in 10 of them live in Orange County, according to data from the 2007 American Community Survey.
While California is expected to vote for Democrat Barack Obama next month, McCain's history makes him a favorite son in the community known as "Little Saigon," located in the heart of conservative-leaning Orange County.
McCain visited Little Saigon for a fundraiser shortly after announcing his presidential bid last year. He was repaid with strong support from the area in the state GOP presidential primary in February.
A telephone survey in August and September showed 51 percent of Vietnamese-Americans nationwide planned to vote for McCain and 24 percent for Obama, marking a contrast from other Asian-American communities, which all preferred the Democratic candidate. The margin of error for the survey of Vietnamese voters _ part of a broader survey conducted by professors at the University of California, University of Southern California and Rutgers University in New Jersey _ was 3.7 percentage points.
The Vietnamese-American community is becoming more politically active. In Orange County, a group of Republican officials led by Assemblyman Van Tran, R-Costa Mesa, opened the Little Saigon Outreach Office last year to ramp up voter registration and community services, such as help filling out forms to start a business.
Tran, a longtime McCain supporter and the first Vietnamese-American elected to the state Legislature, said it's logical for Republicans to fund the office in Little Saigon during the presidential campaign since voters there helped McCain in the primary.
But the California GOP-funded voter registration drives and phone banks aren't just about helping McCain. They're about harnessing Vietnamese-American enthusiasm for the candidate in the hopes the party can lure younger voters who grew up in the United States, are less focused on fighting communism and more likely than their parents to register as independents or Democrats.
"It is a great emerging community and an emerging community in the electoral process," Barajas said "One of the important things for us as we go not just into this election cycle but the next cycle is to start building coalition groups, to start building these networks."
In the two cities surrounding Little Saigon, Vietnamese-Americans make up 27 percent and 37 percent of the electorate, according to the Asian Pacific American Legal Center of Southern California, and have helped elect a flurry of Vietnamese-American candidates to local office. Last year's contentious race for an open seat on the Orange County Board of Supervisors came down to a nail-biting battle between two young Vietnamese-American Republicans.
Republican politicians say Little Saigon is critical due to the growth of the Latino population in the dense, urban center of the county and the election of Latino Democrats from the area to state and national office.
"There's definitely a realization that central Orange County is the battleground," Van Tran said. "It is the proverbial political doughnut hole."


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Virginia triathlon lawyer Doug Landau was a featured speaker during the educational program at last weekend's Washington DC Tri-Mania Summit and Expo. This multisport expo was held at Georgetown Prep School, where more than 2000 athletes, over 60 exhibitors, and Ironman world champion triathlete couple Mirinda Carfrae and Timothy O'Donnell kicked off the DC triathlon season together.
Landau Teaches Athletes How to Protect Themselves
Abrams Landau Ltd. Exhibitor at Expo


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The western border with Egypt has now become the Israel Defense Forces' most turbulent and dangerous front, requiring the deployment of the most elite units.
We need to become accustomed to the new reality that our western border has become a war zone. We still maintain (cold) peace with Egypt, but there is an abyss of hate and terror growing between us and them.
The Israel Defense Forces cannot yet point with any certainty to the party behind Monday's border attack, in which terrorists fired at Israeli contract workers building the border fence, killing one of them.
The general direction is obvious — Gaza — but which group gave the order is not yet clear. Not that it matters too much: All the organizations in the Gaza Strip are up to their necks in terror, in Sinai and from Sinai. Some supply rockets (Hamas) and others supply terrorists (Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees). These groups are joined by global jihad members looking for action and Sinai Bedouin looking for cash — all the ingredients required for a massive border clash.


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Mass Effect - Creating Commander Shepard @ IGN
Creating Commander Shepard is the title of an interview at IGN with BioWare's Casey Hudson that looks at the process and effects of character creation in Mass Effect:
IGN: Character customization is nothing new in games. But usually it's pretty artificial. How much will Mass Effect's character creation affect gameplay and story?
Casey Hudson: The main thing that sets Mass Effect apart from the conventional game experience is that everything is centered on your character and the choices you make. That's something you hear a lot these days, but we've gone to great lengths to ensure that the promise of choice and consequence is fulfilled for players of Mass Effect. You won't be making superficial choices along a pre-determined path. In Mass Effect, you literally stand in the middle of a non-linear galaxy of story elements, which you can unfold however you like. And at any point in the game, you can be wearing your choice of armor, carry your choice of weapons, have your choice of squadmembers at your side, and all of their abilities (and yours) will be ones you've chosen to develop throughout the game. Further, the thing that you're doing in that moment will likely be a story development that resulted directly from a major decision that you made earlier.
Character creation is where you create the basis for all of that choice. You are deciding what kind of a person your character will be, what their potential capabilities will be in certain areas, and how you'd like your reputation to precede you. It's the nature of meaningful choice throughout the game that gives real value and impact to your choices in character creation.
Information aboutMass Effect
SP/MP: Single + MP
Setting: Sci-Fi
Genre: Shooter-RPG
Platform: Xbox 360
Release: Released


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This week federal Treasurer
It is the question facing every Australian as we become increasingly interdependent – economically, culturally and politically – with our Asian neighbours. But as Australia balances its policy settings around security, trade, economics and more, it is critical that the nation fully appreciates the huge growth of innovation and research in the modern Chinese economy.
Innovation is the engine room of the new China, which is no longer simply the world's manufacturing hub. It is now a world leader in research and development, competing against global rivals in terms of new patent applications and new technologies.
Incredibly, China became the world's top patent-filer for the first time in 2011 – ahead of the United States and Japan. Huawei Technologies, a company unknown to most Australians, became the world's No. 1 company for new patent applications in 2008 and has been in the global top five for the past four years. And Huawei is not alone.
While China has much to gain from Australian R&D, it is equally true that Australia has much to gain from China's innovation – and much to lose from missing out on the innovation China has to offer.
As the Treasurer rightly noted in his speech, we are at a "contemporary defining moment" at the beginning of the Asian Century.
To define Australia's relationship with China as one based predominantly on resource exports would be to our nation's great and lasting detriment. Opening up our respective economies to the free flow of new ideas, new technologies and new innovation would establish an unshakable foundation for growth.
As Australia's economic prosperity becomes reliant on China's rise, policymakers have to adjust to this new era of the modern China – the China that leads the world in wind energy, solar energy and new IT applications. This will take time as we try to cope with the size and pace of China's evolution.
But it would be a serious mistake indeed to think of China as simply a buyer of raw materials and a maker of goods.
It is beyond doubt that robust sales of natural resources to China have provided Australia with a solid foundation during the global downturn of the past three years.
However, if the International Monetary Fund is correct and the world is teetering on the brink of a further recession, then it is unarguable that Australia's best interests will be served by a more dynamic and more open trade and investment relationship with China.
In short, we need to take our relationship with China to the next level and in doing so take a less sceptical view of Chinese participation in Australia.
For Australia to fully capitalise on the unprecedented opportunities offered by a stronger economic relationship with China, policymakers must incorporate into their thinking what China can bring to Australia. The investment China has made in R&D has resulted in a dramatic growth in that nation's ability to innovate and produce high-end specialised equipment and products.
Huawei, for example, invests 10 per cent of its annual revenues back into R&D, a sum of more than $US3 billion ($2.9 billion) every year. That figure alone equates to around 10 per cent of Australia's total annual spend on R&D.
Yet despite the overwhelmingly positive role played by private companies like Huawei in the Australian community, some still view Chinese participation with scepticism – or even actively discourage it. I would argue that such a strategy puts more than just thousands of local jobs at risk – it puts the future of Australia's own economy at risk.
Policymakers are right to question the potential security implications of foreign investment from any nation, and China should be no different.
However, if Australia falls for a "one size fits all" policy approach, it demonstrates a lack of understanding of what modern China offers to the Australian economy.
Huawei's submission to the "Australia in the Asian Century" white paper makes it clear that we have much to benefit from China's innovation. "Barriers, placed through restrictive market and trade regulations or practices, reduce opportunities to gain maximum advantage of technologies and their benefits," it notes.
Once the headlines have faded and the media cycle has moved on, Huawei is hopeful there will still be an opportunity to play a future role in Australia's national broadband network. The NBN will take many years to deploy, and in the meantime we are committed to growing our business and delivering the world's best technology to our customers and the Australian population.
If we are to capitalise fully on the benefits of the Asian Century, we need to fully embrace Chinese innovation and R&D in the same way we would any other country. To do anything else would risk not being "on the right side of history".
The Australian Financial Review


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Why so Civil? The French Elections as Seen by "Une Américaine"
At times I wasn't sure if I was watching a presidential campaign or a game show. With all due respect to French television, though, the digitalized image of the Palais de l'Élysée adorning the set of the Hollande-Sarkozy debate did seem like something CNN would do in a desperate, gimmicky move for better ratings. François Hollande, the portly, basset-hound-eyed politician from south-central Corrèze sat across from the Rolex-wearing, model-espousing incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy (appropriately nicknamed "bling[Read More…]


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email: firstname.lastname@example.com
"Pueblo Nights" - by Robin Teller - Marie K. Velardez - Isleta Pueblo, NM
The Pueblo Nights theme came to me on a night when I was at a loss for inspiration. Sitting outside, praying, watching an unbelievably breath taking sunset, my attention was captured by a sky of pink, gold, and apricot that melted away into turquoise, then a blue blanket of color which ever so smoothly turned darker blue into night. As the stars began to pop into twinkles of lights, big and small, my imagination was kicked into play. "Pueblo Nights" represents my offering to the creator as an expression of my love of children and joy for the blessings of daily life.
Symbolic of the female, the central figure represents our spiritual mother from which we draw strength, love and support for the things we do. Her arms are supporting the children in the bowl as they offer the stars to the heavens. She quietly tells the story of the night and all the while as they work there is soft, gentle drum and rattle music for the heart and soul.
Have you ever looked in a child's eyes? Each child no matter what their circumstances always manages to generate that light of hope and imagination,through their love of life. With this thought, she holds a bowl of life on her lap where the smallest child is stirring together the ingredients of love, hope, and inspiration to create the brilliant stars above.
When the stars are made they are passed down directly to be cleaned in the water bowl being held up by one child at her left foot. The stars are washed and passed to the child behind them to be shined to perfection.
The child with the blanket of stars passes the bright finished stars to the one with the blanket who places them on the blanket, prays and sends them out in flight to find their rightful places. The other child on the left interior wall of the shawl chooses to place them very carefully instead.The two on the right arm area are seeking approval on their accomplishments and asking her to kiss them.
The child supporting the wash bowl on its back is representative of the burden we all carry on our struggles of daily life and the child kneeling on her left arm is looking/praying to the heavens for answers and guidance. The shawl is painted with the night sky in Isleta Pueblo. The dark, star studded sky and hills receive a graceful kiss if light from the moon the mother and children gaze at the mystery and beauty. Everyone counts and everyone has a purpose.
Natural grays and browns combined with accent necklaces made of tiny bits of turquoise are the hallmarks of pottery figurines made by the Teller family. Stella Teller's recipe for clay preparation, polishing, and painting is punctuated with liberal amounts of time. There are no shortcuts. Her celerity and dexterity are aptly demonstrated in all of her pottery creations.
The tools that Stella uses do not come from a craft store. She once heated a kitchen knife on the stove to bend into shape for scraping. She uses a mellon baller for carving and a needle for fine lines.
Stella Teller has earned recognition for the excellence of her pottery creations in numerous juried art shows and by museums. The largest storyteller made by Stella can be seen in the permanent art collection at the Albuquerque International Airport. Closer to Chicago, her work can be seen at the Schingothie Center in Aurora and at the Mitchell Indian Museum in Evanston. One of Stella's effigy Turtle Jars is among a traveling collection of the Smithsonian Institution which has been on tour for nearly 6 years.
Stella does not take short cuts to streamline the process of clay preparation, polishing or painting. She has developed seven standard slips for use on her pottery with color variations achieved by diluting or mixing the elements of clay, mineral and vegetal matter to achieve the right hue. Her great-grandmother's river stone is used to rub against the highly refined slip and oils to create a smooth, shinny finish. Traditional firing of pots is done outside with wood and cow dung.
Stella has encouraged her four daughters to express their own passions and feelings through clay and collectors should take note that Stella and her daughters are presently the only Isleta Pueblo potters making storytellers from scratch. The quality and uniqueness of their work can be seen in their figures of humans, bears, turtles, mudheads, and other animal. Demand for the Teller family pottery is high because of its intrinsic beauty and the recognition of its premier quality and exceptional diversity of design.


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Hotel Casa De Nelly Hotel
Vereda la Estrella, San Agustin, Colombia
- HostelBookers
- Hotels
- colombia hotels
- Hotels in san-agustin
- Hotel Casa De Nelly
- Hotel Casa De Nelly Map
Atmosphere 96%
Cleanliness 96%
Facilities 90%
Location 86%
Safety 93%
Staff 97%
Value 98%
- Free Wi-Fi
- 24 Hour Reception
- Book Exchange
- Cable TV
- Café
- DVDs
- Free Parking
- Hot Showers
- Laundry Facilities
- Luggage Storage
- Outdoor Terrace
- Parking
- Restaurant
- Tours/Travel Desk
- WiFi
Check-in / Check-out
Earliest check-in: 00:00
Latest Check-out: 11:00
- No Curfew
Group booking?
Group of 15 or more traveling to San Agustin?
Map and Directions
From the Main Square in San Agustin, you need to go down the road to the left of the church until you meet a crossroads. At the crossroads, you need to take a left which curves round past a shop on the right and the follow the dirt road along for a further ten minutes.
There is a turn off on the left with a sign post for the Casa de Nelly. From here it's a steep climb until the gate on the left.
Taxis from the town will cost you around 5,000 Pesos.


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Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Pathway Genomics Scores Backing, Launches Genetic Testing Service
San Diego-based Pathway Genomics said this morning that it has launched a new, personal genomics testing startup which will offer affordable genetic tests to help consumers identify their risks for diseases. The firm also said it has scored high profile venture backing from The Founders Fund, Edelson Technology Partners, and Western Technology Investment, although it did not disclose any details of that funding. Pathway said it will offer genetic tests for under $250, which will provide an analysis of an individual's risk for disease, as well as information on their maternal and paternal ancestry. The firm said it is certified by the CLIA (Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments) for its own onsite lab. The firm was founded by Jim Plante, who the firm said has founded four venture backed technology companies.


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Q1 Chairman: Ladies and gentlemen, thank
you for your attendance today. Can I, as always, begin by asking
you to introduce yourselves for the record?
Ms Veale: Thank you very much
indeed for inviting us. My name is Sarah Veale and I am Head of
Equality and Employment Rights at the TUC. Could I also just say
to the Committee that with a different hat on (which I am not
wearing today) I am also a member of the Acas Council.
Mr Nunn: I am Simon Nunn. I am
Deputy Head of Research at the Transport and General Workers'
Q2 Chairman: There is a universal
rule of politics that when everyone agrees, they are wrongapart
from the Dangerous Dogs Act! All the evidence we have received
today is universal in its praise and support for the work of Acas.
Ms Veale: I am not sure I agree
with the political analysis of the uselessness or the futility
of agreements. I think that is an indication that Acas is doing
an extremely good job. After all, the whole purpose of Acas is
to work with, if you like, the two sides of industry and to bring
them together when there are problems. If both sides of industry
are saying that Acas is doing a very good job I would defy anyone
else, who has the same depth of knowledge of what Acas does, to
gainsay that. I think it is something very positive and I am very
glad to see it.
Chairman: I am never frightened of consensus!
Q3 Mr Hoyle: As the Chairman has
already stated, the popularity of Acas and everything says what
an excellent service; but are you worried that the Chancellor
is looking to claim monies back in a different way? The Comprehensive
Spending Review is being looked at and one of the principles will
be about how the DTI spends money but also the money it puts into
Acas, does it worry you?
Ms Veale: It certainly does worry
us. I think the trouble with Comprehensive Spending Reviews is
that they are comprehensive and go across the whole of Government;
but because the Government is compartmentalised it means that
each government department then has a limited sphere within which
it is operating. It means that the DTI is looking at Acas and
the Equal Opportunities Commission and its own work but not in
comparison to other activities taking place in other departments;
which means if the DTI has to cut by a particular proportion that
can have a particular effect on the organisation it sponsors.
If you looked at Acas compared to bodies sponsored by other departments
I think you would find it would do proportionately less well,
which is very unfair on the organisation. In a word, yes, we are
very concerned about the level of cuts that Acas has been required
to make in its services.
Q4 Mr Hoyle: Do you think the actual
good name of Acas should overcome that and should be enough to
carry it through the DTI and the Spending Review?
Ms Veale: It is a tall order.
I very much hope so, and it has been very difficult for Acas to
decide where to make the cuts. Obviously the worry is that the
cuts would fall on frontline services because of the magnitude
of them. I think it is very difficult to make all the cuts in
the back room, as it were, even if you were able to sustain an
argument that that was not going to do any damage. I think where
we feel things are at the sharp end, as it were, we are okay at
the moment but there is some worry about whether the impact will
be on frontline conciliation services and collective dispute resolution,
which of course is hugely important to the TUC.
Mr Nunn: I back up what Sarah
has said absolutely. As you say, we seem to have a consensus here
that Acas do their job well. As I pointed out in our submission,
much of the work that Acas does goes unsung because it goes on
behind the scenes; it goes on behind closed doors in difficult
negotiations. To the point that it has become such a part and
parcel of British industrial relations, when proposals are made
to make 25% cuts in Acas (which are going through at the moment,
which will probably mean 25% cuts in Acas staff) we do not know
yet what that impact will be because this is a process that is
ongoing; but the danger always in these cases is when voluntary
severance schemes are put into place the people with the most
experience tend to be lost from the organisation and that is of
particular concern to us as a union.
Q5 Chairman: This resource question
obviously lies at the heart of our inquiry today. Should Acas
not be concentrating on its core work, its original work, rather
than going into other areas, for example the equality and diversity
Ms Veale: It is a very good question,
but I think what Acas is doing on equality and diversity actually
shows that it has a particular role that differentiates itself
from, say, the Equality Commission and from other support services
that exist in that area. The law is very complex on discrimination
but it is not necessarily assistance with legal problems that
employers are asking for and the unions are asking for. What they
want is some help with dealing with a new diverse workforce and
problems and tensions between different groups of workers and
so on which cannot be covered adequately.
Q6 Chairman: You are saying it is
part of the core work, in a sense. We will ask you more questions
about equality and diversity.
Ms Veale: Yes, I think it is part
of the core work and something we would not want to see Acas having
to stop doing.
Q7 Chairman: One of the things which
struck me in the evidence is the emphasis that the business witnesses
have given us in their evidence as to work with small-and medium-sized
companies. I suppose Acas is seen as a relic of the great corporate
era of the 1970s. In fact, it seems its real value is often with
the SMEs. Is that your understanding as well?
Ms Veale: I think it has a different
role in relation to larger companies and in relation to SMEs.
There has been a huge growth in the number of SMEs. Larger companies
tend to have their own system up and running with personnel departments;
but what larger companies get involved in, which smaller ones
do not of course, is collective disputes. That kind of systemic
problem exists where Acas comes in and can help out where deadlock
has been reached and it is impossible to find a solution without
getting a third party in. I think that is a very different kind
of work than the work that it does with smaller and medium sized
enterprises, which are usually bereft of any type of personnel
management system and struggle. It shows how Acas has been flexible
and has accommodated the very different labour market that we
now have and has changed itself to suit the circumstances in which
it operates.
Q8 Mr Weir: In answer to an earlier
question you talked about Acas bringing both sides of industry
together. In your evidence you talk about the reduction in collective
bargaining and more individual employment rights. Why do you think
you need Acas to resolve individual employment rights rather than
collective rights which is its traditional role?
Ms Veale: It can do both; they
are not mutually exclusive. There is less collective bargaining
activity than there wasfar, far less. If you look at employment
relations over the last 20 years, we have generally moved away
from a system where most pay determination was done through national
collective agreements and regional collective agreements to a
system where people actually tend to negotiate their own working
conditions. The downside of that is there might be a reduction
of trade union activity. It means because there is now a much
better floor of basic employment rights that when things go wrong
people want those rights to be recognised and their tendency is
to go straight off to litigatewhich nobody wants and is
in nobody's interestsand that is why Acas has built up
a very impressive portfolio in terms of individual conciliation,
and helping employers as well to set up systems that manage disputes
away from the courts; I think that is one of the chief values.
Q9 Mr Weir: Given there has been
a movement away from collective rights towards individual rights,
why do you think we should have a public body funded by the taxpayer
to deal with these disputes?
Ms Veale: If all employers were
perfect then we would not need anybody reallytrade unions,
Acas the lotbut unfortunately mistakes do get made. Yes,
ultimately in capitalism it is down to the two parties to resolve
those, that is not really going to help anyone. Quite often the
problem is actually a symptom of a much deeper issue in the workplace
which needs to be put right otherwise the problem keeps on popping
up with other individuals. I think it is not simply a question
of cutting off that dispute and everything is all right. It is
a question of having an organisation that can say to the employer,
"That went wrong. We can try and sort that out. It would
have been better if you'd had a system in place that would not
have allowed this to occur in the first place".
Q10 Mr Weir: My understanding of
how Acas works in these individual disputes is that when an employee
takes the case to an employment tribunal it is then referred to
Acas for voluntary mitigation. Do you think there is a case for
perhaps giving Acas a role prior to getting to the stage of an
employment tribunal? When employment tribunals were originally
set up the idea was that they would be low cost and less bureaucratic
than the courts; that does not seem to have worked out and many
people have the same problems as they would with the courts. I
wonder if Acas has a role as a mediator before it gets to a lengthy
employment tribunal. Do you see that as a way it could develop
in the future?
Ms Veale: It is a slightly difficult
question for the TUC because my answer ideally would be that there
should be trade unions in there mediating, sorting out and regulating
the relationship between the employer and the employees. We sadly
accept the fact that a lot of workplaces, especially the smaller
ones, do not have trade unions. The problems do not go away; they
need to be sorted out; and a lot of the time you really do benefit
from a third party intervening. Yes, to answer your question,
there is more of a proactive role for Acas on request to go in
and help employers even if they have not got any disputes bubbling
around at that particular point in time. Within the limited resources
we talked about, that would have to be balanced against the other
work that gets done. Sadly, in the absence of universal collective
bargaining coverage, there probably is an argument for having
Mr Nunn: We ask in our submission
that the Acas duty to promote collective bargaining be returned;
and the reason why we do that is because
Q11 Chairman: We will ask about collective
bargaining later on.
Mr Nunn: In relation to your question,
yes, there has been an explosion of individualised cases, partly
as a consequence of the reduction in collective bargaining. Whether
there is role that Acas can play in terms of intervening prior
to cases getting to tribunal, yes, of course there is. In some
senses what you are saying is that Acas's role increases rather
than decreases as a result of that.
Q12 Mr Weir: Indeed, but the point
I was making was that before Acas becomes involved the employee
and employer have got to the stage of a breakdown and gone to
an employment tribunal. Now that starts a process where lawyers
become involved and both sides often become very legalistic and
that was not the intention of tribunals to happen. That is why
we talk about, for example, reform of divorce law, alternative
dispute resolution. I just wonder if there is a case for some
sort of binding resolution by Acas at an earlier stage before
it gets to the adversarial stage of the tribunal?
Ms Veale: You do get into some
legal difficulties then because people do have rights. Acas can
already conciliate and reach agreements that are legally binding
on parties. As you say, that is normally only triggered when there
is an ET1 put in. In a sense, I do not think you can get round
that because the problem does not lie with how Acas operates;
it lies with the tribunal system which requires people to put
in a form very, very quickly or they lose the right to do so.
In a sense I suppose it is a trigger. It is probably the best
thing you are going to get unless Acas is going to be given the
resources to spend a lot of its time out there troubleshooting
and providing a consultancy service.
Q13 Judy Mallaber: What is the TUC's
view of the fixed periods for conciliation which were introduced
in 2004? Some witnesses, such as the CBI, reckon that is too short
for meaningful discussion and want that to be reviewed.
Ms Veale: I have to say, we would
be 100% with the CBI on that. We said when the consultation took
place, before the fixed periods came in, that we had reservations
about them. Those reservations have been borne out by our people
as well. They are saying it is much too short and does not give
you adequate time to develop a consensus and an agreement; and
it just shuts down before you have got to where you need to get.
Q14 Judy Mallaber: Do you think it
is resulting in a greater number of cases ending up going to a
tribunal hearing?
Ms Veale: It is too early to tell.
It is quite difficult to draw the relationship between the two.
I would certainly agree there needs to be a review done to see
if that is the effect. We suspect that it probably is. The trouble
is you have also got playing in the new dispute resolution procedures
and the other requirements therein, which again have distorted
the applications to tribunals because lots of applications are
going in and bouncing back because they have not done the procedures
properly. It is a bit hard to tell where the problems are coming
fromwhether it is the fixed term conciliation or whether
it is other aspects of these dispute resolution procedures. We
think the whole thing needs to be reviewed, because our real fear
is that cases are not going to tribunals when they should be but,
on the other hand, also are not being conciliated when they could
have been. We seem to have a bit of a dog's breakfast at the moment.
Q15 Judy Mallaber: I can see you
arguing that there is not enough time for the conciliation process
and sorting everything out, but could it not also be argued that
if you have a longer period for conciliation that both sides will
still practise brinkmanship and it will be the twentieth week
rather than the seventh or fourteenth?
Ms Veale: Yes. There is a problem
that the psychology of disputes is that people will leave things
to the last possible moment, and I think that tendency is unavoidable
if you had a one week or a six year period. Dare I insult any
lawyers present, but where there are lawyers around quite often
the parties play the whole thing out as long as they possibly
can and then do the settlement at the tribunal door. I understand
the intention of the Government to avoid that, but I am not sure
that this has done that at all. I am not sure you could do it
through these sorts of means.
Q16 Chairman: You used the phrase
of cases `bouncing back': could you expand on that?
Ms Veale: People think they have
a good case which they put into the tribunal, whatever it is on
(discrimination or whatever) and because they now have to go through
statutory procedure in the workplace, if there is no evidence
that they have gone through that properly or there is some defect
in the way in which they wrote the letter to the employer complaining
about whatever had gone wrong, the tribunal has to throw it back
and say, "You haven't completed form [whatever it is] under
Schedule 1. You'll have to do that before you proceed with this
claim". We are picking up anecdotal evidence that some of
our members, even people with trade union offices backing them,
and certainly in the unorganised part of the workforce, are simply
losing the will to live and saying, "I really, honestly can't
go through all this any more. It's only a £400 claim for
an unlawful deduction [or something]". There is a real worry
that access to justice is being denied and you are not sorting
out workplace problems but simply displacing them. I am sorry,
it is a slightly tangential issue, but it does bear on what Acas
Q17 Mr Binley: I hope you do not
rule me out of order, but the CAB plays a part in reconciliation
before Acas comes in very often, and it is almost a part of Acas
in that respect. Can I ask if you are generally happy from a TUC
point of view with the role that CAB plays? Do you feel that they
get enough training in this respect and enough support? Do you
think that the sort of cutbacks we are seeing at the moment will
impact upon that preliminary work which if done well is so important
to good resolution but if done badly can mess the whole thing
up for months to come?
Ms Veale: I have to be careful
what I say about the CAB because they are staffed by volunteers
and they are a fantastic organisation. I think one of their weaknesses,
and this shows up in a piece of research work they did themselves,
is that they do lack people who have the kind of knowledge that
you need of employment relations and complex discrimination and
employment law. Therefore, I think they have been quite heavily
reliant on help from Acas locally within regions to assist them
in doing their very valuable job. The trouble with cuts with one
organisation that works well with others is that it is going to
have a ripple effect. I think that is going to be quite damaging
and difficult for the CAB, who themselves are not exactly generously
funded and sometimes struggle to deal with these difficult problems.
Q18 Mr Clapham: A little earlier
we were talking about the enormous change which has taken place
in the structure of British industry. We see many more smalland
mediumsized enterprises today. Some years ago Acas used
to have the duty to promote the extension of collective bargaining,
and in fact Simon Nunn referred to this a little earlier. Does
the TUC think that Acas, in the changed situation in British industry,
should actually have the duty to promote the extension of collective
Ms Veale: If I could start and
then perhaps Simon may want to come in on this. The short answer
is, yes, we do. You can get party political about this but I think
anyone would agree that it is obvious one of the costs of taking
steps to reduce the powers of trade unions, the effectiveness
of trade unions, the ability of trade unions to bargain freely,
is that people have to go somewhere else. In a democracy they
have to have the right to exercise a growing number of individual
rights. Our view is that collective bargaining is the most efficient
and best way of resolving a lot of problems that arise from disputes
over people's individual rights. Just one example: if you look
at equal pay, which is at the moment generating huge numbers of
individual claims and causing a lot of work for Acas and the tribunals,
if you have a trade union in there, particularly a recognised
trade union, negotiating on equal pay is part of what they do.
You can solve a problem that affects 3,500 employees through one
set of negotiations. There are huge economies of scale if you
have a successful collective bargaining arrangement. I would add
the Vic Feather comment that collective bargaining is like marital
relations, it is best done consensually. Nobody is arguing for
a return to forcing trade unions on anybody. Where the employer
and the union could be persuaded to have workable recognition
agreements, there clearly are huge economies of scale. For that
reason, we feel that Acas ought to have as part of its duty a
remit to promote collective bargaining, obviously where that is
appropriate and where it is going to work effectively.
Mr Nunn: We had a reference earlier
to whether Acas was a relic from the 1970s; the 1970s are always
discussed when it comes to discussing industrial relation matters
now. Acas originally in the 1970s was set up as part of the mechanism
to improve industrial relations in Britain in response to a breakdown
in industrial relations. Our former General Secretary Jack Jones
was very instrumental in promoting the idea of a conciliation
service. In terms of us asking for a duty to promote collective
bargaining, I would back up what Sarah says. In the modern environment
collective bargaining does not necessarily mean a return to the
1970s. If you look at some countries in Europe, particularly Scandinavian
countries which have very high levels of collective bargaining,
you will find very high levels of productivity. We would look
at coordinated bargaining across the sectors of the economy as
mechanisms to coordinate issues of training, skills and pensions
as well, which is obviously a major issue for many workers.
Q19 Chairman: There are two separate
issues here: one is, is collective bargaining a good thing; and,
if it is a good thing, who should promote it? The question I would
like you to focus on, on the merits of collective bargaining,
is: assuming that collective bargaining is a good thing, is it
right that Acas should promote that; or should it be other people
promoting the merits of collective bargaining? Is there a risk
of Acas's impartiality being prejudiced if it is the body
charged with promoting collective bargaining?
Ms Veale: That politicises employment
relations really, does it not? I would argue that you should try
to depoliticise it. In that case it is quite sensible for Acas
to have a role in promoting it where appropriate. In a large company
in particular, if there are trade unions with substantial numbers
of members, it would seem absurd if Acas did not try and help
the employer and the union to reach some sort of acceptable recognition
agreement; otherwise you are going to end up advising the employer
how to deal with a group of fairly dissatisfied employees who
want to have a collective voice but are being denied it. Where
appropriate Acas should be able to promote collective bargaining;
not to force it as a philosophy down everyone's throatno-one
is suggesting that.


text:
Author Jennifer Hubbard wrote recently about one of the most difficult parts of writing a novel:
There comes a point in the writing of every book where I become sick of the book.
Actually, that's a lie. There's usually more than one such point per book, and they usually come near the end of a round of revisions. Come to think of it, it happened with my short stories, too. That's how I knew I was done: when I could think of nothing else to do to the story, and I had been through every word of it so many times that the words were in danger of stale meaninglessness.
The best way to deal with revision fatigue is to trust in your heart that it's a very useful and necessary feeling: what better time to turn a critical eye on your book than when you think it is an affront to humanity?
The good news is, as Jennifer says, it means you're almost done (at least for now). The danger is getting discouraged by your fatigue and just calling your work finished and turning it in before you've given yourself some time to utilize that fatigue. It can be demoralizing, after all that time and effort, to revisit your work and be unsure of what it was all for.
Just know that the feeling will pass and instead let yourself simmer in it for a while. Power through and keep working. You'll be glad you did later.
What about you? Do you experience revision fatigue? And how do you deal with it?
Art: First World War US propaganda poster by James Montgomery Flag


text:
When Ellen's friend Reese was here, we found out some fun facts about the starlet. See if there are any you didn't know!
- Reese was born in Metairie, Louisiana -- the same town as Ellen!
- She has many animals, including three dogs, two pigs, three goats, one horse, two miniature donkeys, and 20 chickens.
- She planned on going into medicine like her parents, but also told the girls in her schoolyard that she was going to be the next Dolly Parton.
- She was a cheerleader.
- Reese was nicknamed "Little Miss Type A" by her parents.