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The warmongers in Washington are not doing very well.
France, China, and Russia – all veto-wielding members of the Security Council – along with Germany are opposed to war, their spines strengthened by the massive peace demonstrations of Feb. 15-16. As things look now, a veto may well be unnecessary because the United States will be hard-pressed to get the required 9 affirmative votes for war in the Council, as the three African members of the Council have already lined up with France.
Security Council approval is not just a formality. It provides the cover which may be necessary for various nations to support the U.S. war.
In Italy, right-wing Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi – facing overwhelmingly anti-war public opinion, massive demonstrations, and the threat of a general strike from the nation's largest trade union federation – has declared that he wants Security Council authorization.
In Spain, Prime Minister Jose Maria Anzar's party trails the Socialists in opinion polls for the first time in three years, and he too has now called for Security Council authorization.
Most critically, Britain's Tony Blair — Bush's most craven supporter – faces a population heavily anti-war, the largest political demonstration in his country's history, and revolt in his own party. In the words of one expert at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies, Blair "desperately needs UN backing."
The problem for the Bush administration is that without Security Council authorization the United States may not have any significant allies, which in turn may make war politically infeasible. Polls still show a majority of Americans opposed to any unilateral U.S. attack. Despite determined police obstruction the turnout in New York City on February 15 was truly massive, and demonstrations nationwide showed the breadth of the opposition.
Anti-war resolutions have been passed by cities and towns across the country – and not just in Berkeley, Ann Arbor, and Cambridge, but in Atlanta, Austin, Baltimore, Boulder, Chicago, Cleveland, Des Moines, Detroit, Gary, Jersey City, Milwaukee, New Haven, Newark, Paterson, Philadelphia, Providence, San Francisco, Santa Fe, Seattle, Syracuse, and Washington DC., among others.
So Bush urgently needs a UN resolution and he needs it soon – too much delay will interfere with the Pentagon's timetable and allow opposition to grow even stronger.
Secretary of State Colin Powell's previous effort to sway the Security Council was unsuccessful. His claims of an Iraqi-Al Qaeda connection convinced no one (the alleged Al Qaeda chemical weapons site in Iraq was disputed by Kurdish officials, reporters on the scene, and plain common sense: would Washington really have permitted such a facility to remain in the zone controlled not by Saddam Hussein, but by the Kurds?). His visual presentation consisted of artists' drawings (a gimmick pioneered by the Reagan Pentagon, imagining Soviet weapons systems that didn't exist) and photographs that UN weapons inspector Hans Blix insisted were open to multiple interpretations.
The Bush administration has one final hope for getting a Security Council resolution: Iraqi refusal to comply with explicit demands from the weapons inspectors.
Three such demands are in play. One is the insistence that Iraq allow surveillance overflights by U-2 planes and other aircraft. The problem here is that these flights occur at the same time that U.S. and British warplanes are flying over Iraq, with no authorization from the Security Council; Iraq occasionally targets these warplanes and the warplanes routinely bomb Iraqi targets.
In such a situation, Iraq would either have to give the U.S.-U.K. warplanes free rein or else risk hitting one of the U-2s. Nevertheless, it seems as if Iraq has acceded to this demand, depriving Washington of an excuse for war. A second demand is that Baghdad permit Iraqi scientists to be interviewed without handlers present and without tape-recording. It seems as if Iraqi concessions will be forthcoming on this point as well. The third demand, however, is likely to be harder to resolve. According to the terms of Security Council resolution 687 from 1991 – the resolution that called for the elimination of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction – Iraq was banned from possessing any missiles with a range greater than 150 kilometers (93.2 miles). The logic here was that Iraq was entitled to maintain weapons for self-defense, but not weapons that could strike as far as Israel, as had occurred during the 1991 Gulf War. Now, however, the weapons inspectors have reported that an Iraqi missile, the al-Samoud 2, exceeds the permitted range. Bush administration officials and its foreign mouthpieces have maintained that the excess range of the al-Samoud missile represents – in various Blair formulations — a "serious breach," "a significant breach," "a very serious breach." However, the extra range is of virtually no military consequence. Instead of 150 kilometers, the missiles could travel 180 kilometers – hundreds of kilometers short of being able to hit Israel. The editor of Jane's Missiles and Rockets has stated that firing the missiles past their allowed range offered Iraq little military advantage. And the Washington Post noted that "U.N. diplomats and missile experts maintain that the current ranges of Iraq's missiles do not significantly alter the military balance in the region."
Moreover, the Iraqis argue that the reason why some test flights of the al-Samoud have exceeded 150 kilometers is because the missiles were not weighed down by a guidance system; when normally configured, they maintain, the range is within prescribed limits.
Those eager for war have argued that the excess range, even if militarily insignificant, is – in the words of Australian Prime Minister John Howard — "further evidence of a long pattern of deceit and evasion and trickery," just "another example of Iraq's refusals to abide by the decisions" of the Security Council." But in fact, the information on the test flights was provided by Iraq in October 2002 and again in its 12,000 page declaration of Dec. 7, 2002. So, far from showing Iraqi deceit and deception, the al-Samoud is an example of Iraq offering information to the inspectors.
Nevertheless, the real controversy involves what is to happen to the missiles now. On February 21, Blix sent a letter to Iraq demanding that Iraq destroy the missile and all its related equipment beginning March 1. Given the imminent threat of war, and the fact that about half of the 100-120 al-Samoud's have already been delivered to the Iraqi army, it's easy to see why Baghdad will not be eager to give up these weapons. Of course, Saddam Hussein would be well-advised to get rid of the missiles anyway – their value in deterring a U.S. attack is surely less than their harm in increasing the legitimacy and hence the likelihood of an attack. But what if Hussein refuses? Does this constitute justification for war?
There are at least three reasons why such a refusal does not provide morally adequate reasons to go to war. First, the immense costs of war — the risk to the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians, the increased likelihood of global terrorism, the possibility of massive chaos throughout the Middle East, the legitimation of further domestic repression, and the diversion of billions of dollars that should be spent on human needs – are not suddenly worth it because Iraq's missiles have a range of 180 kilometers instead of 150.
Second, while refusing a demand from the inspectors violates resolutions of the Security Council, there have surely been other violations of Security Council resolutions – by Israel, Turkey, and Indonesia, among others – that have been much more serious than a militarily insignificant excessive missile range. Yet no one contemplated war as the solution in these more serious cases.
Third, while an Iraqi refusal to give up the al-Samoud is wrong, it is hardly surprising. U.S. officials have been working for months to discourage Iraqi cooperation with the weapons inspectors. They have essentially been saying to Saddam Hussein: give us access to all your military facilities, give us the right to discover the location of all your weapons factories, military bases, and the like, give us the right to fly spy planes over your territory unimpeded, and when this is all done, regardless of what the Security Council says, the United States will still be committed to "regime change." Such a message is hardly designed to inspire Baghdad's compliance. And now Washington is further insisting that Iraq destroy its most modern missiles.
Any Iraqi refusal to eliminate the al-Samoud comes in the face of U.S. actions that have been in clear violation of the UN Charter. The Charter explicitly prohibits not just the use of force without either Security Council authorization or in self-defense, but even the threat of force (Article II, Section 4). Yet no one can doubt that Washington has been threatening force against Iraq. There has been no Security Council authorization for any such threat, nor has there been any armed attack by Iraq against the United States, and hence these threats are patently illegal.
But it's not just a matter of U.S. threats. The United States has also violated the Charter prohibition against the use of force without appropriate authorization. U.S. officials have acknowledged that U.S. (and Turkish) troops are already on the ground in Iraq (Wash. Post, Feb. 13). It is true that there has been no Security Council resolution condemning these acts of war – but the Charter does not say that the use of force is permissible as long as it is not condemned by the Council. Rather it prohibits the use of force unless authorized by the Council (or in self-defense, which is irrelevant here).
For twelve years U.S. and British warplanes have been flying over Iraqi territory without any authorization and attacking Iraqi radar and anti-aircraft facilities that have tried to interfere with them. In recent months, however, the U.S.-U.K. planes have been targeting military sites without any pretense of acting defensively. For example, in this past week they struck at surface to surface missile sites – which pose no risk to the warplanes. In other words, the U.S. is insisting that Iraq give up some of its missiles that may technically exceed the permitted range at the same time that the U.S. is carrying out unprovoked acts of war against Iraq. These are not circumstances calculated to elicit maximum Iraqi cooperation.
Unprecedented anti-war organizing and mobilization, along with a fortuitous international constellation of forces, have derailed the Bush administration's rush to war. But we need to be ready to address and expose their last ditch effort of using the al-Samoud missile as a pretext for an immoral and potentially disastrous war.


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By Doug Eadie
"It's great to meet you at last!" Turning around and seeing Virginia for the first time, I was taken aback. "She is blind, isn't she?" I thought to myself. "Of course she is, you idiot, there's her guide dog at her side." But for a couple of seconds, seeing her radiant smile, her bright blue eyes looking directly at me, her outstretched hand, I wasn't sure.
This account of my first meeting with Virginia Jacko in September 2006 appears in the opening pages of a book that we have co-authored and which is being published this month. Titled The Extraordinary Odyssey of a Blind Visionary, it tells the story of Virginia, a visionary leader who just happens to be blind.
Since January 2005, Virginia has been president and CEO of the Miami Lighthouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired. This nonprofit organization provides vocational rehabilitation to adults and a wide range of other services to both adults and children, including art and music education, in Florida's Dade County.
For around six months, Virginia and I worked closely together as client and consultant to update the governing role of the Lighthouse board and modernize its committee structure. Our book draws on Virginia's story to provide readers with practical guidance in overcoming personal and professional barriers on the way to a more vision-driven, fulfilling life.
And what a story it is.
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subset: commoncrawl


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The third season of Game of Thrones is here, and we're chronicling the TV adaptation of George R. R. Martin's world of Westeros — and how it differs from the books — in a series of letters between Wired writers (and Game of Thrones fanatics) Erik Henriksen and Laura Hudson.
First, a TV versus book recap of "Kissed By Fire":
Arya: The Hound's trial by combat begins, with Beric Dondarrion as his "judge." It's pretty exciting, and—much like Arya—you can't wait to see the Hound get the pointy end. Except that he doesn't; he kills Beric instead. Thoros is on Beric's body in a flash, whispering a flame-related liturgy which seems sad until holy crap Beric comes back from the dead. From the dead! Turns out the White Walkers aren't the only zombies in Westeros. Arya grabs a knife and tries to stab the Hound herself like a badass, but they hold her back because there's no double jeopardy in trials by stabbing, or something. Later, learn that this is Beric's sixth resurrection thanks to the Lord of Light, but that he comes back a little "less" each time. Finally, Gendry decides to stay with the Brotherhood, completing Arya's no good very bad day by explaining that in the rigid class-based society of Westeros, they can never be family, because she'd always—ultimately–be "milady." In the books: The battle between the Hound and Beric is spot on, though the Hound suffered more serious burns when his shield caught on fire. Interestingly, when Arya tells the Hound to go to hell, on the show Beric says he will, and in the books Beric says he already has. And Gendry was way more of a jerk about the "milady" thing, which is pretty ironic regardless, since he's the son of Robert Baratheon and doesn't realize it.
Jon: The time has come for Jon to prove himself to the wildlings, in secret and sexy ways! First,
Rattleshirt Tormund and Orell (the warg with the eagle) demand that Jon give them all the deets about where the Night's Watch soldiers are stationed and how men many there are. Jon hedges on the last point but finally says there are a thousand soldiers at Castle Black, a number that the super-hostile Orell thinks is a lie. Rattleshirt Tormund gives him the side-eye but lets him walk, saying that if the intel is bad, he'll kill him later. After (possibly) giving up the secrets of his former brothers, Jon chases Ygritte into a secret cave where she announces that's it's time to break another vow he made to the Night's Watch: celibacy. The virginal Jon, to his enormous credit, responds by immediately heading south of the border. That's right book fans: They totally kept the Lord's Kiss scene. Ygritte wants to stay in the sex cave forever and I don't blame her, because we only get scenes where characters experience happiness… what, every couple of episodes? In the books: There's definitely friction between Orell and Jon in the books, mostly because Jon kills Orell before he joins the Wildlings. Some of Orell's consciousness remains in his eagle, however, which subsequently tries to claw Jon's eyes out.
Jaime & Brienne: I'm grouping these two together from now on, as they have truly become the Ernie and Bert of Westeros. Locke finally drags the captives to Lord Bolton, who messes with Jaime briefly by withholding information about the well-being of his sister, then orders the duo unbound and cleaned up. Jaime's stump gets tended to by a creepy former maester namd Qyburn, who was stripped of his title because the Citadel found his "experiments" to be "too bold." Brienne finally gets to take a bath, and of course Jaime strips down and jumps right in the tub with her. After baiting her into an argument—seemingly out of habit—he tells the true story behind his eponymous Kingslaying: The Mad King Aerys really was totally crazy, and secretly hid huge caches of wildfire around King's Landing. After he realized that he'd lost the city during Robert's Rebellion, Aerys told his pyromancer to detonate them all. Jaime saved everyone by killing them both and got branded a dishonorable jerk for his trouble, because apparently letting everyone in King's Landing die screaming from weapons of mass destruction would have been the knightly way? In the books: Bolton didn't jerk Jaime around, but otherwise this is very true to book. Also, the "my name is Jaime" comment he makes at the end was internal monologue rather than spoken, and echoed a similar statement–"My name is Brienne"–made numerous times by the lady-knight when Jaime called her "wench." They both want to be seen as who they are, rather than how they are perceived.
Robb: Lord Karstark, still pissed that Jaime killed one of his sons and then got freed by Catelyn, decides to take it out on the two young Lannister hostages by murdering them. Robb is livid and decides—against the advice of basically everyone—to execute Karstark for the crime (beheading him personally, just like dad would have done) because it's the Right Thing to Do. Obviously, he loses all the Karstark soldiers (half his army) in the process. Talisa suggests that Robb take his armies back to reclaim the North, but he comes up with another plan: Head west and take the Lannister homeland of Casterly Rock. But he needs soldiers to do it, and there's only one unaligned party with enough resources to help: Lord Frey, the man whose daughter Robb was intended to marry before he met Talisa. In the books: The murdered boys on the show are Lannisters (and brothers), but in the novels one is a Lannister and the other a Frey with Lannister blood. The Karstark men actually desert Robb even before he executes Lord Karstark, and Talisa's suggestion—that Robb head home and retake the North—was his idea and the strategy he chose, rather than heading to Casterly Rock (though both were suggested as in our recent military analysis of Robb Stark's campaign).
Cersei: The Queen Regent is pulling a full-on Snow White Wicked Queen, bound and determined to destroy Margaery for being the younger, better version of her in every way. She enlists the help of Littlefinger, so the former Master of Coin sends a handsome young man to ply Loras for information with sex. Sure enough, the Knight of Flowers spills that he's intended for marriage. The second piece of the puzzle falls into place when Littlefinger reminds Sansa (who's still swooning over the idea of marrying Loras) about his plan to sneak her out of King's Landing and she demurs, saying that maybe she should stick around after all. Littlefinger says he totally supports her decision, by which he means that he's totally telling Cersei. After convincing a sassy Lady Olenna to have the Tyrells pick up half the tab for the incredibly expensive royal wedding, Tyrion heads to a meeting with his father and his sister where he learns that Tywin wants to prevent the Stark/Tyrell marriage by preemptively marrying Sansa to a Lannister: Tyrion himself. Congratulations, Cersei, you actually did a thing! And she can't stop smirking about it–at least until she learns the second half of Tywin's marriage plans: She's to marry Ser Loras. In the books: Tywin does learn of the Tyrell plot to marry Sansa into their family with the help of Littlefinger, but Cersei isn't involved. Also, the Tyrells hoped to match Sansa with Willas, Loras and Margaery's older brother, since Loras is in the Kingsguard and cannot marry; similarly Tywin wants Cersei to marry Willas, not Loras.
Stannis: With Melisandre off on some mysterious errand, Stannis goes to see his wife Selyse and confess his infidelity with the Red Lady—only to learn that his wife not only knows all about it, but 100% supports it thanks to her Lord of Light fanaticism. After all, Melisandre was able to give him a terrifying shadow-assassin baby, while she's birthed three stillborn sons (which no joke, she is keeping in jars) and their daughter, Shireen, who has some sort of skin affliction on her face. There is so very much that is messed up about this, but keeping your dead babies preserved in jars in the middle of your room to look at every day surely tops of the list. Shireen is very friendly with Davos, and when she hears that he's in the dungeon, she sneaks down to his cell to bring him a book to pass the time. When he says he's illiterate, she starts teaching him to read. In the books: Though Stannis' wife, Selyse, does become a fervent supporter of Melisandre and the Red God, the scene between her and Stannis never happens, nor do we ever hear of her havings any miscarriages or dead male children—only the inability to produce a male heir. Davos is indeed illiterate, but Shireen has no particular friendship with him and does not visit him. Also given the absence of Edric Storm on the show and the sudden focus on Shireen right after Melisandre said an ominous thing about the power of Stannis's blood, am I the only one a little worried for the girl?
Daenerys: After freeing the Unsullied, Dany asks them to choose a leader from their own ranks, and they select a young man named Grey Worm. When Dany learns that all Unsullied are renamed after various types of vermin after being castrated, she commands them to pick new names that give the pride. But Grey Worm says that he is proud of his name—it's the one he had when Dany freed him. Jorah and Selmy enjoy some camaraderie over battles from back in the day, at least until Selmy suggests that Jorah may hinder Dany more than help when they ultimately return to Westeros, since he's still a pariah for the whole "selling people into slavery" thing. Jorah is not interested in hearing this from someone who joined their party five seconds ago, but it seems like Selmy might have a point. In the books: The Unsullied are indeed given the names of vermin, although for maximum dehumanization, those names are changed each day. Also, Barristan Selmy was still pretending to be Arstan Whitebeard at this point–an old man who claimed to be be a squire—so he and Jorah did no reminiscing about old battles; their relationship was distrustful at best.
The main thing that stuck with me this episode—and I suppose it's a running theme of the show, but I noticed it even more in this particular hour—was that all of these characters are struggling not so much with what they want to be doing but what is expected of them.
This is obviously a big part of Theon's life (who, disappointingly, we didn't see this week), but it also seems the case for Jaime (moral obligation vs. duty as member of the Kingsguard), Stannis' wife Selyse (due to the oh-so-progressive gender norms of Westeros, she's supposed to be giving Stannis sons, and instead gives him a creepy fetus parade and a little girl kept hidden away because of her deformity), and Robb (supposed to be a good commander-in-chief, but instead finds himself killing Lord Karstark, one of his own bannermen, and losing half of his army). Even Tyrion and Cersei, who think their already-diminished roles are to help Tywin rule at King's Landing, discover they're more useful as marriage pawns to secure loyalties and lands. In fact, the only person who seems totally cool with and capable of doing what's expected of him is Grey Worm, the leader of the Unsullied. But then again, it doesn't really seem like Grey Worm has a whole lot of other career options.
To get into spoiler territory for a minute, can I tell you how excited I am to see that we're finally heading into the Red Wedding?! I'm guessing this is going to be the big finale to season three, just as Ned's beheading and the Battle of Blackwater Bay were for the first two seasons. As a friend pointed out to me when we were reading the books, the Red Wedding is basically the moment when George R.R. Martin realized he had way too many characters—and it's starting to feel that way in the show, too. I want longer scenes of characters talking and doing stuff, but instead they've gotten to the point where just to keep things moving, we're more or less ducking in on everyone for a few seconds, then going off to check in on someone else. Time to trim the fat.
First off, I'd like to say that despite my previous criticisms about the show fixating on naked ladies without offering equal eye candy of the male variety, Game of Thrones achieved a very high level of sexy parity in the episode, which is perhaps my favorite kind of parity. Not only did they keep the Lord's Kiss scene and add a totally new dude-on-dude sex scene involving Ser Loras, but I was very impressed by the framing of the bathtub scene between Brienne and Jaime. When she leaps to her feet naked to challenge his insult, I love that they cut the shot above her breasts, and that she is portrayed first and foremost as a warrior, not an object of sexual titillation. Rather than setting Brienne apart as a Naked Lady, the show keeps its eyes on the attributes that really matter: the bravery and strength that transcend her gender. It could have gone so wrong, and reduced Brienne to nothing but her ladyparts–something her stupid society has been doing her whole life–but instead it went so, so right. WELL DONE SHOW. WELL DONE.
Second, I think you've touched on a core theme of the show: the conflicting expectations the characters are forced to struggle with, and how that it makes it so difficult for them (and us!) to figure out the Right Thing to Do. Was it the right thing for Jaime to kill the Mad King before he could deploy medieval WOMD, even though it meant breaking his Kingsguard vows? Was it the right thing for Jon to break his vows to the Night's Watch, even in service of the Night's Watch? Was it the right thing for Ned Stark to show mercy to Cersei and her children, even though it cost him his head and put Joffrey on the throne? Was it the right thing for Robb to execute to Lord Karstark, no matter what the cost to his army? Beric Dondarrion even thinks that letting the Hound go is the "right thing," after his "trial" proves him "innocent," even though he clearly, clearly is guilty.
It's also super interesting to see how Beric tries to reconcile his faith with the outcome of the trial; he tells Arya that "the judgment isn't ours to make" and that the Hound survived not because he was blameless, but because "the Lord of Light isn't done with [him] yet." This defense of the inscrutable ways of the Lord of Light is the same sort of religious rationalization you hear whenever terrible, unjust acts occur: If a god is infallible, then surely none of his acts can be wrong, only right in a way that we cannot yet grasp; the Lord of Light surely must have let the Hound live because like the Cylons, he has a plan. There's a fan theory that the Hound doesn't actually die as he seems to later in Storm of Swords, but goes on to renounce his former life and become a better man at the Quiet Isle monastery–and may emerge again later in the series. So perhaps in a way Beric is right, and the Lord of Light does know what he's doing? (Perhaps, from a certain perspective, the Lord of Light is George R. R. Martin?)
But the show and books don't just set up the characters for conflicts between expectations and reality; they set up readers and viewers as well. When Beric attacks the Hound with his flaming sword, he looks every bit like a hero ripped from the cover of a fantasy novel, which is a big part of why we don't just want him to win—we expect that he will. But the deeper message of Game of Thrones is often fervently anti-fantasy: People don't win because they are good, or because they look the part; they win because they are stronger. Trial by combat is obviously a terrible system of justice for many reasons, but primarily because it privileges the powerful, as though the entire world doesn't already do that constantly. It also reveals the lies we like to tell ourselves about strength and honor and truth–our optimistic sense of moral determinism that says that good will triumph simply because it should.
Just look at poor Sansa, who is basically the biggest fantasy novel fan of all, with her starry-eyed love of chivalry and knights. Joffrey was supposed to be her handsome prince, after all, just like Ned Stark was supposed to be our hero. But it didn't work out that way, and we all ended up just like Sansa at the Sept of Baelor and Arya in the cave with the Brotherhood: screaming that it wasn't fair, that it had to be a different way because everything we'd been taught said that this wasn't how the story was supposed to go. The tragedy of the Stark family is that they embody all the simplistic fairy tale notions about goodness, honor and beauty, and the tragedy of the reader is that we get to slowly realize exactly how false they those notions are by watching the Starks suffer over and over for being foolish enough to believe in them.
Also, Erik, in your discussion about people struggling to live up to expectations, you neglected to mention the one person who is stepping almost effortlessly into the role she's "meant" to play: Daenerys Targaryen. Given where she started, it is shocking how convincing she is as a leader, particularly the head of an army. On a slightly tangential note, that was always the problem I had with Lena Headey (aka Cersei) when she headlined Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles; she was a great actress, but I just never believed her as a leader. Dany, on the other hand, conveys astonishing power and authority, and commands an army like it's the most natural thing in the world. When she speaks, you believe that thousands of soldiers would snap to attention. When the show began, I absolutely bought Emilia Clarke as a 15-year-old naïve. Now I absolutely buy her as a military commander. You rule, Daenerys. And given most of the options in the War of the Five Kings, I'm starting to think you should.
Okay, yes, agreed on the sex parity thing, but one thing you neglected to mention in the bathtub scene is that in the books, Jaime—since he's a POV character, we know this—gets kind of a boner when he sees Brienne in all her giant naked glory. I don't think that negates anything else that happens in the scene, but it does add another dimension to their relationship—i.e., the suggestion it could, at some point, become a relationship-relationship. It's a subtle shading to those characters' unique rapport, but it's there—and after how great this bathtub scene was (I kept expecting to see "EMMY CLIP" flash under Jaime's head during his speech), I wonder if it's going to make it into the show at some point.
And not to turn this Game of Thrones recap into a Sarah Connor Chronicles recap, but my conscience will not abide your comment about Headey as Sarah Connor—a comment that wounds my very soul. The reason you didn't buy Headey in that role is, weirdly enough, the reason I did buy her—because Sarah Connor, for all of her badassery, isn't a leader. She's a waitress at a crappy diner who gets caught up in some robo-craziness from the future. Sarah Connor does all sorts of amazing, admirable, awesome things to protect John, but they're acts of desperation, fear, and precaution; she's someone who's just doing the best she can, trying to hold things together, until John's old enough to take over. Unlike Daenerys, Sarah Connor isn't a stereotypical leader, amassing armies and showing off her power. She's a broke, tough-as-nails single mom whose kid is the most important thing in the world to her—not to mention the most important thing to the world in general.
Which, now that I think about it, doesn't make her all that different from Cersei! Like Sarah Connor, Cersei's known from before Joffrey's birth that, if all went to plan, he'd become the leader of Westeros, not her. Now that that's come true—in name, if not in practice—it's not surprising Cersei feels jilted and disappointed by how it's all turned out. After all those years of preparation, she now thinks she'd be a better leader than Joffrey (and she's probably right), and that she should be more valuable to Tywin (again, probably right).
Watching Daenerys come into her own these past few episodes has been so rewarding because she's so goddamn good at being a dramatic leader; watching Cersei shrivel and shrink has been so sad because she never thought she'd be relegated to the sidelines. Unlike Jaime, Cersei's fall doesn't lend itself to theatrical speeches, nor to opportunities to pose and look pretty even while being covered in mud and horseshit. Cersei's fall is worse, because no one but her seems to even notice that it's happened. She's served her purpose; aside from possibly being of use to marry off, she's done.
Speaking of Daenerys, though, I'm going to throw this out there to the ether and see what happens, but I'm hoping Benioff and Weiss are paying attention to how much everybody's loving Daenerys this season. Because in the books, the number of interesting things Daenerys does after the Astapor BBQ is… not high. Actually having Daenerys doing stuff—and serving as a foil for those losing power in Westeros—has been fantastic. One of the unexpectedly great things about all the shifts in power this season is how Benioff and Weiss have made the first two seasons seem like the calm before the storm. Like most Game of Thrones characters, most Game of Thrones viewers are likely looking back at seasons one and two and saying, "Huh. You know, I thought things were miserable for everybody then, but it turns out they can get so much worse."
It's interesting that you say that about Sarah Connor, Erik, because what made her so amazing to me was the fact that she started out as a mousy waitress in Terminator, then suddenly turned up in Terminator 2 as a stone-cold badass–a woman transformed. She wasn't Cersei; she was Daenerys, and when she went toe to toe with the T-1000 in the steel mill with nothing but a shotgun and a sense of righteous fury, she might as well have been shouting "dracarys." It was less complicated, perhaps, than what Headey offered in Sarah Connor Chronicles, but also more satisfying? I'm only human, you know. Maybe like Sansa, sometimes I prefer my fantasy heroes to be a little bit more fantastical.


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Comfortable public spaces, equipped with high-speed wireless Internet access, are decorated with period furnishings and elaborate trompe l'oeil murals; fitness equipment is available on site.
Satellite television
The Grand Hotel Saint Michel's 45 air-conditioned, bright rooms have handpainted wooden furnishings, and modern amenities such as high-speed wireless Internet and satellite TV with DVD players.Information missing or incorrect? Tell us!Opens in a new window
Grand Hotel Saint Michel
Hotel Amenities
Hotel Amenities
The Grand Hotel Saint Michel features fitness equipment, two lounge rooms with small bar, international newspapers, and high-speed wireless Internet access. A hot-and-cold breakfast buffet (surcharge) is served in the stone-vaulted dining room, decorated in murals, vintage Hollywood photographs, and red-and-gold fabrics. Breakfast can be served in the guest rooms on request. All pastries are baked fresh on the premises.
- Concierge services
- Free newspapers in lobby
- Babysitting or childcare (surcharge)
- Airport transportation (surcharge)
- 24-hour front desk
- Multilingual staff
- Safe-deposit box at front desk
- Dry cleaning/laundry service
- Coffee/tea in common areas
- Elevator/lift
- Fitness facilities
- Total number of rooms - 47
- Turkish bath/Hammam
- One meeting room
- Luggage storage
- Number of floors - 6
- Conference space size (feet) - 377
- Breakfast available (surcharge)
- Tours/ticket assistance
- Free WiFi
- Laundry facilities
- Conference space size (meters) - 35
- Year Built 1901
- 24-hour business center
- Smoke-free property
- Number of buildings/towers - 1
- Steam room
Available in all rooms: Free WiFi
Available in some public areas: Free WiFi
Room Amenities
- DVD player
- Room service (limited hours)
- Air conditioning
- In-room climate control (air conditioning)
- Blackout drapes/curtains
- Minibar
- Free toiletries
- Hair dryer
- Desk
- Satellite TV service
- Premium bedding
- Soundproofed rooms
- Free newspaper
- Daily housekeeping
- Private bathroom
- Slippers
- In-room childcare (surcharge)
- In-room safe
- Iron/ironing board (on request)
- Flat-panel TV
- Free WiFi
- Sleep Number by Select Comfort mattress
Where to Eat
The hotel does not have its own restaurant, but there are several dining options within the surrounding area.
Nearby restaurants:
Delices St-Michel
Brasserie Balzar
Les Fontaines
Please check the Rooms and Rates page to see which rates include breakfast.
Nearby Things to Do
One block from the hotel is the large park, Jardin du Luxembourg, where guests can jog, play tennis, or participate in the French game boules(similar to lawn bowling). There is a large playground area for children.
Hotel guests receive complimentary admission to a health club on the Boulevard St-Germain (10 minutes away on foot).
The recreational activities listed below are available either on site or near the hotel; fees may apply.
- Bicycle rentals nearby
If you have requests for specific accessibility needs, please note them at check-out when you book your room.
- Accessible bathroom
- In-room accessibility
- Roll-in shower
Hotel Policies
Check-in time starts at 3 PM
Check-out time is noon
Payment types
Children and extra beds
- Children are welcome.
- Pets not allowed
You need to know
Extra-person charges may apply and vary depending on property policy.
- No onsite parking is available.
- A tax is imposed by the city: EUR 2.48 per person, per night
Optional extras
- Fee for buffet breakfast: EUR 15 per person (approximately)
- Airport shuttle fee: EUR 60.00 per vehicle (one way)
Hotel Name
- Grand Hotel Saint Michel
- Grand Hotel Saint Michel Paris
- Grand Saint Michel
- Grand Saint Michel Hotel
- Grand Saint Michel Paris
- Hotel Grand Saint Michel
- Hotel Saint Michel
- Saint Michel Hotel
National Rating
This property has received its official star rating from the French Tourism Development Agency, ATOUT France.


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Last week I spoke with Ken Powell, who's been leading a sales transformation at SunGard in his role as VP of Global Sales Enablement. (He was also a speaker this week at the Sales 2.0 Conference in Boston.)
He joined SunGard just 15 months ago, but his prior experience leading a sales transformation in his previous role at ADP helped him hit the ground running. Already he's taken many steps to improve sales effectiveness. These have included:
- Equipping the sales team with mobile devices (specifically, Windows 8 tablets, which have "exceeded" his expectations and are "more business friendly" than the iPad);
- Adopting various Sales 2.0 applications (including Xactly, OneSource, LinkedIn, and SAVO, to name just a few);
- simplifying messaging.
As a company, SunGard is in an interesting spot right now. Formed originally through acquisitions starting in the 1980's, its primary revenue driver is currently software licensing, although they also have a large consulting organization. Ken said one of their aims is to make the consulting aspect a competitive differentiator.
To that end, Ken has already done quite a bit of work with his team to refine the message his teams send to the market. Whether his salespeople are face-to-face with customers or interacting online, Ken has made it clear that they must connect the capabilities of SunGard solutions and capabilities to business outcomes. Given this initiative, it didn't surprise me to learn that one of the next steps for Ken and his team is to incorporate value-based selling tools (and TCO tools in particular) into the selling process. In his words, proof of value is "a natural course of a conversation that professional salespeople need to have today when they're interacting with customers, because it's an expectation."
Since I'm in the business of creating ROI tools, Ken asked what I tell clients about overcoming the fairly typical objection from customers about "fictitious numbers." As we all know, numbers can be arranged in ways that will support almost any kind of story (as Mark Twain said "There are three types of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.") As a result, many customers look at numbers supplied by salespeople with a very skeptical eye.
I said that, in my mind, a major benefit of using a value calculator (or other tools) as part of the sales process is transparency. Whenever we train salespeople on how to leverage ROI tools, we advocate what we call a "peel-the-onion" approach. Salespeople should rely on the default calculations of an ROI tool to generate an initial report. But the next step shouldn't be to simply throw the report over the fence and let the customer evaluate it alone. A much more effective route is to say, "We have this tool to evaluate your business case and decide whether or not this solution makes sense for you. Let's sit down to discuss the numbers together." After that, you answer questions and adjust numbers accordingly as you go.
With a peel-the-onion strategy, the customer sees the numbers evolve and thus becomes invested in the final calculation. For example, you might change the default analysis from three years to five years on the spot. Or, if the customer pushes back on a point, you have options. If the customer says, "Ok, I've seen your case study and how you've done this with other customers, but I personally don't think you'll ever get a two percent reduction in labor for us." At that point you can ask the customer what he or she feels is realistic. If it's one percent, you plug in the numbers for a one percent reduction in labor and show them what that scenario looks like.
The point is to start the conversation with numbers. Numbers will get the customer engaged. Only then can you talk about features and functions and how you'll be able to support those numbers with your capabilities.
Great sales leaders must make hundreds of choices that will influence whether or not their sales teams succeed. This is particularly true for sales leaders that undertake a sales transformation, which by definition involves countless changes that all tie back to a unifying business strategy. It's an interesting journey for any sales leader and I look forward to seeing what evolves at SunGard.
Do you have a sales process that supports a business case? What do you say when customers show skepticism about numbers? Share your thoughts in the comments.


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This game was classified by the community with the following category scores - Violence=0/3, Sex=0/3, Mature Content=0/3. Ever wonder why your teachers made you learn math? Why to one day be on the cover of a game of course! Play through 5 modes of play and multiple difficulty levels in this Brain Age inspired game. Compete against players from around the world in the Global Challenge. The top player after 30 days will have his/her avatar featured on the cover.
Buy Xbox content on Xbox.com. Your Xbox 360 console will automatically download the content next time you turn it on and connect to Xbox Live.Learn More


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'); var yuipath = 'clientscript/yui'; var yuicombopath = ''; var remoteyui = false; } else // Load Rest of YUI remotely (where possible) { var yuipath = 'http://yui.yahooapis.com/2.9.0/build'; var yuicombopath = 'http://yui.yahooapis.com/combo'; var remoteyui = true; if (!yuicombopath) { document.write('
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good playcall on first play. special teams horrible. EDIT: I take it back for now! 3 missed tackles on KO. about 5 on the first play.
Last edited by dal9; 10-20-2012 at 12:33 PM.
break on the fumble recovery. good play by short, though. go ahead and grab it away see what happens.
why is our O-Line so bad?
these damn TE-s got hyped to hell before the season, and have done nothing. What is up with these running punts? did we just start doing it now?
Holy Hunt!
"and that's why he's a cornerback..."
allen would've housed that. great tackle by richards
that is a stupid play call, even if it worked.
on replay maybe not.
typical terbush. for ****s sake I hate this guy so much.
my god that pass in the flat on 2 and 8.
then he throws behind the WR on the screen.
i don't see how marve can be worse.
Last edited by dal9; 10-20-2012 at 01:07 PM.
then you have the kicker who can't make a XP try for 52 yard FG.
I like the play by Short there. give Miller something to think about. Hit wasn't that late.
I hate this. I keep not knowing how to root for Purdue football. I obviously want them to win, but they win it's another excuse for Burke to keep Hope.
Go Boilers!
Looks like it may come to down whether Purdue can get a punt off without getting it blocked
Or it may come down a 2 point conversion
Or it may come down to overtime
well it may accomplish the greater good of getting Hope out of here.
***** christ, just leave this coaching staff in columbus
^"#3 kicker recruit in the country" too
The TEs are a joke...Where have you gone Tim Stratton?
TerBush pick coming up
whatever. business as usual.
^This is when I usually say I'm glad I don't have cable. Unfortunately this abortion was on ABC.
You just knew it was going to end this way
But they played with heart unlike last week.
up 8 with 43 seconds left. lose. open your damn eyes Burke.
^lol read that as "damn your eyes Burke" ... going retro with the curses now...
Really it doesn't matter. Hope's got a $500k buyout, Burke's not paying that. Even if he did Hope only gets paid like $950k. The head football coach at a freaking Big Ten school gets paid under a million dollars, the majority of BCS programs pay ASSISTANTS more than that. Remember how we got Tiller from Wyoming? I saw yesterday they, friggin Wyoming, pays their HC 1.1 million.
We get what we pay for. Hell, honestly, awful as Hope and his staff are they're probably performing above their pay grade. Congratulations Burke, you've gotten a fanbase to the worst possible place, apathy.
I've had the opposite reaction. Of course I grew up near South Bend and my dad briefly worked at ND so its probably different for me than others. Fortunately where I work everyone except for like a couple of people are all Purdue alums in my area.This quote is hidden because you are ignoring this member. Show Quote
That being said I don't think ND will beat Oklahoma next weekend anyways its nice to see them be undefeated this far into the season but I also know it won't last not with our offense the defense is what's keeping them in games and well Man Ti Teo will be in the NFL next year so who knows what will happen
Last edited by Basketball Fan; 10-20-2012 at 08:28 PM.
Missed XP in the 1st, went into OT.


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It can be hard to find an interesting, moderately priced wine. Inexpensive wines aren't usually bad, but they sure can be boring and/or mediocre.
When I went back over my tasting notes from the past few months, I found dozens of wines costing $20 or less that I would never recommend, but I wanted to give you a list of 10 wines in that price range that represent good value. These are the sorts of wines that you can serve at a holiday gathering or give as a gift — or buy for yourself because they're a pleasure to drink.
Good values can be found in obscure regions of the world or wines made from unusual grape varieties, but it can be hard to actually find those wines. So I looked for bottles that are widely available. Not all of these wines can be found in supermarkets, but they aren't rare, either.
2011 Dry Creek Sauvignon Blanc ($16): Dry Creek Vineyard, which celebrated its 40th anniversary this fall, has a long history with sauvignon blanc, which it labeled fumé blanc. This bottling is a newer one. It's racy and fresh, with pink grapefruit, some grassiness and a touch of minerality. Another good white from Dry Creek Vineyard is the dry chenin blanc ($12).
2011 Bonterra Chardonnay ($14): I taste a lot of mediocre California chardonnays in this price range, but this Mendocino County wine, made from organically grown grapes, showcases the bright fruit in a leaner style. It offers juicy citrus, pear and golden apple, along with a little creaminess.
2011 Tablas Creek Patelin de Tablas Blanc ($20): Tablas Creek in Paso Robles has always made some great wines, but most are pricey. A few years ago, the winery started making the Patelin blends using purchased grapes. The white, dominated by grenache blanc and viognier, is rich and fleshy, with bright white stone fruit, a hint of vanilla and nice weight. (The winery's co-owners, the Perrin family, make an even less-expensive white blend from France, the 2011 Famille Perrin Reserve Cotes du Rhone Blanc. It goes for $9-$12.)
2009 Domaines Schlumberger "Les Princes Abbes" Pinot Blanc ($13): France's Alsace region is better known for gewürztraminer and riesling, but pinot blanc is an attractively priced alternative. This wine is fresh and zippy, with green apple and mineral flavors and a long finish.
2011 Bonny Doon Albarino ($18): This domestic albarino from the Central Coast offers pretty, racy white fruit with some floral notes and a bit of minerality. If you want to try wines from albarino's traditional home, Spain's Rias Baixas region, wineries producing well-priced versions include Martin Codax, Vionta and Valminor.
2011 Chateau Ste. Michelle Riesling ($9): Chateau Ste. Michelle is the world's largest producer of riesling. This is the winery's basic, off-dry riesling, and it tastes of fleshy lime and spiced apples. There's a good dry riesling for the same price. For $22, try the 2011 Eroica, a collaboration between Ste. Michelle and Ernst Loosen, a top vintner in Germany's Mosel region.
2010 Souverain North Coast Cabernet Sauvignon ($14): Souverain's North Coast bottlings offer great value. This cab, for example, is bright and savory, with black cherry accented by black olive and spice. The 2010 North Coast Merlot ($14) is another easy-to-drink choice.
2010 Rodney Strong Russian River Valley Pinot Noir ($20): It's no small feat to produce such a tasty Russian River pinot at such a low price. This one is aromatic and a little floral, with bright raspberry and spice and firm structure.
2010 Ravenswood Napa Valley Old Vine Zinfandel ($16): Ravenswood is one of the state's iconic zin producers, and its expensive, single-vineyard bottlings are justifiably famous. The winery's county series, at less than $20 a bottle, offers great value. The Napa Valley zin, for example, is ripe yet bright and lively, with spicy, brambly berry flavors and medium tannins.
2010 Morgan Syrah ($20): Syrah doesn't get a lot of love these days, but good cool-climate syrahs are some of my favorite wines. This bargain from the Santa Lucia Highlands appellation is a great example. It offers bright black fruit, notes of lavender and spice, medium tannins and good concentration. Another one to check out is Qupe's Central Coast Syrah ($17).
Contact Laurie Daniel at email@example.com.


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Click here, or on the image above, to see the new Frame by Frame video on Hitchcock's Psycho (1960).
I've blogged on Alfred Hitchcock's iconic masterpiece Psycho before, and here's part of what I had to say back then, on October 7, 2011;
"Psycho had a curious genesis: Hitchcock was under contract to Paramount Studios for his theatrical films, but was also contracted to Universal Studios for his television show Alfred Hitchcock Presents, an anthology series of mysteries, each running roughly 30 minutes, which debuted in 1955 (the show expanded to an hour in 1962, and ended its run in 1965).
Hitchcock usually confined his input on the series to helping to select the stories for dramatization, lending his name and image to the project, and also providing a series of delightfully droll introductions and postscripts to each teleplay, which he personally delivered in his usual laconic style.
THitchcock would direct an episode of the series, and when he did, the speed and professionalism of the Universal crews astounded him. Ordinarily bored by the filmmaking process — the actual shooting seemed almost an afterthought to his exquisitely detailed storyboards — Hitchcock found himself caught up again in the excitement of actually shooting a movie.
Having known for some time that his 1950s big budget suspense film strategy was fast falling out of favor, Hitchcock cast around for some fresh material, and found it in Robert Bloch's novel, Psycho. Using an intermediary to keep the cost down, Hitchcock bought the rights to the novel, and pitched the project to Paramount.
But Paramount found the material too exotic, offbeat, and problematic, and refused to finance the film. After much negotiation, Hitchcock struck a deal to shoot the film at Universal in black and white, using his Alfred Hitchcock Presents TV crew, funding the budget of $806,947 entirely with his own money, and also deferring his standard director's fee of $250,000 in return for a 60% ownership of the film's negative. Still unconvinced that the finished film would click, Paramount nevertheless acquiesced, and agreed to release the finished film.
Hitchcock shot Psycho on a very tight schedule, starting on November 11, 1959, and wrapping on February 1, 1960. When Psycho opened, it broke the box-office record of all of Hitchcock's previous features, and signaled the beginning of the end for traditional Hollywood censorship, with its sinuous synthesis of sex, violence, and hitherto uncharted psychiatric territory — at least in a major Hollywood film.
Viewers wanted something fresh, and Psycho provided precisely that — the shock of the new. The film became an instant classic, and remains so today; the Psycho house and the Bates Motel sets still stand at Universal Studios, and remain a potent attraction for visiting tourists. More than half a century old, Psycho still has the power to shock, to surprise, to enthrall the viewer."
Now, there's a new Frame by Frame video on the making of the film, which you can view by clicking here, or on the image of Hitchcock himself above.
Tags: Alfred Hitchcock, Anthony Perkins, Paramount Studios, Psycho, Universal Studios


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Cobalah ribuan pengaya yang tersedia di sini, unduh Mozilla Firefox, cara cepat dan bebas untuk menjelajahi Web!Tutup
Selamat datang ke Pengaya Firefox.
Pilih dari ribuan fitur tambahan dan gayakan untuk membuat Firefox jadi milik anda.Tutup
Google Translator for Firefox 22.214.171.124.3 Perlu Mulai Ulang
oleh nobzol
With this addon you can translate any text to your own language with one click or hot-key. You can either translate the selected text, this way the translated text will overwrite the original selected text, or you can translate the full page too.
Tentang Pengaya ini
It's highly recommended to select less text than more, otherwise the translation would appear slower. You can select a maximum of 38000-character long text, if you select longer, you'll get an alert box in some cases. You shouldn't either select pictures and tables because these will disappear and mystic text will appear there.
Now, let's see, how it works. Firstly, you search something that you don't understand because it's in an other language. Secondly, you select this section or sentence. Now you can go three ways:
- Right-click with the mouse and click on "Translate this text with Google Translate" text.
- Click on the Toolbar/Statusbar icon.
- Press the hot-key.
As soon as the translation-progress starts, the Red T will become green, and as soon as the translation ends, it'd be red again. Within a second or two, you'll see that the selection disappears and a text in your language appears there. That's all.
Or, if you want to translate the full page, you can go with the three ways mentioned above, too.
you can find this menu if you:
- right-click on the Red T (in FF3.5 and 3.6), or click on the little arrow next to it (in FF4+) and click "Options"
- go to Add-ons menu and click on configuration of this addon
you can set here:
- what language you want to translate to
- whether you want to see status-bar icon or not (only in FF3.5 and 3.6)
- what (and how) to translate when you click on the Red T or press the hot-key
- the Hot-key
Available target languages: you can translate to every language that you can find on Google Translate page (http://translate.google.com/). If you found a language that isn't in the list of this addon then comment here below.
The language of the original text is automatically detected.
Available user interface languages: Bulgarian, Chinese (Simplified), Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Hungarian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazilian), Russian, Serbian, Slovenian, Spanish (Spain), Turkish.
The translations are powered by Google Translate, the addon uses their translator-program.


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Fred Schepisi's The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith
The Last New Wave: Celebrating the Australian Film Revival kicks off Friday with seven days of seminal works from a decade (the 1970s) that saw a resurgence of Australian film production and launched the careers of some of nation's most prominent film talents, from directors to actors to cinematographers. Though many of the names in the series are immediately recognizable—among them Peter Weir, Mel Gibson, Jacki Weaver, Judy Davis, and George Miller—the majority of the titles might not be, so we've put together a brief guide to some of the not-to-be-missed offerings on display.
Opening Night film The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith marked the international breakthrough of Australian director Fred Schepisi. Based on the Booker Prize-shortlisted novel by Thomas Keneally, the film follows a half-Aboriginal, half-white young man who attempts to conform to the rules of white society but is eventually driven to a violent outburst against it. It competed for the Palme d'Or at the 1978 Cannes Film Festival, where it won wide acclaim. Schepisi would go on to great success in Hollywood in the 1980s with a mix of crowd and critical favorites like Roxanne, A Cry in the Dark, Six Degrees of Separation and The Russia House. Schepisi's semi-autobiographical debut feature about a 13-year-old boy coming of age in a Catholic seminary, The Devil's Playground, is also included in the series, and we are delighted to welcome him to the Film Society for screenings of both films!
Also gracing our theaters is celebrated director Phillip Noyce. Another Hollywood crossover success, Noyce is best-known stateside for a pair of Harrison Ford action flicks (Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger) and the award-winning 2002 drama Rabbit-Proof Fence. In this series, we're heading back to 1977 with Noyce's impressive debut feature Backroads. Influenced by iconic road movies like Easy Rider and Kings of the Road, the film pairs a racist white drifter with a young Aboriginal activist on a journey through New South Wales that includes a cast of colorful ride-alongs and mounting tension as the two are tracked by the police. We'll also be showing Noyce's followup Newsfront, a grand-scope elegy to the work Australia's newsreel cameramen across in fraught decade of the nation's history.
Academy Award-nominated director Bruce Bereford's credits include more than 45 feature films spread across over 50 years, including Oscar winners Tender Mercies (1983) and Driving Miss Daisy (1989). Here we focus on three back-to-back(-to-back) titles made in the mid-70s that helped establish him as a major voice in the Australian Film Revival. Don's Party adapts David Williamson's stage satire about an election-night party turned drunk and ugly. The Getting of Wisdom takes on a 1910 Handel Richardson novel about a country girl adapting to life in a Melbourne boarding school. Finally, the brilliantly-paced heist flick Money Movers follows the disintegration of three employees' well-laid plain to rob the armored-car company they work for. See the lot and save with our Three Film Package!
A look back at the influence of the Australian Film Revival would not be complete without two of its greatest contributions: Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) and George Miller's Mad Max (1979). The former is considered by many (including series programmer Scott Foundas) to be the defining work of the Australian Film Revival. Six time Oscar nominee Weir's celebrated film makes spectacular use of its setting's otherworldly landscape and an unsettling score to tell the eery story of a high school girls' field trip gone wrong.
Mad Max and its sequels hardly need an introduction, though it's worth remembering that if it weren't for this post-apocalyptic, surprise international action hit from doctor-turned-filmmaker Miller, the world would not have Mel Gibson so… thanks? Kidding aside, Mad Max is a film well-worth revisiting on the big screen, if for no other reason than to prepare for Miller's long-awaited return to the franchise next year, Mad Max: Fury Road.
The Last New Wave: Celebrating the Australian Film Revival runs from January 25 – 31 at the Film Society of Lincoln Center. See three or more films and save with our Discount Package!


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Capture the flag
Get the party moving with a great game of capture the flag. This party game is a great kids activity for all ages and for any grown ups who want to try and keep up too!
Number of players:
What you need:
- 2 flags
Start by dividing the children into two teams. Assign Team 1 to the front yard and Team 2 to the back yard.
The teams are given a limited time period, like five minutes, to hide their flag in their part of the yard.
Once the flag is hidden, teams call out that they are finished. They then simply try to get the other team's flag. If they get caught and tagged by the opponent on their territory they go to jail and can only be freed by a team mate who grabs them when their opponent isn't looking.
The first team to capture the flag or all of their opponents wins!
Learning benefits of play, craft and activities:
- Benefits of crafts for kids
- Craft ideas to make for babies
- Why reading is important
- Your child's development milestones
- Why play makes kids smarter
- The importance of outdoor play
- Types of play
- How craft helps unplug kids from screentime
Find more inspiring kids' craft ideas
- How-to videos for kids' crafts
- Make a melted crayon masterpiece
- Easter crafts
- Christmas crafts
- Fun kids craft ideas
- 30 fun things to do with kids (including craft)
- Dress up ideas kids can make
- Crafts to make from the recycling bin
- Fairy-inspired craft ideas
- Great ideas for paper crafts


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Re: Introduction
hi My mom is 81 and she has been diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma. she also has compression fractures in her back. Tomorrow she goes for a balloon kyroplasty for her back and then next week we start with Chemo. Most likely Gemzar. Has anyone had success with Photo Dynamic Therapy?? She had a metal stent placed in the end of July if that makes any difference? Also we are looking into a place in Germany for theapy the Leonardis-klinik. Any suggestions thoughts ideas??


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CHINO – The Chino Valley Fire District board selected Paul Segalla as the new Fire Chief.
The terms of the three-year employment agreement were approved by the Board of Directors at their meeting tonight.
He is expected to begin with the district on March 4.
Segalla has been the Fire Chief for the West Covina Fire Department since 2008.
He has a long history in the fire service, dating back to 1979 when he began his career as a paid on call firefighter in Harvey, Illinois, according to the Fire District's news release.
The 51-year-old Rancho Cucamonga resident is currently an active member of various fire service organizations, including the International Association of Fire Chiefs, the California Fire Chiefs Association and other regional Fire Chief Associations.
Previously, he served as an integral member of the Illinois Fire Chiefs Association, and instructed for the Illinois Fire Service Institute and the Illinois Fire Chiefs Association.
He also served as the Fire Officer Program Director for the University of Illinois Fire Service Institute teaching throughout the Midwest in areas such as Planning, Incident Management, Unified Command and Officer Development, according to the news release.
Segalla's appointment comes after the retirement of Fire Chief Kirk Summers in October.
Contact Canan via email, by phone at 909-483-9340, or on Twitter @ChinoValleyNow.


text:
Telephone FAQ
Top 10 Telephone Frequently Asked Questions
- How do I configure my Voice Mail?
- Will my alarm system work if it is connected to my Cogeco Home Phone line?
- What do I do if cannot hear a dial tone?
- What is the best way to reach Cogeco's technical assistance?
- How do I access my Voice Mail remotely?
- Can I see a log of my long distance calls?
- Can I move my multifunction cable modem from where it was installed?
- Can I get a deleted message back in my voice mail if I deleted it by mistake?
- How can I change the number of rings before my voice mail picks up?
- If I switch to Cogeco, can I keep my existing phone number?


text:
Tyler Gardens & Landscaping Lecture
Saturday, April 20, 2013
Where and When
Time: 9:30 am
Location: Tyler Gardens, Newtown Campus
Contact: email@example.com
Event Information
Presenting the Sixth Annual Tyler Gardens & Landscaping Lecture
Featuring Drew Becher lecturing on Philadelphia Horticultural Society at 185 years
A tour of the Tyler Gardens will follow.
Drew Becher is a highly respected leader in the greening and beautification movement in Washington, D.C., and New York City. Mr. Becher, a brilliant speaker who makes the environment and horticulture come alive, has been the President of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society since 2010.
Reserve space today! See the flyer below for complete details.Tyler Garden Lecture Flyer
$15 admission (Students with ID, $7).


text:
The McCafe x Ferrero Collection includes two drinks and one coffee cake inspired by Ferrero products.
It will sell New White Chocolate Coffee, a white chocolate and sweetened coconut latte available iced or hot and comes with a free Ferrero Collection Confetteria Raffaello candy.
A Golden Nutty Mocha, a hazelnut mocha (steamed milk, chocolate sauce, espresso, and hazelnut syrup), which comes with a free Ferrero Rocher chocolate.
And, the Coffee Chocolate Cake, which is a seven-layered cake with chocolate cream, Italian cheese, and chocolate and coffee mousse, on top of a base of biscuit crumbs. It comes with a free Ferrero Rondnoir.


text:
Topic: Moonface - Know So (Xaric Remix) - INFLUENTIAL HOUSE
Scott, influential house owner, asked me to remix a great producer MOONFACE.
I've finished the remix few hours ago. You could listen it on myspace:
Hope you'll enjoy it
Bittersweet Angel EP - STRIPPED / Istanbul Ep - HYPEMUZIK
www.myspace.com/xaricprogressive / www.myspace.com/atlantdigitalrec


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PITTSBURGH – As the crowd gathered around Steelers running back Rashard Mendenhall, his teammates shouted words of encouragement to him.
Their message to the running back as he came back from a one-game suspension for conduct deemed detrimental to the team was simple: Welcome back.
"He's a pretty darn good football player," said quarterback Ben Roethlisberger. "If he can help this team win football games, we'll take it."
Mendenhall was suspended for the Steelers' 27-24 overtime loss to Dallas Sunday for failing to show up for the Dec. 9 game against San Diego after learning he would be inactive for the second straight week.
Mendenhall said his decision not to show up for the game was not made out of frustration.
"I wouldn't use that word," Mendenhall said. "There's a lot of thought in everything I do."
Head coach Mike Tomlin didn't make promises to Mendenhall upon his reinstatement, but did leave the door open to the running back being active for the Steelers' game Sunday at Heinz Field against the Cincinnati Bengals (8-6). It's a game Pittsburgh (7-7) needs to win to stay in playoff contention.
Mendenhall, the Steelers' leading rusher the past three seasons, is open to whatever role Tomlin has in mind.
"I've felt great this whole time," said Mendenhall, who suffered a torn knee ligament in Week 17 of last season and was sidelined for four games this year with a sore Achilles' tendon.
"I've worked this whole time, so I'm ready for whatever role they have for me."
Tomlin benched Mendenhall in favor of Jonathan Dwyer following the Steelers' 20-14 loss at Cleveland. Mendenhall lost two fumbles on just four carries in that game. But Dwyer and Isaac Redman also fumbled – Pittsburgh lost five fumbles in the game – and the running game has struggled since.
Dwyer has gained only 103 yards on 33 carries since being named the starter.
"I think it's just the minor details, just getting the plays that we know we're good at and sticking with them," said Dwyer, who leads the Steelers with 532 yards on 131 attempts but hasn't gotten more than nine attempts in each of the past two games, both losses.
"Once we do that, we need to keep implementing it throughout the game."
With both Mendenhall and Redman sitting out the Oct. 21 meeting with Cincinnati – a 24-17 Pittsburgh victory – Dwyer gained a career-high 122 yards on 17 carries.
The Steelers are hoping for a similar effort this week in order to take pressure off of Roethlisberger and the passing attack as well as the defense.
"We were successful in running the ball against these guys the last time," said Tomlin. "We don't anticipate that it will be easy just because of our past experience. But we are comfortable with the formulation of a plan, and we look forward to having those guys being a big part of what it is we do."
Roethlisberger said he apologized to offensive coordinator Todd Haley for statements he made following the Dallas game. Roethlisberger questioned some of Haley's play calling.
"(I was) just apologizing for the storm that it created and caused," said Roethlisberger, who said he also apologized to Tomlin and team president Art Rooney II. "We do have a lot of talks behind closed doors – about things, about plays, play calling. ... We have talks about everything. Coach Tomlin and I meet every Monday to talk about the game and what goes on. Just the frustration after a loss, and especially feeling like it was my fault, things blew up."
Odds and end zones
Cornerback Cortez Allen, who sat out Sunday with a groin injury, participated in practice Wednesday. … Cornerback Keenan Lewis (hip), offensive tackle Mike Adams (ankle) and wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders (ribs) were limited in practice. … Defensive end Cameron Heyward (not injury related), safety Troy Polamalu (coach's decision), cornerback Ike Taylor (ankle) and defensive end Al Woods (illness) did not practice.
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Tedeschi Trucks Band Talk About Their Post-Allman Brothers Band Future
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Fresh off their blistering performance at last weekend's Mountain Jam, Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi sat down for an exclusive interview to discuss what the future holds for the Tedeschi Trucks Band now that Trucks' time in the Allman Brothers Band was nearing a close.
The couple were married for almost a decade and each had their respective solo careers before joining forces in the Tedeschi Trucks Band. Asked if they anticipate one day resuming their respective solo careers, Trucks tells Ultimate Classic Rock that he does not anticipate that happening anytime soon but has not closed the door on the possibility.
"Down the road, who knows what will happen? I'm sure she'll do other things and I know I will but right now, there is so much energy and so much going on with this band. I feel like we are still just digging into what it is capable of," Trucks raves.
"I don't have the desire to look elsewhere," he continues. "As much as I love playing with the Allman Brothers Band or my solo band, there is nothing that I am not getting here that I feel I need. So until I get that itch or she gets that itch, I think we are going to be working this thing and seeing how how far we can take it musically and how deep we can dig."
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News Release
Media Contact: TPWD News, email@example.com, 512-389-8030
June 9, 2008
State Parks Offer "Texas Outdoor Family" Weekend Workshops
Summer, Fall Weekends Set Near Austin, San Antonio, Houston
AUSTIN, Texas — The Texas Outdoor Family program is expanding, offering a new series of weekend workshops in state parks this summer and fall. Texas Parks and Wildlife Department began the program two years ago, and is also hosting workshops in local parks through partnerships with cities, river authorities and others.
"Today's children are growing up in urban areas and becoming disconnected with the world of nature and the outdoors," said Walt Dabney, TPWD State Parks Division director. "Many parents are aware of this and are interested in getting back to nature, but they don't know how to get started. This program directly addresses that need, and we want it to become a centerpiece of our outreach and education efforts in state parks."
Workshops in state parks cost $55 per family (up to eight people), and include individual car camping sites for each family, restrooms with hot showers, professional Park Ranger-led programs and instruction, overnight state park police officer public safety and security, a curriculum developed specifically for use and enjoyment of a state park, and state park Junior Ranger certification programs. The entire approach is 'Leave No Trace' Certified so it's environmentally friendly.
"There's no experience necessary for these workshops," said Chris Holmes, a state park regional interpreter who is organizing the new workshop series. "We recognize that many people in today's increasingly urban culture don't have the same skills or backgrounds as earlier generations of Texans. These weekend workshops offer a supportive environment where families can get started in safe and comfortable settings."
For example, the schedule for one upcoming state park weekend includes pitching tents, fire starting and outdoor cooking, and morning and night-time guided talks or tours with park rangers. Most workshops also include activities such as introductions to fishing, kayaking and trail adventure and exploration through GPS and geocaching.
For workshops in state parks, families are expected to bring their own food for the two-day workshops, and a suggested shopping and packing lists for meals and personal items will be provided.
Fees for workshops held in local parks vary, but typically the fee per family of four is $150. This includes all meals, so families do not need to bring food.
Toyota has come on board as a sponsor of Texas Outdoor Family, helping provide funding for equipment to make the weekend workshops possible, and more sponsors are being sought who want to help introduce families to nature and the outdoors.
Visit tpwd.texas.gov/outdoorfamily for more information. Families can register by calling (512) 389-8903 and speaking to a Texas Outdoor Family representative Monday-Friday 9 a.m.-to-6 p.m. After registration, a confirmation packet with directions and details will be sent.
The schedule of upcoming Texas Outdoor Family workshops is as follows. The first two workshops in August are on weekdays-the thinking here is to see if families with children out of school for the summer might enjoy a less crowded midweek experience. All other dates below are Saturday-Sunday. Check the Texas Outdoor Family web pages regularly, as new workshops continue to be added to the schedule.
- Aug. 4-5 — Galveston State Park
- Aug. 13-14 — Bastrop State Park
- Sept. 13-14 — Huntsville State Park
- Sept. 20-21 — Galveston State Park
- Sept. 20-21 — Odessa city park
- Sept. 20-21 — Waco city park
- Sept. 27-28 — Georgetown city park (north of Austin)
- Sept. 27-28 — Kyle city park (South of Austin)
- Sept. 27-28 — Buescher State Park
- Sat., Oct. 4-5 — Brazos Bend State Park
- Sat., Oct. 11-12 — Buescher State Park
- Oct. 11-12 — Rockwall city park (Near Dallas)
- Oct. 18-19 — Georgetown city park
- Oct. 18-19 — Huntsville State Park
- Oct. 25-26 — Brazos Bend State Park
- Oct. 25-26 — McKinney Falls State Park
- Nov. 1-2 — Palmetto State Park
- Nov. 8-9 — Brazos Bend State Park
- Fall 2008 TBA — San Antonio River Authority park
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In March of 2013, President Obama signed the extension of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), reinforcing the United States' commitment to combat and reduce violence against women in many areas, including domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence and stalking.
CU-Boulder is helping to set the standard on implementation of the requirements of VAWA, and is part of the conversation on the national stage. The U.S. Department of Education has chosen CU-Boulder Office of Victim Assistance Director Jessica Ladd-Webert to serve on the Negotiated Rulemaking Committee for VAWA, where she serves as an alternate negotiator representing Mental Health Services. Ladd-Webert will travel to Washington, D.C., on three occasions this year to participate in these meetings.
"The hope is that the law will continue to bring more prevention and awareness around sexual assault, dating violence, domestic violence and stalking," said Ladd-Webert. I'm pleased to lend my voice to the discussion and not only represent CU-Boulder and my mental health colleagues from campuses around the country, but also the voices of survivors."
One of the greatest successes of VAWA is said to be its emphasis on a coordinated community response to violence against women. The university has been coordinating and implementing many aspects of the extended legislation well before its March 7, 2014 implementation date – as well as integrating our Clery Act compliance with VAWA compliance standards.
Setting the stage for an informed and responsive community, in 2005 the university created the Office of Discrimination and Harassment (ODH). Since that time, all employees (including student employees) are required to take the Discrimination and Harassment training course within the first 30 days of employment with the Boulder campus. All CU-Boulder faculty members must complete the training within their first semester of employment. After completing this initial training, all employees and faculty members are required to take a Discrimination and Harassment training at least once every five years, although some departments require employees to complete the training more frequently. Volunteers, affiliates and students who interact with K-12 student populations are also required to take the training.
In June 2013, nine months ahead of federal compliance deadlines, ODH added VAWA-required elements to the Discrimination and Harassment training. This includes explanations and prevention information on domestic violence, dating violence and stalking. The training also states that CU-Boulder prohibits sexual offenses including sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence and stalking. Since June 2013, approximately 4,200 employees (including student employees) have completed either the online or on-site training.
"We want to be ahead of the curve," said Ryan Huff, who chairs the campus Clery Compliance Committee. "As soon as the law was passed, the committee got to work right away to ensure we were compliant with VAWA months ahead of schedule. We want to follow best practices and be a national leader in Clery Act compliance."
For years, CU-Boulder's Student Code of Conduct has been in compliance ahead of new directives from VAWA. These include the "preponderance of the evidence" threshold for finding suspects responsible for sex offenses. Furthermore, both parties in Student Conduct cases have the same rights, such as bringing an advisor to conduct hearings and notifying both parties of the outcome in writing.
The university has also provided training to all incoming freshmen at Orientation, including information on consent, bystander intervention, definitions of sexual assault and more. In addition, Student Affairs is currently working on an online tool for all new students, with training and information on sexual violence and other safety-related topics.
As part of the university's efforts to expand our Clery Act reporting as part of VAWA guidelines, effective Jan. 1, 2014, the CU Police Department started collecting data on three new crime categories: domestic violence, dating violence and stalking. Furthermore, in the existing hate crime category, federal law has added two new protected classes. They are "national origin" and "gender identity." The Police Department has also begun tracking these new protected classes within the hate crime category.
One of the most visible elements of Clery Act compliance is the issuance of the "timely warning" to the university community. VAWA prohibits the use of a victim's name in a timely warning. Historically, CU Police have not used victims' names in timely warnings because it's not relevant to the timely warning's main intention – to provide pertinent information to campus affiliates so they can take whatever protective actions they deem appropriate.
CU-Boulder's Clery Compliance Committee meets at least quarterly to address the university's compliance and best practices. The committee will continue to monitor VAWA rule-making and implement national best practices.


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"Road Ready: Putting your Business Financials in Gear," is the title of the two-part dairy financial management webinar series being sponsored soon by the Professional Dairy Producers of Wisconsin (PDPW).
These latest installments of PDPW's "World Class Webinars" are:
- Wednesday, April 23 – Economics and Dairy Dashboard Diagnostics
- Wednesday, May 14 – Managing Through the Cycles: Staying in Control of Your Business
Both webinars will feature Cornell University agricultural economist David Kohl, MS, PhD, who will provide insights into dairy financial planning and benchmarking; key financial ratios for successful dairy operations; navigating business cycles; operating in a new economic environment; and more.
The sessions will take place from noon to 1 p.m. CDT. If you have a time conflict and cannot view the session(s) live, you can watch a fully recorded session at your leisure.
Non-PDPW members are welcome to participate at a slightly higher registration fee. Register today!


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Article Post
Freelance Writer
Smart Meter + Slot Machine Security
Coincidentally, Las Vegas was the scene last July where supposed security flaws of smart meters were unmasked. The event still has meter makers, utilities, standards organizations and federal regulators talking or hard at work improving security.
At the Black Hat security conference, Mike Davis, a senior security consultant for IOActive, demonstrated how his security team simulated the hacking of 16,000 out of 22,000 smart meters over a 24-hour period. They used a worm, a software patch, that gave IOActive the control to turn power on and off t one-second intervals at 16,000 homes.
"We could have put anything in that worm we wanted as a payload," said Davis. "We did not have enough room in the smart meter to fit our code so we had to dump some functionality out for our worm to work. The functionality we dumped was the ability to wirelessly update our devices. That would have locked out the utility from wirelessly updating the devices."
Like Tommy Carmichael, IOActive had to get its hands on a meter before starting to compromise it. In 2008, the first meters they examined came via a penetration test for a utility. "This is how we initially found some vulnerability," Davis explained. Later, IOActive bought different models on eBay, and got others by dumpster diving at the back of utility meter shops. The discarded meters provided all they needed -- radio communications and firmware. Since Black Hat, Davis no longer sees smart meters on eBay and noticed that defective units are now being sent to secure recycling facilities.
"As much as I'd like to say I am a professional, I'm really a geek at heart. I'm only in it to play with the toys," Davis admitted. IOActive used two smart meters to build the worm and it did not take expensive equipment. Davis confessed that the most valuable tool he used cost $200, a JTAG interface.
Davis reflected on industry reactions since Black Hat. "I'm sure someone inside our company assumed that if we are talking about this we would be the go-to guys for this particular issue. A lot of the feedback we got was that we were not telling the truth about the vulnerabilities, or no meter vendor would ever release their devices without encryption enabled, or even if this were possible, the propagation rate of the worm would be so slow that it would not matter. When our research hit the news it was about the same time the stimulus package came out with funding for meters. People acknowledged us, but no one really wanted to work with us. They just wanted to get their product out."
Of course, a malicious hacker would only have to rip a meter off a house to get started. And what could a criminal or terrorist with reverse engineering skills do? One feature in many devices is a remote disconnect that allows the utility to wirelessly disconnect an individual meter from the grid. "The nature of the worm we demonstrated is the danger that we were able to propagate it without the need for the utility. If we propagated it to hundreds of thousands of meters, we would have the ability to disconnect those," Davis said.
Because meters are wirelessly linked by radio frequency with a one- to two-mile range, worms or disabling viruses could hop from service area to service area on interoperable metering systems.
What are the consequences of hundreds of thousands without power? Someone would have to figure out how the meters are being exploited, create and test a corrective patch and, if firmware is compromised, individually deploy patches to every affected household. "We will continue our research as soon as I get my hands on another device. These devices were made to be sensors, not security devices, and that's what we are seeing in the state of hardware security everywhere, except for devices like Xbox, or PlayStationr where they really care about tampering," Davis concluded.
But the major meter manufacturers are improving security. Philip Mezey, North American senior vice president and COO for Itron, had this to say: "Security of advanced metering and smart grid networks is very much something that Itron and the utility industry has taken, and will continue to take, seriously."
Subscribe to Intelligent Utility magazine today.
Intelligent Utility magazine is the new, thought-leading publication on how to successfully deliver information-enabled energy. This article originally appeared in the November/December 2009 issue.
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GHENT, BELGIUM--(Marketwire - February 28, 2013) - Ablynx (EURONEXT BRUSSELS: ABLX), the biopharmaceutical company focused on the discovery and development of Nanobodies®, announces today that it has raised EUR 31.5 million through a private placement of new shares via an accelerated bookbuilding procedure announced on Wednesday 27 February 2013 after the market closed.
The private placement has allowed Ablynx to place 4,377,919 new shares with a range of domestic and international institutional investors and qualified institutional buyers in the United States at a price of EUR 7.2 per share, a 6.7% discount on the previous closing price. This represents 10.0% of the current number of outstanding shares and will bring the total number of shares after the issue to 48,157,116. The new shares will be admitted to trading on NYSE Euronext Brussels following their issuance, which is expected to take place on 5 March 2013.
The private placement was oversubscribed and certain pre-IPO shareholders and warrant holders sold 1,872,081 shares at the same price in conjunction with this transaction.
The funds will be used by Ablynx to:
KBC Securities NV acted as Global Coordinator. KBC Securities NV, Bryan, Garnier & Co. Limited and Nomura Code Securities Limited acted as Joint Bookrunners for the placement.
Dr Edwin Moses, Chairman and CEO of Ablynx commented:
"We are very pleased to announce the successful completion of the private placement which we believe reflects the strong progress made at Ablynx over the past year. The new funds will give us increased flexibility to invest in our Nanobody pipeline and in particular to build on the successful Phase II results of our rheumatoid arthritis product, ALX-0061, announced earlier this month. We are grateful to our existing shareholders for their continuing support and welcome our new investors. We believe that Ablynx is well placed to deliver significant value to shareholders in the coming years and we look forward to updating them on our progress during 2013."
About Ablynx
Ablynx is a biopharmaceutical company engaged in the discovery and development of Nanobodies®, a novel class of therapeutic proteins based on single-domain antibody fragments, for a range of serious human diseases, including inflammation, haematology, oncology and pulmonary disease. Today, the Company has approximately 25 programmes in the pipeline and five Nanobodies at clinical development stage. Ablynx has ongoing research collaborations and significant partnerships with major pharmaceutical companies including Boehringer Ingelheim, Merck Serono, Novartis and Merck & Co. The Company is headquartered in Ghent, Belgium. More information can be found on www.ablynx.com.
Press release in pdf format: http://hugin.info/137912/R/1682073/550116.pdf