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Throughout 1998 new operas were being composed and old ones were being revived at an accelerating pace. The new opera that attracted the most attention was A Streetcar Named Desire, commissioned and produced by the San Francisco Opera. The music was composed and conducted by André Previn, and Philip Little created a libretto based on the Tennessee Williams play. Renée Fleming sang the role of Blanche, and Rodney Gilfry played Stanley. Other notable premieres included Tan Dun's Marco Polo in New York City, Henry Mollicone's Coyote Tales in Kansas City, Mo., Mark Adamo's Little Women in Houston, Texas, Richard Wargo's Ballymore in Philadelphia and Milwaukee, Wis., and Eric Salzman's The True Last Words of Dutch Schultz in Amsterdam. Also premiered at the Lincoln Center Festival in New York City was Patience and Sarah, an opera by composer Paula Kimper and librettist Wende Parsons about a lesbian relationship between two women in Puritan New England.
Perhaps the most talked-about revival was The Philosopher's Stone, an opera written by three obscure contemporaries of Mozart, who also contributed several pieces of music. The libretto was written by Emanuel Schikaneder, author of the libretto for Mozart's The Magic Flute. Its first performance in more than two centuries was given in Boston by the Boston Baroque ensemble. Other notable revivals included Marvin David Levy's Mourning Becomes Electra by the Lyric Opera of Chicago and Kurt Weill's Die Burgschaft. The Spoleto Festival U.S.A. in Charleston, S.C., was host to the first American production of Francesco Cavalli's 350-year-old opera Giasone. The festival also premiered the new multimedia work Hindenburg. Described as a "meditation on humanity's hubris," the piece was a collaboration between composer Steve Reich and his wife, video artist Beryl Korot.
The effect of new technology was also evident. Some composers incorporated "created" sounds into their works, and several new productions employed various kinds of technology in their music. Magic Frequencies by Meredith Monk was a multimedia work dealing with folk art, outer space, and science fiction; the opera received its first performance in Munich, Ger. The Brooklyn (N.Y.) Academy of Music premiered Chaos, by the group Bang on a Can. The opera featured amplified singers, drum machines, synthesizers, and samplers. Matthew Maquire's libretto included elements of chaos theory in telling the story of two scientists who reach the "chaos zone" and encounter Pierre and Marie Curie.
Puccini's Turandot received its first performance in China when it was staged in an open-air format in Beijing's Forbidden City. Under the direction of Zubin Mehta, Sharon Sweet sang the role of Turandot, and Calaf was performed by Kristjan Johannsson. The producers claimed that at $15 million it was the most expensive opera ever produced.
New Yorkers were not so fortunate. The Lincoln Center Festival clashed with government officials in China when director Chen Shizheng attempted to stage a production of The Peony Pavillion. The classic Chinese opera runs for 20 hours and tells the story of a young woman who dies longing for the ideal love. Her ghost finds her soulmate, she is brought back to life, and the lovers marry. Written in 1598 by Tang Xianzu, the opera was considered a masterpiece of the venerated Kunqu Opera, a highly stylized, traditional form. Chen had revised the production to update and enliven the opera, but the Shanghai Bureau of Culture objected to his changes and refused to release the props, costumes, and sets. Intervention by high-level U.S. and French diplomats (the production was to travel later to France), and appeals by both Chen and Nigel Redden, the newly appointed director of the Lincoln Center Festival, proved futile.
Under the direction of Kurt Masur, the New York Philharmonic opened its season with a cycle of Beethoven and was joined by Isaac Stern as violin soloist. The orchestra went on to perform all nine Beethoven symphonies during a 10-week span. The Cleveland (Ohio) Orchestra had the distinction of performing perhaps the last premiere of a work by American composer Charles Ives, who died in 1954. David G. Porter, an Ives scholar, reconstructed the composer's "Emerson" Piano Concerto, using the Second Piano Sonata (subtitled Concord, Mass., 1840-60) and the Fourth Symphony as resources. The pianist was Alan Feinberg, with Christoph von Dohnanyi conducting. At Carnegie Hall the Violin Concerto of violinist and composer Ellen Taafe Zwilich was also premiered. In observance of Israel's 50th anniversary, the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra under Zubin Mehta spent three weeks touring throughout the U.S. with a series of fund-raising concerts.
The anniversaries of many composers and performers were observed in 1998. Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179) was the earliest composer to be feted. Her Ordo Virtutum received a number of performances, including one for an audience of 5,000 in London's Royal Albert Hall. The Sequentia ensemble performed it in 1998 as part of its project to record all of her music on the Deutsche Harmonia Mundi label. The most lavishly celebrated anniversary--in classical, jazz, and popular circles--was George Gershwin's centennial. Also widely observed were the centennials of two close associates of Kurt Weill: Bertolt Brecht, librettist of Die Dreigoschenoper and Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny, and Lotte Lenya, Weill's wife and most noted interpreter. Luciano Pavarotti and Plácido Domingo both celebrated the 30th anniversaries of their debuts at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. The avant-garde Kronos Quartet and the British early music choral group the Tallis Scholars both commemorated their 25th anniversaries.
The Vienna Boys' Choir celebrated its 500th anniversary in 1998 amid a maelstrom of controversy. Agnes Grossman, who was appointed in 1997 as the choir's first female artistic director, claimed that the young singers were overworked and announced plans to reduce the number of performances, which usually totaled 100 concerts a year. In addition, she wanted to establish a system of sponsorship for tours and concerts. Grossman was blocked by the governing board on both issues and resigned from her position in protest.
Inspired by the success of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, the American Classical Music Hall of Fame and Museum opened in Cincinnati, Ohio. The first inductees included the U.S. Marine Band (also celebrating its bicentennial) as well as many individuals, including Ives, Leonard Bernstein, Igor Stravinsky, Fritz Reiner, Aaron Copland, Arturo Toscanini, Duke Ellington, and Gershwin.
Joanne Falletta, music director of the Richmond-based Virginia Symphony, was appointed music director of the Buffalo (N.Y.) Philharmonic. Masur announced his intention to take on the post of principal conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, starting in 2000. New York Metropolitan Opera director James Levine was appointed to succeed Sergiu Celibidache as music director of the Munich Philharmonic, beginning in the fall of 1999. Andrew Davis, music director of the Glyndebourne Festival Opera in East Sussex, Eng., and chief conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, announced that he would leave those positions to become music director and principal conductor of the Lyric Opera of Chicago in September 2000. Christoph Eschenbach announced that he would end his 10-year tenure as music director of the Houston Symphony when his contract expired in 1999. Christopher Hogwood renewed his contract with Boston's Handel and Haydn Society through the 1999-2000 season, after which he would become conductor laureate. Domingo announced that he would become the artistic director of the Los Angeles Opera in July 2000 in addition to his position as artistic director of the Washington Opera.
Several venues found themselves in need of refurbishment. Two venerable European opera houses, Venice's La Fenice and Gran Teatro del Liceu in Barcelona, Spain, had both been devastated by fire several years ago and were being rebuilt. Work on the Liceu neared completion, but the management still had to find other halls for its productions. London's Royal Opera House continued to struggle with financial problems. It was also under renovation but was forced to close, only partly because of problems related to its physical accommodations. New administrators were appointed after a parliamentary report sharply criticized its financial management. An opera season was held, using the Royal Albert Hall and the Sadler's Wells Theatre.
On the continent new concert halls were opened in Baden-Baden, Ger., and Lucerne, Switz. In the U.S. the Santa Fe (N.M.) Opera House was redesigned, with all seats now under a roof where part of its audience had previously sat in the open air. In September the Seattle (Wash.) Symphony opened its new facility, Benaroya Hall; the $188 million building had a 2,500-seat main auditorium and a 540-seat recital hall. The recently built New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark surpassed expectations and attracted half a million patrons. Despite the problems associated with expanding its season, the Washington (D.C.) Opera decided to remain in the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts after the cost of establishing its own opera house in the downtown area proved prohibitive.
Among the notable musicians who died in 1998 were German baritone Hermann Prey, American baritone Todd Duncan, American conductor Margaret Hillis, Russian composer Alfred Schnittke, and British composer Sir Michael Tippett. Shinichi Suzuki, founder of the Suzuki method of teaching the violin, now used throughout the world, also died in 1998. (See OBITUARIES.)
Zoot suits, double-breasted suits, wide neckties, fedora hats, and other attire from Grandpa's trunk became the fashion again in 1998 as the swing revival, or neoswing, took off in jazz. The fad had had its beginnings in small nightclubs, especially on the U.S. West Coast, in the early 1990s and had quietly spread across the country. Couples began taking swing dance lessons, learning to jitterbug and also to hold each other while dancing, much as their ancestors used to do. With appearances by the Squirrel Nut Zippers on late-night television shows and popular recordings and tours by the Royal Crown Revue, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, and Cherry Poppin' Daddies, the new swing music gained increased popularity in 1998. The music had little to do with the classic big-band jazz of the swing era; instead, simple arrangements and shuffle rhythms dominated, and the most important influences were black 1940s jump-rhythm and blues bands, western swing, and 1950s Las Vegas lounge acts.
More significant in strictly musical terms was the slowly but steadily increasing presence of gifted women jazz artists in the 1990s. College jazz programs and a gradual decline of sexist attitudes were contributing factors, and the three-day Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Festival at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., held during Memorial Day weekend, was the most prominent gathering of jazz women yet, featuring performers such as vocalists Marlena Shaw and Nnena Freelon, violinist Regina Carter, the big band Maiden Voyage, and keyboard improvisers Renee Rosnes and Amina Claudine Myers. Williams had been an important arranger-pianist of the swing era; her fellow pioneer in breaking down gender barriers, Marian McPartland, was given an 80th-birthday tribute at New York City's Town Hall. Veterans such as pianist Barbara Carroll and trumpeter Harry ("Sweets") Edison and young pianists Rosnes and Benny Green were among those paying tribute and, as on her weekly radio program "Piano Jazz," pianist McPartland joined several of them in duets.
In 1939 Jelly Roll Morton composed his only swing-band works, which he hoped to sell to Benny Goodman, who had already made a pop hit of Morton's "King Porter Stomp." Unlike all previous Morton music, the works featured modern swing-band harmonies and no solos, a far cry indeed from the New Orleans ensemble style of Morton's early jazz masterpieces. Goodman did not buy the scores, and the compositions were never performed until 1998, when, 57 years after Morton's death, four of them were introduced by Don Vappie's Creole Jazz Serenaders, a New Orleans-based repertory band.
Unlike 1997, when New York City's two major jazz festivals were held simultaneously, in 1998 the upstart Texaco New York Jazz Festival, centred on late bop to free jazz, was held the first two weeks of June, and the long-standing JVC Jazz Festival, featuring more mainstream works, was held the following two weeks. Ornette Coleman brought a series of concerts titled Civilization '98 to the Umbria (Italy) Jazz Festival, including Coleman's jazz trio joined by fellow alto saxophonist Lee Konitz; Coleman performed with Indian and Sardinian musicians, and his jazz-rock Prime Time band was joined by dancers and a video display. The 10th National Black Arts Festival, in Atlanta, Ga., was highlighted by a particularly daring concert series featuring international free-jazz notables, including, from the U.S., trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith, trombonist George Lewis, and saxophonists Roscoe Mitchell, Fred Anderson, Oliver Lake, and Dwight Andrews (the festival's music curator) and, from Europe, saxophonists Evan Parker (U.K.) and Peter Brötzmann (Germany) and pianists Alex von Schlippenbach and Gunter ("Baby") Sommers (Germany).
Tributes were prominent among the year's recordings. In the year of George Gershwin's 100th birthday, pianist Herbie Hancock's Gershwin's World (Verve), with guests including Kathleen Battle, Joni Mitchell, Stevie Wonder, and the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, was notable. While Columbia/Legacy reissued Miles Davis's The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions as a four-compact disc (CD) set, Yo Miles!, by guitarist Henry Kaiser, Wadada Leo Smith, and guests that included the ROVA Saxophone Quartet and the World Saxophone Quartet's Selim Sivad appeared in tribute to Davis. The late-1997 reissue of Herbie Nichols's The Complete Blue Note Recordings (Blue Note, four CDs) was matched by, among others, the tribute CDs Spinning Song by guitarist Duck Baker and Love Is Proximity by the Herbie Nichols Project. Several significant saxophone-piano duet albums appeared, including Ornette Coleman-Joachim Kuhn Colors (Verve/Harmolodic), Ran Blake-Anthony Braxton A Memory of Vienna (hatOLOGY), and Lol Coxhill-Veryan Weston Boundless (Emanem). Branford Marsalis celebrated his appointment as creative consultant to Columbia Records by immediately signing tenor saxophonist David S. Ware; the first result was Ware's album Go See the World.
Among the year's odd events, an asteroid was named for soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom, and Woody Allen, an amateur clarinetist, released Wild Man Blues, a film centred on his Dixieland playing. The Bear Comes Home, Rafi Zabor's novel about a saxophone-playing bear, won the 1998 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. The Playboy Guide to Jazz on CD by Neil Tesser and Jazz: The Rough Guide by Ian Carr, Digby Fairweather, and Brian Priestley stood out among several new jazz CD guides. Other book highlights included The History of Jazz by Ted Gioia, a critical study; Visions of Jazz, a collection of essays by critic Gary Giddins; New Dutch Swing,a history of modern Dutch jazz by Kevin Whitehead; and Such Melodious Racket, a history of Canadian jazz by Mark Miller. The Canadian jazz magazine Coda celebrated its 40th year of continuous publication.
For many jazz listeners, 1998 would be remembered as the year Frank Sinatra, the master craftsman of emotion and the most popular of swinging postwar singers, died. The year's other deaths included singer Betty Carter, guitarist Tal Farlow, drummer Dennis Charles, jazz pianist-classical composer Mel Powell, saxophonist Benny Waters, pianists Dorothy Donegan and Walter Bishop, Jr., drummer Barrett Deems, blues singer Junior Wells, drummer Roy Porter, Hungarian guitarist Attila Zoller, Japanese bassist Yoshizawa Motoharu, and saxophonists Davey Schildkraut, Glenn Spearman, and Thomas Chapin. (See OBITUARIES.)
In the U.K. the most impressive band of the year was Pulp, led by singer and songwriter Jarvis Cocker. Their new album This Is Hardcore continued Jarvis's quirky, bleak, and apparently confessional style in dealing with the more painful side of sex and relationships, but it also showed a new maturity and musical bravery that put the band ahead of such rivals as Blur and Oasis. Songs like "The Fear," "Dishes," and "Help the Aged" dealt with topics that other performers rarely dared tackle, ranging from fears of sexual inadequacy and loneliness to the pains of growing old. Despite such subject matter, the band proved highly successful. In a year during which several outdoor festivals and major concerts faced severe financial problems, Pulp proved that it could still attract large crowds for its clever, witty, and sometimes brutal songs.
Much of the best of the other new British music came from unexpected quarters, such as Wales--a part of the U.K. seldom renowned in the past for playing a major part in popular music. The best and most popular Welsh band, the Manic Street Preachers, followed the success of Everything Must Go with another best-selling set of passionate guitar-backed songs, This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours, which dominated the best-seller list during early autumn. Other successful Welsh bands included Catatonia, with its album International Velvet, and the Super Furry Animals.
Another unexpected influence on the popular music scene came from the British Asian community. The young band Cornershop, led by Tjinder Singh, mixed sitar-backed Indian styles with modern dance influences in its album When I Was Born for the 7th Time, which sounded like an Impressionist blend of all the sounds that a young Indian might have heard growing up in Britain during the 1980s and 1990s. It included a new version of the Beatles' Indian-influenced song "Norwegian Wood," originally recorded three decades earlier, as well as Cornershop's catchy and cheerful hit "Brimful of Asha." Another Anglo-Asian group, Asian Dub Foundation, created a distinctive blend of guitar rock and rap styles with an Asian edge on angry songs like "Naxalite." Both of these bands were nominated for the Mercury Music Award, the most prestigious British music prize.
British pop music traditionally thrived on novel and unexpected combinations of different, apparently unrelated styles. One other such musical surprise in 1998 was the new album from Billy Bragg, Mermaid Avenue. Bragg, from the East End of London, made his reputation in the 1980s as a solo electric guitarist who wrote highly political songs dealing with such topics as the miners' strike. During recent months, however, this most English of singers had been invited to look through the archives of the U.S.'s most famous folk troubadour, Woody Guthrie, and write new melodies for Guthrie song lyrics that he never recorded before his death and that had never been made public before. The resulting album, recorded with the American band Wilco, mixed country and folk influences on songs, like Ingrid Bergman, that showed a new side to Guthrie as an often playful as well as political songwriter.
Outside Britain the most successful new pop dance band of the year was Aqua. The band came from Denmark, a country with even less of a pop music history than Wales, and wrote novelty songs with a synthesizer backing. They were loathed by many pop music critics but were adored by young audiences and scored hits across Europe and beyond with "Barbie Girl" and "Doctor Jones." The more serious side of the new European popular music was shown by the success of Lo'Jo, a band from Angers, France. Led by keyboard player Denis Bean and two sisters of North African Berber origin, they mixed French balladry with influences from North Africa and the Arabic world and a dash of reggae from the Caribbean in their album Mojo Radio.
The other great success of the multicultural "world music" scene was Baaba Maal, a singer-songwriter from Senegal who emerged as arguably the finest vocalist in Africa. His new album Nomad Soul was a brave mixture of local African styles with influences from Jamaica and even Ireland, but with his concert at London's Festival Hall he proved that his passionate, semi-improvised style was best heard live. The opening act at the concert was the veteran Jamaican guitarist Ernest Ranglin, who traveled to Senegal to record his new album In Search of the Lost Riddim with members of Maal's band. The result, in which Ranglin's rapid-fire reggae-tinged jazz guitar was backed by African acoustic instruments such as the kora, was one of the unexpected delights of the year.
The original soundtrack album for the motion picture Titanic dominated popular music in the U.S. during the early months of 1998, with sales driven by the movie's success and by the popularity of Celine Dion's romantic ballad "My Heart Will Go On." The song debuted at number one on Billboard magazine's "Hot 100" singles chart when it was released commercially. Titanic was the first movie soundtrack to top the Billboard pop album chart since Chariots of Fire in 1982. Titanic held on to the top ranking in the face of competition from new releases by Madonna and Pearl Jam, among others. By the end of the year, it had sold more than 10 million copies, and a sequel, Back to Titanic, sold more than one million and rose to second on the Billboard pop album chart.
Another movie soundtrack, Hope Floats, with contributions from Garth Brooks, Sheryl Crow, the Rolling Stones, and the Mavericks, topped Billboard's country album chart for several weeks. Movie soundtracks also dominated the pop charts during the summer, with five in Billboard's top 10 for the week of July 11: City of Angels (with Alanis Morissette's "Uninvited"); Armageddon: The Album (with Aerosmith's "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing"); Hope Floats; Godzilla, the Album; and Bulworth: The Soundtrack.
Bob Dylan won the Grammy award for album of the year for his Time Out of Mind, and Shawn Colvin won record of the year and song of the year Grammys for "Sunny Came Home." Brooks made history when his album Double Live sold 1,085,373 copies in its first week of sales, more than any other album had sold in a single week since 1991, when SoundScan began computer tracking of album sales. In November he wrapped up a world tour with a concert in College Station, Texas. Over a three-year period, he played 348 concerts to more than five million people.
Canadian country star Shania Twain, who did not perform in concert while her 1995 release The Woman in Me amassed sales of 10 million copies, made her debut as a touring headliner on May 29 in Sudbury, Ont., in support of her third album Come On Over. Released at the end of 1997, the album had sold more than six million copies by the end of 1998 and topped the country album chart for more than 20 weeks. Twain's ballad "From This Moment On" became a major crossover hit, rising to fifth on the pop chart by early December.
The Spice Girls traveled to the U.S. in 1998, though without Geri Halliwell (Ginger Spice), who left the group on May 31. Notable summer tours included the all-women Lilith Fair (featuring Sarah McLachlan; see BIOGRAPHIES), Liz Phair, and Bonnie Raitt, among others); Dave Matthews Band; Pearl Jam; hard-rock's OzzFest (with Ozzy Osbourne, Tool, and Megadeth); the House of Blues Smokin' Grooves Tour (Public Enemy, Cypress Hill, Busta Rhymes); HORDE Fest (Blues Traveler, Barenaked Ladies, Ben Harper); and modern rock group Smashing Pumpkins, who donated their earnings to youth-oriented charities.
Hip-hop again proved its commercial viability as albums by Jay-Z, Snoop Dogg, DMX, Master P, and the Beastie Boys all topped the Billboard pop album chart. Lauryn Hill, a member of the hip-hop soul group the Fugees, made her solo debut with The Mis- education of Lauryn Hill, mixing hip-hop beats and soulful melodies. The album rose to first place on the pop chart, and a single from the album, "Doo Wop (That Thing)," entered the Billboard pop singles chart at number one in November.
Teenage singers Brandy and Monica jumped to the top spot on the pop charts with the single "The Boy Is Mine" and stayed there for 13 weeks, the longest-running chart topper of 1998. Monica later went to number one again with another single, "The First Night." Only Monica and Celine Dion had two number one pop hits during the year. Dion earned the honour for "My Heart Will Go On" and "I'm Your Angel," the latter a duet with R&B star R. Kelly. Though pop music usually dominated the music charts, shock rocker Marilyn Manson reached the top of the album chart with Mechanical Animals, and Korn did the same with Follow the Leader.
Deaths devastated the music world in 1998, among them Frank Sinatra; country's first lady Tammy Wynette, rock and roll pioneer Carl Perkins, Beach Boy Carl Wilson, country producer Owen Bradley, pop star-turned-congressman Sonny Bono, singing cowboys Gene Autry and Roy Rogers, and jazz vocalist Betty Carter. (See OBITUARIES.)
The Canadian corporation Seagram purchased Dutch-owned Polygram for $10.6 billion. In a deal expected to be finalized in December, Polygram joined Seagram-owned Universal Music Group to create the largest record company in the world, with 23% of the worldwide market share, moving ahead of Time Warner and Sony. Retail sales of music on the Internet increased. Industry watchers predicted that on-line sales would amount to $2 billion-$5 billion by 2002.


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Training and AQHA horses
The Last Frontier Farm is a comprehensive combined training facility operated by International Event rider Sharon White. Located between the Allegheny…
Dressage Training and Instruction; beginner through 3rd level. All ages, all breeds.
Specializing in western riding lessons and training, 30 + years experience. Judging and hauling available. Horses for sale.
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PIANC-Smart Rivers 2017 Conference
PIANC News
PIANC USA is fundraising for the Student Travel Scholarship Fund and has made a promising start so early in the year! Already more than $800 has been collected as of January 30th, but we are still in need in more donations to support students to attend PIANC's Dredging 2012 Conference in San Diego, CA. Our goal is $5,000 by October 2012!
All it takes is about five minutes and you can make a tax-deductible contribution to the PIANC USA Student Travel Scholarship Fund. Should you wish to support PIANC USA in this way, you may send a check made out to: U.S. Section PIANC, 7701 Telegraph Rd Casey Bldg., Alexandria, VA 22315.*
At last year's Smart Rivers conference in New Orleans, PIANC USA was happy to fund six students (over $4,000) to travel to and attend the conference. Most of the students attended from Mississippi State University, but we had one from Rutgers University and even the Budapest University of Technology and Economics!
Thank you to those who have already made a donation to this year's fund — you are helping to support the future of your profession and are making a difference in a student's life!
*Contributions to or for the use of the U.S. Section, PIANC, for exclusively public purposes, are deductible in the manner and to the extent provided in Section 170 of the Internal Revenue Code (United States Section PIANC Tax ID # 91-2003558).
revised 1 February 2012


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July 12, 2012 at 7:31 am #13498
I saw one of the members website http://www.agodesign.de/ and on their menu section they are able to display the main photos along with subcategories.
Can admin please explain how to adjust setting for this?
ThanksJuly 16, 2012 at 4:06 am #79486
Admin please reply. its been 3 days and still no update.July 16, 2012 at 7:12 am #79487July 16, 2012 at 8:05 am #79488
I am having trouble getting it to display. I log on and uploaded my photo and inserted the HTML code as shown by your screenshot. But nothing is showing up. Maybe i am not too sure exactly how to set this up and would appreciate if you can reply with step by step instruction.
Thank you very muchJuly 17, 2012 at 7:28 am #79489
almost 24hrs and still waiting for some assistance. please help out.July 17, 2012 at 12:54 pm #79490
1.) Insert a Menu(ex. Animals)then check "Use as Mega Menu" option.
2.) Add another menu below the Categories menu and name it Dog for example. You will know that it is added on the mega menu when you see a "Column" on the right side of the menu title.
3.) Now, to add an image on the menu. Use the Custom Link metabox. Enter a dummy text on the url and the content then click add to menu. Place that menu below the Dog menu.
4.) Edit the new menu and write a space sign like this
` '
to the URL and another on the Navigation Label, this is just a trick otherwise you will not be able to save the menu. On the description place an HTML tag like this:

5.) Check the option.
Use the description to create a Text Block. Dont display this item as a link. (note: dont remove the label text, otherwise wordpress will delete the item)
6.) Save the menu.
IsmaelJuly 18, 2012 at 9:56 am #79491
Hi Ismael,
Thanks for the step by step instructions.
Everything was clear and i was able to set everything up according to your instructions.
However, i uploaded all the resized photos onto photobucket and attached the link onto the description place, and it says that it was not able to locate the photos in file.
Any ideas how to resolve this?
Appreciate the helpJuly 22, 2012 at 12:29 pm #79492
Hi vsit,
It's possible that your Photobucket is not public. Since I've never used them, I'm not sure what options are available. Have you tried to add the images to your Media Library using Media > Add New?
Upload a photo by going to do Media > Add New and following on-screen instructions. Make not of the File URL which will look something like this:
Copy that URL then paste into area where you PhotoBucket URL is.
The topic 'How to adjust product display from menu?' is closed to new replies.


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Small-fee case explodes: Minnesota justices direct judicial anger at Pawlenty and Legislature
At first glance, this looks like a pretty small deal. The Minnesota Supreme Court has added $100 to the annual fee paid by practicing lawyers to renew their licenses. This will raise roughly $2 million a year, which the court will then allocate to subsidize the operation of public defender offices around the state — which represent indigent defendants in criminal cases — and to further subsidize Legal Aid, which helps poor Minnesotans in civil cases.
No biggy, right? Most lawyers can afford an extra $2 a week for such good causes.
But if you read the Supreme Court order and accompanying documents, it's clear that this little order, which was adopted by just 4-3, is carrying a whole lot more baggage. Inside that baggage is judicial anger about the separation of powers, the threat to "liberty and justice for all" (it's in the Pledge of Allegiance, y'know), and justices who are royally pissed off at the governor and the Legislature for abdicating their responsibility to raise the taxes necessary to cover the spending they order, including spending that is required by the U.S. and Minnesota Constitutions.
The memorandum supporting the order, written by Chief Justice Eric Magnuson on behalf of three members of the court, says the fee increase is taken reluctantly and temporarily, almost apologetically, in the hope that it will last only two years, after which the other branches of government will do their jobs.
The two dissents representing three justices argue that the action is unconstitutional, insofar as it amounts to imposing a tax on lawyers, and it is the Legislature, not the Judicial branch, that is in charge of levying taxes.
But the most remarkable piece of the package is raucous, angry concurrence by Justice Paul Anderson. Anderson sides with Magnuson, which makes his the deciding vote in favor of the deal. The license fee is necessary for the maintenance of "a civilized society," Anderson says. But the price he exacts for his vote is a fierce lecture about how government ought to function. He ratifies the deal, then denounces it as necessitated by the "unfortunate impasse" between Gov. Tim Pawlenty and the DFL Legislature. But "unfortunate impasse" is pale language compared to what happens when Anderson gets warmed up.
If I fail to capture what is going on here, I encourage you to read the order, the concurrence and the dissents, but especially Anderson's concurrence, which is a very unusual judicial document. He denounces (not by name, but there is no mistaking it) the famous anti-tax conservative kingpin Grover Norquist, who once famously said that his goal is to shrink government down to the size at which he can drown it in a bathtub.
Anderson, whose political origins are moderate Republican (he got his judicial appointments from Republican Gov. Arne Carlson), has had it with the Norquist (and apparently Pawlenty) aversion to taxes. After paraphrasing Norquist's bathtub comment, the justice writes:
"The problem with this approach is that when you continuously put the government's head under water, it is not the government that drowns — real people drown. Floodwaters breach levees and people drown. Bridges collapse and people drown. I have little tolerance for this anti-government rhetoric given the adverse consequences that result to real people, especially the least advantaged among us, when this myopic approach to governing actually gets translated into policy. I believe that government does have a proper, even an essential role to play in creating and preserving a civilized society."
A little background
In the landmark 1963 ruling in Gideon v. Wainwright, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that criminal defendants who cannot afford a lawyer must be provided one at public expense. In other words, maintaining a sufficient public defender operation is not optional; it is mandatory.
The vast majority of criminal defendants in Minnesota are poor enough to qualify and end up being represented by public defenders. During the budget squeeze of recent years, the public defenders office has been laying off lawyers while their caseloads and other expenses (health insurance anyone?) have been rising.To deal with the problem, public defenders stopped representing clients not absolutely entitled under Gideon to a public lawyer. For example, indigent parents whose custody of their children is threatened no longer get a public defender.
Over recent budget cycles, the public defender's office laid off more than 10 percent of its staff. The typical caseload of a public defender in Minnesota reached almost twice the proper caseload as recommended by the American Bar Association. In 2008, the public defender's office faced a $2.3 million deficit for the biennium. Then because of the state revenue shortfall (or, one could say, the political impossibility of new taxes to make up for the shortfall), the Legislature cut another $1.5 million from the public defender budget. During the 2009 legislative session, the committees responsible for funding the public defender office cut another $2 million, which State Public Defender John Stuart says would have led to another round of layoffs of almost 10 percent of the staff and more cases that the office simply couldn't handle in an adequate or timely fashion.
The legislators hit on the idea of asking the Supreme Court to raise that amount through a hike in the lawyers' licensing fee. The Legislature actually voted for, and the governor signed language authorizing the court to do this.
Well, as is clear from last week's ruling, the court didn't like the idea much. Magnuson (a Pawlenty appointee and close associate who publicly expressed his unhappiness over budget cuts imposed on the judicial branch in general) ordered the increase, writing that he did so reluctantly and hoping that it would only be necessary for one biennium. Magnuson took only three pages to explain his thinking.
Then Anderson spent 10 pages concurring, while explaining how much he hated the situation. He pretty bluntly threatened that he would not vote for the deal after the current biennium:
"It is my hope that at the end of this two-year period, the Governor and Legislature will thoughtfully reexamine their respective positions, consider what it means to live in a civilized society and reflect upon the words 'and justice for all' in the Pledge of Allegiance. If they do such a reexamination, I hope they will, with the support of the people of Minnesota, provide adquate funding for Minnesota's public defenders."
That rhetoric comes from a justice who voted for the deal. Justice Alan Page, who dissented (joined by two other justices), argued that the deal is not just inadvisable but impermissible. For one reason:
"A 'fee' imposed solely to raise revenue to fund an obligation of the state is a tax, plain and simple."
Fee or tax?
This is, of course, reminiscent of Pawlenty's pyrotechnics of 2005 attempting to argue that the 75 cents a pack that the state imposed on a pack of cigarettes was not a tax but a "health impact fee." But that argument was merely political semantics, an effort by Pawlenty to square his advocacy of that revenue raiser with his pledge not to raise taxes. The fee/tax on lawyers is different. If Page is right that the $100-a-year lawyer charge is a tax, then it presents a different problem because the Supreme Court is not empowered to impose taxes. "Because it is a tax, we may not impose it," wrote Page.
Page further argued that funding the public defenders' function is an obligation on the whole state, not on a small segment of the population, namely, lawyers. On that point, while this may not affect Page's technical legal argument, it should be noted that the Minnesota Bar Association did adopt a resolution supporting the deal. So, if the MBA speaks for the state's lawyers, they have agreed to pay. It should also be noted that MinnCare, the state health plan for the poor, has relied on a fee/tax imposed on the state's physicians. Perhaps Page would distinguish the cases on grounds that the provision of medical care to the poor is not an "obligation of the state" in the sense that it is not required by the Constitution, whereas the provision of lawyers to the poor is constitutionally mandated.
The three justices who voted against the fee/tax deal make an interesting coalition. Page is perhaps the most liberal and only DFLer on the court. Justice Helen Meyer is a Ventura appointee and one of the court's moderates. She joined in Page's dissent. Justice Lorie Gildea is a recent Pawlenty appointee (she filed a separate dissent, simply stating that she agreed the court lacked the authority to make the deal, dissociating herself from the rest of Page's opinion).
Chief Public Defender Stuart is in the middle of all this. He agrees that this is no way to run an airline, but the court's order is actually and technically in response to a petition he filed asking them to do it. He remained philosophical as he spoke of the unusual tone of the rulings:
"To varying degrees, the justice all say this isn't the way public defense ought to be paid for, and they're right," Stuart said. "Certainly Justice Paul Anderson was pretty clear in calling out the governor on this. As a matter of theory, I agree with them all that this ought to be paid for out of general funds.
"But it would be very stressful to the operation of the court system to have us lose 30 more lawyer positions. The possibility of interminable delays in certain kinds of cases wouldn't be good either. The way I look at it, the court did the best thing it could in a bad situation."
Stewart said the case in which he reluctantly became a player fits the pattern of recent years in Minnesota, where shrinking revenue and no-new-taxes creates a funding crisis for a vital government function, and the players look for creative "revenue enhancements." Eventually, he said, the "revenue enhancements get stretched too thin" and something will have to give.
"We're just trying to provide good services to our clients and we can't do it if we have to lay off a whole bunch of lawyers every year."
Comments (24)
Well written story. But, I have some Shadenfreund for the Lawyers. I am in the car industry and every day I get to charge customers an extra $100 (min) for registration on vehicle purchases. I understand the point of the story to be the Judicial branch leving "taxes", but the court should have lobbied the Legislature harder.
The key issue, unspoken and not mentioned in this article, is "inherent judicial authority."
That's the trump card the court has, but is loathe to use. But it seems they are getting closer to that.
First, with public defender funding. And, finally, for the funding of the court system itself.
Fees, fees, fees. They have taken the place of taxes, and sometimes are much less fair. Not necessarily in this case, but a progressive income tax levied on all citizens with few loopholes would be the most logical way of funding our government. The wealthy do not like this kind of tax, so they have successfully lobbied since, about 1980, to change our tax system to a fee system. This system is now collapsing all around us. Perhaps people will now begin to understand - "Taxes are what we pay for civilized society . . . A penalty on the other hand is intended altogether to prevent the thing punished." Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Penalties and fees should not be the source of government funding. Civilized society should justly tax citizens to run our state.
Peder DeFor:
Gross State Product in 2000: $186B
Gross State Product in 2009: $263B
Your state+local as a percent:
2000: 19%
2009: 19%
Note: I'm not questioning your numbers, but this would have to include all expenditures, some of which are done with money from the Feds. It is not based on a closed system.
Gross State Product takes into account population growth, inflation, and a host of other factors. While I think it's worth noting that we do not see a significant contraction, we also do not see an increase.
However, within that number we do see some areas where costs are rising significantly. Inflation on health care, for example has consistently outstripped growth in just about anything you can imagine. So the fact that it's relatively constant overall does not necessarily imply that there isn't a lot of pressure on some areas.
But it does suggest that arguments based on "drowning in the bathtub" are overstatement. I agree with you on that point.
Erik, agreed about the drowning. My quick math suggested about a 5% annual increase, maybe 6%. And you're right that there are things that are outstripping that percentage. I'd say that there is a pretty widespread political failure to actually grapple with those things.
Health care of course is a biggie and it will simply continue to get more expensive. That's the price of using the insurance model to cover cradle to grave health expenses. But there is no real movement to change that.
Another piece (which doesn't get enough attention) is pensions, especially public pensions. This problem will get bigger and bigger and no one has the will to tackle it either.
But hey, at least we're getting new signs out near the airport!
Two comments: First a minor correction. Justice Paul Anderson was appointed by Governor Carlson never by Governor Quie. The second is more substantive. Courts are wisely very reluctant to use their authority to order legislative bodies to adequately fund constitutionally mandated services but it does happen. California is now faced with a federal court mandating increased corrections spending and or the release of inmates. A generation ago this state was mandated to adequately fund mental health hospitals. If there is a looming deficit next bienium, what the opinion may suggest is a Supreme Court that may decide further cuts to the public defender system are unconstituional.
Great article. Thanks for the fine reporting.
I am not certain what your intent was -- if your intent went beyond simply reporting an interesting story of conflict. I read the article as an essay about how elected officials have failed to do their jobs and the implications of this failure. And their failure goes unnoticed and unpunished by the electorate.
To me the saddest part of the bigger story is the success of Governor Pawlenty in positioning himself as someone who is fiscally responsible.
It seems to me that these judicial comments assume that raising taxes is the only answer.
What about realigning spending priorities, adequately funding (if they REALLY need it) the judicial system, and cutting other, lower priority budget items? I wonder if any of the judges even considered that.
I can't swallow "I need more -- you have to raise taxes" as the only proper response. But then, I'm not a judge.
"I have little tolerance for this anti-government rhetoric given the adverse consequences that result to real people" (part of Justice Anderson's quote above)
Justice Anderson says it well, and directly contradicts the selfishness of the Grover Norquists of the world.
If we really wanted ineffective, small government, Somalia seems to have that covered. One wonders how Mr. Norquist and his fans would enjoy the Somalian experience.
Chief Justice Eric Magnuson has been speaking about the issue of funding since January. It took some real stones to speak about it in this particular manner.
Chief Justice Magnuson has said that the 10 percent reduction would force the court system to cut 300-400 jobs, which would mean it would be unable to process hundreds of thousands of cases.
Minnesota's court system is not alone. Many state court budgets around the U.S. are in financial trouble including Florida, Arizona, and California.
John you are also correct in pointing out that you do not work in the judicial branch. But since you are a CPA you certainly have a unique perspective in that regard.
Similar to taxing lawyers to support our judicial system is the rumored increase in traffic arrests to support local police budgets. Perhaps now teachers will charge students to get their tests and grades returned to them before the end of the semester?
The Paul Anderson Republicans of the US have become, metaphorically, politically assassination victims by the Grover Norquist crowd. Witness the stepping down of moderate Republican Jim Ramstad. This is not just a California or Minnesota state problem, it is a national tragedy. I ran across a second Grover Norquist quotation: "We are trying to change the tones in the state capitals - and turn them toward bitter nastiness and partisanship." This attempt to wreck our country by these anarchists is reflected in the non-bi-partisan health care vote.
These jokers want to reverse the progressive decisions of the Warren Court, including, the Constitutional right to a court-appointed attorney] for those unable to afford one (Gideon v. Wainwright). Pawlenty is attempting to lead this pack of anarchists to power.
This is one of the times when I completely shoot all of my credentials as a DFLer and a Progressive. I'm proud to call myself both, but we have to be realistic about what's going on if we are, indeed, to have "Progress".
There are two issues in this article. The first is the issue whether the courts can be granted the authority to decide whether a fee that looks a lot like a tax can be raised. On this point, I tentatively agree with Justice Page on purely technical grounds.
The second issue is whether we are deliberately starving out state and local government in an ideological war. I find little evidence to support the idea that state plus local government is either expanding or contracting as a share at any significant rate. We can say, however:
1) The economy has been rather stagnant or in a contraction over the last decade
2) State+Local government, as a share of the economy, is about the same.
3) Funding sources for that government are shifting, relying less on state revenues that are more broadly consumption based and more on local property based revenue or money from the Feds.
4) Despite the relative stagnation overall, costs for some items are increasing faster than others - especially employee costs, most notably health care.
5) Increases in employee costs will fall most heavily on local government because, as the providers of essential services, employees are a much larger share of their relative budgets than the state.
What on earth does all this mean? It means that we are dealing with economic stagnation largely by finger pointing rather than digging into the reality of what's happening around us. The net result is that local governments have a tendency to be squeezed harder.
There is a strong Progressive case to be made that we have genuinely screwed up over the last decade by putting our essential services under pressure and increasing regressive taxes, but that point cannot be made by looking at broad, overall trends. If we are going to be serious about solving the problem, we have to first be serious about identifying it.
Stagnation is problem #1. If you all want to keep fighting like wild dogs over the last scrap of meat, go at it. Just don't think for a second this is "Progressive".
Eric, what a fine piece of work. This is a story that needs to be told. As a lawyer I am acutely aware of how these cuts are threatening our Judiciary. What people ignore is the fact that a fair Judicial system is absolutely necessary for a Democracy to function.
John I: The justices and the whole courts system endured Pawlenty's cuts for years until they could not save an additional penny by "realigning their priorities."
This IS a national problem. It is a selfish (I've got mine, the hell with you) so-called philosophy based in Ayn Rand and economists like Milton Friedman.
Articles like this should be appearing in the national press and the damage done by the anti-tax/anti-government crowd widely discussed by radio, TV and newspaper columnists. Else they will elect yet more governors, state legislators and members of Congress like Tim Pawlenty.
Grover Norquist, founder of Americans for Tax Reform (www.atr.org) says, "My ideal citizen is the self-employed, homeschooling, IRA-owning guy with a concealed-carry permit. Because that person doesn't need the goddamn government for anything."
Grover sees taxation as theft and opposes his Leave Us Alone movement to what he calls The Takings Coalition, which "consists of the Trial Lawyers, the corrupt Big City Machines, the Labor Union Bosses and the two wings of the Dependency Movement - those who remain trapped in dependency and those who make $80,000 a year managing the dependency of others and making sure they don't get jobs and become Republicans."
Erik Hare (#17) I read some time ago, Erik, that Pawlenty's tax cuts for Minnesota's wealthiest few reduced state revenues by $1 billion per year. That's a significant contribution to the "let's shrink government" goal of the anti-tax folks.
When Pawlenty seemed to waver in his commitment at times, Grover Norquist would call, write or visit to help him strenghen his resolve.
John Kline, Michele Bachmann, Erik Paulsen and former senator Norm Coleman are all signers of the Taxpayer Protection Pledge.
At the state level, in addition to Pawlenty and Carol Molnau, 15 state senators and 28 House members have all signed the pledge. You can recognize them by their rhetoric during floor debates.
An excellent article and, for the most part, an interesting discussion.
Although the extra $75 a year won't kill me, I have to agree with the dissent. Fees imposed for purposes other than the administration of the attorney licensing system and in aid of what are seen as insufficient legislative funding are taxes. Discussion of the aspirational goals of the Rule of Conduct have no bearing on that fact.
Our courts are under substantial pressure, as any attorney appearing in Minnesota's district courts knows full well. Some court administrators have curtailed hours, many judges are without the law clerk necessary to keep up with their case loads. Some judges now decline to hear non-dispositive pretrial motions. Decisions on dispositive motions often are delayed well beyond the 90 days provided for. Recent increases in district court filing fees are the product of these problems and funding limitations.
There are many potential ways to relieve the burden on the courts and, in this particular instance, on public defenders. But a $2 million patch is not going to solve the long term problem. It's time the legislature looked at the entire justice system (civil and criminal), identify those things we are legally and/or morally obligated to provide and take steps to ensure that these are available. No parent, for example, should lose custody of a child without adequate legal representation.
TEMPORARY? Since when is Published Orders, re: Separation of Powers raising Revenue Temporary,
www.taxthemax.blogspot.com Chief Justice faces Election 2010,
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One player decided on a school this summer but late changed his mind to look elsewhere. Read here in this article which player has found a school for next season right here on your source for junior college basketball recruiting news JucoJunction.
Gordon College located in the State of Georgia made a run to the NJCAA National Tourney in Hutchinson, Kan. last season the first in school history.
Reigarvius Williams has decided to attend Murray State University in the Ohio Valley Conference
Article Continues Below
for next season. Williams had committed UAB back in the summer then decided to reopen his recruitment later on this summer.
Williams will have two seasons to play for the Racers.
Williams averaged 17.6 points and 10.2 rebounds per game last season for the Highlanders. He shot 54 percent (213-392)
from the floor.
The Highlanders finished 26-7 last season. Williams hails from Macon,GA.
Stay tuned to JucoJunction for the latest in junior college basketball recruiting news all season long right here.


text:
Math Magic
By Anusen Inc
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Math Magic
Fun learning tool
You could try our word version of this application @ http://wordmagic.anusen.com
What's New in Version 4.7
Few parents asked for feature to restting the scores (correct and wrong answers) to 0. Therefore added an option to clear the scores under Default section in Settings screen
Customer Reviews
I love this game when i was 5 it was bedtime i didn't want to leave this game .Now i'm7 i still love it
- $1.49
- Category: Education
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- Seller: Anusen Inc
- © anusen.com
Compatibility: Requires iOS 5.1 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.


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text:
The FLOSSmole Data Collectors are programs to collect data about open source software development. They collect data from major open source software forges and directories, including Savannah, Tigris, Github, Google Code, Launchpad, and SourceForge.
A tool for securing DNS communications between a client and a DNS resolver.
A polyhedral extraction tool (PET).


text: Tried my hand at some chicken breasts for the first time yesterday. Last week I did some leg quarters that turned out absolutely fantastic. I know breasts are a bit leaner piece of meat so keeping them moist was the objective. Now last week I did leg quarters in a brine solution. Actually read the recipe on the back of the box of Morton Kosher Salt. Called for: 3/4 c. - Kosher Salt 3/4 c. - Sugar 1/2 tsp - garlic powder 1/4 tsp - ground pepper enough water to cover the meat. Recipe state to brine for 1 hour which is what I did. I set my lang at about 350 for 50 minutes. Turned out fantastic! Moist and tender and absorbed just the right amount of smoke. Rave reviews from the neighbors I shared it with. For the breasts, I wanted to maintain moisture. I had 3 split breasts and 3 boneless breasts. I came to this forum in search of how best to go about cooking them. After reading the posts the opinion was to brine with your favorite recipe for about 3-4 hours and then use the low and slow approach. So I used the same brine recipe as above, except this time I was going with the low and slow approach between 225 and 250. After brining, I rinsed thoroughly, sprinkled on my favorite rubs (saltless cajun for the boneless and spicy Smoke Mountain blend for the bone-in) I also wrapped the boneless in bacon. 2 hours and 10 minutes later I pulled the breasts when they read 165 or there abouts. Breasts turned out well. very moist and tender, however they were on the salty side. I think I brined for a bit too long. So next time, I will go for an hour for chicken parts...maybe a couple for a whole chicken and 3 for a turkey, but not much longer. Just thought it might help for the next guy looking for suggestions: 00


text:
* Stanley Lee Bowden, 39, of Atlanta, died Thursday, Apr. 21, 2005. Dexter T. Sims Mortuary, LLC, in Royston has charge of arrangements.
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* Joe Graham, 70, of Hull, died Wednesday, April 20, 2005. Lord & Stephens Funeral Home, EAST, in Athens has charge of arrangements.
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The Kappa Deuteron Chapter of the International Fraternity of Phi Gamma Delta at the University of Georgia was recognized with a number of awards this past summer at the fraternity's 27th Fiji Leadership Academy (biennial leadership school) on the campus of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. The chapter received first place in the Zerman Trophy, third place in both the Cheney Cup and the Brightman Trophy, and Honorable Mention in the Baker Cup, the Coon Plaque, the Jordan Bowl and the Owen Cup.
The Zerman Trophy is awarded to the undergraduate chapter which excels in promoting the involvement of its members in student government, the campus newspaper, and extracurricular activities.
The Cheney Cup is presented to the chapter which shows the greatest all-around efficiency in scholarship, fraternity relationships, and general collegiate activities and the Brightman Trophy is awarded to the chapter which has done the most to maintain and improve relations between its chapter and the graduate members of the fraternity in the last year.
The Baker Cup is presented to the chapter which excels in religious, ethical, and social service activities.
The Coon Plaque is awarded to the chapter which has produced the best chapter publication during the preceding academic year.
The Jordan Bowl is presented to the undergraduate chapter which is judged to have achieved the highest comparative scholarship among the undergraduate chapters for the preceding academic year and the Owen Cup is awarded to the chapter which has shown the greatest improvement in scholarship over the preceding academic year.
All awards are presented annually to the undergraduate chapters.
This article published in the Athens Banner-Herald on Monday, October 15, 2001.
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text:
The influence of structural changes on market functioning and its implications for monetary policy: a focus on the euro area
In: Market functioning and central bank policy
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Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
- Barron, John M & Valev, Neven T, 2000.
"International Lending by U.S. Banks,"
Journal of Money, Credit and Banking,
Blackwell Publishing, vol. 32(3), pages 357-381, August.
- Valev, N, 1996. "International Lending by US Banks," Papers 96-010, Purdue University, Krannert School of Management - Center for International Business Education and Research (CIBER).
- Vermeulen, Philip, 2002. " Business Fixed Investment: Evidence of a Financial Accelerator in Europe," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 64(3), pages 217-235, July.
- Vermeulen, Philip, 2000. "Business fixed investment: evidence of a financial accelerator in Europe," Working Paper Series 0037, European Central Bank.
- Hamilton, James D & Kim, Dong Heon, 2002. "A Reexamination of the Predictability of Economic Activity Using the Yield Spread," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 34(2), pages 340-360, May.
- Hamilton, James Douglas & Kim, Dong Heon, 2000. "A Re-examination of the Predictability of Economic Activity Using the Yield Spread," University of California at San Diego, Economics Working Paper Series qt69v8p1m9, Department of Economics, UC San Diego.
- James D. Hamilton & Dong Heon Kim, 2000. "A Re-examination of the Predictability of Economic Activity Using the Yield Spread," NBER Working Papers 7954, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Jean-Pierre Zigrand & Jon Danielsson & Hyun Song Shin, 2001. "Asset Price Dynamics with Value-at-Risk Constrained Traders," FMG Discussion Papers dp394, Financial Markets Group.
- Gertler, Mark & Lown, Cara S, 1999. "The Information in the High-Yield Bond Spread for the Business Cycle: Evidence and Some Implications," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press, vol. 15(3), pages 132-150, Autumn.
- Mark Gertler & Cara S. Lown, 2000. "The Information in the High Yield Bond Spread for the Business Cycle: Evidence and Some Implications," NBER Working Papers 7549, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Grossman, Sanford J & Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1980. "On the Impossibility of Informationally Efficient Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(3), pages 393-408, June.
- Sanford J Grossman & Joseph E Stiglitz, 1997. "On the Impossibility of Informationally Efficient Markets," Levine's Working Paper Archive 1908, David K. Levine.
- Giancarlo Corsetti & Paolo Pesenti & Nouriel Roubini, 2002. "The Role of Large Players in Currency Crises," NBER Chapters,in: Preventing Currency Crises in Emerging Markets, pages 197-268 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Giancarlo Corsetti & Paolo Pesenti & Nouriel Roubini, 2001. "The Role of Large Players in Currency Crises," NBER Working Papers 8303, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Manna, Michele & Pill, Huw & Quiros, Gabriel, 2001. "The Eurosystem's Operational Framework in the Context of the ECB's Monetary Policy Strategy," International Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 4(1), pages 65-99, Spring.
- Batini, Nicoletta & Nelson, Edward, 2000. "When the Bubble Bursts: Monetary Policy Rules and Foreign Exchange Market Behavior," Working Papers 2000-01, University of Sydney, School of Economics.
- Cheung, Yin-Wong & Chinn, Menzie David, 2001. "Currency traders and exchange rate dynamics: a survey of the US market," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 439-471, August.
- Yin-Wong Cheung & Menzie D. Chinn, 2000. "Currency Traders and Exchange Rate Dynamics: A Survey of the U.S. Market," CESifo Working Paper Series 251, CESifo Group Munich.
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So you got yourself a brand spanking new DSLR. What do you do now?
Many photo enthusiasts who get their first upgrade from the "point and shoot†into the world of digital single lens reflex cameras, or DSLRs, often opt to shoot in Program mode, the mode that allows the sophisticated camera to make all the decisions and produce what it computes to be the best image given the circumstances.
But it doesn't have to be that way. Why relegate all the fun decisions you could make to your camera? Isn't the camera a tool? You might ask, where do I start? How do I start making great photos with this nifty new camera?
There are so many resources you could use to speed up your growth as a photo enthusiast, and a great number of these resources are free. Here are some things to do with free online resources that will help you get your photography where you want it to be, and say goodbye to the Program mode!
1. Know your equipment, and maximize use.
Your DSLR kit comes with a manual. Read it, and try out the different functions. If you want summaries from other photographers about what your camera can do, Phot.net has excellent information about a wide range of camera equipment. People who belong to this forum are usually very helpful. If you've got a specific question, participate in the online forum. Meet new photography friends, and gain a whole world of information at your fingertips.
2. Learn about the exposure triangle.
Exposure is the result of how much light reflects back from the subject into your lens, and is recorded as an image by your camera. How to properly expose
an image is crucial to learn because it also gives you the dynamic range of your photograph—this is the gradation of light from the whitest part of the photo (the most reflected light) to the darkest part of the photo (the least light reflected), and everything in between. The more detail you have in your photo, the better your exposure. You can learn about how to make good exposures at this excellent discussion at Digital Photography School, one of my favorite resources online. They even have a newsletter you can subscribe to for free, that you get in your mailbox weekly.
3. Learn composition, and make art.
Composition is what makes a photograph attractive or unique. Centuries of art have taught us what the human brain is attracted to in a visual sense, so there are some simple "rules†you can learn to get you started in making some compelling images.
Good composition can be learned, so why not learn right away how to make your images distinct and stylish? A great place to read a lot about composition is photoinf.com.
4. Learn about white balance and control color.
White balance is the way the camera records color, depending on the temperature of the light that it captures. If the light is "cool†it has a bluish tinge, and the camera records that. If the light is "warmer†it has more yellow in it, so the people might come out with a yellowish cast over them. Digital Photography School has a concise primer on white balance, and some other suggested information below the article. It pays to learn about white balance, to control the color in your shots, and to get "true†skin tones for the people in your images.
Most cameras have white balance pre-settings, and your manual can tell you which icon means which white balance. Learn about white balance, and you avoid photos that have blue people or yellow people in them. Unless you are photographing Smurfs or Mr. Smileys, that is.
5. Know your camera's "modes.â€
DSLRs come with modes that are ways you can tell the camera the circumstances you are shooting in, and help the camera's computer make decisions for the best shot you could possibly get. Some modes include portrait, nightshot, or sport. In portrait mode, a camera tries to isolate the subject by blurring the background, giving the portrait a soft, creamy look. Nightshot mode tells the camera to open the lens opening (called the "apertureâ€) and let more light in to record the dark scene. Sport speeds up the shutter, so that motion can be frozen and not blurry. There are other modes you can use on most DSLRs, and there is a great resource with photos at Photonhead that can help you get acquainted with your camera's modes.
6. Get started on some photo projects.
Photo projects can get your creativity flowing, and there are a lot of sites out there that help you to focus your creativity and learn as you complete your project. Everyone knows Flickr, of course, where you can join a group and shoot specific subjects, have great discussions with like minded hobbyists, and be inspired by the thousands of photos uploaded every minute.
A great resource is this article by a Flickr member titled "7 Photo Projects to Jumpstart Your Creativity.â€
7. Photoshop is your friend.
There are "purists†who say that using Photoshop or other processing software on your digital images ruin the integrity of the photographs and so makes it no longer "photography.†These folks have their point of view, and we should respect that.
But the 21st Century is the digital age, and eschewing Photoshop when we are capturing digital photographs seems to be limiting when Photoshop can help us create images that are unique and beautiful. How much post-processing you do on your images is entirely up to you. You can go crazy or you can do what great makeup artists do—make a lot of makeup look like none at all. It's up to you.
If you're like a lot of new photographers, who want to use software to enhance their digital photographs, there are some basic tutorials to start the fun at Mashable.
8. Flash is also your friend.
Most semi-pro and entry level camera bodies include a pop-up flash. Pressing a button on the side of the pop up unit releases it and gives you instant source of light in very dark or very glary conditions.
It can be confusing to learn how to decide when to use flash, but the rule of thumb is that you "fill†the areas that are dark in your photo with the flash's burst of light. The amount of light your flash gives you along with the exposure you want tell you how much flash you need. You can learn the basics of using flash at Brighthub.
9. Take a course.
There are some excellent online places where you can pay for guidance from a professional. Betterphoto.com is one of the sites I have tried, and the course I took from there really helped me get to know exposure. Betterphoto also has courses on many other topics, including an interesting one on composition and creativity.
MatadorU also has an excellent course I would recommend. MatadorU's photography course is geared toward becoming a travel photographer, but it addresses many of the topics I have mentioned here, in greater detail. The best things about MatadorU is that you get wonderful feedback from your tutor, and you get access to a lifetime of tips on a wide range of topic from equipment to using social media to gain an audience for your work.
Online, there are a few sites that offer basic photography courses. A good place to start is the appropriately named Photographycourses.net.
10. Join a camera club.
It's fun to learn with other people! We learn this in school, and we never seem to outgrow it. Learning with others helps you to maximize your learning and enjoyment, and you gain new friendships this way. There is probably a photo club in your city. Talk to some other enthusiasts, join a forum that is run by a photographer in your city or nearby, and arrange to join some of the photo walks or excursions arranged by the photo club.
Getting started with your new DSLR is not as challenging as you think. These links are just a few resources of the plethora of sites out there. Let's help to grow our photography community and post more resources in our comments!
Welcome back and thanks for reading Imagine That! To keep updated with new posts, subscribe to Imagine That! by clicking on the RSS Feed button on the upper right of the Homepage.
You might also enjoy:
Shooting Winter Coats in a Tropical Country. Outdoors.
The Man at the Window
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text:
Pope Benedict XVI arrives to lead an ordination mass at St Peter's basilica at the Vatican on April 29, 2012, to mark Vocation Day. Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday called for young people to consider joining the clergy, as the Catholic Church struggles to counter a decline in new priests in Western countries
From the outside looking in, it seems the Vatican would be just as happy to throw all its women ministers under the bus.
First, Rome ordered an investigation of all U.S.-based institutes of Catholic women religious, the sisters most people call "nuns." Then Rome forced what amounts to a hostile takeover of their largest leadership group, the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR). Then there is the ongoing debate over whether women can be ordained.
The Vatican initiatives toward the sisters—the investigation and the takeover—seem to have met quiet resolves, at least for now. The investigative reports are in the proper Curia office, and the cardinal who called for the study has long retired. LCWR gently rejected a takeover at its August 2012 meeting, and the group's leaders pledged to start working with the bishop-overseers by explaining what, exactly, it means to be a woman religious. They will meet again this autumn.
An underlying theme of both events echoed the request of a former LCWR president, Mercy Sister Theresa Kane, who in 1979 publicly asked Pope John Paul II to include women in "all ministries" of the church. The code became the coda: ordination of women as priests.
The Catholic Church does not ordain women as priests, and says it never did. Despite volumes of evidence of ordinations of women to the diaconate, the sacred order responsible for the church's charity, the priesthood has always been a different story.
Why? Well, the priesthood is rooted in the action of Christ with the Apostles: "do this in memory of me"—and until recently Christianity has uniformly agreed that Christ as head of the church must be represented by a male and that the church does not have authority to digress from his choice. In modern times some members of the Anglican Communion and various Protestant denominations have created women priests and pastors, but the Catholic and Orthodox Churches retain their older tradition.
So, who are the Roman Catholic Womenpriests (RCWP)? They say they "stand in prophetic obedience to Jesus who calls women and men to be disciples." The Catholic Church calls them excommunicated.
Like other breakaway groups, the RCWP traces the provenance of its ordinations to Catholic bishops who, at some point, were in full communion with Rome. Many other groups—the Catholic Apostolic National Church, the Old Catholic Apostolic Church of North America, the American Catholic Church for example—ascribe to the same or similar justifications for existence: the Catholic Church is either too conservative or too liberal.
The RCWP movement falls on the liberal side of the equation, notably affirming same-sex relationships and women priests. Begun with ordinations in Austria in 2002, it has expanded to Canada and the US and, to a lesser extent in Europe and in South America. In the United States the movement is divided between Roman Catholic Womenpriests-USA and the smaller Association of Roman Catholic Womenpriests. With about 140 clergy around the world, some of whom are former Catholic sisters, RCWP operates mainly in house churches.
So, what does RCWP mean? Are they Catholic? Are they priests?
The first seven RCWP women were ordained on a Danube Riverboat by Argentine independent Catholic Bishop Rómulo Antonio Braschi and Ferdinand Regelsberger, a former Benedictine monk, whom Braschi had ordained as bishop. The fly in the canonical ointment is that one day prior Dusan Spiner, a Catholic priest whose episcopal ordination in the Czech underground church is acknowledged by the Vatican, ordained six of those seven as deacons. It is unknown whether Spiner, who literally missed the boat the day of the priestly ordinations, ever re-ordained any of the seven as priests or as bishops.
Their excommunication papers speak of their violating the law, attesting to their ordinations' invalidity because they were illegal. Yet the typical Catholic argument against women priests is that such ordinations are "invalid"—they didn't take—no matter who performed the ceremonies.
Theological hairsplitting aside, the official Catholic determination is no, they are not Catholic and even within their own movement they are not priests.
Their leaders say no one cares about Catholic officialdom and that people are looking for the ministry of women in the individual worship communities spread out among 29 U.S. states led by RCWP.
Why? Sister Theresa Kane put it well when she explained matters to the pope 33 years ago: "Our contemplation leads us to state that the Church in its struggle to be faithful to its call for reverence and dignity for all persons must respond."
Phyllis Zagano is author of "Women & Catholicism: Gender, Communion, and Authority" and recent winner of a Catholic Press Association book award. She holds a research appointment at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y.