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Politicians and sportsmen are interesting bedfellows — especially in election years. Sportsmen don't constitute the majority, but there are enough of us to warrant courting. It's little wonder that Republican strategists put vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan in Deer & Deer Hunter magazine's October issue and made him the keynote speaker for the Sportsmen's Alliance banquet in Ohio.
Ryan effectively won over many voters with platitudes like, "Hunters and anglers are the best conservationists. It's critical we pass (our tradition) to the next generation. Youth learn great life lessons when you take them hunting."
Democratic strategists have in comparison proven woefully inept and neglectful in courting sportsmen's votes.
We hunters are desperate to empower politicians who will fight to preserve our tradition. We could easily be duped into voting for those supporters, willingly ignoring their significant deficiencies.
Back in 1952, Adlai Stevenson, a rare politician with eloquence and brilliant wit, said, "I offer my opponents a bargain: If they will stop telling lies about us, I will stop telling the truth about them." We sportsmen are hearing a mix of truth and lies in this election. It's often challenging to shed our prejudices and self-interests to grasp the truth.
The Republican primary candidates all wanted our votes and recounted their hunting experiences, philosophies and support of our tradition to encourage our embrace, the same way Sarah Palin effectively chronicled her moose hunting experiences in the previous presidential election. Single-issue voters can be persuaded by efforts like these.
Mitt Romney, despite not being much of a hunter, is certain to win the sportsmen's vote. Few of us critically question how good he really is for our tradition.
Though the economy is by far the greatest single issue of the upcoming election, organizations like the NRA have successfully inflamed gun owners, convincing them that "the most dangerous election of our lifetime is looming — that there is no greater freedom than the ability to own a firearm to protect yourself, your family, your community, and your country."
Sportsmen are distrustful of anyone who would take away their guns. Many have been led to fervently believe that President Barack Obama has an agenda to do that if reelected. Although this may not be true, it's mind-boggling that Democrats have not made a convincing effort to assure us otherwise.
Sportsmen appreciate Romney's strong support of the Second Amendment, which he has said applies "whether for hunting, for sportsmen, for personal protection, for whatever legal purpose someone might have."
Romney supports the NRA because it promotes policies that would prevent disarming law-abiding citizens. "I believe we need to focus on enforcing current laws," he said, "rather than creating new laws that burden lawful gun owners." Romney rightfully gets credit for not furthering gun restrictions while he was governor.
"I have guns myself," Romney said "Law-abiding citizens have a right to protect their homes and their families, and as president I will vigorously defend that right." Freedom!
Safari Club International noted in its Washington Report that hunting emerged as an important issue as early as the South Carolina primary debate. Romney then assessed his hunting involvement: "I'm not going to describe all of my great exploits. But I went moose hunting — I'm sorry — elk hunting with friends in Montana. I've been pheasant hunting. I'm not the great hunter that some on this stage … are. I'm not a serious hunter, but I must admit, I guess I enjoy the sport, and when I get invited, I'm delighted to be able to go hunting."
That personal assessment is a far cry from his self-portrayal in 2007: "I've been a hunter pretty much all my life." He later admitted to having hunted prior to that only twice — once as a teenager hunting rabbits, and the second time shooting quail in Georgia in 2006 with the Republican Governors Association.
Romney's no Teddy Roosevelt. He's at best a hunting dabbler. No one I know recalls ever seeing him fish or hunt in Massachusetts, or shoot at a local sportsman's club or gun range. But that doesn't really matter. His running mate is a deer hunter, with a tree stand, bow and game-filled freezer to win us over.
Though not a hunter, Romney is at least 100 percent behind our tradition — I guess. It's not clear to some authorities I interview that he's what he appears.
A wildlife biologist and avid hunter, who asked not to be named and worked for the state when Romney was governor confided, "I really don't recall the Romney administration and its appointees having much interest in sportsmen or wildlife conservation. … We were small potatoes with little political or financial power … inconsequential in their estimation. …. I recall that when the Romney administration came to power, it immediately seized all state funds, including the Inland Fish & Game Fund.
"The IFGF cannot, by law, be spent on anything but fisheries and wildlife management. … The Romneyites … held onto it for months, long enough that multiple requests (from Mass Fish & Wildlife) failed to get it back, and the United States Fish & Wildlife Service finally had to write a letter informing the governor that the Massachusetts Division of Fish & Wildlife would be forfeiting a huge sum — $3.2 million, I think — in federal funds if the IFGF weren't returned to the control of the Massachusetts Wildlife board. This finally got the Romneyites motivated, and they finally relinquished control.
"They held a press conference, and the governor came out to field headquarters and made a speech about how good it was to help out and get this funding for the sportsmen! It was almost surreal: the guy who took the Fish and Game money and held onto it, despite many calls for reason, spins the spectacle to make it sound like he's a hero for somehow getting it back for us! … Watching that scene play out sure convinced me that he is about as genuine as polyester."
Critics question Romney's regard for bipartisan cooperation, politics over performance, and commitment to the environment. Back when both parties worked to get things done, Bob Durand was — despite being a Democrat — an effective secretary of Environmental Affairs for Republican Governor Paul Cellucci. Despite Durand's leading many successful environmental efforts in our state and working well with Republicans, Romney jettisoned him soon after being elected governor. Subsequent environmental efforts were minimal.
An anonymous source who worked with Durand alleges that, "Durand was perceived as a handsome, bright and effective Democrat who could become future political competition given more exposure."
Critics fear that, with a Romney presidential victory, care for wildlife and wild land would be low on his priorities list and readily sacrificed.
All the Republican primary candidates made freedom a focal issue. During Gov. Romney's administration, though, controls on the media were firmly set in place. Before his election, outdoor writers had direct access to Mass Wildlife staff and other state authorities to answer sportsmen's concerns. After Romney's election, interviews with state professionals had to have prior approval through the governor's staff, effectively controlling the message going out to the public.
Gun rights for personal defense are critical to freedom. But freedom doesn't depend on gun rights alone. Most of us outdoor writers would like our candidates not to just talk freedom and Second Amendment rights, but to also vigorously foster another essential foundation of our freedom — free, unfiltered access for the press.
We also want our candidate to be committed to protecting our heritage of public land, not privatizing it, committed to protecting the wildlife that enriches it, and committed to acquiring and preserving vanishing habitat as the tentacles of suburbia, business interests and development inexorably engulf it. The freedom to hunt means little if we don't have wild places to go to and abundant wildlife to give them value.


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A beautifully luxurious raw silk shawl with a thin golden embroidered border - the perfect accompaniment to set off your regal wedding look!
These Shawls are designed to add elegance and royalty to any Sherwani by enhancing the colours of the overall look. Essential for any Wedding Photoshoot, Sherwani King Shawls are created with luxury in mind.
This item is Eligible for Free Delivery in the UK. More delivery options will be available during Checkout.
Simply return your item within 14 days if you are not 100% satisfied with your purchase
As most Sherwanis are straight cut long length, the most important measurement required for fitting is the Chest Size. Sherwani King uses Standard UK sizing identical to all Major Suit retailers in the UK.
All our Sherwanis fit the specified Chest Size providing a Tailored fit for all gentleman with a height of 5ft 7in to 6ft 2in (170cm to 188cm). If your height is outside this range then we can make adjustments accordingly. Additional charges may apply.
I am in between Sizes?
All chest sizes are good for a fit up or down by one inch. For example, a Size 40 Sherwani will provide a tailored fit for men with chest sizes 39, 40 and 41.
Does My Sherwani come with Trousers?
As standard we provide a Churidar or Open Trouser in a matching or contrasting colour unless stated otherwise. These are universal Sizing and can be adjusted to fit any waist up to 50 inches. If you would like a specific colour of trouser then please add to your order notes and we will send out your requested colour as an alternative (subject to availability)
For most Reception Style Sherwanis we provide a straight cut trouser to compliment the shorter length. In such instances, a universal size trouser will also be sent out as a back up, providing more flexible styling options.
What Accessories will I Need?
We offer a range of Shoes, Scarves and Turbans to compliment your Sherwani. Depending on what your desired look is, you can choose contrasting accessories to compliment your style. We recommend a pair of Mojri-Khussa Shoes as a minimum to complete the look.
What are the exact dimension of My Sherwani: If you would like to know the exact measurements of any Sherwani please Contact Sherwani King to find out more. As standard, the above tables provide a guideline to the exact dimensions, depending on style:

subset: commoncrawl


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Employee Engagement Summit
Watch the Employee Engagement Summit - a free, one-hour webcast about improving employee engagement and communications in the modern workplace.
Communicate openly to build transparency, create stronger communities by sharing best practices, and crowdsource ideas to drive initiatives forward.
Open and dynamic communication across your organization
Yammer helps you improve engagement with everyone in your organization. Enhance communication to build a culture of transparency, keeping everyone from leadership to Firstline Workers informed, aligned, and moving forward. Build communities of interest to bring people together around shared topics, interests, or areas of practice. Gather ideas and feedback from across your network of colleagues to build on the work of others and achieve better outcomes.
Seamless integration for better results
As part of Office 365, Yammer makes it easy to share, create, and edit content right in the app. Every group gets a shared set of resources to manage documents, showcase content, share notes, and organize responsibilities. Intelligence from the Microsoft Graph enhances your ability to search for people, files, groups and conversations. Easily integrate Yammer across your sites and video broadcasts to keep the conversation going as you move across experiences.
Built with trusted security, compliance and control
Yammer gives the enterprise-level security, compliance, and management features you expect from Office 365. Get advanced security technology to protect your network's data. Analytics available through the Office admin center and group insights in Yammer make it easier to understand activity in your network.
"We use corporate activism to improve quality at all levels including a social movement facilitated by Yammer. We're empowering employees with a new voice to co-create solutions that help save lives."
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Paris, France -SOLD OUT!
Pilates Mat Teacher Training is the perfect vehicle for learning the principles of the Pilates Method. It is affordable, easy to integrate into different settings, and a great way to introduce people to Pilates. At BASI we regard Pilates Mat Work as the "crown jewel" of Pilates.
The Mat Program provides a thorough education in the Pilates Mat Work and its infinite applications. It is also the perfect springboard to the Comprehensive Programs that are offered in the U.S. and globally. The Mat Program is often taught as a part of the Comprehensive Program and is the same curriculum for U.S. and international students.
This program is comprised of 24 hours of lecture, discussion, and exercise practice and exercise analysis divided into six modules.
Please review our Refund Policy before registering for a program (may not apply to Licensee territories).
Program schedule is subject to postponement or cancellation, based on student enrollment.
*All fees are in U.S. Dollars (may not apply to Licensee territories).
Program Schedule
Module 1
The Fundamentals
Feb 07, 2020
2pm - 6pm
Verena Tremel
Primary concepts covered include the 10 movement principles of the Pilates method, an overview of the pelvic region and Pilates breathing. A historical overview of Pilates is presented, plus the BASI® approach, and the importance of safety when teaching Pilates are discussed. Repertoire includes fundamental Mat. A one-hour mat class is taught.
Module 2
Anatomy Overview Part 1
Feb 08, 2020
2pm - 6pm
Verena Tremel
Primary concepts covered include an anatomy and terminology overview: major bones, muscles, joints, bony landmarks and center of gravity. The importance and practice of cueing is discussed. Repertoire covered includes intermediate Mat exercises. A one hour mat class is taught.
Module 3
Anatomy Overview Part 2
Feb 09, 2020
1pm - 5pm
Verena Tremel
Primary concepts covered include the BASI® system of movement analysis, exercise physiology, and aerobic/anaerobic exercise. The BASI® format of teaching is discussed and the Block System®, created by Rael Isacowitz, is introduced. Repertoire covered is intermediate Mat and Leg Weights. A one-hour mat class is taught.
Module 4
Posture Assessment
Jun 05, 2020
2pm - 6pm
Primary concepts covered are the principles of alignment and posture assessment. Discussion includes exercise as a tool for assessment. Repertoire covered is intermediate through advanced Mat. A one-hour mat class is taught.
Module 5
Core Strength: Back and Abdominals
Jun 06, 2020
2pm - 6pm
Primary concepts covered are core strength and the relationship of the various muscle groups that make up the core with particular focus on the abdominals and the back extensors. Contraindications, effective exercises and the importance of understanding your client's needs and body type are discussed. Also addressed are the role of the teacher and the importance of flow in a session. Repertoire covered is advanced Mat. A one-hour mat class is taught.
Module 6
Exercise Adaptation
Jun 07, 2020
1pm - 5pm
Primary concepts include an in-depth look into exercise adaptation and the use of assists and modifications. Lecture focuses on how to construct a complete and comprehensive program. Repertoire covered is advanced Mat and Magic Circle. A one-hour mat class is taught. Final Exam will be available online.


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I should be able to figure this out, but I'm completely lost.
The following code deals to a hand of choice a set number of cards (int toDeal):
private void deal(Hand hand, int toDeal) { for (int j = 0; j < toDeal; j++) { Hand temp = hand.handCards(); Card[] s = new Card[temp.getNumCards() + 1]; Card[] q = hand.getHand(); for (int k = 0; k < temp.getNumCards(); k++) { s[k] = q[k]; } s[s.length - 1] = deck.dealCard(); hand.setHand(s); } }
to call it I run:
deal(playerHand, 5);
How do I make a method to add these cards back into the deck (the cards from the temp array)?
Thank you,
any ideas or code greatly appreciated


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The Religiosity of Korean Zen (Hwadu) Meditation
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The Religiosity of Korean Zen (Hwadu) Meditation
Sung-bae Park, Professor of Religious Studies and the founder and director of the Center for Korean Studies at Stony Brook University, delivered this year's Ahnkook Fund for Korean Buddhism Lecture.
Many Korean Zen Buddhists are now crying out for help. They seem to be in the throes of a crisis, since they are missing the religiosity of Zen (Hwadu) meditation.
Their problem is not a neglect of practice, but their attachment to a causal way of thinking.
As a result, they see it as a way to get enlightenment, and this means that Hwadu is treated as a method to achieve a goal.
In this lecture, Park offered the advice: 'Please try to realize what "The Religiosity of Zen Meditation" actually is.'
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LAS CRUCES, N.M. (AP) — Virgin Galactic said Thursday it will make the first-ever rent payment this month for use of Spaceport America in New Mexico as long as all the terms of its lease agreement have been met.
State officials have said the company will pay $85,833 monthly, according to a calculation based on information from the spaceport, the Las Cruces Sun-News reported (http://bit.ly/Xn9djn ).
The amount is one-twelfth of the $1 million a year charged to Virgin Galactic for use of the facilities. It will pay another $2,500 a month in rent for land.
The terminal-hangar, dubbed the Virgin Galactic Gateway to Space, is the main facility to be used by the company to launch tourists to suborbital space, once operations start. The first flights could happen late this year.
The lease agreement takes the space facility one step closer to financial independence, said David Buchholtz, a board member of the New Mexico Spaceport Authority.
"Certainly I look to that as a significant source of operating revenue going forward, so that we don't have to draw on other public sources," he said.
Authority executive director Christine Anderson said the rent will begin accruing Jan. 15.
In a statement, the London-based Virgin Galactic told The Associated Press it was committed to paying rent once the authority has met the conditions of the lease agreement.
"NMSA has indicated that they will have achieved this by the 15th January. Subject to VG's review and confirmation that all the conditions (as agreed in recent discussions) have been met, VG will start paying facilities rent on the Gateway Facility," the company said in the statement.
Virgin Galactic said late last year that it would re-think its plans in New Mexico if a bill that would prevent lawsuits against spaceflight parts manufacturers fails again in the Legislature. Spaceport supporters have said the law change is crucial to the facility's future.
Republican Gov. Susana Martinez has pushed unsuccessfully for two years for legislation to protect the manufacturers from legal liability.
Save Our Spaceport Coalition, a group of aerospace-related companies and business associations, said in November they would tout the benefits of New Mexico's Spaceport America and the need for the legislation.
Virgin Galactic could break its lease with a penalty ranging between $500,000 and $2 million.
A certificate of occupancy was awarded for the terminal-hangar in September, and the building was deemed complete by the architect on Nov. 15, Anderson said. The lease calls for rent payments to begin 60 days after that date, she said.
Since November, contractors have been working on minor building details, and there may be a few things left to do even after Jan. 15, she said.
"We'll have a plan to complete the rest; there's no loose ends after that date," she said
State officials also said a funding shortfall for construction of a southern road to the spaceport, important to Las Cruces, is prompting them to seek another $3 million from the Legislature for the project.
Virgin Galactic to make 1st spaceport rent payment
LAS CRUCES, N.M. (AP) — Virgin Galactic said Thursday it will make the first-ever rent payment this month for use of Spaceport America in New Mexico as long as all the terms of its lease agreement have been met.


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November 19, 2013, 7:32 am
Australian greats George Gregan, David Campese, Ken Catchpole and Mark Ella are among 11 rugby union legends, with almost 500 caps between them, to be inducted into the IRB Hall of Fame.
Staged after the opening day of the inaugural International Rugby Board world conference in Dublin on Monday, the other inductees include Australians John Thornett and Tom Lawton snr.
Halfback Gregan, the most-capped player of all-time with 139 appearances to his name, was able to make it to the Irish capital to accept his accolade.
Campese, the other Wallaby to reach three figures after playing 101 times for his country, will receive his framed IRB Hall of Fame cap and pin at a later date in Australia alongside Catchpole, Thornett and Lawton, the latter posthumously.
Apart from winger Campese, the Australian contingent all captained their country at some point in their careers.
World Cup 1999 winner Gregan led the Wallabies to a 2-1 Test series victory over the 2001 British & Irish Lions, while Catchpole wore the armband in almost half his 27 Test appearances.
Five-eighth Ella, the most successful of three rugby-playing brothers, became the first indigenous player to captain Australia in any sport when he skippered the Wallabies on the 1982 tour of New Zealand.
Lawton, another No.10, steered Australia to their first whitewash of the All Blacks in the Bledisloe Cup campaign of 1929.
Under Thornett's captaincy in the 1960s, Australia became the first nation in 67 years to defeat South Africa in consecutive Tests.
IRB Chairman Bernard Lapasset said: "The IRB Hall of Fame recognises those who have made an indelible mark on our sport through feats on the field of play, displays of great character or through their tireless and inspirational work in driving forward our great game.
"The British and Irish Lions are an institution, a symbol of our history, our present and our future and tours to Australia have delivered bountiful unforgettable memories. These inductees, legends in their own right, have stamped their own mark on this incredible piece of rugby history."
The IRB Hall of Fame was launched in 2006 with the induction of Rugby School and William Webb Ellis.


text: Accent Pillows Accessories Area Rugs Artwork Curios Display Cabinets Fireplaces Lamps Mirrors Other Accent Furniture You Won't Find It For Less! Since 1948, Kane's Furniture has developed a well-earned reputation for offering a wide variety of quality furnishings, all at affordable prices. From living rooms, bedrooms and dining rooms to accessories and more, you'll always find the selection and service you demand at a price you deserve. Our philosophy of delivering the latest styles affordably underlies everything we do. Together with our customer-first service, it's easy to see why Kane's has something for everyone — and always for less. Visit any one of our 18 convenient locations today or see our ad in Saturday's paper for the latest specials.


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With its seamless blend of shrewd commerce, uncompromising luxury and countercultural abandon, all set against a dramatic mountain backdrop, Washington's capital of cool is a study in complementary contrasts
Author Michael Kaplan Photography Nick Hall
WHEN YOU THINK about Seattle, you tend to think Microsoft, or Starbucks, or grunge, with a little Boeing thrown in. While these associations aren't necessarily wrong, they don't do the city justice. What makes Seattle so appealing is the way in which its disparate influences come together. It's a place where dot-com barons sport elaborate tattoos and tattoo artists look like history professors, where you'll encounter dealmakers in the punk clubs and bike messengers in the cocktail bars.
There's a very specific air about Seattle, a sense of inclusiveness, optimism and energy. And while the people here often seem obsessively casual, the focus on quality is intense. You see this in the city's baristas tending to the sheen of golden crema, in its chefs devising new ways to enhance oysters, in its software engineers coding with elegant economy.
When visiting Seattle, leave your pretensions behind, raise your expectations and let loose your pioneering spirit. You'll fit right in.
This and archived issues
of Three Perfect Days
are available for free
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What a wonderful article! Well written and captures the true essence of the Emerald City. Last month we embarked on a one-day "down to earth" tour of Seattle that included the famous Farmers Market, the flagship Starbucks on Pike Street, the Seattle Monorail, the nostalgic Space Needle, and the scenic Bainbridge Island Ferry. I highly recommend the Boeing Factory tour, a short drive from Seattle in Everett. On this tour you will experience the excitement of watching the 787 production assembly line, certainly a thrill. Maybe you will catch a glimpse of United's new 787 fleet.
You are a very good writer and capture the mood of this city so well :-)
I already live here but you made me want to want to visit for a holiday ;-)
Having lived in the Seattle area for a few years now, I agree with what a lot of this little article has to say. Great photograph too. There's one small problem and it's in the blurp underneath the title. As wonderful as Seattle is, it's just like Anchorage – while being the largest city, it's not the capital of the state. Washington state's capital is Olympia. :)
@Rachel – It says "capital of cool" not the actual capital. Easy mistake. Gave me a laugh.


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Just Lion Around
Waiting to see you!
About Our Animals
Potter Park Zoo is home to over 160 species of animals, many of which are threatened or endangered, including Amur tigers, red pandas, snow leopards, bongos and more. Interested in learning more about the animals you'll meet during your trip to the zoo? Check out these animal profiles!
Plan a Visit
Potter Park Zoo is a 20 acre zoo within an 80 acre park located in the capital city of Lansing, Michigan. With over 500 animal residents there is always something new and exciting to see. From special events to programs for children and adults, the Zoo offers family fun and enrichment year round. Come explore the Zoo and help us celebrate, study, and protect the diversity of animals and their habitats.
Support the Zoo!
Each year thousands of children and adults visit Potter Park Zoo and participate in a variety of educational outreach programs. These programs would not be possible with the generous support of friends like you! Your gifts benefit the Zoo by providing ongoing financial support that ensures the health and well-being of all the animals at the Zoo and provides for education and outreach, conservation, animal welfare programs, and capital improvement projects.
Our mission is to inspire people to conserve animals in the natural world. Potter Park Zoo is doing our part to save species around the world through research, education, breeding and release programs and much more.
Wine & Stein
Eat, drink and celebrate spring with the animals while you support a great cause – Potter Park Zoo!
Price: Advance: $25 members | $30 non-members; At the Gate: $35
*This event is only for visitors over 21
Become a Member
Are you ready for a full year of wild adventures? Become a Potter Park Zoo member! Members receive free standard admission, discounts at our gift shop, concessions, and much more. Best of all, you are making a lasting impact on wildlife conservation – for now and for years to come!
Our Mission: Inspiring Conservation of Animals and the Natural World.
The Potter Park Zoological Society is a private, 501 (c) 3, non-profit organization that supports Potter Park Zoo. 38-2153808
Potter Park Zoo
Our Mission


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Endorsed by Curators:
Scaled Agile : SAFe Lean Portfolio Management (LPM) 4.6 Dallas, TX
Endorsed by Curators:
Leading SAFe 4.6
Develop a skillset thats in demand worldwideand empower your enterprise to succeed in a disruptive marketplacewhen you become a SAFe 4 Agilist (SA).
This two-day course teaches the Lean-Agile principles and practices of the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe). Youll learn how to execute and release value through Agile Release Trains, how to build an Agile Portfolio, and how to lead a Lean-Agile transformation at enterprise scale. You will gain an understanding of the Lean-Agile mindset and how to apply the principles and practices of SAFe to support Agile teams, programs, program portfolio management, and to coordinate large Value Streams.
Attending the class prepares you to take the exam and become a certifiedSAFe Agilist (SA).
The following individuals will benefit from this course:
Learning Objectives
After this course, you will understand how to:
Detailed Course Guide
The course consists of the following:
1. Intro to SAFe Introduction to the Scaled Agile Framework
2. Lean Thinking An overview of Lean Software Development and Product Development Flow
3. Agile Development Application of Agile development in the enterprise context. Business Benefits.
4. SAFe ScrumXP An experiential walk-through of SAFe ScrumXP, focusing on scalable technical, project management and economic prioritization practices that enable scaling to the program and portfolio level
5. Agile Release Train Identification, implementation and execution of Agile Release Trains long-lived programs whereby teams-of-agile-teams optimize quality and velocity delivery for the enterprises larger value streams
6. Agile Portfolio Management Agile transformational patterns for Strategy and Investment Funding, Program Management, and Governance
7. Agile Architecture Principles of Agile Architecture, role of System and Enterprise Architects, and Architecting with Flow
8. Scaling Leadership Scaling Enterprise Lean|Agile leadership
By the end of this course, attendees will be able to:
* Apply lean, agile and product development flow principles to improve productivity, employee engagement, time to market, and quality
* Apply the Scaled Agile Framework based on lecture, real-world examples, and insights by Scaled Agile experts
* Understand the skills necessary for an enterprise transformation based on the information and examples presented, and additional recommended readings and resources
* Gain the insights into the leadership skill most effective in unlocking the intrinsic motivation of software development knowledge workers, and begin applying them in your context
SAFe Certification
Attending the class prepares you to take the exam and become a certifiedSAFe Agilist (SA).
Exam Details
SAFeCertification Kit
Attendees who pass the exam will receive:
What You Get
The class registration includes:
Professional Development Units (PDUs) and Scrum Education Units (SEUs)
Our Leading SAFe and other Scaled Agile Framework certification classes are available every weekend inWashington, D.C. metropolitan area and some other places .For more dates and cities please look underMore Events From This Organizeror click on Lean Agile Hub to see the list of upcoming classes
Cancelation policy:
Full refunds will be issued for cancelations made more than 30 days from the start of the course. For cancellations less than 30 days prior to course start, registrants may contact us to change their registration to another offering.
Notice:If you are booking travel please be sure to book refundable tickets. If 4 or more students do not register for the course, the course will be canceled and you will be notified of cancellation at least a week prior to class. We will not be responsible for any canceled airline or hotel reservations.
Endorsed by Curators:
Endorsed by Curators:


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kprince brauchte ein neues Logo Design und hat einen Wettbewerb auf 99designs gestartet.
Aus 30 Designs von 9 Designern wurde eine Gewinner gewählt.
Initially MLW will launch as a do-it-yourself patent and trademark on-line workshop. Customers will be able to log-in, complete a questionaire, and then submit their patent or trademark application. It will allow customers to save money on common legal forms.
My Legal Workshops
I need a logo that will be used on all web pages, corporate identity materials, etc. It should have a graphic design element or logo along with the text "My Legal Workshops". I want .ai files delivered with the results. Winning designer will be required to sign a Work-For-Hire agreement assigning all copyrights to the purchaser.
- The logo should be short and wide as opposed to stacked or square (so that I can have the logo centered across the top of each page of the website).
- Use at least dark (hunter) greens, blacks, and grays in the color pallet.
- The logo should convey ease-of-use, simplicity, and putting power in the people's hands. It's a do-it-yourself process, but you're guided along at each step by the system.
- Include superscript-TM at the end in all designs
- Anything that looks too-much like an uppity law-firm logo
Finden Sie heraus, wie ein Designwettbewerb funktioniert, oder lernen Sie mehr über unsere Logo-Design-Angebote.


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I attended a dinner "CME"talk a month or so ago. Across the table was a physician who I knew as an oncologist with whom I had patients in common 10-12 years ago. He was a partner in a local clinic at the time but now he had changed to a solo private practice.
"I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more"
He still sees some oncology patients, some left over from his old practice which he had left 3 years ago but basically he does general internal medicine which he said he enjoys a great deal. He said he accepts no insurance at all including Medicare.He spends as much time as he needs/wants with each patient.Typically one one hour plus with a new patient and typically 30-45 minutes with an old patient but often an hour if he hasn't seen them for a while. He tells me he gets almost no calls at night or on the weekend. He has a receptionist and a nurse and the receptionist collects most of the fees at the time of the appointment and for the rest he has a contract with a local accounting company to do the followup billing.There is no back room of three clerks calling insurance companies which my dermatologist needs to run his practice.Almost all of of his new patients are referred by former patients or their families.
The clinic where he had formerly worked had progressively restricted the time he could spend with a patient.It was down to fifteen minutes but right before he left the administrator and the executive committee agreed to require three additional patients per 9 hour day.
There are no insurance company clerks to call to approve a test, he feels no pressure to report to Medicare his quality indicators and he does not worry that one day he will be told by one of his patients that he has been delisted by their insurance company because of quality issues.
He tells me that every day for the last five or six years in his old practice he went to work mad and came home madder as third party payers demanded more and paid less and as his partners tried to adapt to it all by making more demands on everyone. Now he goes to work and looks forward to the day much as he did fifteen or more years ago.
His practice is not the concierge practice in which patients may pay a yearly fee to have ready access to their physician rather his is all pay per encounter.
His practice may not be for everyone but he seems to have made it work.More power to him.
"Well, he hands you a nickle
he hands you a dime
he asks you with a grin
if you're having a good time" ....
"No I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more."
Quoted Lyrics are ,of course, from Bob Dylan ( copyright 1965)
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Internet Download Accelerator
от westbyte
The Plugin for Opera adds the ability to download using Internet Download Accelerator* specified file or group of files from the browser's context menu. After installing the plug-in a new section with items "Download link with IDA" and "Download all links with IDA" is added the context menu of Opera.
Right-clicking on the link (example link) you will see a menu with 2 new items added:
- Select "Download link with IDA" if you want to download the selected file.
- Select "Download ALL links with IDA" if you want to download multiple files located on this page.
When entering the page with the video clip, if the video service is supported in the address bar there is a button with which you can transfer the movie for download using Internet Download Accelerator*.
If you highlight text on a page, right-click and choose "Find selection on MyTopFiles.com". You will go directly to the page with the search results where you can download your files.
* The plug-in must be installed on the PC together with Internet Download Accelerator.
- Това разширение може да осъществява достъп до данните ви във всички сайтове.
- Това разширение може да осъществява достъп до разделите и дейността на сърфиране.


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How to Play Bocce
Question :
What are the rules for Bocce?
Answer :
There are various forms for bocce play and rules used around the world.
FUNDAMENTALS OF THE SPORT/GAME OF BOCCE ( or in the USA Bocce Ball )
A simple way to describe the object of the game is relate it to the game of soccer. In soccer the only real object of the game is to get the ball into the goal of the opposing team more often than they do, within an allotted time period. In bocce the only object is for one or more of your teams balls to be closer than any of your opponents balls to the pallina (small target ball, often white) at the end of every set. Rather than a time period you can play a fixed number of ends and total the higher score to win or the first team to a predetermined score. Typical is 11 13 or 15.
Of course as in soccer there are other governing rules. It is with these rules that each of the various styles varies and denote the difference between casual backyard fun and all the other variations up to International competition level of play. The object is always the same as described above.
Bocce is played with eight large balls and one smaller target or object ball called the jack.
There are 4 balls to a side, or team, and they are made in two colors to distinguish the balls of one team from the 4 balls of the opposing team.
A coin toss will determine which team has the jack and which color balls that team selects.
The jack is thrown out by a member of the team having won the coin toss to start the game.
The same player throwing the jack must deliver the first bocce ball.
The opposing team will then deliver their bocce balls until the point is taken or they have exhausted their 4 balls.
This "nearest ball", rule governs the sequence of thrown balls. The side whose bocce is the closest to the jack is called the "in" ball and the opposing side the "out" ball. Whenever a team gets "in" it steps aside and allows the "out" team to bowl.
A team has the option of rolling, throwing, bouncing, banking, etc. its ball down the court provided it does not go out-of-bounds or the player does not violate the foul markers.
A player also has the option of "spocking" or hitting out any ball in play in trying to obtain a point, or decreasing the opposing team's points.
At the end of each frame (when both teams have exhausted 4 balls each), a designated official under the scrutiny of the captain/or designee of each team, will determine the points scored.
Scoring points are all those ball of one team closer to the jack than the closest ball of the opposing team, which can be determined by viewing or by mechanical measurement.
In the event that the two balls closest to the jack belong to opposing teams and are exactly the same distance from the jack, no points will be awarded, and the jack returns to the team which delivered it.
Only balls which are distinguishably closer to the jack than any opponent's balls may be awarded points.
FOUL-LINE FOULS.ln both pointing and hitting, the foremost part of the specific foul-line will not be surpassed by any part of the foot before the ball leaves the player's hand.
One official warning may be granted each team after which penalty will be prescribed.
The penalty for a team committing a 2nd. foul-line infraction will be as follows:
A the team fouled against will be awarded points as they were immediately preceding the foul and the frame will end. The team committing the foul will be awarded no points for the frame.
B or the fouled against team may have the option of declining the penalty and completing the frame.
ILLEGAL MOVEMENT OF A BALL BELONGING TO YOUR OWN TEAM. If a player moves one or more of his team's balls, it or they are removed from the court and considered dead and play continues.
ILLEGAL MOVEMENT OF AN OPPONENT'S BALL. If a player moves one or more of his opponent's balls, those balls are removed and awarded one point each and play continues.
Only one team is awarded points, so only the team fouled against can be awarded points.
ILLEGAL MOVEMENT OF THE JACK BY A PLAYER. If the jack is moved by a player, the team fouled against will be awarded as many points as the number of balls that team has already played the frame will end.
Or, the team fouled against may have the option of declining that penalty and completing the frame.
"Illegal Movement" refers to any movement of a ball by means other than the result of normal play such as kicking, touching, etc.
If a player interferes with an opponent's ball in motion, the team fouled against has the option of:
A playing the ball over
B declaring the frame dead or
C declining the penalty, accept the lie of the touched ball and continue playing.
If a spectator, animal or object interferes with a ball in motion and it does not touch another ball already in play, it must be played over by the same player.
If a spectator, animal or object interferes with a ball in motion and that ball touches another ball already in play, the frame is dead.
OTHER DISRUPTION OF PLAY. Any action which interfered with the position of a ball in play - RENDERS THE FRAME DEAD.
We package easy to follow and more complete rules with every Bocce set we sell. Please click this button
to download the Perfetta Bocce rules. They are in PDF form.
If you do not have the free Adobe PDF reader you can download it here
Other places to find rules and in great detail for all the nuances of the various styles/versions of play:
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International Rules for Bocce in Italian
Bocce Standards Association Rules
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Japan's amazing Nabana no Sato winter light show
Dubbed the best annual light show in Japan, the Nabana no Sato botanical garden has sprouted 7 million LED lights this winter.
The theme of this year's display is nature. The tunnels of millions of LED lights encased in flower-shaped bulbs create amazing natural scenes, such as Mount Fuji at dawn and a rainbow across the sky.
A large area of the park is powered by solar panels.
Apart from the botanical garden, Nabana no Sato, on the southern island of Nagashima, is known for onsens and flower blossoms throughout the year. It's a part of the Nagashima Onsen resort area.
The show runs from mid-November to March 31.
Nabana no Sato, 270 Komae, Nagashima-chō, Kuwana-shi, Mie-ken, 511-1144; open Monday to Friday, 9 a.m.- 9 p.m., weekends and holidays from 9 a.m.- 10 p.m.; JPY 2,000 (US$24), free for children under 12; www.nagashima-onsen.co.jp


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Jump to navigation
(3BL Media/JustMeans) The Central Valley is California's heartland, a 400- mile long place full of farmland. It has some of the fastest growing cities within our most populous state, and two of them, Stockton and Sacramento, are vulnerable to major flood events.
(3BL Media/Justmeans) - It seems fitting, with World Water Week just behind us, and with news of the latest, even more dire assessment of the impacts of climate change from the IPCC still making the rounds, that we should share this story which shows one very effective way to connect the dots.
Given the changes coming down the climate pipeline, water is going to be an area of particular concern, because we are so completely dependent on it to live, and because itâs going to be getting harder to find. Droughts are expected to increase. Snow melt, which often provides water in many regions for most of the year, is accelerating, often providing floods instead of nourishment, and changing rainfall patterns can deprive areas of water that previously had plenty.
Water and energy are inextricably linked. It takes lots of energy to pump water from one place to another and todayâs thermal power plants with their cooling towers are among the nationâs largest consumers of water.
For all of these reasons, the announcement of a new solar desalination initiative is welcome news.
WaterFX is using a 377 foot-long solar array to turn brackish water, a mixture of fresh and salt water, into pure distilled water, also producing concentrated mineral salts as a byproduct. Brackish water is commonly found in estuaries, deltas and mangrove swamps, but it is becoming increasingly common as agricultural drainage as freshwater aquifers are depleted. This phenomenon is known as saltwater encroachment. It can also be expected to increase as sea level rises.
The Water FX technology, which has been dubbed âdrought buster,â is currently being demonstrated in a $1 million project at the Panoche Water and Drainage District in Firebaugh, which serves the agriculturally rich Central Valley in California. Their Aqua4⢠Concentrated Solar Still uses an approach that differs significantly from conventional desalination technology. Not only is it powered by the sun instead of electricity or other means, but it also relies on evaporation rather than reverse osmosis (RO) which is more commonly used. RO has been considered the more cost-effective approach due to the high energy cost associated with evaporation, but with the Concentrated Solar Still, the energy is free and clean. The rate at which fresh water can be recovered from salt or brackish water is also higher, as much as 93%, compared to 50% for RO systems. It also produces commercially desirable concentrated mineral salts as a byproduct.
A larger, commercial version of this plant, will be built later this year on 31 acres of land, capable of producing roughly two million gallons per day.


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The disastrous deal of 1972
By Gregory Bresiger
From its beginning in the mid 1930s, Social Security, the foundation program of the American welfare state, has been an inherently political system. Benefits and taxes have been determined by special interests. The program has been dominated by the needs of politicians to win elections. Social Security surpluses have been pillaged (1), diverted to other purposes, a form of political theft predicted by Senator Arthur Vandenberg back in the 1930s when the program was in its infancy. (2)
From the 1939 Social Security amendments that ended the pretense of Social Security as insurance (3)--a pretense that had been necessary to prevent the courts from striking it down (4)--to the decision to add disability insurance just in time for the 1956 elections, policies have been tailored without regard for future generations. The taxpayers of the future, who had no one to represent them, would pay the higher tax rates required to keep the political promises of today.
But it is not necessary to cite the works of critics of the system to document this political legerdemain. FDR conceded it. Speaking with a friend about Social Security payroll taxes, FDR said "those taxes were never a problem of economics. They are politics all the way through." (5) He boasted that the taxes would build political constituencies that would ensure that Social Security would go on forever and that "no damn politician" could ever scrape the system.
Despite FDR's boast, there were politicians, in the first 35 years or so of Social Security's existence, who thought the system was flawed and should be scrapped or radically changed. These critics included Governor Alf Landon in 1936, Rep. Carl Curtis in the 1950s and 1960s as well as Senator Barry Goldwater, who for one brief moment in the 1964 presidential campaign, suggested that Social Security should be made voluntary. But by the early 1970s, any serious discussion in Congress about alternatives to Social Security would be put off limits by a bi-partisan deal designed to re-elect politicians of both parties.
Crossing the Rubicon in 1972
After nearly 40 years of Social Security politics, a landmark decision was reached in the early 1970s, a decision to automatically increase Social Security benefits when inflation indices rose. That's something that would happen a lot in the following decade as large loose monetary policies wrecked havoc with the American economy. The federal government's critical entitlement decision set off a chain of events that would ensure that higher Social Security payments would hurt both taxpayers and beneficiaries. Both would be run over by double-digit inflation.
The 1972 decision on Social Security was little examined by economists and commentators at the time for its long-term consequences. But a few years later its consequences could not be ignored. That's when the system all of sudden became so expensive that it threatened to implode.
Today one of the participants in the critical decision of 1972 concedes it "was the worst fiscal mistake" of the Nixon administration, (6) which is saying quite a lot since many economists blame Nixonomics for the disastrous policies that led to stagflation. Stagflation, by the way, was something Keynesians and those who believed in the Phillips Curve had said could not happen. Inflation could not happen at the same time as sluggish growth rates, they said.
Pete Peterson, then Secretary of Commerce in the administration of President Richard Nixon, is now very critical of the bi-partisan deal between a Republican president and a Democratic Congress that raised Social Security benefits by 20 percent in an election year--a common practice--but this time Congress and the president added a cost of living clause, something that had never happened before in the history of the system. Even though Nixon had originally proposed a five percent benefits raise, he embraced counter proposals by the Democrats that added 15 percent to his plan. Yet, when originally offered, the higher number was dismissed by Nixon aide John Ehrlichman. He said the 20 percent number was "a political ploy and cannot be considered seriously." (7)
But the 20 percent increase was serious--very serious especially for young and middle class wage earners in the 1970s, 80s and 90s who would find payroll taxes eventually ate up more of their pay than even the hated federal income tax. Payroll taxes would jump from 9.60 percent--divided between the employer and the employee--at the beginning of the 1970s to 15.30 today, an increase of just under 60 percent. And, as we will see later on, high payroll taxes, which hinder job creation, could rise another 60 percent over the next three decades. America might copy many of the social welfare states of Western Europe, where Social Security tax rates of around 30 percent are common. Along with those higher payroll taxes, most Western Europe economies have lower growth rates and higher unemployment rates than in the United States.
The commitment to COLAs and outdoing his opponents in expanding Social Security was part of Nixon's Keynesian transformation. Vice President Hubert Humphrey, campaigning against Nixon in the 1968 presidential race, had pledged his backing for COLAs. So Nixon, in a close contest, also said that he was for COLAs. Nixon said that COLAs would "depolitize, to a certain extent, the Social Security system and give greater stability to what has become the cornerstone of our society's social insurance system."(8) Nixon liked the Social Security hike so much that he tried to put a GOP logo on checks containing the announcement of COLAs.(9)
Social Security bi-partianship--a method of silencing the few critics of the system--was given a boost by the unprecedented. 1972 deal.This political bidding for votes was to be a disaster for the taxpayers. A few years after the 1972 deal the Social Security system, which had run surpluses in the 1960s, started to run up red ink. Taxes had to be increased again and again. Presidents Carter and Reagan, in approving separate "bi-partisan" payroll tax hike deals in the late 1970s and early 1980s, both announced that Social Security had been saved.
History has shown that Carter and Reagan, supposed ideological enemies, were both wrong. Automatic increases in entitlements--joyfully approved by both Republicans and Democrats in 1972--meant that tax increases couldn't keep up with promises. After many tax hikes the system's surpluses grew. But the surpluses didn't grow at nearly the pace that will be needed to pay baby boomers, who will begin retiring around 2,012 and expecting the government to fund their retirement. And many baby boomers are under saving for retirement, no doubt, in part, because of the high payroll taxes that had to be raised many times to pay for the 1972 deal.
Even Nixon, years later, conceded the 1972 deal had been a mistake. He "regretted pegging benefits to the cost of living. "(10) However, at the time, nary a peep was heard from the highly popular Nixon. Or Peterson. Or from the press, which generally applauded the bill. Or from the Republicans or Democrats, most of whom voted for the package (It passed in the House by 302-35 and in the Senate by a 82-4 vote).(11) Those few voting against higher Social Security benefits in an election year were risking political suicide.
No More Social Security Politics
Automatic Social Security payment increases meant the debate about entitlements was over. Social Security had become a secular religion that was beyond debate. The 1972 deal meant no more nasty votes on rate hikes. No more having to put up with a handful of maverick members of Congress who wanted to know how these things would be paid for; who questioned the ethics of election year increases or who wanted to closely examine what Social Security was becoming---the biggest entitlement---and what it would be for our grandchildren. Few were looking closely at what Social Security was.
Even the generic title for Social Security and other government welfare programs---entitlements---was misleading as we will see later on. No one was or is "entitled" to anything. There are no guarantees.
But in 1972 any possible substantial debate over Social Security was ended for a generation. Social Security, as so many lawmakers of both parties have said subsequently during budget debates, was "off the table." Thanks primarily to the presidential ambitions of key political players----Richard Nixon, seeking a huge re-election vote, Wilbur Mills, the most important Democrat in Congress, who was going to run an abortive campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination and Congressional barons such as Senate Finance Committee Chairman Russell Long----Social Security would not only have an unprecedented expansion, but its principles would be beyond debate.
Adding 100 percent cost of living increases (COLAs) was great politics. Both a Democratic Congress and a Republican president were easily re-elected. Nixon, who wanted the taxpayers to know that he had approved the increases, exploited its political value to the maximum. Senator George McGovern, a long-shot underdog presidential candidate running against Nixon who later would have to counter the political fallout from a disingenuous announcement by National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger a few days before the election that "peace was at hand " in Vietnam (it wasn't), complained that Nixon was playing Social Security politics by taking credit for the hike.
The mailing notifying Social Security beneficiaries that payments were higher "implies that older people are indebted to Richard Nixon for the 20 percent increase &[That's] very much like Scrooge trying to take credit for the spirit of Christmas," McGovern complained.(12)
The mailing went out just four weeks before the Nixon re-election landslide (Nixon carried 49 states. The hapless McGovern only won Massachusetts and the District of Columbia).
However, McGovern wasn't above playing Social Security politics either. In the Senate, he had offered a bill containing the 20 percent increase and COLAs. Nixon outmaneuvered McGovern. The GOP could play Social Security politics as well as the Democrats.
In fact, there was no philosophical disagreement over expanding the program, merely a disagreement over who was going to get the political credit. The 1972 deal meant American politics' two major parties were the Big Government party and the Bigger Government party.
A Few Cassandras
Still, a few in Congress thought something was wrong when administration experts said the raise and COLAs were actuarially sound. The experts based their projections on the expectation that wages would have the sane dynamic growth over the next decade as they had in the previous decade. These projections came just as real wages would stagnate.
"I will not dwell on the question of whether the experts &are entitled to our confidence," said Representative Barber Conable. "I say only that we in the Congress are not entitled to the confidence of the American people if we allow ourselves to be stampeded into this vote."(13)
Representative John Byrnes complained that a 20 percent increase would inevitably mean higher taxes. He said no testimony had been taken by Mills' Ways and Means Committee on how the deal would be financed. "Some may call what we're doing here cute politics. I call it irresponsibility."(14)
The deal was a decision that needlessly cost the taxpayers billions of dollars because the benefits formula overweighted inflation though a system of double indexing. That meant the system was paying out too much and the trust fund started to be depleted at an alarming rate.
>From 1975, when the cola increases went into effect, until 1981, the trust fund, which includes funds for Medicare, dropped from $55 billion to $40 billion, a decrease of some 27 percent.(15). The trust fund, by the spring of 1977, had only eight months of payments left. Wrote William Simon, who was Secretary of Treasury in the mid 1970s, "at the rate of depletion the trust funds would be depleted by early 1980s. The unfounded liabilities of Social Security add up to more than $4 trillion."(16)
But the system would not be allowed to fail. The workers would be required to "save " it. Payroll taxes were raised, but it was not enough. Another bi-partisan deal was on the horizon in 1983, which would again "save" the system by raising the rates some more.
Mills' Metamorphosis
Wilbur Mills had originally opposed the addition of COLAs in the 1960s. He initially thought that COLAs--as well as other automatic spending programs--would take power away from Congress. He asked, "Is Congress going to get any credit for future adjustments in benefits, or are we going to...let the Secretary of HEW (Health, Education and Welfare) get all the credit."(17)
Mills ultimately changed because the cola issue was politics. And, after strong efforts by the AARP, an organization that was and remains instrumental to the presidential hopes of many candidates, Mills reversed himself.(18)
Some have suggested the AARP was not the key element in Mills' volte face. Rather, they might have used FDR's "politics all the way through" phrase to explain the change. Fellow Democrat Russell Long, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said Mills and his other Democratic colleagues backed COLAs because they were not going to be outflanked by a Republican administration.
Long said "one reason Chairman Mills came out and advocated this is that the President was likely to advocate it any day." "If there is going to be a parade, I think I would rather be at the front of the parade rather than the tail end," Long said. (19) Interestingly, Health, Education and Welfare Secretary Elliot Richardson admitted that Nixon and Congress were in a bidding war over Social Security benefits. (20)
The success of the Nixon-Mills entitlement deal set a dangerous precedent. Both major presidential candidates, despite their supposed philosophical differences, were in basic agreement about the expansion of the welfare state. The major parties would no longer argue about automatically expanding Social Security benefits. And both parties---when they would start encountering deficits that would threaten to drown the system in red ink---would get together and jointly agree to let more tax increases go through on a "non-partisan basis."
Social Security politics ended at the Potomac. Just as both parties accepted the foreign policies of the cold war, so, also, did they accept the basic assumptions of the welfare state, which were no longer up for debate. By the 1980s, Ronald Reagan, the supposed enemy of big government, would say of Social Security that it "has proven to be one of the most successful and popular (federal) programs."(21)
The 1972 Social Security Deal in History
The remarkable thing about the 1972 episode is that few pols and other elites thought anything remarkable was happening at the time. The cola package was seen as an "incremental" expansion of Social Security. But, as a few commentators have subsequently said, this was a massive expansion disguised as incrementalism.
"As far as I know," writes Peterson, "our domestic economic staff never seriously analyzed the cost of the future cola increases."(22) Nixon, by the way, didn't even think the deal was important enough to mention. In Nixon's some 1,100 page memoir, there is not one mention of Social Security. Given the historic importance of this deal, it is remarkable that Nixon saw no need to discuss his election year deal.
But the significance of the bi-partisan Social Security agreement of 1972 cannot be ignored, understated or exaggerated.
"Few citizens or politicians knew the damage that had been done to Social Security in 1972," wrote former Senate Finance Committee staffer and Social Security commentator Carolyn Weaver. "In one fell swoop the new indexing provisions converted a system characterized by ad hoc growth to one of automatic and uncontrolled growth &"(23)
It meant that, because of over promising, those receiving benefits in the 1970s would receive a better deal than those in the next generation. Each succeeding generation of recipients would get shortchanged. Each future generation would receive less and each generation of taxpayers would have higher payroll taxes. It was, is and remains a pyramid scheme. These conclusions were tacitly acknowledged some twenty years later by a government commission investigating the skyrocketing costs of entitlements.
"Our current entitlement system is based on a huge generational injustice. On average, today's retired Americans will receive huge windfalls that far exceed the value of their prior contributions. On average, Baby Boomers will be lucky to break even---and even that will be only possible by condemning still younger generations to unthinkable tax hikes," according to the commission.(24).
A separate study by the Congressional Research Service found more "generational injustice." The payback period for the average worker who retired in 1960 was 1.1 years. By 1980, it was 2.8 years. And, for those retiring over the next 30 years, the payback period will be between 12.9 and 18.3 years!(24b).
The same study showed Social Security's guardians were and are poor money managers. The study would show real returns for average taxpayers on Social Security taxes will plummet to about 1.5 percent over the next two decades.(25) The real returns of the stock market over the past 75 years---in bad times and good have been about ten percent a year,(26) although superior money managers usually perform a lot better than that.
Who Needs Congress?
Mills had been originally right in opposing COLAs. They did take away power from Congress and allowed administrative agencies such as Social Security---it would become so big that in the 1990s it would merit its own cabinet level department---to make vital decisions on spending. Social Security decisions and legislation are often so complex that few members of Congress can understand what is happening.
Thanks to the Mills/Nixon deal, more and more of the federal budget would be spent without any decision by Congress. The Kerrey-Danforth entitlement commission took notice.
In 1973, just as the COLAs were going to be phased in, mandatory spending took up 45 percent of the federal budget, according to the commission. Most of it (38%) was from so-called entitlements. Ten years later, mandatory spending was 56.3 percent of the federal budget and entitlements were 45.2 percent. By 1993, the numbers were 61.4 percent and 47.3 percent, respectively. And, by the year 2,003, mandatory spending is projected to take up 72 percent of the federal budget, with 58.2 percent going to entitlements.(27) At this pace, Congress' role in social spending may become as inconsequential as whether modern presidents wage war or not!
The Mills/Nixon deal was still being paid for long after the pols had been elected and the major participants in the deal had gone to their graves. Do young people paying high payroll taxes today know who Wilbur Mills was? Or Russell Long? Or that Richard Nixon's controversies involved more than Watergate? One might paraphrase John Maynard Keynes and say that we're all the prisoners of long-dead politicians whose names we have long forgotten. These forgotten pols ensured that Congress was no longer needed.
Entitlements would grow at an accelerated pace and regardless of whether a supposedly anti-big government Congress was elected or not. For decades after the Mills/Nixon deal anyone who dared to challenge Social Security was a "candidate for a frontal lobotomy, " according to Republican Jack Kemp.(28)
The Future of Social Security
It is important to study the history of this system as Americans debate how to "save" this system, a system, many historically illiterate Americans seem to forget, that has been "saved" almost as many times as some of the characters in Sinclair Lewis's timeless novel of evangelism, "Elmer Gantry."
Today, the same Pete Peterson who admits the 1972 accord was a dreadful political deal, calls for the continuation of the Social Security system in a modified form, with taxpayers allowed to control some of their "contributions. " He writes admiringly of the Singapore Social Security system in which citizens are required to pay into a central account.
President Clinton says Social Security can be saved merely by giving the government more authority over the system's assets, which has been exactly the problem throughout its history: The government--or rather pols serving special interests--played with the assets. Sometimes presidents use these trust funds to pay off political debts or to mislead people as to the nation's economic condition.
Say two commentators "Social Security is not a trust fund. Congress uses the reserves built up in Social Security to mask the real size of the federal budget deficit."(29).
Still, the president actually thought--for a while--that the solution to the system's problem was just let the government invest some of the system's revenues in the stock market and the system will be saved, an idea that Vandenberg, 62 years ago, said would "amount to socialism."(30)
Advocates of the Clinton plan seem to think that the same government that squandered billions of dollars over the years, the same government that raised Social Security taxes 24 times over the past 62 years--under both Republicans and Democrats who both played, play and will continue to find new ways to play Social Security politics--will be an excellent money manager.
But if I told you the same adviser who had stolen or misallocated your money for almost 65 years now had a new plan what would be your reaction? Most people, I believe, would want to fire the adviser and maybe even sue him for good measure. They would want to know why no one had launched an investigation. Someone might ask a consumer advocate such as Ralph Nader to charge into the mess if it was a private business that had caused the problem.(31)
The problem of 1972 is the problem of 1956, the problem of 1935 and the same problem of today. Political control of the retirement assets of millions of Americans means their money can be stolen or misallocated as soon as the next election or the next bi-partisan accord. There is every indication that, whatever political solution is imposed, it will be done with utter disregard for future generations. Fetuses don't vote.
"I'm not going to spend a lot of political capital solving some other guy's problem in the year 2010,"(32) said a candid official in the Reagan administration who was asked about the future problems of Social Security and other entitlements. The problem is basic and can not be fixed with another reform commission: The original Social Security Act is open-ended, giving the government unlimited authority over the system, its assets and its promises.(33) Nothing is guaranteed. And the courts have held Congress and the administration are within their rights to take away anything contained in the Social Security Act.(34)
The problems of Social Security mean history tragically or farcically repeats itself time and again. Looking at the past, one may view what will happen in the future if this system is continued: Either taxes must be raised again or benefits cut again.(35) Or probably, as the system continues its inevitable mismanagement and decline, both.
No amount of tinkering can change human nature--the nature of unscrupulous people of all political stripes who want to win elections and are not very particular about abusing their power to tax. James Madison, in Federalist 10, wrote of the taxing power that "there is, perhaps, no legislative act in which greater opportunity and temptation are given to a predominant party to trample on the rules of justice."(36)
In 1972, Nixon, Mills and most of Congress, serving the special interests of a "predominant party " and representing the demands of those who expected greater entitlements, "trampled " on the rights of those who would have to pay for them. The bill for this mischief continues to grow and will be assessed against future generations as long as Social Security survives.
a) "The Big Lie. What Every Boomer Should Know About Social Security and Medicare" by A. Haeworth Robertson, p67 (Retirement Policy Institute, Washington, D.C., 1997
b) "On Revolution," by Hannah Arendt, (New York, Viking Press, 1971), p107.
1) Attending a Securities Industry Association conference in Florida in the early 1990s, I heard economist Douglas Bernheim of Stanford University, who has studied the problem of low savings rates for Merrill Lynch, describe the problem of the Social Security trust fund. "The history of the Social Security system is that, whenever there have been big surpluses, Congress can't resist using them." (Author's notes)
2) "Social Security After 50: Successes and Failures," Edward D. Berkowitz, editor, (Greenwood Press, New York, 1987) pp 60-61. Also see "The Private Papers of Arthur Landenberg, " Arthur H. Landenberg, Jr. (Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1952).
3) "When in 1935 the United States introduced the (Social Security) scheme, the term 'insurance' was retained---by a stroke of promotional genius---simply to make it more palatable. From the beginning it had little to do with insurance and has since lost whatever resemblance to insurance it may have ever have had." From F.A Hayek's , The Constitution of Liberty, pp 288-289, (University of Chicago Press, 1960)
4) See "Louis D. Brandeis, Felix Frankfurther and the New Deal" by Nelson L. Dawson.
5) "The Age of Roosevelt," Vol 2, The Coming of the New Deal, " by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., (Houghlin Mifflin, Boston, 1962), pp 308-309.
6)The comment comes from Pete Peterson's "Will America Grows Up Before It Grows Old. How the Coming Social Security Crisis Threatens You, Your Family and Your Country," pp 98-100, (Random House, New York, 1996)
7) See "Policymaking for Social Security, " by Martha Derthick, p360, (Washington, Brookings Institute, 1979)
8) "Nixon Reconsidered" by Joan Hoff, p135, (Basic Books, New York, 1994)
9) See "The AARP: America's Most Powerful Lobby, " by Charles R. Morris, p78, (Times Books, New York, 1996)
10) See Nixon's comment that he "regretted " supporting "the pegging of Social Security to the cost of living " in Hoff, p 135.
11) Derthick, p362
12) "Promises to Keep. Saving Social Security's Dream, " p 58, by Marshall N. Carter and William G. Shipman, (Regnery, Washington, D.C., 1996)
13) Congressional Record (June 30, 1972), p 23734
14) Ibid, p 23732-33
15) The figures are from "Social Security. What Every Taxpayer Should Know, " p78, by A. Haeworth Robertson, (Washington, D.C., Retirement Policy Institute, 1992). Robertson is a former actuary of the Social Security system. A critic of the system, he has called it "The Big Lie. "
16) "A Time for Truth, " by William Simon, pp 204-205, (Readers Digest Press, New York, 1978)
17) "The Crisis in Social Security. Economic and Political Origins, " by Carolyn Weaver, p 162, (Durham, North Carolina, Duke University Press, 1982).
18) Derthick, p 358.
19) Derthick, page 359. Also see, page 346 for Richardson's admission.
20) Ibid.
21) From "Social Security after 50: Successes and Failures, " Edward Berkowitz, editor, p11, (Greenwood Press, New York, 1987)
22) Peterson, pp98-100.
23) Weaver, p170.
24) "The Bipartisan Commission on Entitlement and Tax Reform, " (Washington, D.C., Government Printing Office, 1995), p55.
25) See Carolyn Weaver's article on Social Security on p 299 of "The Fortune Encyclopedia of Economics, " David Henderson, editor, (Warner Books, New York, 1993).
26) The compound rate of return of U.S. stocks between 1926-1993 was 10.2 percent, according to Ibbotson Associates, Chicago.
27) Bipartisan Commission on Entitlement and Tax Reform, " p 10.
28) "Social Insecurity, " by Dorcas Hardy, p 16, (Villard Books, New York, 1991)
29) From "The Fifteen Biggest Lies in Politics, " p 148, by Major Garrett and Timothy J. Penny, (New York, St. Martin's Press, 1998).
30) "The Private Papers of Arthur Vandenberg. "
31) Interestingly enough, this is precisely what Helen P. Rogers, a certified financial planner, asked Nader to do at the back of her useful little book, "Social Security. An Idea Whose Time Has Passed, " (Wellington Books, Carmel, California, 1985). On January 8, 1986, she wrote Nader that "If you are indeed a Champion of the Consumer you must raise you voice in protest over the bundle of inequities the Social Security system has become." To my knowledge, Nader has never responded to her request.
32) The official was Reagan's OMB chief, David Stockman. Berkowitz, p 15.
33) Representative Carl Curtis, a Republican House member in the 1950s who was a critic of Social Security, often cited Section 1104 of the original Social Security Act, which said that Congress reserves "the right to alter, amend or repeal any provision of this act." From "Social Welfare in the United States," Poyntz Tyler, p. 55, (H.W. Wilson, Bronx, New York, 1955)
34) The story of Fleming vs. Nestor--in which a former Communist was denied his Social Security after "contributing " for many years and the U.S Supreme Court upheld the government--has been detailed in many places. See "The Social Security Fraud " by Abraham Ellis, pp 169-171, (Irvington-on-Hudson, New York, FEE, 1996)
35) That warning came from Senator Robert Kerrey. See "Wall Street Journal " of June 19, page 22. "Senators Air Beefs at Summers hearing.
36) "The Federalist Papers, " Clinton Rossiter, editor, p80, (New York, The New American Library of Literature, 1961).
Reprinted with the kind permission of Gregory Bresiger and the Ludwig von Mises Institute.
� 1996-2020, Enter Stage Right and/or its creators. All rights reserved.


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Yeah, it's me. I published Learning Pixel Art today, which is a book that teaches you pixel art. It's easy to understand and straightforwardly written with lots of helpful illustrations and diagrams, making it great for the first-time pixel artist, but is also a great way for an experienced or veteran pixel artist to refine and improve their craft with the in-depth discussion of techniques and carefully-crafted exercises meant to build skills in a concentric fashion!
And best of all, it's just $0.99!
Read about it here: http://www.logbook-p...ed-buy-now.html
Or just buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00V32EWRG
(guys, I'm a published author, how cool is that?!)


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Hey there, Shapelings! SP will be live blogging the The 67th Annual Golden Globes tonight! Use the link below to follow along with us all evening.
1 thought on "Live Blogging the Golden Globes"
I agree, and feel the same way about commercials, magazine covers, t.v. shows, movies, everything is a connotation to "Sexual Exploits." In the ad, she has her butt up in the air, like that's a natural position. It is unfortunate, as women growing up in this environment seek this type of validation. To expose themselves so uncomfortably, for the sake of selling themselves. That is what fashion represents, is a "statement" we make about ourselves. "Yeah, I look hot." I can hear the minds of women wearing their stilleto's, and tight mini dresses, as they walk that walk.
I have noticed so much more lately, women wearing serious stilleto's during the day, at work, in the office, going to the post office, wearning sweat pants! You can see how uncomfortable they look for these women to wear them. There was actually two people wearing the stilleto's at the post office, and they had this unatural bend in thier knee. I imagine that they must be difficult to walk in, when the heel is so skinny and long, you notice the instability. Oh, but those shoes "Scream Sex."
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Soon, harvest would be in frantic swing, and he would need a second transfer pump. His new Zambelli reversible pump served him well on his first juice run, but he was aware that equipment like that needs to be backed up, as they seem to come with an internal mechanism timed to breakdown at the most inopportune moments. He also decided that it was time to get himself a filter pump and some filters to have for the coming months—wouldn't hurt either to bundle up on a few other wine-making items.
Nick liked Doug, who operated a winery supply business specifically set up for home winemakers and for tiny wineries—he also had his own tiny winery to tend to, plus many acres of grapevines along the shores of Erie.
The other reason Nick liked going to Northeast was the necessary three-hour drive along Route 17, once voted the most scenic road in New York (or was it in the whole country?). It's a string of rolling hills, pastures, small lakes and streams, large silos, fields of grain, and at the close of the trip, grapevines. The trip takes you past some of the oldest settled land in the country, and some of the most active during the American Revolutionary War; you drive by the famed Chautauqua Institute, where intellectual pursuit joins artistic display; and you witness some of the most scenic waterways and secondary roads on the other side of a highway railing.
On his first trip to Northeast, to buy tanks, barrels, and sundry items, Nick stopped in Salamanca to grab something to eat and to fill his tank with gas. It was the first time in his life that he had ventured onto a Native American reservation, and it wasn't until he saw the price of goods and gasoline when he realized where he was, as excise taxes are not levied on reservations, which remain separate nations of a sort.
The city of Salamanca is on the Alleghany Indian Reservation, which the Seneca Nation leases to New York State—until 2030 (who knows?). The same rules that keep excise taxes at bay also allow reservations to host gambling casinos: Salamanca would ultimately have its revenge on the white man when it, too, would profit from the weaknesses of gambling. For the time being, however, the area looked relatively viable but not overwhelmingly prosperous, and while many people looked Native American, with their colorful faces, vaguely Asian cheek and jaw structure, and jet-black hair, he saw many other non-native faces. There seemed to be more drinking establishments per square yard than in his neighborhood at Keuka Lake, but then, that might be true for any place on earth when compared to Keuka Lake. The price of wine at retail was also much less in Salamanca than anywhere other than his industry member discount.
On this second trip to Northeast, Nick left home at 6 a.m. so that he could arrive at his destination early enough to get business done and get back home before sunset. He filled his gas tank and chose not to stop along the way, but he drove relatively breezily so that he could take in the striking New York scenery.
When he arrived in Lucille Ball's hometown, Jamestown, he was under an hour away from his destination, and it wasn't 9 a.m yet.
Entering Northeast reminded him of childhood summers. He knew that Lake Erie is not an ocean, but its massive shoreline and wet horizon certainly gave it that appearance, especially when humidity was high and from a distance you could see the wet air hovering over the water's waves, calling up a particular childhood memory as he and friends descended upon the Bay 14 beachfront at Coney Island in Brooklyn.
As he came closer to the shoreline, he could smell the breakfast grill at a certain diner on the corner of town just before the east/west shore road along the lake begins. They produced a fine breakfast of eggs to order and home fries, and they offered decent coffee, too, which is no guarantee on the road. He was to meet Doug at the winery at 10:30, so there was plenty of time for a leisurely breakfast.
Not known to Nick, that morning Doug had been called away by his vineyard manager to take care of one of the daily emergencies that take place during harvest season. When Nick arrived at Doug's place, on time, he was made to wait, which he could do either outside or in the tasting room.
Doug's tasting room and retail space was small. Nick perused it for ideas that he might use to make his space more efficient. At the tasting bar, cheese accompanied the wines to taste. After watching a couple of transactions, Nick saw how serving the right cheese with each wine boosted how much consumers liked the wine; it was a lesson he was sure to take home with him.
When Doug finally arrived, time had been running out and so the two made a fast walk through the warehouse to look at inventory and through the winery to see how Doug put to use some of the equipment that he thought Nick might want to consider. But for this trip, only the backup transfer pump, a filter pump system and filters and other supplies were all that Nick was prepared to buy, although he did have his eye on the bottling system that Doug assured him would be there in the spring when he would need it and also the Yugoslavian oak barrels that Doug used instead of the more expensive French barrels, but that would also have to wait for another time.
He settled on a transfer pump that was cheaper than the Zambelli he already had; this one was not reversible, but it was for backup and for certain racking jobs so he was comfortable getting it. For the filter system, he wasn't going to produce enough wine in the first year or two to invest in a plate filtering system, so he bought a small cartridge system. Doug had assured him that the new technology of the time provided cartridge filtration to a nominal .2 micron, which was pretty tight.
The system was simply a small pump with a truly slow rate, and a stainless steel cartridge holder. Plastic tubing connected to the tank being emptied of wine to be filtered into the cartridge holder on one side and then a plastic tube coming out of the cartridge holder on the other side and into the tank that would receive the filtered wine. He bought a number of rough filter cartridges, 1 micron, a few .45 micron cartridges, and a smaller number of .2 nominal cartridges for the final filtration before bottling.
He packed a large box with various wine-making chemicals and supplies plus some cheese and bread that he bought from Doug to eat on the drive home, and a few bottles of wine that Doug gave to him to sample.
He was home by 5 pm, enough time to unwind for the following day, which would prove to be an active one.
If you are reading this entry anywhere other than on the vinofictions blog, be aware that it has been lifted without my permission (and without recompense), and that's a copyright infringement, no matter that the copyright information appears with it.
Copyright Thomas Pellechia
August 2010. All rights reserved.
August 2010. All rights reserved.


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- New
3 X Carall Regalia 1386 Car Air Freshener Perfume (65ml)
- Velvet Musk Scented.
- High Quality. Long Lasting.
- Stylish Glass Bottle.
- Genuine Product. Beware of imitation.
- Made in Japan.
- Contents: 65ml
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MTS Nutrition Machine Carbs 10
MTS Nutrition Machine Carbs 10
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- fast absorption for rapid delivery of nutrients
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