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Sweet Micky for President | Slamdance Review
By Don Simpson | January 30, 2015
Director: Ben Patterson
Haiti gained its independence in 1804, making it the first independent nation of Latin America and the Caribbean as well as the only nation in the world established as a result of a successful slave revolt. Since declaring independence, Haiti has suffered 32 coups; and a long history of dictatorships has devastated the nation and its economy. The 7.0 earthquake that hit Haiti in January 2010 left it in utter ruins…just in time for Haiti's next presidential election.
Ben Patterson's Sweet Micky for President follows the very unlikely presidential campaign of Michel Martelly — otherwise known as Sweet Micky, a risqué compas musician who is known for being outrageous, naughty and outspoken. The primary goal of Martelly's campaign is to disassociate the artist's persona from the person (the candidate), all the while leveraging Sweet Micky's notoriety to its fullest potential. Martelly has no political history or platform — though some of his songs do feature profound political lyrics — but who needs a political platform when you are one of Haiti's best-known musicians?
If you followed the Haitian elections in 2010-11, you already know how Patterson's documentary ends; regardless, Sweet Micky is a beguiling trip that follows the ebbs and flows of politics. With Pras Michel as a producer, it seems like Sweet Micky would essentially play like a 90-minute commercial for Martelly; yet, Patterson is certainly not afraid to reveal Martelly's blemishes. If anything, Pras gets the raw end of the deal — he is the political hothead who Martelly must eventually distance himself from. Pras also seems to play a sometimes detrimental role in Martelly's relationship with Wyclef Jean.
Sweet Micky is a surprisingly well-rounded political campaign documentary that showcases the influence that American celebrities have on foreign politics. Alongside The Fugees' Pras and Wyclef, we find Sean Penn, Ben Stiller, and Bill Clinton with some involvement in the Haitian presidential elections. For better or worse, foreign involvement significantly assisted Martelly's campaign — for one, Martelly would have never made it to round two of the elections if the OAS (Organization of American States) did not intervene.
Rating: 8/10
Topics: Film Reviews, News | No Comments »


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Dental care helps keep your pet comfortable and happy. Dental disease can be painful and unpleasant for your pet. In addition, pets with dental disease often have bad breath, and that can be bad for your relationship with your pet, as well. Our Ocala veterinarians have provided some answers to your most commonly asked questions to help keep you on top of your pet's oral health.
What can I do to take care of my pet's teeth?
Dogs and cats need their teeth brushed just like people. You can do this by buying a toothbrush specifically designed for your pet type (dog or cat), and toothpaste formulated for your pet. It's important not to use human toothpaste for your pet. Once you've bought these products, you'll have to train your pet to accept regular tooth brushings. Start by touching your pet's teeth and gums with a gauze on your finger. Once you've gotten your pet used to this process, you can start brushing your pet's teeth with a brush, and then you can start integrating toothpaste into the routine.
In addition to the tooth brushing process, you can also take care of your pet's teeth by giving him or her dental-cleaning chew toys, and by taking your pet to the veterinary dentist at Town & Country Animal Hospital, in Ocala.
How do I know if my pet has dental disease?
If your pet has dental disease, you'll see signs in your pet's mouth and behavior. Inside your pet's mouth, you'll see:
- Discolored teeth and gums
- Chipped teeth
- Cracked teeth
- Missing teeth
- Swollen gums
- Bleeding gums
- Bad breath
Your pet's behavior may also change. You may notice that he or she has difficulty eating or chewing. You may also see a marked loss of appetite.
What can a dental veterinarian do for my pet?
Your pet's dental veterinarians can give your pet regular cleanings and inspect his or her teeth for signs of dental disease. Your pet's dental veterinarians can also fill his or her cavities, if your pet has cavities. Teeth that are too damaged to save can be extracted.
Are these procedures painful for my pet?
These procedures are generally not painful because we use anesthesia to keep your pet calm and relaxed. This is safer for your pet and for the dentist.
Will you need to use anesthesia every time?
We'll decide after looking at your pet's teeth whether or not we want to use anesthesia during the dental procedures.
Why is dental care important for my pet?
Periodontal disease can have long-term implications for your pet's health. Keeping your pet's teeth healthy is an important part of keeping your pet's body healthy.
For more information about pet dental care, contact your Ocala veterinarians at Town & Country Animal Hospital, and make your first pet dental appointment today. We'll inspect your pet's teeth and tell you what the next steps are in order to provide your pet with quality dental care. Don't wait, call us today at (352) 840-7020.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Lyme pastor camping out in the cold this week to draw attention to homelessness
LYME, N.H. (AP) � A New Hampshire church pastor is camping outside in the cold this week to draw attention to homelessness and hunger.
Steven Gehlert has put a small tent on the lawn of the Lyme Congregational Church.
The 64-year-old Gehlert, an experienced winter camper, told the congregation of his plan Sunday.
He tells the Valley News (http://bit.ly/1eEiGw4) he intentionally timed the project to start on Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend. He said King's message was about creating a society where the less fortunate were treated with dignity and respect.
Information from: Lebanon Valley News, http://www.vnews.com


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I've been chatting with a reporter from the Wall Street Journal, who is writing an article about companies that use social software like wikis behind the firewall.
As of an hour or so ago, the article is out, but it's behind the WSJ pay wall. I'm going to see if I can get permission to repost it, or at least the part about me and Intel (and the company-wide wiki I created there). Fans of TinyPodcast (remember that? ;-)) will be pleased to note that Brian was quoted in the article, too. Stay tuned for more info.
The way I found the article is very interesting – it showed up in one of my "ego search feeds". I have RSS feeds for queries in Technorati, Bloglines, Google Blog Search, etc. for my name and the names of my sites, and Bloglines snagged it tonight (it hasn't shown up in any of the others yet). I was able to read the whole article cached on Bloglines, but out of respect to the WSJ, I'm not going to post it or a link to the Bloglines cache without their permission.


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February 17th, 2-4pm
Award winning painter Craig Wylie will be demonstrating how he goes about making a study in oil from a life model. The workshop will take place in the gallery during Wylie's exhibition "Studies for a Painting". Surrounded by drawings from his studio and one of his large scale oil paintings he will explain his process – from making initial decisons about composition and palette, to the lighting and pose of the figure.
Over the course of 2 hours Wylie will develop an oil painted study from a life model posing within the gallery space and the audience will be able to interact with the artist, ask questions and enjoy the spectacle of watching this masterful painter at work.
Born in Masvingo, Zimbabwe in 1973, Wylie studied Fine Art at Rhodes University in South Africa. He moved to London in 1998 and went on to gain great success and critical acclaim for his figurative work. Among such distinctions as winning the BP Portrait Award in 2008 and being commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery to paint Dame Kelly Holmes for their permanent collection, Wylie has consistently pursued the human form as his subject.
Included in your ticket price is an A5 sketchbook and pencil to make your own observational sketches from the model (this is not obligatory!). Tea, coffee and refreshments will also be provided during a break.
We hope you can join us for this special opportunity to watch Craig at work, learn about his artistic practice and develop your own.
Purchase tickets: Craig Wylie: Painting From Life
(photo: Anthony Lycett)


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Discover Where are Striped Bass during Winter?
Scientists have learned that Striped Bass prefer water in the temperature range 20-23 C. You now know that Striped Bass migrate to stay in that temperature range. As you can see in the ocean water temperature graph to the right, all of these places have temperatures below 20 C during the months of December, January, February, March, and April. That's too cold!
You can figure out from the illustration on the left that even though Striped Bass prefer a certain temperature water, they can live in colder water. The water temperature can get all the way down to 5 C (41 F) and Striped Bass can still live. They won't be comfortable, but they'll survive.
Where do the Striped Bass go during the winter months?
Some of the larger Striped Bass stay in the ocean but swim into deeper water to spend the winter. The Striped Bass that are farther south off the coast of Virginia can stay in shallower water just beyond the surf break.
Some Striped Bass swim into estuaries (where a river meets the sea). The three most popular among Striped Bass are the Hudson River, Delaware Bay, and Chesapeake Bay. Some Striped Bass even swim into the Cohamee River in North Carolina.
What do estuaries look like? Most estuaries along the east coast are low-lying areas that have lots of marsh grasses. If you took a picture from an airplane, it may look like this:
Up close estuaries can look like this


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Tynwald Hill
Description: Tynwald Hill is located in the village of St John's in the Isle of Man (NGR 228167 480962). Brown's Popular Guide to the Isle of Man, 2nd Edition of 1876 says, "200 yards beyond the church is the grass-covered mound called 'Tynwald Hill', in Manx called Cronk-y-Keillown, i.e., St John's Church Hill. It is one of the most interesting antiquities in the Island - interesting from the fact that here, for hundreds of years, the Manx people have annually gathered in thousands for the purpose of hearing read, and promulgated, the laws which have during the previous year been passed by the Legislature of the Island. The annual ceremony of promulgation takes place on the 5th of July. A fair is held on the plain adjoining the hill, and adds materially to the bustle. From early in the morning hundreds of vehicles may be seen coming along the roads leading to St John's, and the railway trains are crowded to excess. The highway from Douglas is especially animated on the occasion."
NGR Easting: 228167
NGR Northing: 480962
Linked Records
- Tynwald
- The Tynwald Companion 1980
- Report to Tynwald on Environmental Pollution presented to Tynwald July 1973
- Reports of Boards of Tynwald and of Committees of the Manx Legislature, etc. 1955
- Primitive Folk Moots; or open-air Assemblies in Britain [Tynwald]
- Correspondence with reference to Votes of the Tynwald Court [8 August 1871 - 9 January 1875]
- Report of the Select Committee of Tynwald on Ballacarmel Holiday Cottages
- Memorandum presented to His Excellency the Lieutenant Governor of the Isle of Man (Lord Raglan), and Members of the Tynwald Court on Tynwald Hill, Wednesday July 5, 1916. [The People's Protest]
- 1.Tynwald 2.The Arms of Man
- Reports of Boards of Tynwald and of Committees of the Manx Legislature, etc. 1958
Show all (56)


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Day 1278 (Year 4, Day 182)
Goodbye for now Thailand! Feeling relaxed and so grateful for this amazing vacation. ❤
Goodbye for now Thailand! Feeling relaxed and so grateful for this amazing vacation. ❤
Indeed! It was a super tasty Dinner! Also, I just love the sign!
Lighting our wishes on fire and sending them up into the sky via lanterns was definitely the coolest thing I've ever done on New Years!
My favorite rain fighter😍
Exploring the great indoors for our rainy day adventure ☔
Quite possibly the best dinner we have had in Thailand. You are previewing the crab rolls, though every course was amazing! 😋
A simple and relaxing Christmas Day in Thailand ☀ 💆🏼 💕🎄
Santa comes to Thailand?! Who knew?! 🎅 Such a spectacular and festive Christmas Eve! 🥂
…and on the flip side of all things massage, beach, and food-based, we followed some loud bassy beats, expecting to find an outdoor dance party of some kind. Instead, we found this…. tricked out cars with massive speakers and lights, blasting the same beats in unison. The cars were truly leading this party🎶 🚗
Figured we'd try our hand at cooking some Thai food rather than just eat it all. Not too shabby! We had a pretty great instructor though! 👩🏼🍳


text: Exclusive interview with Pylon…post-punk legends from Athens, GA on the occasion of the release of their double album "Live." Plus tracks from Russian Circles, The Orb and more. Get more Pylon in our live session with the Pylon Reenactment Society, too. You can follow the Just Off The Radar podcast on the NPR One app.


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Targhee 45
$157.46 $209.95
A backcountry pack with capacity for more than a full day's worth of gear. View Details
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A great guide pack of for longer tours and overnight trips, the Targhee 45 has ample room. Stable, torsionally flexible VertFlex suspension keeps it balanced under load and close to the body for the descent, while ice tool and gear attachment points add mountaineering capability.
Harness and hipbelt designed to work while wearing a climbing harness
Dual layer bottom panel for added durability
Anodized aluminum hardware for durability function in the cold
Front Avalance Safety Pocket
Zipper Accessed avalance safety pocket with shovel and probe organization sleeves with room for extra gear
Helmet Carry System
Depolyable helmet carry system for long approaches
Snow Shedding Backpanel
Thermo-formed snow shedding backpanel design


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Scott Kelly Reflects On His Incredible Year In Space
His muscles are sore, his joints ache, he's fatigued and his skin is super-sensitive, the first U.S. astronaut to spend almost a year in space told reporters Friday.
His muscles are sore, his joints ache, he's fatigued and his skin is super-sensitive, the first U.S. astronaut to spend almost a year in space told reporters Friday.
"I'm kind of surprised how I do feel different physically than the last time, with regards to muscle soreness and joint pain," Scott Kelly, 52, said during his first press conference since returning to Earth after 340 days in orbit.
PHOTOS: These Astronauts are NASA's Longest-Duration Space Fliers
Then, there's what Kelly called "the skin issue."
"Because I hadn't touched anything for so long, (had) any significant contact, it's very, very sensitive, almost like a burning feeling wherever I sit or lie or walk," Kelly said.
Kelly and two Russian cosmonauts, including Mikhail Korneinko who was Kelly's crewmate through the year in space, landed in Kazakhstan late Tuesday.
Kelly, a veteran of three previous spaceflights, flew back to the Johnson Space Center in Houston the next day and immediately began a series of post-landing medical tests that will last about a year.
"Initially this time coming out of the capsule, I felt better than I did last time, but at some point those two lines have crossed and my level of muscle soreness and fatigue is a lot higher than it was last time," Kelly said. "That was kind of unexpected."
PHOTOS: Astronaut Gets Stunning View of East Coast Blizzard
NASA and its space station partners flew Kelly and Kornienko for a year as a pilot program intended to pave the way for missions to Mars lasting more than two years. Typically, crews serve aboard the space station for six months.
Kelly told reporters the year passed slowly in space, but he could have stayed longer if it was for "a good reason," such as a mission to Mars.
"It seemed like I lived there forever," Kelly said.
The daily, 250-mile-high views of the planet left Kelly with a deeper appreciation of the environment.
"You can see a lot of pollution over parts of Asia that is almost continuous, constantly there. You can't really see the ground very well. And those fires in California over the summer, that smoke was pretty extensive, covering large parts of the U.S." Kelly said.
NEWS: Scott Kelly, NASA's 1-Year Space Twin, Returns Today
"But the predominant thing is you just notice how thin the atmosphere is, how fragile it looks. So that, combined with these large swabs of pollution, is somewhat alarming.
"People often say ... that we need to save the planet. The planet will be just fine. It's us that is going to have a problem ... I think the planet will eventually recover (but) it probably will be without people," Kelly said.
"For us to take care of the air we breathe and the water we drink is critical. I do believe we have an impact on that and we have the ability to change it if we make the decision to," he added.
Expedition 46 Commander Scott Kelly of NASA rest in a chair outside of the Soyuz TMA-18M spacecraft just minutes after he and Russian cosmonauts Mikhail Kornienko and Sergey Volkov of Roscosmos landed in a remote area near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan on Wed., March 2, 2016 (Kazakh time).
Scott Kelly is a NASA astronaut working for a year in space on the International Space Station. Does he have the stuff of "The Martian,"
the highly anticipated Matt Damon movie to be released on Oct. 2
, chronicling the life of a stranded astronaut on the surface of Mars? While Kelly certainly isn't on his own in space, much of the work he is doing would be useful for a trip to Mars. Here are some of the things the astronaut is working on that Mark Watney (Damon's character in "The Martian") would appreciate.
MORE: NASA's Ultimate Space Twin Experiment
The sun goes through an 11-year cycle of activity, and we are just past the peak of one of those cycles. The solar peak is a time when the sun unleashes more flares and coronal mass ejections (charged particles). When these particles hit the Earth's magnetic field, they can produce spectacular auroras.
But they also can give astronauts a higher dose of radiation.
The space station monitors radiation levels for astronauts close to Earth; in fact, one of the reasons Kelly was selected for this mission was he did not exceed the lifetime radiation levels allowed for astronauts. Radiation is expected to jump for those travelling outside of Earth's magnetic influence. Mars doesn't have much magnetic field to speak of, and the Curiosity mission is monitoring radiation levels on the surface to get more information for future human missions.
Working in space is a harsh business. You're busy all the time, you're stuck in a small environment with several people, and your family and friends are far away. NASA keeps close tabs on its astronauts' psychological health through measures such as doctor calls with astronauts, and
having the astronauts keep journals
during their missions. This will especially be important for Mars, as astronauts will need to be even more self-sufficient due to the time delay in communications between planets. NASA has
for astronauts doing simple tasks; these tasks and their effects on astronauts will be studied as the station work continues.
Microgravity is hard on your body. NASA has its astronauts exercise for a couple of hours a day, which seems to help counteract bone loss for missions of six months. But what about a year, or longer? That's part of what Kelly's mission is supposed to answer. Bones aren't the only things to worry about, either. Muscles shrink, eye pressure increases, your sense of balance changes. Even your immune system may be affected, something that
in detail. So while we think of astronauts as boldly doing spacewalks and experiments on station, understand that they are also part of the experiment. Their very health is being watched for the benefit of future space missions.
While Watney develops a certain affection for potatoes, Kelly recently posted a picture of himself looking pretty pleased next to a floating pile of fruit. It turns out that little comforts do go a long way for astronaut morale, and any nutritionist would tell you that a varied diet of healthy foods is good for you -- not just the freeze-dried stuff the Apollo astronauts survived on during their missions. NASA has an experiment in place to see how well
astronauts are meeting nutritional requirements for their work on station
, and also for their long-term health.
Astronauts are very tied to shipments from Earth right now in terms of eating ... but that is changing in a small way.
Thanks to an experiment called Veggie
, astronauts got to taste some food grown aboard the space station this summer. Lettuce, of course, does not an entire meal make. But as the movie Contact (1997) reminds us, it's through "small moves" that we learn about science. The hope is eventually this experiment will translate into a better way of harvesting crops beyond Earth. For Mars, we're even wondering how viable the soil could be to support plants.
"#ILookLikeAnEngineer on @space_station. Also a scientist, medical officer, farmer & at times a plumber," Kelly wrote with this image in August. What's more, he has to do all those things in a small space. Since every pound hoisted to space costs money, astronauts are accustomed to working in claustrophobic quarters. But NASA, concerned about its astronauts' efficiency and happiness, also has an
experiment that is supposed to look at how best to construct a living space for astronauts
. That way, the habitats designed for Mars will be suitable for long-term living.
MORE: Why 'Space Madness' Fears Haunted NASA's Past
During a recent Twitter chat, Kelly was asked if he wanted to go to Mars. He said yes, as long as he could return. Getting to Mars and back will take hundreds of days of transportation, let alone the time on the surface. The gravity on Mars is less than 40% what we experience here on Earth. And unless spacecraft design changes substantially, the astronauts will be in microgravity on the way there and back. NASA has an experiment to see
how well (or badly) astronauts work on the surface shortly after landing
, an experiment that Kelly is participating in. This will be important not only for returning to Earth, but seeing how well a crew can get adapted to Mars after being in microgravity for the transit.
MORE: 3D-Printed Bubble House Made for Mars


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- Home /
- Organii Wild Rose Cream Soap
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Organii Wild Rose Cream Soap with Organic Shea Butter. Ecocert Certified Organic Bar Soap. Organii Everyday Organics. Vegan.
Suitable for Vegans.
Size: 100g
Sodium Palmate***, Sodium Palm Kernelate***, Aqua, Glycerin***, Elaeis Guineensis Kernel Oil*, Butyrospermum Parkii*, Perfum, Sodium Chloride, Citric Acid, Caramel*, CI77491, Silica, Geraniol**, Linalool**, Citronellol**, D-Limonene**, Citral** *ingredients from organic farming **as component of essential oils ***made using organic ingredients
Although our ingredients are checked on a regular audit basis, some may change unexpectedly. Please check the label before use.
- lovely scented rose soap - Review by miller
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text:
Do you want your children to attend North Barrington Elementary School in Barrington? Browse listings on this page.
To find homes in any of our Barrington Schools visit our main Homes by School information page.
North Barrington Elementary School Gallery Homes
No Results Found.
All parents should verify the school boundaries with the district office. Our MLS information and therefore the above listings are not guaranteed to be accurate relative to school names or district.


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St Kitts and Nevis
Key facts:
POPULATION (Census 2011): 46,325
AREA: 261 sq km
CAPITAL: Basseterre
CURRENCY: East Caribbean dollar (XCD)
HM Queen Elizabeth II
ACTING GOVERNOR-GENERAL: Tapley Season
HEAD OF GOVERNMENT: Prime Minister Timothy Harris
FORM OF GOVERNMENT: constitutional monarchy
PARLIAMENTARY SYSTEM: unicameral
STATE STRUCTURE: federal
LANGUAGES: English (official)
NATIONAL ELECTIONS: last: Feb 2015 turnout: 72.2% next: Feb 2020
NEVIS ISLAND ASSEMBLY ELECTIONS: last: July 2011 turnout: 81.1% next: July 2016
LOCAL GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURE (as a percentage of total government expenditure 2013/14): 24.6%
Saint Kitts and Nevis is a federal constitutional monarchy with two spheres of government, the central government and the the Nevis Island Assembly, which is recognised in chapter 10 of the constitution. There is no local government on either island, however the Nevis Island Assembly serves as a local government for the island, has local tax raising powers, as well as receiving transfers from the federal government proportional to the population proportion. the Nevis Island Assembly is empowered to pass laws that promote peace, order and good government on the island and among others, is responsible on the Island for airports and seaports, education, extraction and processing of minerals, fisheries, health, welfare and labour.
Read the profile of the local government system in St Kitts and Nevis.
CLGF activities in St Kitts and Nevis
CLGF will continue to work with the Nevis Island Assembly as it takes forward the EC funded project "Strengthening local government's role as a partner in development" focused on strengthening the role of local government and other local and national actors in localising and implementing the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).


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Are you ready to pay off your debt but have no clue where to start? Read the first post in my series about paying off your debt, then read through this series until you get to this post, our ninth in the series.
Everyone's debt situation is unique.
That means that not everyone's debt pay off plan will fit perfectly within the debt snowball or debt avalanche methods.
If you're in that situation, that's perfectly fine! Instead, you can create your own customizable debt pay off plan!
Don't try to force yourself into a mold that simply won't fit your situation. It doesn't make sense to set yourself up for failure.
Instead, take the good from each method and add your own twist to make a plan that will work for you.
Not Every Debt Situation Is Black And White
When we were formulating our debt pay off plan we realized that paying off debt isn't as simple as picking the debt avalanche or the debt snowball.
There were more factors to take into account. Granted, our debt was a simple scenario because were only trying to pay off student loan debt.
First, some of our interest rates were variable while others were fixed. The other issue we had was some student loans were federal loans while others were private loans.
So how did we formulate our customized debt pay off plan? First, we figured out which debt was the worst offender of the bunch.
This was easy because our worst loan had the highest interest rate, was a variable loan and was also a private student loan. Next, we attacked that loan with everything we could throw at it.
It took many months before we had to start paying off our next loan. All we had to do in the time between picking our worst loan and completely paying it off was ensure that another loan didn't because more urgent before we paid off the worst offender loan.
Luckily for us, nothing changed, but if it did, we'd simply switch which loan we were aggressively paying off.
Once we had our first loan paid off, we looked at our situation and figure out which loan was the next worst offender and aggressively paid it off. We then continued this process over and over again until all of our student loan debt was vanquished!
Some Variables To Consider When Formulating Your Plan
There are many different types of debt out there, so it is important you fully understand your debt situation. One key is knowing whether your debt is secured debt or unsecured debt.
Your debt is considered secured if took a loan to buy a car, a home or another large asset that you put up as collateral.
Your debt is considered unsecured if you simply signed your name to a loan, such as a credit card, a personal loan or a payday loan and didn't offer any collateral.
What difference does it make? If you quit making payments on a secured loan, you can lose your car, your home or whatever other assets you secured the loan with.
If you quit making payments on unsecured debt such as a credit card, personal loan or payday loan, then the company will have to sue you and get a judgment in order to garnish your wages or force you to pay.
Either way, you should do your best to always pay your debt back and not make late payments.
Another factor to consider is the fact that there are debts with special treatment. Student loans and tax debt are two types of debt that are very difficult to get rid of.
Many people advocate paying these debts off quickly due to the fact that more extreme measures can be taken to collect on these types of debt. The government can take your tax refunds and garnish your wages to collect on these types of debt.
It is also important to know which of your loans have variable interest rates. As interest rates rise, so will your interest on your variable debt.
Most credit cards have variable interest rates, as well as some private student loans along with many other different types of debt such as adjustable rate mortgages. Fixed interest rate debt will not change the interest rate as rates rise or fall.
You'll have to look at these variables and figure out which ones are the largest threats to your debt pay off plan. Figure out which loan you think is the worst offender then get started with your extra payments!
The faster you start paying debt down the faster you'll pay it all off!
Next we'll discuss growing your income, which you can read about here!
Which loan do you plan on paying off first? Will you use the debt snowball, debt avalanche or your own customizable pay off plan?


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Bioshock: Photography
Just a short session last night, and with little progress to show for it. So let's talk about the next significant mechanic the game brings forth. (It dribbles them out one by one.) At a certain point in the third level, you obtain a "research camera". Progress in the plot is in fact contingent on finding it, so the designers clearly felt that finding it at that stage was important.
Despite not being capable of doing damage, the camera occupies a weapon slot. It treats film as a kind of ammo — one of the few types I'm not maxed out on at the moment. This is because you pretty much want to take a picture of every single enemy in the game, as well as certain machines. Doing so gives you research points toward the thing depicted, which are sort of like experience points: they fill up a progress meter until you "level up" and gain some benefit, with increasing numbers of points required for each level. The peculiar thing is, the research points are specific to the thing photographed. You're leveling up for each monster type in parallel. So, although the camera is reminiscent of Pokemon Snap and, more particularly, Beyond Good and Evil (with which it shares the challenge of trying to photograph things while they're attacking you), it also feels a bit like the way you level up specific Jobs with "Ability Points" in Final Fantasy V. This is just one way that the game is at least as much CRPG as FPS.
The number of points you get for taking a picture depends on its quality, which is evaluated and assigned a letter grade in a special picture-grading screen while the action in the world hangs frozen. (If your first picture of a subject is good enough, it can be enough to get you to the next research level all by itself.) Picture quality mainly seems to be determined by how close you are to the subject and how centered it is. The evaluation will often indicate bonus attributes, such as "Action shot" and "Multiple subjects", although it's not clear to me if these are things that affect the letter grade or additional modifiers on top of it. "Multiple subjects" is an interesting one, because, in a limited way, it lets you get credit for photographing the same subject more than once, which is otherwise impossible — attempts at taking multiple pictures of the same thing don't even consume film, an unrealistic touch but a gentle one. There are occasions when the "multiple subject" tag has taken me completely by surprise, because I thought the thing I was photographic was alone. Sometimes it was; sometimes the other subjects were already dead. And yes, corpses can be photographed, but they give only a fraction of the points that a live subject does. The designers really wanted to make sure that the photography that's rewarded is the risky kind. Even the "action shot" bonus seems to mean taking a picture of something at the moment it makes an attack.
And what do you get for your research? The most common benefit seems to be a combat bonus against the subject's type, which is probably worth having, but kind of boring. If that were all you got, I'd probably still try to photograph stuff, but only in the way that I go for items that give a score bonus in an arcade-type game: as a little extra challenge that I don't think about very much and pass by if it looks too difficult. But certain subject types, at certain levels, give you other things, such as gene tonics (passive buffs). You have a limited number of slots for gene tonics, but having more types means having more options. This is enough to trigger the "gotta catch 'em all" response in me, and for a while now, I've basically let no enemy go unresearched.


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Memory Lane, the social networking site that operates Classmates.com, has laid off staffers at its offices in the Seattle area, sources tell GeekWire.
We've reached out to Memory Lane's parent company, United Online, for comment and we will update this post as we learn more. We're hearing that positions were eliminated in a number of functions, from development to marketing to project management.
Memory Lane cut its staff in December 2011 as well, though the company declined to comment on that layoff.
Founded in 1995 as Classmates.com, the company has struggled to adapt as new social networking platforms like Facebook and Twitter have gained steam. Classmates was acquired by United Online for about $100 million in 2004 — the same year that Mark Zuckerberg and crew founded Facebook at Harvard University.
United Online last week posted revenue of $153 million for the fourth quarter, up seven percent over the same period in 2011. Its net loss was $12 million.
United Online also owns Internet service provider Net Zero and online floral delivery service FTD, which is in the process of being spun off.
The company's content and media unit — where Memory Lane is classified — saw revenues fall 13 percent in the fourth quarter to $39.5 million. That unit also piled up an operating loss of $20.7 million on the quarter, compared to a profit of $12.5 million in the fourth quarter of 2011.


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The Kel Corona space station is a brilliant example of taking an avenue not often chosen. From the shaping of the bricks to the superb photography, this build sure is an eye-catcher. The cockpit on the front of the ship also is a separate module that is a self-sufficient vehicle. Amazing craftsmanship can be further seen in the way that the circular rocket assembly is not only built, but also lit.
The Void Raven is another model that demonstrates a memorable form for a ship. Its wide array of weaponry and stealth-looking angles make it an aggressive ship that would definitely be a force to be reckoned with. Having gotten to see this particular model at BrickFair Virginia, I have a profound appreciation for all the engineering and parts usage that went into this model.


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Ahhh... to steam in the oven. Wait. Say what?
That's what I thought when I first found out about the cooking bags by Ready Chef Go. Why would I steam in the oven? Well they have their reasons for thinking it's a good idea. Watch the video and find out!
Ok. Now that you've watched it, what do you think? Will this be a useful novelty to add to your cooking utensils or will it be another half used box that sits on your shelf?
I will definitely use this for soups and stocks, but not in the microwave and not to save time, that's for sure.
And to be honest, another thing that bothers me about this is the one time use of the bags. You know I don't like to waste, and this is a lot of plastic (or whatever these bags are made out of) that they are releasing in the environment!
So I'll give it a solid 2/5, because the quality of the steamed food is outstanding, but it looses stars when it comes to being environmentally friendly and for daily use.
I hope this was helpful!
Blogs and video recipes by Valentina Raffaelli, about healthy (and sometimes not so healthy) recipes from Italy and all over the world, and about how to conduct a healthy life style without feeling like you're on a constant diet! YouTube.com/RealItalianKitchen
Tuesday, July 19, 2016
Seafood Soup Recipe + #ReadyChefGo Review - Real Italian Kitchen - Episo...
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Advances in Business in Asia examines current trends and issues facing organisations operating in a global business milieu. The book comes at a pivotal time when many businesses are emerging from the 2008 Gobal Financial Crisis, and are seeking a way forward in dealing with the opportunities and challenges presented by global capitalism in general, and China, India, and the ASEAN region specifically.The book is a compilation of selected papers presented at AFBE conferences. All contributions were double-blind peer reviewed prior to acceptance, and represent the contributions of eminent academics in their particular field of expertise.The Asian Forum on Business Education (AFBE) is a not-for-profit organisation whose aim is to provide a forum of scholarly exchange in the areas of business, economics and management, with a particular focus on the Asia region.
Assistant Prof Dr Chris Perryer is Lecturer in Management at the University of Western Australia, and Editor of the AFBE Journal. Assistant Prof Perryer has spent many years lecturing and researching in the area of management and ethics in the Asia region.Dr Victor Egan is Secretary of AFBE, and former Associate Dean of the Curtin Business School, Western Australia. Dr Egan has considerable experience lecturing and researching in management in Asia and Africa.Prof Dr Brian Sheehan is President of AFBE, former Dean of Phillip Business School and Associate Dean of RMIT University Business Faculty, Melbourne, Australia. Prof Sheehan has lived in Bangkok for over 15 years, and has lectured in business studies and supervised research theses in Thailand, USA, China, and Malaysia.


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'Gray divorce' cases raise new financial questions for their attorneys.
A recent Bowling Green University study reported that an astonishing 25% of all new divorce cases filed are by those age 55 and older. Is this the result of changing attitudes towards marriage and monogamy amongst the so-called "Baby Boomer" generation?
Regardless of the reason, divorce legal and financial professionals need to sharpen the tools in their toolbox to handle some of the particular financial issues affecting gray divorce.
The first consideration that bears looking at in a new light relates to Social Security income. John, for example, is entitled to receive $2,600 per month at his age 66. Mary, a stay-at-home mom, will receive half of John's benefit ($1,300) at her age 66 - John still keeps his full $2,600. As long as a divorced couple was married at least 10 years, each spouse is entitled to 100% of their own Social Security benefit or 50% of their spouse's, whichever is greater. In most states, within the context of divorce, Social Security is viewed as an entitlement, not an asset of either party. Therefore, if one spouse has a larger benefit than the other, that's generally ignored in the overall settlement. To put this into context, if one party retains 100% of their monthly pension benefit, they are generally required to pay the other party an offset from other assets. Of course, Social Security is not assignable in the way that a qualified pension plan is. However, it still constitutes an income source you can't outlive. For an aging couple who had a long term marriage, Social Security income can be a substantial portion of their combined income. Therefore, Social Security income equalization (in the form of permanent alimony) may in some states be considered reasonable consideration in these matters.
Very few people are aware of the many ways to maximize their Social Security income. Divorced couples in particular have access to certain loopholes that can provide enhanced income over their lifetime. One example is that a divorced spouse may be able to collect spousal benefits (50% of their ex's benefit, reduced for early commencement) beginning at age 62. Upon attainment of age 66, they can switch to receiving their own (unreduced) benefit for life. That certainly complicates the question of how to equalize Social Security income via alimony.
Gray divorce professionals need to view the alimony equation through a different lens. In most jurisdictions, it's generally assumed that alimony will cease at "normal retirement age." However, as life expectancies lengthen, what is the new "normal?" Forget about 65. Many people continue to work well past the age of 70 or 75. The cessassion date for alimony in some states may be a necessary negotiation point in divorce today. Let's suppose that Michael intends to pay Susan alimony until he reaches age 65 (normal retirement age). When he turns 65, he may be surprised to learn that Susan may expect to receive alimony as long as he continues to earn wages. If there's ambiguity in the Judgment of Divorce, the resolution may only be found through post-judgment expenditures by both sides.
Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg; required minimum distributions, tax considerations and pensions in payout status are other significant financial concerns affecting gray divorce. I'm excited to present with my colleague, Melissa Joy, CFP of the Center for Financial Planning on "Social Security Benefits and Gray Divorce" at the upcoming Divorce Catalyst Conference in October as we delve deeper into the finances of "gray divorce."
divorce catalyst conference
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Off2Class recently held a Professional Development Session for the itaki teacher community covering "How to Create Content for Online ESL Lessons".
The webinar session was very well received by a group of online ESL Teachers from various corners of the world. In the session (James Heywood – Head of ESL Content Development for Off2Class) shared his strategies on how to create content for online ESL Lessons.
How does content for an online classroom differ from content for the traditional classroom? Where do you start? What tools do you need? Where do you find your images?
The Off2Class team runs webinars covering a variety of topics. If you'd like a similar professional development webinar run for your school, startup or team, please feel free to get in touch and we'll see if we can organize a session!
If you are looking to create content for online ESL lessons – take a look at the Off2Class lesson library. The Off2Class lesson library has over 500 ESL lessons that were designed from the ground up to be taught in an online ESL lesson environment.
The online ESL classroom presents some challenges for content creation. Content designed for the traditional classroom is not necessarily transferable into the online classroom. Here are some key difference that you should keep in mind when you create content for online ESL lessons:
- Because content in an online classroom (such as on Skype video chat) takes up more of your student's visual field, it plays a much more central role in the lesson
- Because many students are now joining online ESL lessons from small mobile devices, do not try to fit too much wording, imagery or concepts onto any one slide (or page) – keep things uncluttered!
- Try to develop a synchronous set of Teacher Notes (that your students don't see) for each of your slides, with additional ideas on how to elicit and concept check the target language – this will help you keep the slide content uncluttered!
If you haven't yet, register for your free trial Off2Class account and take a look at our content designed for the online ESL classroom for inspiration!


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Costa Concordia Salvage to Take a Year
Costa Cruises salvagers Titan-Micoperi plan to float Costa Concordia, tow it away, expected to take a full year's work
Titan Salvage, a U.S. company owned by Crowley Maritime Group, with Micoperi, an Italian company specializing in underwater construction and engineering have been contracted to refloat the wrecked Costa Condordia and tow it away.
The plan, which will re-float the vessel's hull, places the highest priority for ensuring the lowest possible environmental impact as well as the conservation of tourist and economic activities on the island of Giglio, with maximum safety precautions.
There are four stages of operation in the salvage plan, as follows:
• First, once the ship has been stabilized, an underwater platform will be built and watertight boxes, or caissons, fixed to the side of the ship
• Two cranes fixed to the platform will pull the ship upright, helped by the weight of the caissons, which will be filled with water.
• When the ship is upright, caissons will be fixed to the other side of the hull to stabilize it.
• Finally, the caissons on both sides will be emptied, after the water inside has been purified to protect the marine environment, and filled with air.
Once afloat, the wreck will be towed to an Italian port and after that the salvage team will clean up the waters and restore the marine flora.


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Obama: Could we have predicted…?
by Drew Westen
Psychologist and neuroscientist; Emory University Professor
Original article title: Could We Have Predicted What Happened Last Tuesday?
Originally posted in Huffington Post: November 8, 2010
Plus a second major 2009 article, by Drew Westen, and posted here, below "Could We Have Predicted…":
Leadership, Obama Style, and the Looming Losses in 2010
Watching the Sunday morning talk shows and the president's various appearances since his "shellacking" on Tuesday, what was clear is that the Republicans and the president seem to have learned the same thing from both this election and from their respective years in power, which country singer Brad Paisley has summed up in song: "Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once."
The Republicans, for their part, took home the message from both the election and their years doubling the national debt and the disparity between the upper 1 percent and the rest of us that Americans want a second helping of economic insecurity and inequality. While claiming a victory for the ideology of low taxes (for the rich) and minimal government (for big corporations), none of them could answer why we would expand tax cuts to the same people whose income has skyrocketed while working and middle class Americans have seen their after-tax income drop since the Bush tax cuts (except with platitudes about "job creators").
Nor could any Republican on television this week say precisely how they would cut spending, particularly if it involved programs that would have to be cut to make the slightest dent in the national debt (e.g., Social Security, Medicare, and defense). What we will undoubtedly see instead are symbolic bills passed by House Republicans aimed at activating latent prejudices by calling for cuts in entitlement programs not associated with politically untouchable groups such as older white people (e.g., Medicaid and food stamps), which would have no appreciable impact on the deficit but a very appreciable impact in dividing the two-thirds of Americans who are living paycheck to paycheck against each other.
For his part, from his post-election press conference through his appearance on 60 Minutes through his inexplicable decision to jet off to Asia in a way that seemed to underscore to the American people his disinterest in both their domestic concerns and the feelings they had just expressed at the ballot box, the president once again illustrated three interrelated hallmarks of his presidency: his ability to endorse nearly every side of an issue, his inability or unwillingness to articulate (whether to the American people or perhaps, more importantly, to himself) any governing philosophy or core set of principles that inform his decisions (e.g., a progressive alternative to the Reagan mantra of "government is the problem, not the solution"), and his allergy to leadership, particularly if it means dealing with conflict or aggression from his political opponents.
Over the course of the couple of days he stuck around America long enough to take both sides of the issue, President Obama made clear that he will oppose tax cuts for anyone but the middle class but on the other hand might be willing to extend the Bush tax cuts to the rich, perhaps for a couple years. Like his decision a year and a half ago to cut the stimulus and lard it up with tax cuts the prior eight years had proven to be inert in creating jobs – a decision that just cost Democrats the House, by "proving" to the American people the uselessness of an economic stimulus and of government more generally – extending the Bush tax cuts to millionaires would be both bad public policy and bad politics, as all available data suggest that any extension of tax cuts to millionaires and billionaires would be deeply unpopular with voters, who expressed more than anything else their angry populism last Tuesday.
The president's differing opinions on whether he believes this is a good area for compromise with congressional Republicans was reminiscent of his various speeches on the importance of deficit spending while cutting the deficit, or his major energy speech on why we have to tackle climate change while expanding oil shale (perhaps the dirtiest, most energy-inefficient fuel ever explored), "clean coal" (which sounds great in West Virginia and would be even better if it existed), and offshore oil drilling (not exactly the most prescient moment in a speech made just two weeks before the BP disaster).
Then there was his 60 Minutes interview last night (prerecorded so he could visit Indonesia today), in which he expressed his regret that he and his team were so busy spending money to plug the economic dike that they gave the misimpression that they believed in government spending, when at heart he doesn't really like government all that much, either. In the same interview, when asked about the perception that he's anti-business, he made clear that some regulations are necessary, but they should be made in "collaboration" with the industries that need to be regulated – a position strongly articulated by his predecessor, who most of us believed we had voted against – and then proceeded to offer the two most egregious examples he could find, particularly with the swing voters who swung strongly against him and his party this year, namely bankers and health insurance executives. (You can't make this stuff up.) It's a little hard to imagine Franklin Roosevelt speaking of the robber barons of his era in quite such collegial terms. (To be fair, President Obama has said many other things since Tuesday and in his 60 Minutes interview that hit a more responsive chord.)
After watching the returns Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning, happy to be in a hotel with a sorely needed mini-bar, I had intended to dissect the president's role in this election upon returning home to write this piece at the end of the week. Then on Friday I received an email from a blogger at the DailyKos, telling me that a piece I had written had just drawn nearly a thousand responses. Wondering if I'd made one too many trips to the mini-bar while away (because I couldn't recall having written anything since a CNN.com op-ed on election night), I checked out the DailyKos to see what he was referring to and found an excerpt and a link to a piece I had published here nearly a year ago. As I read it, I realized it was probably a better postmortem than anything I could write today, for two reasons. First, at the time, it expressed a view many people – whether toward the center or the left – were starting to feel but not yet articulating or feeling comfortable articulating in print. Today, as I read it, it almost seems mainstream. Second, it is easy to dismiss a postmortem of an election as post-hoc, written with the benefit of 20-20 hindsight. But it's a lot harder to dismiss a postmortem written a year before the election returns, which in American politics is an eternity.
So below is the unvarnished article from December 2009…
Leadership, Obama Style, and the Looming Losses in 2010:
Pretty Speeches, Compromised Values, and the Quest for the Lowest Common Denominator
As the president's job performance numbers and ratings on his handling of virtually every domestic issue have fallen below 50 percent, the Democratic base has become demoralized, and Independents have gone from his source of strength to his Achilles Heel, it's time to reflect on why. The conventional wisdom from the White House is those "pesky leftists" — those bloggers and Vermont Governors and Senators who keep wanting real health reform, real financial reform, immigration reform not preceded by a year or two of raids that leave children without parents, and all the other changes we were supposed to believe in.
Somehow the president has managed to turn a base of new and progressive voters he himself energized like no one else could in 2008 into the likely stay-at-home voters of 2010, souring an entire generation of young people to the political process. It isn't hard for them to see that the winners seem to be the same no matter who the voters select (Wall Street, big oil, big Pharma, the insurance industry). In fact, the president's leadership style, combined with the Democratic Congress's penchant for making its sausage in public and producing new and usually more tasteless recipes every day, has had a very high toll far from the left: smack in the center of the political spectrum.
What's costing the president and courting danger for Democrats in 2010 isn't a question of left or right, because the president has accomplished the remarkable feat of both demoralizing the base and completely turning off voters in the center. If this were an ideological issue, that would not be the case. He would be holding either the middle or the left, not losing both.
What's costing the president are three things: a laissez faire style of leadership that appears weak and removed to everyday Americans, a failure to articulate and defend any coherent ideological position on virtually anything, and a widespread perception that he cares more about special interests like bank, credit card, oil and coal, and health and pharmaceutical companies than he does about the people they are shafting.
The problem is not that his record is being distorted. It's that all three have more than a grain of truth. And I say this not as one of those pesky "leftists." I say this as someone who has spent much of the last three years studying what moves voters in the middle, the Undecideds who will hear whichever side speaks to them with moral clarity.
Leadership, Obama Style
Consider the president's leadership style, which has now become clear: deliver a moving speech, move on, and when push comes to shove, leave it to others to decide what to do if there's a conflict, because if there's a conflict, he doesn't want to be anywhere near it.
Health care is a paradigm case. When the president went to speak to the Democrats last week on Capitol Hill, he exhorted them to pass the bill. According to reports, though, he didn't mention the two issues in the way of doing that, the efforts of Senators like Ben Nelson to use this as an opportunity to turn back the clock on abortion by 25 years, and the efforts of conservative and industry-owned Democrats to eliminate any competition for the insurance companies that pay their campaign bills. He simply ignored both controversies and exhorted.
Leadership means heading into the eye of the storm and bringing the vessel of state home safely, not going as far inland as you can because it's uncomfortable on the high seas. This president has a particular aversion to battling back gusting winds from his starboard side (the right, for the nautically challenged) and tends to give in to them. He just can't tolerate conflict, and the result is that he refuses to lead.
We have seen the same pattern of pretty speeches followed by empty exhortations on issue after issue. The president has, on more than one occasion, gone to Wall Street or called in its titans (who have often just ignored him and failed to show up) to exhort them to be nice to the people they're foreclosing at record rates, yet he has done virtually nothing for those people. His key program for preventing foreclosures is helping 4 percent of those "lucky" enough to get into it, not the 75 percent he promised, and many of the others are having their homes auctioned out from right under them because of some provisions in the fine print. One in four homeowners is under water and one in six is in danger of foreclosure. Why we're giving money to banks instead of two-year loans — using the model of student loans — to homeowners to pay their mortgages (on which they don't have to pay interest or principal for two years, while requiring their banks to renegotiate their interest rates in return for saving the banks from "toxic assets") is something the average person doesn't understand. And frankly, I don't understand it, either. I thought I voted Democratic in the last election.
Same with the credit card companies. Great speech about the fine print. Then the rates tripled.
The president has exhorted the banks, who are getting zero-interest money, to give more of it to small businesses. But they have no incentives to do that. There are too many high-yield, reasonably low risk investments to make with zero-interest federal loans. I wouldn't mind a few billion to play around with right now myself, and I can't say I'd start with some guy who wants to start his own heating and air company, or an existing small business owner who is hanging on by his fingernails in tough economic times. I'd put my money in something like emerging markets, or maybe Canada. (Have you noticed how well Canadian equities are doing lately?) Or perhaps Chinese wind turbines. (Oh, we're investing there already with stimulus funds.)
The time for exhortation is over. FDR didn't exhort robber barons to stem the redistribution of wealth from working Americans to the upper 1 percent, and neither did his fifth cousin Teddy. Both men told the most powerful men in the United States that they weren't going to rip off the American people any more, and they backed up their words with actions. Teddy Roosevelt was clear that capital gains taxes should be high relative to income taxes because we should reward work, not "gambling in stocks." This president just doesn't have the stomach to make anyone do anything they don't want to do (except women to have unwanted babies because they can't afford an abortion or live in a red state and don't have an employer who offers insurance), and his advisors are enabling his most troubling character flaw, his conflict-avoidance.
Like most Americans I talk to, when I see the president on television, I now change the channel the same way I did with Bush. With Bush, I couldn't stand his speeches because I knew he meant what he said. I knew he was going to follow through with one ignorant, dangerous, or misguided policy after another. With Obama, I can't stand them because I realize he doesn't mean what he says — or if he does, he just doesn't have the fire in his belly to follow through. He can't seem to muster the passion to fight for any of what he believes in, whatever that is. He'd make a great queen — his ceremonial addresses are magnificent — but he prefers to fly Air Force One at 60,000 feet and "stay above the fray."
It's the job of the president to be in the fray. It's his job to lead us out of it, not to run from it. It's his job to make the tough decisions and draw lines in the sand. But Obama really doesn't seem to want to get involved in the contentious decisions. They're so, you know, contentious. He wants us all to get along. Better to leave the fights to the Democrats in Congress since they're so good at them. He's like an amateur boxer who got a coupon for a half day of training with Angelo Dundee after being inspired by the tapes of Mohammed Ali. He got "float like a butterfly" in the morning but never made it to "sting like a bee."
Do you think Americans ought to have one choice of health insurance plans the insurance companies don't control, or don't you? I don't want to hear that it would sort of, kind of, maybe be your preference, all other things being equal. Do you think we ought to use health care as a Trojan Horse for right-wing abortion policies? Say something, for God's sake.
He doesn't need a chief of staff. He needs someone to shake him until he feels something strongly enough not just to talk about it but to act. He's increasingly appearing to the public, and particularly to swing voters, like Dukakis without the administrative skill. And although he is likely to squeak by with a personal victory in 2012 if the economy improves by then, he may well do so with a Republican Congress. But then I suppose he'll get the bipartisanship he always wanted.
No Vision, No Message
The second problem relates to the first. The president just doesn't want to enunciate a progressive vision of where this country should be heading in the 21st century, particularly a progressive vision of government and its relation to business. He doesn't want to ruffle what he believes to be the feathers of the American people, to offer them a coherent, emotionally resonant, values-driven message — starting with an alternative to Ronald Reagan's message that government is the problem and not the solution — and to see if they might actually follow him.
He doesn't want to talk about social issues, even though they predictably have gotten in the way of health care reform and will do the same on one issue after another. Abortion? You don't advance a progressive position by giving a center-right speech at Notre Dame that emphasizes cutting back on the number of abortions without mentioning that sex education and birth control might be useful means to that end, mumbling something about a conscience clause that suggests that pharmacists don't have to fill birth control prescriptions if it offends their sensibilities, and allowing states to use health care reform to set back the rights of women and couples to decide when to start their families based on somebody else's faith. If you believe that freedom includes the freedom to decide when you will or won't have a child, say it, say it with moral conviction, and follow it up with action. Perhaps something as simple as this: "I won't sign a health bill into law that forces women and couples to have a child they did not intend and are not ready to parent because of the dictates of someone else's faith or conscience." You know what? A message of that sort wins by 25 points nationally, and you can speak it in Southern and win with evangelical Christians in the deep south if you speak to them honestly in the language of faith. That shouldn't be hard for a president who is a religious Christian.
Gays? Virtually all Americans are for repealing don't ask/don't tell (except for conservatives who haven't yet come to terms with their own homosexuality — but don't tell them that, or at least don't ask). This one's a no-brainer. Tell Congress you want a bill on your desk by January 1, and announce that you have serious questions about the constitutionality of the current policy and won't enforce it until your Justice Department has had time to study it. Don't keep firing gay Arabic interpreters. But that would require not just giving the pretty speech on how we're all equal in the eyes of God and we should all be equal in the eyes of the law (a phrase he might want to try sometime). It would require actually doing something that might anger a small percentage of the population on the right, and that's just too hard for this president to do. It's one thing to acknowledge and respect the positions of people who hold different points of view. It's another to capitulate to them.
Immigration? Joe Wilson yells, "You lie." So instead of acting like a man and going after Wilson on the spot (the man just attacked him in front of the entire nation in a joint session of Congress), he accepts his apology the next day, and a day later rewards Wilson for his incivility and bigotry by tightening the rules so that illegal immigrants can't even buy insurance themselves on the health care exchanges the Democrats are creating sometime between 2013 and 2025 (depending on how many seats they lose in the meantime, and hence how long, if ever, it takes for the exchanges to get set up).
Good policy? No. Not only is it inhumane – can you imagine being really sick or in terrible pain but being too afraid even to go to a clinic because you might be deported? – but it's a public health hazard for sick people not to get care and spread their illnesses, a drain on American taxpayers as illegal immigrants who finally have no choice but to find their way, when they're incredibly ill, to emergency rooms or public clinics, and a despicable policy toward their children, many of whom are American citizens, but who in either case shouldn't have to be sick, in pain, and without preventive care as their bodies and minds are developing, no matter where their parents come from.
Is it good politics? No. During the election I tested messages on just this issue, and a strong progressive message beat the most convincing anti-immigrant message we could throw at it by 10 points. Two weeks ago, I tested messages on just this issue as it applied to health care, and that margin had doubled.
If you just talk sensibly with Americans, they are sensible people. But ask them one-dimensional polling questions like, "Do you think illegal immigrants should get health care?" and you'll entirely miss the art of the possible.
Jobs? Watch for a $25 billion plan that makes good political theatre and that every economist I know says will move the unemployment rate from 10.0 percent to 9.95 percent. Not enough to save 30 seats in November. And not enough to save a generation of families from financial ruin and lower education, higher unemployment, and poorer health for the rest of their — and their children's — lives.
The problem with the president's strategic team is that they don't understand the difference between compromising on policy and compromising on core values. When it comes to policies, listen all you want to the Stones: "You can't always get what you want" (although it would be nice if the administration tried sometime). But on issues of principle — like allowing regressive abortion amendments to be tacked onto a health care reform bill — get some stones. Make your case to the American people, make it evocatively, and draw the line in the sand. That's how you earn people's respect. That's the only thing that will bring Independents back.
And that's where the problem of message comes in. This White House has no coherent message on anything. The message on health care reform changed even more frequently than the interest rates on credit cards last Spring, and turned a 70-30 winning issue into its current 30-50 status with the public. Last week on the Sunday news shows, I remember watching in disbelief as Larry Summers smugly told the 15 million Americans out of work that the recession was definitively over and that all economists agree. Then Christina Romer, another of the president's chief economic advisors, announced on the next show that the recession is definitely not over.
That's simply inexcusable. The least two members of the economic team can do before they fan out on the Sunday morning shows is to agree on whether we're in a recession, how it relates to joblessness, and how to talk about it sensitively without seeming out of touch. That's the job of the White House messaging team, which has been AWOL since at least the start of the health care battle last Spring.
It's the same problem we've seen with messaging the deficit. Are deficits good — we're supposed to deficit spend our way out of a severe recession, right? — or bad — they're a drag on the economy and stealing from the next generation. So which are they? How about telling the American people, at the very least, when they're good and when they're bad, not flipping back and forth in the same sentence between deficit spending and deficit reduction.
To be honest, I don't know what the president believes on anything, and I'm not alone among American voters. He introduced his recent job summit by saying that even in these times, the role of government should be limited. Really? That was a nicely nuanced reinforcement of the ideology of limited, ineffective government promulgated by Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. Unfortunately, it runs against all the available data and everything Democrats have stood for since FDR.
Abortion? Who knows. Gays? I suspect intellectually he believes in equal rights but deep down he thinks they're icky. Something is sure holding him back from doing the obvious. Immigrants? He probably has an opinion, but he's not going to waste political capital on them; he sold them out in 15 seconds on health care. Foreclosures? Nice speeches, and I'm sure it really concerns him when he hears the stories of families firsthand. But not enough to divert the cash from the lenders to the borrowers. And the problem is, the average American knows it. Job creation? Would be nice, and I presume he believes that people who want to work ought to be able to work. But when 700,000 people were losing their jobs a month in his first few months of office and millions have lost their jobs on his watch (a process, of course, initiated by his predecessor, whose name, to my knowledge, he has not uttered since entering office), three letters should have come to mind: W – P – A. President Roosevelt had no legs to stand on, but he sure had spine.
The Politics of the Lowest Common Denominator
And capping off all of these aspects of the president's leadership style is his preference for the lowest common denominator. That means you don't really have to fight, you don't have to take anybody on, you don't take any risks. You just find what the public is so upset about that even the Republicans would stipulate to it if forced to (e.g., that excluding people from health care because they have "pre-existing conditions" is something we can't continue to tolerate) and build it into whatever plan the special interests can hammer out around it.
Unfortunately, what Democrats just can't seem to understand is that the politics of the lowest common denominator is always a losing politics. It sends a meta-message that you're weak — nothing more, nothing less — and that's the cross the Democrats have had to bear since they "lost China" 60 years ago. And in fact, it is weak.
Want health care reform? Let Congress work it out, and whatever comes out, call it a victory. It's telling that when the Senate triumphantly announced that it had the 60 votes for cloture on Friday, insurance stocks hit a 52-year peak.
Energy? Okay, if you don't really want to mess with the oil and coal industries, let the caps slip higher and higher and industry will cut pollution around the edges. It won't really solve the problem, but it's the golden mean between the right thing to do and the wrong thing to do, which is the essence of Obampromise. It also hamstrings you in Copenhagen, but oh well, they could use a little global warming there this time of year anyway. Have you noticed it's cold as hell over there?
Financial regulation? The president's all for the good stuff: regulating derivatives and other fancy financial products no one but the people making bundles off of them who crashed the economy (and now run it) understand. Tell bankers the days of wine and roses are over. But if we have to have half-reform so Goldman Sachs is willing to keep sending its best and brightest through the revolving door at Treasury, that's okay; the Dow is up. So jobs are bleak and the average American is enraged that Wall Street had a bumper year — with record bonuses — as they're losing their homes. But you know the old adage about a half a loaf.
That's in fact what the health care debate is over. We shouldn't have had to settle for half a loaf. If the president had simply placed appropriate blame on the health insurance industry for its pre-existing conditions, it's cutting off care for breast cancer victims in the middle of treatment, and its doubling our premiums and co-pays during the Bush years, he would have harnessed populist anger and pushed this bill through six months ago, and it would have looked like the change we were told to believe in. But if you cut backroom deals with every special interest who is part of the problem and offer the American people no coherent message while the other side is messaging straight out of the messaging memo written by Frank Luntz ("government takeover," "a bureaucrat between you and your doctor"), you can expect half a loaf. And the other half will be paid for by middle class taxpayers, as in the Senate bill, which includes provisions like taxing good middle class tax plans like PPOs, which will disappear as soon as insurance companies and big businesses have the excuse of the missing tax break. Remind me, when we've just had the largest transfer of wealth to the upper 1 percent of the country from working and middle class Americans in a century, why it would be such a terrible thing instead, as in the House bill, to ask people who make over a million dollars a year to pony up for the health care of their (and their friends') housekeepers, instead of taking away health care plans union workers traded for salary increases?
The president's biggest success has been on the international stage: He's not George W. Bush, and he's eloquent to boot. He's done a great deal with that eloquence to speak to Muslims around the world and to make clear to others in the international community that America is back — mostly. But that international community is just starting to learn that his eloquence doesn't always have much behind it.
Am I being too hard on the president? He's certainly done many good things. But it would be hard to name a single thing President Obama has done domestically that any other Democrat wouldn't have done if he or she were president following George W. Bush (e.g., signing the children's health insurance bill that Congress is about to gut to pay for worse care for kids under the health insurance exchange, if it ever happens), and there's a lot he hasn't done that every other Democrat who ran for president would have done.
Obama, like so many Democrats in Congress, has fallen prey to the conventional Democratic strategic wisdom: that the way to win the center is to tack to the center.
But it doesn't work that way.
You want to win the center? Emanate strength. Emanate conviction. Lead like you know where you're going (and hopefully know what you're talking about).
People in the center will follow if you speak to their values, address their ambivalence (because by definition, on a wide range of issues, they're torn between the right and left), and act on what you believe. FDR did it. LBJ did it. Reagan did it. Even George W. Bush did it, although I wish he hadn't.
But you have to believe something.
I don't honestly know what this president believes. But I believe if he doesn't figure it out soon, start enunciating it, and start fighting for it, he's not only going to give American families hungry for security a series of half-loaves where they could have had full ones, but he's going to set back the Democratic Party and the progressive movement by decades, because the average American is coming to believe that what they're seeing right now is "liberalism," and they don't like what they see. I don't, either.
What they're seeing is weakness, waffling, and wandering through the wilderness without an ideological compass. That's a recipe for going nowhere fast – but getting there by November.
Drew Westen, Ph.D., is Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at Emory University, founder of Westen Strategies, and author of The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation.


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Finding A Truck Repair Place
It is important that we should be able to have trucks, this is because trucks are usually able to provide a lot of help that otherwise would not be possible for other things such as extract spaces and so on. It is usually important that even if you own a truck you have a good idea of repair garages, this is a very important thing to get to look at it for a lot of things get to have to work in the best way possible when they are known. It is very important that one should be able to have a truck repair garage that will be able to accommodate the truck repair, this is a very important thing that should be given priority for the trucks life depend on this choice.
It is very important that one should have the repair shop that is able to get to ensure that the repair truck is at its benefit, this can easily get to be done by looking at different methods of getting one so that you can sieve in through and be able to finds the best one for you. It is often important that one is able to ask his friends and family on help concerning the availability of truck trucks and repair garages, this is because your friend and family will give you the right referrals that are needed for your truck. By getting to look at the internet to have access at the different websites available is very important in ensuring that one can be able to get to have the best repair garage, this is a very good way for you will have all the information that you will need.
It is very important that one is able to use social media, this is very instrumental for one can be able to get to ensure that they have the information that people need when they need to have to get the new truck repair shop from previous users. In order that you are able to get the best garage one should be able to get the one that offers great prices, also one should ensure that the price that he paying is able to correspond to the service that have been offered. It is important that you should be able to get to have to do research n issue concerning garage so that you should be able to get to have the best one for his or her ruck, thus this methods should be looked at.
The Path To Finding Better Services


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Simple Captcha using PHP with GD library
Captcha can come in handy when fighting against spam and bot attacks. It generates random images and asks the user to re-enter the characters it sees in order to verify whether user is a human or not. We will develop a simple captcha script in PHP by using GD library. The only requirement is that you should have the GD library installed. It gives you the ability to create and manipulate image files in different formats in PHP.
The first thing we need to do is that search for a TrueType font on the internet. There are several sites which give TrueType fonts for free. Download a font of your choice from such a website. The TrueType font file will have .ttf as its extension. Place this file in the same folder in which you will place your PHP script. In this example we will use Turn Tablz font.
Now create a new file named captcha.php and add the following code in it -
/*Create a 220x35 image*/
$im = imagecreatetruecolor(220, 35);
/*Color code for orange*/
$orange = imagecolorallocate($im, 0xFF, 0x8c, 0x00);
/*Color code for white*/
$white = imagecolorallocate($im, 0xFF, 0xFF, 0xFF);
/*Generate a random string using md5*/
$md5_hash = md5(rand(0,999));
/*Trim the string down to 6 characters*/
$captcha_code = substr($md5_hash, 15, 6);
/*Store the value of the generated captcha code in session*/
$_SESSION['captcha'] = $captcha_code;
/* Set the background as orange */
imagefilledrectangle($im, 0, 0, 220, 35, $orange);
/*Path where TTF font file is present*/
$font_file = './TURNBB__.TTF';
/* Draw our randomly generated code*/
imagefttext($im, 30, 0, 5, 30, $white, $font_file, $captcha_code);
/* Output the image to the browser*/
header('Content-Type: image/png');
Here we first create a new image of the specified size - 200x35 by using imagecreatetruecolor(). Next we use imagecolorallocate() function to create resource identifiers for the colors we need i.e. orange and white. We generate a random string by using md5() function and then trim it to a string having 6 characters. We also store this string/code in a PHP session variable so that it can be accessed later on for verification. After this we create a rectangle and fill it with orange color by using imagefilledrectangle(). Then we write our code over this rectangle by using imagefttext(). Finally we send the image to the browser by setting the appropriate header and using imagepng() function.
We can now use this script in evaluating any form. Create another file named form.php and add the following code to it.
<?php session_start(); ?>
<form method="post" action="">
CAPTCHA check (six letter code):

<input type="text" name="captcha" size="20" maxlength="6">
<input type="submit" value="Submit">
/*if captcha code is posted*/
/*CAPTCHA is valid. You can process the form now.*/
echo 'CAPTCHA is valid. You can process the form now.';
/*Invalid CAPTCHA*/
echo 'Invalid CAPTCHA. Try again!';
As you see we have given the source of captcha image as captcha.php. When a user accesses this form, automatically a random captcha image is generated and displayed. Also the corresponding code has been stored in the session variable $_SESSION['captcha']. When the re-enters the code and submits it we can check the entered value of the code against the stored session value and then process the form only if both match. Check out the working demo of the code below -


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Getting Modeling Pictures – How Do I Pose for Photographers?
If you are a teenager, male or female and are new to the world of model entertainment then you might not understand the importance of creating awesome poses and looks when shooting with fashion, glamour or modeling portfolio photographers.
These modeling tips will help you to get started in getting those awesome pics.
Go Here For More FREE Modeling Tips!
For instance, they will need to be willing to work hard and learn what modeling poses for photographers mean to their modeling career.
And, even if they want even a small chance to get noticed by a top, big name agency like IMG, Elite or Ford.
The following ideas are intended to help you better understand what works if your teenage daughter or son wants to be a model and maybe climb to the higher ranks.
Where to Find Ideas for Picture Poses
Speaking of ideas, you can get a lot of great ideas for poses high fashion and glamour type magazines.
Invest in a few magazines and let your teenager choose 10 (12 to 15 would be better) modeling poses to try.
You, as a parent encouraging your teen or preteen in this career field, will need to guide them.
You can do this by evaluating how natural they look when they try various poses and help them pick their best ones.
It is vital that modeling poses for photographers look natural.
Believe it or not, this does take practice.
Your son or daughter will have to be dedicated and willing to practice, practice, practice these poses over and over again until they get them right.
They need to do this before setting up a portfolio photography session so they will at least have some idea of what's expected of them.
Some other things you can do to encourage your child is to spark their own creativity and let them create their own poses.
Now that we have covered some great ideas for modeling poses, we will cover a little about what you should know about posture, body language and working with fashion photographers.
Good posture – No slouching
Smiles or no smiles? – This depends on the kind of pose
Body language – This is something you will need to discuss with the photographer to find out what bad habits may need to be overcome.
Rapport with photographer – Try to find a professional photographer that you and your teenager or preteen can identify with.
This puts less stress on you, your child and the person creating the photos.
Eye blinking – It take practice not to blink when the camera starts shooting at you. Try to practice at home by blinking between shots.
This short and basic guide should help you learn a little about modeling poses for photographers that will hopefully gain the interest of talent agencies and help your child land some great modeling jobs for a fabulous career in performing arts or entertainment.
100% FREE Printable Model Planner
Get your 100% free printable model planner to help you reach your modeling career goals. You'll also get the Bob Pardue modeling mini-course with tons of beginner model tips you can use to start your career as a model.
==> Go here to download now (limited time).
Do you have anything to add? Please write your thoughts in the comment box.
Oh, if you liked this post about how to pose for photographers, or found it helpful, please click one of the buttons below & share it with your friends. It would be a big help to me and your friends can enjoy the benefits too! Thanks a bunch!
If you are ready to take that next step to learning how to model, check out my book below. It's available on Kindle and ready for instant download. Just click the picture to buy now…
Thanks for stopping in! – Bob
Filed under: Modeling Tips • Photoshoot for Beginners


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Mayamam Weavers
Belt with Black Horn Buckle 43" | Tres Mundos #1Regular price $40.00
Description From Mayamam Weavers
Handsome black belts bring a bright accent to your basic blacks (or whites, reds, etc). They close with an slide style black horn buckle and are adjustable. Hand loomed on the traditional backstrap loom, the embroidery is woven into the background incorporating motifs drawn on collective memory and daily life. Measuring from the buckle center to the end, these are all 39" long. To get the best fit, thread a tape measure through the belt loops of the pants you are wearing, then add approximately 5-7" to that number to get your belt size. Each is one of a kind but you can ask us to weave a custom belt for you. 100% cotton belting.
Fair trade handwoven home goods and accessories inspired by the rich colors and traditional techniques of Mayan culture. Mayamam Weavers supports a women's weaving cooperative in Guatemala with fair wage jobs, skills-based education and childcare.
Mayamam Weavers really wants you to be thrilled with your purchase! If the product is not what you expected, contact them as soon as possible to let them know, and they will send you a prepaid postage label so you can return it. They do accept returns for whatever reason within 30 days.