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Commentary by Don Curry in North Bay
Municipal councils in Canada's smaller centres do not appear to be at the forefront in analyzing demographic and diversity trends affecting their communities. They ought to be looking for immigrants closer to home, rather than overseas.
I see it in discussions with municipal politicians from my perch in Northern Ontario, and in a recent Brockville Recorder and Times news article about attracting immigrant entrepreneurs. The municipality secured a provincial government grant to commission a study on the topic, one in which I am particularly interested.
The population of Canada is rising steadily and is more than 36 million people. Approximately 300,000 immigrants are now arriving annually.
Generally, newcomers to Canada do not emigrate to smaller centres, but to the larger ones, with Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver taking the majority. What is becoming more prevalent, however, is secondary migration to smaller centres.
Immigrant-owned businesses
In North Bay, population 54,000, where I live, there are more than 70 first generation immigrant-owned businesses. This is a relatively recent occurrence. Temiskaming Shores, population 10,500, is 90 minutes north of North Bay and it has more than 20 first generation immigrant-owned businesses. There, too, this is a recent occurrence.
The Brockville story that caught the attention of New Canadian Media noted the municipality of 22,000 people could attract immigrant entrepreneurs already in Canada. It was based on a study that contained a number of recommendations to make the municipality more receptive to immigrants.
I completed a study for the Far Northeast Training Board that will be released in January that covers some of the issues that Brockville council was discussing. I interviewed 36 immigrant business owners in 11 municipalities in Northeastern Ontario, the smallest with only 400 people and the largest the City of Timmins, population 43,000.
It supports the conclusion of the Brockville study that you don't have to recruit internationally for immigrant entrepreneurs — they are already here. I expect to report on it in this space when it is officially released in January.
Moving within Canada
But for now, I can tell you that it shows two-thirds of the immigrant entrepreneurs in the study area were born in India, but did not come to Northern Ontario from there. They came from the Greater Toronto Area (GTA).
Dissatisfied with the high cost of GTA home ownership, high cost to purchase a business, and the congestion of the big city, they looked for alternatives and found them in Northern Ontario. They are just as likely to find them in Brockville, just a few hours down Highway 401, and in other smaller Ontario centres.
For municipal councils and economic development organizations, this is terrific news. Many smaller centre business owners want to sell their business and retire. Demographers have seen this coming for years, as more baby boomers retire.
In many cases their children have moved to a larger centre, or they are not interested in continuing the family business. In our region, we are seeing immigrant entrepreneurs moving north to fill the void.
Caught up in detail
The municipal council in Brockville, according to the newspaper report, was receptive to the study but reluctant to allocate funds in its budget to make Brockville a more welcoming community for immigrants. That is typical of what I hear in Northern Ontario as well.
Municipal councils, in my experience, spend far too much time on the mundane day-to-day issues that should be the purview of municipal staff members, and far too little time looking at the long-term future of their communities. The large cities in Canada, however, understand the value of putting policies, procedures, and people in place to ensure they are doing all they can to attract and retain immigrants.
Many of the smaller ones still haven't figured it out. Studies such as the one presented this month in Brockville and next month in the Far Northeast Training Board catchment area of a large chunk of Northeastern Ontario should serve as a wakeup call.
While municipal councils in smaller centres spend months poring over budgets, their population may be in decline and they are doing little to reverse the trend. They are preoccupied with minutiae.
Now they know it is far easier to recruit people from the GTA than from India. But it will take municipal will to make things happen on a larger scale.
Don Curry is the president of Curry Consulting (www.curryconsulting.ca). He was the founding executive director the North Bay & District Multicultural Centre and the Timmins & District Multicultural Centre and is now the chair of the board of directors.
Commentary by Paul Wojda in Thunder Bay, Ontario
Immigration represents both an incredible opportunity and a challenge for Thunder Bay and Northwestern Ontario.
As skilled workers across a wide range of fields retire from the workforce in Northern Ontario, employers are struggling to find trained and experienced replacements who can step in to take their place.
Owners of small businesses throughout the region who would like to sell and retire are finding it challenging to find buyers. The inability to fill these gaps has a potentially devastating impact on smaller communities, leaving them with a reduced tax base and fewer services.
While the development of the local workforce to meet these needs is a necessary and desirable outcome, immigration can allow these businesses to survive and flourish while this training takes place.
Net negative migration
The number of immigrants arriving in the region has remained fairly steady over the past few years, but overall, the region has been experiencing negative net migration. This has sparked a number of efforts to reverse this trend and to encourage immigration both from other parts of Canada and other countries.
The Common Voice Northwest conference in September 2016 brought together stakeholders from across the region to analyze the topic and to develop a series of next steps to address it. The creation of the Northwestern Ontario Immigration portal represents an effort to provide newcomers with an accurate picture of the advantages and resources available should they move to the region.
Job opportunities, businesses for sale, funding opportunities and other resources are centralized in one location to make the immigration pathway a seamless process for prospective newcomers.
In addition, city and regional representatives have been attending job fairs, conferences and expositions around the world to showcase the opportunities available. The emphasis of these marketing efforts focuses primarily on the unique benefits of life in Northwestern Ontario.
Personalized attention
There are a number of distinct advantages for immigrants looking to move to a smaller community outside of the larger metropolitan areas. One of the key messages that is repeatedly heard from newcomers is the personalized attention and support they receive upon their arrival.
In Northwestern Ontario, there is often more of a communal effort to help welcome newcomers and support their integration, since they are seen as essential to the survival and growth of the community. While there is a vast representation of different cultural groups from around the world, they do not tend to be grouped into enclaves as they might in large cities, resulting in a fuller integration into the community as a whole.
Recently, Thunder Bay has seen a rapid increase in the number and variety of restaurants and grocery options to meet the needs and desires of newcomers from diverse backgrounds to the area. The overall high quality of life with affordable housing, excellent health care facilities and a wide range of entertainment and dining options also plays a role in attracting and retaining newcomers.
Local residents can enjoy all the amenities of a bigger urban centre while still being only minutes away from a vast array of outdoor recreation opportunities. While some may see the area as being isolated, it is easy to connect to larger centres such as Toronto, Winnipeg or Minneapolis through several daily flights from the international airport or by ground transportation.
Keep students here
Encouraging newcomers to choose a smaller community can be a challenging process. A main obstacle can be convincing them to visit, tour and see the area with their own eyes.
One way to address this is by building on the success of Confederation College and Lakehead University in attracting international students.
These students are often highly skilled, motivated and bring a wealth of previous experience. Since they have already overcome that first step of visiting and living in the area, it would be advisable to create more programs to encourage them to stay rather than leaving upon graduation for larger urban centres.
The creation and enhancement of economic incentives for newcomers to settle in smaller communities can help to stimulate the purchase of businesses for sale, allowing those communities to continue to benefit from the services and jobs they provide.
Expansion of the Provincial Nominee Program could allow more discretion in this area, to both support the settlement of newcomers and to help sustain the existence and quality of life in smaller communities.
With affordable housing, employment opportunities, diverse recreational pursuits and an exceptionally high quality of life, Thunder Bay and Northwestern Ontario represent an incredible destination for immigrants to create a new life in Canada.
Paul Wojda is the youth programs facilitator of the Thunder Bay Multicultural Association
Commentary by Surjit Singh Flora in Brampton
Kathleen Wynne, the current premier of Ontario, and Linda Jeffrey, the past Wynne Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing and Brampton's current Mayor, are a study in contrasts.
As Ontario's 25th Premier, Wynne is both at the height of her power and the low depths of popularity. But even with her popularity at below 20 per cent, she remains a powerful politician in control of her cabinet and caucus and with the ability to set and implement her political agenda.
This is despite Wynne's now self-admitted mismanagement of our province's electricity system, which she now concedes has caused such hardship in the province that some are forced to choose between feeding themselves or heating their homes.
It is a sad reality that Premier Wynne and her Liberals are looking more and more likely to hold on to power in the 2018 election as both the NDP and Conservatives appear to be parties struggling to seize any of the public's attention, let alone imagination.
On one hand, Andrea Horwath and her NDP seem to have little ground to stand on, given that the Liberals have all but assumed much of the left's territory, leaving the NDP with few policy options and little to say.
And, then, there is Patrick Brown, who with so many opportunities to pillory a Liberal government mired in scandal, continues to squander his opportunities to effectively hold this government to account while failing to be consistent in publicly expressing his own party's policies and platform.
The recent by-elections in Ottawa and Niagara were an indictment of an ineffective opposition that bodes well for Wynne going into her pre-election year.
Contrast Wynne with Brampton Mayor Linda Jeffrey. Like Wynne, Jeffrey served as an Ontario Liberal Minister of Aboriginal Affairs, as well as Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. Her predecessor, Susan Fennell, had presided over a virtual renaissance in Brampton.
During her tenure as Mayor, Brampton saw major investments in public infrastructure, and a massive $300 million expansion of public transit funded jointly by all three levels of government despite the fact that, at the time, there was no formal program in place from the Federal and Provincial governments to fund it.
All of that travelling to Ottawa paved the way for the single largest provincial/federal investment in Brampton's history, but was ultimately part of what I have always believed to be an organized campaign to run her out of office.
Her frequent travel was at the heart of unfounded accusations, innuendo and vicious allegations that lasted all of two years. After having been cleared of all but two ridiculously minor issues just days prior to the 2014 municipal election, Fennell lost to Jeffrey, who promised to clean up City Hall.
Two years later, under Jeffrey's leadership, Brampton's reputation has sunk to new lows. Jeffrey presides over a fractious Council that cannot agree on anything. An LRT line that had unprecedented public support was defeated despite over $300 million in approved provincial funding.
A search for a new chief administrative officer attracted only one candidate, who, since being hired has been on a rampage at City Hall that has seen virtually the entire senior management fired, drawing comparisons to a mini "reign of terror" with blood-soaked corridors and a civil service in disarray.
And even when she wins, Jeffrey loses. After recently scoring a coveted nod from her former Liberal government colleagues to locate a university in Brampton, it was revealed that even that effort is plagued with a lack of organization and little in the way of a plan, leaving Council slack-jawed, asking, "What do we do now?"
Wynne and Jeffrey are Liberals, but complete opposites: Wynne is powerful and blessed with a weak opposition; Jeffrey, powerless and cursed with a fractious and ineffective Council.
But both have one thing in common: they both need to be replaced and 2018 can't come soon enough.
Brampton-based Surjit Singh Flora is a veteran journalist and freelance writer.
by Ainslie Cruickshank in Ottawa
Social conservatives are hoping two anti-sex education candidates will split the vote in the upcoming Ottawa-Vanier byelection, leaving Progressive Conservative Andre Marin out in the cold.
"I don't think it's realistic that they will win without a large party machine behind them but they can certainly get enough votes to cause the pro-radical sex-ed PC candidate to lose if it's a close race," said Jack Fonseca, a senior political strategist with Campaign Life Coalition.
The coalition is a national anti-abortion organization and a vocal opponent of Ontario's new sex education curriculum. It's putting its support behind both Elizabeth de Viel Castel, a candidate running for the new single-issue political party Stop the New Sex Ed Agenda, and Stephanie McEvoy, who is running for the Canadian Constituents' Party and also opposes the sex-education programming the Wynne government introduced last year — the first update to the sex-ed curriculum since 1998.
The new curriculum includes updates on healthy relationships, same-sex relationships, consent, mental health, online safety and the risks of "sexting".
Marin has expressed support for the new sex-education curriculum, telling the Toronto Star that PC leader Patrick Brown "fell on the right side of the issue" after the party flip-flopped on it in the run-up to the Scarborough-Rouge River byelection. Requests for comment from Brown and Marin were declined Friday.
"The goal is to send a message to the PC establishment that you can't win by alienating social conservatives. The social conservative wing of the party is very important and this is an issue you can win on," Fonseca said.
The new curriculum is "age-inappropriate" and will put children in "harm's way," he said.
"Candidates owe it to the public to be open and honest and forthright on their position on such issues," said Liberal campaign co-chair and Advanced Education Minister Deb Matthews.
While Matthews said she disagrees with their position, she added she gives members of the new anti-sex ed party credit for making their views on the issue clearer than Brown has.
"Parents want their kids to learn how to protect themselves from sexual predators, from online predators. We want kids to understand what healthy relationships are. And I think the public is with us on that," she said.
In Ottawa-Vanier, Fonseca said Campaign Life Coalition will encourage its supporters to not only vote for either de Viel Castel or McEvoy, but also to volunteer and donate to their campaigns.
Queenie Yu, the force behind the new Stop the New Sex Ed Agenda party, is running under its banner in Niagara West-Glanbrook. She previously ran as an independent on an anti-sex ed platform in the Scarborough-Rouge River byelection, coming in fourth with 575 votes.
While some parents do support the new curriculum, many have concerns, Yu said.
"Each child is unique. Just because a child reaches a certain age doesn't mean they're ready to learn about certain subjects. Parents know their kids best. Parents – not the government – should be deciding when, what and how much their children should be learning about sex," she said.
In Niagara West-Glanbrook, Fonseca said Yu is a "supportable" candidate but Campaign Life Coalition would be happy to see Sam Oosterhoff, the PC candidate, win the seat given the support he showed for parental rights during his nomination campaign.
While Yu said she hasn't spoke with Oosterhoff, she said she has been assured by mutual friends that the 19-year old candidate shares her values.
"I'd vote for him if I lived in the riding," she said, noting her goal for the anti-sex ed party isn't necessarily to win seats but rather to keep the issue in the public eye.
Charles McVety, the president of the Canada Christian College, warned a split with social conservativescould cost the PCs the 2018 election after Oosterhoff won the nomination over party president and former Conservative MP Rick Dykstra and Niagara regional Councillor Tony Quirk.
That's a message Fonseca repeated Friday.
Pursuing a more liberal approach to social issues risks alienating the conservative base and invites the creation a new, "formidable" conservative party in the province, he said, adding that could result in Liberal governments for years to come.
By arrangement with ipolitics.ca
Commentary by Surjit Singh Flora in Brampton
A few weeks before Brampton Council begin debate on the latest budget, the city and province delivered a big lollipop to the citizens of Brampton in the form of a University to be built in our city.
At the risk of sounding cynical, I can't help but suspect this little bit of theatre is meant to divert the attention of Bramptonians away from the poor economic performance of our city, the recent tax increases, stagnant municipal services, and the provinces' ruinously expensive and incompetently handled hydro mismanagement.
Now, don't get me wrong, I, like many, believe a university campus is something Brampton needs, and needs badly. In fact, I know many parents are excited at the thought of their children obtaining a quality post-secondary education in their own city.
Downloading to taxpayers
But for anyone who listened to what was said at the Brampton press event, while Brampton has been chosen as the site of one of two new university campuses, there was no specific timeline or details about where or when this facility will be built, how it will be funded, or how much of the cost the province will download onto the backs of Brampton taxpayers in order to make the announcement a reality.
What we do know is that there is a $90 million allotment for each of the two municipalities approved in this round of funding. Let's remember that when then Premier Dalton McGuinty wrote his infamous letter to the Brampton citizens promising that Peel Memorial Hospital would not be closed – just before he closed it − the replacement facility's phase I costs were over $300 million and Bramptonians were practically extorted into paying $60 million towards the project.
If you think this is an isolated occurrence, think again. When the province promised to finish highway 410 north to highway 10, it was only accomplished after the Region of Peel was forced to pony up over $40 million to the province.
Citizens in the dark
Will $90 million build a university campus? I highly doubt it. I am convinced we are going to be put in the position of shelling out millions more from municipal coffers – your tax money – to provide land and capital funding in order to make this happen. How sweet does that lollipop taste now?
Let's face it, we have no idea what we are getting out of this latest deal. We know from the past the province promised to keep our original hospital open, then closed it, then tore it down. The slogan for the new Peel Memorial was "More than a Hospital," but in fact this too was a lie. The new Peel Memorial will be much less than a hospital. It will house outpatient services, clinics, dialysis, and will not have an emergency department. Instead, it will have an urgent care centre that closes down at night, and while some services now housed at Brampton Civic are moving to the new building, Brampton is getting much less than it deserves in terms of health care services. This does not bode well for our university.
Brampton Councillor Gurpreet Dhillon says this council worked hard work to make this university happen and Mayor Linda Jeffery maintains this is exciting news for Bramptonians. This from a council that turned down $300 million in funding for a light rail line up Main Street that over 70 per cent of the citizens wanted.
I think the citizens of Brampton have some fundamental issues with trusting this council and these concerns are well justified.
So, I think we can all look forward to a future that will see more tax levies for health care, our university, and whatever other lollipop the city or province thinks up to throw at Brampton, in an attempt to win our votes with our own money. That makes us all a bunch of suckers.
Brampton-based Surjit Singh Flora is a veteran journalist and freelance writer.
Commentary by Evelina Silveira in London, Ontario
A recent study published by the Western University's Centre for Research on Migration and Ethnic Relations found a severe lack of visible minorities in leadership roles in organizations in London, Ontario.
While the study made headlines, the findings came as no surprise to me. I have lived in London all my life, working as a diversity consultant for the 10 years. I would like to offer an explanation as to why inroads have not been made in visible minority leadership in London, Ontario.
Flashback to about 13 years ago, when I started to work on a business plan for Diversity at Work: I interviewed many leaders in London asking them whether my idea of having a business which promoted hiring and supporting diverse candidates would ever fly.
I will never forget the answer I received from a human resources consultant who had previously held many jobs in the recruitment and leadership fields. She said: "Evelina, as long as there are enough white people to fill the jobs, no one will ever consider anyone else, because they don't have to."
Essentially, she conveyed that there really was no need to change the recruitment process and that it was too much work to do so.
A late joiner
In comparison to other cities, London has lagged behind. Perhaps it is because the jobs could easily be filled as the human resources consultant suggested, or maybe we ignore the ever-growing presence of visible minorities which started in the mid-1980's.
Some of our largest employers and institutions have only recently developed diversity policies, later than their counterparts in other comparable cities which have a high number of visible minorities and immigrants. I often scan the diversity plans of the public service organizations in London and it would appear that the effort or the kind of approach being used – if at all – are not producing much in terms of achieving a representative workforce, let alone diversity in leadership.
My observations are consistent with the findings which indicate a very low level of visible minority participation, notably 5.3 per cent on agencies, boards, and commissions. Their lack of participation at these levels can have ramifications for how services are delivered, in addition to resource allocation.
Furthermore, there is a tendency, especially with boards, to recruit people they know, often friends and co-workers, to fill vacancies. This can perpetuate the lack of representation and the effort to create a more diversified board and committees.
It is startling how many workplaces have not implemented the strategies and best practices that can help mitigate these gaps. How might we explain the disconnect? There are a multitude of reasons why this occurs and this is key to understanding the problem of under-representation in London's publicly-funded organizations.
Consider these possibilities:
· Foreign credentials and work experience are not recognized. Generally speaking, if an applicant has not graduated from a leadership program in North America or the U.K , there is a good chance their education in leadership may not be recognized. Leadership experience from other parts of the world may not be taken into consideration for a host of reasons, including cultural differences in how we do business and interact with employees.
· Effective leadership requires highly developed communication skills: in person, in writing and over the phone. An internationally-trained applicant is disadvantaged if they have a pronounced accent and have an indirect style of communication. Interviewer bias can hamper heavily-accented applicants, who may be mistaken as unqualified because they speak differently. Across cultures, there are variations in how we conduct meetings, presentations and write reports. The Canadian standards are often learned in school or through work experience.
At civic level: zero
The number of visible minorities and immigrant leaders in municipal organizations is at a glaring zero per cent!
Given that government organizations are held to a higher standard than the private sector to have a reflective workforce, as well as to meet Employment Equity standards, this represents a failure of implementation and consequently lost opportunities for diversifying the workforce and gaining new skills and perspectives.
With increasing job insecurity, good benefits and salaries, public service employees are not likely to leave their jobs. Understandably, this represents fewer opportunities for external applicants to get hired.
It would be interesting to know if the City of London has an internal mentoring program to assist aspiring leaders. Research consistently indicates that visible minorities and immigrants find a lack of mentors in the workplace.
Successful leaders often attest to the significance of mentors throughout their careers. There have been some attempts over the last few years to develop internships for immigrant professionals at the City of London. However, it is hard to know if this experience translated into permanent employment with the City.
Finally, we cannot overlook bias and racism in the recruitment and selection process, although it does not probably explain the huge disconnect between the population and their representation in the workforce. In my experience, if the leadership in an organization is not familiar with the business benefits of a diverse workforce, they are very unlikely to support and initiate programs which can facilitate the entry and promotion of visible minorities within their organizations.
Evelina Silveira is the President of Diversity at Work in London, a three-time award winning firm which specializes in creating inclusive workplaces and diverse customer bases. She has co-authored two globally acclaimed books and is the publisher of the Inclusion Quarterly.
Commentary by Surjit Singh Flora in Brampton
In the run up to a recent Scarborough by-election, Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown spent much time making speeches and handing out press releases supporting his candidate, as political party leaders often do. Towards the end of that political contest, he made a pledge that, should his party form a government, he would scrap Ontario's revised sex education curriculum.
However, all of this effort proved to be nothing more than toying with the emotions of poor parents for no other purpose than to grab their votes.
But, lets step back for a moment. In 2015, Patrick Brown wanted to win the leadership of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party win a seat in the Ontario parliament. In order to do this, he needed strong support from a broad range of people across the Conservative party, and in the riding he ran in to gain a seat in the legislature.
Consistent theme
One theme that came up numerous times was his criticism of the Liberal Wynne Government's controversial sex education curriculum, which was received by a section of parents with serious reservations and mixed feelings. Brown and his party seized on this uneasiness, and as the Conservative leader, he has repeatedly spoken of revising it or scrapping it altogether.
And, in my opinion, he and his party have benefited by taking this position.
And now, back to the recent Scarborough by-election. In the final days of this contest, we saw a huge flip-flop by Brown.
First, a letter "pops up" at the end of the campaign repeating the party position that he as leader would scrap the curriculum. Then comes the flip-flop and Brown's denials, complete with a watering down of the much promoted "scrap the curriculum" platform.
In the mean time, voters were bombarded with newspapers and television news broadcasts repeating the original Conservative pledge.
By the time Brown flip-flopped, his party had a new seat in the legislature and any hope parents may have about seeing the controversial curriculum dealt with flopped with Brown's flip, leaving many confused about what the leader of the Progressive Conservative party actually stands for.
Questionable leadership
Patrick Brown's now famous flip-flop is, to paraphrase former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, is like politicians who promise to build bridges, even where there is no river. In this case, Brown would have us believe he was asleep at the switch when all of this was going on.
First, he was unaware of the highly organized tactic that saw 13,000 copies of the now famous letter, in both English and Chinese, delivered to homes at the end of the Scarborough by-election. Then, he denied any part in it, suggesting the letter was the product of the party. Then he flip-flopped on the policy itself, saying he will at least review the curriculum.
Brown needs to be reminded of the old story about the boy who lived in the jungle and decided one day to play a prank on nearby villagers by screaming, "help me, help me, lion, lion!!"
The villagers stop what they are doing and immediately grab their tools and rush to the boy's aid only to find him laughing, and admitting it was all a joke. The villagers left confused and a bit angry. The next day the boy played the same prank, the villagers ran to his aid, and again, he had to admit it was all a joke. The villagers left very angry.
The next day, a lion did appear and the boy screamed for help, but the villagers were tired of his pranks and no one came to help him, so the lion ate him.
My point: Mr. Brown, you can't continue to treat the voters of Ontario like that boy treated the villagers.
In 2018, there is going to be a provincial election. As leader of the Conservative Party, Mr. Brown, you either have a platform and policies or you don't. The voters of Ontario are not looking for a party or a leader that plays fast and loose with his promises, or compromises his party's policies.
People are looking for a friendly and honest leader who is prepared to make commitments and deliver on them.
I question whether you are that leader.
TORONTO: The Law Society of Upper Canada's Challenges Faced by Racialized Licensees Working Group on Thursday released a report proposing 13 recommendations to address issues of systemic racism in the legal professions.
The report is the culmination of thorough study and province-wide consultations, showing that racialized lawyers and paralegals face longstanding and significant challenges at all stages […]
Indo-Canadian Voice
A UK-based Sikh organization is coming to Canada to hold a free media workshop in Mississauga on August 17 at Dixie Gurdwara.
The Sikh Press Association – a facilitator between the Sikh community and international media – will be holding the interactive workshop from 6 to 8 p.m. in an attempt to help locals learn media skills directly from professionals.
Indo-Canadian Voice
Commentary by Tasha Kheiriddin
Most of Islam's leaders present their faith as one of peace. That, unfortunately, is not how a majority of Ontarians see it these days.
According to a study commissioned by the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI), "only a third of Ontarians have a positive impression of the religion and more than half feel its mainstream doctrines promote violence (an anomaly compared to other religions)." Of Canada's six major religions, Islam is the one most likely to be viewed by respondents as an incubator of violence. The report concludes that "there is an epidemic of Islamophobia in Ontario."
There is, of course, also an epidemic of radical Islamist terrorism in the world, playing out nightly on the video screens and smartphones of the globe. Just this weekend ISIS slaughtered 200 people in a Baghdad market. According to Le Monde, in the first eighteen months after it established its "caliphate" in 2014, the terror group killed 1,600 people in 83 terror attacks and hostage events in 20 countries. And whatever the Orlando shooter's true motivations, he claimed to have killed fifty people at a gay nightclub in ISIS' name.
Many religious Islamic states, such as Saudi Arabia, oppress their own people, particularly women, in the name of Islam. They mete out violent punishments for "crimes" such as adultery, blasphemy, pursuing same-sex relationships and criticizing the government, punishments which include lashes and death by stoning. When the Saudi government attempts to justify these punishments as consistent with or Muslim religious law, it doesn't make Islam look like a faith that likes to turn the other cheek.
Asking the average person to ignore this — to completely separate violence practiced in a religion's name from the religion itself — is a tall order. While it's true that the vast majority of Muslims want nothing to do with ISIS, abhor its practices and are far more likely to be its victims than its accomplices, the fact remains that its atrocities cause the Muslim faith to be viewed with suspicion and fear.
And as long as countries like Saudi Arabia continue to follow a form of religious law that runs completely counter to Western values of equality, freedom and minority rights, Islam will have a hard time being seen as a religion of peace.
Islam isn't the first faith to be linked to violence, of course. The Crusades saw Christians and Muslims wage war in the Holy Land from the 11th to the 15th centuries. The Catholic Inquisition saw thousands of Jews expelled from Spain and thousands of other "unbelievers", including Muslims, tortured and killed. In 19th and 20th century Canada, up to 6,000 First Nations children died in residential schools run by Christian priests and nuns; countless others were abused. Between 1969 and 2002, 5,000 people died in Northern Ireland due to sectarian violence between Catholics and Protestants. In 1985, Sikh terrorists bombed Air India Flight 182 out of the sky, killing 329 passengers. Religious violence in India between Hindus and Muslims continues to claim nearly a hundred lives a year.
And as with many 'religious' movements, many of ISIS' motivations are rooted not in faith — or even in a perversion of faith — but in power, money and territorial control. In war-torn regions where legitimate employment is hard (or impossible) to come by, many recruits join the organization purely for the income. Nevertheless, at the root of ISIS lies a fundamentalist, extremist version of Islam. Here's how writer Graeme Wood described it in his fascinating, in-depth profile of the terror group for The Atlantic last year:
"Virtually every major decision and law promulgated by the Islamic State adheres to what it calls, in its press and pronouncements, and on its billboards, license plates, stationery and coins, 'the Prophetic methodology,' which means following the prophecy and example of Muhammad, in punctilious detail. Muslims can reject the Islamic State; nearly all do. But pretending that it isn't actually a religious, millenarian group, with theology that must be understood to be combatted, has already led the United States to underestimate it and back foolish schemes to counter it."
Until ISIS is defeated, Islam will continue to be viewed with suspicion and mistrust. Until Islamic governments treat women, minorities and LGBT individuals as equals, the faith will be seen as discriminatory and out of sync with Western values.
And all the public education campaigns in the world, such as those currently playing out across Toronto, won't change the fact that fundamentalist practitioners of Islam maintain a worldview very different not only from those held by non-Muslims, but from those held by moderate Muslims as well.
As with any extremist religion-based movement, it's the latter group that holds the key to transforming the faith and the way it is perceived. Moderate Muslims need to speak out against extremism, from the mosque to Main Street. Otherwise, radicals and their actions will continue to feed the fires of prejudice, help elect Donald Trump to the White House, and undermine the very principles of tolerance and equality which Western countries — including the millions of Muslims who call them home — hold dear.
Published under arrangement with ipolitics.ca
-- Canada's economic development minister Navdeep Bains at a Public Policy Forum economic summit


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This is why I never joined the NRA. I suspect that the government has the NRA membership list and will go after them first.
You don't think the gov't can figure out your Internet Protocol address?
This is why I never joined the NRA. I suspect that the government has the NRA membership list and will go after them first.
in the republik of illinois we have the foid card. lucky us.
What difference does that make? Man up. The Revolution wasn't won by folks who hid their guns.If the goobermint ever starts confiscating anything from private residences, do you think your 2A rights are all you have lost? It will have been PAST time to fight then.
wise choice.
If they don't, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the NRA supplied the list voluntarily... with appropriate cover of course.
And why I never applied for a CHL or took a course, and why I don't hang around gun shops or ranges, where the ATF slugs lurk.
If I showed up at a range with something interesting like a Steyr precision rifle or even an SVD, much less a .50-cal. turnbolt, my license plate would be over at ATF before you can say "sic 'em, Dan-O!"
If you buy ammo they know, let alone that pesky form you fill out when you buy a gun.
You have to sign in at most ranges. They track purchases made with credit, debit or check.
They know you have firearms and more so I refuse to hide. I'm proud to be a gun owner especially with my new sig 226 .40 cal elite dark nitron with the short reset trigger and night sights.
I have a hard time believing that the state of Georgia (mine), Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, ... are going to willfully assist the Feds in going door-to-door to collect guns from anyone. An outright confiscation has no chance of passing and even less chance of succeeding. It may take 2 or 3 individuals fighting back to kick off the resistance, but I have little doubt it will occur. Given the weak state of our economy and the mess in Europe that could be the catalyst to bring down the whole house of cards.
I can not imagine the House ever passing such a ban let alone confiscation. Even Congress is not that dumb!!

subset: commoncrawl


text: This is one of the greatest time-lapse videos I've ever seen. Filmmaker Jamie Scott not only made multiple exposures over the course of many minutes and hours, he returned to his Central Park locations time and time again over the course of six months, and because he set his tripod and lens and camera in the exact same way each time, his resulting time-lapse video shows the trees change colors and shed their leaves, in an instant. It's a beautiful work of art. To see more of his tremendous videos, visit his web site. He's got quite the portfolio of work, including many high-end commercials you're likely to be familiar with.


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BP Comment Quick Links
|Strength of Schedule Report
December 7, 2004
Prospectus Matchups
Under the Knife, circa 1948
The Flatiron Building--one of the coolest structures yet conceived by man--is at 175 Fifth Avenue in New York City. At one time, it housed the offices of Baseball magazine within its triangular confines. Baseball was a monthly that had a 50-year run beginning in 1908. The miracle of this publication is that there are any left as historical documents. Never in my life have I seen anything published on more ephemeral ephemera. Take the paper on which your daily newspaper is printed and reduce the thickness by 75% and you'll have some idea as to how pulpy it was. Fortunately, with scanners, the contents of Baseball will live on long past the time the last issues have returned to dust.
Lately, I have been thinking about how hectic baseball offseasons are compared to what once was, when there was no free agency to worry about. I thought that looking at some wintertime issues of Baseball--my vast personal holdings include 11 copies of this publication dating from the late '40s--would confirm my suspicions that the game pretty much went into stasis in the cold months. Naturally, as soon as I cracked the first one, I got into reading and forgot about what I was looking for in the first place. Instead, I began focusing on an uncredited editorial in the January 1948 issue, the thesis of which was that returning players with injury questions would attract more attention in spring training than would new players.
The piece lists a number of players who had physical troubles in 1947 or immediately thereafter. This is interesting only as a moment in time--a crossroads for a group of players who were suspect physically at that point in time. You could draw up a similar list in any given offseason, really. Either in spite of or because of the eternal nature of this topic, I thought it would be interesting to see how well the men they mentioned got on with their careers from that point forward. Let's take them in the same order in which Baseball presents them:
If Baseball still roamed the earth and wrote the very same editorial today, which modern players would they be discussing? BP's injury go-to guy, Will Carroll, suggests the list would probably contain a still-fragile J.D. Drew, Andy Pettitte, Brad Penny, Kevin Brown, and, of course, Joe Mauer and Jason Giambi. We can only hope their fate is a healthier one than the ones experienced by most of the men in that article.
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The WordPress development team introduced a featured called "Multisite" in its early 3.0 development. In a nutshell, what this means for users is that you are now able to host multiple sites with only one installation of the WordPress platform, which opens up numerous exciting possibilities for site owners. At Convertiv, we have deployed several instances of WordPress with the Multisite feature enabled and optimally configured for our clients – hang out through the end of this post to see a few short case studies of clients we've helped harness the power of the WordPress Multisite feature to give you a swift idea of our capabilities.
WordPress Multisite is Perfect for….
Sites that want to branch out beyond just one web site. Some examples of sites we have deployed Multisite for include (but are not limited to):
- Blog Networks – sites that want to host a main site as a network hub, and invite their users to start a blog within the network. This type of implementation is typically geared toward a niche market and groups with similar interests, such as photography sites, bridal networks, tech blogging networks.
- Corporate sites/Multiple domains – many online businesses (both large and small) have multiple web properties for different divisions of their product lines and services. Using Multisite (with or without domain mapping) gives them the ability to run multiple sites under one roof.
- Internal Networks – sites don't always have to be viewable by the general public and in this case, we've implemented the Multisite feature to give companies/schools/groups the ability to host multiple internal sites for communication, networking and organization.
One Installation – Multiple sites
Until the year 2011, if you wanted to run several different web sites on the WordPress platform, you were forced to depend on multiple installations of WordPress. For users who have a network of sites, or maintain several web sites of their won, this can be cumbersome. With WordPress Multisites, you now have the ability to host one or one hundred (or a thousand) sites with just one, single installation of WordPress. Probably the biggest, and most successful, example of a large multisite network that showcases the largest Multisite nework currently in operation on the web today is the hosted service found at WordPress.com, which currently hosts over 350,000 blogs on its service, at the time of this writing.
The concept is pretty easy to understand:
1. We install WordPress on our client servers.
2. We fire the configuration that tells WordPress to include the Multisite feature.
3. We set up Multisite and optimally configure the Network for our clients use.
Our goal is to encourage autonomy and independence through education and training. When done, our clients understand the basic tenants of the Multisite feature enough to add sites to their network easily and quickly, with complete confidence. WordPress makes it easy – our education and training make it even easier.
Network of Sites
With WordPress Multisite installed – the primary domain that it gets installed on is considered the primary site, or blog. So, if we install WordPress on http://domain.com – the live site on http://domain.com operates just like a regular WordPress web site. We can create a new theme with its own features, just as we would with a regular WorddPres siste. Once Multisite is installed and set up, the process of adding new sites on the multisite set up is relatively easy. With Multisite enabled, WordPress splits the typical Dashboad into two distinct parts:
- Site Admin Dashboard – the control center where users manage and maintain the primary site, or blog..
- Network Admin Dashboard – the control center where Adminstrators manage and maintain the network of sites created with the use of the Multisite feature.
Within the Network Admin menu, users have access to six different items that they use to configure, manage and maintain the new Network:
- Admin: Create new sites and new users in your network.
- Sites: View a list of the sites in your network, along with details about them that enables users to manage sites within their network.
- Users: See detailed info about current users in your network, , along with the ability to manage users within their network (including which sites they are subscribed to, profile information and login/password information)
- Themes: View all the Currently available themes to enable or disable them for use in your network.
- Options: Change settings and configure your network.
- Update: Upgrade all sites in your network with one click.
Upon set up, we need to make a decision on whether we'd like individual sites to utilize a subdomain or a subdirectory within the network. The difference is this:
- Subdomain – when new sites are created, the URL of the new sites looks like this: http://newsite.domain.com (where 'newsite' is the name of the site added to the network).
- Subdirectory – when new sites are created, the URL of the new sites look like this: http://domain.com/newsite (where 'newsite' is the name of the site added to the network).
There are different things to consider when deciding to use either the Subdomain or Subdirectory configuration for Multisite (such as web server configuraitons, domain mapping needs to name a few), and this is something I would strongly recommend discussing with your developer before proceeding with a WordPress Multisite installation.
Domain Mapping a WordPress Multisite
Through the implementation of a small add-on for WordPress Multisite, users can configure specific domain names for sites within the Multisite network. With domain mapping in place, instead of the default subdomain (newsite.domain.com) or subdirectory (domain.com/newsite) domains, users can register domain names and use them within the Multisite Network and have individual domains (like yourdomain.com, mydomain.com) as the URL for each site within the network.
We assist our clients with the server side set up for the use of domain mapping, which does involve some special apache and DNS configurations – and once in place, not only can you host several sites within a WordPress Multisite environment, you can host multiple domains, as well!
SEO, Analytics, Sitemaps & Social Media
WordPress Multisite works much in the same way as regular (single-user) WordPress. We assist our clients with the Search Engine Optimization, Plugin recommendations (specific to their individual use case) and configuration, Sitemaps for Google and other major search engines and social media integration with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and more.
Convertiv Case Studies
Recently, we have successfully completed the implementation and deployment of several large scale sites utilizing the WordPress Multisite platform. Here are two sites that use the Multisite feature to meet their individual goals:
- Cheapflights.com – Cheapflights is a London-based company specializing in helping their customers find great deals on flights, hotels and travel. Cheapflights has several different properties around the world, each with a completely different focus for regional travel destinations. With domain names like news.cheapflights.com (USA), news.cheapflights.co.uk (UK) and more, the folks at Cheapflights wanted to use the same design for each of their regional blogs, as well as the same features – but each with different content that is regionally specific. We implemented the WordPress platform with Multisite features for them, with a custom design and custom features (specific to their needs) and they now can easily deploy additional sites for their different regions, all within one installation of the WordPress software.
- Bostinno.com – Bostinno is a tech-based news site located in Boston, MA (USA). We launched their site on WordPress with the Multisite features in place so they can grow their tech news reach into other regional areas such as New York City, Philadelphia and beyond! Initially, we launched their Boston initiative at bostinno.com – but as they prepare to launch their sites within other citiies in the United States, using the Multisite feature, they will be able to easily launch those sites, apply the custom design and development we already completed and start building regional web sites easily and successfully. Bostinno.com utilizes the domain mapping feature that will allow them to add their sites with their own specific domains (such as nycinno.com, phillyinno.com, etc).


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Cambridge company tries to build a better french fry
Excerpts from the Innovation Economy blog.
Producing a crispy french fry without a deep fryer is one of the Holy Grails of food science. This month, a Cambridge research company, DuraFizz, invited me to taste their latest project, fresh from the oven.
I met with founder David Soane, formerly a tenured chemical engineering professor at the University of California, Berkeley; Dan Jacques, a former Ocean Spray executive; and Lauren Fortin, a University of Massachusetts-trained food scientist.
It's tough to bake potatoes and achieve anything like a proper french fry texture, Fortin explained. And once you dunk a potato in hot oil, it gets fattening fast.
What DuraFizz has been developing is a healthy fry that's super-crispy but baked in an oven. The customers they have in mind aren't just restaurant chains and frozen food producers, but also schools and military installations. The coating they have developed, called Oh So Crisp, uses starches and flours from corn, rice, and potatoes, which form a layer around the potato.
"The ingredients are all natural,'' Fortin said, and the fries are gluten-free.
Soane says the coating works by creating a stiff, ridgy layer that your tongue and teeth perceive as crispiness, along with pores that allow the moisture inside the potato to escape to avoid sogginess. Even when you reheat the fries in a microwave, Soane says, they stay crispy.
"And there are no new ingredients in the coating - nothing that would require FDA review,'' he said.
DuraFizz is working with Russet House, a Canadian company that produces sweet potato fries for restaurants and grocery chains like Trader Joe's, on production tests of Oh So Crisp.
Fortin whipped up two samples in a convection oven, baking them at 400 degrees for 10 minutes. I tried them sans ketchup.
Both the white and sweet potato fries had a crunchy coating. On the white potato fries, the coating was so assertive it overwhelmed the potato filling. For that reason, I preferred the sweet potato variation, which had been cut thicker. It had a light, pillowy interior.
But while Oh So Crisp conferred a substantial crunch, it had a strange stickiness, adhering to my tongue and teeth in a way you don't expect from a french fry, a bit like a candy coating would.
Fortin said they are working on a way to apply a thinner coating more evenly, eliminating the problem. If a traditional, well-made fry is an A (and healthfulness isn't factored in), I'd grade DuraFizz's sweet potato fries a solid B, and the white potato fries C-plus.
As for calories and fat: A 100-gram serving of McDonald's french fries (slightly bigger than a "small'' order) has 324 calories and 15.5 grams of fat, while the same serving of Oh So Crisp fries has 170 calories and zero grams of fat, according to DuraFizz.
It will be interesting to see whether Oh So Crisp is adopted by the restaurant and food service industries; an earlier product from the company, instant cappuccino foam that didn't require hot steam, never took off.
For now, the only place you can taste Oh So Crisp fries is at Arizona Pizza Company in Hadley, where a basket costs $5.49. (Regular fries there cost $2.99.) Once the Oh So Crisp coating is made in large volumes, it won't add much to the price of fries, the company says.
"We've been talking with the Army, universities, and restaurant chains,'' Jacques said. "Their big question right now is how are you going to make enough to supply us?''
The company is focusing first on sweet potato fries, which have a higher profit margin, Jacques said.
And the award goes to . . . Boston University created a nifty award in 2010: Innovator of the Year, handed out annually as part of an event called Tech, Drugs and Rock & Roll. The award is intended to honor a faculty member "whose cutting-edge research has led to creation of companies that benefit society,'' BU spokesman Richard Taffe said.
This year's recipient is Avrum Spira, cofounder of Allegro Diagnostics and head of the Division of Computational Biomedicine at BU's medical school. Allegro is commercializing Spira's research into gene-based tests that could spot lung cancer sooner and better manage its treatment, in current or former smokers.
Spira has authored 37 peer-reviewed papers and attracted more than $3.5 million in funding for research. Maynard-based Allegro has raised $8.9 million in total funding, Taffe said.
Business ideas abound On Thursday, 10 teams of Babson College students and recent graduates will present the business ideas they have been developing over the summer. They include KokoBerna, which is marketing holistic facial care products, and RooferQuotes, which sounds a bit like LendingTree for roof repair services.
The event is free; register at http://2011babsondemoday.eventbrite.com.
For the full Innovation Economy blog, updated daily, visit www.boston.com/innovation.


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Beauty comes in all shapes & sizes. Tall, petite, curvy, straight, average. Hopefully whatever category you fall into, you've mastered how to dress for it. Gahhh, if only it were that easy! Luckily, a few smart retailers are making it easier to find clothing that will fit our varied shapes & sizes.
A Guide to Petite, Tall, and Plus-Size Retailers
February 18, 2016
A Birthday LBD
May 12, 2015
This is my first post coming to you as a wise, mature, now-using-eyecream 33-year-old! My husband and I usually go out to dinner on our birthdays — but this year, I declared that I wanted a date night IN. I wanted to light candles, play some music, make dinner, and celebrate at home. But! There was a catch: I still wanted to get dressed up (like a true fashionista).
Recent Purchases – February
February 9, 2015
Happy Monday, ladies! Remember last month when I blogged about my recent closet additions? Well, you all seemed to dig that kind of post — and I dug getting positive feedback on my purchases because that immediately reduced my buyer's remorse! Well, today I'm back with another round-up of my recent purchases.


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That's how much a quarterback is worth this season so far in Central Texas.
Belton, Florence, Gatesville, Killeen and Temple are a combined 14-2 as district play begins.
All five schools have quarterbacks starting for the second straight season. All five quarterbacks had proven themselves.
Harker Heights, Ellison, Salado and Lampasas all entered the season with new quarterbacks.
They are a combined 1-12 this season.
The value of the quarterback position has never been more clear. If a team is going to win at any level, it has to have solid leader under center. Temple (2-1) has Syracuse commit Zach Allen.
Florence (2-1) has Kaleb Hardy.
Friday, Belton senior Peter Shelburne, Gatesville senior Cole Edmiston and Killeen junior Garrett Gaskamp proved it.
That was the number of unanswered points Belton scored Friday behind Shelburne.
Down 12-0 against Round Rock, Shelburne quickly led the Tigers (3-0) back into contention. First he hit Derick Bates for an 80-yard bomb. Then he found Chase Thornal for a 11-yard touchdown pass. Finally, he capped it off with a 50-yard strike to Brandon Rhoades.
By the end of the first half, he had thrown for 249 yards and — along with the Tiger defense — led Belton to 34 unanswered points.
Edmiston, who had 273 yards passing, did his work throughout the Hornets' 35-14 win over Taylor.
He started the game with a 85-yard touchdown pass to Colton Williams. He ended the game hitting his last nine passes, including a 30-yard score to Tyler Jaynes as Gatesville (4-0) kept rolling.
Garrett Gaskamp had his worst game of the season throwing the ball in a 42-41 win over Round Rock Stony Point. Although he did hit Eric Jackson for a 36-yard touchdown pass less than two minutes into the game, the junior was only 5-of-16 for 51 yards. But he did damage on the ground. Gaskamp had 12 carries for 100 yards and two touchdowns for the Roos (3-0).
That's the number of points the three teams are averaging per game, and a big reason they are a combined 10-0. All three quarterbacks did what they needed to do — just like they have been doing all season — win.
Not quite nine.
Ellison, Harker Heights and Salado are averaging 8.7 points per game.
And the struggles look dire.
Especially in Salado, where they had to watch last season's quarterback, Mike Richardson, throw for a state-record 722 yards as he led Marble Falls to a 62-55 win over Boerne Champion. If he hadn't transferred to play for the Mustangs, the Eagles undoubtedly would be better. But he is gone and Salado is 0-3.
Harker Heights and Ellison, meanwhile, have been rotating quarterbacks without success.
The Knights have only scored 10 points in three games. Both Salado and Ellison have scored 34 points this season — better than Harker Heights, but still only 11.3 points per game.
Ellison quarterbacks Rasheed Dashiell and Trent Jones have thrown five interceptions. Harker Heights quarterbacks Troy Smith and Damion May have thrown nine interceptions.
Both teams are having pains as they grow with their inexperienced quarterbacks.
Lampasas (1-3) also has a first-year starter in Kleg Kennedy and has averaged only 16.3 points per game and thrown for 146 yards this season. That passing total is not usually a problem for the Badgers, who traditionally run the ball 50 times a game.
However, the losses by these four teams cannot all be pinned on quarterback play.
A team cannot solely depend on one position. Defenses must step up, running backs have to hit holes, offensive linemen have to hold their blocks.
At the end of the season there is only one number that matters — the amount of wins it takes a team to make the playoffs.
And it takes a good quarterback to make those wins happen.


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First, I would like to say thank you for all of the help and ideas that I have gotten from CC and the many wonderful people on this site. It has made things much much easier on some of the cakes that I have made.
The question that I have is: How far ahead should I start molding the RKT for the characters of my cake from actually assembling the components of my cake? Is there a set amount of time that they will need to set up or would it be better to start the same day as assembly? This will be the very first time of ever using RKT and I am very nervous about it.
Any help with this will be greatly appreciated. Thank you so much. God Bless
Check out this thread.. I'm sure it will help.
Thank you so much. That is going to be very helpful on this project. As usual, if you can't find it here, you just can't find it. lol thanks again.


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Plus, with top brands such as Dewalt, you're also guaranteed quality when you shop with us. Every hole saw and self feed bit in our range is available at the lowest possible price, meaning you're getting the highest possible quality of product at a price that suits you. Browse the full range of hole saws and self feed drill bits online today.
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Artist description:
No description entered.
Canvas Draw Created Mar 06, 2013 640 x 460px Unless noted Copyright 2013 TheStuff.
We encourage you to submit a comment and let the artist know what you think of this drawing. Please log in or join to post a comment.
Post a comment
anim3luver Mar 06, 2013
really like de color here plus the shapes n effects--looks very cool n lovely :)) gr8 work~
pencildream Mar 06, 2013
nice abstract work!
Page 1


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TORONTO - Amir Johnson has seen Tristan Thompson up close, banged bodies in the post and tried to keep Cleveland's forward from getting to his sweet spot.
Given his youth and inexperience, Thompson's game is far from a finished product, but Johnson sees a lot of good things in store for the Canadian hoopster.
"He's become a very good athlete,"said Johnson of Thompson. "His post moves are getting better. I think the sky's the limit for that kid."
Thompson turns 22 on March 13, three days after he makes his final visit to Toronto for this season.
The Cavs aren't heading for the post-season, but they are heading in the right direction, picking up the pieces in the post LeBron James era.
There's an all-star piece in point guard Kyrie Irving, who was ruled out of Tuesday's away game against the Bulls with a sore knee, and an emerging big in Thompson.


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According to the case study, one client of Integware, a large medical device manufacturer, was able to achieve several key business metrics that contribute to increased efficiency after implementing a PLM system.
Fort Collins, CO (PRWEB) March 13, 2014
Integware, one of the premier PLM implementation firms in the country, today announced that they have released a case study focused on the effect of global PLM implementation on one of their clients. The case study and its accompanying infographic break down the effectiveness that PLM had after it was implemented.
According to the case study, one client of Integware, a large medical device manufacturer, was able to achieve several key business metrics that contribute to increased efficiency after implementing a PLM system.
"Our client saw an immediate improvement in efficiency after implementing a basic PLM system," said a spokesman from Integware. "The results are borne out in our infographic. They were able to consolidate their PLM systems from five to one, reduce order creation time by 75%, and perhaps most impressive of all, they were able to achieve a 100% reduction in human error related to PLM and ERP data."
In addition to the huge reduction in error and order time creation, the client was also able to reduce the time needed to generate the DMR by 99%, effectively reducing search time from 3-5 days to as little as 2 minutes.
"These results are indicative of just how effective a PLM system can be for a business," said the spokesman from Integware. "Before this study began, this client had never implemented a PLM system before. The immediate positive impact that this system had on their organization is proof of how even a basic PLM system can help an organization save huge amounts of time and money."
Integware is an ideal choice for any organization looking for PLM consulting. The team at Integware specializes in PLM training for organizations that are new to PLM, or who want to upgrade and refine their existing PLM system. For more information and to speak with a certified PLM consultant, please visit http://www.integware.com.
About Integware:
Integware is a company that is committed to doing what is right in the face of challenge and adversity. They are principled, trustworthy and continuously strive to improve themselves and their customer experience.
They help their clients overcome and transform their most pressing business challenges by accelerating innovation, reducing product development costs, maintaining compliance and driving strategic business development. Integware's deep understanding of software, process and industry standards have helped them develop a rich set of best practices that are able to be leveraged across all industry segments.


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LONDON (Oct. 16)
The traditionally positive relationship between the United States and Israel is "back in harness" and the strains over President Reagan's September 1982 peace initiative and the war in Lebanon are now over, Julius Berman, chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said here today.
Berman presented this assessment to a plenary session of the Board of Deputies of British Jews during which he traced the evolution of the U.S.-Israeli relations during the Reagan Administration. He said the U.S. now realizes the invalidity of its initial hope that the so-called moderate Saudi Arabia, together with Jordan, would act as the catalyst towards a Middle East peace settlement.


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Design innovative letter styles and custom fonts.
Operates multiple-needle, chainstitch sewing machine to join edges of garments or garment parts with felled seam: Guides edge of garment through folding attachment or folds edge according to style specifications to form seam. Presses knee control to lower machine arm. Positions folded garment edge under needle and releases knee control to raise machine arm. Guides garment edge under needle and against gauge. Performs duties as described under SEWING-MACHINE OPERATOR, REGULAR EQUIPMENT Master Title.


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MINRIN® Orally Disintegrating Tablet (Fast Dissolving Desmopressin) and Tablets in Treatment of Primary Nocturnal Enuresis (MELT)
This study has been completed.
Ferring Pharmaceuticals
Ferring Arzneimittel GmbH
Information provided by (Responsible Party):
Ferring Pharmaceuticals
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
First received: June 7, 2011
Last updated: June 11, 2013
Last verified: June 2013
- Full Text View
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- No Study Results Posted
- Disclaimer
- How to Read a Study Record
Desmopressin in treatment of nocturnal enuresis (bedwetting).
|Nocturnal Enuresis
|Study Type:
|Study Design:
|Observational Model: Cohort
Time Perspective: Prospective
|Official Title:
|MINRIN® Orally Disintegrating Tablet (Fast Dissolving Desmopressin) and Tablets in Treatment of Primary Nocturnal Enuresis With Special Focus on Patient Satisfaction
Resource links provided by NLM:
MedlinePlus related topics: Bedwetting Urinary Incontinence
Drug Information available for: Desmopressin Desmopressin acetateU.S. FDA Resources
Further study details as provided by Ferring Pharmaceuticals:
Primary Outcome Measures:
- Assessment of patient and parent satisfaction [ Time Frame: 3 months ]
Secondary Outcome Measures:
- Number of wet nights [ Time Frame: 3 months ]
- Assessment of drinking volume [ Time Frame: 3 months ]
- Assessment of urine volume [ Time Frame: 3 months ]
- Assessment of patient compliance [ Time Frame: 3 months ]
|Study Start Date:
|June 2011
|Study Completion Date:
|May 2013
|Primary Completion Date:
|March 2013 (Final data collection date for primary outcome measure)
|Patients treated with orally disintegrating tablet
|Patients treated with tablets
|Ages Eligible for Study:
|5 Years and older (Child, Adult, Senior)
|Sexes Eligible for Study:
|Accepts Healthy Volunteers:
|Sampling Method:
|Non-Probability Sample
Study Population
Patients with primary nocturnal enuresis
Inclusion Criteria:
- Treatment of primary nocturnal enuresis within an overall therapeutical concept, eg, in cases of failure of other non-medicinal therapies or with indication of a medicinal therapy caused by nocturnal ADH deficiency
- The patients and their parents have been informed about the study and have given their written consent for participation.
Exclusion Criteria:
- The prescription of Minirin® tablets / Minirin® orally disintegrating tablet (fast dissolving desmopressin) is contraindicated
Contacts and Locations
Choosing to participate in a study is an important personal decision. Talk with your doctor and family members or friends about deciding to join a study. To learn more about this study, you or your doctor may contact the study research staff using the Contacts provided below. For general information, see Learn About Clinical Studies.
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT01368913
Show 73 Study Locations
Please refer to this study by its ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT01368913
Show 73 Study Locations
Sponsors and Collaborators
Ferring Pharmaceuticals
Ferring Arzneimittel GmbH
|Study Director:
|Clinical Development Support
|Ferring Pharmaceuticals
More Information
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on September 21, 2017
|Responsible Party:
|Ferring Pharmaceuticals
|ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:
|NCT01368913 History of Changes
|Other Study ID Numbers:
|Study First Received:
|June 7, 2011
|Last Updated:
|June 11, 2013
Additional relevant MeSH terms:
Urinary Incontinence
Nocturnal Enuresis
Urination Disorders
Urologic Diseases
Behavioral Symptoms
Elimination Disorders
Mental Disorders
Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms
Urological Manifestations
Signs and Symptoms
Deamino Arginine Vasopressin
Antidiuretic Agents
Natriuretic Agents
Physiological Effects of Drugs
ClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on September 21, 2017


text:
Missionaries To Visit Relatives In Cedar Grove
Cedar Grove - The Rev. and Mrs. Garret DE JONG and son, Conrad, missionaries in Kuwait, Persian Gulf, Arabia, arrived
in New York City last Wednesday and have spent the past week in New York with Mrs. DE JONG's sister, Miss Jean KUYPER.
From there they are continuing to Chicago, planning to arrive at Cedar Grove Friday. A public reception, which was
announced for Thursday night, is being held Friday evening, May 27, instead, at the Cedar Grove Reformed church.
The DE JONG family are here on their furlough after six years of service in Arabia. Part of their vacation will be spent
in Iowa with Rev. DE JONG's relatives. They will also make an extended visit with her parents, the Rev. and Mrs. C. KUYPER
of Cedar Grove.
Mrs. DE JONG, who was formerly Miss Everdeen KUYPER, is a graduate of Hope College, Holland, Michigan, and was an
instructor for some time at the Wisconsin Memorial academy. A host of friends join in welcoming the DE JONG family to
Cedar Grove.
Copyright 1997 - 2005 by Debie Blindauer
All Rights reserved
Census Records | Vital Records | Family Trees & Communities | Immigration Records | Military Records Directories & Member Lists | Family & Local Histories | Newspapers & Periodicals | Court, Land & Probate | Finding Aids


text:
Russell Brand reveals Harry Styles yoga session
Russell Brand has joked he does yoga with Harry Styles.
The British comedian hit headlines recently following claims he had bonded with Demi Moore over the stretching exercise.
The star apparently also partakes in group yoga and quipped the One Direction heartthrob joins in with special sessions held at Russell's home.
"I am afraid [Harry Styles] is taken, he's one of the people doing yoga in my house right now," he laughed to BBC Radio One about the singer, who celebrates his 19th birthday today.
"Like 100 [people do yoga in my house]... It was alright, it was a bit cramped. [Yoga] will liberate you from the material world in a safe and lovely way. It should be a daily practice. Think of all the things you do every day; drink coffee smoke a cigarette... It will open up your mind to realms and realms of new things."
In aid of British charity Comic Relief, Russell is launching the Give it Up concert, which will feature stars such as Nicole Scherzinger.
The long-haired funny man admires the former Pussycat Doll for her down-to-earth attitude.
"You saw her using an escalator? Oh, that's brilliant. That's classy! She utilised the escalator," he laughed. "A lot of people would say, 'Oh no, I'm scared of that! What if I catch my long, silken boa?' But Nicole, she's up and down that. Me, I'd be like, 'Stop the thing!'"
Russell will host the Give it Up event, which aims to raise money for those struggling with alcohol and drug addiction.
The 37-year-old admits he's nervous and would like a little help from some fellow famous faces.
"There's a lot of pressure. Florence [Welch], she needs to do it. Get up on stage! Or Adele," he said.
"Prince, I love you ever so much. If you're in a room now with Prince get him to come up here. I tried to email him but I haven't had a response."
© Cover Media


text:
The Headache That Is the Hall
Could you imagine if drugs prevented anyone from getting into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? It would be the worst Hall of Fame ever. It'd be the size of a canoe. Most of your favorite bands wouldn't be allowed near the place. You could have the induction ceremony at 8 a.m. and everyone would show up on time. The speeches would be bland.
And the music? The music would be horrendous.
Thankfully, there's no rule like this. And...


text:
DOT calls Amtrak threat a bargaining ploy
Top state Department of Transportation officials are calling Amtrak's threat to end rail service in the SunRail corridor a bluff. And legislative leaders question the federally-subsided corporation's motives. It's setting up a high speed game of chicken that threatens to derail one of Gov. Charlie Crist's top priorities. Read more here.


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The New York Giants don't have much time to prepare for their latest attempt at that elusive first victory of the season.
Looking to avoid their first 0-6 start in 37 years, the Giants hope to continue their success at Soldier Field and hand the Chicago Bears a third straight defeat Thursday night.
At 0-5 for the first time since the strike season of 1987, New York must quickly move on from Sunday's 36-21 loss to Philadelphia and focus on a 3-2 Chicago team that's looking to stop its own regression.
The Giants began the season fueled by the idea of possibly playing a Super Bowl on their home field, but now will focus only on winning a game.
New York has not dropped its first six since going 0-9 in 1976.
"For us, we're not even thinking about the playoffs now," linebacker Spencer Paysinger said. "Right now we are 0-5 and looking for our first win, hopefully coming on Thursday."
The Giants have won two straight against the Bears and their last four at Soldier Field, with the latest matchup in Chicago coming in 2007. Given the current state of the team, however, relying on past success in this series seem like it would hardly be enough.
New York is allowing a league-worst 36.4 points per contest, yielding at least 31 in all five games to tie an NFL record set by the 1954 Chicago Cardinals. The Giants rallied from a 19-7 halftime deficit to lead 21-19 late in the third quarter Sunday, then allowed 17 unanswered points.
Eli Manning threw three of his league-high 12 interceptions on consecutive series in the fourth quarter. The two-time Super Bowl MVP has thrown eight touchdowns but has completed 53.7 percent of his passes and been sacked 15 times.
"The guy is trying to play the best he can," coach Tom Coughlin said. "He's certainly trying to do too much. He knows his team and he knows his responsibility. He's an extremely accountable guy and he's going to do everything he possibly can. Sometimes it's not to be done that way."
While others outside the organization might be quick to blame Manning for the Giants' struggles, his teammates will not.
"It's everyone, the receivers, the offensive line. Everyone is to blame for some of these losses," said receiver Victor Cruz, who had five receptions for 48 yards Sunday after recording 10 for 164 and a TD in the 31-7 defeat at Kansas City a week earlier.
"It's pretty frustrating. We understand that one of these games has to turn for us."
The Giants won't have running back David Wilson this week, as he suffered a neck injury Sunday after running for 16 yards, six carries and his first touchdown.
New York, which averages a league-low 56.8 rushing yards, will go with a backfield combination of Brandon Jacobs, who ran 11 times for 37 yards against the Eagles, and the recently re-signed Da'Rel Scott.
Jacobs had 62 yards and a TD on just six carries in New York's 17-3 home win over the Bears in 2010. The Giants sacked Jay Cutler nine times in the first half and sent him to the bench with a concussion.
Cutler has been sacked nine times this season, but six have come in back-to-back losses to Detroit and New Orleans. He is completing a career-best 65.7 percent of his passes and threw for a season-high 358 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions Sunday, but Chicago lost 26-18 to the Saints.
With Brandon Marshall often double-teamed, Cutler connected 10 times with second-year receiver Alshon Jeffery, who had a team-record 218 receiving yards and one score.
Jeffery has 15 receptions for 325 yards with two touchdowns the last two weeks after catching 13 passes for 104 and no scores in the first three.
Marshall caught 15 balls for 217 yards and two TDs the first two games, but has 16 receptions for 161 yards and one touchdown in the past three. That's caused him to vent some frustration he claims stems from the team's current slide instead of his own recent lack of production.
The Bears have been outscored 50-20 in the first half of the last two contests.
"Sometimes the formula may go to me, sometimes it doesn't. Whatever's best for the team to win, that's what we need to do," said Marshall, who has a TD on Sunday but was held to season lows of four receptions and 30 yards. "I'm always going to be frustrated when our offense isn't No. 1 in the league. I'm always going to be frustrated when we're losing."
The Bears held New Orleans to a season-low 347 yards but failed to force a turnover for the first time in 11 games. Chicago is third in the league with 14 takeaways, while New York's 20 turnovers are the most in the NFL.
Manning is 2-1 against the Bears despite completing 53.9 percent of his passes with one TD and four picks.
Teammate Hakeem Nicks had nine receptions for 142 yards last week. He had eight for 110 against the Bears in 2010.


text: Austal Ships has reported that a pair of cruise yachts ordered by Bora Bora Cruises of Tahiti are in the final stages of fitout at its modern shipyard south of Perth, Western Australia. "Tu Moana" and "Tia Moana" (meaning 'strong on the ocean' and 'sure and stable on the ocean') each provide 74 passenger berths in 37 outside cabins. The two cruise yachts will feature a high degree of comfort and luxury with a modern design inspired by Tahitian traditional art and incorporating the European touch of Tillberg Designs. Onboard features include a restaurant and galley catering for all passengers in a single sitting, gymnasium, library, indoor and outdoor lounges, two jacuzzis, an expansive sun deck and a host of watersports equipment, with easy access to the water. The 69 metre monohulls were launched prior to Christmas and will shortly undergo final sea trials before leaving Western Australia in late March or early April in time to commence operations in mid-June. They will operate seven-day/six night programmes from Bora Bora, with extended cruising within the lagoons of Leeward sister islands of Tahaa, Raiatea and Huahine. Austal developed the term Cruise Yachts to reflect the balance these smaller vessels provide between the most desirable characteristics of a private motor yacht and the requirements of commercial cruise operations. "Austal Cruise Yachts combine an intimate onboard experience with the ability to visit spectacular locations, like Bora Bora's huge but relatively shallow lagoon, that are inaccessible to traditional ships," said Austal Sales Manager, Glenn Williams. "Austal's specialty lies in tailoring the design and fitout to meet the intended role, so we can produce Cruise Yachts that will match virtually any combination of passenger demographics and operational requirements," he added. Austal's Managing Director, Mr Bob McKinnon, said the ability to produce Cruise Yachts highlighted one of the benefits provided by the synthesis of the expertise of the Austal group's various subsidiaries. "In designing and building cruise yachts Austal Ships can draw upon Image Marine's experience in building commercial live-aboard dive vessels and the styling and high level fitout and finish expertise that Oceanfast has demonstrated in luxury motor yachts such as the 70 metre "Aussie Rules" delivered to golfer Greg Norman last month," Mr McKinnon said. "Combining this with the skills that have established Austal Ships as a world leader in the fast ferry market, ensures that we can provide the full spectrum of fitouts, from basic but comfortable for operators targeting the budget conscious passenger through to 5 star for the ultra-luxury segment." In addition to completing the two cruise yachts for Bora Bora Cruises, Austal Ships is currently building 66 metre and 86 metre high speed vehicle-passenger catamaran ferries. Under construction at Image Marine are four 41 metre catamarans (two for Norway and two for Hong Kong) and three 22 metre monohull Coast Guard vessels for Kuwait. Oceanfast's orderbook consists of four luxury motoryachts, while US-subsidiary Austal USA has two passenger vessels under construction for New York – a 41 metre monohull and a 43 metre catamaran.


text:
Ghosts of Passovers Past
I have never quite gotten used to celebrating two seders.
After doing only one seder for each of the nine Passovers I was in Israel, the second night now seems like religious deja vu, a "Groundhog Day," where I'm setting the table yet again, rereading the haggadah and singing the same songs, thinking that if only I get it right this time, I won't have to relive the night once more.
In my life, I figure, I've been at almost 50 seders — 60, if you count the whirlwind week in Ukraine when we led them daily for the locals — and looking back through the years, I can chart the course of my life: location, family status, relationships, religious level, political affiliations and — thank God there were no photographs — some embarrassing fashion eras.
My first 17 Passovers, I did two seders in Brooklyn with the five members of my immediate family, plus guests. For me, the highlights of both nights focused on the afikomen ritual. The hiding of the second matzah somewhere in the house was accompanied by an intricate set of clues, which my father dispensed sparingly throughout the long night. So what if the clues weren't always historically accurate ("Give me liberty or give me death" = Thomas Paine = windowpane = on the windowsill), the game served its purpose: it kept us awake, children and parents alike. Back then, it seemed to be about the prize we'd receive if we negotiated well (you can't complete the meal unless you eat a piece of it), but now I see it was about engaging us, connecting us to a tradition that was partly sourced in the custom, partly personalized by our own eclectic families.
I was 18 when I spent my first Passover away from home in Jerusalem on vacation from yeshivah. As learned and religious as I was at the time, it was a disappointment to find myself at a fast-paced, no-nonsense, no-time-for-commentary seder. It was a surprise, really; I had no idea that all seders weren't like mine — with various degrees of fighting over how many sections you could expound upon or how long you could drag the songs out.
This Israeli modern Orthodox family did a rat-a-tat reading around the table (one which I would long for in later years), and I had to stumble over my paragraph in embarrassingly accented American Hebrew. Alas, there was no afikomen search! But praise the lord, there were presents. In an odd custom I have yet to see repeated, when the cup of Elijah was filled and we opened the door, a secret Santa had left a bag of goodies outside, wrapped and ribboned, with our names on them.
Since that seder, I have seen many different customs, from the children hiding the afikomen from their parents, to the different types of must-have seder night foods. When you aren't at your own seder, you are forced to adopt other people's customs ("I hope you eat kitniyot," my Conservative friend said the year I was out in Rosh Ayin, which was the beginning of my adaptation of Sephardic custom on Passover) and take on other tunes (by the end of one potluck seder my friends and I were so tired of fighting for our own melodies that everyone just cacaphonously sang out loud the last song simultaneously in their own favorite tune).
But it wasn't all fun and games. For many of the seders, I had meticulously prepared something meaningful, though what was meaningful, I see now, changed along with me. In my early 20s it was Torah insights on the text. During my years living in Israel, it was Zionist-type commentary, and as I got older, I related the text to contemporary issues: feminism, human rights, the meaning of freedom.
In 1998, I went with Hillel students to the former Soviet Union and conducted seders for both the elderly, who remembered forgotten tunes from the years before communism, or for the younger ones, who could hardly grasp the concept of religion but sure could understand freedom.
People find freedom in the most unlikely of places, such as prison (see page 10), the holy breaking of the waves, the state of Israel or the original Exodus. "In every generation let every man look upon himself as if he came forth out of Egypt," is the Passover commandment that stresses the quest to turn the journey into a personal one.
From New York to Miami to Kiev, Jerusalem and California, all my seders were different — yet all had some elements that were the same: not just the wine, the matzah, the fight over seating arrangements or the falling asleep at the table, but the sense of connectedness to each other, to our past, to our future.
At a time of great fear for Israel, for Jews everywhere — for humanity — Passover is here to teach us that we may not share certain traditions, interpretations or opinions, but as Jews we share a common past and a cojoined destiny.
Happy Passover.


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Inner Light Ministries to host 'Summer Song'
Master kora player and Grammy nominee Youssoupha Sidibe will perform world music fusion alongside local bands Love Eternal and the Rev. Robert Seals and the Mystic Truebudoors on Aug. 17, at the Inner Light Ministries, 5630 Soquel Drive, Soquel.
The event, runs 7-11 p.m., is part of Summer Song, an evening of sacred song and celebratory dance for all ages.
The suggested donation is $15 to $20.
For band information, visit www.ysidebe.com, www.loverternal.org and www.truebudoors.org.
The Sentinel welcomes submissions for Faith Digest. Email items to firstname.lastname@example.com, mail them to Faith Digest, 1800 Green Hills Road, Scotts Valley, CA 95066, or fax them to 831-429-9620.


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MINOOKA — Two new businesses to Minooka received approval for liquor licenses which will allow them to also have video gaming licenses.
The Minooka board of trustees, at its March meeting, voted to approve A2 liquor licenses for Java Jills, 841 S. Ridge Road, and for Stella's, 2035 S. Ridge Road.
Java Jills is a coffee shop and Stella's is a café and "gathering place;" both businesses will have video gaming.
In order to have video gaming, an establishment is required by state law to have a liquor license, said Minooka Village Administrator Dan Duffy.
"Without a liquor license, they wouldn't be able to have state regulated gaming," Duffy said.
An A2 liquor license allows limited liquor for on-premise use in restaurants.
Village Trustee Terry Houchens voted against both ordinances, saying the businesses will essentially be video gaming parlors.
"I hope I am wrong about the way they turn out," Houchens said. "It's nothing personal, I just feel uncomfortable in this situation."
Trustee Barry Thompson made the motion to approve the liquor ordinances contingent upon both businesses' background checks coming out clear.
Schiebel honored by board
Minooka Village President Pat Brennan presented former Planning and Zoning board member Glen Schiebel with a plaque honoring 23 years of service to the village.
Schiebel served on the village's original Planning Commission from 1984 to 1993. He then became chairman of the Planning and Zoning board and served from 1998 to 2011.
"We recognize and appreciate your dedication," Brennan said.
Schiebel said he served the village through six mayors, beginning with Ray Offerman.
"It was a pleasure to work with a lot of good citizens of Minooka, a lot of changes have come," Schiebel said. "It was a lot of fun."
In other business, the board:
• Approved the official zoning map for the village with no changes from last year.
• Hired Ottosen-Britz, Kelly, Cooper & Dinolof, LTD as legal counsel for employment and collective bargaining issues, replacing
• Approved the 2014 Motor Fuel Tax funds of $420,000 for street maintenance for 2014.
• Approved the final plat Unit 2 for Minooka Industrial Park, LLC. The motion was tabled in February due to permits from the IDNR and Corp of Engineers that hadn't cleared. All permits have now come through, according to Duffy.


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Yup, turns out it was all just a dream, America; a beautiful, post-party, clothes-still-on, loveseat-too-small, fucked up tequilla-dream. According to Exclaim!, Andrew W.K. will NO LONGER be a U.S. Cultural Ambassador to the Middle East. I know what you're thinking right now, and I totally agree: this is the single worst decision that our country has ever made.
In case you're wondering what the fuck I'm even talking about, here's a recap. Yesterday, Pitchfork and some other less pitchfork-y sources reported that the U.S. State Department (and yes, I checked into this, and "U.S." definitely stands for "United States of America") had invited Andrew W.K. to be a cultural ambassador to the Middle East. According to a now very awkward and depressing post on his website, Andrew was operating under the (totally logical) assumption that he had been "invited by the State Department to travel to the Middle Eastern country of Bahrain and share his music and partying with the people there." For "security reasons," there were no other specific details, save for the fact that we do know that his excellent adventure and/or bogus journey was to begin this December and would surely have included plenty of bloody-nosed visits to "elementary schools, the University of Bahrain, music venues, and more, all while promoting partying and world peace." (Again, not sending him on this mission sounds like the worst idea we've ever had).
Taking to his Twitter in response, Andrew pretty much summed it all up:
I'm just blown away. After a year of planning, the US State Dept. just canceled my Middle East trip because I'm too party.
Oh well. I guess it'll fall to some other brave and wise ambassador to teach the leaders of the Middle East that "when you're fightin' you feel alright."
• Andrew W.K: http://andrewwk.com
• U.S. Department of State: http://www.state.gov
More about: Andrew W.K.


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Tristan Anderson has used a computer-controlled machine to make metal tongs for fireplaces this year in his technology education classes at D.C. Everest Senior High School. And those tongs, while rudimentary, might just be the stepping stone to a career in the metal manufacturing industry.
Anderson, a 16-year-old sophomore, is the type of student local metal manufacturers need as they look for the next generation of educated and skilled workers.
Marathon County has 71 metal manufacturing and fabrication businesses that employ roughly 4,000 people, according to the Marathon County Development Corp., the economic development arm of the Wausau Region Chamber of Commerce. Metal manufacturing companies in Marathon County are competitive in national and international markets and are driving business for the future, Wausau Region Chamber of Commerce Economic Development Director David Eckmann said. Marathon County is projected to employ about 5,000 metal manufacturing employees by 2020, he said.
Anderson was one of about 65 students from 10 local schools who participated Wednesday in the Heavy Metal Bus Tour organized by MCDEVCO. The tour was designed to show students already interested in the manufacturing industry possible career choices and give the students an idea of the skills they need to develop.
"Technology is always advancing and (the industry) will need us to keep making stuff," Anderson said.
Anderson was among a group of students who visited Norlen in Schofield and Imperial industries in Rothschild. A second group toured A&B Process Systems in Stratford and Jarp Industries in Schofield.
Technical colleges and universities have built or are developing programs to train workers in the latest developments in welding, robotics and computer-operated machinery, but local businesses want to see students begin preparing for careers in manufacturing before they get into college.
Norlen Vice President and General Manager Jeff Brillhart said high school students need to develop "hard skills" such as math, blueprint reading and geometric design, as well as "soft skills" such as communication and teamwork. Norlen's metal manufacturing plant uses robotic arms, computers and old-fashioned manpower to make parts ranging from metal bottoms on fire extinguishers to handles found on military transport vehicles.
Events such as the Heavy Metal Tour are an investment in the future of local manufacturing, Brillhart said.
"It's our responsibility in the manufacturing community to give opportunities for young kids to grow a passion for this industry," Brillhart said.
Collin Pfingsten, an 18-year-old senior at D.C. Everest, was impressed by the high-tech machinery he saw and the wide variety of products developed at Norlen. Pfingsten, who has worked in construction and home remodeling, said he likes the challenge of taking an idea and developing a final product he can hold or see.
"I've always liked working with my hands and building things, that is just the way my brain is wired," Pfingsten said.
Nick Polak, a technology education teacher at Wausau West High School, said students should be impressed by the potential for careers in local metal manufacturing businesses.
"It's not just a dirty, low-skilled job," Polak said. "There is room for advancement and growth."
Source: Wausau Daily Herald