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The coffee shop girl signaled a greeting from her hospital bed, her face a pointillist palette of wounds, one eye forced shut, the other gazing off into a void. Nahrain Yonaan offered her one functioning hand; the other was swathed in gauze, a mangled claw.
She seemed cheered to think that I came to visit from the U.S. Army base in southern Baghdad where she served coffee and soft drinks to the troops, a place she had become fond of, where each day she stepped into a life comfortably apart from the deepening despair of Iraq outside the gates. She had encouraged her melancholic younger sister, Narmeen, to find work with the Americans as well. I allowed her to embrace the illusion, propagated by her mother, that a certain captain had made the trip to the squalor of Kindi Hospital in an act of solidarity.
Nahrain took my hand. She was blinded and maimed. And she did not yet know the worst: Narmeen and an aunt had been killed in the drive-by shooting and subsequent bombing that mutilated the body of this once-vivacious 25-year-old. Nahrain survived the fusillade and escaped from the targeted minivan after pretending she was dead. But in one of those acts of valor and imprudence so prevalent in wartime, she slipped back to the bullet-ridden vehicle and--in a bid to save her sister and aunt--tried to remove the bomb deposited there by attackers who were keen to finish off the victims. It exploded in her face. "Nahrain was the light of my family," her mother, shattered, confided to me.
The lamentable fact was that no one had come from the base, nor would the Army do anything to help this broken young woman. Masked gunmen had attacked the minivan she was traveling in because it ferried her and others to jobs at the U.S. camp. The assassins had stalked the vehicle from the base, a frequent scenario in the Iraqi killing grounds. She and her fellow commuters were the latest victims of a grisly but effective guerrilla strategy: eliminate any Iraqi who was "collaborating" with U.S. forces, even if their role was no more significant than serving beverages in a base cafe or cleaning the floors.
"We'll see what we can do," the major at the base, known as Camp Cuervo, told me later when I inquired whether Nahrain could be transferred to a military hospital, where perhaps her vision and limbs could be saved. "She was very popular. But we have a lot going on right now."
I made my way back to my Iraqi colleagues, who were waiting at the front gate from which Nahrain's vehicle had taken off a few nights earlier. We were apprehensive that we too would be shadowed on the way out. As I left, the major advised, "Hey, man, be careful driving out of here."
I left Iraq last summer after covering the conflict there for two years as a Los Angeles Times correspondent. There's a lot not to miss: the carnage, the ubiquitous sense of menace, the logistical barriers of reporting a story in a place where foreign journalists are shut out from much of Iraqi society. But there is also a deep sense of regret for having left behind so many Iraqi colleagues and friends, people who repeatedly risked their lives for me and others. Most have no chance to leave. It is hard to avoid feeling that I abandoned them, though none ever puts it that way.
I spent time before I left clearing out old files, revisiting past stories. I came across a photo of a battered Nahrain in her hospital bed in spring 2004. That was one story that took me a long time to get away from. But there were others too: some momentous, some lost in the daily stream of mostly bad news from Iraq.
The euphoria that followed the fall of Baghdad and the ouster of Saddam Hussein was already diminished by the time I first came to Iraq in June 2003, arriving overland in a Baghdad-or-bust Suburban that motored from Amman through the vast expanses of Al Anbar province, the sprawling swath of western Iraq, to the capital. That was the practice then, when travel was still relatively safe and no one had an inkling that Al Anbar would soon become ground zero of an insurgency that would stymie the cocky U.S. troops and claim the highest number of American casualties since the Vietnam War, with no end in sight.
"The American jet fired a missile at the mosque," the young man insisted, as others nodded in agreement. "We could see an airplane and a flash of light."
This was in a place called Fallouja, the so-called city of mosques, an insular town west of Baghdad that before long would become infamous as the symbolic heart of the Iraqi insurgency. But at this point, in July 2003, it was still a place where Western journalists could venture and even be received with traditional Arab hospitality, though lines were being drawn.
Many here, clerics and ex-generals alike, owed their well-being to the Baath Party of Saddam Hussein. He, in turn, referred to governorates such as Al Anbar, where Fallouja was located, as "white provinces" because they were loyal as opposed to the restive Shiite south and rebellious Kurdish north. To his often-divided Sunni Arab compatriots and other allies co-opted by the Baath apparatus, Hussein had communicated an unwavering message: We are a civilized minority holding back a tide of potential usurpers. Fallouja had fallen without a fight to the U.S. mechanized onslaught. Its sons, however, were soon manning the ramparts of resistance, jihad and martyrdom.
Among them was a cleric named Laith Khalil Dahham, an ascetic young man from a hamlet called Al-Bahawa in the lush date palm groves along the Euphrates to the west of town. Dahham had been a gifted scholar known for his dedication to the mystical Suffi teachings that have long held great allure in Iraq. He had risen quickly to become imam of the Al Hassan ibn Ali mosque, which drew adherents of Suffism.
But Sheikh Laith, as he was known, had joined the escalating ranks of Sunni clerics who were providing spiritual validation to the then-burgeoning insurgency. He embraced a militant stance early on. It seems naive now, after so many clerics and mosques in Iraq have been implicated, but at the time it was unclear that the anti-U.S. campaign would garner so much religious support--or that disenfranchised Sunni Arabs from places such as Fallouja would become the principal foot soldiers in an uprising that would thwart the most potent military force on the planet.
At Friday services, the firebrand railed against the "occupiers," alarming U.S. officers who monitored the weekly sermons. Angry young men came to partake in sizzling night sessions at the mosque complex, where worship melded seamlessly into calls for jihad.
Then, after late prayers on June 30, 2003, a huge explosion rocked the compound, killing at least a half dozen of Sheikh Laith's followers. The Army said that a makeshift bomb-making factory on-site had ignited by mistake. The imam initially survived the blast. He was shown on Al Jazeera television in a hospital stretcher, his gaunt body scarred from shrapnel, his battered face Christlike in its agony. He was shuffled from hospital to hospital, but adequate care was never found. Sheikh Laith was 25 when he died.
I arrived at the mosque the next morning, just as the worshipers were hoisting the unadorned coffins of those who had been killed. Bearded young men in white Arab dress and red-and-white checkered head scarves known as yasmah discharged Kalashnikovs into the air, waved black banners and vowed resistance. It was a scene out of the Palestinian intifada--in Iraq. U.S. soldiers were nowhere to be seen as the defiant funeral cortege bearing the wooden boxes marched down the dusty streets to a wind-swept cemetery. Across from the mosque, men who said they were "witnesses" were unanimous: A U.S. warplane had attacked the holy site.
At many subsequent bombings, it seemed, the story was the same: U.S. aircraft or artillery were said to have fired at the target, be it a police station, a line of recruits or a mosque. With every attack, with every outrage committed in the name of "resistance," fingers were pointed at supposed U.S. aggressors.
The Army called it fiction. But myths resonate in the paranoia-drenched atmosphere of Iraq, where a quarter-century-plus of Baathist rule had pummeled the concept of truth.
My interpreter, Suheil Ahmad, and I traveled to Al-Bahawa, Sheikh Laith's home village, in search of the dead man's relatives.
A friendly Sunni sheik accompanied us and provided the needed introductions in the conservative farm region, where the cycles of crops and prayer dictate daily life.
The late imam's extended male family--he came from a prominent tribe--greeted us along a canal amid the date palm-fringed ribbon of green that caresses the Euphrates. The men sat in the shade of the mourning tent, sipping tea and fingering beads. Sheikh Laith's father and uncles, all dressed in traditional tribal headdresses and robes, spoke with deep pride of the precocious scholar who now, indisputably, rested in paradise. Later, a longtime acquaintance, Ahmed Jasim, marveled at his friend's passing. "He has had a wonderful death," Jasim told me. "We are all hoping to have a similar end, to be martyrs like Sheikh Laith."
At the time, U.S. authorities--notably L. Paul Bremer III, the U.S. administrator and de facto proconsul--were dismissing the mounting attacks as desperation acts by "bitter enders" who would soon be annihilated by superior U.S. forces. But it never felt like that in Fallouja or elsewhere in western Iraq, where anger was building, arms and munitions were abundant and there was no shortage of volunteers--many unemployed young men gravitating in their discontent to militant mosques--to take on the U.S. troops.
The people of Sunni Arab Iraq, long divided by tribe and region of origin, had found a common enemy.
After the imam's wake, we drove into the town of Amriya to visit some of the dead man's followers, who had gathered at the house of an elderly and half-blind sheik. Abandoning caution, he began to complain that U.S. troops had arrested several area "boys" who had been transporting arms from the south. The young militants in the room quieted him and wondered aloud whether Suheil and I were intelligence agents. We quickly changed the subject to the imponderables of Sufist philosophy and then made an apologetic exit. "That was a very perilous moment, Mr. Patrick," Suheil advised me as we sped back toward Fallouja and its crown of minarets, our eyes on the rearview mirror.
It was becoming apparent--with every new ambush and roadside bombing, with most every interview I conducted--that this was going to be a long and bloody fight. Could it possibly be, I wondered, that the war was already lost?
The Russian Kamaz flatbed truck lumbered down the sweltering streets of Baghdad, its driver evidently confident that no one would take notice amid the bustle and confusion that followed the ouster of Saddam Hussein.
Concealed in the rear were more than 1,000 pounds of military-grade, high-impact explosives. At the core of the "cocktail" was a 500-pound, Soviet-made bomb meant to be dropped from an airplane. Cradling the big bomb were mortar shells, rockets, grenades, bullets: a sinister potpourri that was still widely available in Iraq, thanks to the extensive looting of Hussein's armories, though no one paid much attention to all that at the time of the U.S. invasion.
The driver--steel-nerved, fanatical or likely both--threaded the rolling bomb through the hubbub of Baghdad, reaching the site of the former hotel that housed the United Nations compound. He apparently accelerated into a wall and detonated his payload just before 4:30 p.m., as many inside were getting ready to go home. It was Aug. 19, 2003.
The truck was about 30 feet from the building, outside the concrete wall, but the blast was fierce enough to tear through the U.N. complex, collapsing the nearest corner of the three-story structure and exposing ravaged offices. It was as if someone had taken a giant can opener to the building.
The bomb killed about two dozen people, including Sergio Vieira de Mello, the U.N. point man in Iraq, a debonair Brazilian and much-admired international civil servant who had navigated thorny humanitarian and peacekeeping challenges in Cambodia, Kosovo and East Timor, among other postings. Iraq, alas, would turn out to be a test of a different order of magnitude. Months later, a rebel video hawked by open-air vendors would identify the suicide driver as an Egyptian militant who had gained holy-warrior street cred by targeting Coptic Christians in his homeland.
The finely planned and perfectly orchestrated attack on U.N. headquarters was the first major suicide bombing in post-Hussein Iraq--a grim milestone to be followed by hundreds more such incidents. Today Iraq is practically synonymous with kamikaze violence; it's almost hard to recall a time before car bombs.
The United Nations had largely opposed the U.S. invasion, but at that point it was still seen as a potential U.S. ally in steadying Iraq's deteriorating security climate. Along with De Mello, among those killed was Arthur C. Helton, a noted human rights advocate and an expert in refugee matters with whom I had spoken when I reported on U.S. immigration. He had come to look into the issue of displaced persons in Iraq. In those somewhat heady days, it still seemed conceivable that international aid organizations would descend on Iraq and make a difference.
"We're looking forward" to their arrival, a U.S. Army officer, Col. William Mayville, had told me not long before in the northern city of Kirkuk, where American forces initially had secured the oil fields and eventually moved into the ethnic tinderbox that is the northern city.
The flood of international aid workers never came to pass, like a lot of expectations there. In retrospect, it's clear that the rubble at the U.N. headquarters signaled the effective end of the notion that a global partnership might bring peace and stability to Iraq--at least for the foreseeable future. Many Iraqis had little sympathy for the U.N., which Hussein had long demonized as the agent of U.S.-organized sanctions that had throttled the country for a decade.
Iraqis came to examine the damage; this was before bombings became passe and onlookers feared being targeted in follow-up blasts. I stood in a debris-strewn highway median across from the site. The ground was littered with anti-aircraft shells, the common detritus of post-Hussein Iraq--and useful material for the improvised bombs that already were ravaging the roads.
Soon, most international U.N. personnel left the country, and Baghdad took on a fortress-like feel. Concrete "blast walls," massive sandbags, zigzagging concrete barriers, barbed wire and other fortifications chopped up the city, while armed men in various guises toted rifles and manned machine-gun nests in a once-glorious capital whose previous occupiers had included Mongols, Turks and Brits.
Ten days later, on Aug. 29, a car bomb detonated outside the gold-domed shrine of Imam Ali, a revered relative of the prophet Muhammad, in the Shiite capital of Najaf as worshipers were leaving Friday prayers. The bomb-laden vehicle was set off by remote control just as the targeted cleric was exiting one of the mosque's turquoise-tiled doorways. Blasted to bits was Ayatollah Mohammed Bakr Hakim, who had recently returned from exile in Iran and was a political and spiritual leader of Iraq's Shiite majority--and a man despised by many Sunni Arabs as an Iranian turncoat. As many as 120 others were killed, too. "They were basically collateral victims," said an FBI man who was working the case in Baghdad. "This was like a Mafia hit."
For hours, thousands thronged to gawk at the jagged remains of the charred SUV in which Hakim had been riding. It was said that all that was left of his body was a finger with a ring on it.
Filing past the twisted wreckage of Hakim's SUV, it was difficult not to be struck by the utter cold-bloodedness of attackers who would sacrifice so many lives to get one man. Or did they intend it that way? The few hospitals were overwhelmed and didn't have room for all the remains of the other blast victims; workers stacked corpses and body parts in the corridors--not the last time I would come across this macabre spectacle.
The two attacks of August 2003 made clear that something noxious had been unleashed in Iraq. There may have been a window following the invasion and the fall of Baghdad when some kind of political resolution could have been worked out. But now that seemed an increasingly remote possibility. This was a lot more than angry young men with head scarves taking potshots at U.S. convoys.
On the streets of Najaf, the mood turned volatile. Foreigners were suspect. The following day, as mourners gathered and funeral processions carried the dead to the sacred ground of the city's vast cemetery, a mob gathered outside the hotel where I and several other foreign journalists were monitoring events from a roof. The men bared knives.
We thought about jumping to the next building, but it was too far away. Ultimately, a Shiite cleric posted himself at the door and prevented anyone from entering. "These are our guests," he insisted. "We should treat them as guests."
The mob dispersed, and we were able to make our getaway, aided by some police cars that came to rescue us.
The surviving policemen of the Sunni Arab town of Khalidiya, having seen their co-workers killed in a blast targeting their station, cited the usual culprit: a U.S. warplane.
And just why would U.S. forces target U.S.-trained and U.S.-paid police? I asked at the bloody scene. "We refused to patrol with the Americans," explained one angry survivor, whose cousin was among at least 17 killed that morning, Dec. 14, 2003. How then, I inquired, did the engine block from the apparent bomb-car end up atop the rubble of the police station? "There were two American missiles," he responded, explaining that one had hit the car. Other events would soon overtake this maddening exchange.
"They found Saddam!" The cry went up suddenly as journalists at the bombing scene dashed to their cars. "They found Saddam!"
An Iranian news agency had broken the story, based on a tip from a visiting Kurdish leader. We all raced away. The slaughter in Khalidiya received scant notice in the next day's news accounts.
"He was caught like a rat," Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno told me and my colleagues that evening in Tikrit, Hussein's erstwhile stomping grounds. The tough-talking New Jersey native was briefing the press at one of Hussein's former palaces along the Tigris, now the headquarters of the U.S. 4th Infantry Division. It turned out that Hussein had been holed up a few miles away in a simple shack; the ditch outside, with a Styrofoam plug, some bricks and a weathered carpet for camouflage, had been used as an emergency haven.
The generals and their minions chuckled at the rustic setup, but the fact was that Hussein had avoided capture for more than eight months despite one of the largest manhunts in history. Those familiar with the ex-dictator's official hagiography commented on the location's significance: It wasn't far from where a young Hussein, on the run and shot in the leg, was said to have swum the Tigris en route to an epic escape that would take him into exile in Cairo and expose this cunning and ruthless country boy to the broader currents of pan-Arab nationalism.
The next day dawned frigid and blustery in Tikrit. U.S. Army Blackhawks, flying fast and near tree level to avoid ground fire, obligingly ferried reporters to the site of the capture. The sparseness of Hussein's den was striking, practically in the shadow of some of his most sumptuous palaces. There was no running water in the two-room adobe shack where he had laid low. Inside, bottles of honey, packages of new shirts and underwear in plastic wrapping and assorted clothing lay strewn about. Journalists opened Hussein's mini-fridge, fingered his books of Arabic poetry and descended into his "spider hole."
I was particularly struck by the shirts: the loud polyester kind that has worn out its welcome in much of the world, but remains au courant in retro Iraq. Hussein was a tyrant and a murderer. But no one ever said he didn't know his people, their habits and their easily offended sense of pride.
Hussein's capture sparked buoyant new forecasts that the insurgency would fold. Triumphant officials hinted that he had been holding it all together, controlling a network of funds and operatives, a kind of Professor Moriarty in his web of rebellion.
It didn't take long, though, to realize that Hussein's capture wouldn't make much difference. At the time, the U.S. military death toll in Iraq was about 460; the number recently exceeded 2,000, with thousands more injured, many maimed for life. Hussein's capture didn't pacify the seething Sunni heartland either. A separate Shiite uprising would soon ignite. And the seeds of sectarian warfare--the most chilling scenario in this very heterogeneous land--were already being sown. Within months, the images of a pathetic Hussein acquiescing to a U.S. medical examination hardly seemed to matter.
A few weeks after Hussein's capture, a suicide bomber plowed his vehicle into Nabil, a restaurant along Baghdad's upscale Arasat Street popular with foreigners. At least eight people were killed and more than two dozen injured in the New Year's Eve blast. The injured included seven staffers from the Los Angeles Times and the spouse of our technical assistant. I was on vacation with my family in a snowbound village in northern Italy when I heard the news. As joyous Italian children set off fireworks and sparklers to celebrate the New Year, I frantically dialed satellite phone numbers in Baghdad, desperate for details.
"It's terrible, Patrick," our disconsolate office manager, Salar Jaff, kept repeating to me, his tone scratchy and barely audible on the sat phone, a disembodied voice from another planet. I could easily envision the now-familiar bedlam and bloodshed. It seemed inconceivable, though, that this could be happening to my friends and colleagues, a little more than a week after I had left on a break.
All of our people ultimately survived the Nabil blast. Through a quirk of fate, the early arrivals that night had changed tables to what turned out to be a safer spot; a pregnant Iraqi woman and her husband, celebrating life in the face of the bloodletting engulfing their country, had been crushed and killed by the collapsing masonry at the very table where my colleagues were supposed to have sat. "They died in our place," Mohammed Arrawi, our computer tech, later told me, numbed at the thought. It was an inauspicious kickoff to the New Year, 2004.
"Let's take one more chai."
The morning was beginning to swelter, though it was only March. The scorching Iraqi spring was bearing down on us. The stink of dried blood and sweat permeated the air. This was the Shiite Ashura holiday--a date, as it happened, that would become part of the celebrated litany of Shiite martyrdom.
I had come to Karbala, one of the sacred cities of Shiite Iraq, expecting trouble. Hundreds of thousands of Shiites were gathering here for the holiday, which marks the 7th century martyrdom of Imam Hussein, Shia's most beloved figure and the grandson of the prophet. Throughout Iraq, people were increasingly worried about sectarian attacks--especially Sunni versus Shia, and vice versa. Karbala seemed the obvious target.
Kalashnikov-bearing Shiite militiamen stopped all cars approaching the city, including ours, and patted down everyone entering the area housing the two gold-domed shrines to Imam Hussein and Imam Abbas, Hussein's half brother. Nonetheless, the place felt vulnerable and tense as the multitudes descended.
The early-morning rites came off without incident. The chief spectacle--white-robed men striking themselves on their heads with swords--was as bloody and medieval as expected. Other self-flagellators paraded through the dense crowd, beating themselves with chains, in some cases laced with razor blades. It was a ritual shedding of blood, not the involuntary variety usually on display.
For these faithful, Imam Hussein was not a figure of the distant past. They chanted of his martyrdom and beheading on the plains of Karbala as though he had been killed just days before. Many of the pilgrims were Iranians, ecstatic about finally being able to visit the Shiite holy sites; access had long been tightly controlled in a regime suspicious of Persians, traditional rivals of Arab Iraq. Many Iranians donned gauze masks--a modicum of protection against the atmospheric soup of dust, grime and blood.
My big preoccupation that morning, March 2, 2004, was to avoid getting trampled. Hundreds of thousands of people shuffled past the city's two main shrines; separating the two monuments was a pleasant but now teeming palm-filled park--almost like a Mexican zocalo--on a site reduced to rubble a decade earlier as Saddam's forces crushed a Shiite rebellion. Once among the mass of pilgrims, I and others were carried about as though part of a larger organism, and most everybody was sprayed repeatedly with blood from the penitents. I don't like crowds as a rule and felt terribly vulnerable knowing how little it would take for a human stampede to kick off. I was relieved once we were out of the maelstrom and vowed never to get sucked into an Iraqi crowd again.
We paused at a chai stand at a quieter spot down the road, one of a number of sites where volunteers were providing hourglass-shaped goblets of sweetened tea from steaming caldrons. I savored two, then three glasses of the narcotically sugary drink and smoked as many cigarettes, taking in the retreating humanity that was then decamping from the shrine site, many still engaging in ritual self-mutilation as they ambled by.
My Iraqi interpreter, Raheem Salman, wanted to leave; Westerners always drew stares, even in the Shiite heartland, which welcomed the ouster of Hussein. I understood the value of not lingering. This was to be my last chai. And that's when we heard it: a not-so-distant thud, like a mortar round. "Not good," said Raheem, who had helped navigate me out of difficulties in Najaf and other places.
A few seconds later, another blast erupted about 40 yards down the street to our right, more or less where we would have been walking had we not procrastinated over the chai. Debris, falling bodies and panicked worshipers were soon coming our way in a kind of rippling, uneven wave. The next explosion was closer, perhaps 20 yards to our left. A fireball shot into the air. The ground shook.
Through pure chance, we found ourselves in a relatively secure spot--right between two killing zones. In that terrifying instant, my mind somehow recalled the televised scenes of people fleeing the World Trade Center attacks in 2001. The survival instinct kicked in.
We shoved our way through the cascading victims and the miasma of debris and dust closing in from both sides. I glimpsed figures falling, others unconscious and some shrieking in fright: men, women, children. We cut down a side street filled with garbage up to our ankles and ran as fast as we could, adrenalin driving us on. The detonations persisted: We assumed the city was under mortar attack. I counted eight blasts before we ducked behind a brick wall at a construction site. I used my sat phone to call my wife, my office in Los Angeles and my bureau in Baghdad, as we hunkered down and then prayed we would get out alive.
Once it seemed relatively safe to wander about, we found several bomb sites littered with ball bearings--flesh-piercing metal pellets packed into suicide vests and belts. Strips of human tissue and globs of coagulated blood clung to buildings, walls and overhead cables like gruesome confetti. Bloodied shoes were scattered about. I recall a pair of blood-drenched girl's sneakers; she must have been about my daughter's age. I offered my satellite phone to anguished Iranian pilgrims who were desperate to call home. One man was collecting pieces of seared flesh and placing them in a plastic bag. They deserved a decent Muslim burial, he explained, as he went about his task.
A week later, I returned to the site of the tea stand to retrace my steps. I wanted to measure how close the bombings were--and, to some extent, exorcise the still-palpable fright. Nine suicide bombers had struck in Karbala, the deputy police chief told me, killing 130, while as many as 70 other pilgrims perished in synchronized strikes the same hour at the resplendent Shiite shrine of Khadimiyah in Baghdad.
On the main drag in Karbala, an entrepreneur was hawking CDs with video clips of the fireball we had seen close up, spliced with scenes of slaughter. The CD, which cost about 40 cents, was a big seller.
More than a year later, the hunted eyes still follow me.
The rebel in white sneakers was in shock, stooped over on the curb, life seeping from his young body. Another insurgent lay dead on the sodden ground nearby, a big chunk of his back blown open, exposing a gouge of raw meat and jagged bone. I caught the dying man's gaze as I passed by with a Marine squad.
There was no obvious hatred in those eyes, no anger, just the fear and dread of a young man knowing he was taking his final breaths. He shivered in the cold with massive internal injuries, though no wound showed. Among the last things he would see on this earth was the unthinkable: U.S. Marines on the streets of Fallouja, a place he surely thought would never meet such a fate, abandoned by God, he might say. We didn't stay long. "He could be booby-trapped," a Marine said. A medical corpsman did attend to the wounded insurgent. But it was too late. He was dead in a matter of minutes.
They called last November's battle for Fallouja the Marines' most intense bout of urban warfare since Hue, more than a quarter-century earlier. I was among the few journalists who were able to live with a Marine infantry company as it prepped for the fight, and then walk in with the troops as they took the rebel-held city.
In the anxious days before the attack, there was a lot of talk about "payback time," as Marines recalled comrades lost and maimed in and around Fallouja, as well as the corps' ignominious retreat from the city during an aborted incursion the previous spring. When word came that the invasion was imminent, some of the men in the unit I was accompanying--Charlie Company of the 1-8, out of Camp Lejeune, N.C.--began composing what they called "just-in-case" notes. These were letters, tucked in their body armor or pockets or wallets, to loved ones back home: dads and moms, wives and children, best friends.
"That's the first time I thought about death," said Lance Cpl. Stephen Ross O'Neill, 19, of Cincinnati, who had just addressed such a missive to his father. "I don't think anyone should have to write a letter like that."
Among the journalists in our camp, nerves were becoming frayed as "I-Day," or the day of the invasion, neared. Some had decided not to go in during the first 24 hours, expecting a blood bath. We were all feeling queasy and not getting much sleep. An experienced broadcast journalist who had opted to stay behind asked what I and my colleague, Times photographer Luis Sinco, intended to do. We had decided to go in, largely because to do otherwise would have felt like a betrayal of the Marines who had been decent enough to share their lives with us. "Don't ask me to push your wheelchair," the broadcast guy sneered at me.
On the eve of the attack, we headed out before dawn in the Marines' trademark 7-ton trucks, a line of transport vehicles brimming with troops motoring through the chilly rain of the western desert. In the fog and mist the scene felt like a replay of a World War I battle. "My friends are back home flipping burgers," boasted Rafael Peguero, 19, from the Bronx, as we rumbled along toward the rebel stronghold.
We spent the daylight hours in foxholes gouged from the scorpion-infested earth north of Fallouja. Nightfall brought a spectacular display: Artillery and jets pounded the city, softening up the town before the onslaught. The Marines cheered each explosion. It was hard to imagine anyone surviving the bombardment. Finally, about midnight, we headed in, hiking through desert brush, swampy canals and bomb craters to the town limits.
It was a rough entry. The platoon I accompanied was pinned down for four hours at a traffic circle under heavy fire. A cold rain descended upon us. Before the invasion, I had imagined an almost invincible front of thousands of Marines and dozens of tanks and armored vehicles as we crossed the threshold into Fallouja. Now, though, there were no more than a dozen soaked and freezing grunts in the vicinity, and the enemy appeared to be everywhere. Illumination rounds of white phosphorous periodically transformed the inky night into an eerie day, exposing our vulnerable position and drawing curses from infantrymen who were seeking cover in the dark. I'd written about several Marine units that had been overwhelmed and nearly wiped out; I didn't savor being part of the next one.
I pulled my flak vest tight and stuck my helmeted head down in the curb, getting as low as I could to the grimy street as rocket-propelled grenades and tracer fire arced overhead. I tried to calm myself by transporting my mind elsewhere--to a favorite family retreat in Italy's Dolomites, near the Austrian border, where my wife, daughter and I go to escape. The first snow there would be falling.
Somehow we weren't overrun, and before dawn the platoon I was with finally started moving deeper into the city--first in the shadow of a giant Marine bulldozer, which shortly broke through the pavement and got stuck. Advancing through those abandoned streets in the dark was even more terrifying than being pinned down.
Fallouja was surreal and sinister; most civilians had wisely fled, leaving mainly U.S. troops and guerrillas, who took up hiding positions in houses and waited for a clear shot. Unseen U.S. aircraft groaned in the sky. We all knew the pre-sunrise lull would soon end--and it did. Insurgents opened fire on the squad I was with shortly after first light (and morning prayers) as we proceeded down a residential street. I was caught a little to the right of the main group and dashed for cover into a seemingly abandoned house; all the Marines scattered to walls on the left.
I was on my own, unarmed, at the entrance of a building with fire coming from several directions. And I wasn't aware of an important fact: Marines had entered the house a few minutes earlier and found it filled with arms and ordnance--and possibly wired to blow up. Numerous homes and vehicles had been booby-trapped.
"You gotta cross," Staff Sgt. Dennis Nash, the platoon commander, yelled to me from across the way. "We'll cover you . . . on three."
I didn't have time to think about it. At the count, I grabbed my bulky pack and sprinted across the street, no more than 15 feet wide but appearing as a vast chasm at that moment. The Marines put down a wall of fire; I could hear bullets skipping on the pavement. I dived through a hedge and onto a strip of mud where two riflemen--I recall a tall Dominican American kid, Dominguez, from New Jersey--were covering me. "I never knew you could run so fast!" one Marine after another repeated to me later. My harried dash swiftly entered company lore.
We spent several nights in mosques, many heavily damaged after serving as rebel redoubts. Waking up in a place as sublime as the Khulafa Rashid mosque in Fallouja--and finding sleeping Marines on its fine carpet as a dazzling morning sun pierced the stained glass--was something very strange indeed. After a few days of the American blitz, Fallouja lay in ruins.
For many Marines, Fallouja was their first experience in sustained combat: urban warfare, house by house, fire from the "mooj," or mujahideen, at some points coming from 360 degrees. Iraq had mostly been a hit-and-run affair; troops seldom faced off against their enemy and frequently referred to the insurgents as "phantoms" who quickly melted into the population. "I've been waiting for this fight ever since I joined the Marines," Staff Sgt. Nash, an 11-year veteran, told me. "This battle is going to be written about in history books."
Famously, Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, who headed the Marine expeditionary force that reclaimed Fallouja, declared that U.S. forces had "broken the back" of the insurgency. The fact is, the rebels lost a safe haven, but were far from beaten. A grim revolt already had broken out in the much larger and strategic northern city of Mosul. Samarra, Fallouja, Mosul, Tal Afar, Qaim, Buhruz--how many times had I attended press briefings and heard Sunni rebel strongholds declared "secured," only to be contested again?
I began receiving e-mails from relatives and friends of these Marines. They wanted to know about their men in Fallouja. The experience was very humbling and somehow harked back to a different war era, when people scanned newspaper accounts for word of their loved ones. Of course, the Internet and satellite technology had made it all so much more accessible and faster.
One woman from Texas e-mailed me photos of her recent wedding, which her brother, a captain in Fallouja, had missed. Then there was the wife of a combat engineer who was ecstatic to receive a call from her husband after I lent him my sat phone. "I am currently six months pregnant with our baby boy and he hasn't got to be here for any of it," she wrote of her husband. "Him calling was so special to me, and it made my day. We have lost several babies in the past, including one last year during the war and he was unable to be with me at that time. This is the first baby that has thrived and is making it this far. I know that he is a strong man, and that is what keeps me going."
A Marine mother from Connecticut put it to me this way: "You are our only link every morning."
Election day, Jan. 30, 2005, broke cold and ferocious in Baghdad. From the L.A. Times bureau at the heavily barricaded Hamra Hotel, we could see puffs of smoke and feel the familiar detonations. It seemed as though the worst predictions for violence might materialize. But I'd learned to expect the unexpected in Iraq.
As the hours went by, the capital quieted down; more people headed for the polls, some dressed in their best clothes. We could see lines of citizens defying death threats and walking to the booths in a city now free of cars and under extremely tight security. The desire not to be left out in this singular experiment in democracy became infectious among certain groups, especially Shiites and Kurds, who had suffered such repression under Hussein's rule.
A colleague and I headed into the Jadriyah neighborhood near our hotel. Walking the streets wasn't something one did regularly in Baghdad anymore, not since the kidnappings and beheadings of Westerners. Most news organizations had given up independent houses and opted for restricted life in some version of an armed compound. We all were terrified of being kidnapped and thrown in a cage for our loved ones to view on a grisly video. Long gone were the days when we jumped in a car without thinking twice and headed off to Mosul or Kirkuk, Najaf or Basra, the Syrian border or Kurdistan in search of a story. We now traveled in armored vehicles with bodyguards and a chase car, plotting every trip.
As we ambled through the oddly festive capital on election day, someone from among a group of children playing soccer in the streets yelled and threw something at us. A harmless anti-aircraft shell skittered our way. We maintained our pace and didn't look back. My Fallouja experience was still raw, and I stayed close to the walls to avoid snipers overhead, just like the Marines had taught me.
It was exhilarating strolling those streets, now largely devoid of traffic; civilian vehicles had been mostly banned as a measure against car bombs. The war seemed to take the day off--though there were, in fact, scores of attacks in the capital and elsewhere, mostly in the morning. People proudly displayed their purple index fingers, dyed to show that they had voted. The image is a cliche now, but it's hard to understate how uplifting it felt then. I'd never experienced Baghdad like this. The election site, at a school, was downright inspiring.
"We feel we are really doing something good," said Abdul Munaim Abdul Karim, a 63-year-old engineer and secular Shiite, who said he and his wife trekked six miles to find their polling place. "This is a historic day for Iraq."
An occupational hazard of working as a journalist in Iraq is to be accused of being too negative. Yet on Jan. 30, we were probably too positive. The press hailed the results (though we dutifully noted the poor Sunni Arab turnout, dampened by threats, distrust and a call for a boycott).
But what became obvious in the months following the elections is that the vote likely exacerbated Iraq's festering ethnic and political divides. Shiite- and Kurdish-backed slates captured about 75% of the votes; the long-dominant Sunni Arab minority felt more marginalized than ever. We were soon witnessing a relatively new and sinister phenomenon: paramilitary-style executions of civilians, reminiscent of the death squads of Latin America's civil wars of the 1970s and '80s.
Scores of bloated bodies, victims of sectarian slaughter, floated in the Tigris. Most appeared to be Shiites who had been kidnapped by Sunni Arab assassins. Inevitably, bodies of abducted Sunnis began to appear in ditches in Shiite-dominated Sadr City and environs, their hands tied behind their backs, blindfolds over their eyes, bullet holes in their heads. Witnesses reported that men in white SUVs--a trademark of the largely Shiite security services--arrived at night and took away their men.
History may well judge the landmark Iraqi elections of January 2005 as a seminal advance for democracy in the Middle East. Up close, though, the vote seemed to open even wider the floodgates of mass murder.
In February, I received an e-mail from a Marine captain with whom I had spent time during the Fallouja operation three months earlier. We'd met one dark evening in an abandoned building near city hall, where his hard-hit recon platoon--with a Purple Heart rate approaching 50%--had taken up sniper positions. They picked off rebels, one by one, from the blacked-out windows. The captain informed me that he had been seriously injured in a raid south of Fallouja after we last spoke; his ulnar nerve and an artery were severed in his right forearm, and he was scheduled for nerve-graft surgery. A sergeant whom I'd also met had been killed in the same operation.
"The election turnout was inspiring," the captain wrote. "It was good to see that our contributions mean something to these people."
I couldn't help but admire that kind of hopefulness. But I also couldn't help feel that he and others had been used as instruments of someone else's grand ambitions--like warriors from time immemorial, I suppose. The entire enterprise in Iraq rests on two shaky premises: First, that the disenfranchised and radicalized Sunni Arab minority--accustomed to being dominant--will somehow acquiesce, accept the new Iraq and abandon its armed struggle. And second, that the Iraqi armed forces, notoriously infiltrated by the rebels, will be able to keep the peace without a large-scale, open-ended U.S. troop presence.
The country's Shiite political elite--mostly longtime exiles with strong links to Iran--know they've ascended for one major reason: U.S. force. But they cannot say that to the Iraqi public. Instead, they must hint obliquely that Hussein's overthrow was the result of some kind of internal Shiite revolt or divine intervention. To give credit to the Americans, to Sgt. Nash and the men of Charlie Company and all the others, would be political suicide.
U.S. forces in Iraq have no illusions about their dual, contradictory role. They prop up the government and provide some measure of security--probably holding off an all-out battle for control of Baghdad. On the other hand, their very presence is the insurgency's major selling point.
I saw Nahrain Yonaan one last time before I left Iraq.
We arranged to meet at a mutual friend's house. At this point, I dared not go into her neighborhood in Baghdad's southern Doura district, a hotbed of insurgent activity and rebel checkpoints. Nahrain looked drained, lacking the vitality I had sensed even when she was half-conscious in that hospital bed more than a year earlier. She had lost her left eye, her right eye was close to sightless, her hearing was disintegrating and several toes and fingers were mangled or missing. Pain was constant and shrapnel remained in her body--the result of pitiable medical care.
The frequent gunshots in her neighborhood terrified her; she feared insurgents might return to finish her off. "Everyone was nice to me during my time with them," she said, still befuddled that the Army had not offered medical assistance. "I was shocked to be ignored by them."
By Nahrain's side sat her older sister, Atoor, 27, a spirited soul who was filled with resentment about the new Iraq. "I am a young woman, but I can no longer go out freely and walk the streets," she said. "I cannot put on jeans and walk out because people will start calling me bad names." As Christians, Atoor and Nahrain were appalled at the graffiti that smeared their churches, the bombs at Sunday services, the coerced wearing of head scarves and the threats to a group that had lived side by side with Muslims for centuries. In their view, a wave of fundamentalism and moral absolutism was sweeping their nation.
Nahrain and her sister were on their way to Amman, Jordan, looking to start fresh in a new place. Their dream was to acquire U.S. visas, but the sisters had little hope of ever being granted the prized documents, despite relatives in America who were willing to sponsor them. Iraq, the country of their birth, wasn't for them anymore.
It's something you hear a lot in Iraq these days: The lucky ones get out. "I still have hope in the future and in life," Nahrain said, "but not here."
I bade farewell to Iraq in mid-July, hoping for the best as we careened down the airport road, past the bomb-gouged potholes and the unlucky spots where so many had been blown up. I must have traveled this way 50 times. A few months earlier, Marla Ruzcika, a 28-year-old aid worker from Northern California and a friend of many journalists, had been killed there, along with her driver-translator, in a suicide bombing that had targeted a convoy traveling near her car. The fate of this woman whose exuberance seemed to mock the very notion of mortality was on my mind as we sped along.
I got dropped off and double-stepped with my bags past the carcasses of vehicles destroyed by suicide bombers to the relative safety of the Nepalese contract guards at Checkpoint One, behind a comforting concrete wall. I took a deep breath. I endured a final round of searches, preoccupied as always that someone in line might be concealing a bomb and preparing for paradise. I then waited eight hours in the Baathist cathedral that is the Baghdad airport terminal for a flight out.
A series of odd summer sandstorms had enveloped Iraq, and the few commercial flights were spotty. Many blamed the Americans--who else?--for the curious meteorological events that had cast an ochre pall over the battered capital. Something about military activity in the west kicking up the sand and dust.
Abruptly, the sky cleared and the Royal Jordanian jet that was to extract me and a motley assemblage of security contractors and assorted Iraqis approached the airport on its delayed run from Amman. As if on cue, an explosion shook the terminal. A mortar landed harmlessly about 100 yards away, drawing a glance from the seen-it-all security men also waiting for the flight. "They're getting closer," commented an Aussie contractor, who looked out the terminal window and watched the reddish-brown earth erupt as the mortar struck the desert.
We boarded uneventfully and took off safely, the jet banking severely into the overcast skies to avoid potential rocket fire. Two hours later I was in a taxi in Amman. This had been my 12th or 13th trip into Iraq. I'd lost count. But I was in one piece, more or less. I telephoned my wife in Italy. It was time to start a new life. Iraq was somebody else's story now.

subset: commoncrawl


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32. Halco: Low-Voltage LED Elevator LampHalco's ProLED elevator lamps are a low maintenance, energy saving alternative to traditional incandescent. ProLED elevator lamps draw 2.6W compared to 20W incandescent, saving over $76 in energy costs over the 40,000 hour life of the ProLED lamp. Backed by a 5-year warranty, the series includes GBF and 1383 equivalents. Literature: Low-Voltage LED Elevator Lamp Product Information
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31 Mar 2014 - Version 1.0.021
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21 May 2013 - Version 22.214.171.124
Download size: 42 MB
Works with Windows Phone 8
App requires:
phone identity
owner identity
media playback
data services
movement and directional sensor
HD720P (720x1280)
WVGA (480x800)
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The most addictive racing game with realistic controls and 50+ real cars!
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WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has begun to reassess its foreign policy on such topics as Iran, Syria, Afghanistan and missile defense that were viewed as too politically sensitive for any substantial shifts during the presidential campaign.
For months, these issues had what some U.S. officials called "AE" status, meaning any policy changes would be put off until after the election.
But with Obama winning a second term, top administration officials say they are considering whether to deepen U.S. involvement in Syria's civil war, accelerate the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan and offer Iran a compromise deal to curb its enrichment of uranium.
They also are considering how to work out new cooperation with China, an undertaking that Obama campaign operatives had feared might alienate swing-state voters anxious about Chinese trade policies and competition.
The administration already is taking a new direction on the worsening Syrian conflict, which threatens to spread turmoil and refugees across the Middle East. After months of trying to limit the U.S. role, administration officials said they have begun trying to help reshape the civilian-led rebel movement so it can better defend itself against heavily armed military forces loyal to President Bashar Assad.
The opposition formed a new umbrella group over the weekend that was recognized Monday by six Persian Gulf states as the "legitimate representative" of the rebels.
Since the conflict began early last year, the Obama administration has resisted pressure to deepen collaboration with the opposition and has refused to supply heavy weapons to its fighters. Advocates of that approach, including some top U.S. officials, argue that unless Washington and its allies strengthen and better organize the insurgents, the administration could see Syria taken over by dangerous militants, or a victory by Assad that would strengthen his Iranian allies.
Many U.S. officials are determined to steer clear of even low-level military involvement or support for the rebels, partly because of the risk that extremists would obtain U.S. weapons. But officials acknowledge that the policy is getting another look.
International talks about Iran's disputed nuclear program were suspended in the summer by mutual consent. The White House didn't want to appear too conciliatory, and Iranian officials thought they couldn't negotiate an acceptable deal while Obama was running for re-election.
Now both sides are signaling a willingness to talk one-on-one, or as part of the six-nation group that held three meetings with Iran this year. Negotiations could resume as soon as this month.
The talks could raise a controversial proposal that many analysts believe is key to any solution: allowing Iran to conduct low-level uranium enrichment for peaceful purposes, as permitted under international treaty, but with tough international safeguards and monitoring to ensure that it doesn't use the program to make weapons.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other top administration officials have spoken favorably of this idea, but the White House barred discussion of it during the campaign.
In Afghanistan, the administration is embroiled in deliberations on whether to front-load the departure of the 68,000 remaining U.S. combat troops. Though the last U.S. troops won't leave until the end of 2014, some administration officials want to start the withdrawal early next year. Some senior military officials are seeking a delay, arguing that they need the full complement for next year's fighting season.


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Richard Krauzlis, Ph.D.
Richard Krauzlis, Ph.D.
Eye Movements & Visual Selection Section Chief
Rich Krauzlis earned his undergraduate degree from Princeton University and doctorate in Neuroscience from the University of California, San Francisco, in Steve Lisberger's laboratory. After postdoctoral training with Fred Miles and Bob Wurtz at the National Eye Institute, he was recruited to the Salk Institute in 1997, where he was promoted to Full Professor in the Systems Neurobiology Laboratory. In 2011, Rich returned to the National Eye Institute as a Senior Investigator in the Laboratory of Sensorimotor Research and Chief of the section on Eye Movements and Visual Selection.
Work in Rich's laboratory is aimed at understanding the brain mechanisms that link motor control to sensory and cognitive processing, using a variety of techniques to manipulate and monitor neural activity. One key result from his lab's work is that the superior colliculus (SC), a structure on the roof of the midbrain best known for its role in the motor control of orienting movements, contains a "priority map" that keeps track of behaviorally relevant objects in the visual field. Activity in this map is important for deciding where and when to look, but also plays a crucial role in selecting which signals are taken into account when making perceptual judgments, even in the absence of orienting movements.
Rich's vita includes papers on pursuit and saccadic eye movements, physiological studies of the superior colliculus, cerebellum, and cerebral cortex, psychophysical studies of visual motion perception and visual attention, and computational modeling of eye movements. He has authored several review articles on eye movements, including a chapter in the graduate textbook Fundamental Neuroscience. He also serves on the Editorial Boards for Journal of Neuroscience and Journal of Vision and is a Senior Editor for Vision Research.


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COLLEGE STATION – Texas A&M is down to one prominent voice that has not spoken on the Aggies' historic shift to the Southeastern Conference – and from this point forward it's arguably the most important voice considering Aggies' passion for football.
Coach Mike Sherman on Monday declined to address the big-picture aspect of the move to the SEC, although a week earlier he had promised he'd talk about it at length once A&M president R. Bowen Loftin made the announcement official.
It's official – the Aggies threw a big party in the Zone Club a week ago, complete with SEC commissioner Mike Slive – but still nothing from Sherman. Considering he's .500 as a Big 12 member (21-21), there might be plenty of reason for any perceived timidity on his part about competing in the nation's best football conference.
(A&M also reiterated to me that the move to the SEC wasn't all about football, but my perspective is from what 95 percent of fans and media show up to Aggieland for).
It also doesn't help that Sherman's program is coming off two of the biggest gags in school history in successive weeks, in blowing a 17-point halftime lead to Oklahoma State and an 18-point halftime lead to future SEC foe Arkansas, so I'm guessing those aided his going back on his word and not addressing the move. Sherman is 0-5 against the SEC over four seasons.
A few notes from Monday's weekly press conference, with Texas Tech at hand starting 6 p.m. Saturday in Lubbock:
* Sherman said defensive end Jonathan Mathis is out for the season with a leg injury. The Aggies will apply for a medical redshirt for the senior. Ben Bass is scheduled to earn his second consecutive start in Mathis's place at Tech.
* Strong safety Steven Campbell (leg) is expected back in a "couple of weeks," Sherman said, after Campbell missed the 42-38 Arkansas loss.
* I had flashbacks to the Dennis Franchione era today, with discussions of a coach punting on fourth and short in crucial situations, spirit bracelets and the coach turning questions back on reporters, a Franchione specialty. Franchione was 22-20 through his first 42 games, one up on Sherman to this point.
* Defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter said "all jobs are open" as the Aggies continue searching for answers on that side of the ball. A&M is ranked last nationally – 120th – in pass defense with another passing team at hand Saturday in the Red Raiders.


text: HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- The Reserve Bank of India on Tuesday left its lending rate unchanged at 8% and commercial banks' cash reserve ratio at 4.25%, noting that inflationary pressures have eased of late. The RBI said it is closely monitoring growth and inflationary trends and will update its assessment of them as part of its projections for 2012-13 in January. The decisions, which are in line with market expectations, held the U.S. dollar steady against the Indian currency, with the greenback USDINR, +0.0000% trading at 54.78 rupees minutes after the RBI decision. The 30-stock Sensex 1, +0.10% gave up early gains and retreated, however, shedding 0.2% to 19,204.48.


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Elisabeth Moss arrives for our interview by chopper. Which might seem pretty flash, even for an actress whose character Peggy Olson has been a vital part of the acclaimed 1960s ad agency drama series Mad Men for five seasons.
But no, it's all part of her day on Top of the Lake.
She's been out filming scenes where her police detective, Robin Griffin, has been searching by air for the runaway 12 year-old at the centre of the story. And the diminutive Moss arrives at the Glenorchy Hall looking very much a local in Ugg boots and a hoodie, which, it must be said, set off her vivid blue eyes very nicely.
It was her first time in a helicopter, just one of the firsts the series has offered the 30-year-old American actor.
Top of the Lake represents her first major role since the Mad Men role of Peggy, the shy girl from the typing pool whose copywriting talent saw her rise through the ranks despite many personal setbacks.
Acting since she was a child, Moss first came to wider attention as Zoey Bartlet, the teenage daughter of Martin Sheen's President Jed Bartlet, on Aaron Sorkin's series The West Wing before graduating - via the occasional movie role - to Mad Men.
Playing Peggy as the character has become more sensible and successful - last season she was poached by another agency - still presents a challenge, she says.
"It's a delicate balance between allowing her to grow and allowing her to change and retaining sight of the original Peggy that we love and not losing sight of the original person and the character that the audience has identified with.
"So it becomes easier in the sense that she becomes closer to myself, it becomes more fun because she is more confident and funnier, and you definitely want to have something new to play."
TotL certainly offers that. And not just because Peggy has rarely done a scene outdoors whereas Moss has been out in the wilds, scouring mountain ranges and lake edges most days during her months on the shoot.
"There's definitely pressure. It's the biggest thing I've ever done ... but I prefer to think of it as a challenge otherwise you'd get scared and I think that in the beginning you feel that more, but after two or three months you are just doing your job and trying to do the best job you can.
"The amount of stuff that you are involved in is pretty epic."
Moss had pursued the part after hearing about it. Campion had originally planned on using an Australian actress - partial funding by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation for the six-part series had depended on it - but didn't find anyone she thought was right.
"The material is quite difficult and quite complicated," says Campion. "You can't get away with just being real - you have to have some other quality that holds your interest. "And Lizzie did an audition that she sent to us and I guess we weren't holding out much hope. But for the first time we found ourselves riveted.
"She holds you and she's mysterious and I think for her it's a great role because it is so different from the Peggy character that she is so loved for in Mad Men.
"She's got that hardness but Lizzie stays open, she lets you in ... she can ground the work and she can keep it surprising."
Moss's Griffin, is a policewoman specialising in crimes against children, who, while visiting her ailing mother in Queenstown, gets involved in the life of young Tui Mitcham (Jacqueline Joe) when it's found the girl is pregnant. Griffin also has her own troubles to face including an old flame who has resurfaced. Moss: "It becomes a kind of diving down the rabbit hole kind of thing where she starts uncovering all the lies and secrets of this place and ends up going on this journey to look for this girl, but also look for herself."
Moss headed to the Queenstown-based shoot just a few days after wrapping the fifth season of Mad Men, arriving with the new Antipodean accent she had been practising for months.
"It's such a difficult accent," she says in her own Californian tones. "What we've done, and I think it's kind of important for us to stress, is that we are not trying to do a regionally specific Australian or Kiwi [accent] or whatever. We just wanted it not to sound American and we just wanted to tell the story. It's essentially Jane's accent.
"The whole thing from the beginning was 'let's not try to prove a point here, just take all the American out of it so that we can listen to the story'."
If Mad Men has one thing in common with TotL, is that's it's partly about sexual politics - though the Campion series is far more extreme.
"There's are things that are far worse than sexual harassment in the workplace going on. It deals with different elements of people's psyches and evil.
"It's a bit darker than the ass-grabbing that we've done on the show at times," she laughs "but both are equally important to show, I am sure."
Top Of The Lake starts on UKTV on March 25.
Mad Men's sixth season starts on SoHo on April 14.
- TimeOut


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Science Friday® and SciFri® are registered service marks of Science Friday, Inc. Site design by Pentagram; engineering by Mediapolis.
|They're tiny, they're stinky, and they're probably coming soon to your neighborhood. About 8 years ago, the brown marmorated stink bug was first spotted near Allentown, Pennsylvania. Now the Asian import has been found in states from Virginia to Oregon -- and with no natural predators in the US, the spread is predicted to continue. It has become an agricultural pest in the mid-Atlantic states, although the bugs have made themselves known to homeowners as well. The insects try to invade buildings as the weather turns cooler, sometimes leading to sizable infestations in homes. We'll talk about the bugs, and their prospects in the US.


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I'm back this week with part two of my funtastic chat with Josh "Josho" Mandel. This time, the maestro chats about why point-and-clicks were a dumbing down from the parser days, the making of Freddy Pharkas, his voicework as King Graham, his thoughts on LucasFilm and Myst (loves the former; loathes the latter), and Space Quest 6.
If you want to buy Space Quest 4-6 for only $10, DRM free, get it here to support Matt Chat at no extra cost to you!
You can download the mp4 here as well.


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text: Bluetooth Speaker: Minx Go 16 January 2014 david Blog A while back (probably towards the end of 2012 in fact) I saw one of those Bose SoundLink bluetooth speakers being demonstrated. I was pretty impressed and made a mental note that it would be a cool thing to buy. Since my phone/tablet/laptop all have bluetooth, it makes sense to be able to beam out some nice quality sounds from them. If nothing else, it's a bit like having a hi-fi in every room of your house, you can just carry the speaker round with you. Anyway, now I've finally decided to get one there seems to be a lot more choice, and there are some cheaper alternatives that still give good sound quality. So I've bought a Minx Go made by Cambridge Audio. It's quite an impressive thing and has worked with every bluetooth device I've got. It also means that if we're watching BBC iPlayer on my MacBook, then I can enjoy nicer sound quality. The Minx Go is a bit bigger than the Bose one, but that doesn't matter to me... It was quite a lot cheaper though. But despite the cheaper price, the sound quality still seems excellent as evidenced by the review in What Hi-Fi found here where it receives top marks. It especially gives nice bass for a relatively small unit I reckon. Of course, other bluetooth speakers are available, but I have to say I'm quite happy with my choice.


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Microsoft added another weapon to its advertising arsenal today, acquiring the European mobile advertising company known as ScreenTonic SA. Based in France, ScreenTonic refers to itself as the "European pioneer in mobile advertising." Back in January, the company boasted that it had surpassed the one billion mark in page impressions sold.
ScreenTonic's forefront product is known as STAMP Technology, and it consists of a management platform, ad server, and reporting and billing tools. One selling point of STAMP is all the factors that can be accounted for when creating targeted ads. Some of those factors include screen size, audio capabilities, formats (WAP, XHTML, video), geolocation, capping, and user information. Using STAMP, Microsoft will have fine-grain control over its targeted advertisements while hopefully luring more advertisers to its Internet-driven platforms like Windows Live and MSN.
While ScreenTonic's major focus has been mobile devices, Microsoft stated in a press release that it expects the company's technologies to also be useful in targeting PC users and Xbox gamers. "Together, we will be able to provide relevant ads where consumers are, when they are actively engaged and communicating," said Steve Berkowitz, Microsoft's senior vice president of the Online Services Group.
Besides technology, another important piece of this acquisition is the fact that ScreenTonic has strong relationships with some very large brands and operators in Europe. Companies such as McDonald's, Nokia, Toshiba, Apple, and Disney help fill out ScreenTonic's laundry list of connections. Being that ScreenTonic already has a strong presence in Europe, expect Microsoft to start reaping the benefits of this acquisition within the next few months.
Because ScreenTonic is a privately held entity, the financial details of the acquisition were not released.


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Beginning fall 2012, PSU adopted new automated waitlist notification technology. This functionality sends an email to the student who is first in line on a waitlist for a course within seconds of a spot opening up. The student is given 24 hours to add the course. If this student does not add the course, the next student on the waitlist will be notified that a spot is available in the course. This system has been working incredibly well and has helped many departments determine when demand is high enough to open new sections of classes and keep their existing popular courses full.
The automated messaging continues throughout the priority registration period, but ends 24 hours before the first day of the term. Once the term has begun, no more waitlist notification emails are sent. This decision was made to give instructors more control over the enrollment in their class.
For those of you instructing high demand classes, here are a few things you can do to optimize your enrollment:
- Publish in your subject header in the Schedule of Classes that students must attend the first class meeting or they may be dropped from the course.
- Contact your department scheduler to request a "Department Approval" restriction on your course after the first class meeting. This will prevent other students from adding the course online if a currently registered student drops your course. This will ensure that only the students who attended the first class session and obtained permission to add on a Special Registration form will be able to add your class.
- At the first class meeting, gauge how many seats are available due to non-attendance and sign Special Registration forms for students who are present. Best practice is to sign in students based on waitlist order.
- After the first class meeting, send an email to each student who did not attend the class telling them that because they missed the first class meeting they will be dropped from the course.
- Send an email to email@example.com stating your course CRN, Subject, Course Number and a list of students (with PSU ID) whom you wish to drop for non-attendance. Please confirm that you have notified the students when you make this request.


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Mayhew's Head Vet Dr Ursula Goetz giving a vet demo during Open Day.
Maisie the double merle has to contend with being blind and deaf, because she was bred that way. Double merle matings should never happen, and in this interview you can hear Maisie's owner, Hayley Justice, talk about how she communicates with and trains her beautiful dog. Taylor Wilkins tells host Julie why he started his company, Cody's Comforts, which provides responsibly sourced, natural products for dog owners. Plus the DogCast Radio News.
In this episode you can hear Mark Winik talk about his debut novel, The Dog Healers, and listen to Julia Robertson explain why she founded the charity War Dogs remembered. Plus there's the DogCast Radio News, and what Mischief the German Spitz puppy has been up to.
In this episode you can hear about Service Dogs UK, a fantastic charity which trains assistance dogs to support veterans of any service - military personnel, police, firefighters, paramedics and the coastguard - who develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder due to their job. Also, listen to Dr Jody A Dean, a clinical psychologist talk about how her book, Roxie the Doxie finds her Forever Home, is helping children understand and talk about adoption and other family issues. Plus the DogCast Radio News and some thoughts on the alpha dog myth.
In this episode you can hear about Muffin's Halo for Blind Dogs, and what motivates people to enter their dog in a fun dog show. In the DogCast Radio News, listen to stories about the latest dog related research. Plus there's a new member of the DogCast Radio team!
In this episode you can hear trainer, behaviourist, writer, broadcaster and wolf expert Maxwell Muir talk about what wolves mean to him personally, their plight in a modern world, and his hopes for their future. Plus we have the DogCast Radio News.


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The Importance of Caving Knee Pads
If you're going caving, then you'll need to wear and bring some special equipment like a helmet, caving under suit, wetsuit and pads for caving.
If you're going caving, then you'll need to wear and bring some special equipment like a helmet, caving under suit, wetsuit and pads for caving among others. While other gear like the harness, descenders, ascenders and headlamps are all considered important, not much attention is usually given to the pads for your knees and elbows. This is unfortunate since they are very important.
Why Pads are Important
Protective pads for caving are designed to do just that, protect your knees. The best material is neoprene, although others are available. Regardless of what you use, their purpose will always be the same, and that's to make sure your knees don't get hurt while you are crawling around. Although different types are available, all caving knee pads are responsible for protecting your kneecaps, which are made up of the patella and meniscus tissue. When you kneel on hard surfaces like rocks, these can get scraped, wounded or bruised, and left untreated may cause problems later.
Aside from that, these pads will also shield your knee from abrasion and other damage that might arise from crawling in caves or bumping them against hard surfaces. Note that athletes in contact sports also wear pads, but the ones used for caving are stronger and more durable.
Function of Safety Pads
These pads can function in different ways, with some designed to be a bonnet for the knees. For caving purposes, the padded area is in front of the knee or covers a good portion of the front and sides. Some pads for caving look like a hat while others are designed similar to a glove or cuff which is slid over your foot up your leg all the way to your knees. These special pads, it should be noted, provide protection not just for your knees but also for your legs. By wearing protective padding, your kneecaps won't suffer or experience deterioration even during intense activities like caving, plus it acts as a deterrent against knee injuries and inflammation.
Ultimately, what a good pair of pads does is keep your knees from getting beat up during caving. One of the things you need to know is that your kneecap is just 1 ¼ inches thick and a couple of inches wide, so it can be vulnerable. If you spend a lot of time caving or plan to, getting protective pads for caving will be necessary so you don't wear out your kneecaps quickly.
Caving knee pads are crucial.


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Hub replicas act as both consumers and masters to further distribute replicated data to a larger number of consumers. Hub replicas receive replication updates from their suppliers and send replication updates to their consumers. They do not accept modifications, but instead return referrals to the masters.
Configuring a hub server consists of preparing an empty suffix to hold the replicated suffix and enabling replication on that suffix. Optional advanced configuration can include choosing a different replication manager, setting referrals, setting the purge delay, and modifying change log parameters.
The following sections explain how to configure one hub server. Repeat all procedures on each server that will contain a hub replicated suffix.
If an empty suffix does not already exist, create it on the hub server with the same DN as the intended master replica.
For instructions, see Creating Suffixes.
If the suffix exists and is not empty, its contents will be lost when the replicated suffix is initialized from the master.
If you have hub replicas, enable them now.
You can use DSCC to perform this task. For information, see Directory Service Control Center Interface and the DSCC online help.
Enable the hub replicated suffix.
$ dsconf enable-repl -h host -p port hub suffix-DN
For example:
$ dsconf enable-repl -h host1 -p 1389 hub dc=example,dc=com
For advanced hub configuration, the only parameters that you might want to modify are related to the change log. As a supplier, a hub server requires a change log.
You can use DSCC to perform this task. For information, see Directory Service Control Center Interface and the DSCC online help.


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My answer to What is the most important activity a successful sales team manager/leader does each day?
Answer by Jeannette Marshall:
The most important activity a success sales team manager/leader does every day is being out in the field with their team. Most rely solely on results and metrics while they sit behind their desks, look busy and attend management meetings. Your job is to help drive revenue. Chances are you were given the post because you have expertise that can be used to mentor and coach individuals. Being a sales manager that shows a genuine interest in helping his/her team builds championships and motivates a loyal team.
What is the most important activity a successful sales team manager/leader does each day?
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Here follows a selection of what goes on at the New York Irish Center:
Saturday Senior Computer Club – ongoing
The Saturday Seniors Computer Club continued its growth in 2012. 10-14 Seniors come together every week to share and learn from each other in our cozy downstairs Library space. James McHugh has developed a unique program where friendly computer savvy volunteers guide the Seniors through the virtual world of social media, email, YouTube, Facebook, Skype and much more besides. This is a relaxed mixing of the generations where computer tips and stories of bygone times fill the air over a keyboard and a cup of tea. There are two courses every Saturday at 10am and 11.30am.
Visit www.nyirish.org for further details.
Wednesday Senior Lunch Program – ongoing
One of the Center's longest running programs is The Wednesday Senior Lunch, held Every Wednesday The Center warms to the sound of Seniors enjoying each other's company over lunch. The food is provided courtesy of an ever increasing roster of New York Irish Bars and Restaurants, many of whom have supported this program since its inception in 2006.
Story Corps - February 2012
Modelled on the highly successful NPR radio series, one of our interns, Rachel O'Donnell produced our very own "StoryCorps" recordings. This was a unique opportunity to capture some of the oral history of our Seniors. Conor Murphy of Verbatim Studios contributed his time and expertise Pro Bono, helping to ensure a high quality product. Five participants were recorded; Frank Gordon, John Houlihan, Tom McCluskey, Tony Lambe and Patrick Morgan. New York Irish Center Board Member and Volunteer Padraic Feeney conducted the interviews. The recordings can be enjoyed on our website at www.nyirish.org.
Children's Programs -ongoing
Jane McCarter, Arts and Cultural Director, is heading up our Children's Programs at the Center. In 2012, she produced three distinct programs, laying the groundwork for the future development of our Children's programming.
Jane's most ambitious, collaboration with Christel Rice, Niall O'Leary and Vera Doherty, a two week Summer program, the Tír na Nóg Children's Festival.
The Festival was a unique blend of the arts; visual, musical and theatrical, celebrated via one of the richest veins of Irish mythical folklore, Tír na Nóg. Jane also produced Oíche Shamhna, where children learned about the Irish roots of Halloween, and the Children's Christmas Party.
All of our 2012 Children's events were a great success and Jane has exciting plans for 2013. Watch this monthly space for details, bookmark our website at www.nyirish.org or check us out on Facebook.
Irish Movie Night Program -ongoing
Chris Deignan created the Monthly Irish Movie in 2011 and continued it in to 2012. We like to think we offer a unique moviegoing experience where quality Irish film meets unmatched Irish hospitality. Doors open at 7.30pm and moviegoers are encouraged to mingle and enjoy our pre-show downstairs hospitality where they can enjoy FREE tea, coffee, snacks and popcorn and a discount bar, hosted by our friendly team of Movie night volunteers.
As in 2011, we continued our collaboration with the 1st Irish Theatre Festival, under the auspices of their Artistic Director, George Heslin. This year we enjoyed a first time collaboration with the Irish Rep's Ciaran O'Reilly who performed the opening monologue of Dancing at Lughnasa before a screening of the movie of the same name. Our next Movie Night is on Friday Dec. 21, doors 7.30pm features John Huston's "The Dead" and our short is an Irish original, "Cluck". Tickets at www.nyirish.org
Live Music Program - ongoing
Chris also developed the Live Music Program. This is a very exciting program which attracts many new people to the Center. We have a wonderfully intimate space, highly conducive to the enjoyment of quality musical entertainment.
One of the highlights of the year was Grammy Award Winner Susan McKeown who was joined on stage by another major Irish talent, Michael Brunnock. Chris plans to expand the program in 2013.
Annual Fundraiser, June 2012
Our annual benefit was held on June 14th at Symphony Space, a prestigious 800-seat venue on Manhattan's Upper West Side. This year represented a move away from the traditional Dinner Dance format and it proved to be a great success. Mark Fox, a member of our Executive Board produced the show, ably abetted by Jane McCarter as Stage Manager. The two stars of the show, both titan of Irish comedy, were Brendan Grace and Pat Shortt, with music provided by Colin Smith. All played to a packed house rung loud with laughter, inspiring us to reach even greater heights in 2013.
Genealogy Program - ongoing
Bridget Bray created the Genealogy Program which was held twice in 2012. The first course was in January and the second in October. Over 30 people attended each session. The talks/workshops focused on how to get started in tracing your family roots. Bridget's enthusiasm and knowledge are infectious and impressive and it's no wonder that she was also the driving force behind a very well attended two day Genealogy Event in Manhattan in October.
She has tapped in to a rich vein of breath to see what she has in store for us in 2013.
Public Relations Program - ongoing
Howard Maxwell started the Public Relations Group which developed the monthly New York Irish Center Newsletter. It has been published every month this year and we look forward to expanding it in 2013.
Response to Sandy - ongoing
Under the able direction of Paul Finnegan, a tireless Corina Galvin and a team of volunteers, the response of the New York Irish Center to Hurricane Sandy has been considerable. The Center received many donations from the community and with the help of The Padded Wagon, delivered several truck loads of aid to the Rockaways.
Thank you to everyone for their help and please continue to do all you can to help those affected by Hurricane Sandy.
New Promotional Video
In 2012, Paul Finnegan commissioned a new promotional video. Produced in collaboration with New Aims Production (based in Ireland), the video runs just over four minutes in length and tells the unique story of the New York Irish Center and its development since 2003.
Check it out the on home page of our website at www.nyirish.org.
It has been a memorable year and as we look forward to 2013, we invite you to join us on our journey as we continue "Building Community, one person at a time"


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The Earth may be warming, but human activities are not responsible: Even if the Earth is warming, it is obviously part of the continuing recovery from the "little ice age," the cool period from the fifteenth to eighteenth centuries.This argument tacitly assumes that the Earth's climate system has a "normal" state that it pushes back to after unusually warm or cold periods, like a stretched spring returning to its normal length. While this might appear commonsensical, it has no foundation in either the record of how climate has varied or the fundamental physics of the atmosphere. The Earth's climate has no "normal" state to which the climate seeks to return, so there is no reason to expect that an unusually cool period will be followed naturally by a return to warmer conditions.
Rather, when interpreting cause-and-effect in the temperature record, one has to consider the forcings. One can make a strong argument based on solar proxies (like sunspots) that the increasing temperature between the 17th century to about the middle of the 20th century was due to increasing solar forcing.
However, for the particularly rapid warming of the late 20th century, we have a good knowledge of the forcings of the climate. As I described here, we can eliminate solar variability as a primary driver. In fact, the only forcing that explains the warming is the increase in greenhouse gases.
In summary, there is no evidence that today's particularly rapid warming is caused by the same thing as caused most of the warming over the last few centuries. By considering the forcings, we can conclude that most of the recent warming can be attrbituted to human activities. Thus, the argument that today's warming is simply a continuation of some natural trend is unsupported by any science.


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FY06 Learning in the Arts for Children and Youth
Brooklyn Philharmonic, $20,000
To support the School Residency Initiative. The program will provide 12 weeks of music education programs for elementary school students, professional development for teachers, workshops, demonstrations, and field trips.
Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra (consortium), $30,000
To support a consortium project titled School Partners with Artists Reaching Kids. Musicians will join classroom teachers from Kettering School District's elementary schools to create lesson plans that incorporate music concepts into classroom curricula.
Detroit Symphony Orchestra, $55,000
To support music education activities at the new Detroit School of the Arts. Students will receive year-round music activities, performances, and coaching opportunities.
Greater Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras, $45,000
To support the Incentive Community Program. Components of the project include weekly music lessons, ensemble classes, and instrument rental for inner-city and minority youth.
Hawaii Youth Symphony, $20,000
To support the Symphonic Orchestra Program. Orchestra students from the Hawaiian Islands are brought to Honolulu to rehearse and subsequently perform in one of three youth orchestras.
Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, $20,000
To support continuation of the School Partner Program. The professional development project provides Indianapolis public school teachers with the training and skills necessary to teach an arts-integrated curriculum, and it supplies the resources necessary to implement the program for students in kindergarten to 5th grade.
Los Angeles Jewish Symphony, $20,000
To support A Patchwork of Culture: Exploring the Sephardic-Latino Connection. The program is designed to teach students in the 3rd to 5th grades about the similarities and differences between Sephardic and Latin American music.
Los Angeles Philharmonic (consortium), $20,000
To support the Community Partnership Project, a consortium project. With the Byzantine-Latino Quarter Foundation Community Center, the orchestra's education staff and musicians will teach classroom and after-school lessons in music appreciation and instrumental performance in the Pico Union neighborhood of Los Angeles.
Milwaukee Youth Symphony Orchestra, $15,000
To support the Progressions program. The after-school scholarship program will provide hands-on music training and orchestral music experience to predominantly African American and Latino students in the 3rd and 4th grade.
New York Philharmonic (consortium), $50,000
To support the School Partnership Program, a consortium project between the New York Philharmonic and the New York City Department of Education. Students in the 2nd to 5th grade will attend workshops held by trained teaching artists.
New York Youth Symphony, $20,000
To support Making Score. The project will consist of a series of educational courses designed to introduce aspiring young composers to fundamental principles of musical composition.
Portland Youth Philharmonic, $20,000
To support an orchestral training program. Refinements to the existing program will include the addition of wind ensemble opportunities, advanced music theory courses, and community master classes.
San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, $50,000
To support the Artist Development Program. Designed to complement the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra's core program of weekly rehearsals and concert performances, the program will provide students with coaching, apprenticeship, mentorships, and specialized training in chamber music, instrument care, and auditioning techniques.
Alamo Community College District/ St. Phillip's College, $10,000
To support the Academy of Fine Arts. St. Phillip's College arts faculty, San Antonio Symphony musicians, and other professional artists will give weekend and summer classes in music, theater, and visual arts for middle and high school students.
American Composers Forum (consortium), $45,000
To support a consortium project titled Composer Apprentice National Outreach Endeavor. In partnership with the Minnesota Humanities Commission, Native American composers Brent Michael Davis and Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate and music educator Elizabeth Jaakola will teach orchestration and choral arranging to Native American students in Denver.
Carnegie Hall (consortium), $65,000
To support a consortium project titled LinkUP! Classroom teachers whose schools are administered by the New York Department of Education will use a curriculum designed to teach their students basic music concepts, including how to read and write music notation, compose and perform works, and appreciate the concerts they will attend at Carnegie Hall.
Midori & Friends, $35,000
To support Adventures in Making Music and the Adventure Concert Series. The program will offer free, twice-weekly instruction in woodwind, brass, percussion, and violin to inner-city youth.
Project STEP, $24,000
To support the String Training and Educational Program. The project will prepare gifted African American and Latino children, ages 6 to 18, for careers in classical music as soloists, teachers, and orchestra members.
Settlement Music School, $40,000
To support the Advanced Study Program. The tuition-free program provides students with pre-professional music training through individual study classes, collaborative efforts with professional musicians and composers, and performance opportunities.
University of Rochester, $10,000
To support Eastman Pathways. The program offers music lessons and performance opportunities for urban youth at the Eastman Community Music School.
University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, $30,000
To support the Community Strings Partnership, a collaborative effort between the Strings Pedagogy program and the Latino Arts Strings program. The sequential, after-school music project will engage students, ages six to 18, in the weekly study of their selected instrument for as many as 44 weeks.