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Men's Premium T-Shirt
The ultimate in comfort and intensely soft, our Premium Tri-Blend shirt is our most popular apparel style! This vintage graphic tee has knitted striations similar to your comfy P.E. T-shirts when you were young.
Tags: San Jose, men, Brent Burns, Hockey, Men's Premium T-Shirt, Brent Burns GO SJ T,
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Potato and Parsnip Mash
Parsnips add a sweet, peppery flavor to these mashed potatoes.
Mashed potatoes are one of the ultimate comfort foods, but even they can get a little tired. Here we mix sweet parsnips and earthy potatoes, then fold them together with extra-virgin olive oil, for a simple change that makes a world of flavor difference.... Read More
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Rep. Jim Himes gains his footing in Washington
Area congressman's balanced tone stands out in Washington
WASHINGTON -- U.S. Rep. Jim Himes was just 10 weeks into his first term in the House of Representatives this spring when embattled insurance giant AIG handed out about $200 million in retention bonuses, prompting outrage from lawmakers, the Obama administration and American taxpayers, who had funneled billions of bailout dollars to the firm.
The issue was a personal one for Himes, whose southwestern Connecticut district includes the headquarters of the American International Group's financial products unit. The former Goldman Sachs executive was caught struggling to defend the financial industry from charges that its greed had led to the nation's economic woes while pleading with new Capitol Hill colleagues for a levelheaded response to the populist anger.
Himes ended up joining virtually all of his fellow Democrats in backing a measure to impose a 90 percent tax on some bonuses from companies that got government bailout money, even though he was "not terribly proud of that bill." Himes said his vote gave him leverage in later discussions over regulating compensation and a chance to push for a more measured response.
"What I was trying to say to people is (you can) be angry about the fact that AIG paid the bonuses, but remember, we own the company," said Himes, 43. "The instinct to burn the place down was not a healthy instinct."
The issue was emblematic of Himes' first nine months as a congressman. He's emerged as a major player on the thorny issues of executive compensation and financial regulation, even as he grapples with how to meet the wide-ranging needs of a district that encompasses both the well-to-do suburbs of the Connecticut "Gold Coast" and the struggling industrial cities of Norwalk and Bridgeport.
Himes is learning to navigate that tough political terrain while finding his footing in Congress -- an institution where seniority rules, and the freshman is at the bottom of the pecking order. While adapting to the rules and rigors of Capitol Hill, Himes is acutely aware his seat is a major GOP target. Republicans are watching his every vote as possible evidence he is in lockstep with Democratic leaders and the Obama administration.
This fall, Himes faces what could be his toughest challenge yet when the House debates a Democratic plan to overhaul the nation's health care system, a measure that Himes has warily supported.
The issue has prompted loud protests at lawmakers' town hall meetings nationwide. During events this month, Himes has fielded questions from constituents worried about the potential price tag of President Barack Obama's proposal for a public option -- government-run insurance offered as an alternative to private coverage.
Health care aside, the unassuming lawmaker so far has been a reliable Democratic vote on major social and policy questions in Congress. He backed party leaders on such issues as the $787 billion economic stimulus passed in February, a revamp of the credit card industry and an energy bill that would cap greenhouse gas emissions blamed for climate change.
Himes has broken with top Democrats by casting selective votes to pare government spending and by insisting on a congressional investigation of the ties between campaign contributions and the funding that lawmakers secure for pet projects. Recently, he bucked party leaders by urging them to slow down congressional consideration of the health care legislation.
According to the Washington Post congressional votes database, Himes has voted with a majority of his Democratic colleagues 95.2 percent of the time -- 3 points higher than the average 92.9 percent for Democrats.
That record has been ammunition for political opponents who say Himes is out of touch with his moderate constituents.
"The trouble for Jim Himes is his consistent support for big government, higher taxes and trillions of dollars in spending," said Tory Mazzola, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee. "Himes is voting with [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi and liberals in Congress rather than the independent voters in his district."
Himes defends his voting record as matching a district he labels "socially progressive but fiscally conservative or moderate."
"And I think that's a pretty good description of the way I look at things," Himes added.
GOP strategists have been poring over Himes' record as part of their plan to capitalize on the difficult votes that Democrats from centrist districts face on health care, climate change and the economy.
The National Republican Congressional Committee put Himes on a list of 70 Democrats it believes are most vulnerable in next year's election, and they are targeting his seat in hopes of putting Connecticut's 4th Congressional District back in their column next year. Republicans held the seat from 1969 until last November, when Himes defeated moderate Chris Shays by tapping into voter fatigue with the 21-year incumbent and enthusiasm for Obama.
But next year, Himes could be more vulnerable facing voters without Obama at the top of the Democratic ticket. He will be up against one of at least four Republicans vying to challenge the first-termer, including state Sen. Dan Debicella, of Shelton; 24-year-old Will Gregory, of New Canaan; Rob Russo, a former state senator from Bridgeport; and Norwalk resident Rob Merkle. National Republicans lost perhaps their best potential challenger when state Senate Minority Leader John McKinney opted not to go after the seat once held by his late father.
Himes has raised $948,000 for a re-election bid, with the bulk of his donations coming from the financial sector.
Whatever notions of a leisurely start to the session that Himes and his fellow freshmen entertained didn't last long. Within days of their swearing-in ceremonies in January, the new members were tackling such weighty topics as the financial industry bailout and the stimulus package.
"The first two months were unquestionably" busy, said Himes, who likens his early days in office to "drinking from the fire hose."
Himes initially seemed caught off guard by the pace of the House, which was all the more frenzied for him because of his seat on the Financial Services Committee. The panel has been among the busiest on the Hill this year, largely because of its central role shaping an overhaul of the financial regulatory system and vetting proposals to perk up the ailing economy.
Himes now says he's "settled into something of a rhythm" in Congress.
The unassuming lawmaker navigates the House hallways with more confidence, even when passing through the reporter-packed speaker's lobby just off the House floor. In interviews, he is thoughtful and speaks carefully but without the sense of programmed caution some other new legislators exhibit. During votes, he easily meanders among throngs of colleagues on the House floor.
Himes has spoken just more than a dozen times on the House floor, each time referring only occasionally to notes.
His status as a first-termer means he has limited opportunities to press his views. But he has powerful allies in Reps. Rosa DeLauro and John Larson. Both Connecticut lawmakers are well-placed members of the Democratic leadership.
Himes also has aligned himself with a group of self-described moderate, pro-growth Democrats who share some of his views about government regulation. Himes co-chairs the New Democrat Coalition's Financial Services Task Force, a position that gives him a leading role in developing the group's proposals for regulatory changes.
HANDLING A DIVERSE POPUlATION
As his predecessor often observed, the very nature of Connecticut's 4th Congressional District poses a dilemma for Himes. It's politically treacherous terrain, one that combines poor Democratic-leaning communities and affluent suburbs that historically have favored Republicans, as well as the hub of the hedge fund industry.
"I'm quite certain I've got one of the most demographically diverse districts in the country," Himes said. "It's a good day when I have a strong sense of what my constituents really want."
It would be tough for any politician to balance those divergent interests, said Scott McLean, chair of the political science department at Quinnipiac University in Hamden.
Himes is "in a very unpredictable political situation," without a clearly defined base of support in the suburbs or the urban areas, McLean said.
"He can't go too far one way without potentially alienating the other part of the district," McLean said. On vote after vote in the House, "he's got to find the right formula."
Among the trickiest topics for Himes politically is the one in which he is an expert -- financial regulation -- because it can force him to choose between the financial sector's wish for a mostly unfettered market and the demand from blue-collar workers to rein in risks and excess on Wall Street.
He is a passionate supporter of free enterprise who worries about the risks of too much government involvement. But he also believes in limits whenever financial decisions incur systemic risk and said "effective regulation does not need to come at the expense of growth and innovation."
"There is a very delicate balancing act between keeping our financial services sector vibrant and innovative and -- God knows -- employing people and paying taxes and not [leaving the country]," Himes said, "but never, ever putting us in this position again."
"That's a really tough line to toe," he said. "It's technical. It's esoteric. It gets warped by emotion and anger."
Rep. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said Himes' background gives him instant authority on the topic.
In a White House summit with Obama in March and other meetings, Murphy said it has been "pretty amazing to see the respect [Himes] has commanded on a lot of issues."
"He has a background in that sector, but he also has a real sense about him that things went too far on Wall Street," Murohy said. "He is a really good spokesman for reform."
Himes has made strategic moves that capitalize on his expertise. Murphy said Himes "immediately positioned himself as one of the go-to people in Congress on issues related to financial regulatory reform and housing."
After Himes reluctantly supported the bonus tax bill, he came back with a proposal of his own. Along with Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Fla., Himes introduced a measure to block bailout recipients from doling out "excessive" compensation until they repaid the government or agreed to a payment schedule. The measure, which passed the House on April 1, stalled in the Senate but has largely been overtaken as the Obama administration has moved separately to force the firms to abide by executive pay guidelines.
Perhaps no challenge will be fiercer for Himes in the next weeks than the already ferociously debated health care reform working its way through the House.
"A lot of these issues like health care and the banking situation and the recovery could be potentially [difficult] for him," said Quinnipiac's McLean. Health care, in particular, "is really going to put him on the spot."
So far, Himes has been generally supportive of the more than 1,000-page bill still being assembled by House leaders, which he said would ensure Americans have "stable access to high-quality care." And Himes supports a "properly structured" public option that would boost competition with private insurers -- so long as the private and government-run programs are on "a level playing field."
"I think the public option is an important element of increasing competition in the insurance market. It's a mechanism for increasing competition and therefore reducing prices," Himes said. But "it can't be in there undercutting the market with public subsidy dollars."
Himes said he is concerned the House bill doesn't do enough to rein in costs. That could be a big hurdle since Himes has been staking out a more conservative position on government spending than some of his Democratic colleagues on Capitol Hill.
He's already heard from constituents worried about some aspects of the proposal. And he's likely to hear quite a bit more. He's scheduled three health care town halls this week -- in Greenwich on Monday, Aug. 31; in Norwalk on Wednesday, Sept. 2; and in Bridgeport on Thursday, Sept. 3.
Members of Right Principles, a Fairfield-based political action committee that characterizes itself as "Unapologetically American" on its Web site, are likely to continue their strategy of peppering Himes with tough questions on the health care issue.
A memo distributed by the group and obtained by the Hearst Connecticut Newspapers stated, "The objective is to put the rep on the defensive with your questions and follow-up. The rep should be made to feel that a majority, and if not, a significant portion of at least the audience, opposes the socialist agenda of Washington."
Because of the possibility that crowds could overflow the meeting in Norwalk, Himes decided Friday to move that event from City Hall to the Norwalk High School auditorium.
Himes said it comes with the territory -- and he welcomes the enthusiasm from "so many constituents eager to share their opinions."


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Posted by Alisa on Tuesday, May 6, 2014
Denise Richards took her three daughters- Sam, 10, Lola, 8, and Eloise, 2, shopping at Fred Segal in West Hollywood, CA on Monday (April 5).
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the images shown on the site. I do not claim credit for any of the pictures unless otherwise noted. Images on this blog are copyrighted to their respectful owner. If an image appears on alisacelebkids that belongs to you, and you wish for it to be taken down, please E-mail me and I will promptly remove it.


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olivier.jacq wrote:For those of you who want to try the Brest area, please download :
* w010n40.tar.gz on the usual download site,
* http://blaniel.free.fr/pub/flightgear/b ... t_photo.7z
Then extract the files in the proper locations (i.e. Textures and Terrain)
Add the content of materials.add file in your materials.xml
Then start FG with --airport=LFRB
Enjoy !
N.B. : all aerial pictures are under Creative Common licence, see : http://www.brest-metropole-oceane.fr/vu ... sages.html
HHS wrote:A pity that the landclasses not match with the image. Would be great to have forest where forests are and the water feect on the water displayed there.
olivier.jacq wrote in Thu Sep 09, 2010 4:04 pm:Hi all, HHS,HHS wrote: Concerning the sea, maybe a cut in the dds file would be enough to have the "usual" sea in FG.
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About Casa Dolce Casa Tiles
All of our products are in stock and are ready to be shipped from our warehouse within 24 hours from order confirmation. Our merchandising and communication tools (Displaytems, catalogs, etc.) are always available to satisfy customer requests. Specialized American personnel are on staff to provide precise answers to specific technical questions.


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Before I bought it I searched for some pictures and found nearly nothing, so maybe it helps somebody to decide. Bought from Germany, either Ebay:
http://www.ebay.de/itm/4x-Mooncaps-16-Z ... Sw1DtXF2~K
or directly contact seller at email@example.com
I love the design. As I have my leaf very shortly and drove only few kilometers without the caps, I cannot say anything about consumption, but think it is the same. It is winter here and I am all the time around 18 kWh. The only thing is that you can hear a little noise on driving, but nothing that would disturb much.
I also have to solve the security somehow, unfortunately somebody stole one overnight in the first week


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The history of Islamic Principlism in Iran covers the history of Islamic revivalism and the rise of political Islam in modern Iran. Today, there are basically three types of Islam in Iran: traditionalism, modernism, and a variety of forms of revivalism usually brought together as fundamentalism.[1] Neo-fundamentalists in Iran are a subgroup of fundamentalists who have also borrowed from Western countercurrents of populism, fascism, anarchism, Jacobism and Marxism.[2]
The term Principlists, or Osoulgarayan, is an umbrella term commonly used in Iranian politics to refer to a varieties of conservative circles and parties. The term contrasts with reformists or Eslaah-Talabaan who seek religious and constitutional reforms in Iran.
"Fundamentalism is the belief in absolute religious authority and the demand that this religious authority be legally enforced. Often, fundamentalism involves the willingness to do battle for one's faith. Fundamentalists make up only one part of any religion's followers, who usually fall along a wide spectrum of different interpretations, beliefs and strong values."[3]
There are some major differences between Christian fundamentalism and what is called Islamic fundamentalism. According to Bernard Lewis:[4]
"In western usage these words [Revivalism and Fundamentalism] have a rather specific connotation; they suggest a certain type of religiosity- emotional indeed sentimental; not intellectual, perhaps even anti intellectual; and in general apolitical and even anti-political. Fundamentalists are against liberal theology and biblical criticism and in favor of a return to fundamentals-i.e. to the divine inerrant text of the scriptures. For the so call fundamentalists of Islam these are not and never have been the issues. Liberal theology have not hitherto made much headway in Islam, and the divinity and inerrancy of the Quran are still central dogmas of the faith ... Unlike their Christian namesakes, the Islamic fundamentalists do not set aside but on the contrary embrace much of the post-scriptural scholastic tradition of their faith, in both its theological and its legal aspects."
The Islamist version of political Islam ("neo-fundamentalism" in this article) emerged in response to the perceived shortcomings of fundamentalism. The Islamists, with their cosmopolitan backgrounds, introduced various tools they had borrowed from the West into their organizational arsenal. Ideologically, they drew on antimodernist philosophies that embodied Western dissatisfaction with the consequences of industrialization and positivism.[5]
Iranian fundamentalists and conservatives, commonly describe themselves as "principalist" (also spelled principlist); that is, acting politically based on Islamic and revolutionary principles.[6][7]
Currently there exists three main types of Islam in Iran: traditionalists (represented by Hossein Nasr, Yousef Sanei), modernists (represented by Abdolkarim Soroush), fundamentalists (represented by Ali Khamenei, Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, and several Grand Ayatollahs the youngest one Mahdi Hadavi).[8] Subsequently, religious fundamentalism in Iran has several aspects that make it different from Islamic fundamentalism in other parts of the world.[9] Finally, fundamentalism in Iran is not limited to religious fundamentalism. In fact, Iranian secular fundamentalists can be just as dogmatic and ideological as religious fundamentalists—-deny that any religious law or social practice can be just or equal.[10] The terms Iranian "conservatism," "fundamentalism" and "neo-fundamentalism" are all subject to numerous philosophical debates. Javad Tabatabaei and Ronald Dworkin and a few other philosophers of law and politics have criticized the terminology and suggested various other classifications in the context of Iranian political philosophy.[11][12][13][14] According to Bernard Lewis:[15]
"Even an appropriate vocabulary seemed to be lacking in western languages and writers on the subjects had recourse to such words as "revivalism", "fundamentalism" and "integrism." But most of these words have specifically Christian connotations, and their use to denote Islamic religious phenomena depends at best on a very loose analogy."
Some researchers, categorized Iranian thinkers into five classes:[16]
Traditionists who account for the majority of clerics keep themselves away from modernity and neither accept nor criticize it. Traditionalists believe in eternal wisdom and are critics of humanism and modernity. Traditionalists believe in a sort of religious pluralism which makes them different from Fundamentalists. Fundamentalists are also against modernity. Contrary to traditionists, fundamentalists openly criticize modernity. Moreover, fundamentalists believe that for reviving the religion in the modern era and for opposing modernity, they need to gain social and political power. This makes fundamentalists different from traditionists and traditionalists who are not interested in gaining political power.[16]
As an example of different views on fundamentalism, one can refer to Ruhollah Khomeini who is considered as populist,[17] fundamentalist and reformer by various observers. In July 2007 Iranian reformist president Mohammad Khatami said that Ruhollah Khomeini was the leading "reformist" of our time.[18]
The birth of fundamentalist Islam in Iran is attributed to the early 20th century, almost a century after secular humanism and its associated art and science entered Iran.[19] Sheikh Fazlollah Nouri and Navvab Safavi were among the pioneers of religious fundamentalism in Iran and today serve as the Islamic Republic's foremost heroes and role models.[20]
Iran was the first country in the post-World War II era in which political Islam was the rallying cry for a successful revolution, followed by the new state formally adopting political Islam as its ruling ideology.[21] The grand alliance that led to the 1979 revolution abandoned the traditional clerical quietism, adopting a diverse ideological interpretation of Islam. The first three Islamic discourses were Khomeinism, Ali Shariati's Islamic-left ideology, and Mehdi Bazargan's liberal-democratic Islam. The fourth discourse was the socialist guerrilla groups of Islamic and secular variants, and the fifth was secular constitutionalism in socialist and nationalist forms.[22]
Hassan Rahimpour Azghandi offers the following apologia for the emergence of Islamic fundamentalism:
While some researchers refute explanations of "Islamic fundamentalism" as an anti-imperialist political force directed against Western dominance in the Islamic world, others, such as Moaddel, argue that Islam has been politicized only during the second half of the twentieth century as a discourse of opposition, not to Western domination in the state system, but to the ideas, practices, and arbitrary political interventions of a westernizing secularist political elite. This elite has established ideologically uniform, repressive states which have imposed a Western model and outlook in Muslim societies by coercive means. Islamism thus emerged as a competing narrative contending for state power against a secularist discourse. Its goal was to seize state power through an Islamization of all aspects of life in a Muslim society.[24]
In May 2005, Ali Khamenei defined the reformist principle-ism (Osoulgaraiee eslah-talabaaneh) of his Islamic state in opposition to the perceived hostility of the West:
In January 2007, a new parliamentary faction announced its formation. The former Osulgarayan ("principalist") faction divided into two due to "lack of consensus" on Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's policies. The new faction was named "Faction of creative principalists" which is said to be critical of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's neo-principalist policies and to reject conservatism on such matters related to the government. The main leaders of the faction are Emad Afroogh, Mohammad Khoshchehreh, Saeed Aboutaleb and MP Sobhani.[26]
There is a lot that is unique about Iranian fundamentalism but it nonetheless must be seen as one of the Abrahamic revivalisms of the twentieth century.[27] As in the course of the Persian Constitutional Revolution nearly a century earlier, the concept of justice was at the center of the ideological debates among the followers of the three Islamic orientations during and after the revolution. The conservatives (principalists) adhered to the traditional notion of Islamic justice, one which, much like the Aristotelian idea of justice, states that "equals should be treated alike, but unequals proportionately to their relevant differences, and all with impartiality." Neoprincipalists, on the other hand, gave a messianic interpretation to the concept, one that promised equal distribution of societal resources to all—including the "unequals." And finally, those with a liberal orientation to Islam understood the notion of justice in terms of the French revolutionary slogan of egalité, i.e., the equality of all before the law.[28]
While the principalists (conservatives) were generally suspicious of modern ideas and resistant to modern lifestyles at the time of the Iranian revolution, the Islamic radicals (neo-principalists) were receptive to many aspects of modernity and willing to collaborate with secular intellectuals and political activists.[28]
Many of the so-called neo-principalists (neo-fundamentalists), like Christian fundamentalists, pull out a verse from the scriptures and give it a meaning quite contrary to its traditional commentary. Also, even while denouncing modernism as the "Great Satan", many principalists accept its foundations, especially science and technology. For traditionalists, there is beauty in nature which must be preserved and beauty in every aspect of traditional life, from chanting the Qur'an to the artisan's fashioning a bowl or everyday pot. Many principalists even seek a Qur'anic basis for modern man's domination and destruction of nature by referring to the injunction to 'dominate the earth' – misconstruing entirely the basic idea of vicegerency: that man is expected to be the perfect servant of God.[19] An example of an environmental problem is the overpopulation of the earth. The Neo-fundamentalists's family policy is to increase the population dramatically. Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's call for increasing Iran's population from 70 to 120 millions can be understood in the same line.
In Mehdi Mozaffan's chapter on a comparative study of Islamism in Algeria and Iran, he says,
A major difference between Shia fundamentalism in Iran and main stream Islamic fundamentalism is that the former has nothing to do with Salafism. According to Gary Legenhausen: "The term Islamic Fundamentalism is one that has been invented by Western journalists by analogy with Christian Fundamentalism. It is not a very apt term, but it has gained currency. In the Sunni world it is used for groups descended from the Salafiyyah movement, such as the Muslim Brotherhood." It is worth noting that the concept of "Salaf" (السلف) does not exist in Shia theology in contrast to Sunni Islam as well as Christianity (a similar concept referred to as "original Christianity").[30] Political Islam consists of a broad array of mass movements in the Muslim world, which share a conviction that political power is an essential instrument for constructing a God-fearing society. They believe that Muslims can fulfill their religious obligations only when public law sanctions and encourages pious behavior. To this end, the majority of these movements work to take control of state power, whether by propaganda, plebiscite, or putsch.[31]
A look through several generations of clerics in seminaries shows significant differences in viewpoints and practical approaches. When young Ruhollah Khomeini urged his mentor Ayatullah Husain Borujerdi, to oppose the Shah more openly. Broujerdi rejected his idea. He believed in the "separation" of religion from politics, even though he was Khomeini's senior in rank.[32] However just before his death Hossein Boroujerdi (d. 1961), expressed his opposition to the Shah's plans for land reform and women's enfranchisement.[33] He also issued a fatwa for killing Ahmad Kasravi.[34] Khomeini remained silent till his seniors Ayatollah Haeri or Ayatolla Boroujerdi's, were alive. Then he was promoted to the status of a Grand marja and started his activism and established his Islamic Republic eventually. Among Khomeini's students, there were notable clerics whose ideas were not compatible with their mentor. As examples of the prototypes of his students one can mention Morteza Motahhari, Mohammad Beheshti and Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi. Criticizing Mesbah Yazdi and Haghani school Beheshti said: "Controversial and provocative positions that are coupled with violence, in my opinion...will have the reverse effect. Such positions remind many individuals of the wielding of threats of excommunication that you have read about in history concerning the age of the Inquisition, the ideas of the Church, and the Middle Ages".[35] Morteza Motahhari, the most notable student of Khomeini, was widely known as the main theoretician of Iranian revolution (next to Ali Shariati). While Mesbah Yazdi was an advocate of expelling secular University lecturers, Motahhari insisted that the philosophy of marxism or liberalism must be taught by a marxist and liberal respectively. Both Motahhari and Beheshti were assassinated by terrorist groups early after the revolution. Motahhari also introduced the concept of "dynamism of Islam".[36]
After the triumph of the revolution in February 1979, and the subsequent liquidation of the liberal and secular-leftist groups, two principal ideological camps became dominant in Iranian politics, the "conservatives" (fundamentalists) and the "radicals" (neo-fundamentalists). The radicals' following of Khomeini of the revolution rather than his incumbency of the office of the Supreme Jurist (Vali-eFaqih) or his theocratic vision of the "Islamic Government." Today, Mohammad Taqi Mesbah Yazdi clearly rejects Khomeini's "Islamic Republic" and supports the idea of "Islamic government" where the votes of people has no value.[28]
Contrary to Iranian traditionalists, neo-fundamentalists as well as Iranian liberals have been under the influence of western thinkers. The Islamic neo-fundamentalists have also borrowed from Western countercurrents of populism, fascism, anarchism, Jacobism, and Marxism[37] without the welfare state. During the 1990s, Akbar Ganji had discovered crucial links that connected the chain murders of Iran to the reigning neoconservative clergymen (Ali Fallahian, Gholam Hossein Mohseni-Ejehei, Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi) who had issued the fatwas legitimizing assassinations of secular humanists and religious modernists. In May 1996, Akbar Ganji presented a lecture at Shiraz University entitled "Satan Was the First Fascist." He was charged with defaming the Islamic Republic and tried in a closed court. His defense was later published under the title of "Fascism is one of the Mortal Sins." (Kian, Number 40, February 1997.)[38]
Another important issue is the concept of "insider-outsider" introduced by Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran. Accordingly, in his administration outsiders have less rights compared to insiders and cannot have any administrative posts. He stated that "I mean, you [to his followers] must trust an insider as a member of your clique. We must consider as insiders those persons who are sympathetic towards our revolution, our state and Islam. The outsiders are the ones who are opposed to the principle of our state."[39]
In another speech Ali Khamenei compared what he called "American fundamentalism" and "Islamic fundamentalism":
He also made a clear distinction between what he called "extremism" and "fundamentalism": " There may be a handful of extremists here and there, but all the elements serving in various departments of our country are fundamentalists in essence."[39]
Iranian neoconservatives are against democracy, Universal Declaration of Human Rights and disparage the people and their views.[43] In particular Mesbah Yazdi is an aggressive defender of the supreme leader's absolute power, and he has long held that democracy and elections are not compatible with Islam. He once stated that:
In contrast to neo-principalists, principalists accepts the ideas of democracy and UDHR. During his lifetime, Ayatollah Khomeini expressed support for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; in Sahifeh Nour (Vol.2 Page 242), he states: "We would like to act according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We would like to be free. We would like independence." However, Iran adopted an "alternative" human rights declaration, the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam, in 1990 (one year after Khomeini's death).
There exists various viewpoints on practice of controversial Islamic criminal codes like stoning. Ayatollah Gholamreza Rezvani states that the Quran sanctions stoning unequivocally and since it is the word of God, it must be carried out in real life as if Rezvani is the Prophet on Earth tasked by God to carry forward this message. This is in contrast to principalist point of view. In December 2002, Hashemi Shahroudi, the principalist Head of Judiciary ordered a ban on the practice of stoning.
During Khatami's presidency, Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi claimed that an unnamed former CIA chief had visited Iran with a suitcase stuffed with dollars to pay opinion-formers. "What is dangerous is that agents of the enemy, the CIA, have infiltrated the government and the cultural services," he was quoted as saying. On top of its official budget for Iran, the CIA had given "hundreds of millions of dollars to our cultural officials and journalists," he added. "The former head of the CIA recently came here as a tourist with a suitcase full of dollars for our cultural centres and certain newspapers. He made contact with various newspaper chiefs and gave them dollars."[45][46] Nasser Pourpirar for instance believes that a significant portion of Iranian history are baseless fabrications by Jewish orientalists and Zionists. The whole existence of Pre-Islamic Iran is no more than a Jewish conspiracy and the most important key for analyzing today's world events is the analysis of ancient "Jewish genocide of Purim."[47][48][49] Another neoconservative theorist, Mohammad Ali Ramin believes that contemporary western history (e.g. Holocaust) are all fabrications by Jews. He also claimed that Adolf Hitler was a Jew himself.[50] M.A. Ramin, Hassan Abbasi, Abbas Salimi Namin and others have been giving speeches about Jewish conspiracy theory, Iranian and western history intensively all over the country since the establishment of Ahmadinejad government in 2005.[46] Currently, Abadgaran described itself as a group of Islamic neo-principalist,[51] have the control over current Iranian government. However, it lost the 2006 city council election.
The problem with identity is at the heart of fundamentalism, no matter it is Islamic, Jewish or Christian. If people's religious identity becomes more prominent than the national identity, fundamentalism will rise. In other words, fundamentalism can be seen as "identity-ism." Many of the religious remarks that are made in Iran, especially from official platforms, basically rest on identity-oriented thinking and the inculcation of an identity known as a religious identity.[52]
Under Ahmadinejad, neo-conservative forces are determined to make the Islamic Republic more Islamic than republican. Whether they will succeed is another matter. Power in Iran is a complicated matter, and various factions exist even among conservatives, who run the gamut from hard-liners to pragmatists. Some among Iran's leadership would accept accommodation with the West in exchange for economic and strategic concessions, while others are content to accept isolation from the West. Others favor a "Chinese model," which in Iran would mean opening the economy to international investment while maintaining the clergy's dominance. It is these complex internal forces that will decide the future of Iranian politics.[53]
Navab Safavi, a neo-fundamentalist cleric.[54] The group's aim was to transform Iran into an "Islamic state." To achieve their objective, the group committed numerous terrorist acts. Notable among these was the 1946 assassination of Ahmad Kasravi, an intellectual who had criticized the Shia Islamic clergy. The group also assassinated two prime ministers (Ali Razmara and Hassan Ali Mansour, 1951 and 1965) and an ex-prime minister (Hazhir, 1949).
The anti-Western attacks prior to the Revolution. Since then, it has conducted terrorist attacks against the interests of the clerical regime in Iran and abroad. The MEK advocates the overthrow of the Iranian regime and its replacement with the group's own leadership.[55][56]
During the 1970s, the MEK killed US military personnel and US civilians working on defense projects in Tehran and supported the takeover in 1979 of the US Embassy in Tehran. In 1981, the MEK detonated bombs in the head office of the Islamic Republic Party and the Premier's office, killing some 70 high-ranking Iranian officials, including Chief Justice Mohammad Beheshti, President Mohammad-Ali Rajai, and Premier Mohammad-Javad Bahonar. Near the end of the 1980–1988 war with Iran, Baghdad armed the MEK with military equipment and sent it into action against Iranian forces. In 1991, the MEK assisted the Government of Iraq in suppressing the Shia and Kurdish uprisings in southern Iraq and the Kurdish uprisings in the north.[55][56]
In April 1992, the MEK conducted near-simultaneous attacks on Iranian embassies and installations in 13 countries, demonstrating the group's ability to mount large-scale operations overseas.[56] MKO is recognized as a terrorist group by both US and EU.[55] The MKO maintains fascistic behaviour with all those who do not share its views and positions and routinely attacks Iranian intellectuals and journalists abroad. For instance, MEK agents attacked Iranian journalist Alireza Nourizadeh and injured him seriously.[57]
Haghani Circle is a neo-fundamentalist school of thought in Iran founded by a group of clerics based in the holy city of Qom and headed by Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, an influential cleric and theologian.
The school trains clerics with both a traditional and modern curriculum, including a secular education in science, medicine, politics, and Western/non-Islamic philosophy (the topics that are not taught in traditional schools). It was founded by Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, Ayatollah Dr. Beheshti and Ayatollah Sadoughi.
Many famous theologians and influential figures in Iran's politics after the revolution were associated (as teacher or student) with the Haghani Circle or follows its ideology.
The association is composed of right wing conservative elements of Iran's political culture, including the nation's foremost politicized clerics, the Friday prayer leaders in most of Iran's metropolitan areas, the bazaar merchants, and the Supreme Leader. Not surprisingly, members of this faction support a continuation of the status quo, including strict limits on personal freedoms and the continued primacy of the clergy in the nation's day-to-day governance. Important constituents of the Militant Clergy Society include the Islamic Coalition Society and the Coalition of Followers of the Line of the Imam.
The Combatant Clergy Association was the majority party in the 4th and 5th parliaments after the Iranian revolution.[58] It was founded in 1977 by a group of clerics with intentions to use cultural approach to overthrow the Shah. Its founding members were Ali Khamenei, Motahhari, Beheshti, Bahonar, Rafsanjani and Mohammad Mofatteh[59] and its current members include Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Ahmad Jannati, Mahdavi Kani, Reza Akrami and Hassan Rohani.
As the foremost advocates of the Iranian status quo that has left millions disenfranchised, the Militant Clergy Society is exceedingly unpopular among rank-and-file Iranians.[60]
Ansar-e-Hezbollah is a militant neo-fundamentalist group in Iran. Mojtaba Bigdeli is a spokesman for the Iranian Hezbollah. Human Rights Watch strongly condemned the brutal assault on students at Tehran University halls of residence in the early hours of Friday 9 July 1999 by members of the Ansar-e Hezbollah.[61]
Supreme Leader these groups set up arbitrary checkpoints around Tehran, uniformed police often refraining from directly confronting these plainclothes agents. "Illegal prisons, which are outside of the oversight of the National Prisons Office, are sites where political prisoners are abused, intimidated, and tortured with impunity."[62] On 8 March 2004 the Basij issued a violent crackdown on the activists celebrating the International Women's Day in Tehran.[63] On 13 November 2006, Tohid Ghaffarzadeh, a student at Islamic Azad University of Sabzevar was murdered by a Basij member at the University. The murderer reportedly said that what he did was according to his religious beliefs. Tohid Ghaffarzadeh was talking to his girlfriend when he was approached and stabbed with a knife by the Basij member.[64]
Various theories of state based on immediate divine legitimacy have been proposed over the years by Iranian clerics. One can distinguish four types of theocracies. Typology of the types of government adumbrated in Shiite jurisprudential sources can be summarized as follows (in chronological order):[65]
Since the election of pro-reform president Mohammad Khatami in 1997, there have been two basic approaches, two outlooks, toward the achievement of reform in Iran: "Reformists" within the regime (in-system reformers) essentially believe that the Constitution has the capacity—indeed, the positive potential—to lead the "Revolutionary" government of Iran toward "democracy." By contrast, secularists, who remain outside the regime, basically think that the Constitution contains impediments profound enough to block meaningful reform.[66][67]
On the other hand, fundamentalists and in-system reformers on one side and neo-fundamentalists on the other side are struggling over "Khomeini's Islamic Republic" versus "Mesbah's Islamic administration." Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi and Ansar-e-Hezbollah call for a change in the Iranian constitution from a republic to an Islamic administration.[68][69] They believe the institutions of the Islamic Republic, such as the Majlis (Iran's Parliament), are contradictory to Islamic government which is completely centered around Velayat-e Faqih and total obedience to him.[70]
Ali Khamenei, himself, has remained silent on the issue of whether Iran should have an Islamic Republic or an Islamic Administration.[71] However, he clearly rejected the supervision of Assembly of Experts on the institutions that are governed directly under his responsibility (e.g. Military forces, Judiciary system and IRIB).[72]
Neo-fundamentalists believe that the supreme leader is holy and infallible and the role of people and elections are merely to discover the leader. However, the legitimacy of the leader comes from God and not the people.[73] In January 2007, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani who won the 2006 election for Assembly of Experts, clearly rejected this idea and emphasized on the fact that the leader and the cleric members of the Assembly of Experts may make wrong decisions and the legitimacy of the leader comes from the people not the God.[72]
Beyond these theoretical debates, elements of the "Islamic Administration" are (in practice) slowly replacing those of the "Islamic Republic".[71]
Upon establishment of Islamic Republic, the two factions (conservatives and radicals) differed on foreign policy and cultural issues. The radicals (neo-cons) adamantly opposed any rapprochement with the United States and, to a lesser extent, other Western countries, while seeking to expand Iran's relations with the socialist bloc countries. They advocated active support for Islamic and liberation movements, so called "export of the revolution", throughout the world. The conservatives favored a more cautious approach to foreign policy, with the ultimate aim of normalizing Iran's economic relations with the rest of the world, so long as the West's political and cultural influence on the country could be curbed.[74]
According to Iranian scholar Ehsan Naraghi, anti-Western attitude among Iranian Islamists has its root in Marxism and Communism rather than Iranian Islam. Iran and the West had good relations with mutual respect after the Safavid era. However, with the emergence of Communism in Iran, anti-Western attitudes were taken up by some extremists. As Naraqi states, anti-Western attitude in other parts of the Muslim world has a different root than the one in Iran.[75]
After the end of the Iran–Iraq War in 1988 and the death of Ayatollah Khomeini, pragmatists (under the leadership of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani) sought to normalize Iran's relations with other countries, particularly those in the region, by playing down the once-popular adventurist fantasy of "exporting the Islamic revolution" to other Muslim lands.[74] After the victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the 2005 elections and the defeat of pragmatists/reformists (under the leadership of Mohammad Khatami), the Neoconservatives who gained full control of both parliament and government for the first time since the Iranian Revolution again recalled the idea of exporting the revolution after years of silence.
Since the Iranian Revolution, the new Islamic Republic of Iran has pursued an Islamic ideological foreign policy that has included creation of Hezbollah, subsidies to Hamas,[76] opposition to Israel and Zionist leaders, and aid to Iraq's Shiite political parties.[77][78] Hamas leaders verified in 2008 that since Israel pulled out of the Gaza strip in 2005 they have sent their fighters to Iran to train in field tactics and weapons technology.[79] In an interview in 2007, Hezbollah Deputy Secretary-General Naim Kassem told the Iranian Arabic-language TV station al-Qawthar that all military actions in Lebanon must be approved by the authorities in Tehran; in 2008 Iran issued a stamp commemorating a recently killed Hezbollah leader.[80][81]
Fundamentalism and political realism are diplomatically incompatible. It is believed that the most evident characteristic of diplomacy is flexibility. The reason Iran's diplomacy has encountered many shortcomings and lost numerous opportunities provided by international or regional political developments is the country's focus on fundamental values and neglect of national interests. Fundamentalism is always accompanied with idealism while diplomacy always emphasizes realities. Therefore, the model of realistic fundamentalism will not work in the diplomatic arena.[82]
Muslim thinkers in the world generally believe in a sort of "religious internationalism." Even religious modernists in Iran have still some inclinations towards religious internationalism, and the concept of nation-state is not firmly established in their mind. These kinds of beliefs are mainly rooted in traditional thinking rather than postmodernism. There are however some religious intellectuals like Ahmad Zeidabadi who are against religious internationalism.[52][83]
Meanwhile, Western countries have adopted various different strategies with respect to fundamentalists. The attitudes of these countries have been mainly driven by geopolitics and the oil market rather than religious extremism itself. According to Graham Fuller of the RAND Corporation and a former Vice-Chairman of the National Intelligence Council at CIA, "United States had no problem with Islam or even Islamic fundamentalism as such. [...] one of the closest American allies in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, is a fundamentalist state."[84]
Also Maryam Rajavi, the leader of an Islamist-Marxist group, has been invited several times by EU parliament members to address the assembly. In 2004 Alejo Vidal Quadras, European Parliament's first Vice President, met Maryam Rajavi whose group is listed as a terrorist group by EU and USA.[85][86]
Mehdi Noorbaksh, a professor at the Center for International Studies, University of St. Thomas in Texas, believes that the perceived threat of Islamic fundamentalism to world peace and security is based on politically and ideologically motivated misinterpretation of the reformist nature of Islamic revival. The portrayal of Iran as a radical Islamic terrorist state by the US has strengthened the extremists and weakened democratic, reformists groups in Iran. According to Professor Noorbaksh, "The spread of democracy and the introduction of socio-political reforms in the Middle East, especially in Iran, will undermine US domination over the region."[87]
One of the main clarion calls raised within the geography of events known as the Cultural Revolution was the call for seminary-university unity. The original idea was a reconciliation between science and religion. In other words, the meaning of seminary-university unity was a resolution of the historical battle between science and religion. Resolving this battle is a scholarly endeavour, not a political and practical one. However, after the revolution, since clerics came to rule over the country, the idea of seminary-university unity, which meant understanding between seminary teachers and academics, gradually turned into submission by academics to clerics and seminary teachers, and it lost its logical and scholarly meaning and took on a political and practical sense.[88] Appointment of Abbasali Amid Zanjani as the only cleric president of University of Tehran in 27 December 2005 can be understood in the same line. Tehran University is the symbol of higher education in Iran. Abbasali Amid Zanjani hold no academic degree[89] and was appointed by Mohammad Mehdi Zahedi, the minister of Science, Research, and Technology in Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's cabinet.
There was a journal in the 1980s, by the name of "University of Revolution" which used to include some material written by neofundamentalists. They wrote many articles to prove that science is not wild and without a homeland, that it is not the case that it recognises no geography, and that it is therefore possible for us to create "Islamic sciences."[88]
In 2007, Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, a well-known cleric, attacked the University people calling them the most indecent people.[90] In April 2008, four leading clerics namely Abdollah Javadi Amoli, Ebrahim Amini, Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi and Mohammed Emami-Kashani criticized Iranian Universities, University students and Iranian Higher education system as being secular, non-Islamic, indecent and cheap.[91]
Both Iranian principle-ism and neo principle-ism are associated with their own art, cinema and literature. In cinema, the first attempts were perhaps made by Masoud Dehnamaki. Dehnamaki, a famous neo-principalist, made his first documentary film "Poverty and Prostitution" in 2002. His next documentary was "Which Blue, Which Red," a film about the rivalry between the Iranian capital's two football teams, Esteqlal and Persepolis, and their fans. He is now making his debut feature-length film "The Outcasts". Iranian journalist turned documentary filmmaker Masud Dehnamaki was formerly the managing director and chief editor of the weeklies "Shalamcheh" and "Jebheh," which were closed by Tehran's conservative Press Court. These journals were among the main neo-principalist publications. The rightist newsweekly "Shalamcheh" under the editorship of Masoud Dehnamaki, one of the strongest opponents of President Khatami and his policies, has been closed down by the press supervisory board of the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, presumably for insulting or criticizing the late Grand Ayatollah Kho'i, who had called the "velayat-e faqih" position unislamic, prior to his passing away.[92]
Perhaps the most influential neo-conservative newspaper during the 1990s and 2000s was Kayhan daily. Hossein Shariatmadari and Hossein Saffar Harandi (who later became a Minister of Culture) were the main editor and responsible chief of the newspaper. In 2006, the British ambassador to Tehran met Hossein Shariatmadari and acknowledged the role of Kayhan in Iran and the region.[93]
To promote art and literature, Islamic Development Organization was founded by Ayatollah Khomeini. In 1991, Ali Khamenei revised the organization's structure and plans. The plan is to promote religious and moral ideas through art and literature.[94] According to the Minister of Culture, Hossein Saffar Harandi, the funds for Qur'anic activities would increase by fourfold in the year 2007. "All of the ninth governments' cultural and artistic activities should conform to the Holy Book," he declared.
While promoting their own art and literature, principalists are against the development of art and literature that has no "valuable content." In late 1996, following a fatwa by Ali Khamenei stating that music education corrupts the minds of young children, many music schools were closed and music instruction to children under the age of 16 was banned by public establishments (although private instruction continued).[42][95] Khamenei and his followers believe that "Nihilism and Beatle-ism" have ravaged Western youth.[96] According to the renowned novelist and the first president of Iranian Association of Writers after the revolution, Simin Daneshvar, Islamic Republic has been generally hostile toward Iranian writers and intellectuals. This is contrary to the attitude of the Pahlavi regime, Daneshvar added in an interview with Etemaad Daily in 2007.[97]
In 2007, Javad Shamghadri, artistic advisor to president Ahmadinejad, publicly stated that: "Like many other countries in the world, Iran too can get along without a film industry." "Only 20 percent of people go to the cinema, and their needs can be provided through the national radio and television network," he added.[98]
In the early times of 1979 revolution Ayatollah Khomeini declared that what mattered was Islam and not the economy. In one of his comments, he dismissed the concerns of his first prime minister, Mehdi Bazargan, about the economy by simply noting that "Economics is for donkeys!"[99] However Khomeini in many occasions advised his followers about justice and giving priority to the rights of the deprived and the oppressed members of the community.[100]
"Association of the Lecturers of Qom's Seminaries," or ALQRS (Jame'eh-ye Modarresin-e Howzeh-ye 'Elmiyeh-ye Qom), published their authenticated version of Islamic economy in 1984. It was based on traditional interpretation of Islamic jurisprudence, which the ALQRS find compatible with the market system and neoclassical economics. They emphasize economic growth against social equity and declare the quest for profit as a legitimate Islamic motive. According to ALQRS, attaining "maximum welfare" in a neoclassical sense is the aim of an Islamic economic system. However, the system must establish the limits of individual rights. In accordance with this ideological-methodological manifesto of the ALQRS, in February 1984, the council for cultural revolution proposed a national curriculum for economics for all Iranian Universities.[103]
The concept of "Islamic economics" appeared as a rainbow on the revolutionary horizon and disappeared soon after the revolutionary heat dissipated (the end of the 1980s and after the death of Ayatollah Khomeini). It disappeared from Iranian political discourse for fifteen years. In the June 2005 presidential elections, neither the populist-fundamentalist winning candidate, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, nor any of his reformist or conservative opponents said a word about Islamic economy.[104] However, after the establishment of Ahmadinejad's government, his neoconservative team opened the closed file of Islamic economy. For instance, Vice-President Parviz Davoudi said in 2006:
Factional conflict dominated Iranian economic politics under the Ayatollah Khomeini from 1979 to 1989. The two principal factions were a statist-reformist group that favored state control of the economy and a conservative group that favored the private sector. Both factions claimed Khomeini's support, but by 1987, he clearly had sided with the statist-reformists because he believed state capitalism to be the best way of heading off any threat to Islam. Khomeini's death on 3 June 1989 left the factions without their source of legitimation.[87]
Principalists, irrespective of their genders, support a very strict life style for women in Iran. The women in the seventh Iranian parliament were against the bill on Iran joining the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), which the female reformists in the sixth parliament had fought for vigorously. The women in the seventh parliament have exhibited conservative, right wing tendencies, setting them apart from their counterparts in the preceding parliament.[106] In July 2007, Ali Khamenei criticized Iranian women's rights activists and the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW): "In our country ... some activist women, and some men, have been trying to play with Islamic rules in order to match international conventions related to women," Khamenei said. "This is wrong."[107] However he is positive on reinterpreting Islamic law in a way that it is more favorable for women – but not by following Western conventions.[108][109] Khamenei made these comments two days after an Iranian women's right activist Delaram Ali was sentenced to 34 months of jail and 10 lashes by Iran's judiciary.[110] Iranian judiciary works under the responsibility of the Supreme Leader and is independent from the government.
Principalist in Iran supported traditional Iranian dress code on Iranian women soon after the revolution of 1979 which was outlawed by Pahlavi regime. Since then Iranian police, governed under the responsibility of the Supreme Leader, have continuously attacked women who do not adhere to the dress code. Fighting such women is considered "fighting morally corrupt people" by principalists. In 2007 a national crackdown was launched by the police in which thousands of women were warned and hundred were arrested. Violators of the dress code can be given lashes, fines and imprisonment.[111][112] Sae'ed Mortazavi, Tehran's public prosecutor, made this clear when he told the Etemad newspaper: "These women who appear in public like decadent models endanger the security and dignity of young men". Mohammad Taqi Rahbar, a fundamentalist MP, agreed, saying, "Men see models in the streets and ignore their own wives at home. This weakens the pillars of family."[113]
In October 2002, Ali Khamenei asked the Iranian women to avoid feminism and sexism in their campaigns for better female rights. "In the process of raising women's issues and solving their problems, feminist inclinations and sexism should be avoided," he told a group of female parliamentarians.[114]
Like many other Grand Ayatollahs, Ali Khamenei believes that women should be wives and mothers. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has publicly stated: "The real value of a woman is measured by how much she makes the family environment for her husband and children like a paradise." In July 1997 Khamenei said that the idea of women's equal participation in society was "negative, primitive and childish."[115]
Fundamentalist scholars justify the different religious laws for men and women by referring to the biological and sociological differences between men and women. For example, regarding the inheritance law which states that women's share of inheritance is half that of men, Ayatollah Makarim Shirazi quotes the Imam Ali ibn Musa Al-reza who reasons that at the time of marriage man has to pay something to woman and woman receives something, and that men are responsible for both their wives' and their own expenses but women have no responsibility thereof.[116] Women, however, make up 27% of the Iranian labor force, and the percentage of all Iranian women who are economically active has more than doubled from 6.1% in 1986 to 13.7% in 2000.[117]
In terms of health, life expectancy went up by eleven years between 1980 and 2000 for both Iranian men and women. With respect to family planning, "levels of childbearing have declined faster than in any other country," going from 5.6 births per woman in 1985 to 2.0 in 2000, a drop accomplished by a voluntary, but government-sponsored, birth control program. The fact that these changes have occurred within an Islamic legal regime suggests that formal legal status may not be a key factor determining women's well-being.[117]
Women in Iran are only allowed to sing in chorus, and are not allowed to attend sport stadiums. In 2006 Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, surprisingly, ordered the vice president to allocate half of the Azadi Soccer Stadium to women. Six Grand Ayatollahs and several MPs protested against Mr. Ahmadinejad's move, and finally the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei ordered the president to reconsider his order and follow the clergy.[118]
The issue of tolerance and violence has been subject to intense debates in Iran. A cleric and member of the conservative Islamic Coalition Party, Hojjatoleslam Khorsand was cited by "Etemad daily" as saying that "in cultural issues, a policy of tolerance and laxity is not acceptable."[119] Ayatollah Mohammad Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi, a member of the Assembly of Experts, said about Islam's enemies: "They presented principles such as tolerance and compromise as absolute values while violence was introduced as a non-value." Mesbah-Yazdi believes that "the taboo – that every act of violence is bad and every act of tolerance is good – must be broken." Opponents of violence – "even some of the elite" – have been "deceived and entrapped" by "foreign propaganda," he said. Mesbah-Yazdi believes that "The enemies of Islam must also feel the harshness and violence of Islam."[120] He also stated that "The culture of tolerance and indulgence means the disarming of society of its defense mechanism."[121]
Dividing Iranians into Insider and Outsider was first introduced by Ali Khamenei.[39] "Kayhan", which is governed by Ali Khamenei, editorialized on 5 August 1999 that an Insider is "someone whose heart beats for Islam, the revolution and the Imam," while Outsiders are those who have "separated their path from the line of the Imam, the system, and the people who, by relying on citizens' rights, want to introduce themselves as equal partners."[120]
Irreligious people in Iran have less rights then religious people, for example President of Iran by constitution must be religious. While Jews, Christians and other minorities have the right to take part in University entrance exams and can become members of parliament or city councils, irreligious people are not granted even their basic rights. Most irreligious people, however, hide their beliefs and pretend to be Muslims.
In one occasion, Persian daily "Neshat" published an article[122] which called for abolishing the death penalty, claiming that the capital punishment is no cure for maladies afflicting modern society. In reaction to this article, conservative "Tehran Times Daily" stressed that writers of such articles must remember that the Iranian Muslim nation will not only never tolerate such follies but that the apostates will be given no opportunity to subvert the religion. Neshat's article drew severe criticism from the theologians and clerics, particularly the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, who in clear words warned that apostate journalists will be liable to the death penalty, noted the article in the opinion column of the paper adding that the judiciary also promptly warned against any acts or words that undermine the pillars of the Islamic revolution.[123]
In 2002, Ansar e Hezbollah, a hard-line group best known for disrupting reformist gatherings and beating up students, declared a "holy war" to rid Iran of reformers who promote Western democracy and challenge the country's Supreme Leader. Masoud Dehnamaki, an ideologue with the group, also said that Iranians who try to appease Iran's enemies such as the United States "should be stopped."[124]
During Mohammd Khatami's presidency, minister Ataollah Mohajerani launched a tolerance policy ("Tasahol va Tasamoh"). This policy was criticized harshly by conservatives and ended in resignation of the minister.[125][126]
While some conservatives like Emad Afrough support the idea of Civil society, some like Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi are opposed to the idea of civil rights for citizens. Emad Afrough stated: "If we do not actively seek cultural change, our national and ethnic cultures get destroyed. We must consciously choose to answer the questions confronting us. Today's question is civil society ... I believe we can easily reconstruct civil society here (in Iran) based on our own values and cultural characteristics. Civil society is a necessity, and the growing complexity of society requires it. Our historical past also supports it. In reality, in Iran, as in elsewhere in the Middle East, the only obstacle to civil society is the state."[127] Mesbah Yazdi, however, stated: "It doesn't matter what the people think. The people are ignorant sheep."[128]
In February 2004 Parliament elections, the Council of Guardians, a council of twelve members, half of whom are appointed by Ali Khamenei, disqualified thousands of candidates, including many of the reformist members of the parliament and all the candidates of the Islamic Iran Participation Front party from running. It did not allow 80 members of the 6th Iranian parliament (including the deputy speaker) to run in the election. Apart from Ali Khamenei, many conservative theorists as Emad Afrough supported the decision of Guardian council and accused the reformist parliament members of "being liberal, secular and with no Iranian identity".[129] Referring to 7th parliament members, Ali Meshkini said that the list of candidates had signed by Imam Mahdi: "...I have a special gratitude for Honorable Baqiyatullah (aj), whom when seven months ago during the Night of Power the Divine angels presented him with the list of the names and addresses of the members of the (new) parliament, His Eminency signed all of them...".
In 2007, Ali Khamenei claimed that "Today, homosexuality is a major problem in the western world. They [Western nations] however ignore it. But the reality is that homosexuality has become a serious challenge, pain and unsolvable problem for the intellectuals in the west."[131] Khamenei, however did not mention any names of western intellectuals.
While Iran has been quick to condemn attacks on Shia mosques and Shia holy places all over the world,[132] it has been intolerant toward other religions. For instance in 2006, authorities in the city of Qom arrested more than 1,000 followers of the mystical Sufi tradition of Islam. Iran's hard-line daily "Kayhan" on 14 February 2006 quoted senior clerics in Qom as saying that Sufism should be eradicated in the city, while the Reuters news agency reported that in September one of Iran's hard-line clerics, Grand Ayatollah Hossein Noori Hamedani, called for a clampdown on Sufis in Qom.[133][134] In 2006, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad launched a plan to suppress what he called "indecent religious associations that work under the cover of spirituality and Sufism".[135] Morteza Agha-Tehrani, one of the closest disciples of Mesbah-Yazdi and moral advisor to President Ahmadinejad was the leader of a raid on Sufi mosques in Qom.[136]
Islamic scholarship in Iran has a long tradition of debate and critique. This tradition has come to pose a challenge to the constitutional order of the Islamic Republic of Iran, as a number of seminary-trained scholars have applied their critical methods to basic issues of state legitimacy, in particular the state's right to insist on interpretive closure. For example, Dr. Mehdi Ha'iri Yazdi, the son of the late Shaykh Abdolkarim Haeri, the founding member of the Qom Theology School, has written a book about criticism of velayat-e faqıh. The regime has responded with force, convening special clergy courts to silence and imprison scholars, in violation of seminary norms of scholarly debate. These conspicuous acts of discipline seem to have backfired, as each escalating punishment has generated new critics within.[121][137]
In Iran, unlike most countries, epistemological debates have political implications. Because the Islamic Republic stakes its legitimacy on the scholarly authority of its jurist-ruler, the regime takes such debates quite seriously. Through the Special Clergy Court, the regime has tried to clamp down on relativism, calling it self-defeating. The dissident seminarians, too, have distanced themselves from relativism, calling themselves legitimate religious authorities. It is unclear how the dissidents will reconcile the two seminary norms of open debate and scholarly authority, or what political ramifications might follow from such a reconciliation. It is already clear, though, that the dissidents are creating an unprecedentedly rich documentary record of Islamic critique of the Islamic state.[121]
Abdolkarim Soroush, advocate of Islamic pluralism,[138] believes that fundamentalism in Iran will self-destruct as it is afflicted with an internal contradiction, which will shatter it from within.[139] Similar ideas have been put forward by Iranian scholar Saeed Hajjarian.[140] Abdolkarim Soroush, Mohsen Kadivar, Saeed Hajjarian and Seyyed Hossein Nasr are among most notable critics of fundamentalism in Iran. Today Iranian neofundamentalists are a very strong minority in Qom seminaries. However, they enjoy support from two Grand Marjas, namely Nasser Makarem Shirazi and Hossein Noori Hamedani as well as direct support from supreme leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei.[8]
There was a handful of Iranian victims among the thousands of innocent dead of 11 September 2001 attacks.[141] Behnaz Mozakka was among the victims of 7 July 2005 London bombings.
In 1943, a Saudi religious judge ordered an Iranian pilgrim beheaded for allegedly defiling the Great Mosque with excrement supposedly carried into the mosque in his pilgrim's garment.[142]
In 1987, Saudi Arabia's fundamentalist regime attacked Iranian pilgrims who were doing a peaceful annual demonstration of Haj and killed some 275 people. 303 people were seriously injured. For years, Iranian pilgrims had tried to stage peaceful political demonstrations in the Muslim holy city of Mecca during the hajj. Iran sees the 1987 massacre of Iranian pilgrims as the first major attack by Sunni extremists like Osama bin Laden and the emerging Al-Qaeda on Shia Iranians. A few days before the massacre of Iranian pilgrims by Saudi police, USS Vincennes shot down Iran Air Flight 655, killing 290 civilians.
In March 2004 (Ashura), Al-Qaeda killed 40 Iranian pilgrims at the Shia holy places in Iraq. Many others were injured in the blasts. Ashura commemorates the killing of the revered Imam Hussein at the battle of Karbala in the seventh century AD. It is the event that gave birth to the Shia branch of Islam which predominates in Iran. Ashura is by far the most significant day in the Iranian religious calendar, and it is commemorated as a slaughter of innocents by traitors and tyrants.[143]
Justifying the attack on Iran, Saddam Hussein accused Iranians of "murdering the second (Umar), third (Uthman), and fourth (Ali) Caliphs of Islam".[144] In March 1988, Saddam Hussein killed about 20,000 Iranian soldiers immediately using nerve-gas agents. According to Iraqi documents, assistance in developing chemical weapons was obtained from firms in many countries, including the United States, West Germany, the United Kingdom, France and China.[145][146][147][148] Iraq also targeted Iranian civilians with chemical weapons. Many thousands were killed in attacks on populations in villages and towns, as well as front-line hospitals. Many still suffer from the severe effects.[149] In December 2006, Saddam Hussein said he would take responsibility "with honour" for any attacks on Iran using conventional or chemical weapons during the 1980–1988 war but he took issue with charges that he ordered attacks on Iraqis.[150][151]
Written by Principalists:
Written by others:
Ruhollah Khomeini, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mohammad Khatami, Iran
Mohammad Khatami, Ali Khamenei, Iran, Hassan Rouhani, Israel
Azerbaijan, Turkey, Pakistan, Persian language, Armenia
Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Qom Province, Ruhollah Khomeini
Iran, YouTube, Iranian presidential election, 2013, Economy of Iran, Ali Khamenei
Iran, 1979 in Iran, Pahlavi dynasty, History of Iran, Islam in Iran
Islam by country, Islam in China, Islam in Russia, Shia Islam, Islam
Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Religion, Politics of Iran, Iran, Ali Khamenei
United States, Israel, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mohammad Khatami, Iran–Iraq War


text:
Foundation Course in Acting and Performance (HNC)
Course accredited by the SQA and recognised by the CDMT
Qualification awarded by The MGA Academy of Performing Arts (HNC)
Duration 1 year (4 or 5 days a week)
Scheduled teaching per week 20 hours average per week
The MGA one-year foundation course in Acting offers a pre-vocational year designed to prepare you for the demands of professional, full-time training and provides you with the skills required to audition successfully for the country's leading Drama institutions.
It is directed at those students who have left school (or are about to leave) and are intending to pursue vocational training but who either don't quite yet have the skills required to audition successfully or who do not have the required academic qualifications to start a Bachelor of Arts qualification.
The course is designed to thoroughly prepare you for the process of auditioning and the rigours of taking up a three-year place at a Drama school, expanding your skill set and enabling you to realise your full potential in your future training.
MGA Foundation Students have gone on to study at, amongst others, the American Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, Arts Educational Schools, Bird College, Guildford School of Acting, Laine Theatre Arts, Mountview Academy, Performers College, Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama – and, of course, The MGA Academy of Performing Arts.
The Foundation schedule runs for one whole academic year over three full-time terms of training and an HNC qualification is awarded to those who successfully complete all the required modules.
The course is technique orientated, giving you a solid foundation in the key discipline of Acting that can then be built upon in future studies.
Specialist classes and training workshops include:
- Acting and performance
- Monologue and preparation
- Voice and vocal technique
- Text analysis and Scene Study
- Actors Movement
- Singing and Dance for the Actor
- Audition technique
- Theatre History
- Professional and personal development
MGA's unique focus on audition technique and professional development will ensure that students are best placed to gain entry into any of the UK's distinguished drama schools.
Though MGA has an excellent track record, given the nature and level of competition for Drama School places, we cannot guarantee that foundation students will be accepted at their chosen full-time provider and successful completion of the MGA foundation course does not automatically mean that students will progress onto MGA's own three-year programmes.
You must be a UK or EU citizen to apply for MGA's professional full-time training courses and be able to provide proof.
Tuition fees
The MGA Academy of Performing Arts is the only accredited Council for Dance and Drama Education and Training college in Scotland. We are also the largest independent SQA Approved Centre running professional training courses in Scotland. All tuition fees are kept to an absolute minimum but do reflect the expertise of the teaching staff, quality of facilities, small class sizes and sheer number of contact teaching hours offered.
Please visit our fees and funding page for more information and read the fee notes carefully or contact us to arrange a consultation.
Equipment checklist
MGA students are expected to have the following – a definitive list is discussed at audition stage.
- MGA Full-Time uniform – purchase here
- Jazz trainers/shoes
- Tap shoes
- Ballet tights, leotard and shoes
- Knee pads
- Dictaphone, notepad and pencil
- Boys will also need a pair of dress shoes and a black suit
- Girls must have a pair of character shoes and character skirt, and a black cocktail dress
Are there any other course costs?
There is a reading list and a kit list of important items that students need to purchase before the first day of term. This can be discussed during the interview at the audition stage and will be issued on acceptance of a place. Advanced and third-year students must also pay to join the Spotlight Casting Directory and become a member of Equity before their second term.
We run a Professional Expenses Account on behalf of our student and the costs of this are communicated during the audition process.
Is there any funding available?
SAAS funding may be available to Scottish and European students and you should contact your Local Education Authority for advice on other sources of funding for full-time training for which you may be eligible.
Several charitable trusts exist that help finance performing arts students and a directory listing these grant-making trusts and charities should be available at your local library.


text: Enjoy the freedom of a two wheeled vehicle that moves under your own power. Whether you're looking for a reliable bike to get around town, to take on a weekend get-away, or a bike built for a mountain or dirt adventure – we've got something for everyone at every level of experience. At the Bicycle Escape you can count on honest prices and sales without the big pitch. Come on in and see what's in stock or just drop in for a visit.


text:
Dead Fred asks:Are you a Desperate Genealogist?
Click the e-book above for details!
Dead Fred's Genealogy Photo Archive, a free, fun photo genealogy research web site devoted to helping you visualize your heritage!
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Photo #67914
Last Name: Hoover/Hover
First Name: Myrtle
Middle Name: Estelle
Subject's City: Ithaca
Subject's State: NY
Subject's County: Tompkins
Subject's Country: USA
Photographer's City:
Photographer's State:
Nee: CHURCHILL
Type**: PRT
Comments: Myrtle Estelle Hoover/Hover (Nee: CHURCHILL) | Ithaca NY USA | | Comments: Myrtle Estelle CHURCHILL. She was known by "Estelle." (b. 15 July 1876, probably in Chemung County, NY; d. May 1936 in Ithaca, Tompkins County, NY.) Daughter of Henry or Merritt CHURCHILL and Amanda Caroline GREEK. Estelle married Frank HOOVER on 1 Dec 1894, probably in Chemung County, NY. They had three children: Marion HOOVER Beyerl, Gladys L. HOOVER Shepherd and Janet HOOVER Hadlock.
Digital Image Only? NO
Everyone Listed In This Photo:
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text:
Marcia Cross, husband Tom Mahoney and their adorable 2-year-old twin daughters, Eden and Savannah, were spotted leaving a shopping mall on Sunday (June 7). Eden was all smiles in daddy's arms, while Savannah proudly rode the escalator with mom.
The Desperate Housewives actress recently opened up about taking the twins to the hospital where Tom undergoes treatments for an undisclosed type of cancer. "I was sort of apprehensive, but we just wanted to make it really normal. We didn't tell them where they were going in case we had to change plans, but they came in and they were so happy to see him. They just wanted to explore everything. It was great. It's the best medicine. They don't know what a hospital is, they don't care. It's just, 'There's dad!' "


text:
BRAVO! Program Connects UA Students With Research Opportunities Abroad
More than 220 UA undergraduates have worked in labs representing 34 countries since the BRAVO! program began in 1992.
Ten UA students are spending their summers not just studying abroad, but working daily in research groups across the world.
The Biomedical Research Abroad: Vistas Open! – or BRAVO! – program began in 1992 and sends students to work in labs run by colleagues of University of Arizona faculty mentors.
"The U of A is a terrific place for this program because we've got a tremendous amount of research taking place here and we have faculty mentors who are very well-connected internationally," said Carol Bender, University Distinguished Outreach Professor and director of BRAVO! and the Undergraduate Biology Research Program.
"By sending the students primarily to collaborators of their faculty mentors at the UA, we have a built in measure of quality assurance. A UA mentor won't send a student into a situation where the student won't be well looked after," Bender said. "It's not only an intense scientific experience, it's an intense cultural experience. We send them not as a group, but on their own, so they become our scientific as well as cultural ambassadors."
More than 220 UA undergraduates have worked in labs representing 34 countries since the BRAVO! program began. This year's BRAVO! students are researching in England, Singapore, Germany, France, Japan, India and Kenya and come from five UA colleges: the College of Science, College of Medicine, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, College of Engineering and the Mel & Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health. The BRAVO! program is funded through grants from the National Institutes of Health and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
Microbiology student John McMullen is researching at the University of Montpellier II, in Montpellier, France.
"This is a wonderful program to not only allow for students to conduct research in a different lab with similar goals but also to learn about life and science in a different country. BRAVO! gives students the ability to broaden their cultural awareness in a scientific setting and in everyday life," he said.
Mollecular and cellular biology major Sophie Hapak is working with high-resolution NMR spectroscopy at a lab at the Leibniz Institute of Molecular Pharmacology in Berlin.
"As scientists, it is important for our growth as independent thinkers to spend time in other labs," she said. "Working with other people, learning new techniques, and learning how other people perform familiar tasks have, I believe, made me a more well-rounded and knowledgeable student. Of course, people can rotate in other labs in the U.S., but the fact that we get to work in a different country adds another dimension to the experience."
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text:
|Trouvez les meilleur spots
Go surfing only when needed. Find here for your surfing only the best weather maps for surfers available on internet. These come from governemental agencies around the world such as the NAVY. If you want some advice on how to interpret the maps or how to proceed, go to the FAQ.
|Costa Rica
|Costa Rica
7 Days Forecasts. Size and Direction of SWELL. maps produced by the NOAA. Thoses maps are specially good for the wind direction.
5 Days Forecasts. Size and Direction of SWELL. Produced by the US Navy. They are easy to use.
8 Days Forecasts. Direction of Wind. Produced by the US Navy, available on www.wetterzentrale.de . Very accurate at 48 h.
Wannasurf.com sur votre portable
RSS Tous les flux RSS de Wannasurf.com
Newsletter Toutes les nouveautés par courriel


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Provides One Stop Shopping for natural resources or environmental geospatial data at anytime, from anywhere, to anyone. The Gateway allows you to choose your area of interest, browse and select data from our catalog, customize the format, and have it downloaded or shipped on CD for use in GIS software.
Web Soil Survey
Web based application that allows customers to prepare soil reports and maps, and to download soil data.
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Kimberly is a very insecure girl. She cuts herself...
The love of my life * Complete *28272514
- by Bizzle's____Queen
- Rating:
- Published: 31 Mar 2014
- Updated: 26 Apr 2014
- Status: Complete
I've been dating Justin for a year now and it's our anniversary. Justin makes me feel like a queen and I'm so appreciative of him. He is the love of my life and I couldn't ask for more.
Join MovellasFind out what all the buzz is about. Join now to start sharing your creativity and passion
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text:
Ahoy, it is the time of the year again. The Google Summer of Code has just ended and here I come with the final report, joining my fellow Amarok GSoC student Konrad Zemek with his excellent posting.
|Newer MTP device configuration dialog
Before I sum things up, let me quickly mention what I've done the very last week. In short, it was full of little features and polishing.
What I've done this week:
- Fixed small glitches in playlist tooltips (properly escape HTML markup) and in MemoryMeta (show non-compilation albums with empty album artist).
- Implemented reading of the device folder structure, showing the actual track path as its location (the format is compatible with kio-mtp):
- Implemented better fall-back when we fail to read device's storage entries (mostly because the Android device has its screen locker). It turns out that (at least Samsung's MTP stack) only blocks storage listing, but happily lists all the files and other entries. So we exploit that and infer storage ids from them. :-)
- Added support for specifying the Music folder, the folder where new music is put into. I was trying a handful of approaches how to make this editable by user and ended up with an editable combo box that shows root items and provider nice completion for all folders. I had to implement full QAbstractItemModel of MTP folder because of this, but it was fun. ;-)
- Finally added option to show only tracks under the Music folder. This is handy in order not to pick up misc music files like ringtones.
- KCompletion is weird and subclassing it to my liking seems impossible because few methods are virtual and other ones use private d-pointer extensively. Fortunately QCompleter is much nicer and works (pretty well) even with a hierarchic model.
- MTP folder/storage model is weird. There are storages (e.g. Internal memory vs. SD card) and folders, so in order to remember "put things here" you have to save either storage or folder id and whether it is a storage or a folder. I guess this is because it was designed by Microsoft...
Wrapping up
Let's see if the goals outlined in the initial project proposal have been met:
- Complete MTP Collection rewrite that removes the dependency on deprecated MediaDevice framework: Check
- Actual communication with the device is strictly asynchronous (threaded) in order not to block the UI: Check
- Zero-configuration device detection and enumeration, plug & play: Check
- Enumeration of tracks on the device along with their metadata: Check
- Playback of tracks stored on devices with on-demand background loading: Check
- Ability to transfer tracks out of and to MTP devices, with possibility to transcode: Check
- Full playlist management (for devices that support them): No, see below
Future work
- The problem with playlists is that the ones created in the most popular music player on Androids, the Google Play Music, aren't visible through the MTP API. It needs further investigation whether and how these could be accessed. In short-term I'll try to add support for traditional playlists, but I'll need external testers for that.
- I haven't touched the album API at all, because my device (S III Mini with Android 4.2) happily ignores it and shows albums correctly without it. It might be however needed for proper album support on older devices. If it turns out this is the case during user testing, I'll add support for it.
- Ability to specify custom file naming when uploading music would be nice.
- Album art. My device displays album art embedded in file tags and I plan to add generic support to embed these to our transcoding/copying framework, but we could make use of the MTP thumbnail API.


text:
Shooter kills 2 at Brazil pre-Carnival party
Brazilian police are searching for a gunman who fired into a crowd at a pre-Carnival street party, killing two and wounding 10 other people.
Such violence is highly unusual before and during Carnival, which attracts hundreds of thousands of foreign visitors annually.
A police spokesman in the city of Novo Friburgo, about 80 miles (130 kilometers) northeast of Rio de Janeiro, says they don't know the motive for the shooting and haven't located the gunman.
A 43-year-old woman and a 20-year-old man were killed.
The shooting happened late Sunday at a popular neighborhood gathering known as a "bloco" party.
While Carnival is still nearly a month away, each weekend leading up to the big bash sees hundreds of warm-up parties take to the streets across the nation.


text:
"I Need Someone To Buy My House In Ramsey !"
We buy houses anywhere in Ramsey and other parts of Louisville, and at any price. Check Out How Our Process Works. We're ready to give you a fair offer for your house.
If you want to sell your Ramsey house fast… we're ready to give you a fair all-cash offer.
Step 1
Call or Submit
Your Info
Tell us about your property – Quick, Easy & Free!
Step 2
Match It To
Our Criteria
If it meets our buying criteria, we'll contact you to set up a quick appointment
Step 3
Meet With Us
At Your Home
We'll present you w/ a fair written, no-obligation offer
Step 4
Choose Your
Closing Date
We close at a local reputable title company, cash in your hands in as little as 7 days
Stop the frustration of your unwanted property. Let us buy your Ramsey house now, regardless of condition.
Avoiding foreclosure? Facing divorce? Moving? Upside down in your mortgage? Liens? It doesn't matter whether you live in it, you're renting it out, it's vacant, or not even habitable. We help owners who have inherited an unwanted property, own a vacant house, are behind on payments, owe liens, downsized and can't sell… even if the house needs repairs that you can't pay for… and yes, even if the house is fire damaged or has bad rental tenants.
Basically, if you have a property and need to sell it… we'd like to make you a fair cash offer and close on it when you're ready to sell. We buy Ramsey houses, and we're ready to buy your's.
A Little Bit About National Home Team
Since 2009, National Home Team has been involved in over 1,000 real estate transactions across the country, both as buyers and sellers. Our wholesale real estate model is simple — we help homeowners and other stakeholders who have found themselves with an underwater mortgage, need to stop foreclosure, or just want to sell their house fast for cash. We do this by leveraging our expansive network of real estate investors and specialists to provide owners with a fair and transparent cash offer and a quick closing process.
— Daniel DiGiacomo, Founder
Do You Need To Sell Your House in Ramsey , Louisville?
Even if an agent can't sell your house, we can help. (Sometimes selling a house through a real estate agent is not for everyone.) And as a bonus…
- you don't need to clean up and repair the property
- don't waste time finding an agent who you trust and who can deliver on their promise of selling your house quickly
- you won't need to sign a contract that binds you to an agent for a certain term
- or deal with the paperwork and the waiting and wondering (and hoping)
We'll know very quickly if we can help you, and unlike selling through an agent, you don't have to wait to see if the buyer can get financing… we're ready to buy right now!
All that hassle can add stress, months to the process, and in the end after paying the agent's expensive fees, you may or may not be ahead of the game.
What People Are Saying About National Home Team
"Working with Daniel was an honor…"
I live in Houston and wanted to sell one of my properties in Baltimore to free up some cash for another project that I was working on. I contacted Daniel and within three weeks my house was sold…
– Kwan Johnson
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I had enjoyed living in my home for twenty-three years, so it was important to me that when I chose to sell my home, I wanted to work with someone who was interested in the community for more than just a quick business transaction…
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Daniel DiGiacomo's consistent striving to learn, educate and share knowledge with investors is outstanding! His commitment to the communities where he invests, makes them all stronger for his leadership…
– Becky Hammer
We work differently at National Home Team. When you contact us and submit the short property information form (below), we'll give you a fair all-cash offer on your house within 24 hours… and the best part is: we can close whenever YOU choose to close – it's entirely up to you. It doesn't matter what condition the house is in, or even if there are tenants in there that you can't get rid of… don't worry about it. We'll take care of it for you. And if you need the cash quickly, we can close in as little as 7 days because we buy Ramsey houses with cash and don't have to rely on traditional bank financing. (Go here to learn about our process →)
In short…
No matter what condition your house is in; no matter what situation or timeframe you're facing…
Our goal is to help make your life easier and get you out from under the property that's
stressing you out… while still paying a fast, fair, and honest price for your house.
Or Give Us A Call Now At: 844-218-8881
We help property owners just like you, in all kinds of situations. From divorce, foreclosure, death of a family member, burdensome rental property, and all kinds of other situations. We buy houses in Louisville… including Ramsey and surrounding areas and pay a fair cash price, fast. Sometimes, those who own property simply have lives that are too busy to take the time to do all of things that typically need to be done to prepare a house to sell on the market… if that describes you, just let us know about the property you'd like to be rid of and sell your Ramsey house fast for cash.
If you simply don't want to put up with the hassle of owning that house any longer, and if you don't want to put up with the hassle and time-consuming expense of selling your property the traditional way, let us know about the property you'd like to be rid of and sell your house fast for cash. Talk to someone in our office before submitting your property information by calling us today at 844-218-8881
We buy houses in Ramsey and all surrounding areas in Louisville. If you need to sell your house fast in Ramsey , connect with us… we'd love to make you a fair no-obligation no-hassle offer. Take it or leave it. You've got nothing to lose.


text:
6 Ice Cream Scoops We Love in Portland, OR
I love ice cream because it serves as an ideal canvas to create virtually unlimited flavors. Want breakfast for dessert? Try maple with bacon ice cream, or even an oatmeal and brown sugar creation.
From a fiery chocolate ice cream at Cool Moon Ice Cream to a bourbon toffee treat at What's the Scoop?, the Portland ice cream scene has a handful of places that sell such innovative choices. Here are six of our favorites.
About the Author: Aaron Wakamatsu is a food blogger who loves to eat very spicy food. He also loves delicious, normal meals, but still prefers to entertain friends by consuming random fiery combinations. Please follow him on Twitter @aaronwakamatsu.
All products linked here have been independently selected by our editors. We may earn a commission on purchases, as described in our affiliate policy.


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Least Ambitious Woman in America Continues to Collect Welfare After Winning $1M Lottery
A 24-year-old Michigan woman who won $1M in the state lottery last September still collects welfare from her home state.
Amanda Clayton was forced to publicly defend her decision to remain on welfare after she was the subject of a local TV station exposé:
I feel that it's okay [to receive welfare] because I mean, I have no income and I have bills to pay. I have two houses.
Rather than collect her winnings in annual installments, Clayton opted to receive a lump sum payout of $500,000 last September. She used a portion of that money to buy herself a new car and, for some reason, to increase the number of homes she already had by one hundred percent. She paid for both car and house in cash.
For what it's worth, Clayton is just as surprised as you are that she is still eligible for $200 a month in food stamps.
"I thought they would cut me off, but since they didn't, I thought maybe it was okay because I'm not working."
A member of the state House of Representatives is now sponsoring a bill that would require lottery winners to have their eligibility for public assistance re-assessed if they received prize amounts greater than $1,000.
Another Michigan resident continued receiving public aid after winning a $2-million lottery jackpot in 2010.