text:
Fab Spending Levels for 2009 Down 25%— Lowest Levels since 2003
Fasten your Seat Belt – this Ride is not Over Yet
By Christian Gregor Dieseldorff, SEMI Industry Research and Statistics Department, San Jose, California, November 24, 2008
SEMI's World Fab Forecast tracks money spent on equipping fabs, fab construction projects and capacity per fab.
Money Spent on Fabs Equipping
The latest quarterly publication of the World Fab Forecast (November 17, 2008) reveals that spending on fabs equipping is expected to be about $27 billion (B) in 2008, a change of -29% year-over-year (YoY). The data predict 2009 to drop down to $20B (see Figure 1), or a change of -25%, which will be the lowest number since 2003. This may drop even further as the economic outlook continues to deteriorate.
For 2008, Japan is the region with most money spent, $6.0B, on fabs equipping. This number is expected to drop by over 34% to $4.0B in 2009. South Korea is second in 2008 spending, and will drop by 4% to $4.8B in 2009. The largest spenders in Japan in 2008 are the Flash JVs between Toshiba and Sandisk, Elpida, Toshiba, Fujitsu, Spansion, Sony and Renesas. Flash Alliance alone is the second largest spender for fabs equipping worldwide, second only to Samsung.
Although all other regions show negative rates in the double digits in 2009 for money spent on fabs equipping, Europe and Mideast show a positive growth. The absolute dollar amount is much less, about $2.5B compared to other regions such as Korea, Japan and the Americas (with about $4.8B, $4.0B and over $3.0B respectively). But the contrast is still remarkable. Europe and Mideast has had steady spending in the range of $2.0B to $2.6B since 2007. The European semiconductor industry does not focus on memory, so non-memory makers— such as Intel with fab 28 (Kiryat Gat, Israel) and AMD (Dresden, Germany) who received recently a financial injection from investors in Abu Dhabi— are responsible for this positive growth rate,.
Taiwan makes the largest cutbacks in money spent on fabs equipping: from about $9.0B in 2007 to $4.5B in 2008 and another reduction of 50% in 2009 to reach about $2.0 to 2.5B in equipment spending. Equipment spending in almost all other regions is expected to drop by 20 to 30% in 2009.
But not all regions will have a large drop in spending— Korea drops by only single digits in 2009. While Hynix continues to respond to the crisis by making cuts, Samsung maintains a strong position. Samsung stands out in the industry, with about $7.6 billion in cash reserves at hand. Korea could have the smallest decline of all regions in 2009 if Samsung and Hynix maintain their current ramp plans. This is a big question though, and we will have to wait until the New Year for more clarity regarding CAPEX for these two companies.
Money Spent on Fab Construction Projects
In 2008, out of a total of 10 major construction projects, five are for new fabs and three are for 300mm fabs. In 2009, out of a total of 16 known planned construction projects, only six are new fab constructions with higher probability whereas only five are for 300mm fabs.
Spending on fab construction projects in 2008 is expected to decline by 41% YoY as more projects are pushed out or put on hold (see Figure 2). Construction spending in 2009 is expected to decline about 25%, to reach its lowest level in six years.
The Americas and Japan stand out with positive growth rates in construction spending for 2009. Japan is expected to spend twice as much as the Americas, mainly driven by Toshiba, the Flash/Alliance JV, and Panasonic. Worldwide, Toshiba and the Toshiba/Sandisk Alliance represent the largest spenders on fab construction projects in 2009. In the Americas, AMD has announced the construction of their $4.0B fab in upstate New York, which is getting an additional $1.2B incentive from the state. This will be the only new high volume fab project beginning construction in the Americas in the past three years. The last new high volume fab in the Americas was Samsung's 300mm fab in Austin, Texas, which began construction in 2006.
Capacity Trends
The World Fab Forecast tracks and forecasts capacities per fab, in great detail. In 2008, we expect overall capacity to grow by 5%, and in 2009 grow by about 4 to 5%.
The growth rates for 2008 and 2009 are the lowest since 2002. The growth rate for 300mm fabs in 2008 is the lowest in history, with 2009 even further declining.
In response to the economic crisis, oversupply, and falling average selling prices (ASP), most memory companies are closing their 200mm fabs. However, some companies maintain smaller but still positive growth rates of their 300mm fabs. For 2009, foundries are expected to maintain the strongest growth rate of about 8%, followed by MPU and then Memory.
Utilization Rates for Foundries
Utilization rates in 4Q08 for foundries are expected to reach the lowest levels in years. For example, Chartered's utilization rate will drop to 63%, the level they saw in 2005. UMC's utilization rate may drop as low as 55%, the lowest since 2001. We expect utilization rates to remain low through first half of 2009. As of mid-November 2008, most foundries maintain their planned capex for 2008. Only UMC has announced, at the end of October 2008, cuts in their 2008 capex (from $600M to $450M). Chartered has not announced any cuts of their 2008 capex plan (currently $630M). TSMC has yet not announced any capex cut, although they have announced hiring freezes. All foundries are expected to reduce their capex for 2009.
How the Outlook Changes
At the beginning of 2008 and even into mid 2008, the outlook for 2009 looked positive, but this has all changed (see Figure 3) very quickly.
Since the burst of the "dot.com" bubble, the semiconductor industry has become more dependent on consumer products, and therefore on the consumer. The whole industry, and especially the memory segment, has experienced falling ASP since 2007, mainly due to oversupply. The outlook was still positive because of increasing demand forecasts. Consumer confidence was still looking up.
The collapse of the credit and mortgage bubble in September 2008 changed all that. People who are losing their homes are not likely to spend on the latest gadgets, so prospects for consumer spending have dropped, and with it, the forecast for increasing demand of electronics and semiconductor devices.
What the Future Holds for Us
More and more semiconductor companies are posting losses and are forced to make cuts.
Layoffs cause more jobless consumers, and therefore more people cutting back on spending. This creates a domino effect, which is already affecting the end of the electronics supply chain, the retail stores. The effect will make 2009 even worse than 2008 for the semiconductor industry. Consumer confidence is now so low that it is below the recession point, according to the University of Michigan survey index value of October 2008. And the events of the past several months show that no country is immune to the now worldwide financial crisis.
Companies without large cash reserves are struggling and vulnerable. We can expect more mergers, such as Micron's purchase of Qimonda's share in Inotera mid-October 2008; Panasonic's efforts to acquire Sanyo in November 2008; and other rumors such as Toshiba buying Sandisk and Micron acquiring Qimonda. Mergers will create redundancy, which can lead to more lay offs.
Some Light at the End of the Tunnel
In 2008, four 300mm fabs are beginning operations and only three are expected to begin operations in 2009.
Samsung has $7.6 billion cash reserves at hand. Intel's cash position still looks good. And now one company suddenly stands out: AMD, who made an unexpected move involving an outside investor. AMD's fab plans received a huge financial boost, which spurs investment in the regions where they have fabs (such as Dresden) and stimulates regions where they plan to build new fabs (such as Luther Forest in upstate New York).
In times of struggling markets and economic recession, new ideas are born and new opportunities are created. The oil crisis caused an increasing interest in renewable energy and energy conservation, such as the solar industry. The population continues to grow, and items are being replaced or run out, which means that there is a natural demand. Severe cuts in spending will create an economic vacuum which will need to be filled. Once we reach the bottom, we will see growth again. The semiconductor industry experiences severe slowdowns about every 5 to 8 years. At the moment all data indicate that we see growth again in 2010……until we cycle into the next slowdown.
SEMI World Fab Forecast report provides high-level summaries and graphs; in-depth analyses of capital expenditure, capacity, technology and products, down to the detail of each fab; and forecasts for the next 18 months. These tools are invaluable for understanding how 2009 will look, and learning more about capex for construction projects, fab equipping, technology level, and products.
Please visit www.semi.org/fabs for additional information on these reports.


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Business, labor oppose energy project slowdownsBy MARK HAYWARD
New Hampshire Union Leader
March 04. 2013 10:38PM
Business and labor groups are lining up to kill legislation designed to slow, if not halt, controversial large-scale energy projects in the state, including hilltop wind farms and the Northern Pass high-voltage energy transmission lines.
"It's not often that we're on the same page, but we certainly are on this one," said Joe Casey, business manager of the Local 490 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
Casey said he contacted all 400 members of his Concord-based trade union to encourage them to telephone their state representatives to oppose four pieces of legislation expected to be considered today by the House Science, Technology and Energy Committee.
The bills call for:
--A moratorium on wind and transmission projects.
--A popular vote prior to approvals of such projects.
-- The burial of transmission lines.
--The required placement of transmission lines along state rights of way in most cases.
"It could be devastating to us, especially the moratorium," Casey said. He said IBEW electricians worked on the Lempster Mountain wind farm, and they would likely work on construction of the Northern Pass transfer station in Franklin.
IBEW electricians earn about $27 an hour, along with health care benefits and retirement, he said.
The Business and Industry Association has also gone on record against the legislation.
BIA Vice President Mike Licata said the organization has not taken a stand one way or another on Northern Pass or any specific wind farm. But he said BIA has had a strong philosophical opposition to legislation that targets a specific business or project. He said the state has an existing process - the Site Evaluation Committee - to review projects to make sure they comply with regulations and are good for the state.
"It's inappropriate for the Legislature to insert itself into the existing process and change the rules," Licata said.
He said the BIA is not coordinating opposition with labor groups.
Whatever recommendation emerges from the Science, Technology and Energy Committee will have to go to the full House, then the Senate before landing on Gov. Maggie Hassan's desk for a signature.
Environment New Hampshire Politics Energy Top Section Stories

subset: commoncrawl


text:
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A Nebraska judge denied bond Tuesday to an Indiana doctor accused of killing four people with ties to an Omaha medical school that kicked him out of a residency program more than a decade ago.
Dr. Anthony Garcia, of Terre Haute, Ind., is accused of fatally shooting Creighton University pathologist Roger Brumback and fatally stabbing Brumback's wife, Mary, earlier this year at the couple's home. Garcia also is accused in the 2008 killings of 11-year-old Thomas Hunter, whose father worked at the university, and his family's housekeeper, Shirlee Sherman.
Garcia was arrested in Illinois last week and extradited Thursday to a jail in Omaha. On Tuesday, Judge Lawrence Barrett ruled that Garcia would have to remain in jail ahead of his trial.
Roger Brumback was chairman of the Creighton University School of Medicine's pathology department, while Hunter's father was a professor who worked closely with Brumback in the department. The two men had fired Garcia from the pathology residence program for "unprofessional conduct" in 2001.
Attorneys for Garcia, who was wearing a yellow jumpsuit during his appearance in Douglas County Court, argued unsuccessfully that there wasn't enough evidence to try Garcia. He is due back in court for a preliminary hearing on Aug. 14, when the judge will decide whether there's enough evidence for a trial.
Nebraska prosecutors are weighing whether to seek the death penalty against Garcia. Regardless, a conviction of first-degree murder in Nebraska brings a minimum sentence of life in prison without parole.


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Get More Done
4 Ways to beat that "Damn, this is going to be hard" feeling.
By Carson Tate Illustration by atipus
For professional athletes, facing and overcoming pain, adversity, and discomfort is all part of a day's work. Knowledge workers, the majority of the workforce today, encounter a different type of adversity — intellectual discomfort.
You know the feeling of intellectual discomfort. It's that gut reaction you feel when you prepare to start a project, and, as you skim the document, you think to yourself , Damn, this is going to be hard.
This will push your intellectual capacity. And that feels challenging, overwhelming and scary. In this moment, you might stall. You might even choose to give up. Or worse – not even give it a shot, delegating it to someone else. This is the work you know you were born to break through to get to your best future self.
Just like how athletes must practice to be comfortable in discomfort, you must as well if you hope to improve your skills and advance your career. The hard stuff, the stuff you'd rather skip or do later is often the stuff that's most necessary. Every time we choose to play it safe or bypass challenging intellectual prompts, we impede our ability to innovate and grow, waste our own (or our company's) money, and squander our talent.
So why do we avoid intellectual discomfort? Because it requires our deepest level of thought, attention, and presence – much of which we've lost touch with as a result of full inboxes, the growing number of social media platforms, and media content that updates constantly. Deeply intellectual work is soul work that takes more time and energy. And it goes against the ways we've conditioned ourselves to work – on autopilot. We observe life versus engaging in it, whether we mechanically scroll through our social media feed to distract ourselves or use apps to make every step of our day more mindless.
But rarely do we improve when the task is easy. As a cross country runner in college, I detested the mile repeat workout that consisted of running four to six one-mile sets. You had to run each set, which was four laps around the track, as fast as you could with only one lap to recover between sets. It was a grueling and uncomfortable challenge for me every time. However, the speed and endurance that I developed through this type of workout prepared me for the challenge and pain of actual races. It was because I had experienced pain during these workouts that I knew in my gut that I could push through the pain when it truly counted. It was only after I chose to incorporate mile repeats into my workouts consistently that I started breaking my previous personal records.
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A while back I wrote a post on the difference between can not and cannot and in the comments to that post a reader asked me to write about the difference between and and and . Well, it turns out there really is not a difference in meaning between and or and . Within and without are simply the correct ways of writing these words. Within and without should not be written with a space between with/in or with/out, according to all major dictionaries. This is a good lesson for us all (myself included) to be sure in the future to remember that these words are always written as one word (i.e. within), not two separate words (with in). But since we are talking about the word within there is a small but important difference in usage to be noted between the words and . I am going to take the time to go over that difference today.
In vs. within
In (a preposition) expresses a period of time during which an event will take place or a situation remains the case. In expresses that a specific stated time will elapse before another event happens.
Here are some examples of correct usage (with what the examples mean in parentheses): I will leave for vacation in a month. (Exactly one month from now I will go on vacation.) We'll be there in an hour. (Exactly one hour will go by and then we will arrive.)
Within (a preposition) expresses that something will occur inside a particular period of time. Within is used to express that some stated time or less will pass before something happens.
Here are some examples of correct usage (with what the examples mean in parentheses): We'll reach the cabin within the hour. (We will arrive sometime between now and one hour from now.) You must send off your registration within three days. (You have from now until three days from now to send your registration.)
Illustration of the notation for the model, showing the four possible combinations of states at the beginning and end of the interval At time t = 0 , a sunlit state is indicated by x 1 < 0 and a shaded state by x 1 > 0 ; at time t = T a sunlit state is indicated by y n > T and a shaded state by y n < T . The different sections are coloured to indicate how they contribute to the (log) likelihood functions: red denotes a contribution to on-switching functions [eqns (7) and (9)] and yellow to off-switching function [eqns (8) and (10)].
Illustration of the notation for the model, showing the four possible combinations of states at the beginning and end of the interval At time t = 0 , a sunlit state is indicated by x 1 < 0 and a shaded state by x 1 > 0 ; at time t = T a sunlit state is indicated by y n > T and a shaded state by y n < T . The different sections are coloured to indicate how they contribute to the (log) likelihood functions: red denotes a contribution to on-switching functions [eqns (7) and (9)] and yellow to off-switching function [eqns (8) and (10)].
In terms of the switching times, { x 1 , y 1 , x 2 , y 2 , ..., x n , y n }, for a given patch, the likelihood functions for λ on ( t ) and λ off ( t ) are then
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text:
After losing three rounds in court, the opponents of a disputed land trade are seeking an alternative to further legal action.
"To be clear, our clients are not making an offer to settle but only communicating their willingness to talk," wrote Ralph Bloemers, attorney for the Hood River Valley Residents Committee, in a July 7 letter to Mt. Hood Meadows and Hood River County.
However, Meadows believes the conversation with HRVRC should include its plans for construction of a destination resort.
"We are interested in collaboration that deals with the entire Cooper Spur expansion, including both the ski area and the private land because, alternatively, it's difficult for parties to come together to resolve part of a dispute knowing they will be in court over the remainder if it's not all settled at once," said Dave Riley, Meadows general manager.
But Mike McCarthy, HRVRC spokesperson, said the group only wants to talk about the future of the 640 acres that Meadows received from the county. He said Meadows has already publicly stated that it doesn't plan to build a resort on that property so there is no need to address that issue.
"We're interested in the future of the land trade and also protecting the watershed and those are the discussions we would have with Mt. Hood Meadows," said McCarthy.
Instead of pursuing an appeal to Circuit Court Judge Donald Hull's final dismissal of its case in May, the HRVRC is looking at two options to resolve the dispute. These include having the county buy back the forest land it exchanged for 785 acres owned by Meadows. The second alternative is for Meadows or the HRVRC to arrange for a conservation group to buy the property.
"Our clients have already begun the process of gathering information on suitable conservation buyers. Based on some initial inquiries, our clients believe there is a very real potential to close this type of deal," wrote Bloemers.
The former county land under debate adjoins the 160 acres of Cooper Spur Inn holdings purchased by Meadows in 2001. Because the company had publicly stated an intent to build a destination resort in that area, the HRVRC legally challenged the market value assigned to the property since it did not factor in that future use. The county and Meadows argued that state law required appraisals of forest land to be based on the "highest and best" existing use and not on speculation.
Several times during legal proceedings within the past year, Riley said he offered to hire a professional mediator so Meadows and the HRVRC could resolve long-standing differences. Last fall, the land-use watchdog group said they would consider that solution if Meadows' laid its development plans on the table first and explained its "vision" for the mountain.
Riley said the company has met that request in a recent series of community meetings. He said conceptual plans have been displayed to gather public comment on the size, shape and siting of the project. He said concerns about wildlife, traffic and natural resource protection will be incorporated into the final designs. However, Riley said those architectural renderings cannot be completed until the county finishes its mapping of qualifying sites. He said at that time Meadows will know whether all or part of its private land meets state criteria for resort development. If not, he said Meadows will seek a land-use exception that could allow greater flexibility of design. Either way, Riley said he would welcome HRVRC assistance to help Meadows create an environmentally-friendly plan. He is hopeful that the HRVRC will stop the fight against any Meadows' development plans that began more than 20 years ago.
"People in the community are tired of the multi-decade fight and lawsuits. We believe both parties have legitimate needs which can be met if everyone really wants to resolve the dispute," he said.
Riley said Meadows has also received a range of other offers for its new acreage, including interest from a national non-profit youth camp, several timber companies, and a third-party land trust. Since Meadows does not intend to develop the resort on that property, Riley said the company is willing to consider a variety of options.
He said those possibilities could also include a land exchange with the U.S. Forest Service. However, the HRVRC has stated it will fight any trade with the federal agency to prevent the privatizing of public property on the north face of Mt. Hood.
"The advantage of a global settlement is that both parties end up with long-term certainty. We are prepared to work in good faith to make that happen if they are," Riley said.
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Bella News
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Bella Wins Toronto Film Festival and Has Oscar Hopes
Leap of Faith : Eduardo Verastegui finds his true spirit in Bella
"Bella" Opens Latino Film Festival
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TIFF Founder Says Festival Hasn't Gone Hollywood
Novice Director Wins at Toronto
Goya Foods Launches Promotional Sponsorship of Bella
WorldNetDaily.com : 'Bella' turns in highest per screen performance
Bella Gets Rave Reviews
Read all about it here!
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Eduardo Verastegui explains Bella with Neil Cavuto of Fox News.
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Watch Tony Bennett Praise Bella At New York Premiere
Ryan Seacrest interviews "Bella" star Eduardo Verastegui
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Watch Eduardo's Story
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Bella Receives Tony Bennett Media Excellence Award at Emmy Gala
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text:
They proliferated in the wake of the Columbine High School shootings in 1999, as concern about school security soared and the federal government began offering three-year grants to support the cost of deploying police officers in schools.
They proliferated in the wake of the Columbine High School shootings in 1999, as concern about school security soared and the federal government began offering three-year grants to support the cost of deploying police officers in schools.
The school resource officer — a uniformed cop serving the mixed roles of authority figure, confidant and mentor — became a fixture in schools across the region, from Kingston to Warwick. At one time, at least 25 of the 34 school districts in Orange, Ulster and Sullivan counties had police officers in their buildings during school hours, interacting with students and staff members and organizing programs.
But over time, the trauma of Columbine faded, the grant money dried up and government budgets tightened. And with that, school resource officers became scarce.
Today, as school security comes under renewed scrutiny in the wake of last month's horrific school shootings in Newtown, Conn., school and police officials say that SROs, as they are known, proved to be valuable assets, far more than just an armed presence in schools. But some school administrators say they simply can't afford them at a time of rising costs, new mandates and a state-imposed cap on tax increases.
Middletown School District was paying more than $300,000 a year in salaries, benefits and related police costs when school officials decided last year to eliminate the three school resource officers they had at the high school and each of its two middle schools, Superintendent Ken Eastwood said.
In doing a cost-benefit analysis, administrators concluded that the unarmed security monitors who also patrolled Middletown's school halls — 10 at a time at the high school — could cover more ground at less expense than a lone police officer, especially in a building as large as the 2,000-student high school, Eastwood said. The district spends $1.1 million a year on monitors and equipment such as surveillance cameras.
"I'd rather have that kind of coverage than one or two other people," he said.
Statewide, the ranks of school resource officers plunged in 2010, when New York pulled 92 state troopers out of schools because of fiscal constraints. The state had paid for that deployment for four years, after two federal grants totaling $11.3 million ran out, but officials chose to drop that cost — $10.5 million a year in salaries alone, according to the state police. Fifteen local school districts, including Minisink Valley, Sullivan West and Ellenville, lost in-house cops as a result.
Other districts such as Middletown, which had paid to have local police in their schools, also shed their school resource officers. Monroe-Woodbury, which had gotten a federal grant in 2000 to put a Woodbury cop in its high school, pulled the plug after that officer retired in 2010. Pine Bush, a 2001 grant recipient, dropped its position at the high school last year.
At least one school district and a BOCES site have reinstated school resource officers since the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School.
Fallsburg School District, which has a police officer at its junior/senior high school and splits policing costs with the Town of Fallsburg, decided last month to fill a similar position that had been left vacant at its elementary school. And Orange-Ulster BOCES, in collaboration with county officials, has resumed footing the bill to have two sheriff's deputies in its halls in Goshen.
In addition, the Liberty school board is seeking to expand the coverage of its school resource officer, to five days a week from two. To do so, the district must negotiate a new contract with the Village of Libery and pay an additional $62,000 a year, officials said last week.
Warwick police, who once had two officers stationed in the Warwick Valley schools but now have one, have taken a different approach to the heightened security concerns. Starting Monday, the department will have officers walk through each school as part of their daily patrol shifts — a 15-minute visit, at no cost to the district.
"This is something I think we're going to do on a continuous basis," Warwick police Lt. Thomas Maslanka said. "One of our most precious commodities is in that building."


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A Stinky Bogus Trend Story
The New York Times Styles section strikes again.
Will the New York Times Styles section please change its name to the New York Times Bogus Trend section?
Styles, which appears on Sundays and Thursdays, has previously tortured readers with bogus trend stories about dudes who love cats, chicks who are proud of their flat chests, fellas who think being chubby is hip, hotties who wear special contact lenses so that their eyes look like saucers, and New York babes who ride bikes.
The section mines the bogus vein again with a Sunday piece deceptively and bogusly titled "The Great Unwashed" (Oct. 31). The story's deck—in the print edition only—states, "Some people have all but abandoned the idea of soap, shampoo or deodorant and yet still manage to have friends, relationships and office jobs."
The text of the piece dials that categorical headline and deck back, way back, destroying the idea that "a contingent of renegades" who resist the "culture of clean" exists. Indeed, the story brims with accounts of its subjects' washing and deodorizing strategies. The only thing remotely unusual about the story's subjects is that they don't wash as often as some other people.
Jenefer Palmer, the story's first subject, showers three times a week or less. Todd Felix showers daily, but with an unscented body wash. Bethany Hoffmann Becker reports on her Facebook page that she uses wipes after running but showers before getting into bed. Blake Johnson bathes every other day. Tara Freymoyer shampoos with Herbal Essences. And Alice Feiring bathes four times a week. Not a single subject of the story claims to have completely abandoned washing.
A couple of subjects confess to sometimes cleaning their smelly parts with a soapy washcloth or a baby wipe. There's a name for this kind of bathless personal hygiene: It's called a "sink shower." Why its practitioners should be excluded from the ranks of the washed is beyond me. Likewise, one of the story's subjects uses a "natural deodorant" and another uses a "sliced lemon" on her armpits. In my book, anything you rub into your underarms—be it mothballs or gunpowder—to smother smell qualifies as deodorant. If you're a user, you don't belong in a story about nonusers.
Conveniently enough for the Times, almost none of its subjects appears to work a sweaty job. Except for the times their bosses have yelled at them, they've probably never perspired on the job in their lives. The Times story includes a cosmetics executive, an actor who also works as an online producer,a paralegal, a law-school applicant, an eyeglass salesman, a property manager, and a wine writer. Maybe the story's engineer sweats on the job, but he's silent about his bathing regimen—his only comments are about giving up deodorant. A slightly less bogus headline for this story would read "Some People Who Don't Have To Bathe Every Day Don't."
If the underlying subject of the Times story is body-odor management, it leaves unexamined the dominant role unwashed clothes—as opposed to unwashed bodies—contribute to one's stinkiness. (To test my thesis, I invite you to bury your face in a basket of six pairs of your dirtiest underwear. If you survive the infusion, get back to me.) Folks who bathe daily but wear the same unwashed clothes over and over quickly turn ripe. Folks who skip bathing for a few days but still don freshly laundered garments every day radiate a relatively charming fragrance. I'll bet that every bath-averse person named in the story puts on clean clothes every day and that a good number of them slip on something different at the end of the work day.
I hope this critique doesn't inspire the Times to run a bogus trend story titled "People Who Never Wash Their Clothes."
The first of many stinkers to encourage me to write this bogus trend piece was reader Levi Fishman. Thanks, Levi! Send your stink to email@example.com and take a whiff of mine on my Twitter feed. (E-mail may be quoted by name in "The Fray," Slate's readers' forum; in a future article; or elsewhere unless the writer stipulates otherwise. Permanent disclosure: Slate is owned by the Washington Post Co.)
Track my errors: This hand-built RSS feed will ring every time Slate runs a "Press Box" correction. For e-mail notification of errors in this specific column, type the word stink in the subject head of an e-mail message, and send it to firstname.lastname@example.com.


text:
I love fall! I love the colors, smells, sweaters and hot cocoa.
And in my happiness I want to giveaway a few books.
I decided to try a blog hop with Good Choice Reading.
I have three (gently read once) books I want to pass along which means I'll have three winners! The first winner gets their first pick, etc.
These are the books:
SIGNED The Unwritten Rule
Girl likes boy; boy likes girl but is boyfriend to said girls BFF.


text: Sijun Forums :: View topic - general problem with my work Log in to check your private messages Sijun Forums Forum Index >> Work in Progress View previous topic :: View next topic Author Topic : "general problem with my work" Boink!memberMember #Joined: 18 Jan 2009Posts: 52Location: Serbia, Belgrade city space port Posted: Sat Jul 04, 2009 6:52 am Well I posted my problem with matte paintings, but when I think better I think I have a general problem fitting things together.. they always seem layered.. And I can't put my finger on it. It seems as I'm mixing different styles ..but i'm not sure.. any comments r welcome Back to top Joe84memberMember #Joined: 26 May 2004Posts: 262 Posted: Sat Jul 04, 2009 7:59 am one thing i do see is inconsistent perspective. for example the first piece, the orange guy should be at least smaller to truly fit in. It also seems that your pictures are using a wide view, but the distortion of using a "wide" lens isnt apparent in your figures. Back to top Boink!memberMember #Joined: 18 Jan 2009Posts: 52Location: Serbia, Belgrade city space port Posted: Mon Jul 06, 2009 7:00 am So .. how would that distortion look like? Back to top Immortal_SoulsmemberMember #Joined: 08 Apr 2003Posts: 66Location: Adelaide Australia Posted: Mon Sep 21, 2009 3:10 am I like your work. I think to fix your problem you need to draw proportional lines and line things up that way. You should be able to find some guides on this online. Great work by the way, looks great! Here's a quick example on what I mean though, this was whipped up quite quick though. It's just to give you a general idea on how you can make things look much better with perspectives to your images. Hope that helps in some way. Although make sure to look up some guides to get better perspectives than what I've provided. _________________Why dont you clone yourself! -- Why's that?-- So you can go and F*** yourself!!! *Quote from Arnold Schwartzeneggars movie The 6th Day* Back to top Display posts from previous: All Posts1 Day7 Days2 Weeks1 Month3 Months6 Months1 Year Oldest FirstNewest First Sijun Forums Forum Index -> Work in Progress All times are GMT - 8 Hours Page 1 of 1 Jump to: Select a forum Digital Art----------------Digital Art DiscussionWork in ProgressGallery/Finished Work Miscellaneous----------------Random MusingsArchive : Sep99 - Dec00 You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot vote in polls in this forum Powered by phpBB © 2005 phpBB Group


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This month in Washington, D.C., a group of Kennedy-era staffers met for a reunion, including some women who worked for Kennedy the White House.
While Kennedy's womanizing is well documented, not much is known about his policies on women's issues or the women who worked for him.
From the Here & Now Contributors Network, Deborah Becker of WBUR has the story of some of these trailblazers.
Their stories reveal a president who relied on them and a politician who recognized the growing importance of women in the workplace.
- Deborah Becker, host and reporter for WBUR in Boston. She tweets @wburdebbecker.
It's HERE AND NOW.
JFK's womanizing is well documented, but what was his relationship with the women who worked for him? Some of them recently gathered in Washington. From the HERE AND NOW Contributor's Network, WBUR's Deborah Becker has this story.
DEBORAH BECKER, BYLINE: No women held top-level positions in the Kennedy administration, but an estimated two-thirds of JFK's White House staff were women. This at a time when few women had careers.
NANCY HOGAN DUTTON: If you were a woman, you belonged in bed, in the parlor, in the kitchen or behind the typewriter.
BECKER: Nancy Hogan Dutton started out as an administrative assistant in the White House in 1961. She recalls one night when Kennedy adviser Mike Feldman noticed she was working late.
DUTTON: He came into my office with a sheaf of papers and said: Oh, I'm so glad I found you. The president needs this typed by 8:30 tomorrow morning. I said: Mike, I don't type. And he said: Well, what do you do?
BECKER: These White House women did a lot. They wrote letters for the president, they coordinated media coverage and campaign logistics, and some were recruited to help create new government agencies. Take Mary Ann Orlando. Based on her work for JFK's father, she was asked to help create the Peace Corps.
MARY ANN ORLANDO: We had no public affairs office. So if the phone rang and it was someone from a newspaper, I was public affairs. And if congressmen called or a senator something or other, I was congressional affairs. And, you know, it was really hilarious because all these senators were thinking they were talking to somebody with great power there, you know?
BECKER: Then there's the woman referred to as the godmother of the White House women.
JEAN LEWIS: My name is Jean Lewis. I'm 95 years old, and I was a secretarial assistant in the White House.
BECKER: At her home in Arlington, Virginia, where the walls are lined with photos from her time at the White House, Lewis proudly goes through a detailed scrapbook.
LEWIS: Yeah. Oh, yeah, look at the mail. There we go. This is the campaign headquarters.
BECKER: She was a woman ahead of her time - a divorced mother of two from Montgomery, Alabama, pursuing a career. She finds a personal letter from then-Senator Kennedy after she turned down a job as a secretary in his office.
LEWIS: The next thing, I got a letter from Kennedy urging me to reconsider. And I was so flattered that I agreed to work for the summer. And then I was hooked.
BECKER: As a result of her enthusiasm and hard work, she was put in charge of all logistics for key political events such as the 1960 Democratic Convention in Los Angeles. Her scrapbook also contains never-before-seen photos from election night in 1960.
LEWIS: There's the president and Bobby - we were all at Bobby's house up in Hyannis Port listening to the returns.
BECKER: There's Ted Kennedy.
LEWIS: Yeah, that's Ted. I was the only person there that night with a camera, with my little Brownie.
BECKER: Does the Kennedy Library know you have these?
LEWIS: No, they don't know that.
BECKER: Despite her access and responsibilities, women like Lewis were often excluded, even from the White House dining hall.
LEWIS: It was very mundane in many ways. For example, eating your lunch out of a machine in the basement...
BECKER: Because...
LEWIS: Well, because you weren't allowed in the White House mess. But I thought it was always worth it.
SUE MORTENSEN VOGELSINGER: I was so happy being where I was. It was the most exciting job in the world.
BECKER: Right after getting her degree from Penn State, Sue Mortensen Vogelsinger went to Washington. She didn't care about prestige or her job title because her work was meaningful.
VOGELSINGER: Getting on a helicopter on the South Grand(ph) of the White House, I mean what more could you ask for in this world? If they wanted to call me a secretary, fine.
BECKER: Vogelsinger was one of the eight staffers in the press office. Five were women. The three high-ranking staffers were men. The women, Vogelsinger says, quietly did their jobs. In fact, she's rarely been asked about her experience being with Kennedy in Dallas in 1963.
VOGELSINGER: I was on Air Force One. Normally we would have been on the motorcade, but it was a short stop so we thought, well, we'll just stay on the plane and get it done. And one of the stewards came running through and said somebody's been shot.
BECKER: Back in Washington on November 22, 1963 was another secretary, Nancy Larson. She got her job after meeting Kennedy press secretary Pierre Salinger, on a plane. She was a flight attendant with a political science degree who won him over with extra martinis and beating him at gin rummy. Larson was the first person in the White House to learn of the president's assassination. At a recent gathering of JFK-era staffers, she described what happened when a reporter called shortly after 12:30 p.m. that day.
NANCY LARSON: So I said nothing is happening here. And he said the president's been shot. The phones just started ringing off the hook.
BECKER: Larson's bosses were away. Salinger, en route to a trade mission, had his plane turned around but did not have a destination yet. Assistant Press Secretary Mac Kilduff was in Dallas. He called Larson and told her to tell Salinger where his plane should go.
LARSON: He said, Nancy, when Pierre calls you, tell him the plane should go to Washington. And at that moment I understood why the plane was going to Washington and I just said, oh no, Mac. And he said, you can't say anything. It hasn't been announced it yet.
BECKER: So despite their job descriptions, Sue Vogelsinger says, they and everybody else knew that these women were important.
VOGELSINGER: Jobs couldn't have been done without us. There's no question. I think we all felt that way. Even I think many of our so-called bosses understood that pretty well too. I don't know that any of them particularly admitted it out loud.
BECKER: That dichotomy between what was said out loud and what was whispered was, of course, a big part of Kennedy's life as well. These women described JFK as fiercely intelligent, charming and interested in their lives. They all agreed that working with Kennedy was the best experience of their careers and they thought they were helping usher in a new era of social enlightenment. Privately, as we now know, Kennedy was a compulsive womanizer. So did these other women of the White House know that was going on?
LEWIS: All this stuff about womanizing just bores me.
LEWIS: It does.
ORLANDO: I was working with the press. I got asked every question you can imagine. And I'm sure somebody at some point would have asked me at least one question about one woman somewhere, but I never got a question like that.
DUTTON: I remember asking a wise old Democrat, there are all these rumors, why isn't it in the press? And he said there are more votes in virility than there is in fidelity.
BECKER: As that joke suggests, the early '60s were a very different time for the sexes. It was President Kennedy who took the first steps to change things. He created the first and only Presidential Commission on the Status of Women. In this 1962 interview with Commission Chair Eleanor Roosevelt, Kennedy explained that the panel would consider how to deal with the increasing number of women in the workforce.
PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY: This is a great matter of great national concern, and I think that in this great society of ours we want to be sure that we - that women are used as effectively as they can to provide a better life for our people. In addition to meeting their primary responsibility, which is in the home.
BECKER: Despite that view of women's responsibilities, 50 years later Kennedy's commission is considered to have been extremely progressive. The report it issued is credited with helping pave the way for the women's movement. The commission's recommendations included things such as guaranteed paid maternity leave and subsidized daycare - things women still don't have today. But these women, from the JFK White House, hope that their roles ultimately helped the women of the future.
ORLANDO: That was a long time ago. It's just, those men were brought up to believe that women had certain functions in the world, and they believed it. And it was just the beginning of women saying, hey, I did that, not him. In a way it was showing the way for the next generation.
YOUNG: Mary Ann Orlando, what she did was help set up the Peace Corps during the Kennedy administration. She ends her report from WBUR's Deborah Becker. From NPR and WBUR Boston, I'm Robin Young.
I'm Jeremy Hobson. It's HERE AND NOW. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.


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Not only is LMU providing an educational opportunity to Appalachian residents, it is improving the health of our community as animal health can have a great impact in the overall wellbeing of their human companions."
Harrogate, Tennessee (PRWEB) August 12, 2014
Lincoln Memorial University-College of Veterinary Medicine (LMU-CVM) will welcome the members of the Inaugural Class of 2018 when orientation begins later this week.
LMU-CVM is one of only 30 veterinary colleges in the United States, and Tennessee is one of only three states to have two veterinary colleges. There are 20 men and 76 women in the LMU-CVM Class of 2018. 32 members of the class come from the immediate tri-state region of Tennessee, Kentucky and Virginia. The average age is 24. Members of the LMU-CVM Inaugural Class will go through orientation activities on Thursday and Friday, culminating in the LMU-CVM Inaugural Class White Coat Ceremony on Friday, August 15, at 4 p.m. in Tex Turner Arena on the LMU main campus in Harrogate, Tennessee.
"This is another landmark achievement for our institution." President B. James Dawson said. "The LMU-College of Veterinary Medicine extends LMU'S mission of service to humanity through the training of ethical doctors who will attend to the health and wellness needs of animals within rural communities, especially within the Appalachian region. Not only is LMU providing an educational opportunity to Appalachian residents, it is improving the health of our community as animal health can have a great impact in the overall wellbeing of their human companions."
As part of LMU-CVM's "clinical immersion" concept, high emphasis is placed on the development of both technical and non-technical skills throughout the curriculum. LMU-CVM students will pursue a four-year course of study leading to the doctor of veterinary medicine degree. The first two and a half years of the curriculum will take place on campus, with the last semesters of study occurring at off-campus clinical sites to begin integrating and applying all of the knowledge and skills acquired during the pre-clinical experience.
LMU-CVM students will attend lectures within the Hamilton Math and Science Building on the LMU main campus, and learn hands-on veterinary techniques at the 700 acre LMU-College of Veterinary Medicine DeBusk Veterinary Teaching Center (DVTC), located in Ewing, Virginia. The DVTC, composed of five individual facilities, will be used for large and small animal core clinical skills instruction, including safe animal handling, in years one through three of the curriculum. The DVTC will also include a staging facility for ambulatory outreach to Appalachian farms as well as a clinical research area.
"It's an exciting adventure to lead an innovative new veterinary college," said Dr. Glen Hoffsis, dean of LMU-CVM. Hoffsis became dean and associate vice president of LMU-CVM in July 2014. Previously Hoffsis had been serving as a consultant to LMU-CVM. He retired as dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Florida in July 2013 after serving in that capacity for seven years. He also has served as the dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at The Ohio State University.
Lincoln Memorial University's College of Veterinary Medicine is located on the LMU main campus in Harrogate, Tenn., with additional academic facilities in nearby Lee County, Va. LMU-CVM is an integral part of the University's Division of Health Sciences and provides real-world, community-based education in a collaborative learning environment. For more information about LMU-CVM, call 1-800-325-0900, ext. 7150 or visit us online at vetmed.lmunet.edu.


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Welcome to the CRG Discussion Forum!Forum registration problems: Make sure you enter your email correctly and you check your spam box first. *Then* email KurtS2@gmail for help.Classified ads are not allowed on the forum.
Oh no, not again.....
so your saying this car was special order paint back in 69 and that specified color was evening orchid?
Quote from: ZLP955 on April 15, 2013, 06:36:07 AMOh no, not again.....yep the paid know all there is to know about Z/28s experts screwed up and still will not admit their mistake. i bet i was driving and autocrossing Z/28 before these experts came on the scene.


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Andy Schachat's On the Run: New Hampshire makes a big deal about Boston MarathonANDY SCHACHAT
April 19. 2014 8:16PM
It is here, the most anticipated road race in American history. Twelve months after two bombs exploded at the finish line of the 2013 Boston Marathon, the 2014 edition has arrived. The eyes of running communities from all four corners of the planet will be watching on Monday as well over 30,000 runners take part. As always, the masses will include a few hundred from the Granite State.
The Boston Marathon is often called the Super Bowl of road races which makes the New Hampshire running community very lucky. We are so close to the action that it seems every member of the New Hampshire road race scene is either at the race (as a runner, volunteer, staff, or spectator), at home or work tracking runners internet, or knows someone who fits one of those categories.
It could be argued that outside Massachusetts no state makes a bigger deal of the Boston Marathon than New Hampshire. Numerous members of the New Hampshire media stand at the finish line waiting to talk to runners who have finished. The top male and female get prime coverage in print and on electronic media outlets. Thanks to a New Hampshire based running club, the Gate City Striders, those two top finishers are honored with a formal award, the Henri Renaud award, named after the only New Hampshire runner to win the race, which he did in 1909.
Boston is personal to us. That's why the tragedy of a year ago was so painful. Sadly, a number of New Hampshire residents suffered severe injuries and are still struggling to recover. Others were involved in what have become known as "near miss" stories. Two New Hampshire women were about to finish when they saw the first bomb in front of them then heard the second bomb behind them. Others finished, with family and friends at the finish line, then walked away mere minutes before the explosions. The term, "there but for the grace of God. ..." has been uttered quite often this past year.
It is also why the past year has been one of preparation and anticipation for this state's running community. New Hampshire runners joined the rest of the world in pledging to be at the start line this year to show their support for the race, its victims, and its hero's. Race director Dave McGillivray eloquently put it at recent gathering in New Hampshire when he said, "They picked on the wrong people. Endurance runners never quit." That has been the mantra in these parts as runners all over the state worked hard to get an entry to this year's Boston.
The calendar has created a unique situation. The Boston Marathon is always the third Monday in April. Last year that occurred on April 15, the earliest date possible. This year it falls on April 21, the latest date possible. That means these past few days have been spent looking back, honoring victims and heroes of the tragedy. It has also created a designed approach by the race organizers, the Boston Athletic Association.
"The days leading up to the marathon will be spent reflecting on the tragedy of last year", BAA executive director Tom Grilk said at a meeting a few weeks ago. "But on Monday it will be time to say 'this is the Boston Marathon' and we must go on."
So, how will it be? For starters, one of New Hampshire's largest contingents will toe the line on Monday. In a typical year New Hampshire has about 300-350 entrants in the Boston Marathon. This year the number is close to 550. Some of them have a goal of doing what they were denied last year, finishing. Approximately 5,500 runners were stopped on the course because of the bombings. Five thousands of them accepted the invitation to come back this year. Granite State runners are amongst them.
Other New Hampshire runners will be running carrying a lot of emotion. Some still can't talk about last year without tearing up.
At the front of the Granite State pack will be men and women racing for the Henri Renaud award. On the women's side the overwhelming favorite is Lebanon's Andrea Walkonen. Walkonen will start with the elite women, the only New Hampshire female starting with that group. The elite women will start thirty minutes before the elite men so Walkonen could easily be the first New Hampshire runner across the finish line. As for the men? Keep your eyes on another Lebanon runner, Kevin Johnson.
Obviously, there will be changes. Runners will not be allowed to bring bags to the start, put them on buses, and have those bags waiting at the finish. More security will be visible and there will be more vigilance paid to spectators. Many eyes will be on the lookout for anyone, and anything, suspicious.The other change is in the size of the field. The past few years there have been about 25,000 entries into the race. This year the number was increased to 36,000. That has resulted in the field being divided into four waves, 9,000 apiece, and spaced apart so it will take about 90 minutes to get everyone across the finish line.
One other change. As he has done for the past few years, a New Hampshire resident will start his day in Hopkinton. When the runners have left he will get in his car, drive to the finish and greet as many New Hampshire runners as possible. Instead of the usual high five and congrats he is prepared to do something different.
I plan on giving them the biggest hugs they ever got.
- - - - - -
Running shorts: The Dover Race Series has become something special. The St. Mary's Academy 5K and Red's Race For A Better Community, held last weekend, had much larger turnouts than the previous year.Winners: Sandown's Louis Saviano and Portsmouth's Rhyan Radack at St. Mary's and Scott McGrath, Andover, Mass., and Denise Sandahl, Bow at Red's..Newmarket's Kyle Williams took first at the Out of Hibernation 5K in Portsmouth on April 12. ...Very special race on April 27 in Greenland, the Chief Maloney 10K, held in honor of the Greenland police chief who lost his life in the line of duty two years ago.
Andy Schachat's column appears every other week in the New Hampshire Sunday News. Email him at firstname.lastname@example.com.


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ObamaCare primer
Like the headlights of a Mac Truck on I-95, HealthSource RI (HSRI), our health insurance program under what is both derisively and fondly called ObamaCare, is coming at us hard and fast:
l Enrollment starts on Tuesday, Oct. 1;
l Insurance coverage begins at 12:01 a.m., New Year's Day, 2014;
l Then the whole enrollment process for next year is over (for individuals), March 31.
But it's taken quite a long time to get here.
Way back, 104 years ago, President Theodore Roosevelt said the government should see to it that all Americans are provided with health care. He was one of the first world leaders anywhere to propose the idea. And it caught on right away – only not in this country.
Over the years other U.S. presidents – FDR, Truman, Johnson, Nixon, Carter and Bill Clinton (with First Lady Hillary to coordinate a national health care system) – all took a swing at it. And missed.
During the last century, Republicans, Democrats and third parties of all stripes have tried to get universal health care going in the U.S. But every time, strong political and economic factions shot it down.
In the meantime, every other industrialized nation on Earth adopted some method of protecting their citizens against devastating losses due to catastrophic illness or injury – the cause of almost 75 percent of all bankruptcies in the U.S.
Finally, when President Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act (ACA), in 2010, it marked the end of one very long journey for the country – and started a short, intense sprint in Rhode Island.
Basically, the ACA seeks to expand Medicaid coverage for lower income Americans, provide federal subsidies to help pay insurance premiums for those making more (for example, in Rhode Island, a single person making less than $46,000 a year, or a family of four earning under $94,000, qualify for some federal help), and give small businesses tax credits to offset the cost of maintaining health insurance policies for their employees.
The ACA asked states to set up their own exchanges where their citizens and businesses could go to buy affordable insurance. The plan was to reduce the number of Americans without health coverage – estimated to be about 47 million people – and lower the overall cost of health care in this country, which is currently higher than any other nation on the planet.
Rhode Island was the second state to sign on to the provisions of the ACA. By Executive Order, in January 2011, Governor Lincoln Chafee made Rhode Island one of 17 states (plus the District Of Columbia) to opt to set up and run it's own insurance exchange, now named HealthSource RI.
The other 33 states have, by default, become either willing or unwilling partners with the federal government to provide greater availability of health insurance within their borders. Some have accepted federal Medicaid money to expand health care to low-income families but are letting the feds set up insurance exchanges for the rest of their people.
But 23 state governments have taken a hard line and refused to accept any part of the ACA.
In Rhode Island, however, turning down federal funds was never an issue, including grants totaling roughly $65 million awarded to help HSRI get started.
The task was to develop a program that would marry new plans from health insurance companies doing business in the state with new ACA guidelines. HSRI would then provide access, and a competitive marketplace, for individual and small business plan purchasing. Health care reform in every sense of the word.
To get going, insurance plans and levels of coverage needed to be devised, and premiums established for each level. Workable deductible, co-insurance and co-pay amounts had to be decided, along with a thousand other details.
And all of this – every category of care, lab service, test, etc. – had to be negotiated with the insurance companies that would provide coverage.
Then a delivery system had to be created, a website for access by individuals and businesses that would provide the answers for each person's unique situation, and be the essence of "user friendly."
The complete program had to be ready to go, start to finish, in about 30 months.
Christine Ferguson was named director of HSRI in June of 2012. Her experience in this field is long and distinguished. She came over directly from the faculty of George Washington University's School of Health and Health Services. Before that, she was both commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, and ran Rhode Island's Department of Human Services. Back when she was counsel and chief of staff for U.S. Senator John Chafee, she helped to overhaul the country's health care system.
Making it simple hasn't been easy
So Ferguson speaks with great authority when she says it's very difficult to make something as complex as the services HSRI provides, both approachable and simple for people to use.
She puts it this way: "It all looks and sounds really complicated. But when somebody who doesn't know a thing about health insurance goes on the website, or calls in to talk to one of our staff, in 5, 10 minutes tops, they get it."
Individuals and small businesses can use the website (healthsourceri.com), the phone, the mail, or come in person to find out what fits their needs and to buy insurance. The department is hiring 75 support people to work with those seeking health insurance answers.
Ferguson is proud of what her new department has achieved. Working out of a converted, windowless, basement gym, a staff of dedicated men and women have turned in virtually countless hours building what she claims is "the best health care system in the country."
And she may be right.
By the end of August, rates and plans were available on the HSRI website, along with automatic calculations of government subsidies and tax breaks available to Rhode Islanders.
The process has proved to be painless, totally non-threatening and fast. Specific insurance rates, tax credits, etc. come on screen almost instantly.
Many people remain confused about ObamaCare because of all the fiery rhetoric and misinformation it's generated over the past three years. In the middle of August, the Kaiser Family Foundation conducted a nationwide poll on ObamaCare awareness and found that as many as 51 percent of Americans say they don't have enough information to understand how it will impact them or their family.
Forty-four percent either think the law has been repealed (8 percent), overturned by the Supreme Court (5 percent) or are unsure whether it's still the law (31 percent).
Also in August, The Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation that tracks health insurance trends, reported that 27 percent of 19- to 29-year-olds they sampled were completely unaware new health care exchanges were coming.
That's crucial information, because the law states that exchanges like HSRI must become self-sustaining, and not reliant on general state revenues, fairly quickly. To do that, a broad swath of the population needs to enroll, and start paying premiums – young, old and in-between; healthy as well as those who aren't.
A huge public awareness campaign is being waged nationwide. And in Rhode Island, more than $2 million has reportedly been budgeted to promote HSRI. The information gap should start to close here.
Disinformation campaigns
But by the same token, there's a lot of money being spent on disinformation campaigns. A vocal and violently anti-ObamaCare crowd in Congress continues to try to derail it. And consumers get stuck in the middle wondering just what this new health care insurance program is and what it isn't.
First, let's take a quick look at what it isn't. Regardless of what you've seen or heard on some of the cable news networks, a few radio talk shows and claims made by politicians and pundits, this is not some new "government-run" health insurance.
Three insurance companies that have been providing coverage for people in Rhode Island in the past – Blue Cross Blue Shield of Rhode Island, Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island, and UnitedHealthcare – will still provide it, via HSRI, next year. And Tufts Health Plan recently announced it would come on board with HSRI in 2015.
It also isn't anymore "socialized medicine" than automobile insurance is "socialized car repair." (But like car insurance, most, but not all, Rhode Islanders will be legally required to have some type of health insurance, and there could be penalties for those who don't.)
Most of HSRI's premium rates for 2014 are now available. They are based solely on the coverage chosen and the age of the insured – the older the insured, the higher the rate.
Women are no longer penalized for being female – they pay the same premium rate as men. And people with pre-existing conditions are no longer rated up because of it. So how is that going to compare to the premiums people pay now?
Monthly premiums under HSRI will probably go up a few dollars for some people, and down a few dollars for others. But there is no evidence for "sky rocketing" insurance premiums some folks are still threatening will happen.
With HSRI, the highest annual out-of-pocket expense for a single person is $6,350 (total deductible and co-pay, without adding in monthly premiums), and $12,700 for a family. And there are plans with annual out-of-pocket costs lower than that.
The program also does away with lifetime caps – there will be no limits on the amount an insurer will pay over the lifetime of the policy. The family of a person struck with a catastrophic health problem no longer has to worry about "running out of insurance."
Some health services have no out-of-pocket expenses at all. Preventive care such as annual check-ups, vaccinations, diabetes and osteoporosis screenings, cholesterol and blood pressure screenings, mammograms, pap smears and other cancer screenings, even colonoscopies and many other services, are free to patients. These are, or will become, part of the law.
Young people can already stay on their parents' insurance plans until age 26. And insurance companies are required to refund over 80 percent of all profits unspent on actual health care now.
Making it affordable
Expanded Medicaid coverage will allow many more lower income people to afford insurance. Anyone who isn't otherwise insured, and makes up to 138 percent of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL), will qualify for Medicaid in Rhode Island. That means that a single person making up to $15,856 a year, or a family of four earning a total of $32,499, will be eligible for health care under Medicaid.
There are 12 insurance plans available through HSRI for individuals and their families, and 16 plans for small employers and their employees.
All Rhode Island companies employing 50 people or less on a full-time basis are considered small businesses, and can buy health insurance through HSRI. It's estimated that there are 95,000 such companies in the state.
For-profit businesses with fewer than 25 full-time employees (earning an average of under $50,000 each) may qualify for a deduction on their 2014 taxes ranging up to 50 percent of their contribution to insurance premiums paid during the year. For non-profit companies, the tax credit tops out at 35 percent.
HSRI is one of the very few insurance exchanges in the U.S. to offer full employee choice. An employer decides how much he or she will contribute to each employee's monthly premium, and then selects either a sort of "one size fits all" plan, where everyone gets the same coverage, deductibles, co-pays, etc., or a plan that allows each employee to pick and choose the coverage they want for themselves and their families.
The employer's involvement after choosing the program is simple: One check each month to HSRI takes care of it.
It would be naïve and, frankly, downright silly to assume the introduction of HSRI will go off without a hitch. After all, it only looks clean, simple and slick from the outside. Check under the hood and you see it's a massive undertaking with a million moving parts. It's insurance, and little on Earth is more complicated than that. Plus, it's a collection of new insurance plans, new computer software programs and new people attempting to meet the needs of thousands of new customers in a very short amount of time.
But the hard work has been done. And the people at the heart of HSRI are pros, with a vast amount of experience and real dedication. They know what they're doing. So problems – and there will be a few – will be small, limited and swiftly corrected.
At an HSRI presentation in North Kingston recently, a local business owner there to get a briefing said, "I am really impressed with this. I've never seen so many choices. I think you people have done a great job."
Everyone who learns what HSRI will offer seems to feel the same way – the amount of health care choices are remarkable and easy to understand. It's another thing Christine Ferguson is banking on.
"If we are seen as offering health insurance with clear advantages and competitive pricing, it will help attract businesses to Rhode Island," she said.
More businesses means more jobs. And that's another commodity Rhode Island can truly use.


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Blog Archives
Talk Back: Lil Wayne and the Corporations Behind Him
Rapper Lil Wayne's music is in heavy rotation on most urban radio stations in the US. His misogynistic lyrics are generally (not always) tolerated and celebrated.
But when he released a track last week with the artist Future that trivialized the violent killing of civil rights icon Emmett Till, the misogyny and disrespect sparked public outrage. Although L.A. Reid, CEO of Epic Records (Future's label, not Wayne's) has apologized and promised to remove the offensive content from the track, Lil Wayne has been silent. The family of Emmett Till is demanding an apology from the artist.
We believe Emmett Till's family and the black community deserve more than an apology — from Lil Wayne and the corporations that back him.
We want answers and real action from Epic Records, Cash Money Records, Sony Entertainment, Universal Music Group, Clear Channel, Radio One, and Viacom — media corporations that consistently provide a platform for misogynistic and hateful messages about black and brown communities.
We encourage others to join us and talk back to these corporations. How? Here are some ideas:
Share or create your own memes. Express yourself in an Open Letter and post it to your blog. Talk about this with your friends, film it and upload it to youtube. Make a PSA. Create a remix or mashup that gets people thinking. Use satire to critique what you see. Organize a petition. Organize direct action. Do something totally creative and unexpected to get people talking about this. Support the media that is reflective of who we are as a diverse people.
And use twitter to call out not only @
LilTunechi, but @epic_records, @UMG, @ SonyEntNet, @ClearChannel, Radio One and @Viacom.
Together, let us TALK BACK – through our words and actions- and be heard.
Collectively, we are strong. The question is — are we willing to act?
Talk Back: Team Light Skin v. Team Dark Skin Party
Check out these responses to today's Light Skin v. Dark Skin Party at Adesso Night Club in Philadelphia. Feel free to circulate these memes. We want to provoke critical dialogue around this issue.
Adesso Night Club: 215-640-6000
Party Promoter: @BurnaNewPhaze
When we called Adesso night club, its manager asserted that the theme of the party is a "prank" and hung up the phone. But as one ally of FAAN noted, "If people are coming based on the promotion of the flier, than it's more than just a 'prank'. In the face of opposition, calling it a "prank" is probably their safety valve."
These memes were created by FAAN Mail friends and allies. Special thanks to Race and Gender Studies scholar Dr. Yaba Blay of the (1)ne Drop Project for contributing insight as well as the Fuller quote pulled from her essay: Skin Bleaching and Global White Supremacy.
Watch this Talk Back video featuring high school students analyzing the memes above:
Talk Back: "It's Free Swipe Yo EBT"
In this talk back, FAAN Mail responds to "It's Free- Swipe Yo EBT" a controversial music video produced by emerging artist, Chapter. The music video has reached over 400K views and received over 3,000 comments on youtube, including many charged reactions.
In this conversation, we consider key media literacy questions about this piece:
Who is the AUTHOR and TARGET AUDIENCE?
What is the MESSAGE?
How might different audiences INTERPRET this message?
What TECHNIQUES are used to attract audience attention?
In what CONTEXT does this message exist?
What are the EFFECTS? (i.e. who benefits or is harmed by this message?)
We also ask– is this music video an effective attempt at SATIRE?
If you would like to hear artist Chapter's commentary about her piece, see here.
We have developed questions to send the artist Chapter in order to get a better understanding of her motives and point of view. However, in response to our interview request, Chapter's PR Representative wrote:
"Chapter is an College Educated young woman. I reviewed your FAAN Mail Project -I found it to be misleadng being that you never had any reseach done about Chapter background, nor have you took the time to read the above post- The music video "It's Free Swipe Yo EBT is Satire Chapter is playing a role in her music video-Keywanda. Please look over her web-site http://www.chaptersworld.tv she has also been on the news NBC ABC – please look under news on her web-site to gather facts about the artist. Please also watch her interview. Chapter is from South Central Ca, her mother was a Welfare Queen, she was abused as a child. Her mission is in her music."
Join the conversation by leaving a comment under the video, on our Facebook page or here.
Talk Back: Consuming Reality TV
Is it possible to enjoy reality shows like Jersey Shore and Basketball Wives, while keeping a critical eye? We explore this question and more in this living room conversation.
FAAN Mail is a media literacy and media activism project based in Philadelphia.
Talk Back: The News Stand & Black Womens' Bodies
What do you notice about this picture?
What do you notice about this photograph of a news -stand at the 34th St Subway platform in NYC?
Have you seen this type of display before?
When I lived in NYC three years ago I walked by news stands like this on a daily basis. Recently while visiting NYC, I walked by this newsstand and took this photograph.
The other night I showed the picture to my friends and asked what they noticed.
It was a media literacy moment, FAAN Mailstyle. Here's some video of the conversation:
What do I notice?
I notice a typical NYC newsstand. And as I point out in our discussion, I notice a discrepancy between the way white women and black women are represented. To put it bluntly, I see lots of white faces and lots of black booties.
BlackandBrownNews.com (BBN), an award-winning digital news and information distributor, did a fascinating news story about this in 2009 titled "New York City Newsstand Vendors: Exploiting Some, Protecting Others":
We found shopkeepers – many of them people of color – who exploited the images of Black and Latino women while going to great lengths to protect the image of White women on like magazine covers.
This news story led to a campaign and according to the Founder, legislation is now on the table. I'll come back to this later.
In addition to observations around representation when looking at this photograph, my friends and I discussed the question of impact. We wondered what we learn from these images. How do we interpret these spectacles (when we do notice them)?
The little boy holding his lunch box, the teenage boys with their book bags, the grown man who is my boss, what do they think when they see this? What does this teach them?
The black girls out there… the teenage sister who is looking for validation, excited to hear someone call her sexy as if it is the only compliment that matters… and perhaps the only compliment she hears on a regular basis. What does she learn from this?
The men who shout, grab and follow…. the ones who throw epithets and glass bottles when their cat calls are ignored… Do they notice the newsstand? What does it teach them and the men who silently look upon them?
Street harassment has often made me feel like I am on display…. humanity stripped, objectified. I remember feeling that way and then walking passed newsstands not much different than this one. Including a shot of a magazine display in Walking Home, my film about street harassment, was an effort to make this connection visible.
But this connection goes beyond how I personally feel. There is a connection that speaks to our history. This newsstand may appear insignificant, but it is symbolic of a history that is still unfolding, where black and brown women in particular experience a unique form of normalized sexual exploitation and violence, one that is colored by sexism and racism. It is symbolic of a history where black women go missing and so does the media coverage about their disappearance. A history where black women have been viewed as "unrapable," where joking about sexual violence in song lyrics is interpreted as "funny" or "shocking," but ultimately accepted as pure entertainment by audiences andjournalists alike.
It is also a history where men and women have recognized our value and worth and fought to resist this, break the silence and heal themselves and each other.
Then and Now
bell hooks and other scholars have argued that the dehumanization of black and brown men and women's bodies has been used to justify and reinforce the oppression of black and brown people. In Black Sexual Politics, author Patricia Hill Collins explains:
"For both women and men, Western social thought associates Blackness with an imagined uncivilized, wild sexuality and uses this association as one lynchpin of racial difference. Whether depicted as "freaks" of nature or as being the essence of nature itself, savage, untamed sexuality characterizes Western representations of women and men of African descent."
It is this narrative that helps explain why it was once acceptable for a black woman named Saartjie Baartman aka the "Hottentot Venus" to be caged, scrutinized and demonized at European Freak Shows. And it is this narrative that helps explain why newsstands like the one above exist all over NYC.
So what do we do with this newsstand, this symbol?
I wonder how Saartjie Baartman would answer that question.
Let me suggest that we notice it, seek to understand its implications and impact and talk about it. And then– if we care– we can act.
To all of those arguments that blame women and black women specifically for choosing to objectify themselves (you know, the whole "well she CHOSE to be in that video, magazine, party flyer, etc.") this newsstand illuminates a reality that those arguments often overlook. Rather than simply blaming women who make those choices, we should be asking in what context are women making those choices?
And for the black women who adamantly distinguish themselves from "those women" and argue that they are not affected by these representations, I want to know what they think of this newsstand as a symbol. Is there still a disconnect? Or is there a reason to pay attention?
I am curious about the action steps outlined by Black and Brown News which asserts the following:
New York City newsstands are licensed by city government and they are also bound to law. According to New York Penal Code Penal Law Sections:
–245.10 Public display of offensive sexual material is defined as showing of the female genitals, pubic area or buttocks with less than a full opaque covering, or the showing of the female breast with less than a fully opaque covering of any portion thereof below the top of the nipple.
–245.11 And a person is guilty of public display of offensive sexual material when he with knowledge of its character and content he displays or permits to be displayed in or on any window, showcase, newsstand, display rack, wall, door, billboard, display board, viewing screen, moving picture screen, marquee or similar place, in such manner that the display is easily visible from or in any: public street, sidewalk or thoroughfare; transportation facility; or any place accessible to members of the public without fee or other limit or condition of admission such as a minimum age requirement.
If you notice or think that a newsstand is in violation, please take the time to contact the appropriate authorities.
Apparently it is possible to report violations to NYC City Officials. Of course as BBN has mentioned, enforcement has been an issue.
Let's keep this conversation going. What are your thoughts? What's next?
By Nuala Cabral


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Back in the old Shutterbug Classified days I sometimes asked for references before purchasing an item from a seller I wasn't familiar with. Maybe a phone call to the seller can help if the description doesn't seem clear enough.
For what it is worth, I have had far less problems (none) here than on E-bay when it comes to accurate descriptions.


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NetWellness is a global, community service providing quality, unbiased health information from our partners. NetWellness is commercial-free and does not accept advertising.
Thursday, August 18, 2016
Medical geneticists and genetic counselors are health professionals with specialized training and experience in human and medical genetics and counseling who can give information and supportive counseling concerning many disorders or abnormalities. Cancer genetic counselors and cancer geneticists specialize in counseling families about inherited forms of cancer. Genetic specialists should have certification from the American Board of Genetic Counseling or the American Board of Medical Genetics.
Genetic counseling is available to individuals and families with a medical history or increased personal risk for a wide range of genetic conditions. Genetic counseling provides patient with:
Genetic counselors and geneticists provide information about certain genetic conditions including:
During a typical genetic counseling session for cancer susceptibility, the genetic professional will take a very detailed cancer family history by asking questions such as:
Genetics counselors also:
Genetic counselors can also help families work through decisions about whether to have testing and can explore the issues that surround genetic testing and offer support throughout the testing process. Some examples of the services offered by genetic counselors include:
This article is a NetWellness exclusive.
Last Reviewed: Jun 22, 2011
Clinical Instructor of Genetics
School of Medicine
Case Western Reserve University


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December 15. 2017 12:12AM
NH College Hockey: Parker breaks through
By ALEX HALL
New Hampshire Union Leader
Franklin Pierce University's Haley Parker heads up ice during recent action. (Jon Donell/Franklin Pierce Athletics)
Haley Parker was frustrated with herself heading into the Franklin Pierce University women's hockey team's two-game home series with St. Michael's College last month. The freshman forward from Londonderry and Proctor Academy had yet to score her first career goal despite plenty of opportunities.
Parker finally broke through when she scored on the power play with 5:57 remaining in the Ravens' 5-2 victory over St. Michael's on Nov. 10.
"Getting that first goal out of the way and the jitters of getting my first goal finally gone, that's when I felt like I started hitting my stride," Parker said.
Since registering her first goal, Parker has scored three more times and logged three assists over eight games. As Franklin Pierce (7-6-1) enters the holiday break, Parker ranks third on the team in scoring with 11 points (four goals, seven assists).
Getting her first goal out of the way is not the only reason behind Parker's success. She has developed good chemistry with her linemates: senior center Alex Brolsma and sophomore right wing Meg Gilbride.
Gilbride has a very good shot while Brolsma, who is 5-foot-9, has good hands and knows how to use her height to her advantage in front of the net, Parker said. People have told Parker that she sees the ice well.
"We just all contribute so well together. I feel like that's why we work," Parker said. "We don't step on each other's toes. We're not too selfish with the puck. I feel like my line in general moves the puck a lot."
When Franklin Pierce finds itself in a specialty-teams situation, Parker can be found on one of the team's two power-play units or on the penalty kill. Brolsma and Parker are usually the first forwards to go out when the Ravens are on the penalty kill, Parker said.
The Ravens, who enter the break on a three-game winning streak, have scored 10 of their 37 goals on the power play and own a .845 penalty-kill percentage.
"Our power play is where we get most of our goals," Parker said. "And with the PK, I feel like we have a really good system. Our team is willing to go down and block shots and take one because we know it's an opportunity to save a goal."
When Franklin Pierce gets back on the ice next month, Parker wants to continue playing the way she has been recently.
"I'm not looking to score a bunch of goals," Parker said. "I'm looking to make good plays and come out with a win."
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WHILE it wasn't under the most ideal circumstance,
Mike Robinson
realized a dream on Sunday at the Whittemore Center.
The freshman goaltender from Bedford made his first career home appearance for the University of New Hampshire men's hockey team in its 4-3 loss to Merrimack College.
"I'm from New Hampshire. I'd always come to these games as a kid and to finally play in this rink is just a dream come true," Robinson said after the setback.
After the Warriors took a 4-1 lead at the 6:43 mark of the second period, Wildcats coach
Dick Umile
relieved senior goaltender
Danny Tirone
in favor of Robinson. Tirone allowed four goals on the 11 shots he faced.
Robinson made 12 saves, including nine in the second period, over his 32:17 of time in net. Umile said Robinson "went in in a tough situation and did a good job."
"I felt like I was seeing the puck well, I was feeling it well and I felt good," Robinson said. "I just wanted to give my team a chance to come back in that game."
Robinson, who was selected by the San Jose Sharks with the 86th pick in the 2015 NHL Entry Draft, has allowed one goal on the 20 shots he has faced over two relief appearances. He made seven saves and allowed one goal over his 15:47 of time in net during the third period of UNH's 5-2 loss at Providence College on Dec. 1.
It is tougher to come into a game in progress compared to starting, Robinson said, but he always makes sure he is mentally prepared in case he is called on.
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DARTMOUTH COLLEGE men's hockey coach
Bob Gaudet
said every team goes through tough stretches during the season. For the Big Green, that experience has come at the beginning of the year.
Dartmouth will take a 2-7-1 overall record into its two-game, non-league road series at No. 2 Denver. The defending national champion Pioneers (9-3-4) will host Dartmouth tonight at 9 p.m. and again Saturday night at the same time.
The Big Green are 0-5-1 over their last six games and have not scored more than two goals in any of those contests.
"I keep on telling the guys that hard work works," Gaudet said. "We're working hard and practicing well and the adversity that we faced will help us be a much more stronger, confident team going into the new year."
Part of the reason behind Dartmouth's offensive struggles has been a tendency of being really unselfish with the puck instead of firing it on net, Gaudet said. The Big Green have also had difficulty getting out of their own zone at times.
"We've had stretches in games where we've spent too much time in our own end," Gaudet said.
While Dartmouth has had its struggles, it did receive some good news on the injury front this week.
Senior goaltender
Devin Buffalo
, who has missed the past four games with a lower-body injury, should be available for one of the two games at Denver, Gaudet said. The Big Green will also see freshman defenseman
Joey Matthews
return to the ice sometime later this season, Gaudet said. Matthews has missed three games due to injury.
"It hasn't been great in terms of Ws but I think we're growing and our hard work is going to pay off," Gaudet said.
The NH College Hockey column runs Fridays during the season. Alex Hall can be reached at email@example.com.


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Reviewed by Gabby V. (age 8)
In the book, Mayor Hubble is in Trouble, I liked when A.J insulted the ferret. I liked it because he said, ''I hate ferrets!" and also said, "You're a dumb head." I thought both were funny. But I did not like it when A.J. and Andrea played hardball like when Andrea wrote mean things about A.J. Then A.J looked in her diary. I thought they were both being mean. I liked the pictures in this book, how they express the characters' feelings. My favorite characters are A.J. and Alexia. I like A.J. and Alexia because Alexia likes to ride her skateboard and I like to ride my skateboard, too. A.J. is my favorite character because he is funny. My favorite part is when A.J., Ryan, Alexia and Mayor Hubble and his other friends go to their secret hiding place.
I recommend this book to kids who like to laugh out loud. Also to kids who like sneaky books. This book has lots of very funny characters. Like A.J. who is a funny guy. This book is for mostly second and third graders. This book is for mostly second and third graders because it will be a hard book for kindergarten and first graders.