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Q. Our granddaughter's behavior is causing our family a great concern and anxiety. She is 8, attends an all-girls school, is very good in studies and tops in tests. She is very athletic and enjoys taking part in only boys sports, such as martial arts. She likes to wear only boys clothes and cuts her hair very short like a boy. The only time she wears girls clothing is for school, a uniform. Outside of school time she does not like girls dress. When we take her to buy clothing, she goes straight to the boys section.
Our question is whether she has a problem identifying her gender. Is this common with some girls? Will she outgrow the problem and act like a girl? Are we paranoid over something we should not be worrying about? Please point us in a right direction.
A. The "right direction"? Love her.
I have a great concern about your great concern and anxiety, which can do her actual harm where her choices simply won't.
For one thing, I have no answer to "act like a girl." Do you mean like Tammy Duckworth, Serena Williams, Selena Gomez, Renee Richards, Marissa Mayer, Sally Ride ? Help me here.
Plus, martial arts are not "boys sports," they're sports, and very short hair is not a boy's haircut, it's a haircut, and pants and shirts are "boys clothes" only because she's finding them in the boys department; the moment they're on her body, they're a girl's clothes.
That is, assuming your granddaughter identifies female and just likes sportier things. That's certainly quite common and a strong possibility, the best answer to which is to shut up and love her as-is and let her shop in whatever department she pleases, without hand-wringing or eyebrow-raising or "What about this cute dress ?"
Also possible is that she identifies male and feels as if she's in the wrong body. That's far, far less common, and also a much more difficult, anxiety-inducing path for sure, especially for her, "him" would be appropriate then, but also for the family.
If indeed that's the case, though, that's an even stronger argument for family to love her fiercely and cease all hand-wringing, eyebrow-raising or skirt-pushing, because (a) forcibly applying pink is not going to work, not one bit, toward changing anyone on the inside, and (b) because early acceptance of a child's outside-the-mainstream choices could be, no exaggeration, a matter of life and death. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention doesn't quantify the suicide risk for transgender youth, citing a need for more study, but on the National Transgender Discrimination Survey of nearly 6,500 "gender nonconforming" people, a heart-rending 41 percent reported having attempted suicide. (http://bit.ly/eE9DmV)
Your granddaughter, just by the odds, is probably not transgender, but acceptance is the only answer regardless. (If she turns out to be an LGBT person, try PFLAG (http://community.pflag.org).) Conveying the message that there's something wrong with the unchangeable, inside properties of a child risks lasting damage to the child's self-worth.
Your granddaughter's gender story is going to write itself the way it wants to no matter what any of you says or does. So, be one of the heroes who banishes expectations and gender assumptions, and instead is loving, kind and supportive of who, and whoever, she is.
• Email Carolyn at tellmewashpost.com, follow her on Facebook at www.facebook.com/carolyn.hax or chat with her online at noon Eastern time each Friday at www.washingtonpost.com.
© 2013 The Washington Post


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Von Crastenburg Family
The Von Crastenburg Family are a powerful dynasty from New England and are one of the richest families in the world. Jill Von Crastenburg is a member of this family.
Wealth and Influence
The Von Crastenburgs have been said to have once owned half of the island of Algonquin in Liberty City. If this is true and they still own parts of the city, their wealth could easily reach the trillion US dollar mark and above. The family are well-known in Liberty City's social scene and high society Algonquin. Their residences are among the largest and most opulent in America and their official residence is a 19 bedroom mega mansion estate in the exclusive part of Westdyke in Alderney. In Los Santos the family owns the Von Crastenburg Hotel.
Possible Inspiration
The Rothchild family are the most likely the inspiration for the Von Crastenburgs and share many of the same similarities such as:
- Both made their fortune in the investment banking industry.
- Both are considered one of the wealthiest families in the world.
- Both have attracted the limelight for their extravagance.
Family Friendships
The Von Crastenburgs are one of the most prominent families on earth and as such hold an impressive list of very high-profile friends such as:
- The Parker family
- The Cleethorpes family
- Bruce Spade
- Poppy Mitchell
- Julio Ochoa, mayor of Liberty City
- Joe Lawton, president of the United States
- many others.
Jill Von Crastenburg
Jill is the 13 year old heiress to the family's vast fortune, she is a regular fixture on the city's club scene and a leading figure in the Liberty City party circuit. Jill has achieved celebrity status for living the extravagant lifestyle the Von Crastenburgs are notorious for. She is best friends with socialite Cloe Parker and is known throughout the city for her STD Positive status and sex tape despite only being 13.

subset: commoncrawl


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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke brushed off talk the central bank's ultra-easy monetary policy is creating asset bubbles, Bloomberg News reported Friday, citing unnamed people who went to a meeting Bernanke held earlier this month with dealers and investors. The reported comments to the 15-member Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee dismiss a key concern coming out of the minutes of the last Fed meeting.
Read the full story: Bubble, loss concerns played down by Fed officials


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UPDATE: Shane Jenkin Imprisoned Indefinitely For Blinding Girlfriend In Savage Attack (PICTURES)
A woman whose partner gouged out her eyes has told how she has turned her life around, as the man responsible is due to be sentenced.
Shane Jenkin, 33, launched his "premeditated, sustained and vicious attack" on Tina Nash last year, breaking her jaw and nose and leaving the mother-of-two blind.
He will be sentenced at Truro Crown Court later after admitting GBH with intent last month. After he pleaded guilty, Nash said she was glad he had "at least taken responsibility for changing my life forever".
However Nash revealed she was coming to terms with her injuries in an interview with the BBC.
She told Jon Kay: "I feel like I'm coming to terms with it. I was in quite a dark place back then. I don't feel as low as I did."
The 31-year-old said she had been "sleeping and thinking" for nine months as she adjusted to her new life.
She added: "I feel stronger, a lot stronger. I've got a way to go yet but I'm on the right track
"I don't feel proud of myself, I'm doing it for my kids. I want them to be proud of me."
She also spoke of the outpouring of support she had received, including countless messages and letters, which her family read to her.
Nash said: "I don't think I'm brave, I'm surviving, I'm getting on with it. You only get one life so I'm not going to let him ruin it.
"To be honest I feel nothing towards him. I don't feel anger because that's a feeling and I don't want to have feelings for him. So no, I'm not going to waste my time."
When Kay asked her if she had "Kind of deleted him?", Nash replied: "Yep. He never existed."
Attempts to save the sight in one of her eyes failed and she was left completely blind.
She said: "I truly feel that, when he was strangling me, he was trying to murder me.
"He has taken everything from me and robbed me of one of the most precious things in life - my sight.
"I miss the things which people take for granted the most such as seeing the sky and the sea."
She added: "Some days I just don't want to get up, but I'm determined to provide a future for my children and this is my motivation."
Powerfully-built Jenkin, of Sea Lane, Hayle, Cornwall, was originally charged with attempted murder but court staff confirmed he had admitted GBH at the court last month.
Her sons were aged 13 and three at the time of the attack.
In a previous interview with the BBC, Ms Nash said she thought she could change Jenkin but warned other victims of domestic violence to get out "before it is too late - it's not going to get better, it's going to get worse".
Nash, who bravely faced Jenkin in court at a previous hearing, added that she had been left feeling "buried alive, claustrophobic and not in control of my life" by the assault.
She said she hoped Jenkin was not "buzzing" over being the last person she ever saw and wondered if he was "bragging about it".
After the attack, Jenkin blamed her, she said.
"He didn't try and help me.
"If I had seen someone in that much pain, looking like that, then the first thing I'd do is get help and he didn't and I can't forgive him for that.
"He said I was like his best mate so I don't understand why he would hurt someone he was supposed to care about."
The victim said there were previous occasions when she helped Jenkin get out of trouble for hurting her.
"I have done so much for him and this is how he repaid me."
Explaining why she could not walk away from the relationship, she said: "I thought I could change him and help him.
"I thought he was getting better."
Detective Inspector Chris Strickland, of Devon and Cornwall Police, said Jenkin carried out a "premeditated, sustained and vicious attack on a defenceless woman".
"Our view is that Jenkin deliberately strangled Tina into a state of unconsciousness in order that he could inflict these terrible injuries," he said.
"Tina's life will never be the same and her lifelong disability will be a constant reminder of the attack.
"Her injuries were so shocking that friends who saw her soon after the incident found it difficult to stay in the room.
"Tina has displayed incredible strength however and has shown great desire to be able to care for her two children despite not being able to see them as they grow up."


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Difference between revisions of "User talk:Gta-mysteries/Archive"
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My resolution on GTA III, GTA VC, and GTA SA is good, it's a 1200x800x32. I also use a 1400x900 for GTA SA, So it's no such much as the resolution it's just the graphics in a way.
My resolution on GTA III, GTA VC, and GTA SA is good, it's a 1200x800x32. I also use a 1400x900 for GTA SA, So it's no such much as the resolution it's just the graphics in a way.
== [[:Image:Metallic Red Bobcat.jpg]] ==
== [[:Image:Metallic Red Bobcat.jpg]] ==
Revision as of 13:29, 22 January 2010
Hi, welcome to Grand Theft Wiki! Thanks for your edit to the User:Gta-mysteries page.
Please leave a message on my talk page if I can help with anything! -- GuildKnight (Talk) 20:04, 27 April 2009
Shopfront articles
I must ask, do these shopfronts articles really need their own article? How many sentences can completely detail the shops, and how important are they as far as gameplay is concerned? Would a list of businesses be more efficient instead of a huge mess of very short articles? - ZS 09:38, September 16, 2009 (UTC)
I have a question, would it help if the articles had more images? And how much space does an article take up?--Gta-mysteries 03:42, September 17, 2009 (UTC)
- Images can be provided and most solid articles must have at least 1,500 KB (roughly 3 paragraphs, each with at least two or three sentences, including, images, categories and formatting). By the looks of the topic you're covering, there simply isn't much to talk about aside their appearances in games and their address, because these businesses are otherwise useless as far as gameplay is concerned and are only there for show.
Managing these articles will be an unnecessary nightmare if every one of them has their own articles. Would it be more practical to sort them in alphabetical lists instead of crowding out the business categories and hampering maintenance? - ZS 09:10, September 17, 2009 (UTC)
Other than the businesses what about the businesses I made for the empire building feature. Do those look ok?--Gta-mysteries 22:55, September 21, 2009 (UTC)
- Businesses involved in Empire Building can be listed under a specialized list because they have specialized roles (where they can be summed up in a description field on exactly what sort of business they are), but not individual articles, because they are only just that: An otherwise unusable shop with only a destructible interior to show. Start with a list; I'll like to see if the list works first before coming to a definite conclusion. - ZS 08:52, September 22, 2009 (UTC)
When you say start a list do you mean a list on the empire building page of on a separate page?--Gta-mysteries 02:42, September 24, 2009 (UTC)
- You can put it in a separate page titled "List of businesses involved in Empire Building" or something. You can link it from the main Empire Building page, probably in the "See also" section. - ZS 14:03, September 24, 2009 (UTC)
- I agree entirely that un-enterable unimportant shopfronts should not have their own articles. Nobody is ever going to want to look at those articles - why would anyone do that? And as ZS says, it's creating unnecessary content which will be difficult to manage. The content you've made is good, and should be put into a list or table, like Businesses in Los Santos and perhaps Shops in Los Santos - if it's a table you could have an image next to each one. If the shop is enterable, then sure, have a page if you think it needs one (as well as being in the list/table), and shove in a couple of screenshots - that's manageable. If it has a special function (like Empire Building), then put it in a special list for that. Gboyers talk 10:18, October 13, 2009 (UTC)
Hello. May I ask you to please not create so many redirect pages. I mean L.C.P.D Directed to the LCPD page is fine. But redirects like Cop (clothing), The Exchange (III) and Benson (car) are complely unneeded. They clog up space and no one would search for these. So I wish for you not to make these pages. Good luck! --Chimpso 02:37, October 7, 2009 (UTC)
- Instead of the redirects would it be better to just edit the pages where the link is and put the right one in?--Gta-mysteries 03:16, October 7, 2009 (UTC)
- Obviously, it would make more sense to correct the links themselves, than to create dozens of unnecessary redirects - especially given the fact that the vast majority of the redirects that you created were only linked to from - now redundant - talk page discussions. In future please just make sure that you know why the red links are there, as they may have only been suggestions for article names. Also, unlike Wikipedia, most of the time we try to avoid using article names with brackets in them - for example "Tug (GTA IV)" - the main reason being that nobody would willingly type that into the search box, that's why we use names like Tug Boat and Police Car. - Hardrock182 08:53, October 7, 2009 (UTC)
Just a quick reminder. When you add a "Gallery" section to an article, the last line of code should be "</gallery>", not "<gallery/>" - (notice the minor difference?) while the positioning of the "/" may seem irrelevant, it actually causes the categories on the article to disappear for some reason. So in future just make sure you use the correct code for galleries. Thanks. - Hardrock182 18:41, November 2, 2009 (UTC)
I deleted the images because there is no need for them. A-Dust 00:51, December 22, 2009 (UTC)
Image:Sanchez (GTAVC) (Trial by Dirt).png
Mind reuploading this image? Some recent server update deleted the full image for some reason. - ZS 10:53, January 13, 2010 (UTC)
I just reuploaded it, and am doing the same for other images that got deleted too. And whenever you are on here does the recent activity board say hours instead of minutes?-- Gta-mysteries 21:03, January 13, 2010 (UTC)
Your first reply: Could you get some pictures of some special vehicles from GTA San Andreas please. I can't do it myself because of my computer resolution. If so they are the green Pizza Boy from Ice Cold Killa, the green Packer from Cop Wheels, the SWAT Tank from End of the Line, the three Vortexes, and the BF Injection from Cut Throat Business, and the other two Campers in Jizzy. Thanks --Gta-mysteries 21:12, January 18, 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply. As you know, there is a image in the SWAT truck article. And can you tell me each vehicle for each mission please?
|0ComeKillLah, Meh|Talk to me!| 05:54, January 22, 2010 (UTC)
|Pizza Boy
|Ice Cold Killa
|Cop Wheels
|Cut Throat Business
|BF Injection
|Cut Throat Business
I have seen your images and it needs some adjustment on the resolution. Tell me, what is your computer resolution? |0ComeKillLah, Meh|Talk to me!| 10:18, January 22, 2010 (UTC)
My resolution on GTA III, GTA VC, and GTA SA is good, it's a 1200x800x32. I also use a 1400x900 for GTA SA, So it's no such much as the resolution it's just the graphics in a way.
Ok, for somehow, I have resized two of your images. Look at them below.
- Green Pizza Boy.jpg
- Light Green Packer.jpg
Resized too.
Anyways, the Campers and Vortexes from missions are done by ZS and they looked fine. And the BF Injection, cropped by you, looks also fine.
Feel free to tell me for more images. But not now, have problems with grapical card. =/
|0ComeKillLah, Meh|Talk to me!| 13:29, January 22, 2010 (UTC)
Image:Metallic Red Bobcat.jpg
Could you provide the name of the mission where this Bobcat appears? And is this a reproduction Bobcat or one taken from the mission? - ZS 12:51, January 22, 2010 (UTC)
Wrong Editings
I was in my homepage and I noticed that ZS is creating new images in some vehicle articles. I checked one of it and see the history. I saw your edit and this happens. You make some wrong edits. Please don't do that again next time. If you don't know what you are doing, DON'T do it.
It's just an advice/warning, I won't scold you. :P
|0ComeKillLah, Meh|Talk to me!| 13:15, January 22, 2010 (UTC)


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Thursday, December 1, 2011
Advisory on Representing Clients with Mental Competency Issues
The American Immigration Council's Legal Action Center (LAC), in collaboration with the University of Houston Law Center Immigration Clinic, is pleased to announce the release of a new practice advisory: Representing Clients with Mental Competency Issues under Matter of M-A-M-.
Until recently, attorneys and immigration judges had limited guidance about safeguards that might be available to ensure a fair hearing in immigration court for noncitizens with mental competency issues. As a result, many such individuals have been ordered deported without access to counsel or any assessment of their abilities. Others have languished in jail indefinitely while immigration judges delayed proceedings in the hope that they would find representation or that their conditions would improve. Extended stays in detention centers, however, have instead caused people's conditions to deteriorate, at times resulting in psychosis and catatonia. The lack of protections has even led to mistaken deportations of U.S. citizens.
In May 2011, the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) issued a precedent decision in Matter of M-A-M, which set forth a framework for immigration judges to follow when hearing cases involving noncitizens with mental competency issues. The LAC's practice advisory provides a detailed analysis of that decision — the first published decision from the BIA in nearly fifty years to provide substantive guidance on hearings involving respondents with mental disorders — and offers strategic advice on how to address issues that may arise in the context of representing such individuals.
In connection with the LAC's Practice Advisory, the National Disability Rights Network (NDRN) has released a detailed fact sheet entitled The Protection & Advocacy (P&A) System: An Overview for Immigration Attorneys. The Protection and Advocacy System is a network of independent agencies in every state that provide, by federal mandate, legal representation and other advocacy services to protect the rights of persons with disabilities. The NDRN fact sheet discusses the types of assistance that P&As may be able to offer immigration attorneys representing clients with mental competency issues. For more information about the LAC's work on behalf of noncitizens with mental competency issues, please see Our Litigation and Advocacy. For a commplete list of all LAC Practice Advisories, please click here.
For more information contact Wendy Sefsaf at email@example.com or 202-507-7524.


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As part of the Legal Studies Workshop series Tatiana Alfonso Sierra, graduate student in sociology at UW-Madison, presents "Redistributing through Property Rights: Collective Land Tenure Systems and Economic Redistribution," 12:30 to 1:30 p.m., Lubar Commons (Room 7200).
The Legal Studies Workshop Series, sponsored by the Institute for Legal Studies, is designed to bring together graduate students and faculty working on law-related topics from around campus.
Please email Laurie Wood if you are interested in attending.
Submitted by Law School News on December 11, 2013
This article appears in the categories: Featured Events


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Sheriff Ben Johnson has some advice for the owners of the Internet cafes that weren't shut down this week as part of a three-year federal and state investigation into illegal gambling.
"Take the money and run."
Sheriff Ben Johnson has some advice for the owners of the Internet cafes that weren't shut down this week as part of a three-year federal and state investigation into illegal gambling.
"Take the money and run."
The Volusia County sheriff's suggestion seemed like a timely bet Friday.
Just two days after investigators raided and shut down seven cafes in Volusia and Flagler counties and dozens more statewide affiliated with Allied Veterans of the World, the odds against the strip-center gaming parlors were spinning faster than a slot machine reel.
On Friday, a Florida House committee voted 15-1 on a bill that would ban Internet cafes. Sen. John Thrasher expects the Senate will fast-track his similar bill after it's taken up in a committee Monday. The measure could be ready for Gov. Rick Scott's approval by the end of the month.
"I think the governor's ready to sign it as soon as it gets to his desk," said Thrasher, the St. Augustine Republican whose district includes Flagler and northeast Volusia County.
The new legislation would make it easier for law enforcement agencies to close illegal gambling operations, the sheriff said. Though he was proud his agency played a part in this week's multi-state investigation, loopholes in the law have made it difficult to pursue similar cases.
"It's very complicated," Johnson said. "There's a lot of unnecessary hoops you have to jump through (to prove a case)."
Since Wednesday's closures, Johnson said he's received calls from a couple of other Internet café operators. He warned them the next case won't take three years to build.
"We're going to go after them," he said.
The House bill approved Friday clarifies that the Web-based gambling devices used in the cafes are illegal. The games operate under gray areas of the law designed for raffles held by charities or sweepstakes-style games commonly used as promotions by businesses like McDonald's and Coca-Cola.
"These machines have always been illegal," Rep. Carlos Trujillo, R-Miami, the bill's sponsor, said at Friday's committee meeting in Tallahassee. "They're considered games of chance. They're illegal."
Proving it, though, isn't easy. Investigators needed to bring in experts to help prove that the games were illegal.
"They're extremely difficult to prosecute, and they're costly," Trujillo said, adding that café operators have been "very creative . . . they've basically skirted state law."
The Legislature has been slow to act. While the House passed a similar bill last year, it was never taken up by the Senate. Before this week, lawmakers were pushing a moratorium that would prevent new cafes from opening — which, critics noted, would have had the effect of making those already in existence even more profitable.
Then came Wednesday's closure of 49 cafes and the filing of charges against 57 people with ties to the St. Augustine charity, including 11 locally; investigators' allegation that less than 2 percent of Allied Veterans' $300 million in proceeds over five years actually went to charity; the resignation of Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll, who had done consulting work for the company as a lawmaker; and the revelation that Allied Veterans' backers contributed more than $1 million to Florida campaign accounts. (The Republican Party of Florida announced Friday it would donate $300,000 to the Florida Veterans Foundation.)
Rep. Jim Waldman, D-Coconut Creek, who cast the lone dissenting vote at Friday's committee meeting, questioned the timing of the bill — made public Thursday night — more than the intent. He called the proposal a "knee-jerk reaction" to the week's events.
"We ought to be looking at regulating all forms of gambling in the state of Florida," Waldman said.
For longtime critics of the operations, even this week's speedy turnaround isn't fast enough.
"They should have never opened," said Dan Francati, who manages the Daytona Beach Kennel Club & Poker Room. The Internet cafes don't pay the taxes his business does, Francati said. And players who feel cheated have nowhere to turn.
"They are unregulated, untaxed strip-mall casinos," Francati said. "They were a sham."


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i usually pick up the biggest spool i can a few times and turn it over, then leave then come back and do it a few times just to watch them dance and attempt to continue their charade.
copper is more lucrative than gold in leveraging society. it is required in abundance.
Looks like these guys are stopping people from...
*puts on sunglasses*
Do I hear...The Who?
Perhaps improving the job market and your nations distribution of wealth might help. People go to extremes when they cannot afford the basics of life. If your kids needed to eat you too would risk toasting yourself with an electrical line.
who is dumb enough to go a electrical substations to take cable when there is other cable that is easy to get and is safer to get.
Right. Like active plumbing: http://rochester.ynn.com/content/top_stories/525390/apparent-copper-theft-leads-to-flooding-of-future-reoc-building/ [ynn.com]
One of the reasons newer A/C condensers have signs like "NO COPPER INSIDE" is exactly because of this.
The reason for this happening? Copper is in areas that have no guards, alarms, curious onlookers. Then it is just one insulation-burning step away from a recycler and cash per pound.
The only real solution is to start forcing recyclers to have a chain of custody, similar to what pawnshops have when someone tries to sell/pawn something. No "well, I got this copper from an old remodel I just did" BS which serves now. Require a valid ID for sale with valid contact info. Some recyclers do their homework with this, but there are always others who don't.
That's the problem. When the scrap dealers will accept parking meters and in one case, the pendulum from a hundred-year-old clock, then the problem isn't the meth-head looking for a fix. A reputable place will require ID and call the place. Some of the places here provide coffee, a tent, and insulation strippers.
No really, parking meters. They started stealing the parking meters.
... Some of the places here provide coffee, a tent, and insulation strippers...
You know copper recycling is profitable if they can afford to provide strippers.
Some of the places here provide coffee, a tent, and insulation strippers.
What is the tent for? "Methhead just stripped all the copper out of the last relative's house who let him stay there and now has no other place to go" I'm assuming?
I think that is exactly a tool that might need to be used more, although it takes resources and manpower from an already strained system (and property crimes are low on the list in general) -- more sting operations like that. Perhaps even a recycling center that is persistant, but is able to keep tabs on the perps just for evidence reasons.
A long term sting like that would do three things -- make the thieves doing that leery of recycling centers in general, throw a number in prison, and perhaps help find o
If they're stealing the stuff it's because someone is paying them to do so, go after those thieves.
I wonder what would happen if you rounded them up and took them out to a mine and gave them picks.
If you promised meth in exchange for whatever you want out of the ground you would get a lot of digging and some amount of killing each other. On the whole I bet it would be a very productive mine.
I don't want to see any of you heartless punks turning in Bubbles.
I can definitely see why someone would put their life at risk by snitching on criminals, for that kind of reward. They could live like a king!
That's even more than I could get for finding that lost dog!
Given how relatively little money they make from the scrap sales (only $4/lb, even if they carried 100lbs it's only $400), $3000 is enough to make one meth-head turn on another I'd wager.
Life imitates art again: welcome to the world of Mad Max. Water ain't the only finite resource. Have you had the catalytic converter stolen off your SUV yet?
All science is either physics or stamp collecting. -- Ernest Rutherford


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"why the government should subsidize such a mature and profitable industry whose main contribution is to create amusing and sometimes antisocial entertainment"
Gotta have circuses with your bread.
Why is it that corporations get tax breaks at all?
Why is it that the ultra-rich, mostly Republicans, get to shuffle their income through loopholes like calling it "capital gains" (taxed at a mere 15%) while the middle class get robbed blind by the tax code?
We should fix the tax code, that's no question. But the "fixes" supported by the Republicans are more Robber Baron style "crony capitalism", nothing more.
Why is it that corporations get tax breaks at all?
Because corporate taxes in the US are stupidly high. If they didn't get tax breaks they'd go somewhere else, and who could blame them?
Then why are they not all in Somalia? No taxes at all there. Because from the stats I've seen higher taxes on the wealthy lead to lower unemployement and greater economic growth [thomhartmann.com] yet all we hear from the right is "Give teh rich more MONIES! nom nom nom". If this strategy worked, why didn't Raygun sit on top of unprecedented growth? Oh right, we had a nice little recession after he cut the hell out of taxes on the rich.
Its actually quite simple, the rich hoard, the poor and middle class spend. All that money being hoarded? is dead money, its gone, poof! If they invest it it sure ain't here. No in the past 30 years we've had trickle upon, voodoo economics, the "hey lets have trade agreements with those with NO workers rights or environmental laws, that'll work!", two wars while CUTTING taxes, the first time in the entire history of the USA that's happened BTW, and "bailout baby bailout".
If the right were correct in their theory, why we should be having a hell of a economy, with jobs everywhere....oh wait, they used their tax breaks to close 21,000 factories [businessinsider.com] in this decade alone. Why? Because in China they can poison the workers, the air, the water, and it costs them NOTHING. No OSHA, no clean air act, no workman's comp, they can give every worker cancer and all they'll get is fired.
Is that REALLY the America you want? Where your kids play outside wearing gas masks so they don't get sick, and where your ass better have enough money for purified water or you will suck down so many toxins you might as well drink gasoline? Personally I like having clean air, water, and not working in sweatshops, thanks. of course that must make me an evil socialist since I don't support everything that can be done to maximize profits, which in the end is all the right gives a fuck about.
Then why are they not all in Somalia? No taxes at all there.
They don't have to go to Somalia. They could go to Germany, say, or France. They can go to almost any other country on the face of the planet. Last time I checked the US was #2 in corporate tax rates. We lose out on billions of dollars when companies recognize profits in other countries because it's too expensive to repatriate the money.
And then you just go off into generic lefty screed #235. Look, none of this has anything to do with the f
In an ideal world, you would not have to tax the corporation but each share holder directly for capital gain and dividends. There would have no exception to the tax code except health related condition, no deduction for children, no deduction for old people,
replace Ha/O by Ha/Oa
The tax should be a fix percentage, like 25%
A fixed percentage could only ever be ideal if it was a wealth/capital tax and not an income or sales tax.
Fixed percentage income (and sales) taxes lead to positive feedback loops in wealth concentration, which at the very best hamper the economy severely and at worst causes a total economic collapse.
I specified capital gains at the beginning of my post and I did not said sales tax I talked about a luxury goods tax. if you include those in the income, why would it leads itself to a positive feedback loops in wealth concentration ?
In an ideal world, you would not have to tax the corporation but each share holder directly for capital gain and dividends.
I've had the same thought myself. Why tax a corporation, since you can just tax the owners of that corporation?
There would have no exception to the tax code except health related condition...
Your system has already failed. Once you make any 'exception', you must now quantify and police this exception. Can I deduct my asprin? Birth control pills? My artificial leg? Then you will have others start complaining that THEY have an important thing that needs to be deducted.
And there should be a luxury taxe around 25% that applies on all alcohol and tobacco, on object worth more that 2000$,...
You are once again opening the door to more taxes. Guess what will be the next 'luxury item'? Guns? Fast food?
The better question is, "why do corporations pay tax at all?"
To encourage corporations to actually invest back into their products instead of stockpiling money that then is used to buy up competition.
it's simply built into the price you pay. So it's just effectively a VAT in different clothing.
Corporate taxes are on net profits, not turnover.
Corporate taxes are on net profits, not turnover.
VAT isn't based on turnover either.
VAT isn't based on turnover either.
One meaning of the word turnover is sales revenue. And that is exactly what VAT is based on.
Consider this: there isn't a single dollar which can flow through a corporation (and that's all money does: flow through corporations) which isn't already taxed:
So? Taxes has to payed in one way or another. Profit taxes tend to be very effective in that they hurt startups and companies who fall on rough times the least. They also as previously mentioned encourage reinvesting in the company and growth in general.
You sell a hundred bananas and, in so doing, generate $100 profit, however of that $100 you have to pay $50 in corporate taxes.
Meanwhile, a less profitable company only sold 50 bananas and end up making zero profits because of static costs as rent.
the net effect of eliminating that corporate tax would be a reduction in prices for your customers
No, the net effect would be that you would have to tax something else instead, like a $0.33 sales tax on the bananas.
The less profitabl
you seem to believe profit is a bad thing
No, I don't. I simply believe that adding too much volatility to an already volatile system is bad. And that means that you place a decent part of taxes where they cause less volatility.
Btw, in your first post you basically claimed that it makes no difference where taxes are placed, so why are you so opposed to corporate taxes in the first place? Unless you have some ulterior agenda.
you seem to be of the view that all companies having identical profit margins is a desirable outcome of governmental policy
I simply can't see how you could have come to that conclusion, unless you think I am some kind of extremist that want 100% cor
Why is it that the ultra-rich, mostly Republicans...
Yeah, because all of those Democrats in DC are all dirt poor...
Gotta have circuses with your bread.
+1. [wikipedia.org]
Sad but true.
"why the government should subsidize such a mature and profitable industry whose main contribution is to create amusing and sometimes antisocial entertainment"
Subsidy [reference.com]: a direct pecuniary aid furnished by a government to a private industrial undertaking, a charity organization, or the like.
So the article writer assumes that not taking money is the same as giving money. That is some screwed up logic right there. It makes me wonder why we're subsidizing this writer (by not taxing his income at a higher rate).
Sure, you can complain about the tax system and about all the tax breaks so-and-so qualifies for, but it's dishonest to say that the government is subsidizing EA. I'd even say it's pandering, since by the second paragraph they mention (and have a screenshot of) Dead Space 2. The implicatio
What is the difference exactly between giving you $100 and lowering your tax by $100? Of course they're the same and that's why the governments favourite way to partially subsidize projects is tax breaks.
Even the politicians are honest about it, when they lower the tax on say food or books they actually say they're subsidising food or books.
What is the difference exactly between giving you $100 and lowering your tax by $100? Of course they're the same and that's why the governments favourite way to partially subsidize projects is tax breaks.
Even the politicians are honest about it, when they lower the tax on say food or books they actually say they're subsidising food or books.
I understand where you're coming from, but there are some practical and philosophical distinctions between the two:
They aren't the same. Tax code complexities can easily make that $100 vanish. You forget the US's little game with standard deduction and itemized deduction. You have to itemize to claim many of these tax breaks. If the itemized amount + that $100 tax break is less than the standard deduction, which can easily happen if you don't have mortgage payments, then those tax breaks are useless to you. (If you itemize, you can deduct mortgage payments, but not rental payments, because the US wants citizens to
but remember, all those programmers with an education burn out and go work for insurance companies writing boring accounting programs when they're done with games. But they wouldn't have gotten the education without the carrot of making video games. Most game companies start as small businesses, it's one of the last industries where you can start a business by yourself and grow it into multi-millions of dollars in a reasonable time. So many game houses get small-business credits for years until they get bou
"Since filling out even a simple return can be rather game-like, maybe they're just doing what they do best."
So is this the new real-time strategy game you want to sell to our future accountants? Personally I tend toward games with the fewest rules, they're more entertaining.
"evading the IRS and taxes"
"Since filling out even a simple return can be rather game-like, maybe they're just doing what they do best."
So is this the new real-time strategy game you want to sell to our future accountants? Personally I tend toward games with the fewest rules, they're more entertaining.
you have a staff, a lantern, and a large piece of pork.
look around
You are in a large room
there are large twisty tax breaks across the floor, all alike.
On the other side is an armored car and there are piles of gold on the floor there.
But EA is a "job creator", so those tax breaks "trickle down" to the hoi polloi in the form of jobs.
I think it works more like this.
1. Have somewhat obnoxious business taxes.
2. Hand out tax breaks to select businesses.
3. Power!!!
Not only that, but entertainment is US most profitable industry,
Really? According to this, it's #51 (2008)
Is that before or after Hollywood's accounting?
There is no reason tax breaks need to translate into more jobs. From econ 101: companies maximize profit.
profit = (1-tax rate) * (tax free profit as a function of size)
maximize that function by taking the first derivate with respect to size and the tax rate term drops out--it is irrelevant to the maximization. So corporate taxes are irrelevant (in the econ 101 world).
I find it amusing that other corporations would be bitching. Just about every corporation out there uses some form of voodoo accounting to show a loss regardless of their actual profits. This article doesn't show what's wrong with the video game industry in terms of tax breaks and federal funding it shows what's wrong with our country and tax system as a whole.
Show losses get yourself lower taxes and some pork and who cares what sort of sleazy accounting methods you use.
From TFA, EA conforms to generally accepted account principles, or GAAP as we call it in the biz. So hop off me jet pack and don't assume because a company shows a loss they are sleazy, chadwhick. I find it quite amusing that the common folk just assumes every corporation has some evil voodoo master accountant, probably wearing a green visor with a bean counter too, sitting in the back room scheming how to make the common tax payer subsidize his/her (to be pc) business. The amount of rigamarole that a corporation such as a EA has to go through to even file its taxes costs more than what most of us make in the past 4 years combined. Yeah, the tax code has all these fancy dancy write offs, deductions and what not, but it also has something called phase outs. Yeah, phase outs. That means the nice little deduction that congress gave you, gets phased out over certain income levels. Take the article with a grain of salt. Its a complicated subject that takes years to master and it was written by somebody with a liberal arts degree who asked 2 questions to 2 people.
"I find it quite amusing that the common folk just assumes every corporation has some evil voodoo master accountant,"
Does the financial crisis wring a bell? Maybe, just maybe you missed this...
Video (trillions in secret special give-aways)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJqM2tFOxLQ [youtube.com]
http://dailybail.com/ [dailybail.com]
I find it quite amusing that the common folk just assumes every corporation has some evil voodoo master accountant, probably wearing a green visor with a bean counter too, sitting in the back room scheming how to make the common tax payer subsidize his/her (to be pc) business.
You mean there's a company out there who's accounting department isn't trying to minimize their tax burden? Isn't that their job? Accountants don't come up with new laws for tax breaks, of course. Big companies have lobbyists fo
Well the problem is that when we here record profits what they REALLY mean is record EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization) which is a fancy way of saying we made sales, and cut costs.. before then the accountants will start their magic JuJu to whittle the taxable portion down as far as they can so they don't have to pay dividends to shareholders. That's where executive salaries come in because companies would rather pay for ridiculous properties in New York City, multi-million dollar salaries, hoard huge sums of lucre, and racing teams than pay out the dividends or taxes. When the CEO wants X million dollars that's where it comes from... In normal business accounting you WANT to be paid out of the non-EBTDA money... because that's what investors and efficiency guys don't question.
I guess most people have learnt from Enron and Arthur Anderson Accountants that even the accountants can't be trusted once they get the benefits from closing their eyes. So while you are in all likelihood correct, the damage that has been done to the reputation of accountants the world over is pretty hard to repair.
Simplify the US tax code, so that it does not manipulate the market by rewarding/penalizing different industries, based on what legislator wants to curry favor with a particular company.
Of course, that leaves a lot less opportunity for graft and corruption, so the odds of it getting done in DC are slim to none.
"Simplify the US tax code, so that it does not manipulate the market by rewarding/penalizing different industries"
You're under the delusion that any system can't be gamed, all tax systems are gamed by corporations and lobbyists - just who do you think is electing your president and writing your laws? Until Americans start becoming well informed and involved seriously in understanding how the relationships between business and government works you will all forever be lost.
The following are both true statements.
The US has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world.
The US has one of the lowest corporate tax burdens in the world.
There is a lot of scope for simplifying. For example, the US is one of the few companies that tax income no matter where it is produced. Most countries only tax corporate income on the income produced within that company. So US multinational companies are at a disadvantage because they have to pay corporarte tax twice [both US and foreign]. Ins
I worked at a video game company here in Vancouver, and I remember tax time being interviewed by a consultant about my "R&D" innovations. Anything, I mean ANYTHING, even remotely like R&D. "Uh, you mean even the work I spent optimizing the code?" "Yes."
I was told at one point in the company's history, our biggest source of income were tax credits from the Government of Canada.
While I did not work in video games, I had similar experiences while working in Canada. Those tax breaks were huge for our company even though I would not call what we did R&D.
One coworker got headhunted into a much better position just due to the fact that he had hands on experience in getting these tax breaks for our company and a sizable bonus based on a percentage of the money he could get for the new company.
I was told at one point in the company's history, our biggest source of income were tax credits from the Government of Canada.
Was that time the first year or so? Many tech companies go the first couple years on government grants alone. What private investor with reasonable funds would risk their money on something that's not guaranteed to return 11% in Q3? I actually think its one of the best things the government does. Sure there is favoritism and corruption but we should try (however impossible it may sound) to fix that, not cut R&D spending.
Was that time the first year or so?
I was told it was the first five years. In those first five years, they released profit making games.
I too have worked for Canadian companies doing software development, and as best as I can make out the Canada R&D tax credit is basically a 'D' (development) tax credit which pays companies to do what they would be doing anyway.
Hey! The video display on their pump plays crap while I'm filling up. Maybe they could get the entertainment credit for that.
"Because video game makers straddle the lines between software development, the entertainment industry and online retailing, they can combine tax breaks in ways that
Entertainment is what it takes, eh? Sounds like Adobe needs to put this [p01.org] into their website! Or maybe they can make a trailer for CS6, and add nuclear strikes or even a BFG 10000. They can add a mode where software developers break the hearts of artists by suggesting they change their design. Suddenly work becomes more fun and Adobe gets tax breaks. Win-win.
Toss it out, start over, and if it grows longer than the Hong Kong tax code (about 200 pages) - Congress is fired and a new group of people start the task. Flat rate, single deduc
Really, a tax like that should be progressive and have a cutoff on the low end pinned to real income.
In the beginning, the vast majority of wage earners were not even required to file a tax return, much less actually pay income tax. Anyone who made enough money to be required to file most likely already employed an accountant.
While in perfect proportion, losing 20% of 30,000 a year hurts a lot more than losing 20% of a million a year. However, all of that can be expressed in just a page or 2.
Start with an exemption that is 200% of the poverty line (poverty line for a single person is $10,890), and then index it for inflation. One deducti
But that would mean rich people actually have to pay taxes. We can't have that!
(Seriously, though, politicians' campaigns are sponsored by corporations and people with money, so a tax code that doesn't outrageously benefit them is pretty much out of the question.)
So tell me, if EA can deduct all developer salaries as R&D expenses, why can't an indie developer likewise deduct his entire paycheck and pay no income tax?
The indie game developer, with the right business structure, could probably deduct his paycheck from his business, so he doesn't have to pay as much tax on his business profits, but then it turns into personal income, and he has to pay payroll taxes from the business, as well as payroll taxes as an individual, plus Social Security, Medicare, unemployment insurance...
On a related note, billionares like Warren Buffet famously only pay ~15% on his long-term capital gains and dividends, but the government ha
However, Buffet himself has said flat out that he pays a smaller percentage on his overall income than his staff do. He argues that the fix for the current economic problems requires that people at his income level be taxed MORE.
At least here in Canada, salaries/wages are taken off the revenues before they calculate the tax. If you've formed a corporation as an indie developer you can (as the corporation) write off the salary as a cost of doing business, but don't get ahead of yourself. You as the individual working for your own company still pays personal taxes on all gains, so in the end do you really win more than just being a sole proprietorship? That depends on a ton of variables.
"But largely because of deferred revenue, deduc
Here is a huge tax irony. A business that must repair its equipment to do business gets to write off its cost of repairs. However, a salaried wageslave person who has to go to the doctor to get fixed up, cannot write off the cost of their repair, i.e. medical cost, except through a complicated series of tax actions. The reality is, and has been, the wage slave middle class are the slow moving, easy tax targets -- the sheep to be fleeced. If the politicians wanted to be fair, they would allow individuals to
Companies should be encouraged to provide Medical Insurance for their workers. On a yearly basis this could of course be partly written off as a "cost of business" (this will get companies to actually do it). Then we get the insurance companies to provide "wellness" coverage and things roll forward to the point where if somebody falls off a ladder or just gets sick then that cost is still covered.
BTW a company should cover any kind of injury that happened WHILE ON THE CLOCK. (personally i think somebody kee
I thought they just got paid for other peoples games.
Video game developers receive such a rich assortment of incentives that even oil companies have questioned why the government should subsidize such a mature and profitable industry whose main contribution is to create amusing and sometimes antisocial entertainment.
Maybe the oil companies should clean up their messes before they start casting stones...
Wow. I didn't see the connection at first. Dawning my tinfoil hat:
Pres Clinton
Chicken ranchers.
Pres W
Mohair ranchers (Mohair is vital to the economy of the Texas Hill Country) Mohair Production [wikipedia.org]
NASCAR Track owners
Oil Companies
Hedge fund managers
Pres Obama
Meh. I own property in Orange County, Florida (although I no longer live there, I can't exactly get out of it unless it burns down or I get foreclosed), which means I subsidize EA. I worked there once. You're probably aware that they hire college/highschool greenhorns who either burn out or decide an asexual life is the life for them. While I do not exactly begrudge them that, I do question the need to subsidize it. End the tax breaks for these people, please. Thanks, from a guy in the Florida Keys whose li
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. -- Oscar Wilde


text:
In New York City, the street in front of a high school was painted with big white letters that were supposed to read "school." But the word painted read "shcool." The city says a contractor made the mistake after some street repairs.
Street Warning Misspelled In Front Of School
By editor • Jan 25, 2012


text:
By Michael Aneiro
Yesterday this blog wrote about how the June's bond sell-off pushed investors to pull $9.9 billion last month from the biggest bond fund of them all, the now $268 billion Pimco Total Return Bond Fund (PTTRX), as Bill Gross's flagship fund fell by 2.5% in June, trailing 92 percent of comparable funds. Why? In large part due to a big bet on Treasury inflation-protected securities, or TIPS, which have had a terrible time lately as rates rose but inflation did not. A Bloomberg story by Miles Weiss and Alexis Leondis today says Gross was buying TIPS back in April, betting that money printing by the world's central banks would push up consumer prices, as some other big fund managers were avoiding them:
While Treasuries subsequently fell as he had predicted, so did inflation expectations, amplifying rather than limiting losses for Gross's Pimco Total Return Fund (PTRAX), which had 12 percent of its $289 billion in Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities at the end of March. The world's largest mutual fund fell 4.7 percent in the next two months, prompting $9.9 billion in withdrawals in June, the most on record.
The losses highlight the challenge Gross faces as he steers Pacific Investment Management Co. through what's arguably the biggest market challenge for the $2 trillion bond-fund manager since its inception in 1971. A premature bet against Treasuries caused his flagship to trail peers in 2011, prompting Gross to apologize to clients. With about 10 percent of the TIPS market owned by Pimco, according to Morningstar Inc., his success is tied in part to an asset class fellow bond manager Jeffrey Gundlach has avoided.
"Unless inflation goes higher, then all you have with TIPS is interest rate risk, just like every other Treasury," said Gundlach, the portfolio manager for the $39 billion DoubleLine (DBLTX) Total Return Bond Fund. "It's an asset class that is exposed to investor surprise and disappointment."
Looking at the TIPS market Wednesday, the iShares Barclays TIPS Bond Fund (TIP) is up 3 cents to $112.41. still down 7.6% over the past two months.


text:
The May Issues
- Najib Benouar
The May issues are in and we've got a mixed bag on our hands.
May can be a tricky style month to predict. It puts us in the late-spring-but-it-might-already-feel-like-summer zone of weather, so it's hard to know whether we're going to want to see umbrellas or madrases. (GQ hedged with umbrellas). It's safe to assume most of this stuff went to print while April showers were still raging (and Derrick Rose was still playoffs-bound), meaning everyone's predictions were a little off. So, in the name of menswear journalism, we trod through the mid-weight blazers, the white canvas shoes (well in advance of Memorial Day), a few instances of déjà vu and an unsettlingly low amount of eye candy to bring you...
Everything you need to know from May's crop of glossies.»


text:
- the two men were somehow related
- the men lived near each other
After all, it was a joint affidavit signed by both of them. They even lived in the same state.
Turns out that they lived 300 miles from each other. Thanks to my Casefile Clues proofreader for catching my rather glaring error.


text:
The Premier League did not fail to disappoint this weekend as it again threw up some surprise results.
Proceedings started on Saturday afternoon when Manchester United played host to Newcastle United.
And the game brought about another shock defeat for the Red Devils as the Premier League champions lost 1-0 against Alan Pardew's side.
Liverpool defeated West Ham 4-1 to push themselves into second spot as Chelsea were unexpectedly beaten 3-2 by Stoke City.
Palace claimed all three points against fellow Premier League relegation candidates Cardiff City, while Southampton picked up a valuable point against Southampton.
There were also wins for Norwich at West Brom and Tottenham beat Sunderland at the Stadium of Light on Saturday.
Fulham's new manager Rene Meulensteen picked up his first win since taking over the reins at Craven Cottage as the west London side defeated Aston Villa 2-0.
And Arsenal could only pick up a point against Everton on Sunday.
Click through the following pages to see who we think played an integral part in their side's weekend fixture.
Do YOU want to write for GiveMeSport? Get started today by signing-up and submitting an article HERE: https://www.givemesport.com/writeforgms


text:
Lawyer & business paragon Rick Silva L'90
By Art Carey
Wearing a toupee and a fake mustache, Rick Silva posed as a failed pharmacist from Philadelphia on the highly rated reality TV series Undercover Boss last February. As president and CEO of Checkers and Rally's restaurants, he performed all sorts of jobs alongside his unwitting employees – making sandwiches, grilling burgers, cooking fries, manning the drive-thru window.
At a restaurant in Homestead, Fla., he befriended an employee named Todd who told him about his ambitions to be a chef. When the manager of the restaurant shouted at Todd and told him to stop talking, Silva was shocked by the manager's disrespectful manner.
When he asked Todd why he tolerated such abuse, he learned that he needed the job to help support his mother and was afraid of being fired. Silva was so disturbed by the manager's behavior that he felt obliged to confront him.
When he asked the manager why he yelled at his employees, the manager replied: "If I don't scream at them, they don't listen to me."
Then he added: "I'm not going to let you continue telling me I'm disrespecting my crew. Have you been in the fast food business before?"
Silva, who oversees the largest double drive-thru restaurant chain in the country, with 800 restaurants in 30 states, felt he had no choice but to break character and drop his disguise.
"I've been in the fast-food business for over 20 years. I'm CEO for this company."
The expression on the manager's face was a reality-TV "money shot" – stunned, his mouth open in disbelief.
Silva immediately shut the restaurant down.
"I was not comfortable he had the capacity to run the restaurant at the standards we require in this company," Silva recalled. "His attitude towards his employees was not to my liking. In our company, we are here to serve the employees and guests. If things are not done right, if there's a problem, we're going to fix it."
And fix it he did. Silva reopened the restaurant the next day with a new manager, dispatched the offending manager for more training, and enrolled Todd in culinary school and gave him $15,000 to help support his mother. (Silva, who generally keeps a low profile, was surprised to be chosen from among the 100 or so CEOs who audition for about 12 spots.)
"I learned so much from that show, and we made some significant changes as a result," Silva recalled recently from company headquarters in Tampa, Fla. "The show reflects who I am and hopefully shows my passion for business and maintaining incredibly high standards, as well as my respect for both our employees and guests…At the end of the day, I'm fully accountable for the results in all our restaurants. If they're not perfect, it's my responsibility."
It's such an attitude, combined with a keen appetite for competition, that has propelled Enrique "Rick" Silva, 46, L '90, to the top job in a fast-paced business that was far from his thoughts when he was studying law at Penn. Along the way, he has earned a reputation as a bold leader of change and passionate businessman who tolerates little deviation from excellence.
Rally's began in 1985 in Jefferson, Indiana; Checkers began in 1986 in Mobile, Ala. The restaurants are virtually the same with double drive thru service, a walk-up counter, and no dining room. The two chains competed with one another until 1999 when they merged.
Over-expansion led the chain to falter in the early 2000s, and the private equity firm Wellspring Capital Management assumed control. In February 2007, they recruited Silva, who came to Checkers with plenty of experience. For 13 years, he worked for Burger King. He began as an in-house lawyer but soon moved to the business side. As a Cuban American, he was fluent in Spanish and an ideal candidate to oversee Burger King's Latin American operations. He later ran the company's U.S. restaurants as well as its franchise business.
During Silva's time there, Burger King went through two changes of ownership before going public. All the while, Silva applied himself to the tasks at hand, dramatically improving the efficiency and profitability of the restaurants under his command.
"It was a wonderful experience, trying to change the culture, the people, the systems, and the financial results," Silva says.
Silva is trying to work the same magic at Checkers. Of the company's 800 restaurants, 300 are owned and operated directly by the chain itself, the remaining 500 are franchised.
The company has 6,000 direct employees, and 20,000 employees altogether. It is privately held but Silva reveals that systemwide revenue in 2011 was $669 million. The chain sells 310,000 burgers per day; 2.2 million burgers per week; 113 million burgers a year.
Nevertheless, in the fast-food firmament, the Checkers/Rally's chain is something of an underdog. McDonald's has over 14,000 restaurants; Burger King, 7,500, and Wendy's, about 6,000.
But Silva is undaunted and plans to expand the number of Checkers restaurants to between 1,200 and 1,500 in the next five years. The restaurants are spread across the country, but the largest number, in descending order, are in Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Louisiana, New York, Kentucky, Alabama and California.
Silva is proud of the fact that over the past two years, his restaurants' sales results have climbed at a faster clip than those of his bigger competitors.
"Our food is what sets us apart," Silva says, "and we deliver much better value. We do a lot of focus groups to ensure that the taste of our food is what differentiates us. We sear and hand-seasoned beef on the grill and have a unique proprietary process for our fried food, such as our seasoned french fries."
Another distinguishing feature: the restaurants stay open until the wee hours, 2 a.m. on weekdays, 4 a.m on weekends, monopolizing late-night appetites.
Silva has harnessed the latest technology to make the restaurants more efficient and improve guest satisfaction and speed of service. Because they are strictly drive-thru, with no dining rooms, the restaurants can be built on only half an acre. Most are assembled from prefabricated modules, further reducing costs and making them more attractive to potential franchisees. Says Silva: "The cost of building our restaurants is the lowest it's ever been."
A new freestanding restaurant costs about $500,000 to build, including equipment and signage. Site development (landscaping, parking, curb cuts, etc.) adds another $150,000 on land that is typically leased A franchisee pays a $30,000 onetime fee, plus four percent royalties on gross sales, Silva says.
Business is in Silva's blood. His parents emigrated from Cuba with little more than the clothes on their back and a small suitcase. Although they were professionals on the island, they took a variety of odd jobs in Miami. Eventually, Silva's mother, a pharmacist, earned her license in the U.S. and the family opened a small pharmacy.
"That's where I really fell in love with business," Silva says. When he wasn't in school, he was working. He kept the books, tracked inventory and dealt with customers.
"My mother was a natural businessperson who had an instinctive understanding of what customers need and the importance of being part of their lives. As a small family drugstore competing with national chains, we learned quickly we needed to differentiate ourselves. We needed to supply customers with something they couldn't get elsewhere."
After high school, Silva attended the University of Miami, where he earned a degree in business administration and accounting. Believing that a law degree would prove helpful, he applied to the University of Pennsylvania. The Penn experience was "amazing," he says, "the best decision I ever made." He was impressed by the diversity of the students and the intellectual vitality of the place. (He served on the Law Alumni Society Board of Managers until recently.)
Chris Gegylys, now an in-house lawyer for Covance Inc., a company that assists the pharmaceutical industry in drug development, was Silva's roommate during their third year of law school.
"He was always balanced in the way he approached things and very well liked by his classmates," Gegylys recalls. "His family was important to him, and he had strong family values. He also always had a strong interest in business. He would spend his spare time reading Business Week and following business stories in the news."
After Penn, Silva joined the large Miami law firm of Greenburg Traurig.
At Greenburg Traurig, Silva gravitated to real estate law because it was the closest thing to business. Then, after three years, came the offer from Burger King.
"It's interesting where life will take you," Silva reflects. "I guess I shouldn't be totally surprised that I ended up in this business. My grandfather ran a restaurant in Cuba. And when he came to Florida, we cooked a lot at home. I love food and I absolutely love this industry. It's a very interesting business, and people don't realize how dynamic and exciting it can be because it's so competitive. In order to be successful in fast food, you have to very nimble and sophisticated."
Thomas Haas, an industry consultant and analyst and former publisher of the Nation's Restaurants News, has been impressed by what Silva has accomplished. "They were in pretty bad shape before Rick came," Haas says. "Any time you don't have consistency in management and ownership you're in trouble, and Checkers and Rally's were in trouble."
Hass lauds Silva for expanding and diversifying the menu and stabilizing the quality of the brand.
"He's taken a concept that was dead in the water and brought it back to life," Haas says. "You have to be a pretty good operator to stabilize a struggling concept and move it in positive direction, which is what Rick has done."
Carl Stanton, a partner of Wellspring Capital Management in NYC, lauds Silva and his team for taking "an under performing asset when we invested in it and adding tremendous value."
"He's got classic leadership skills, and by that I mean he has the right mix of vision – a sense of where to take the company and how to make it grow – as well as fierce attention to detail and performance and tremendous personal integrity, so people who work for him very quickly realize that he has their best interests in mind as well as those of the broader company, and it's very easy to work for somebody like that. Which is not to say he's an easy boss. He's got a tremendous work ethic, but everybody who works for him knows first and foremost he demands a lot from himself."
Joe Hertzman, who owns 13 Rally's restaurants and was one of the first Rally's franchisees in Kentucky and Indiana, calls Silva "one of the finest CEOs and people I've had the pleasure to do business with."
"He's a sophisticated operator and visionary, while at the same time being a real down-to-earth, leave-your-ego-at-the-door type of guy," Hertzman continues. "I've been in this business for 30 years, and have seen a lot of different executive teams come and go. Rick's done a great job of putting a first-class team together and really moving the brands forward."
Over and over again, those who know Silva mention his humility, combined with a fierce inner drive.
"The biggest thing that stands out with him is that he's very humble. You would never know he's the CEO," says Rick Giusto, managing partner of Greenburg Traurig's Miami office who still says in touch with Silva. "On the other hand, there's this very quiet intensity underneath. When he sets a goal for himself, one way or another he's going to get there, and he'll outwork everybody to do so. But he'll only ask of you what he asks of himself, which is one reason he's been so successful."
Silva describes himself foremost as "very dedicated." Dedicated to a balanced life. Dedicated to his family (he and his wife, Lisa, his high school sweetheart, have been married 22 years and have two children, Michael, in college, and Jessica, a high school senior). And dedicated to his job.
"Every day I wake up, I feel like the luckiest guy in the world," Silva says. "I could not imagine doing anything else."


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Endless Possibilities Collection of Water Garden Ponds
Collection of Water Garden Ponds
Back Yard Front Yard Garden Hardscape Large (5,000 - 10,000 sq ft.) Medium (1,000 - 5,000 sq ft.) Patio Pond Side Yard Small (Under 1,000 sq ft.) Stone / Rock Water Garden Waterfall
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I am labeling this YardShare's "Must View" yard if you are looking for ideas on pond design. I'm thankful you've decided to share your talents with us.
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Story highlights
- In a Connecticut school, at least 26 were killed, including at least 20 children
- Saul Cornell: Gun rights ideology makes a mockery of values of Second Amendment
- He says New York recently upheld a reasonable gun law, but Illinois did not
- Cornell: It is time to inject more sense and reason back into the debate over guns
In a Connecticut elementary school, 26 people, including 20 children, were killed by a gunman Friday morning. This comes on the heels of a shooting rampage on Tuesday in Oregon, where a masked man opened fire into crowds at a mall, killing two before killing himself.
Tragic images flash across our television screens and computer monitors, as they have so many times in recent memory. These events will once again set in motion a predictable cycle of ineffectual chatter about gun violence in America. We will be told that now is not the time to discuss policy.
By tomorrow, a well-funded gun rights propaganda machine will move into action. For the adherents of this ideology, the solution to the problem of gun violence is not better regulations but more guns. School shootings? Arm the teachers. Movie theater shootings? Arm the moviegoers.
Contemporary gun rights ideology makes a mockery of the Enlightenment ideals of the Framers of the Second Amendment. The Founders obviously supported gun ownership, but they favored strong gun regulation. America has the former, but nobody seems willing to talk rationally about the latter. We all need to take a cue from the Founding Fathers.
Some have interpreted the Second Amendment's affirmation of the right to bear arms as a barrier to reasonable regulation. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Second Amendment does not pose a barrier to gun regulation, it requires it. As long as there have been guns in America they have been regulated. It would have been impossible to muster the militia to fight the British if we applied today's gun rights ideology to the American Revolution. Registration, mandatory inspection of firearms and frequent training were all essential to a well-regulated militia. In America today, we have many more guns, but far less government regulation of firearms.
Our ideas of armed self-defense are at odds with the Founders' vision. At the time the Second Amendment was written, the common law view of the right of self-defense inherited from England was very limited. Indeed, returning to the original understanding of the right of self-defense would require repealing "stand your ground" laws that some states have adopted.
Under English common law one had a legal duty to retreat, not stand your ground. As early as 1328, Parliament acted to limit armed travel, with the notable exception that members of the nobility were allowed to travel with armed retainers, a legal recognition of the privileges of aristocratic birth.
The American Revolution did not usher in a new era of expansive gun rights. Thomas Jefferson, one of the most pro-gun voices among the Founding generation, proposed but failed to secure a robust individual right to have arms included in the Virginia Declaration of Rights in 1776.
Individual states did recognize a right to travel armed with a musket to meet the legal obligation to attend militia musters, but states and localities regulated the exercise of this right and in some cases prohibited traveling with a loaded weapon or discharging a weapon at or near a muster.
In 1835, Massachusetts passed a law that severely limited the right to travel armed: "no person may go armed with a dirk, dagger, sword, pistol, or other offensive and dangerous weapon, without reasonable cause to apprehend an assault or violence to his person, family, or property."
The key legal concept here is reasonable cause for fear, precisely the standard that gun rights advocates wish to overturn and a federal court in New York recently upheld.
Supporters of gun regulation won an important victory when the Second Circuit Court of Appeals upheld New York State's requirement that one show "proper cause" to obtain a license to carry a concealed handgun in public.
The court rejected the idea that one had a right to carry arms in the absence of a reasonable fear of imminent violence. The lead plaintiff in the case, Alan Kachalsky, said that the court's emphasis on reason is a "ridiculous interpretation of the Second Amendment." Sadly, the idea of reason has become ridiculous to some.
But champions of gun control were handed a defeat when on Tuesday, in Illinois, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the state's ban on carrying a weapon in public is unconstitutional. In contrast to New York, and against the advice of experts, Illinois did not rewrite the law to include an exception for arming oneself when there was a reasonable fear of imminent danger.
The Court of Appeals' ruling in the New York case has put us in the right direction; Illinois ought to follow New York's example.
It is time to inject more sense and reason back into America's debate over guns. Not talking about changing our default gun policy will guarantee more tragedies.


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ASUS ROG Strix GL553VD Gaming Notebook Review (Core i7 7700HQ + GTX 1050)
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CUDA Spotlight: GPU-Accelerated High Energy PhysicsThis week's Spotlight is on Valerie Halyo, assistant professor of physics at Princeton University.Researchers in the field of high energy physics, such as Valerie, are exploring the most fundamental questions about the nature of the universe, looking for the elementary particles that constitute matter and its interactions.One of Valerie's goals is to extend the physics accessible at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland to include a larger phase space of the topologies that include long-lived particles. This research goes hand in hand with new ideas related to enhancing the "trigger" performance at the LHC.(In particle physics, a trigger is a system that rapidly decides which events in a particle detector to keep when only a small fraction of the total can be recorded.)


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Situated in a quiet leafy residential area , this villa is currently laid out as two apartments. The present accommodation comprises of ground floor apartment with living room , 2 bedrooms , bathroom and kitchen. The first floor apartment also has a living room , 2 bedrooms , bathroom and kitchen. There is a garden with mature trees and a small pool.There is also a possibility to detached some land to build another house. We are delighted to welcome you to our latest selection of Blue Square properties. We have offices throughout the coast to help you sell or purchase a property.Blue Square's global marketing and local expertise has allowed us to become the real estate company of choice on the coast. Unsurpassable customer service is our priority. Our experienced, multi-lingual team of property hunters seek the very best properties foryou. We have also launched 'Blue Square Aftersales' which means not only do you get a first class customer experience during the selling or buying process, we are here for you always.We hope you enjoy our selection of properties and remember this is just a selection of our database of 3500 properties so please do call one of our British consultants to discuss your project.
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At some point in your pet collecting career, it's best just to give up and admit you're obsessed. When Lil' Game Hunter went live with 3.0.8, I started looking at my options to get to 75 pets. Most people shouldn't have too much difficulty reaching 50 (Shop Smart, Shop Pet...Smart), but 75 is a little unnerving. I don't have any of the Collector's Edition, Trading Card Game, or fan event pets, and I also play Horde. That leaves me without access to the Sprite Darter Hatchling, and on a lot of realms also makes it harder and more expensive to get the White Kitten, on top of being more expensive to get the lion's share of the faction-specific pets (which, naturellement, are Alliance). What's up with the Horde and pet hate? Sheesh.
So that was somewhat worrying, and I approach this achievement with one question in mind: is it possible to do this without having dropped money on CE, TCG, or event pets?


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Wednesday, October 29, 2014 - 7:00pm to 8:00pm
Join French Conversation Hour to keep up your French language skills through open conversation with other French speakers. Whether you speak enough to hold a basic conversation, or you can rattle off long stories, all are welcome. No class, no formal lesson - just practice for current French speakers.
Meeting Room
Maze Branch Library


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It has been coming on for a while now. The cloudy days and cooler nights have me thinking of baking. Today, I couldn't help myself. We just had to have homemade rolls with dinner.
So I looked up a no knead recipe. One of the top no knead roll recipes was from Oprah. Since it didn't have any milk in it, I gave it a try.
These first couple pictures are of my dough as it is rising. I used a plastic ice cream container left-over from our last milkshake party, and poked a couple holes in the top to allow it to breath while the yeasties were doing their rising thing.
Here are the rolls after I punched them down and formed them:
I had warmed the oven slightly (by baking brownies and then opening the door up to let it cool some) so that they would rise well.
Here they are after they have been buttered and are browning.
They turned out nice and brown on top.
My husband asked if this was a new recipe, because they were not as dense as the dinner rolls I typically make. Then he got himself a second light and fluffy roll to slather good jam on. I call that success.
What are you baking?
Sunday, October 3, 2010
No Knead Rolls
It has been coming on for a while now. The cloudy days and cooler nights have me thinking of baking. Today, I couldn't help myself. We just had to have homemade rolls with dinner.
Posted by Mer at 7:39 PM
Labels: bread baking, dinner rolls, no knead bread, recipes
5 comments:
- StefRobrts said...
Those look great! I'm definitely trying that recipe!
- October 3, 2010 at 9:10 PM
- Mer said...
Thanks, Stephanie. They turned out better than I had expected from a "no knead" recipe. :) Let me know what you think when you try them.
- October 4, 2010 at 6:56 AM
- StefRobrts said...
I made these last night and they turned out perfect. Very light and fluffy. Thanks for sharing the recipe :)
- October 11, 2010 at 9:03 AM
- Mer said...
Yay! Glad they worked out for you. I was certainly impressed with how light they ended up. :)
- October 11, 2010 at 4:30 PM
- Jackie said...
You're lovely pictures convinced me...I gotta try this one! Thanks, sweet niece! <3
- October 14, 2010 at 10:08 AM


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Mount Union?s Assistant to the President for Diversity Affairs, Dr. William Coleman, returns from China
April 27, 2010
Dr. William Coleman, assistant to the president for diversity affairs, recently returned from a three-week trip to China.
Pictured (L-R): Dr. Liangwu Yin and Dr. William Coleman
Coleman's trip was for the purpose of exploring possible connections to Chinese institutions of higher learning. These possible connections include student and faculty exchanges, collaborative research, guest lectures, cultural workshops, summer programs and study tours.
Coleman said the two institutions that look promising are Northeast Normal University in Changchun City, Jilin Province, about 90 minutes by plane from Beijing, and Hefei University in Hefei, Anhui Province, about 2 hours from Beijing.
'I met with vice-presidents, deans, department chairs, undergraduate and graduate students at both institutions,' said Coleman. 'I also had extensive tours of campuses.'
Coleman said in the next couple of weeks he will be talking with President Giese, the President's Council and others about the feasibility of developing specific programs with one or both of these institutions.
Coleman said the reason for his trip was to try to get Mount Union College to have a tie to China, seeing as it is probably the second most powerful country in the world, second to the U.S., in terms of economics, military and impact on world events.
'As an educational institution, we must create an educational environment with much more of a Chinese presence,' Coleman said. 'This means offering a Chinese language major or minor, developing more courses in the curriculum related directly to China, and establishing student/faculty exchanges between Mount Union and Chinese universities.'
To expand Mount Union's interaction with China, Coleman has developed an Asian Initiative, with its main objective being to target Asia, especially Japan and China, with a comprehensive educational program. The initiative includes collaborative research, summer language and cultural workshops, internships, guest lectures and joint conferences.
'Our college mission statement mentions the importance of helping our students understand and live in a multicultural, multinational world,' Coleman said. 'Thus, we must expand our Asian efforts both in the curriculum and programmatically.'
While in China, Coleman lectured to a modern Chinese history class at Beijing University on contemporary Sino-American relationships, and to 150 freshman and sophomore English majors at Hefei University on intercultural communication between Americans and Chinese.
'I was the first American professor they had ever seen or heard from,' Coleman said.
Coleman said he spent some time traveling with Dr. Yin of Mount Union's Department of History, who is on a sabbatical leave this semester and is teaching at Beijing University.
'I visited the Great Wall, Forbidden City, Tineman Square, and Yellow Mountain among other tourist sites,' Coleman said. 'I spent time in both cities and the countryside.'
Coleman said when he traveled alone and needed assistance or did not understand something, someone would always come to his aid and help him.
'The people were wonderful and very understanding of this foreigner and very friendly,' Coleman said.
Coleman said he is excited about his next trip to China, on which he will be accompanied by President Giese. Coleman said that upon their return, they hope to solidify the relationships with the universities' administration.
'I'm looking forward to a return visit, even if the flight from Chicago to Beijing is 13.5 hours nonstop.' Coleman said.


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|Version 27 (modified by 12 years ago) (diff),
Using Vim with Django
This page is intended to be used as a collection of hints for using the Vim editor with Django.
TOC(inline, UsingVimWithDjango)?
Vim Modeline
To insure that all developers are using a standard tab format (as long as they are using Vim), you can add a Vim modeline (special comment) to your files, to set people in the same mode for that file. Example:
# vim: ai ts=4 sts=4 et sw=4
Tab Setting Reference for Python and Vim
Development takes place on Google Code, where the subversion repository includes predefined snippets for django/python/etc.
SnippetsEmu allows one to define abbreviations which can be expanded into larger blocks of text. The abbreviations can also contain place markers which can be 'jumped to' in a similar manner to the macros defined in TextMate on OS X.
One can add specific abbreviations for models or templates based on file contents. Adding the following line to your ~/.vim/after/ftplugin/python.vim file (create it if you don't have it) will allow you to define abbreviations just for models (use the file \Program Files\vim\vimfiles\after\ftplugin\python.vim under Windows):
if getline(1) =~ 'from django.db import models' "Your abbreviations here endif
The following is an example collection of Django specific abbreviations for use with the plugin. More examples can be found in the subversion repository. Please email the author with any of your own additions (f dot ingram dot lists at gmail dot com):
Snippet addmodel class <{}>(models.Model):<CR><><CR><CR>def __str__(self):<CR>return "%s" % (<{}>,)<CR><CR>class Admin:<CR>pass<CR><CR> Snippet mcf models.CharField(maxlength=<{}>)<CR><{}> Snippet mff models.FileField(upload_to=<{}>)<CR><{}> Snippet mfpf models.FilePathField(path=<{}>, match="<{}>", recursive=<False>)<CR><{}> Snippet mfloat models.FloatField(max_digits=<{}>, decimal_places=<{}>)<CR><{}> Snippet mfk models.ForeignKey(<{}>, edit_inline=<False>)<CR><{}> Snippet m2m models.ManyToManyField(<{}>)<CR><{}> Snippet o2o models.OneToOneField(<{}>)<CR><{}>
Snippet fore {% for <{entry}> in <{list}> %}<CR>{{ <{entry}>.<{}> }}<CR><{}>{% endfor %}<CR><{}>
The xmledit.vim plugin is really useful for editing XML and HTML files. It makes tag completion easy and allows you to bounce between start and end tags.
Syntax for templates
Dave Hodder has contributed standard Vim syntax files.
If you are interested in rolling your own, this is a simple addition to let Vim deal with Django template syntax:
Create the file:
with the following content:
syn region djangotagmarkers start="{{" end="}}" syn region djangovariablemarkers start="{%" end="%}" command! -nargs=+ HiLink hi def link <args> HiLink djangotagmarkers PreProc HiLink djangovariablemarkers PreProc delcommand HiLink
The Project plugin adds IDE file organisation functionality to Vim.
Something like the following could be used to view a project's files. It looks scary but is definatly worth trying.
Django Project=/path/to/project CD=. filter="*.py" { settings.py urls.py apps=apps { Polls=polls { views.py Models=models { models.py } } ToDo=todo { views.py Models=models { models.py } } media=mediaDir { images=imagesDir { } } }
Such a structure can also be created by using the build in '\C' command which will recurse through the whole directory tree.
Although this is not Django-specific (I don't think some of the other stuff in here is very Django-specific either), PIDA looks like a pretty nice IDE environment for VIM+Python, which would therefore help you out in Django :).
Django Project Manager: By panosl
The idea is to create a plugin, that will wrap the functionality of django-admin/manage.py along with project.vim.
This will one to create a new django project from within vim, and generating a Project file with all the files pre-specified. This could be extended to allow, the creation of apps within the project, leveraging the usage of manage.py.
So a regular session would be:
:djsp [projectname] # This will in turn generate the required Project file with all the files of the project.
:djsa [appname] # This will create a new app, and update the Project file with the new data regarding the application.
At this point, this is enough, even though we could still wrap a bit more of django-admin/manage, by allowing inner commands to launch/stop the test server and similar additions.
In my opinion this would help with django development and help focus more on the development that usually happens within the editor, which in our case, is ofcourse (G)Vim.
These are some notes for anyone considering writing this plugin.
- Vim has the 'read' command which can read the output from a command into a buffer using the pling operator. E.g. :read !dir will read a directory listing into the current buffer.
- Vim has special buffers for storing different types of output. See :help special-buffers and :help cwindow
- The Project plugin has the function CreateEntriesFromDir() which can be used to create new entries. Passing '1' as the arguement will create a recursive entry which would be most appropriate for creating Django entries.
It would be useful for the plugin to grab any tracebacks and place the cursor in a suitable spot.
Attachments (5)
python.vim (572 bytes) - added by 12 years ago.
Sample ftplugin file containing SnippetsEmu abbreviations for Django models
django.tar.gz (4.6 KB) - added by 12 years ago.
Unzip this file in your ~/.vim/ directory to install snippetsEmu.vim and Django specific abbreviations
django-vim-taglist.png (56.7 KB) - added by 11 years ago.
screenshot of vim with the taglist plugin
django_url_snippets.vim (544 bytes) - added by 10 years ago.
SnippetsEmu for urls.py
django_view_snippets.vim (310 bytes) - added by 10 years ago.
SnippetsEmu for views.py
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