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(CNN) -- As President Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon talk tough about cracking down on the deadly drug war, the United States is changing tactics in the battle against illegal narcotics at home.
Legalizing marijuana is off the table, the White House says.
The man Obama picked to be the new "drug czar," Gil Kerlikowske, has made it clear that the United States is going to do a better job of treating addicts to try to reduce the demand for narcotics.
Kerlikowske, 59, is a military veteran with 36 years of law enforcement experience. The drug czar oversees an agency that sets the country's drug-control strategy.
The White House and Congress want to see more drug courts, and increased funding for the program 250 percent in the spending bill signed in March.
It's a campaign pledge that the Obama administration thinks will give nonviolent offenders "a chance to serve their sentence, where appropriate, in the type of drug rehabilitation programs that have proven to work better than a prison term in changing bad behavior," according to the White House Web site.
Judge Paul Gluchowski, who works with the Prince William County Juvenile Drug Court in Virginia, dismissed the notion that a drug treatment program is the easy way out. Watch what it's like inside the drug court »
If anyone thinks that, he said he'd tell them they should "come and talk to some of the participants. A lot of them probably wish they never agreed to undergo drug court. And a lot of them have given up because it's too hard."
Those who slip up in drug court can be forced to wear ankle-monitoring bracelets or put into juvenile detention.
"If they don't give up, then when it comes time for graduation and you see the shine on their face, when you know that they have accomplished something, and they know that. That's what it's all about," Gluchowski said.
Vice President Joe Biden stressed the importance of drug courts and prisoner re-entry programs when he announced Kerlikowske's position in March, saying they "can serve as the light at the end of the tunnel, of a very long, long dark tunnel, for those who are stuck in the cycle of drug addiction and incarceration."
Kerlikowske said he was committed to tackling the nation's drug problem, but noted that it would take a "coordinated and multifaceted effort."
"The success of our efforts to reduce the flow of drugs is largely dependent on our ability to reduce demand for them," Kerlikowske said, calling the nation's drug problem one of "human suffering."
"It requires prosecutors and law enforcement, courts, treatment providers and prevention programs to exchange information and to work together. And our priority should be a seamless, comprehensive approach," he said.
In meeting with Calderon on Thursday, Obama tried to show Mexico's president that he is committed to ending a crisis that hits so close to home.
Obama vowed to beef up security along the border and to work to slow the flow of guns and drugs. He said the United States shares responsibility for the drug problem, saying "a demand for these drugs in the United States is what is helping to keep these cartels in business."
But he also tried to limit expectations that there could be any sort of quick fix.
"Now, are we going to eliminate all drug flows? Are we going to eliminate all guns coming over the border? That's not a realistic objective," he said. "What is a realistic objective is to reduce it so significantly, so drastically that it becomes once again a localized criminal problem, as opposed to a major structural problem that threatens stability in communities along those borders."
The White House has listened to those who say legalizing marijuana will pull the rug from under the violent cartels in Mexico and boost the U.S. economy, but that option is not on the table.
Asked Thursday if that is something realistic, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano quickly responded, "No, it is not."
Sixty percent of drug criminals sent to prison re-offend, compared to 17 percent of graduates of drug court, according to the National Association of Drug Court Professionals.
Drug policy experts like those numbers, but say the nation needs more treatment options.
"For individuals who don't have the resources, don't have public health insurance, can't afford it themselves, the single best way that they can access treatment is to get arrested," said Ryan King, a policy analyst with the Sentencing Project.
"And that's wrong. What we need to do is make sure for every American that is abusing drugs and wants to stop, that they have the resources made available to them, regardless of whether they can afford them."
CNN's Jim Acosta and Kristi Keck contributed to this report.
All About Marijuana • Barack Obama


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Congressman Grayson Asks for an Investigation into Federal Reserve's FOMC leak
The Federal Reserve's Open Market Committee released its recent minutes 24 hours early to a handful of big banks, private equity firms and other insiders.
Congressman Alan Grayson wrote the following letter to the Chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform (Darryl Issa) today:
I respectfully request an *investigation of the Federal Reserve leak of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) minutes on April 9 and 10, 2013. According to Bloomberg News, the list of individuals who received the information included staff at Barclays PLC, BB&T Corp., BNP Paribas SA, Capital One Financial Corp., Fifth Third Bancorp, HSBC Holdings PLC, Nomura Holdings Inc., PNC Financial Services Group Inc., Regions Financial Corp., U.S. Bancorp, UBS AG and Wells Fargo & Co.
I have long been concerned about the Federal Reserve's management of sensitive market-moving information. One example of blatant information "asymmetry" is the five-year lag before FOMC meeting transcripts are released to the public. As the Huffington Post reported in 2012, "Many of those people have since left the central bank and gone to work in the financial industry, taking with them privileged information about the Fed's thinking that is still closed to the public." [Here's the HuffPost article.] This includes Susan Bies, who is now a board member at Bank of America; Laurence Meyer, who founded Macroeconomic Advisors; and Brian Madigan, who is now at Barclays.
Some relevant questions to consider during your investigation include:
1) Who specifically received this information early?
2) Did any insider trading result from this leak?
3) Did Goldman Sachs release a note encouraging clients to short gold [see this and this; Goldman's note says: "We recommend initiating a short COMEX gold position …."] right after receiving the leak information, due to the leak itself? Who else might have profited from the early release of this information?
4) What are the internal control procedures in place for the Federal Reserve to manage sensitive market-moving information? How did these procedures fail?
5) Why does the Federal Reserve continue to withhold the transcripts of FOMC meetings secret for five years, when there are many people who have been present at those meetings who have moved on to private sector employment within that blackout period?
Good questions.
Nobel prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz agrees, saying that the World Bank would view any country which had a banking structure like the Fed as being corrupt and untrustworthy.
The non-partisan Government Accountability Office calls the Fed corrupt and riddled with conflicts of interest, and that insiders can get very rich by stay close to the Fed.
We noted last year:
Let's start by looking at what information was revealed in response to the previous, watered-down version of Ron Paul's Fed audit bill:
- The Fed gave huge bailouts to foreign banks, including Gaddafi's Libyan bank, the Arab Banking Corp. of Bahrain, and the Banks of Bavaria, Korea and Mexico
- The Fed bailed out hedge funds, McDonald's and Harley-Davidson
- The Fed threw money at "several billionaires and tens of multi-millionaires", including Christy Mack, the wife of Morgan Stanley's John Mack, billionaire businessman H. Wayne Huizenga, and Michael Dell, co-founder of Dell Computer, hedge fund manager John Paulson and private equity honcho J. Christopher Flowers ***
As Senator Sanders noted last October:
A new audit of the Federal Reserve released today detailed widespread conflicts of interest involving directors of its regional banks.
"The most powerful entity in the United States is riddled with conflicts of interest," Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said after reviewing the Government Accountability Office report. The study required by a Sanders Amendment to last year's Wall Street reform law examined Fed practices never before subjected to such independent, expert scrutiny.
The GAO detailed instance after instance of top executives of corporations and financial institutions using their influence as Federal Reserve directors to financially benefit their firms, and, in at least one instance, themselves. "Clearly it is unacceptable for so few people to wield so much unchecked power," Sanders said. "Not only do they run the banks, they run the institutions that regulate the banks."
The corporate affiliations of Fed directors from such banking and industry giants as General Electric, JP Morgan Chase, and Lehman Brothers pose "reputational risks" to the Federal Reserve System, the report said. Giving the banking industry the power to both elect and serve as Fed directors creates "an appearance of a conflict of interest," the report added.
The 108-page report found that at least 18 specific current and former Fed board members were affiliated with banks and companies that received emergency loans from the Federal Reserve during the financial crisis.
[T]here are no restrictions in Fed rules on directors communicating concerns about their respective banks to the staff of the Federal Reserve. It also said many directors own stock or work directly for banks that are supervised and regulated by the Federal Reserve. The rules, which the Fed has kept secret, let directors tied to banks participate in decisions involving how much interest to charge financial institutions and how much credit to provide healthy banks and institutions in "hazardous" condition. Even when situations arise that run afoul of Fed's conflict rules and waivers are granted, the GAO said the waivers are kept hidden from the public.
(Indeed, the Fed routinely allows favored bankers to make billions of dollars from inside information.)

subset: commoncrawl


text: The content on this page has restricted access. If you have a username and password for this system, use them to login below. Please be certain you are using your ACNM Member ID number and NOT your certificate number as your username. Use the first four letters of your last name and your member ID number as your password. If you forgot your password, click here. To login, enter your username and password. Forget your password? If you are a member of the system and can not remember your password, enter your email address below and we will email your matching username and password. |


text: PaymentPayment & Returns Payment can only be made by credit card.Accepted credit cards are: Visa, Mastercard Western Union enjoys at least 2% off in our website, more details please contact us. When placing an order, your billing address must correspond to the address of your credit card otherwise we will not be able to process your order. All transactions are secured. Our website is provided with an SSL encryption system to protect personal and payment data. Item must be returned in original condition and packaging. Sale merchandise must be returned within 60 days from date of delivery. The reason for returns caused by yourself (eg, size, color you choose), cannot be accepted. Order contains Michael Kors watches cannot be cancelled as every watch is customized. You will be reimbursed on the credit card that was used for purchase. Shipping fees for return is paid by customer. |


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Yeah Arizona! |
At 9 am when gates open. Only ones tailgating (game is at 1 pm). |
Map of the facility. Dodgers on the right side, Sox on the left. |
More pictures after the jump...(if this jump thing works...)
So many choices... |
Lovely stream separating the Dodgers and White Sox |
I wasn't allowed over to the Minor League fields on this day |
Stream to a lake |
More of the lake |
Dont most bats fly? |
Josh Beckett |
Thunder Thighs Chad Billingsley |
Chad Billingsley |
Skinny Swag Dee Gordon |
Dee Gordon |
Zack Greinke and Javy Guerra |
Fear the Beard Matt Guerrier |
Shawn Tolleson and Josh Wall |
Ramon Castro |
Adrian Gonzalez - the goatee is back |
Matt Magill and Kelvin De La Cruz |
AJ Ellis and Luis Cruuuuuz |
I see you too Hanley Ramirez |
Matt Kemp running by quickly |
Chris Capuano is all smiles |
JP Howell has a crazy beard |
Captain K Clayton Kershaw |
Clayton Kershaw |
The Owners - Walter and Katsen |
Team Italy was practicing there as well |
Getting those drills in |
Chad's backside |
Bo Jackson, I mean, Yasiel Puig and Alex Castellanos |
The beard is BACK! Matt Guerrier |
Chad looking up |
Cute interaction with Matt Wallach and a young fan. Matt signed the ball, dropped the ball, picked it up and instead of just giving it back to her, proceeded to dust it off on his uniform. Very cool. |
Ecstatic young fans with Matt Wallach. The boy said "Thank you Mr. Dodger!" How can you not stop and sign for that kid. |
Charley Steiner is going to back to the fence! It is high! It is DEEP! It could be...!!! Oh wait, he's just giving someone an autograph. |
An autograph from Stan Katsen does not make that ball worth a billion dollars, does it? |
White Sox practicing. There were almost no Sox fans around. |
White Sox players coming out of the tunnel. |
If you are a White Sox fan and want to interact with the players, you might want to consider coming down to Camelback Ranch. There were only a couple of fans there. |


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Correction Appended: March 30, 2012
The killing of Trayvon Martin has kindled a moral and legal debate over race as searing as any since 1955, when 14-year-old Emmett Till was murdered in Mississippi for allegedly whistling at a white woman. George Zimmerman, 28, a former altar boy and wannabe cop, fired the bullet that killed Martin, 17, on Feb. 26 in Sanford, Fla., outside Orlando. Zimmerman has said that Martin brutally assaulted him. But even if that's true, what kind of law would excuse Zimmerman's deadly shot?
When it comes to a confrontation on a dark street, at least two...
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Make your check payable to the Peoria County Collector.
Show All Answers
Partial payments are not accepted. You may pay one full installment by each due date or you may pay the entire amount by the first due date. If a payment is made after its respective due date, a penalty of 1.5% per month is added.
Notify the Supervisor of Assessments office in writing of the change. Use this downloadable change of address form. Mail the form to: Supervisor of Assessments 324 Main St. Room 301 Peoria, IL 61602.
The tax remains with the property regardless of ownership. To determine your liability for paying the tax, check your closing statement to see if the seller gave you credit, or contact your attorney.
Many mortgage companies pay electronically, and do not require a bill. We suggest that you contact your mortgage company to confirm this. A bill is mailed to you for your records. Do not pay this bill if you have an escrow. If in doubt, please contact your mortgage company.
Cash, checks, money orders and cashier's checks are all accepted methods of payment. Please do not send cash when mailing your payment. Apple Pay, Debit/Credit Cards, Electronic Checks, Google Pay, PayPal, and Venmo are accepted via the website. Please note that Debit/Credit Cards, along with Electronic Checks, are the only options able to be paid by phone at 855-394-0671. A convenience fee based on the amount of your taxes will be charged for the use of this service and will be disclosed prior to the completion of your transaction. Electronic payment options are not accepted in the Treasurer's office.
Yes but there are terms and conditions. Click here to go to the Prepayment Program Peoria County offers.
No, this office does not report late tax payments to any credit bureau.
Call the Peoria County Clerk at 309-672-6059, and ask for a redemption amount. Make sure to have your parcel number handy.
A taxpayer has a right to appeal their property tax assessment for any reason. The burden of proof, however, will be on the taxpayer to prove why they should have their assessment changed. Just saying: "My taxes are too high" is not sufficient. Note also that three things may happen on appeal. 1) the tax may be raised; 2) it may be lowered; 3) it may remain the same. Contact the Board of Review at 309-672-6022 for further details.
Your Township Assessor can look up a parcel number by property address, or you can contact the Treasurers Office at 309-672-6065 opt #5. You can also look it up online here by your address. When entering your address less is more. Enter just your house number and the name of the street. If you enter too much or spell something out that is abbreviated in our system, the search will result in no findings.
Yes you can. Please make sure your math is correct and list the parcel numbers of the properties you are paying on your check. Include the correct coupon(s) for each payment you are making.
Your cancelled check is your receipt. In addition, if you include a self addressed stamped envelope we will send a receipt back.
We suggest that you call the Supervisor of Assessments office at 309-672-6910 to verify that you are receiving the exemptions for which you qualify. They can also answer any questions pertaining to your assessed valuation.
Failure to pay your taxes will allow them to be sold at the annual tax sale in November. After the sale takes place, additional penalties, interest (as much as 36% per year) and costs are added to the amount necessary to redeem your taxes through the County Clerk's office. The state statutes control the legal responsibilities of the taxpayer and tax buyer. It is important to understand that at the tax sale your property is not being sold, only your delinquent taxes. In the event your taxes are sold, you will receive certified notice under the statute as to what actions you need to take. If you do not redeem your taxes in full at the end of the redemption period (usually 2-1/2 years), the tax buyer can actually acquire legal title to your property at that time.
Failure to receive a bill does not excuse you from your real estate obligation. You should immediately contact our office and we will furnish you a copy of the original bill. This needs to be done before the due dates to avoid penalties. You can also obtain a copy of your current tax bill online.
The Owner Occupied Exemption reduces the assessment up to a maximum of $6,000 above the base year assessment. The Owner must live in the dwelling. No application is required. There is no age or income requirement.
Pleasure Driveway PKD is another name for the Peoria Park District.
Tax bills are sent to you by the County Treasurer. They can be paid directly to the Treasurers office (by mail or in person), to your township collector except for the City of Peoria Township Collector, by credit card or to local banks that accept tax payments. Tax payments are due by June 4th and September 4th for tax year 2023.
The 2024 tax sale will be held November 4, 2024. Delinquent notices will be sent out around October 14th by certified mail.
These exemptions are filed with the County Assessor by September 1st and will be applied to the following years taxes. The Senior Exemption needs to be filed only once while the Senior Freeze Exemption needs to be filed annually. If you purchase a new property, exemptions need to be filed.
The "official" copy of the plat is filed with the County Recorder.
State statutes require the pension portion of the tax levy to be broken out from the rest of the levy. A few years ago, only a single line for each tax body was displayed for the entire levy.


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Apple's new iPad will be like the iPhone X as it gets facial recognition in 2018
Apple is working on a redesigned, high-end iPad for as early as 2018 that incorporates key iPhone X features such as slimmer edges and facial recognition, according to people familiar with the matter.
However, the new version of the tablet is unlikely to include an OLED screen, which provides more vivid colours and sharper clarity, the people said. They asked not to be identified talking about private product development.
At least one new iPad model with a screen size similar to the 10.5-inch iPad Pro is planned to include Face ID for unlocking the device, making payments, and sending animated emojis. The feature would replace the iPad home button that has come with a fingerprint scanner since 2014, one of the people said. The updated tablet is expected to be released later next year, a little more than a year after the last major iPad Pro upgrade, the people said.
By removing the home button, Apple plans to noticeably reduce the size of the edges on the top and bottom of the device for the first time since its introduction in 2010, bringing the design closer to that of the recently released flagship iPhone X. The new version will mark the first revamped look for the iPad since the first iPad Pro debuted in 2015. An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment.
The iPad had been Apple's second-largest product line as recently as 2015. But demand waned and global tablet sales declined 17 per cent the past three years. Apple couldn't avoid the down draft completely and iPad revenue fell behind sales generated by the company's services business and Macintosh computer products.
Now the iPad may be having something of a comeback. The Cupertino, California-based company reported last week that iPad revenue rose 14 per cent to $US4.8 billion ($6.25 billion) in the fiscal fourth quarter, with an 11 per cent increase in the number of units sold.
The future for mainstream computing
Apple still sees the iPad as its future for mainstream computing and has upgraded the device's capabilities in successive years to appeal to business and professional users. It last updated the device in June by adding a 10.5-inch screen size option to the iPad Pro and a ProMotion screen that makes jumping between tasks smoother. Earlier this year, Apple released a cheaper version priced at $US329 to boost sales.
One key iPhone X enhancement that is unlikely to make its way to iPads next year is an OLED - or organic light-emitting diode - screen, according to people familiar with Apple's supply chain. OLED screens more accurately reproduce colours, but are more difficult to produce in mass quantities than standard liquid-crystal displays. Samsung Electronics, which supplies OLED panels for iPhones, would be the only display maker with the capacity to produce the new screens for iPads next year, but technical and financial constraints still make that unlikely, according to a person with knowledge of Samsung's display operations.
Other suppliers, including LG Electronics, Japan Display, Sharp, and smaller China-based firms like BOE Display and Tianma Microelectronics are also unlikely to have the ability to supply tablet-sized OLED screens to Apple next year, other people familiar with the supply chain said.
Face ID, the iPhone X's main new feature coming to the next iPad, lets users unlock the device with their face and a glance of their eyes instead of a password or fingerprint. Early reception has been positive for the feature, which also allows for payment authentication and sending Animojis, an animated emoji based on a user's facial movements and speech. Given that the new iPad model is about a year away from release, the plans could change due to supply and manufacturing constraints on Face ID components, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans aren't public.
Like the iPhone X, the new iPad is expected to include a faster processor and a custom Apple graphics processing unit, one of the people said. Apple is also preparing a new version of its Apple Pencil stylus and new software tools for using the stylus, the person said.
— with assistance by Sam Kim, Pavel Alpeyev, Min Jeong Lee, and Yuan Gao
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Have you been searching for the perfect all-in-one art center for your budding artist? Well, this Super Rolling Art Center by Alex toys is the one for you!
ALEX TOYS Super Rolling Art Center
This multi-purpose art center is the perfect option for your young artist; it is colored in the fun primary colors of red, blue and yellow and creatively designed for little ones 3 years and older in mind. This unit features a chalkboard on one side and a dry erase board on the other. There is a paper roll on the top of the piece that pulls down for drawing and painting.
On one side of the unit there are cup holders and 4 cups made for storing crayons, chalks and markers. On the other side, there are also cup holders and 4 special non-spill cups made for paints. On the bottom, there are two convenient storage shelves that you can store supplies in when not in use. You can move this art center around without scratching the floors with the large front handle and 2 rubber wheels. It is generously sized at 43.75"H x 31"L and assembly with included tools is required. This awesome art center will inspire creativity and hours of independent play.
Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Platinum Award {Oversize Shipping; $30.20}


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Contact Lens Prescriptions And The Law
On February 4th, 2004, a Federal Law called the "Fairness To Contact Lens Consumers" act went into effect. This law made it much easier for you to enjoy the savings and convenience of ordering contact lenses on-line. What does the law say? The law requires your eye-doctor to release your prescription. If you had your last eye-examination after February 4, 2004, your doctor should have handed your prescription to you on completion of the fitting, whether you asked for it or not. If an online company requests confirmation of your prescription from your doctor, he/she is legally required to confirm the prescription within 8 business hours. If your doctor fails to respond to our request within 8 business hours, the law allows us to assume the prescription is valid. Your doctor may NOT require you to sign any form of release or waiver prior to confirming your prescription. Online companies are allowed to contact your doctor by phone, fax or email. Online companies generally use Fax and/or Phone to request confirmation of prescriptions. Do I need to provide you with my doctor's phone and fax number? No. If you provide the online company with your doctor's name (or the store where he works), and the city where you had the exam, they can generally find the phone and fax number. How long is my prescription valid for? A minimum of 1 year, and 2 years in many states. Your doctor may place a shorter expiration time on your prescription, but only if there are documented medical reasons for doing so. If your prescription has an expiration date, you may want to ask your doctor to explain the medical reasons he/she has placed such a restriction on your prescription. My doctor is requiring me to return for a follow-up visit before releasing the prescription, is this legal? Yes. The doctor may want to evaluate your eyes with the trial (fitting) lenses in place prior to releasing the prescription. He/she may also require you to pay for the fitting in full prior to releasing the prescription My Doctor refuses to release my prescription unless I sign something. Is this legal? No. Your doctor may not require you to sign any form of release or waiver prior to confirming your prescription. |
Thursday, October 22, 2015
Contact Lens Prescriptions And The Law
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Esther 1
1-3This is the story of something that happened in the time of Xerxes, the Xerxes who ruled from India to Ethiopia—127 provinces in all. King Xerxes ruled from his royal throne in the palace complex of Susa. In the third year of his reign he gave a banquet for all his officials and ministers. The military brass of Persia and Media were also there, along with the princes and governors of the provinces.
4-7For six months he put on exhibit the huge wealth of his empire and its stunningly beautiful royal splendors. At the conclusion of the exhibit, the king threw a weeklong party for everyone living in Susa, the capital—important and unimportant alike. The party was in the garden courtyard of the king's summer house. The courtyard was elaborately decorated with white and blue cotton curtains tied with linen and purple cords to silver rings on marble columns. Silver and gold couches were arranged on a mosaic pavement of porphyry, marble, mother-of-pearl, and colored stones. Drinks were served in gold chalices, each chalice one-of-a-kind. The royal wine flowed freely—a generous king!
8-9The guests could drink as much as they liked—king's orders!—with waiters at their elbows to refill the drinks. Meanwhile, Queen Vashti was throwing a separate party for women inside King Xerxes' royal palace.
10-11On the seventh day of the party, the king, high on the wine, ordered the seven eunuchs who were his personal servants (Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar, and Carcas) to bring him Queen Vashti resplendent in her royal crown. He wanted to show off her beauty to the guests and officials. She was extremely good-looking.
12-15But Queen Vashti refused to come, refused the summons delivered by the eunuchs. The king lost his temper. Seething with anger over her insolence, the king called in his counselors, all experts in legal matters. It was the king's practice to consult his expert advisors. Those closest to him were Carshena, Shethar, Admatha, Tarshish, Meres, Marsena, and Memucan, the seven highest-ranking princes of Persia and Media, the inner circle with access to the king's ear. He asked them what legal recourse they had against Queen Vashti for not obeying King Xerxes' summons delivered by the eunuchs.
16-18Memucan spoke up in the council of the king and princes: "It's not only the king Queen Vashti has insulted, it's all of us, leaders and people alike in every last one of King Xerxes' provinces. The word's going to get out: 'Did you hear the latest about Queen Vashti? King Xerxes ordered her to be brought before him and she wouldn't do it!' When the women hear it, they'll start treating their husbands with contempt. The day the wives of the Persian and Mede officials get wind of the queen's brazenness, they'll be out of control. Is that what we want, a country of angry women who don't know their place?
19-20"So, if the king agrees, let him pronounce a royal ruling and have it recorded in the laws of the Persians and Medes so that it cannot be revoked, that Vashti is permanently banned from King Xerxes' presence. And then let the king give her royal position to a woman who knows her place. When the king's ruling becomes public knowledge throughout the kingdom, extensive as it is, every woman, regardless of her social position, will show proper respect to her husband."
21-22The king and the princes liked this. The king did what Memucan proposed. He sent bulletins to every part of the kingdom, to each province in its own script, to each people in their own language: "Every man is master of his own house; whatever he says, goes."
THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.


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Nothing described in this post is Barack Obama's fault. If a nation of spoiled nincompoops decides to have a tantrum against a necessary war, and then decides you're a perfect pity object because half of your ancestors came from a place that did not evolve to a state of having written language, physics, mathematics or technology, then you might as well take advantage of it and be president.
However, Halloween this year was dead in the water, and it's Barack Obama's fault.
Back in 2009, the first year he was elected, we noticed a shift in our quiet Dallas suburb. Where the year before it had been all local kids in our mostly-white and partly-Asian middle class suburb, now people were driving their kids in from other places. The apartments nearby, or neighborhoods even farther away.
Where we once had kids who mirrored the demographics of the neighborhood, we now had an inverse group: our neighbor is probably 5% non-white, but the kids coming on Halloween were 95% non-white. And older. Sometimes accompanied by parents, many of whom carried beers.
To put it mildly, "values clashed."
Our ideal in this neighborhood is that you go somewhere, contribute, get rewarded and then as you can, give back. You give back by making things like parks, colleges, knowledge and social stability. We don't drive our kids to the richer suburbs to the north because then we're taking from somewhere else, giving nothing back, and basically becoming parasites — and parasites slow down the process of growth.
Other people have different values, and judging by the crowds that year, they outnumber us ten to one.
This year, only a few people turned on their porch lights and gave out candy. They were quickly mobbed and shut down by 7:30 PM, leaving bands of kids and their clueless parents to roam the streets, then go back to the cars they'd parked at the entrance of the neighborhood, making it look like a party was going on at a house near there.
One neighbor expressed his view this way: "I'll take care of the kids from here, and from people we know or should know. I don't want someone that I have no reason to know coming by. That's not the point of the holiday. And I don't want random people seeing my house, and what I have."
But we can't say that in public, or we get accused of being in-egalitarians (subsets of this: classist, racist, genderist). Anyone who does not insist that we are all equal and deserve whatever free stuff is being handed out anywhere is bad.
Barack Obama's election was a signal of the final dogma shift in this country from "help those who help themselves" to "go everywhere and demand a subsidy," and that's why the Tea Party and even some Democrats think he has brought the spirit of socialism, and parasitism, to a once-prosperous land.
In the meantime, the lights stay off and the doors stay closed on Halloween until adults can man up and be honest about this problem.
Tags: affirmative action, barack obama, bill clinton, diversity, halloween


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One Hour Enamel Paint-Metrocity Qt
Article number: | P-6053 |
Availability: | In stock |
Our One Hour Enamel (OHE) is a total game-changer for both professionals and DIY'ers alike! Our water-based enamel formula has a stone-like Satin topcoat built-in. It is a great choice for painting cabinets, trim, or updating exterior and interior doors. This quick cure formula knocks out projects in record time.
Available in Quarts and Gallons. Coverage per Gallon is approximately 400sq feet.
Wise Owl Paint™ Wisdom for PRO Results:
* Do not overwork. Lay down enough paint so that it has enough product to self-level but avoid drips.
* Do not use Wax over Enamel.
* The recommended recoat time is 2 hours.
* Use our Stain Eliminating Primer before for superior adhesion.
* Use a microfiber 3/16 inch roller. If spraying, you may thin with water if needed but not more than 10%.
* If using Glaze over Enamel, no need to use Varnish first. Apply glaze right over enamel. Must seal the glaze with Varnish or Clear OHE.
* Do NOT use clear shellac as a primer with One Hour Enamel! It will cause the paint to crackle.


text:
I recently received an email from a grandmother asking for book recommendations for her gifted granddaughter, who shows considerable talent in math and physics. That request, plus the recent book meme floating about teh Internetz listing some of the great books in Western literature got me thinking about compiling a similar meme thing for popular science books. The emphasis here is on "popular": books that are engaging and accessible to a truly general reader, ideally with a strong narrative component. (Weighty tomes delving into the minutiae of a given field need not apply, although one must make a few exceptions for books that were truly influential.)
In an ideal world, of course, one wouldn't need to compile a separate list for science-y books, because the Powers That Be that decide such things would have greater knowledge of, and respect for, the many talented writers out there who choose to write about science. While we're waiting for our long-overdue integration back into the general bookworld -- and broader culture at large -- to take place, I took a superficial inventory of the many books on science scattered about our apartment and compiled the following working list. We have some obvious biases -- physics, math and science history, with the odd foray into forensics and chemistry -- plus, a few notable fictional works that have a history of inspiring present and future scientists. (I also asked my pal Lee Kotther for a few of her suggestions.)
Alas, many of my books are still in storage. So I know I'm missing many significant titles. But one has to start somewhere. Ergo, I offer the following popular science book list, in no particular order. The rules, as always are simple:
1. Highlight those you've read in full
2. Asterisk those you intend to read
3. Add any additional popular science books you think belong on the list
4. Link back to me (leave links or suggested additions in the comments, if you prefer) so I can keep track of everyone's additions. Then we can compile it all into one giant "Top 100" popular science books list, with room for honorable mentions. (I, for one, have some quirky choices in the list below.) Voila! We'll have awesome resource for general readers interested in delving into the fascinating world of science!
0. Principia, Isaac Newton
Oh, just kidding. Granted, it's an influential work that pretty much founded modern physics, but has anybody read the Principia in its entirety lately? Really? How about De Revolutionibus? If so, do you not have a life? Seriously, Newton would turn over in his grave in horror at any inclusion of his masterpiece in a list of popular science books. Which is why I'm starting with....
1. Micrographia, Robert Hooke [I've looked at the pretty pictures, but that's not exactly "reading"]
2. *The Origin of the Species, Charles Darwin
3. Never at Rest, Richard Westfall
4. Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman, Richard Feynman
5. Tesla: Man Out of Time, Margaret Cheney
6. The Devil's Doctor, Philip Ball
7. The Making of the Atomic Bomb, Richard Rhodes
8. Lonely Hearts of the Cosmos, Dennis Overbye
9. *Physics for Entertainment, Yakov Perelman
10. 1-2-3 Infinity, George Gamow
11. The Elegant Universe, Brian Greene
12. Warmth Disperses, Time Passes, Hans Christian von Bayer
13. Alice in Quantumland, Robert Gilmore
14. Where Does the Weirdness Go? David Lindley
15. *A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson
16. A Force of Nature, Richard Rhodes
17. Black Holes and Time Warps, Kip Thorne
18. A Brief History of Time, Stephen Hawking
19. Universal Foam, Sidney Perkowitz
20. Vermeer's Camera, Philip Steadman
21. The Code Book, Simon Singh
22. The Elements of Murder, John Emsley
23. *Soul Made Flesh, Carl Zimmer
24. Time's Arrow, Martin Amis
25. The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments, George Johnson
26. Einstein's Dreams, Alan Lightman
27. *Godel, Escher, Bach, Douglas Hofstadter
28. The Curious Life of Robert Hooke, Lisa Jardine
29. A Matter of Degrees, Gino Segre
30. The Physics of Star Trek, Lawrence Krauss
31. E=mc<2>, David Bodanis
32. Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea, Charles Seife
33. *Absolute Zero: The Conquest of Cold, Tom Shachtman
34. A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines, Janna Levin
35. Warped Passages, Lisa Randall
36. *Apollo's Fire, Michael Sims
37. Flatland, Edward Abbott
38. Fermat's Last Theorem, Amir Aczel
39. Stiff, Mary Roach
40. Astroturf, M.G. Lord
41. The Periodic Table, Primo Levi
42. Longitude, Dava Sobel
43. The First Three Minutes, Steven Weinberg
44. The Mummy Congress, Heather Pringle
45. The Accelerating Universe, Mario Livio
46. Math and the Mona Lisa, Bulent Atalay
47. *This is Your Brain on Music, Daniel Levitin
48. The Executioner's Current, Richard Moran
49. Krakatoa, Simon Winchester
50. *Pythagorus' Trousers, Margaret Wertheim
51. Neuromancer, William Gibson
52. The Physics of Superheroes, James Kakalios
53. The Strange Case of the Broad Street Pump, Sandra Hempel
54. Another Day in the Frontal Lobe, Katrina Firlik
55. Einstein's Clocks and Poincare's Maps, Peter Galison
56. The Demon-Haunted World, Carl Sagan
57. The Blind Watchmaker, Richard Dawkins
58. The Language Instinct, Steven Pinker
59. An Instance of the Fingerpost, Iain Pears
60. *Consilience, E.O. Wilson
61. Wonderful Life, Stephen J. Gould
62. Teaching a Stone to Talk, Annie Dillard
63. Fire in the Brain, Ronald K. Siegel
64. The Life of a Cell, Lewis Thomas
65. Coming of Age in the Milky Way, Timothy Ferris
66. Storm World, Chris Mooney
67. The Carbon Age, Eric Roston
68. The Black Hole Wars, Leonard Susskind
69. Copenhagen, Michael Frayn
70. From the Earth to the Moon, Jules Verne
71. Gut Symmetries, Jeanette Winterson
72. Chaos, James Gleick
73. *Innumeracy, John Allen Paulos
74. The Physics of NASCAR, Diandra Leslie-Pelecky
75. Subtle is the Lord, Abraham Pais
My bias for books with a strong narrative is patently obvious, isn't it? Correct my imbalances (you know you want to! What are some of your faves?


text: What's the word, hummingbird? Over 50 performers, including Octet Lucille Lortel award winner Kuhoo Verma, Broadway alum Jonathan Burke and more, teamed up to sing Bye Bye Birdie's "Telephone Hour." The video, which was directed by Devanand Janki, was introduced by original Bye Bye Birdie star Chita Rivera during the organization Live & In Color's weekly online talk show Be Our Guest on August 26. "I wanted to present it including and centering around a BIPOC cast to give it a whole new resonance for 2020," Live & In Color founder and artistic director Janki said. Live & In Color develops new work for the stage that promotes and celebrates diversity. Learn more here, and enjoy the video below!


text: One of the Festival's official partners, Orange, has just begun its annual Glastonbury ticket giveaway. Head over to www.orange.co.uk/glastonbury where there's the chance to win a pair of 2010 Festival tickets every day from today until June 9th. All you have to do is find their orange welly in the Glastonbury crowd.


text:
Twitter is betting that bigger is better with a new look designed to entice new users.
It's the drastic change that Twitter needs to jump start its growth, even if it looks an awful lot like that other social network. The makeover's similarities to Facebook are startling: The cover photo now spans the full width of your browser and is overlaid with a large profile photo. The emphasis on larger images replicates Facebook's focus with its own recent redesign. But maybe the familiarity will appeal to Facebook's 1.2 billion monthly active users, few of whom have embraced Twitter's overwhelming stream of constant content.
Twitter is also changing the way you view tweets. The redesigned profile page lets you pin a tweet to the top, which will give other users an idea of what kind of content to expect from you. Tweets with a lot of retweets and replies will be larger than the other tweets in your stream.
Twitter looks different, but it hasn't changed its ways. Your timeline still features a chronological view of tweets, although now each tweet has its own card instead of a solid stream broken up by only line breaks. When you look at other profiles, you can view timelines in different ways: all tweets, tweets with photos/videos, or tweets and replies. Previously, you could view all tweets or tweets with replies.
The redesign closely resembles the early tests first noticed by Mashable in February, but with a few tweaks. Like your News Feed on Facebook, your Timeline is now centered, bracketed on the left by your bio information and thumbnails of photos you've tweeted and on the right by Twitter's follow recommendations and trending topics.
In a cognitively dissonant move, the new look affects only your profile page. Your home Twitter page, which you look at far more often than your own page—it's where you read tweets from people you follow, after all—looks exactly the same.
The redesign is rolling out on Twitter's website today for a small group of users and will soon be available for all users. Twitter is giving some high-profile users like First Lady Michelle Obama and actor Channing Tatum early access to the redesign. Newbies who sign up for Twitter as of Tuesday will see the new design immediately. The look is available only on the desktop version of Twitter and doesn't affect the network's mobile apps.


text:
A new look to T-TESS is coming soon! Interested in testing the new site before it launches? Reach out to our support team for details.
Latest Resources and Updates T-TESS Tips (Fall, 2023) T-TESS Virtual Instruction Rubric Guidance for Virtual Instruction Rubric
Quick Links Recertification Policy- FAQ
T-TESS is a system designed by educators to support teachers in their professional growth.
T-TESS strives to capture the holistic nature of teaching – the idea that a constant feedback loop exists between teachers and students, and gauging the effectiveness of teachers requires a consistent focus on how students respond to their teacher's instructional practices. For those reasons, each of the observable domains in T-TESS focuses on teachers and students rather than separating them out into separate domains. Ultimately, T-TESS is a process that seeks to develop habits of continuous improvement, and the process itself best leads to that outcome when appraisers and teachers focus on evidence-based feedback and professional development decisions based on that feedback through ongoing dialogue and collaboration.
Download the Implementation Guidebook
Download the T-TESS Rubric
The T-TESS Rubric includes 4 Domains and 16 Dimensions. T-TESS domain and dimension rubrics include specific descriptors of practices and 5 performance levels; Distinguished, Accomplished, Proficient, Developing, and Improvement Needed.
The purpose of the teacher's role during this process is to share insights and think about his or her pedagogy and professional practices. A goal of the evaluation process is to include the teacher in a systematic way that assists with individualized professional growth and development.
View Teacher Resources »
The appraiser has a vital role in assessing teaching proficiency and ensuring that teachers and administrators derive reliable and meaningful information from the teacher evaluation process. By providing evidence-based feedback, appraisers help teachers and administrators make decisions that support efforts to improve instructional quality and student performance.
View Appraiser Resources »
Involving district-level leaders in T-TESS implementation ensures that T-TESS becomes a process for education innovation. Successful implementation hinges on collaboration within and among departments and a deepened commitment to growth-centered supervision of instruction and capacity building throughout the organization.
View District Resources »
The Texas Education Agency has created 2 training programs for Educator Preparation Programs; the Field Supervisor Observation Training for Teacher Certification Candidates, and the Field Supervisor Coaching Training for Advanced Certification Candidates.
View EPP Resources »


text:
Sportsmobile builds an extraordinarily capable new home-away-from-home perfect for a wide variety of outdoor pursuits
For everyone who loves the outdoors but would still like to enjoy all the comforts of home on their adventures, we bring you Sportsmobile's Ultimate Adventure Vehicle.
The Ultimate Adventure Vehicle project was designed to create a well-rounded vehicle capable of meeting a wide variety of transportation needs, from running everyday errands to serving as a rolling base camp for multi-week outdoor adventures. This rugged four-wheel drive van includes all the amenities you'd expect to find in a much larger motorhome, and yet achieves unprecedented levels of around-town maneuverability, open-road fuel-economy, serious off-road capability, and back-country camping practicality no other vehicle can match.
Uniquely suited to a wide variety of outdoor activities from mountain biking to sea kayaking, the Ultimate Adventure Vehicle is equally at home dry-camping on a remote mesa in Canyonlands National Park or pulling into the valet stand at a funky resort in the Florida Keys. Based on a full-size Ford E350 one-ton cargo van, the vehicle features interior and exterior modifications and an innovative new four wheel-drive system.
4-Wheeling in Moab
"I enjoyed 'wheeling with you while in Moab. We put those big beasts through the gauntlet, and I was very impressed with the performance, comfort and drivability of the Sportsmobile 4WD, especially since we were on the very difficult routes! "Take care and I hope to see you on the trail sometime soon."
— Bill Burke, 4×4 Driving Instructor – shown above guiding vans
Introducing the Ultimate Adventure Vehicle
At the Los Angeles Auto Show, yes — it was a stopper.


text: /* * Copyright (C) 2008 Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton <firstname.lastname@example.com> * Copyright (C) 2010 Igalia S.L. * * This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or * modify it under the terms of the GNU Library General Public * License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either * version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. * * This library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, * but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of * MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU * Library General Public License for more details. * * You should have received a copy of the GNU Library General Public License * along with this library; see the file COPYING.LIB. If not, write to * the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, * Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA. */ #ifndef ConvertToUTF8String_h #define ConvertToUTF8String_h #include <wtf/Forward.h> typedef char gchar; gchar* convertToUTF8String(WTF::String const& s); gchar* convertToUTF8String(URL const& s); #endif /* ConvertToUTF8String_h */


text:
This article is more than 1 year old
EMC accused of stifling discrimination claims while battling class-action
Denies alleged sexist ways
EMC ignored internal discrimination claims from female employees whilst fighting a class action lawsuit filed by other female employees.
That is the claim made by ex-EMC VP Paul Goetz in papers filed with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination (MCAD) and the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. It strikes a chord with the recent ousting of VMware CEO Diane Greene, EMC's highest-ranked female executive.
Goetz claims he was demoted and placed in a hostile environment after forwarding discrimination complaints from female staff in his consulting part of EMC up the management chain in 2006. EMC is accusing him of downloading confidential documents and denies his claims vigorously. The company says this information could be used to its competitive advantage by Goetz' current employer, Savvis.
The Portland Business Journal reports that EMC has filed a suit in Suffolk Superior Court, Mass, against Goetz, alleging he copied confidential EMC files to his PC's hard drive and has not returned them. Goetz's lawyer, Valerie Samuels, a partner with Posternak Blankstein & Lund in Boston, Mass, said: "He went to them with these complaints and they ignored him and then retaliated against him. Having seen their position paper (response to the MCAD), I'm convinced they are just looking to drive him into the ground with legal fees."
The background to this involves a class action against EMC filed by ex-EMC sales reps Tami Remien and Debra Fletcherf who worked in EMC's Chicago office in 2004. They say male employees received preferential treatment and, eventually, they lost their jobs. EMC has said emphatically that its company policy is not to tolerate discrimination against women at all. EMC CEO Joe Tucci has stated that female EMC salespeople actually earned more on average than men in the period between 2001 and 2004, and that female representation at the higher echelons of the firm has more than doubled in recent years.
Goetz is saying that his discrimination message was stifled because it would have provided support for the women in the class-action case. His filed papers say that EMC's HR executive and legal counsel did not deal with the claims he forwarded. He also alleges he was directed to destroy documents alleging EMC-employed Accenture contract staff had been physically threatened by EMC staff. Goetz's complaint states: "EMC willfully failed to investigate these complaints because it feared that a comprehensive investigation might impair the company's defense of the pending class action."
The complaint goes on to claim that Howard Elias, EMC's EVP for global services, and James Dowson, EMC's CTO for global services and a named executive in the discrimination complaint by females, responded to his discrimination claim forwarding by saying he overstated his business unit's consulting services by 90 per cent and that he had developed unfair compensation practices. Goetz subsequently became VP global services sales which, he alleges, was a demotion.
In November 2007 he left the company taking data on which is his discrimination claims were based.
Goetz' attorney says: "My understanding is that EMC has been saying that they have cleaned up their act. However, what happened to Mr. Goetz has shown that it hasn't."
A private EMC response has been filed with MCAD referring to Goetz' claims.
Copyright © 2008, Blocks & Files.com


text:
First Day Out
Insane Clown Posse
Got another funky rhyme
Another funky, funky rhyme
Got another funky rhyme
Another funky rhyme
Another funky, funky rhyme
Aw shit, man, that's the ICP!!!
This is my jam!!!
I'm on a psychedelic, motherfucking inter-gallactic void G!!!
Aw, shit!
Well, they let the gate up so I bail
It's been six months pick me up from the county jail
With a smog mother payin' my dues
Steel toliets, worn blankets, and rubber shoes
But I ain't naggin'
Here come the fellas I can hear the muffler draggin'
8 men in the car long
And the Faygo is almost gone
My nuts are kinda hard so I need a mate
So my homeboy's cousin set me up with a blind date
She said "Pick me up at three"
Can't bitch, the bus don't ride your street, ho
We gonna eat at Mexican Village
Take a cab and I'll pay the tab
And when she showed, well, I'll be damned
Left my wallet at home on the TV stand
Have her pay him and for dinner too
The knot in my sock, it done bit you
She's all prettied up for nothing
I'm smelling like shit and my chin is scruffing
And I'm chewing on my food like a pitbull
Cuz I won't front for the ho
Stuck my face in a bowl of soup
And just sucked it all up threw my missin' tooth
The bitch jumped up with a boom
"I have to fix my hair" and broke to the bathroom
She's got the tab, so I go for mine
And order up some '52 vintage wine
Hey, Louie, bring a fuckin' steak with that
Motherfuckers like jail say fuck dat
She's back now and her hair ain't fixed
Probably took a long greasy-ass smelly shit
I ain't saying nothing though
I ain't saying nothing bout the funkin' ho
What's up bitch, I'm ready to break
How long can one fat bitch take?
Quite snacking and pay me saps
Cuz we goin' home to meet her pops
"So Joe, what is that you do for a living?"
"Aww, come on pops,
you seen me selling rocks on Verner and Springwell.
Matter fact, I think I sold to that fat bitch in the kitchen"
Your dad's really cool sweetheart
I mean him letting me use his car
And he slipped me a fifty
Violent J is kinda nifty
If I'd a hit you'd be home through
But now your coming home with me
Dad I gotta bitch in the bedroom
Take your ass to the bar and don't come home soon
Now the juggla's known to smack hoes
But I need the shot too
So I switch to the mack mode
Now woman, you know I love you
So why don't you just let me fuck you
Now bitch, I know you's a freak
So let me get a little kiss on your cheek
And a fuck to go with that
Come on, nympho, let me hit that
Tell ya what you let me stick it
And I gotta left over piece of chicken for ya
Ya little sewer skank
Ya nasty little pipe-smoking sac-chasing ho
And that was that
A little smooth talking she was on her back
And I'm finally sticking
Dump ya, and I'm eating my chicken
You'll never guess what
My first day out and I caught my nut
First day out and I caught my nut


text:
During Monday night's presidential debate, President Obama provided some tough rhetoric when highlighting his foreign policy credentials. However, Governor Romney was quick to point out that Obama not too long ago traveled the world apologizing for U.S. leadership.
Upon entering office in 2009, Obama sought atonement for the supposed sins of his predecessor. From Trinidad to Turkey, Obama, hat in hand, told foreign publics that "America has shown arrogance" and "at times we sought to dictate our terms."
Rather than demonstrating principled leadership, Obama acted as if he were competing in a popularity contest. Though his personal approval ratings at the time were sky high in some parts of the world, this failed to translate into greater cooperation on tough issues such as adequate troop contributions for NATO's mission in Afghanistan.
Three years later, the U.S. has failed to see the restoration of its international influence. Since the emergence of the "Arab Spring" almost two years ago, Obama has led from behind in Libya and outsourced U.S. leadership in Syria to the United Nations.
Sanctions on Iran are only now starting to bite because of Congress's insistence that they be implemented in the first place. Iraq has witnessed a doubling of terrorist attacks since U.S. troops withdrew last December, and with the upcoming 2014 withdrawal date in Afghanistan, the Taliban need only wait until NATO is out before regaining control.
The U.S. cannot solve all of the world's problems, nor should it try to do so. However, it's important to note that when an international crisis erupts, the world looks to the U.S. first before responding. This is not something the U.S. should apologize for.
For more information: Barack Obama's Top 10 Apologies: How the President Has Humiliated a Superpower


text:
Incoming goods
Outgoing goods
Value added services
Stock management
Material flow control
Goods tracking
Intuitive work station dialogs
Guided picking via mobile and voice terminals
Unicode and multi-language capability
Time zones, regional date, time, and number formats
Live views of warehouse processes
Report design and planning
WAMAS® has a massive base of installed systems and has proven itself in numerous international projects. WAMAS® enables you to achieve sustainable savings. The availability of our 24/7 service worldwide and up-to-date software releases guarantee you a reliable investment.
State-of-the-art usability concepts
Manage and optimize multiple sites
View of all process levels
Integrated performance and optimization functions
Easy configuration and adaptation during operation
Openness to enable future changes
WAMAS® Logistics Software brochure 2017 English


text:
the spelling
Theater is one of those American spellings that is attributed to Noah Webster.* But like most of successful American spelling reforms, it wasn't made up by an American. It was a long-standing spelling in England, and the predominant spelling at the time when the English colonies in America were first being settled. The OED says:The word started as theatrum in Latin, and in French it lost its -um. The French pronunciation makes sense with the -re spelling, but the modern English pronunciation does not. However we pronounce that syllable, in whichever English accents we have, it is the same syllable that is spel{led/t} -er in words like butter or later. It's thus no wonder that English writers preferred the -er for some time (and Americans have preferred it for most times), since it is the more Englishy spelling, if by 'Englishy spelling' we mean (as I do) 'spelling that reflects English pronunciation'.
The earliest recorded English forms, c1380, are theatre and teatre; from c1550 to 1700, or later, the prevalent spelling was theater (so in Dictionaries from Cawdrey to Kersey), but theatre in Holland, Milton, Fuller, Dryden, Addison, Pope; Bailey 1721 has both, 'Theatre, Theater': and between 1720 and 1750, theater was dropped in Britain, but has been retained or (?) revived in U.S.
The fashion (for these things are fashion) of using the French spelling has won out in Britain for this and many other words of its ilk: centre, calibre, litre, lustre, sombre, etc. But the fashion is not consistent. Cloister, coriander, and disaster (among others) have -re spellings in French from -rum spellings in Latin, but -er spellings in all standard contemporary Englishes. And then there's metre and kilometre but perimeter and thermometer, etc. Note, though, that despite their common Latin/Greek etymology (metrum), they have different vowels in the me syllable in BrE. American pronunciation of kilometer as 'kill LAH mitter' drives some Brits I know batty, as it obscures the relation between the met{er/re} and the kilomet{er/re}. They prefer 'KILL-o-meetah'. (I just tried to get Better Half to say it. He said 'kill LAH mitter' and explained 'I'm disarmingly transatlantic'.)
This particular difference has a lot in common with the -or/-our difference: variant spelling in early modern English, then American English settling on the more phonetic spelling, and British English settling on the more French spelling. I've more to say about that, but that's going in the book.
(By the way, I'm trying to get into the habit of listing BrE/AmE variants alphabetically. I may not always succeed, but it's why the ones in this post are listed in those particular orders. I'm also trying to alternate which goes first in British/American, US/UK, BrE/AmE, etc. )
the meanings
place where you... | What Americans usually say | What the British usually say |
watch a play | theater* | theatre |
watch a film/movie | (movie) theater* | cinema |
hear a (university) lecture |
lecture hall, auditorium | lecture theatre |
have surgery | operating room; OR | (operating) theatre |
There are of course other uses of theat{er/re} that extend from the 'drama place' use--e.g. political theat{er/re}. They are generally the same in both countries, but for spelling.
spelling again!
Photo by Kevin Dooley (Flickr) |
* This post originally said theater was in Webster's 1828 dictionary, but, as David Crosbie points out in the comments, it was not, though center and caliber and maneuver (vs. BrE manoeuvre) are there. (Sorry--I'd depended on and possibly overinterpreted someone else's work. You can consult the 1828 dictionary here.) The word does not occur at all in Webster's 'Blue-backed speller'.


text:
This chapter explains how to use the Pup graphical update program, and how Puplet works to provide notifications of available updates.
Update Notifications
Puplet works constantly in the background, checking for available software updates from the enabled repositories. When updates become available a package icon appears in the notification area, along with an alert which appears for a short time and reveals the number of updates available.
Once the notification tray icon is present, there are a number of possible actions it can perform:
- Refresh checks for new updates
- View Updates launches Pup providing more detail about the package(s) to be updated, allow de-selection of available updates and/or starts the update process
- Apply Updates starts the update process selecting all available packages
- Quit closes Puplet, no packages are updated
The Package Updater (Pup)
This program features a scrollable text window under the heading Updates Available. In this text window all of the available updates are listed and selected by default. If you wish to remove any of the packages queued for update, mark the box next to the relevant package.
Some updates have a circular arrow icon next to them, indicating that these changes won't be applied until the next system reboot.
Further information about each update can be found by selecting the desired package and left-clicking the Update Details text.
Once satisfied with the package selection, choose the [Apply Updates] button. Pup checks for dependencies, ensuring that the updated packages will have everything required to function correctly. If dependencies are added a dialogue will appear, with new packages to be installed. Review this dialog and select [Continue] to complete the update.
The packages will then be downloaded and installed. If a reboot is needed for some of the changes to take place, you will be informed of this at the end of the updates.
Table of Contents |


text:
Raltegravir use in real life – 1 year data in HIV multi-experienced patients
Raltegravir im Behandlungsalltag – Erfahrungen des 1. Jahres bei multipel vorbehandelten Patienten
Suche in Medline nach
Veröffentlicht: | 2. Juni 2010 |
Aims: Raltegravir (RAL) has shown considerable potency and safety in several clinical trials. We evaluate the efficacy of raltegravir containing antiretroviral (ARV) regimens in HIV+ patients with several treatment failures in "real life".
Methods: Cohort of consecutively enrolled patients switching to a raltegravir containing ARV regimen until Dezember 2008. The drug was prescribed in patients with virologic failure under previous ARV combination. Data were recorded at baseline and during 52 weeks of follow-up.
Results: A total of 55 patients were analysed. Baseline characteristics were as follows: mean age was 47 (range 31–64) years, female 16,3 %, mean time on ARV´s: 12,3 (5–20) years; CDC group C was n=27 (49,1%), B n=17 (30,3%) and A n= 11 (19,6%). Baseline HIV-RNA and CD4+ counts were [median (IQR)]: 4,38 (1,04–5,2) log 10 copies/ml and 254 (2-846) cells/µl, respectively. Most frequently concomittantly used new protease inhibitor was darunavir (24 pts.=44%), 10 pts. had maraviroc (18%), 7 pts. etravirine (13%) and 4 pts. T-20 (7%) combined as an active antiretroviral with raltegravir. 14 pts. (25,4%) received only RAL as a new compound. The tolerabillity and safety was generally well. After 4 weeks 17 pts. (30%) presented a suppresed viral load <40 copies/ml; 45 % (25 pts.) at wk 12 and 58,2% (32 pts.) at wk 24. The mean CD4+ count increased to 317/µl (wk 4), 351/µl (wk 12) and 384/µl at wk 24. In June 2009 48 pts. (87,3%) were still on their RAL combination, 7 pts. stopped their ARV regime due to virolocic failure and/or lack of compliance. 38 pts. reached wk 52 at June 2009, data from 34 pts. were available. 23 pts. were <40 copies/ml (51,1% NC=F) at wk 52, mean CD4+ count was 368/µl.
Conclusion: Although the overall efficacy of RAL containing regimens in HIV multi-experienced patients was encouraging, in comparison to the favourable study-results (60% <40 copies7ml), in real life it seems more difficult to replicate these results.


text:
Volume 6. November 2006. Article ID 1344
Our purpose in this descriptive, exploratory study is to report on our efforts in conducting a cyber tutoring project that combined two curricular domains ---- mathematics education and engineering education. Although we had carried out 6 prior cyber mentoring projects involving aspects of scientific literacy (Boxie & Maring, 2001; Maring, Levy, & Schmid, 2002), the project reported here was the first time we designed one in the areas of mathematics education and quantitative literacy.
Since 1999 we have carried out over 35 cyber tutorials [often referred to as "cybermentoring projects"]involving preservice teachers and tutees in elementary, middle, and secondary schools dispersed across Washington state. Our cyber tutorials employed video conferencing as a system and tool, utilizing both "desk top video conferencing" [e.g., iVisit, CU-SeeMe, NetMeeting] and, since 2002, high end video conferencing (Johnson, Maring, Doty, & Fickle, 2006). But, the project we are reporting on here involves the first time we have carefully explored cyber tutoring in mathematics. Our overarching research question [and, actually, the point of our paper] had two parts: does cyber tutoring in mathematics provide opportunities for worthy practical experiences for preservice teachers and does it also provide robust opportunities for further research into questions and topics related to mathematics education. In this report, we offer details about two engineering mathematics application/engineering assignments ---- a pop bottle activity and a plastic straw bridge building exercise. The focus of our paper is more largely about mathematics, engineering design, and tutor/tutee interaction than it is about technical considerations related to the video conferencing.
In this report, our primary purpose is to explore tutor/tutee interactions (carried on through video conferencing) in the context of a bridge building simulation, using plastic straws and masking tape. The project used cyber connectivity to engage preservice teachers and pupils with each other as tutors and tutees in an alternative high school 110 miles from our campus. The school was located in a small city in an agriculturally based rural community. Since the school district is committed to mathematics education for all students and since administrators perceived the project as innovative and motivational, permission was quickly granted to conduct the project. When we asked the teacher of the tutees to describe their alternative school context, she said that it resembled many American alternative high schools in that at-risk students, teen parents, working teens, former drop outs, non-traditional learners, and self-directed learners comprised the school population. Some of the students viewed as at risk were often described as discouraged, disinterested, or hard to serve learners when they were in traditional classrooms. Many of the students had records of failing grades, behavioral problems, and chronic absences. As for the mathematics background of the cyber tutees, they were enrolled in "Basic Mathematics," a "practical" mathematics course for less advanced students and for whom the geometry and algebra courses offered at the alternative high school would not be appropriate. Although the cyber tutees were high school sophomores and juniors, the teacher recommended that the cyber tutoring focus on reviewing or reteaching mathematics related to concepts and procedures taught in earlier grades [e.g., fractions, ratios, perimeters and how these had relationships to geometric shapes].
Since this was a new subject matter area for us to apply cyber mentoring/tutoring to, we were more interested in investigating pedagogical aspects than in delving deeply into learning theories, the ins and outs of problem solving, or how the project might result, causally, in a positive impact on pupil learning. However, by the time we completed our analyses of this cyber tutorial in mathematics and engineering applications, we could see that its cyber context had potential for examining some of the current issues and trends in research in mathematics education. For example, investigations of video conferencing tutorials could be used to analyze levels and components of "mathematics talk" (Hufferd-Ackles, Fuson, & Sherin, 2004) on the parts of cyber tutors and cyber tutees. The dialog below provides a sample of one of the discussions that took place between a student and her cyber tutor. The [negative] attitudes towards mathematics revealed in the dialog, because they were a major part of the cyber tutor/tutee interactions during the project, are presented and discussed in subsequent sections of this of this report.
Bridge is for Boys
Kim: I am just a designing person. That's why we did so well on the [design the pop bottle] candle [project] because I designed it and decorated it.
Cyber tutor: Yeah, but we are going to learn a lot about math and angles and ...
Kim: [laughs]
Kim: I don't like angles.
Cyber tutor: [Is that] right?
Kim: Hmm, hmm, hmm. this [building a straw bridge project] is more of a guy thing and I...
Cyber tutor: You know, it doesn't have to be a guy thing, though. I enjoy this kind of stuff, Sara enjoys this kind of stuff.
Kim: Hmm. (smiling but still not convinced)
Using video conferencing in preservice teacher education is a relatively recent innovation (Phillion, Johnson, & Lehman, 2003; Anderson & Rourke, 2005). Nichol and Watson, (2000), in England, described their uses of video conferencing and video tutoring with preservice teachers. Their analyses of the archived tapes focused on verbal and nonverbal communication in the tutorial process. They concluded that video tutoring can potentially be a more effective form of tutoring than face-to-face interaction. Edens (2003) conducted formative and summative evaluations of a video conferencing project involving preservice teachers and noted that benefits for preservice teachers included contact with students in real classrooms, use of technology in teacher preparation coursework, and collaboration between schools and universities.
We designed a pop bottle activity and plastic straw bridge building exercise in such a way that they had clear foci on mathematics applications (e.g., use of fractions, ratios, and perimeters and their relationships to geometric shapes). The video below provides a brief introduction to the project along with a sample clip of instructional interaction. Notice that the cyber tutor mentions both the process and the answer. She values the tutee's use of correct thinking and procedures more than getting the correct answer. Although the tutor/tutee dialog in the video clip might be depicted as a valuing, on the part of the tutor, of correctness over thinking about procedures, the tutor indicated in a subsequent conversation with the teacher and a supervising professor that she intended her words to be an encouragement for procedural thinking.
Video Overview. (Click on image above to launch)
We also designed and guided the tutorial and mathematics activities so that they aligned with the construct of "quantitative literacy" (National Research Council, 1993; Madison and Steen, 2003) and empirically verified social learning theories pertaining to tutor/tutee interactions (Lepper, Drake, & O'Donnell, 1997).
In order to facilitate team building in the context of socialized learning, the initial phase of our unit involved asking tutors and tutees to experience a unified vision of what is meant by "engineering design competencies." To accomplish this, we urged them to be creative as they constructed some object as a team from a two-liter pop bottle. As a result, in this team-building exercise, tutor-tutee teams created a terrarium, a candle holder, a race car, and a flower pot. After completing the design and construction of these "creations," team members took physical measures and made calculations. Their mathematics applications complied with the participating teacher's earlier specifications of the germane state mathematics standards [referred to in our state as Essential Academic Learning Requirements].
After the pop-bottle project's team-building and design activities, we began the bridge-building "adventure." The aim of this stage of the project was to enable the pupils to continue their mathematics learning in designing, constructing and analyzing a prototypic engineering-type model. The assignment for the teams called for a bridge made of plastic straws to span a 14 inch space between two movable tables. Connector options included masking tape, straight pins, small finishing nails and gumdrops. A test of the bridge's strength would be determined by wrapping a string around its center and suspending gradually increasing weights, up to ten pounds, from the string. Key mathematics concepts included the Pythagorean Theorem, perimeters and areas of triangles, and ratios pertaining to weight-of-bridge-to-load-supported.
An initial step of our mathematics/engineering applications project was to create a collaborative relationship between the preservice teachers, classroom teacher, and faculty. Hence, in our early video conference planning meetings, we identified the educational goals of everyone involved. The primary stakeholders were engineering and education faculty who wanted to design and carry out a project as one of the initiating events that would lead to the formation of a engineering and education partnership and center. Quantitative analysis along with engineering applications in mathematics, both in K-12 and postsecondary educational contexts, were envisioned as a major emphasis of the future center. Since the bridge-building/mathematics activity and project was viewed by many on our campus as worthy and interesting, it actually did play a part in establishing the "Engineering Education Research Center" on our campus. The classroom teacher participated in the project because she felt it would help some of her students stay engaged in mathematics learning and because she felt it would be a helpful practicum experience for preservice teachers. The preservice teachers volunteered for the project because the cutting edge technology intrigued them and because they valued having an additional practicum/hands on opportunity to become better prepared for careers as teachers. The tutees liked the project and looked forward to the weekly sessions, too. They enjoined the attention and assistance of college students and felt that the video conferencing was "cool".
The cyber tutors met via video conferencing with the classroom teacher and, on campus, with faculty from engineering and education to plan the project. As a part of these planning discussions, state "essential academic learning requirements/EALR's" in mathematics were considered as a framework to identify areas for tutorial focus. Based on these deliberations, the lessons took place in two stages. The first involved a pop-bottle activity. Adapted from Transferable Integrated Design Engineering Education/TIDEE (Davis, 2004), the pop bottle lesson was developed to enhance team-building and design experiences. The lesson plan chosen for the more extensive mathematics/bridge-building simulation was also adapted from TIDEE (Davis, 2004).
Written directions for the pop bottle exercise are given in the image below, along with a link to a PDF document describing additional details. This exercise set the stage for the tutees early in the tutorials, preparing them for the mathematics focus of the overall project by including such mathematics vocabulary as measurements, units, inches, centimeters, circumference, and fraction.
Written Directions for Pop Bottle Exercise and Contest. (
Download complete PDF version for class use)
Our cyber tutors were "trained" when we discussed with them guidelines for expert, effective tutoring (Lepper, Drake, & O'Donnell-Johnson, 1997). We had selected Lepper's recommendations and analyses to provide a research-based, yet concrete list of "expert" tutorial practices for the cyber tutors. To bring this research down to a practical level, we constructed an "INSPIRE" hand out, shown below, to guide tutor behavior and related reflections, discussions, and analyses of archived or transcribed interactions.
reliance on, and commitment to, a fundamentally Socratic style of tutoring.
make increasing demands on the students in each tutoring sessionand
use progressive strategies when debugging and incorrect response.
convey their high expectations in a very indirect and unprepossessing manner.
are likely to ask students to explain their strategies or to summarize their problem-solving process.
devote a great deal of effort to encouraging or motivating students, not just to work hard, but to enjoy their work and to feel challenged, empowered, and curious about the domain of study.
After we discussed Lepper's ideas with the cyber tutors, we provided assistance regarding tutoring in the context of high end video conferencing. The guidelines below contain this additional tutoring advice (adapted from Roller, 1998).
Tutoring is more effective than group instruction for many reasons. These include more time spent reading, immediate feedback, more tailored teaching, more extended interaction between tutor and student, and strong positive emotional relationships.
The classroom teacher chose students to participate in the cyber tutoring based on their expressed interest in the project. Each of the students was enrolled in an Applied mathematics course at the school. In this article, we are focusing descriptions and analyses primarily on tutor/tutee interactions involving a female graduate student cyber tutor who recently completed her student teaching and a female alternative high school senior who strongly disliked mathematics.
In addition to the training
offered when we gave them and discussed the INSPIRE and Guidelines handouts, we also provided the cyber tutors with hands-on pre-tutoring introduction to the operation of the Polycom video conferencing unit. This technological training included such technological skills as using the document camera, the zoom and pan features of the remote controller, and integrating the uses of a pc or of a tablet pc as part of the cyber tutorials. As noted in the introduction, we also provided a written overview to the plastic straw bridge building exercise.
Most of the 12 cyber tutoring sessions took place during one semester once a week for an hour. However, during one of the sessions, the distant tutees became so interested and engaged that they asked their teacher and were given permission to video conference for a second hour. In order to provide our cyber tutors with an overview and the proposed schedule of the project they had volunteered for, we wrote up a Bridge-building Simulation summary document in PDF format and emailed it to them.
The transcribed dialog below took place after the pop bottle experience, described previously. It illustrates talk on the parts of a cyber tutor and two tutees related to length of a diagonal, the use of a new
tablet pc, and missing pieces in the measurements of triangles
Kevin: [laughing to signify his answer of no
Cyber tutor: Hold on... let me show you. (Pauses) I'm using our new tablet pc
computer, so I'm all excited. I'm drawing on the computer screen. OK? so we have two inches here. Hey, I can make it black too. Oops. And you want tot tall part of our triangle there to be four inches, Kevin?
Kevin: Two times four divided by two. (as he is calculating area)
Cyber tutor: OK. well, this is going to be our c squared, or our c actually. This is just going to be our c. So this will be our a, our b, and our c. To find the length of c, right here [using a pen on the worksheet under the document camera]... the formula is a squared plus b squared equals c squared. So hey, Kim, why don't you do this on a piece of paper...
Cyber tutor: Kim, do you have the paper that we did the original problem on last week? Or any piece of paper?
Kim: I got a piece of paper...
Cyber tutor: OK, the formula, have you guys done that before to find missing pieces of measurements of triangles?
Cody: Most people [in this class] are basic math, not too much algebra, so they may have...
Kim: Yean I'd say so [meaning I've done this kind of math before.
After this interaction, one of the project directors, who was monitoring the session, reminded the cyber tutor to be mindful of how expert tutors avoid "telling" too much or too often, in keeping with the tutor training guidelines for being Socratic and for using scaffolding. He also talked with the cyber tutor about how the use of inductive questioning can often be a more effective pedagogical approach than direct telling.
Subsequent dialogs between the cyber tutor and tutees showed how the cyber tutor encouraged the tutees to stick with the project in the transition to the straw bridge building exercise [note the last scaffolding technique in the Guidelines, above]. We want to point out that most of the interaction, when it revealed "mathematics phobia", involved "Kim", the tutee of focus in our study. Later on, in our "Impact on Student Learning" section, we will discuss how she did not let her distaste for mathematics prevent her from earning her GED.
Tutee "Kim" struggled with her lack of knowledge of how to do the calculation of the area, exhibiting yet again her pervasive dislike of another aspect of mathematics. The "calculation of the area" dialog also revealed that the cyber tutor employs Lepper's "Encouraging" guideline yet again in order to get "Kim" to stick with the challenge and mathematics task at hand.
As we noted in our Introduction, our study was descriptive and not an experiment. Thus, to measure impact, we rely on anecdotal information buttressed by some quantitative data.
In phone conversations with the teacher, we learned her professional judgment that "Kim's" attitude towards mathematics and doing her daily mathematics assignments greatly improved during and after the cyber tutoring. The teacher noted that she felt the pop bottle and bridge building simulation definitely contributed to "Kim's" staying in school, doing her mathematics assignments, and earning her GED. In the same phone conversation, the teacher said that she felt the video conferencing tutorial was a "very powerful motivation and tool" for her students and especially for "Kim" to "stick with and keep doing mathematics." Both common sense and the fact that our study is descriptive prevent us from even wanting to infer that the cyber project "caused" "Kim" to succeed in these ways. But we do think that her involvement in the 14 video conferencing sessions helped improve her attitude, which in turn contributed to her larger success. In terms of objective data, the teacher provided the following information about "Kim's" growth in mathematics:
We designed this project to meet the interests of various stakeholders: engineering and education faculty, a classroom teacher, preservice teachers, and students who were tutored.
One of our major purposes was to determine if an engineering problem could be utilized to shed light on tutor/tutee interactions in cyber contexts. We also wanted to see if the use of high end video conferencing as a tool for educational partnerships would be feasible when the curriculum dealt with mathematics and engineering-related applications.
In carrying out the project with alternative high school students, we saw that both the cyber tutor and the tutees were quite engaged in the activities. One tutee, about to graduate from the alternative high school, exhibited impressive academic gains that the teacher felt helped her move from being "on the verge of dropping out" to showing clear improvements in her test scores, number of assignments completed, and grades in mathematics. The preservice teachers who served as cyber tutors spread the word to their classmates that cyber tutoring is "fun" and innovative, that it provides them with helpful experiences and confidence before they begin their capstone student teaching, and that it is a worthy addition to their resume when they begin their searches for teaching positions.
Our experiences in this project indicate to us that cyber tutoring in mathematics and engineering applications has potential in terms of providing more "field-based" experiences for preservice teachers and for reaching high need and under challenged students who might not have access to other support.
In our upcoming work, we are taking steps to address the following questions:
Many of the foregoing directions and considerations for future research arose not only out of our successes, but also out of the problems and shortfalls we encountered. In closing we should acknowledge briefly that all of our cyber tutors would have benefited from additional tutor training experiences, that some of them would have tutored more effectively if they had more regularly utilized "peripherals" such as the document camera and integrated laptops into the tutorial sessions, and that all of the cyber tutors would have done a more effective job if they had been provided more coaching and reflection opportunities by professors and graduate students who are specialists in mathematics education. In our ongoing and upcoming research, we are attending to these matters.


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Information about UIA Training center is available on the Airlines website
From now on all visitors to UIA`s website have access to information about the workings of the Airline's Training center - TRTO (Type Rating Training Organization). The training center page contains details about training courses for aviation personnel, pictures and a video of practical courses and information about the Instructors.
The training centre of Ukraine International Airlines was founded in 2008 for the purpose of ensuring the professional training and retraining (refresher courses) of aviation industry specialists according to the Ukrainian and International standards. The UIA Training Centre obtained the Certificate of State Aviation Administration which guarantees the right to train aviation personnel.
Teaching activities are conducted by qualified Instructors, who have been properly certified and have experience in relevant spheres, and also passed special preparation of conducting theoretical and practical lessons and training.
After taking the course and passing the appropriate exams students obtain the Certificate.
"I'm absolutely sure that the main business principle and competitive advantage of our Airline is the quality of our services, - said Vladimir Gaidamaka, Chief-pilot-instructor for UIA.- Having our own Training center for aviation personnel, we can intensify the process and provide the highest level of staff training. We have all necessary requirements for that: including a maintenance base, training program to deliver highly-qualified personnel".


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Microsoft has announced a lawsuit against Motorola, alleging that several of the mobile company's Android devices infringe on nine of its patents. The software giant is suing in US District Court in Washington, and is also bringing a complaint before the International Trade Commission (ITC). The patents are all related to key smartphone experiences that include syncing e-mails, calendars, and contacts, scheduling meetings, and notifying applications about changes in signal strength and battery power. Microsoft specifically names two Motorola devices, the Droid 2 and the Charm, but says these are just examples and not a comprehensive list.
The suit comes just as Microsoft readies the release of its Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system, the successor to Windows Mobile. Motorola was once a big backer of Windows Mobile, but in recent years it has shifted to Google's Android. Although manufacturers can use Android for free, Microsoft argues that phone makers should consider the potential patent infringement issues and the related costs of the mobile OS.
The nine patents in question in the ITC complaint include:
- 5,579,517: Common name space for long and short filenames
- 5,758,352: Common name space for long and short filenames
- 6,621,746: Monitoring entropic conditions of a flash memory device as an indicator for invoking erasure operations
- 6,826,762: Radio interface layer in a cell phone with a set of APIs having a hardware-independent proxy layer and a hardware-specific driver layer
- 6,909,910: Method and system for managing changes to a contact database
- 7,644,376: Flexible architecture for notifying applications of state changes
- 5,664,133: Context sensitive menu system/menu behavior
- 6,578,054: Method and system for supporting off-line mode of operation and synchronization using resource state information
- 6,370,566: Generating meeting requests and group scheduling from a mobile device
"We have a responsibility to our customers, partners, and shareholders to safeguard the billions of dollars we invest each year in bringing innovative software products and services to market," Horacio Gutierrez, Microsoft's corporate vice president and deputy general counsel of Intellectual Property and Licensing, said in a statement. "Our action today merely seeks to ensure respect for our intellectual property rights infringed by Android devices; and judging by the recent actions by Apple and Oracle, we are not alone in this respect," he added in a Microsoft on the Issues blog post.
Apple earlier this year claimed that HTC's Android (and Windows Mobile) handsets violate a number of its patents. To avoid a similar fight with Redmond, HTC paid Microsoft for patent licenses. Regardless of the outcome of the HTC vs. Apple battle-turned-war, Android incurred costs for HTC, in spite of its free licensing.
It's next to impossible to build a mobile device nowadays without extensive licensing agreements. Microsoft provides companies using Windows Mobile and Windows Phone operating systems with patent protections, while Google simply provides moral support. When Microsoft made the "Android isn't free" allegations, it was widely assumed that the software giant was referring to HTC's legal problems. With today's attack on Motorola, it's clear that Microsoft had more than just HTC on its mind.
Source: ars technica