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Months after Karen Hughes assumed the role of diplomat-at-large to the Muslim world, she told Time magazine that one of her two key influences on understanding Islam was Georgetown Prof. John Esposito. She's not alone. The FBI has repeatedly consulted him, and much of academia holds him in high regard.
But when he's not busy shaping
U.S. policy toward the Muslim world, Prof. Esposito mentors a man who wishes he could be a suicide bomber and who recently (and publicly) reinforced his support for "martyrdom." He has collaborated on two books with Dr. Azzam Tamimi, and he still maintains a close relationship with him to this day.
Despite rubbing elbows with elites in government and academe, Prof. Esposito's mentoring of an avowed "martyrdom" supporter actually fits in line with his overall record. He has publicly defended known advocates of Islamic terrorism, and although he was considered a leading expert on political Islam in the 1990's, he was downplaying the threat posed by the Taliban and bin Laden right up until 9/11.
Still-solid reputation
While Prof. Esposito has long courted controversy—most recently when the Georgetown-based center he founded in 1993 accepted $20 million last year from (and took the name of) a notorious Saudi prince—he has somehow been able to maintain a relatively high reputation in academic and government circles.
That Prof. Esposito is still largely respected owes to the subtlety of his apologism. He acknowledges that there is radicalism in Islam, and he generally avoids defending the likes of Hamas and Hezbollah. Even as he argues for engaging Islamists, he does so without overtly endorsing their worldview. But Prof. Esposito skillfully minimizes the threat posed by radical Islam, and as demonstrated by his close affiliation with Dr. Tamimi, who told a massive crowd in the UK last week that "dying for your beliefs is just," he willingly associates with avowed cheerleaders of Islamic terrorism.
Prof. Esposito's defenders—and there are many—claim that his critics conflate his practical advice that Islamists cannot simply be ignored with apologism for radical Islam. While such an answer may be appealing for those who believe in giving the benefit of the doubt, it simply doesn't square with the facts.
Although Prof. Esposito is less transparent than most apologists for radical Islam, the Georgetown scholar is more than a mere apologist. He defends supporters of Islamic terrorism. He even mentors them.
Downplaying the Taliban
Though most Americans were not aware of the Taliban or the threat they posed, there were a significant number of experts warning about the ascendancy of the so-called religious students movement in Afghanistan. Esposito was not one of them.
A Nexis search reveals that between bylines and quotes, Esposito's name appeared over 200 times between 1994, the year the Taliban first emerged, and September 10, 2001. Only a handful of times did he mention the Islamic tyrants, and just once did he say something that could be deemed critical. In a quote, he called the Taliban "radical." That was it.
Despite being listed in an August 2000 Associated Press article as a "specialist in Asiatic Islam," he did nothing to warn policymakers about the dangers of the Taliban. Quite the opposite, in fact. But it wasn't just the Taliban he downplayed. Esposito was the most vocal advocate of embracing, rather than fearing, Islamist movements that started gaining traction in the early 1990's.
His 1992 book "The Islamic Threat : Myth or Reality?" unsurprisingly comes down mostly on the side of "myth." The closing paragraph concludes: "Islam and most Islamic movements are not necessarily anti-Western, anti-American, or anti-democratic. ... they do not necessarily threaten American interests. Our challenge is to better understand the history and realities of the Muslim world." As Daniel Pipes noted in a Wall Street Journal review of the book, Esposito even recommended that U.S. foreign policy should "be carried on in the context in which ideological differences between the West and Islam are recognized and, to the greatest extent possible, accepted or at least tolerated."
At a time when others were sounding the alarm about the well-documented brutality of the Taliban, Esposito was urging for calm. In a lengthy Commonweal article in September 1997, Esposito dedicated 4,000 words to extolling "the richness and diversity of the Muslim experience." The only reference to the Taliban was in the opening, where he implied that the capture of Kabul had received far too much attention.
In what was somehow not a career-killer, Esposito—shortly before 9/11—argued that bin Laden was not nearly as great a threat as advertised, that his danger was needlessly hyped by the media. From the issue of Fletcher Forum of World Affairs that was still on newsstands on September 11, here is Esposito in his own words:
"Bin Laden is the best thing that has come along, if you are an intelligence officer, if you are an authoritarian regime, or if you want to paint Islamist activism as a threat. There's a danger in making Bin Laden the poster boy of global terrorism, and not realizing that there are a lot of other forces involved in global terrorism. Bin Laden has become the new symbol, following in the footsteps of Qaddafi, Khomeini, and Sheikh Omar Abdur Rahman. Bin Laden is a perfect media symbol: He's tall, gaunt, striking, and always has a Kalashnikov with him. As long as we focus on these images we continue to see Islam and Islamic activism through the prism of ayatollahs and Iran, of Bin Laden and the Afghan Arabs."
Defending known terror supporters
While he merely downplays the threat posed by Islamic terrorists, Esposito has openly lauded terror supporters. The Georgetown academic has lavished praise on two in particular: former University of South Florida professor (and convicted terrorist) Sami al-Arian, and al-Jazeera phenomenon Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi.
When USF moved to fire al-Arian in April 2002, Esposito wrote to the university's president that he was "stunned, astonished, and saddened." While naysayers point to acquittals he received on a number of charges, al-Arian pleaded guilty after the trial, admitting that he was, in fact, a key leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad. But even before the admission that was an Islamic terrorist, al-Arian was indisputably an avowed Islamic radical long before 9/11. Among other examples, the former USF professor played host in the early- to mid-90's to some of the most notorious jihadists in the world, all of which was well-documented by the Tampa Tribune and in the 1994 PBS documentary "Jihad in America" by Steven Emerson.
In other words, the public record on al-Arian was more than well-enough established as of April 2002 that there was simply no way that Esposito could have been "stunned" or "astonished."
Even more troubling is the affection Prof. Esposito has displayed for Sheikh Qaradawi. In 2003, he fawned over Qaradawi's "reformist interpretation of Islam and its relationship to democracy, pluralism and human rights." The famous cleric, though, has issued fatwas endorsing suicide bombings in Israel and has said that those who kill Americans in Iraq are "martyrs" with "good intentions." Qaradawi also supports the killing of homosexuals or anyone who has converted away from Islam.
With neither al-Arian nor Qaradawi does Esposito have any plausible deniability. But he doesn't owe nearly as much of an explanation for those sleights of hand as he does for his still un-severed relationship with his protégé, Azzam Tamimi.
Tamimi's teacher and partner
Since Tamimi's stirring support for "martyrdom" in Manchester, Britain last week, Esposito has been curiously silent. He refused repeated requests by this columnist for comment. Esposito shouldn't be expected to criticize every radical statement made by a fellow professor, but he has a duty to speak up when the academic in question is inextricably linked to him.
Scholar Martin Kramer, who has done more careful analysis of both men than anyone, goes one step further, saying in an interview for this column that Esposito has done a great deal to raise his protégé's profile by "manufacturing Tamimi's credentials as an academic author."
In 2000, Esposito co-edited with Tamimi a book called "Islam and Secularism." The next year, Tamimi published a biography of Tunisian Islamist Rachid Ghannouchi, which was part of a series edited by Esposito. In the book's introduction, Tamimi calls Esposito his "ustadh," or teacher.
Even after Tamimi's repeated support for the Islamic terrorist groups such as the Taliban and Hamas, Esposito still sits on the board of advisors of the Institute for Islamic Political Thought, founded and run by Tamimi, who confirmed this fact during a phone interview. He's had multiple opportunities when comments by Tamimi should have prompted his resignation. None did.
A November 2001 Spanish newspaper article about an interview with Dr. Tamimi was titled, "I admire the Taliban; they are courageous." The following July at a speech in South Africa, Dr. Tamimi paid stirring tribute to "martyrs" who blow themselves up. Then in 2004, Dr. Tamimi expressed to the BBC his desire to become a suicide bomber: "If I can go to Palestine and sacrifice myself I would do it."
What's most disconcerting about the case of Tamimi is not that someone who studied under and later worked with Esposito could turn out to be so noxious. It's that someone like Tamimi almost certainly could not have kept hidden his real—and deeply-held—beliefs from his mentor and collaborator.
In two separate phone interviews, Tamimi was quite freewheeling. Though he gave the standard disclaimer that "any killing of innocent people is unacceptable," he quickly clarified—or rather, contradicted—his statement. When asked if this applies to "innocent people in Israel," he responded, "Palestine is a special case." How so? "It is legitimate for the Palestinians to fight the Israelis who are occupying their land." Does this apply to Americans and Brits killed in Iraq? "Of course it holds true in Iraq."
Tamimi's only testy moment during either interview came when asked if it was morally acceptable to kill Americans who are only in Iraq to rebuild things like roads and schools. He snapped, "It is not my responsibility to tell the Iraqi people who they can kill or not."
To put it gently, Tamimi is not afraid to express radical views to a stranger, or for that matter, to 8,000 people in Manchester. It raises the question: What kind of venom has he spewed privately to Esposito?
Better yet, what has Esposito said back?


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SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – The Department of Kinesiology at Evangel University has announced its graduation awards for 2012.
The awards were given during the baccalaureate service on Thursday, May 3, in Evangel's chapel auditorium.
The following Kinesiology awards were presented:
Outstanding Graduate in Exercise Science-Pre-Physical Therapy
- Benjamin J. Boyer from Battle Creek, Mich.
Outstanding Graduate in Exercise Science-Personal Training
- Julianna Hudson from Doniphan, Mo.
Outstanding Graduates in Physical Education
- Katelyn D. Haymes from Mount Vernon, Mo.
- Zachary T. Johnson from Springfield, Mo.
Outstanding Graduates in Recreation
- Jeremy A. Garten from Springfield, Mo.
- Ashlee M. Luko from Nixa, Mo.
The John and Cora Irene Holsinger Award for Outstanding Student in Kinesiology
- Jonathan W. Bundrick from Springfield, Mo.
Evangel's 54th annual commencement ceremony was held on Friday, May 4, at James River Assembly of God in Ozark, Mo. Of those graduating, 87 received master's degrees.

subset: commoncrawl


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Top 106+ Henry cartoon english
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"Brown is not running to be US senator," says one Republican insider, "he's running to be . . . governor in 2014."
Brown, according to several Republican observers, is running a hopeless US Senate race (as Joe Malone did in 1988, against Ted Kennedy) to set the stage for a more realistic statewide race (for Malone, it was state treasurer in 1990).
Malone never did make it to the Corner Office, but his quest — including his failed gubernatorial challenge to fellow Republican Paul Cellucci in 1998 — went a long way toward defining the Mass GOP.
Brown could be poised to do the same, even though most GOP insiders harbor no illusions about Brown's chances in the January 19 election.
After all, more than 650,000 people voted in the Democratic Senate primary — nearly half of them for Coakley — but only 160,000 voted in the Republican primary. And nearly every observer agrees that Massachusetts voters are far less willing to vote for Republicans in congressional elections than for state offices.
Yet while Mass GOP leaders fully expect Brown to lose, there's a strange optimism that he will lose well. Or, at least, not lose disastrously.
"He's almost the dream candidate," says Amy Lambiaso, consultant with Liberty Square Group, who works with Republican candidates. "He's an excellent worker — he'll raise the money, he'll knock on doors."
Others echo that sentiment, and say that his efforts could help the state GOP revitalize and re-emerge as a political force in 2010.
"The Brown campaign is going to send a signal of what next year's statewide elections portend," says Bob Hedlund, a Republican state senator.
A tanking economy and a string of scandals have turned the public against Beacon Hill Democrats. For Republicans to take advantage, they need strong candidates, money, activism, and a good message.
Some state GOP insiders believe that Brown's Senate campaign might infuse that into the party. But, surprisingly, others fear it might do the exact opposite.
Defining the issuesBrown's effect on the 2010 state races could depend on whether he runs a highly ideological campaign or strikes a more centrist tone.
Throughout his political career, Brown has been considered a staunch conservative. His first race for the State Senate, in 2004, was defined largely by the issue of same-sex marriage, which Brown opposed. He is extremely popular among the conservative base of the state party, say insiders.
That's worrisome to those in the wing of the state GOP — personified by gubernatorial candidate Charlie Baker — who believe the party needs moderate candidates who focus on job creation and fiscal responsibility. They want to downplay social issues like same-sex marriage and abortion, and to distance themselves from the hard-line rhetoric of the Tea Party movement.
See all articles by: DAVID S. BERNSTEIN
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I've got a bit of a problem with the use of eglSwapBuffers in my Series 60 code.
I was running my app full screen which seemed to automatically make it use the direct screen access code.
When I displayed the menu I was hitting memory corruption errors. I tracked this down to the menu display causing loss of direct screen access, which freed the bitmap being used for this but OpenGL still had a pointer to this now dead bitmap and in the call to glClear it corrupted the heap trying to write to this dead pointer.
I debugged into the sample apps to see how they avoided this problem and discovered that apps like Example3D and GlExample were calling eglSwapBuffers at the start of their draw cycles and this call sorted out the dead pointer problem and stopped the heap corruption.
This solution also fixed my problem but it doesn't seem to be right thing to do, surely eglSwapBuffers should be called straight after the drawing code to copy it to the display ASAP. The method used in those sample apps is postponing the screen update until the next animation cycle causing an unwanted lag in updating the display.
I've just had a look through some of the other sample apps and believe they are surviving this problem by luck, the ones that run in full screen but don't call eglSwapBuffers until after their draw cycle are actually drawing to freed memory but getting away with it because writing to freed heap space doesn't actually corrupt anything unless some other code tries to use that heap.
I've confirmed this by making the following change in the \OpenGlExamples\3Dexamples\openglex\rain sample.
TInt CRainContainer: :DrawCallBack( TAny* aInstance )
CRainContainer* instance = (CRainContainer*) aInstance;
if ( instance->iRain->GetState() == CRain::ERunning )
/* Call the main OpenGL ES Symbian rendering 'loop' */
// Added following alloc and heap checks to churn and test the heap
TAny *xxx1=User::Alloc(100);
instance->iRain->AppCycle( instance->iFrame );
In the first call to User::Heap().Check(); after the menu was displayed the code paniced with User-49, what has happened is the alloc of 100 bytes has gone into the space freed by deleting the direct screen buffer, the opengl draw code has then trashed the free cell pointer at the end of this new alloc cell, which was picked up by the heap check afterwards.
At the moment I can't see any solution other than calling eglSwapBuffers before my draw code, and having to put up with the lag in updating the display.
But I suggest this whole situation needs to be looked at carefully to prevent other people hitting this same problem I did with heap corruption, it was very very hard to track down, involved writing a heap dump function to analyse what was corrupting my heap, lots of memory watch break points to track back step by step who was responsible for the corruption, then watching the same memory watch points in the sample apps to work out why they didn't hit the same problem as me.
At the very least all the sample apps need to be changed so they aren't writing to freed memory.
Steve Townsend
Great Ape Software Ltd


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Members of the committee charged with nominating candidates to replace former Cook County Health and Hospitals System Board Member Rev. Dr. Calvin Morris met on Tuesday to finalize a schedule for the upcoming nominating process.
The nominating committee is made up of representatives from 14 health care and community organizations. Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle's office selected the organizations that make up the committee.


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what do you experience during Zazen?
describe your feelings? what do you go through? try to explain what it is you experience....
when i sit i dont feel much. mostly just thoughts that come and go, they arise and just float by while i continue sitting, at times i experience brief moments without any thoughts at all, but they are actually not different from thought, having thoughts or not does not matter, as i write these lines i suddenly feel no difference between the 2 states. they are truly one.
thought or no thought does not exist, yet they exist at the same time.
at times i sense like everything i see blurs and becomes darker yet it is the same as always. it somehow blurs and becomes focused at the same time. i do not know how to even explain it. it is like everything becomes part of everything else and yet stays itself. it feels like everything is still yet the world moves.
i feel nothing yet i feel everything all at once. as i write these words it seems to me that everything i wrote does not describe what i experience during Zazen. i guess i lac the words to describe it, or it is more likely it is beyond words? ( i do not know )
i am reminded of a koan i once read :
forgive me if what i wrote seems like the rambling of an idiot, i humbly bow my head to you all.Gutei's Finger
Gutei raised his finger whenever he was asked a question about Zen. A boy attendant began to imitate him in this way. When anyone asked the boy what his master had preached about, the boy would raise his finger.
Gutei heard about the boy's mischief. He seized him and cut off his finger. The boy cried and ran away. Gutei called and stopped him. When the boy turned his head to Gutei, Gutei raised up his own finger. In that instant the boy was enlightened.
When Gutei was about to pass from this world he gathered his monks around him. `I attained my finger-Zen,' he said, `from my teacher Tenryu, and in my whole life I could not exhaust it.' Then he passed away.
forgive me if i have wasted your time.


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Board of Regents to establish, appoint presidential search committees
At its meeting on March 21, the Board of Regents will consider agenda items to establish and appoint the initial members of two committees that will assist with the national search for the next president of the University of Nebraska.
Both committees, the Presidential Search Outreach and Advisory Committee and the Presidential Search Screening and Selection Committee, will be comprised of representatives of key constituencies with which the NU president interacts including students, faculty and administrators, supporters and donors, the public, and members of the Board of Regents. The committees will work with consultants from Isaacson, Miller, the executive search firm that has been retained by the Board, to help identify, recruit, assess and recommend candidates for the university presidency.
Regent Howard Hawks, Chairman of the Board of Regents, said nominations for the committees were sought from the student regents, faculty senate presidents, campus chancellors, University of Nebraska Foundation leadership, and members of the Board.
"The Board of Regents is interested in increasing the involvement of key stakeholders in the process that will lead to the identification and selection of the next president of the University of Nebraska," Hawks said. "This is a critical leadership position, not only for the university but for the entire State of Nebraska, and the search will benefit from enhanced participation by more constituency representatives."
The Presidential Search Outreach and Advisory Committee will work with the professional search firm to solicit stakeholder input on issues facing the university and qualities the university should seek in the next president, conduct a broad and inclusive search, seek nominations and applications for the position, and determine how well potential candidates meet criteria that will be established by the Board.
The Presidential Search Screening and Selection Committee will review and evaluate application materials, select and interview leading prospects, conduct and/or review reference checks, and recommend to the Board of Regents no fewer than four candidates who agree to become public finalists for the position. Final selection of the next president will be made by the Board of Regents following university visits and public forums by the finalists that will provide opportunities for Nebraska citizens and university constituents to meet the candidates and provide feedback to the Board.
The Presidential Search Outreach and Advisory Committee will be co-chaired by Regents Tim Clare of Lincoln and Bob Phares of North Platte. Other proposed members are:
- Renaisa Anthony, Assistant Professor of Health Promotion and Deputy Director of the Center for Reducing Health Disparities, College of Public Health, University of Nebraska Medical Center
- Gail Baker, Dean of the College of Communication, Fine Arts and Media, University of Nebraska at Omaha
- Juan Casas, Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, College of Arts and Sciences, University of Nebraska at Omaha
- Hal Daub, Board of Regents, District 8, Omaha
- Herbert O. (Dele) Davies, Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs and Dean of Graduate Studies, University of Nebraska Medical Center
- Helen Abbott Feller, President of Churn Thoroughbred Farm, Inc., Wisner
- Ronnie Green, Vice President of Agriculture, University of Nebraska and Vice Chancellor of the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
- Barry Kennedy, President of the Nebraska Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Lincoln
- Kevin Knudson, Student Regent-elect, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, junior majoring in political science, Omaha
- John Massey, Director and President of J.G. Elliott Insurance Center and member of the Board of Directors of the University of Nebraska Foundation and Foundation Trustee, Scottsbluff
- Dawn Mollenkopf, Associate Professor, Department of Teacher Education, College of Education, University of Nebraska at Kearney
- Joseph Oravecz, Dean of the Division of Student Affairs, University of Nebraska at Kearney
- Tonn Ostergard, President and CEO of Crete Carrier Corporation and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the University of Nebraska Foundation, Lincoln
- Harvey Perlman, Chancellor, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
- Jim Pillen, Board of Regents, District 3, Columbus
- Connor Schulte, Student Regent-elect, University of Nebraska at Kearney, junior majoring in advertising and public relations, Kearney
- Judy Walker, Aaron Douglas Professor and Chairperson of Department of Mathematics, College of Arts and Sciences, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
- Charles (Chuck) Wilson, retired physician and former member of the University of Nebraska Board of Regents, Lincoln
- Gail Walling Yanney, retired physician, community volunteer and philanthropist, Omaha
The Presidential Search Screening and Selection Committee will chaired by Regent Howard Hawks of Omaha. Other proposed members are:
- Susie Buffett, Chairman, Sherwood Foundation, Omaha
- Jeffrey Gold, Chancellor, University of Nebraska Medical Center
- Brian Hastings, President and Chief Executive Officer, University of Nebraska Foundation, Lincoln
- Jordan Koch, Student Regent-elect, University of Nebraska at Omaha, senior majoring in elementary education, Yankton, South Dakota
- Marjorie Kostelnik, Dean of the College of Education and Human Sciences, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
- Steve Nelson, President, Nebraska Farm Bureau, Axtell
- Krupa Savalia, Student Regent, University of Nebraska Medical Center, M.D./Ph.D. Scholars Program, West Orange, New Jersey
- Rob Schafer, Board of Regents, District 5, Beatrice
- Kent Schroeder, Board of Regents, District 6, Kearney
- Julie Shaffer, Professor of Biology, College of Natural and Social Sciences, University of Nebraska at Kearney
- Thomas Warren, President, Urban League, Omaha
- Bob Whitehouse, Board of Regents, District 4, Papillion
The Outreach and Advisory Committee is expected to convene soon, and work over the spring into the summer. The Screening and Selection Committee likely will begin its work in the summer and continue into the fall.
The Board of Regents continues to invite input from the public on the presidential search, as well as nominations of potential candidates, at www.nebraska.edu/presidentsearch. All news and information related to the presidential search will be housed at this web site.
Melissa Lee
Director of Communications,
University of Nebraska


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One of the greatest success stories in post-milennial television is CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. Now incorporating two other series (CSI: Miami and CSI: NY), the franchise all started with the mothership launched in 2000 by powerful Hollywood executive producer Jerry Bruckheimer and creator Anthony E. Zuiker. Though a procedural somewhat in the vein of the Law & Order series, CSI punches up its storytelling with biologically invasive visual effects and a soapy interest in its characters' sexy private lives.
The series follows the exploits of the team of criminalists working the graveyard shift of the Las Vegas Crime Lab ("the number two crime lab in the country"): supervisor Dr. Gil "Gruesome" Grissom (William Petersen of Manhunter); assistant supervisor Catherine Willows (Marg Helgenberger), a single mother troubleshooting her ex-husband (Timothy Carhart); a team of "CSI-3"s (Jorja Fox's Sara Sidle, George Eads' Nick Stokes, and Gary Dourdan's Warrick Brown); and DNA/trace technician Greg Sanders (Eric Szmanda). (Robert David Hall also turns up frequently as Coroner Albert Robbins.) Calling the shots is the punnily named detective Captain Jim Brass (Paul Guilfoyle).
The hook of the series is that crimes are solved on the basis of evidence, scientifically collected. Though these CSIs frequently overstep their bounds by doing witness interviews, it's basically all about the evidence, collected through high-tech toys and low-tech tricks as Grissom reminds his investigators to keep emotions and assumptions at bay. The series' appeal is largely its scientific angle, little explored by the time the series debuted (though some will recall the unfortunately short-lived UNSUB as having focused on crime scene investigation, employing similar style and substance). Danny Cannon, who directed the pilot and many subsequent episodes, established a much-copied slick style incorporating fantastic voyages into corpses.
The series' signature theme song--The Who's "Who Are You?"--plays on the search for perps, but also the show's interest in its characters, who Catherine describes as "not Crime Scene Investigators. We're just a bunch of kids that are getting paid to solve puzzles." Grissom resembles the remark. He's distinguished first and foremost by his forensic genius (with a special emphasis on entymology), but also by his penchant for cultural references and puzzles and his anemic social life: he lives for his work. Offering a potential respite from his loneliness is attractive forensic artist Teri Miller (Pamela Gidley of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me).
Miller exemplifies Season One's interest in story arcs spread over a few episodes. Another, left unresolved in Season One, involves a serial killer toying with Grissom. Other CSIs toy with romance, such as Catherine's flirtation with a structural engineer played by Brad Johnson (Always), and Warrick struggles with a gambling addiction. TV fans will also note the presence of a number of familiar faces in guest star roles: Rainn Wilson (The Office), Gregg Henry (Payback), Dakota Fanning (War of the Worlds), Milo Ventimiglia (Heroes), Jarrad Paul (Monk), Mark Valley (Fringe), Gregory Itzin (24), John Beasley (Everwood), Sam Jones III (Smallville), Glenn Morshower (24), and Reginald VelJohnson (Die Hard), among them.
CSI is mainstream TV that's not deep or challenging or realistic, but its strong hook and snazzy style have served it well for nine seasons. Who woulda thunk a show about cops greeted as "the nerd squad" would becomes a smash hit, finishing every season in TV's Top 10?
CSI: Crime Season Investigation - The First Season comes to Blu-ray with an unusual but generally satisfying image that's a definite upgrade. The nicely framed 1.78:1 image is a first for Season One, which was broadcast and reissued on DVD in a 1.33:1 aspect ratio (it was presumably shot "protected" for either ratio, but looks great in widescreen). This change alone is cause for celebration, but the 1080i picture also offers significantly more detail than ever before. It can also look a bit noisy at times, in part due to intentional grain and in part due to digital sharpening, but this colorful transfer is probably as good as Season One is ever likely to appear. The picture is matched with an impressive DTS HD 7.1 surround soundtrack that delivers clear dialogue and robust musical cues.
Special features include the Unaired Director's Cut of the Pilot (with optional Director's Commentary by Danny Cannon); Deleted Scenes for the Pilot (in HD and also with optional commentary); Deleted Scenes for selected Season One episodes (in SD); and the original Network Launch, Series & Episodic Promos (in SD). Fans will especially appreciate the "Gag Reel" (3:53, SD) and over forty-five minutes of featurette material.
The 2002 featurette "CSI - People Lie...But the Evidence Never Does" (19:13, SD) gives an overview of the series at its outset, with executive producer Jerry Bruckheimer, executive producer Carol Mendelsohn, creator Anthony E. Zuiker, William Petersen, Marg Helgenberger, Robert David Hall, Paul Guilfoyle, George Eads, technical advisor Elizabeth Devine, Jorja Fox, Gary Dourdan, director-producer Danny Cannon, and Eric Szmanda.
The 2009 retrospective featurette "CSI: Season One - Rediscovering the Evidence" (27:54, HD) gets some perspective on the series' inception and the special place the first season has in the hearts of cast and crew. Interviewees include Zuiker, Mendelsohn, Cannon, Petersen, director Kenneth Fink, Eads, Guilfoyle, director Richard J. Lewis, Hall, David Berman, and Szmanda.
Plus, BD-Live promises more exclusive content for players hooked up to the internet. Fans of CSI are encouraged to go Blu for this terrific set, which will no doubt also garner new followers for the popular series.
Review gear: |
Panasonic Viera TC-P55VT30 55" Plasma 1080p 3D HDTV
Oppo BDP-93 Universal Network 3D Blu-ray Disc Player
Denon AVR2112CI Integrated Network A/V Surround Receiver
Pioneer SP-BS41-LR Bookshelf Speaker (2)
Pioneer SP-C21 Center Speaker
Pioneer SW-8 Subwoofer


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China's factories appear to be on the mend this month, according to an early gauge of activity in the country's all-important manufacturing sector.
HSBC said its "flash" measure of sentiment among manufacturing purchasing managers was 49.7 in May. The rebound from the index's final reading of 48.1 in April was sharper than analysts had expected.
While the index showed improvement, any number under 50 still indicates a deceleration in the manufacturing sector.
Still, economists said advances in new orders and output prices were positive developments that suggest factories are now on firmer footing
"Today's PMI reading suggests that downwards pressure on the manufacturing sector has eased markedly," said Julian Evans-Pritchard of Capital Economics. "While downwards pressure on the economy remains we aren't seeing as rapid a slowdown this quarter as last."
China's economy is off to a sluggish start this year, with first quarter GDP coming in at 7.4% -- a touch slower than Beijing's 7.5% annual target.
Related: Fears grow over China property flameout
The real estate market is showing signs of weakness. Industrial production, retail sales, and investment growth have all disappointed.
The worrying economic data out of China has raised expectations Beijing will respond with stronger stimulus measures in an effort to stabilize growth.
"Downside risks to growth remain, particularly as the property market continues to cool," said HSBC economist Hongbin Qu. "We think more policy easing is needed to put a floor under growth in the coming months."
The Chinese government will release its official PMI measurement for May on June 1.


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Create a Website Account - Manage notification subscriptions, save form progress and more.
Though safe for drinking by humans, monochloramine, like chlorine, is toxic to fish and other aquatic organisms at levels used for drinking water. Fish hobbyists or home aquarium owners must neutralize or remove monochloramine from water used in aquariums or ponds.
As with chlorine, fish (including fresh and salt water fish), amphibians, and reptiles are harmed by monochloramine as it passes through the gills, directly entering their bloodstream.
Products are available at fish and pet supply stores to remove monochloramine from aquarium water including: treatment products (drops or tablets) that remove both ammonia and chlorine, or iological filters (for ammonia) and chemical agents (for chlorine).
Aquarium owners should routinely test their water for ammonia and chlorine concentrations. Test kits are available at pet shops and aquarium products suppliers.
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We take our water quality very seriously. Should you experience these issues, please contact City Hall by calling 559-935-1533.
A representative will be sent to your home shortly.
It is our constant goal to provide you with a safe and dependable supply of water. Water quality is tested in house daily and outsourced weekly to independent labs to ensure that we are meeting or exceeding all Federal and State regulations.
The link to our water quality reports can be found here.
If you are experiencing water quality issues, you can fill out a complaint form here. Staff will be notified, and you should receive a response in short order.
If you have any further questions, please contact our Public Works Secretary.
1(559)935-1533 ext. 150
Water hardness is measured as Calcium Carbonate (CaCO3) in mg/l on a scale, as represented by the one below. Lower CaCO3 levels in water samples are considered soft, and water samples containing 251 mg/l of CaCO3 are too hard for domestic water use.
Our latest Consumer Confidence Report indicates that our water has 110 mg/l of CaCO3. This would qualify as being moderately hard water.
Contact City Hall at 935-1533 Monday-Thurs. 7:30am -5:30pm and after hours contact P.D. at 935-1525 Staff is available 24hrs. a day 7 days a week.
Backflow conditions can be a serious threat to water quality, for additional information please refer to the Backflow Standards page.
Your concern will be handled promptly.


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Leaders Must Speak Out on Wailing Wall Arrest
Israel's Declaration of Independence provides that "The State of Israel…will uphold the full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of race, creed or sex" and "will guarantee full freedom of conscience, worship, education and culture." Last week, officials of the Jerusalem police violated Anat Hoffman's most basic civil and human rights by subjecting her to crude misogynistic and demeaning mistreatment that crossed all boundaries of decency.
Hoffman is the executive director of the Reform Movement's Israel Religious Action Center. On Tuesday evening, October 16, she was arrested for leading a group of more than 200 women in the Sh'ma Israel prayer and wearing a tallit, a prayer shawl, at the Western Wall. The women, who had come to Israel to mark the 100th anniversary of Hadassah, the Women's Zionist Organization of America, were celebrating the beginning of the Hebrew month of Heshvan.
At the coercion of Israel's ultra-Orthodox religious establishment, women are forbidden to read from the Torah or to wear prayer shawls or tefilin in the plaza in front of the Wall. Women who defy these prohibitions, including Hoffman, are routinely harassed. Earlier this year, during the summer, Hoffman disclosed that, "four women were detained at the Western Wall, each for wearing a tallit. The authorities say they were disturbing the public peace according to regulation 201 A4 of the Israeli legal code. The punishment for this crime is six months in prison. They also broke regulation 287A by performing a religious act that 'offends the feelings of others.' The punishment for this crime is up to two years in prison."
The ugly facts do not seem to be in dispute. Indeed, the Jerusalem police has not contested or denied the accuracy of Hoffman's account of her ordeal. She told the Forward's Debra Nussbaum Cohen that when a policeman ordered her to stop reciting the Sh'ma, she complied, but the other women in her group continued praying. She was then arrested and taken to a police station where she claims she was shackled and physically abused.
"In the past when I was detained," she continued, "I had to have a policewoman come with me to the bathroom, but this was something different. This time they checked me naked, completely, without my underwear. They dragged me on the floor 15 meters; my arms are bruised. They put me in a cell without a bed, with three other prisoners, including a prostitute and a car thief. They threw the food through a little window in the door. I laid on the floor covered with my tallit."
The leaders of the Reform Movement have condemned this loathsome incident in no uncertain terms. Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center for Reform Judaism, said that "it is intolerable that any woman should be arrested for praying at one of Judaism's most cherished sites." Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism called the treatment to which Ms. Hoffman was subjected "deplorable and degrading."
Other American Jewish leaders have also spoken out. ADL national director Abraham Foxman, said that, "If the reports are accurate…there is certainly no justification for the mistreatment of Ms. Hoffman by the police." Rabbi Steven Wernick, the CEO of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, denounced Ms. Hoffman's "arrest in shackles" as "deplorable… Her shocking, brutal, undemocratic and frankly un-Jewish treatment is a stark affirmation of the existential threat Israel is facing by extremist religious forces within the Jewish State, specifically, from its Chief Rabbinate."
Fair enough. But why has there not also been a massive outpouring of indignation on the part of Israeli public figures, in particular those political and moral leaders who purport to promote civil and political rights for all of Israel's citizens? And what about the Israeli politicians of all but the religious parties who regularly assure American and other Diaspora Jews of their commitment to religious pluralism?
Imagine their outrage if a Jew, any Jew, were arrested, let alone physically roughed up, for wearing a tallit and praying in public in, say, Russia, or Venezuela, or France, or Iran. Imagine the denunciations in the Knesset or on the part of the Israeli ambassador to the United Nations if a Jewish woman anywhere else in the world had been shackled, stripped, forcibly dragged across the floor, and left to lie on the floor of a prison cell covered by her tallit.
As a lifelong Zionist, as the son of a mother who survived Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, as a husband, as the father of a daughter, and as the grandfather of a granddaughter, I am repulsed at the thought that Israeli officials could treat a Jewish woman, or any woman for that matter, so atrociously and with such utter contempt.
Last December, ultra-Orthodox thugs spat on an eight-year-old schoolgirl in Beit Shemesh because they disapproved of the way she was dressed. The only significant difference between them and the Jerusalem police officials who shackled and mistreated Hoffman appears to be that the latter wear uniforms and cloak their reprehensible behavior under a veneer of legality.
In the context of anti-Semitic manifestations with which we are all too familiar, the image of a Jewish woman being humiliated and abused for being true to her religious beliefs and then being forced to cover herself with a tallit in a prison cell takes on nightmarish connotations of Kafkaesque dimensions.
Women who regularly wear a tallit during services in their Conservative, Reform or Reconstructionist synagogues in the United States or in other countries in the Diaspora should not have to fear being arrested or otherwise manhandled for doing so when they wish to pray in Israel, including at the Western Wall.
If Israel is truly to be, in the Prophet Isaiah's words, a light unto the nations, its political and intellectual leaders must now take the lead in unambiguously condemning the despicable way that Anat Hoffman was treated by the Jerusalem police and providing assurances to Jewish women the world over — and to their sons, their husbands, their fathers and their grandfathers — that no similar obscenities will be tolerated in the future.
Menachem Z. Rosensaft is vice president of the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Their Descendants. He teaches about the law of genocide and World War II war crimes trials at the law schools of Columbia, Cornell and Syracuse universities.


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Job Information
Ryder System Customer Service Coordinator in Amarillo, Texas
Job Seekers can review the Job Applicant Privacy Policy by clicking HERE. (https://ryder.com/job-applicant-privacy-policy)
At Ryder, our most important competitive advantage is our people. CULTURE- INTEGRITY- FAMILY . As a Customer Service Coordinator, you'll be part of a dynamic team, equipped to succeed and empowered to develop your transportation & logistics career. This is an essential industry and we've been in the game since 1933!
Shop Location - Amarillo TX 79102
Work Schedule - Tuesday through Friday 8 AM-5 PM, Saturday 8 AM-4:30 PM
Hourly – Paid Weekly!
The Customer Service Coordinator, or CSC , will support the shop management process through timely customer communications and scheduling, inventory ordering and stocking, repair follow-up and maintenance file management. In this role, you will acquire proven industry knowledge, skills and resources to develop your operations & fleet maintenance background. We allow you to carve out your own career path and promote from within , based on performance. The ideal path of progression in this role is an Ops Supervisor.
If you're motivated, coachable, and looking for a fast paced, inclusive environment, you've come to the right place. Competitive pay & fast growth, full benefits package, 401k employer match, PTO, and a discount on shares!
You thought that was it? Take a look at a few of these: Ryder's most recently been named "Top Company for Women to Work for in Transportation (https://newsroom.ryder.com/news/news-details/2022/Ryder-Named-One-of-the-Top-Companies-for-Women-to-Work-For-in-Transportation-in-2022/default.aspx) " by Women in Trucking, one of Fortune Magazine 's "World's Most Admired Companies (https://newsroom.ryder.com/news/news-details/2022/FORTUNE-Magazine-Names-Ryder-Among-Worlds-Most-Admired-Companies-for-10th-Consecutive-Year/default.aspx) ", & one of "Reader's Choice Excellence Awards (https://newsroom.ryder.com/news/news-details/2022/Ryder-Voted-Among-Top-10-3PLs-in-Readers-Choice-Excellence-Awards-by-Inbound-Logistics/default.aspx) " by Inbound Logistics. What about our green initiative…? We have the largest EV footprint in the U.S. In addition to that, Verizon has recognized Ryder with their "Supplier Environmental Excellence Award (https://https/www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220712005382/en/Ryder-Receives-Verizon%E2%80%99s-Supplier-Environmental-Excellence-Award) "
Here is from people that work here!
This is Ryder:
Essential Functions
Customer Service: improve the quality and consistency of customer communications and meet customer's expectations.
Perform customer relationship activities to include customer interface, issue resolution, and customer satisfaction.
Execute customer communication protocol as it pertains to PM scheduling and follow up, breakdowns and vehicle status updates Work Flow Management: enhance branch productivity through effective work scheduling and planning.
Create repair order tasks and update work planning sheet.
Review maintenance reports to identify and schedule preventative maintenance, repair campaigns, and vehicles requiring follow-up.
Coordinate with rental counter to identify repair requirements, available substitute units and vehicle wash requirements.
Coordinate outside repair with vendors and customers Parts Management: contribute to cost containment through effective inventory planning and warranty.
Execute parts inventory management processes to include conducting physical inventory, parts ordering, receiving, stocking, managing purchase orders and parts invoice, and coordinating parts pick-up and delivery.
Make recommendations on min-max levels to the inventory planning team.
Manage parts obsolescence.
Ship warranty and return parts.
Organize and ensure cleanliness in the parts room Administrative.
Effectively handle all incoming shop calls.
Clerical duties within the shop operations which include vehicle maintenance files.
Process all Accounts Payable.
Create repair orders for technicians.
Additional Responsibilities
Performs other duties as assigned.
Acute attention to detail.
Ability to communicate effectively, both verbally and in writing.
Effective phone skills.
Strong organizational, prioritizing, and multitasking skills
Proven ability to make good decisions in a fast-moving environment.
Skills and Abilities
Strong computer skills to include spreadsheet and word processing software packages required.
Experience using Microsoft word and excel intermediate preferred.
H.S. diploma/GED, required
Three (3) years or more customer service with issues resolution experience required.
DOT Regulated: No
#LI-post #INDexempt #FB
Job Category: Operations and Support
Ryder is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer and Drug Free workplace. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, status as a protected veteran, among other things, or status as a qualified individual with disability.
Job Seekers can review the Job Applicant Privacy Policy by clicking HERE. (https://ryder.com/job-applicant-privacy-policy)
Current Employees:
If you are a current employee at Ryder (not a Contractor or temporary employee through a staffing agency), please click here (http://wd5.myworkday.com/ryder/d/task/1422$3.htmld) to log in to Workday to apply using the internal application process.


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Advanced TinyMCE Editor
Download, Installation, Documentation and How to Modify this WordPress Plug-in
Turn your existing WordPress editor into the following WYSIWYG powerhouse:
Thanks to Chris Carson of Navy Road Software, I am pleased to announce the new version 0.5.0 of the Advanced TinyMCE Editor for WordPress. The Advanced TinyMCE Editor plug-in builds from previous releases by Assaf Arkin of Labnotes and me (see earlier documentation), and updates it to be compatible with the current WordPress v. 2.2.
The Advanced TinyMCE Editor plug-in:
- Doubles the editor's available functions to 60, adding important functional areas such as table, styles, inserts, and others
- Improves existing functionality in handling images, links, etc.
- Corrects errors and arbitrary restrictions in the standard WordPress visual editor, and
- Provides easy Control Panel configuration of your WordPress editor.
This version 0.5.0 upgrade, largely from Chris, makes these improvements:
- Provides improved control panel control of the Advanced TinyMCE plug-in
- Allows you to add and enter new style sheets without needing to modify code
- Allows you to configure which advanced buttons appear on or off in the editor
- Provides guidance on earlier width problems, esp. for small screen (800 x 600) older laptops.
Again, Chris, many thanks!
These changes have also led to complete updates to the download and installation, installation gotchas, detailed features, and how-to-modify instructions below.
TinyMCE and its advanced options are from Moxiecode Systems AB. Please note that the Advanced TinyMCE Editory plug-in has not been tested in WP versions prior to 2.2 and has not been tested in all browsers beyond Firefox and IE. Comments and improvements are welcomed!
Download version 0.5.0 of the zipped Advanced TinyMCE Editor from here (NOW DISABLED! advanced_tinymce_050.zip; 192 kb)
Installation instructions are:
- Back-up the files in the two specific subdirectories used by the Advanced TinyMCE Editor as noted below
- Download the zip file; unzip into a temporary reference location
- First, copy over the entire Advanced TinyMCE subdirectory over to your standard plug-in directory:
/wordpress home or root - that is, your WP starting point/
advanced-tinymce subdirectory [copied here]
Once copied over, the subdirectory will contain three files: advanced-tinyMCE.php, control_panel.php and a read_me.txt file.
- Second, update the TinyMCE js plug-ins directory by copying the multiple files in the subdirectory created from the extracted download. The target location for these files on your local system may be found at:
/wordpress home or root - that is, your WP starting point/
[subdirectories for plug-in additions -- copy here]
Please note that your target subdirectory will itself already include a number of additional TinyMCE plug-ins that came as part of the standard WP installation; do not erase these! They supplement the new functionality you just added.
- Under the Plugins menu item in your WP administration center, activate the Advanced TinyMCE Editor option (if this plug-in does not display, you did not correctly finish Step #3 above)
- Go to the Options menu item in your WP administration center, then Advanced TinyMCE and make configuration choices (see next section). You must save settings from this Control Panel screen before the plug-in becomes active
- Go to the Visual editor under the Write or Manage menu options within your WP administation console
- If you do not see the options and buttons you earlier selected, you will need to clear your browser cache (esp. for Firefox, which will likely require a full Clear Private Data flush, see below) and then refresh the page
- Begin editing and then Enjoy!
Unlike normal plug-ins, the need for Step #4 results from the tight integration of the distributed TinyMCE in WordPress.
If you have any problems, carefully repeat the above steps. If problems still remain, re-install your original configuration from the backups.
Control Panel Configuration
Once the Advanced TinyMCE Editor plug-in is installed, you configure the editor for style sheets and which buttons you want to have active from the Control Panel. This panel is accessed via the Options > Advanced TinyMCE menu items on the WP administration center:
Please note that you must Save Settings on this display before your changes become active. And, when first installed, you also need to select Save Settings to initially activate the plug-in.
Adding and Changing Styles
The Advanced TinyMCE Editor enables you to make assignments and display user-defined styles via dropdown lists. You can add any style sheets you wish (typically, 'style.css') in the Control Panel, and their embedded styles will then become available for assignment and display in the editor.
To enter a new style sheet, you must provide the full URL path in the Control Panel dialog (including the http://!). See the example in the above figure. Also, you can enter multiple style sheets, so long as each one is separated by a comma.
Note: Stylesheets containing complex declarations may not be displayed correctly by the Advanced TinyMCE Editor. Make sure the stylesheets entered here contain only simple class declarations, e.g., ".someclass". If you see a stylesheet declaration not show up in the Editor, consider splitting out the direct and simpler declarations into a separate file.
If you are familiar with earlier operation of this plug-in, you will know that style sheets are initially specified in the tiny_mce_config.php file (see discussion under Deprecated below). You may still do so, and any style sheets in this file will also appear within the editor dropdown lists. However, only style sheets that you enter directly on the Control Panel willl appear in this Control Panel dialog.
This feature to add your own style sheets can also be helpful when you are testing many style options. You can temporarily define a test_styles.css file somewhere on your system, modify individual styles and refine what you may then want to later keep. After testing, you can save your final styles to a permanent style sheet location and delete the temporary style sheet reference from the Control Panel.
Note: When you change or add style sheets, you may need to do a cache flush using Clear Private Data within Firefox (see below) due to a known browser bug before your changes show in the editor.
Editing Button Display
The 60 or more functions in the Advanced TinyMCE Editor are organized by row and clustered by group. A group is separated by others within a row by a separator bar.
Chances are that some or many of the functions in the Advanced TinyMCE Editor may not be of interest or use to you personally. The Control Panel enables you to select which of these functions will display in the editor. If all items in a given group are unchecked, the entire group and its separator bar will also not display.
The Advanced TinyMCE Editor adheres to the plug-in philosophy of not requiring any changes to the underlying WordPress code, including its baseline use of the standard, simple TinyMCE. Thus some choices are limited in the plug-in, such as the restriction that only three rows of buttons are available (among others). The rather fixed choices in the Control Panel for functions and buttons is a result of this philosophy.
Note: When you change editor buttons, you may need to do a cache flush using Clear Private Data within Firefox (see below) due to a known browser bug before your changes show in the editor.
Editor Width
Early distributions of the Advanced TinyMCE Editor caused sporadic complaints regarding crowding or overlapping of display buttons on smaller displays. This issue is particularly acute for older laptops limited to 800 x 600 displays. Under the worst case, that is combining all buttons and a small display, you can see something like the following (800 x 600 basis):
This is because the starting basis for advanced functionality in TinyMCE is hardwired into three rows, and each row forces the absolute width. However, even with such a small display, if you are willing to remove buttons (about 35% in total), you can still achieve a functional editing area:
Of course, a display this narrow has its own limitations. (Which is one of the reasons that 800-width displays are rapidly phasing out.)
At a 1024-width, there is still some overlap, as the following diagram shows. But, only removal of a few buttons can produce a very acceptable editing display area, and most users can easily remove some functionality (I personally do not have a need for R-to-L word wrapping and some of the Microsoft-specific functionality.)
By the time display widths reach 1280, all buttons and functionality can clearly be displayed. (Again, many users will still choose to remove some unused buttons in any event.)
(Some of these screen captures at lower resolutions are poor given the dynamics of my current flat-screen display.)
If these approaches are still not satisfactory, it is necessary to directly modify the underlying code.
Note: When you remove editor buttons from display, you may need to do a cache flush using Clear Private Data within Firefox (see below) due to a known browser bug before your changed display width shows in the editor.
Functional Description
The result of the complete installation is shown in this figure. Each of the buttons is described below. Note if you modify your actual file (see below) that the number of your buttons and their order may change from this screen!:
This image shows three rows (A, B, C) of 60 buttons and dropdown lists, each of which is described below by row, group number and item from left-to-right. New functionality added by virtue of this Advanced TinyMCE plug-in above the standard advanced options in WordPress is shown with an asterisk (*).
From top-to-bottom and left-to-right, these buttons are:
- A1a — 'Undo" levels, typically set to 10 steps
- A1b — 'Redo' levels, typically set to 10 steps
- A2 — standard 'Print' for the post/page in the editor *
- A3a — standard 'Cut'; may be limitations in some browser configurations *
- A3b — standard 'Copy'; may be limitations in some browser configurations *
- A3c — standard 'Paste'; may be limitations in some browser configurations
- A3d — 'Paste Text' for pasting without formatting; may be limitations in some browser configurations *
- A3e — 'Paste Word' for pasting Word with some formatting retained; may be limitations in some browser limitations *
- A3f — 'Select All' in the editor window *
- A4a — 'Format' dropdown according to standard CSS styles
- A4b — 'Font Family' dropdown to select font typeface *
- A4c — 'Font Size' dropdown to select font size *
- A4d — 'Styles' dropdown to pick existing styles *
- A4e — 'CSS Style' brings up a comprehensive popup dialog for editing or entering new styles, enabling styles to be edited visually *
- A5 — the 'HTML' button brings up a direct HTML editing window, with all code shown. Unlike the Code tab, all HTML codes are shown (but with conversion errors corrected; see discussion above) *
- B1a — 'Bold'; standard function
- B1b — 'Italics'; standard function
- B1c — 'Underline'; standard function
- B1d — 'Strikeout'; standard function
- B2a — 'Bullet List' is a standard function per existing CSS formatting
- B2b — 'Number List' is a standard function
- B3a — 'Justify Left', applied to highlighted text
- B3b — 'Justify Center', applied to highlighted text
- B3c — 'Justify Right', applied to highlighted text
- B3d — 'Justify Full', stretch text to margins for highlighted text
- B4a — 'Indent' highlighted text, sometimes treated as <blockquote>
- B4b — 'Outdent' to return indented text to standard left margin
- B5a — 'Text Color' enables highlighted text to have color changed *
- B5b — 'Background Color' enables background for highlighted area to have color changed *
- B5c — 'Text/Background Color Selector' is a more general option for choosing any RGB value for text or background *
- B6a — 'Subscript' enables that for the highlighted text *
- B6b — 'Superscript' enables that for the highlighted text *
- B6c — the 'Character Map' brings up a popup dialog to insert special characters and symbols *
- B6d — the 'Emotions' button brings up a popup for a choice of emoticons *
- B7a — 'Insert Date' provides a date insert at the point of the cursor; format is settable *
- B7b — 'Insert Time' provides a time insert at the point of the cursor; format is settable *
- B8a — the 'Horizontal Rule' inserts a standard rule at the point of the cursor *
- B8b — the 'Advanced Horizontal Rule' allows the rule to have its formatting set via a popup menu *
- B9a — 'Image' brings up an advance image dialog, including image swaps *
- B9b — 'Media' enables Flash, Shockwave, etc., to be inserted at cursor position with settable parameters (not fully tested) *
- B10a — 'Link' is a more advanced link insertion and settings popup *
- B10b — 'Unlink' removes existing link settings *
- B10c — 'Anchor' enables anchor tags to be set in the current document *
- C1a — 'Table' insert or edit an existing table; major functionality, with specifics covered in the next few buttons *
- C1b — 'Table Row' for modifying entire table rows at a time *
- C1c — 'Table Cell' for setting specific table cell properties *
- C1d — 'Insert Row Before' *
- C1e — 'Insert Row After' *
- C1f — 'Delete Row' *
- C1g — 'Insert Column Before' *
- C1h — 'Insert Column After' *
- C1i — 'Delete Column' *
- C1j — 'Split Merged Table Cells', as described *
- C1k — 'Merge Table Cells' for the highlighted selection *
- C2a — 'Citation' provides a means to put <cite> tags on highlighted text *
- C2b — 'Abbreviation' provides a means to put <abbr> tags on highlighted text *
- C2c — 'Insert' provides a means to put <ins> tags on highlighted text *
- C2d — 'Delete' proovides a means to put <del> tags on highlighted text *
- C2e — 'Attributes' provides a means to put <attr> tags on highlighted text *
- C3a — 'Direction LtR' sets scrolling and editing from left-or-right *
- C3b — 'Direction RtL' sets scrolling and editing from right-to-left *
- C4 — 'Spellchecker' toggles spell checking off or on; may work off of IE spell lists; also see documentation about spelling lists *
- C5a — 'Visual Characters' provides screen display of hidden characters like spaces (via and tab, etc) *
- C5b — 'Remove Formatting' actually has fairly minimal impact by removing cell and related spacing and formatting. Apparently has minimal effect on embedded codes; it's use needs better documentation *
- C5c — 'Cleanup' is also not apparent, likely requires poor code base; not yet fully tested *
- C6a — 'Find' brings up a popup to search for the given string *
- C6b — 'Replace' allows replacement of the found search string *
- C7 — 'Fullscreen' expands the current editor space to occupy to full screen *
- C8a — the 'More' tag is a specific WordPress option for splitting posts into a summary and detailed entry, split at the point of insertion
- C8b — 'Help' brings up a minimal (unfortunately) WP-specific help on the editor; not very useful.
Please note that the behavior and functionality of the image (B9a) and link (B10a) are also improved over the standard WordPress distribution.
If you would like more information on the various button names, see the initial TinyMCE documentaton at: http://wiki.moxiecode.com/index.php/TinyMCE:Control_reference.
Known Issues
These are the known issues with WordPress v. 2.2 and this plug-in.
A Firefox Gotcha: Clear Private Data Caching Flush
One problem common to the Firefox browser is the need to clear the cache before you see the plug-in buttons display properly. To do so, go to the main menu Tools > Clear Private Data and then set the screen as shown and clear the data.
Important for Firefox users! |
Standard Advanced Toggle
Apart from this plug-in, which corrects this hidden requirement, the standard WordPress distribution requires a toggle of Alt-V (IE) or Shift-Alt-V (Firefox) to toggle the standard editor's advanced buttons on and off.
Color Picker
The 'More Colors' option on the Advanced TinyMCE brings up a blank popup. (See http://trac.wordpress.org/ticket/4288.)
In part to overcome this issue, I added an additional color picker from this source: http://tinymce.moxiecode.com/punbb/viewtopic.php?pid=16270. See B5c above.
Control Panel Display in IE
There are some minor display problems of the Control Panel in Internet Explorer. They do not affect operation.
Possible WordPress v. 2.2 Issues
As an earlier post by me summarized (with other external references), there are issues of compatibility with many current plug-ins and WordPress v. 2.2. You may encounter problems with the Advanced TinyMCE Editor for these reasons, which may have nothing to do with the plug-in itself and may be devilishly difficult to diagnose and remedy.
I expect releases after WP v. 2.2 to get increasingly stable.
Instructions for Your Own Modifications
The actual Advanced TinyMCE Editor plug-in is quite simple, even though installation is a little more complicated than for a standard WordPress plug-in. This complication is because of the added step of adding the new plug-in subdirectories to TinyMCE's own JavaScript listings (see Step #4 under 'Download and Installation' above).
But, with a little bit of familiarity, the simplicity of all of this becomes quite clear, which should enable you to make your own modifications and extensions.
With the instructions below, you should be able to remove, add, change the order of buttons, change editor behavior when in 'code' mode and update the system on your own when new releases of TinyMCE or WordPress are issued.
Changing Group and Button Display Orders
To change the group or button display orders in the Advanced TinyMCE Editor, you will need to edit the advanced-tinyMCE.php file (the one placed into your standard /plug-ins/ directory), starting at about line 47. The basic layout of this portion of the file is shown below:
$this->arr_btns = array( array( array( "undo", "redo"), array( "print"), array( "cut", "copy", "paste","pastetext", "pasteword","selectall"), array( "formatselect","fontselect", "fontsizeselect", "styleselect", "styleprops"), array( "code") ), array( array( "bold", "italic", "underline", "strikethrough"), array( "bullist", "numlist"), array( "justifyleft", "justifycenter", "justifyright", "justifyfull"), array( "indent", "outdent"), array( "forecolor", "backcolor", "advcolor"), array( "sub", "sup", "charmap", "emotions"), array( "insertdate", "inserttime"), array( "hr", "advhr"), array( "image", "media"), array( "link", "unlink", "anchor") ), array( array( "tablecontrols"), array( "cite", "abbr", "acronymn", "ins", "del", "attribs"), array( "ltr", "rtl"), array( "iespell", "spellchecker"), array( "visualchars", "removeformat","cleanup"), array( "search", "replace"), array( "fullscreen"), array( "wp_more", "wp_help") ) );
You can see this layout corresponds to the rows above (A, B, C, the first set of inset 'arrays') and then group (the second set of inset 'arrays') and then finally order within each group.
The naming correspondence between a button label and its actual button should be evident in comparison with the functional listings above. (Note, a couple of the named array items are "extra" in that they do not result in a corresponding button display; for example, 'iespell'.)
To change these orders and displays, simply manipulate the row and group items. Note you are limited to the three row arrays. Also note that, when completed, your edits will cause each group to be separated from the following one by a separator bar on the Advanced TinyMCE menu display.
When you make such changes, always be careful about your use and location of quotes, syntax characters and spelling! Note each array listing must start and end with the parentheses.
Adding Functionality
If you discover new functionality that you want to add to the editor, three steps are necessary.
- First, you must copy the functionality file or subdirectory to the TinyMCE JS /plug-ins/ subdirectory (not your standard WP one!) (see Step #4 under 'Download and Installation' above).
- Second, add the new function to the extended function array in the same advanced-tinyMCE.php file, beginning at about line 38:
function Advanced_TinyMCE_Editor(){ $this->arr_plugins = array( "advcolor", "advhr", "advimage", "advlink", "cleanup", "contextmenu", "directionality", "emotions", "fullscreen", "iespell", "insertdatetime", "media", "print", "searchreplace", "style", "table", "visualchars", "wphelp", "xhtmlxtras");
The name corresponds directly with the file name entered under the plug-ins subdirectory. The order of entry does not matter.
- And, then, third, add the associated button name (it should be described in the add-in functionality) to one of the three arrays noted above for 'Changing Group and Button Display Orders'.
That's it!
You should note that Moxiecode maintains a wiki with listings of additional plug-ins, and also keeps a series of look-up pages (check out all of the dropdown list pages!) for TinyMCE's own included advanced functionality. There are also other add-ins that you might find at SourceForge or with a Google search.
Changing Code Processing
Since at least the WordPress 2.1 release, the TinyMCE editor has had the nasty habit of removing <div> tags when toggling between 'Visual' and 'Code' views.
This comes from the WP team's (arbitrary) decision about this matter (and many others, see below). The code causing this nasty change is in the initial configuration file for TinyMCE, generally found under this path:
In that file you'll see this code:
$valid_elements = 'p/-div[*],-strong/-b[*],-em/-i[*],-font[*],-ul[*],-ol[*],-li[*],*[*]';
What this code basically says is to replace all <div> tags with <p> tags, <b> and <i> with <strong> and <em> respectively, keep all font and bullet tags, and then, as a capper, keep all remaining all other tags not specifically listed (*[*]).
Actually, this is all pretty good practice to use valid XHTML, except for the curious <div> replacement.
TinyMCE offers nice control of such parsing matters, but it definitely is not a good idea to make changes directly to the WordPress supplied configuration files. Rather, I isolated such changes to the Advanced TinyMCE plug-in code itself. Thus, this code is now added to the plug-in advanced-tinyMCE.php file:
function extended_editor_mce_valid_elements($valid_elements) { $valid_elements = '-strong/-b[*],-em/-i[*],-font[*],-ul[*],-ol[*],-li[*],*[*]'; $valid_elements = apply_filters('extended_editor_mce_valid_elements', $valid_elements); return $valid_elements; }
Note that the only change I made was to remove the unwanted <div> with <p> replacement.
Note, you could make your own changes within these same lines of code. For example, Moxiecode provides a set of instructions to make your code completely XHTML compliant (see bottom of page). That documentation and related material on the TinyMCE wiki site are probably worth inspecting if you are going to get aggressive about making your own code changes (but, proceed with caution!).
Of course, these are fairly fundamental changes in that they act to re-write underlying page code. Use at your own risk and you are on your own!
BTW, I'd like to thank Tim Rohrer for pointing me in the right direction for this fix.
What to Do in the Case of Future Upgrades?
To keep current with new releases in either WP or TinyMCE, you can follow the same steps as what was outlined for 'Adding Functionality' above. Simply inspect the current TinyMCE functions, those supplied with the new version (as they come out) of WP, and make your desired updates and corrections.
Deprecated from Version 0.4.0 Documentation
This topic applies to the earlier 0.4.0 distribution, but has been deprecated in the current version. It no longer applies to Advanced TinyMCE version 0.5.0!
Including Your Own Styles
After invoking the Advanced TinyMCE Editor, the styles dropdown list is only initially populated with two internal WordPress styles, mce_plugins_wordpress_more and mce_plugins_wordpress_page.
To include your own styles, you will need to find and edit the tiny_mce_config.php file located here:
/wordpress home or root - that is, your WP starting point/
[tiny_mce_config.php located here]
At approximately line 45 in that file, you will see reference to the standard WP style that is used. You can add your own style(s) to it by adding a comma and then entering the relative URL location of your specific styles, as shown in yellow below:
$mce_css = get_option('siteurl') . '/wp-includes/js/tinymce/plugins/wordpress/wordpress.css, /wp-content/themes/[your_theme]/[your_style.css]';
Do not forget the comma!, don't word wrap, and pay attention to quotes and semicolons.
Note that my own system uses relative URL addressing (yours may differ!) by setting a specific blog address URL under General Options in my WP admin center. Also note that you will need to substitute your specific theme and style names. Finally, you may need to clear your browser's cache (see instructions for Firefox above) in order to have the new styles properly populate the dropdown list.
I'd like to thank Jules on the Web Veteran blog site for the tip underlying this earlier change. Jules' posting has other useful TinyMCE hints as well.
Last Updated 7/16/07


text:
Jack in the Pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum) can be an interesting addition to shade gardens and wooded areas. This native of moist eastern woods as far west as Minnesota is easily recognized by its unusual inflorescence that appears in late May. In botanical terms, the 'pulpit' is a spathe and the 'Jack' is a flower-bearing spadix. The spathe is often striped purple and green. Tiny flowers on the spadix may be male, female, or some of each. Female flowers give rise to bright red berries, revealed when the spathe dies and falls away in late summer. Also attractive are the plant's two large leaves, each with three leaflets, usually held about one foot above the ground, although some specimens can be more than two feet tall.
The red berries, along with all other parts of the plant, contain needle-like crystals of calcium oxalate that can cause irritation to sensitive or broken skin when touched, and a burning and swelling of the lips and tongue if eaten. This burning sensation is immediate and so intense that it is unlikely anyone would manage to swallow the berries; however, if plant parts were swallowed, they could cause a severe irritation of the throat and digestive system that would require medical attention.
Jack in the Pulpit is tolerant of a wide range of soil pH, from somewhat acidic to somewhat basic (alkaline), and will thrive in dappled to deep shade. This plant is winter hardy into zone 3, and will grow best in moist but well-drained soil. The below-ground parts of the plant can be harmed or killed by excess moisture during the winter or early spring. For this plant to thrive, the soil should be high in organic matter. Incorporate compost, well-rotted manure, peat moss or other organic matter before planting, and mulch the plants with compost, grass clippings or decorative organic mulch, such as cocoa bean shells or pine needles, each year.
Don't collect plants from the wild. Instead, buy them from nurseries that specialize in native plants and wildflowers. Some general garden centers will also carry Jack in the Pulpit plants in the spring. You can transplant the tuber of Jack in the Pulpit in early autumn, after the above- ground plant parts have died back.
You may be able to buy seeds through the mail, collect them in the woods, or get seeds in early fall from a friend whose Jack in the Pulpit has ripe red berries. Remove the red flesh and plant the seeds immediately; don't let them dry out. Sow the seed outdoors where you want the plants to grow, covering the seeds with ¼ to ½ inch of soil. Seedlings should come up in early spring. Another method is to refrigerate freshly cleaned seeds in a plastic bag with some moist sand or potting soil for six weeks, then sow the seed in pots. In spring, plant the seedlings outdoors. Once plants become established in a favorable site, they are likely to self-seed.
Some additional resources I explored - many of which cover many of the species found in our Western New York woods:
Great and detailed article about "Jack"
Blog illustrating many of the same wildflowers found in our woods
The Native Plant Society of Northeastern Ohio
Great and detailed article about "Jack"
Blog illustrating many of the same wildflowers found in our woods
The Native Plant Society of Northeastern Ohio
~ from Google images ~ |
Apparently Georgia O'Keefe liked these strange flowers, too ...


text:
The US military has issued soldiers in Afghanistan with a new class of lightweight unmanned drone known as the Switchblade, which can be carried in a backpack and used on the battlefield in place of an air strike.
The Switchblade, manufactured by the AeroVironment Corporation in Monrovia, California, weighs just under six pounds (2.7kg) and can be rapidly launched and sent over the nearest ridge to circle above the battlefield before being sent to zero in on the enemy – usually the chest or head of an enemy combatant.
The weapon, which commanders have dubbed the "Flying Shotgun", has been widely tested by the US Army, US Marines and US Air Force. It has proved so effective that AeroVironment has announced more than US$14m (£9m) worth of Switchblade systems and related engineering contracts in the past 10 months.
The increasing use of drones to target militants under the Obama administration has proved controversial as critics say assassinations conducted by drones amount to extrajudicial killing.Like larger Predator or Reaper drones, the unmanned Switchblade is flown by a "pilot" who monitors the flight from a video screen. The Switchblade can loiter above the target before being sent in to strike. It typically flies far lower than other drones, often less than 500ft above the ground and is highly manoeuvrable, allowing it to circle in on a fixed or fleeing target.
The Switchblade is designed for use by small ground units who need to attack nearby targets – snipers on a ridge, rebels on a rooftop or an ambush the next ridge over.
Defence analysts believe warfare in the future will see many more mini armed drones which are now called "loitering munitions" and provide ground troops with a view described as coming from "the tip of the bullet".
However, arms control groups and peace activists see the new weaponry as at best controversial. Bruce Gagnon, the co-ordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, said it would not be long before the drones were being used domestically. "People are beginning to see that these technologies are going to be dual use – meaning over there and back here at home," he said.
Like much of the drone war, the deployment of the Switchblade is kept secret. The US military refuses to acknowledge how many Switchblades are in stock, in which countries they are deployed or to which units they are being supplied. The only official acknowledgement came from an army general who last October admitted that "less than a dozen" Switchblades have been deployed.
However, in a February 2010 solicitation for production specifications of these mini-drones for the US Army's Redstone Arsenal asked potential suppliers to provide the "cost per system for quantities of 500, 2,000 and 20,000 units".
Following successful battlefield testing, the Switchblade has now been being distributed to conventional infantry troops including the 2nd Battalion of the 16th Infantry Unit based at Fort Riley, Kansas. Last month, members of the battalion spent a week practising the launch, flight and detonation of the drones.
While drone strikes from fixed-wing aircraft have a chain of command that stretches from Afghanistan to the United States, with multiple steps to avoid civilian casualties or friendly fire casualties, these ultra-light, portable drones bring the decision to kill down to the level of platoon commander or even individual soldier.
According to Gagnon, the advent of the small drone is another step in the military's bid to have battle fought by robots. "We have been seeing this attempt by the military to essentially roboticize warfare. It gives them two very valuable results, it lessens the price, as a drone is much cheaper than an F-16, and secondly it takes increasingly less people on the battlefield.
"You still need a lot of people back home flying them and sitting in front of the computers," said Gagnon, "but it puts less people in harm's way and the Pentagon is happy about this. It is easier to sell endless war when fewer GIs are coming home in bodybags."
"Technology is moving at lightning speed and policy is moving at glacial speed," said PW Singer, the author of Wired for War, a critical analysis of the military use of robotic technologies. "This tech is proliferating, with more than 50 countries now building, buying and using military robotics. The cat is already out of the bag."
Jonathan Franklin writes for the Guardian, where this article originally appeared.


text:
Stephen Ira, a junior at Sarah Lawrence College, uploaded a video last March on We Happy Trans, a site that shares "positive perspectives" on being transgender.
In the breakneck six-and-a-half-minute monologue — hair tousled, sitting in a wood-paneled dorm room — Stephen exuberantly declared himself "a queer, a nerd fighter, a writer, an artist and a guy who needs a haircut," and held forth on everything from his style icons (Truman Capote and "any male-identified person who wears thigh-highs or garters") to his toy zebra.
Because Stephen, who was born Kathlyn, is the 21-year-old child of Warren Beatty and Annette Bening, the video went viral, garnering nearly half a million views. But that was not the only reason for its appeal. With its adrenalized, freewheeling eloquence, the video seemed like a battle cry for a new generation of post-gay gender activists, for whom Stephen represents a rare public face.
Armed with the millennial generation's defining traits — Web savvy, boundless confidence and social networks that extend online and off — Stephen and his peers are forging a political identity all their own, often at odds with mainstream gay culture.
If the gay-rights movement today seems to revolve around same-sex marriage, this generation is seeking something more radical: an upending of gender roles beyond the binary of male/female. The core question isn't whom they love, but who they are — that is, identity as distinct from sexual orientation.
But what to call this movement? Whereas "gay and lesbian" was once used to lump together various sexual minorities — and more recently "L.G.B.T." to include bisexual and transgender — the new vanguard wants a broader, more inclusive abbreviation. "Youth today do not define themselves on the spectrum of L.G.B.T.," said Shane Windmeyer, a founder of Campus Pride, a national student advocacy group based in Charlotte, N.C.
Part of the solution has been to add more letters, and in recent years the post-post-post-gay-rights banner has gotten significantly longer, some might say unwieldy. The emerging rubric is "L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.," which stands for different things, depending on whom you ask.
"Q" can mean "questioning" or "queer," an umbrella term itself, formerly derogatory before it was appropriated by gay activists in the 1990s. "I" is for "intersex," someone whose anatomy is not exclusively male or female. And "A" stands for "ally" (a friend of the cause) or "asexual," characterized by the absence of sexual attraction.
It may be a mouthful, but it's catching on, especially on liberal-arts campuses.
The University of Missouri, Kansas City, for example, has an L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. Resource Center that, among other things, helps student locate "gender-neutral" restrooms on campus. Vassar College offers an L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. Discussion Group on Thursday afternoons. Lehigh University will be hosting its second annual L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. Intercollegiate Conference next month, followed by a Queer Prom. Amherst College even has an L.G.B.T.Q.Q.I.A.A. center, where every group gets its own letter.
The term is also gaining traction on social media sites like Twitter and Tumblr, where posts tagged with "lgbtqia" suggest a younger, more progressive outlook than posts that are merely labeled "lgbt."
"There's a very different generation of people coming of age, with completely different conceptions of gender and sexuality," said Jack Halberstam (formerly Judith), a transgender professor at the University of Southern California and the author, most recently, of "Gaga Feminism: Sex, Gender, and the End of Normal."
"When you see terms like L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.," Professor Halberstam added, "it's because people are seeing all the things that fall out of the binary, and demanding that a name come into being."
And with a plethora of ever-expanding categories like "genderqueer" and "androgyne" to choose from, each with an online subculture, piecing together a gender identity can be as D.I.Y. as making a Pinterest board.
BUT sometimes L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. is not enough. At the University of Pennsylvania last fall, eight freshmen united in the frustration that no campus group represented them.
Sure, Penn already had some two dozen gay student groups, including Queer People of Color, Lambda Alliance and J-Bagel, which bills itself as the university's "Jewish L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. Community." But none focused on gender identity (the closest, Trans Penn, mostly catered to faculty members and graduate students).
Richard Parsons, an 18-year-old transgender male, discovered that when he attended a student mixer called the Gay Affair, sponsored by Penn's L.G.B.T. Center. "I left thoroughly disappointed," said Richard, a garrulous freshman with close-cropped hair, wire-framed glasses and preppy clothes, who added, "This is the L.G.B.T. Center, and it's all gay guys."
Through Facebook, Richard and others started a group called Penn Non-Cis, which is short for "non-cisgender." For those not fluent in gender-studies speak, "cis" means "on the same side as" and "cisgender" denotes someone whose gender identity matches his or her biology, which describes most of the student body. The group seeks to represent everyone else. "This is a freshman uprising," Richard said.
On a brisk Tuesday night in November, about 40 students crowded into the L.G.B.T. Center, a converted 19th-century carriage house, for the group's inaugural open mike. The organizers had lured students by handing out fliers on campus while barking: "Free condoms! Free ChapStick!"
"There's a really vibrant L.G.B.T. scene," Kate Campbell, one of the M.C.'s, began. "However, that mostly encompasses the L.G.B. and not too much of the T. So we're aiming to change that."
Students read poems and diary entries, and sang guitar ballads. Then Britt Gilbert — a punky-looking freshman with a blond bob, chunky glasses and a rock band T-shirt — took the stage. She wanted to talk about the concept of "bi-gender."
"Does anyone want to share what they think it is?"
She explained that being bi-gender is like manifesting both masculine and feminine personas, almost as if one had a "detachable penis." "Some days I wake up and think, 'Why am I in this body?' " she said. "Most days I wake up and think, 'What was I thinking yesterday?' "
Britt's grunginess belies a warm matter-of-factness, at least when describing her journey. As she elaborated afterward, she first heard the term "bi-gender" from Kate, who found it on Tumblr. The two met at freshman orientation and bonded. In high school, Kate identified as "agender" and used the singular pronoun "they"; she now sees her gender as an "amorphous blob."
By contrast, Britt's evolution was more linear. She grew up in suburban Pennsylvania and never took to gender norms. As a child, she worshiped Cher and thought boy bands were icky. Playing video games, she dreaded having to choose male or female avatars.
In middle school, she started calling herself bisexual and dated boys. By 10th grade, she had come out as a lesbian. Her parents thought it was a phase — until she brought home a girlfriend, Ash. But she still wasn't settled.
"While I definitely knew that I liked girls, I didn't know that I was one," Britt said. Sometimes she would leave the house in a dress and feel uncomfortable, as if she were wearing a Halloween costume. Other days, she felt fine. She wasn't "trapped in the wrong body," as the cliché has it — she just didn't know which body she wanted.
When Kate told her about the term "bi-gender," it clicked instantly. "I knew what it was, before I knew what it was," Britt said, adding that it is more fluid than "transgender" but less vague than "genderqueer" — a catchall term for nontraditional gender identities.
At first, the only person she told was Ash, who responded, "It took you this long to figure it out?" For others, the concept was not so easy to grasp. Coming out as a lesbian had been relatively simple, Britt said, "since people know what that is." But when she got to Penn, she was relieved to find a small community of freshmen who had gone through similar awakenings.
Among them was Richard Parsons, the group's most politically lucid member. Raised female, Richard grew up in Orlando, Fla., and realized he was transgender in high school. One summer, he wanted to room with a transgender friend at camp, but his mother objected. "She's like, 'Well, if you say that he's a guy, then I don't want you rooming with a guy,' " he recalled. "We were in a car and I basically blurted out, 'I think I might be a guy, too!' "
After much door-slamming and tears, Richard and his mother reconciled. But when she asked what to call him, he had no idea. He chose "Richard" on a whim, and later added a middle name, Matthew, because it means "gift of God."
By the time he got to Penn, he had been binding his breasts for more than two years and had developed back pain. At the open mike, he told a harrowing story about visiting the university health center for numbness and having a panic attack when he was escorted into a women's changing room.
Nevertheless, he praised the university for offering gender-neutral housing. The college's medical program also covers sexual reassignment surgery, which, he added, "has heavily influenced my decision to probably go under the Penn insurance plan next year."
PENN has not always been so forward-thinking; a decade ago, the L.G.B.T. Center (nestled amid fraternity houses) was barely used. But in 2010, the university began reaching out to applicants whose essays raised gay themes. Last year, the gay newsmagazine The Advocate ranked Penn among the top 10 trans-friendly universities, alongside liberal standbys like New York University.
More and more colleges, mostly in the Northeast, are catering to gender-nonconforming students. According to a survey by Campus Pride, at least 203 campuses now allow transgender students to room with their preferred gender; 49 have a process to change one's name and gender in university records; and 57 cover hormone therapy. In December, the University of Iowa became the first to add a "transgender" checkbox to its college application.
"I wrote about an experience I had with a drag queen as my application essay for all the Ivy Leagues I applied to," said Santiago Cortes, one of the Penn students. "And I got into a few of the Ivy Leagues — Dartmouth, Columbia and Penn. Strangely not Brown."
But even these measures cannot keep pace with the demands of incoming students, who are challenging the curriculum much as gay activists did in the '80s and '90s. Rather than protest the lack of gay studies classes, they are critiquing existing ones for being too narrow.
Several members of Penn Non-Cis had been complaining among themselves about a writing seminar they were taking called "Beyond 'Will & Grace,' " which examined gay characters on shows like "Ellen," "Glee" and "Modern Family." The professor, Gail Shister, who is a lesbian, had criticized several students for using "L.G.B.T.Q." in their essays, saying it was clunky, and proposed using "queer" instead. Some students found the suggestion offensive, including Britt Gilbert, who described Ms. Shister as "unaccepting of things that she doesn't understand."
Ms. Shister, reached by phone, said the criticism was strictly grammatical. "I am all about economy of expression," she said. "L.G.B.T.Q. doesn't exactly flow off the tongue. So I tell the students, 'Don't put in an acronym with five or six letters.' "
One thing is clear. Ms. Shister, who is 60 and in 1979 became The Philadelphia Inquirer's first female sportswriter, is of a different generation, a fact she acknowledges freely, even gratefully. "Frankly, I'm both proud and envious that these young people are growing up in an age where they're free to love who they want," she said.
If history is any guide, the age gap won't be so easy to overcome. As liberated gay men in the 1970s once baffled their pre-Stonewall forebears, the new gender outlaws, to borrow a phrase from the transgender writer Kate Bornstein, may soon be running ideological circles around their elders.
Still, the alphabet soup of L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. may be difficult to sustain. "In the next 10 or 20 years, the various categories heaped under the umbrella of L.G.B.T. will become quite quotidian," Professor Halberstam said.
Even at the open mike, as students picked at potato chips and pineapple slices, the bounds of identity politics were spilling over and becoming blurry.
At one point, Santiago, a curly-haired freshman from Colombia, stood before the crowd. He and a friend had been pondering the limits of what he calls "L.G.B.T.Q. plus."
"Why do only certain letters get to be in the full acronym?" he asked.
Then he rattled off a list of gender identities, many culled from Wikipedia. "We have our lesbians, our gays," he said, before adding, "bisexual, transsexual, queer, homosexual, asexual." He took a breath and continued. "Pansexual. Omnisexual. Trisexual. Agender. Bi-gender. Third gender. Transgender. Transvestite. Intersexual. Two-spirit. Hijra. Polyamorous."
By now, the list had turned into free verse. He ended: "Undecided. Questioning. Other. Human."
The room burst into applause.
by MichaelL Schulman
Source – The New York Times


text: Cognex Deep Learning simplifies the automatic inspection of complex fabric patterns including weaving, knitting, braiding, finishing and printing. With no tedious software development is required, the software algorithm trains itself on a set of known good samples to create its reference models. The inspection identifies and reports defective areas on the fabric while tolerating large but irrelevant variations in its appearance.