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The election of George W. Bush to a second term as President of the United States, combined with an increase in the Republican majority in both houses of Congress and an increase in the conservative faction of the majority, is likely to continue ominous conditions for HIV/AIDS service organizations and for national HIV/AIDS public policy. While the specific details of any negative impact cannot be ascertained fully at this time, there is a nearly universal consensus within the HIV/AIDS community that the fight against AIDS will be threatened seriously, domestically and globally, by a second Bush term in office. The very real difficulties, attacks, and outright setbacks that were experienced in the first term give credence to the concerns over what will happen over the next 2 - 4 years.
Key factors affecting the overall impact of a Bush second term on HIV/AIDS will be the degree to which Mr. Bush's and his administration's tendency towards right-wing conservative ideological principles prevail and the degree to which a hard line, regressive approach on HIV/AIDS, especially the domestic HIV agenda, is promulgated to reward social conservatives and Christian fundamentalists for their support in the 2004 elections and appease those constituencies for their continued support. Again, the first term and some post-election actions suggest that conservative ideology and social conservative and religious viewpoints will continue to have a heavy influence on how the administration and Congress responds to the HIV/AIDS pandemic, here and abroad.
The impact on national HIV/AIDS public policy of a second term likely will be across the board and emerge over time. The impact on three areas, however, likely will be more immediate and very negative. These areas are Federal appropriations for HIV/AIDS, reauthorization of the Ryan White CARE Act, and health care access, specifically Medicare.
Mr. Bush's first term saw a marked reversal of the fairly steady increases (albeit at times incremental) in discretionary Federal funding for HIV/AIDS. For the past few fiscal years, Mr. Bush's Budget Requests basically have called for flat-funding for domestic HIV/AIDS programs and funding for global AIDS programs well below needed levels. Overall, Congress has adhered closely to the President's requests in passing the actual appropriations. When inflation and rising caseloads are taken into account, there has been an effective cutback in funding for domestic HIV/AIDS programs. The recently enacted omnibus appropriations bill for FY 2005 exemplifies this trend.
Nearly all Federal budget experts agree that the administration's FY 2006 Budget Request will call for an overall cut, for some individual programs deep cuts, in non-defense discretionary funding. With a strengthened Republican majority, Congress likely will continue to adhere closely to the administration's budget as it enacts appropriation legislation. The reduction in non-defense discretionary funding will be driven by the impact of the already enacted tax cuts, Mr. Bush's stated intent to make permanent many of the tax cuts, the record level deficit, the continuing and growing costs of the military campaign in Afghanistan and the war in Iraq, and the costs of homeland security. This reduction trend likely will continue in the out-years (FY 2007 and thereafter). According to a paper published by GalleryWatch and Federal BudgetObserver, the Federal Office of Management and Budget itself projects that over the next four years non-defense discretionary funding will be cut by $11.6 billion. If Mr. Bush is successful in achieving his goals of overhauling the Federal income tax and restructuring Social Security, the need for further cuts in non-defense discretionary funding may well exceed the OMB's $11.6 billion projection.
Given this context, Federal spending for domestic HIV/AIDS programs will be at best flat-funded and may well experience actual reductions (the Federal HOPWA program already has experienced a nearly $13 million reduction in funding, after the across-the-board recision, in the FY 2005 omnibus spending bill). Actual or effective reduced funding for the CARE Act and for domestic HIV prevention can be expected under the Bush second term.
Reauthorization of the Ryan White CARE Act
The current authorization of the Ryan White CARE Act expires on September 30, 2005.
While work on reauthorizing the Act has been underway, especially among HIV/AIDS public policy advocates, for the past 18 months, actual proposals from the administration were not expected until after the 2004 elections. Likewise, Congressional action was not expected until the new 109th Congress convenes in January.
With a second Bush term now a reality, the administration's thinking will have a major, if not overwhelming, influence on reauthorization. The most salient likely influence will be a further move towards the "medicalization" of CARE Act services, especially under Title I. If this trend is realized, then the result could be to render ineligible many or all of the mental health and social supportive services now funded under Title I. This would have a drastic, negative impact on the funding to AIDS service organizations, and other community-based organizations.
The administration, with the support of the majority in Congress, is also expected to call for changes in the funding formulas for Titles I and II. The stated intent of the administration's proposed formula changes will be to achieve greater funding equity among Title I jurisdictions and among the states, the District of Columbia, and the territories funded under Title II. A revision or outright elimination of current hold harmless provisions is expected to be proposed or at least supported by the administration and the Congressional leadership. If such proposals are enacted, and when applied to the above described funding scenarios, then the effect of the formula changes could be a major reduction in Title I and Title II funding to Northeast and West Coast jurisdictions, smaller reductions to Mid-West jurisdictions, and significant funding gains for Southern jurisdictions.
A further potentially negative factor for reauthorization is the election of Tom Coburn to the Senate. Mr. Coburn is a hard-core political and social conservative. As a U.S. Representative from Oklahoma, Mr. Coburn was a key player during the previous reauthorization of the Act. He is expected to try to play a similar leadership role even as a freshman senator. Mr. Coburn can be expected to propose changes and amendments to the Act that would promote abstinence-only programs, enhanced partner notification and contact tracing efforts, and the "medicalization" of HIV/AIDS services.
Health Care Access: Medicaid
Medicaid is the largest source of health coverage for people living with HIV/AIDS. In 2003, President Bush proposed to change the financing of Medicaid to a block grant, which would have eliminated the entitlement nature of the program in exchange for states receiving lump sums of Federal dollars. A block grant approach effectively would cap Federal Medicaid spending. A capped Medicaid program would essentially leave states "holding the bag" for increases in their Medicaid costs, especially during economic downturns or disasters/emergency situations. It is widely held by advocates that a capped Medicaid program would lead to capped enrollment, reductions in benefits, increased cost-sharing and increased numbers of the uninsured. Through tireless advocacy, consumer groups, including strong support from the HIV/AIDS community, across the country working closely with Congressional allies helped stop the President's proposal in 2003.
Health care experts widely expect Mr. Bush to revive his Medicaid capped entitlement and block grant proposal early in his second term. The common assumption is that the administration's Medicaid proposal will be entwined in the FY 2006 budget process. By "burying" Medicaid changes in the budget process and with a bigger Republican majority in Congress, the administration's Medicaid proposal will be much harder to defeat. In addition, the nationwide pressure on the states to cut their Medicaid costs may make many governors willing to support the administration in exchange for relief on their state budgets.
If Mr. Bush's proposals are enacted, then the impact on thousands of people living with HIV/AIDS likely will be negative to a significant, perhaps life-threatening, degree.
Impact on Other HIV/AIDS Public Policy Areas
Medicare is increasingly growing in importance to people living with HIV/AIDS, and is the second largest source of funding for HIV care. In late 2003, Congress passed the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003, which added a drug benefit (Part D) to Medicare. The law allows private drug plans to administer the drug benefit and create formularies and approval processes for accessing drugs. The most immediate concern to PWAs is the loss of Medicaid drug coverage on January 1, 2006 for dual eligibles (there are about 80,000 in the U.S. with HIV) without an immediate fall back for drug coverage in case they are not enrolled in a Part D plan. Other major concerns include the availability of antiretroviral and non-HIV prescriptions for PWAs, whether off-label use of medications will be covered, the appeals process for PWAs who are denied medications through their plans, and the ability of ADAP to wrap around Part D.
Prior to the 2004 elections, an advocacy hope was to influence the new administration's implementation of the Part D benefit and to work with Congress to make actual changes in the law that would mitigate negative impacts. The election results make changes in the law a dim prospect, at best. The administration's Mark McClellan seems amenable to addressing some of the concerns of the HIV community, but it is quite clear that implementing the benefit will take some time to work out, and PWAs run the risk of having their regimens interrupted while the problems in the system are fixed.
Prescription Drug Pricing
The increasing costs of prescription drugs is the biggest factor in keeping the increases in overall health care costs above the rate of inflation. The close relationship between the Bush administration and the pharmaceutical industry and the industry's strong lobbying efforts in Congress have blocked efforts to effect Federal drug price control policies. Again, the election results are not likely to change this situation. The lack of drug price controls is squeezing public programs and causing more and more employer-based plans to pass on costs their employees. States are forced to deal with the high price of prescription drugs in varying ways, some of which have the effect of limiting access to drug treatment. While New York State enjoys a relatively solid safety net to ensure access to needed medications, especially for people living with HIV/AIDS, New York is not immune to pressures to control rising drug costs. Attempts to enact a preferred drug list under Medicaid are an example.
Domestic HIV Prevention
Beyond the likely impact of flat or reduced funding for domestic HIV prevention programs, the second term of the Bush administration likely will continue the trend towards a more politically and socially conservative approach to HIV prevention that minimizes or even disregards sound public health science. The administration likely will continue to push for an increased emphasis on abstinence-only-to-marriage programs (which received a $30 million increase in the FY 2005 omnibus spending bill). The shift in priorities at the Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention away from primary prevention likely will continue. This will result in decreased funding support for efforts to reach and intervene with at-risk communities, especially among men who have sex with men, drug users, and women of color. Enactment of proposed guidelines for the review of HIV prevention materials, unless changed in light of comments from GMHC and others in the HIV/AIDS community, will also have a negative, chilling effect on the ability of community-based programs to produce materials that are appropriate for targeted audiences.
HIV/AIDS Research
After a ten year period during which the NIH budget has doubled, a period of stagnant funding is likely with annual increases that are below the rate of biomedical inflation. For HIV/AIDS research, this likely will mean that little new research will be funded unless current projects are de-funded. An additional negative impact of a second Bush administration is the likely continuation of outright hostility towards the NIH's HIV/AIDS research program by the leadership at the Department of Health and Human Services and, some members of Congress.
Global AIDS
A generally perceived impact of the last four years of the Bush administration has been an increase in the Federal government's attention to the global AIDS crisis. Mr. Bush's announcement of a major $15 billion initiative in his 2003 State of the Union Address and Congress's enactment of his proposed initiative underscored the administration's attention to the global AIDS pandemic. All too often, however, this has been more of a shift in attention from the domestic HIV/AIDS agenda to a focus on global AIDS. Moreover, the administration's approach to global AIDS has been characterized as being more unilateral than multilateral, as evidenced in the administration's stance towards generic antiretroviral drugs that have been approved by the World Health Organization. Also, funding for the President's global AIDS program has been well below expectations and even below the annualized amounts authorized by Congress. The administration has also allowed its approach to be guided by political and social ideologies over sound public health and the local needs of recipient countries.
These trends are very likely to be continued in the second term. An ominous indication of this was the recent strong opposition of the administration to the Global Fund's starting a fifth round of funding to initiate new programs.
Human Rights
A Bush second term and the results of the Congressional elections likely will stall any efforts to lift the immigration bar on entry to the United States by HIV-positive individuals. The administration is also expected to continue, and perhaps expand, the policy of discriminating against HIV-positive personnel in the military. Negative impact on HIV-positive immigrants was foreshadowed by the administration during its first term ending of PRUCOL, a previous option to petition the government for lawful stay used by many HIV-positive immigrants. Finally, the administration, in its first term, moved away from forceful Federal enforcement under the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) of disability discrimination laws, leaving enforcement to the states. Again, these trends are likely to continue, if not increase, in the second term.


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ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) -- New York City is getting nearly $190 million in the first round of federal money to help recover from Superstorm Sandy, U.S. senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand said Tuesday.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency is sending $75 million to the New York Police Department to cover some of the extra staffing costs before and after the storm hit Oct. 29. New York University's Langone Medical Center will get $114 million to recover from flood damage at the hospital.
"The city's first responders and hospital workers put their lives on the line to take care of New Yorkers, and this first round of federal dollars is a down payment on making sure that at least their expenses are taken care of," said Schumer, who had taken FEMA administrator Craig Fugate on a tour of the hospital.
"Nothing beats seeing the damage with your own eyes," Schumer said.
Funds for the hospital will pay for a structural evaluation and electrical work and reimburse for the cost of leasing emergency equipment, overtime pay and the renting temporary space. It will cover about 75 percent of the hospital's expenses from Sandy.
Federal funding for other New York City hospitals is expected soon.
The NYPD is getting the money to reimburse it for staffing costs while officers were called out for rescue and security details and door-to-door checks for residents who might be in danger. It will also help cover the costs of removing some fallen trees and directing traffic as well as distributing gasoline, which was in short supply for days.
"Our NYPD officers were on the front lines before, during and after the storm to stand by their fellow New Yorkers," Gillibrand said. "These necessary reimbursements are an important step as we continue the unified effort in Washington to fully fund New York's needs for recovery and rebuilding."
These are the first awards of federal money to help New York City, Long Island and the Hudson Valley recover.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo made his pitch in Washington on Monday for $42 billion in federal aid, including $9 billion for preventive measures to reduce damage and costs from the next superstorm.
Feds release 1st FEMA funds for NYC
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) -- New York City is getting nearly $190 million in the first round of federal money to help recover from Superstorm Sandy, U.S. senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand said Tuesday.

subset: commoncrawl


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Pitches and Rejected but Professional
Fund: Morgenthaler Ventures
Posted by zerp on 2013-09-10
I pitched a partner after an introduction from a co-founder. It took several weeks but finally heard back. They were professional in getting back (it is 100x better to get a no than to waffle for 6 months). I have not yet received any feedback, though I asked for it. Can't say how I would give this firm negative marks. They seemed to move fast relative to other funds.PRIVATE: Members Only


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The story goes that a Mr Goddard - who says that he and his friends go rat hunting a couple of times a week - decided to see if he could bag one of the bigger ones. They took an air rifle and headed to the edge of the estate.The group had heard rustling and scratching near the wall before he got the shock of his life.
'The first went right past but we got the second one. Then three more got away."
Rats in Indonesia and South America can grow up to three feet long, and witnesses say the rats in Bradford are just as big 'I've never seen any as big as this. The one I shot was absolutely terrifying. I was shaking, Goodness knows where the others went. I'm glad I don't live there.'
Estate resident Rebecca Holmes, 38, was in no doubt that large rodents are in the area - after having cornered one in her house. The mother-of-five said her cat Marie had cornered one in the lounge, but the rodent stood its ground - because it was around the same size as the domestic cat.
Carol Beardmore, who represents the Eccleshill on Bradford Council, sounding just like your typically pompous local politician, played down suggestions that hundreds of giant rodents were plaguing the estate.
She said: "I live on the estate and while I'm not saying we don't have rats - everywhere has rats - I am not aware of an infestation of giant rats." She added: "I live close to a wood ... and we have not seen anything like that, and if we had I am sure my cat would have caught it."
Just what kind of super-cat does this woman own? As Miss Holmes testimony suggests, your average moggy would have more sense than to tangle with a 30 inch rodent!
As we saw before the 'culinary solution' awaits the brave locavore!
Your Pal


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Happy Halloween!
Monday, October 31, 2011
Happy Halloween!
6 comments:
Happy Halloween to you!ReplyDelete
Happy halloween-great carvings!ReplyDelete
You too! Love the carvings.ReplyDelete
whoa, a unicorn and an owl? your pumpkins just blew ours out of the water. love them!ReplyDelete
happy halloween AND happy belated! xo
Oh oh! I love the horse and the owl!!! I am bookmarking to copy that owl next year!ReplyDelete
We found the pumpkin ideas on google and thought they were neat. :)ReplyDelete
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Video – Shotgun Alley – Give It All Up For Rock
If you have been listening to the Hard Rock Hideout Radio show the last couple of weeks, you have heard this hot New Zealand band, Shotgun Alley.
Check out Shotgun Alley's clip "Give It All Up For Rock" below!
Check out Shotgun Alley on myspace at this link.
Leave A Comment ↓


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For my latest Coffee With Comedians, or CWC if you prefer abbr.'s, I sat down with Abigail Bruley, who is a member of improv group Nielsen and the creator and head writer of Down The Show.
Aubrie: When did you first get into comedy? Was there a specific moment? Cause you do improv and sketch.
Abigail: Comedy, always was there. I did impressions of all the priests from my elementary school. Improv is a very new venture for me. I did it because I thought that it was a great way to come up with ideas for sketches. And I do. I find it a great way to come up with ideas for everything.
Aubrie: Did you take a class through PHIT?
Abigail: My first improv class was at the UCB in New York, and then much later on, I decided to sign up for a class here with Andy Moskowitz, and he was amazing and adorable. My troupe formed out of that class!
Aubrie: Did you notice any differences between New York and Philly Improv-wise?
Abigail: Yes, sure, of course. My classmates were very different. Philly is more laid back and fun and experimental, New York is more traditional, everyone had an end goal in mind of being famous or whatever.
Aubrie: How did "Down The Show" come about?
Abigail: I was working for NBC in Philadelphia when I was asked to come up with some content ideas for one of their local shows. So, I came up with a comedy segment where we would bring local stand-ups into the studio and tape them doing a two minute bit. That went well, so I pushed a bit further for it to include original sketch. Ultimately, it didn't work out with NBC, but I kept running with it on my own and Down the Show was born!
Aubrie: Do you do a lot of the writing per show?
Abigail: Well, I've taken a lot of stuff that was already produced like "Booty Shorts for Men" by Secret Pants. But, I do do a lot of the writing for other sketches in the show. I also try to collaborate with people that write stuff specifically for the show, just so I have a chance to get different perspectives on it from outside observers.
Aubrie: Have you always done this, or did you start it recently?
Abigail: I've done it since the beginning of Down The Show. I mean it's so subjective. How do you know if it's only funny to you and your friends, right? I don't want to alienate people.
Aubrie: Are you inspired by anything in particular while writing or before an improv show? Do you have a pre-show ritual?
Abigail: I try to get lost and go on walks in the city and just be alert to things. I get a lot of great ideas that way.
Aubrie: What was the weirdest place you found inspiration?
Abigail: The most recent was probably a guy walking in front of me dry brushing with a tooth brush and he kept spitting, and I came up with a character based around that guy dry brushing.
Aubrie: Do you have a favorite comedy moment?
Abigail: I saw Louis CK when he played the Academy of Music and he had this bit that is about how he doesn't drink that much or smoke or do drugs, and his one big vice is being able to sleep, And he was like, "You know what sleep is like to me?" and he went into really great detail about what it might feel like to get a really deep blow job from a tribal woman with devil tongues, and I was hyperventilating, I was laughing so hard. That is the hardest I've ever laughed. I love that guy so much.
Aubrie: Me too.
Abigail: And the show Louie – I think about that when I'm writing. The thing I admire most about the writing on that show is the slow simmer type of humor and the retching honesty. I don't necessarily need something to be knee-slappingly funny. The first time I realized sketch comedy could be non-Saturday Night Live was The State and I was obsessed with it. A great deal of The State wasn't funny, it was just bizarre and weird. And, that made me love it even more.
Aubrie: The State had a lot of recurring characters. Do you have a recurring characters or a through-line, or hope to have a through-line eventually?
Abigail: This episode I wrote a skit that I hope comes back in the next episodes. That's the first one. Other than that the only thing that the first two have in common, and that I think I'm going to continue on with, is that they have stand- up comedy mixed with sketch mixed with original music and artwork. That's going to be the standard.
Aubrie: Do you film live music or use recorded music in the show?
Abigail: My husband is a musician so he does all of the music. I'm going to have a new theme song every episode, and he always does the theme song. In the first episode the theme song is me and him singing in our closet. And for this theme song I wanted it to sound like a bunch of drunk sailors screaming at a bar so he got a bunch of his friends into this space to sing lyrics that he wrote- which are amazing- and I'm pretty excited about it. It's gonna be awesome!
Aubrie: Do you have a favorite Philly stage moment?
Abigail: Asteroid is great! And The Kristen & Amie Show. They are just so good. They amaze me. The arsenal of characters they pull out is awe inspiring.
Aubrie: Were there particular moments from each show that blew you away?
Abigail: Asteroid's edits in themselves are hilarious, and they are just so goofy and fun with each other. What I do remember was that every moment that blew me away in that show in particular were done by chicks, and I thought that was really interesting. I mean, how can chicks not be naturally funny? We are an absolutely ridiculous gender.
Aubrie: And outside of comedy, what are your hobbies and interests?
Abigail: Hmmm, I am at Fairmount Park almost every single day, so I guess you could say I'm the outdoorsy type. I like noodles. I eat noodles a lot.
Aubre: What kind of outdoorsy stuff?
Abigail: I used to be big into biking but I don't do that anymore. I'm tired of trying to ride a bike because my bikes keep getting stolen. I don't know, I guess I'm just a super girl- I'm really into skating.I go to the River Rink. I am also into logic puzzles.
Aubrie: ME TOO! I never meet anyone who is, and that is why I am so excited. Any other hobbies?
Abigail: My husband and I have a little music project we do. And I'm also a freelance illustrator.
Aubrie: Have they been published anywhere around here?
Abigail: The most recent was published in the City Paper.
Aubrie: Is the music project with your husband recorded in the closet?
Abigail: Yes! I stand in there with headphones on and a stocking over the microphone!
You can catch the screening of the 3rd episode of Down The Show on May 4th at Underground Arts with Dan St. Germain, and see past episodes at www.youtube.com/user/downtheshow.


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The drama Savages, from three-time Oscar-winning filmmaker Oliver Stone, follows entrepreneurs Ben (Aaron Johnson) and Chon (Taylor Kitsch), and their shared girlfriend O (Blake Lively), who run a lucrative business raising some of the best marijuana ever developed. But, the legendary weed of these Laguna Beach heroes soon catches the interest of the Mexican Baja Cartel, headed by the merciless Elena "La Reina" (Salma Hayek). Along with her brutal enforcer Lado (Benicio Del Toro) and her head attorney Alex (Demian Bichir), Elena demands a partnership which she ensures by kidnapping that which they love most, and what was once a peaceful and easy lifestyle becomes a high-stakes battle of wills.
At the film's press day, director Oliver Stone talked about shooting Savages on film, his motivations for the unconventional ending, how possible he thinks the portrayal of the cartels could be, that he likes his actors to be the best advocate for their characters, and whether or not he took the different perceptions that both sides of the border might have about the film into consideration. Check out what he had to say after the jump.
Question: Now that the industry is moving away from film as the standard, what do you expect the next generation of filmmakers to be like when film is no longer the foundation?
OLIVER STONE: Wow, that's a really pregnant question, and you're so right! I make a film like this every two years, so every time I come back to it, there's a new technology going on. And now, truly because of the projections system, we're moving inexorably to a digital projection. It's frankly more consistent and it's certainly better than film print projection, around the theaters. The consistency of film print projection was always widely variable. I would go to the theaters in Texas or Alabama, and sometimes there were mistakes made. Sometimes they don't change the bulbs.
On the other hand, the irony of the whole situation is that film is still, to me, in my opinion, without a doubt, 15 to 20% better than the digital. In its range and its blacks, and the depths of its blacks. When you see this movie, if you see it with a good projector, the colors pop, and I love that. My eye plays off film. I never know what's going to happen because your eye does wander. It's an anemographic film, so there is no comparison. I've seen the digital and it's good, it's just not at the same level, and that's because it's a medium that's different. There's something in the film stock that you cannot get.
People say that it's so much better, and [James] Cameron, Michael Mann and George Lucas all led the way. My protest against digital has been me saying, "What's going to happen to film?" The result is that Kodak is out of business. That's a national tragedy. We've got to keep making film. I really feel strongly about that. We can't give it up. It may be like the baseball card business or the comic book business, and it'll be antique, but I don't think it's going to go away. It's like books. You don't always have to have an e-book. You can have a real book. I'd like to see the old way maintain. I think it will be like antique cars. It'll grow in value. I'm going to hold onto my Blu-ray collection because I really think it's hardware and it's important. I don't want to live in a cloud, all my life. Sorry to be preachy.
All of the twists and turns with the ending are very interesting. What was your motivation for that and your decision to do that?
STONE: There are twists and turns in this movie, and some of them are pretty wild. There are a lot of them, actually, if you start counting back. A lot of relationships are discovered, as you go, so it does pick up its momentum. I would say there's a romantic way out, which was from the book. I see the world a little bit more realistically. I love the ending of the book. It reminds me of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. I do think the drug world and the drug deals go on. We all have idealism. We think we're healthy and then, all of a sudden, one day, you have cancer. The truth has a mind of its own. I think the whole film is an argument for the love or not love between three people. I had to deal with my own conscience on it.
Do you have a fear about something really happening with the drug cartels, like what's shown in the film?
STONE: It's prophetic. I did go to Mexico and talk to a few people who are heavy down there. We had a DEA agent, and we had computer consultants. This is hypothetical fiction. This is not Traffic. Traffic is wonderful movie, but it's much more documentary-like. This is a hypothetical situation that hasn't happened yet, and it allows us to imagine. You can imagine the worst, but there has not been any major violence on this side of the border yet, except in Texas. There have been minor events so far, but nothing big has broken. It's in the interest of the Mexican cartels to keep it south because, if they start to move here, they're going to get a lot of bad publicity and there are going to be a lot of consequences.
They are here and they are growing. We know that. There's been buzz. We know that they have Indian land, and they may have deals here in California because the best laboratory in the world is now here. All of these possibilities exist, but quite frankly, from all my research, I couldn't find anything like this that had already happened. No one was talking about that. We do have an independent growers market here, which is like a boutique business, and they're very good people. They grow great stuff. It's the best I've ever had, in 40 years. It's like Wal-Mart coming to town. If that does happen, Wal-Mart will definitely be interested in making good product because they'll take the niche business and bring it up. Mexican weed is shit, as we say in the movie. They would be interested in growing better weed because there's money in it.
We don't know the answer yet, but right now I think it's hypothetical. Let's keep it that way. What was clear to me, when I was in Mexico, was the connection between the money and the political parties. There's too much money in Mexico. There's a huge amount, washing around, and they need to put the money in a legitimate economy. When you hear people say that one party will favor this cartel or that cartel, you get a picture of why Elena might be dead meat. She was losing her power.
In this movie, you have so many layers between the story and each character. As a filmmaker, how did you prioritize what had to be there and the amount of room you had to play?
STONE: We cut a lot. The book is 120 scenes and, in a movie, we had 30 scenes to play. We had to make decisions with the script. We made decisions in the editing. We had to consolidate so much. There were so many things that were different in the movie than the book. You have to read the book to understand that. But, the book definitely inspired me. Don Winslow did a great job of writing it. He knew that world and it really gave me the desire to make a movie about it. We have some good deleted scenes that you'll see one day that are fun, but they had to go. Benicio's home life was among them. And Uma Thurman was Blake's mom.
As far as how the actors see their roles versus how you see them, do you like that conversation with your actors?
STONE: I think it's good that every actor is the best advocate for his or her own character. They are the lawyer for their own defense. A good actor will be thinking, feeling and questioning, and Blake [Lively] was one of the most aggressive, in terms of questioning everything in the script. She was different than the concept in the book. She was more of a flower child than the girl who was more punk rock in the book. She always wanted to emphasize the heart and the hope that she had, and I liked what she did, very much. She's very elegant and sophisticated. She reminds me of a very smart Meryl Streep, at that age. She could go all the way. She's got the chops.
What led you to cast Salma Hayek to be the head of a drug cartel?
STONE: I had no choice. When you meet La Reina de la Sur, she's tough. Salma came from Mexico and she just propelled herself to Hollywood. I guess she didn't speak much English when she got here. I met her years ago, when I did U-Turn. The first time I met her, she said, "You son of a bitch! You didn't even see me for. You gave it to Jennifer Lopez!" I was stunned because I didn't know her. But, 15 years later, I went right to her. I said, "This is the one." I didn't even see another actress. I wanted Salma. I wrote her a note in Europe and just said, "You're the one!" When Universal said, "Is she tough enough?," I said, "Sweetheart, she's tough!" Now, Jennifer Lopez is going to come after me. She's got a heart in the movie, though. She has this strong, Latin fixation for family and, when she tells that story about her husband and children, I think she really puts her heart out there and transfers it to Blake while still being ruthless.
Do you think things can ever be resolved in the drug war?
STONE: There is no closure in the drug war. Unfortunately, the truth is that people do go scot-free and it's unfair. A lot of the top drug people who have been arrested are also free. There are deals made, all the time, and there's a lot of corruption that works both ways. By creating that false environment of a war on drugs, and cruel and unusual punishment with these crimes, 50% of our U.S. population is in jail without having hurt anybody, mostly for drugs. This is a tremendous inequality in our system, and it's been written about. The truth is really ugly, so if you make a movie where you romanticize the truth, you don't get your revenge on these kinds of things.
How concerned were you with avoiding some of the common stereotypes of drug trafficking stories? How did you take into consideration the different perceptions that audiences on both sides of the border might have about the film?
STONE: Well, we're going to Mexico, right after we open here. That'll be our first country, so we'll find out. I think people are fairly reasonable and understand the realities of the situation. We showed some of the cruelty, but we didn't show all of it because it's too rough. You have to deal with it, otherwise you're just sanitizing a situation that's gotten extreme. I've made several movies about drugs, including Scar Face. It's funny, when I did Scar Face, you would've thought that it was a cartoon, but so many of them acted like him. What I saw in Miami, with my own eyes, was larger than life. And, what I see in Mexico is larger than life. I've met quite a few of the growers here. We are seeing entertainment become politics and we're seeing people acting out in ways that are extremely violent and destabilizing. No rules apply. We're in an era of no rules now, it seems.


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February 07, 2012
Marinated eggplant and beluga lentils
9 comments:
Scrumptious! The kind of dish I could eat on a daily basis.ReplyDelete
Looks wonderful! A very healthy dishReplyDelete
I love egg plant so I must try this when they come back in season here. DianeReplyDelete
Just been to the fridge and pantry. Have each and every one of the ingredients and tomorrow's menu has suddenly been changed :D ! OK - had never heard of 'beluga lentils' but there are plenty of brown ones saying 'me, me, me!'. And the eggplant whispered it would be very happy to be in such a dish :D ! Tell you later . . .ReplyDelete
I am on such an eggplant kick too, just sliced some up to grill on the BBQ for dinner. Delicious! V jealous of you growing your own!ReplyDelete
Heidi xo
There's nothing like a hearty bowl of lentils. In fact, last week I posted a recipe for warm lentils with mozzarella di bufala. But, this recipe looks delicious - I'll have to try it once summertime rolls around and eggplant is back in season!ReplyDelete
Hi MARIA!ReplyDelete
I just came across your site and love your recipes! And, your photos are very beautiful too! I 'll be back soon!:) Anna
Eggplants are one of my most favourite vegetables in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD! I love having it with anything, baked, roasted... and most of all, in a good curry :)ReplyDelete
Oh, this looks so fantastic! I love your recipes Maria! Thank you for your beautiful inspiration:-) ~JulianeReplyDelete


text: Because it would be silly and confusing to name the sequel to Zack Snyder's 300, 301 or 300: 2, the follow-up has now been given the official title of 300: Rise of an Empire. Previously, the Noam Murro sequel/spin-off was titled 300: Battle of Artemisia, but perhaps that was too confusing and so we're now left with this generic title that continues the theme of recent movies (The Dark Knight Rises, Rise of the Guardians, etc). Deadline reports that the Legendary Pictures film will keep its release date of August 2nd, 2013 intact. 300: Rise of an Empire stars Eva Green, Rodrigo Santoro, Sullivan Stapleton and Andrew Tiernan in a story based off of a Frank Miller comic. Be sure to catch up with all of our previous coverage on the 300 spin-off here.


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I always felt that enterprise Java was a giant hairball. The more I learned the less I liked. Everything was wrong. Since I had a Jini job, and Jini I felt, was actually a well-designed technology, I didn't worry too much about the pathetic state of enterprise Java. Now though, I was waiting in line and I was going to choke down the Java EE Kool-aid regardless of how I felt about it. ... Most of this garbage is probably a result of a rush-to-market standardization (I use that term loosely) process. To some extent, the technology was born of fear, rushed to market to be the first to fill an obvious need. Regardless, the enterprise Java world was blessed with a number of forward-thinking open projects such as Spring, JBoss, and Hibernate. These efforts, I think, really drove improvements in the standards. I may be wrong, but from my outsider's view, developers, being so pragmatic, finally got sick and tired of the crap and started building the right stuff.His questions at the end of the article are enlightening, and worth considering:
How are organizations dealing with the turmoil of the rapidly changing enterprise computing landscape? There are so many options and choices. There are so many tools and frameworks, many of which don't seem to worry much about backward compatibility. Knowing how fast things are changing, what is the thought process for picking a suite of enterprise tools for constructing an application? Once the choices are made and the application is built, how do companies evolve? I've been bitten by this recently on my own small EE project. In a matter of a year, the component technologies have changed dramatically. Deprecation is rampant, backward compatibility is elusive, and the standards are changing. I understand the issue of technology migration in general but in this EE world, the depth and breadth of the problem seems so vast as to make it intractable for traditional approaches. As I interviewed for all the J2EE jobs I spoke of eariler, this theme seemed universal. All the companies were struggling to keep up. All the companies were in some form of entropic distress. None of them seemed to have an answer other than to throw more people and more expertise at their problem. Hire someone well-versed in the latest toolkits and TLAs and hope they are the hero that saves the day. Maybe my impressions are wrong. Maybe I'm trying to justify my ingrained prejudices toward enterprise Java. I don't know. But now that I've sipped the Kool-Aid, I'm beginning to wonder if I'm making a mistake. Ah heck! Look on the bright side: If nothing else, there's plenty of work to do! Gulp!


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He did last night. He touched 45 heads.
On Jimmy Kimmel live.
Oh Jimmy. I love you.
Did you watch? His teeth! They're so white!
So Jimmy has this competition where he faces off against his guest – who can touch the most heads in 30 seconds? Needless to say, Tom Cruise was very, very good at head touching.
Then he and Jimmy exchange gifts. The GMD gave Jimmy a Cadillac. Jimmy gave the GMD a tin of popcorn. He should be doing more of this, see? Especially more interviews with Guillermo.
Rusty Business!
Tom Cruise touches heads
Guillermo and Tom Cruise Part 1
Guillermo and Tom Cruise Part 2


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Those who've seen the Matt Dillon-Neve Campbell-Denise Richards film Wild Things no doubt remember one thing about it: The scene involving Matt Dillon, Neve Campbell, Denise Richards, and their activities in a Florida motel room. But those with particularly good memories may recall something else about it: The movie relied upon a dizzying number of double-, triple-, and quadruple-crosses—so many that it was tempting, when the final credits began to roll, to conclude that the movie had been utterly arbitrary, that there was no way for the characters to have planned so perfectly and kept so many competing agendas straight in their heads. But that's when the movie did something utterly ingenious: During the final credits, it rolled a handful of scenes that filled in all the gaps in the movie, showing the characters' secret behind-the-scenes plottings. And what do you know: When you fit them into the movie's plot, the whole thing was perfectly logical.
Sadly, few screenwriters are kind enough to provide these scenes, which are a crucial way of testing how plausible any movie's plot twists are. Luckily, as a service to moviegoers, Slate's "Plot Holes" department has offered to take a current film with plot points that may be confusing or obscure and supply the necessary scenes to make them crystal clear. Let's examine the Morgan Freeman thriller Along Came a Spider. Critics have charged that the film contains a plot twist two-thirds of the way that defies any rational explanation. "A few loopholes I can forgive," wrote Roger Ebert. "But when a plot is riddled with them, crippled by them, made implausible by them … I get distracted." The Los Angeles Times' Kenneth Turan wrote that "[T]he film's coincidences and implausibilities periodically threaten to spin it out of control. …" Could anything have been done to make the movie work? As it turns out, the answer is yes. As the following missing scene shows, it takes only a page or two of dialogue to show that every one of the film's plot twists makes perfect sense.
(Spoiler Alert: You may wish to stop reading here if you plan to see the movie.)
The scene is set two years before the main action of the film, in the guard house of the Cathedral School, an elite private academy in Washington, D.C. The players are JEZZIE FLANAGAN (Monica Potter) and BEN DEVINE (Billy Burke), both of whom work as Secret Service agents guarding the school's students.
INT: Jezzie and Ben, talking
Say, have you noticed anything odd about that computer teacher, Mr. Soneji?
Like what, Jezzie?
Like the fact that his face would appear to be a patently obvious latex mask, devised by a Hollywood makeup artist.
Oh, right, that.
Well, listen. I've done some research into Mr. Soneji, and I've come to a conclusion: He's going to try to kidnap Megan Rose.
Whoa, really?
Yep. And I've had an idea: What if we let him kidnap the girl, and then kidnap her from his lair, and then pretend to be him—using the same voice-distortion device that he uses—and then demand a ransom? No one would ever suspect us! The investigators would nab Soneji, and we'd get away with the money! And I can work with the lead investigator on the case, thereby throwing him off the scent! I'm certain he'll be the sort of lone-wolf investigator who'd never bother working closely with the law enforcement authorities to discover any holes in my story. And finally, once we've got the money, I can arrange things in just such a way that Soneji comes after me, necessitating his execution and allowing us to get off scot-free!
Man, Jezzie, that's one seriously complex plan.
Yeah. I stayed up all night working on it. In fact, I even created a nifty graphics program that outlines most of the major points in it. I've saved it on the hard drive of my computer. Pretty much, if you boot up my home computer—BAM! There are my plans, laid out for you to unravel in a matter of seconds. Like most criminal masterminds, I like to store stuff like that on my hard drive.
Do you think that's such a good idea?
Oh, it'll be fine. It's password-protected with a phrase that's nearly impossible to guess, unless you're some sort of supergenius psychiatrist-detective and I happen to have mentioned that phrase and how very, very, very important it is to me. But what are the odds of that ever happening?
Yeah, I suppose you're right. But there are still some things I'm unclear on: How do you know that Soneji's not simply going to kill the girl? And how do you know what sort of voice-distortion device Soneji will be using? And how are we going to manage to kidnap a child from the kidnapper? I mean, won't he hide her, and safeguard her, in order to prevent rescuers from getting to her? Like, what if he hides her on a boat? How will we manage to sneak in and take her from him?
Oh Ben, I was hoping not to have to tell you this: I'm actually secretly a brilliant criminal witch with magical powers of deduction and foresight. And I can fly, look!
[JEZZIE suddenly zips about the room at lightning speed.]
As this missing scene demonstrates, critics who find the film's plot twists implausible are merely being churlish and overlooking the rather obvious psychic-witchlike capacities of the film's villain. For shame, Mr. Ebert! For shame!


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Matthew Ritchie speaks to Michael Dowse about his follow-up to Goon, romantic comedy The F Word which premieres at Toronto.
Coming off the success of the Golden Box Office Award-winning hockey comedy Goon, Canadian filmmaker Michael Dowse was ready for a change.
So when he got word that screenwriter Elan Mastai's film adaptation of the popular T.J. Dawe and Michael Rinaldi play Toothpaste and Cigars had left Fox Searchlight, he jumped at the chance to help bring it north of the border.
Retitled The F Word, the romantic-comedy tells the story of a young twenty-something (Daniel Radcliffe) who falls for a girl (Zoe Kazan) at a party, only to discover she's in a serious relationship.
The film, which has its world premiere at TIFF today, is being sold by eOne (international) and UTA (US). eOne has Canadian rights.
What made you decide to film a romantic comedy after Goon?
It's kind of a reaction, actually. Goon was a very confident, sort of in-your-face violent movie and I wanted to do something completely different as a director. I obviously wanted to keep it close to what I'm comfortable doing in terms of comedy, but I wanted to try and tap into a different side of emotion. That was a challenge. I also wanted to make something that was a little bit quieter of a film.
Why did you cast Daniel Radcliffe as the lead?
I met with him and really liked his sense of humour. With the character, it's a tough thing to cast and you don't want somebody that is such an obvious choice for the lead, because then you can kind of lose the tension of the movie. I thought Dan just had such a great sense of humour and was the kind of person that people could get behind and root for. He's just such a great person and that really shines through in the comedy.
What do you think it is about the storyline that really connects with people?
I think so many people can relate to being the friend. I think it's a common story where a lot of women have been in one of those situations where they have a guy who they become close with who isn't their significant other and they question it. And I think every guy has been in that situation where they harbor feelings for a girl who they're quote-unquote "friends" with.
Everybody can relate to that situation and I think it's a very simple but powerful love story that everybody understands.
How do you think premiering at TIFF helps Canadian films in the long run?
It's just the place to sell it as a Canadian film. If you have a good film, it provides you with the platform to sell it, and no other festival in the world provides that same platform. The crowds are fantastic and they couldn't be more supportive. So in terms of tipping the scale in your favour as a filmmaker or producer, Toronto is just fantastic for that because you get the home crowd advantage. That's everything.


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(AP) -- Prosecutors say they're charging a Stockton man with triple-murder in the deaths of a woman taken hostage during a bank robbery and police shootout that killed two other robbery suspects.
Ron Freitas of the San Joaquin County District Attorney's Office said the charges being filed Monday make 19-year-old Jaime Ramos eligible for a death sentence.
Freitas says the charged may include 22 counts of attempted murder of police officers stemming from last week's running gun battle.
Police say that on Wednesday three armed men entered the bank branch and took three women hostage. Two women survived with injuries, but a 41-year-old mother of two, Misty Holt-Singh, was used as a human shield and died.
Ramos is the sole surviving suspect. It is unclear if he has an attorney.
Meanwhile, police say they've confirmed that one of the robbery suspects who died last week was among those suspected in an earlier heist at the same bank branch.
Officer Joe Silva said Sunday that investigators are confident that 27-year-old Alex Gregory Martinez, who died Wednesday in a shootout that also killed a hostage, had been among those who robbed the Bank of the West on Jan. 31.
Silva says detectives linked Martinez to the two robberies by reviewing surveillance video, interviewing witnesses of the robberies and the similar circumstances.
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MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) —Vermont anglers will have some opportunities for year-round fishing in some of the state's lakes, ponds and rivers after the new year.
The Vermont Department of Fish and Wildlife says the 11 new river sections will have catch-and-release trout fishing with artificial flies or lures outside of the normal trout fishing season, opening more than 70 miles of river to year-round trout fishing.
In addition open water catch-and-release bass fishing will be possible for all lakes, ponds and reservoirs not listed as "seasonally closed waters." The rule does not apply to ice fishing.
Fish and Wildlife Commissioner Patrick Berry says the new fishing regulations will greatly expand angling opportunities and help promote open-water fishing.
Details of the new regulations are available on the department's website.As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.


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A mentor of mine, the individual who turned me on to Python, has passed on. The whole deal was a bit sudden and really gave me pause. What I'll try to do here is briefly summarize Larry's body of work, and put it in perspective with regard to software development and domain specific software. Although his efforts won't see headlines in either mining circles or software ones, what he did was pretty amazing.
Larry worked for Mintec, a mine software vendor, from 1990 on. His specialty and his passion were Ore Control, the place where mine operations and engineering come together, the place, figuratively speaking, where the rubber meets the road. This part of the mining process, in my opinion, was often the bastard child of most upper management. My impression was that at the time Larry began his career at Mintec not all, but many management types had the idea that if you just planned the mine right and threw a bunch of grunts into the pit with some equipment, everything would magically happen. Tactical execution and measurement of that process are important. Larry was one of the people who recognized this immediately and did something about it. He championed until his death the idea that Ore Control and short range planning were information intensive parts of the mining process that demanded an operational database and a programming API that allowed for dynamic process configuration.
Around the year 2000, Mintec released a planning database and a Python API. Larry was very much a software implementer at the time and not a developer. Nonetheless, his input was an important part of the feedback loop within the relatively small mine software company. He told me that they had been looking at Lua as an API. It did not particularly work for him and they settled on Python instead. By comparison, I've heard that one of the other software mining companies uses Perl for its API, and another one VBA. I'm biased, but I think that for ease of learning for the customer and internal productivity, Mintec made the right choice. They started out with Python 2.1, then, along with some changes to the API, switched to Python 2.2. Today we are using Python 2.5.
As a programmer, Larry was mixed. He was a miner first, and anything that got in the way of his goal was a mere distraction. His code was clean, but seldom bulletproof. I would call him an offensive programmer, the opposite of a defensive one. He was an upbeat optimist. I was and am a somewhat morose pessimist. Much to the entertainment of those working around us, we would argue about code. The Larryism that caused me the most heartburn was the variable declared inside a conditional block (Python is a dynamic language that allows you to do that) that under a corner case didn't get executed.
Larry: Well if your data were squared away it would work!
The crown achievement of Larry's Mintec career, in my estimation, was not so much his code, but his driving through of the whole MineSight Operations package, basically the Ore Control software I described above, internal to Mintec and within the mining industry. I saw things from the client side where Larry was the vendor and I represented the mining company. I can attest to the blood, sweat, and tears involved. Spending weeks away from your family doing an implementation in a decidedly unergonomic, dusty mine office and debugging software over the phone on Christmas Day are things you can't pay someone enough to do. Larry was a true believer in his product and did what was necessary to make it happen.
Ironically, Larry was promoted to Project Manager for MineSight Operations about eight months before his death. He had arrived after all that hard work. I would tease him about spending his time in a corner office with the head of the company smoking cigars and sipping scotch. He laughed. The guy never stopped working. He was very much a type A personality. The corporate life would have been easier on him and his family. I don't know how well he would have liked it long term. He loved to be in the thick of things, fixing things, making things work beautifully.
The main lesson I can glean from Larry's life is that if you want to do something significant, liking what you do is not enough. You have to care intensely and passionately about what you're doing. He was one hell of an individual.


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India's PM has wasted no time pursuing a new maritime doctrine in the Indian Ocean and beyond.
By Patrick M. Cronin and Darshana M. Baruah
December 02, 2014
The Modi Doctrine for the Indo-Pacific Maritime RegionOnly six months into his tenure, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is breathing new life into the concept of Indo-Pacific security. Indeed, it is not too early to describe the key elements of an emerging "Modi Doctrine" focused on the vigorous pursuit of political influence through greater maritime power. Acutely aware that India's development is best advanced across the sea lanes of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the prime minister is embarking on a course of intensified engagement with other regional maritime powers.
The Modi Doctrine for the Indo-Pacific Maritime Region
India's PM has wasted no time pursuing a new maritime doctrine in the Indian Ocean and beyond.
View on thediplomat.com
Preview by Yahoo
If the Modi Doctrine persists, then about a quarter century of "looking East" is truly set to be followed by a long-term period of "acting East." Heightened security cooperation with Japan, Australia, and the United States are three prime indicators of the new doctrine. Strengthening existing security ties with Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and deepening cooperation with islands in the Pacific and the Indian Ocean are other factors underpinning this doctrine.
Eighty-eight months ago, in August 2007, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe underscored the rising significance and linkages between the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Abe told the Indian Parliament that the rising "confluence of the two seas" would draw together Asia's two wealthiest democracies. Three months ago, while visiting Abe in Tokyo, Prime Minister Modi took steps to operationalize a "special strategic global partnership." He talked of "vikas vaad" (peaceful development) and "vistar vaad" (expansionism) characteristics of nations in the 21st century, noting that nations engaging in vikas vaad lead to development. In perhaps a thinly veiled reference to China's maritime coercion he pointed out that some countries are still stuck in the "18th century" mindset, engaging in "encroachments" of other's territory.
Burgeoning Indian-Japanese security cooperation is one reason to believe that the Look East policy is genuinely now the Act East policy. The two countries are now fully committed to the joint production of a large, four-engine amphibious aircraft, the ShinMaywa US-2. This is critical departure for both countries. For Japan, the US-2 would mark the first major sale of military hardware overseas since the end of the Second World War. In fact, Japan is reportedly mulling over a new government-financing agency to ensure that money does not hold back the implementation of its recently relaxed export guidelines.
Meanwhile, for India, joint production will diversify and boost India's defense industry, while also adding significant maritime domain awareness and response capacity. Up to 18 short-takeoff-and-landing planes will help patrol a 7,500-kilometer coastline and deliver troops to the Andaman Islands in the Bay of Bengal, the Nicobar Islands in the eastern Indian Ocean, and the Lakshwadeep Islands off the southwest coast.
Modi is also taking a less cautious and more self-confident approach to security relations with Australia. Operationalizing what amounts to a thickening network of intra-Asian security ties, Modi and Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott have announced a new framework for enhanced security cooperation. Addressing the Parliament in Canberra last month, Modi called for doubling down on maritime cooperation. He said that Australia and India share "a natural partnership," are both dependent on the oceans as "lifelines," and harbor growing concern about "access and security."
Maritime security and cooperation are nothing new for these two countries with access to the Indian Ocean. Last February, Australia was one of 17 navies participating in the 20-year-old Milan naval exercises off the Andaman Islands. But seven years have passed since India and Australia conducted bilateral naval maneuvers as part of the annual Malabar exercise featuring the United States and India. During the first visit to Australia by an Indian prime minister in nearly 30 years (Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi visited in 1986), the two leaders pledged to rectify the lapse in bilateral naval cooperation both in the form of more frequent exercises but also closer policy coordination. Modi and Abbott also suggested greater support for regional capacity building among smaller island nations, from Maldives, Mauritius and Seychelles in the Indian Ocean, to Fiji and other South Pacific islands. It helps that Australia is currently chairing both the Indian Ocean Naval Symposium (IONS) and the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA).
Modi's evolving doctrine in the Indo-Pacific is also being largely encouraged by regional institutions seeking a greater security role from New Delhi. In the east, the rhetoric has been that India so far has failed to play its role of a security provider in the region. However, with the new government under Narendra Modi, there appears to be a significant shift in Delhi's attitude and willingness to collaborate with regional players in the security domain. Apart from ASEAN, countries from the Indian Ocean Rim Association grouping, too, are looking at India to shoulder more of the traditional and non-traditional security responsibilities of the region and take on more of a leadership role. In this regard, India also recently held the first Indian Ocean Dialogue under the realm of IORA at the port city of Cochin in the Arabian Sea.
Meanwhile, Modi has also revived U.S.-Indian relations. After a successful visit to the United States two months ago, he will host U.S. President Barack Obama as a special guest for Indian Republic Day on January 26, marking the 55th anniversary since the signing of the Indian Constitution. Bilateral relations have come a long way since the end of the Cold War, when India first announced its Look East policy, but often the vision of close relations has faltered from inflated expectations. This time around, there is reason to believe the bilateral vision is more firmly rooted in realistic national interests of both countries. Officials are optimistic that the relationship can include co-development and co-production of defense projects, something that would provide the bilateral relationship with serious ballast.
Basing the Indo-American relationship on a clear understanding of India's own goals is at the heart of recommendations made in an important forthcoming RAND study, Look East, Cross Black Waters, by Jonah Blank, Jennifer D. P. Moroney, Angel Rabasa, and Bonny Lin. The authors focus on practical areas of cooperation, including building up greater support in humanitarian assistance and disaster relief and cooperation over the Andaman and Nicobar Islands west of the Strait of Malacca. Those areas are priorities for the Modi government, too. With an eye toward growing maritime interests across the Indo-Pacific, in 2001 India created the joint Andaman and Nicobar Command. The Andaman and Nicobar Command is the country's only tri-service command rotating between the Army, Navy and the Air force. That command now includes 15 ships, two Navy sea bases, four air force and naval air bases and an army brigade.
Although neglected for far too long, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands have been a crucial factor in India's maritime strategy. Its strategic location in the Indian Ocean puts India at an advantageous position in the changing geopolitics of the region. Known as India's strategic outpost, the islands are central to India's engagements with regional navies and can emerge as the focal point of New Delhi's evolving Indo-Pacific doctrine.
India's strategic community and defense forces alike have called for strengthening the Andaman and Nicobar islands to realize its potential to serve as the center for capacity building and knowledge sharing on issues across the Indian Ocean. Former Indian ambassador Hemant Krishan Singh has advocated developing the Andaman and Nicobar Islands as a "regional hub" for the East Asia Summit and the ASEAN Defense Ministers Meeting plus initiatives on maritime security and HADR cooperation. With support from regional players such as Japan and the United States, the islands can emerge as a strong focal point for addressing issues in the Indo-Pacific. It is more pertinent than ever for India to look toward its untapped, strategically located islands.
The "Modi Doctrine" also reflects a significant China factor. Strengthening ties with Colombo and other islands in the Indian Ocean and vigorously pursuing the Maritime Silk Road initiative underlines Beijing's expanding presence in the Indian Ocean. The docking of Chinese submarines in Sri Lankan ports is highly contentious, a concern New Delhi has voiced without any hesitation. At the 2014 "Galle Dialogue" in Sri Lanka, Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval emphasized the need to keep the Indian Ocean a zone of peace in order to maintain stability in the region. Reflecting on India's concerns over the Chinese submarines in the islands, he called on "great powers not to allow escalation and expansion of military presence in the Indian Ocean."
New Delhi is realizing the need to play a prominent role in the regional security architecture and Modi's Indo-Pacific doctrine seems to be shaping the discourse precisely. India is showing a strong interest under Modi in diversifying India's arms suppliers while at the same time bolstering India's indigenous defense industry. The month after Modi took office, the United States supplemented previous missile sales to India by announcing that it would deliver Harpoon missiles to be deployed on India's four active but aging Shishumar class diesel-electric submarines. With the Pentagon looking at expanding its arms cooperation with more allies and partners, it will be interesting to see whether the president's visit in late January opens up new promises of defense industrial cooperation.
India is also enhancing its role with ASEAN, with which India plans to have $100 billion in two-way trade by the end of 2015 and double that in 2020. In defense, during a visit to Vietnam in late October, Modi announced that India will quickly implement a $100 million defense credit line to Vietnam, which would enable Hanoi to acquire four offshore naval patrol vessels to improve Vietnam's surveillance and maritime domain awareness. The prime minister has also been voicing India's concerns over the tensions in the South China Sea. While India has always maintained that freedom of navigation through international waters is crucial, New Delhi usually refrains from making a direct comment on disputes outside of its territories. What is of significance is Modi's choice of platforms in bringing up the issue. He first mentioned it in his joint statement with Obama, then with his Vietnamese counterpart during his trip to Vietnam and at his maiden presence at the East Asia Summit and the India-ASEAN summit in 2014. His call for a binding Code of Conduct in the South China Sea reflected a willingness to assure India's friends and key players in the region that India may finally be ready to take on the role of a security provider that the region demands. Although it appears that India is quickly shedding its "nonalignment" policy, it is unlikely that India will venture far out of its principles on alliances with other nations, especially in the security domain. The Indian Navy was auspiciously completing its annual Singapore-Indian maritime Bilateral Exercise (SIMBEX) when Modi assumed office in late May, and the decade-old strategic partnership with Indonesia would seem likely to take off now that Indonesia's new leader, President Joko Widodo is similarly embarked on a maritime strategy.
In addition to stronger security relations with Japan, Australia, the United States, and ASEAN, India is signaling a desire to play a more active role in the geographically important island nations of the region, especially in the South Pacific.
Significantly, after leaving Australia, Modi made a rare visit to Fiji. The coup-afflicted island country of about 850,000 hosted Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in 1981, at a time when the treatment of ethnic Indians was a growing concern. But consecutive visits by Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping last month attest to the fact that Fiji is no longer removed from mounting geopolitical competition.
Delhi has watched China intensify relations with Fiji. Although China and Fiji will mark 40 years of diplomatic relations next year, China only established an embassy in Suva in 2001. Since seizing power in 2006 and then shedding his uniform to win office via the ballot box, former Commodore and now Prime Minister "Frank" Bainimarama has brought Fiji into closer economic and security alignment with China. That trend allowed Xi to proclaim "a natural kinship" with the island late last month. More tangibly, China signed five Memorandum of Understandings with Fiji and agreed to inject some $11.4 million of aid into Fiji, which is almost midway between Chinese seaports and Lima, Peru.
If Fiji has played the China card, China is playing the South Pacific card. In August, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) hospital ship Peace Ark made a goodwill visit to Fiji and four other South Pacific nations. While in Suva, Xi met with 7 of 12 Pacific Island nation leaders whose geography affords useful vantage points for gathering intelligence and monitoring space activity. It turns out Pacific islands are well located to keep taps on U.S. military operations in Guam and the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands. And much of the competition is in cyber and outer space, making critical underwater fiber optic cables more important, as well as the need for tracking outer space activity.
India cannot match China's largesse, but even so Modi announced a new $1 million adaptation fund to provide technical assistance, a $75 million credit line for Fiji, an increase in funding for island communities, visa on arrival for the island nations, and a Pan Pacific Islands Project to support telemedicine and online education.
But for all these bilateral and multilateral maritime moves, India is heavily focused on strengthening its own capacity for maritime security. Long a global hub of information technology, India now appears intent on leveraging its IT prowess for strategic and operational maritime security.
India recently switched on operations of a Very Low Frequency (VLF) transmitting station at the Indian Naval Station Kattaboman in Tamil Nadu off the southern tip of India. The VLF transmitter enables more secure fleet communications, especially with Indian submarines. Although India currently operates only a single nuclear submarine leased from Russia, it is preparing to commission an indigenously developed, 6,000 ton nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine some time in 2015. India is expected to build at least three Arihant-class boats, which may carry K-4 submarine-launched ballistic missiles with a range of about 2,200 miles.
The recent sixth anniversary of the "26/11" Mumbai terror attacks, which involved terrorists hijacking an Indian fishing boat to infiltrate the major port city in western India, was remembered with a major exercise involving 30 ships submarines and craft of the Indian Navy, Indian Air Force, and Coast Guard, as well as various civilian agencies. But more striking still was the inauguration of an Information Management and Analysis Center (IMAC) at Gurgaon for tracking ships in India's territorial waters and throughout the Indian Ocean.
The IMAC is a maritime intelligence fusion facility, involving not just the Navy and the Coast Guard but also coastal states and other governmental agencies, where data from coastal, air, and space surveillance systems will be persistently monitored and prominently displayed on huge screens. Tens of thousands of platforms can be tracked every day, and the IMAC is apparently set to become under Modi a hub of India's larger National Command Control Communication and Intelligence Network. In announcing the IMAC on the November 26 anniversary, Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar said India must have "zero tolerance" for terrorist attacks; but at the same time the ambitious maritime domain awareness system made clear Modi's interest in flexing India's regional maritime muscle.
One of India's top strategic thinkers, Dr. C. Raja Mohan, a Distinguished Fellow and Head of Strategic Studies at the Observer Research Foundation, explained the essence of Modi's strategic thinking at a recent conference we attended in New Delhi. The prime minister is ready to return India to its natural sphere of influence and become the next security provider in the Indo-Pacific region, Dr. Mohan argues. Now that roughly half of India's economy is tied to global markets, India's seaward expansion is logical and inexorable. India has never been as dependent on maritime security as it is today and is likely to become tomorrow. While nuclear deterrence prevents major interstate war on land, India's future hinges on exploiting free seas and the ability to shape the balance of power hinges on the Indian Navy. In short, contends Mohan, the Modi Doctrine, if there is one, is to pursue strategic influence — through a growing maritime orientation, shaping the Indo-Pacific regional balance of power, reclaiming a lost sphere of influence, and becoming an active participant in regional institutions.
Strategic patience is always prudent in forecasting the rise of India. Yet the present momentum behind Modi and his embryonic maritime doctrine for the Indo-Pacific region appears to be gaining steam.
There are, however, major challenges that have to be met in order to keep up with Modi's diplomatic pace. While it is easy to declare that India's "Look East" policy is now "Act East," implementation and coordination of the same within India's diplomatic levels is a major challenge. For India to establish its credibility and project its new maritime doctrine, the prime minister will have to ensure that his ministries deliver on his policies. There is definitely a greater political will within this government to play a more active security role in the region, which is being pursued through engagements and collaborations with key players. Modi should now look toward forging multilateral engagements in region with countries such as Japan, Indonesia, Australia and the U.S.
Former U.S. Secretary of State John Jay wrote in 1900 that the Mediterranean Ocean was the ocean of the past, the Atlantic Ocean the ocean of the present, and the Pacific Ocean the ocean of the future. If Modi's self-confident new policy has its intended impact, then Jay's prophetic pronouncement will need to be amended to reflect the growing power across the Indo-Pacific Oceans.
Dr. Patrick M. Cronin is Senior Director of the Asia-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security in Washington, D.C. Darshana M. Baruah is Junior Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi.


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ACC Team Preview: Georgia Tech Yellow JacketsPosted by Chris Kehoe on October 31st, 2013
Head coach Brian Gregory has a young team on the upswing in this year's ACC. However, this Georgia Tech team is still too inexperienced and without enough depth to move far from the lower third of the league. The program has had its fair share of star power over the last few years, with Derrick Favors, Iman Shumpert and Gani Lawal making the jump to the NBA. Unfortunately Tech has not quite been up to its usual standards as of late, a far cry from the 2003-04 powerhouse squad that romped its way to the national title game. Last season the Yellow Jackets were one game above .500 overall and went a relatively dismal 6-12 in conference play. They lost two starters at the guard position to graduation, but will likely be poised to be better this season thanks to the development of their duo of star freshmen and inclusion of seasoned transfer Trae Golden. Losing senior stalwart Mfon Udofia will not be easy, but he never quite played up to his high school scouting reports as a top-35 recruit and a top-10 point guard. Golden, a transfer from Tennessee, should be more than capable filling in for Udofia at the position.
Georgia Tech began last season in ACC play with an 0-5 start, struggling in shooting the basketball both from two-point range and the line, finishing last in the ACC in both. This year's team will revolve around how effectively their four best players perform. Sophomores Robert Carter, Jr. and Marcus Georges-Hunt will likely be the focal points, with Golden feeding them the ball early and often. Georges-Hunt is a slashing wing who is adept at finishing at the rim and not turning the ball over. The team's leading scorer as a freshman, expect big strides from him this season. Carter Jr., on the other hand, is an interior bruiser with a soft touch who averaged close to a double-double and will only continue to grow in his second season. Matched inside with senior center Daniel Miller, Gregory will have one of the ACC's more versatile and tough interior combinations. In terms of newcomers, none of the freshmen are expected to start this season, but highlighted arrivals include 6'8" forward Quinton Stephens and New Hampton prep school product Travis Jorgenson. Off the bench expect athletic scorer Jason Morris to provide a needed punch in the second unit with his slashing and high-flying escapades. Backup point guard Solomon Poole should continue his career reserve duties, this time backing up Golden instead of Udofia.


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There was a lot of initial fan outrage that Timur Bekmambetov's movie version of Mark Millar's "If supervillains ruled the world" comic Wanted ditches the costumes, superpowers and even plot of its source material. But early reviews of the movie seem to suggest that the comic's biggest selling point - that it's a fun, dumb actioneer with pretentions to depth - still remains, but now has added gun porn, jokes and Matrix effects, to boot.
Over at Comic Book Resources, the official (or so it claims, anyway) first review of the movie starts by letting comic fans know what not to expect from the upcoming Angelina Jolie/James McAvoy movie:
For those familiar with Mark Millar and JG Jones' comic, you're going to see it very accurately reflected for about twenty minutes, before the film then goes on its own wild ride, though with a few snags and bulletholes from the original. It ditched the supervillains, it ditches the "bad guys won," it ditches the celebration of amorality of the lead. But for all the themes and dubious morality it ditches, it grows its own.
This is apparently what happens when the movie writers hadn't read the end of the comic before writing the script. Not that the movie seems to suffer from straying so far from what the faithful would've expected:
[W]hat's most gorgeous about "Wanted" is the tone. The language, the visuals, the effects, have their tongue so far in cheek it triggers the gag reflex (in a good way). The film spends huge amounts of money, time and effort telling basic jokes. But they're far funnier as a result and fuel this rollercoaster of a ride with an energy lacking in the dour Wachowski movies. This is an adult superhero comedy masquerading as an action flick. It's fresh, it's fast, it's funny and it's one hell of a surprise. It really sells the whole "mundanity vs madness" theme running through the film, from the cascading cereal packets to the bizarre camera-mounted handguns.
Over on British site Entertainment Wise, they're in agreement with some of the above, at least:
[T]here's a lot of fun to be had here - no shocks, but a lot of big bangs, blood spurting and some genuinely funny gags... Wanted is a great ride - bullets, babes, and tonnes of wish fulfilment for the frustrated male 9-to-fiver. However, it takes itself far too seriously, especially given its very silly script (again, we point you to the 'shoot the fly' scene). Great fun for a Saturday night, or for a slow weeknight when it's out on DVD, but not the action movie reinvention that the brilliant trailers promised.
The movie gets released on June 27th, meaning that there are still 10 days for critics to announce that the movie glorifies violence and is a threat to society.
Wanted - The First Review [Comic Book Resources]
Wanted [Entertainment Wise]


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Welcome to the Veteran Student Success Center
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You served our nation ... now let us serve you! The Citadel proudly offers veterans the opportunity to complete or advance their education in an environment that understands and appreciates military service. We are ranked by U.S. News & World Report (2019) as the No. 1 College for Veterans in the South.
We are here to assist those whose lives are connected to the military, as they transition and learn to navigate through the college experience. We recognize and honor their sacrifices and value their life experiences as they broaden the diversity of the staff, faculty and student body.
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J.G. Dawes first appeared in Pine River around the end of 1898 or early 1899. He was a flour salesman and had come to Pine River to make a deal with George Barclay.
Jefferson G. Dawes would make a big impact on Pine River. At the request of Grace, George's daughter, he was going to be involved in the Grand Jury proceedings for George's death. He would be the major of Pine River and he would marry Amarilla.
J.G. was born on 7 March 1847 in New York. Tracking him from that date to 1898 reveals nothing in the Minnesota census nor the U.S. Federal. Single men are hard to trace. His parents were James Daws and Mary Ann [Sooderhaus]. I will share more about J.G. in a future post.
Looking at his photograph, I think that J.G. must have been the kind of person that you would notice.


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Wednesday, July 08, 2009
UNCLE. U N C L E. UNCLE UNCLE UNCLE UNCLE. Loud and clear. Uncle.
I no longer wish to train for a bodybuilding competition and ultra marathons simultaneously. I am not sure that both can not be done simultaneously, but for me, I am no longer experimenting with that goal. I am choosing to no longer train for both a bodybuilding competition and ultra running.
As I look back on the changes I have made since beginning this journey in December I wonder how it all began? Couldn't I just lift a few times a week without deciding I should try a show? I has happily building a bit of muscle and maintain it as I was running 100 mile weeks. I guess that would be like me running a few miles a day without deciding I should run a 100! Ha, that would just not be Me.
I learned so much about myself. I learned that I am driven by goals. I love to set a goal and reach a goal, to come short of a goal, learn from the experience and try again. Sure, I love to just run a five mile route with Topaz each day..but I do love to see progress in my times, in my races, just as I like to see progress in other areas of my life as well. I won't get too deep here into those other areas such as mental, spiritual, etc. at this time. Running is physical, mental, spiritual, cleansing, meditative and joyful. That will be another post.
I learned that it is very difficult for me to train for two disciplines that seem at such odds with one another. When I first realized I was having difficulty running long and gaining muscle I went to the forum boards at Precision Nutrition and asked if there were any ultra runners training for a body comp and if anyone felt I could train for both and be successful with both. You can probably guess what the responses were. No no and no. I wouldn't give up quite so easily. I still tried to do both and was able to for a few months. I have built a few pounds of muscle and dropped fat but it has been plenty difficult to do.
I think that after injuring myself at McNaughton it was a bit easier for me to go the bodybuilding route..I never thought I would actually think of bodybuilding first and ultra running as a second, but I did for a while. Then Topaz became sick and couldn't run with me so it was even easier for me to delve deeper into bodybuilding.
As I began to run less I noticed I wasn't as happy. I didn't feel joy as much as I usually did, I felt antsy, like I had all of this time and what should I do with it; I would think about a race and then poo poo it, telling myself I was moving on. I think I was becoming a bit depressed. Not only the lack of endorphins, but more than that. I didn't have goals to reach for weekly, monthly, summer wasn't filled with a morning run with Topaz, an afternoon roller blade with the boys, a night track session or run around the lake during baseball practice, a few weight workouts. I am used to training 2 or more sessions a day. Lifting 45-60 minutes a day with a 20 minute 'cardio session' really was not doing it for me.
I wanted to feel as I do when I spend a day at the ski hill, repeat after repeat..the feeling from a hard track workout, a 25 mile training run..the feelings of joy, of being in the moment, of working hard and feeling pretty darn proud of myself for getting in the hard work.
A few weeks ago when Alicia asked me to join her at Afton for a midnight run I at first thought no, not in my training scheme. I kept thinking about it. I told Steve that they were meeting at midnight and I'd like to go but I probably shouldn't. He looked at me like I had a third eye. Why not? We don't have anything going on, do we? Yeah, like we have something going on midnight on a Friday night. Not. Troy had a baseball game that would be finished at 9, it was perfect timing for me. I would be back home before they even awoke. I told him about the bodybuilding and that hours on the trail wasn't conducive to this. He couldn't believe it. Julie. This is what you love to do. Do what you love to do. I did. I loved it. I missed it. I missed running. I missed moving my body forward, breathing heavily, feeling joy in the moment, laughing, I missed my friends.
As Kevin and I were running down the trail, in the deep woods, in the dark, I said it. I said it and I yelled it over and over. UNCLE. UNCLE.UNCLE.UNCLE.
I am an ultra runner. I love to run. Running gives me such joy, it has become a part of my life, a good part of my life and I now know how much it means to me. I now know how much I missed it and I will miss it no longer.
I know some will say 'oh, so you need running to be happy, how sad.' Well, I have no answer to that. All I know is yes, I love to run and yes, it does make me happy, it makes my soul happy.
9 comments:
i am glad you are not giving up running! to be perfectly honest though i was hoping you would prove them all wrong! :) i figured if anyone could you could. i guess that means that if you couldn't then indeed it can't be done!! i don't think i could give up running for body building either. i have always wanted big muscles too, but if it meant i had to part with running...i wouldn't do it either. even though i swore off anything over a 50k and don't do hundreds (one was enough) what running i do do makes me happy too. some people just don't get that, but those are usually the type that choose food and tv for comfort.
- Steve said...
Welcome back, Julie! So glad to hear you aren't going to give up ultra running. You've been such a great inspiration to runners, myself included. Have a great time this weekend up at the SHT!!! Wish I was going, but I'll have to settle for a nice long and cost-free run at Afton.
- Londell said...
Some people need to smoke, some need to drink, some neat to cheat in a relationship, some need the thrill of crime, some race cars, etc to find happiness... You have one of the better, healthier things in life to make you happy. Kudo's and continue to enjoy life..
- Matthew Patten said...
I fear a new JB on the horizon.
Hell hath no fury like a motivated Julie Berg.
The crowd outside of the ultra community will not understand, but they didn't understand to begin with.
I get it.
- Helen said...
Yeah - Julie's BACK!!!!
I for one absolutely NEED running to be happy and I think that is perfectly OK. Actually, it's more than that... it's a GREAT thing. Heck, when you know what makes you happy you can never be unhappy, right?! Well, until we get injured... but even with your 'low' level strength training that won't be you!
Looking forward to a fun weekend up north.
Julie, I love your blog! I think it is AWESOME that you realize what it is you want and you changed your course. Good for you!
- Damon said...
I'm about where you are as well. I have been saying for 20 months that after I finished WS, I was going to retire from ultra. I really love my training time in the gym as well.
But, after not getting to race last year when I was in great shape, and then not running well this year while fighting an injury, I still feel that desire to keep at the running. Maybe if I'd finished WS finally, I'd feel differently. But, for now, I'm going to continue to run and to lift, and hopefully do OK with my running.
- SteveQ said...
Great post. You define what you do and don't let what you do define you. I thought the malaise in running you felt was from lack of progression - there's not much longer than 100 miles you can run and you can do those handily, and doing more and more 100s gets ridiculous after a while - so I expect you're starting to think in terms of (shudder) racing faster. Welcome to the dark side!
- Travis said...
Funny how sometimes we have to fall out of love with something before we realized how much we really do love it. Looking forward to crossing paths again!


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There are those special people who touch your life so evocatively that things will never be the same again. The sanctified folks call it an anointing. Others refer to it as a unique quality, a special gift that impacts others in a significant way. I've learned to not take the role of those people for granted. I have met three of them: Dr. C. Eric Lincoln, Dr. Samuel Procter and Dr. John Hope Franklin.
I met each of these great men through my studies at Duke University. I decided to move from Missouri to Durham, NC to study due to the contributions of C. Eric Lincoln and John Hope Franklin. I was amazed at their ability to press beyond the obvious.
Lincoln's book The Black Muslims in America introduced to the world the mind of the Nation of Islam. I wanted to sit at his feet. I came to Duke to take classes with Lincoln. All I needed was one. I loved his humor and bent on life. To this day I laugh whenever I think of the time he told us the story of his temptation to become a minister. He talked about how he practiced preaching in front of a mirror and was certain he could fascinate people with his preaching.
Sam Proctor came to Duke as a visiting professor. By the time he arrived I had graduated. This didn't prevent occasions for us to meet over lunch to discuss faith and life. I'll never forget the day he called Alvin Bernstein while we were at the Duke Divinity School book store. "You guys need to pick up The History of God by Karen Armstrong," he said. We both did. "It will open your eyes..." It did.
Arvil Strickland, my African American History professor at the University of Missouri used Franklin's book like the Bible. From Slavery to Freedom told the story of our past like no other. I came to Duke because I wanted to walk on the ground where he taught. I'll never forget our first encounter. I was picking up Chinese food when he walked in to get his take out order. He smiled at the cashier-there was something about this man that stood apart from others.
"Dr. Franklin," I approached him. "I'm Carl Kenney and I love your work."
"Carl Kenney," He said. "I love your work." My heart stopped beating. He knew my work. His words reflected more of a statement about him than about me. He was in touch with the world around him. Despite his work with President Bill Clinton, and his travels around the world, he found time to read the local newspaper. He was a gentle man. The struggles of his past had not hardened his heart, but rather shaped a man full of faith and love.
Franklin died on yesterday. He left behind countless imprints. Many have been moved by his gentle spirit. Yes, many know his scholarship. Others simply knew the man. From Victor and the boys at Imperial Barbershop next to the Hayti Heritage Center to D.J. Kraze and the patrons of the Ideas Coffee House-Franklin has made an impression that we will never forget.
I called my friend Dante James to check on him yesterday. As a documentary film maker, James has garnered inspiration from the sages. He thought of them when he worked on "Eyes on the Prize". They walked with him as he produced "Slavery and the Making of America." I felt his pain as we spoke.
"This is hard Carl," he said. "This is really hard'.
I reflected on the conversation I had with Dante about Gordon Parks. I imagined then how it must have felt to have a conversation with him. I considered how blessed I have been to walk in the steps of greatness-C. Eric Lincoln, Samuel DeWitt Proctor and John Hope Franklin-three men who are no longer with us.
I approached a stop light near the intersection of HWY 54 and HWY 55 in Durham. As the light turned red I said a prayer. "God, remind me, mold me, teach me," I paused. "To be more like these great men." I stand on the foundation built by their efforts. I pray for this generation. Our leaders are dying. Our inspiration is dying. Our strength is dying away. Grant us the strength we need to be more like them. "


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|Spiderweb Hexagon
|A scrappy Hexagon Spiderweb
It was the morning of my class in Philadelphia but I was so excited about this pattern that I had to solve the mystery right away. Barbara had already figured out the centers of the block. I did the rest!
Although the mystery was solved and I thought I would make a small sample before I post about this quilt. Sadly, I realized this morning that I am not cut out for foundation piecing.
I have never attempted to make a quilt using paper foundation.
For a girl who loves to just get her fabrics out and start cutting, or pick up the scraps and piecing, this method is a LOT OF WORK! Those of you who have worked with foundations piecing, this should be a piece of cake!
But since I figured out the pattern, Barbara and I thought it would be fun to start a quilt along, I am going to learn how to foundation piece and make this quilt.
|Betsey Tellford Goodwin's Rocky Mountain Quilts
Leave a comment and let me know if you are.
If there is enough interest, I will post on how to draft this block. You will have to figure out how to piece the hexagons.
Visit Barbara Brackman's Material Culture to learn more about these quilts and her process on the quilt she made!