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MUSIC 185: Technologies of Musical Expression
Music is made and experienced through technology created for it. These technologies allow for expression but influence the result. This course will utilize special collections, acoustical tools, music-making apps, live musicians, and media both historical and modern to reflect on the ways people make music expressive. The course is designed around creative projects and hands on experiences with digital and analogue media, player pianos, archival manuscripts, and sound sculptures to stimulate discussion about the role of technology in our musical experiences. Projects can include performances using digital and analogue media, performance art, creating player piano rolls, or performance ethnographies, etc. WAYS credit for 3 units and grade only.
Last offered: Winter 2018 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
MUSIC 220B: Compositional Algorithms, Psychoacoustics, and Computational Music
The use of high-level programming language as a compositional aid in creating musical structures. Advanced study of sound synthesis techniques. Simulation of a reverberant space and control of the position of sound within the space. This course must be taken for a minimum of 3 units and a letter grade to be eligible for Ways credit. See http://ccrma.stanford.edu/. Prerequisite: 220A.
Terms: Win | Units: 2-4 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
Instructors: Wang, G. (PI) ; Fram, N. (TA)
2018-2019 Winter
2-4 units |
UG Reqs: WAY-A-II |
Class #
Section 01 |
Grading: Letter or Credit/No Credit |
| Students enrolled: 21 / 24
01/07/2019 - 03/15/2019 Mon, Wed 3:30 PM - 5:20 PM at Knoll217 with Wang, G. (PI); Fram, N. (TA)
Exam Date/Time: 2019-03-21 3:30pm - 6:30pm (Exam Schedule)
Instructors: Wang, G. (PI); Fram, N. (TA)
MUSIC 223B: Sonic Experiments in Composition
The course will present post-1945 works with timbre serving as an organizing principle or compositional metaphor, in the context of historical works in which timbre plays a structural role. Composers considered may include: Alvin Lucier, Pauline Oliveros and other American experimentalists; Scelsi and his influence on the French Spectral school; the first and subsequent generations of French Spectralism; and contemporary composers of experimental music such as Peter Ablinger. Topics will include: process and form; timbre in relation to time and space; harmonicity and noise; and the influence of analog and digital technology on instrumental composition. This course must be taken for a minimum of 3 units and a letter grade to be eligible for Ways credit for AII.
Terms: Spr | Units: 2-3 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE
Instructors: Alessandrini, P. (PI)
2018-2019 Spring
2-3 units |
UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-CE |
Class #
Section 01 |
Grading: Letter (ABCD/NP) |
| Students enrolled: 7 / 10
04/01/2019 - 06/05/2019 Wed 2:30 PM - 5:20 PM at Knoll217 with Alessandrini, P. (PI)
Instructors: Alessandrini, P. (PI)
MUSIC 260: Transcultural Perspectives of South-East Asian Music and Arts (FRENCH 260A)
This course will explore South-East Asian (SEA) cultures and their influence on modern and contemporary Western art, particularly in France: for instance, Claude Debussy (Gamelan's music), Jacques Charpentier (Karnatak music), Auguste Rodin (Khmer art) and Antonin Artaud (Balinese theater). In the course of these interdisciplinary analyses - focusing particularly on music and dance - we will confront key notions in relation to transculturality: orientalism, appropriation, auto-ethnography, nostalgia and exoticism. We will also consider transculturality as interior to contemporary creation, through the study of contemporary SEA composers. Viewings of sculptures, marionette theater, ballet, opera and cinema will play in integral role. To be eligible for WAYS credit, this course must be taken for 3 units and a letter grade.
Terms: Spr | Units: 2-3 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
Instructors: Kretz, H. (PI)
2018-2019 Spring
2-3 units |
UG Reqs: WAY-A-II |
Class #
Section 01 |
Grading: Letter or Credit/No Credit |
| In Person
| Students enrolled: 1
04/01/2019 - 06/05/2019 Tue, Thu 10:30 AM - 11:50 AM at Braun102 with Kretz, H. (PI)
Instructors: Kretz, H. (PI)
NATIVEAM 39: Long Live Our 4Bil. Year Old Mother: Black Feminist Praxis, Indigenous Resistance, Queer Possibility (AFRICAAM 39, CSRE 39, FEMGEN 39)
How can art facilitate a culture that values women, mothers, transfolks, caregivers, girls? How can black, indigenous, and people of color frameworks help us reckon with oppressive systems that threaten safety and survival for marginalized people and the lands that sustain us? How can these questions reveal the brilliant and inventive forms of survival that precede and transcend harmful systems toward a world of possibility? Each week, this course will call on artists, scholars, and organizers of color who clarify the urgency and interconnection of issues from patriarchal violence to environmental degradation; criminalization to legacies of settler colonialism. These same thinkers will also speak to the imaginative, everyday knowledge and creative healing practices that our forebears have used for millennia to give vision and rise to true transformation.
Terms: Spr | Units: 1-4 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-ED
Instructors: Caruthers, J. (PI) ; Holt, A. (PI)
2018-2019 Spring
1-4 units |
UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-ED |
Class #
Section 01 |
Grading: Letter or Credit/No Credit |
| Students enrolled: 10
04/01/2019 - 06/05/2019 Wed 6:30 PM - 8:20 PM at Departmental Room with Caruthers, J. (PI); Holt, A. (PI)
Instructors: Caruthers, J. (PI); Holt, A. (PI)
NATIVEAM 122: Historiography & Native American Oral Traditions and Narratives
This course is an introduction to Native American Literature in the United States in a (post) colonial, or decolonized context (in the last seventy years). The readings focus on the complex social and political influences that have shaped Native American literature in the last half of the twentieth century to the present. It is an introduction to nNative American fiction, poetry, drama, nonfiction and autobiography. It draws on the historical (literary sovereignty) and theoretical frameworks (American Indian Literary Nationalism) used by Native American writers in the United States; how trends in Native American writing build on and integrate traditional modes of Native American nstorytelling (oral tradition & the verbal arts). It takes a specific in - depth look at Native American oral tradition. Where the overarching aim of the course is to address the nquestion: How do you define Native American literature? Students will be required to provide their own definition from what they learn about Native American oral tradition and the challenges (historic and otherwise) inherent in a (post) colonial or decolonized world for Native Americans.
Terms: Aut | Units: 4 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
Instructors: Red Shirt, D. (PI)
2018-2019 Autumn
4 units |
UG Reqs: WAY-A-II |
Class #
Section 01 |
Grading: Letter or Credit/No Credit |
| Students enrolled: 5
09/24/2018 - 12/07/2018 Tue, Thu 6:30 PM - 8:20 PM at 200-201 with Red Shirt, D. (PI)
Axess Enrollment will open for students on September 1st.
Instructors: Red Shirt, D. (PI)
NATIVEAM 143A: American Indian Mythology, Legend, and Lore (AMSTUD 143M, ENGLISH 43A, ENGLISH 143A)
(English majors and others taking 5 units, register for 143A.) Readings from American Indian literatures, old and new. Stories, songs, and rituals from the 19th century, including the Navajo Night Chant. Tricksters and trickster stories; war, healing, and hunting songs; Aztec songs from the 16th century. Readings from modern poets and novelists including N. Scott Momaday, Louise Erdrich, and Leslie Marmon Silko, and the classic autobiography, "Black Elk Speaks."
Terms: Aut | Units: 3-5 | UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-A-II, WAY-ED
Instructors: Fields, K. (PI)
2018-2019 Autumn
3-5 units |
UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-AmerCul, WAY-A-II, WAY-ED |
Class #
Section 01 |
Grading: Letter or Credit/No Credit |
| Students enrolled: 14
09/24/2018 - 12/07/2018 Tue, Thu 3:00 PM - 4:20 PM at 200-205 with Fields, K. (PI)
Axess Enrollment will open for students on September 1st.
Instructors: Fields, K. (PI)
NATIVEAM 211: The California Missions: Art History and Reconciliation (ARTHIST 211, CSRE 111)
Sites of the spirit and devotion, sites of genocide, foreboding actors in Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo, the subject of fourth-grade school projects, the Spanish Missions of Alta California are complex sites of inquiry, their meanings and associations different for each visitor. This seminar examines the art and architecture of the California Missions built between 1769 and 1823. Constructed with local materials and decorated with reredos, paintings and sculptures from Mexico and Spain, the Missions are at once humble spaces and flagships of a belated global baroque. They were also the laboratories of indigenous artists and artisans. This course seeks to understand how Mission art was meant to function, how and why it was made, what its materials were, while asking what the larger role of art was in a global system of missions. Can the study of this art lead to the reconciliation of populations in North America and within the field of art history? The Missions require a specific reexamination of the relationship between European and colonial forms, not as objects of curiosity or diffusion but as viable and globally informed agents.
Last offered: Spring 2018 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II, WAY-ED
OBGYN 81Q: Perspectives on the Abortion Experience in Western Fiction
Explores the role of media in delivering abortion-related messages as well as the broader questions of how abortion and related issues are fundamentally integrated into the social fabric of US and global societies. Abortion remains one of the most controversial and polarizing challenges of our time. Yet, it has been a clinical, social, political, and cultural fact in a broad swath of societies for centuries. As is common for such lightning rod issues, the topic of abortion has featured prominently in novels and films. Each treatment provides a unique perspective on at least one aspect of abortion, whether it be clinical, social, political or cultural. How abortion is portrayed in novels and films provides the student of history, anthropology, and biology with insights into the author's or director's perspectives, and into societal attitudes and mores.
Last offered: Spring 2018 | UG Reqs: WAY-A-II
OSPBER 17: Split Images: A Century of Cinema
20th-century German culture through film. The silent era, Weimar, and the instrumentalization of film in the Third Reich. The postwar era: ideological and aesthetic codes of DEFA, new German cinema, and post-Wende filmmaking including Run Lola Run and Goodbye Lenin. Aesthetic aspects of the films including image composition, camera and editing techniques, and relation between sound and image.
Terms: Win | Units: 3-4 | UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-A-II
Instructors: Kramer, K. (PI)
2018-2019 Winter
3-4 units |
UG Reqs: GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-GlobalCom, WAY-A-II |
Class #
Section 01 |
Grading: Letter (ABCD/NP) |
| Students enrolled: 12
01/07/2019 - 03/15/2019 - with Kramer, K. (PI)
Instructors: Kramer, K. (PI)
Notes: For students participating in the Bing Overseas Studies Program in Berlin only.
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Given the recent discussion about cell phone conversations on the bus, I thought I'd share this PSA, spotted earlier today on an eastbound 27:
I realize I'm probably in the minority on this, but I don't find anything inherently wrong with cell-phone talking in transit. After all, you can't expect silence on the bus. Folks are talking to each other, babies are crying, the driver is calling out stops over the PA … you get the picture. If the conversations are quiet and about subjects that are appropriate for public consumption, I don't see the harm. When they're not, the problem isn't cell phones; it's rudeness. Loud, personal conversations are a no-no, whether on the phone or in the flesh.
Even though I'm not a big bus phone-talker, I think having the option is one of the (many) advantages of public transportation. Drivers must pay attention to the road, while we transit types can use our travel time as we see fit (see below)–even, if we so choose, to check on a restaurant reservation or catch up with Mom.
Your turn.

subset: commoncrawl


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Borlänge [2] is an average-sized Swedish city in the province Dalarna. With a population of roughly 50,000, it is the most populous city in the province.
Get in
The town is easy to reach. The road network is excellent and the only time to expect traffic jams is at four o'clock when most people head home from their work. There is also a railway station and an airport.
By plane
Flights to Dala Airport in Borlänge go from Stockholm, tickets can be booked online at the site of the airline Skyways [3]. Borlänge can also be reached by air from Malmö, Gothenburg and from Oslo, the capital of Norway. Tickets online at Direktflyg [4]. Both airline sites have booking services in English.
By train
Borlänge is an important railway hub, tickets can be bought at the website of the Swedish railway company SJ [5].
By bus
Bus is in general the cheapest way of reaching Borlänge from other cities. Tickets can be found at the website of Swebus Express [6] (Available in english).
Get around
Getting around by car is easy, however the road-signs are - as in the rest of Sweden - in Swedish so a map is suggested.
The bus-network covers the entire town and the villages outside. A ride inside the towns borders costs 17 SEK for adults (over 16 years old), and 14 SEK for children.
The one decent restaurant of Borlange is Stationsgatan 1, located smack in the middle of the town, very close to the tourist information office. There's an half-way decent italian restaurant, Malu, next to the town park, liljekvistska. The owners, Mauro and Luca, are a nice bunch bunt don't expect haute cusine. They do decent pasta though. Another place you might want to check out is Saga Restaurang located opposite Bragegallerian. They have a really good seafood soup.
But what you really should indulge in is Pizza. Borlange is famous for having about one pizzeria per 1000 inhabitants. If you feel adventourus you should check out the pizzeria at Hemkop Tjarna Angar. Any local will show you the way. The pizzas are simply fantastic.
Younger people go to S2, located opposite of Stationsgatan 1, or Flamingo for dancing. If you want a pub with the real local feel you should check out "Engelska". It's kind of a dive bar and populated by a diverse bunch of people. Bolanche, above Stationsgatan 1, is the place for people in the ages 25-30+ while Liljan, located in the Liljan "galleria" on the park side, is the place for the more mature. If you like rock you may wnat to head to The Rock House, opposite Flamingo, altough it's usually kinda deserted. And as always it's easiest to ask the locals were to find these places.
Get out


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Digital Production
The Gnomon Workshop offers the most comprehensive set of Digital Production tutorials anywhere. The broad scope of the tutorials contained in this section range from foundational understanding of the software tools all the way to the professional application of these tools and concepts used by artists working in the film and game industries.
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The Gnomon Workshop is widely regarded as the global leader in training tutorials for the designer working in the entertainment industry. With tutorials ranging from foundational drawing and design concepts to process tutorials from some of the top concept and character designers in the world, there is surely something here to inspire.
As the tattoo industry has seen an explosion in popularity over the last few years, the need training in this field has also grown. In these video tutorials, some of the top tattoo artists in the world share their techniques and their take on the art of tattoo. The tutorials range from absolute beginner level to advanced color and blending techniques used by some of the world's best.
The Gnomon Workshop offers professional training on most of the software applications used in today's digital pipelines. There are foundational titles to introduce users to the software and tools, as well as advanced production titles that discuss application tools and processes vital to the production of digital assets and media.
Professional Training for Artists
The Gnomon Workshop seeks out the most highly-regarded traditional and digital artists and technicians currently working in the entertainment and design industries. Our instructors have shared their practices working at such top studios as Pixar, ILM, Blizzard, and many more.Instructor GalleriesInstructor Interviews
Bill Buckley has been working as an animator and artist in the video game industry for over ten years and has worked on three of the top ten best-selling video game franchises in history. His roles have included Senior Animator, Story Artist, Digital Cinematographer, Concept Artist and currently, Animation Director with First Contact Entertainment. He has provided story art and animation on popular titles for companies such as THQ, Disney Interactive, Limbic, SCEA, Activision (Neversoft and Infinity Ward) and StarBreeze. His resume includes major titles such as Tony Hawk Proving Ground, WWE Smackdown vs. Raw, NBA 2007, Disney's Club Penguin, eight Guitar Hero titles, Call of Duty: Ghosts, Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, John Wick The Impossible Task in VR and ROM Extraction. His work has also been featured in commercials, comic books and theme park attractions. When Bill is not transforming his wild imagination into usable art assets, he enjoys mentoring and teaching game art to aspiring artists. He has lectured at universities and conventions, both domestic and abroad, and has published two graphic novels as well as contributed to numerous gaming textbooks. Bill received a BA in Fine Art with an emphasis on Entertainment Arts and Animation. Bill lives in Southern California with his talented and gorgeous wife (who wrote this bio) and his adorable baby girls.
Try a Class on Campus
Gnomon specializes in computer graphics education for careers in the entertainment industry.


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As BCO prepares to revamp its flagship design bible, current Guide to Specification described as pushing 'sealed glass boxes' and stifling innovation
More from: Industry calls for BCO Guide overhaul
Key players in commercial development have said the industry bible, the British Council for Office's flagship Guide to Specification, is stifling innovation.
Critics described the guide as 'too prescriptive' and 'a victim of its own success'. The comments emerged in response to news that the BCO will launch an updated guide in 2014, for which it is seeking feedback from the industry.
The latest edition of the BCO Guide was published in 2009, before recent updates to the Building Regulations, specifically Part L, and prior to the introduction of the London Plan and BREEAM offices, and the wider adoption of BIM.
The guide, which contains recommendations for everything from office temperature to occupant density, has been widely adopted as the rule of law by clients, agents and occupiers. But its success is also viewed as a barrier to the wider adoption of sustainable design.
Speaking at the 2013 BCO Annual Conference in Madrid last week, Peter Williams, director and head of buildings services at engineering consultancy WSP, said: 'The danger is that the BCO Guide has started to make the market, rather than inform it.'
'It's looking like a one-way street. We hadn't made it clear in the guide that there are choices to be made.'
Benjamin Lesser, development manager at commercial developer Derwent London, agreed, describing the guide as 'a victim of its own success.' Lesser said: 'It has become a specification and it's read as a simple checklist. We need to unshackle ourselves from the BCO one-size-fits-all glass box with fan-core units.'
We need to unshackle ourselves from the BCO one-size-fits-all glass box with fan-core units
The most controversial aspect of the BCO Guide is its suggested office air temperature of 24ºC. Critics in the property world say this has encouraged the over-specification of air conditioning, limiting the adoption of natural ventilation and driving excessive energy use.
The suggested occupant density ratios of 1 person per 10m² in the BCO Guide are also seen as out of step with the greater density employed in flexible working space plans.
'We are overspec-ing buildings,' said Russell Durling, senior project manager at Derwent London. 'Sustainability is the issue. The 24ºC rule needs to be relaxed. The BCO spec has become the standard for agents, but agents are dinosaurs.'
'Temperature bands should be wider,' agreed Allen Williamson, director of engineering consultancy Norman Disney & Young. 'In a sealed environment, you would expect tighter conditions, but a naturally ventilated environment will tolerate a wider band.'
But Williams disputed criticism that the BCO Guide encourages a preference for air-conditioned offices over naturally ventilated ones. He said: 'The assumption is that the BCO Guide has moved us towards tightly controlled, sealed boxes. This is not the case – naturally ventilated buildings are in the guide.'
But Williams admitted that, because natural ventilation guidance is absent from the widely read summary, this has fueled the misconception that the BCO advocates sealed buildings.
Neil Pennell, head of sustainability and engineering at developer Land Securities, who oversaw the complete revision of the 2009 BCO Guide to Office Specification and the second edition of the BCO Guide to Fit Out, is hoping the 2014 edition will address some of these issues through a change of format.
Pennell said: 'The problem is not the guide – it contains nuanced advice – but the summary at the end. [It] is all the agents have read, and they read it as a specification, not as guidance.
Agents read the guide as a specification, not as guidance
Referring to the BCO's plans to launch the future edition online, he said: 'With the new guide we are looking to create a more flexible tool, accessible for a mobile world. We want to create a flexible, adaptable guide, regularly updated, and globally recognised.'
But engineer Hanif Kara, founder of AKTII, warned against the rigid adoption of the guide. He said: 'The danger of writing documents like these is that they become the bible.'
Kara's concerns included the over-specification of floor loads and an obsession with column-free spaces. He said: 'What has driven steel construction over concrete is the desire for open spans. But we can live with columns.'
Kara also said the future BCO Guide would need to address existing stock. He said: 'Seventy-five per cent of our offices are already built. How does the guide deal with that?'
Architect Glenn Howells and quantity surveyor John Boxall also emphasised the importance of a flexible guide – specifically when it comes to office capacity.
Boxall said: 'With the standard occupant density rate at one per 7-8m², we are building offices 40 per cent smaller than 15 years ago. The guide is out of date.'
Other commentators called for the BCO to incorporate a more sophisticated definition of sustainability to include the wellbeing and productivity of occupants.
Richard Francis, director of project manager Gardiner & Theobald, said: 'There are lots of studies of LEED-accredited buildings which show [they lead to] a reduction in leavers and absentee days. The office sector needs to do more of this research, but hospitals know this already – that a view outside makes people need less medication.'
Pennell agreed. He said: 'If people can read better, they make less mistakes [and] fresh air makes them stay more attentive, provided they have good food and access to drinks. There are lots of things that impact on productivity. And some degree of control over the temperature and lighting has a massive effect on people's comfort.'
But, despite its perceived failings, Williams defended the power of the BCO Guide to influence the good design of office space. He said: 'It's there to advise clients and designers. A lot of what's built is built speculatively. The guide is a safety net. It is providing good advice to prevent investment going wrong. These documents have their weaknesses. But they are the best that are out there.'
Industry calls for BCO Guide overhaul
BCO conference: offices becoming obsolete faster than predicted
BCO conference: Occupiers missing out on BIM cost savings
BCO conference: Lamont predicts 'modest growth this year.'
Myners: 'Funding for lending is fuelling an irresponsible housing bubble'
It is heartening to hear developers at the BCO defend the value of good design
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How to add gg-arrange-front to your website:
To embed gg-arrange-front in your page add following code:
Do not forget to add this to <head> section (preferred method to load icons faster) or before </body>:
SVG code for gg-arrange-front.
Use it to embed SVG directly in page or to paste it in UI editor application, such as Sketch, Adobe XD, Affinity Designer or Figma.
Most editors ignore SVG viewBox attribute. Because of that when you paste SVG in editor, dimensions often don't match, making it hard to align icon. Code below includes extra transparent rectangle that matches viewBox, so if you paste icon in editor it will have same dimensions as in HTML:
Or click this link to download SVG.
Add code below to your stylesheet to use gg-arrange-front as background:
Add code below to your stylesheet to use gg-arrange-front as pseudo element's content:
Avoid using Iconify in CSS if you can. Images are loaded one by one, which might affect performance if there are too many images. Monotone images cannot inherit color from stylesheet, so you must set color attribute.
Add code below to your script to use gg-arrange-front as React component.
Customize gg-arrange-front appearance:
Iconify icons can behave like images or like glyphs. Difference is very small, but important.
Icon will not have special alignment, perfect for being used as decoration (similar to img tag).
Icon will behave like glyphs aligned below baseline, perfect for being used inside text (similar to glyph fonts).
If you want it for decoration, select "block" option, if you want image to be placed in middle of text, such as placing emoji in text, select "inline" option.
You have selected a monotone icon.
Monotone icons do not have hardcoded colors, which means you can set any color.
By default color for monotone icons is the same as text color, which means you can style icons using css like this:
.iconify { color: red; }
Monotone icons when used as external resources cannot inherit color from stylesheet, therefore you must specify color. If possible use icon in HTML, not in CSS.
By default height is set to "1em", width is automatically adjusted for each icon.
If you want to, you can set custom width and/or height. Unlike other images, SVG doesn't squish content when width/height ratio is wrong, so you can set any width and height you want.
You can use stylesheet to set custom dimensions like this:
.iconify { width: 24px; height: 24px; }
You can flip and rotate icon. Transformations are done using SVG transformations, not CSS. This ensures image content remains within its bounding box and allows you to apply additional CSS transformations.
Iconify is a modern open source icon framework that can be used with over 50 icon sets, offering over 40,000 icons.
Iconify is designed to replace outdated glyph fonts and offer huge choice of icons. Unlike other SVG frameworks, Iconify only loads icons that are displayed on page. That means your visitors will not have to load multiple fonts to display icons from different icon sets, you are no longer limited to icons available in 1 icon set.
See how to use Iconify for details. Iconify is currently available as SVG framework for browsers, as React component and as Angular component.
Browse 50+ icon sets that offer over 40,000 well designed icons to find perfect icons for your project!
If you are using Sketch, check out Iconify plug-in for Sketch to speed up design process.
See about page to learn more about Iconify and project goals.


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Limbaugh strikes back at Williams
Rush Limbaugh hit back Friday at NBC anchor Brian Williams, after Williams criticized the conservative radio host for saying New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie has been overly praiseworthy of President Barack Obama in the wake of Hurricane Sandy.
"Brian, come on. What do you think the stroll on the beach with Obama and Christie was? It was politics. Why do you think Obama called Christie and wanted to go into town? It was politics," Limbaugh said on his radio program Friday, according to audio from Daily Rushbo.
"Real leadership would've have been Christie and Obama and whoever else gathering in a command center and coordinating relief efforts with them not on the scene," Limbaugh added.
Earlier this week, Limbaugh said Christie showed "man love" for Obama and that Christie has gone "overboard in praising a failed president."
On NBC's "Rock Center" Thursday, Williams criticized Limbaugh.
"So after all this loss you might be curious as to why Rush Limbaugh went after Gov. Christie today. It was because he's getting along so well with the president, working together, saying nice things about Barack Obama. Just when we feared the storm wiped away everything, we learned politics survived," Williams said.
Limbaugh said Williams and NBC have their "own mess to clean up."
"Brian Williams, since you saw fit to misrepresent me on your great show last night, let me ask you: have you watched your network lately? Have you watched your sister [network] MSNBC lately?" Limbaugh said. "You guys have your own mess to clean up there because you and your colleagues — you're not only destroying news and journalism in this country — you're not even doing your job. Does Benghazi ring a bell?"
He continued: "You know, Brian, four Americans died as it turned out unnecessarily. They were murdered, Brian. And people are trying to get answers and NBC doesn't care. In fact NBC is helping cover it up."
Limbaugh also doubled-down in his Christie criticism Friday, saying that Christie essentially was "endorsing Obama," while saying, "to hell with you, Mitt."
"Bipartisanship here was Gov. Christie a week before the election essentially endorsing Obama. In my book, that's not bipartisanship. There's another word for it, but it ain't bipartisan. But it is from their perspective. Gov. Christie basically said, 'To hell with you, Mitt,'" Limbaugh said.
Limbaugh said the Obama-Christie meeting was pure political symbolism.
"It didn't accomplish anything. Not for the residents. It did accomplish things for Obama. Big whoop. And by the way, if you doubt me, what was the press reaction to this?" Limbaugh said. "The question still being asked is, 'Did it help Obama? Did it help Christie? Is it the reason why Obama got a bump in the polls?' Obama doesn't deserve a bump, he hasn't done anything."


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From the Series: Questions to Ask Software or Cloud Vendors
Part 2 - Tough Questions to Better Qualify Any Cloud Vendor
How can you more quickly qualify and evaluate any cloud vendor?
This white paper is designed to reduce the complexity of the cloud buying process by providing ten penetrating questions to ask cloud vendors to become a more informed buyer. Customers interested in purchasing any cloud service (for example, IT help desk or customer service) encounter a myriad of problems and obstacles during the purchase process. The white paper provides practical "how to" advice to help avoid mistakes that even the most experienced professionals make that cost a lot of time and money. Use these questions to poke and prod at your list of cloud vendors.
Some topics covered include:
- Using uptime and support service level agreements to manage our relationship
- Is your cloud software web-native?
- How to qualify the reliability and security of a data center; SSAE 16 (formally SAS 70), Trustwave PCI Certification and SysTrust Compliance
- Adding licenses & provisioning disk space
- Access to your data
- How are maintenance windows handled?
- Is source code escrow available?


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Cynthia Neff takes on Boyd for supe seat
Democrat Cynthia Neff, a retired IBM executive, announced her plans to challenge incumbent Kenneth Boyd for the Rivanna District seat on the Albermarle County Board of Supervisors.
"What has been going on [within the board] is appalling, and it is not okay," said Neff at her announcement on Tuesday.
Neff, who was trounced in a 2009 run against Delegate Rob Bell for the 58th District seat, cited the controversial last minute Western Bypass vote by Lindsay Dorrier at the June 8 Board of Supervisors meeting as an example of the lack of continuity between board members and the community.
"Someone needs to stand up for the citizens," she said. "Have we had enough of Ken Boyd yet?"Read more on: Albemarle Board of Supervisorscynthia neff
26 comments
thank you
I had the pleasure of meeting Ms. Neff when she ran for Supervisor in 2009. She is a thoughtful and intelligent woman with a big heart, and I hope we are lucky to have her on the Board of Supervisors after this Election Day.
Hooray! Time to get rid of Paranoid Boyd and his Tea Party friends.
Neff complains about Dorrier, a Democrat, and then blames Boyd. Neff is another tax and spend liberal like Rooker and Mallek.
Yes definitely had enuf of Boyd, thanks for asking. All he's done is add more development and traffic and pollution on 29. Need act of god to get him to listen on what we want. Clean house, amen. Neff will bring good perspective and preserve quality of life that is why we live here.
Wake up R.T.! Everybody knows Boyd and Thomas are pulling the strings on Dorrier. If Cynthia lived in Scottsville, maybe she'd run against Lindsay. But she's in Boyd's district, so she's running against Kenny. Duh.
Hallelujah! Time to bring intelligence back into local governance and eliminate the sneaky behind-the-scenes operations we have witnessed recently. No matter where you stand on specific issues, TRANSPARENCY is the only thing that keeps our democracy intact and protects us from authoritarian "we know better than the people" kind of rule.
"......authoritarian "we know better than the people" kind of rule"?
You mean the kind that got Obamacare passed with bribes, kickbacks, secret deals, no input from Republicans (who belong in the "back of the bus" according to Dear Leader) or the public at large? Thousands of pages in the bill the public couldn't see and which weren't even read by virtually all who voted for it? You have the nerve to say yet another libtard Dem who supported the Obamacare monstrosity and programs like it which will bankrupt this country, will put an end to "authoritarian "we know better than the people" kind of rule"?
You have got to be joking.
Anybody who uses the phrase "Dear Leader" in an attempt to malign the duly elected President of the United States as some sort of communist immediately loses all credibility.
Teatards are funny.
Realist, the joke is you for bringing in a bunch of issues that have nothing to do with this LOCAL election. It's a shame you are only capable of seeing things in stereotype black and white...but that's your problem, not mine. (When in the heck did "Obamacare" enter a discussion about Ms. Neff's candidacy?)
Meanwhile, for those of you who are able to speak without rehearsed soundbites out of the same ol' playbook (yawn) and would like to have an intelligent discussion about what promises to be an interesting campaign & election, let's continue!
caroline I notice that all of your postings are written as if you feel the only way to get your opinion out is to try and belittle anyone you are responding to, I believe there is a name for that condition you may want to get some help, I hope you don't parent or teach you pupils in that same manner.
I am just tired of the rehearsed responses to anything "Non-Republican." It's like a push-button doll where it hears the word "Democrat" and immediately responds with a recording of the word "Obamacare." I think we can do better in elevating the level of our discussion and I'm sorry -- if someone jumps that far off topic I am going to point it out. If my way of saying it is not warm and fuzzy, oh well. You can move onto the next post. :-)
"Jack M and his lemmings need to go one after the other off a cliff that would help sustain the rest of us that use common sense." - C'ville Delight, June 7, 2011
Of course...this wouldn't be belittling in any way, riiiight?
Glass houses, throwing stones and all that jazz, C'ville D. ;-)
Ooh. Burn.
apples and oranges
Aww, poor baby can't admit he does the same thing. Grow up.
Game, set, match.
Not my proudest moments here, Chuck, I admit it. I'm just really incensed by what has happened with our local "leadership." And quite saddened, honestly. I think Mr. Dorrier was put in a horrible position and I don't think people are going to forget it anytime soon, regardless of how the bypass turns out.
Boyd has been manipulating Dorrier to years! That's a well-known fact!
Boyd does have a track record of sneaking around and kissing developers' boots. Remember all the secret NGIC meetings. Stay tuned for Wood's latest request to expand the Growth Area.
Problem with ALL our local politicians is that they kowtow to developers and other local interest groups and don't consider what's best for the majority of us who live here.
It's just a bad case of Good Ole Boys gone wild.
The "boys" have run the show long enough.
3 bartowski's and 1 threaded base CFL
"Neff is another tax and spend liberal like Rooker and Mallek."
As opposed to borrow and spend Republicans, who think everyone else should give them a free ride?
That cute little phrase is old, out of date, and frankly dishonest. The only ones I see trying to live within a budget these days are Democrats.
"no input from Republicans"
The complete lie the realist has been convinced to echo just keeps echoing. The Republicans were allowed to have input, and the bill has many examples of it. What Obama made clear is that they had better have some different input than the previous eight years, in which they did nothing, except subsidize giant pharma at the taxpayers expense.
"no input from Republicans"
3 Caesonia and 1 threaded base CFL
@cville delight:
What was that you were JUST saying about people who can only express an opinion by belittling those with whom they disagree?
Pot/kettle, ass-hat?
The Ken Boyd mindset is not much different from that of the judges in the Salem witch trials. This time around, the witch is "sustainability," which is interpreted in the narrow mind to be forced on the local citizenry by an outside international "agenda." Fear ensues. Other judges are swayed. Despite the outcries from the MAJORITY of the sensible public, hysteria prevails.
Folks, you can call it anything you want, but in 1692 -- and in 2011 -- paranoia is paranoia.
Let your voice be heard in November that we are not going to surrender to this time-consuming, distracting nonsense.
Cynthia Neff also appears locally-produced interview program Politics Matters with host Jan Paynter: http://bit.ly/pm-neff


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I have a rope in my back yard for practice.
Currently, I have a chain around a tree limb attached to a triangular screw link and small screw link and small descending ring attached to that. I have been able to use a single rope pulled through that. The rope is held in place by a washer (from On Rope book) in front of a stopper knot. After that is a figure 8 with a carabiner that I put back on the rope the first time I ascend. I have a small rope on the carabiner I use to retrieve the rope. It works, except I think it would all be easier to run the rope through a pulley and have the system stop against the pulley. I confirmed that the washer or any of the knots would stop against the pulley, so the size is good, and it seems solid to me. I cannot find evidence of others using this application, though. Any opinions regarding if that would be a safe application to have a knot block against a pulley?


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In case you haven't yet heard the siren call, thousands of musicians, music fans, tech geeks, entrepeneurs, fashionistas, and journalists will shortly be descending on Austin, TX for SXSW Interactive and SXSW. This years' melting pot of musically inclined interactive goodness promises to be a great one, and Ustream will have plenty of live coverage of events at the festival just in case you didn't cough up the dough for a festival pass. So be sure to check out live progamming from the following partners:
Startup Bus 2012
Daily at 12pm PT
Imagine this: you and a team of strangers, on a bus traveling 60 mph, have 72 hours to conceive, build, and launch a startup. That's what will be going down on the StartupBus daily until Monday. Then, during SXSW stay tuned for live broadcasts of the StartupBus Finals, and go inside the hottest parties across Austin, TX.
Social Media Clubhouse
Starting Friday, 3/9 at 12p PT/3p ET
The Social Media Clubhouse will bring together some of the leading speakers and participants in Austin to let you in on all the fun and excitement that comes out of the interactive portion of SXSW. [clear here]
AP Live SXSW Interviews
Starting Monday, 3/12 at 10a PT/1p ET
The AP will be on-location in Austin providing coverage of Interactive and one-on-one interviews with some of the key figures on the scene. Monday kicks off with an interview with the director of SXSW Interactive, Hugh Forrest. Stay tuned on Tuesday and Wednesday for more interviews!
League of Young Voters
Monday, 3/12 starting at 7:30am PT/10:30am ET
The League of Young Voters will be broadcasting a number of panels and discussions during SXSW Interactive. Here's a quick schedule of events: [clear here]
Can Bloggers Put the Hope Back in to the 2012 Election?
Date: 3/12 at 7:30am PT
Brooklyn Castle: An Interview with Filmmaker Katie Schultz and John Forte
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Why Hasn't the Internet Made Voting Awesome?
Date: 3/12 at 10:30am PT
Newtek at SXSW
Starting 3/12 at 10a PT/1p ET
Live coverage from the NewTek exhibit at SXSW featuring guest bloggers, interviews, and musical performances throughout the conference.
The FILTER and Converse Rubber Tracks Showcase
3/15 at 5p PT/8p ET
This year, Converse and FILTER will bring together some of the most buzzed about bands for a live concert on Ustream! This year's showcase will feature Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Alberta Cross, Howler as well as Converse Rubber Tracks recording artists Viva Viva, Yawn and Re-Tros from China.


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Latest Heart News
HealthDay Reporter
TUESDAY, Jan. 3 (HealthDay News) -- People who have heart attacks in the United States are far more likely to be readmitted to the hospital within 30 days than people in 16 other countries, a new study indicates.
Researchers suspect that the average length of stay, which was just three days in the United States compared with at least six days in other countries, is the main reason for the higher readmission rates. When they completed an analysis that adjusted the data for length of stay, they found that location was no longer a predictor of readmission.
"We found two striking predictors of 30-day readmission. Having multi-vessel disease and being in the U.S. This difference is probably multifactorial, but the length of stay is the shortest in the U.S. It was three days here and six, seven or more in other countries," said study senior author Dr. Manesh Patel, an assistant professor of medicine in the division of cardiology at Duke University in Durham, N.C.
"When we adjusted for the length of stay, the difference went away. We're really good at opening up their arteries, but we provide more episodic care. Our systems of care may not be as integrated as they are in other countries. We need to make the link from the hospital to the primary care doctor to ensure that patients are getting set up in cardiac rehab and that they're following up with a cardiologist," Patel said.
And, while the study found that U.S. patients had higher readmission rates after a heart attack, Patel noted that mortality rates weren't higher in the United States.
Results of the study are published in the Jan. 4 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The study looked at people who were hospitalized for a specific type of heart attack called an ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI). This type of heart attack accounts for up to 38 percent of all heart attacks, according to background information in the article, and the coronary artery is completely blocked by a clot in these cases.
The study included 5,745 people from 296 hospitals in 17 countries who were admitted for a STEMI. Most (5,571) survived to be discharged from the hospital. Of those, 11.3 percent overall ended up being readmitted within 30 days.
Thirty-day readmission rates in the United States were 14.5 percent, but just 9.9 percent in the other countries in the study. The average length of stay was three days in the United States compared with eight days in Germany, the country with the longest average length of stay.
People who had multi-vessel disease, which means they had more than one blockage leading to the heart, were almost twice as likely to be readmitted to the hospital within 30 days, according to the study.
The other significant predictor of readmission within 30 days was being in the United States. After excluding people returning to the hospital to have additional elective procedures, people admitted in the United States had a 53 percent greater chance of being readmitted within 30 days vs. people in other countries.
After adjusting the data to account for differences in the patients, such as age and underlying health conditions, the researchers found a 14.4 percent readmission rate in the United States vs. a 9.3 percent rate for all of the other countries. Italy had the lowest readmission rates at 4.4 percent, followed closely by Germany at 4.8 percent. Canada had a 5.6 percent adjusted readmission rate, according to the study.
"This study compared the U.S. against 16 other countries and asked how do we [the U.S.] measure up? And, their findings were a little disturbing. About 60 percent of patients with major heart attacks were discharged in three days or less. And, our readmission rates were higher than in other countries. We have the technology and the ability to provide quality care, but we're just not doing well. Even for the sickest patients, we're not doing well," said Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum, a preventive cardiologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, and a spokesperson for the American Heart Association.
"This is probably not just about length of stay, but may also be about follow-up. It might really be OK to leave the hospital in three days, but you have to understand what the follow-up is. You need to understand the treatment plan, the medications, the follow-up appointment schedule, the cardiac rehab and the diet. If these things are all in place, readmission rates would probably go down," Steinbaum said.
"We're not sure that staying in the hospital longer would keep you from being readmitted. We know we provide good initial care. But, how well is that care transferred from the hospital to the home? We have to make sure patients know how they need to follow up," Patel said.
Copyright © 2012 HealthDay. All rights reserved.


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(CNN) -- The owner of the Gulf of Mexico oil rig that exploded last year, killing 11 workers and leading to what has been called the worst oil spill ever, said Monday that calling 2010 its "best year" in safety "may have been insensitive."
Transocean Ltd., in a recent filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, said hefty bonuses and raises to top executives were based in part on the company's "performance under safety" last year.
"We acknowledge that some of the wording in our 2010 proxy statement may have been insensitive in light of the incident that claimed the lives of eleven exceptional men last year and we deeply regret any pain that it may have caused," Transocean said in a statement to CNN. "Nothing in the proxy was intended to minimize this tragedy or diminish the impact it has had on those who lost loved ones. Everyone at Transocean continues to mourn the loss of these friends and colleagues."
The statement did not address the controversy over the decision to give out cash awards despite the oil spill disaster.
That includes a $200,000 salary increase for Transocean President and Chief Executive Officer Steven L. Newman, whose base salary will increase from $900,000 to $1.1 million, the SEC report said. Newman's bonus was $374,062, according to the report, which Transocean filed Friday.
Newman also has a $5.4 million long-term compensation package the company awarded him upon his appointment as CEO in March 2010, according to the SEC filing.
"Notwithstanding the tragic loss of life in the Gulf of Mexico, we achieved an exemplary statistical safety record as measured by our total recordable incident rate and total potential severity rate," the SEC statement reads. "As measured by these standards, we recorded the best year in safety performance in our company's history."
The company called that record "a reflection on our commitment to achieving an incident-free environment, all the time, everywhere," the SEC filing said.
The April 20, 2010, explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig injured 17 workers and killed 11 others, including nine Transocean employees, according to the SEC filing. It has been called the worst spill in U.S. history. The well was capped three months later, but not before millions of barrels of oil spilled into the Gulf.
In January, President Barack Obama's National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling released a report that spread blame for the accident among Transocean, BP -- which leased the rig -- and Halliburton, which installed the rig's cement casing.
The commission said problems with deepwater drilling are "systemic" and that only "significant reform" will prevent another disaster.
Another report released March 23 determined that the oil spill was caused by a piece of drill pipe trapped in the rig platform's blowout preventer, a device intended to stop oil from flowing into the Gulf. The report was commissioned by various U.S. agencies, including the Interior Department and the Department of Homeland Security.
The Interior Department has said a much broader report that relies on additional sources of data, including eyewitness accounts and photos, will be released this summer.
The oil spill has prompted a flood of lawsuits against BP, Transocean and Halliburton from a variety of plaintiffs, including owners of Gulf businesses who say they suffered heavy financial losses because of the spill.
The plaintiffs also include Transocean shareholders who contend the company falsely claimed it had remedied past safety problems with its blowout preventers before the Gulf spill.


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Page 2By Jeffrey Rothfeder
Can IT Save the Healthcare Industry?
A healthcare industry consortium in California may have discovered the perfect way to convince physicians in the Golden State to provide high-quality healthcare: Pay them bonuses to do so.
In 2003, under a program that has spawned imitators nationwide, the Integrated Healthcare Association, which brokers partnerships among medical providers and payers, debuted a program in which six health insurers, representing 7 million patients, measured the level of medical care doled out by 45,000 doctors, based on a set of performance measures.
The doctors who scored best received a tidy windfall from the insurers at the end of 12 months. In all, the top-ranked physicians logged about $50 million in bonuses in the first year of the pay-for-performance program.
Health professionals generally agree on what constitutes superior clinical and patient satisfaction standardseverything from the use of appropriate medication to timely access to care to appropriate communication between doctors and patientsand these criteria became the basis for measuring physician performance in the California project. But the program's developers decided to add another, more unconventional benchmark: investment in information technology.
Ten percent of the rankings were based on whether physicians had installed electronic records systems in their practices and were using clinical decision-making tools when seeing patients.
The results were telling: Physicians who spent the most on computer systems also scored highest in clinical and patient satisfaction.
"There's no doubt that IT makes a difference in quality of care," says Tom Williams, IHA executive director and a 25-year veteran of health insurance administration. "The IT component provides the structure to support the process of clinical care. When you undergird the process with a good foundation, you will get a better outcome."
Williams is so convinced of the value of information technology that IHA has doubled its weight in the physician performance rankings for 2005, to 20 percent.
While IT can help, its impact is limited as long as healthcare remains the poster child for dysfunctional business models. In the fun house that is the healthcare industry, hospitals and doctors have no incentive to cut costs and to become more productive because so few of their consumersthat is, patientsare footing the bill.
The task of paying falls primarily on insurers, which are obviously interested in trimming the costs charged by providers, but only by using their vast numbers of customers as leverage to dole out less money, rather than by installing technology to create the collaborative networks that could improve communications between payers and hospitals.
But by squeezing providers, insurers frequently end up lowering the quality of healthcare that patients receive. And even though they feel the pain of the industry's acutely ill business model, patients can't complain when they are asked to pay higher insurance premiums for lesser care; in most cases, they have no other place to go. In such a distorted business environment, with thousands of organizations sharing a growing economic pie that survives despite the turmoil, the idea of investing millions of dollars in innovative computer-based solutions to streamline operations and upgrade quality is anathema.
"Healthcare is a trillion-dollar-plus market, and IT spending has been little more than an afterthought," says Jeffrey Green, director of compliance for financial solutions at Laserfiche, an electronic records provider based in Long Beach, Calif. "There are thousands of companies with a stake in the market and no dominant firms to drive automation or demand more efficient behavior."
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Strong Medicine
IT may not be a panacea yet, but most healthcare experts agree with IHA's Williams that technology is critical to solving the nation's healthcare woes, which are reflected primarily in skyrocketing prices and clinical care that is inconsistent at best.
In the past few months, while promoting a ten-year plan to modernize the U.S. healthcare system, Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson has repeatedly complained that the nation's medical information system is stuck in the early 1900s, in the age of manila folders. Thompson argues that electronic record systems would improve patient care, diminish dangerous medical mistakes and in the process cut the nation's $1.6 trillion-a-year healthcare bill by at least 10 percent.
The lack of computerization is at least symptomatic of why the healthcare system in the U.S. is in such dismal shape.
While most industries spent the 1980s and 1990s installing computers and adopting leaner, customer-targeted operational systems, the healthcare industry lagged woefully behind.
In 2004, healthcare companies spent about 3 percent of revenue on IT, compared with about 5.5 percent for financial services firms, according to META Group Inc. That gap was even more pronounced a decade ago. By 2002, only about 13 percent of hospitals and 28 percent of physicians' offices had electronic records systems, according to a recent HHS report.
Among healthcare companies, medical plan insurers have been the most enthusiastic users of IT, in part because they are as much financial services firms as medical companies.
Chiefly, they have built electronic claims networks to automate the reimbursement and payment process with the goal of squeezing labor and other administrative costs out of their payment systems and directing these savings straight to their bottom line. And they've done a fairly good job of that, as evidenced by the recent spate of improved insurance company profits and margins.
But in the grand scheme of the nation's massive healthcare system, these claims networks are the equivalent of stand-alone deviceswithout permanent links between insurers and healthcare providers to offer real-time information on individual clinical history and plan coverage at the doctor's office or the hospital bed. As a result, they've had little impact on improving the level of treatment patients receive.
In fact, while hospitals, doctors and insurers have dawdled, medical care in the U.S. has suffered. In most industries, improvements initiated by any playera real-time, point-of-sale database system at a retailer, for instance, or a supplier's factory automation effortcascade throughout the supply chain, lowering costs, advancing efficiency and quality, and ultimately offering customers better products and service.
But in healthcare, the relationships among companies are more adversarial than collaborative. As a result, the impact of an initiative tends to bloat the total system, not streamline it, and it can further confuse patient care rather than simplify it.
For instance, although hospitals have generally avoided implementing computerized clinical records, they have freely invested in advanced diagnostic technology, such as million-dollar-plus magnetic resonance imaging machines. These purchases are justified because MRIs are a doctor-magnetphysicians prefer to work in hospitals with the most up-to-date equipmentand the machines pay for themselves since hospitals can charge a high price for these procedures.
In 2001 alone, new clinical technologies accounted for more than 20 percent of the increase in healthcare costs, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers. Some of these higher costs are, of course, acceptable, because these procedures can save lives. But a large segment of the increase is the result of physicians recommending high-tech options when they aren't clinically warranted.
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Profit Motive
That inflames insurers, which in response use their own technology to try to blunt increases in medical costs charged by providers, and to tamp down what they view as overuse of clinical procedures by doctors and hospitals.
A prime example, Aetna, the No. 3 medical insurer, recently completed a $20 million overhaul of its data systems, the goal being to identify physicians who are prescribing procedures and drugs too liberally, among other things.
Treatment and diagnostic orders from such doctors are monitored closely, and in many cases their requests for MRIs must be approved by radiologists on Aetna's payroll. Patients who are using Aetna's medical network too freely are also in the insurer's sights; they're facing curtailed coverage and higher co-payments.
Thanks in part to its new data network, Aetna's operating income rose 40 percent in the quarter ended Sept. 30, to $302 million, from $216 million the year before; the insurer's operating margin improved to 6 percent from 4.8 percent.
But Aetna's greater efficiencyand similar technological initiatives by other major healthcare insurershas done nothing to slow the ballooning cost of medical insurance and little to stem the increase in healthcare spending.
The results of data mining and improved database management on the part of insurers are not typically shared with the provider side of the industry to enhance performance throughout the healthcare network. Instead, they're used as a prybar to leverage additional profit opportunities; medical plan premiums have risen 60 percent since 2000, despite a general drop in administrative costs. That far outpaces the 7 percent per year increase in the nation's total healthcare bill, which itself is more than double the inflation rateand is one reason why the number of uninsured Americans has swelled to 45 million.
"The very nature of how we provide healthcare dictates against costs coming down," says John Quinn, chief technology officer in Capgemini's healthcare practice. "Competitive pressures and market pressuresand the technology to relieve themare not catalysts for cost cuts that are passed along to consumers. In healthcare's coloration, they're a set of incentives for each segment of the industry to find their power points and their counterpart's pressure points to produce better revenue and earnings for themselves."
Given the chaotic business model of the healthcare industry, it's no surprise that the consumer, in this case the patient, is bearing the brunt of it.
Despite the amount of money spent on healthcare, huge quality gaps contributed to as many as 79,000 avoidable deaths last year, according to the nonprofit National Committee for Quality Assurance. More than $1.8 billion in excess medical expenditures are linked to the healthcare system's inability to provide needed care at a cost of $9 billion to the U.S. economy in lost wages and productivity.
"The system is deeply polarized, delivering excellent care to some people, and generally poor care to many others," says NCQA President Margaret O'Kane. "It's not a question of knowing how to treat heart disease, diabetes or mental illness. We know how. We're just not doing it."
One way to start would be to overhaul the healthcare industry's business model so the productivity and quality gains that technology has brought to virtually every other industry can finally have a significant impact on healthcare. The biggest payback, experts say, could come from computerizing the clinical settingchiefly, installing electronic patient records and electronic prescribing systems where patients are treated.
According to healthcare experts, about 87 cents of every $1 in premiums received by insurance companies is earmarked for medical care payments, while 13 cents goes to administration, sales and profits. With the industry's operating profit margins about 6 percent currently, administrative and sales costs are in the 7 percent range. Trim administrative costs by 10 percent and the gain to the healthcare system is minimal.
But if clinical expenses are cut by the same 10 percentprimarily though the implementation of electronic patient records networksa savings of nearly 9 percent in the nation's medical expenditures is possible, notes Vincent K. Roach, president and CEO of healthcare consultants Daou Systems Inc.
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Poor Prognosis
While this solution may seem obvious, physicians and other healthcare providers have been extremely reluctant to install electronic patient networks, because they believe they have little to gain and much to lose.
Their concern is that such a system would require a substantial investment and, despite paying the freight, they would not take part in the economic benefits that accrue from it. In fact, their incomes could be lowered because improvements in care would limit the number of times patients need to be seen, and minimize the number of diagnostic procedures doctors perform.
Providers pay about $10,000 a year for electronic clinical data systems, according to an analysis by Partners HealthCare System in Boston, but of the $19,000 they save, two thirds ends up in the hands of those who pay for care.
To overcome this resistance to electronic clinical files, some patient advocates and insurers are taking steps to realign the healthcare model more along the traditional approach used by other industries. They are making those who stand to gain the most from the technology pay for it.
California's pay-for-performance system is one example.
Insurers, which profit directly from lower medical costs, are essentially subsidizing technology initiatives on the part of providers who could achieve savings in cost of treatment. There are about three dozen other similar pay-for-performance programs across the country, many backed by corporations whose healthcare costs are among the highest in the nation, including Ford Motor Co., General Electric Co., United Parcel Service Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc.
Ford Vice Chairman Allan Gilmour recently said the automaker spent $3.2 billion on healthcare in 2003 for 560,000 employees, retirees and their families, a tab that increased the price of each car and truck built in the U.S. by as much as $1,000.
Meanwhile, HHS, through its healthcare modernization plan, which calls for a universal electronic patient records system within ten years, is working on a program that would offer low-interest loans and grants to encourage physicians and hospitals to install this information technology.
The federal government's recommendations and initiatives carry enormous clout, because its massive healthcare agencies, particularly Medicare and Medicaid, are responsible for about 40 percent of the nation's medical payments.
"Everyone in healthcare supports universal electronic records, but the disagreement is over how to get there," says IHA's Williams. "There needs to be an organizing force, and only the federal government has the power and leverage to play this role."
|How Do We Get Value From Healthcare It?
|Metrics should focus on the relationships between healthcare IT and the following:
Cost reductions issuing from decreased administrative clinical staffing and resource requirements (i.e., elimination of paper chart pulls and transcription services).
Revenue enhancements resulting from improved charge capture and charge entry to billing times.
Productivity gains stemming from increased procedure volume, reductions in average length of stay, and increased transaction processing rates.
Service delivery advances from better adherence to clinical protocols and improvements in the stages of clinical decision-making (i.e., initiation, diagnostics, monitoring and tracking, and acting).
Clinical outcomes improvements represented as reductions in medical errors, decreases in morbidity and mortality, and expedited recovery times.
Stakeholder satisfaction improvements resulting from decreased wait times, improved access to healthcare information, and more positive perceptions of care quality and clinician efficacy.
Risk mitigation resulting from decreases in malpractice litigation and increased adherence to federal, state and accreditation organization standards.
Source: Center for IT Leadership, Partners Healthcare system
There's also motivation for some large hospital systems to install electronic records on their own, because improved patient care could lead to better agency rankings and, ultimately, additional revenue. That was the conclusion of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, which in 2000 developed one of the most successful computerized clinical care networks yet, a system the hospital calls eRecord.
This network, which will cost about $500 million over 12 years, allows doctors and other clinicians at eight of UPMC's 20 hospitals to see a patient's full medical record during treatment and to input additional steps or results learned during the session. In addition, prescriptions are entered electronically and automatically sent to the hospital's pharmacy to be filled immediately.
The system helps in decision-making, reminding a doctor ordering a CT scan that one was just conducted the day before, or alerting nurses and pharmacists that the patient has an allergy to the a drug they're contemplating prescribing. It also offers advice, such as sending a note to a physician that a patient on antibiotics who has been in the hospital for a long time and whose white blood count has gone up could be at risk for colitis.
UPMC executives are pleased with the results of the network, although so far, those results are mostly anecdotal. Write-ups of as many as 10,000 reports per month are instantly available to all clinicians now and are virtually free to compose and distribute, compared with the 38-hour delay and $10 per report fee that were the norm before the technology was installed.
Pharmacy costs at UPMC's largest hospital were about $34 million last year, down from $35 million the year beforean impressive achievement considering that total pharmaceutical expenditures in the U.S. were up about 12 percent last yearbecause of more efficient pharmacy management.
These gains, of course, potentially benefit the hospital, particularly its reputation, and insurers, who are paying less for patient care. But so far they're of limited value to physicians' pocketbooks and, thus, could repel rather than attract top clinicians. UPMC argues that physicians have to see the hidden value in clinical data systems, because one way or another, within the next decade these systems will help transform healthcare to the point where physicians will be able to treat some patients with common or recurrent symptoms completely by e-mail.
"Docs won't adopt this technology without remuneration, but they have to consider its possibilities," says Dr. Dan Martich, vice president of eRecord at UPMC and co-director of the cardiothoracic intensive care unit at the hospital center. "If you're a critical-care doctor seeing 20 patients in a day, you're working 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., or something like that, and getting from $10 to $60 a visit. If you lop off two or three visits, go home an hour or more earlier and instead do a dozen e-consults from home at $5 a clip, the whole thing is revenue neutral. And you get to spend more time away from the office. Or you could see more patients in the same amount of time because the technology makes the visits much more efficient. So you walk away with more money."
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: Insurance Dilemma">
The Insurance Dilemma
Network collaboration between payers and providers to handle electronic claims more quickly and with less overhead is in many ways more of a long shot than clinical data systems.
Electronic data interchange and other automated information schemas currently handle upwards of 80 percent of medical insurance claims, but in general they haven't done much to cut the costs of healthcare and enhance productivity, beyond limited scaling back of insurers' administrative expenses. And they have done nothing to improve patients' experiences.
The nature of the networkspoint to point, but with very little interaction or information sharing beyond the basic data in the insurance claimmitigates against true technology gains.
The main problem is the same one faced by the healthcare industry in all its attempts to rein in uncontrolled costs and deficient patient care: A farrago of companies makes standardization virtually impossible.
In fact, when the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, also known as the HIPAA rules, mandated a set of standards for claims-processing networks, many providers and payers turned to third parties to handle these transactions instead of designing their own systems to meet the legislation's guidelines. In the process, insurers and clinicians are communicating and sharing data even less.
Is a payer-to-provider network that delivers prompt payments, instant coverage approval and, ideally, a wealth of historical information about patients, treatments and medication even possible?
The best chance lies in regions where a few very large providers do business primarily with a few very large insurers. Such systems are still somewhat rare, but one fledgling example is the New England Healthcare EDI Network (NEHEN), a consortium of major Boston-area providers such as Partners Healthcare (which represents big hospital systems such as Massachusetts General and Brigham and Women's Hospital), CareGroup HealthCare System and Lifespan. The payer members of NEHENTufts Health Plan, Harvard Pilgrim HealthCare, Network Health and Neighborhood Health Planinsure more than 80 percent of the people in Massachusetts who have healthcare coverage.
In business since 1998, NEHEN is essentially a series of networks that link in real time the health plans to the healthcare providers' information systems, which allows the hospitals to determine standard patient insurance coverage in about five seconds, down from what used to take days, and to be reimbursed for treatment in a little more than a month, as opposed to at least three times that in the past.
NEHEN's goal is to slash the claims payment period to within a week. Though NEHEN has yet to include any clinical information applications, it already processes more than 3 million transactions a month, while delivering significant returns to its participants.
Partners Healthcare says it saves $9 million annually in transaction costs by using NEHEN, with the average cost of determining patient coverage eligibility down to about 10 cents from more than $2. On top of that, improved cash flow and quicker reprocessing of patient claims when they are mistakenly denied has brought further savings.
"The Decade of Health Information Technology: Delivering Consumer-centric and Information-rich Health Care"
July 21, 2004
The Department of Health and Human Services' plan to computerize health and create a nationwide health information network
Web Sites
Manages California's Pay for Performance program
Researches the role that IT can play in improving the quality of healthcare
Consortium of Fortune 500 companies aimed at improving healthcare safety, quality and patient value
"We will have to demonstrate actual and consistent returns in some big programs before payer-provider systems start to be embraced by the entire healthcare community," says Lewis Redd, chief of the healthcare practice at Capgemini.
That sentimentlooking forward and hoping for a future of plenty while living in a present where the situation is rife with serious problemsexpresses the state of the healthcare industry.
As long as the industry's business model remains an inscrutable mix of rivals grabbing profits from an ever-growing pie, with no financial motivation to cut prices, to treat patients with the deference they get from any other industry, and to view partnerships with anything but suspicion, it's unlikely that healthcare will solve its ills any time soon.
Information technology seems to hold some answers, but it will take timeand billions of dollars in wasted spendingbefore IT proves to be the antidote the healthcare industry needs.


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So feel free to submit your orders ladies!
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Friday, November 2, 2007
I got the sample jars!
Posted by Vanessa at 10:44 PM .
So feel free to submit your orders ladies!
3 comments
- Christiana Divine @ Memoirs of A Shopping Addict said...
Whoa momma, that's ALOT of jars! haha. :]
- November 2, 2007 at 11:15 PM
- LynaV said...
hey i would looove some samples! just wondering, how much they are? and how much is shipping to canada?! thanks girl!
- November 8, 2007 at 8:17 PM
- LynaV said...
oh my goodness! im sorry! it says right at the top :( lol im so blind! anyways thanks!
- November 8, 2007 at 8:18 PM
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MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. – It has become the kind of drive that LeBron James probably wishes fans would forget.
The Miami Heat superstar has received all kinds of flak since posting a video showing police escorting him -- while driving the wrong way. He was on his way to Sun Life Stadium for Friday night's Jay Z and Justin Timberlake concert in Miami Gardens.
While many were angry with James, the majority of criticism was leveled at the police department involved in the escort.
The exact department was impossible to make out in the original video posted on Instagram, but on Monday the Miami-Dade Police Department confirmed that an off-duty officer working for Sun Life Stadium that night provided an escort for James.
"He received a call that LeBron James was stuck in traffic and to facilitate him to get him to the next intersection, which he did," said Miami-Dade Police Maj. Nancy Perez. "He drove in the opposite lane, which is against policy, so that's where the problem comes in."
Perez said the escort wasn't scheduled.
"He just took him (James) from one intersection to the next intersection, which is really less than even a mile," she added.
The Miami-Dade Police Department is investigating.
"We're looking into the fact of who notified this officer and who told him to take LeBron James to the next intersection," said Perez.
According to a TMZ.com report, Jay-Z refused to start the concert without James, which prompted police to escort him to the stadium.
LeBron Escort Poll


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Millaa Millaa is an Aboriginal word meaning plenty of water or waterfall and this is as true as ever as some of the most beautiful waterfalls are within a few minutes drive of the town. The main one of course is Millaa Millaa but further along Tourist Drive number nine stop in and photograph Zillie Falls and Ellinjaa Falls to name a few.
In the main street is a lovely park with a larger than life statue of Christie Palmerston and one of his Aboriginal guides. The Palmerston Highway is named after this famous explorer.
Coffee shops and the local hotel provide convivial hospitality for visitors and the historical museum is open most mornings from 10.00am to midday.
The main industries of the Millaa Millaa area are dairying and tourism and most of the rainforest is now World Heritage-listed so enjoy your stay.
Note: Information on listed products and services are provided by the operator and were correct at the time of publishing. Rates are indicative based on the minimum and maximum available prices of products and services. Please visit the operator's website for further information. All prices quoted are in Australian dollars (AUD).


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eco - plants a tree for each frame sold and makes it easy to donate your unwanted eyewear.
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CoolFrames Designer Eyewear Boutique is an authorized ECO by Modo online retailer. All frames are guaranteed to be defect-free and authentic. We will replace any defective or damaged items to ensure 100% satisfaction. Our in-house optical lab can install custom prescription lenses into any eyeglass frame and many sunglass styles. We specialize in Essilor presciption lenses including Varilux Progressives, Transitions as well as Crizal Alize and Sapphire (Forte) Anti-Reflective coatings.


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BEIJING (Reuters) - China's economy relies on an excessively high level of investment and risks a potentially destabilizing increase if the government aims to keep growth around current levels for years to come, new International Monetary Fund research suggests.
Already running high as measured by a theory used by economists to assess capital-to-output ratios, investment accelerated between 2007 and 2011 to counter the effects of the global financial crisis, IMF staff wrote in a research paper on China's soaring investment levels.
"Depending on precise assumptions, over this period, China may have been over-investing by between 12 and 20 percent of gross domestic product relative to its steady-state desirable value," the report said.
"Even allowing for elevated investment levels associated with most economic take-offs, the econometric evidence suggests that China is over-investing," it said. "China's predicted investment norm over the last 30 years has ranged between 33-43 percent of GDP. In reality, it has fluctuated in a much broader band of 35-49 percent of GDP."
The IMF says its working papers do not necessarily represent the organization's policy, and that the reports describe research in progress that is published to spur debate.
The potential for severe internal economic imbalances in China stemming from an extended period of investment-driven growth, plus the risk that the excess capacity it creates spills into the global economy, are a recurring theme of IMF research.
A rise in fixed asset investment spending has helped underpin a rebound in China's economic growth in recent months, after seven successive quarters of slowing expansion - the worst run since the depths of the global financial crisis.
China officially targets GDP growth of 7.5 percent this year and analysts broadly believe the government has had an informal annual target of 8 percent or more for years - a level regarded until now as necessary to create enough jobs for the country's 1.3-billion strong population.
In a report earlier this year that Beijing sanctioned, the World Bank - the IMF's sister organization - assumed that China could maintain growth of 6-7 percent a year until 2030 with the right mix of structural economic reforms.
Average annual growth of around 10 percent for most of the last 30 years since China began a landmark program of economic reform, has seen the country transformed from impoverished laggard to the world's second-biggest economy - and likely to take top spot from the U.S. before the end of the next decade.
Beijing said in September that it had given fast-track approval to infrastructure projects worth $157 billion, a move analysts say has been key to cementing a fourth quarter bounce in GDP.
Total planned investment in newly started projects, a leading indicator of fixed asset investment, accelerated to 35.2 percent year-on-year in October from 31.3 percent in September, according to Ting Lu, chief China economist at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch.
The IMF stressed there were limitations to the model it was using and the assumptions it made, adding that on some simple metrics, the efficiency of China's return on investment was broadly in line with emerging market economies.
But the report added that by its calculations, a sustained period of over-investment meant that China now required ever higher investment to generate the same amount of growth, forecasting that investment's share of GDP could soar to 60-70 percent from current levels around 50 percent.
"Under such a strategy, vulnerabilities will likely grow in the form of hidden deadweight that will have to be paid in future in one form or another. The cost of financing such an elevated level of investment could undermine overall economic stability," it added.
Whether those vulnerabilities would eventually erupt into a full-blown funding crisis was far from clear, the IMF research said, particularly given China's heavy use of household savings, rather than external financing, for investment spending.
That funding model in itself has added strain which impeded the transition the government has said it wants to achieve in rebalancing growth towards domestic consumption and more dynamic small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
"In China, a large burden of the financing of over-investment is borne by households, estimated at close to 4 percent of GDP per year, while SMEs are paying a higher price of capital because of the funding priority given to larger corporations," the IMF report said.
Reporting by Nick Edwards; Editing by Richard Borsuk


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SAN JOSE, California (CNN) -- Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor and Democratic firebrand, stood behind a podium at the San Jose Convention Center and neatly summed up the current zeitgeist of the left.
"Is the president perfect?" Dean asked a buzzing audience of left-leaning bloggers, political activists and organizers on Thursday evening. "No. But it sure is better than having Bain Capital, I mean Mitt Romney, in there."
Dean's growling joke crystallized the prevailing liberal sentiment about President Barack Obama as the curtain rose on Netroots Nation, the annual progressive conference started in 2006 by the creators of the Daily Kos, a popular left-leaning blog and founding member of an online grass-roots movement that eventually helped lift Obama into the White House.
Obama the senator made a pilgrimage to the 2007 conference, then called Yearly Kos, and charmed the assembled bloggers as he mounted what seemed an impossible primary campaign against Hillary Clinton.
In 2013, Obama the president sent a YouTube video. He wasn't exactly missed.
On a host of issues from National Security Agency surveillance to Wall Street reform to foreclosure assistance to the Keystone XL pipeline debate, the more than 2,000 activists in San Jose for the eighth Netroots Nation expressed dismay about the compromises and slow pace of progress that have so far marked Obama's tenure in the White House.
"If George Bush was in there, I'd more frustrated," said Tony Alexander, political director for a local chapter of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union. "But we have Barack Obama, so it's a little less frustrating."
But frustrating nonetheless.
To many here, the hard-won battles of the 2012 campaign have not yielded much at all.
"We are in the middle of foreclosure crisis, and we haven't seen any real action on principal reduction, and we haven't seen any of the banks get prosecuted for some of things that were supposedly under investigation," said Liz Butler, a fellow at the Movement Strategy Center, a social justice organization. "A lot of us have concerns within the progressive, social justice and environmental movement about the lack of action on a whole set of issues."
Scott Paul, a self-described "labor Democrat" and president of the nonpartisan Alliance for American Manufacturing, pointed to Obama's promise at the Democratic National Convention to create 1 million new manufacturing jobs by the end of his second term.
"The first five months are in, and there is virtually no job creation, so they are already way behind on manufacturing," said Paul, who was enticing conference-goers to his display in the Netroots Nation exhibition hall with classic arcade games such as Galaga and Pac-Man. "How much of it was rhetorical? A lot of it was, clearly."
Across the hall from Paul's display, staffers from the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, a 1 million-member advocacy group founded by two former MoveOn.org organizers, was doing a brisk business handing out blue-and-white bumper stickers declaring, "I'm from the Elizabeth Warren wing of the Democratic Party."
Warren, the senator from Massachusetts who endeared herself to the left by pushing for student loan reform and greater Wall Street regulation, long ago surpassed Obama as a darling of the left, said Adam Green, a co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.
The president's attempt to pass sweeping gun control legislation after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School offered a glimmer of hope for liberals, Green said, but that soon faded.
"The American people want to believe in something, someone, and there are moments like the gun debate when the president did what progressives wanted all along, which is propose the boldest possible bill and barnstorm the country fighting for it," he said.
"But on things like foreclosures, and even jobs, there is the absence of a policy. On some things he is just wrong, and on other things he is just absent. Why isn't he giving a speech on jobs every single week? Why isn't he owning that issue? He is almost treating his presidency like he is treading water. There are people who want to rally behind his leadership if he is willing to lead, but he is not."
Obama recorded a video message for the conference that ran during the opening night of speeches on Thursday. It was sandwiched between the address by Dean and another by Sandra Fluke, the attorney and women's rights activist who became a Democratic celebrity during the 2012 presidential race when radio talker Rush Limbaugh called her a "slut" for advocating for greater access to contraceptives.
"We won't always agree on everything, and I know you'll tell me when we don't, but if we work together, I am confident we will keep moving this country forward," Obama said in the video, which was met by tepid applause though it highlighted accomplishments such as increasing home sales and passing an extension of the Violence Against Women Act.
The president's complicated relationship with his party's activist wing is, in a certain sense, as institutional as it is ideological. Every president, liberal or conservative, has been forced to make compromises that rankled even his most loyal supporters.
But Obama's other challenge is that the political left has long had a knack for restlessness, even with one of its own occupying the Oval Office.
Until the second term of President George W. Bush exposed his party's fault lines, Republicans for decades had a prized tradition of marching in lockstep with party leadership, especially when the GOP held the White House.
The Democratic Party, meanwhile, is routinely disparaged -- even by its own professional class in Washington -- as less a party than a feuding and loosely affiliated federation of special interests and demographic groups: organized labor, abortion rights supporters, environmentalists, racial minorities, students and others.
"Every president has to operate within the framework of a lot of competing interests and organizations that are supporting or against him, especially Democrats," said Jann Dorothy, a Netroots attendee from Sacramento, California, who is supportive of the president. "He has to always balance the various constituencies that are out there. It's a bit like herding cats."
Dorothy said that "a lot of people here are frustrated, very upset" about the NSA surveillance and data collection programs that former contractor Edward Snowden revealed this month.
Obama's approval rating has slipped in the wake of revelations about his administration's sweeping surveillance programs, but Democrats continue to give him high marks. A CNN/ORC International poll from this week shows Obama's approval rating among Democrats at 83 percent, down six percentage points from last month. Among liberals the rating fell three points to 75 percent
But the lanyard-wearing Netroots crowd bristled at party labels. They were more likely to identify themselves with a particular cause -- opposing the Keystone pipeline, for instance, or halting forced deportations of illegal immigrants. Breakout sessions at the conference largely focused on tactical matters such as media strategy and grass-roots organizing, not passing Obama's political agenda.
"I don't think there is a terribly strong allegiance to the Democratic Party here," Dean said in an interview with CNN.
It is a demanding bunch. Everyone who came to Netroots arrived with a pet issue or two, but it was difficult on the conference's first day to find anyone who said the president had done enough to satisfy his or her demands.
The exceptions to that rule were supporters of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights, who applauded the president for backing same-sex marriage and said the administration has accomplished most of what they wanted.
Still, many questions about the president from a reporter were met with shrugs and the occasional eye roll.
The tension revealed itself in a roundtable session Thursday morning with leaders from Organizing for Action, a grass-roots advocacy group that sprang from Obama's last campaign.
The group seeks to pressure members of Congress to back the White House's agenda, largely through local media events and partnerships with sympathetic interest groups such as Planned Parenthood.
But several activists who attended the roundtable pointedly questioned the group's executive director, Jon Carson, about its mission: Is its goal just to help Obama get his agenda passed? Or does it care about other progressive issues that don't quite jell with Obama's objectives?
The topic of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would transport crude oil reserves from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, was repeatedly broached. Several attendees doubted Organizing for Action's sincerity on climate change given the president's punting on a decision on construction of the 1,700-mile pipeline.
"Sometimes the administration is standing in the way of the agenda we all voted for," one participant said.
Carson gamely tried to manage the situation.
"I think what I would say is, we do partnerships primarily on specific actions," he said. "That's what we are offering. We wouldn't ask anyone, 'Let's make sure 100 percent of our agenda lines up before we go yell at (Sen.) Kelly Ayotte before her vote on background checks.' But when we do line up our agendas on what we care about, we will find at least 80 percent matching."
Sara El-Amine, the group's national organizing director, said, "We can't be all things to everyone."
Despite the evident frustration, there were no hints of outright anger about Obama among the convention participants. He is still their president, and as Dean pointed out, it could be much worse.
Former Obama campaign staffers wandered the hallways sharing hugs with friends in the blogger community, and Obama T-shirts are a frequent sight on the backs of conference-goers. Booze-soaked parties are as much a part of the agenda as networking and political organizing. The 2016 presidential race and discussions about putative front-runner Hillary Clinton are only conversation topics when brought up by reporters.
The anxiety here is hard to define, but it might have something to do with the fact that liberals find themselves in the unusual position of being two-time winners on a grand scale.
For a progressive movement that started as an underdog insurgency fighting back against the powerful Bush administration, it's kind of weird to be on top for five years running. These activists crashed the gate a long time ago. Their ambitions are a bit less sweeping, more prosaic and narrowly focused.
"It's exciting to be coming together after we all performed really well as a party," said Jess McIntosh, a spokeswoman for Emily's List, a group that supports female Democratic candidates. "We ran really good candidates; we had really good issues and we won. So I think now we all get to stand around and talk about what do we do with a win, which might not be the most natural position for everybody here."
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Tiešā saziņa par Lindab produkciju un sistēmām
Attēls 1/5
As early as 2008, NCC launched a project to develop the concept of low energy houses that meets the criteria for passive housing. This concept is also an important part in the development of the company's technical platforms, both for small houses and apartment buildings. "You could say that passive housing is based upon five important steps," explains Eugene Camara. "We must reduce energy losses, make energy consumption more efficient, harness solar energy, be able to measure and display energy consumption individually, and finally to choose environmentally friendly energy sources."
Beckombergavägen 1
168 54 Bromma