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Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Amazing Health Through Cabbage
Eating four ! cup servings of cabbage each week can reduced breast cancer risk by 45%according to research. The credit goes to the vegetable's stores of indole-3-carbinol. This phytonutrients prevents the fluctuating estrogen levels that can lead to disease-causing cell mutations.
* Super speedy metabolism
Crisp cabbage is one of the nature's sources of the slimming compound sulforaphane. This detoxifying agent naturally boost the body's production of myrosinase, an enzyme that flushes fat -trapping toxins from cells and turbocharges metabolism.
* Deeper Sleep
Munching on 1 cup of cabbage before bed can ensure more restful sleep. The magic ingredient: tryptophan. Brain cell use this amino acid to manufacture serotonim. Increased levels of this neurotransmitter prompt sleep inducing alpha waves in the brain to improve slumber quality.
* A healthier heart
To slash heart disease risk by 40 percent, consider eating 1 cup of folate rich cabbage daily. Reseach report that the nutrients converts the artery-damaging compound homocycteine into the amino acid methionine. This strengthen blood vessel walls, resulting in improved circulation and a decreased risk of harmful blood clots.
Posted by rinelle at 4:19 PM 0 comments
Labels: health tips
Monday, October 27, 2008
Is it True?
Stop for a moment and catch your thought. What are you thinking right now? Is it true that your thoughts shape your life?, would you want what you were thinking right now to become true for you? If it's a thought will come back to you?
Posted by rinelle at 3:56 PM 0 comments
Labels: personal
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Sculpt legs with stair strategy
Posted by rinelle at 12:52 PM 0 comments
Labels: health and fitness
Friday, October 24, 2008
Could decaf cause cancer?
My sister,s concern about the safety of decaffeinated coffee might stem from old reports that particular decaffeinating solvent, trichloroethylene, was found to cause cancer in mice. Fortunately this ingredients has'nt been used since 1970's and the decaf coffees curently on the market have all been deemed safe. Most used all natural ethyl acetate, a solvent derived from fruit like apples and bananas, in the decaffeination process.
However , I do suggest that you limit the decaf coffee intake to less than three cups a day since decaf is generally made from robusta coffee beans. These beans have high concentrations of diptenes, fats that have been shown to elevate cholesterol levels
Posted by rinelle at 3:48 PM 0 comments
Labels: drinks, healthy tips
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Favorite Comfort Food with Half the Fat
I love everything about my moms meatloaf.... except the oil that collects in the bottom of the pan while cooking. For a healthier slice of comfort without altering the family recipe from the loaf by hand and place it in the broiler pan with a foil - lined drip pan underneath. As the ground beef cooked, the oil will fall through the broiler - pan grates into foil.
Posted by rinelle at 3:37 PM 0 comments
Labels: healthy tips
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Express Your Love
Your loved ones knows you love them. How could they not. You feel love for them all the time. But even if your love is obvious to you, your family needs to hear it. We often assumes that people especially those who are close to us, know what we are thimnking and feeling, and therefore we don't need to keep repeating our love and affection. The truth is that doubt spring up, even if they are not rational, and all family members are reassured when you share your feelings for them.
I grew up in a big family, sharing a home with brothers sisters and cousins. But I never doubted my place in it.. Everyday my mother said she loves me. Every single day. There were a lot of mouths to feed, and times that we are struggled. But I never felt unwanted, or overlooked, because there was always a hug coming , always a smile...
Posted by rinelle at 3:14 PM 0 comments
Labels: personal
Service...an act of courage
There is never an ideal time to do anything. We can wait forever if we think that ideal opportunities will present themselves for acts of kindness and deeds of love. Grasp the opportunity. Make the most of good times and bad times. There must be a certain reckless abandon about the way we act. We cannot always be careful and calculating. We must do what should be done even when we don't have the time or things are not convenient.
Let's have the courage to live fully even when it is risky , vibrantly even when it leads to pain and spontaneously even it will leads to mistakes.
This attitude should be characterise not only the way we live, but also the way we serve. Service is never safe. It is always risky. We never know how we will be received ad what the outcomes will be. Service also never perfect. We serve inspite of our mistakes and our weaknesses. And service can also lead to pain. It can lead to the server feeling empty after having given much, It can result in lack of appreciation. It is usually involves carrying burdens that are not our owns.
The more we think about all of this , the less we are likely to do . Thus, service is an act of courage. It is an act of boldness. It is in some way foolhardy thing to do.
Posted by rinelle at 10:57 AM 0 comments
Labels: personal reflection


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Paid search spend growth held steady in Q4 with 14 percent growth year-over-year, according to Merkle's latest Digial Marketing Report. That's up from 13 percent growth see in Q3. Google's many changes, including device separation, helped drive growth.
In Q4, CPCs were off just 0.5 percent and click volume growth slowed to 15 percent year-over-year. Mobile phone clicks accounted for 47 percent of clicks, up from 33 percent the year before. Tablet share fell to 9 percent with the device bidding separation. Desktop spend rose after the device separation to 63 percent.
A number of changes kept Google growing
Google paid search spend grew 19 percent year-over-year in Q4, down slightly from 20 percent growth in Q3. Spending on non-brand, however, rose slightly to 21 percent in Q4.
The biggest Google growth drivers among Merkle's client set in Q4 were:
What has not had a dramatic impact, so far, are Expanded Text Ads (ETAs). Merkle continued to see mixed results from ETAs. Overall, across the client set included in the report, click-through rates for ETAs when appearing at the top of the page were 1 to 3 percent lower, across all devices, than those of Standard Text Ads. There were CTR increases compared to Standard Text Ads on desktop and tablet when ETAs appeared at the bottom of the page, but that volume represents a small fraction of total ad clicks.
Bing & Yahoo
Bing Product Ads showed positive growth in Q2 even as overall spend on Bing and Yahoo was down from the previous year. Combined spend across Bing Ads and Yahoo Gemini was off 13 percent year-over-year, compared to a 14 percent year-over-year decline seen in Q3.
Bing Product Ads helped buoy the overall trend, with spend growth on Product Ads increasing significantly to 16 percent in Q4. Product Ads accounted for 17 percent of Bing search ad clicks among retailers included in the report, up from 15 percent share in Q3.
Text ad spend growth, however, was off by 17 percent in the fourth quarter compared to the previous year.
Non-brand spend on Bing and Yahoo Gemini fell by 15 percent year-over-year in Q4; clicks were off by 18 percent and CPCs grew 4 percent on non-brand clicks.
The Digital Marketing Report is available for download (with registration) here with a lot more data and analysis.
The post Merkle: Google Q4 search growth aided by changes other than ETAs appeared first on Search Engine Land.
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February 2019

subset: commoncrawl


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Barack Obama defends his birthday "gift"
President Obama got what he wanted for his birthday, but by his own admission, it wasn't as spectacular as one would hope for.
Back in June, the president told NPR that what he really wanted for his 50th birthday was a debt ceiling deal. He got that gift, of course, just two days ahead of his birthday today. But at a fundraiser that doubled as a birthday celebration last night, the president acknowledged that few are happy with the way the deal was reached.
"Obviously, we've just gone through an extraordinary week in Washington, an extraordinary two weeks in Washington," he told a group of 100 wealthy supporters the Aragon Ballroom in Chicago. "It's not the kind of extraordinary the American people are looking for."
Mr. Obama defended the debt package as "responsible" in paying down the national debt and added that it's "not going to dismantle our social safety net." He also took a jab at Republicans, remarking, "I give the other side credit. They are single-minded in their focus in wanting to cut programs and shrink government."
The president's fundraiser was his first in a month, after he put his campaigning on hold to deal with the debate over raising the debt limit. The 100 supporters who attended the dinner donated as much as $35,800 for tickets, while about 2,400 other donors -- some donning cone-shaped birthday hats with the Obama campaign logo on them -- paid a minimum of $50 to attend a larger event. The party-goers were entertained by the likes of musicians Jennifer Hudson and Herbie Hancock and the band OK Go.
While the debate over the debt limit may have discouraged his supporters, particularly progressives, the president said during his fundraising events that the struggle proved just how important the next election is.
"We've already seen over the last week just how different the two visions are in terms of which direction we should take the country," Mr. Obama said in a video teleconference with supporters. "This is really important moment in our history."
The 2012 election, he said, "in some ways may be more important than the last one."
In the future, Mr. Obama said, he wants to take on immigration, energy policy, tax reform, and continue to work on building up the economy and reducing the deficit and debt in a responsible way.
While wrapping up the debt deal must have been a relief to the president, he told his supporters Wednesday that he couldn't have had a better birthday present than spending the night in Chicago.
"It's true that I turn 50 tomorrow," he said, adding that by the time he wakes up tomorrow he expects an email from AARP "asking me to call President Obama and tell him to protect Medicare."
Today, the president has a quiet public schedule, but privately he'll have two birthday celebrations. First, his senior staff will hold a toast for the president in the White House Blue Room today. In the evening, Mr. Obama and First Lady Michelle are hosting White House Rose Garden party for some of their friends, which the Obamas are paying for themselves, reports the Chicago Sun Times' Lynn Sweet.
Even if the debt deal has left the president feeling weary at age 50, he can take comfort in knowing he's still the 5th youngest president, according to CBS News White House Correspondent Mark Knoller. He took office at 47 years old. The youngest ever president was Teddy Roosevelt, who took office at 42.
Obama, staff toast debt deal with burgers
Obama to Chicago for 50th birthday fundraiser
Photos: Obama on the campaign trail


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Joe Jonas has revealed the elevator drama he posted on Snapchat at the weekend (23-25Sep16) was all prank.
The singer and his ex-girlfriend Demi Lovato, who are now good friends following their split in 2010, claimed they experienced a near disaster hours before an exclusive show for Marriott Reward Members in Los Angeles, when they were trapped inside an elevator for four hours with Joe's DNCE bandmates last week (ends23Sep16).
Joe documented the incident on Snapchat by posting a video in which he spoke directly to the camera and said, "We've been stuck in an elevator for four hours." Demi, who was standing behind him, grimaced and muttered, "Oh my God."
He then moved his camera around to show his bandmates and ended the video by sighing.
However, Joe has now revealed the former couple was joking.
"It was a lot less dramatic," he tells People magazine. "It was a total prank and we fooled everyone. I made the video saying we got stuck in the elevator, but we really weren't. But I guess it's bad karma to say that because I don't want to get stuck in the elevator anytime soon."
"(Demi and I) were talking yesterday and I said, 'I think we fooled everyone because it's on every press site', but we really weren't stuck in the elevator," he continues.
Joe goes on to explain he has been caught in a similar situation in the past and it is not something he wants to relive.
"I have been stuck in an elevator before and it was terrifying," he says.
Joe recently opened up to Billboard magazine about his friendship with Demi, saying she's the "best version of herself I've ever known", after she sought help for her addiction issues in rehab.
"I know a lot of friends who've gone through similar things and it's when you have to live with your new self for a few years - that comes with a lot of struggle," he added. "And being a pop star on top of that, that's a lot of pressure, but she's amazing at speaking truth to what she believes."
Disney sensation Miley Cyrus sheds another layer of her tween dynamic as she edges closer...


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By Johnbosco Agbakwuru, Abuja
It was shocking and earth-shaking in the Nigerian Senate, yesterday, when it was revealed that the Jonathan government spent a whooping 14 million Pounds (N4.3 billion) to secure the conviction of Chief James Ibori, former governor of Delta State.
The disclosure was made by Sen. Victor Lar, Chairman, Senate Committee on Drugs, Narcotics, Financial Crimes and Anti-Corruption, during the 2015 budget defence of N542,199,776 for the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.
Analysts say spending that much to secure the conviction of a single person is astonishing and baffling, especially as the person was tried and convicted in the UK and not in Nigeria. Political meanings are being read to what is seen as secret spending.
Sen. Lar added that the N4.3 billion 'is more than ten years recurrent and capital budgets of all the anti-corruption agencies put together'.
It should be recalled that Chief Ibori was convicted on April 17, 2012, and sentenced to 13 years by Southwark Crown Court for financial crimes. At that time, many admirers of the strongman of Delta State politics had accused the Jonathan government of underhand dealing in the conviction, alleging that Chief Ibori's conviction was traded for British interest in Nigerian oil.
By Sen. Lar's revelation, analysts are wont to conclude that such a whooping sum was uncalled for, and that the money could have been put to better use in fighting corruption internally.
The Jonathan government has variously been accused of not fighting corruption frontally. It is a major plank on which the opposition party is promoting Gen. Mohammadu Buhari, who is generally seen as a no-nonsense anti-corruption person.
Sen. Lar also stated that people criticized the present government of not doing enough to fight corruption because Nigerians were impatient, adding that the difference between the present administration and the previous ones was that the present follows due process.


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Subscription Fee/Product offlineSelling on Konga Created 1 year ago | Updated 1 year ago
DADorcas A B
I sincerely don't know what is happening with Konga. I paid for Subscription since Thursday and this will make it forth messages I will be sending to konga, none of my item are online. If you want sellers to pay for subscription, don't you think you should have some commitment making sure that there is sales on our store? I stopped paying for subscription because there was no reasonable sales on my store and now after paying, I have to be sending emails to put my store live. Someone should please look into this cos I am tired of selling emails.
MAMayowa A SPosted 1 year ago
Same thing happened to me before i discovered that you need to enable the products. They've all been put under pause. so you need to click on the enable button to enable each of the products. Hope this clarifies.
JmJessica m SPosted 1 year ago
Moderator no longer comment... Less staff less productive results
JmJessica m SPosted 1 year ago
I am having same issues.... Since I paid for subscription out of 184 product 5 is showing. I'm trying not to give up on Konga and face other seller portal
DADorcas A BPosted 1 year ago
@ Jennifer,Thank you so much. I Have Clicked on that before coming here and it is still not showing live but it showing that it is live on SHQ. It is almost a week now, I have over a 100 item but Just 11 is showing. I am tired of Going back and forth with Konga. This is one of the reason I stopped paying subscription cos it is like you are just giving away your money and now Konga has made it mandatory for every one to pay You have to beg Konga again to put your item up after paying for subscription.
jpjennifer p BPosted 1 year ago
Hi Dorcas, I had this same issues earlier, but i had to enable my products after paying for my subscription. You might want to try this. Please share your store name here.
ABAsaolu B BPosted 1 year ago
It's been three days my product were approved or enabled and they are not still showing live in site. Even after been on review for over a week. I don't honestly understand, what's the point subscribing when sales are not forthcoming.
Howdy, Stranger!It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, login with your konga credentials!
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This promotion is for Rewards members only. To take advantage of exclusive offers like these, join Office Depot® OfficeMax® Rewards now!
Tripp Lite 2U UPS Replacement Battery Cartridge 48VDC for select SmartPro UPS Systems 1 set of 4 Item # 435310
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Tripp Lite's premium UPS replacement battery cartridges breathe new life into UPS systems suffering from expired or weak internal batteries. Each replacement battery cartridge is carefully screened and certified to meet or exceed original specifications and ships ready for installation into your UPS system. Reusable packaging holds expired batteries for recycling center delivery. See Tripp Lite's UPS replacement battery web page to confirm compatibility and quantity required.COMPATIBLE WITH TRIPP LITE MODELS SMART1500RMXL2U, SMART2200RMXL2U, SMART3000RM2U, SU1500RTXL2Ua, SU2200RTXL2Ua, SUINT2200RTXL2UA and other UPS systems referencing this RBC.
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|Item #
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|RBC94-2U Replacement Battery Cartridge; One pre-assembled battery pack consisting of four 12V batteries
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2U Replacement Battery Cartridge for Select Tripp Lite UPS Systems
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If the volunteer with materials for your fantastic pre-planned Read-Aloud doesn't arrive, don't panic. In a pinch, all you really need to conduct a Read-Aloud are some kids, some books and some fun. The key is to use what's on hand at your site and to conduct activities that require no preparation and few or no supplies.
Give-away books
Flip the regular schedule on its head and let kids choose their give-away books first. Then read those books with the kids in small groups. If children choose a chapter book, read a little bit of it to give them a taste of the story. Talk with the kids about why they chose a book, what they think will happen in the story and what they think of the characters or topic.
Books in the Reading Corner
Explore the books on the shelves in the Read-Aloud room. Talk with the kids about which books they like and which books they don't. Talk about ways the kids could use the books (for fun reading, for doing a school assignment, to recommend to a friend who lives at the site, etc.). Then read a few of the books the kids are excited about.
On-the-fly activities
Use on-hand craft supplies
- Make posters to decorate the Reading Corner. They could show what the kids like about the Read-Alouds or their favorite books.
- Draw self-portraits or a scene from a book they've read or heard.
- Put out a variety of craft supplies that you find on site, such as construction paper, stickers, markers and crayons, etc,. and let the kids have unstructured creative time.
Play get-to-know-you games
- Alike and different — put people in pairs (volunteers and kids, kids and kids, etc.) and let them talk for a little bit. Ask them to figure out some things they have in common (both like dogs, both born in July) and some things that are different (different favorite colors or foods, different music, different eye color). Then encourage each pair to share what they've discovered about their partner with the group.
- Two truths and a lie -- ask the kids to think up three things about themselves. Two should be true and one made up. (For example: I like coconut. I was born in the summer. I have two brothers.) Then each kid, in turn, tells the group the three things and the group has to guess which one is the lie.
Play word games
- Start with one word and see how many rhyming words the kids can list.
- Do Madlibs as a large group, or in small groups and share the results. There's even a free Madlibs app that you can download and use. Some of TRC's Read-Aloud sites have Madlibs in their binder.
Explore your surroundings
- Be scientists or detectives. If you can take the kids outside, look for bugs, birds, plants, types of cars, colors, shapes or any category of items. Inside, have them observe the room for shapes, patterns, small items. Help the kids to make a list or draw pictures of what they find.
- Ask the kids to close their eyes and listen carefully — what do they hear? If there aren't a lot of ambient noises, make some by moving a chair, shaking your keys, zipping a coat, opening a cabinet. Ask the kids to guess what the sounds are. You can also play an immense variety of sounds from the BBC stimulus sound library.
- Play I SPY or I HEAR ("I spy with my little eye something that is round." Or "I hear with my little ear something that sounds squeaky.")
Get up and move
- Do yoga
- Have a dance party using music from your phone or Youtube. If you have or can find a variety of genres of music, have the kids adapt their dancing to the type of music.
- Use a watch to time activities, such as standing on one leg, jumping jacks or wall sits.
- Do a unified movement activity, like Tootie-Ta or Bananas Unite.
Play games
- Charades
- Telephone
- I Spy/I Hear
- I'm going on a picnic and I'm going to bring…
- Simon Says
- Musical Chairs
- Red Light, Green Light
The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray, but fun and meaningful experiences with books can still happen at your Read-Aloud, even without your theme materials. As long as kids are hearing books read aloud. talking with you about books and get to choose a book to keep, you've accomplished your goal. And the extra good news is that you already have a Read-Aloud planned for next time!
To receive credit for this online training, please fill out the form here.


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This is from my Sister in The Lord, Marie !!
Enjoy !!
- 3-year-old Reese :
'Our Father, Who does art in heaven,
Harold is His name.
- A little boy was overheard praying:
'Lord, if you can't make me a better boy, don't worry about it.
I'm having a real good time like I am.'
- After the christening of his baby brother in church,
Jason sobbed all the way home in the back seat of the car.
His father asked him three times what was wrong.
Finally, the boy replied,
'That preacher said he wanted us brought up in a Christian home,
and I wanted to stay with you guys.
- A Sunday school teacher asked her children as they
were on the way to church service,
'And why is it necessary to be quiet in church?'
One bright little girl replied,
'Because people are sleeping
- A mother was preparing pancakes for her sons, Kevin 5, and Ryan 3.
The boys began to argue over who would get the first pancake.
Their mother saw the opportunity for a moral lesson.
'If Jesus were sitting here, He would say,
'Let my brother have the first pancake, I can wait.'
Kevin turned to his younger brother and said,
'Ryan, you be Jesus!'
- A father was at the beach with his children
when the four-year-old son ran up to him,
grabbed his hand, and led him to the shore
where a seagull lay dead in the sand.
'Daddy, what happened to him?' the son asked.
'He died and went to Heaven,' the Dad replied
The boy thought a moment and then said,
'Did God throw him back down?'
A wife invited some people to dinner.
At the table, she turned to their six-year-old daughter and said,
'Would you like to say the blessing?'
'I wouldn't know what to say,' the girl replied.
'Just say what you hear Mommy say,' the wife answered.
The daughter bowed her head and said,
'Lord, why on earth did I invite all these people to dinner?'


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Tanning is a ritual that almost every beauty-savvy woman goes through, at some point in time. While the sun is the best way to tan, and the beach is the ideal location, one has toRead more →
The concept of tanning has evolved since when it began as purely a means to achieve a more aesthetically appealing skin tone, and to avoid looking excessively pale. Now, it has become a practice forRead more →
Glowing, gorgeous skin is something that ranks really high in the list of things that we want every summer. While baking in the sun is perhaps the most cost effective way of getting this look,Read more →
Top Health Benefits of Using Tanning Beds Many researches and experts have pressed on the fact that UV light is crucial and necessary for the optimal well being of every human being. Although outdoor tanningRead more →
5 HEALTH BENEFITS OF TANNING BEDS YOU PROBABLY DIDN'T KNOW We all know that excessive exposure to UV rays is bad for the skin and could cause cancer. It may be from excessive tanningRead more →
As the trend of spray tanning begins to grow, people are coming in terms with how useful and beneficial this method is. Not only is the tan, obtained through this method, clearly visible and lasting,Read more →
With tanning salons gaining reputation for the quick and easy solution that they provide, it is feasible to mention that the demand for them has greatly increased. Since customers are on the lookout for theRead more →
Self tanning is a different approach to get that sun-kissed skin without running the risk of one's wellness from the damaging radiation of the sunlight. Nevertheless, even if you have the most effective self sunlessRead more →
Historically, tanning beds had quite reduced result and occupied to 30 minutes to achieve results, no wonder Stand-Up Sun tanning Display's really did not exist back then. Who would certainly want to mean Thirty Minutes?Read more →


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Battery Life Hack Exposed
Tired of changing your car or boat battery too soon? or sometimes buying another power tools because the battery died and won't charge? Do your phone or laptop drain too fast after using for a year? Well these are the common problems with batteries but we don't really care about.
Why most batteries are not meant to last?
The truth is quality batteries are expensive and hard to market. That's why companies create cheaper and affordable batteries but will not last longer compared to high end expensive batteries.
So why do I need to recondition batteries?
Well simply because to save hundreds of dollars or even thousands if your running a transport business or if you're maintaining a farm. Portable power is now a necessity and having batteries running at 100 percent capacity is definitely a time and money saver.
Battery shops buy old car batteries or give discounts when you buy new battery and exchange your old one, the main reason is, they know how to recondition batteries and sell it, easy money. Now, how about learning how to do this trick in your own garage and bring back most of your old batteries to 100 percent running condition?
How to recondition old batteries
Learning how to recondition old batteries back to 100% of their working condition is not really that hard. The Battery reconditioning method works for nearly all types of batteries (car, boat, phone, laptop, solar, forklift, golf cart, and a lot more).
Reconditioning batteries involves specific steps for each type of battery, so you must ensure that you have the right information and execution guide in order to avoid injuries. When dealing with Lead Acid Batteries, wearing safety goggles and gloves is a must.
Try Battery Reconditioning Guide


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Seth, a native of Williamstown, grew up in the beautiful Berkshires. He brings with him significant commercial land sale experience, having worked and travelled around the country for Redstone Properties in Williamstown for six years.
Many are familiar with his family as they owned Buxton Brook Bed and Breakfast on North West Hill Road in Williamstown, a favorite for many years among locals and visitors alike.
Seth attended school in the Berkshires before he headed out West to Colorado to follow his passion for snowboarding, skiing and adventure. Upon returning to the Berkshires to be close to family, he pursued a career in vacation and land sales. After working at Vacation Village, where he helped families to achieve their dreams of travelling and vacationing together, Seth turned his attention toward helping people achieve land and commercial property ownership.
Seth's eye for matching people up with dream vacations and properties also applies to his company, Koi Crazy, where he sells show-level Japanese koi fish to koi lovers and hobbyists.
In his spare time Seth enjoys golf, skiing, and walks with his chocolate lab. He lives in Pownal, Vt., with his wife and young daughter, and looks forward to sharing his love of the area and his experience to help others find the perfect property or sell the one they currently own.
Seth is proud to join the team at Burnham Gold Real Estate.


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It took me a few days to gather photos from our various Halloween activities, but here they are…better late than never!
Our family theme this year was "Space". Cam had mentioned being an astronaut a few months ago and it was the only suggestion that I thought was do-able…any other time I asked him what he wanted to be it was always Lightning McQueen. Ugh! So we went with space…Clara was our alien princess, mommy was a starry sky and daddy was Space Ghost.
For Cam's costume, I went with a pattern, McCalls 6417. It was simple and quick…a one-piece suit and a set of boot covers. Since I procrastinated the entire costume-making endeavor, I didn't get authentic NASA patches ordered in time, so I painted my own using a Google image search and a steady hand. Ruth was in paper mache mode with Asher's pteranodon head so she made Cam a space helmet…it's a good thing she did, cause I had run out of time. It was hilariously oversized, but it made an excellent candy receptacle. He loved the costume!
The icing on the cake was Cam's rocket pack. Again, we were short on time so Ruth donated two perfectly shaped bottles and we taped them to a small plastic cutting board. I cut out some fancy felt flames and hot-glued them in. Voila!
Clara's costume was inspired by a pattern, Simplicity 1769. I made her a short cape with 3 eyeballs on pipe-cleaners. The rest of the costume consisted of a comfortable baby outfit: onesie, skirt and tights, all handmade. I found a pair of florescent green knee-high socks at Target and turned them into baby tights. They were sooo easy! Hopefully I'll come up with a quick tutorial for them soon.
Space Ghost was my crowning achievement. Brian's such a good sport for putting up with a one-piece, back-zippered full body double knit costume. I used McCalls 6475 for the basic idea and added the feet, which I totally made up and it turned out great! The comparison pictures were taken the day after Halloween, and he had left his red cuffs in a bathroom somewhere! Oh well…it was awesome while it lasted ;)
As is typical, mommy's costume got left for last and wasn't exactly what I had envisioned…the starry headband was the best part Just some wire and felt stars on a dollar store headband. Couldn't be easier. The rest of it was thrown together from my closet along with a sheer starry gathered skirt that never quite fit right. Oh well…next year, I'll start with my costume! (yeah, right!)


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Today was grey and a little bleak, and with heaving fruit trees over the fence it was time to get into the kitchen for a bit of baking time.
Tom was keen to help out so we made an Orange sponge cake with surprise.......orange icing along with currant and citrus biscuits. Both recipes we used were just a basic sponge and biscuit recipe that I changed a little and I needed to use currants as I seem to have two bags of them in the cupboard.
Bell is at her cousins tonight and the boys are in bed early. Mr H and I are working our way through the "Breaking Bad" series on DVD so we will watch that this evening while enjoying a takeaway Curry.
Sunday I'm hoping to do a bit of over due tidying in the garden, blitz the housework and make sure everyone is sorted for going back to kindy and school on Monday.
Hope you are having a good weekend where you are. xo


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|One tire was harmed in the making of this post
That's almost a perfect scenario for me. To feel like a nice, reliable thing nicely and reliably notified me that it was time to celebrate a product well used, and move on. Looking at the photo above, the tire is perhaps a bit beyond that point, but nonetheless it soldiered on, and did not actually fail me on my commute. The "flup-flup-flup-flup-flup" sound was that flap of sidewall hitting the brake arm every time around, and for both the flap and the brake arm, I am grateful that they informed me prior to a blowout or some other less pleasant failure mode. That's pure wear you see there, as far as I know: I don't think I ran over something, and I'm sure that the brake pads aren't rubbing the tire. That's just several thousand commuting miles taking its toll. Call it Spring, Summer, Winter, rain and beating sun, just adding up, just breaking down.
Thank you, cheap reliable tire, for performing your lowly but vital task for all those miles, and for letting me know when it was your time to go. Happy Flat Tuesday!


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Turnbo Home | Table of Contents | Keyword Search| Bibliography | Biography
By S. C. Turnbo
As we have mentioned elsewhere Jess Bias settled on Shoal Creek in Taney County, Mo., in 1832. A few months after Hiram Bias, son of Jess Bias, had killed the big bear in the burr oak tree which we have told in another place. He and his father started out into the hills together to kill deer. They had only went up the creek a short distance above where they lived and found a spring at the foot of the hill on the east side of the creek where the creek bottom extends along the stream. This spring is on what Is now the Rufe Jones farm below Protem. "After we had drank water at the spring we crossed the creek to the west side and went up the bluff and after walking along on top of it a short distance up the creek when we saw a bear on the side of the bluff below us) It said Hiram Bias. "We carried a rifle each. My fathers gun was large and carried a big ball. My gun was small and carried a little bullet. When we saw the bear it was standing still and looking at us. My father says to me, Hiram, we must kill that bear, but it will take both of us to do it. We must shoot at it the same moment. We will take aim at it with our guns and when I give the signal you pull the trigger and I will too; `and directly father says, Shoot, and we shot and the bear dropped on the ground and lay quiet. Deeming it prudent to reload our rifles before venturing up to It for fear the animal might revive and while we were reloading the guns father says, My gun did the work for your gun is too small to hurt a bear very much. Your bullet only tickled its ribs. I aimed behind the shoulder and I know my bullet killed it, said he. I told him that I aimed behind the shoulder too but I will not claim to have wounded or killed Bruin until we examine and find out something about it. As soon as we had reloaded the guns and the bear showing no sign of life we went down where It lay broadside with its back down the hill and found that one of the balls had struck It behind the shoulder and the other bullet had took effect in the shoulder high up, but owing to the long shaggy coat of hair on the beast we were not able to determine which one of the balls hit it behind the shoulder until we had taken off the hide when we found that the small bullet from my rifle had penetrated Bruins heart. The big ball from fathers gun had struck the bears shoulder and lodged in the joint of the shoulder blade. This settled it as to who killed the bear and my father like a good fellow gave me the praise of killing Bruin which made me feel as big as any bear hunter could feel. I kept the hide of that bear until long after I was married and it was the only bed I and my wife had to sleep on until we were able to own a better one."
Turnbo Home | Table of Contents | Keyword Search| Bibliography | Biography
Springfield-Greene County Library


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Therefore, youll need a patio umbrella which appears to be fragile and temporary. However, most buyers are confused about the size, color and material choices. It is indeed annoying also to not to be able to look people in the eyes because the eyes are being blind by the sun.
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If you have the patio, pool side, or your backyard where you can always find many of these at different rates and styles to suit your lifestyle. Now each usually has outdoor space, which is made to meet the needs of the people. But there are a number of owners may not know what to get and how to install them. The roomy and colorful patio umbrellas can accommodate up to 4 people, depending upon the users requirement. Remove the pad, old umbrellas, and so on. At the same time, they provide a chic look and enhance the ambience to the hilt.


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Since there is no guaranteed way to eliminate muscle soreness after lifting weights, the best approach is a preventive plan. While it is common to expect some muscle soreness after lifting weights, you can reduce the occurrence by adjusting your lifting routine. If your pre-planning doesn't do the trick, you have options to lessen your muscle soreness and speed your recovery. Soon, your soreness won't interfere with your next workout, thus bringing you closer to reaching your fitness goals.
Step 1
Warm up completely before you begin your weight lifting session to prepare your muscles and lessen post-workout soreness. Spend five to 10 minutes doing full-body movements such as walking, stair climbing or jumping rope to increase circulation.
Step 2
Use a lighter amount of resistance if you repeatedly experience uncomfortable muscle soreness. Decrease the weight slightly and perform your usual number of repetitions to see if it reduces your soreness after a workout.
Step 3
Reduce the eccentric portion of the strength training move. Lower the weights to a count of two instead of a slower count of three or four to reduce muscle soreness.
Step 4
Increase the amount of rest in between sets. Rest for one to two minutes between each set instead of 30 to 60 seconds, or increase the rest time between three and four minutes to allow for greater muscle recovery and a lesser chance of discomfort.
Step 5
Increase the amount of recovery time in between each workout. Wait at least 42 to 78 hours before you lift weights again to allow enough time for muscle recovery and to prevent muscle soreness.
Step 6
Stretch the muscles that you have trained to diminish your chances of being sore. Include stretches for your major muscle groups such as your chest, back, shoulders, arms, hips and legs.
Step 7
Avoid activities that increase the pain during your rest days. Walk to increase the blood flow to your muscles, but avoid any strenuous activities such as sport play or running long-distance.
Step 8
Increase your intake of antioxidants such as Vitamins C and E to speed cell recovery. Speak with your doctor about the correct dosage; an increase of antioxidants can minimize your muscle soreness.
Step 9
Get a massage, which may reduce your muscle soreness and increase your relaxation response.
Step 10
Soak in an epsom salt bath for temporary relief of your muscle soreness.
Step 11
Apply topical pain-relieving ointments that contain aspirin, once you have clearance from your physician, to alleviate your muscle soreness.
Things You'll Need
Epsom salt
Muscle-relief ointments
Speak with your physician if your muscle soreness lasts longer than a week or interferes with your work and sleep.


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Bible Believers' Newsletter 672
"We focus on the present Truth – what Jesus is doing now. . ."
Christian greetings in the precious Name of our Lord Jesus Christ; we are pleased you could join us in fellowship around God's unchanging Word. And if you are a new subscriber we offer you a hearty welcome and invite you to request our free PowerPoint presentation, "The Second Coming of Christ".
Reverend Ted Pike has the strong "Freedom Warrior Attitude" against the Global Power Elite espoused last week by Adrian Salbuchi, "NOT giving in to them; NOT giving them your Free Will, and REFUSING TO SERVE THEM. By yielding your free will you take the mark of the beast. Brother Pike is Director of the National Prayer Network, a Christian/conservative watch dog organization. Always available for interview by talk show hosts, he preaches against the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith who have saddled 45 states with "hate laws" capable of persecuting Christians with intent to steal free speech in the US as they have in Canada with "hate laws" that make criminals of Christians. His article was co-written by staff writer, Sister Harmony Daws. Their article, The Coming Jewish 'Utopia' ruled by Noahide Laws forms the basis of Part VI of our study, The Mark of the Beast".
This Newsletter serves those of like precious faith. Whoever will receive the truth is welcome to feed their soul from the waters of the River of Life. Everything here presented should be confirmed personally in your own Bible.
Your brother-in-Christ, Anthony Grigor-Scott
CIA: Frank G. Wisner arrived in Cairo
February 2, 2011 For the [US] National Security Council, it is not enough to simply safeguard the interests of the United States. It is absolutely indispensable to preserve the Egyptian-Israeli peace deal, which implies having to choose the next country leadership. Thus, the NSC called Frank G. Wisner, former Ambassador to Egypt (1986-91) . . . Mr. Wisner is the son of Frank G. Wisner Sr., co-founder of the CIA and Gladio. Together with Allen Dulles, Wisner Sr. was one of the architects of the US secret intervention doctrine: support those democracies which make a "good choice," oppose those which make the wrong choice.
As for Frank G. Wisner Jr., he has always worked for the Agency and continues to do so, serving in particular as one of the Directors of Refugees International . . . a personal friend of President Hosni Mubarak . . . His arrival was discretely preceded by a telephone call from Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to his Egyptian counterpart General Sami Enanthe Egyptian army is trained and equipped by the Pentagon. Officially, Mullen commended him for his restraint, a message which was perfectly deciphered by Cairo which, a few minutes later, announced that the army regarded the protests as legitimate.
Frank G. Wisner Jr. is not known to the US public either as a diplomat or as a master spy, but as an unscrupulous financier. He was part of the Enron power elite involved in the fraudulent bankruptcy of the corporation that ruined countless small investors and, later, as Vice Chairman of American International Group whose share prices plummeted by 95% during the 2008 financial crisis, prior to its bailout with taxpayers' money. . . He married Christine de Ganay (Pal Sarkozy's second wife) and, in that capacity, reared Nicolas Sarkozy during his New York years. . . [and] recommended his friend Bernard Kouchner as French Foreign Minister with the mission to mobilize European states in favour of Kosovo's independence. Full story: voltairenet.org
Egypt's Generals seek Ways to ease Mubarak out with His Dignity Intact
February 5, 2011 Mubarak's hours and days are numbered. Americans have made up their minds and are encouraging the army to form a national unity government. The likely outcome is that Vice-President Omar Suleiman becomes the new president with the top military brass retaining key positions. This will be seen as a major victory for the opposition and the Egyptian public . . .
The US is playing an essential role in getting the army to talk with the multiple constituencies of the opposition. The Egyptian army wants to assert its control, but also an orderly and peaceful transition. The generals are trying to send two powerful messages to the people: that it is the most respected national institution and that it is distancing itself from the Mubarak regime. It's clear that the army will fill that vacuum and is trying to find a dignified exit for Mubarak. . . Full story: independent.co.uk
Comment: Two senior Israeli officers and three US generals have arrived in Cairo to take control of the military command in Egypt . . . in securing a coup d'etat if Mubarak refuses to go quickly. Both the US and Israel are seeking to turn Egypt into a state along the lines of how Pakistan or Turkey is run giving more power to the military who are very dependent on America's annual billion and a half "aid." This is not an exercise in democracy for the Egyptian people but an extension of totalitarian dictatorship for US and Israeli interests. Daniel 11:42 informs us that Egypt will not escape her Judaeo-Roman oppressors.
Mubarak's government angered the Islamic world when it refused to open the Rafah border crossing for relief workers seeking to provide medical assistance to the Palestinians during Israel's 22-day war on the Gaza Strip from December 2008 to January 2009 (tehrantimes.com).
The fading power of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's government leaves Israel in a state of strategic distress. Without Mubarak, Israel is left with almost no friends in the Middle East; last year, Israel saw its alliance with Turkey collapse (haaretz.com). From now on, it will be hard for Israel to trust an Egyptian government torn apart by internal strife. Israel's increasing isolation in the region, coupled with a weakening United States, will force the government to court new potential allies.
Playing Games with People's Hunger
February 9, 2011 Not everyone gets billions of dollars in interest free money from the Fed. Most people work for the money they get. This creates a real problem for people whose wages have been stagnant (or declining) while the US government shovels trillions of dollars to banks to help them cover their gambling losses. What do banks like Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan do with the free money? They "play" . . . with wheat prices, with corn prices, with oil prices. There is no supply/demand reason for commodities to be as high as they are now. It's all speculation based on free money given to bankers. Note: The prices will come down eventuallyprecipitouslybut in the meantime hundreds millions of people go hungry and have had their standard of living decimated. Full story: realecontv.com
Comment: Rothschildsthe catalyst igniting civil unrest in the Middle East to play out their endgame.
Big Win for Biotech: USDA Deregulates Monsanto Alfalfa
February 7, 2011 After nearly five years of legal and regulatory battles, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has fully deregulated Monsanto's Roundup Ready alfalfa that is genetically modified (GM) to be resistant to Roundup herbicide. . . Monsanto was one of the top contributors to [Chairman of the Agriculture Committee, Frank] Lucas's campaign committee in 2010. A political action committee and individuals associated with Monsanto donated $11,000 to his campaign last year, and Lucas has received $1,247,844 from the agribusiness industry during his political career, according to watchdog site www.opensecrets.org. . .
In a letter to Vilsack, CFS science policy analyst Bill Freese outlined several instances in which APHIS based its EIS on outdated data and figures provided by "entities with financial ties to the biotechnology industry". . .
Full story: truth-out.org
Bush's Swiss Visit off after Complaints on Torture
February 7, 2011 Former US President George W. Bush has canceled a visit to Switzerland, where he was to address a Jewish charity gala, due to the risk of legal action against him for alleged torture . . . groups including Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and International Federation of Human Rights said the cancellation was linked to growing moves to hold Bush accountable for torture, including water-boarding. He has admitted in his memoirs to ordering use of the interrogation method that simulates drowning. . . Full story: dailystar.com.lb
The Mark of the Beast Part VI
The mark of the beast is wisdomhuman reasoning against the revealed Word of God. It comes in as many forms as there is sand upon the sea shore, but because of collectivism, the public mind is persuaded by the philosophy of a select number of powerful interrelated satanic groups which include the Judaeo-Roman Catholic church (and her harlot, once Protestant daughters), Judaeo-Roman Catholic Islam, the City of London, the Khazar Black Nobility, Judaeo-Communism, Judaeo-Freemasonry, and Judaism itself (which Satan employed to murder Israel's Messiah). Each of these entities, and a plethora of lesser factions, employs its own peculiar mark of the beast to produce the unforgivable sin by means of which Satan is building his kingdom (Hebrews 6:4-8). The group commanding the largest percentage of world population in a time of global catastrophe is the vessel Satan will use to attain global hegemony, his open rule and personal worship.
At this time in human history the option of freely choosing to take one mark of the beast in preference to another or the Seal of God will not exist as the days of grace and free moral agency will have passed "and all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond will receive the mark of the beast in their right hand, or in their foreheads on pain of death. . . And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world" (Revelation 13:8, 15-18). Those who drafted the US Declaration of Independence declared unambiguously that rights are granted by the Creator to individual human beings, not to the state: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men [in Adam's race] are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights. . ." principal among which is free will to determine one's personal destiny. God's love is such that He will never coerce or force anyone to serve Him against their own free will and desire, so clearly the Judaeo-Roman Catholic church, Judaeo-Roman Catholic Islam, Khazar Black Nobility, Judaeo-Communism, Judaeo-Freemasonry, the Jews' City of London, and Judaism itself have one thing in common: severally and individually they are the antithesis of God.
"The kingdoms of this world and the glory of them" truly are under Satan's dominion (Matthew 4:8-9). The enmity to God and Adam's race shared among these groups is clearly expressed in references from the Talmud and Zohar quoted in Endnotes 1, as will be seen when you compare this main article with what has been revealed in the previous five parts of this series. You cannot possibly fail to recognize the domineering influence of the Babylonian Talmud over the Judaeo-Roman Catholic church and its abomination, the Judaeo-Roman Catholic religion of Islam. The Lubavicher rabbi Schneerson is one of scores of false messiahs, who declared, "The religious tolerance of today, and the trend towards greater freedom, gives us the unique opportunity to enhance widespread observance of these [Noahide] laws." His intolerant objective is to do God a service against His will by stealing the unalienable God-given Right of every man in Adam's race to free will and expression and enforce Judaism's totalitarian mark of the beast, the fraudulent Noahide laws, on pain of death.
Had this misguided 'messiah' of "the synagogue of Satan" read his Bible when he might have known the Lord, he would have learned that the coming global catastrophe will be the time of "Jacob's trouble," whose unbeliefs stem from the mark of the beast imposed upon Israelites by non-Semitic, anti-Semitic self-styled Jews such as he.
Faith is a clear understanding of the revealed Word of God. It is the mind of God in you assuring you will be judged of no man, but will judge the world. The purpose of this series is to identify the mark of the beast and the most powerful groups that are uniting to crucify the Son of God afresh unto themselves and to force the mark of the beast that you may prove all things and make your calling and election sure.
The Coming Jewish 'Utopia' ruled by Noahide Laws
By Reverend Ted Pike and Sister Harmony Daws
Most of the world's great religions teach that their own way will prevail in the end. Muslims believe the whole world will someday accept their one god, Allah, and Mohammed as his prophet. Most Christians believe that in a coming "millennium" Christ will firmly yet benevolently rule a restored and enlightened world. Religious Jews also await their future triumph, promised by the Talmud and keenly anticipate a messiah they believe will exalt the Jewish people and Judaic monotheism to dominate the nations.
The Encyclopedia Judaica says hope in the coming Jewish messiah is intense, especially among Orthodox Jews in Israel: "Orthodoxy retains unimpaired the traditional doctrine . . . Among Orthodox rabbis, there is no lack of speculation on the meaning of contemporary events in light of the messianic hope" ("Messiah," p. 1416).
In this ideal Jewish world, what happens to the rest of us? What is the status of Gentiles, especially Christians? The Babylonian Talmud, the highest ethical and religious guide for observant Jews, says Gentiles can join Judaism as proselytes today or in the future messianic kingdom, as long as they sincerely follow seven commandments. These "Noahide laws," says the Talmud, form the basic moral code God gave Adam; they prohibit idolatry, blasphemy, murder, theft, "illicit relations," eating meat with blood, and "failing to establish courts of justice".
Medieval Jewish authority Maimonides, whose work remains highly influential, wrote in his 12th century Mishneh Torah that Jews should compel Gentiles to practice Noahide law. In a recent article for The Jewish Press, America's largest independent Jewish weekly, Rabbi Moshe Ben-Chaim says Gentiles can be improved just like Jews, but through conversion.
"The Noahide laws," writes the rabbi, "are the bare essentials that entitle a human being to retain his right to life." Remember he is speaking of Gentiles as well as Jews and, yes, he said right to life. Ben-Chaim cites Isaiah's prophecy that someday Gentiles will flock to Jerusalem to "learn Torah." Jews must encourage this mass conversion, he says, by refusing to voice acceptance for other religions. "No, that deludes gentiles into believing we view their religions on par with Torah," the rabbi writes. "Judaism views all other religions as imposters, since no other religion was God-given . . . Again, God said, "One Torah . . . for yourselves, and the convert." This means no other laws are acceptable, for any people."
In this rabbi's words we find contemporary mainstream affirmation, in one of American Jewry's biggest publications, that deviance from Noahide law cannot be morally tolerated by observant Jews. Ultimately, if things were as they should be, Gentiles should be forced to comply.
International Code of Justice
With increase of the power and influence of Judaism including its ultra-Orthodox branches, it is not surprising that Judaism recommends the seven Noahide precepts as international law. In a discussion with other religious leaders and President George Bush Sr., Rabbi Yakov Cohen said the road map to world peace is found in the seven Noahide Laws.
Worldwide Noahide observance was promoted by prominent Hasidic Rabbi Menachem Schneerson. The late rabbi was the seventh leader of the widespread Lubavicher movement. Viewed as clannish and eccentric in dress, the Lubavichers are nevertheless very powerful and well-funded, with enormous influence on the burgeoning ultra-Orthodox movement in Israel. Before his death in 1994, he was the reigning "temporary Messiah," or "Tzaddik," to a large segment of Kabalist ultra-orthodox Jewry. He said global observance of Noahide law would bring world peace and messianic redemption. Schneerson and his movement are so powerful that they persuaded Bush Sr. to proclaim Education Day USA in which Schneerson is honored and Noahide law upheld as an exalted code of ethics to inspire and guide mankind. Schneerson trained thousands of rabbis to spread strict Jewish observance (centering on the "Zohar" or mystical/revolutionary Kabala) around the world.
"Influencing non-Jews to keep their mitzvos, the Seven Noahide Laws . . . will assist our task of making the world into a dwelling place for God, and help bring about the arrival of Messiah" Schneerson said in 1987. "Every Jew has the obligation to ensure that all the peoples of the world observe the Seven Noahide Laws . . . The religious tolerance of today, and the trend towards greater freedom, gives us the unique opportunity to enhance widespread observance of these laws."
Michael Kress, in an article for the Noahide.org thinktank, approvingly describes a growing number of Noahide-observant ex-Christians who reject the gospels' account of Jesus and center their lives around the Seven Laws. In 1991, Yeshiva University's law school hosted a symposium of Noahide scholars. Their press release notes, "In previous generations, the precarious or outright hostile conditions in which world Jewry survived precluded any public discussion of the Code [presumably because host nations were not at all pleased to hear about Jewish plans for worldwide legal control].
"In our generation, however, discussion of the Code both in print and on the Internet has increased noticeably. The last two decades have witnessed a dramatic increase in the number of rabbinical and academic writings as well as the new phenomenon of books and web pages written for a lay or popular readership." The press release says an unprecedented number of Gentiles want to live according to the Noahide laws and form an audience for scholarship about them.
Life in the Jewish Utopia
Would worldwide coerced observance of the Noahide laws create more religious freedom and tolerance? Not a chance. The first law is against idolatry, and what is idolatry? The Babylonian Talmud repeatedly says worship of the false prophet Jesus Christ is idolatry, a crime worthy of death. The Talmud also says Christ was a blasphemer, a violator of the second Noahide precept. This makes His worshippers, who claim He is God, blasphemers also. 1
In his Noahide.org article, Michael Kress confirms that many observant Jews believe Christianity (with its "polytheist" belief in the Trinity) violates Noahide law. If Noahide law were globally enforced, Christians and all other "idolaters" would face extermination under this "peace-creating" universal code!
A visionary book, published in 1932 by Jewish Talmudic scholar Dr. Michael Higger, describes the brave new Jewish world. 2 Higger says when a Jewish one-world ruler, messiah, comes, he will enforce Judaic monotheism. There will be no room for the "idolatrous". . . Only those who are convinced of Israel's divine purpose in the world will be welcome to join Israel in the upbuilding of an ideally spiritual life on earth. Israel, the ideal, righteous people, will thus become spiritually masters of the world. . ." (p. 41).
Before the messianic era begins, "in general, the peoples of the world will be divided into two main groups, the Israelitic and the non-Israelitic. The former will be righteous; they will live according to the wishes of one, universal God . . . All the other peoples, on the other hand, will be known for their detestable practices, idolatry, and similar acts of wickedness. They will be destroyed and will disappear from earth before the ushering in of the ideal era" (p. 37). "Consequently . . . idolatry and idol-worshippers, wicked people, unrighteous nations, will disappear from the earth" (p. 39). Goodbye, Christians.
The ravings of a fanatic? Solomon Schechter, founder of Conservative Judaism, along with the council or "Kallah" of Texas Rabbis, did not think so. They gave the book official endorsement.
The Nations must Suffer First
Higger provides extensive references from the Babylonian Talmud, describing enlightened monotheism under messiah. But the Talmud teaches such tranquility will be dearly bought; a time of Gentile anguish is necessary to displace Gentiles from their control of the nations and dominion of Jews. Such suffering will be so great, says the Talmud, that even "the Almighty Himself will bewail it" 3.
The Zohar, or Kabalah, rivals the authority of the Talmud for most deeply religious Jews. It teaches that, as the divine yet visible, practical manifestation of God's will in this world, it is Israel's job to "wage war" against Gentile control by any means possible. "Proper order" can only be restored by breaking down Gentile and Christian influence 4.
This explains how a devout Orthodox Jew and head of the Anti-Defamation League, Abe Foxman, can rationalize being a man of prayer and piety and yet energetically promote homosexuality and immorality among the "goyim." According to the Zohar's reasoning, causing "travail" among the Gentiles such as Communism, wars, financial panic, media corruption of society, breakup of families, abortion, pornography, and homosexuality is necessary to bring about a great good 5. The Talmud and Zohar teach that this period of "birth pangs" among the Gentiles will eventually recede as humanity is ushered into a new age of Judaic enlightenment . . . in which belief in one true God and observance of His laws will prevail over the "confusion" of Christian "polytheism".
Judaizing Christianity
Even today, encouraged by Jewish leaders, Christianity is being heavily Judaized as Israel is slavishly venerated and Old Testament rituals and observances are increasingly practiced by [so-called] evangelicals. Talmud-quoting Messianic Jews and false prophets such as Dr. John Hagee set the standard for millions of evangelicals, inviting them to transition toward Talmudic Judaism [which is Pharisaism]. (See, To Pray or Not to Pray . . . in Jesus' Name). This is part of Jewish activism's strategy to take faith in Christ out of Christianity, ultimately replacing it with the seven Noahide laws.
Both Talmud and Zohar proclaim the Jewish people to be semi-divine and occupy a position even above angels. "He who smites an Israelite on the jaw is as though he had thus assaulted the Divine Presence, for it is written, One who smiteth man (i.e., an Israelite, Gentiles are not called Man) attacketh the Holy One" (Sanhedrin 58b). Already, through ADL hate laws in countries like Canada and Britain, Judaism and rabbinic literature cannot be verbally "assaulted" through criticism. Such "anti-Semitism" is punished severely as a hate crime. ADL's US State Department "Office of Global Anti-Semitism" defines "anti-Semitism" as "strong criticism of Israel's leaders." Suggesting a Jewish conspiracy or even repeating the New Testament allegation that the Jews had Christ crucified are among 14 offenses considered anti-Semitic. (See, The Real Motive Behind the 'Department of Global Anti-Semitism').
These laws are precedents which can be joined with Noahide law and enforced from Jerusalem, to make it a capital offense in the new Jewish world order to "blaspheme" the "holy people" by criticism. Just this year, Knesset members tried to get Jewish Italian scholar Prof. Ariel Toaff indicted in Israel for his book that said there was truth to the 15th century "blood libel." Israel already has authority from Knesset to demand extradition from any nation of persons who "insult the memory of the Jewish dead" by questioning the accuracy of the six-million figure of Holocaust victims.
Hate laws, emerging worldwide, have one real purposeto criminalize that religion which perpetually reminds and accuses Jews that their forefathers were guilty of deicide and that they share that guilt as long as they venerate those who had Christ crucified, the Pharisees, authors of the Talmud and Zohar.
Mortal Combat
Devout Jews have real reason to seek to outlaw Christianity as a form of idol-worship. Why? Because Christianity does threaten Judaism. It is fundamentally subversive and threatening to Jewish power and religious authority. It undermines the whole concept of "chosenness" or salvation through belonging to a particular race. That's part of why Christianity has been persecuted and resented by Jewish leaders since the beginning of the Church Ages. That's what makes the unholy alliance between [so-called] evangelicals and Israel such a strange state of affairs.
The Book of Acts describes how different from Judaism was the early Christian church. It relates how the Holy Spirit's first infilling caused a group of Christians who spoke in Galilean to be heard in the languages of their listenersAfricans, Arabs, Jews and Romans alike. In explanation, Peter quoted the prophet Joel: "In the last days, God says, I will pour out My Spirit on all people . . . And everyone who calls on the Name of the Lord will be saved".
Peter then preached an eloquent overview of the life and crucifixion of Christ, Who was raised from the dead for the salvation of every personIsraelite and Gentilewho would repent and trustfully obey Christ for Life. When his listeners asked what they should do, Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off [Gentiles]for all whom the Lord our God will call" (Acts 2).
Christ's Message was of radical inclusion, open arms so broad they crossed all boundaries of race, gender, and religion. His once tiny church grew faster than a pro-athlete on steroids as missionaries traveled the early world, preaching the good news that salvation was now possible (for everyone!) through simple faith and forsaking of sin. Few things could have been more threatening to the racism of the Pharisees, which depended on firm physical barriers between Jew and Gentile. By the gift of His Spirit and union of all believers into one church, Christ ended the need for dramatic physical separation from "unclean" non-Jews. He also ended any need for the Pharisees as an institution of guidance for the Jewish people. Because Christ rejected and excoriated them, the Pharisees masterminded His crucifixion.
Every individual, Jewish or not, must face the sobering question, "What will you say of Jesus, who is called Christ?" Was He Israel's true Messiah, whose living Spirit can redeem our souls? Or should we seek peace from more government and the solutions of Jewish rabbis administered from a global court in Jerusalem?
We know our answer. What's yours?
1 The Talmud said Jesus was, along with Balaam and Titus, one of the three greatest enemies of Judaism (Gittin 56b-57a). The New Testament confirms that the Pharisees considered Christ demon-possessed (John 8:48), a charlatan empowered by the Devil (Matthew 12:24), a deceiver (Matthew 27:6), a blasphemer (John 10:36), and having an unclean spirit (Mark 3:30). The Talmud says He was a bastard, son of adulterous Mary (Sanhedrin 106b). He was hung on the eve of Passover because He was a sorcerer and apostate (Sanhedrin 43a). He was a fool who fell down and worshipped a brick (Sanhedrin 67a). He was executed by stoning, burning, decapitation, and strangling; Jews are encouraged to lecture against Christ (Sanhedrin 106b). Christ is in hell, wallowing in boiling hot excrement (Gittin 56b-57a).
The Talmud recommends persecution of Christians. Christians are heretics (Abodah Zarah 16b), apostates (Shabbethai 116). Christians may be legally thrown into a pit to die (Abodah Zarah 26b). Christians deserve death for observing the Sabbath (even though they observe the Noahide laws) (Sanhedrin 58b) and studying the Torah, by which they mean the so-called "Oral Torah", or Talmud (Sanhedrin 59a). Christianity is an unforgivable sin, seducing Jews to idolatry (Abodah Zarah 17a). The testimony of a Christian is unworthy to be admitted to a Jewish court (Shulshan Aruk, Hoshen Mishpat 34, 31). Jews are forbidden to return a lost article to a Christian (Hoshen Mishpat 266, 2). Matthew, Luke, Nicodemus, and Thaddeus were executed as heretics (Jewish Encyclopedia, "Jesus," page 171). Jews should rejoice, dress in white, and eat, drink, and be merry at the death of a Christian. They should hate a Christian with utmost hatred and consider him an enemy (Semahot ch. 2, p. 35).
The Zohar sanctions killing of Gentiles, including Christians. "Take the life of the Kliphoth [Gentile and Christian] and kill them, and you will please God the same as one who offers incense to Him." (Sephar or Israel 177b) "The people of the earth are idolaters, and it has been written of them, 'Let them be wiped off the face of the earth.'" (Zohar I 25a, Pranaitis translation, "The Talmud Unmasked," p. 80). "When these shall be exterminated, it will be as if God had made heaven and earth on that day" (Zohar I, Bereshith, 25b). "At the moment when the Holy One, blessed be he, will exterminate all the goyim of the world . . . the Lord alone will appear great on that day" (Zohar, Vayshlah 177b, de Pauly translation). "It is certain our captivity will last until the princes of the Gentiles who worship idols are destroyed" (Zohar I, 219, Pranaitis, p. 80). "In the palaces of the fourth heaven are those who lamented over Sion and Jerusalem, and all those who destroyed idolatrous nations, and those who killed off people who worship idols . . . " (Zohah I, 38b, 39a).
The preface to the Soncino edition of the Zohar says: "The Zohar appeals to many Jews in a way that makes them regard it as the most sacred of sacred books! For it mirrors Judaism as an intensely vital religion of the spirit. More overpoweringly than any other book or code, or even than the Bible, does it give to the Jew a conviction of an inner, unseen spiritual universean eternal moral order" (p. 12).
2 The Jewish Utopia, Michael Higger, Ph.D., The Lord Baltimore Press, 1932, 160 pages. This book is available for $15 postpaid from Emissary Publications, PO Box 294, Colton, OR 97017 USA (503-824-2050).
3 Sanhedrin 98b. Hugger employs the words "Israelitic" and "non-Israelitic," which, like the word "Israeli," is legal sleight of hand that leads the uninitiated to read and understand he is speaking of Israelites and non-Israelites when in fact he is referring to non-Semitic self-styled Jews whose forebears have no history in Palestine, no part in God's Covenant with Abraham and his seed, or in the Sinaitic Covenant, but are "Israelitish" imposters trying to steal back the birthright Esau sold to Jacob.
4 Zohar I, 160a. Here we see the common link between the Jew's "Society of Jesus," or Jesuits who also believe "the ends justify the means," the MOSSAD, whose motto states "By Way of Deception Thou shalt do War," and Islam.
5 Discussion and documentation of virtually all these topics can be found in articles archived at www.truthtellers.org, in my book Israel: Out Duty, Our Dilemma, or in my four video documentaries airing at video.google.com. nl672.htm
Pass it on . . . please send this article to someone you know
Brother Grigor-Scott is a non-denominational minister who has ministered full-time since 1981, primarily to other ministers and their congregations overseas. He pastors Bible Believers' tiny congregation, and is available to teach in your church.
Bible Believers' Church
Currabubula NSW
Australia 2342
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HBO has officially announced a renewal for comedy series "Veep" and "Girls" for second seasons. HBO is known to renew shows based on premiere ratings.
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The Highlands Attractions
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So the bin Laden raid leaves us with an empirical test case for a core counterinsurgency contention.
Proposed by Dave Kilcullen and others, counterinsurgency theorists argue that theirs is the truer path to robust counterterrorism, the pursuit of which is the only reason counterinsurgency is germane in the U.S. context. Counterterrorism requires intelligence on terrorists and their environs. Intelligence requires local knowledge. Local knowledge requires the protection of vulnerable populations from reprisal, plus some incentive -- money, justice, political access, whatever -- to make cooperation with the anti-insurgent faction sensible. If you don't provide those resources and meet people where they are, then your counterterrorism hunt is fruitless.
U.S. counterterrorism just succeeded, massively, in a place where we don't have a counterinsurgency campaign. But we clearly had sufficient local knowledge (read: informers and ground operatives) -- plus signals intelligence, plus persistant surveillance -- to meet our objective.This seems like a pretty simple deal, right? Let's reformulate what Spencer has written in the simplest possible terms:
- Some COIN advocates sold their operational approach by saying that it involves the collection of intelligence that enables accomplishment of the primary national objective, which is the destruction of al-Qaeda and its associated movements.
- A significant step towards the accomplishment of that objective was achieved in a manner that suggests that the COIN campaign in Afghanistan did not meaningfully contribute.
- As such, we should reconsider whether the massive expense, reduced operational readiness, and other sacrifices being made to enable that COIN campaign are actually essential to accomplishment of the fundamental goal; i.e. is the war in Afghanistan really accomplishing anything vis-a-vis the president's stated objective, which is, lest we forget, to "disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda"?
During the debate over possible courses of action that preceded the president's announcement of an escalation, the various positions were basically boiled down to "CT," "CT-plus," and "COIN." I'm not going to rehash the details of all of that, because it's boring and you almost certainly already know the broad strokes. (If not, read this.) But!: one of many, many insidious effects of that simplification was the way that "counterterrorism" or "CT" came in the popular lexicon to mean something like targeted direct action against terrorist networks, personnel, and support infrastructure -- i.e. killing terrorists -- without what constitutes the other half of that definition in military doctrine: "action taken indirectly to influence and render global and regional environments inhospitable to terrorist networks." Now, it may be the case that the DOD definition is too broad to be meaningful, and you could certainly make that argument. But by this definition and according to the justification of the mission provided by Presidents Bush and Obama, any USG activities undertaken in Afghanistan would constitute "counterterrorism"... including COIN, FID, SFA, development assistance, economic support, etc etc ad infinitum.
Now take another look at Spencer's post in this light. "Counterinsurgency theorists argue that theirs is the truer path to robust counterterrorism, the pursuit of which is the only reason counterinsurgency is germane in the U.S. context." He goes on to explain the presumed linkage between security to governmental capacity to popular loyalty to local knowledge to actionable intelligence, which serves to clarify what he really meant by "the truer path to robust counterterrorism": COIN ops will presumably result in military forces getting more information about the environment and the enemy than they otherwise would have (without sustained on-the-ground presence), meaning you can kill more terrorists this way.
I want to vigorously dispute Spencer's characterization of this questionable (and opportunistic) corollary as "a core counterinsurgency contention." What we see here is a cunning conflation of two superficially plausible semi-truths: 1) persistent, visible, dispersed presence by counterinsurgent security forces will enable the accumulation of local knowledge that is essential to effectively targeting insurgent cadres and thus enabling the broader counterinsurgency effort, and 2) the local knowledge that's accumulated as a result of sustained presence and security will include intelligence that allows the counterinsurgent force to undertake targeted, effective offensive operations against al-Qaeda terrorists (whose numbers in the Afghan AO are infinitesimal if not zero).
It's only fair to further note that when Spencer writes "the pursuit of [counterterrorism] is the only reason counterinsurgency is germane in the U.S. context," he's engaging in a bit of selective memory (or revisionist history). Many advocates for escalation and a broad-based COIN effort in Afghanistan were proponents of a widely-held view in both liberal internationalist and neoconservative circles, one that has only recently -- with a downturn in popular support and enthusiasm for overseas adventurism -- started to recede from the public forum: faith in what we can call the "state strength" paradigm. They believe(d?) that weak states posed the greatest threat to global and national security, that poverty, disenfranchisement and lack of economic opportunity not only drove local conflicts, but threatened Americans' way of life. Here's how it's pitched (pdf):
We know where extremists thrive. In conflict zones that are incubators of resentment and anarchy. In weak states that cannot control their borders or territory, or meet the basic needs of their people. From Africa to central Asia to the Pacific Rim – nearly 60 countries stand on the brink of conflict or collapse. The extremists encourage the exploitation of these hopeless places on their hate-filled websites.In this telling, poor economic conditions and injustice stoke disaffection and rage while weak governments are insufficiently capable of taking steps to either ameliorate these conditions or control their disaffected populations, and the whole thing ends up with pissed-off foreigners flying airplanes into office buildings. In short, they believed that failed states created terrorists, and that the best way to fix these failed states would be to build governmental capacity through a wide-ranging nation assistance and state-building effort while taking direct military action to defeat the most immediately dangerous security threats... what's been called, in the imprecise shorthand of our political narrative, "COIN."
In a defense and foreign-policy establishment where this worldview predominates, almost to the exclusion of all others, is it fair to say that "the pursuit of [robust counterterrorism] is the only reason counterinsurgency is germane in the U.S. context"? I would argue that it isn't the only reason, and that Kilcullen et al's focus on the CT-enabler angle was merely a matter of opportunistic calculation to appeal to those few "realists" who may not have fully bought into the contemporary conventional wisdom. The real challenge doesn't come from such obviously inadequate policy justifications as the narrowly-circumscribed one that Spencer seeks to highlight, but rather from the undifferentiated monolith that is the state-strength paradigm. It is close to a fact of political science that the risk of civil violence is closely correlated with low per-capita GDP/quality of life (as Jay Ulfelder points out today in a fortuitously-timed post). But it is far more difficult to establish causation, and causation is what we need to understand if we want to bring policy instruments to bear on a security problem. Consider just a few of the multivariate assumptions about the causes of conflict and violence that are embedded in the state-strength paradigm.
Violence is caused by: poverty; unequal access to or distribution of resources; unemployment; the inability of the justice system to fairly adjudicate disputes; the inability of the police to enforce the writ of the state; the inability of security forces to maintain the monopoly of violence; the inability of security forces to defend borders/sovereignty/protect against outside influence and/or infiltration of adversarial elements; the inability of security forces to undertake and/or sustain effective offensive operations against identified targets such as terrorists or insurgent groups; etc.Some of these may be true, some specious, and some outright absurd. But the lumping of these many purported causes, drivers, or enablers of conflict under one broad rubric -- "state weakness/failure" -- has allowed for that paradigm's furtherance through unified (or at least complementary) advocacy by disparate power bases and interest groups: DoD can talk about the requirement to build capacity and capabilities in partner security forces in order to defend borders and eliminate safe havens; while State can emphasize the need to build whole-of-government capacity with a specific focus on the institutions of justice and so on; and USAID and the development community can pitch the imperative of improving the delivery of basic assistance to address human suffering, economic inequality, and other purportedly fundamental drivers of conflict.
This is how we end up with a sort of meta-COIN, a universalization of vague and arguably specious tactical principles to the level of foreign policy: a global emphasis on development, the effective provision of goods and services, and capacity-building (both in governance and security); counterterrorism in the very most literal interpretation of the definition, emphasizing both the indirect actions that influence and render global and regional environments inhospitable to terrorist networks (economic development, conflict resolution, civil governance capacity-building) plus direct action against terrorist networks... but the easier and cheaper version: direct action by partner security forces (military assistance, foreign internal defense, security force capacity-building). And then you've still got the ultimate trump card in reserve: direct military action by U.S. forces, which Kilcullen insists is basically the worst-case, avoid-at-almost-all-costs scenario.
What I'm getting at is this: while advocates of escalation in Afghanistan may have used the troop presence ---> security ---> popular confidence ---> actionable intelligence ---> direct action against terrorists rationale to help justify their preferred operational approach, it's hard to imagine they were being totally serious and/or honest with themselves. (How were COIN ops in Afghanistan going to provide actionable intelligence about terrorist networks and individuals that reside almost exclusively in Pakistan?) Most COIN advocates are (were?) also believers in the bigger idea, the state-strength paradigm; they saw COIN as a means of sanctuary denial, as an extended process through which Afghan society would be inoculated against the threat of insurgency and by extension, al Qaeda influence. And state-strengthening is/was the answer for Pakistan, and Yemen, and Somalia, and... everywhere, right?
What's wrong with all that, then? Well, the whole concept might be totally bogus, for one thing. We don't really understand the root causes of civil violence, even at the sub-national level. There are a whole bunch of different kinds of civil violence, and localized insurgency with a terrorist component is very, very different to international terrorism (even if you want to identify that as a component of "global insurgency" (pdf)). We can't say why, for example, one country's contentious social issues spark civil war, while those of a similar country do not, at least not with any real certainty... and that question isn't half as complicated as why some disaffected individuals choose to engage in international terrorism against a distant adversary, one that is almost certainly unconnected in any clear way to whatever tangible, material grievances that individual may have, while others join a political party or a local insurgency or just do a lot of drugs. And that's something we ought to think about before we decide to re-order our foreign and security policy around the imperatives of global development, state strength, and capacity-building. There may be plenty of good reasons to prioritize state strength, but it's not totally clear that counterterrorism justifies it.
To parrot Spencer: Let's consider this, shall we?


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carpout \*fh
Sends error messages to the filehandle fh. You should provide a reference
to the filehandle glob, although you can also just use
the filehandle's name for this function.
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