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Ooo Wizarding World Facades
Remember when photos surfaced of a 'mock' facade for the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal's Islands of Adventures a while back? Well they're at it again!
WizardingWorldHarryPotter.com has some photos of more of the facades being built off site at The Nassal Company's location in Florida. They're looking really great! Seems like once the steel is up at the theme park they'll just be able to move these giant facades into place. Very smart!
Check out the photos!


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subset: commoncrawl


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And I'm in for a new project already, not sure which one though but I'm ready to find it or find them.
The festival was great to make, great to witness it happening and be there, and also great that we got so much positive feedback and reactions we'd never expected. The Spotlight:Romania Exhibition in GEMAK has been prolonged for another month because of all the interest it received.
And I already need to think of something new, something fresh, what to do in 2016.
It's not only the events I want to think about, but other things too. My new photo project, writing, what to do with this blog and the mixed feelings I have about what I should do with it. It's seems that sometimes, the fact that I have so many ideas becomes my enemy. Each project that I come up with and some of the ones that are offered to me tempt me genuinely, and I'm so not good at being realistic about time and my capacity to do everything. Because in the end this is what it's all about, me wanting to do all of them, and then time and energy saying neeeeh, we're much shorter/lower/unavailable than you thought. No matter how much you stretch – and I do stretch a lot – not everything can be done. And that's something hard for me to accept. Hell knows why.
What's for sure is that the success of Spotlight:Romania gave me a taste of the rewards an extensive project can bring me. Of the fact that you can decide to go for something, and if you pursue it systematically enough, it just might happen. A taste of what it's like to work with people as a team – me, the one allergic to the simple mentioning of the term, always willing to take over and do things by myself – this time it was good and enjoyable and it gave me energy and a certain feeling of belonging. And yes, the project gave me self-confidence and made me more humble and grateful at the same time. A good combination for the spirit and for the future.
I think I'm ready for holiday already. And for 2016.
And here's a video of the opening of Spotlight:Romania. My speech included.


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University of Cambridge
Location: Cambridge - United Kingdom
Project type: Education - Universities and Campus
- 64000
- 64000
It is extremely important to us that students, staff and visitors have a safe, secure and pleasurable experience while at the university. With the installation of the SALTO access control system at Clare College we are confident this will be achieved. Its sophisticated mix of online and offline access control points together with the advantages conferred by the SVN system enable us to manage up to 64,000 users and up to 64,000 doors in a single system if required, making the college both a secure and accessible environment for all its users.
Key benefits
Given the outstanding worldwide reputation of Cambridge as a seat of learning, this was an extremely important contract for us, giving SALTO the opportunity to fully utilise its access security expertise in an unrivalled location.


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So if you want to include Elves in a work of Fantasy fiction that should be pretty simple right? I mean everyone knows how Elves speak – what kind of names they have etc – Elrond, Legolas, Galadriel – they all sound suitably, well, Elvish.
That's the position I was in recently when contemplating writing a fantasy work including Elves, Dwarfs etc – the standard fantasy tropes – but with a twist of course. So wanting to be fairly thorough about my world building I decided I would need a naming system for people and places – a constructed language effectively. And therefore following on from that I naturally thought I should take a look at Quenya – the main Elvish language created by Tolkien – surely I could just use that as a basis and make up some cool and realistic sounding Elvish names.
But having read part of an online Quenya course (which is very good by the way and fascinating in itself), I realised that it wasn't so simple. The author of the course includes a lengthy section on copyright, the main aim of which is to defend the right of people to publish courses such as his and also their own works in Quenya – not for profit even seems to be a bit controversial. The author of the course made the point that any commercial fictional work that used Quenya to create a naming system and language would effectively be in breach of Tolkien's copyright.
That stopped me in my tracks – I hadn't even considered that. So I looked into it a bit more – did other fantasy works with Elves really have their own unique languages. The main works are actually games – D&D and Warhammer – they both have their own languages – Elven and Eltharin respectively – although I suspect both are fairly superficial in nature. I looked a bit further and found that fictional works also had their own languages – for instance the Elvish language of Gael Baudino's Strands series is based on the Romance languages, and the Elvish languages of Andrzej Sapkowski's The Witcher saga, are apparently based on Welsh, Irish, French and English.
So it seems other authors and creators of Elvish cultures have also endeavoured to steer clear of using Quenya – a shame in a way as Tolkien created such a rich language – no one could do something more comprehensive I suspect for a race that doesn't exist, but also you could also say it would be great to write fiction in Tolkien's world, which also would be derivative and remain in the sphere of fan fiction.
So where does that leave my Elvish setting? Looking at creating a new language I suppose – and probably digging out a Conglang book such as the Language Construction Kit. However, I'm still planning on learning more about Quenya for the inspiration and also to make anything I create myself a bit richer.


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The Bamboo Network: Asia's Family-run Conglomerates
Why have family-owned conglomerates founded by ethnic Chinese become key economic factors throughout Asia? The answers are trust and tradition.
(originally published by Booz & Company)One of the most important economic developments since the end of the Cold War is occurring with little notice in Southeast Asia. In Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam, the Philippines and the Coastal Zone of China, a remarkable economic change is taking place led by overseas Chinese business families, or what could be called the bamboo network.
Valuable lessons for Western businesses can come from learning how these families came to dominate and to propel the economies of Southeast Asia. With little more than the shirts on the backs, the founders of this bamboo network typically fled China at about the time when Chairman Mao Zedong proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic of China on October 1, 1949. Like an army of Horatio Algers, they worked hard in their new homes, saved most of what they earned and then put it all into their own businesses.
The story told by a former student of mine, now back in Hong Kong, is typical. He said that when his grandfather came to the United States he got a job ironing shirts in a hand laundry. After a number of years he had saved enough to go to Hong Kong and invest $50,000 (Hong Kong) in the rice business. That business is now a huge conglomerate spread over Asia and Australia.
Today, many small family companies such as the one started by my former student's grandfather have grown into enormous conglomerates with dozens of related companies spread throughout Southeast Asia and beyond. Not only are these enterprises key economic factors in the region, they have unique abilities to avoid dealing with government regulations and restrictions because of their ability to shift money, people and resources from one country to another.
The combined output of the 55 million overseas Chinese is equal to a good-sized country, or close to $600 billion. Ethnic Chinese are major and sometimes prime sources of capital and entrepreneurship in Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Vietnam and their former homeland of China.
The achievements of the members of the bamboo network are impressive. In Indonesia, the businesses of Liem Sioe Liong account for 5 percent of the country's economy. In Hong Kong, Li Ka-shing owns 12 percent of the listed stocks. In Thailand, ethnic Chinese control the four largest private banks.
The successful ethnic Chinese business family controls dozens and dozens -- sometimes hundreds -- of interlocking, medium-sized businesses in four, five or more countries.
This array of family relationships extends throughout Southeast Asia, where entrepreneurs, business executives, traders and financiers of Chinese background are the major players in the local economies.
The founders of these overseas Chinese businesses are a fascinating breed. They typically started with little wealth, building their family enterprises from scratch and working, saving, and reinvesting at prodigious rates. The Confucian ethic is alive and well in the bamboo network. The family is the basic unit of management. This provides loyalty, flexibility, speedy decisions and low overhead. It also breeds a crucial business element: trust.
Centralized family control minimizes company bureaucracy and paperwork -- and leaves a very modest paper trail for potential government investigators. Key information is related verbally and retained in the heads of the senior managers rather than in the tremendous flood of paperwork typical in Western business. Money is borrowed from family members or friends on trust. Transactions of great size are often dealt with by common understanding and a note jotted in a diary.
A good example is Henry Sy, the most successful Chinese entrepreneur in the Philippines. When this modest billionaire invites his children and grandchildren for Sunday lunch, they all come. After all, each of his six children is an executive in his company. While the family gathering may be a social occasion, it also serves as a gathering of senior management to discuss planning and finance.
Traditionally, the head of the family makes the main decisions.
Within the organization, the flow of information is tightly controlled. The amount of company knowledge given to a specific subordinate depends on the degree of trust that the leader has in the individual. Most, if not all, of the top management positions are filled by family members. Other strategic posts are usually reserved for close relatives and for those who have worked for the family for long periods of time. The authoritarian leadership style seems to work because of the moral authority of the founder and his unrivaled experience.
So while outside professional managers of these enterprises may be well paid, they quickly encounter the limits of their authority, especially when they deal with family members who nominally report to them.
Simon Murray, who served as managing director of a major enterprise in Li Ka-shing's multibillion dollar family group, put it this way: "I'm just the guy driving the truck. Li's in the back, telling me which way to go."
Rungs Of The Ladder
Typically, one generation of family leadership passes on control to the next. Although the Salim Group of Indonesia remains securely in the control of its founder, Liem Sioe Liong, his youngest son, Anthony, is in charge of operations.
Another example is provided by the Formosa Plastics Group headed by Y. C. Wang. Mr. Wang has displayed a strong devotion to keeping control of his empire within the family. Each of his 10 children is an executive in the family business. His brother, Y. T. Wang, is president of Formosa Chemicals and Fibre, and runs that business with Y. C.'s son, William Wang. Y. C.'s daughter, Cher Wang, is president of Everex Systems, a personal computer manufacturer in California. Another son, Winston Wang, is senior vice president of Nan Ya Plastics, which produces circuit boards and other electronic components.
Daughter Charlene Wang and her husband are president and chairman of First International Computer, the world's largest manufacturer of motherboards, the circuit boards used to make personal computers. (Ostensibly, the daughter started this business on her own. However, she secured the necessary initial financing with her father's guarantee.)
In 1993, Robert Kuok officially retired from the day-to-day running of the Kuok Group's vast array of companies, which remains essentially a family-run enterprise. In the traditional Chinese manner, he divided the Hong Kong and Singapore/Malaysian operations between two sons, with the older son taking over the Hong Kong location. Equally in the Chinese business tradition, the "retired" Mr. Kuok keeps a close eye on the business and influences major decisions.
The head of an expatriate Chinese company typically is a "paterfamilias." He is all powerful in both social and business spheres. He entrusts key activities and positions to family members: sons, sons-in-law, nephews, brothers, uncles and occasionally daughters. Within the family, confidence in his judgment borders on the absolute. The combination of owner and manager avoids the "agency" problems that Western business face in getting managers to promote the interests of the owners.
Frequently, the retiring heads of first-generation Chinese businesses summon their eldest sons to return home to take over. In cases in both Taipei and Hong Kong, for instance, the eldest sons were doctors with established practices in the United States. Both abandoned their professions and returned to take over the family business.
When Y. K. Pao, the Hong Kong shipping and property magnate, arranged for his succession, he had a problem: no sons. Mr. Pao divided his business among his four sons-in-law: a Chinese doctor, a Japanese architect, a Shanghai banker and an Austrian lawyer. Despite their unusually diverse backgrounds, apparently Mr. Pao had no thought of turning over the businesses to professional managers.
An Informal And Flexible Structure
As a result of some of these management chains, these companies have not had to downsize to stay competitive; they never upsized in the first place. Due diligence to them is not an endless array of studies, memos and meetings with a large and expensive retinue of lawyers, accountants and investment bankers. It's a conversation among trusted friends and relatives. Kinship, dialect and common origin -- in a clan or a village -- provide the basis for mutual trust in business transactions in the network, even when conducted at great distances.
A common core of values is remarkably persistent, notably hard work, conscientiousness, loyalty to superiors and trust among family and friends. The resultant certainty and informality facilitate business transactions over or around governmentally imposed barriers.
For example, when Taiwan had strict exchange controls, someone in the bamboo network could deposit a large sum with a gold shop in Taipei and the next day a relative could withdraw the money from an affiliated gold dealer in Hong Kong.
As the family conglomerates have grown, they have served as incubators for the future management of related enterprises. The head of the Lippo Group in Hong Kong, for instance, got his start with the Salim Group of Indonesia. The head of the Salim Group got his initial financing from the Sophonpanich family that controls the Bank of Bangkok. Each of these are very successful ethnic Chinese entrepreneurs who now regularly join forces in making new investments in China, Southeast Asia and elsewhere.
Most of the investment capital flowing into China does not come from Europe, Japan or the United States, but from these overseas Chinese. The movement of China from Communism to capitalism is being financed and managed by those who fled or were expelled in 1949, and by their descendants.
Funnel For Western Investment
Since Deng Xiaoping launched his economic open-door policy in 1978, overseas Chinese have accounted for about 80 percent of all foreign investment in China.
In fact, most of the Western companies that have moved successfully into mainland China, including Motorola, Coca-Cola, KFC, Lockheed, Chrysler and Procter & Gamble, started joint ventures with members of the bamboo network. Western companies have what the members of the bamboo network lack in some cases, including technical expertise, consumer marketing skills and the ability to manage large-production operations.
In contrast, the typical bamboo network enterprise has a low profile, which reduces the likelihood of becoming a target of public criticism or governmental action. The enterprises serve as middlemen, making components for someone else. The owners know the key government officials of the countries in which they operate and they are great deal makers. Yet they do not produce or market any major consumer product and they therefore have little experience in managing large manufacturing operations. They are much better at real estate than in automobile production; much better in hotels than in aircraft production.
For these and other reasons, synergies between East and West may be difficult to arrange, and trying to transform an informal Chinese enterprise into a bureaucratic, Western-style corporation is bound to fail.
Still, partnerships can be mutually beneficial if the players appreciate the differences in each other's operating methods. There is no question that the ethnic Chinese business can offer essential entree to leading growth sectors of Asia.
Several thumbnail sketches of specific bamboo network enterprises may help to explain the very special nature of this unique phenomenon.
Charoen Pokphand Group Of Thailand
The Charoen Pokphand Group, whose wealth is estimated at more than $5 billion, is the largest conglomerate in Thailand. It began as a small seed company founded by a Chinese merchant who moved to Bangkok. The company grew into a conglomerate as it expanded the market for its seed. CP now controls more than 200 companies in Thailand, Indonesia, Taiwan, Turkey, Portugal and the Philippines. CP is also the largest investor in mainland China, with interests in almost every province. Only half of CP's revenues come from its Thai operations.
Exhibit I shows the tip of the iceberg: the major publicly held businesses owned and controlled by the family. The family owns a controlling 33 percent of the key company, CP Feedmill. It owns another 5 percent of Feedmill through Bangkok Industrial.
CP also controls Bangkok Agro-Industrial through a direct 9 percent ownership plus 5 percent from Bangkok Produce Merchandising and another 5 percent from CP International Trading and 3 percent from CP Northeastern. CP Feedmill, in addition, owns a controlling 60 percent of Bangkok Agro-Industrial, 99 percent of CP Merchandising and 57 percent of CP Northeastern.
Exhibit I is a simplified version of a far more complex reality. For example, CP's investments on the mainland are not made directly by its headquarters in Bangkok, but by a subsidiary in Hong Kong. The subsidiary owns a controlling interest in the umbrella corporation that actually makes the investments in China. Each of the individual investments takes the form of a joint venture, with one or more native enterprises.
Li Ka-Shing Group Of Hong Kong
Li Ka-shing, a Hong Kong real estate tycoon with a personal net worth estimated at $6 billion, moved to Hong Kong as a poor refugee from China. He began to work at age 12 for a company making plastic flowers. Mr. Li soon started his own plastics company. His little plastic company now owns the controlling interest in Hutchison Whampoa, one of the biggest ex-British "hongs" that traditionally dominated Hong Kong. It also controls the Husky Oil Company of Canada and the Hong Kong Electric Company and owns 9.4 percent of Mochtar Riady's Lippo Ltd., which has gained some notoriety recently. (See Exhibit II.)
Hutchison Whampoa owns a controlling interest in Cavendish International, while Cavendish holds a minority interest in Hutchison. Moreover, Cheung Kong is the family's basic holding company, but the family owns the Imperial Bank of Commerce of Canada directly. Also, Mr. Li controls Husky Oil through ownership by the family directly, plus shares held by Hutchison Whampoa as well as its subsidiary Cavendish International.
Over the years, Mr. Li has teamed up with a variety of bamboo network enterprises. For example, he has joined the Lippo Group of Indonesia and Taiwan International Securities in financing the New China Hong Kong Group, which also includes Singapore's Trade Development Board and 10 mainland Chinese companies and ministries.
Ong Beng Seng Group Of Singapore
A very special characteristic -- perhaps protective -- of the bamboo network is that the family-oriented enterprises rarely seem to own their individual companies outright, in contrast to the notion of the wholly owned subsidiary so familiar in the United States.
Exhibit III shows the publicly owned Hotel Properties Limited. This is the key holding company of the Ong Beng Seng Group of Singapore. HPL owns 100 percent of HPL of Singapore. In turn, HPL of Singapore owns 50 percent of HRC Holdings. HRC Holdings operates Hard Rock Cafes throughout Southeast Asia. HPL also holds a 50 percent interest in Luxury Holdings, which, in turn, owns upscale hotels throughout the area. HRC Holdings owns 70 percent of HRC Hong Kong Holdings, which holds a 95 percent interest in the Beijing Liang Sing Restaurant and Recreation Company. Also, HPL holds 60 percent of Cleaton Investments, which has a 70 percent interest in PT Bali Giri Kencana through wholly owned EIE Bali.
HRC Holdings also owns outright Planet Hollywood Holdings, which has a 30 percent interest in Planet Hollywood, a Hong Kong-based enterprise.
Bangkok Bank Group
The Sophonpanich family, a key bamboo network enterprise in Thailand, some time ago adopted a Thai name. The key holding of the family is the Bangkok Bank, the largest financial institution in the country. (See Exhibit IV.) The bank holds 10 percent of the shares of Bangkok Insurance and also provides 30 percent of its premium income. In turn, the insurance company owns 4 percent of the bank as well as 9 percent of Bangkok First Investment & Trust and 5 percent of Krungdhep Warehouse.
The family owns another 8 percent of the Investment company and its Warehouse subsidiary owns 3 percent of the Insurance company. The Bangkok Bank holds 9 percent of the stock of the Warehouse company as well as 30 percent of the Bumrungrad Hospital. The family owns 3 percent of the hospital directly.
The widespread control of the Sophonpanich family can be seen by the identity of the key officers in the network. Chartsiri Sophonpanich is president of the Bangkok Bank. His brother Chote is chairman of the Warehouse and his brother Choedchu runs the Investment company.
Salim Group Of Indonesia
The Salim Group, founded by Liem Sioe Liong, controls more than 60 enterprises in Hong Kong and Singapore, in addition to the majority of Indonesia's blue chip companies: Indocement, Indosteel and Indomilk.
Salim exemplifies the transnational nature of the bamboo network. Salim manages two ports in China in a joint venture with a company linked to the government of Singapore. This business is conducted through a three-times-removed unit, the Netherlands-listed Hagemeyer Group, which, in turn, is owned by a Hong Kong-listed corporation that is a part of the Salim Group, headquartered in Indonesia.
The First Pacific Company is the Salim Group's major Hong Kong subsidiary (Salim is Mr. Liem's Indonesian name, but he usually is called by his Chinese name, Liem Sioe Liong). First Pacific is listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Of First Pacific's operating companies, only its Pacific Link Communications is based in Hong Kong. The others are elsewhere in East Asia, notably Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia. As noted earlier, Hagemeyer does business in Asia, but is basically a Dutch company.
In 1938, a penniless Mr. Liem left China for Java. He started a small trading company. During the Indonesian war of independence, Mr. Liem supplied the rebels with clothing, food and arms. When the war was over, his friend Suharto, who became president, did not forget him. In free Indonesia, Mr. Liem was allowed to start companies in product areas ranging from nails to banking. Salim Group's flagships in Hong Kong and Singapore operate in 25 countries in Asia, North America and Europe. The Group maintains business interests in distribution, property management, financial services and telecommunications.
The Salim Group has teamed up with the Kuok family of Malaysia to develop a hotel and golfing resort in Indonesia and a cement factory in Wuhan, China. On occasion, both groups team up with Thailand's CP Group.
Kuok Group Of Malaysia
As noted earlier, no widely known consumer products have a Chinese brand name. The members of the bamboo network produce for others. They provide raw materials or manage real estate. Their operations include wholesaling, financing and transportation. An example of this specialization on an international scale is the Kuok Group of Malaysia.
Kuok's businesses include shipping, commodity trading, iron ore mining and sugar plantations across Southeast Asia. They also include the influential South China Morning Post. None of these enterprises involves products marketed via the Kuok name. The Group's most consumer-oriented enterprise, its luxury hotels, bears names such as Shangri-La.
Substantial Political Risk
The future political risk facing the overseas Chinese business families is substantial. However, their ability to work successfully across national borders is a prime asset. Great uncertainty is attached to any scenario that involves China. Nevertheless, the members of the bamboo network will attempt to accommodate the changing political and economic environment and take full advantage of the opportunities provided by an increasingly globalized marketplace. As the saying goes, "Bamboo bends; it does not break."
Under the most optimistic scenario, the government on the mainland will continue to move toward capitalism and relax some of the controls over its people. In that event, the bamboo network will face to the East, to mainland China. The overseas Chinese will develop closer ties with the mainland. A happy unification with Hong Kong would be the basis for closer ties with Taiwan. On the other hand, should China revert to Communism -- or mishandle the integration of Hong Kong -- the bamboo network will face to the West. Overseas Chinese commercial families will develop closer ties with North America and Western Europe. At home, they will emphasize the substantial opportunities elsewhere in Southeast Asia and in Australia. An old saying among overseas Chinese is, "Keep your bags packed at all times."
Under either eventuality, the bamboo network will survive and prosper. The future of these family-oriented enterprises will be in the hands of the American-educated younger generation. They will seek to exploit the tremendous possibilities that arise from combining their unique cultural characteristics with modern management and advanced technology. The major remaining question is whether they can pull off the combination of the best of the East and the West.
The shortcomings of the family-run businesses of the bamboo network are not to be underestimated, especially their low-tech nature, limited marketing capability and inbred management styles. Nevertheless, China and Southeast Asia are the booming part of the global economy. We must know more about them because they can be our customers, suppliers or competitors -- and likely all three.
There is much that Western businesses can learn from the bamboo network.
First and foremost, family business is alive and well. While the largest United States corporations are downsizing and spinning off their divisions, the human scale of a family-based enterprise can be a great advantage.
Second, keeping overhead low and making speedy decisions are essential in the global marketplace. You don't need big staffs if the key people are competent and have the authority to act.
Third, trust is a key advantage. It can bridge great distances and overcome all sorts of obstacles. If you can trust the honesty and competence of your key people, you will save time and money.
An old Mandarin proverb offers a final note of caution: "If you think you understand, you don't really understand."
Reprint No. 98106


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Ok, so the blogs about being free are done (last one) - I just want to add a few thoughts here before I throw myself on the blog about my earlier LinuxTag Flames. FYI this will probably be more controversial than that one, so brace yourself (or don't read if you don't like honest yet strong opinions).
This is related to some discussions on the web about the FSF, the FSFE, and pragmatism vs idealism. And prompted by Ben Martin's blog about Meritocracy.
Let me tell you my point up front: those who see a difference between pragmatism and idealism in FOSS are wrong.
Read on to figure out why I say that...
Basic assumption
We want as much Free Software as possible, right? Let's first look at why we want that:
- Because it is better for Freedom. "In a world where speech depends on software, Free Speech depends on Free Software." (Donald B. Marti Jr). Need I say more?
- It helps companies to be independent of a few large businesses, it is better for the economy. FOSS promotes a free market where everyone can choose from a series of vendors.
- It's good for second- and third world countries because they don't have to waste dollars on big US or European companies and they can learn from the code.
And I'm sure there are more reasons. So, our goal should be simple: spread as much Free Software as possible, and educate people about it. Firefox does great in this regard (at least as much as can be expected) by showing the why on their site and in the browser when you start it for the first time. Oh, and they do it this way: FIRST get them the software (free as in free beer), then try to educate them. Firefox has been very instrumental in me explaining what I do for KDE to completely IT ignorant people. I say, I am part of KDE. It's an international blablabla doing FOSS. FOSS? Yes, ever heard of open source, linux? Nope. Firefox? Yes, I know $friend using it. Ok, so that's developed by volunteers in their free time. They do that because they believe it helps make this world better. blablabla. Thank you Firefox!
Idealism vs Pragmatism
So where is this idealism vs pragmatism? Well, some people apparently dislike Ubuntu because it makes it easy to get non-free codecs. Or dislike openSUSE because it ships binary firmware. Or firefox because they make money thanks to Google. Well, screw that. Sure we must try to get such things to be opened up, but what end user is interested in those niche 'pure FOSS' distro's which barely run anywhere, can't play mp3's or can't visit Facebook, gmail and other popular sites?
Others are against making money with FOSS. Doesn't get any sillier. I'd rather have Novell make a deal with MS, letting our 'friends' from Redmond distribute SUSE licenses, than not have these customers at all. Sure such a deal has disadvantages and I don't know enough about the details to properly argue about it, but the basic principle I have no problem with. And there are plenty more examples more or less like this. Google's deal with Firefox. Ubuntu One. Darn, if BP sponsored me to do marketing for a year, fine, as long as they don't expect me to say to the world I think they're doing great in the Mexican Gulf ;-)
Idealism is going for the BIG WIN. Pragmatism is how you do it. They're two sides of the same coin. That's what I think.
It's about the world, stupid
I want *the world* to use Free Software, not 1% geeks. Commercial parties can play a huge role here, and I'm happy to let them experiment, stumble and fall, get back up and *spread the darn software* in the process. Because I believe in the end, it will work out. Take dual licensing. Is it evil? Hell no, in the end it turns out the 'free' version becomes so much better the model doesn't even work anymore... See MySQL, for example. In the end, money goes into improving Free Software, and the FOSS model ensures domination ;-)
Let me put one thing straight: I'm perfectly fine with those who hack on FOSS because IT IS FUN and don't care much about anything else. Power to you. I'm argueing with those who say they want everyone to be free and use FOSS but at the same time restrict people in what they can do!
So pragmatism vs idealism is wrong. You need pragmatism if you want your ideal world, and by only idealism you get - fairly litte. And the FSF has done plenty of pragmatic things, which is why they made a huge difference. The reason I mentioned them is that lately, some actions seem a bit too extreme to me... But there are ppl out there in 'our world' who are FAR more extreme, and hindering FOSS adoption that way. Either by opposing things, stopping others who're doing great, or just being negative and thus giving a bad impression to the outside world.
I admit, I might have went a bit over the top in the text above and there are probably plenty arguments to explain why some examples were wrong. And I admit, there are things you shouldn't be doing, there are boundaries. But in the end, it boils down to: do you want to spread Free Software everywhere, or are you just focusing on your own narrow group of fellow hackers?
I go for world domination. I want the vast majority of people on this planet to use Free Software, knowingly or not. What about you?


text: Elegant and timeless, the chandelier has long been held as the epitome of luxury in homes across the world. Now you can bring this fixture into your own home with one of our transitional pewter chandeliers. Each one features a beautiful pewter finish, but that is only the beginning. You'll find a vast array of options, each expertly made and featuring fine design elements combining the best of modern and traditional. Find dazzling crystal chandeliers as well as more modern items with colorful shades and vibrant patterns. You'll also find a selection of mini-chandeliers to adorn more modest dining areas and entryways or even bathrooms. Come check out our selection and find your ideal fixture here at Destination Lighting.


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Praise be to Allah.
This message contains fabrication about Allaah and claims to know that which is known only by Allaah. How does he know that the house that is built in Paradise for its owner will be overlooking the Throne of the Most Merciful, the palace of the Messenger (blessings and peace of Allaah be upon him) and the river of al-Kawthar?
The Throne of the Most Merciful is the roof of all creation and is above all creation, so how can this house be overlooking it?
The Prophet (blessings and peace of Allaah be upon him) encouraged some deeds and promised houses in Paradise to those who do them, but he did not give details of their location or what they overlook.
Moreover, this kind of message is a kind of foolishness which the scholars have pointed out and warned against being tempted to publish them, such as that message which describes the number of rak'ahs of the prayers as a phone number to contact Allaah, may He be exalted -- Allaah forbid -- or that in which they liken the Hereafter to a journey on an airline with tickets, seats and other foolish things; and the pamphlet in which there is information about the Prophet (blessings and peace of Allaah be upon him) and they call it the passport of the Prophet or the ID card of the Prophet! All of that is a waste of time and money, and may also be a kind of mockery and making fun. The aim of those who do that may be bad or it may be good; we do not know the truth of the matter, but whatever the case it is not permissible to publish such messages; rather we must beware of them and warn others about them.
The number of rak'ahs mentioned in the question refers to the regular Sunnah rak'ahs. For more information on that, please see the answer to question number 1048.
And Allaah knows best.


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Listen in as Joe Friday and Ben Romero keep Los Angeles safe from killers, burglars, swindlers, and common punks. Webb was one of the most distinctive actors, directors, and producers ever to work in American radio. And the episodes you're about to hear will demonstrate that.
Includes an informative Program Guide by radio historian Elizabeth McLeod!
Episodes Include: Police Academy 08-25-49; Auto Burglaries 09-01-49; The Sullivan Kidnapping 09-10-49; Cop Killing 09-17-49; The Brick-Bat Slayer 09-24-49; The Truck Hi-Jackers 10-01-49; The Spring Street Gang 12-01-49; The Jade Thumb Rings 12-08-49; The Garbage Chute Murder 12-15-49; The Roseland Roof Murder 12-29-49; The Big Smart Guy 06-08-50; The Big Purse 06-15-50; The Big Grab 06-29-50; The Big Frame 07-06-50; The Big Bomb 07-13-50; The Big Youngster 08-17-50; The Big Chance 08-25-50; The Big Check 08-31-50; The Big Poison 09-07-50; The Big Make 09-14-50
Please note: This CD-R product is manufactured on demand using recordable media. This allows us to make a wider range of series and episodes available.


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PG for mild action, rude humor and some language.
April 27, 2012
Voices of Hugh Grant, Selma Hayek, Jeremy Piven, Martin Freeman, Brendan Gleeson, Imelda Staunton, David Tennant, Al Roker, Anton Yelchin
Peter Lord, Jeff Newitt
Sony Pictures
More on this movie at IMDb.com
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CBN.com - Get ready to laugh. The artists behind Wallace & Gromit and Chicken Run are sailing the high seas in their new claymation movie, The Pirates! Band of Misfits.
Aardman Animations, based on England, continue to perfect the art of claymation entertainment. This new film about a less than heroic pirate and his shabby shipmates' adventures is family-friendly and, at times, incredibly funny.
The Pirates! Band of Misfits is by no means a history lesson (Queen Victoria and Charles Darwin are characters). Think of it like a more family-friendly option compared to the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, with less violence and more clay.
The Pirate Captain has one dream – to win the Pirate of the Year Award. To do that, he'll have to break his losing streak and beat his rivals Black Bellamy and Cutlass Liz. Prize in mind, The Pirate Captain and his motley crew hoist their Jolly Roger and leave the Spanish Main looking for adventure and spoils to prove he has what it takes to be named Pirate of the Year. His quest tests his courage, loyalty and wit – and his determination to win, no matter what.
Hugh Grant, whom audiences will know from films such as Notting Hill and About a Boy, is the voice of our unlikely hero, The Pirate Captain. His second in command, whom he likes to call No. 2, is The Pirate with a Scarf, voiced by Martin Freeman (a well-known British actor who is currently filming The Hobbit with Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson). British actors Imelda Staunton (Chicken Run, Nanny McPhee) and David Tennant (Doctor Who) voice the roles of Queen Victoria and Charles Darwin, respectively. Brendan Gleeson (Braveheart), Jeremy Piven (Entourage), Selma Hayek (Frida), Anton Yelchin (Star Trek) and even TV weatherman Al Roker round out the cast in roles with names such as The Pirate with Gout, Black Bellamy, Cutlass Liz, The Albino Pirate, The Pirate Who Likes Sunsets and Kittens and more.
With a message of treasuring what's most important above all else, The Pirates! Band of Misfits shows how fame and fortune are shallow riches. Loving things instead of people will leave you wanting – a lesson The Pirate Captain must learn. You also get the sense that the filmmakers are making a statement about the plight of endangered animals. World leaders are painted in a nasty light, with Queen Victoria as the villain. As previously mentioned, this movie is a complete work of fiction. In fact, the Queen was a beloved monarch. Though she and other pirate-hunting royals prosecuted pirates for their crimes, she was not the scallywag she appears to be in this story.
Captain Jack Sparrow can be comical, but these clay pirates have some downright hilarious moments. The script is layered with so much pirate lingo and humor it might even be hard for some moviegoers, especially young ones to catch all of the dry British humor. All in all, the film delivers an enjoyable 3D movie experience.
Rated PG, The Pirates! Band of Misfits is fairly clean of offensive content. It's PG rating is in part to scary moments (ones that may be too intense for small children) and Selma Hayek's scantily clad pirate character, Cutlass Liz.
Aardman Animations should be proud of The Pirates! Band of Misfits. It is without a doubt the best feature film the studio has released since their witty and heartwarming movie, Chicken Run, back in 2000.
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Hannah Goodwyn serves as the Entertainment producer for CBN.com. For more articles and information, visit Hannah's bio page.
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If You're Easily Embarrassed Maybe Don't Buy These Pants
This teen found out the hard way that her new Zara pants make a super embarrassing noise every time she bends down.
The Daily Mail reports that the teen made the unfortunate discovery while out to dinner with her family.
Part of the problem is that the pants are pleather, and any of us who lived through the pleather pants phase of the late '90s and early 2000s knows that all sorts of problems can come from those pants.
See the 25 weirdest scams ever


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"WhatI really learned in the army was how to be a pacifist."
Bruce "Utah" Phillips
According the obituary in the Globe & Mail newspaper Monday, 16 June, 2008, about the legendary folkie qua union organizer, Utah once placed his TV set in a lilac hedge at the back of his home, tied a scarf around it, taped a cigarette to the front of it, and sent it to the Great Beyond with a shotgun blast.
The other day, a good friend, quite proudly I must say, announced that when he reached age 70, he stopped buying and reading newspapers.
I would certainly never chastise such decisions by anyone to rid themselves of the exposure to today's mass media. In fact, despite my own addiction to the electronic aquarium, I applaud the Howard"I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore"Beale's of the world. If firing a bullet hole into your wired wonderful world of Disney cathode ray tube, or tossing it over the balcony,gets your rocks off, be my guest.
Of course, in the Middle Ages, news was spread among the great unwashed by means of songs, as the wandering minstrels of the day travelled from town to town, lute or harp in hand,imparting the news of the land by means of singing ballads or reciting poetry.
In some ways, this was the start of the modern song form. In order to remember the stories, the balladeers would create short succinct verses, 4-6 lines that rhymed. As the news of the day developed over the weeks and months, new verses were added and as the songs became longer and longer, people either nodded off to asleep or shouted obscenities, another reason the wandering minstrels kept wandering. Call it "The Birth of the Boos." The ole mouth born raspberry, so often tossed the Brooklyn Dodgers, as well as throwing rotten eggs and tomatoes.
I have no evidence to impart, however, that any of them were picked off by shotguns or appropriate weaponry of the day. It is a good bet though that the young maidens went home with the bass player.
Now, more to the point, I began thinking of all the stories that my dear friend, or anyone engaged in TV set executions,might have missed recently.
There was an excellent documentary, on PBS last Saturday night, about Pete Seeger. a wild and crazy 'commie' guy. He's remarkable, a banjo player, who that got gigs, to boot!
For Sports' fans, how 'bout Tiger Woods, at the U.S. Open? Even on one leg, Tiger beat back the opposition with birdies and eagles and just plain human drive and talent.
Or how the Turks scoring three goals, in less than 15 minutes, to oust the beleaguered Czechs from the Euro Cup last Sunday? Then, gulp, scoring the tying goal with time virtually out in stoppage time of OT, and then winning the quarter final match-up against the stunned Croatians in a shoot-out.
Not enough? The young Croatian with the kidney transplants scoring a remarkable goal against Poland as well as the one goal the team scored today in the quarter final.
The Boston Celtics coming back from a 24 point deficit to defeat Kobe and the Lakers, in LA, and then wrapping it up at home. So refreshing to see team guys like Paul Pearce, Ray Allen, and Kevin Garnett winning it all, especially against the less than humble Mr. Bryant.
How would these modern Luddites know about 2 rare whiteravens with blue eyesbeing found on the Left Coast or, gulp, the mystery of the running shoes washing up on BC coastline? Something is definitely afoot Sherlock!!! It's elementary my dear Watson! An advertisinghoax, by Nike, no doubt. "You can leave this mortal coil but your shoes will never rot: Call OUR 1-800-HOT-LINE begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 1-800-HOT-LINE end_of_the_skype_highlighting "WE HAVE YOUR LOVED ONE'S SHOES."
My favourite story of the week however is the one about the famous Vij's restaurant here in Lotusland that is now serving crispy critters - crickets! In the future, grasshoppers served in tandoori sauce or something.
Apparently, crickets are full of iron, calcium, and are environmentally-friendly... once dead. They don't cause deforestation of the rain forests unlike those big beefy things that spew noxious farty methane gases into the atmosphere.
Eat a cricket and save the environment! It works for me.
I'll report back to ya once I've given them a go. I'm a bit squeamish but only cause the family dog's name was Cricket.
Otherwise, fill up that wine glass and open the gullet.
The first time I ever ate octopus, I had no idea. It was in a "fish soup" in Spain. From there, by the time I left Cordoba, I was happily downing raw herring and baby crabs in their own ink...pour some more cervasa por va fore, where do I fight de bull?
Well, as usual, I digress.
When Pete Seeger was with The Weavers, the group had the opportunity to do a cigarette commercial for TV. When Pete, a non-smoker, non-drinker, asked the reason, he was told "cause we need the money." Pete left the group saying "we don't need the money that much." Now, there's integrity for ya!
Pete was not averse to appearing on the ole Boob Tube, when they let him, but he wasn't about to sell-out to commercial advertisers.
In those days, one could puff that cigarette and walk a mile for a Camel but if you were suspected of un-American activity - meaning if ya dissed Old Glory or the President or spoke about "unions" other than the ones between men and women, blessed by the church, and racial equality- you were banned from the air-waves as a commie pinko rat. Such was the fate of ole Pete - for almost 20 years, till he finally was allowed to appear on the Smothers Brothers Show and sang "we're waist deep in the big muddy and the big fool says to push on." The big muddy was Vietnam. The Big Fool was President Johnson...and the rest is historical.
As we already know from the Dixie Chicks experience, not much has changed in the ability of the big fools to smoother dissension in the land of the free.
In any event, I certainly can sympathize with those who turn-off their TVs or shun newsprint due to sheer volume of, or space taken-up by, Advertising. Even the 'alternative' press here in Lotusland - The Georgia Straight - begins now with 4 pages of full-page coloured ads. Once passed the post, trying to find the articles among the barrage of ads in any newspaper is a task not for the faint of heart or Mr. Magoos of the world.
As for our friends from Nike, in case you really think I was over the top, the good news, in case you missed it,is Tiger Woods' dad is NOT dead. You can hear him in a voice-over Nike ad as clear as the day he was born. How's that for bad taste! Maybe Adbusters can counter with a Charlton Heston voice-over ad blasting a shotgun bullet into his TV whenever that Nike Ad comes on, shouting "from my cold, dead hands."
Now, in reference to the above, you should also be acutely aware that there is more value today in being dead or non-human than being a normal breathing slob, holding down the nine-to-fiver.
Recently in the TV advertising landscape, I have seen car-making robots playing basketball and cell phones marching like penguins o'er Antarctic ice fields.
You, shoes or no shoes, have been replaced Bunky. You are an unemployed time-bound worthless piece of degradable packaging. When you croak - and you will - and maybe meet Tiger Woods' dad,have no fear - your new cell phone is "life proof." That's what it says in the ad. "Life proof," and that's for sure.
Robots as Michael Jordan, er, well, even though they're white robots.
Cell phones got bigger and better than God.
Capitalism will eat itself. Chomp. The next consumer item fad is you!
Imagine a planet with no human beings and a bunch of cell phones talking to each other about last night's robot's basketball game?
"Blow up your TV, throw away your papers, move to the country, and build you a home..." John Prine.
I say, old being,
Cricket anyone?
Bob Stark is a musician, poet, philosopher and couch potato. He spends his days, as did Jean-Paul Sarte and Albert Camus, pouring lattes and other adult beverages into a recycled mug, bearing a long and winding crack. He discusses, with much insight and passion, the existentialist and phenomenological ontology of the Vancouver 'Canucks,' a hockey team, "Archie" comic books and high school reunions. In other words, Bob Stark is a retired public servant living the good life on the wrong coast of Canada.
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This was the twelfth visit of the Committee to France and was part of the programme of periodic visits for 2015. The visit was not carried out in reaction to the tragic attacks which took place in Paris on 13 November 2015 and the subsequent events.
During the visit, the delegation paid particular attention to the conditions of deprivation of liberty in three remand prisons affected by overcrowding and to the regime of certain categories of convicted prisoners in different establishments, including in a unit holding "radicalised" prisoners. In addition, the delegation carried out a detailed analysis of the situation of involuntary patients in psychiatric establishments. Twelve establishments of the police and gendarmerie were also visited, notably with a view to examining the material conditions provided there for persons deprived of their liberty.
The delegation held consultations with Christiane TAUBIRA, Minister of Justice, and with senior officials of the Ministry of Justice. It also met with Michel LALANDE, Director of the Private Office of the Minister of the Interior, and Etienne CHAMPION, Director of the Private Office of the Minister of Social Affairs, Health and Women's Rights, as well as with other senior officials from these ministries.
Further, the delegation met with Adeline HAZAN, General Controller of Places of Deprivation of Liberty, representatives of the Rights Defender (Ombudsman) and the National Consultative Commission on Human Rights, and members of non-governmental organisations active in areas of interest to the CPT.
At the end of the visit, the delegation presented its preliminary observations to the French authorities.
The visit was carried out by Committee members Maïté DE RUE, First Vice-President of the CPT (Head of delegation), Régis BERGONZI, Dan DERMENGIU, Nico HIRSCH and Anna LAMPEROVA. They were supported by Julien ATTUIL-KAYSER and Janet FOYLE of the CPT's Secretariat, and assisted by three experts: Didier DELESSERT, Chief Medical Officer of the Prison Medical Services of Valais Hospital (Switzerland), Timothy HARDING, psychiatrist and former Director of the University Institute of Forensic Medicine, Geneva (Switzerland), and Vincent THEIS, Director of Luxembourg Prison (Luxembourg).
The delegation visited the following places of deprivation of liberty:
Law enforcement establishments
- Albi Police Headquarters
- Alençon Police Headquarters
- Aulnay-sous-Bois Police Station
- Local Reception and Investigation Service, 8th administrative district, Paris
- Local Reception and Investigation Service, 9th administrative district, Paris
- Police Headquarters, 14th administrative district, Paris
- Toulouse Police Headquarters
- Toulouse-Mirail Police Station
- Albi Local Gendarmerie Brigade
- Alençon Local Gendarmerie Brigade
- Cugnaux Local Gendarmerie Brigade
- Toulouse-Mirail Gendarmerie Investigation Brigade
- Condé-sur-Sarthe Prison
- Fresnes Remand Prison, including the Regional Medico-Psychological Service (SMPR)
- Nîmes Remand Prison
- Villepinte Remand Prison
Health care establishments
- Gérard Marchant Hospital, Toulouse, including the Specially Adapted Psychiatric Hospital Unit for Prisoners (UHSA) and the "Marcel Riser" Long-Term Care Unit (USLD)
- University Hospital Centre of Toulouse (targeted visit to the UF1 unit for psychiatric treatment without consent)
- "Louis Crocq" Unit for Difficult Patients (UMD), Albi


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The Global Journal is finding its mark—not just with serious believers but also with opponents of the Gospel. Thus, following the appearance of our issue dealing with the Editor's apologetic approach (Vol. 3, No. 1 [4/02]), Richard Packham, a "free-thinking" retired lawyer, whose web essay endeavouring to refute my legal apologetic was the object of Boyd Pehrson's article, "How Not To Critique Legal Apologetics," posted on his home page a "Response to Pehrson" http://home.teleport.com/~packham/pehrson.htm
Normally, we would not use space in the Global Journal for a rejoinder, especially when Packham has not even been able to get the name of our journal straight (!). But an Editor must surely defend a fine contributor, and Pehrson's original article does not warrant the treatment to which Packham has subjected it.
Packham begins by castigating Pehrson for ad hominem argumentation—in that Pehrson questions the level of Packham's legal expertise. In point of fact, the reason for this was simply that Packham, in his first article (the one that started all this) introduced his own legal background in an effort to show that he was indeed qualified to refute someone of my academic and legal qualifications! Had Packham not brought up the issue of curriculum vitae, Pehrson would doubtless not have bothered. "What goes around, comes around."
In discussing the Ancient Documents rule, Packham downgrades Pehrson's perfectly valid point that any court in the common-law world would admit the Gospel records (as Simon Greenleaf, the foremost expert on the law of evidence in the 19th century so well argued in his classic, The Testimony of the Evangelists). Says Packham: "Remember that 'authentication' is only the first step in presenting evidence." Quite: but neither Greenleaf, Montgomery, nor Pehrson ever suggested otherwise! The weight of the admitted documents must still be presented—but that is exactly what Packham and his ilk never face. They are not worthy to tie the laces of such scholars as F. F. Bruce (The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable?)—and they have yet to face the consequences of my History and Christianity and Tractatus Logico-Theologicus. Moreover, Packham seems to be saying that the Ancient Documents Rule never goes beyond the authentication of the document itself (that is, it has nothing to do with the admissibility of the statements which are themselves contained in the authentic document). Putting it otherwise, Packham appears to be arguing that when the Ancient Documents Rule is applied to a writing, the document can be regarded as genuine or authentic and yet full of errors. However, in California for example (Evidence Code Section 1331) a document found to be an ancient writing comes into evidence for the truth of the matters stated therein (since the Ancient Documents Rule functions as an exception to the more general Hearsay Rule). It is not just that the document is authentic–the statements therein actually come into evidence (see Estate of Nidever, 181 Cal.App. 2d 367 [1960]; Kirkpatrick v. Tapo Oil, 144 Cal. App. 2d 404 [1956]). And as long as the hearsay statements contained in the genuine or authentic document have been "acted upon as true" by persons with an interest in the matter, they are admissible (cf. the Law Revision Comment to Section 1331). We think that dying for the truth of what they wrote should qualify the Apostolic witnesses in this regard!
As to the application of the Hearsay Rule itself, Packham asserts that Pehrson "reveals his own unfamiliarity with legal argumentation in his citation of McCormick on Evidence, where that handbook quoted the case of Samuel H. Moss, Inc. v FTC, in which the court chastised the trial court for being so strict in excluding hearsay evidence. Pehrson makes several blunders here that no one familiar with legal writing or legal argumentation would make." Actually, it is Packham who commits the egregious blunders. He complains that the cited case is "over fifty years" old and would be cited only "when the lawyer is desperate and cannot find any more recent case on point." As a matter of fact, the age of a case is only relevant if a more recent case overrules it (which didn't happen here). In England , we still cite such cases as those in Coke's Reports—even though they go back to the 16th and the 17th centuries. And, contra Packham, the fact that Moss was an administrative proceeding with "more relaxed procedural rules" does not make the case any less significant; after all, critical matters of property and status are decided every day in administrative tribunals! As for the employment of obiter dicta, these have continuing importance even if the obiter comment was not controlling in deciding the case. Further, it should go without saying that "Pehrson and Montgomery do NOT "imply that in countries [where there is no rule against the admission of hearsay] hearsay is accepted by the courts on the same level as eye-witness testimony."
The whole point of Pehrson's Hearsay discussion was to stress that (a) the Gospel materials in large part depend on firsthand, non-hearsay evidence (John: "That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you"; Peter: "We have not followed cunningly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty"; etc., etc.); and (b) even the dependent material (cf. Luke 1:1-4) would be accepted where the Hearsay rules still applied in American courts do not constitute part of procedural law (this would include decisions in civil actions by judges in England and most Commonwealth countries and decisions in both civil and criminal trials by continental European judges).
The issue of the sufficiency of evidence is the real centre of this controversy. Here, Packham, like secular critics of the New Testament documents and the life of Jesus in general, never faces the fact that the same standards of documentary and testimonial soundness which apply to the New Testament are those applied to the entire corpus of classical materials, historical and literary. To throw out the one is, logically, to throw out the other. The same applies in the handling of evidence in ordinary life: If you object to the accuracy of the resurrection accounts (i.e., if you reject the evidence that Jesus died on the Cross and that he was alive subsequently, eating with his disciples), you might as well give up all reliance on funeral practice—since you will not be able to distinguish the dead from the living, the corpse from the undertaker.
Finally, we have Packham's expression of "pain"—"the pain of knowing that people remain in bondage to the myths and superstitions of former ages, to the stories preserved in that black-bound book called the Bible." Here, we meet the classic fallacy of over-generalisation. Pehrson, last we heard, was discussing certain New Testament documents. The Bible consists of sixty-six books. Has Packham and his ilk ever really taken the time to study the defense of this literature across twenty centuries? What about the innumerable prophecies of the Old Testament fulfilled in detail in the life of Jesus (see my Christ Our Advocate—www.ciltpp.com)? Why was this prophetic case never refuted by the religious leaders of Jesus' time who knew their Old Testaments and whose murderous treatment of Jesus showed that they had the means, the motive, and the opportunity to destroy his claim to Messiahship had they the evidence to do so? The real "pain" is that Packham never faces the totality of the evidence. Perhaps, after all, there is an ad hominem point to be made: If the great physicists such as Einstein reject the flat-earth theory, we do not spend much time with the few adherents of that viewpoint. In the realm of legal practice and jurisprudence, it is Sir Matthew Hale, Sir William Blackstone, Simon Greenleaf, Abraham Lincoln, Sir Norman Anderson, Lord Denning, Lord Diplock, Lord Hailsham, et al. versus Packham (cf. Ross Clifford, Leading Lawyers' Case for the Resurrection). One need not really hesitate for very long in deciding which side to join.
* * *
This issue of the GLOBAL JOURNAL begins with one of the most important articles we have ever published—an article illustrating the stark contrast between reactionary politics (with which, sadly, not a few fundamentalist Christians have been identified) and true, biblical Christianity: "Holocaust Denial: What It Is and Why Evangelical Scholars Must Categorically Reject It," by Richard V. Pierard, Professor of History Emeritus at Indiana State University. Dr. Pierard's contribution is followed by a matching essay hitting the liberal, "politically correct" approach to things Jewish: "Why Liberals Didn't Understand Passion Play 2000," by Professor Craig Parton, Esq., American director of our International Academy of Apologetics, Evangelism and Human Rights (www.apologeticsacademy.eu). Then we take a crack at the cults by way of Gordon Allen Carle's "How Mormon Scholars Conduct Patristic Research To Prove the Legitimacy of Their Religion." Lastly—having stuck it to the far right, the far left, and the sectarian hinterland—the issue concludes with a nice piece of philosophical theology: Associate Editor Dr Edward N. Martin's "Infinite Causal Regress and the Secunda Via in the Thought of Thomas Aquinas."
— John Warwick Montgomery


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Meet Wayne Barton
Wayne Barton is an American-born professional woodcarver who lives in Park Ridge, Illinois, with his Swiss-born wife, Marlies. First given an interest in woodcarving at the age of five under the tutelage of his Norwegian grandfather, he has had a serious interest in, and love for carving all his life.
Wayne took his formal training in Brienz, Switzerland, the woodcarving center of that country. Although versed in all disciplines of carving, he specializes in chip carving and has devoted the last fifty-plus years to its advancement. Single handedly, he has been the driving force of the recognition and renaissance chip carving has enjoyed in North America.
Wayne Barton is the author of eight best-selling books published in six countries (also translated into Korean) and a video, all devoted to chip carving. They are the most informative and instructional books and video on the subject available. He has developed the finest and the most popular chip carving knives used by more carvers than any other knives. These are the knives that have set the standard by which all others are judged. He also developed and pioneered the very popular ceramic sharpening stones in use today.
Wayne is the founder of The Alpine School of Woodcarving, Ltd., the oldest establishment in North America specializing in, and dedicated to the education, training, teaching, and encouragement of chip carving. In addition, he has taught at a variety of other venues including colleges, clubs, institutions, and organizations across the United States, Canada, and in Switzerland. He is also a visiting artist/lecturer at the esteemed Chicago Art institute in Chicago, Il. His carvings are sought after by collectors and can be found in private collections around the world.
Wayne Barton's work has been recognized and honored in special exhibition at the Swiss National Museum in Zurich, Switzerland. In 2005, he was named woodcarver of the year by Woodcarving Illustrated. Today, he continues carving, teaching and introducing others to this most enjoyable, decorative and easy-to-learn style of carving.


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Hi, I am Avinash, but this is not my story. This is the story of Avni, my sister. I know the smell of cement and bricks still pulls her to the incident seven years ago where she made a daring yet ruthless decision. I know she is drifting away. I know she has begun to find comfort in Vivaan. But I don't know if I like it.
Hi, I am Avni, but this is not my story. This is the story of Vivaan, the stunning, vivacious painter. There is something sad about the paintings he has locked away from the world in his storeroom. But he never talks about it. But then there are a lot of things he doesn't talks about, like how deeply he loves me.
And what about Dev and Kangana? Isn't this their story too? It wouldn't have been if only we did one single thing differently on that ill-fated night, the night that changed the course of our destiny. And hey, I am Vivaan.
And what about me? Why does nobody talk about me? Or talk to me? Because I am a little girl or because…Well, this is my story too. You will ask who I am? The answer lies somewhere in the pages of BEYOND SCARS.
Grab your copy @
About the author
"Alka Dimri Saklani writes contemporary fiction. Her books are labeled as 'intense' by most of her readers. Her debut novel ""45 Days in a Cancer Hospital"" was longlisted for Crossword Books Award 2013. Writing is her first love, the love that seized her when she was just 8.
She holds MBA degree in HR and worked with a leading MNC before turning to a full-time writer.
Born and brought up in Vadodara, a city in Gujarat, her roots hail from "Dev Bhumi" Uttarakhand. Apart from writing, she loves music, reading, traveling, and spending time with her two naughty kids.
You can stalk her @
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Explore ICR
For over five decades, the Institute for Creation Research has equipped believers with evidence of the Bible's accuracy and authority through scientific research, educational programs, and media presentations, all conducted within a thoroughly biblical framework.
- Who We Are — Discover more about ICR's history and mission.
- What We Believe — Understand our biblical and scientific distinctives.
- How We Do Research — Understand our approach to scientific investigation.


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Start by taking a careful look at your property and its immediate surroundings. Is your site sunny or shady? Is the soil heavy and poorly drained, or sandy and overly porous? Are there any views that you would like to screen or highlight? Is your property exposed to prevailing winds? Taking the time to do this properly will help you to make the right choices.
Measure your property and draw up a list of all existing features. Transfer all these details to a scale drawing. Mark its orientation and the direction of prevailing winds. Cover your sheet with tracing paper and sketch your landscaping plan onto that. Finish up by taking a few photographs of your property from different angles. You can cover these photos with tracing paper and sketch an elevation plan of your new landscaping onto that, as well.


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Create stunning fluid artworks with Mont Marte's acrylic pouring paint range. This paint is pre-mixed and ready to flow! So choose your colors and get ready to see some amazing effects come to life on your canvas.
- Ideal for acrylic pouring and fluid art
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"?people's movements of resistance against deprivation, against unemployment, against the loss of natural resources, all of that is termed 'terrorism.'"
? Edward Said
The only known photograph of Rebecca Rubin is a headshot that looks like it was taken for her driver's license. She's wearing a plain gray sweatshirt, her long brown hair is unkempt, and her expression is careworn. But splashed across thousands of 'Wanted' posters across the country, her face aligned next to those of serial murderers and bank robbers, the headshot sends a message that she is someone to be frightened of. This, though Rubin ? aliases "Kara" and "Little Missy" ? has never harmed a soul.
According to the FBI, Rubin, 37 years old, belongs to an ultra-radical group known as the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), which along with its sister organization, the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), authorities describe as "the most active extremist elements in the United States." In the late 1990s, Rubin is alleged to have participated in a spree of arsons that caused upwards of $55 million in damages. As recently as 2008 FBI spokesman Richard Kolko described the loose-knit confederacy of eco-guerillas as "what we would probably consider the No. 1 domestic terrorism threat."
But those who know Rubin best will point out, correctly, that while she has perhaps destroyed property, she has never harmed nor even deliberately targeted a human being. They will tell you, also correctly, that the FBI's Most Wanted poster, which warns Rubin is "armed and dangerous," is false, since no member of the ELF or ALF has ever wielded a firearm to further their cause. They will argue that the acts of "terrorism" Rubin and others are accused of came after many years when protests and boycotts failed to prevent the logging of old-growth forests, or to deter polluters from violating environmental regulations, or to protect animals from being abused in the name of medical science. They will say that radical animal and environmental rights activists like Rubin ? who has not been accused of any further crimes since she went underground five years ago ? are being redefined as terrorists in a post-9/11 era of increased surveillance and hobbled due process.
Rubin grew up in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, surrounded by a wilderness of forests and mountain peaks. Nearby Vancouver Island is so wild it's believed to have the world's highest concentration of mountain lions. Her parents divorced when she was young, and she grew up with her mother, a nurse. As a girl Rubin was quiet, at times painfully shy, with a lifelong affinity for the outdoors and wildlife. According to friends, she lived for some time in a cabin in Canada's Kootenay region, east of Vancouver, with only her cats for company. She worked odd jobs but mostly she volunteered at wildlife sanctuaries. She studied at Vancouver's Simon Fraser University, but was soon itching to be in the field. When renowned anthropologist Jane Goodall came to guest lecture there, Rubin was so inspired that she trekked to East Africa and spent time on a gorilla reserve. She dreamt of someday starting her own wildlife rescue facility.
In 1994, 20-year-old Rubin was back in Canada, protesting a landfill project proposed for Burns Bog, a spectacular peatland in Vancouver, when she met David Barbarash, a fellow Canadian animal rights activist based in the Pacific Northwest. They began dating amidst the spirited and often combative environmentalist movement emerging in the region at the time. Barbarash was drawn to Rubin's earnest devotion. "The thing with the radical fringe," says Barbarash, "is it attracts people who are isolated in society for whatever reason and are looking for something to belong to. Rebecca was intelligent and she didn't have emotional problems. She was one of the true people in the movement ? she was in it for the right reasons."
At the time environmental and animal rights advocacy was increasingly generating results. The activists were organized, capable, uncompromising. They built tent cities and chained themselves together to thwart loggers. In California a woman named Julia "Butterfly" Hill lived for 738 days in an ancient redwood nicknamed Luna, in order to prevent the tree from being logged. In Oregon, activists blockaded police and loggers for nearly a year at the Warner Creek area of the Willamette National Forest, until they secured an agreement from the Clinton Administration that no logging would be permitted there. The four days of mass protests surrounding a meeting of the World Trade Center Organization in Seattle in 1999 emboldened the movement and infuriated industry interests.
But the movement itself was no monolith. Among the ranks of anarchists, vegans, hippies, misfits, and intellectuals, there were those who were more hardcore than others, who argued that corporations and the government could not be reasoned with. It was this militant faction that would take up the banner of the ELF and ALF, and it was to this more militant strain that Barbarash belonged and to which Rubin was soon drawn.
Barbarash, who for several years was the North American spokesman for the Animal Liberation Front, already had a history of run-ins with the law. Two years before hooking up with Rubin he'd served four months in prison for releasing cats from a University of Alberta lab ? cats that had been earmarked for use in medical experiments. By 1994 he and a fellow member of the ALF, 24-year-old Darren Todd Thurston, were the subject of an investigation by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in connection with a number of threatening letters that had been sent anonymously to Vancouver game hunters. Inside were razor blades, which the letters alleged had been smeared with rat poison and HIV-infected blood.
In March 1997, police executed a series of raids that targeted Thurston and Barbarash, including one on the home of Rubin's stepfather, Douglas Taylor, where Rubin was living at the time. According to RCMP records of the raid, Barbarash "ran from the rear door away from the [Taylor] residence, without shoes or a jacket, and fled the area." The police continued their surveillance of Barbarash and Thurston for another year, before finally arresting them in March 1998 for the threatening letters. Police also picked up Rubin, and charged her with possessing packaging for batteries, which they claimed she was going to use to build an incendiary device. "Poor Rebecca," recalls Barbarash's attorney, Michael Klein. "She was this bewildered woman, going 'What am I doing here?' There really wasn't much evidence against her." The following year, after revelations that Canadian authorities had dispatched undercover officers to incite Barbarash and Thurston into burning down a barn ? with the undercover cops going so far as to provide the gasoline ? the charges against all three were thrown out.
Barbarash says the intense scrutiny from the Canadian authorities brought him and Rubin closer together. After the raid on Rubin's house, which he says left her parents none too pleased, the pair rented a tiny apartment in Vancouver. "We were both feeling under siege and paranoid," he said. But ultimately, within six months, Rubin had broken up with Barbarash, packed her things and moved out. Barbarash says the relationship was a casualty of stress; he regrets their parting. "I was in love with her," he said.
Yet investigators claim it was during this period of intense scrutiny that Rubin stepped up her involvement in the radical animal rights movement and began traveling into the United States to commit acts of sabotage on behalf of the Animal Liberation Front. According to the FBI, in October 1997 Rubin was involved in the illegal release of 2,000 minks from a farm in Palmer, Idaho, where the ALF claimed the minks were being electrocuted and skinned alive. And a month later, the FBI contends, Rubin and several other members of the group traveled to a horse corral in Burns, Oregon, where it was rumored that wild horses, captured in wilderness areas managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, were being auctioned off (to slaughterhouses, the ALF maintained). Rubin was apparently a last-minute recruit for the action, which involved releasing the horses and burning down the barn using timed explosives. She was given the task of "obtain[ing] the necessary items to make the timing devices," which she allegedly helped assemble and carry to the barn. On a frigid winter night, the group released the horses, set the barn ablaze, locked the access road gate to prevent fire trucks from getting in, and then buried their clothes after dousing them in acid. The next morning, BLM employees arrived to find the barn a smoldering heap, the damages totaling some $200,000. The ALF issued a statement claiming responsibility and denouncing the BLM's policies as "genocide against the horse nation."
Jacob Ferguson, a former ALF member who would later become an FBI informant, describes Rubin, whom he knew by her alias "Kara," as a reliable partner. "She wasn't super athletic, but she was really smart, and she was really good," he said. Rubin would take elaborate routes to the site of a planned arson, he said, making multiple transfers on buses to ensure she wasn't being followed. She always kept her long hair in a tight bun, he recalls, "so she wouldn't leave any evidence." But, he adds, "She wasn't really into doing arson. She was into setting animals free." Still, after calling it off with Barbarash, Rubin linked up romantically with Kevin Tubbs, a longtime animal rights activist who would later confess to participating in at least 14 arsons, among them a handful at which he said Rubin was present.
A year after the Oregon arson, Rubin participated in an arson at a stable in Rock Springs, Wyoming. But the action didn't go as planned. As the devices were placed near the barn, Rubin prematurely opened the gate to release the horses. In the chaos that ensued, the action was abandoned and the group fled. The ALF nonetheless issued a press release decrying the "slaughtering of horses for foreign dinner plates." Though the operation was a bust, the crew was already onto their next act, which unfolded just a week later.
The October 1998 arson at the ritzy Vail Mountain ski resort in Colorado ? a high-end getaway frequented by celebrities and moguls ? catapulted the ALF to national attention. Angry over a planned 4,100-acre expansion, which they believed would endanger the local lynx population, the group assembled to take out their most visible target yet. According to court records, Rubin was dispatched to help construct several incendiary devices and was also among a handful of participants assigned to drive to a staging area on the mountain to drop off canisters of gas and diesel fuel. As the group made their way to their destination, however, their truck got stuck in the snow, and Rubin and the others were forced to bury the canisters and drive back down the mountain, with the plan of returning a few days later to finish the job. For reasons of scheduling, however, only two individuals returned to the Vail site; Rubin was not among them. Nonetheless, she was inextricably connected to the events that followed, as one of her confederates retrieved the fuel she helped to bury and placed the firebombs she helped to build next to several buildings along a one-mile span on the ridgeline.
Just before dawn, explosives ignited Vail Mountain in an inferno that engulfed a radio tower, the resort's elaborate Two Elk Lodge restaurant, and four ski lifts. More than a hundred firefighters from ten different battalions converged on the scene to battle the blaze ? an effort hampered by the rugged terrain and a lack of water on the slopes. All told, the damages exceeded $25 million. At a press conference the next day, Vail Resorts President Andy Daly told reporters, "I'm very grateful that no one was up there." In fact, the group had gone to lengths to avoid human injury, setting the fires at night when the resort was closed, and avoiding a cabin where they discovered a pair of sleeping hunters. Nevertheless, even as the resort burned, the ALF issued a press release warning skiers to steer clear of Vail until it "cancels its inexcusable plans for expansion."
By this point the FBI had launched a probe into the string of arsons in the region. John Ferreira headed up the bureau's investigation, initially dubbed "Arson Heat," a moniker that agents found so objectionably lame that it was changed to "Operation Backfire." The case wasn't an easy one. Ferreira, now retired and the owner of a sports memorabilia shop in Eugene, said the groups' raids were carefully executed, leaving almost nothing in the way of clues. The case languished, evincing little attention outside Oregon and Colorado, where the arsons were concentrated, and mustering few additional funds and manpower from FBI headquarters. As if sensing the FBI's impotence, the ELF and ALF launched action after action. Rubin was spotted at several of these, including one in August 1999, where she was reportedly the getaway driver during the release of 55 beagles implanted with human pacemakers at a medical research laboratory in Orange, California.
But then came the attacks of September 11, 2001, which gave the federal government a mandate and an influx of cash to track down homegrown terrorists of every stripe. The decisive break came in 2003 when agents were able to gather enough evidence to summon Jake Ferguson before a grand jury. He would later admit to at least 15 acts of sabotage and agree to cooperate in exchange for leniency. Central to that agreement was the concession that he would wear a wire, and the conversations that he taped with his friends and fellow activists enabled the FBI to link Rubin and a dozen other individuals in a grand conspiracy case that covered twenty acts of eco-sabotage. "Rubin came to our attention because of Jake," Ferreira said. "We had no idea who she was before that."
In truth, many of the participants barely knew each other and weren't even involved in the same events. But under the definition of conspiracy laws in the U.S., they were all linked into a group dubbed "The Family" by law enforcement, and held liable for every arson. This spurred law enforcement to devote serious manpower to apprehending the various members of the ALF and eventually to put Rubin on the most wanted list.
The last arson to which Rubin is linked came in October 2001 ? the burning of another government-owned horse corral, this one in Litchfield, California. According to a participant who asked not to be named, the group was jittery about the operation, fearing that security would be tighter in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Still, they proceeded as planned, with Rubin illegally crossing into the U.S. in the company of Darren Todd Thurston. Rubin and Thurston were picked up by two other participants and driven to Seattle. The following day the pair washed down the truck to be used in the operation, and wiped clean the equipment they'd need?backpacks, water bladders, flashlights, pepper spray?to remove any traces of fingerprints. They then drove to Eugene, Oregon, to pick up Rubin's boyfriend, Kevin Tubbs, before continuing on to Litchfield, where they set up camp. The following night, dressed in all black with socks over their shoes to avoid leaving identifying footprints, Thurston and Rubin cut and removed part of the fence and used a rope and plastic tarp to funnel the horses out of the corral. The others set up handmade incendiary devices attached to buckets of fuel. The operation would cause approximately $200,000 in damages.
After the Litchfield arson the participants scattered and the arsons stopped. By now a series of grand jury subpoenas had been handed down in connection with the arsons, and the group was spooked by a fear that the FBI was closing in. Rubin returned to the work that had inspired her at the outset ? protecting animals. She went home to Canada and finished her undergraduate degree in April 2002, majoring in geography. A few months later she started as an intern at the Island Wildlife Natural Care Center on Salt Spring Island, near Vancouver. Jackie Ballarone, a longtime employee, recalls Rubin as "dedicated and passionate," but said "she had a very veiled past and didn't reveal anything about herself." A background check conducted during the interview process at the wildlife center yielded no evidence of her previous life, and Rubin didn't offer details. Given what they know about her now, said Ballarone, the organization doesn't want any association with Rubin. Neither do other groups that hired Rubin, like the Ventana Wildlife Society in California, where she spent six months in 2004 as an intern working with endangered California condors. Current Ventana employees wouldn't comment, but a former colleague, Curt Mykut, says that while Rubin was at Ventana she showed no evidence of her tumultuous past. "She was one of the more dedicated employees," he said. "It's a very solitary job, mostly hiking in the park to keep tabs on the birds." To feed the condors Rubin would often be tasked with hauling carcasses of stillborn calves deep into the forest. "She never complained," said Mykut. She was also taking ornithology courses online and talked about a future devoted to rehabilitating wild birds. "I think she probably [viewed the job as] an opportunity to leave her past behind and really make her way in the field," he said.
It was not to be. In December 2005 the FBI made a series of sweeping indictments in the Operation Backfire case. The indictments, which named 18 people, decimated the radical environmental and animal rights underground in the U.S., and ended any chance of a quiet redemption for Rubin. Most of the accused were captured or turned themselves in, and pled guilty. One of the group's leaders, William Rodgers, who went by the alias "Avalon," asphyxiated himself with a plastic bag in his jail cell. The others, most with the threat of domestic terrorism charges looming over their heads, made the wrenching decision to give confessions that implicated their compatriots. Kevin Tubbs, Rubin's former boyfriend, was sentenced to 13 years in prison. Darren Thurston served three years in prison before being deported to Canada. Rubin, along with three others, fled the U.S. and became fugitives.
Jacob Ferguson, the ALF member turned FBI informant, laments that everything they burned down was rebuilt, bigger and better. If anything, Operation Backfire has benefited industry groups that have for decades sought to classify radical environmental and animal rights activists as eco-terrorists. The term "eco-terrorism" has been in circulation since the early 1980's, coined by the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise, a group backed by mining and timber interests, property rights advocates, off-road vehicle clubs, and conservative think tanks. In 1988 the group drafted what came to be known as the "Wise Use Agenda," which called for opening 70 million acres of federal wilderness areas to commercial development, mining in national parks, old growth forest logging, and increased oil exploration in Alaska wilderness areas. A few years later an organization known as the "Alliance for America" was formed by similar groups, who defined themselves as those "who view big environmental groups as a threat to their livelihood and way of life."
Their efforts came to full fruition when Congress passed the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act of 2006, which effectively made it a crime of domestic terrorism for individuals to interfere with any animal-related company, including medical researchers, grocery stores, even zoos. The measure amended a 1992 law known as the Animal Enterprise Protection Act with changes in language that were subtle but crucial: The term "economic damage," which in the old legislation referred exclusively to physical property damage, became "economic disruption," a broader category that covered a company's loss of profits, both "real and projected" ? an important caveat because sentencing guidelines are based on the dollar amount of financial damages. The term "animal enterprise," which previously covered only businesses directly related to animals ? such as laboratories, zoos, furriers, circuses, and grocery stores ? was expanded to include third party companies doing business with animal enterprises, such as accountants, investors, and securities firms. Most important, disrupting any of these animal enterprises or causing "reasonable fear" amongst their employees would now be a crime of terrorism?a designation that, in addition to ratcheting up potential prison terms, brought with it an array of enhanced investigative and surveillance authority.
The law itself was largely inspired by a March 1997 documentary, "It's a Dog's Life," which aired on Channel 4 television in Britain and depicted the treatment of test animals at Huntingdon Life Sciences, then the largest contract animal testing company in Europe. Shot surreptitiously over two months by an animal rights activist working undercover as a technician at Huntingdon's laboratories in Cambridge, England, among the footage captured were images of beagle puppies being kicked and punched in the face by laughing workers when the animals cried out and wriggled during blood tests. The film sparked an international animal rights campaign called Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, whose aim was to shut Huntingdon down through protests and the "secondary targeting" of the company's clientele, investors, and business affiliates. In an effort to quell the outrage, Huntingdon moved its corporate headquarters to New Jersey, but activists in the U.S. continued the campaign through a website that published the home addresses of Huntingdon's corporate officers, who were then visited by protestors shouting "murderer" and throwing red paint at their doors. By 2000 Huntingdon had lost major investors, was nearly bankrupt, and was delisted from the New York Stock exchange.
But Huntingdon, courtesy of Congress, had the last laugh. In 2003, with protests against the company in full swing, a little known lobbying organization called the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), jumped into the fray. Bankrolled by major corporations, among them big pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer that pay up to $25,000 in annual dues, ALEC has had proven successes in getting pro-business legislation passed and environmental regulations rolled back (the Natural Resources Defense Council denounced the group as "corrosive, secretive, and highly influential"). It counts among its members 2,400 state lawmakers, nine former governors, and 80 congresspersons, who draft over 1,000 pieces of ALEC-drafted legislation each year, 17 percent of which are passed. Working closely with members of Congress ALEC managed to draft the language for the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, right down to the proposal to impose penalties based on financial damages and a suggestion to put defendants into a terrorist registry. The group noted that the preceding legislation was "overly narrow," and argued that existing laws, such as the Patriot Act, were of no use in these cases because "the federal definition of terrorism requires the death of or harm to people, an element not characteristic of eco-terrorists." It was a key concern: Domestic terrorism needed to be redefined to mean harm against corporate persons, not just flesh and blood persons.
The resulting legislation, which passed in a secret roll call vote by overwhelming majorities in both houses, covers not just acts of vandalism, but virtually anything that can affect the company's bottom line, and as such has been criticized by activists, including the Humane Society of North America, for having a "chilling" effect on a wide array of legitimate forms of protest. In 2006, the same year the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act was passed, the Patriot Act was amended to allow for the wiretapping of individuals suspected of "animal enterprise terrorism," meaning any suspected activist ? even one never convicted of or charged with a crime ? could be monitored and placed without notice on a terrorist watch-list that circulates among both local and federal law enforcement.
The AETA has already been put into action under the Obama Administration. Last year three activists from Northern California were charged under its auspices for having picketed a biomedical researcher's home; they now face five years each in prison. Critics say the kinds of undercover investigations once mounted by groups like the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals are now prosecutable as terrorism offenses. PETA's website, for example, has an archived video of an investigation in a hatchery where baby chicks have their beaks cut off, and another of a farm that supplies Land O'Lakes, where farmers drive spikes into the spines of cows too weak to get up. Pus drips from open sores near the udders that are giving milk.
Although ELF/ALF activists like Rubin were well aware they were breaking the law, none could conceive the impact that the terror attacks of 9/11 would have on their situation or the precedent their case would set. Even the lead FBI agent who investigated the Operation Backfire arsons was loathe to put Rubin and her peers in the same category as Osama bin Laden. "We never imagined they'd be called terrorists," said Ferreira. His colleague, Jane Quimby, sounded sympathetic when discussing Rubin, whom she described as a "low-level participant" in the arsons ? someone who "really walked the walk, and talked the talk" when it came to helping animals. "I guess under the law she is considered a terrorist, but philosophically does she meet the standard? No," said Quimby.
Recently I went to see Rubin's ex-boyfriend, David Barbarash, who works as a film curator and lives in a remote coastal town near Vancouver that's only accessible by ferryboat. Barbarash, now 45 years old, says he himself was spared prison only because he'd been deported from the U.S. and was in Canada during the time the arsons were committed. As he spoke about Rubin he was on the verge of tears. He told me that though they had remained friends after their breakup, the last time he'd spoken to her was in 2005, around the time she disappeared ? just before the first round of Operation Backfire indictments were handed down. "The thing I wonder about is, if she was arrested and convicted along with all the others, would she be out of jail now?" said Barbarash. "What's happened to her is harsher in a way. It's a sentence in exile."
After visiting Barbarash I went to see Rubin's mother and stepfather in Vancouver. They live in a large, modern, wood-frame house overlooking the city's glittering downtown. I wondered at the pain and frustration Rubin's absence had caused them. In 2007 Rubin's mother traveled to Bangladesh as part of a Canadian non-profit group that had sponsored a nursing clinic in the city of Dhaka. It seemed the kind of trip a mother would have wanted to take with her idealistic daughter. Instead, any visit from Rubin with family and friends means legal jeopardy for all involved. By turning herself into a fugitive, Rubin had not just made herself disappear, but silenced herself as well. When I knocked on the front door, Rubin's stepfather, Douglas Taylor, answered but did not invite me in. "The charges are unmitigated baloney," Taylor told me. "I could tell you why, but I'm not allowed to talk about it because I'm fairly convinced they're listening." He pointed to the ceiling to signal the place was bugged. Then he said goodnight and politely shut the door.
PETRA BARTOSIEWICZ is a freelance journalist whose book on domestic terrorism trials, The Best Terrorists We Could Find, will be published this year by Nation Books. This is an expanded version of her article on Rubin's case in the January 2011 issue of Marie Claire magazine. You can reach Petra at www.petrabart.com.