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Looking for answers to your nutrition questions? Look no further! Our Nutrition FAQ page has an assortment of answers to common nutrition-related questions conveniently organized into categories.
General Nutrition FAQ
University Dining employs a full-time dietitian to meet with students. Schedule a meeting with the dietitian at 715.232.3599, via email at email@example.com, or ask a nutrition question by Contacting the Dietitian.
University Dining wants to help you accomplish the health goals you set for yourself. We encourage individuals to focus on developing a balanced eating plan and improving your health now and for the future. We also encourage students to work with our Registered Dietitian and your health care provider (Health Services are available on campus) to ensure you can meet your goals.
You can also find nutrition information for our menu items on our online menu database. The menu database can calculate calories, protein, fat, carbohydrates, fiber, sugar, and vitamins listed on the Nutrition Facts Panel. You can find the link for the nutrition information on our Online Menu.
University Dining has a wide variety of choices available in all operations. University Dining provides detailed nutritional analysis of items online or on the labels of house made pre-packaged items. In addition to providing helpful, evidence based resources, University Dining also offers many items that may assist you in achieving your balanced health goals.
A few examples:
- Extensive salad bars in our cafeterias
- Steamed vegetables
- Several fruit options per meal
- Whole grain breads and tortillas
- Low fat/fat free dairy options and dairy alternatives
- Salt and sugar alternatives
- 100% orange, apple, and cranberry juices
- Lean protein sources, including lean meats, beans, legumes, and nut butters
- Trans fat free frying oils
- Balanced snack options in our retail areas
In addition to Health Services, our Registered Dietitian is available to meet with students who have chronic medical conditions like diabetes, high blood pressure, or high cholesterol. The Registered Dietitian can provide you with additional nutrition information and education to help you manage your chronic medical condition while attending UW-Stout. The Registered Dietitian can be reached at 715.232.3599, or email@example.com to set up an appointment.
Our Registered Dietitian recommends using nutrition information from credible sources that are evidence based.
- Avoid "fad" diets that require you to restrict or eliminate certain food groups or categories of foods for a brief period of time. Change your thoughts about what a "diet" is. A "diet" is not something that you do for a short period of time and then revert to your old habits. Your diet is all the food that you eat on a regular basis.
- Instead, focus on making lifestyle changes that can benefit your health now and in the future. Instead of thinking about your diet, think about the foods you eat as your eating plan. Improve the quality of your eating plan by setting achievable goals and making small daily changes.
- Focus on nutrient rich foods instead of labeling foods as "good" and "bad". Some foods provide more nutrients than others. These foods are more nutrient rich or nutrient dense. Examples of nutrients include carbohydrates, proteins, fats, and vitamins like vitamin C, vitamin A, B vitamins, vitamin E, vitamin D, and minerals like iron, zinc, calcium, phosphorus, and potassium. Choose foods that are more nutrient dense more often. Choose foods that are less nutrient dense (foods with high calories/fat or sodium content and low nutrient content) less often. All foods can fit into a healthy eating plan with the right amount of balance.
- Deciding if nutrition information is credible can be a challenge today because of the vast sources on the internet. If you're unable to schedule a meeting with the Registered Dietitian, you can also find nutrition information at the following website: https://www.uwstout.edu/life-stout/dining/nutrition
- If you find a resource that you would like more clarity or input about, please email or call the Registered Dietitian. The Dietitian is here to help you achieve your health goals. The Registered Dietitian can be reached at 715.232.3599, or firstname.lastname@example.com
This information is not intended to take the place of medical advice from your healthcare professional. Check with your healthcare professional before starting any diet, nutritional supplement, or exercise program. In addition, while all efforts have been made to ensure correct information is presented in this material, new research is frequently released and may invalidate certain pieces of data.
Food Allergy and Intolerance
Answers to commonly asked food allergy and intolerance questions as well as dietary needs frequently asked questions.
A food allergy is an auto-immune response to a protein in a food. A food allergy occurs when the body believes a food that you have consumed is harmful. The body responds by releasing several chemicals in an attempt to protect your body from the perceived harmful food. The chemicals that are released can impact the respiratory system (shortness of breath, wheezing), digestive tract (nausea, vomiting, diarrhea), skin (hives, rash, or swelling of the hands, mouth, or face), or cardiovascular system (weakened pulse, dizziness).
There are 9 major allergens that make up approximately 90% of food allergies. These are wheat, eggs, milk, soy, crustacean shellfish, fish, tree nuts, peanuts, and sesame. There are more than 160 foods that have been known to cause food allergens. Food allergies can be confirmed through testing with a physician.
Anaphylaxis is the body's way of reacting to the proteins found in the allergy-causing food. Symptoms can range from mild to severe, and can involve the skin (hives, eczema, swelling of hands, face), nose (congestion or runny nose, sneezing), mouth (swelling or tingling of tongue or throat, dry cough, taste changes, problems swallowing, turning blue) or gastrointestinal tract (vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal cramping), and difficulty breathing or chest pain. An episode of anaphylaxis can be a serious problem that may need immediate medical attention. This may include the use of an epinephrine auto-injector or calling 9-1-1 to get emergency medical treatment.
A food intolerance is a physical reaction to a food. It happens when something in the food irritates the digestive system or when a person is unable to digest the offending food. It does not include an immune response from the body.
Common symptoms of a food intolerance include nausea, gas, abdominal cramps, bloating, heartburn, headaches, vomiting, or diarrhea. Common food intolerances include lactose or gluten intolerance. Allergy testing cannot determine food intolerances. If you suspect you have a food intolerance, seek the advice of your physician to determine if you have an intolerance or other medical concerns.
Vegan and Vegetarian Diet FAQ
Vegan and vegetarian items are denoted on our menu boards in the dining areas. The information can also be found in our online menu database. The database has the capability to filter items that are vegan or vegetarian. View our Online Menu
Dining offers an extensive salad bar, several types of fruits, dairy-free milk, cheese, margarine, and hot vegetables without added butter daily in the cafeterias.
Protein alternatives include black bean burgers, garden burgers, fishless fish, and chick'n, nuts, seeds, and legumes available at lunch and dinner. Additionally, there are several vegetarian and vegan entrees available throughout our cycle menus.
The Dining online menu database lists the ingredients of our menu items so that students who would like to follow a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle can determine the ingredients of the foods they choose to consume. See the link in the previous question to begin analyzing your selected foods.
We welcome and encourage suggestions for additional vegetarian and vegan options.
If you have a suggestion or comment about our vegetarian and vegan options, let us know by completing our Feedback Form
You're also welcome to schedule an appointment with the UDS Registered Dietitian, available at 715.232.3599 or via email at email@example.com
Individuals who follow a vegan or vegetarian diet still need to ensure they are meeting their daily nutrient requirements. Nutrients to focus on include complete proteins, omega 3 fatty acids, vitamin B12, calcium, vitamin D, iron, zinc, and iodine.
- Vitamin B12—Vitamin B12 is generally only found in animal sources, but plays a major role in metabolism, red blood cell formation, DNA creation, and central nervous system functioning. B12 can be found in dairy foods and eggs, nutritional yeasts, fortified cereals, and meat alternatives. Vitamin B12 deficiency is common among individuals who follow a vegan or vegetarian diet.
- Iron—Iron is considered an essential mineral and is very important in oxygen transportation for body tissues and cell growth. Nonheme iron is found in plant foods like beans and lentils. Due to concerns about the absorptive capacity of nonheme iron, avoid consuming tea, coffee, and cocoa with foods that have iron.
- Vitamin D—Vitamin D is a key component of bone health, immunity, and nerve & muscle function. Vitamin D can be obtained from sunlight exposure, mushrooms grown in light, and fortified dairy products or plant-based milks, egg yolks, and fortified orange juice.
- Calcium—Calcium is important for bone health, as well as your vascular health, and muscle & nerve function. Calcium can be found in dairy products, as well as calcium-fortified foods and beverages, tofu made with calcium sulfate, and leafy greens (spinach and Swiss chard may have poor absorption due to oxalate content).
- Omega 3 Fatty Acids—Omega 3 fatty acids (EPA and DHA) are involved in your cardiovascular health and eye/brain development, as well as cognitive and mental health. Eggs, flaxseeds, walnuts, and soy can help keep EPA and DHA levels normalized. Marine algae supplements can also be used to maintain normal levels.
- Protein-Protein is essential to maintain your muscle and bone mass and plays a role in your immune system. Legumes, soy (like tofu), whole grains, nuts, seeds, and some vegetables are good sources of protein. A diet rich in variety can help you consume adequate amounts of protein daily.
If you feel that your diet is lacking certain nutrients, nutrition supplements may be beneficial. Speak with your medical provider to determine if supplements would benefit your nutritional status.
This information is not intended to take the place of medical advice from your healthcare professional. Check with your healthcare professional before starting any diet, nutritional supplement, or exercise program. In addition, while all efforts have been made to ensure correct information is presented in this material, new research is frequently released and may invalidate certain pieces of data.


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Since the day President Obama was elected, gun owners have been on an unprecedented buying spree, purchasing everything from .22 ammunition to every kind of semi-automatic firearm available.
Their fears are not unwarranted — especially because, for a while, the federal government seemed to be racing private owners to buy the ammo first.
Closer examination shows that some fears of federal activity on this front are overblown. Others, though, are deeply rooted in legitimate concerns.
While Obama claims to support "common-sense" gun laws, he has made high-profile public announcements telegraphing his anti-gun intentions and engaged in behind-the-scenes gun control — tweaking government regulations to deny gun rights to veterans, seeking the same for Social Security recipients, and using the ATF to ban certain types of popular ammo. Calling guns more dangerous than terrorism, Obama recently indicated he'll devote the rest of his time as president to gun control.
Calling guns more dangerous than terrorism, Obama says he'll devote the rest of his time as president to gun control.
But one event in particular fed fears of back-door government gun control: the unprecedented purchase of ammunition by the feds.
In early 2013, the Internet blazed with news that the Department of Homeland Security intended to purchase over 1.6 billion rounds of pistol and rifle ammunition. The order would fulfill DHS requirements for five years, reportedly. DHS has 55,471 employees authorized to carry firearms, which comes to about 5,800 rounds per year, per employee.
For perspective, during the first year of the war on terror, approximately 72 million rounds were expended in Iraq and another 21 million in Afghanistan — about 2,000 rounds per war fighter. Thus, giving DHS agents a much larger quota of 5,000 rounds did seem extreme.
Some people asserted the feds deliberately intended to dry up the private market for ammunition. Lawmakers demanded answers. Yet the overall requisition, in context, may not have been unreasonable.
The largest order, 750 million rounds, came from DHS's Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) for instruction purposes. Another 650 million rounds were slated for Inspections and Customs Enforcement, or ICE. FLETC public affairs director Peggy Dixon said at the time that the purchase request was "a ceiling. It does not mean that we will buy, or require, the full amounts of either contract." FLETC in fact uses approximately 20 million training rounds per year, and overall, actual DHS purchases have declined continually since 2009. In 2014, DHS-planned purchases were 75.1 million rounds, down from 84.4 million in 2013.
But there was more. In 2012, the Social Security Administration published a requisition for 174,000 rounds of hollow point pistol ammo — a particularly lethal type and certainly not suited for target shooting. Why on earth would the SSA need it? For that matter, why does SSA need a police force, much less highly trained SWAT teams? Do they anticipate an armed revolt by elderly Social Security recipients upset with their latest cost of living increases? Do they fear an anti-government conspiracy launched over tepid coffee in the reading lounges of retirement communities across the country? Given Obama's attitude toward the elderly (e.g. "Granny, take the pill") they may have reason to fear.
Giving DHS agents a much larger quota of 5,000 rounds did seem extreme.
Again, though, many such purchases are based on a justifiable rationale — or at least justifiable for the size of the government we have. (Whether it should be that large in the first place is a very different question.)
An unfortunate consequence of massive government growth and expansion is the requirement for a law enforcement presence to oversee it all. One would not think the Social Security Administration or the Department of Agriculture, for example, would need a large law enforcement presence.
But welfare and food stamp fraud is epidemic. Some gangsters engaged in these activities are as dangerous as drug traffickers – and are involved, often, in both. Determined welfare fraud rings connected to organized crime are ripping off billions of taxpayer dollars. One of the most dangerous federal law enforcement jobs is — believe it or not — ole' Smokey Bear, the National Park Service rangers, since a great deal of criminal activity takes place within the peaceful aura of life in the woods. (Marijuana fields, for example, are guarded by trigger-happy, AK-47 toting goons.)
At the same time, fears of an omnipresent federal law enforcement infrastructure are justified. The growing federal police force contains the potential to evolve into a police state.
The increasing use of SWAT-type raids against established businesses like Gibson Guitar, Duncan Outdoors and Mountain Pure Water Co., and countless smaller raids against other non-threatening targets for essentially routine administrative matters reinforce the belief among many that such a police state is just around the corner, if not here already. Innocent people have been killed in some of these unwarranted raids.
It is not the amount of ammunition purchases posing the threat. Instead, it is the ominous growth of federal law enforcement under a president who abuses power and ignores the constitutional limits of his office.
The growing federal police force contains the potential to evolve into a police state.
Obama has done his best to induce panic among gun owners. This, more than anything else, has created the shortages – driven by an unprecedented increase in private market demand. At the height of the frenzy, the NRA provided a good analysis in its American Rifleman magazine. While ammunition manufacturers are loath to admit exact production numbers, the NRA found that between 2007 and 2012, excise taxes on ammunition purchases doubled.
Many other reports tell a similar story, but it is easy to understand with a simple example. There are over 80 million gun owners in the U.S. If every single one went out and bought just 100 rounds – barely enough for one afternoon on the range – it would require 8 billion rounds of ammo. But many gun owners have been stockpiling, and retailers seek to purchase large quantities to capitalize on higher demand and prices. The shooting sports, meanwhile, have enjoyed a revival, even on college campuses.
Despite the unprecedented explosion in demand, the shortage is now largely past. After producing round the clock for years, ammunition manufacturers are now able to fulfill orders for most of the popular calibers, albeit at higher prices. Even the popular .22, long unavailable after supplies of other ammo reappeared, is finally coming back on the shelves.
While the ammo shortage was not caused by excessive government purchases, Obama can nonetheless take credit for creating justifiable panic among private citizens that prompted an unprecedented ammo buying spree that cleared retailer shelves for years. It would not be at all surprising to see another uptick in demand if Obama makes good on his threat to push more gun control.
Read more at LifeZette.com

subset: commoncrawl


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Arranged Marriages
Dear Rabbi,I don't understand the Jewish way of setting up marriages. Why in today's day and age should two adults submit themselves to being set up in an arranged marriage? How could they possibly rely on the judgment of a stranger rather than on their own feelings regarding something as important as choosing a life partner?
Dear David,
If your facts were right, you'd actually be asking a great question! However, your understanding of the Jewish way of finding a marriage partner is inaccurate. Allow me to set the record straight.
According to Judaism, people cannot be married against their will. There is no such thing as arranged marriages. Rather, the way "getting set up" works is that people who are interested and ready to get married approach experienced match-makers who, after interviewing candidates about their interests, goals, intended lifestyle and preferences regarding a prospective spouse, suggest what they consider to be compatible people.
If, after hearing about the other person, both people are interested, a meeting is arranged between the two to give them an opportunity to see if they like each other. When the date is over, each contact the matchmaker about whether they want to continue or not. If one or both does not want to continue, it's over between them and a new suggestion will be offered to each. If they're both interested in continuing, they do so only as long as they're both still interested, or until it results in marriage.
Considering the divorce rate of 50-60 percent among the secular population in the U.S., it's worth examining some of the many advantages of the Jewish approach to finding a life partner.
Trying to find Mr. or Mrs. Right in a bar, a club, a concert a museum or any other event, makes the odds very slim: you might not meet anyone at all; and even if you do, you might not be interested in her; and even if you are, she might not be interested in you; and even if she is, she might not be interested in marriage; and even if she is, she might not be Jewish.
According to the Jewish approach, however, two people who are both interested in marriage and deemed compatible from the outset meet in a quiet, relaxing setting with no distractions and with no head-games for the explicit purpose of determining whether they are compatible as life-partners. These conditions greatly ease the process and increase the odds of finding "the right one".
Also, the nearly endless search for that needle in a haystack is physically, emotionally and mentally exhausting. This has several drawbacks: the over-exertion expended in finding a mate necessarily distracts one from learning, growing and following self-enriching pursuits; it also causes desperation which may result in settling for unhealthy, incompatible relationships for lack of other options or loneliness, and may even result in giving up on finding "the right one" altogether. Marriages that result from such relationships are virtually doomed to failure.
The Jewish approach, however, liberates one from the laborious and fatiguing process of unsuccessfully sifting the social haystack. This thereby enables prospective candidates for marriage to continue to develop their interests, abilities, characters and maturity level, which only further prepares them for marriage when they are introduced to the right one. In the meantime, they are spared the pain, frustration and disillusionment that results from the trial and error of meaningless relationships based on convenience, loneliness and despair.
Since the matchmakers are by and large sensitive, insightful people who are usually experienced in their trade, they can generally be relied upon to sift through all the available and interested people they know to make fairly accurate suggestions about compatibility in looks, tastes, interests, lifestyles and life-goals. But these are only suggestions. The individuals themselves decide from the outset whether they want to meet or not, and it's totally up to them whether to continue or not, and whether to get married.


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File List Blueprint
- Choose Create from template in the Confluence header
- Select File List and hit Next
- Enter the details for your file list and hit Create
- Drag files from your desktop or choose browse for files to search for files on your computer
Here's an example of a file list page:
- Expand: view each file's details and preview.
- Upload and download: drop files to upload, and download all files.
- Version history: see and manage other file versions.
Attachments appear on the page, and you can expand each attachment to preview the file and/or view its details.
In this example, we've created three file list pages to store project-related presentations, images and customer feedback. Confluence looks after the versioning of the files, so there's no need to use the document file name to mark version numbers.
Once you save your page, Confluence will create an index page and add a shortcut to your space sidebar. The index page lists the latest File List pages in the space. Create as many File List pages as you need.
- Space shortcut: a quick way to find all of your file lists in this space.
- Create a new list: create more file lists in this space.
- Current file lists: see all the file lists in this space.
Customizing this blueprint
You can customize the templates that are used by the File List blueprint - see Customizing blueprint templates.
The File List blueprint template uses the attachments macro. You can customize the macro to change the sort order or hide features such as version history and the upload attachment fields.
You can also edit the Content Report Table macro used on the Index page to specify the number of pages you want to display.


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This theme supports WordPress embed and is additionally compatible with the SoundCloud Shortcode plugin.
Simply paste your Souncloud shortcode or URL in your post and the theme takes care of the rest. Nice.
The SoundCloud Shortcode plugin allows you to easily integrate a player widget for a track, set or group from SoundCloud into your WordPress Blog by using a WordPress shortcode.
It also supports these optional parameters: width, height and params. The «params» parameter will pass the given options on to the player widget.


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is a resource for the promotion of "skills for a better world". It is in active use by teachers that wish to teach themes related to peace, or wish to promote peace skills in their classrooms, and for facilitators of workshop in peace related themes. The website is also used as a resource for workshops at summer camps and seminars, both in connection with youth work and by voluntary organisations involved in training mediators, teaching for intercultural/interreligious dialogue and other such activities.Developing skills for a better world
Many skills must be developed to nourish peacework. Specialised competence is needed to support all the measures that make a holistic input for peace. A great deal and diversity of knowledge is needed to develop the best strategies. This is beautifully exemplified by the Peacework Tree diagram, created by Tim Wallis, former director of Nonviolent Peaceforce.
Educationforpeace-dot-com focuses on the skills regarded as the core peace skills: communication, conflict transformation, personal conflict management, promoting positive attitudes, dialogue and more.
Educationforpeace-dot-com gives a short introduction to education for peace and its pedagogical platform, and describes how to build up a successful workshop around a topic. You will find suggestions for exercises and games for the various stages of the workshop, together with various educational "packages" and activities for each topic to be covered, skill to be trained, or stage of the workshop (warming up, evaluation etc.) - see the drop down menus above. The site includes over 200 different activities. The aim and instructions for each activity is included, in addtion for the time required and the age group most suited.
Some of the activities are limited to certain age groups and themes. Others fit into a broad range of educational situations. Some we have made ourselves, others we have "borrowed" (with permission) from other webs sites and books. All of the excercises have been quality assured by trials in various Oslo schools, and workshops on the basis of other countries, such as Canada, Palestine, Egypt, Mexico, Indonesia, Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, Ukraina and Syria.
The activities are marked with the following colour code according to the age range they are suited to:
- Primary School |
- Middle School |
- Secondary School |
- College/Adult |
The Norwegian Peace Council has now entered a partnership with Peace Action Training and Research Institute of Romania (PATRIR) and Nansen Dialogue Center Serbia for a project on violence in schools.Participation to Decision Making. Reduction of Violence in SchoolsParticipation in Decision Making: Reducing violence among youth by improving the public policies for preventing and combating violence in schools at local level is a PATRIR project, designed in collaboration with the Norwegian Peace Council from Norway and the Nansen Dialogue Centre from Serbia.Through this project, we aim to empower a multi-sectoral group of active citizens from Cluj-Napoca that, together with the project coordinators and foreign experts, will conduct a comprehensiv conflict analysis on the topic of violence in schools, in order to bring improvements to the existing policies that should address it. The multi-sectoral group will be guided to make use of public consultations and dialogue sessions, awareness raising campaigns, create inter-sectoral partnerships and based on an international comparative study on the addressed topic, formulate and put forward 2 policy proposals to the Cluj-Napoca City Hall and Cluj County School Inspectorate that will contribute to the preventing and combating of violence in Cluj-Napoca schools. More information related to the project here. |
Thank you for visiting our site. We hope that you enjoy the activities and find them as useful as we have.


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Earnings ex-Losers Look Great
- John Mauldin
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- October 30, 2016
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- Comments
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- View PDF
Earnings: The Shell Game
Analysts Gone Wild
Phantom Earnings Growth
Energy Drag
Oily Estimates
Zombie Production
Washington DC, New York, Lots of Florida, and the Cayman Islands
"Formula for success: rise early, work hard, strike oil."
– J. Paul Getty
"Any jerk can have short-term earnings."
– Jack Welch
Profits are the mother's milk of economic, stock market, and portfolio growth. Employment and tax revenues are driven by profits, too. Nothing good happens unless there are profits and lots of them. So it is no wonder that we pay attention to the earnings of companies in the stock market quite closely.
It's quarterly report time for US stocks. If you just casually glance at the earnings news, you might think companies are having a great year. Many are beating expectations and reporting impressive revenues and profits. The markets reward companies for meeting expectations (as we shall see below). But the reality is that the S&P 500 is on track for a sixth straight drop in year-over-year earnings. How do companies keep continuing to beat expectations when earnings are falling?
Their apparent success is explained partly by the fact that earnings reporting is a shell game, partly by the fact that not all businesses and industries are doing equally well, and partly by really bad earnings forecasting by the "experts." It has been a while since we have looked at the whole earnings process.
It turns out most companies are doing well, but a small group shows results so dismal that they weigh down the entire market. Worse, that group may not recover nearly as fast as some analysts think. We will see why in a little bit.
First, though, I want to announce some business changes. Tony Sagami has moved from Mauldin Economics over to Mauldin Solutions, LLC, which is the name for my new investment advisory firm that will soon be making some rather significant announcements. In addition to being a great writer, Tony has deep experience in the investment advisory world. We first met decades ago when he was working for Bill Donoghue. Tony went from there to owning his own very successful advisory firm. He has worked for me at various companies over the years. He has just the mix of talents I need at Mauldin Solutions, so I'm excited to have his help.
To fill Tony's shoes at Mauldin Economics, another old friend and colleague, Patrick Watson, will take over as Yield Shark editor. He'll keep helping me with Thoughts from the Frontline, continue co-editing Macro Growth & Income Alert with Robert Ross, and start writing the free weekly Connecting the Dots that Tony formerly produced. If that sounds like a lot of work for one person, it is; but Patrick is one of very few who can handle it.
Incidentally, in today's business world where so many relationships are temporary and superficial, I'm proud to say that Tony, Patrick, and I have been friends and colleagues in various ways for about thirty years now. They knew a much younger me from long before I began writing these letters. Through many twists and turns we've learned a lot together, and we're only getting started.
We will re-launch Connecting the Dots under Patrick's stewardship next Tuesday, Nov. 1, by automatically sending it to everyone on the Thoughts from the Frontline list. I promise you will want to read it every Tuesday from now on. If for some strange reason you don't, just click here to opt out of that list.
Now on with our story. Before we look at the current quarter, I want to review just how crazy the whole earnings game is.
Earnings: The Shell Game
You own stocks for two reasons. You either think the shares will gain value, or they will give you dividend income, or both. Neither will happen unless the company is making money or at least has the plausible hope of making money someday. Earnings reports are important because they tell us whether that's happening.
They're important for a deeper reason, too. A company's market value is essentially the present value of its expected future profits. Small changes in that "expected" number can have a kind of domino effect. Public-company executives know this and try to put their best feet forward. Analysts are supposed to see through such maneuvers and discern reality. They issue forecasts about companies, and then each quarter we get to see if the forecasts were right.
Somehow this innocent-sounding exercise has evolved into a giant expectations shell game. For the most part, Wall Street doesn't care if a company's report is good or bad; it cares whether the results match, beat, or fall below the consensus analyst forecast. A company "wins" the game and earns a higher share price by delivering unexpectedly positive numbers. This creates all sorts of perverse consequences.
You can see the problem all the time in the way analysts, in response to a company's guidance, revise their forecasts downward as the release of the earnings report approaches. Michael Lebowitz at 720 Global published a great chart on the phenomenon last week. These are averages for the 17 quarters from 2Q 2012 through 2Q 2016:
Profit projections made one year out are usually way too optimistic. Over the next twelve months they fall steadily to a point just below the eventual actual number. Voila: a huge failure to deliver on the year's goal gets transformed into a "we beat expectations" victory.
This happens all the time, as Lebowitz shows in this chart for the same 17 quarters.
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Here's how Lebowitz explains this chart:
The black line represents quarterly forecasts of earnings growth one year in the future. The green line shows that, six months later, earnings growth has been revised downwards in every instance. Earnings expectations continue to get revised lower as shown by the red line, which represents earnings expectations three months prior to their release. The yellow line shows expectations in the quarter that earnings are due to be released. As you can see in every instance, earnings expectations are at their highest a year in advance, and lowest in the quarter they are due to be reported. Hardly a coincidence, we suspect.
Indeed, this pattern is hardly coincidental. It resembles the sort of fact manipulation routinely practiced by political-messaging operatives. Early on, you tell people how wonderful the future will be when there's no way anyone can prove you wrong. As reality draws nearer and the chances of looking foolish increase, you get more cautious. Then at the end you purposely dampen any enthusiasm so your voters (or investors) will get a pleasant surprise.
Unexpected bad news is the absolute worst thing, for both Washington and Wall Street, so both work hard to avoid it – by intentionally disseminating information they know (or should know) to be wrong. They defend this practice by saying it's better to err on the side of caution. That's true, usually, but they are still erring on purpose instead of giving their honest opinions.
You know where this goes next. Wall Street ears fill with "whisper numbers" that supposedly reflect the "real" estimates that analysts don't publish. Who gets the whisper numbers, and when do they get them? The potential for abuse is obvious. People who get reliable whisper numbers can trade ahead of the unwashed public and disfavored institutions that must rely on published forecasts.
Giving someone who is not inside the company advance notice of actual earnings is illegal, and you can get in serious trouble for it. But that doesn't stop a lot of interesting action from happening right before some companies announce their earnings. I should note that there are many legitimate money managers who go to extreme lengths to try to figure out what is going on in the companies they cover, to the point of counting the cars in the parking lot or the number of trucks leaving a warehouse, and so on. But that is just the side story…
The net result of this earnings forecast manipulation is a stock market with a last-minute bullish bias. The rosy early forecasts convince investors to buy a stock, and then the lower last-minute revisions convince them not to sell even when results are nowhere near original expectations. Then, all these forecasts get aggregated into sector and market forecasts, convincing strategists to maintain or increase their allocations to stocks instead of other asset classes.
And the manipulation does make a difference. Mark Hulbert, writing at MarketWatch, gives us the following chart and story:
Consider the percentage of recently-reporting companies that beat Wall Street's expectations. Among the firms in the S&P 500 that have reported this earnings season, for example, 76.1% beat the analyst consensus and just 16.8% missed.
Nor are these recent results a fluke. Over the last 16 quarters (or four years), according to Standard & Poor's data, more than two-thirds of all S&P 500 companies' earnings beat expectations. In no individual quarter was the share beating less than 63%.
Beating expectations has now become expected, in other words.
In contrast to the largely clueless analysts, however, investors appear to be seeing through the expectations game. They have stopped getting particularly excited by beating expectations, for example. At the same time, they severely punish companies that fail to clear the artificially low hurdle that their expectations game has created.
This asymmetry is evident in the performance of a company's stock immediately after reporting its earnings. During the current earnings season, the stocks of companies missing expectations fell 2.3% following their earnings reports, versus just a 0.6% average gain among companies that beat. (Data is from J. P. Morgan Markets.)
I don't think this phenomenon is the result of some nefarious conspiracy, but it might as well be. It is the fault of both company management and all-too-willing analysts responding to the incentives before them. It usually works… until it doesn't – and I think we're approaching a time when it won't.
Analysts Gone Wild
Equity analysts are a big part of the problem. Their job should be getting those estimates right rather than taking what are clearly suspect numbers from companies and plugging them into their spreadsheets. The chart below is from my friends at Ned Davis Research. It shows the consensus estimates for S&P 500 operating earnings when those estimates are first created and then what happens to the estimates over time. This chart starts with the year 2012, and there has not been one year since that has not seen a significant revision downward of earnings forecasts. Note that initial estimates have been higher every year than the year before, except in 2016, and that the drop-off in earnings estimates was more precipitous in 2015 and 2016 than in prior years.
In 2015 (the green line if you are seeing this in color), consensus estimates went from an initial forecast of $137 to barely above $100 by the end of the year. That is a huge miss – over 30%. But that expectations dive didn't dismay the analysts, because they initially predicted roughly the same level of earnings for 2016; and as of September 30, it looked as though earnings are going to come in at roughly $110.
For 2017, earnings predictions started above $140 and are now down to $132. In a world where GDP growth may be in the neighborhood of 2%, do you think it makes a whole lot of sense that earnings are going to grow by 20% in 2017? Really? Honest?
And these are operating earnings – you know, what I called EBIBS: Earnings Before Interest and Bad Stuff. You can download this fascinating spreadsheet, which is a treasure trove of data maintained by my friend Howard Silverblatt at S&P, then open it and scroll down to about line 100, where you can see the comparisons of operating and reported earnings. Reported earnings are what go to the tax authorities and are in fact what companies really earned. What you will find is that reported earnings are generally lower, and sometimes a lot lower, than operating earnings. Surprise, surprise.
When bullish analysts talk about the price-to-earnings ratio (P/E ratio) being roughly 20 today, they are using operating earnings in their calculation. If they used reported earnings, they would find that the P/E ratio is roughly 24, more than a 10% difference and certainly up in nosebleed territory. I should note that the much more useful CAPE (the cyclically adjusted P/E ratio created by Prof. Robert Shiller), today's P/E is 26.79. That is back up in 2007 range and was exceeded only in the irrational markets of 2000 and 1929. And it's higher than when the bear markets of 1901 and 1966 started.
Digging a little farther, you find that analysts are projecting earnings to grow roughly 30% from where we sit today by the end of 2017.
It rather boggles the mind that people take these estimates seriously. But that is the problem: a very large number of people and market advisors do, which is why, of course, you hear that you've got to be bullish and stay in the market. Because if earnings really do rise that much, a forecast of 2500 on the S&P is not unreasonable in this market environment. And so you get a lot of predictions of a big S&P 500 bull market in 2017.
It won't be long before Barron's puts out its annual forecast issue. It will be interesting to see just how bullish the estimate for the S&P will be. Just a wild guess from me, but I bet the consensus will be somewhere in the 2400 range.
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It seems the Barron's forecasters and the analysts running the S&P numbers are all drinking from the same well. That must be some mighty fine water.
Phantom Earnings Growth
The S&P data does in fact show that earnings-per-share growth is increasing. That is good, right? Do we not want earnings to grow? Of course we do – but that's not what is happening.
What is happening is that companies are using the ultra-low interest rates the Federal Reserve has set to borrow money to do stock buybacks, which give us the illusion of growing earnings without actually increasing them – and creating a lot more debt on company balance sheets.
How have earnings actually done in real (inflation-adjusted) terms? That is a different story.
This is data from Robert Shiller, who tracked earnings back to 1871. He then inflation-adjusted using 1983 as a starting point. This chart, which starts in 1966, shows that earnings in real terms have fallen back below their 2006 peak.
Energy Drag
FactSet Research is another treasure trove of corporate financial data. They keep close tabs on S&P 500 company earnings – a tough job because that's a constantly moving target: The numbers change every time a company reports or an analyst changes a forecast.
The Energy sector has been important to corporate earnings for a long time, but perhaps even more so since oil prices plunged back in mid-2014. If this quarter brings another decline, it will be the first time the S&P has recorded six consecutive quarters of falling year-over-year earnings. Energy has been a big part of the fall-off.
Energy's outsized influence is hard to describe. Here's a FactSet chart worth a thousand words:
What you see here is this quarter's earnings growth for all S&P 500 companies, broken down by sector. The blue bars are the latest numbers, using actual data for companies that reported before Oct. 21 and estimates for others that reported since then.
Looking left to right, we see that Financials, Utilities, and Real Estate all had decent growth, with earnings rising 5% or more since the same quarter last year.
Likewise, we see that Consumer Discretionary, Health Care, Technology, Consumer Staples, and Materials also grew earnings faster than the S&P 500 Index average. Telecom and Industrials were below average... and then there's Energy. Earnings in that sector dropped 73.1% in the past year.
Per FactSet, 26 of the 37 large-cap energy companies have either reported or are projected to report lower year-over-year earnings this quarter. Their combined falling earnings completely overwhelm the combined earnings gains of all other S&P 500 companies. Yes, all of them.
(Note that the fact earnings dropped does not mean a company ran a loss. It just means it was less profitable than a year ago.)
Consequently, the S&P 500 earnings growth rate for the quarter just ended is -0.3%. If you exclude Energy, then growth would have been +3.3%. Not surprisingly, excluding Energy is exactly what lots of Wall Street people are doing when they talk to customers. The market is fine, they say, except for those dadgum energy companies.
Now, I certainly see the point of excluding outliers when you evaluate a data set. They can cloud important changes in the middle of the curve. But if you're going to exclude outliers, you should do it on both sides. If it's fair to exclude extra-bearish energy, we should exclude extra-bullish Financials, too. But then the blended earnings growth is even lower than 3.3%, which is not so great in the first place. So no one does that.
That said, some earnings growth is better than none. It's true that US-listed large-cap companies are scoring bottom-line growth in the aggregate, except for a handful of large energy names. That has been the case every quarter for the last two years. I am quite surprised no one has created an S&P 500 ex-Energy ETF. It would probably attract billions. Except of course, that energy would probably start massively outperforming just about the time the first billion got into that new ETF, leading to a mass exodus. (Note: You can actually find sector ETFs for each sector in the S&P 500 if you want to focus in on specific sectors or exclude some. A little complicated, but with the right algorithm there can be some outperformance of the total index.)
Oily Projections
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The reason we don't have that ETF may be that Wall Street believes the earnings drought is about to end, thanks to higher oil prices that are surely coming in 2017. FactSet tracks those estimates, too. Here they are.
Those green arrows show rising oil price estimates. Wall Street thinks WTI crude will average $55.88 by Q3 of next year, allowing Energy sector earnings to more than triple from this quarter.
Can that really happen? Anything is possible. This rosy scenario would still show Energy earnings rising at a much slower pace than they declined from the last peak in 2014. This, in turn, allows analysts to presume nothing will go wrong in other sectors and the entire market will return to normal growth next year.
As FactSet described the situation in their Sept. 23 bulletin:
The Energy sector is actually projected to report the highest earnings growth (307%) and be the largest contributor to earnings growth for the entire S&P 500 for CY 2017, due in part to the expectation that the average price of oil in CY 2017 is expected to be nearly $54. Thus, any downward revisions to the estimated (average) price of oil for 2017 could result in analysts lowering expectations for expected earnings for the sector (and the index as whole) for 2017.
I bolded that key phrase in parentheses. Hopes for S&P 500 profit growth in 2017 are highly dependent on rising oil prices. Oil isn't quite everything, but it's critical. If oil doesn't recover as projected – or some other problem emerges – Wall Street will have no choice but to revise valuations downward – which won't be good for stock prices in any sector.
Zombie Production
The next question is whether oil prices will indeed recover as Wall Street presumes. That depends on the balance of supply and demand. Climate change agreements notwithstanding, the world still burns and will go on burning massive quantities of fossil fuel. Slowing economic growth has reduced energy demand growth, but the absolute numbers remain strong. This will change as greener technology spreads, but very slowly. The real mystery is on the supply side.
We know OPEC is trying to agree on production quotas. They will meet in November to make a final decision. I'm not optimistic that they can reach a deal, and I have no illusions that they can enforce any deal they might reach when the vast majority of OPEC members will cheat. There's also non-OPEC Russia to consider. Putin is in no position to reduce cash flow right now.
The situation is further complicated by the fact that the US shale industry is the pivot point now, filling the role formerly held by Saudi Arabia. Our companies can dial production up and down quickly, too. Many observers have thought the shale industry would fall as many debt-laden companies went belly up. It hasn't turned out that way.
This Oct. 24 Wall Street Journal headline tells the story:
It appears that even bankruptcy can't make these companies turn off the pumps. From the WSJ:
Energy investors have long hoped that falling prices would solve themselves by driving producers into bankruptcy and stanching the flood of excess supply. It turns out that while bankruptcy filings are up, they have barely impacted fossil-fuel markets.
About 70 U.S. oil and gas companies filed for bankruptcy in 2015 and 2016. They now produce the equivalent of about 1 million barrels a day, about the same as before they declared bankruptcy, according to Wood Mackenzie. That represents about 5% of U.S. oil-and-gas output.
That resilience has kept energy inventories flush and prices capped. Oil shot to $50 a barrel this summer, but has had trouble making much progress beyond that mark. On Friday, oil futures in New York rose 0.4% to $50.85 a barrel.
The theory that bankruptcies would help balance the market "was misguided to begin with," says Roy Martin, a research analyst at energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie. "And people are starting to come around to that now."
This is exactly the way chapter 11 was meant to work. The process is designed to save companies that can be saved, and many energy companies are using it to lighten their heavy debt loads, adapt to lean times and keep producing.
(Note: Oil priced for delivery in December 2016 is $48.70 this weekend.)
The same thing is happening in coal. The leading companies are all bankrupt, but production hasn't missed a beat.
I believe what's happening here is that people are forgetting the concept of "sunk cost." If you've already spent the money to locate oil and drill into it, pumping it out is not expensive. Your creditors will want you to do exactly that, too, so you can stay current on your payments. Go bankrupt and the court-appointed trustee will order you to pump.
In addition, the new technologies I described last year (see "Riding the Energy Wave") are making it profitable to drill and produce oil at ever-lower prices. The result is that more production comes on line every time prices rise to $50 or so. That seems to be the cap on WTI crude, at least for now. There are companies in the Permian basin that can reliably lift oil out of the ground and make a profit at $40 a barrel, and I am told that the same thing is happening in North Dakota's Bakken. The last I read, the Permian Basin in West Texas had produced some 50 billion barrels since oil was first struck in West Texas in 1920. The naysayers were talking about running out of oil in West Texas in the '70s. Present estimates are that there are another 50 billion barrels of recoverable oil in and around the Permian. And it is getting cheaper every quarter to produce that oil.
And gods only know how much gas is in those fields. The first LNG (liquid natural gas) export terminal in New Orleans is finally open, and there are others scheduled to open in the near future. These terminals are going to provide a massive new source of export earnings for energy companies and go a long way to help us lower the trade deficit. But the profits from that export business are not going to be showing up in any significant form in 2017. It will take awhile.
This is the problem for stocks: Wall Street's 2017 earnings forecast is not going to come true unless crude can punch its way higher, to the mid-$50s, and stay there. For that to happen, we would need to see some sustained combination of higher demand and/or lower supply. It's not impossible, but I can't tell you what would do it.
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We haven't talked about currencies, either. The strong dollar has been cutting into the revenues of US multinationals. Many analysts think the dollar will change directions next year, too, and that shows up in their earnings projections.
I'm the first to admit the greenback looks a tad overbought, but think about the competition. What other currency will get more attractive than the USD in the next year? The euro? Sterling? Yen? All the other major currencies have their own problems, far greater than the dollar's. Yes, the US could well enter recession next year, and the Fed might cut rates, even into negative territory. But currency values are relative. The dollar may weaken, but everything else will weaken even more.
One additional point: Investors are moving in a herd from active management to passive management, moving literally hundreds of billions of dollars into passive funds. Sometimes they do ring a bell.
Bottom line: If you're tempted to jump into US stocks with both feet, based on a 2017 earnings recovery, all I can say is "Good luck." I think you're going to need it.
Washington DC, New York, Lots of Florida, and the Cayman Islands
There is not all that much travel between now and the middle of January for me, which is good, as I have a lot of writing to do. I need to get to DC sometime in the middle of November for several meetings and to New York towards the first part of December. Then I have two conferences in Florida in January, and in the middle of February I have to be in the Cayman Islands – oh shucks. There will be lots of friends and fun in each of these locations, so life is generally going to be pretty good.
I usually stay away from politics in this letter, as I know that a significant number of my readers would have a semi-visceral aversion to my personal politics. And since my "beat" is economics and finance and investments, I comment on politics only as it affects those realms. But this is my personal section, and I want to express something that is just confusing the heck out of me.
As most longtime readers know, I was on the executive committee of the Republican Party of Texas for almost 20 years. I held many statewide posts and had significant roles in our conventions. I was on the finance committee and worked with lots of candidates and campaigns over the years. I am intimately involved with the mechanics of polling and consider myself somewhat of an aficionado of polling and demographics as applied to politics.
But dear gods, can somebody help me make sense of what is going on in our country? I can go to Real Clear Politics (run by good friends of mine) and read the numbers, just like you. In any presidential race of the past 40 years, if you had numbers like we have today, you would cue Don Meredith to start singing, "Turn out the lights, the party's over." (Those of less-advanced generations might not get the reference to Dandy Don and Monday Night Football, but it has to be somewhere on YouTube.)
Everywhere Donald Trump goes, he is in front of crowds of 10,000–20,000 people and sometimes 30,000. Vice presidential nominee Mike Pence is drawing reasonable support at smaller venues. Hillary Clinton is drawing less than half the numbers Trump does in head-to-head rallies, and sometimes only a few hundred people show up.
I can see the polls and the pre-voting numbers on the one hand, and I see the enthusiasm of the Trump crowds on the other; and they just do not add up anything that I understand about the political process. I have now concluded that my understanding of this presidential race is somewhat like my understanding of China. Almost everywhere I go I am asked about my opinion of investing in China, and my answer is almost always, "I do not understand China, and there are 100 other countries that I think I can understand, so I will choose to go there with my money." I am probably making a huge mistake, which would not be my first huge investment mistake and missed opportunity, but I do not understand China.
And I do not understand this election. I will be throwing my usual election party, of course. Six weeks ago I thought it wouldn't turn out to be an interesting night, as we'd just be watching the down-ballot races for Senate; but now I don't know.
Maybe the polls are right, and they call Florida early, and we cue Dandy Don. Then again, it could just get interesting. This is part and parcel of what I have been talking about from an investment standpoint: There is a significant part of the population – what we think of as the middle class – that has been left out of the party. I think this is the dynamic we are seeing in the political race; and if that is the case, then if you think 2016 is wild, just wait until 2020.
I keep telling you to pay attention to the Italian referendum scheduled for December. It's massively significant, and nobody is paying attention to it. It could affect the global economy more than the US election will. Seriously. I cannot state that strongly enough.
As you no doubt know, because I keep promising it, I am in the middle of writing a book on what the next 20 years will look like. It's called The Age of Transformation. The most difficult chapters to write are proving to be the chapters on the future of work and the distribution of income and wealth. The research I am doing is forcing me to rethink some of my core philosophical assumptions – things that I thought were fundamentally true. This is a very uncomfortable process for me personally. For 20 years I have had glib answers – most of which have been historically proven to be correct. But I am having to really come to grips with the concept that past performance is not indicative of future results. And that might be especially true when it comes to the future of work.
I am horrified by the fact that I am even entertaining the possibility that William Gibson might be right. Gibson was the first true cyberpunk sci-fi writer (back in the '90s with the writing of Neuromancer). He foresaw a dystopian world where the divide between those with assets and privilege and those without was shocking. Think Blade Runner. Something must be done to avoid such a truly obscene outcome, and all of the solutions I am coming to require me to rethink my core beliefs about economic and social reality. The basic issue is that those of us who are in the Protected class are going to have to figure out how to more equally distribute the benefits of our position in the future. And do not ask me how, because right now I do not know. And therein lies my angst.
There is some irony in the fact that I am writing a book about the unbelievable pace of change that is going to impact our lives in the next 20 years, and I am faced with having to change far more than I thought I would have to.
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This presidential race is a mild taste of what we're are going to be dealing with in the future. Fact is, 99.99% of us do not have the option of moving to some isolated spot and ignoring the world for the next 20 years. We are going to have to deal with it, up-front, close, and personal. I am truly excited about all the wonderful things that are going to happen. It is just the personal philosophical and operational adjustments that don't thrill me.
Your looking at the future through a very dark, cloudy crystal ball analyst,
John Mauldin
P.S. If you like my letters, you'll love reading Over My Shoulder with serious economic analysis from my global network, at a surprisingly affordable price. Click here to learn more.
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Boat inspection stations at Bloedel Donovan and Lake Samish will be opening for the season starting on April 25, 2015. Inspectors will be checking both the interior and exterior of all watercraft to see that they are clean, drained, and dry (weather permitting) and are not at risk for transporting aquatic invasive species to our local waters.
Permits are required for all watercraft prior to launching or operating on Lake Whatcom or Lake Samish. For more information on permit fees visit Annual Permits and Fees. You may purchase your permits at the time of inspection by credit/debit card. If you take the online AIS Awareness Course in 2015, you may be eligible for a $10 discount to be applied to each annual permit you are purchasing.
Opening Day Hours of Operation:
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Lake Samish WDFW Launch: 6:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
For more information on our seasonal hours of operation visit Inspection Locations or call (360) 778-7975.
From all of our 2015 inspectors, we wish you a very fun and safe boating season!


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The Brixton Collection's modern styling and bold palette create chic and stunning settings. Contemporary and transitional designs are power loomed in cobalt, yellow and green, which are then balanced with a more neutral gray. The combination of colors lends itself perfectly to the watercolor effects used throughout the collection.
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Only Orson Welles could produce a masterpiece out of a film starring Charlton Heston as a Mexican. Of course, the story of Welles' rise and fall is practically legendary. At 26, he made that greatest of American films, Citizen Kane (1941), which took on newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst in a thinly disguised biopic. Welles' was already at work on his second film, The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) when the backlash from Kane sent RKO into a panic. Fearing another flop, studio executives took Ambersons away from the young filmmaker, gave it a happy ending, and recut it. The result was a truncated masterpiece, which should have been the equal of Welles' first film. Welles' was practically backlisted and spent the rest of his career primarily in Europe, acting in almost anything to scrape up enough money to produce his own films.
Welles had already been cast for the role of Captain Quinlan in Touch of Evil when co-star Charlton Heston dared to suggest that the man who made Citizen Kane could also direct. According to Heston's "Actor's Journals" memoirs, the producers initially thought his advice was ludicrous, but realized that they would essentially be getting a "two for the price of one" (actor and director) bargain. Welles was signed on to direct, and immediately re-wrote the screenplay for Whit Masteron's ((A pseudonym for authors Bob Wade and H. Bill Miller.)) novel "Badge of Evil." The result was another repeating chapter in Welles' ongoing story: the film was a commercial flop until later audiences discovered it.
Of course, there is a very small body of hopelessly predictable, wannabe filmmakers and critics who erroneously fancy themselves as "going against the establishment consensus" by denying the artistic merits of Welles, Citizen Kane, Touch of Evil, or The Trial (1962). Such an attitude is like that of the equally small minority in contemporary pop music who feebly attempt to deny or protest the artistry of the Beatles, simply because that band set the bar too high. However, as an art professor once told me: "If you want to be a great painter, then you have to know great painting." Those who are too uninformed to know the difference between elitism and discernment can be dismissed. Failure to recognize the aesthetic eminence of Welles' or his greatest works renders one superfluous.
Touch of Evil does not merely stand with Welles' best work, it also stands among the greatest achievements of American cinema. On the surface, it shouldn't. After all, it's garish, grotesque, and pure sleaze; indeed starring Charlton Heston and Marlene Dietrich both in Mexican makeup, which almost amounts to black face, an obscenely obese ((Welles was actually not as obese as portrayed here (or as he was in later life). Low camera angles and makeup assist Welles the director in making Welles the actor look his worst. The result is his greatest role since Falstaff.)), dissipated Welles in padded nose, Za Za Gabor (in a small part), and some of the most laughable dialogue writing ever committed to celluloid… until you recognize it as the baroque, pulp parody it is.
Janet Leigh, Akim Tamiroff, Joseph Calleia, Gabor, and Dennis Weaver are delightful. Under Welles' direction Heston shines in his most emotionally complex role as Mike Vargas, making one wish the actor/director team had worked together more often (Heston, worshipful of Welles, attempted to commission the director for both 1970's Julius Caeasar and 1972's Antony and Cleopatra). Dietrich, as the Mexican fortune telling Gypsy whore Tana, delivers jaw dropping zingers with characteristic aplomb: "He was some kind of a man. What does it matter what you say about people?" and "You should lay off the candy bars, honey. You're a mess. Your future is all used up." She could have been making epitaphs for Welles himself, whose last American film this was. Despite being hailed, even in its botched studio cut, by luminaries such as Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut, and Peter Bogdanovich, and highly praised throughout Europe, Touch of Evil was relegated to playing on double "B" movie bills in artless America. Naturally, Welles was blamed, and considered finished by the studio systems.
Volumes have been written about the twelve minute opening shot, Welles' choreography, and the virtuoso black and white camerawork of cinematographer Russell Metty. Part of the film's initial stateside rejection was undoubtedly due to the meddling of Universal executives who recut the film, attempting to make the roaming, overlapping, unorthodox narrative into something linear (it didn't work). A disgusted Welles disowned the cut. Just as he stuck by Sam Peckinpah when the studio interfered with Major Dundee, Heston condemned Universal for mutilating Welles' work. Seven years after Welles' death, editor Walter Murch, following the original script and volumes of memos, restored Touch of Evil to the director's intent. In its mid-90s theatrical re-release, American critics loudly echoed their European counterparts, making it a belated success, which is only fitting. It's terrific entertainment. Watch it first for its aesthetics, then again for its narrative.


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Backyard Guide to the Night Sky
by Howard Schneider
Stargazing's too much fun to leave to astronomers, but often we're blinded by science—dry facts can easily turn enchantment into a chore. We just want to lie down, look up, and understand the heavens above. The National Geographic Backyard Guide to the Night Sky shows us how.
Authors Howard Schneider and Patricia Daniels cover everything a beginning stargazer will need to know, from understanding the phases of the moon to picking Mars out of a planetary lineup.
Star charts and tables present key facts in an easy-to-understand format, sidebars and fact boxes present illuminating anecdotes and fun facts to sweep us swiftly into the stardust, and by the time we realize we've learned solid science we're too engrossed to object. The guide includes an appendix full of resources, from books and web sites to lists of astronomy clubs and associations to local planetariums and museums.
Publisher: | National Geographic |
Edition: | 2020 |
Product: | INJ100 |
Format: | Paperback |
Size: | 5.375" x 8" |
Pages: | 288 |


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NEW YORK — Attorneys representing Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said Wednesday he intends to challenge a subpoena compelling him to testify before a special grand jury in Georgia investigating former President Donald Trump and his allies' actions after the 2020 election.
Graham was one of a handful of Trump confidants and lawyers named Tuesday in petitions filed by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis as part of her investigation into what she alleges was "a multi-state, coordinated plan by the Trump Campaign to influence the results of the November 2020 election in Georgia and elsewhere."
Graham attorneys Bart Daniel and Matt Austin said in a statement Wednesday that the Republican senator "plans to go to court, challenge the subpoena, and expects to prevail," and they slammed the probe as politically motivated.
"This is all politics. Fulton County is engaged in a fishing expedition and working in concert with the January 6 Committee in Washington," they wrote, adding that, "As Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Graham was well within his rights to discuss with state officials the processes and procedures around administering elections."
"Should it stand, the subpoena issued today would erode the constitutional balance of power and the ability of a Member of Congress to do their job," they went on. They also said they had been informed by Fulton County investigators that Graham "is neither a subject nor target of the investigation."
"Should witnesses choose to challenge an order that they testify before the Special Purpose Grand Jury, the District Attorney will respond in the appropriate court to compel their appearance," Fulton County district attorney's office spokesperson Jeff DiSantis said in an email.
In the petition submitted Tuesday, Willis wrote that Graham, a longtime Trump ally, made at least two telephone calls to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and members of his staff in the weeks after the November 2020 presidential election, which Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden. During those calls, Graham asked about reexamining certain absentee ballots "to explore the possibility of a more favorable outcome for former President Donald Trump," she wrote.
Willis also filed petitions to compel cooperation from former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who was one of Trump's primary lawyers during the failed efforts to overturn the result of the election, as well as lawyers Kenneth Chesebro, Cleta Mitchell, Jenna Ellis, John Eastman and Jacki Pick Deason.
Giuliani was recovering Tuesday after undergoing surgery to have two heart stents put in, his son, Andrew Giuliani, said while filling in for him as co-host on radio's "The Rudy Giuliani Show."
Because she is trying to compel testimony from people who live outside of Georgia, Willis had to submit petitions for a judge's approval. The judge overseeing the special grand jury signed off on her petitions.
The next step is to deliver the documents to a prosecutor wherever each potential witness lives so that they can be presented to a local judge to hold a hearing. If that judge determines that the person is a "material and necessary witness" and that the trip to Atlanta to testify would not be an undue burden on the potential witness, the judge would issue a subpoena to compel the person to testify before the special grand jury. Someone who fails to comply with a subpoena can be found in contempt.
Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.


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Winner of the 2007 Agatha Award for Best Novel!
From the Dagger award winning author Louise Penny comes the second Armand Gamache mystery set in the stunning countryside of Quebec.
Welcome to winter in Three Pines, a picturesque village in Quebec, where the villagers are preparing for a traditional country Christmas, and someone is preparing for murder.
No one liked CC de Poitiers. Not her quiet husband, not her spineless lover, not her pathetic daughter—and certainly none of the residents of Three Pines. CC de Poitiers managed to alienate everyone, right up until the moment of her death.
When Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, of the Sûreté du Quebec, is called to investigate, he quickly realizes he's dealing with someone quite extraordinary. CC de Poitiers was electrocuted in the middle of a frozen lake, in front of the entire village, as she watched the annual curling tournament. And yet no one saw anything. Who could have been insane enough to try such a macabre method of murder—or brilliant enough to succeed?
With his trademark compassion and courage, Gamache digs beneath the idyllic surface of village life to find the dangerous secrets long buried there. For a Quebec winter is not only staggeringly beautiful but deadly, and the people of Three Pines know better than to reveal too much of themselves. But other dangers are becoming clear to Gamache. As a bitter wind blows into the village, something even more chilling is coming for Gamache himself.


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- Spun Print
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LTA Lufttechnik has the ideal concept for all environmental conditions. Whether a large company or a small business – LTA filtration systems adapt flexibly for a wide range of applications.
Electrostatic oil and emulsion mist filters are the preferred solution for precipitation of aerosols in industry. Not only are these highly efficient (far in excess of 99% as new), they also work with fully washable filter elements that are almost free from pressure loss. This means that the power for the conveying fans can be reduced to a minimum while the disposal costs are limited to the wastewater when cleaning the filter elements. Electrostatic precipitation only loses a minimal amount of cooling lubricant during the transition to the gas phase.
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FK Lowry Piling have successfully completed a £600,000 Piling contract for the New Weir Road Bridge in the North East for Farrans Construction.
The new road bridge will be a three span cable-stayed bridge with an A-frame pylon rising to 105m (344ft) crossing the River Wear between Castletown on the North, to Pallion on the South bank. The new bridge will have two lanes of traffic in each direction, plus dedicated cycle ways and footpaths along its full length.
It is scheduled to open in spring 2018. Twice the height of Nelson's Column, and bigger than Big Ben, Sunderland's new bridge will be hard to miss.
FK Lowry Piling installed 800 No. 350mm Sq.& 270mm Sq. Driven Precast Piles using its modern Juntann PMX20 Driven Piling Rigs. Driven Precast Piles were driven to depths of 12-16m through underlying soils of Made Ground, firm Clays and dense Sands for working loads of up to 1200kN . The Pile Design was verified by the installation and testing of 4 No. Static Load Tests.
FK Lowry Piling continues to build on our Driven Precast portfolio in the North East Market following recent projects at the Port of Tyne and Bedale By-Pass Projects.
"The Wear Crossing is a wonderful project to be involved with and we were delighted to work with Farrans Construction on the successful delivery of this high profile scheme. Driving conditions were not particularly easy due to presence of stiff/hard Clays. However, our PMX20 with its 5t accelerated Hammer was able to drive the 350mm Sq. precast sections to the design Toe Levels."Sam Pyper, Contracts Manager


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