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As most of you who follow me on Twitter or know me personally know, next week I will be attending San Diego Comic-Con. For the second year in a row, I will be live blogging the event, updating as I go through the day with pics and panel summaries.
This year, however, I've also agreed to cover the event for Cineplex.com, the official site of Canada's largest chain of movie theatres. It's an exciting opportunity for me, as it will give my coverage of the event exposure to a large audience… hopefully we'll have some new people swinging through as a result!
In terms of how that will impact my posting here, I'm still going to update throughout the day with pics and blurbs about going on, but my "Day in Review" posts will probably be posted there, and not here. I'll still post a link for everyone so that you can head over and check them out!
Meanwhile, after the break is my summary of panels that I intend to attend and cover. Check it out!
4:45-5:45 The Expendables 2-Real American Heroes
Sylvester Stallone and the legendary cast of the sequel to 2010's smash hit film preview the real-deal muscles, weapons, skills, and explosions that went into making a film even bigger and badder than the original. Terry Crews, Randy Couture, Dolph Lundgren, Jean Claude Van Damme, and Arnold Schwarzenegger will join the panel discussion.
4:35-6:35 Sony: Total Recall, Looper, and Elysium
Total Recall-Welcome to Rekall, the company that can turn your dreams into real memories. For a factory worker named Doug Quaid (Colin Farrell), the mind-trip sounds like the perfect vacation from his ordinary existence. But when the procedure goes horribly wrong, Quaid becomes a hunted man. The line between fantasy and reality gets blurred and the fate of his world hangs in the balance as Quaid discovers his true identity, his true love, and his true fate. Based on Philip K. Dick's classic story "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale," this brand new take on some of his most visionary ideas is directed by Len Wiseman, who will join stars Colin Farrell, Kate Beckinsale, Jessica Biel, and Bryan Cranston on stage.
Looper-In the futuristic action thriller Looper, time travel will be invented-but it will be illegal and only available on the black market. When the mob wants to get rid of someone, they will send their target 30 years into the past, where a "looper"-a hired gun, like Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt)-is waiting to mop up. Joe is getting rich and life is good…until the day the mob decides to "close the loop," sending back Joe's future self (Bruce Willis) for assassination. Writer/director Rian Johnson will join Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Emily Blunt to discuss the film.
Elysium-Ever since writer-director Neill Blomkamp broke through with his first feature film, District 9, people have been wondering what he has in store for an encore. Be a part of the first audience anywhere to get a first look at his new movie, Elysium, as stars Matt Damon and Jodie Foster join Neill and producer Simon Kinberg on stage.
11:30-12:30 Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained
The Weinstein Company presents a sneak peek at the highly anticipated new film from acclaimed director Quentin Tarantino. Fans will get to see exclusive footage from Django Unchained and take part in a special discussion with Tarantino and the cast. You won't want to miss this!
2:30-5:00 Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures Preview Their Upcoming Lineups
Legendary Pictures: Pacific Rim–From acclaimed filmmaker Guillermo del Toro comes Warner Bros. Pictures' and Legendary Pictures' epic sci-fi action adventure Pacific Rim. When legions of monstrous creatures, known as Kaiju, started rising from the sea, a war began that would take millions of lives and consume humanity's resources for years on end. To combat the giant Kaiju, a special type of weapon was devised: massive robots, called Jaegers, which are controlled simultaneously by two pilots whose minds are locked in a neural bridge. But even the Jaegers are proving nearly defenseless in the face of the relentless Kaiju. On the verge of defeat, the forces defending mankind have no choice but to turn to two unlikely heroes — a washed up former pilot (Charlie Hunnam) and an untested trainee (Rinko Kikuchi) — who are teamed to drive a legendary but seemingly obsolete Jaeger from the past. Together, they stand as mankind's last hope against the mounting apocalypse. Pacific Rim also stars Idris Elba, Ron Perlman, and Charlie Day.
Warner Bros. Pictures: Man Of Steel
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey-From Academy Award-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson comes The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, a production of New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Jackson returns to Middle-earth in an adventure that begins 60 years before the events depicted in The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. The first of two films adapted from J.R.R. Tolkien's enduringly popular masterpiece, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey follows titular Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman), who-along with the wizard Gandalf (Ian McKellen) and a band of 13 Dwarves led by Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage)-is swept into an epic quest to reclaim the lost Dwarf Kingdom of Erebor from the fearsome dragon Smaug. The film's ensemble cast includes Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving, Ian Holm, Christopher Lee, Hugo Weaving, Elijah Wood, Orlando Bloom, Evangeline Lily, and Andy Serkis as Gollum.
6:00-7:00 Marvel Studios: Iron Man 3
Producer Kevin Feige and special guests provide an inside look at the ever-expanding Marvel Cinematic Universe
So that's it for me, schedule-wise. With the movie focus of the site, I think I'll be skipping most of the biggest TV panels this year. Plus, I've already attended panels for "True Blood", "The Walking Dead", "Game of Thrones" and "Fringe" at past conventions. (although even as I write this I'm thinking, "hmmm that Friday 10 am 'Community' panel sounds doable", LOL). It's a pretty big time commitment to get into these things, you literally have to suck it up and get in line MANY hours early, and then (often) stay through the preceding panels in order to get to the ones you want.
I'm going to need my time on the floor as well. And it's just too much to hit it all.
But there's a full slate of shows there. This'll be the first time I do Hall H all day Saturday. I've hit it both times before, but then abandoned ship in order to see the costumes (Saturday is the best day in that regard). This time, I'm just getting in line at the crack of dawn, heading in, and staying til the show is over. 😀 Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Tarantino, Damon, Jodie Foster… Ther's just a ton of legendary stars ahead to see!
Hopefully you'll all want to stick around and check it out. If not, regularly scheduled movie related content will resume on my return the following week! Please bear with me as I go, it may get tough to get back to comments, and there may be some glitches as I try to blog from the road… but I'm sure at the end of the day, I'll be able to provide you guys with top notch coverage of Comic-Con!


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About I'll Take You There
by Wally Lamb
Hardcover: 272 pages
Publisher: Harper; First Printing edition (November 22, 2016)
In this radiant homage to the resiliency, strength, and power of women, Wally Lamb author of numerous New York Times bestselling novels including She's Come Undone, I Know This Much is True, and We Are Water weaves an evocative, deeply affecting tapestry of one Baby Boomer's life and the trio of unforgettable women who have changed it.
I'll Take You There centers on Felix, a film scholar who runs a Monday night movie club in what was once a vaudeville theater. One evening, while setting up a film in the projectionist booth, he's confronted by the ghost of Lois Weber, a trailblazing motion picture director from Hollywood's silent film era. Lois invites Felix to revisit and in some cases relive scenes from his past as they are projected onto the cinema's big screen.
In these magical movies, the medium of film becomes the lens for Felix to reflect on the women who profoundly impacted his life. There's his daughter Aliza, a Gen Y writer for New York Magazine who is trying to align her post-modern feminist beliefs with her lofty career ambitions; his sister, Frances, with whom he once shared a complicated bond of kindness and cruelty; and Verna, a fiery would-be contender for the 1951 Miss Rheingold competition, a beauty contest sponsored by a Brooklyn-based beer manufacturer that became a marketing phenomenon for two decades. At first unnerved by these ethereal apparitions, Felix comes to look forward to his encounters with Lois, who is later joined by the spirits of other celluloid muses.
Against the backdrop of a kaleidoscopic convergence of politics and pop culture, family secrets, and Hollywood iconography, Felix gains an enlightened understanding of the pressures and trials of the women closest to him, and of the feminine ideals and feminist realities that all women, of every era, must face.
My review
I have loved Wally Lamb's work for years and had the joy of meeting him this past October at Reading With Robin's Evening With Authors. He is a gracious, fun, and kind man; it was wonderful to meet the man behind the words.
I'll Take You There visits many locals that I know from "real life" and that drew my attention right away, it's always fun to read about the places we know. My parents attend plays at the Garde Theatre in New London, Connecticut, my home state. Incidentally, today marks the anniversary of the Sandy Hook shootings, I grew up in Newtown and so much of who I am and what I love is wrapped up and tied into Newtown. My prayers and love are with the families who lost children and loved ones that horrible December 14th, and my prayers and love are with all those who have their hearts still in Newtown in any way.
So that side-track isn't actually unlike Felix, Lamb's protagonist who has a voice that is friendly and conversational, who is at times distracted into other thoughts and stories – or by ghosts. I'm not a big fan of the supernatural so this was harder for me to comfortably accept as a reader, though eventually it didn't jar me so much. It was a creative tool to give us backstory and depth into his family relationships, to interact with the past in a meaningful way and allow us to live historical scenes with the characters.

subset: commoncrawl


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At the Stone Column (Luna) - Úvoz Street 24/160, Hradčany
Úvoz Street 24/160, Hradčany
Originally a Renaissance house, with Baroque reconstruction in 1706; from the same period originates the stone column with a statuette of Virgin Mary and stucco busts of the Luna and the Sun, placed here in the memory of a painter and house owner K. Luna. The house used to be occupied by Kalaš sisters: Klementina (1850-99) was a much admired opera diva, Marie (1857-1937) was a translator and keen promoter of Czech literature abroad. Until 1953 the Museum and Library of Jaroslav Vrchlický were located there.
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Leading Gun Control Advocate: "We'll get it done by the end of January"
Steve Watson
Jan 4, 2013
A leading gun control advocate who co-chairs a national committee with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg says that the Vice President, Joe Biden, personally promised him that Obama will pass sweeping firearms reforms by the end of the month.
Boston Mayor, Thomas M. Menino, co-chair of the Mayors Against Illegal Guns organisation, told reporters at the City Hall that Biden had "guaranteed" him that far reaching gun control measures would be quickly implemented in 2013.
"He said, 'Tommy, I guarantee you, we'll get it done by the end of January,'" Menino said, adding that Biden had telephoned him several times to discuss gun control over the past two months.
"They're going to get it done." Menino said, intimating that Biden had made promises to him before the latest school shooting had even occurred.
Menino has spent most of his time hospitalized since October with a range of ailments. It was this ongoing illness that seemingly prompted the calls from Biden.
The Mayors Against Illegal Guns organisation group has lobbied Obama to introduce broad gun reform measures since his election in 2008. The group, consisting of around 500 mayors nationwide, has called for further empowering the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to crack down on the proliferation of firearms.
Among their recommendations has been a call to allow ATF agents greater discretion to conduct criminal investigations and background checks at gun shows. "Criminal activity endemic to some gun shows goes unchecked" the group noted in a 2009 report.
"I understand the second amendment, the right to bear arms. But I don't understand how young kids should be able to get guns," Menino said.
The Mayor added that Obama now has "no excuse not to pass strong (gun reform) legislation," given that he no longer has to worry about getting re-elected.
"It's time to get this moving and moving quickly," Menino said. "Let's do it now."
Earlier this week, an Obama administration official told The Huffington Post, that the president plans to quickly push for new gun control measures beginning this month:
The official, who spoke about legislative plans only on condition of anonymity, said that coming standoffs over deficit reduction are unlikely to drain momentum from other priorities. The White House plans to push forward quickly, not just on immigration reform but gun control laws as well.
Steve Watson is the London based writer and editor for Alex Jones' Infowars.com, and Prisonplanet.com. He has a Masters Degree in International Relations from the School of Politics at The University of Nottingham in England.
This article was posted: Friday, January 4, 2013 at 12:30 pm
Tags: gun rights


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"It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous state may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country."
Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis, Dissenting Opinion: New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann (1932)
The above quote from Justice Brandeis' famous dissent is the origin of the idea of 'the laboratory of democracy'. This is an idea with much merit but which we have, unfortunately, not seen utilized within The United States to any kind of a significant degree. Whether through fear of losing power, fear of interference from the federal government, lack of imagination, lack of interest or fear of the unknown, 'experiments' with democracy in this country take the shape of trying to impose different sets of laws and rules upon the citizens rather than on the process by which those laws and rules are determined. The idea in this nation is that differences in democracy are measured solely by the end result of the legislative process rather than the process itself.
A large problem with mankind, in general, and Americans, in particular, is our hubris. We think that, because we are as far along as mankind has ever been, we are the end of the road and have to have everything right. What we should keep in mind is that we are just another middle age. As we express shock, disgust, and amusement at the attitudes, beliefs and lack of knowledge of the world of a thousand years ago, so will mankind view us a thousand years hence. We will not fail the future if we don't have everything right; we will fail them if we don't try new things to give those who come after us additional data which they can use to get closer to being right than we ever can.
I try to occasionally write articles under the Laboratory of Democracy umbrella to look at different ideas which might be worth experimenting with (if not at a federal level then perhaps at a state or local level) to see how our idea of constitutional government can be improved based on lessons learned from our own 225 years of history conducting the American Experiment. Today's topic is about how we can change how we conduct voting to better represent the views, needs and desires of 'we the people.'
The reasons to change the way we vote are numerous. A fundamental reason to change it is that Americans tend to vote AGAINST candidates rather than FOR them. We have shaped the idea of democracy into an expression of our personal fears. We seem to feel stronger about candidate's who we DON'T want in an office than we do about those we support. Usually this is perfectly understandable, as the candidates we have to choose from are often not that good, so it is often easier to identify candidates who are LEAST in line with what we want than it is to identity ones whom we can wholeheartedly support.
One obvious problem with this method is that when people are primarily voting AGAINST a candidate, they are afraid to 'waste' their vote by casting it for someone who they might approve of but who has no actual chance of winning. This fear of 'wasting my vote' was intensified after the 1992 Presidential election saw a significant number of votes cast for Ross Perot (who supporters of losing candidate George H. W. Bush blamed for costing him his bid for re-election) and after Al Gore's narrow loss (or win, whichever you consider it to have been) to George W. Bush in 2000, which was partially blamed on those in Florida who had voted for Ralph Nader. Aside from the fact that no candidate is ever OWED any citizen's vote (a candidate bears the burden of needing to EARN someone's vote), those who support a candidate (or, more accurately, who OPPOSE a particular candidate) are afraid to 'waste' their vote by casting it for third party candidates who have no chance of winning.
Bill Clinton's first nominee for Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, Lani Guinier, supported a change in how we cast votes for political candidates in this country. Termed 'Cumulative Voting', the method which she supported was that each voter would get one vote for each candidate for a particular office and that they could spread those votes among the candidates and give any candidates as many of their available votes as they wanted. For example, if there were four candidates running for President, then each voter would get four votes to cast for President, any one of those candidates getting any or all of those votes, and multiple candidates being able to be given votes by each voter. While she was on the right road, I believe, she was headed in the wrong direction.
Academic studies and theories on Alternative Voting Methods go back at least several hundred years. In 1770, Jean-Charles de Borda proposed the Borda Count as a method for selecting members of the French Academy of Science. The last 30 years has seen an increase in such studies and research, in large part through the various researches which have been done in Game Theory. There are also MANY historical examples of the effectiveness of quite a few different methods of conducting and totaling votes. The Republic of Venice, for example, thrived for over 1,000 and developed a VERY complex but very effective form of Approval Voting for selecting the Doge which survived almost unchanged for over 500 years, until the Republic was conquered by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1797. Many articles with additional information about Alternative Voting Methods, including Approval Voting, are available on-line. Some of these include:
As with most of the alternative voting systems I have heard of (equal & even; weighted ballots; fractional ballots; instant run-off; etc.) none of them truly address the idea that most people, at least in America, seem to cast their votes, at least for higher offices, against candidates rather than for them. This means that they see ANY method of spreading their voting strength around as weakening their opposition to a candidate they oppose. For example, under cumulative voting, say you have four votes you can use to vote for a particular office and you do NOT want Candidate A to win. You know that everyone else who is voting for that office will also have four votes to allocate and you fear that those who support Candidate A (or who oppose Candidate B) will each cast ALL of their four votes for Candidate A. Will you then be willing to risk the election of Candidate B by only giving him three of your votes while you 'waste' your fourth vote on Candidate D?
So, when we explore the idea of alternative voting methods, we MUST consider realistic human nature (and human fears) when we think about the problem. To do otherwise, to pretend that man will make his choices based on the greater good rather than base self-interest, or that he will willingly and comfortably accept the idea of his candidate losing because it is 'the will of the majority' and put aside his personal animosities after an election is unrealistic, at best. Therefore, the question is, how can we change voting into a positive process where people vote FOR candidates because there is NO NEED to vote AGAINST any candidates.
One possible solution is simply to allow a voter to vote equally for EVERY candidate that they think would be worthwhile to support. This method of voting is termed 'Approval Voting'. To use the Approval Voting method, as an example, say that there are five candidates (A, B, C, D, and E). You personally support candidate C; candidate A is a major party candidate who you do NOT want to see in office; candidate B is a major party candidate who you have no real objections to and see as a better alternative to candidate A; candidate D is an independent candidate who you think could be interesting but who has no realistic chance to win; and candidate E is the local homeless wino transvestite who somehow manages to get on the ballot for EVERY election.
Under this scenario, you can not only cast your vote for candidate B (to help oppose the candidate you don't want to win) you can ALSO cast an equal vote for candidates C (your preferred candidate) and for candidate D (the one you think is interesting and have no objections to). In such a case, you have accomplished all of your positive voting goals, you have shown your opposition to the candidates you do NOT want to see in office (A and E) by not voting for them, you supported your preferred candidate (C) and you gave support to the other candidates that you had no objections to. In this scenario, none of the votes you cast weakened your personal voting power in any way while, at the same time, made it more likely that candidates other than those from the major parties could win because EVERYONE else who liked candidates C and D could also vote for them but, maybe instead of voting also for candidate B, they voted for candidate A. In a very real way, the candidate who had the most REAL support, who was APPROVED by the most voters, would win the election because all votes cast for any and all candidates would count equally to their totals. In this system you can vote for any one of the candidates, any possible combinations of the candidates, or all of the candidates for that office… you can vote FOR candidates rather than AGAINST them.
Now, are there potential problems with a system such as this? Of course there are. A primary one, obviously, is how to prevent ballots being stuffed because the total votes cast for an office can (and would) be greater than the voting population as a whole and not by a predictable percentage (as if every voter HAD to vote for three candidates, no more or less, which would result in a vote total that was three times the number of voters). Another obvious one is to ask if the winning candidate would have to get a majority of ALL votes cast, or just a higher total number of votes than any other candidate. The first of these two possibilities could lead to either a need for a run-off election or a 'None of the Above' result. THAT, however, is where the Laboratory of Democracy comes into play. Let's encourage some cities and/or counties to experiment with it (or, in fact, with ANY of the other alternative voting methods) before any states try it, and then let some states experiment with it. The is the beauty of the Laboratory of Democracy idea, not every location has to use the same processes and, by allowing and encouraging them to experiment with different process, we can gather data about which process variations work well, work partially but need more tinkering with, and don't work at all.
Too many people in this nation think that trying different ideas of government means having different laws (like using the Ten Commandments as the basis of their laws, for example). They miss the point that democracy is not the RESULTS of the democratic process but the PROCESS itself.
Thank you for reading this article. Please read my other articles and let me know what you think. I am writing them not to preach or to hear myself think but to try to create dialogs, debates and discussions on the nature of our constitutional government and how we can improve it by building upon what we have seen and learned over the course of the 225 years of The American Experiment.
Rhys M. Blavier
Romayor, Texas
"Truth, Justice and Honor… but, above all Honor"
© copyright 2008 by Rhys M. Blavier


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Business Situation
To offer the best possible service, existing and potential customers must be able to contact Feenstra easily at any time. Appointments with service engineers and advisers are planned centrally at the head office in Lelystad, where a team of around 100 call centre employees is available between 8 a.m. and 9 p.m. To make the appointment scheduling process as efficient as possible, a planning tool was developed six years ago. It allowed the team to schedule home appointments to provide advice about central heating installations, solar panels, home insulation and home security.
Three generations of the tool have been rolled out during this period. The first version of the planning tool allowed appointments for the sale of central heating installations to be made nationally for the first time. The second version enabled other products to be added, such as appointments for the sale of solar panels, home insulation and home security. The second-generation tool was also considerably faster.
"There has been a visible improvement in our customer satisfaction. They are able to access clear information, are helped sooner and always deal with suitably qualified experts."
Avanade helped Feenstra develop and implement the new tool and worked closely with the company to design, prepare and roll out the upgrade. At the start of the process, the first task was to gain a clear insight into Feenstra's requirements. The final aim was to plan appointments as efficiently as possible, so customers and potential customers would receive the best possible service and so advisers could maximise productivity during their work days.
The tailor-made solution was developed by Avanade based on Microsoft Azure, which is Microsoft's cloud solution. "We recommended Azure because it is a scalable platform. The main advantage is that you are not responsible for hardware and hosting, or the related depreciation. This helps to significantly reduce monthly costs," explains Vincent van Baak, Project Manager at Avanade.
ResultsThe latest version of the planning tool was implemented with the help of Avanade. This version builds on the foundations established by previous generations. The system is used to plan appointments for around 20 field agents working day shifts. During the winter season, which is the busiest period for Feenstra, the team is expanded to 120 employees planning the activities of 55 agents working day shifts. In addition, employees are available seven days a week to schedule appointments.
The latest tool has helped improve productivity. "The solution allows staff to process customer requests faster than before and to schedule appointments more efficiently based on the skills and region of advisors," says Vincent van der Slot, Functional Manager at Feenstra. According to van Baak, the simplified interface, which is more user-friendly than the previous system, is another benefit. "For example, advisers can now use the same login details for every application," he explains.


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This blog is made to share news on Alzheimer's Disease in India. To raise awareness among the population in and from India, inform people of the resources they may have in their country and about actions taken by organizations. Also, it aims to support families and caregivers there to cope with this disease; help researchers worldwide and advocates in collecting datas and infos, develop views on the local Public Health Policy toward the affected elderly population in India.
Join our Family Caregivers, Volunteers and Care Professionals on Facebook and LinkedIn.
Access NGOs, infos, news updates, support and discussions....at the following links :
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Monday, February 25, 2013
Echoing Healthy Ageing, Counselling, Mumbai.
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Just How "Major" Was Monday's Finance Document?
There was a lot of buzz leading up to the the note on world financial matters released by the Holy See on Monday.
One of the first references I saw to it was in a story with a headline something like "Major Vatican Document to Be Released Monday." I clicked on the story and saw that the document in question was to be released by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. My eyebrows immediately went up, and I began pondering the sense in which the term "major" was being used.
I suspect that the person who wrote the headline was using the term in its ordinary sense, which would signify a document of great importance relative to others issued by the Holy See, on some kind of absolute or general scale. You know, the way a papal encyclical is a major document.
But I suspect that the person who wrote the headline was under a misimpression, because the document was not major in this way.
"Major" is a relative term, and while it might be accurate to say that the document was "major" by the lights of the PCJP, it was not major in the overall Vatican sweep of things. The mere fact that it's being issued by the PCJP tells you that much.
That's no slight to the PCJP. It is a dicastery (department) of the Holy See, with its own proper work and role. It's just not a venue the pope uses to issue major documents, when "major" is read in terms of the Vatican as a whole.
Because of the controversial nature of the document, it attracted a great deal of comment in the press, with some loving and some loathing it. Others loved certain aspects of the document and loathed others. And there was a great deal of discussion regarding what kind of authority the document has.
George Weigel stated:
The truth of the matter is that "the Vatican" — whether that phrase is intended to mean the Pope, the Holy See, the Church's teaching authority, or the Church's central structures of governance — called for precisely nothing in this document. The document is a "Note" from a rather small office in the Roman Curia. The document's specific recommendations do not necessarily reflect the settled views of the senior authorities of the Holy See; indeed, Fr. Federico Lombardi, the press spokesman for the Vatican, was noticeably circumspect in his comments on the document and its weight. As indeed he ought to have been. The document doesn't speak for the Pope, it doesn't speak for "the Vatican," and it doesn't speak for the Catholic Church.
Fr. John Zuhlsdorf wrote:
I can say this: Thanks be to God this "white paper" doesn't form part of the Holy Father's Ordinary Magisterium.
Every once in a while the Holy See's smaller offices, Pontifical Councils and so forth, have to put out a paper to justify their budgets and remind everyone that they take up valuable space. These documents, which do not form part of the Holy Father's Magisterium, can deal with critical issues like how to be a safe driver. The dicasteries keep busy by hosting seminars on how to play sport and so forth.
Mark Brumley states:
Even though Catholics are not obliged to accept the policy proposals of this "note," many Catholics will nevertheless want to hear what the council says, and others are likely to be influenced by it, even though it does not represent "the Vatican's position" (contrary to what some media accounts and some leftwing Catholics would lead you to believe).
Each of these gentlemen is correct in the assertion that the document does not represent the Church's teaching authority or magisterium—at least the document as a whole does not. (It does contain quotations from other documents which do carry magisterial authority, and those passages carry the same authority as they had in their original context.)
This is stuff that people who make a close study of the Holy See and the way it operates are aware of, but the secular media doesn't pay close enough attention to know, and they regularly misrepresent things. Because the media doesn't know how to process these things, they haven't done a good job informing the general public about them, and so the ordinary person gets misleading headlines like "Pope Calls for World Bank" or things like that.
So how do we know that gentlemen like Weigel, Zuhlsdorf and Brumley are correct?
What I'd like to do here is offer a few brief thoughts on the subject. First, in this post, let's deal with the question of how "major" the document is or—per Weigel and Zuhlsdorf—what the status of the Pontifical Commission for Justice and Peace is. In a second post, we'll look at the question of whether documents like this represent the Magisterium of the Church.
First, let's talk about the Roman Curia—the set of "dicasteries" or departments that includes the PCJP (the picture above is Pope Benedict addressing the Curia in 2009). The basic document governing the Curia is an apostolic constitution issued by John Paul II in 1988 called Pastor Bonus (Latin, "Good Shepherd"). This document provided the overall legal and organizational framework within which the Curia works today (though Pope Benedict has modified it a bit). According to the document:
Art. 1 — The Roman Curia is the complex of dicasteries and institutes which help the Roman Pontiff in the exercise of his supreme pastoral office for the good and service of the whole Church and of the particular Churches. It thus strengthens the unity of the faith and the communion of the people of God and promotes the mission proper to the Church in the world.
It then explains the concept of a dicastery and an institute more closely:
Art. 2 — § 1. By the word "dicasteries" are understood the Secretariat of State, Congregations, Tribunals, Councils and Offices, namely the Apostolic Camera, the Administration of the Patrimony of the Apostolic See, and the Prefecture for the Economic Affairs of the Holy See. . . .
§ 3. Among the institutes of the Roman Curia are the Prefecture of the Papal Household and the Office for the Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff.
Another thing that Article 2 of Pastor Bonus explains is that:
§ 2. The dicasteries are juridically equal among themselves.
This means that they have an equality before the law, though it does not mean that they are all equal in duties or influence. The New Commentary on the Code of Canon Law notes:
While the dicasteries are technically juridically equal, they are not equal in importance or power. Normally no dicastery has any power over another; each responds directly to the pope regarding its activity (p. 479; on cc. 360-361).
The commentary then, in further passages, remarks on some of the differences in the influence and power of different dicasteries, noting that the Secretariat of State plays a central role and is especially close to the pope, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has an especially influential role among the congregations, etc.
In practice, it is not difficult to determine the relative influence of particular departments. They are, in fact, listed in Pastor Bonus itself in terms of their relative importance. Notice that Article 2 lists the Secretariat of State first, then the Congregations, then Tribunals, then Councils, and then Offices. This is the same order that you find if you go to the Roman Curia's page on the Vatican web site. You'll see exactly the same list of categories, in the same order (and further expanded and extended to include additional bodies).
This is the basic power structure within the Curia. While all departments may be juridically equal, those dicasteries that are higher up in the hierarchy have more influence in practical terms and those which are lower have less. The Secretariat of State has the most influence, followed by the Congregations. These include the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which has the most influence of all congregations (which is why it's listed first in every such list; it doesn't come in this order alphabetically in Latin; the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, the Congregation for Clerics, and the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments would all come before it alphabetically in Latin), then other dicasteries with portfolios sufficiently weighty to be given the status of Congregation. Afterwards there are the Tribunals, and then we get to the Councils, one of which is the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. And it's not at the top of the Council list. It's the fourth one down in another non-(Latin-)alphabetical list of Councils that gives at least something of an idea of the relative influence of each Council.
As the commentary quoted above notes, these departments do not normally exercise power over each other. For the most part, they function in dependently based on their own particular missions. There are, however, exceptions. The Secretariat of State plays a coordinating role among the dicasteries to some extent. When a question of doctrine is in dispute, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith gets called in. The Signatura (one of the Tribunals) may be called upon to settle certain disputes between dicasteries about which one is competent in a particular area. And the pope himself can always intervene and make other provisions. But the general level of authority is indicated by the hierarchy given in Pastor Bonus, and Councils are not at the top of it.
This is why Weigel refers to the latter as a "rather small office" in the Curia and why Zuhlsdorf refers to it as one of the Curia's "smaller offices." This isn't true just in terms of staff size. It's true in terms of their relative level of authority.
It's also why I raised my eyebrows at the claim that a "major" document would be released by the PCJP. As a Council, it occupies a place (and not the first place) on the fourth tier of dicasteries, and it's not the kind of department that is used to issue "major" documents in terms of the overall sweep of things at the Vatican. A given document may be major compared to documents the Justice and Peace council normally issues, but under ordinary circumstances they won't be major compared to documents issued, say, by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, or the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments—or the pope himself.
If one wants to accurately assess the import of a particular document, an important part of that assessment will be the nature of the one issuing the document.
That still doesn't get us to the question of whether the document represents the teaching authority or Magisterium of the Church, though, so let's talk about that next time.


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Tuesday, January 10, 2012
The Energetic Facts of Life
5 comments:
"The sins of the mothers and fathers are on your head now. So live it up if you want to live them down."
I like and living it!
Slept through half a day and night after a period of 24 in what time awake I might come to recognize as base spirit desire un-rationed-rational reactionary land.
Dreamt of being sent, by a tribesman, adrift down a current of water, then came an "open box" minotaur which I felt to be, on a head hunt, bare-breasted damsels in distress from a clan of sadistic wackos, and cavalry on the side of clueless.
Going out of One's way to save cats and dogs that only get mutilated through and by One's fickle vision. Like taking pre-mix cakes and offerings to you chosen congregation.
I lost and loving it.
- 6:08 pm, January 11, 2012
Shit. Like. You are not the only One center of the universe. Steep, man.
- 6:19 pm, January 11, 2012
- Theofilia said...
WV's "premath" translation?
"each human being is a minature model of the universe, a microcosmic version of the entire Creation, just as each tiny sequoia seed contains an entire giant redwood tree."
- 12:02 pm, January 15, 2012
- Charles Stone said...
For some time I have been perusig your book: The Lucid View! You metion that JFK was atoning in a way for the sins of others! Have you see the recent book Me & Lee ny Judyth Vary Baker which finally provides detailed evidence about the events preceding the killing and more its importance. My associate, Iona Miller has published in Paranoia and on DMT. Here is my website: www.washingtontiger.weebly.com Check out our Tavistock video! Your comments are appreciated. Charles W. Stone
- 10:20 am, January 25, 2012
- Jasun said...
Not seen it no, and my serpent's path has taken me a long way from JFK and C-theories (or fact) these daze.
Thanks for sharing tho.
- 2:31 pm, January 25, 2012


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This is part one of a three part series on using Thought Leadership as a marketing strategy. I won't pretend that I thought this all up myself. I read far and wide and distilled it all into what I think are the most important elements. I will be sure to name the influential sources at the end of part 3.
What Is Thought Leadership?
It might sound obvious but a thought leader is a recognised leader in the current thinking, advancements and improvements needed in one's field.
What differentiates a thought leader from any other knowledgeable company/person is the recognition as being at the forefront of understanding and/or application of a discipline(s) and having the confidence to promote or share those ideas.
This means providing both clients and competitors alike with insights which can be actioned or applied to their own work. Thought Leaders have a lot in common in that they have a public outlet for their thoughts (blog, public speaking, whitepapers), have something valuable to say and a commitment to publishing on a regular basis. Thought leaders are committed to being fair and balanced, to sharing experiences and fostering the learning and development of others.
It can be difficult to determine who is a thought leader and who is just a pundit. Essentially, a company/person is simply a pundit if they undertake any ideological discussion or criticism of a problem without presenting solutions that are grounded in some experience.
A Position That Is Granted – Not Claimed
Occupying a thought leadership position is important not only because of the advantages that it provides but also because of the disadvantages that a company would experience if a competitor occupies that position (and becomes more trusted or positions conflicting thoughts/messages).
On the flip side, the market advantage for a company is where thought leadership positions it in the minds of clients. That position is one of a premier provider and trusted advisor in their field.
A Thought Leadership position is, however, perishable. It is granted by the market and it is the market that sees a company as a thought leader (and which the company must work to build/maintain). A company is not a thought leader simply because it claims to be.
Within this is an inherent paradox – what is important to a company/person might not be important to their clients (at least at first). One of the critical roles of a communicator or marketer is to make the case for the thought (thinking about a problem or need). This has an important alignment with the traditional buying‐decision process i.e. awareness.


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BATTLEFIELD - Vietnam TET
Shout! Factory
Жанр :Вопрос : 21/09/2010 Producer : Shout! Factory Студия : Shout! Factory / Timeless Media Продолжительность : 180 Языки : English Язык : en Диски : 3 Медиафайлы : ЦИФРОВОЙ ВИДЕОДИСК Характеристики : Бокс-сет видеоформат : НТСЦ Регион : 1 UPC : 0011301667151 В главных ролях :
Краткие сведения : BATTLEFIELD - Vietnam TET! In 1968, National Liberation Front guerrillas (Viet Cong) and North Vietnam Army troops launched a massive offensive against the cities and towns in South Vietnam. For three years, the insurgents had been trying to wear down the South, but they now staked everything on a desperate all-out bid for victory. Although the Tet Offensive proved to be the beginning of the end for South Vietnam, it was the worst defeat suffered by the Communists in thirty years. Now for the first time, TMG and NBC Universal bring you these detailed accounts of the pivotal battles of the Vietnam War. Each episode covers one great battle, featuring portraits of the leaders and commanders, explanations of weapons and tactics, a review of the political and military situation leading up to the battle, troop deployment, and the story of the battle itself. Narrated by Gavin McFadyen (Treasure Seekers, Africa's Forgotten Kingdom). Watch rare archival footage from vaults around the world!
TET August 11, 2011
Автор: Larry M. Aranda
All the relevant information. What I like most about Battlefield is that they don't present a biased presentation. They give both sides good or bad.


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I'm back from the awesome Race Brook Lodge. Twenty-plus artists friends and I were there for a week -- some working on assignments, others working on personal projects, and then there was me, doing absolutely nothing but hanging out, eating, and sleeping.
Sadly, the waterfall was sans water, but a lovely hike nonetheless. The pizza was amazing...until Baba Louie's burned down. (I swear we had nothing to do with it.) And teaching whiffle ball to the Hungarian artist duo Zoltan Boros and Gabor Szikszai was more amusing than the actual game. It also seems that I am an excellent first-game bowler but suck at any subsequent rounds.
Unfortunately I can't show any of the work that was done since some clients are more sensitive about that than others. But a quick run down of a few of the projects:
Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell were working on their next calendar. This time they will be telling a visual story throughout the months.
Tony Palumbo was working on a few "sword" cards for a tarot deck that he, Julie, Boris, and Dave Palumbo are all collaborating on. (It was fun to hear Julie talk about being in the art director's seat on the project.) The set is being published three cards at a time in Heavy Metal magazine, starting now, and will take three years to complete.
Dan Dos Santos was working on a Tor cover, the sequel to Dark Warrior Rising. When the painting is done I'll post a few shots in progress.
Greg Manchess was finessing a few sketches of Egyptian pharaohs for National Geographic -- a cover plus two large scale interior paintings that will run in the February edition. (Progressions on that, once published.)
The only bit of work that I did was to go through a few Spectrum books and start making a first pass stab at curating the next Spectrum exhibit. Based on the post-it notes, we are not in for an easy ride. Somehow we'll need to select just 150ish works of art out of four editions.
Everyone else was working on private commissions and personal works. Some stunning pieces that I am very much looking forward to seeing done.
Our "Free To Be You and Me" photo::
TOP: Dave Palumbo, Ben Foster, Dave Seeley, Scot Brundage.
MIDDLE: Dan Dos Santos, Donato Giancola, Christine, Tiffany Prothero, me, Rebecca Guay.
BOTTOM STANDING: Steph Laberis, Wesley Allsbrook, Greg Manchess, Tony Palumbo, Julie Bell.
KNEELING: Arkady Roytman, Zoltan Boros and Gabor Szikszai .
THERE IN SPIRIT but sensible to get out before people started climbing on the rafters: Boris Vallejo, Steven Stroud, Lars Grant-West, Cyril Van Der Hagen, Giancola's Carrie, Naomi, and Cecilia, and Dos Santos' Chris and Uno.
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Race Brook Lodge
I'm back from the awesome Race Brook Lodge. Twenty-plus artists friends and I were there for a week -- some working on assignments, others working on personal projects, and then there was me, doing absolutely nothing but hanging out, eating, and sleeping.
13 comments:
It looks like an amazing gathering - What a setting for a murder mystery!
Thanks for the report from Olympus.
-lee moyer
- Irene Gallo said...
Hey Lee,
It's not so much Olympus as it is living in and around NY. It's hotbed of illustrators. (Although becoming less so since everything is delivered through email these days.) Add Dos Santos' motivational skills and some fall leaves and you've got yourself a retreat.
- Mike Dutton said...
I'm so jealous of the East Coast Illustration circle! Tiffany's been encouraging me to start a west coast retreat though, so look out. ;)
- Howard Lyon said...
What a blast. I can't wait to see the work from it. I am with Mister Dutton, extremely envious! What fun time!
- Tracy Flynn Art said...
I am extremely envous as well, I think we need a mid-west evnet like that as well!
- Tristan Elwell said...
So, how does one get an invite to one of these shindigs? ;)
- Tony Shasteen said...
Looks like it was a great time! What an amazing opportunity for everyone involved!
As far as bowling goes, I understand. I'm also an excellent first-game bowler and suck at any subsequent rounds, although I think my decline in skill is tied to the amount of cheap bowling alley beer I drink while playing. That's my story anyway...
It sounds truly inspired and inspiring (of many things, including envy).
Any group with those headliners has to be considered the Crème de la Crème.
-lee again
- Carl V. Anderson said...
Love to see the Spectrum with all the sticky notes in it. That is what mine looks like when I'm looking up artists and trying to find new books whenever I get a new Spectrum book.
- capprotti said...
I don't think I've ever been more jealous in my life! :-P But it's so great to see the art world coming together in such a cool way. It will only help the industry grow in all the best ways :-P Keep it up!
- Unknown said...
Come on, Dutton - I live up the street from you and I was there! You gotta stop being a bum about missing the Sunday night sketch jams anyway ;)
Irene, thanks for the recap, the week flew by so quickly and like you, I succumbed to the vile temptresses of good food, late nights and snoozing under falling leaves. Come to think of it, I think I covered all 7 deadly sins at the retreat, so then I know it was a good trip!
Hi Irene,
I got a wonderful chance to meet you at Donato's back in April - I found your blog thru Eric Fortune's myspace, and I have to say it's photos like that first one that make me wish I hadn't moved back to Virginia!!!
And how is Arkady still wearing that same shirt??? :P
take care!
Cynthia Sheppard
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Thursday, April 23, 2009
All The Fallen Robins
I've been listening to Leonard Cohen's "The Chelsea Hotel", which is about Janis Joplin. Supposedly the two met at the Chelsea Hotel, she gave him head while the limousines were waiting (we are not told if he gave her head), and she spoke to him so sweetly and so strong. The lyrics deserve several listenings from a feminist: the talk about ugliness and beauty and especially the ending where he muses over not loving her the best, not thinking over every fallen robin, but all this with an odd ambiguity.
Janis Joplin died before this song was written. Her life killed her. She was a robin who fell. But then so many artists fall that way. Still, what was that world like for women, the super-hyper-sexualized world of popular music in those days? Especially for a woman who had the divine fire in her shell of nothing special? Who had the job of multi-tasking as sexual objects, cheerleaders AND the creative geniuses? It must have been extremely hard.
That phrase about 'every fallen robin' stuck with me. I think it would not be applied to men who die of drug overdoses or suicides, because they are not small birds. Or chicks.


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Rocky Patel Releases 15th Anniversary Cigar
Rocky Patel likes to tell people that no one in the cigar industry thought he would last ten years in the business. Now he's about to celebrate year 15.
To commemorate the occasion, Patel today released a cigar called Fifteenth Anniversary by Rocky Patel. It's a medium dark, trunk-pressed cigar that's wrapped in Ecuadoran tobacco grown from Habano seeds. The binder and filler tobaccos are entirely Nicaraguan, and one of the filler varieties is grown on a farm that was specially dedicated to this cigar. The cigars come in dark boxes with metallic plates, and the double bands are the color of gun metal steel.
"I wanted to do something special to celebrate our 15 years in the cigar business," said Patel, the owner of Rocky Patel Premium Cigars, which is based in Naples, Florida. "I wanted a cigar that's like the Decade on steroids. The Fifteenth has the elegance and the balance of the Decade, but it has the richness, complexity and spice that kind of puts it over the top."
Patel spoke about one of the fillers, which he said comes from "a special farm in Estelí. I think it's some of the richest, and spiciest tobaccos I've ever had. The farm is just dedicated to that filler." He also said that he had been waiting to use the Habano seed Ecuadoran wrapper tobacco, which comes from a very high priming, for about two years.
While Patel has built his brands primarily with cigars that are rolled in Honduras, namely those made by the Plasencia family, this new brand is made in the Tabacalera Villa Cuba S.A. cigar factory in Estelí, Nicaragua. Patel owns the factory along with Amilcar Perez. Cigar Insider toured the first version of the factory in December, and it has since been relocated to a larger space in Estelí. Tabacalera Villa Cuba makes cigars in slow, artisan style. It has been in operation since December 2008, and also makes the Rocky Patel 1961 cigar along with some private label brands.
The cigars there are made with triple caps, the bunching is done entubado style, a slow process where each filler leaf is rolled in a sort of tube, and the cigars get two binder leaves rather than simply one.
"We wanted it triple capped, rolled the Cuban way, all by hand," said Patel during a tour of the factory. "I think it changes the flavor profile. The flavor is different." The factory, he says, "gives us a whole new style. We can experiment with more boutique stuff."
The Fifteenth Anniversary by Rocky Patel brand comes in four sizes, all of them packed in boxes of 20. The Robusto measures five inches long by 50 ring gauge, the Toro 6 1/2 by 52, the Torpedo 6 1/8 by 52 and the Corona Gorda 6 by 46. (The word "toro" is typically a synonym for corona gorda in the cigar industry, so Patel is doing something nontraditional by having both sizes, with quite different dimensions.) Pricing still has to be determined, but Rocky Patel Premium Cigars said it would be close to the Decade, which are $8 to $12 apiece.
The Rocky Patel Decade, released to celebrate Patel's 10th year in business, delivered Patel his highest ratings ever. The Rocky Patel Decade Torpedo scored 95 points in a February 2008 Cigar Insider, and was the number 15 cigar in Cigar Aficionado's Top 25 cigars of that year.
Launching the Fifteenth Anniversary is but one part of Patel's grand plans for this year and beyond. "My goal is to be the top brand," he says.
Click here to watch an interview with Rocky Patel.


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EAST LANSING, Mich. (AP) No. 19 Michigan State held Arkansas-Pine Bluff scoreless for almost 10 minutes and went on to win 76-44 on Wednesday night.
Garry Harris scored 13 points, Travis Trice had 12 and Branden Dawson added 10 for the Spartans (7-2).
Michigan State started the game with a 14-0 run, led 38-12 at halftime and kept a comfortable lead in the second half.
The Golden Lions (1-7) missed their first 13 shots and didn't score until 9:48 into the game.
Arkansas-Pine Bluff's DaVon Haynes, who is from Detroit, scored a season-high 20 points - all after halftime.
The Golden Lions had seven points over the last 2:20 of the first half to finish with 12, the fifth-lowest total at halftime by a Division I team this season, according to STATS LLC.
The Southwestern Athletic Conference team was competitive - for at least a half - in its last two losses to Oregon and Arizona State. It trailed the Ducks 37-30 at halftime and lost by 21 and was behind the Sun Devils by two points in the first half before losing by 13.
Arkansas-Pine Bluff's road-weary players might simply be tired of traveling all over the country. The Golden Lions haven't had a home game in Pine Bluff, Ark., and won't until Jan. 2, against Mississippi Valley State.
Michigan State, meanwhile, played at the Breslin Center for the sixth time in seven games - since starting the season with a loss to Connecticut in Germany and a win over Kansas in Atlanta - and will play its next two games in East Lansing.
The Spartans were not sharp offensively early against an overmatched team. They missed nine of their first 10 shots - including all five of their early 3-point attempts - but got second-chance points with offensive rebounds by taking advantage of their size and aggressiveness.
Michigan State made 14 of their next 20 shots to build a 26-point halftime lead.
Spartans coach Tom Izzo kept pushing his team even ahead by 30 points in the second half. After Haynes made an uncontested dunk, Izzo called a timeout with 8:29 left in the game to scream at center Derrick Nix about playing soft defense. The Spartans got a scare about a minute later when key reserve Adreian Payne fell hard and was slow to get up, but he came back in the game after being briefly evaluated on the bench.
Michigan State has won 69 straight home games against unranked nonconference teams.
Follow Larry Lage on Twitter:http://twitter.com/larrylage


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Despite the best efforts of his political opponents and a large swath of the media to hold Donald Trump accountable for the utterances of even the most fringe of his supporters—a standard to which no other candidate is ever held—the worst that his detractors can fairly say about him is that he has been careless in retweeting imagery that can be interpreted as offensive....Careless is a key word these days. Comey said Hillary was "extremely careless in... handling of very sensitive, highly classified information," and here's Kushner conceding that Trump may have been careless and those accusing him of anti-Semitism are careless. Hillary was careless — extremely careless — with something vastly important. But these other carelessnesses.... Well, we might say Trump's retweeting shows him behaving in a trivial fashion where carelessness doesn't matter, but the man is tasked to prove to us that he can be trusted. We're going to have to trust everything in the world to him if he's President, so he ought to take pains to prove his trustworthiness, not expect us to apply social media standards and say it doesn't matter. As for those who call the use of that star anti-Semitic, these people are atrocious hacks. They disgust me beyond words. And I appreciate Kushner's testimonial to his wife's father, despite its limited value. Family supports family. But Kushner is some special family:
In my opinion, accusations like "racist" and "anti-Semite" are being thrown around with a carelessness that risks rendering these words meaningless.
I am the grandson of Holocaust survivors. On December 7, 1941—Pearl Harbor Day—the Nazis surrounded the ghetto of Novogroduk, and sorted the residents into two lines: those selected to die were put on the right; those who would live were put on the left. My grandmother's sister, Esther, raced into a building to hide. A boy who had seen her running dragged her out and she was one of about 5100 Jews to be killed during this first slaughter of the Jews in Novogrudok. On the night before Rosh Hashana 1943, the 250 Jews who remained of the town's 20,000 plotted an escape through a tunnel they had painstakingly dug beneath the fence. The searchlights were disabled and the Jews removed nails from the metal roof so that it would rattle in the wind and hopefully mask the sounds of the escaping prisoners.Ah! I will stop my copying now. Please, read the whole thing.
My grandmother and her sister didn't want to leave their father behind. They went to the back of the line to be near him. When the first Jews emerged from the tunnel, the Nazis were waiting for them and began shooting. My grandmother's brother Chanon, for whom my father is named, was killed along with about 50 others. My grandmother made it to the woods, where she joined the Bielski Brigade of partisan resistance fighters. There she met my grandfather, who had escaped from a labor camp called Voritz. He had lived in a hole in the woods—a literal hole that he had dug—for three years, foraging for food, staying out of sight and sleeping in that hole for the duration of the brutal Russian winter.
I go into these details, which I have never discussed, because it's important to me that people understand where I'm coming from when I report that I know the difference between actual, dangerous intolerance versus these labels that get tossed around in an effort to score political points....


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How to survive in the wilds of Australia
With white picket fences and tree-lined streets, Tumut, 400 kilometers west of Sydney, is as quaint as a rural Australian town gets.
It also has a dark past.
For centuries the Tumut River was a meeting place for members of the Wiradjuri, Wolgan and Ngunnawal Aboriginal nations. Sometimes they went to war, but mostly they lived in peace.
As expert hunter-gatherers, they rarely went without.
Their world came to an end in the early 1800s when white settlers streamed in from coastal settlements to clear land for grazing.
The tribes resisted, but the technologically superior invaders made short work of their foes.
Survivors were herded into Catholic missions where they lost the will to share the rich oral history and survival skills passed down for countless generations.
It may have been lost forever if not for a New South Wales Parks and Wildlife initiative that facilitated hundreds of hours of face time between rangers and Aboriginal elders.
Among the participants was 36-year-old Wiradjuri ranger, Shane Herrington.
"I was born in Brungle Mission, an Aboriginal settlement 20 kilometers north of Tumut, but I never learned anything about my grandfather's people when growing up," he says.
"I knew what a boomerang and clap sticks were, but nothing more than that."
Today Herrington is a walking, talking encyclopedia on the Wiradjuri Nation and Australian bush survival skills.
He knows what foods they ate, what medicines they used, how they made tools, weapons, rope, nets, fire, shelter, boats and clothing out of possum and wallaby skins.
He's the Bear Grylls of the Great Dividing Range -- and he's willing to share his skills with anyone who joins the Wiradjuri Wonders Aboriginal Discovery Tour.
More on CNN: Surviving the world with Bear Grylls
Don't eat the mushrooms
Herrington is in his element as we walk down a fire trail in the Wereboldera State Conservation Area –- a 10-minute drive from Tumut, but a million years behind as far as civilization is concerned.
There's nothing out here but trees. And they all look the same until he starts pointing out their nutritional and medicinal values.
"This is a curry bush," he says, picking off a few leaves and crushing it in his fingertips.
"It's an herb like rosemary for cooking meat, but if you boil it in water, the vapor helps clear congestion, coughs and colds.
"This is custard apple berry," he continues, picking a small fruit from the next tree and giving it to me to eat.
It's not all that appealing. It tastes like foam.
Herrington picks up a rotting berry from under the tree and gives it to me. This one tastes like raspberry jam.
I try false sarsaparilla and native cherry, but abstain from munching on a fluorescent mushroom.
"I am very skeptical of anything that is fluorescent in the bush," Herrington says. "It usually means danger."
So how was all this stuff discovered? Through trail and error on human guinea pigs, Herrington explains.
"I wouldn't have wanted to be a weak or sick person or someone who couldn't contribute to the tribe," he says.
"They were the ones used to test foods to see if they were poisonous."
More on CNN: 10 amazing Australian hikes
The art of war
We progress to the business of making weapons and tools.
"Nine times out of ten when my ancestors went to war, it was about women," he explains. "Because women were hoarded."
We get to work making an axe by grinding the edge of a round river stone against a larger, tougher piece of quartz. It's a two-man job; I'm required to pour water to wash away the powder and filaments so Herrington can keep on grinding.
I pour from a "coolamon" –- a multi-purpose, canoe-shaped vessel made from red box tree and hardened by fire to give it a lip to retain water.
With our axe head made, we find a Kurrajong tree and start stripping the bark we then weave together to make string and rope.
It's boring, monotonous work, but it's a survival skill every indigenous Australian had to master.
"There's a misconception that women did the weaving and men made axes," Herrington says. "But men had to make rope to finish their axes and women had to make axe heads to cut meat before they cooked it."
More on CNN: The real bush tucker: How to dine like a native
After attaching our axe head to a stick using our bush-made string and sap from a green wattle tree, Herrington teaches me to use other weapons.
The boomerang is surprisingly easy to throw but aiming it is impossible –- a problem Herrington and his ancestors got around by practicing to the point where they could anticipate the boomerang's trajectory.
We also throw spears using a "woomera" – a wooden spear-launcher that lets spears travel much faster and more accurately than if thrown by hand.
Herrington uses it to launch a spear 30 meters into the woods, though mine lands limply on the dirt not far from our feet.
Fortunately, we don't have to rely on my aim to eat and lunch is delivered by another ranger in a hamper.
There's barbecue kangaroo with bush peppers and small bush tomatoes, damper bread with wattle seed and a delicious radish-like salad made from the fruit of the Kurrajong tree.
It'd been prepared the day earlier, but it's nothing Herrington couldn't rustle up on his own.
"I can survive here indefinitely," he says.
Wiradjuri Wonders Aboriginal Discovery Tours (+61 0 2 6947 7025), Tours are by reservation only and depart from the Old Butter Factory on the Snowy Mountain Highway, Tumut. Tours for up to 10 persons are A$188 ($171) for half a day or A$376 for a full day, with gourmet bush tucker lunch included.
More on CNN: 6 great Australian train journeys


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Please read description carefully.
Do not base your order on the picture presented.
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text: Dividers bolt into existing holes in shelves. Available 137⁄8"H, which fit into shelving units as they are shipped or 87⁄8"H if you are adjusting shelf heights or adding a shelf. When selecting 137⁄8"H dividers for sections of shelving without doors, select the model numbers from the "W/O Door" column. For sections of shelving with doors, select model numbers from the "With Door" column. When selecting dividers to be used in the contoured back top section of 16"D Contour shelving, use model DC-161-C for sections without doors and model DC-161-CD for sections with doors (DC-161-CD dividers require drilling one hole for installation).


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Alex McFarland on Spiritual Town Hall: Survival of America Depends on Revival of Christianity
Christian apologist Alex McFarland says that in order for America to survive there needs to be a revival of Christianity. He plans to host a spiritual town hall meeting tonight (Tuesday evening) in Charlotte, N.C., to address the position that a Christian worldview in America needs to be re-established.
"We encourage people everywhere to get serious about prayer, get serious about living out their Christian faith because I personally believe that to save America, to preserve our Constitution, we have to again in this culture reassert and proclaim and even defend the Christian worldview," McFarland recently told The Christian Post.
"The survival of America depends on a revival of Christianity. It is time for God's people to join together and pray," he states.
"Awaken – America's Spiritual Town Hall" takes place at First Baptist Church at 7 pm ET and is scheduled to be webcast live online at http://www.truthforanewgeneration.com.
McFarland, who is the director of the Christian Worldview Center at North Greenville University, said the event will emphasize "prayer, unity within the body of Christ, and the proclamation of truth."
"This spiritual town hall meeting is designed to inspire and equip the church to not only seek the face of God, but once again to proclaim the Gospel to our culture," he said.
McFarland said he was inspired to create the spiritual town hall meeting because in the same way so many politicians call town hall meetings to present their viewpoints and to interact with people at the same time, he would like to see this interaction transpire in a discussion about America and the church.
"One of my passions is to encourage churches and equip churches to reach people for Christ. Many churches in America will not see any salvations in the next 12 months and yet we are called to help people find new life in Jesus Christ," he said. "At the spiritual town hall meeting people will be able to ask questions of experts like Dr. Ken Hemphill and others. They can ask questions they can interact and hopefully come away from the spiritual town hall meeting with not only a vision for what they can do for the Gospel in their community but a commitment for the duration to see America saved through the reassertion of a Biblical worldview."
During a radio broadcast on an American Family Network program on Monday, McFarland re-emphasized his belief that the nation needs revival.
"We're going to talk about revival. We're going to talk about the spiritual condition of our country. One of the things that we really need to talk about is religious freedom in America," he said. "We've got to have a revival in America and the church is the conscience of the culture. This is really about a one night rally and with the help of God do what we can do to change the spiritual direction of our country."


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Thursday, December 20, 2012
Responding to Compliments: Do I Really Have to Say "Thank You" or Can I Just Spit Three Times?
By Ela Newman
Instructor in Developmental Writing and in ESL
University of Texas at Brownsville
Advice about Compliments … the Surprise of the Hour
"Well, at least they have a healthy pile of magazines I can shuffle through," I consoled myself after hearing that it would be a bit longer before the doctor could see me. Passing over the monthlies dealing with sports, cars, and teenage-hood, I settled on a magazine concerning lifestyles–and that's where I found the surprise of the hour… an article entitled 10 Things Your Mother Never Taught You, which included a section on how to take a compliment.
"Really?" I thought, questioning the piece's relevance to the average American audience. To my at-least-somewhat-assimilated mind (which has lived in the US for about ten years now), most Americans seem to accept compliments almost automatically.
Responses to Compliments… Spitting
As I began to read the section, I recalled having to adjust my reactions to compliments when I relocated to the US. In Poland, where I was raised, people almost invariably downgrade or even reject compliments. Reading on, I found mention of someone's relatives who, in the face of a compliment, spat three times in order to avoid bad luck.
Read more »


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View more videos at: http://nbcchicago.com.
The light of day shone on a World War II fighter plane Friday for the first time in almost 68 years, when crews recovered the crashed aircraft from the waters of Lake Michigan.
On Dec. 28, 1944, a FM-2 "Wildcat" Fighter aircraft crashed and sank during a training mission in Waukegan Harbor, NBCChicago.com reported. Engine failure was blamed, and the plane was left in about 200 feet of water, according to NBCChicago.com.
Friday's recovery, which had an audience of nearly 100, was the first milestone toward getting the plane restored and eventually in a museum, the Chicago Tribune reported. A 78-year-old pilot from Mettawa, Ill. paid for the recovery, according to the newspaper.
"It's a pretty inspiring thing," pilot Charles Greenhill told the Tribune. "You think you get used to it, but you don't."
The plane is expected to be transported to Greenhill's Kenosha, Wis., hangar and then to Pensacola, Fla., where it'll undergo a full restoration -- which could take at least five years -- at the National Museum of Naval Aviation, the Tribune reported. It's hoped that the plane will permanently reside in a proposed museum on the former Naval Air Station Glenview site in Illinois, according to the newspaper.
Courtesy NBCChicago.com
Crews remove a FM-2 "Wildcat" Fighter aircraft on Friday that crashed during a training mission on Dec. 28, 1944, in Waukegan Harbor.
Related: WWII veteran returns wedding photos 68 years later
The "Wildcat" aircraft was one of the planes used to train Navy pilots during World War II, and they'd practice flying from the naval air station and from aircraft carriers, the Daily Herald in suburban Chicago reported. During the war, over 17,000 pilots trained over Lake Michigan, according to Rockford, Ill. NBC affiliate WREX.
"This thing would've been a piece of junk," Greenhill told the Daily Herald. "Instead, it will become a piece of history that people will be able to see and appreciate."
The recovery happened on a day of related significance: Friday was the 71st anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, which claimed thousands of lives and launched the United States into World War II, according to The Associated Press.
Related: Pearl Harbor dead remembered on 71st anniversary
Related: NBC's George Lewis blogs about remembering Pearl Harbor
More content from NBCNews.com:
- Woman survives six days in snow eating tomatoes
- Shark bait? Rotting whale on Malibu beach raises fear
- Mormon church website: 'Sexuality is not a choice'
- 7 dogs rescued as police bust dog fight
- Video: Deaf twins hear for the first time


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Battle for Venezuela being fought online
LIMA, Peru — The battle for Venezuela is being fought as vigorously online as on the streets, with opposition activists tracking the government crackdown on social networks, and authorities fighting back by cutting Internet to a clash-torn city, and selectively blocking websites and a communication app popular with protesters.
Beatriz Font, a local TV reporter in San Cristobal, capital of the western border state of Tachira, said Thursday night that she could hear gunshots and police were breaking up protests just as they had the night before when Internet service was cut in this city.
"We're still without Internet. And some people don't have water or electricity either," Font said from this university town which has seen some of the fiercest anti-government demonstrations.
Later, the U.S. company Zello said Venezuela's state-run telecoms company, CANTV, had just blocked access to the push-to-talk, "walkie-talkie" application, a hugely popular organizing tool for protesters from Egypt to Ukraine.
The app for smartphones and computers supports up to 600 users on a single channel, and company CEO Bill Moore said it became the No. 1 app in Ukraine on Thursday for both the Apple and Android operating systems. In one day this week, Zello reported more than 150,000 downloads in Venezuela.
Some believe Venezuela's information war, which last week included the government's blocking of images on Twitter after violence in Caracas claimed three lives, is only just beginning.
The socialist government cemented a near-monopoly on the country's broadcast media during the 14-year rule of President Hugo Chavez, who died last March, and social media have been crucial in recent days for opposition activists as they organized and exchanged information on deaths, injuries and arrests.
Net-savvy activists reported a serious nationwide degradation in Internet service provided by CANTV, which handles about 90 percent of the country's traffic. They said websites including NTN24.com, a Colombia-based regional news network, and pastebin.com, bulletin boards that cyberactivists use to anonymously share information, were being blocked.
U.S.-based company Renesys, a top analyzer of global Internet traffic, confirmed the website blocking and service degradation, but said it could not determine if CANTV was decreasing bandwidth.
"I certainly don't know from our data if it is deliberate, although given the context, it seems plausible," said Renesys researcher Doug Madory.
Venezuela's traffic to its close ally Cuba over the ALBA-1 cable, meanwhile, appeared unaffected, he said.
Programmer and cyberactivist Jose Luis Rivas, who is from San Cristobal but did give his location for fear of persecution, said the Internet went out in most of the city of 600,000 about midnight Wednesday.
All across Venezuela since street protests accelerated last week, opposition activists have posted online YouTube videos of riot police and national guard breaking them up. Sometimes the security forces are accompanied by pistol-packing motorcycle gangs of Chavista loyalists that the opposition also blames for killings and other abuses.
Rivas said that on Wednesday night, before the Internet went out in San Cristobal, people were live-streaming video of a crackdown by security forces.
Cutting the Internet deprived people of their only access to uncensored information and Rivas said people told him "they felt fear because they were no longer informed."
Government officials have not commented on the Internet outage and did not respond to Associated Press queries on either it or the service degradation and website blocking.
Spokespeople for Conatel, the government telecommunications regulator, and the Ministry of Information, said they were not authorized to discuss the matter.
Conatel's director, William Castillo, tweeted Thursday that social networks were being "invaded by cybercriminals who are attacking accounts and manipulating information."
Information Minister Delcy Rodriguez used Twitter to complain that they were being used to incite "coup-directed violence and create anguish in a major psychological operation."
Hacktivists have indeed been attacking government websites from abroad, rendering many unreachable with denial-of-service attacks that flood them with data packets.
Twitter complained last week that CANTV blocked access to images on the service, and company spokesman Nu Wexler said Thursday that it had since taken measures to "ensure continuity of service."
Twitter also continued to tweet a workaround that lets users in Venezuela to receive tweets on their cellphones via text message.
Venezuela has been blocking websites that track the black market rate for the country's currency for months and that blocked access for some weeks to the popular Web address-shortening application Bitly.
The international director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Danny O'Brien, said he thought the Venezuelan Internet censorship to be "somewhat haphazard and arbitrary," indicating that not a great deal of thought had gone into it.
Nearly half of Venezuela's population relies on government-controlled media as its sole information source, the rest on the Internet. But cutting off Internet is not smart political strategy, said O'Brien.
"I think the important lesson people should learn from these Internet blackouts is that they just throw fuel on the flames of civil unrest," he said.
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Welcome to my blog! I'm a Sr. Software Development Engineer in the Seattle area, who has been performing C++/C#/Java development for over 20 years, but have definitely learned that there is always more to learn!
All thoughts and opinions expressed in my blog and my comments are my own and do not represent the thoughts of my employer.
Once again, in this series of posts I look at features of Visual Studio that may seem trivial, but can help improve your efficiency as a developer. The index of all my past little wonders posts can be found here.
Well, my friends, this post will be a bit short because I'm in the middle of a bit of a move at the moment. But, that said, I didn't want to let the blog go completely silent this week, so I decided to add another Little Wonder to the list for the Visual Studio IDE.
How often have you wanted to change an option or execute a command in Visual Studio, but can't remember where the darn thing is in the menu, settings, etc.? If so, Quick Launch in VS2012 (or Quick Access in VS2010 with the Productivity Power Tools extension) is just for you!
For those of you using Visual Studio 2012, Quick Launch is built right into the IDE at the top of the title bar, near the minimize, maximize, and close buttons:
But do not despair if you are using Visual Studio 2010, you can get Quick Access from the Productivity Power Tools extension. To do this, you can go to the extension manager:
And then go to the gallery and search for Productivity Power Tools and install it. If you don't have VS2012 yet, then the Productivity Power Tools is the next best thing. This extension updates VS2010 with features such as Quick Access, the Solution Navigator, searchable Add Reference Dialog, better tab wells, etc. I highly recommend it!
But back to the topic at hand! In VS2012 Quick Launch is built into the IDE and can be accessed by clicking in the Quick Launch area of the title bar, or by pressing CTRL+Q. If you have VS2010 with the PPT installed, though, it is called Quick Access and is accessible through View –> Quick Access:
Regardless of which IDE you are using, the feature behaves mostly the same. It allows you to search all of Visual Studio's commands and options for a particular topic. For example, let's say you want to change from tabs to tabs expanded to spaces, but don't remember where that option is buried. You can bring up Quick Launch / Quick Access and type in "tabs":
And it brings up a list of all options on tabs, you can then choose the one appropriate to you and click on it and it will take you right there!
A lot easier than diving through the options tree to find what you are looking for!
It also works on menu commands, for example if you can't remember how to open the Output window:
It shows you the menu items that will get you to the Output window, and (if applicable) the keyboard shortcuts. Again, clicking on one of these will perform the action for you as well.
There are also some tasks you can perform directly from Quick Launch / Quick Access. For example, perhaps you are one of those people who like to have the line numbers in your editor (I do), so let's bring up Quick Launch / Quick Access and type "line numbers":
And let's select Turn Line Numbers On, and now our editor looks like:
And Voila! We have line numbers in VS2010. You can do this in VS2012 too, but it takes you to the option settings instead of directly turning them off and on. There are bound to be differences between the way the two editors organize settings and commands, but you get the point.
So, as you can see, the Quick Launch / Quick Access feature in Visual Studio makes it easy to jump right to the options, commands, or tasks you are interested in without all the digging.
An IDE as powerful as Visual Studio has so many options and commands that it can be confusing to remember how to find and invoke them. Quick Launch (Quick Access in VS2010 with Productivity Power Tools extension) is a quick and handy way to jump to any of these options, commands, or tasks quickly without having to remember in what menu or screen they are buried!
Print | posted on Thursday, November 15, 2012 7:17 PM |
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text: All of my work is original and authentically hand created. I work from my studio in my home in Cornwall, South West England and take my inspiration from the beautiful landscape- the nearby sea and moorlands. I also like to paint historical subjects and fantasy. The area I live in is steeped in Arthurian myths and legends and fairy stories. I have sold examples of my work through various galleries in the UK and to many international buyers via online sites.