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2007 Los Angeles Auto Show Photos & Coverage Part 2
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The Los Angeles Auto Show came to prominence last year when it emerged from the shadow of the mammoth Detroit Auto Show by moving to November from its previous mid-January slot and received the "International" designation from the OICA for the first time since it's inception in 1907.
Over a dozen concept and production vehicles are expected to make their global debuts at this year's LA Show alongside some 30 vehicles making their first appearance on North American shores.
Hyundai's Concept Genesis Coupe has been rather loudly unveiled at the LA Auto Show today, by virtue of Sonic Orange paintwork, and a hood, roof, and ground effects made from carbon fiber. Power will come from an unspecified turbo four or the optional 3.8-liter, 300 horsepower V6 with power sent to the rear wheels through a six-speed manual or auto gearbox. This is not a replacement for the Tiburon coupe, however. Turns out, there will still be a milder front-wheel drive coupe continuing on in the lineup alongside the Genesis Coupe -- possibly based on the Veloster Concept. Other optional goodies will include Brembo brakes and a limited-slip differential. Combined with the aerodynamic trickery on this concept version, these have us eagerl waiting for the production version in spring 2009.
Chevrolet has announced that its Tahoe Hybrid will start at $50,490 for 2WD models and $53,295 for 4WD models, including the $900 destination charge. The 2WD model is said to get 50 percent improved city fuel economy with an overall 30-percent mpg improvement. The full-size SUV pairs a V-8 with a full hybrid system developed with then-DaimlerChrysler and BMW. The result is an SUV that can still tow 6,000 pounds in 4WD models (6,200 pounds with 2WD, Chevy says) but has the city fuel economy of a four-cylinder {{{Toyota Camry}}}.
Jaguar's stylish new XF sedan that cannot be anything short of a complete success made its first appearance on North American soil at the 2007 Los Angeles Auto Show. Engine options consist of two 4.2-liter V-8s -- a naturally aspirated variant making 300 horsepower and 310 lb-ft of torque, the other a supercharged mill that makes 420 horsepower and 408 lb-ft of torque. Both will be mated to a six-speed automatic transmission. Jaguar has set the base price of the standard 2009 XF at $49,975 and the supercharged version at $55,975. Deliveries will begin March 2008.
Improving on the not-quite-a-real-hybrid last-generation Silverado Hybrid, Chevy introduces the 2009 Silverado Hybrid, which can drive at speeds up to 30 mph on electrics alone. The new hybrid system boosts fuel economy 40 percent in the city and 25 percent overall. With a 6.0-liter V-8 engine, the Silverado Hybrid can tow 6,100 pounds and, as long as you don't have a lead foot, can supposedly drive from San Francisco to San Diego on one 26-gallon tank of gas.
The U.S. version of the hotly-awaited 2009 Nissan GT-R Porsche-hunter carries the same 480 horsepower twin-turbo 3.8-liter V-6 as the right-hand drive version that was seen last month at the Tokyo Motor Show. Price will start at a Z06-competitive $69,850. Dealers will begin taking pre-orders in January with deliveries beggining in June.
Like the Tundra, the Sequoia is vastly improved and should grab a larger share of its shrinking segment. The Tundra's aluminum 5.7-liter V-8 is optional on SR5 and Limited and standard on the new Lexus-like Platinum. The old 4.7 iron block remains the base engine until a new smaller V-8 derivative of the 5.7 is ready.
The Tundra's cheesy familiar dash makes it into the Sequoia, but the SUV gets an independent rear suspension for third-row seating (with optional electric fold-down) good enough for average-size adults on short trips. There's a false floor under the flat-folding second and third rows. The Sequoia feels smaller than the Tundra, and that it is, except in its fuel economy. That's where bad timing can really hurt.
The 2009 Chevrolet Aveo5 is a sporty, economical, yet practical addition to GM's 2007 LA Auto Show lineup. Powered by a Ecotec 1.6-liter DOHC engine, the Aveo5 is capable of fuel economy ratings of 26 city / 34 highway, while still producing a full 107 horsepower and 106 lb-ft of torque. The engine comes mated to a five-speed manual or four-speed automatic transmission, and is supplemented by variable valve timing technology. In true "tall car" style, passenger and cargo room are generous in the Aveo5, even incorporating a folding rear seat for a full 42 cubic feet of cargo space. Pricing has yet to be announced, but with the right MSRP, this guy could be a serious contender to Toyota's Yaris and Scion's xA.
At an estimated 18-city/19-highway mpg, Chrysler's 4WD, Hemi-powered hybrids fall just short of GM's hybrid-powered, 4WD versions of the Chevrolet Tahoe and GMC Yukon, which are EPA rated at 20-city/20-highway mpg, respectively. But the Hemi hybrids still manage a 25-percent overall improvement and an almost 40-percent city mpg improvement compared with their non-hybrid Aspen and Durango twins, according to the automaker. Chrysler's Multi-Displacement System, which allows the engine to run on four cylinders when all eight aren't necessary, also aids in fuel savings.
The Chrysler hybrids produce an estimated 345 horsepower (up to 385 with the electric boost) and 380 lb-ft of torque with the 5.7-liter Hemi, besting the 6.0-liter V-8-equipped GM hybrids, which produce 332 horsepower and 367 lb-ft of torque. Despite the torque and horsepower advantage, the Hemi hybrids' towing capacity is the same as GM's 4WD hybrid twins at 6000 pounds (GM's RWD versions can tow up to 6200 pounds).
Mazda presented the continuing work-in-progress that is the 2018 Mazda3 Concept at the LA Auto Show today. The design was chosen through an online competition that Mazda ran, asking young designers to present their vision of Mazda's sporty compact car. The winner of that competition, design student Mallory McMorrow (pictured), was on hand to help bring her design from the sketch pad to the full scale clay model shown - with the help of Mazda designer Jacques Flynn and Mazda's U.S. design chief Franz von Holzhausen. The final, full-scale concept model will be completed and unveiled November 24 at the LA show.


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Goodbye Nexus City
Happy new year everyone! I've used that guitar cover of The Ecstasy of Gold above as a placeholder song in various big projects over the years that haven't worked out. It seemed fitting to share it here.
Near the end of 2012, I made the very difficult decision to abandon Nexus City (and it's spinoff game, Selma's Story).
For those of you with no idea what Nexus City is – it's an RPG I was collaborating on with the writer Jonas Kyratzes. Originally a very small game, over time it grew completely out of control – at this point, Jonas and I have worked on it on and off for over two years. However, that doesn't really paint an accurate picture – I haven't worked on Nexus City itself since 2011, and I only worked on the spinoff game, Selma's Story, for two months last year.
That said, even though it's not a project I'm actively spending much of my time on, Nexus City has weighed heavily on my mind.
I've been thinking of Nexus City as "the thing I'm working on" since 2010. As a result, for a long time now, I've felt like I wasn't really in control of what I can work on. Promising games would come along, and I'd stop myself from getting too deep into them, because I had to finish Nexus City first. Everything became a big ordered list of what I could work on and when, how long I could spend on it. It's only when a project like Super Hexagon came along, and forced itself on me – became too much to ignore, that I was able to turn that part of my head off. And I could do it, but even then I constantly had that pressure – when this is done, I need to get back to Nexus City.
I don't think that's creatively healthy.
Nexus City is an amazing world with an amazing story, and there were times when I was completely obsessed with it – but the momentum is long gone now, and at this point I don't think it's ever going to happen. I need to move on to other things.
So, what's next for this year? Right now – for the moment, I think I may just take some time off. I feel like I haven't really done that in some time – it's just been one project after another pretty much as long as I remember. After that? I don't really know! I have a clean slate again for the first time in a very long time, and I'm very excited about that.20 Comments

subset: commoncrawl


text: Ben takes on new fiendish forms in Ben 10: Omniverse, Galactic Monsters. Halloween is coming early to Bellwood, and to beat scary new villains like zombie clowns and evil vampires, Ben will have to take some monster alien forms of his own. Get to know two of them, Snare-oh and Blitzwolfer, in the Ben 10 Game Creator, and check out the monstrously remixed show opening here! Monsters, mummies and werewolves may be taking over, but Ben has defended the universe from the worst of the worst. Now it's hero time on Monster Planet! The spooky fun begins with "Something Zombozo This Way Comes", when Ben and Rook must stop Zombozo and the Circus Freaks from turning everyone in Bellwood into zombie clowns. Tune-in to Cartoon Network every Saturday morning to see who comes out of the shadows next!


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(visited by Arijit Goswami and Satyajeet Sonal)
09-May-2010 -- I first came to know about this project from my dear friend Mr. Ranadeep Basu, who has already visited one confluence point in Rajasthan and he was the one who really inspired me to be a part of it.
So when we found that this point lies near to our project road: Chapra-Rewaghat-Muzaffarpur (NH-102), I decided to make a try if time permits from my job commitment. I was doing the road inventory and pavement condition survey of the NH-102 on 9th May 2010, along with Mr.Satyajeet Sonal, a final year student of NIT, Patna and presently doing his summer training in our company (Scott Wilson India Pvt. Ltd.). Unfortunately as we crossed Maker town, which is at km 35+000, we encountered a road blockade due to a serious accident. Seeing the ensuing tension within the crowd we decided to call off our days work and started returning back to our base at Muzaffarpur. To get a maximum utilization of this unprecedented spare time I decided that on our way back we will try to visit this confluence point. This point is located at a distance of around 4.8 km from km 36+600 of NH-102(the start of Rewaghat bridge over Gandak River) in the north east direction.
The point was mainly accessed after traveling around 4.7km on the brick paved bund road of the southern bank of Gandak River and we walked the rest 100m to reach the point. The point lies on the original river bed of the Gandak River, but with the seasonal change in the river regime the area is being presently used for cultivation purpose. There were few mud huts also in the vicinity. However, during discussions with villagers of the Nayatola village, which lies just on the southern side of the bund road, it was learned that during peak monsoon season, this area where the confluence point lies, get fully inundated. We did not have to try very hard to reach the point and after few minutes of stray walk we finally reached the point within plantation of bitter gourds. The Photo #1 taken on the eastern side of the point shows the general land use of the area. The Photo #2 shows the GPS reading at the point while the bund road in south is shown in Photo #4. At the end I will also like to render my thanks to our driver Tariq (shown in Photo #7), who did a great job in driving our car through the narrow 2.5m wide brick paved bund road.


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Source: Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
SLOCUM, JOSHUA, sailor and author; b. 20 Feb. 1844 in Mount Hanly, N.S., son of John Slocum and Sarah Jane Southern; m. first 31 Jan. 1871 Virginia Albertina Walker (d. 1884) in Sydney (Australia), and they had seven children; m. secondly 22 Feb. 1886 his first cousin Henrietta Miller Elliot in Boston; they had no children; d. on or shortly after 14 Nov. 1909 in the Atlantic Ocean.
Joshua Slocum's ancestors were loyalists from Massachusetts. When he was eight his family moved to the extreme western tip of Nova Scotia; his formal education ended two years later. Although his father worked on land, the males on both sides of his family had traditionally been seamen. Joshua was a cook on a local fishing boat for a while. In 1860, shortly after his mother died, he went to sea.
A year later Slocum was in the Pacific, where he would spend most of the next 23 years, developing into an accomplished sailor and navigator. About 1869 he became an American citizen. In 1875 he built a ship in the Philippines and was paid with a small ship, the first he owned. He gathered a crew to fish off Siberia; his wife Virginia, pregnant with twins, and their three children came with him. Slocum moved to larger ships twice, and remembered the second, the Northern Light, as the "finest American sailing-vessel afloat." But the age of sail was ending. In early 1884 Northern Light needed repairs that economic conditions could not justify and so became a coal barge. Slocum's career was in its twilight.
Slocum bought a new ship, the Aquidneck, which he later claimed was "nearest to perfection of beauty," and took it to South America. There Virginia died. His sons believed that he never recovered from the shock. Two years later, however, he remarried, and after six days sailed with his new wife and two of his sons to South America. At the end of 1887, following many troubles, the uninsured Aquidneck was lost on a sand bar. Slocum and his family built the Liberdade from local materials and sailed it to Washington, where the vessel was exhibited at the Smithsonian Institution. Slocum wrote a book about the adventure, which he published and sold himself, without much success. No ships were subsequently offered to him. For a while he was employed in a Boston shipyard; his wife worked as a seamstress. In 1892 an acquaintance gave him an old sloop, the Spray, which he completely rebuilt and used for an unsuccessful fishing season in 1894. He was middleaged and groping for a living. The world saw no value in his sailing skills.
In response Slocum decided to celebrate those skills by sailing alone around the world, which no one had done. He left Boston in the Spray on 24 April 1895. He returned to Nova Scotia for the first time in 35 years to visit childhood friends, and in Yarmouth he bought the one-handed clock he called his navigational chronometer. The joke hid his skills as a navigator, including his ability to find longitude by complex calculations from lunar observations. It also concealed his spirituality; lunar navigation for him was "reading the clock aloft by the Great Architect." He crossed the Atlantic to Gibraltar, where, daunted by stories of Mediterranean and Red Sea pirates, he changed direction and headed southwest towards Cape Horn, visiting Virginia's grave en route. At the end of the Americas, where the Atlantic and Pacific collide to form the most dangerous sea in the world, Slocum had "the greatest sea adventure of my life." After completing the difficult 400-mile passage through the Strait of Magellan, he was driven by a storm for four days towards Cape Horn. He thought, mistakenly, that he had rounded it, and headed north towards one of the greatest death-traps in the oceans, the shallow entrance to Cockburn Channel. In freezing darkness and fierce squalls he struggled to stand off it, and with daylight worked north into the Strait of Magellan to retrace his route into the Pacific.
Sailing westward, Slocum, a passionate reader, stopped at islands of literary significance to him: Más a Tierra (Isla Róbinson Crusoe), where Alexander Selkirk, the inspiration for Robinson Crusoe, had been stranded; and Upolu (Western Samoa), where he visited the widow of writer Robert Louis Stevenson. He arrived in Australia on 1 Oct. 1896. Word of his voyage had preceded him, and he was received with curiosity and honour. He gave newspaper interviews, raised money by giving tours of his boat, accepted hospitality, saw Virginia's relatives, and waited for the season to change. Slocum left Australia on 24 June 1897 and passed to southern Africa. By now his exploit was famous, and the explorer Henry Morton Stanley and the Boer leader Paul Kruger both received him. From the Cape of Good Hope he re-entered the Atlantic and arrived in Newport, R.I., on 27 June 1898 after a voyage of 46,000 miles. He proclaimed himself healthier, happier, and younger than when he left.
The trip had been a step into unimaginable isolation. And yet in a sense Slocum was never fully alone. He befriended a spider on Spray; turtles, porpoises, and sea lions listened to his songs; when he was sick, the pilot of Columbus's Pinta guided Spray. Although he does not seem to have been particularly Christian, he was respectfully sympathetic to all religions, and he felt the sacred in many things at sea. He withdrew from the human world and made the ocean his country.
The American public reacted with curiosity and scepticism to Slocum's voyage. His serialized account of it, which appeared during 1899 and 1900, was a popular success, as was his book, Sailing alone around the world (New York, 1900). Lectures and the book's royalties gave Slocum an income, and he bought a farm with his wife. But he was not a landsman; he drifted back to Spray and began spending winters in the West Indies. When in New Jersey to lecture to a yacht-club in 1906 he was charged with raping a 12-year-old girl, and after 42 days in jail did not dispute a reduced charge of indecent assault. He became more withdrawn from humanity. On 14 Nov. 1909 he sailed for the south from Massachusetts and was never heard from again.
[Nova Scotians claim Slocum as one of their own. A monument to him was unveiled at Westport in 1961; press articles about him appear with increasing frequency; and his book about his world voyage was adapted for radio in 1984. His defiance of a changing world, once seen as an oddity or a nuisance, is now as honoured as his seamanship.
Joshua Slocum is the author of three books on his life at sea; the first two, Voyage of the "Liberdade" ; description of a voyage "down to the sea" (1890) and Voyage of the "Destroyer" from New York to Brazil (1894), were privately issued at Boston. A publisher's edition of Voyage of the "Liberdade" which omitted some appended material appeared there in 1894, and has been reprinted (New York, 1967). "Sailing alone around the world" first appeared in monthly instalments in Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine (New York and London), September 1899–March 1900, and was then published in monograph form (New York, 1900). It has since gone through numerous reprintings and subsequent editions, as well as several translations.
The full texts of Slocum's books, including the appendices to the 1890 Voyage of the "Liberdade", and many of his letters are available in The voyages of Joshua Slocum, a new edition prepared by Walter Magnes Teller (New Brunswick, N.J., 1958; 2nd ed., Dobbs Ferry, N.Y., 1985).
Archival sources on Slocum are relatively few and are scattered. Whatever papers he had were lost with Spray. His early life was documented by his eldest son in Victor Slocum, Capt. Joshua Slocum: the life and voyages of America's best known sailor (New York, 1950; repr. Homewell, Eng., 1981), a British edition of which was published under the title The life and voyages of Captain Joshua Slocum (London, 1952). In The voyages of Joshua Slocum, Teller provides a note on sources; additional documentation appears in his preliminary biography, The search for Captain Slocum, a biography (New York, 1956), and in the extensively revised and augmented version of it, Joshua Slocum (New Brunswick, 1971).
The main holdings in public institutions are in the United States. There is also material in the Mitchell Library, Sydney, Australia. The holdings of the PANS are disappointing. The only material relating to Slocum is a few pages of research notes within the C. B. Fergusson papers at MG 1, 1846, F/3; however, the genealogical collection and clipping files contain some useful items. There are also some relevant clippings and notes in the Arch. files of the Yarmouth County Museum and Hist. Research Library, Yarmouth, N.S., including an account of Slocum's visit from the 29 Sept. 1897 issue of the Planters & Commercial Gazette of Port Louis, Mauritius.
A fictionalized "autobiography" of Slocum by Robert Blondin, 7° de solitude ouest: autobiographie apocryphe reconstituée à partir de souvenirs recueillis au grenier de la légende volontaire du héros, was published in Montreal in 1989, and is now available in an English translation, The solitary Slocum (Halifax, 1992).
Modern solo sailors have taken Slocum as their inspiration and their teacher. However, they have yachts that are products of a technologically advanced society, are sponsored, and are linked to supporters at home by radio. A good indication of the extent to which these sailors are no longer isolated is provided in Dan Chu and Bonnie Bell, "While Bill Pinkney sails the world alone, thousands of Chicago school kids are keeping him company," People Weekly (Chicago), 26 Nov. 1990: 101–5. b.d.m.]
R. B. Powell, "First, solo trip around the world," Chronicle-Herald (Halifax), 15 Aug. 1964: 9. Along the clipper way . . . , ed. Francis Chichester (London, 1966). D. B. Sharp, "Joshua Slocum – sailing master," Nautical Quarterly (New York), no.3 (April 1978): 88–97. W. [M.] Teller, "The Canadian who sailed alone around the world," Canadian Geographic (Ottawa), 100 (1980–81), no.3: 74–79.
© 1994–2023 University of Toronto/Université Laval
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Brian D. Murphy, "SLOCUM, JOSHUA," in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 13, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–, accessed September 29, 2023, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/slocum_joshua_13E.html.
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Evil Under the Sun
1Again I saw all the oppressions that are done under the sun. And behold, the tears of the oppressed, and they had no one to comfort them! On the side of their oppressors there was power, and there was no one to comfort them. 2And I thought the dead who are already dead more fortunate than the living who are still alive. 3But better than both is he who has not yet been and has not seen the evil deeds that are done under the sun.
4Then I saw that all toil and all skill in work come from a man's envy of his neighbor. This also is vanity1 and a striving after wind.
5The fool folds his hands and eats his own flesh.
6Better is a handful of quietness than two hands full of toil and a striving after wind.
7Again, I saw vanity under the sun: 8one person who has no other, either son or brother, yet there is no end to all his toil, and his eyes are never satisfied with riches, so that he never asks, "For whom am I toiling and depriving myself of pleasure?" This also is vanity and an unhappy business.
9Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. 10For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up! 11Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? 12And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.
13Better was a poor and wise youth than an old and foolish king who no longer knew how to take advice. 14For he went from prison to the throne, though in his own kingdom he had been born poor. 15I saw all the living who move about under the sun, along with that2 youth who was to stand in the king's3 place. 16There was no end of all the people, all of whom he led. Yet those who come later will not rejoice in him. Surely this also is vanity and a striving after wind.
All Those Lonely PeopleEcclesiastes 4:1-16 Sermon • Includes Transcript • 40:25 • ID: 2294
No Series were found this for passage.
Scripture taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. Copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Text provided by the Crossway Bibles Web Service.


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You have to be quite a bastard to get your own royal fan club. Charles I has one—The Society of King Charles the Martyr celebrates the 17th-century Stuart king who was executed in the English revolution.
And so does Richard III, in the form of the Richard III Society, whose members (aka Ricardians) are devoted to rehabilitating the name of the most notorious medieval monarch: a man whom Shakespeare famously painted as a deformed, black-souled fiend, determined to "seem a saint, when most I play the devil."
The Ricardians have been in good spirits this week, after the remains of their hero were formally identified by a team of cartographers, archaeologists, genealogists, bone specialists, and DNA analysts, working out of Leicester University and coordinated by Philippa Langley, a member of the Richard III Society. At a press conference, Monday, the team stated that it was "beyond reasonable doubt" that a skeleton dug up last fall under a parking lot was indeed that of the long-lost king.
The skeleton had a curve in its spine, a lump hacked from its skull, spindly arms and the marks of "humiliation wounds" inflicted after death, including a knife to the backside. It had been buried in a shallow grave, perhaps with its hands tied, certainly with little ceremony. It had not exactly rested in peace.
The revelation has been a massive (and craftily orchestrated) PR coup for the city of Leicester. It has also been a boon for the Ricardians. Their chairman, Dr. Phil Stone, wrote yesterday that he hoped the discovery would "open up the debate about the king and his reputation." And it has.
Some backstory—in case you skipped history and/or English lit (and/or all the news this week so far). Before Richard III was king he was a notably loyal lieutenant to his brother, King Edward IV, keeping order in the north on behalf of the king. But when Edward IV died, Richard usurped the crown from his brother's 12-year old son, Edward V, justifying his actions on the spurious grounds that the boy and his brother were illegitimate. Later, Richard quite probably—although this is ultimately unproven—had Edward V and his brother murdered. (You see where Game Of Thrones gets it from?)
Despite a reign that featured some relatively enlightened policies, particularly in the realms of social justice and public finance, Richard's brief reign was stained by the crime of his usurpation—a wild action that threw into disarray the fragile politics of a realm only recently recovered from civil war.
The immediate product of the usurpation was Richard's own defeat: killed by another usurper, Henry Tudor, at the battle of Bosworth on August 22, 1485. But the longer-term product was a blackening of Richard's name. Successive writers loyal to the incoming Tudor regime built up an image of Richard from a usurper king who met a sticky end to a crippled beast whose inner malice was perfectly expressed by his outward grotesqueness. "That crewell nature of his did so rage agaynst yt self in that lyttle carkase," wrote the early 16th-century historian Polydore Vergil. Everyone else—More, Edward Hall, Raphael Holinshed, and Shakespeare—followed suit.
That image is what the Ricardians still kick against today. The gap between the Tudors' black propaganda and the reality of Richard's life and career seems to strike them as an offense against all reason and honor. They have striven long and hard to humanize the man—as has been done this week—in the hope that it may help others to reassess his reputation.
Not everything, of course, has turned out perfectly. When I spoke to one Ricardian last fall, before much work on the skeleton had been completed, she speculated that "if [the skeleton] is Richard and he wasn't a hunchback, then we can say 'that's one thing the Tudors got wrong. What else did they get wrong?'"
Unfortunately, we now know that Richard was, if not precisely a hunchback, pretty heavily afflicted by a spinal deformation from around the age of 10. His weak, thin, arms, and lopsided shoulders would have presented exactly the sort of impression that the Tudor writers gave him. Vergil again: "He was lyttle of stature, deformyd of body, thone showlder being higher than thother." So in fact, one of the earlier Tudor propagandists got it spot on.
Where does this leave Richard? Historically, we haven't learned very much at all. The Leicester findings mostly confirm reports about the last hours of his life and his death. As was suspected, he was killed by a blow from behind while unhorsed. He was clearly abused after his death. He was buried in ignominy. Moreover, his appearance matches what many of his detractors stated, even if his character is no better known. Of his deeds nothing changes. He was a loyal servant, a dastardly usurper, and a well-meaning but doomed king.
But even in the absence of much new information, the Richard III Society will surely flourish. The evidence was not quite as helpful to them as they may have hoped, but the publicity has been tremendous. Richard is being debated. Indeed, 527 and a half years after his violent death in the English Midlands, Richard III finds himself dug up, plastered all over the TV bulletins, and trending on Twitter. That's the way to get yourself a new generation of fans.


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I am trying to make a theoretical hedge to a bull call spread. (buy out the money call, sell further out the money call)
What I have now is almost effective but there is one possible 80% loss (amongst consistent 70% gains in an equally likely scenario, and 300% gains in an extreme scenario)
Best case scenario: 70% gain
Worst case scenario: 80% loss
Black swan bearish scenario: 300+% gain (this is a factor of the hedge)
What I would like my hedge to do is mitigate the worst case scenario.
Here is the rationale: QQQ Bull Call Spread in near term, this is bullish (qqq represents the nasdaq composite)
FAZ long calls in back month (to mitigate theta), this is bearish as FAZ is a 3x leveraged ETF (albiet on the finance sector). FAZ will increase in value 3x for every 1 point move down QQQ makes. Calls will get intrinsic value very quickly.
For this site's sake, I'm not caring too much about the symbols. I am interested trying to find a cheap hedge that increases 3x faster if the other side of the trade fails. Right now I almost have that, but not yet.
The key variables to manipulate are:
Balance: How much of the hedge is held in proportion to the main trade. This simulation shows 10 bull call spreads, hedged by 1 long call in an inverse ETF
Theta: The front month expires faster than the back month. The back month hedge can be closed before the effects of theta become apparent. But the further out you go for the back month, the most expensive it gets
Expense: the hedge ideally should not be more expensive than the potential profit of the main trade, but it is expected to cut into the theoretical max profit of the main trade.
The key is to get the shape of the risk profile to have a smaller dip into the negative at any point on the graph.


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Mickie Rosen, head of global media at Yahoo, who was responsible for properties including Yahoo News, Sports and Finance, is leaving the company effective Sept. 1, Yahoo revealed Monday in a regulatory filing.
The change was announced just hours after Yahoo disclosed the resignation of three board members: Daniel Loeb, Harry Wilson and Michael Wolf, effective July 31, bringing the size of the company's board down to seven. "The remaining directors are committed to revisiting the board's size and composition," Yahoo said in a statement. However, the two events are believed to be unrelated.
The board members' resignations were disclosed alongside Yahoo's announcement of its repurchase of 40 million shares of Yahoo common stock owned by hedge fund Third Point, at a purchase price of US$29.11 per share. Loeb is CEO at Third Point; the hedge fund had nominated Wilson and Wolf as Yahoo board members.
In a separate filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Yahoo said that Rosen, who had served as senior vice president, global media and commerce since 2011, would receive severance benefits specified in her existing agreement with the company. A Yahoo spokeswoman declined to comment further on Rosen's departure or provide information about a replacement.
Yahoo's media division includes multiple site properties that are critical to the company's business, such as Yahoo Sports, Yahoo Finance and Yahoo Video, which provides original, premium and third-party content that is distributed across Yahoo's network.
Since October, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer has attracted more attention for a slew of small mobile acquisitions than for revamping Yahoo's media offerings. But video in particular is one of four key revenue opportunities the company expects to focus on in the immediate future, Mayer said last week during the company's second-quarter earnings call.
During the call, Mayer called video a primary area of investment over the next year, along with new products geared toward improving the company's display advertising revenue, which fell by 11 percent in the quarter.
Yahoo faces enormous pressure to reinvent itself and demonstrate its relevance to users who have flocked to rival Internet companies such as Facebook, Twitter and Google. Some industry analysts have characterized the company as a sinking ship, but the departures of board members Loeb, Wolf and Wilson and media chief Rosen are not connected, said Erik Gordon, associate director at the University of Michigan's Zell Lurie Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies.
"Loeb dumped two-thirds of his stock, and his guys left the board, because he thinks the chances of the stock price going up are too slim to justify the risk of having so much money in the company," Gordon said.
But Rosen left for her own reasons, including the fact that Yahoo's media team "are losing their independence," he said, adding that Mayer wants more direct control over the media business.
Yahoo's stock has risen more than 70 percent over the past year, though Mayer's tech-celebrity status and the company's stake in the profitable Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba have been key factors in its ascension, experts have said.


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The Secret Beyond Matter
The site you are about to read reveals a crucial secret of your life. You should read it very attentively and thoroughly for it concerns a subject that is liable to make fundamental changes in your outlook on the external world. the subject of this chapter is not just a point of view, a different approach, or a traditional or philosophical thought: it is a fact which everyone, believing or unbelieving, must admit and which is also proven by science today.
Matter: The Other Name For Illusion
Mr. Adnan Oktar tells the Secret Beyond Matter


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WASHINGTON (AP) ? President Barack Obama is telling Latino voters their choice in the election "will not be that difficult" because he's the only one who backs comprehensive immigration reform.
In a reference to Mitt Romney, Obama says the GOP's "leading candidate" would even veto the Dream Act, which gives a pathway to citizenship to children here illegally if they attend college or join the military. Romney has said he would support modified legislation that applies only to young people who join the military.
Despite Obama's support for reform, he has made little progress on immigration. He blames congressional Republicans, saying they are unwilling to work on the issue.
Obama spoke during an interview with Eddie "Piolin" Sotelo, a Hispanic radio personality.


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Wednesday night the Cotuit Santuit Civic Association met at the Cotuit Library to hear representatives from Three Bays and Mass Audubon describe their proposed dredging and bird habitat restoration application. Engineers were also in attendance to answer questions.
This was an informational session for the members of the Association. January 8 the application will be presented to Barnstable's Conservation Commission for its review, part of a long permitting process that will require sign off from the town's waterways and shellfish committees, the state, and eventually the Army Corps of Engineers.
The application is for a permit to dredge, in three winter phases, about 800 feet or 11 acres of sand off of the western spit of Sampsons and backfill it through pipes to the east end by the Wianno Cut, the man-made breach dug through the sand spit in the early 1900s. This would build up the sand-starved section behind the western jetty of the cut, prevent an over-wash and breach of Nantucket Sound through the island into the Seapuit River, and re-establish a gentle berm on a beach that is now a sheer wall of eroded scarp unsuitable for the nesting shorebirds that make the barrier island one of the most important shorebird breeding areas in Massachusetts.
Here's a bullet list of random new things I learned. If you want to get smart about the project, go to the 3 Bays website and take a look at the application and engineering plans yourself.
- The western spit and Cotuit entrance to the three-bays has been dredged several times in the past: 1934, 1947 and 1967. Three Bays has been active in dredging the internal channel and has shaved a few dozen feet from the point in recent times. I remember the 1967-68 project when the sand was not pumped east, but deposited in a small hill right behind the point, a hill that has since been overgrown with beach grass.
- No one knows what the recent appearance of clay on the south side of Cotuit point means. It would need to be excavated and trucked away.
- The opening of the channel will improve Cotuit Bay's water quality about 7% (I don't know by what measure, e.g. nitrogen ppm, etc.) and the overall three-bay systems by 3%
- The tree removal proposed by Mass Audubon is to reduce the copse of trees around the eastern shores of Cupid's Cove (variously referred to last night as "Cupid's" "Pirate's" and "Lovers Cove) to reduce predation of tern and piping plover chicks by crows.
- The sand is needed to provide more open breeding ground for the birds who cannot breed in dense vegetation. Hence the plan is not to pump, shore up, and plant protective beach grass, but to create more open sand areas favorable for the birds to make their nests.
- This application gives the two groups permission to maintain the project over a decade without having to re-apply.
- If nothing is done then several scenarios could emerge. 1) the east end breaches, Seapuit River is compromised, and the island could join Grand Island/Oyster Harbors 2) Cupid's Cove will continue to overwash and eventually breach and 3) the Cotuit end could join the mainland around Riley's Beach.
- Sampson's was the private property of one Harry Bailey (must research who he was) who donated it to Mass Audubon with the express wish that it be maintained as a wildlife sanctuary.
- In 1958 there were 1000 pairs of nesting common terns, the best year ever. Now a good year is considered to see less than half that number, with 400 pairs nesting in 1998. Other species include roseate and least terns.
- In terms of bird predation, the biggest killers are crows and coyotes. Humans only can be directly connected to one percent of bird deaths.
- Kicking people off the island is not a motive. The barrier island is very crowded with boaters and sunbathers in the peak months of July and August. While Mass Audubon requires a membership card to sit on the beach (I strongly recommend you get one for your family if you haven't and put it on an automatic renewal) there is no indication they are trying to "kick people" off the beach. Dickheads who bring dogs to the island should be horsewhipped. For the most part the bird wardens do a good job "fencing" off the breeding spots with string and sticks and generally being a friendly presence, checking membership cards and offering to educate people about the importance of the reserve.
- The project will cost $1.5 million, which will need to be raised from private donors. Former town councilor Rick Barry quizzed Lindsay Counsell, the executive director of Three Bays, about the use of public funds, but it wasn't clear to me whether Three Bays would seek town assistance as it tries to get its dredging projects integrated with the town's comprehensive dredging plan. That would cut down on the expensive re-permitting process.
- The engineers said alternatives to the proposal have been considered and rejected as too expensive or unfeasible due to the regulatory environment. Questions from the audience about alternatives to carving off of the point for sand, and going into Nantucket Sound either as part of a process to widen and deepen the navigational channels or take sand from further out in the Sound were rejected due to regulatory difficulties in such "sand mining."
- Best case scenario for starting the three-year project would be to get all permits in place by next fall and commence the first dredging in January and February 2014. That small window follows the busy holiday season at the Cotuit and Cape Cod Oyster Companies, and would complete the work before the birds migrate and begin to breed in late April, early May. The dredging would continue in 2015 and 2016.
Conclusions: I remain in favor, but the sad reality is this is a Sisyphean project that will need to be repeated over and over. The culprit in everybody's mind is the "armoring" of the coast line by the wealthy waterfront owners in the late 19th and early 20th centuries with groins, bulkheads and jetties. If we were to seek an everlasting solution then the answer would be to remove the Osterville jetties, plug the Wianno Cut, and force the removal of all man made structures along the coast line that now impede the natural coastal drift of the sand.
And even then, if that impossible vision were achieved, we'd need to confront that fact that rampant coastal development has utterly trashed the interior estuaries and getting nitrogen levels down is the only way to get water quality back to pre 1970-Rape-Of-The-Cape levels.
So, dredge away and dredge some more, don't bring your dog to the island, read up, and get involved.


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AP Newsbreak: AZ sheriff played probe for laughs
Apr 23, 2012, 12:17 AM
Associated Press
PHOENIX (AP) – An audio recording has surfaced of an Arizona sheriff playing his refusal to cooperate in a racial profiling investigation for laughs at a fundraiser for an anti-illegal immigration group in Texas. He ridicules politicians who sought the probe and displayed contempt toward federal authorities who were _ and are still _ investigating him on two fronts.
The dismissive comments in 2009 by Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio came as the U.S. Justice Department had already launched a civil rights probe of his trademark immigration patrols and the FBI already was examining abuse-of-power allegations for the sheriff's investigations of political foes.
In the September 2009 speech in Houston, Arpaio boasted that he arrested hundreds of illegal immigrants after politicians and federal investigators started to pick apart his patrols. He said he wouldn't cooperate with the inquiry, but said he would tone down the patrols _ if he was proven wrong.
"But I'm not. After they went after me, we arrested 500 more just for spite," the self-proclaimed "America's toughest sheriff" said, pausing for laughter and applause.
In an interview Thursday, Arpaio defended his comments before Texans For Immigration Reform as a collection of humorous off-the-cuff remarks intended merely to show that he wasn't going to back down to critics.
"These are not official, under-oath speeches," Arpaio said. "It's strictly a speech that when I'm talking to certain groups, they like to hear what I have to say, because they know I'm under the gun."
The sheriff currently awaits a lawsuit that the U.S. Justice Department has promised to file over its civil rights allegations. Arpaio's office is accused of racially profiling Latinos and retaliating against critics of its immigration patrols.
Talks to settle the case before going to court fell apart earlier this month when Arpaio balked at a proposal to let a court-appointed official monitor his operations to make sure his office isn't making unconstitutional arrests.
The current status of the criminal investigation against Arpaio's office is unknown. At the time of the speech, the FBI was already several months into its investigation of the sheriff's anti-public corruption squad that criminally investigated county officials and judges who were at odds with Arpaio in legal and political disputes. A grand jury has been investigating those allegations since at least December 2009.
Two county officials and a judge were charged in cases that collapsed in court just a few months after they were filed. An Arpaio ally who prosecuted the cases was disbarred in a ruling earlier this month by an ethics panel of the Arizona courts.
That decision said the cases were brought to embarrass the trio of county officials and that evidence suggested the sheriff conspired with the prosecutor to intimidate the judge with unfounded criminal charges. But the panel said it didn't have jurisdiction for potential criminal cases.
The FBI declined to provide an update on its investigation. Federal prosecutors didn't respond to a request for an update.
The recording of the Texas speech was given to The Associated Press recently by Joel Robbins, a Phoenix attorney and longtime Arpaio critic who said he bought a copy from the group after reading about it in a newspaper.
At the time of the speech, only Maricopa County Supervisor Don Stapley had been criminally charged, though the sheriff was investigating other county officials.
"We have already indicted one, so I am not their favorite guy," Arpaio said in Houston, drawing laughter. "The county has cut my budget $35 million just for spite. But I'm still locking them all up. I have ways to get the job done."
Paul Charlton, an attorney who represented Stapley and has listened to portions of Arpaio's speech, described the comment as "close to a confession as you may ever get."
"He is drawing the nexus himself between the budget cut of $35 million dollars and an investigation of the Board of Supervisors. A threat to lock them up, which in fact he did," Charlton said.
Arpaio maintains that he never investigated county officials because they cut his budget.
Elsewhere in the speech, Arpaio _ a former federal drug agent _ makes the Justice Department the butt of his jokes, saying, "It usually takes them two years to open a letter up and then another two years to buy the airline ticket."
The sheriff also boasted of kicking federal civil rights investigators out of his office. And he acknowledged that most controversies were only to his benefit, pointing out that his re-election campaign raised $50,000 when the Rev. Al Sharpton came to Arizona to criticize his immigration patrols.
The crowd cheered and whistled when Arpaio raised the possibility of subpoenaing President Barack Obama to testify in a civil rights lawsuit that might be filed by the federal government. They lined up to have Arpaio sign a copy of his latest book.
Meanwhile, a modest but noisy protest brewed outside the hotel. Several dozen anti-Arpaio protesters carried signs saying "No To Racism," while his supporters carried signs such as "Sheriff Joe Arpaio, USA Hero."
Democratic state Rep. Steve Gallardo, a longtime Arpaio critic who listened to portions of the speech, said the sheriff's comments prove that he uses illegal immigrants to elevate his national political profile.
"This is not about enforcing our laws," Gallardo said. "This is about going after human beings. This is about targeting elected officials. This is about, exactly, using immigrants as props or pawns in his own world."
For his part, Arpaio said his only regret in making the speech was that he used the wrong figure for the number of illegal immigrants arrested after the civil rights inquiry began.
"It was wrong," Arpaio said. "It wasn't 500. It was thousands."
(Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)


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One of the main "lessons learned" from the war of July-August 2006 is that the modern concept of asymmetric warfare, which emerged in the late 1990s in the United States, is already in dire need of revision. Hizbollah's military performance during the war demonstrates that asymmetric warfare can no longer be identified exclusively with political actors who adopt "non-traditional" methods "that differ significantly from the opponent's usual mode of operations" (as per the US military's definition).
Amal Saad-Ghorayeb is a Lebanon-based scholar. She is the author of Hizb'ullah: Politics and Religion (Pluto Press, 2001). Her forthcoming book is The Iran Connection: The Alliance with Syria, Hizbullah and Hamas (IB Tauris, 2010)
Also by Amal Saad-Ghorayeb in openDemocracy:
"Washington in Lebanon and Palestine: fatal manipulation" (6 August 2007)
"The Israel-Hizbollah prisoner-deal" (14 July 2008)
The thirty-three-day war illustrated that Hizbollah had not merely perfected the art of guerrilla warfare, but had surpassed it altogether with a new paradigm of warfare which fuses "non-traditional" methods with the "usual mode of operations" conducted by conventional armies (see Frank G Hoffman, Hybrid Threats: Reconceptualizing the Evolving Character of Modern Conflict [Strategic Forum, Institute for National Strategic Studies, April 2009]).
At the forefront of those dissecting this new model of combat are American military strategists who fear it will set off a "hybrid warfare" contagion among both non-state and state actors opposed to the US, for whom the Hizbollah resistance template will function as a means of balancing out power-asymmetries (see Paul Rogers, "America's new-old military thinking", 23 July 2009). The expectation is that non-state opponents of the US will mimic the conventional aspects of the Hizbollah hybrid, while enemy states will borrow its unconventional methods.
In response to such a prospect, many defense planners at the Pentagon are now urging advocates of repositioning the US military for irregular warfare and counterinsurgency to abandon this strategy and refocus on conventional methods better suited to fighting anticipated "hybrid threats". Thus, while the US and Israel were busy adapting their conventional armies to face unconventional threats, Hizbollah was effectively conventionalising its military doctrine, tactics and weapons while regularising its armed forces.
The strategic entity
The Hizbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah reflected on this paradigm shift, just days after the assassination in Damascus on 12 February 2008 of the resistance's leading military strategist, Imad Mughniyeh. As elaborated by Nasrallah, the resistance has undergone a three-stage development process, from being an armed resistance that fought alongside a spontaneous "large popular resistance", to an "organised and concentrated armed military action", leading to the final stage which ushered in "an unparalleled new school of warfare that functions as a combination of a regular army and guerrilla fighters." In this synthesis, Hizbollah appears to have struck an artful balance between the conventional and unconventional in its military strategy, tactics, weapons, and organisation, signalling its shift from a resistance group to a resistance army.
On the strategic level, Hizbollah's resistance has evolved from a classic guerilla group which forced Israel to unilaterally withdraw from south Lebanon in 2000 after a protracted war of attrition, into a "quasi-conventional fighting force" that prevented Israeli forces from staging a reoccupation. Nasrallah expounded on Hizbollah's radical departure from standard guerrilla strategy by drawing distinctions between the strategies underlying the two modes of warfare:
Also in openDemocracy on Lebanon's travails:
Hazem Saghieh, "Lebanon's election, no solution" (20 June 2005)
Hazem Saghieh, "Syria and Lebanon: keeping it in the family" (14 December 2005)
Alex Klaushofer, "Lebanon: unity within diversity" (17 July 2006)
Roger Scruton, "Lebanon: the missing perspective" (20 July 2006)
Paul Rogers, "Lebanon: war takes root" (3 August 2006)
Zaid Al-Ali, "'Whatever happens, Hizbollah has already won'" (10 August 2006)
Hazem Saghieh, "How the European left supports Lebanon" (14 August 2006)
Jihad N Fakhreddine, "The Lebanese enigma: strength in weakness" (16 August 2006)
Paul Rogers, "A phoenix from Lebanon's ruins" (17 August 2006)
Nadim Shehadi, "Riviera vs Citadel: the battle for Lebanon" (22 August 2006)
Paul Rogers, "Lebanon: the war after the war" (12 October 2006)
Mai Ghoussoub, "Lebanon: slices of life" (31 October 2006)
Alex Klaushofer, "Lebanon's two futures" (11 December 2006)
Hazem Saghieh, "Lebanon's internal struggle: two logics in combat" (19 December 2006)
Mai Ghoussoub, "Beirut and contradiction: reading the World Press Photo award" (13 February 2007)
Robert G Rabil, "Lebanon, Syria, Iran: lessons of Sharm el-Sheikh" (11 May 2007)
Zaid Al-Ali, "Lebanon's Palestinian shame" (19 June 2007)
Fred Halliday, "Lebanon, Gaza, Iraq: three crises" (22 June 2007)
Robert G Rabil, "Lebanon divided" (7 August 2007)
Vicken Cheterian, "Lebanon: short memory, system failure" (25 September 2007)
Hazem Saghieh, "Rafiq al-Hariri's murder: why do Lebanese blame Syria?" (21 February 2008)
Hazem Saghieh, "Lebanon's '14 March': from protest to leadership" (1 April 2008)
Robert G Rabil, "Hizbollah and Lebanon: the curse of a state" (21 May 2008)
Zaid Al-Ali, "Lebanon: chronicles of an attempted suicide" (20 May 2009)
Robert G Rabil, "Lebanon at the crossroads" (5 June 2009)
Hazem Saghieh, "Hizbollah's 'divine victory': three years on" (20 July 2009)
"I draw attention to the strategic difference between a resistance that fights a regular army occupying the land and launches operations against it from within the land, meaning a guerilla war of attrition, and a resistance that stands in the face of an aggression seeking to occupy the land and prevents it from doing so and inflicts defeat on it.... resistance liberates land but for resistance to prevent an aggression against a country, this is something new."
Until 2000, Hizbollah's concept of resistance was in line with conventional usage, meaning a popular liberation struggle against foreign occupation, with the sole mission of expelling the occupiers. In the post-withdrawal phase beginning in 2000, Hizbollah revised its military doctrine from one centred on liberating territory to one which sought to deter Israel from attacking Lebanon and, should that strategy fail, would defend the country from Israeli aggression. The definition of resistance was consequently expanded to include the withstanding of an invasion or in other words, resisting the threat of occupation. By reconstructing the concept of resistance in this fashion, Hizbollah had entrusted itself with the mission of defending Lebanese territory from attack, a role traditionally carried out by state militaries.
The technological army
The rationale behind Hizbollah's redefined military strategy was that Israel would "retaliate for its defeat and humiliation in June 2000." Once liberation had been realised, Imad Mughniyeh immediately set about preparing for the forthcoming war, toiling "day and night". Reports from Israeli officers corroborate these claims, revealing that the resistance had constructed its prepared defences years ahead of the 2006 war, most likely beginning in 2000 (see Andrew Exum, "Hizbullah at War: A Military Assessment" [Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Policy Focus 63, December 2006]). As one high-ranking Israeli officer observed: "We found an enemy that had prepared a long time for battle. Very resolute, well equipped, skilled and coordinated, unlike what we encountered in Gaza and the West Bank." Equally confounded by Hizbollah's preparations, were Unifil observers who seemed oblivious to the construction beneath them as expressed by one officer: "We never saw them build anything. They must have brought the cement in by the spoonful."
While such advance planning and preparation are not unique to conventional armies, Hizbollah's "elaborately prepared defensive works" shared more in common with a regular army's preparations for repelling an invasion than with a guerrilla group's plans for staging an attack and absorbing the anticipated counter-attack. The resistance's intricately designed network of underground bunkers, well-camouflaged and concealed launcher sites (dubbed "nature preserves" by Israelis), fortified firing positions and defensible communications, constituted a formidable military infrastructure constructed for the clear purpose of maintaining a campaign of sustained defence.
Hizbollah's adoption of both conventional and unconventional tactics, weapons and organisation must therefore be viewed within the framework of this overarching defensive strategy and within the limits imposed by the asymmetrical nature of the conflict (see Stephen D Biddle & Jeffrey A Friedman, The 2006 Lebanon Campaign and the Future of Warfare: Implications for Army and Defense Policy, Strategic Studies Institute, United States Army War College, September 2008). In contrast to its previous liberation strategy which utilised standard guerrilla tactics designed to exhaust an enemy over an extended period of time, the conventional defensive strategy Hizbollah embraced had to be pursued swiftly - to repel an invasion before giving it the chance to turn into an occupation - with the limited resources and capabilities at its disposal. Translated in operational terms, this meant Hizbollah could only partially employ the means that conventional armies use in pursuit of their defensive strategies, having also to rely on unconventional methods originally formulated for guerrilla-style wars of attrition against occupation forces.
On the tactical level, the low visibility Hizbollah shares with other irregular forces served it well in pursuing its strategic objectives in so far as it did not have exposed targets like barracks and tanks; nor did it leave behind a "logistical footprint" that could be hit. Resistance forces used combined tactics whereby they "would hold in some places but yield in others, counterattack in some locations but withdraw elsewhere", as detailed in one US military report.
On the one hand, the resistance dispersed its forces into small cells who engaged in mobile-combat tactics and surprise attacks, in line with other unconventional military actors.
On the other hand, it adopted tactics that are usually identified with conventional armies. In contradistinction to guerrillas' hit-and-run raids, Hizbollah fighters also fought a positional war, holding their ground for long durations of time and refusing to cede territory to Israel's advancing forces. Furthermore, although the resistance's fighters are embedded in the civilian population, as are most irregulars, they refrained from blending into it as do guerrilla groups. Like classic conventional armies, resistance fighters donned military uniforms to distinguish themselves from civilians and concealed themselves in bunkers.
The conjoining of unconventional with conventional warfare was also mirrored in the wide range of weapons Hizbollah used, combining rudimentary weapons accessible to most guerrilla groups, with advanced weapons' systems which even rivalled those of some states. But it was not simply this juxtaposition of the outdated and the modern which testified to Hizbollah's unique contribution to warfare, but more tellingly, its skill in turning the primitiveness of these weapons to its advantage while using more advanced weapons creatively (see Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, "Hizbollah's Outlook in the Current Conflict" [Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Policy Outlook 27, August 2006]).
Hizbollah succeeded in effectively paralysing northern Israel with its daily salvos of unguided, short-range Katyusha rockets which evaded interception by Israel's high-tech missile-defence shields, enabling the group to extract much strategic value out of this tactically useless weapon. The movement also launched conventional, medium-range artillery rockets against other Israeli towns and cities which were previously out of its reach, giving substance to its threats to hit Tel Aviv in the event of an Israeli attack on Beirut.
More sophisticated still was Hizbollah's surprise strike on an Israeli warship, with a radar-guided, anti-ship cruise missile, presumably an Iranian variant of the Chinese C-802. In parallel with its hybridisation of missiles, the resistance employed both older, Russian-made wire-guided anti-tank missiles like the AT-3 Sagger, the AT-4 Spigot and AT-5 Spandrel and more advanced ones such as the AT-14 Kornet, AT-13 Metis-M and the RPG 29. In fact, the resistance inflicted the highest number of Israeli casualties with these anti-tank munitions by targeting tanks, personnel, and any houses, shelters and vehicles used by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). All this displayed Hizbollah's resourcefulness in combat.
In the field of electronic warfare as well, Hizbollah neutralised Israel's technological superiority with "simplicity", to borrow Nasrallah's terms. By relying on fiber-optic landlines rather than more advanced wireless-signals for its communications' network, Hizbollah immunised it from Israeli attempts at electronic jamming. In this manner, the movement managed to circumvent Israel's highly vaunted electronic-warfare system and preserve its command-and-control system for the entire duration of the war.
At the same time, Hizbollah was able to penetrate Israel's electronic-warfare devices with its own advanced intelligence-gathering capabilities. Aside from its Mirsad-1 reconnaissance drones, which it flew over Israeli airspace as far back as 2004, the movement acquired other surveillance technology including electronic-eavesdropping equipment which it used to monitor cellphone conversations in Hebrew between Israeli reservists and their families. Moreover, using other devices and techniques, Hizbollah intercepted and decoded Israeli radio communications, enabling it to track the movements of Israeli tanks as well as to monitor casualty reports and supply-routes.
The pressure exerted on Israel by these innovations is reflected in its planned introduction of the Trophy system (TAPS) which uses radar to track incoming missiles; in August 2009, it began to be installed on Israel's latest generation Merkava IV tanks, which suffered a number of damaging strikes in the 2006 war.
The resistance university
In terms of organisation, Hizbollah's resistance is characterised by several features of an irregular force. As a community-based movement, Hizbollah's fighting forces consist of an elite core of around 1,000 professional fighters in addition to an inestimable number of village-men who serve as reservists. The decentralised command-and-control structure coupled with virtually impenetrable organisational secrecy is typical of guerrilla groups. However, these characteristics are offset by the tight discipline and strong coordination of its fighters, which is peculiar to conventional armed forces.
Moreover, Nasrallah's threat to unleash "tens of thousands of trained and equipped" fighters on Israeli forces should they stage a ground invasion, alludes to the possibility that Hizbollah could be transforming its reservists into a professional fighting force. Reports of Hizbollah's launch of a "sweeping recruitment and training drive" months after the 2006 war, lend some credence to such inferences.
But despite the demonstrated success of its model of warfare, Hizbollah has re-evaluated its combat performance, and tried to anticipate Israel's operations' plan for the forthcoming war based on the latter's weaknesses. The movement's future strategy and tactics will therefore be governed by these calculations as affirmed by Nasrallah: "We also learned from the July war experience and made the required evaluation and discovered the points of strength and the point of weakness on our side as well as on the enemy side, and acted based on that."
It is precisely this ongoing effort to meticulously study its enemy which sets Hizbollah apart from other forces in the region that have previously engaged Israel in combat. In a manner reminiscent of Orientalists' probing of the "Arab mind", Hizbollah has striven to penetrate the Israeli psyche and not merely its military mindset as a means of overcoming its arch-foe.
Another factor which accounts for the success of the Hizbollah resistance model is the process of self-evaluation and adaptation to circumstances and needs. Rather than adhering to a rigid military strategy, no matter how successful it has proven to be in the past, the resistance constantly re-adapts itself to a changing political and military environment. Hizbollah's strength therefore lies in its adoption of a non-doctrinaire military doctrine.
This could well mean that the resistance will revise its military strategy for the next war, shifting it from a purely defensive doctrine to one which is partly defensive and partly counter-offensive; in other words, one which remains essentially defensive but which is injected with a strong dose of offensive capability. Furthermore, there is a strong likelihood that the movement will introduce new tactics to meet its wider strategic objectives. This possibility is insinuated by Nasrallah's well-known threat of unleashing a "big surprise" in the event of an Israeli war on Lebanon.
Most observers initially thought that Nasrallah's surprise was the resistance's acquisition of anti-aircraft missiles which it would use against Israeli planes violating Lebanese airspace. While Hizbollah is already known to have the SA-7, and presumed to have obtained the more advanced SA-18 in 2002, many reports surfaced in 2008 about its acquisition of the sophisticated SA-8 mobile air-defence missile-system. However, although the movement will use the advanced SAMs if these reports are proven true, it is doubtful that this is the surprise Nasrallah referred to now that he has openly threatened to shoot down Israeli planes with these missiles, removing the element of surprise from their use.
A more plausible theory is that Nasrallah's surprise alludes to the resistance's adoption of a new military strategy and tactics as suggested by his subsequent threat to Israel: "The army of our enemy will witness an unprecedented method of fighting by courageous, tough and devoted resistance fighters in the battlefield; something they had never seen since the establishment of their usurping entity." Nasrallah reinforced the challenge by - in response to the so-called "Dahiyeh doctrine" enunciated by Gadi Eizenkot, the head of the IDF's Northern Command - reformulating the old equation of "Beirut for Tel Aviv" as "Dahiyeh for Tel Aviv".
The tactics envisaged by Nasrallah could also include incursions into Israeli territory, as suggested by resistance fighters interviewed by the respected journalist, Nicholas Blanford: "One local commander in south Lebanon said that Hizbollah had fought a defensive war in 2006. 'Next time, we will be on the offensive and it will be a totally different kind of war', he says. Jawad [a local fighter] says that the next war will be 'fought more in Israel than in Lebanon', one comment of many from various fighters that suggest Hizbollah is planning commando raids into northern Israel."
Though these remarks may be construed as psychological warfare, the Israeli defence establishment has been preparing for a scenario whereby resistance commandos would infiltrate northern border communities and kill Israelis.
The last war
Regardless of which tactics are employed, Hizbollah has to ensure that they fulfill Nasrallah's "promise" of dealing a decisive blow to Israel. As recounted by the Hizbollah leader in 2007, the surprise he has in store for Israel has the potential to "change the course of the war and the fate of the region" and "realise a historic and decisive victory." A year later, Nasrallah repeated that "our next victory will be definite, unequivocally decisive and crystal clear", as Hizbollah would "crush" the five divisions which Ehud Barak had threatened to deploy in Lebanon. The expected finality of the next-war's outcome is further underlined by Nasrallah's prediction of the eventual "destruction" of the "usurping entity" which would result from Israel's foreseen defeat.
It is useful at this point to compare Nasrallah's post-war discourse with Hizbollah's declared objectives during the July-August war. In 2006, the movement did not lay out any military objectives except to defend Lebanon from Israeli aggression and prevent its enemy from occupying territory. As such, Hizbollah was able to proclaim victory - at least in the tactical sense of having won that particular battle - when it acted in self-defence and denied victory to its opponent whose forces were compelled to withdraw without achieving a single one of their government's declared aims.
But the movement has already set the strategic bar very high for itself for the next round of conflict. Having pronounced as its new objective a "decisive victory" with profound regional implications, Hizbollah will have to ensure that it achieves a strategic victory in its next battle with Israel. Such a victory must end, once and for all, the state of "open war" that exists between the two enemies, and more significantly, neutralise the perpetual threat which Israel poses to the region. Accordingly, any future war with Israel must necessarily be the last for Hizbollah.
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By David Crane defrev at gmail dot com February 5, 2009 On January 29, 2009, the Washington Times reported that the U.S. Army is recalling "more than 16,000 sets of ceramic body armor plates that the Pentagon's inspector general believes were not properly tested and could jeopardize the lives of U.S. service personnel." This came just one day after the …Read More »
Tag Archives: dragon skin body armor
Chinese Armor-Piercing (AP) Sniper Rounds and XSAPI Body Armor
By David Crane defrev at gmail dot com November 19, 2008 Human Events is reporting on the use of Chinese armor-piercing a.k.a. armor-penetrating (AP) bullets by enemy snipers in Afghanistan and Iraq. According to the article, this new Chinese AP rifle ammo is copycatting U.S.-made AP ammo design, and is "sending alarm bells through the Pentagon as it hurries to …Read More »
Flexible Biological Scalar Body Armor for Future Soldiers?
By David Crane defrev at gmail dot com July 31, 2008 MIT materials science and engineering researchers are studying the flexible biological scalar armor system a.k.a. flexible dermal armor system utilized by Polypterus senegalus a.k.a. Senegal bichir a.k.a. Gray bichir a.k.a. "dinosaur eel", a "living fossil" fish, for its potential applicability for developing more advanced military body armor, vehicle armor …Read More »
Army Acquisition Capos Fraudulently Alter Body Armor Test Results
By Roger Charles, DefenseWatch June 12, 2008 Thanks to an Air Force debarment action against Pinnacle Armor, manufacturer of Dragon Skin body armor, documents have been obtained, and witnesses deposed that provide hard evidence that the Army Acquisition capos fraudulently altered test reports to reflect the results desired by this band of criminal knaves. And, they did so knowing full …Read More »
KSEE 24 News Video Story on Attempted Sale of Dragon Skin Body Armor on eBay
by David Crane defrev at gmail dot com "Central Valley News Station" KSEE 24 News has a video report on the federal investigation that is now underway due to the attempt to sell Pinnacle Armor Dragon Skin body armor on eBay by mystery sellers. Click on the link below to watch the story:… Dragon Skin: Ebay Investigation Click here to …Read More »
Mystery: Attempt(s) to Sell Level IV Dragon Skin Body Armor on eBay
By Roger Charles 02-14-2008 While investigating offers on eBay for the sale of two Dragon Skin body armor vests, DefenseWatch discovered that a congressional staffer had confirmed that there is a DOJ IBA Task Force investigating the Army's body armor procurement program. What began as a rather routine inquiry into the commonplace sale of military equipment on the inter-net soon …Read More »
Pinnacle Armor Files Federal Lawsuit Against DOJ and NIJ: The Plot Thickens…
by David Crane defrev at gmail.com DefenseReview readers are well aware that we've been following the Pinnacle Armor Dragon Skin body armor vs. U.S. Army Interceptor Body Armor Program for quite some time, now. As you also know, the Pinnacle Armor vs. U.S. Army situation subsequently resulted in the Departiment of Justice (DOJ) Office of Justice Programs (OJP) pulling (i.e. …Read More »
U.S. Army Stops Independent Testing of Interceptor Body Armor (UPDATE 1)
By Roger Charles DefenseWatch 10-17-2007 UPDATE to following article: Two congressional sources report that the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (on the staff of the Secretary of Defense) caught the Army's attempted exemption of current Interceptor vendors from independent testing, as allowed in the original solicitation. Under pressure from DOT&E, in August the Army issued a modification not listing …Read More »
Why the U.S. Army Acquisition Mafia Fears Side-By-Side Body Armor Testing
by Roger Charles DefenseWatch October 15, 2007 When NBC News had a German lab conduct side-by-side, comparative tests of Pinnacle Armor's Dragon Skin and the Army's Interceptor Body Armor System on May 3 earlier this year, the real surprise was how well the Interceptor ESAPI (Level IV) plates performed. Yes, that's right. The Army acquisition mafia "got lucky" in Germany, …Read More »
More Washington Corruption: DOJ Joins Efforts To Kill Dragon Skin
By Roger Charles August 30, 2007 (originally published on August 17, 2007) The Department of Justice (DOJ) has now joined the Army acquisition mafia in attempting to deny America's Grunts an honest chance for determining just what is the "best-available" body armor. In a flagrant abuse of discretionary authority, the DOJ's Office of Justice Programs has intervened in an unprecedented …Read More »


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