text:
Periodically smoking marijuana doesn't appear to hurt lung capacity, the largest study ever conducted on pot smokers has found.
Even though most marijuana smokers tend to inhale deeply and hold the smoke in for as long as they can before exhaling, the lung capacity didn't deteriorate even among those who smoked a joint a day for seven years or once a week for 20 years, according to the study published Tuesday in JAMA, the journal of the American Medical Association.
In recent years, studies on marijuana smoking and its effects on lung function have been contradictory. While most studies have shown no effects on the lungs from smoking cannabis, others have shown adverse effects, and still others have shown improvement in lung function. Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, and University of Alabama at Birmingham knew tobacco smoking causes lung damage and leads to respiratory issues such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), but they wanted to be clear whether smoking marijuana, had similar effects.
They measured lung function multiple times in more than 5,100 men and women during a 20-year period. In fact, the research shows, some people who regularly smoke marijuana can have a slight improvementin lung function.
Experts say that people shouldn't simply take the news as green light to get high, but should also consider other factors.
"Marijuana is a complicated substance, and for people who are thinking about what they've done in the past or are thinking about using marijuana or believing it can help medically, their decision should not be based on lung consideration," says study co-author Dr. Stefan Kertesz, a researcher and primary care doctor at University of Alabama at Birmingham and the Birmingham VA Medical Center.
"It's not a decision about lung health, it's all the other issues: the risk of addiction, an increase in the chance of having accidents and social functioning."
Researchers reached their findings by using data from the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults, collecting repeated measurements of lung function and smoking from March 1985 to August 2006. More than half of the participants, or 54 percent, said they were current marijuana smokers, cigarette smokers or both when the study began. The average marijuana use was only a joint or two a few times a month — typical for U.S. marijuana users, Kertesz said.
The authors calculated the effects of tobacco and marijuana separately, both in people who used only one or the other, and in people who used both. They also considered other factors that could influence lung function, including air pollution in cities studied.
The analyses showed pot didn't appear to harm lung function, but cigarettes did. Cigarette smokers' test scores worsened steadily during the study.
Researchers measured how well participants could blow air in and out. A healthy adult can exhale about a gallon of air in one second. Although their study focused on lighter smokers, they found some people who smoked more than a joint a day for seven years, could exhale slightly more air than that.
Kertesz says that extra strength may come from the habit of deeply inhaling, holding and slowly exhaling marijuana smoke.
"It's a tiny increase; it's not a big increase to lung health," he says. "So be careful not to say that, 'Oh, wow! Lungs work better on marijuana.' That would be totally inaccurate."
Authors say there weren't enough heavy users (those who smoked two or more joints a day) among those in the study to draw firm conclusions on that group.
Dr. Donald Tashkin, who has studied the relationship between marijuana smoking and lung function for more than 30 years as a professor of medicine at UCLA, says the study confirms what other research has also concluded.
"This is a well-done study involving more subjects than in the past," says Tashkin, who is not affiliated with the new study. "The public should take away it's a confirmatory study, but larger and longer than previous studies demonstrating, once again, that smoking marijuana does not impair lung function, unlike tobacco."
Tashkin says scientists have a theory that lung capacity is not affected in marijuana smokers because the chemical THC in marijuana has immunosuppressant properties that interfere with the development of respiratory issues such as COPD. He says this indicates there will be lower rates of COPD, but marijuana smokers are still at risk for chronic bronchitis, which means they tend to have increased cough and mucus. The study didn't look at the risk of lung cancer.
And Tashkin cautions about drawing overall conclusions from the new work: "We're only talking about one end point. We're not looking at lung cancer, chronic bronchitis symptoms. We are not looking at other effects, behavioral effects. We are looking at lung function."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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All that stress is shrinking your brain, study finds
Donating your body to science? No one wants a chubby corpse
Another reason dogs rule: They know what you're thinking


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subset: commoncrawl


text:
Fifty-one thousand is a lot of people to show up to a college football scrimmage, and before yesterday, that was the all-time Alabama record. But you add the magnetic appeal of Nick Saban to the mix ... and all the sudden, 51,000 seems paltry. Nasty Nick drew over 92,000 people to his first spring game at Alabama.
Ninety-two thousand people showed up for a scrimmage. More than that, actually. The stadium holds 92,138, and there were people watching from the ramps. There were people sent away. From a game where the stakes were no higher than bragging rights between the Crimson team and the White team. Were people under the impression that Bear Bryant would be exhumed at halftime and coaching the Crimson team? I don't understand.
From the Mobile Register:
"It's hard to put into words, but you know, it's 80 percent the reason why we had a sellout crowd at the A-Day Game is because of how coach Saban handles business, his approach to things," junior guard Antoine Caldwell said.
I still don't understand.
Tide fans believe in new coach [AL.com]
We Be Balling Baby!!! Bama A-Day Photo Commentary [Loser With Socks]


text:
Some analysts are predicting that the commodity price boom of the new millennium as something that has played itself out. Except for shale gas and its downward pressure on U.S. natural gas prices, however, natural resource-based commodity prices have remained high by historical records in the last few years, despite the feebleness of the recent global economic recovery. The great spike in commodity prices starting at the end of the 1990s has not been significantly reversed along the global downturn, remaining on average not far from their 2008 levels (Chart 1). And in fact, they have occasionally exhibited signs of revival quicker than the global economic output (Chart 2). So the question now is: have we entered a phase of descending commodity prices in general?
Chart 1
Chart 2
Can history shed some light here?
Several authors have recently revisited long, historic series of commodity prices - see e.g. Erten and Ocampo (2012), Jacks (2013), and Arezki et al (2013). The focus has been either on the old Prebisch-Singer hypothesis - according to which the "terms of trade" between primary products and manufactured goods tended to fall in the very long run - and/or on the frequency and shapes of past price cycles.
Directions - upward or downward - of long-term price trends coming out from these studies vary among different types of commodities and they depend on starting points in time used as a reference. The picture gets blurry in some cases when commodities themselves have evolved and are hard to compare over time (e.g., poultry or soybean production today are highly different from what they were decades ago).
Results have been more convergent on the revelation of previous cycles and of rising price volatility. Those works tend to agree on the localization of at least three supercycles of commodities since the 19th century, besides the one initiated at the end of the 1990s. Typically 20-year boom periods have reflected strong demand associated with moments of rapid industrialization and urbanization - like the US in the 1890s, or China in the 2000s - along which supply takes a long while before matching that demand. When this happens, periods of much lower commodity prices have followed.
Spotting trends or previous cycles is a highly useful exercise for it calls attention to the interplay between demand and supply over time. However we can't use this to forecast future paths of specific or general commodity prices at a certain point in time - as illustrated by the non-homogeneity of shapes of previous cycles.
As one can see on Chart 3, commodity prices relative to manufactured goods may move and stay significantly lower or higher for substantial periods regardless of the presence of a long-run trend or drift. It all hinges on the relative strength of forces behind the demand for primary commodities relative to the demand for manufactures, and the supply of commodities relative to the supply of manufactures (Brahmbhatt and Canuto, 2010). When looking ahead at a certain point in time, it is fundamental to approach the nature, intensity and time length of factors playing on each side of the equation at that specific moment: one cannot look for any predetermined historic shape of commodity super-cycles. Chart 3
Source: Brahmbhatt and Canuto (2010)
Whither the Prebisch-Singer dynamics?
When independently raising their very long-term gloomy prospects regarding commodity prices, Hans Singer and Raul Prebisch in 1949 emphasized the two different sides of the equation. Singer's price pessimism was based on strong beliefs about relatively unfavorable price- and income-elasticities of demand for commodities, whereas Prebisch suggested an asymmetry in the appropriation of productivity gains between commodity-dependent and industrialized countries. While eventual productivity gains on the former's side were automatically transmitted into lower prices, they would be captured in the form of stable prices and rising wages and profit volumes in the latter, given the prevalence of cost-plus pricing and labor unionization in industry. This fit well with Prebisch's critical views about social and political structures inherited by Latin America from its past as a leading commodity producer, as compared with the evolution toward a welfare state in advanced, industrialized US and Europe. Thence his views about the need for Latin America to diversify towards a manufacturing industry-based society, like other natural resource-rich advanced economies - Canada, Australia - had apparently done.
This is no time and place for any evaluation of how dated and/or incomplete those "structuralist" views were, much less of the policy proposals that came over time to be associated with them. However, in our view, it remains useful to think of the evolution of commodity prices relative to manufactured goods as reflecting the relative paths of demand elasticities, productivity and supply bottlenecks.
Have we started the descending phase of the supercycle?
It is worth highlighting two distinctive features of the current commodity supercycle, the peak of which has supposedly been reached:
First, the correlation between resource prices over the past 30 years has substantially increased (McKinsey, 2013). Beyond the strong demand-pull on all commodities exercised by China's industrialization-cum-urbanization, there is a higher correlation induced by the technological evolution. Natural resource-based products have risen as input and, therefore, as costs to other commodities (e.g., fertilizers in agriculture). Furthermore, substitutability between uses (e.g., sugarcane can either turn into ethanol or sugar) and sources (e.g., alternative fuels and forms of power generation) has increased, making price shock transmission more widespread.
Second, volatility has been higher and rising, when compared to the past (Arezki et al, 2013). This is often associated with the increased size of commodities as a class of financial assets, even if ultimately supply and demand fundamentals operate as gravity centers (Canuto, 2008) (Songwe, 2011). There is also much reference to the role played by an increasing incidence of natural phenomena (floods and droughts, variable temperatures) on agriculture production, as well as of social and political factors on oils, metals and minerals (conflicts, labor strikes). Nevertheless those factors can be mostly associated with short-term volatility.
Beyond short-term supply and price fluctuations, more structural factors seem to be at play behind the persistent volatility:
"Supply appears to be progressively less able to adjust rapidly to changes in demand because new reserves are more challenging and expensive to access. For example, offshore oil requires more sophisticated production techniques. Available arable land is not connected to markets through infrastructure. Mineral resources increasingly need to be developed in regions that have high political risks. Such factors not only increase the risk of disruptions to supply but also make supply even more inelastic. As supply becomes increasingly unresponsive to demand, even small changes in that demand can result in significant changes in prices. Investors may be deterred by the volatility in resource prices and become less inclined to invest in new supply or resource productivity initiatives." (McKinsey, 2013, p.1)
At the margin, except for shale gas, supply-side costs are still pointing upwards almost everywhere in the commodities universe. There is no sight of a pace of innovation and physical investment enough to grant the supply elasticity necessary for that price-descending phase of the supercycle to unfold. And as promising as the shale-gas revolution may look like to the US economy in the years ahead, it seems a stretch to expect it - through substitution and correlation - to be a fully countervailing factor to rising marginal costs of other natural resource-based products.
On the other side of the equation, in turn, the current growth soft patch faced by many emerging markets does not point out to any drastic future reversal of its propensity to create demand for commodities. Urbanization and poverty reduction have remained steady in the developing world, and there is no sign of a major macroeconomic downturn beyond the recent accommodation to lower growth rates (Canuto, 2013).
Back in 2008, I argued that:
"If one may paraphrase Mark Twain, recent news about the death of the commodity supercycle and of a 'commodity bust' were somewhat exaggerated."
Five years later, I think this still applies.
This article is based on notes that I prepared for a round table on "The commodities outlook: moving past the supercycle" at the 2013 Toronto Global Forum.
Follow the latest from Otaviano Canuto at twitter.com/OCanuto and keep up with the World Bank's efforts to help countries fight poverty and close gaps in income and opportunity at twitter.com/WBPoverty.


text:
This was my first purchase from the debut collection for LeSportsac in Spring 2006. I stood in the LSS flagship store in Omotesando, Tokyo, for close to an hour deliberating over this. It was horribly expensive as the price in Japan is always marked up way above the US retail price. This cost US$198 in the US but in Japan, it was probably close to US$300. This is the only purchase I regretted because the sides of the bag do not maintain their shape well.
I also picked up the Stellina version for daily use.
I wanted the Citta Rosa in the Zucca style but was unable to find it at first, so I got the Campeggio instead. I used this frequently for shopping. This has been in storage for the past 2 years and to my horror, it was covered in brownish stains when I took it out this morning to photograph. Thankfully, I was able to scrub most of the stains off with good ol' Dynamo. (The pic below is taken pre-washing.)
And then of course after I bought the Campeggio, I found the Zucca and had to get that too ;-p My favourite is the character in the middle yakking away on the phone while his friend stands next to him with a gun.
This is L'Amore in the Buon Vaggio style with all the Tokidoki characters paired up.
This is Paradiso in the Ciao Ciao style. It's not the most useful as the lack of a broad base means that you can't put much in it without it bulging unattractively. But I chose it as it shows off the print beautifully and I wanted a bag style that I did not already possess. I always end up buying the larger LSS bags as I like to see the prints in larger sizes.
Vacanze was the last print that LeSportSac did with Tokidoki so I splurged and got the largest bag style, Avventura. I use this most frequently for overseas trips as my carry-on bag as I can squeeze lots of stuff inside it, including my laptop. I also tend to shop a lot in airport duty-free so this is great for those impulse purchases. Sometimes I also just fold it up and throw it in my suitcase as an extra bag for shopping. The side net pockets are very convenient as a temporary hold for all the paraphernalia you need when travelling.


text:
Services on Demand
Related links
- Cited by Google
- Similars in Google
Water SA
On-line version ISSN 1816-7950
Print version ISSN 0378-4738
LEE, S; PARK, W and PARK, H. Investigating the cooperative strategies between China and North Korea for the Tumen River Area Development Programme. Water SA [online]. 2011, vol.37, n.2, pp.255-264. ISSN 1816-7950.
Addressing the equitable management of an international boundary river, this study aims to find the optimal strategy with regard to how to build multi-purpose dams and allocate the benefits and costs thereof. The interests of the riparian countries (North Korea and China) are defined in terms of the cooperative 2-person nonzero-sum game, and the Nash product is then calculated for various alternative strategies. The results reveal that the Kangkudong Dam and the Simpo Dam should be collaboratively constructed, and that the benefits of the 2 dams should be allocated according to relative demand in order to provide North Korea and China with sufficient benefits and to equitably address their conflicting interests. Furthermore, the suggested strategy was found to be optimal or at least quasi-optimal when the North Korean economy, which is regarded as a crucial source of uncertainty in this case, moved from a low-growth scenario to a high-growth scenario.
Keywords : Boundary river management; Tumen River; Nash bargaining solution; cooperative game theory.


text:
Three hospitalized after East Central house fire
A house fire in East Central Spokane sent three people to the hospital Wednesday morning.
The fire started in a house at 4th Avenue and Magnolia Street just after 1:30 a.m.
Firefighters were heading to the house for a medical call, but when they arrived, firefighters could see flames inside. The crew called for backup.
Three adults were already outside the house when firefighters arrived, but as soon as an ambulance got on scene, all three were taken to a local hospital for smoke inhalation.
Dave Haworth, a Spokane fire battalion chief, said he doesn't know what condition the people were in.
Firefighters said the fire started in a back bedroom and crews were able to keep it contained to that room. Once backup arrived, the fire was quickly extinguished. Fire damage is limited to the back bedroom, but there is smoke damage throughout the house.
Winter conditions make it hard to fight even the simplest fires.
"We are using water, so we have icing issues," said Haworth. "Crews are going in, getting hot and sweaty and wet, then coming out in the freezing temperatures."
An investigator arrived around 4 a.m., to determine the cause of the fire.


text:
We asked our team of talented stylists to find us the perfect suit. A combination of style, quality, comfort, fit and affordability. Our selection of modern and contemporary men's formal wear is hand-picked with each and every one of our customers in mind. We have a huge selection of men's clothing from suits, blazers, dress shirts, dress pants, sports coats, ties, men's accessories and more!
ISW Menswear specializes in tuxedo apparel for weddings, prom, galas, charity balls and other special occasion formal events. We're unique from other tux companies because of our large selection of tuxedo options. We carry every different style, in every different color, for any different size. Big and Tall, slim or modern fit, traditional tuxedos or weddings suits, ISW Menswear carries them all. That's why we pride ourselves each year as the Prom Headquarters.
Located in Texas, we proudly serve the DFW area with five local store locations. Our Frisco location serves all of Plano, McKinney, Allen, Lewisville, The Colony, and Carrollton. Our Richardson location serves all of Murphy, Wylie, Garland, Addison, Farmers Branch and University Park. Our Mesquite location serves Rowlett, Rockwall, Sunnyvale, Forney, Balch Springs and Terrell. Our Dallas location serves Cockrell Hill, Lancaster, Oak Cliff, DeSoto, Duncanville and Cedar Hill. Our Arlington location serves Grand Prairie, Irving, Euless, Fort Worth, North Richland Hills and Mansfield. We invite you to stop by today or browse our site! There is a perfect suit for you out there, and we are here to make sure you find it.
ISW Menswear has the best deals on the brands you know. Shop name brand designer men's clothing without the high price tag of a department store. We carry Michael Kors, Calvin Klein, DKNY Donna Karan New York, Ralph Lauren, Kenneth Cole, Mezlan, Robert Graham, Hugo Boss, Ermenegildo Zegna, Ike Beha, Jones New York, Tallia Orange, English Laundry, Johnston & Murphy, Florsheim, Ted Baker London, Geoffrey Beene, Stacy Adams, Steve Madden, Tiglio, Carrucci, Canali, Baroni, Coppley, Enro, Tommy Hilfiger and more.


text:
Objective: To convey all the relevant information about shipping and logistics management. This workshop focuses on the functional areas of Container & LCL Shipping, Freight forwarding, Custom clearance process, inland trucking and warehousing practical functional areas.
Shipping and Logistics involve managing the transfer of products from the place of their origin to the place of their consumption. It include activities such as material handling, Warehousing and packaging, Inventory Management, Supply chain Management, Procurement and customer service. Logistic and shipping is a part of the supply chain and value chain in most industries. It is an essential component of the supply chain and value chain for any successful business. All manufacturing and shipping companies needs logistics activities for the distribution of their products.
Content Outline:
Who can attend? Anyone who want's to build their Career in Shipping and Logistics can attend this workshop.
Workshop Presenter: Industry expert will be going to conduct the workshop for better understanding of attendees.


text:
Does Google Need Digg?
For months, bloggers have been speculating on the future of Digg, a news-aggregation site that allows members to vote on the popularity of online news stories. A recent post from the popular blog TechCrunch predicts that Google will soon buy the startup for $200 million. But more recently, Valleywag, a Silicon Valley gossip rag, refuted the claim, writing that the deal was completely off.
While neither Google nor Digg would discuss any deal talks, the chatter highlights the fact that Google News is a weak spot in the Google empire: many experts in the field believe that it lags behind other online news services in providing timely updates on big stories. For instance, it took Google News about an hour to report on Tim Russert's death from when the news first hit the wires. Google publicly claims that this was due to a glitch, but even when everything is running smoothly, its speed still isn't impressive: it took the site about 25 minutes to post a story on Donald Rumsfeld's resignation two years ago, while the news hit the front page of Digg within minutes.
Google News and Digg both offer the service of spotlighting popular news stories around the Web, but they do so in different ways. Digg relies completely on its community of citizen editors to find interesting news stories and submit them to the site to be voted on by others. It employs algorithms to determine when a story is gaining enough votes to be bumped to the Digg front page, where it explodes in popularity because it's viewed by millions of visitors to the site.
Google's system is more automated, and it doesn't benefit from the wisdom of human crowds. Josh Cohen, a business product manager at Google, says that the company's algorithms wade through the headlines and stories of 4,500 English-language news sources (and thousands of others in 21 different languages). Next, another algorithm scans the story for keywords and groups them according to category. Articles are then ranked in two ways. First, Google's algorithms look at the location of the story on the news site's page, which is a hint to its importance. Second, the story is ranked within its cluster. Duplicates are ranked lower than original content, for instance. And the sources that people click on more often are ranked higher, says Cohen.
It might not make sense for Google to redesign its news aggregator to be more like Digg, says Greg Sterling, founder of Sterling Market Intelligence, a consultancy. Google is traditionally conservative when it comes to changing how people interact with its services, although recently, it has experimented with allowing journalists and sources related to news stories to comment on the articles that it collects from other sites. Instead of overhauling Google News, it would make more sense, says Sterling, for Google to employ data collected from Digg users to improve the speed and utility of Google News algorithms.
If Google were to buy Digg or gain access to Digg's intellectual property or the data that it has on its community, it would only be a shortcut to getting something done fast, says Dan Gillmor, director of the Knight Center for Digital Media Entrepreneurship at Arizona State University's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. But he's hesitant to read too much into the rumors, and he believes that Google is capable of improving on its own. "Even though I don't think they've done that well with Google News so far…it's not like they're out of this," says Gillmor.
And while the speed at which news stories are posted matters, another important challenge for online news aggregators is disambiguating stories that are high quality from those that are merely popular. Neither Digg nor Google News does this consistently well, says Gillmor. "Google should be working on ways to combine reputation, but not just reputation of some editorial product: reputation with popularity," he says. "Everyone in this field should be doing that." Gillmor adds that there's enormous possibility out there for the company that gets that right, but "we're a long way from seeing it sorted out."
Google's Cohen claims not to be interested in data from Digg that highlights how it spotlights and promotes stories. But he does say that engineers are constantly trying to improve Google News by looking at different types of data, including the type of news links that people click on. "There's a whole host of signals that you can use," he says, including community voting signals. "It's a question of what you want to get out of it."
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text:
Hi everyone! Thanks for stopping by for the Parade of Homes blog hop!
House of Smith's is a fun new blog my husband, Cason and I started in order to track the cosmetic part of our families progress on our home remodel and design style, shift! As a full time stay at home Mom of three beautiful girls and running a small business from home, I have found a new appreciation for the beauty and upkeep of my house! And as each day goes by, and a new project gets done the phrase "Love the Space You're In" becomes more and more meaningful to me!
I often try to find new fun ways to update, change, and decorate our "space" on a budget. There's something to be said about finishing a great project in your home, looking back, and saying to each other...
"WE did that !!!"
The House of Smiths blog is my way to share, inspire, and learn from our new attempts at tackling projects on our very long list of "things to do!"
At the Smith house, our motto is... "Making a house, our HOME... one space at a time!"
For my regular readers, some of this might be repeat. But there's a lot of NEW fun projects that we have been working on, that I waited till NOW to reveal
The three spaces that I have chosen to show are:
The Laundry Room


text:
The Magic Flute
Papagena and Papgeno
at the Doge's Palace
San Marco
Photographed 19 Febbraio 2012
Images and Text © by Merisi
Wonderful details. Enjoy Carnevale!ReplyDelete
I think it would be marvelous to see these in person...and better yet, to wear them and be someone else for a while! So beautiful.ReplyDelete
That's pretty freaky!ReplyDelete
Fabulous! Looks like you're having a great time at Carnival. Enjoy!ReplyDelete
Mozart's music inspired these costumes, these costumes inspire me. Creativity rules!ReplyDelete
Che meravigliaaaa!!! (e che invidia... scherzo)ReplyDelete
Wish I were in New Orleans, myself...Ash Wednesday tomorrow...then Lent...but Spring is just around the corner...love the pics...
You have posted some wonderful photos from Venice M.ReplyDelete
Dear Merisi, Your Carnevale photographs are sensational! We love Venice but have always stayed away during Carnevale. Your photographs make me want to take part of the fun. GinaReplyDelete
As I wrote it to Corey, I've been away from the net for a good while.
(was busy, scary, anxious and tired)
AND I'm very happy to come back to your 2 blogs, to see you're both enjoying yourselves there in Venice. Delighted to meet Venitian characters virtually.


text: Europe's police force, Europol, has approved requests to send private citizens' banking data to the U.S. Department of Treasury without sufficient consideration for data protection laws, according to an internal report. An official report on an investigation carried out by the organization's Joint Supervisory Body (JSB) was made public by the German Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information on Wednesday.Since August 2010, the European Union has allowed European citizens' financial data to be transferred to the U.S. under the Terrorist Finance Tracking Agreement, also known as the Swift agreement. However, one stricture of the accord specifies that the U.S. must "clearly substantiate the necessity of the data" in combating terrorism. The JSB inspection team was made up of seven data protection experts who found, that of the four requests made by the U.S. since the Swift pact was established, all were too abstract to allow proper verification for whether they comply with the accord.The report concludes that given the dearth of information, verifying whether the requests to date "are in line with the conditions of the agreement, is impossible."Oral statements from the U.S. Treasury to Europol personnel had a bearing on the decisions, but even the JSB team has no knowledge of the content of those statements. Therefore it is impossible to tell whether omissions in the written requests were rectified by oral information, according to the report. This renders proper inspection by Europol's Data Protection Office impossible, concluded the report. Giving Europol a role in implementing the controversial agreement was one of the concessions made to the European Parliament after it initially rejected the accord over concerns about civil liberties. On Wednesday these misgivings resurfaced. Parliamentarians said that Europol appears to be just rubberstamping requests for the transfer of bulk data, without any kind of scrutiny or oversight. Alexander Alvaro, Parliament's rapporteur on the TFTP Agreement, called for "all relevant documents must be declassified.""This report should send alarm bells ringing in Brussels," added Sophie In't Veld, vice-president of the parliamentary committee on civil liberties. "It would seem Europol has not been respecting the agreed data protection safeguards which we insisted upon as a condition for this agreement to go ahead. We need clarification on how these data transfers are being processed."The Commission is due to publish its evaluation of the TFTP on March 17.


text:
Elliott Smith
born on 6/8/1969 in Omaha, NE, United States
died on 21/10/2003 in Los Angeles, CA, United States
Elliott Smith
|Elliott Smith
Steven Paul "Elliott" Smith (August 6, 1969 October 21, 2003) was an American singer-songwriter and musician. Smith was born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised primarily in Texas, and resided for a significant portion of his life in Portland, Oregon, the area in which he first gained popularity. Smith's primary instrument was the guitar, but he was also proficient with piano, clarinet, bass guitar, drums and harmonica. Smith had a distinctive vocal style, characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery",[1] and used multi-tracking to create vocal layers, textures and harmonies.
After playing in the rock band Heatmiser for several years, Smith began his solo career in 1994, with releases on the independent record labels Cavity Search and Kill Rock Stars (KRS). In 1997, he signed a contract with DreamWorks Records, the label for which he recorded two albums.[2] Smith rose to mainstream prominence when his song "Miss Misery"included in the soundtrack for the film Good Will Huntingwas nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Song category in 1998.[3]
Smith suffered from depression, alcoholism and drug dependence, and these topics often appear in his lyrics. At age 34, he died in Los Angeles, California from two stab wounds to the chest.[4] The autopsy evidence was inconclusive as to whether the wounds were self-inflicted.[5] At the time of his death, Smith was working on his sixth studio album, From a Basement on the Hill, which was posthumously completed and released.
Early life
Steven Paul Smith was born at the Clarkson Hospital in Omaha, Nebraska, the only child to Gary Smith, a student at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Bunny Kay Berryman, an elementary school music teacher. His parents divorced when he was six months old, and Smith moved with his mother to Duncanville, Texas. Much later in his life, Smith got a tattoo of a map of Texas on his upper arm and said, "I didn't get it because I like Texas, kind of the opposite. But I won't forget about it, although I'm tempted to because I don't like it there."[6]
Smith endured a difficult childhood[7] and a troubled relationship with his stepfather Charlie Welch.[8] Later in life, Smith would come to terms with the possibility that he had been sexually abused by Welch at a young age.[9] He reflected the impact of this part of his life in the lyrics of "Some Song": "Charlie beat you up week after week, and when you grow up you're going to be a freak."[8] The name "Charlie" also appeared in the lyrics for "Flowers for Charlie" and "No Confidence Man". The family was a part of the Community of Christ through much of Smith's childhood,[10] but eventually began attending services at a local Methodist Church. Smith felt that going to church did little for him, except make him "really scared of Hell".[11] In a 2001 interview, he stated, "I don't necessarily buy into any officially structured version of spirituality. But I have my own version of it".[12]
At the age of nine, Smith began playing the piano, and at ten began learning guitar on a small acoustic guitar bought for him by his father.[13] At this age he also composed an original piano piece, "Fantasy", which won him a prize at an arts festival.[14] Many of the people on his mother's side of the family were non-professional musicians; his grandfather was a Dixieland drummer and his grandmother sang in a glee club.[14]
At fourteen, Smith moved from Texas to Portland, Oregon, to live with his father, who was then working as a psychiatrist, along with his stepmother and two half-sisters. It was around this time that Smith first began using drugs, including alcohol, with friends as well as experimenting with recording for the first time, borrowing a four-track recorder.[14] During high school, Smith played clarinet in the school band and also played guitar, piano and sang in the bands Stranger Than Fiction[8] and A Murder of Crows,[15] billed as either Steven Smith or "Johnny Panic".[16] He graduated from Lincoln High School as a National Merit Scholar.[17]
After graduation, Smith began calling himself "Elliott", saying that he thought "Steve" sounded too much like a "jock" name, and that "Steven" sounded "too bookish".[17] According to friends, he had also used the pseudonym "Elliott Stillwater-Rotter" during his time in the band A Murder of Crows.[18] Biographer S. R. Shutt speculates that it was either inspired by Elliott Avenue, a street that Smith had lived on in Portland, or that it was suggested by his then-girlfriend. A junior-high acquaintance of Smith speculates that it was so as not to be confused with Steve Smith, the drummer of Journey.[19]
1991-1993: Heatmiser
- Main article: Heatmiser
Smith graduated from Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts in 1991 with a degree in philosophy and political science. "Went straight through in four years", he explained to Under the Radar in 2003. "I guess it proved to myself that I could do something I really didn't want to for four years. Except I did like what I was studying. At the time it seemed like, 'This is your one and only chance to go to college and you had just better do it because some day you might wish that you did.' Plus, the whole reason I applied in the first place was because of my girlfriend, and I had gotten accepted already even though we had broken up before the first day." After he graduated, he "worked in a bakery back in Portland with a bachelor's degree in philosophy and legal theory."[13]
While at Hampshire, Smith formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust.[20] After Smith graduated from Hampshire, the band added drummer Tony Lash and bassist Brandt Peterson and began performing around Portland in 1992. The group released the albums Dead Air (1993) and Cop and Speeder (1994) as well as the Yellow No. 5 EP (1994) on Frontier Records, and were then signed to Virgin Records to release what became their final album, Mic City Sons (1996).
Around this time, Smith and Gust worked a number of odd jobs around Portland, including installing drywall, spreading gravel, transplanting bamboo trees and painting the roof of a warehouse with heat reflective paint. The pair were also on unemployment benefits for some time, which they considered an "artist grant".[21]
Smith had begun his solo career while still in Heatmiser, and the success of his first two releases created distance and tension with his band.[21] Heatmiser disbanded prior to Mic City Sons' release, prompting Virgin to put the album out inauspiciously through its independent arm, Caroline Records. A clause in Heatmiser's record contract with Virgin meant that Smith was still bound to it as an individual. The contract was later bought out by DreamWorks prior to the recording of his fourth album, XO.
1994: Roman Candle
His first release, Roman Candle (1994), came about when Smith's girlfriend at the time convinced him to send a tape of "the most recent eight songs that [he'd] recorded on borrowed four-tracks and borrowed guitar" to Cavity Search Records.[21] Owner Christopher Cooper immediately requested to release the entire album of songs, which surprised Smith, as he was expecting only a deal for a seven-inch record.[6] Regarding the record, Smith said: "I thought my head would be chopped off immediately when it came out because at the time it was so opposite to the grunge thing that was popular... The thing is that album was really well-received, which was a total shock, and it immediately eclipsed [Heatmiser], unfortunately."[21]
Smith felt his solo songs were not representative of the music Heatmiser was making: "The idea of playing [my music] for people didn't occur to me... because at the time it was the NorthwestMudhoney and Nirvanaand going out to play an acoustic show was like crawling out on a limb and begging for it to be sawed off."[22]
The instrumentation of the recordings was primarily acoustic guitar, occasionally accompanied by brief electric guitar riffs or a small drum set played with brushes. Only the final track, an instrumental titled "Kiwi Maddog 20/20" (a reference to the low-end fortified wine), had full band instrumentation.
One of Smith's first solo performances was at the now-defunct Umbra Penumbra on September 17, 1994. Only three songs from Roman Candle were performed, with the majority of the ten-song set being B-sides, Heatmiser tunes and unreleased tracks.[23] Soon after this performance, Smith was asked to open for Mary Lou Lord on a week-long U.S. tour. Several more short tours followed, and Smith helped her record one of his songs, "I Figured You Out", which he once called "a stupid pop song [written] in about a minute" that he discarded for sounding "like the fucking Eagles." Despite this, Smith continued to perform the song live until his death in 2003.
1995-1996: Elliott Smith and Either/Or
In 1995, Smith's self-titled album was released on Kill Rock Stars; the record featured a style of recording similar to Roman Candle, but with hints of growth and experimentation. Though the majority of the album was recorded by Smith alone, friend and The Spinanes vocalist Rebecca Gates sang harmony vocals on "St. Ides Heaven", and Heatmiser guitarist Neil Gust played guitar on "Single File". Several songs made reference to drugs, but Smith explained that he used the theme of drugs as a vehicle for conveying dependence rather than the songs being about drugs specifically.[24] Looking back, Smith felt that the album's pervasive mood gave him "a reputation for being a really dark, depressed person", and said that he later made a conscious move toward more diverse moods in his music.[25]
In 1996, filmmaker Jem Cohen recorded Smith playing acoustic songs for the short film Lucky Three: An Elliott Smith Portrait. Two of these songs would appear on his next album, Either/Or, which was another Kill Rock Stars release. Either/Or came out in 1997 to favorable reviews.[26] The album found Smith venturing further into full instrumentation, with several songs containing bass guitar, drums, keyboards and electric guitars, all played by Smith. The album title was derived from the two-volume book of the same name by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, whose works generally deal with themes such as existential despair, angst, death and God.
By this time, Smith's already-heavy drinking was being compounded with use of anti-depressants.[27] At the end of the Either/Or tour, some of his close friends staged an intervention in Chicago,[27] but it proved ineffective.[7] Shortly after, Smith relocated from Portland to Brooklyn, New York.[28]
1997-1998: "Miss Misery" and the Oscars
In 1996, Smith was selected by director and fellow Portland resident Gus Van Sant to be a part of the soundtrack to his film, Good Will Hunting. Smith recorded an orchestral version of "Between the Bars" with composer Danny Elfman for the movie. Smith also contributed a new song, "Miss Misery", and three previously-released tracks ("No Name #3", from Roman Candle, and "Angeles" and "Say Yes", from Either/Or). The film was a commercial and critical success, and Smith was nominated for an Academy Award for "Miss Misery". Not eager to step into the limelight, he agreed to perform the song at the ceremony only after the producers informed him that his song would be played live that nighteither by him or another musician of their choosing.[21]
On March 5, 1998, Smith made his network television debut on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Miss Misery" solo on acoustic guitar.[29] A few days later, wearing a white suit, he played an abridged version of the song at the Oscars, accompanied by the house orchestra. James Horner and Will Jennings won the award that night for best song with "My Heart Will Go On" (sung by Celine Dion) from the film Titanic. Smith did not voice disappointment about not winning the award.[30]
Smith commented on the surrealism of the Oscars experience: "That's exactly what it was, surreal... I enjoy performing almost as much as I enjoy making up songs in the first place. But the Oscars was a very strange show, where the set was only one song cut down to less than two minutes, and the audience was a lot of people who didn't come to hear me play. I wouldn't want to live in that world, but it was fun to walk around on the moon for a day."[31]
1998-2000: XO and Figure 8
In 1998, after the success of Either/Or and "Miss Misery", Smith signed to a bigger record label, DreamWorks Records. Around the same time, Smith fell into depression, speaking openly of considering suicide,[27] and on at least one occasion,[7] made a serious attempt at ending his own life.[32] While in North Carolina, he became severely intoxicated and ran off a cliff. He landed on a tree, which badly impaled him but broke his fall.[7] When questioned about his suicide attempt, he told an interviewer, "Yeah, I jumped off a cliff, but let's talk about something else."[28]
Christopher Cooper, head of Cavity Search Records (which released Roman Candle), said about this time in Smith's life: "I talked him out of thinking that he wanted to kill himself numerous times when he was in Portland. I kept telling him that he was a brilliant man, and that life was worth living, and that people loved him."[27] Pete Krebs also agreed: "In Portland we got the brunt of Elliott's initial depression... Lots of people have stories of their own experiences of staying up with Elliott 'til five in the morning, holding his hand, telling him not to kill himself."[28]
Smith's first release for DreamWorks was later that year. Titled XO, it was conceived and developed while Smith wrote it out over the winter of 1998, night after night seated at the bar in Luna Lounge, it was produced by the team of Rob Schnapf and Tom Rothrock. XO also contained some instrumentation from Los Angeles musicians Joey Waronker and Jon Brion. It contained a more full-sounding, baroque pop sound than any of his previous efforts, with songs featuring a horn section, Chamberlins, elaborate string arrangements, and even a drum loop on the song "Independence Day". His familiar double-tracked vocal and acoustic guitar style were still apparent while his somewhat personal lyrical style survived. The song "Waltz #2 (XO)" even touches upon the abusive tendencies of his stepfather toward himself and his mother with lines like "XO, mom, it's ok, it's alright, nothing's wrong". The album went on to peak at number 104 on the Billboard 200[33] and number 123 on the UK Album Charts,[34] while selling 400,000 copies[35] (more than double that of each of his two Kill Rock Stars releases), becoming the best-selling release of his career.[36] Smith's backing band during most of this period was the Portland-based group Quasi, consisting of former bandmate Sam Coomes on bass guitar and Coomes's ex-wife Janet Weiss on drums. Quasi also performed as the opening act at many shows on the tour, with Smith sometimes contributing bass guitar, guitar or backing vocals. On October 17, 1998, Smith appeared on Saturday Night Live and performed "Waltz #2 (XO)". His backing band for this appearance was John Moen, Jon Brion, Rob Schnapf and Sam Coomes.
In response to whether the change to a bigger record label would influence his creative control, Smith said, "Sometimes people look at major labels as simply money-making machines, they're actually composed of individuals who are real people, and there's a part of them that needs to feel that part of their job is to put out good music."[37] Smith also claimed in another interview that he never read his reviews for fear that they would interfere with his songwriting.[38] It was during this period that Smith appeared on Dutch television in 1998 and provided a candid interview in which he spoke of his assessment of his music career up until that point:
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mostly only know things are different because people ask me different questions; but I don't feel like things are very changed. I mean, I still, I do the same things that I did before ... I think about the same things, so ... I'm the wrong kind of person to be really big and famous.[39]
As part of the Dutch television special, Smith played live versions of "Waltz #2 (XO)", "Miss Misery" and "I Didn't Understand"the latter two songs were performed solely on piano, while the first song was cut short by Smith, as he explained: "I had to stop it because it's... you know, what's the point of playing a song badly? It'd be better to play it and mean it, than to just walk through it."[39][40]
Smith relocated from Brooklyn to Los Angeles in 1999,[28] taking up residence at a cabin in the Silver Lake section of town.[41] That fall, his cover of The Beatles' "Because" was featured in the end credits of DreamWorks' Oscar-winning drama American Beauty, and also appeared on the film's soundtrack album.
The final album Smith completed in his lifetime, Figure 8, was released on April 18, 2000. It featured the return of Rothrock, Schnapf, Brion and Waronker, and was partially recorded at Abbey Road Studios in England, with an obvious Beatles influence in the songwriting and production. The album garnered very favorable reviews,[42] peaking at number 99 on the Billboard 200[33] and 37 on the UK Album Charts.[34] The album garnered praise for its power pop style and complex arrangements, described as creating a "sweeping kaleidoscope of layered instruments and sonic textures."[43] However, some reviewers felt that Smith's trademark dark and melancholy songwriting had lost some of its subtlety, with one reviewer likening some of the lyrics to "the self-pitying complaints of an adolescent venting in his diary."[44]
Album art and promotional pictures from the period showed Smith looking cleaned-up and put-together. An extensive tour in promotion of the record ensued, book-ended by television appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and the Late Show with David Letterman. However, Smith's condition began to deteriorate as he had become addicted to heroin either towards the end of or just after the Figure 8 tour.[7]
2001-2002: Addiction and scrapped recordings
Around the time he began recording his final album, Smith began to display signs of paranoia, often believing that a white van followed him wherever he went.[11] He would have friends drop him off for recording sessions almost a mile away from the studio, and to reach the location, he would trudge through hundreds of yards of brush and cliffs. He started telling people that DreamWorks was out to get him: "Not long ago my house was broken into, and songs were stolen off my computer which have wound up in the hands of certain people who work at a certain label. I've also been followed around for months at a time. I wouldn't even want to necessarily say it's the people from that label who are following me around, but it was probably them who broke into my house."[21] During this period, Smith hardly ate, subsisting primarily on ice cream. He would go for several days without sleeping, and then sleep for an entire day.
A follow-up to Smith's 2000 album was originally planned to happen with Rob Schnapf, but their sessions were abandoned. Smith also began distancing himself from manager Margaret Mittleman, who had handled him since the Roman Candle days.[7] He finally began recording a new album with only himself and Jon Brion as producers sometime during 2001. The pair had recorded a substantial amount of music for the album, when Brion confronted Smith about his drug and alcohol abuse.[45] Their friendship promptly ended, and Smith scrapped all of their work up until that point. He later said: "There was even a little more than half of a record done before this new one that I just scrapped because of a blown friendship with someone that made me so depressed I didn't want to hear any of those songs. He was just helping me record the songs and stuff, and then the friendship kind of fell apart all of a sudden one day. It just made it kind of awkward being alone in the car listening to the songs."[21]
When Brion sent a bill for the abandoned sessions to DreamWorks, executives Lenny Waronker and Luke Wood scheduled a meeting with Smith to determine what went wrong with the sessions. The singer complained of intrusion upon his personal life from the label, as well as poor promotion for the Figure 8 album. The talks proved to be fruitless, and soon after, Smith sent a message to the executives, stating that if they did not release him from his contract, he would take his own life.[7] In May 2001, Smith set out to re-record the album, mostly on his own, but with some help from David McConnell of Goldenboy. McConnell told Spin that, during this time, Smith would smoke over $1,500 worth of heroin and crack per day, would often talk about suicide, and on numerous occasions tried to give himself an overdose. Steven Drozd of The Flaming Lips and Scott McPherson played a few drum tracks, Sam Coomes contributed some bass guitar and backing vocals, but almost every other instrument was recorded by Smith.
Smith's song "Needle in the Hay" was included in Wes Anderson's 2001 dark comedy film The Royal Tenenbaums during a suicide attempt scene. Smith was originally supposed to contribute a cover of The Beatles' "Hey Jude" for the film, but when he failed to do so in time, Anderson had to use The Mutato Muzika Orchestra's version of the track instead.[46] Anderson would later say that Smith "was in a bad state" at the time.[46]
Smith's live performances during 2001 and 2002 were infrequent, typically in the Pacific Northwest or Los Angeles. A review of his December 20, 2001 show at Portland's Crystal Ballroom expressed concern over his appearance and performance: his hair was uncharacteristically greasy and long; his face was bearded and gaunt; and during his songs he exhibited alarming signs of "memory-loss and butterfingers".[47] At another performance in San Francisco that month, the audience began shouting out lyrics when Smith could not remember them.[48]
In the first of only three concerts performed in 2002, Smith co-headlined Northwestern University's A&O Ball with Wilco on May 2 in Chicago.[49] He was onstage for nearly an hour, but failed to complete half of the songs.[50][9] He claimed that his poor performance was due to his left hand having fallen asleep, and told the audience it felt "like having stuff on your hand and you can't get it off."[9] Smith's performance was reviewed as "undoubtedly one of the worst performances ever by a musician"[51] and an "excruciating [...] nightmare".[52] A reporter for the online magazine Glorious Noise wrote, "It would not surprise me at all if Elliott Smith ends up dead within a year."[53]
On November 25, 2002, Smith was involved in a brawl with the Los Angeles Police Department at a concert where The Flaming Lips and Beck were performing.[54] Smith later said he was defending a man he thought the police were harassing. Assuming that Smith was homeless, the officers allegedly beat and arrested him and his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. The two spent the night in jail. Smith's hand and back were injured in the incident, causing him to cancel a number of shows.[21] Wayne Coyne, lead singer of The Flaming Lips and a friend of Smith's, stated concern over Smith's appearance and actions, saying that he "saw a guy who had lost control of himself. He was needy, he was grumpy, he was everything you wouldn't want in a person. It's not like when you think of Keith Richards being pleasantly blissed out in the corner."[55]
2003: Reemergence and From a Basement on the Hill
Smith had attempted to go to rehab several times, but found that he was unable to relate to the popular treatments for addicts that used a Twelve-Step Program basis for treatment. "I couldn't do the first step [...] I couldn't say what you were supposed to say and mean it."[21] In 2002, Smith went to the Neurotransmitter Restoration Center in Beverly Hills to start a course of treatment for his drug addiction. In one of his final interviews, he spoke about the center, "What they do is an IV treatment where they put a needle in your arm, and you're on a drip bag, but the only thing that's in the drip bag is amino acids and saline solution. I was coming off of a lot of psych meds and other things. I was even on an antipsychotic, although I'm not psychotic."[21]
Two sold-out solo acoustic concerts at Hollywood's Henry Fonda Theater, on January 31 and February 1, 2003, saw Smith attempting to reestablish his credibility as a live performer. Before the show, Smith scrawled "Kali The Destroyer" (the Hindu goddess associated with time and change) in large block letters with permanent ink on his left arm, which was visible to the crowd during the performance.[56][57] On several songs, he was backed by a stripped-down drum kit played by Robin Peringer (of the band 764-HERO), and on one track, members of opening band Rilo Kiley contributed backing vocals. Smith would play only one more concert in his adopted hometown, three months later at The Derby.
After his 34th birthday on August 6, 2003, he gave up alcohol, caffeine, red meat, refined sugar and his longtime (sometimes abused) regimen of psychiatric medication.[7] Director Mike Mills had been working with Smith during his final years and described Smith's troubles and apparent recovery: "I gave the script to him, then he dropped off the face of the earth [...] he went through his whole crazy time, but by the time I was done with the film, he was making From a Basement on the Hill and I was shocked that he was actually making music."[58]
With things improving for Smith after several troubled years, he began experimenting with noise music and worked on his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba's iMac with the intent of learning how to record with computers, noting that it was the only method with which he was still unfamiliar.[21] Smith jokingly labeled his experimental way of recording "The California Frown" (a play on the Beach Boys' "California Sound").[59] He said of the songs, "They're kind of more noisy with the pitch all distorted. Some are more acoustic, but there aren't too many like that. Lately I've just been making up a lot of noise."[21]
He was also in the process of recording songs for the Thumbsucker soundtrack, including Big Star's "Thirteen" and Cat Stevens' "Trouble".[58] In August 2003, Suicide Squeeze Records put out a limited-edition vinyl single for "Pretty (Ugly Before)", a song that Smith had been playing since the Figure 8 tour. Steve Hanft described the last six months of Smith's life as being "like the light at the end of the tunnel" and was convinced that Smith was clean and recovered.[27]
Smith died on October 21, 2003 at the age of 34 years from two stab wounds to the chest.[4] At the time of the stabbing, he was at his Lemoyne Street home in Echo Park, California[60] where he lived with his girlfriend, Jennifer Chiba. According to Chiba, the two were arguing,[35] and she locked herself in the bathroom to take a shower.[61] Chiba heard him scream, and upon opening the door, saw Smith standing with a knife in his chest. She pulled the knife out, after which he collapsed and she called 9-1-1. Smith died in the hospital with the time of death listed as 1:36 p.m. A possible suicide note, written on a Post-it note, read:
"I'm so sorrylove, Elliott. God forgive me."[4]
The name "Elliott" is misspelled as "Elliot" in the coroner's report; however, a coroner informed the Smoking Gun website "that Smith's first name was misspelled in the report", not on the Post-it note.[4] While Smith's death was originally reported as a suicide, the official autopsy report released in December 2003 left open the question of possible homicide.[4]
According to Pitchfork Media, record producer Larry Crane reported on his Tape Op message board that he had planned to help Smith mix his album in mid-November. Crane wrote, "I hadn't talked to Elliott in over a year. His girlfriend, Jennifer, called me [last week] and asked if I'd like to come to L.A. and help mix and finish [Smith's album]. I said 'yes, of course', and chatted with Elliott for the first time in ages. It seems surreal that he would call me to finish an album and then a week later kill himself. I talked to Jennifer this morning, who was obviously shattered and in tears, and she said, 'I don't understand, he was so healthy.'"[62]
The coroner's report revealed that no traces of illegal substances or alcohol were found in his system at the time of his death, but did find prescribed levels of antidepressant, anxiolytic and ADHD medications in his system, including Clonazepam, Mirtazapine, Atomoxetine and Amphetamine.[63] Also, no hesitation wounds were found on Smith, a trait typical of suicide by self infliction.[35] With his death not being officially declared a suicide, journalist Alyson Camus noted numerous discrepancies and contradictions in the case that suggest foul play.[64][65] However, the authorities do not seem to be investigating the case further.[66]
Smith's body was cremated.[67] No public burial site or memorial was ever formally announced.
Shortly after Smith's death, a fan memorial was initiated outside Solutions Audio (4334 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, California), the site at which the cover of the Figure 8 album was shot. Farewell messages to Smith were written on the wall, and flowers, photos, candles and empty bottles of alcohol mentioned in Smith's songs were left. Since then, the wall has been a regular target for graffiti,[68] but is regularly restored by fans.
Memorial concerts were held in several cities in the United States and the United Kingdom.[59] A petition was soon put forth with intent to make part of the Silver Lake area a memorial park in Smith's honor. It received over 10,000 signatures, but no plans to establish the park have been announced.[59] A memorial plaque located inside Smith's former high school, Lincoln High, was hung in July 2006.[69] The plaque has the line "I'm never gonna know you now, but I'm gonna love you anyhow" from Smith's song "Waltz #2 (XO)".
Since Smith's death, many musical acts have paid him tribute. Songs in tribute to, or about, Smith have been released by Pearl Jam ("Can't Keep" on the Live at Benaroya Hall concert album);[70] Sparta ("Bombs and Us");[59] Third Eye Blind ("There's No Hurry to Eternity", originally titled "Elliott Smith", on the Live from Nowhere, Volume 2 compilation);[71] Ben Folds ("Late" on Songs for Silverman);[72] Brad Mehldau ("Sky Turning Grey (for Elliott Smith)" on Highway Rider); Rhett Miller ("The Believer" on The Believer);[73] Earlimart ("Heaven Adores You" on Treble and Tremble);[74] Joan As Police Woman ("We Don't Own It" on Real Life);[75] and Pete Yorn ("Bandstand in the Sky" on Nightcrawler, a song jointly dedicated to Jeff Buckley).[76] Several tribute albums have also been released since his death, including Christopher O'Riley's Home to Oblivion: An Elliott Smith Tribute.
The band Grandaddy played the track "Oh Well, OK" in the encore of its reunion tour (August to September 2012). During the song, images of Smith and the Solutions Audio Memorial were displayed on a screen behind the band.[77]
On July 30, 2004, Jennifer Chiba filed a lawsuit against the Smith family for 15% of his earnings (over $1 million),[78] claiming that she and Smith lived as "husband and wife",[79] that the singer pledged to take care of her financially for the rest of her life, and that she worked as his manager and agent from around 2000 until his death.[80] A state labor commissioner ruled her claim as manager to be invalid, as she had worked as an "unlicensed talent agent" under California's Talent Agencies Act. The case made it to the California appellate court in October 2007, but was defeated 21; Chiba could potentially appeal the case to the Supreme Court of California.[81]
Posthumous releases
From a Basement on the Hill, almost four years in production, was released on October 19, 2004, by ANTI- Records (a part of Epitaph Records). With Smith's family in control of his estate, they chose to bring in Rob Schnapf and Smith's ex-girlfriend Joanna Bolme to sort through the recordings and mix the album. Although Smith had voiced his desire for it to be a double album or a regular album with a bonus disc, it was not clear whether it would have been possible for him to release it that way had he completed it.[21] As completed by Schnapf and Bolme, it was released as a 15-track single album. Many songs from the sessions (later leaked onto the Internet) were not included, such as "True Love", "Abused", "Stickman" and "Suicide Machine" (a reworking of the Figure 8-era unreleased instrumental "Tiny Time Machine").[45] There has been unconfirmed speculation that Smith's family made the decision not to include some songs on the record.[45][82]
Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, a biography by Benjamin Nugent, was rushed to publication and hit stores shortly after From a Basement on the Hill, barely beyond the first anniversary of the musician's death. Smith's family, as well as Joanna Bolme, Jennifer Chiba, Neil Gust, Sam Coomes and Janet Weiss, all declined to be interviewed. It contained interviews with Rob Schnapf, David McConnell and Pete Krebs. The book received mixed reviews, with Publishers Weekly remarking that while "Nugent manages to patch together the major beats of Smith's life, he can offer little meaningful insight."[83]
On May 8, 2007, a posthumous two-disc compilation album entitled New Moon was released by Kill Rock Stars. The album contained 24 songs recorded by Smith between 1994 and 1997 during his tenure with the label, songs that were not included on albums, as well as a few early versions and previously released B-sides. In the United States, the album debuted at number 24 on the Billboard 200, selling about 24,000 copies in its first week.[84] The record received favorable reviews[85] and was Metacritic's 15th best-reviewed album of 2007.[86]A portion of the proceeds from album sales were to go to Outside In, a social service agency for low-income adults and homeless youth in Portland, Oregon.[87]
On October 25, 2007, a book titled Elliott Smith was released by Autumn de Wilde,[88] which consists of photographs, handwritten lyrics and "revealing talks with Smith's inner circle."[89] De Wilde was responsible for the Figure 8 sleeve art, making a landmark and de facto Smith memorial of the Solutions Audio mural. A five-song CD featuring previously unreleased live recordings of Smith performing acoustically at Club Largo in Los Angeles was included in the release.
Following the singer's death, the Smith estate licensed his songs for use in a number of film and television projects, such as One Tree Hill, The Girl Next Door, Georgia Rule and Paranoid Park.
In a March 2009 interview, Larry Crane said that the estate of Elliott Smith was now "defunct" and all rights previously held by the singer are now in the control of "his parents".[90] Crane went on to say that his parents own the rights to Smith's high school recordings, some of the Heatmiser material, all solo songs recorded up until his 1998 record deal with DreamWorks Records and From a Basement on the Hill.[90] DreamWorks Records was acquired by Universal Music Group in 2003, and Interscope Records currently "owns all studio and live recording from Jan 1998 to his passing, except for the songs on From a Basement on the Hill."[90]
In December 2009, Kill Rock Stars announced that it had obtained the rights to re-release Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill, originally released by Cavity Search and ANTI-, respectively.[91] Roman Candle would be remastered by Larry Crane.[91] Along with the press release, Kill Rock Stars posted a previously unreleased track of Smith's, titled "Cecilia/Amanda", as a free download.[91] Roman Candle and From a Basement on the Hill were re-released on April 6, 2010, in the US.[92]
A compilation titled An Introduction to... Elliott Smith was released by Domino Records on November 1, 2010, in the UK and Kill Rock Stars on November 2 in the US.
There remain over a hundred unreleased tracks. Many have leaked on the internet.
Musical style and influences
Smith respected and was inspired by many artists and styles, including Big Star,[93] The Clash,[24] The Who,[93] Led Zeppelin,[93] The Kinks,[94] Pink Floyd,[93] Rush,[93] Elvis Costello,[95] Television,[96] Motown and flamenco records,[14] AC/DC,[97] Hank Williams[14] and Scorpions,[98] Smith claimed to listen exclusively to selected albums (such as The Marble Index by Nico) for months.[97] Sean Croghan, a former roommate of Smith's, said that the singer "listened almost exclusively to slow jams" in his senior year at college.[98] Smith was also known to gain inspiration from novels, religion and philosophy. He liked classic literature, especially Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot and Fyodor Dostoyevsky (and other Russian novelists).[97]
Smith mentioned his admiration for Bob Dylan in several interviews, citing him as an early musical influence. He once commented: "My father taught me how to play 'Don't Think Twice, It's All Right'. I love Dylan's words, but even more than that, I love the fact that he loves words."[14] Smith covered Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" several times in concert. Smith has also been compared to folk legend Nick Drake, due to his fingerpicking style and vocals. Darryl Cater of AllMusic called references to "the definitive folk loner" Drake "inevitable",[99] and Smith's lyrics have been compared to those in Drake's minimalist and haunting final album.[100]
Smith was a dedicated fan of The Beatles (as well as their solo projects), once noting that he had been listening to them frequently since he was about "four years old"[101] and also claimed that hearing The White Album was his original inspiration to become a musician.[97] In 1998, Smith contributed a cover of the Beatles song "Because" to the closing credits and soundtrack of the film American Beauty. Although this was the only Beatles song that Smith ever officially released, he is known to have recorded at least two others ("Revolution" and "I'll Be Back"), and played many songs by both the band and the members' solo projects at live concerts.[102]
Regarding his songwriting, Smith said:[103]
Smith said that transitions were his favorite part of songs and that he preferred to write broader, more impressionistic music closer to pop rather than folk music.[14] Smith compared his songs to stories or dreams, not purely confessional pieces that people could relate to.[31] When asked about the dark nature of his songwriting and the cult following he was gaining, Smith said he felt it was merely a product of his writing songs that were strongly meaningful to him rather than anything contrived.[31] Larry Crane, Smith's posthumous archivist, has said that he was surprised at the amount of "recycling of musical ideas" that he has encountered while cataloging the singer's private tapes:[90] "I found songs recorded in high school reworked 15 years on. Lyrics became more important to him as he became older, and more time was spent working on them."[90]
- Main article: Elliott Smith discography
- Studio albums
- Roman Candle (1994)
- Elliott Smith (1995)
- Either/Or (1997)
- Figure 8 (2000)
- From a Basement on the Hill (2004)
- New Moon (2007)
- Huey, Steve. Elliott Smith Elliott Smith : Songs, Reviews, Credits, Awards : AllMusic. AllRovi. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Schreiber, Ryan (March 31, 2000). Elliott Smith: Figure 8 | Album Review | Pitchfork. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Grant, Jess (November 9, 2011). Elliott Smith Miss Misery | Best Songs Ever | BitCandy. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 Rocker's Autopsy Doesn't Rule Out Homicide | The Smoking Gun (January 8, 2004). Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Dansby, Andrew (December 31, 2003). Smith Autopsy Inconclusive | Music News | Rolling Stone. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 6.0 6.1 Shutt, S. R.. Sweet Adeline | Biography Page 6. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5 7.6 7.7 Gowing, Liam, Mr. Misery, December, 2004, pp. 8092. URL accessed on April 17, 2013.
- 8.0 8.1 8.2 Shutt, S. R.. Sweet Adeline | Biography Page 3. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 9.0 9.1 9.2 Carpenter, Ellen (October 21, 2009). 'Why I Can't Listen to Elliott Smith's Music' | Spin | Newswire. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Nugent 2004, pp. 1214.
- 11.0 11.1 Nugent 2004.
- Sweet Adeline | Biography Page 2. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 13.0 13.1 Kagler, Marcus (2003). UTR Issue 4. Archived from the original on June 15, 2006. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 14.0 14.1 14.2 14.3 14.4 14.5 14.6 Shutt, S. R.. Sweet Adeline | Biography Page 2. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Sweet Adeline | Music. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Recorded Music: Elliott Smith, 1969-2003 (October 23, 2003). Archived from the original on November 18, 2006. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- 17.0 17.1 Shutt, S. R.. Sweet Adeline | Biography Page 4. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Peschek, David (October 24, 2003). Obituary: Elliott Smith | Music | The Guardian. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Pittman, Mark (2004). Being There. Archived from the original on February 17, 2005. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Shutt, S. R.. Sweet Adeline | Biography Page 5. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 21.00 21.01 21.02 21.03 21.04 21.05 21.06 21.07 21.08 21.09 21.10 21.11 21.12 Kagler, Marcus (June, 2003). Under the Radar News Elliott Smith Better Off Than Dead, Elliott Smith Comes Clean. Archived from the original on November 5, 2003. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Fritch, Matthew (September, 1998). "Down on the Upside" (46).
- Elliott Smith Setlist at Umbra Penumbra, Portland
- 24.0 24.1 Shutt, S. R.. Sweet Adeline | Biography Page 7. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- Peisner, David. Elliott Smith Interview: Well Rounded Entertainment. Archived from the original on September 19, 2000. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Acclaimed Music Either/Or. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 27.0 27.1 27.2 27.3 27.4 mtvnews.com: Elliott Smith:. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- 28.0 28.1 28.2 28.3 Kelley, Brendan Joel (October 30, 2003). XO, Elliott Page 1 Music Phoenix Phoenix New Times. Retrieved on April 17, 2013.
- NBC.com > Late Night with Conan O'Brien > Episode Guide. Archived from the original on October 13, 2007. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Garcia, Gilberta (October 12, 2000). Back to Earth Page 1 Music Phoenix Phoenix New Times. Archived from the original on October 13, 2007. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- 31.0 31.1 31.2 Anderman, Joan, Tunesmith to the Miserable but Don't Mistake His Characters for Him, Says Elliott Smith, March 26, 1999.
- Scherl, Alexis. Why We Love Elliott Smith --- Ink Blot Magazine. Archived from the original on May 19, 2008. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- 33.0 33.1 [[[:Template:BillboardURLbyName]] Elliott Smith Chart History | Billboard]. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- 34.0 34.1 Chart Log UK: DJ S The System of Life. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- 35.0 35.1 35.2 Petridis, Alexis (March 19, 2004). The Mysterious Death of Elliott Smith | Music | The Guardian. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Nugent 2004, p. 201.
- Dansby, Andrew (April 22, 2000). Smith Comes Up Roses: Elliott Smith : Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on October 1, 2007. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Allen, Jamie. CNN.com Entertainment Elliott Smith Keeps Moving May 17, 2000. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- 39.0 39.1 Elliott Smith on Dutch TV '98 (Part One) YouTube (November 17, 2006). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Elliott Smith on Dutch TV '98 (Part Two) YouTube. Google, Inc. (November 17, 2006). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- (December, 2003) "The Long Slow Death of Elliott Smith".
- Figure 8 Reviews Metacritic 2. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Huey, Steve. Figure 8 Elliott Smith : Songs, Reviews, Credits, Awards : AllMusic. AllRovi. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Smith, Ethan (April 24, 2000). Möbius Smith. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 45.0 45.1 45.2 Elliott Smith Lives Again! From a Basement on the Hill V.2 The Confabulators Archive. Archived from the original on February 12, 2006. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 46.0 46.1 Miller, Nancy (December 20, 2004). The Life Melodic | EW.com. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- "Elliott Smith (1969-2003)" (October 29, 2003). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Stoltz, Peter. Magnet Live Review: Elliott Smith. Archived from the original on October 13, 2007. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Murtaugh, Dan, A&O Ball Signs on a Second Headliner, February 5, 2002. URL accessed on June 24, 2013.
- Sweet Adeline | 05.02.02 Riviera Theatre Chicago, IL. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Winn, Luke. NUcomment A&O Ball: Did You Behave? 5.21.02. Archived from the original on October 29, 2007. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Dombal, Ryan, 'Shot in the Arm', March 5, 2002. URL accessed on June 24, 2013.
- Brown, Jake (May 3, 2002). Just Say Yes | Glorious Noise. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Lang, Alison (October 24, 2003). "Elliott Smith Found Dead at 34". The Queen's Journal 131 (27).
- Friends, Peers Mourn Elliott Smith | Billboard. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Sweet Adeline | January 2003. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Bemis, Alec Hanley (October 14, 2004). Sleepwalker Page 1 Los Angeles LA Weekly. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 58.0 58.1 Perez, Rodrigo (August 16, 2005). Elliott Smith, Polyphonics Bring Balance to 'Thumbsucker' Soundtrack Music, Celebrity, Artist News | mtv.com. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 59.0 59.1 59.2 59.3 Smith, R J (July 18, 2004). Music; Elliott Smith's Uneasy Afterlife New York Times. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Rocker's Autopsy Doesn't Rule Out Homicide | The Smoking Gun (January 8, 2004). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Dodge, Marty (January 12, 2004). Blogcritics.org: Smith's Girlfriend Speaks.... Archived from the original on January 13, 2004. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Crane, Larry (October 22, 2003). Tape Op Message Board :: View Topic OT: Elliott Smith Has Died.... Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Pelisek, Christine (January 1, 2004). The Elliott Smith Mystery Page 1 News Los Angeles LA Weekly. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Camus, Alyson (April 9, 2010). The Elliott Smith Mystery: More Questions by Alyson Camus | Rock NYC. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Camus, Alyson (October 21, 2011). Corollary and Correction to "Searching for Elliott Smith": The Facts As We Know It Behind His Death, Part One | Rock NYC. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Hurewitz, Jeremy. [http://web.archive.org/web/20060320050416/http://www.nypress.com/18/25/books/hurewitz.cfm New York's Premier Alternative Newsspaper. Arts, Music, Food, Movies and Opinion]. Archived from the original on March 20, 2006. Retrieved on July 21, 2013.
- Elliott Smith (1969 2003) Find a Grave Memorial. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Pierce, Tony (August 28, 2007). This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things: LAist. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Baumgarten, Mark (July 13, 2006). Elliott Smith, The Myth and the Man, Memorialized-- Local Cut. Archived from the original on August 8, 2006. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Hay, Travis (July 18, 2011). From the Vault: Pearl Jam @ Benaroya Hall 2003 | Guerilla Candy. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Elliott Smith (There's No Hurry to Eternity) by Third Eye Blind YouTube (February 9, 2011). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Interview: Ben Folds | Music | The Guardian (April 29, 2005). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Robertson, Jessica (December 9, 2005). Rolling Stone : Rhett Miller Becomes a "Beleiver". Archived from the original on September 14, 2006. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Perez, Rodrigo (September 30, 2004). Elliott Smith Casts a Long Shadow Over Earlimart's Treble Music, Celebrity, Artist News | mtv.com. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Tiny Mix Tapes Reviews: Joan as Police Woman Real Life / B-Sides. Archived from the original on June 29, 2007. Retrieved on June 24, 2013.
- Sweet Adeline | June 2004 (June, 2004). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Grandaddy Oh Well, Okay (Live @ Shepherd's Bush Empire, London, 04.09.12) YouTube (September 4, 2012). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Camus, Alyson (May 16, 2011). The Elliott Smith Mytery" Jennifer Chiba's Motives for Suing Smith's Family... Revised | Rock NYC. Retrieved on June 26, 2013.
- Futterman, Erica (October 17, 2007). Rolling Stone : KISS Announce "Kissology Vol. 3," Bob Dylan "I'm Not There" Concert Coming to NYC, Foxy Brown Pleads Not Guilty. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- C-Murder to Be Tried for Murder; Plus Britney Spears, 'Hannah Montana,' Linkin Park, My Chemical Romance & More, In for the Record Music, Celebrity, Artist News | MTV.com (October 17, 2007). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Brown, Jake (October 17, 2007). Elliott Smith's Girlfriend Cut Off | Glorious Noise. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- From a Basement on the Hill Review Metacritic. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Amazon.com: Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing (9780306813931): Benjamin Nugent: Books. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Hasty, Katie (May 16, 2007). Buble Sidesteps Bone Thugs to Claim No. 1 | Billboard. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- New Moon Reviews Metacritic. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Highest and Lowest Scoring Music and Albums Metacritic. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Cohen, Jonathan (February 14, 2007). Elliott Smith Rarities Compiled on 'New Moon' | Billboard. Retrieved on June 26, 2013.
- Sweet Adeline | May 2007. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Elliott Smith: Autumn de Wilde, Beck Hansen, Chris Walla: 9780811857994: Amazon.com: Books. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 90.0 90.1 90.2 90.3 90.4 Brown, Jake (March 30, 2009). Elliott Smith's Archives: The Glono Interview with Larry Crane | Glorious Noise. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 91.0 91.1 91.2 Breihan, Tom (December 15, 2009). Hear an Unreleased Elliott Smith Song | News | Pitchfork. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- killrockstars. Archived from the original on March 19, 2010. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 93.0 93.1 93.2 93.3 93.4 Nugent 2004, pp. 21.
- LaGambina, Gregg (March 26, 2003). "Back Where They Started:".
- Greenfield-Sanders, Timothy (August, 1998). "The Delicate Sound of an Explosion".
- Greg Dwinnell with Elliott Smith. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 97.0 97.1 97.2 97.3 Elliott Smith Archive Interview 'There Has to Be Darkness in My Songs' | The Latest Music Blogs, Free MP3s, Best New Bands, Music Videos, Movie Trailers and News Analysis (October 26, 2010). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- 98.0 98.1 New Moon, (2007), ', Kill Rock Stars,
- Cater, Darryl. Roman Candle Elliott Smith : Songs, Reviews, Credits, Awards : AllMusic. AllRovi. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Huey, Steve. Elliott Smith Elliott Smith : Songs, Reviews, Credits, Awards : AllMusic. AllRovi. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Smith said this when asked "Have you been listening to a lot of Beatles lately?" in Strange Parallel.
- Sweet Adeline | Audio. Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Elliott Smith Gives a Songwriting Lesson YouTube (April 16, 2006). Retrieved on June 25, 2013.
- Bibliography
- Nugent, Benjamin (2004). Elliott Smith and the Big Nothing, Da Capo Press.
External links
|Find more about Elliott Smith on Wikipedia's sister projects:
| Quotations from Wikiquote
| Images and media from Commons
- Official website
- Official Cavity Search Records website
- Official Kill Rock Stars website
- Elliott Smith collection at the Internet Archive's live music archive
|Elliott Smith
Albums: Roman Candle · Elliott Smith · Either/Or · XO · Figure 8 · From a Basement on the Hill
Posthumous collections: New Moon
Songs: "No Confidence Man" · "Needle in the Hay" · "Say Yes" · "Miss Misery" · "Baby Britain" · "Happiness" · "Son of Sam" · "Stickman"
Films: Lucky Three · Strange Parallel
Associated acts: Heatmiser
|Elliott Smith · Neil Gust · Brandt Peterson · Sam Coomes · Tony Lash
Albums: Dead Air · Cop and Speeder · Mic City Sons
Demo and EP: Music of Heatmiser · Yellow No. 5
This article uses material from the article Elliott Smith from the free encyclopedia Wikipedia and it is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.


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Items filtered by date: March 2011
Wednesday, 27 April 2011 19:01
The British Beat #3 (11 DVD/BD reviews)
Welcome to the third edition of The British Beat, my quarterly column on DVD and Blu-ray releases of British TV shows and feature films. This time I have 11 reviews for you: Candlelight in Algeria and Thunder in the City (from VCI); Fresh Fields: Set 1, Midsomer Murders: Set 17, Murder Investigation Team: Series One, Upstairs Downstairs: Series One, Murphy's Law: Series 3, and Single-Handed: Set 1 (from Acorn Media); Dalziel & Pascoe: Season 3 (from BBC Video via Warner Bros.); and Is It Legal?: Series Three and The Governor: Season One (Region 2 releases from Network).
Published in The British Beat


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Opinion: Obama Should Release His College Transcripts
As the battle rages on regarding the non-release of Mitt Romney's income tax data with Sen. Harry Reid claiming that the GOP presidential candidate hasn't paid any taxes for ten years, it's astonishing that the focused-headlines don't switch to President Barack Obama's unreleased records – in particular, his college transcripts. In an attempt to keep the nation's minds off of President Barack Obama's unreleased data, the controversial representative from California, Nancy Pelosi, has now joined in the Reid tax-attacks against Romney.
If the White House set Reid up for this Romney challenge – which many people believe it has – there is a simple answer as to why Reid was picked. How many more terms could this senator possibly run for at his elderly age? If the whole Romney tax-challenge blows up in his face, he's near the end of his career anyway. The same might be said for the elderly Nancy Pelosi. At this stage of her career, what has she really got left to lose?
Regardless of the reason Reid and Pelosi are leading the cry for Romney's tax information, the whispers on the "right" for Obama's records on various issues are extremely disappointing. Seeing how reserved and even polite the politicians on the "right" are when the politicians on the "left" are so unrelenting and bold with their unsubstantiated claims is frustrating – even maddening.
Let's assume for a moment that people do care about what they should be concerned about – the reason why the current president isn't releasing his data. In particular, many – including me – are interested in what information the college transcripts have to offer about Obama. Certainly, the release of Obama's college data would tell us more about Obama that we don't know than Romney's tax data would tell us about Romney that we don't already know.
No matter what Romney's tax data shows us, we already know he has been an extremely successful businessman – which obviously equates to extreme wealth. We already know this. What we don't know – and can only assume is extreme doubt – is what is so sacredly hidden in Obama's unreleased files.
What could possibly be in Obama's college transcripts that could hurt his image – or more? There has been a great deal of speculation. Mostly, people are assuming the obvious which is that his grades weren't up to par, and that would be an embarrassment to the President and a blow to his reputation for being highly-intelligent. I – and apparently many other people – don't think that's it at all. If Obama's college transcripts show that he wasn't a straight-A student, he wouldn't be the first president – and he likely won't be the last. Besides, where is it written that a president has to be a scholar in every academic area? Nowhere.
So, if it's not the grades, what is in there that just can't be released to the public? Let's think about what else would be in the transcripts. There would be the names of the courses he took. Perhaps Obama had interest in and took some controversial and possibly even anti-American courses. Again, this is only speculation because his college transcripts are not public. More damaging than finding out what courses of study Obama may have taken – and even which campus activities and groups he took part in – would be administrative information including his method of entering the colleges and universities.
Maybe – just maybe – the college transcripts would reveal that Obama was a "foreign exchange" student. Now, that is a possibility that would be devastating to an American president.
Would such information prove that he wasn't born in the United States? Of course not. But it might prove that he cheated the system to get into the schools of his choice. Either would be a devastating blow to his image.
Forget Romney's taxes that will simply confirm his wealthy. Let's see Obama's college transcripts and find out what is necessary for him to hide.
About Scott Paulson
Scott Paulson writes political commentary for Examiner.com and teaches English at a community college in the Chicago area. The views and opinions expressed in this post are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of CBS Local.
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Trimbach at Trinity
Last night had a great food and wine experience. It was a dinner with Jean Trimbach (above right) providing the wines (some of Alsace's best) and the wonderful Trinity restaurant in Clapham providing the food. Chef Adam Byatt (above left) began the evening with a pig butchery demonstration, which I'll cover separately. It really was an embarassment of riches.
This is about as pretty and funky as we get with food,' says Adam as he introduces the next course. It's a combo of smoked eel, steamed osyter and goujons of sole with a leek terrine and horseradish sauce. Brilliantly executed: I particularly liked the leek.
Labels: Alsace, restaurants


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