text:
According to the Bible, the city of Antioch, founded by Antiochias, was where the Nazarites were first called Christians (Chresteons.) At that time, Antioch was the capitol of Syria in the area which is now Turkey. This first church was established by the apostles Peter and Thomas 325 years before the Roman Catholic Church was established by the emperor Constantine. The apostle St. Thomas was a Gnostic by education and carried the early church teaching into India and established a school at Malabar. This school of Esoteric and Gnostic teaching was attended by Jews, Hindus and Christians alike.
Thomas believed that the true church was carried in the heart and his students, ordained in the Malabar Rite, traveled throughout the middle-east spreading the teachings they had received rather than establishing churches. Being Gnostics, steeped in the ancient wisdom teachings, they proliferated the knowledge of symbolism, mysticism, alchemy and other arcane subjects that were later taken up by the Rosicrucians, Masons, and other secret societies until the 1500s, when the Malabar priests settled in Holland. All of these teachings were given in secret because the Roman Catholic Church had banned them and threatened with death anyone possessing such teachings. It was at this junction in history that the Alexandrian Library was burned to the ground, having been the repository of the world's most elevated ancient since history, as we know it, began. teachings
Our Free Church of Antioch is a Christ oriented church, originally established in Santa Barbara, California by Bishop Warren Watters in 1992. Bishop Warren was a Bishop in the Church of Antioch, which is an off-shoot of the Liberal Catholic Church of Antioch. The Liberal Catholic Church of Antioch, the Greek Orthodox and the Russian Orthodox churches, the Egyptian Coptic Church, the Celtic Church in England and the American Orthodox Catholic Church are all lumped together as "the Orthodox Church" by the Vatican. They are recognized by Roman Catholicism as being legitimate because of their Apostolic Succession. The Church of Antioch, Malabar Rite, can verify its lineage back to St. Peter and St. Thomas through eleven verifiable lines. There are five more known lines but these are not certifiable due to a missing signature, death certificate or other incomplete detail.
The church in North America ordains men and women equally and in many cases teaches co-masonry to both, although that is not an official part of the priest's training. In Europe only men are ordained. Here in the United States the church has spread widely under many different names. Many of these are lead by women bishops and archbishops but these are not recognized by Rome. If the church truly is carried in the heart, where everyone may be, then the Apostolic Succession is irrelevant, for the Bible states, " All true believers are priests unto God." Nevertheless, one who has been touched by the rod of apostolic empowerment will never believe it to be irrelevant.
The goal of Archbishop Warren Watters was to Ordain Women into the lines of Apostolic Succession...as he believed they were meant to be in the first place. At his death at age 102, his wife Bishop Ellen Watters succeeded him as the head of the church. At the passing of Archbishop Ellen, Bishop Michelina T Foster was nominated by the Board to take the 'reins of the church'. This she has succeeded in doing: expanding the church, its membership, and the members of the clergy. Priests ordained by Bishop Michelina, Bishop Warren, and other Bishops of the Free Church are located in many states around the United States and in Hawaii.
The Free Church of Antioch is centered in Warner Robins, Georgia as the Desert Light Chapel of Antioch. The Spiritual Work is ongoing, and from Georgia, the website and newsletters are generated. The church teachings blend basic and esoteric Christianity, New Age Thought and the Arcane Wisdom. It is a church of the heart and is open to interested seekers from all walks of Life. Meditation for humanity and the planet are incorporated into a more modernized Mass and augmentation of the Seven Rituals of the Church. The Angelic Kingdom is recognized as are the major principles of the Great World Religions of all time. Humanity is believed to be on its journey toward Divinity... and the Free Church of Antioch is here to hold the energy of Spirituality to assist this process toward the Light, and Love and Power of the Ages until all is restored in God's Plan on Earth.
From the point of Light within the Mind of God
Let light stream forth into the minds of men.
Let Light descend on Earth.
From the point of Love within the Heart of God
Let love stream forth into the hearts of men.
May Christ return to Earth.
From the center where the Will of God is known
Let purpose guide the little wills of men -
The purpose which the Masters know and serve.
From the center which we call the race of men
Let the Plan of Love and Light work out
And may it seal the door where evil dwells.
Let Light and Love and Power restore the Plan on
"The above Invocation or Prayer does not belong to any person or group but to all humanity. The beauty and the strength of this Invocation lies in its simplicity, and in its expression of certain central truths which all men, innately and normally, accept - the truth of the existence of a basic Intelligence to Whom we vaguely give the name of God; the truth that behind all outer seeming, the motivating power of the universe is Love; the truth that a great Individuality came to earth, called by Christians, the Christ, and embodied that love so that we could understand; the truth that both love and intelligence are effects of what is called the Will of God; and finally the self-evident truth that only through humanity itself can the Divine Plan work out."
For more contact information, see: Meet the Clergy page for e-mails and websites


text:
Hi all. I'm trying to get a jump start on some homework for next semester and wanted to run this problem by you guys:
A government research lab has concluded that an artificial sweetener commonly used in diet soda pop will cause death in laboratory mice. A friend of yours is desperate to lose weight but cannot give up soda pop. Your friend wants to know how much diet soda pop it is possible to drink without dying as a result. Write a program to supply the answer. The input to the program is the amount of artificial sweetener needed to kill a mouse, the weight of the mouse, and the weight of the dieter. To ensure the safety of your friend, be sure the program requests the weight at which the dieter will stop dieting, rather than the dieter's current weight. Assume that diet soda contains 1/10th of 1% of artificial sweetener. Use a variable declaration with the modifier const to give a name to this fraction. You may want to express the percent as the double value 0.001. Your program should allow the calculation to be repeated as often as the user wishes.
Below is the code I have created; did I do my math right? I think I have, but I just want to make sure before I keep plugging away.
public class killthemouse { public static double amtToKillMouse = .2; public static double weightMouse = 50; double weightHuman = 300; public static double weightWant = 200; public static double sweetenerConcentration = 0.001; public static void main(String[] args) { double Ratio2KillMouse = ((amtToKillMouse / weightMouse)); double convert2Human = (Ratio2KillMouse * weightWant); double humanFatal = (convert2Human / sweetenerConcentration); System.out.println(humanFatal + " units will be fatal to a human."); } }

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Research Technical Officer
Leanne has worked in the Research Department at Phillip Island Nature Parks since 1993. The main focus of her work is monitoring the breeding success, survival & weights of penguins at sites on the Summerland Peninsula. Leanne's position involves field trips to offshore islands to monitor other penguin colonies in Victoria. Her role also includes monitoring breeding colonies of crested terns and silver gulls.
Email: email@example.com
Phone: + 61 (3) 59512803
Mail: Phillip Island Nature Parks, PO Box 97, Cowes Vic. 3922, Australia
Professional Area
Little penguin ecology
- Monitoring breeding success & survival of penguins
- Satellite tracking penguins during breeding & non breeding
- Collection of samples for penguin diet analysis
- Assisting in seabird & shorebird counts and banding
- Collecting penguin & seal faecal samples for diet analysis
- Development & maintenance of biological databases
- Maintaining reference library & associated database
- Graduate Certificate in Environmental & Heritage Interpretation – 1993, Deakin University, Melbourne
- Associate Diploma in Natural Resource Management – 1992, Frankston TAFE, Melbourne
Chambers, L. E., Renwick, L.and Dann. P. (2009). Climate, fire and Little Penguins. Strategic Assessment of the Vulnerability of Australia's Biodiversity to Climate Change. CSIRO Melbourne.


text:
THE WOW FACTOR! South Facing one-of-a-kind impeccable. 772 sq. f t.one Bedroom & over-sized Den (or spacious 2nd Bedroom with very large closet). Balcony opens from open plan living and dining room, laminate flooring, gas fireplace, crown moulding, renovated kitchen with stainless steel appliances, marble backsplash, quartz countertop, designer colors, newer blinds, new switches & touch-screen dimmers. Renovated bathroom with granite countertop, new lighting & many other updates to this stunning suite (see additional features below) Master with sliding doors to balcony. OPEN SAT & SUN 2-4PM
Additional Features:
- Pets & Rentals allowed – great investment opportunity
- Peaceful seaside community all about the lifestyle
- One parking & one storage locker - ample visitor parking
- Kitchen also includes 30" stainless/steel under-mount sink, newer faucet ,under cabinet lighting, redid cabinets & hardware
- Bathroom also includes new under cabinet motion censored lighting, new exhaust fan, rain shower head
- All light switches & electrical plugs changed & all tamper proof
- Bedrooms, diningroom & fireplace accent lights all on dimmers
- All light fixtures changed & thermostats changed to programmable digital
Location, Location, Location!
- Run, Bike, Ski all in the same day – conveniently located to great hiking paths, biking trails & ski slopes
- Close to schools, parks, shopping, recreation centres, charming Deep Cove, Cates Park and yes, even Starbucks!
- Bask in the feeling of being away from it all while enjoying the nearby conveniences, easy hwy/bridge access & a short commute to downtown


text:
Hey, hey, keep rolling, keep rolling there. No, no, no, no, this sucker's electrical. But I need a nuclear reaction to generate the one point twenty-one gigawatts of electricity that I need. Wow, ah Red, you look great. Everything looks great. 1:24, I still got time. Oh my god. No, no not again, c'mon, c'mon. Hey. Libyans. So you're my Uncle Joey. Better get used to these bars, kid. Oh, I sure like her, Marty, she is such a sweet girl. Isn't tonight the night of the big date? Erased from existence.
Wait a minute, wait a minute. 1:15 in the morning? I swiped it from the old lady's liquor cabinet. Uh, Doc. That's Strickland. Jesus, didn't that guy ever have hair? No no no, Doc, I just got here, okay, Jennifer's here, we're gonna take the new truck for a spin.
Thanks a lot, kid. They're late. My experiment worked. They're all exactly twenty-five minutes slow. Doc, you gotta help- She's just trying to keep you respectable. Marty. Marty. Marty.
Right. Thanks, thanks a lot. Your not gonna be picking a fight, Dad, dad dad daddy-o. You're coming to a rescue, right? Okay, let's go over the plan again. 8:55, where are you gonna be. Oh no, don't touch that. That's some new specialized weather sensing equipment. Uh, well, okay Biff, uh, I'll finish that on up tonight and I'll bring it over first thing tomorrow morning.


text:
Unless you've been living under a rock lately, you've heard of director Christopher Nolan's new movie Inception. What you may not have noticed is his longstanding practice of "fridging" female characters.
Inception is a long-generating story, one that Nolan's been working on for over a decade, biding his time and building up enough of a reputation in Hollywood that he could get the backing for his dazzling mindfuck of a pet project. And build up a reputation he has: Nolan has had a string of hits, both financially and critically. On the review-aggregating site Rotten Tomatoes, not one of his films rates below a 75%. His last movie, The Dark Knight, grossed over 1 billion dollars worldwide. There are precious few filmmakers in Hollywood who have so successfully balanced artistic achievements with the culture of spectacle, not so much infusing blockbusters with a decent story as crafting intricate scripts that just so happen to have blockbuster potential.
It's a goddamn shame, then, that he feels the need to fridge the hell out of his women. By way of definition:
fridge, v. to kill off a female character solely for the purpose of giving the story's main male hero a reason to angst. Coined by Gail Simone in response to a storyline in The Green Lantern in which the hero's girlfriend is killed and literally stuffed in his refrigerator. In 1999, Simone started a website, Women in Refrigerators, that lists all of the comic book women who have been fridged.
(In case you haven't figured it out by now, THIS POST CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS FOR ALMOST EVERY CHRISTOPHER NOLAN MOVIE EVER MADE. Also, I am not a scientist or a professional researcher.)
Don't get me wrong: I love Christopher Nolan's movies. Memento is one of my favorites. I own The Dark Knight. Next week I will see Inception for the third time in theaters. But there's always a lingering icky feeling after the credits roll, when I watch the actors' names rise from the bottom of the screen and try to remember whether any of the women listed did anything important other than die. More often than not, the answer is a resounding no. And when they do live, they're usually evil.
Don't believe me? Let's have a look.
CASE STUDY: Memento (2000)
The movie that made us all sit up and go, "Christopher WHO?" A crackerjack film noir told in reverse about an amnesiac named Leonard (Guy Pearce) who's looking for the man who killed his wife...or is he?
The women:
Natalie (Carrie-Ann Moss). A bartender who Leonard meets on his search through the underbelly. By turns helpful and treacherous, Natalie ultimately manipulates Leonard for her own purposes, using his disability to kill off or maim those who are threatening her. She's undeniably shady, but just how bad she is depends on your interpretation of the movie's events. Alive, antagonist.
Mrs. Jankis (Harriet Sansom Harris). Apparently she has no first name. Leonard repeats the story of the Jankis' several times: Sammy Jankis has the same brain damage as Leonard, but his wife doubts whether or not he's faking it, so she decides to test him. She asks him to give her an insulin shot, then another one in a few minutes after his memory has erased the first. Surprise, surprise, he wasn't faking, and she dies. This is the first instance of a wife dying due to her husband's actions. Dead.
Leonard's Wife (Jorja Fox). No, seriously, Leonard's Wife
is her official credit. She didn't get a fucking name either
. Oy. Anyway, she actually sort of dies twice in the movie, once when she and Leonard are first attacked; she survives the attack, but Leonard doesn't remember that, and the loss drives him through most of the film. It's revealed at the end, though, that she was actually the one with the insulin, and Leonard invented Sammy Jankis and his wife in order not to deal with the guilt. So really we get two dead-because-of-her-husband-wives for the price of one. Dead.
CONCLUSIONS: Two dead, unnamed wives inadvertantly killed by their husbands' conditions; one femme fatale. We're off to a bangup start. Movie also fails the Bechdel Test: at no point in the movie do two women even speak to each other.
The Bechdel Test: a litmus test developed by writer Alison Bechdel in 1985 to gauge the agency and autonomy of a story's characters. The test has three parts: 1) Are there two female characters who 2) talk to each other 3) about something other than a man?
CASE STUDY: Insomnia (2002)
Detective Frank Dormer (Al Pacino) hunts for serial killer Walter Finch (Robin Williams) in Alaska with the assistance of a local cop named Ellie Burr (Hilary Swank). After he accidentally shoots his partner and covers it up, though, he and the killer wind up morally entangled, and Ellie gets suspicious.
The women
Ellie Burr (Hilary Swank). Here's a good one: Burr practically salivates over Dormer at the film's outset, telling him that he's her idol, but she's also the only one sharp enough to catch the mistakes that Dormer made in his cover-up. Despite getting no backup from the rest of the local cops, who call her "Nancy Drew," she solves the mystery on her own and is the only one left standing as the credits roll. Technically she's an antagonist for the main character, but she's a principled one with plenty of agency. Alive, antagonist.
Kay Connell (Crystal Lowe). Every serial killer story needs a naked, beaten female victim, and teenaged Kay Connell fits the bill. She's already dead before the opening credits, so we only glimpse her in flashbacks and as a bloated corpse on a morgue slab. (I couldn't find any pictures of her that weren't naked and mutilated, so I didn't put one up.) Dead.
Tanya (Katherine Isabelle). Kay's "best friend," who was sleeping with Kay's boyfriend. Portrayed as a callow Lolita who comes onto Dormer and doesn't really care about her dead friend. Alive, but a Whore.
Madonna-Whore complex: a psychological condition in which men divide women into ultra-"pure" Madonnas who can never be sullied with sexual intimacy, and dirty, dirty Whores who can never possibly be wives or mothers. As in men's minds, so in culture. For example: every single Taylor Swift video, ever.
The hotel manager (Maura Tierney). According to IMDB, she's "Rachel Clements," but I don't recall her ever being called by her name in the film. She's shown to be hard-working and professional, but is also deeply compassionate. When the sleepless Dormer is coming unglued, she listens to his desperate confession and advises him. This is the first instance of another motif in Nolan's films: women acting as the conscience of men. Which, hey, it's still using a woman as a secondary prop to a man's emotional arc, but at least she isn't evil. Alive, good.
CONCLUSIONS: Not so bad. We have two strong, principled, professional women, though one of them is technically an antagonist. We've also got a dead, mutilated teenager and a Whore, but...it kinda balances out? No on the Bechdel Test: no two women speak to each other through the whole movie.
CASE STUDY: Batman Begins (2005)
Taking over the Batman franchise, Nolan took him back to his roots for an origin story, detailing how Bruce Wayne trained himself into a crime-busting machine.
women woman
Rachel Dawes (Katie Holmes). As the one woman in Batman Begins, Rachel is brave and smart. As the only ADA with the figurative nads to stand up to the crime syndicate, she's an invaluable ally to Batman and Jim Gordon. She's also another "conscience woman," directing Bruce away from vengeance after his parents are gunned down. (Which, by the way, isn't it funny how much Bruce flashes back to his dead father? While never seeming to give a thought to his dead mother? Yes, I thought that was funny, too.) Rachel does need to be saved an awful lot. Alive, good.
CONCLUSIONS: No chance at the Bechdel test, but Rachel is still a fairly good female character...
CASE STUDY: The Dark Knight
Nolan's second entry in his revival of the Batman movies.
The women
Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal): ...d'oh! Now, obviously the Batman franchise is based on pre-existing material, so Nolan can't 100% be blamed for this one. But still, every comic book director picks and chooses which canon to use from the books, and this is what Nolan chose. (God help us if he ever tries his hand at Catwoman.) ETA: I've been informed in the comments that Rachel Dawes was NOT in the comics and that her movie character was not based on any recognizable pre-existing Batman character. So Nolan created a woman and introduced her into the Batman universe solely for the purpose of killing her off. Not only does her death provide angst for Bruce Wayne, it turns Harvey Dent evil and Jim Gordon borderline-suicidal. Wow, screw fridging, that's like a deep freeze! Dead.
Detective Andrea Ramirez (Monique Gabriela Curnen): Shown to be Jim Gordon's strong right hand, despite the fact that she's a rookie. She ultimately betrays them all to the crime syndicate, gets Rachel killed, and almost gets Jim Gordon's family killed. Alive, antagonist.
Barbara Gordon (Melinda McGraw): Exists in the movie solely to be Gordon's wife, mother of his children, and a Madonna. The only time she's ever seen outside their home is when she and her children are taken hostage by Two-Face; she puts up absolutely no fight even when the dude has a gun to her son's head. (And while we're on the subject of Gordon's family: Gordon's son is "Jim Gordon, Jr." but guess what his daughter's credited as? "Jim Gordon's Daughter." That's right, she gets no name, and it's made explicit in the movie that she's not her father's favorite. Nice.) Alive, but a Madonna.
ETA: I totally forgot about Judge Surrilo! You know, the female judge who was willing to preside over Dent's prosecution of all the mobsters at once. You know—the one who gets blown up. Yeah, that one. Dead.
CONCLUSIONS: All the women are either dead, evil, or a Madonna. The film sort of passes the Bechdel test in that Ramirez calls Barbara Gordon to warn her that she should leave the house; but that's done at Two-face's gunpoint, so it's sketchy at best. Apparently the only way to get women to talk to each other in Nolan movies is to point a gun at them.
CASE STUDY: The Prestige
Two rival magicians, Angier (Hugh Jackman) and Borden (Christian Bale), duke it out in turn-of-the-century England.
The women
Julia (Piper Perabo). Angier's wife. Drowns—half-naked and bound, onstage—during a botched magic trick; the messup was possibly Borden's fault, and her death incites the antipathy between the two. The manner of her death is of some importance: there's a strong undercurrent through the movie about the sacrifices that magicians make for their craft, and it's understood that women are a necessary sacrifice. See below. Dead.
Sarah (Rebecca Hall). Borden's wife. Hangs herself in despair because of what she believes is her husband's fickle nature and unfaithfulness. What she doesn't realize is that she's actually married one of two twin brothers; they never tell anyone the truth because it would mean exposing their best magic trick. So basically Borden watches his wife sink into depression and alcohol abuse rather than tell her the truth, all for the sake of his career. Lovely. Dead.
Olivia (Scarlett Johansson). She is first Angier's assistant; Angier sends her to spy on and sleep with Borden, and she switches sides in disgust. She's a good accomplice, particularly for Borden who she helps revolutionize his career. They fall in love, but she also becomes disgusted by his fickleness. Again, the twins can't be bothered to tell her the truth. Despite being traded like a pawn between the men, she has a fair amount of agency and independence. One could argue that she's a Whore, but given her sympathy for the dead Sarah and her decision to leave Borden, I think that she avoids that trap. Alive, good.
CONCLUSIONS: Two dead wives, twice the manpain. (Or well, triple, if you count the twins separately.) This story, too, was an adaptation; but, again, Nolan chose to take this project on. Something about dead wives really appeals to him. Sarah and Olivia do speak to each other once, but only so that Sarah can object to Olivia calling her husband "Freddie," so it's definitely about a man.
CASE STUDY: Inception, 2010
A team of extractors led by Dom Cobb (Leonardo Dicaprio) invades the mind of an energy magnate, but they're dogged by a shade from Cobb's past, Mal (Marion Cotillard).
The women
Mal. Let's get the obvious one out of the way: the dead wife. And not only is she dead, we actually see her die four times over, both in dreams and in real life. Twice are suicide, once she's shot by her husband, and once she's shot by the movie's other woman. Her madness and eventual real-life suicide were her husband's fault. After her death she haunts his subconscious and is the film's femme fatale and villain. Plus, most of the time she's she's not even real. Besides the few flashbacks where she's crazy and suicidal, she spends most of the movie as a goddamn projection of Cobb's memory of her, laced with his guilt and self-loathing. She has absolutely no autonomy of her own. It's like Chris Nolan's worst hits, all wrapped up in one admittedly-gorgeous Frenchwoman. Very dead, antagonist.
Ariadne (Ellen Page). Curiously, the film that has the worst representation of women also has the best female character that Nolan can offer to date. Ariadne is described as an ever better architect than Cobb was, she's the only teammember who calls him on his emotionally-disturbed shit, yet she is a constant support and guide for him. She's the ultimate example of woman-as-conscience, persistently pushing Cobb to face his demons. Ultimately she's the one who completes the job they were hired to do, by shooting shade-Mal and literally drop-kicking Fischer out of Limbo. As the newest teammember, she's a stand-in for the audience, asking all the questions we're wondering; though Cobb is the main character, we're meant to identify with level-headed Ariadne. However, she is still a prop to Cobb's emotional and physical journey. We do see her "die" at one point, stabbed by Mal no less. On the scale of Christopher Nolan movies, she's pretty damn good, but he's still got a long way to go. Alive.
CONCLUSIONS: A decidedly mixed bag. The very best and worst, packed into one. It also comes closest to passing the Bechdel test: Ariadne and Mal talk, but Mal is technically a projection of Cobb's mind and their conversation was subtextually about Cobb. So it's debatable.
+ Going through the IMDB database, I counted up the number of named characters in the above movies. (Although as we've seen, "named" is a fairly relative term — "Gordon's Daughter" and "Leonard's Wife," for example.) There were 94 names roles for all of Nolan's major films. (I'll confess I haven't seen Following or Doodlebug. If someone has, please chime in.) Even being generous with what constitutes a name, only 23 of those roles belonged to women.
+ Of those 23, only 17 had speaking roles (more than one line).
+ Of those 17, only 9 were alive at the end of the movie.
+ Of those 9, 5 were antagonists, Whores, or Madonnas.
+ That just leaves the hotel manager in Insomnia (who apparently has a name — I was generous there), Rachel Dawes in Batman Begins, Olivia in The Prestige, and Ariadne in Inception. One of them dies in a later film, and one "dies" in a dream, one is almost a Whore, and one barely has a name.
+ Of the 6 women who are wives in Chris Nolan movies, only Barbara Gordon survives her movie. Of the other 5, 4 commit suicide.
+ Of the 8 women who die, 6 are inarguably cases of fridging. Remember, "fridging" means killing a woman off solely to give the main male hero a reason to angst. The two wives in Memento match this profile to a T, as do the two wives in The Prestige, Mal in Inception, and Rachel Dawes in The Dark Knight.
But fridging is obviously only part of a larger problem in Nolan's cinescape. Recent studies have shown that women get only about 30% of the speaking roles in films and tv shows, despite making up half the population. In Nolan movies, only 23% of the named roles are women. I haven't the wherewithal to examine the percentage of speaking roles that belong to women, but I'm guessing that it's not many.
Again, let me be clear that I am a fan of Nolan. I belive he's a visionary. But speaking as a woman who watches his movies, I find myself longing to see someone like me onscreen, who doesn't die horribly. I want to believe that he is better than this. I want to believe that he just hasn't been challenged on it yet.
Consider this your gauntlet, Mr. Nolan.
This post originally appeared at Gadzooks! Republished with permission.
Want to see your work here? Email us!


text:
A chilling video shows a group of people singing "Ave Maria" as they watch flames engulf the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris.
As massive plumes of yellow brown smoke fill the air above the church, ash can be seen falling on tourists and others around the island that marks the center of the beloved city.
The video was first shared on Twitter by French correspondent Ignacio Gil Monday evening.
The video was retweeted more than 25,000 times and triggered emotional responses from around the world.
The catastrophic fire that has engulfed the cathedral as it was undergoing renovations threatened one of the greatest architectural treasures of the Western world.
The blaze collapsed the cathedral's spire and spread to one of its landmark rectangular towers before being extinguished. Paris fire commander Jean-Claude Gallet said two-thirds of the Notre Dame's roofing has been "ravaged."
The 12th-century cathedral is home to incalculable works of art and is one of the world's most famous tourist attractions, immortalized by Victor Hugo's 1831 novel "The Hunchback of Notre Dame."
Prosecutors opened an investigation into the cause of the fire as Paris police said there were no reported deaths. Some 400 firefighters were battling the blaze well into the night.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.


text:
Information about cookies: To get an optimal navigation, the website use cookies, Accept cookies
Dear customer,
You are ordering following article quantity (x ).
This article cannot be purchased per single piece or per unit quantity
Please select a quantity for this article. Try to round up to full carton or nearest packing :


text:
The joy of collecting Porsche Boxster model cars.
The Boxster models will appeal to anyone who loves the sporty two-seater. The full-size Porsche is based on a sophisticated mid-engine concept which guarantees balanced handling and cornering. The Boxster was first presented as a concept car in 1993 at the Detroit Motor Show. The mid-engine roadster was launched on the German market in 1996. You can buy models of the much-loved sports car in 1:18 and 1:43 scale. Even the small-scale Boxster model highlights the roadster's strengths, which include a spacious interior and a trunk both front and back.


text:
Japan's two main airlines will begin providing Wi-Fi on some international flights, with Japan Airlines to begin offering services next month.
JAL will start offering Wi-Fi from July 15 on flights between Tokyo and New York, it said. A one-hour plan will cost US$11.95, while 24 hours of access will cost US$21.95. The Wi-Fi will be offered for free through September for first class and other elite passengers.
The service will be offered on the New York route every other day until Aug. 5, then on every flight. In late August, Wi-Fi will be expanded to flights from Tokyo to Los Angeles and Chicago, and in October flights to Jakarta will also get access.
All Nippon Airways said its Wi-Fi service will go live in the middle of next year, initially on its international routes served by certain Boeing 777 and Boeing 767 aircraft. ANA did not say whether it will launch the services on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which it was the first airline to use.
Despite the early promise of such services, Wi-Fi has yet to become mainstream for airlines and passengers, in part due to the cost. Outfitting a single plane for the service can cost an airline over $100,000, making some companies wary, and passengers have been unwilling to pay when other entertainment is available often for free.
JAL said it will use a service provided by T-Mobile. ANA will use service provider OnAir, which uses satellites to provide its connections and lists British Airways, Qantas and Singapore Airlines among its customers.
JAL has rebounded strongly from its 2010 bankruptcy and years of safety mishaps, and is now booking strong profits under the leadership of Kazuo Inamori, the founder of electronics maker Kyocera and of KDDI, Japan's No. 2 mobile operator. News reports in Japan say the airline, which is currently mostly owned by a government-backed fund, is eyeing an IPO later this year.


text:
Poedua is an oil painting on stretched canvas, meaning the composition is painted on a fabric support which is stretched to keep it evenly tensioned, over an expandable wooden stretcher. Canvas supports began to replace traditional wooden panel supports from about the 16th century and were the most commonly used type of support by the 18th century.
The canvas used for this painting is probably linen (untested) and it has a twill weave, which creates a distinct texture which is visible through some areas of the paint layer. Linen is a common support for paintings of this age, but other fabrics are also used as supports for paintings, including hemp and cotton. The canvas is attached with small metal tacks around the sides of the stretcher bars. We think there's a good chance that this is probably the original attachment because there are no old holes in either the canvas or the stretcher, which can indicate that the canvas has been taken off in the past.
The back of the canvas is no longer looking as it would have when Webber first painted it! The canvas is made of a natural fibre which has darkened and discoloured because of the process of ageing and deterioration. We have found the canvas to be in quite a good condition, given its age. There are a few areas we will need to address in our treatment, including some small tears and embrittlement around the edges. This has occurred because over time the fibres have become inelastic and snap rather than stretch. There are some areas of damage which we can't determine the extent of just yet because they have been covered with patches on the back.
The back of the canvas is also dirty from being exposed to the world for the past 226 years! There is a layer of dirt and some staining present, which are a combination of age-soiling and various deposits and residues. We hope to be able to reduce some of this soiling with cleaning, but this action probably won't dramatically change the way the canvas currently appears. What we hope to achieve is a reduction of the dirt matter, which if left, can accelerate deterioration.
An interesting discovery for us is that Poedua has never been lined. Lining is the attachment of a new support to the entire reverse of a painting on canvas. Its aim is to give additional support and reinforcement to a weakened or damaged canvas. It was a very common restoration procedure in the past and most paintings of this age have been lined at some point. The fact that the canvas has remained unlined means that we can see the back of the original canvas and a lovely inscription, presumably by the artist himself.


text:
- Inside Athletics
- Tickets
- Fan Zone
- Media Zone
- Social
- Shop
- Donate Now
Batsula, who was recently award the ITA/Cissie Leary Award for Sportsmanship in the Southeast Division, which went to the women's tennis player who displays inspiring dedication and commitment to her team, and which has enhanced the team's performance and exemplified the spirit of college tennis. Batsula a four-time all conference selection, compiled a 22-11 overall record, was 15-6 in dual play, and 11-0 in conference play in her senior season. The
""It is a great honor for Olya to represent ETSU and the Atlantic Sun Conference in the NCAA Woman of the Year competition," said head coach Steven Brooks. "This just shows how important she was to the program and to the university. Being named the national winner of the Cissie Leary Sportsmanship award earlier - it would be incredible for her to win this award."
Off the court Batsula has been active in the community throughout her ETSU career helping out with the Boys and Girls Club, the Children's Advocacy Center, Girls Inc., Relay for Life, Special Olympics, and Toys for Tots. Even though Batsula was busy with academics and practices she still found time to give lessons to wheelchair bound students and underprivileged kids. Batsula would even drive 20 minutes to
Additionally, Batsula graduated Magna Cum Laude, in May of 2008, and was named the 2008 Buccaneer Leadership Award winner and earned the Faculty Award in the Department of Kinesiology, Leisure and Sport Sciences. Batsula attended the National Leadership Conference as a representative of ETSU. A three time ITA Scholar Athlete, she was a member of the Phi Kappa Phi National Honor Society, the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee and was awarded the Buc Wild competition by attending more than 50 athletic events not in her own sport.
The NCAA Women of the Year award consistent of 128 conference and independent nominees that represents all three divisions and have excelled in academics, athletics and community services. Nominees are selected based on service and leadership activities, academic achievement, athletics excellence, and a personal statement describing benefits she has gained from her experience as a student-athlete.
Batsula joins former teammate Maria Ilina, who was the nominee from the A-Sun in 2007.
For more information about the women's tennis team or ETSU athletics visit www.etsubucs.com


text:
Inside Hearst Castle, America's favorite palace (Pictures)
William Randolph Hearst built one of the largest media empires in history, as well as one of the most ostentatious homes and art collections. Then he went $100 million in debt. CNET Road Trip 2012 stopped in for an exclusive tour.
View from down the road
SAN SIMEON, Calif.--There aren't many buildings in America that are as interwoven into our culture as Hearst Castle. The longtime palace-away-from-home of media mogul William Randolph Hearst, this central California mega-mansion played host to the power elite from Hollywood to Washington, D.C. for years, and was fictionalized in Orson Welles' classic film "Citizen Kane."
This 165-room estate, built by esteemed California architect Julia Morgan on 250,000 stunning acres, features four main buildings with a total of 58 bedrooms and two giant pools with a total of 550,000 gallons of water.
Hearst Castle is famous for its -- and Hearst's -- monumental collection of original and replica art spanning centuries and a diverse range of styles. Each year more than 630,000 people drive hours to visit, and since it opened for public tours in 1958, more than 38 million people have spent time there. And that's not including some of the 20th century's most rich and famous, from Winston Churchill to John Paul Getty to Charlie Chaplin and Gary Cooper.
Neptune Pool
Very likely among the first things that most visitors see when they step off the shuttles that bring them to Hearst Castle from below is the Neptune Pool.
Completed in 1936, the pool contains 345,000 gallons of water. The final in a series of three designs for a magnificent pool for the site, it is 104 feet long, 58 feet wide, and 95 feet wide at alcove. It features an oil burning heating system, light-veined Vermont marble decorating the pools and colonnades -- which have a set of four 17th century Italian bas-reliefs on their sides.
Aerial view
An aerial view of the main parts of Hearst Castle, including the Neptune Pool on the left, and the main Casa Grande dominating the image.
Roman pool
CNET reporter Daniel Terdiman got a special behind-the-scenes tour that included a visit to the top of the steps leading to the diving platform over the Roman Pool, a second swimming facility that contains 205,000 gallons of water.
A tiled indoor pool that is accompanied by statues of eight Roman gods, goddesses, and heroes, its likely inspiration was an ancient Roman bath such as the Baths of Caracalla. According to the Hearst Castle Web site, "The mosaic tiled patterns were inspired by mosaics found in the 5th Century Mausoleum of Galla Placidia in Ravenna, Italy. They are also representative of traditional marine monster themes that can be found in ancient Roman baths. The statues are rough copies of ancient Greek and Roman statues. One such copy represents the 'Apoxyomenos.'"
Assembly hall
This is Hearst Castle's Assembly Room. A giant living room where most social evenings began when Hearst had society's best and brightest on hand, there were with cocktails, lively discussion, and an opportunity to mingle with one of the early 20th century's most powerful men.
Looking down at the Neptune Pool
A view down at the Neptune Pool from above. The main structure on the far side of the pool features a bust of Neptune, along with columns made in Egypt and Syria from the first to the fourth centuries.
The north collonades at the Neptune Pool feature four 17th-century Italian bas-reliefs on their sides.
Gothic Study
Hearst occupied the entire third floor of the main building, known as Casa Grande. Although his private chambers -- as well as those of his mistress, Marion Davies -- were on this level, the highlight is the Gothic Suite, which "evokes a church, with its high windows and painted arches," explains the Web site. "But three thousand books and an imposing conference table show that this was actually Mr. Hearst's personal library and executive board room" where he could conduct high-level meetings involving his many businesses.
Ostensibly Hearst Castle's dining room is where all meals were eaten. Hearst and architect Julia Morgan called this grand room the "Refectory," the "term for a monastery dining hall. Its high windows, bright silk banners, and gleaming silver candlesticks convey the atmosphere of a church from the middle ages."
Dining table
The long dining table, found in the Refectory. This is where all meals were served, whether the cream of Hollywood society was in attendance, or whether it was simply Hearst and his mistress, Davies.
Palm trees
Anyone who has visited Hearst Castle knows that the visual highlights include huge and beautiful gardens, along with many palm trees.
South side of the castle
A look at the south side of Casa Grande, which was styled after a Spanish cathedral and was done in Mediterranean Revival style.
Diving board view
A look down the Roman Pool from atop the stairway.
Side room
Constructed from 1927 to 1934, the Roman Pool complex is best compared to an ancient Roman bath. Located indoors, its water "was heated as in a tepidarium," explains the Web site. "However, in Hearst's complex there were no hot or cold baths as there were in the ancient complex. The Roman Pool complex was designed to contain an exercise room, sweat baths, a handball court and dressing rooms."
Off to the side
A look into one of the side areas of the Roman Pool.
Into the water
"The Roman Pool is decorated from ceiling to floor with one-inch square mosaic tiles," according to the Web site. "These glass tiles, called smalti, are either colored (mainly blue or orange) or are clear with fused gold inside. The intense colors and shimmering gold of the tiles combine to create a breathtaking effect. The designs created by the tiles were developed by muralist Camille Solon. The inspiration for some of these designs came from the 5th Century Mausoleum of Galla Placidia."
Light flows through glass bricks from above into the Roman Pool, creating a contrast with the indoor area, including this bridge which goes up to a diving platform.
South Celestial Bedroom
Located in the south tower of the mansion's main building, this is the South Celestial Bedroom, a stunning room with three balconies looking out over world-class views of California's Central Coast, the Pacific Ocean, and the thousands of acres of the Hearst estate. Famed journalist Hedda Hopper was said to have spoken of the bedroom, where she often slept, as "like a jewel box." According to "Hearst Castle," by Victoria Kastner, Hopper also said, "I never knew which meant more to me, the gold room or the view from its windows."
Rear of Casa Grande
This is the rear of Casa Grande, with a facade featuring 600-year-old columns from Venice, Italy, and windows from France that are hundreds of years old.
Wine cellar
Hearst Castle features a 10,000-bottle capacity wine cellar that to this day still holds many full bottles. Hearst himself was not fond of overdoing alcohol, and it was said that, at Hearst Castle, "drinks were served, not drunks." However, his mistress, Marion Davies, was known to abuse booze, and it is assumed that much of what was stored in the wine cellar was for her use and that of her friends.
Wine cellar 2
Another look at the Hearst Castle wine cellar.
Assembly hall shorter view
The walls of the Assembly Room are lined with walnut paneling, some which is original and some which are replicas, as well as "vivid tapestries, all dating back to the 16th century," the Web site explains. "Neoclassical marble statues brighten the corners and fine bronze sculptures sit atop the large tables in this room of the property. But the jigsaw puzzles, poker table, and comfy overstuffed chairs show that the Assembly Room was also a place for socializing and fun."
Hearst bedroom
This was Hearst's private bedroom, on the third floor of the man mansion building.
Hearst bedroom - Casa del Mar
In his 80s, Hearst moved from the main building into one of the three guest houses on the property, Casa del Mar. This is his bedroom in Casa del Mar, which had a total of eight bedrooms and comprises 5,350 square feet.
Marion Davies bedroom
This is the bedroom of Hearst's mistress, actress Marion Davies, on the third floor of the main mansion building, across the Gothic Study from Hearst's own bedroom.
Hearst dressing room
This is Hearst's private dressing room, on the third floor of Casa Grande.
Doge Suite
This is the Doge's Suite in Casa Grande, featuring an 18th century Italian ceiling, and a 17th century Italian bed. "Inspired by the ornate chambers of the Doge's Palace in Venice, this richly decorated suite of two bedrooms and a private sitting room was assigned to Mr. Hearst's special guests," according to the Web site. "They were literally surrounded by museum-quality art, including beautifully painted antique ceilings overhead. An arched marble balcony featuring carved lions -- long a symbol of Venice -- frames views of the eastern mountains."
Doge Sitting Room
This is the Doge's Sitting Room in Casa Grande.
This is the kitchen in Casa Grande, featuring this giant rotisserie oven.
Rest of kitchen
A look at the rest of the Casa Grande kitchen, including this long preparing table.
This is Hearst's pride and joy: His library. According to the Hearst Castle Web site, "guests were welcome to browse through the...four thousand books. This imposing architectural space also showcases one of Mr. Hearst's most treasured collections: one hundred and fifty ancient Greek vases, all more than two thousand years old. These fragile clay vessels are displayed throughout the room and provide fascinating glimpses of daily life in ancient Greece. At 80 feet in length and filled with precious objects, the library is truly a place to get lost in."
Tennis court with glass bricks
Above the Roman Pool are these two tennis courts, featuring glass bricks allowing light to flood into the pool below. After working up a sweat on the courts, guests were invited to go downstairs to refresh themselves.
Under the collonades
A view from under the collonades, alongside the Neptune Pool.
Front of Casa Grande
A look up at the two towers from the front of Casa Grande.
Dressing room
There were a set of dressing rooms in the Roman Pool building. Guests would each have one to themselves while they were swimming.


text:
Sitemap Automator
- Quickly Submit your site to all search engines
- Instantly get important site feedback from search engines
- Fix any SEO problems with your site
- Works with any website
Don't wait for search engines to find your website among the billions of others trying to attract their attention. Lead them through your websites with industry standard XML Sitemap files.
Sitemap Automator makes it so easy to create XML Sitemap files that tell search engines all about your website including which pages to index, how often to come back for fresh, new content, and how important each page on your website is. It takes the hassle out of submitting your website to search engines by automatically notifying major search engines when your XML Sitemap file has changed. Best of all, with these XML Sitemap files search engines give you important submission feedback such as the top keywords your website will appear for in their index and who is linking to your website.
Just enter your website address and Sitemap Automator will take care of the rest, generating Google, Yahoo, Bing and Ask.com compliant Sitemaps allowing you to take control of how search engines treat your webpages. Whether you built your website by hand, in Dreamweaver, Rapidweaver, or iWeb, Sitemap Automator will work for you.
Help search engines with their job so they can attract more visitors to your website!Now works with Yahoo, Bing and Ask.com search!
The easiest way for Mac users to create XML Sitemaps offers the following features and benefits.
With the Sitemaps program you can find out what search terms return your website, who is clicking on your website for these search terms, and which of your pages Google knows about.
Powerful Filters Do All The Work For You
With Sitemap Automator you don't have to go through each page one at a time like you would with any other XML Sitemap generator.
Sitemap Automator is the only tool that lets you create filters to automatically set your web page attributes. You can set filters to apply a high priority to your important articles or set the update frequency to daily for your content you update everyday. All this can be done automatically each time you update your XML Sitemap file with Sitemap Automator.
Even prevent certain files from being added to your XML Sitemap such as those you don't want Google, or other major search engines to index. The powerful filters help you save time when creating an XML Sitemap for hundreds of pages so you can get your XML Sitemaps up as quick as possible.
Create Your XML Sitemap In Minutes & Get Indexed by Search Engines Today
Sitemap Automator is fast! It's so fast that it can scan over 10,000 links in less than 5 minutes. Once the scanning is finished, you can manually add any other links or edit the meta data associated with each page.
Sitemap Automator will even tell you if any of your pages were rejected or cannot be properly scanned, helping you avoid having certain pages rejected by search engines. Broken links and unreachable pages can prevent your entire website from being properly indexed by search engines. Sitemap Automator will make sure this does not happen.
Most of your meta information will have already been filled in for you by setting up Filters. With your XML Sitemap scan complete, you are now ready to create your XML Sitemap and notify search engines on the next tab.
Instantly Publish Your XML Sitemap to your FTP Server or MobileMe
Publish your sitemap file right from within Sitemap Automator. You can upload it to your FTP server or your MobileMe/iDisk without ever leaving the application.
Once it's uploaded, submit your XML Sitemap directly to search engines by pressing the Notify Search Engines button.
Now you've got your sitemap uploaded and you're on your way to an improved listing in Google, Yahoo, Bing and Ask.com.
Quickly Add & Edit Important Web Page Meta Details
Once your website scan is complete you can quickly add or modify any of the meta information for each one of your web pages. You can even modify multiple pages at once. Just select the pages you want to modify and click the edit button in the lower left hand corner.
Want to quickly edit a specific web page? Just use the Filter Search Field in the toolbar to quickly find the page you are looking for.
If you need to apply new filters and re-scan your website that's no problem either! Sitemap Automator can remember all the meta details you have set for each page so the next time you scan your site you will not have to make any additional changes.
See Exactly Where Your Website Appears In Search Engines
Once you submit your XML Sitemap to Google you get to see exactly where your website appears for various search terms as well as how many users are clicking your website for that specific term in Google's search engine result page.
Search information is graphed over time and you can even compare your keyword performance by country and in Google's specific search engines such as image search and video search. The average position of each search term in Google's result page is shown next to each keyword as well.
Yahoo and Bing also provide similar feedback including who links to your website, and any problems they experience when adding your website to the search index.
Find Out Why Your Website is Not Appearing In Search Engines
Have you ever wondered why some of your pages are not being added to Google's search index?
Control How Often Google Scans Your Website
When you first get your website online, waiting for Google to come scan your website can be frustrating. With your sitemaps account you can see exactly how often Google comes to your website and how much of your bandwidth it is using.
See Exactly How Many Websites Link To You
The number one biggest factor in improving search engine rankings is getting high quality websites to link to your website. With your Webmaster Tools account you can see exactly how many websites link to each individual page on your website. You can even see the anchor text (the clickable keywords used to link to your website) websites are using to link to your website. Keywords used in anchor text increase the chance of your website appearing for those phrases in Google.
Find Out How Websites Link To You
Anchor text is one of the most important factors too ranking well in search engines. Each time a website links to you it is equivalent to a vote of confidence for your website. More specifically the anchor text they use to link to your website helps identify what your website is all about.
With your sitemap.xml file you can find out exactly what anchor text is being used to link to your website and you can use that information to optimize your website for those keywords. The more websites that link to you with a specific keyword, the easier it becomes to rank higher for that keyword in search engines.
The following tool will show you hundreds of the most commonly used anchor text.
See How Fast Your Website Loads
In early 2010 Google announced that the speed of your website will be a factor in how well your website ranks in their search engine result pages. This means that a slow loading website will not only annoy your visitors, it can also potentially hurt your search engine rankings.
Your Google Webmaster Tools account now shows you how fast your website loads and even compares your site's load time with other sites in your industry. It will pinpoint the individual pages that are causing problems so you can easily fix them and graph your website's speed over time.
Even better, you can speed up your website instantly with WebCrusher, the most powerful website optimizer.
See just how easy it is to get your website listed in all major search engines with RAGE Sitemap Automator. Just enter your website and scan your site. Your XML Sitemap will create a listing of all your web pages and then submit them to Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask.com.
In this example we used Apple's iWeb to create our site, but it doesn't matter what tool you have used, RAGE Sitemap Automator is compatible with any website. Whether it was built with Apple's iWeb, WebDesign, Rapidweaver, Dreamweaver, Freeway, or Sandvox.Watch Tutorial
This video tutorial will show you how you can verify your website with Google Webmaster Tools. Verifying your website only takes a few minutes. Once verified, Google will start providing you with detailed reports about your website.Watch Tutorial
In this video we teach you how to make sure that your XML Sitemap file was published correctly to your website.Watch Tutorial
Once you have created your Sitemap with Sitemap Automator you can now geo-target your website to specific countries. This means, your website's ranking goes up almost instantly for the customers you are targeting.
This video describes exactly how you can do this, step-by-step, with your Google Webmaster Tools account.Watch Tutorial
Buy Now: $29.95
File Size: 18.7 MB
Latest Version: 3.9.9
Frequently Asked Questions
I've used this product a lot & it just simply works. It maps all of your pages (I mean ALL of them) & ALL of the links contained throughout your website. You can even set filters to include more or less content (URLs & links). The support & documentation is equally as great. The docs even include a bunch of tips for optimizing your search engine results! I highly recommend this product, as it's only getting better (I beta test for Rage). So, stay tuned & info [more...]
- Versiontracker.com Reviewer
As a very small business we do not have a large IT budget. Your software made much of what was necessary to achieve on our new website simple and far less time consuming than would otherwise have been the case. It was money very well spent and I would recommend it to any business in a similar position to ours where every dollar must count.
- Andrew Bryant
We have benefited from RAGE Software because it quickly indexes our entire Wordpress Site and allows us to post the .xml file to our web server all in about 1 minute, saving us LOADS of time and dramatically helping to improve our SEO. RAGE Software's Sitemap Automator is fully Webmaster Tools compliant and our web presence has improved by using Sitemap Automator on our site and sites we've developed.
- Marc Rosenberg


text:
Traces of nerve agent found in killing of Kim Jong-un's brother, court hears
Malaysian chemist testifies he found VX traces on 2 defendants, as well as on Kim Jong-nam's body
A government chemist testified Thursday that he found traces of the banned VX nerve agent on two women being tried in Malaysia on charges of murdering the estranged half-brother of North Korea's leader.
The testimony was the first evidence linking VX to Indonesian Siti Aisyah and Doan Thi Huong of Vietnam, who are accused of smearing the nerve agent on Kim Jong-nam's face in a brazen assassination inside a crowded airport terminal in Kuala Lumpur on Feb. 13.
Raja Subramaniam, who heads the Malaysian government's Centre of Chemical Weapon Analysis, said he found VX in its pure form and VX precursors on Huong's white jumper and found a degraded product of VX on Huong's fingernails.
Huong was seen on airport surveillance videos wearing a white jumper emblazoned with the big black letters "LOL," the acronym for "laughing out loud."
The chemist, who is the only Malaysian with a doctorate in chemical weapons analysis, said laboratory tests also detected VX acid, a degraded product of the nerve agent, on Aisyah's sleeveless T-shirt.
He said VX will degrade once it is exposed to the atmosphere, and even faster when it is in contact with water, leaving degraded products of VX.
"The presence of VX precursors and VX degradation products confirms the presence of VX itself," he told the court.
Raja also confirmed that he found VX on Kim's face, eyes, clothing and in his blood and urine.
- Viet, Indonesian women plead not guilty in Kim's homicide
- V for venom: Questions about the nerve agent found in Kim killing
Aisyah and Huong have pleaded not guilty to murder, which could bring a death penalty if they are convicted. They have not testified, but their defence has said the women were duped by suspected North Korean agents into believing they were playing a harmless prank for a hidden-camera TV show.
Raja earlier described VX as the "deadliest nerve agent created" and literature showed that 10 milligrams could be fatal. He said VX is oily and difficult to detect because it is colorless and odourless, and can be easily transported in a water bottle. He said Malaysia's airports do not have the special equipment needed to detect VX.
Targeted eyes would be deadly: expert
Raja also said rubbing VX on the eyes and neck would be the fastest way to kill a person, compared to splashing or spraying the chemical. He said VX doesn't evaporate quickly, making it a strategic choice because a person could be targeted without affecting the surroundings. It takes six days for a drop of VX to evaporate, he said.
He agreed with the prosecutors' assertion that Kim didn't inhale VX because no nerve agent was detected on a nasal swab.
The trial at the Shah Alam Courts Complex is to resume Monday, with the judge, lawyers and the two suspects visiting Raja's laboratory to see VX-tainted samples from the two women before they are formally submitted as evidence. This came after Raja told the court it would be safer to view the samples in the lab because the VX may still be active.
Gooi Soon Seong, lawyer for Siti, told reporters that detection of VX on the women was not enough to convict them.
"If I have the knife, it doesn't mean I killed the person. They must have other stronger evidence," he said.
He also said Raja was inconsistent and shouldn't be afraid to open the VX-tainted samples since he testified VX could easily be washed off and doesn't evaporate quickly.
Hisyam Teh Poh Teik, Huong's lawyer, said the defence has another explanation of why VX was present on the Vietnamese and would reveal this later.
The VX-tainted evidence from Kim's body and clothing was presented in court Wednesday in sealed plastic bags, and the lawyers and court officials wore surgical masks and gloves as they viewed it.
Earlier witnesses testified Kim quickly suffered symptoms of chemical poisoning and died from acute VX poisoning within two hours of the attack.
VX is banned by an international treaty as a weapon of mass destruction but is believed to be part of North Korea's chemical weapons arsenal. Kim was the eldest son in the current generation of North Korea's dynastic rulers, but was believed to have been cast out by his father and had lived abroad for years. He reportedly never met current leader Kim Jong-un, who is widely believed to have perceived his older sibling as a threat and targeted him for assassination.
The trial is being closely watched by the Indonesian and Vietnamese governments, which hired the defence lawyers for both women.


text:
A business can live or die based on how well it handles projects.
For example, a new marketing campaign can create a flood of new business, or it can waste a ton of time and money with nothing to show for it.
The question is, how do you steer the ship so all your projects sail smoothly? What do successful project managers know that you don't?
One book that promises some answers is "Mastering the Leadership Role in Project Management: Practices That Deliver Remarkable Results," by Dr. Alexander Laufer.
It has a list price of $49.99, and Amazon sells the hardcover edition for $35.98. However, if you own a Kindle or a device that can run a Kindle app, you can, for a very limited time, get the e-book edition for free.
Laufer, a chaired professor of civil engineering at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, presents eight chapter-length case studies covering a variety of challenging projects across a wide spectrum of businesses.
Laufer "demonstrates both how to become a great project leader and how to lead your teams in applying the specific project practices that impact success. Laufer and his extraordinary team of contributors focus on 'take-home practices' you can use right away, whether you're planning a new project or revitalizing a project that's already in trouble."
The book is definitely aimed at project leaders, though I suspect that anyone involved in any aspect of project management would benefit from the information presented here.
It's interesting to note that "Mastering the Leadership Role in Project Management" has 11 user reviews, and every single one rates it five stars. That's rare for any book, let alone one dealing with business.
I'm not sure how long Amazon plans to offer this for free. Could be a couple more days, could be just a few hours. Whatever the case, if you want to become a master of project management but don't want to spend upwards of $50 for the privilege, grab this while you can.


text:
Business Administration Scholarship
Let us help you succeed.
Deadline: May 29, each year: Number Available: Multiple Amount: $2,000
Minimum GPA: 70 or 2.5 and better. Eligibility: Current U.S. high school students only.
Step 1: Fill out an application.
Step 2: Select "Business Administration" on the Intended majors question.
Step 3: Click on the scholarships button.
Apply Now
For more information, read our terms and conditions.
Free! Your application brings you more than scholarship money.
It allows over 3,000 colleges to compete for you. Colleges can only contact students that are likely
to get accepted through a formal application. Remove the guess work and let colleges compete for you now.
Back to Scholarships Page
Be sure to pass the word along about our college Scholarships.


text:
Today is "Cycle Six, Day Ten" which in Chemotherapy parlance means that the first day of my sixth and final cycle of Chemo was ten days ago. Internally some demonstrative part of me is screaming, "Are you Florence Kling DeWolf-Harding me? I've peaked and valley-ed a thousand times, at least forty days have passed?!!?"
This cycle involved a notch or two increase in my experience of "Chemo Brain" (crippled short term memory, seemingly no ability to focus or multi-task, general foggy thinking/feeling).
So, having finished the blessed poison I was anxious and a bit premature in my efforts to read through the last eight months of journal entries to draw out all the redemptive lessons, experiences, ups & downs and draft a "Shit Howdy" personal story. It would be something to point to as a tangible "it was all worth it" trophy that helps make a little more sense of the hell I just went through. Evidence that "I'm back… a contributor, a participant, a value or needed/appreciated "producer". It would've been an honest and vulnerable inspiration, a vehicle for God to call His people to fuller consecration and deeper worship.
I can't do it. It can't be done. I'm fried.
It is hard being weak, limited… on the bench… non-productive, beached (or is it "Shipwrecked"?).
So, this morning Lori reads out of one of her favorite Devotionals:
"Thank Me for the conditions that are requiring you to be still. Do not spoil these quiet hours by wishing them away, waiting impatiently to be active again. Some of the greatest works in My kingdom have been done from sick beds and…
Instead of resenting the limitations of a weakened body, search for My way in the midst of these very circumstances. Limitations can be liberating when your strongest desire is living close to Me.
Quietness and trust enhance your awareness of My Presence with you. Do not despise these simple ways of serving Me. Although you feel cut off from the activity of the world, your quiet trust makes a powerful statement in spiritual realms. My Strength and Power show themselves most effective in weakness."*
I HAVE tasted a bit of this, yet still resist the thought that His grace and Power are best seen in/through my weaknesses (2 Corinthians 9).
- Craig McConnell
* Lori's devotional is "Jesus Calling: Enjoying Peace in His Presence", by Sarah Young).


text:
Every year around this time, the coaching rumor mill kicks into gear.
As flailing teams watch the season slip away, a handful of doomed head coaches know they're not for long, soon to be replaced by The Next Guy.
Nobody benefits more from this ugly process than the surging, young assistant coach. Mike Klis of The Denver Post threw one name into the ring this week, citing Denver Broncos offensive coordinator Mike McCoy as the best choice out there to take the next step.
"I don't know how Mike McCoy can't be on top of everyone's list," Klis said on NFL Network's "Total Access" on Tuesday. "... You can't get a much different quarterback from Peyton Manning to Tim Tebow. You can't get a different offensive system with the (read-option) that the Broncos had (to the) the no-huddle, spread passing offense with all the intricate pass patterns that Manning has going. And McCoy has been successful with that."
McCoy's work last season was excellent. The New York Jets have no idea what to do with Tebow, but McCoy -- in the course of a few weeks -- realigned Denver's offense to make the most of his quarterback's unusual gifts. That creativity -- that flexibility -- is prized in a head coach. It's exactly what has Sean Payton's name floating around this week.
It's more challenging to gauge McCoy's work with Peyton Manning. The joke is that McCoy is an OC only in title, while Manning grinds stones into diamonds. That's too easy. McCoy has proven he can work with a variety of passers and schemes and his name will be mentioned as teams look to fill vacancies after the season.


text:
Details emerged today on Google's broad social networking ambitions, first reported here in late September, with a follow up earlier this week. The new project, called OpenSocial (URL will go live on Thursday), goes well beyond what we've previously reported. It is a set of common APIs that application developers can use to create applications that work on any social networks (called "hosts") that choose to participate.
What they haven't done is launch yet another social network platform. As more and more of these platforms launch, developers have difficult choices to make. There are costs associated with writing and maintaining applications for these social networks. Most developers will choose one or two platforms and ignore the rest, based on a simple cost/benefit analysis.
Google wants to create an easy way for developers to create an application that works on all social networks. And if they pull it off, they'll be in the center, controlling the network.
What They're Launching
OpenSocial is a set of three common APIs, defined by Google with input from partners, that allow developers to access core functions and information at social networks:
- Profile Information (user data)
- Friends Information (social graph)
- Activities (things that happen, News Feed type stuff)
Hosts agree to accept the API calls and return appropriate data. Google won't try to provide universal API coverage for special use cases, instead focusing on the most common uses. Specialized functions/data can be accessed from the hosts directly via their own APIs.
Applications can have full functionality on profile and/or canvas pages, subject to the specific rules of each host. Facebook, by contrast, limits most functionality to the canvas page, allowing a widget on the profile page with limited features.
OpenSocial is silent when it comes to specific rules and policies of the hosts, like whether or not advertising is accepted or whether any developer can get in without applying first (the Facebook approach). Hosts set and enforce their own policies. The APIs are created with maximum flexibility.
Launch Partners
Partners are in two categories: hosts and developers. Hosts are the participating social networks, and include Orkut, Salesforce, LinkedIn, Ning, Hi5, Plaxo, Friendster, Viadeo and Oracle.
Developers include Flixster, iLike, RockYou and Slide.
What This Means
The timing of OpenSocial couldn't be better. Developers have been complaining non stop about the costs of learning yet another markup launguage for every new social network platform, and taking developer time in creating and maintaining the code. Someone had to build a system to streamline this (as we said in the last few sentences in this post). And Facebook-fear has clearly driven good partners to side with Google. Developers will immediately start building on these APIs to get distribution across the impressive list of hosts above.
And they'll do it soon, too. It's clear that the developers who arrived early to the Facebook Platform party won easy customers. Those that came later had to fight much harder. Developers found their new gold strike, and they will soon all be there, mining away.


text:
Lea Wait here, with the tale of a tale.
It started when an agent suggested I write a contemporary mystery for children. My previous books for ages 8-12 were historical novels, not mysteries, (although many of my characters had secrets …) so writing a different sort of book was a challenge.
I ended up with Pizza To Die For. It's set in New Jersey (a state I lived in for many years while dreaming of being in Maine,) and, yes, it includes a murder. And, taking a page from cozy mysteries, it also includes recipes.
My protagonist, Mikki Norden, wants to be a chef. She does all the cooking for her family and studies cookbooks. Her mother is an unpublished (so far) mystery writer, who studies books on poisons and plots.
Mikki's parents have just separated, and she and her mom have moved from Seattle, Washington, to New Jersey, to live with a grandmother she has never met and (yuck) attend the same high school her mother graduated from. Mikki learns she's half Italian, and finds a mentor in Anthony Baldacci (she calls him Mr. B) who owns a local Italian restaurant. And then, one morning, she and a new friend visit Mr. B … and find his body. And he smells of almonds.
As Mikki would tell you, having talked mysteries with her mother for years, the smell of almonds (without almonds in the vicinity) is a sure sign of arsenic poisoning. But the local police assume Mr. B died of a heart attack. What's a girl to do when no one will listen to her? She'll solve the crime herself — with the help of a couple of bumbling has-been hit men who, it turns out, used to work for her grandfather.
I had a lot of fun writing Pizza To Die For. It's very different from any of my other books, for adults or children, because it's funny, and populated by a lot of quirky characters. I even included some of Mikki's recipes … grandchild tested.
But — here's the writers' dilemma — no publisher wanted it. Editors liked it, but said they were confused. They felt Mikki was too mature to classify Pizza To Die For as a book for 8-12 year olds. On the other hand, she was too young to fit into the Young Adult category. (Mikki changed ages several times in the writing, but ended up at fourteen, a freshman in high school.)
And, yes, she's a mature — but sometimes naïve — fourteen. But I liked her, and thought my readers — both young and old — would like her, too.
So, for the first time, I decided to self-publish a mystery.
It's shorter than my adult mysteries (200 instead of 300 pages.) It's humorous. The characters, of course, all have secrets. The New Jersey suburbs are far from the coast of Maine, where many of my books are set, but my friends who live in NJ will recognize bits and pieces of real towns.
I've been pleased by early responses to Pizza To Die For, from both young and old(er) readers. Who doesn't enjoy a light mystery sometimes?
As Mikki said, when she was in a quandary, "Maybe there was hope. In the meantime, there were desserts."
And who doesn't like desserts?
Pizza To Die For is available as an e-book for Kindle or Nook or from Kobo and as a trade paperback from Amazon


text:
Ancient World Mapping Center poster at UNC's University Research Day
March 4, 2014 in Antiquity À-la-carte, Interest, News, Presentation
This afternoon, the Ancient World Mapping Center is participating in The University of North Carolina's annual University Research Day. The Center will be displaying a poster collage of our latest research and programming, especially in regard to Antiquity A-la-carte 3.0. The poster features with special prominence an image of our forthcoming Strabo Online web application in connection with Duane Roller's new translation of the Geographika for Cambridge University Press. It also displays images of A-la-carte's capability to map man-made features according to the Pleiades database and the AWMC's collection of shapefiles, to represent coastal variations both within periods of ancient history and in contrast to the modern topographical aspect, and to map surviving ancient features at tenths-of-a-second accuracy with the use of handheld GPS devices. A PDF file of the poster (licensed under a Creative Commons CC BY License) can be seen here.


text:
Department Of Interior
|Office of the Secretary
Contact: Hugh Vickery, DOI
|For Immediate Release: June 9, 2004
Secretary Norton Announces Grants in 16 States, 21 Latin American and Caribbean Countries to Conserve Migratory Birds
(WASHINGTON) -- Interior
Secretary Gale Norton today announced 40 grants to conservation organizations
working in 16 U.S. states, 21 Latin American and Caribbean countries,
and Puerto Rico to support neotropical migratory bird conservation.
The grants total $3.8 million in grants and will be matched by $16 million
in contributions by partnering organizations.
There are 341 species of nearctic-neotropical migrants, birds that breed in the United States and Canada, and winter in Latin America. Examples of these birds include species of plovers, terns, hawks, cranes, warblers and sparrows.
"The conservation of
neotropical migratory birds extends beyond our borders and depends on
partnerships with other nations as well as states, tribes, conservation
organizations and many others here at home," Norton said at a meeting
of the Migratory Bird Conservation Commission. "Through these grants,
the Interior Department is supporting cooperative conservation projects
from Maine to Argentina."
The Neotropical Migratory
Bird Conservation Act of 2000 establishes a matching grants program
to fund projects that promote the conservation of neotropical migratory
birds in the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean. The money
can be used to protect, research, monitor and manage these birds' populations
and habitats, as well as to conduct law enforcement and community outreach
and education. By law, 75 percent of the money goes to projects in Latin
America and Caribbean countries while 25 percent goes to projects in
the United States.
"Neotropical migratory
birds are important for our ecosystems," Norton said. "They
work as nature's pest controllers and pollinators and provide many hours
of enjoyment for birdwatchers and outdoor enthusiasts."
Project summaries can be found at http://birdhabitat.fws.gov.
Alaska. "Nest Survivorship of Migratory Birds & Development in Arctic Alaska" by the Wildlife Conservation Society will match $227,077 to $79,449 in grant funds.
Arizona. "Effects of Fire on Buff-Breasted Flycatchers & Other Neotropical Migrants by the Arizona Cooperative Fish & Wildlife Research Unit will match $34,211 to $11,400 in grant funds.
Michigan. "Variables Associated with Avian Mortality from Collisions with Communication Towers" by Joelle Gehring, Ph.D. will match $198,960 to $38,500 in grant funds.
Minnesota. "Grassland Songbird Use of Conservation Buffers in Southwest Minnesota" by the Wildlife Habitat Management Institute will match $112,277 to $6,542 in grant funds.
Montana. "Conservation of Cottonwood Gallery Forest Birds in Southeast Montana" by Montana Audubon will match $30,400 to $10,120 in grant funds.
Wisconsin. "Glacial Lake Grantsburg Bird Habitat Initiative" by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources will match $277,100 to $92,300 in grant funds.
Puerto Rico. "Rio Encantado Migratory Bird Wintering Habitat Conservation Project" by the Conservation Trust of Puerto Rico will match $1,463,000 to $250,000 in grant funds.
Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas; Mexico. "Gulf Crossings Technical Assistance Project" by the Gulf Coast Bird Observatory will match $268,905 to $33,328 in grant funds.
Alabama, Louisiana; Mexico. "Migratory Stopover Habitat Protection Along the Gulf of Mexico II" by The Nature Conservancy will match $750,000 to $250,000 in grant funds.
Alaska, California; Mexico. "Protecting Neotropical Migrants from Invasive Species in the North American Islands" by Island Conservation will match $925,365 to $250,000 in grant funds.
California; Mexico. "Bird Use of Restored Riparian Habitat in the Overwintering Period" by Point Reyes Bird Observatory Conservation Science will match $771,481 to $143,280 in grant funds.
Colorado; Mexico. "U.S.-Mexico Grassland Bird Conservation II" by the Nature Conservancy will match $683,375 to $228,125 in grant funds.
Delaware, New Jersey; Argentina, Chile. "Multi-National Conservation of Red Knots" by the Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences will match $667,690 to $222,653 in grant funds.
Ohio; Venezuela. "Demography of Cerulean Warblers on Breeding & Wintering Grounds" by the Ohio State University will match $171,612 to $57,204 in grant funds.
Projects in Latin America and the Caribbean
All Latin America and Caribbean. "Advancing a Rang-Wide Approach to Waterbird Conservation" by Birdlife International will match $699,270 to $200,000 in grant funds.
Argentina. "Management Plan for Migratory Bird Conservation at Small Sea 'Mar Chiquita' RAMSAR Site" by the National University of Cordoba will match $141,470 to $45,860 in grant funds.
Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay. "Shorebird Conservation & Rice Cultivation in Southern South America" by Wetlands International Argentina will match $63,250 to $20,932 in partner funds.
Bahamas. "Tools for Sustainability: Benefitting From All 'Dem Birds by the Bahamas National Trust will match $294,005 to $99,550 in grant funds.
Bahamas, Grenada, Jamaica. "Caribbean Pride" by RARE will match $753,190 to 75,000 in grant funds.
Brazil. "Protecting Migratory Shorebird Habitats in the Amazon Estuary & Coast" by the Nature Conservancy; Brazil Program will match $655,000 to $100,000 in grant funds.
Brazil. "Conservation of Neotropical Migratory Birds in Brazil" by Conservation International will match $957,426 to $100,000 in grant funds.
Caribbean wide. "The West Indian Whistling Duck & Wetlands Conservation Project" by the Society for the Conservation & Study of Caribbean Birds will match $777,010 to $100,000 in grant funds.
Colombia. "Silvopastoral Systems as Habitats for Wintering Neotropical Migratory Passerines" by the American Bird Conservancy will match $124,820 to $41,108 in grant funds.
Colombia. "Migratory Birds in the Fuquene Lagoon" by the Wetlands Foundation of Colombia will match $64,000 to $21,300 in grant funds.
Colombia. "Conservation of Migratory Birds in the Coffee-producing Zone of Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta" by the Alliance for Critical Ecosystems will match $ 103,282 to $33,727 in grant funds.
Colombia. "La Conejera Wetland" by the La Conejera Wetland Foundation will match $349,270 to $105,514 in grant funds.
Colombia, Venezuela. "Providing Safe Haven: Habitat Conservation For Migratory Birds in the Orinoco River Basin" by the Nature Conservancy will match $679,129 to $150,000 in grant funds.
Costa Rica. "Conservation Project for Migratory Birds in Costa Rica" by the Costa Rican Conservation Foundation will match $167,510 to $55,128 in grant funds.
Ecuador. "Wild Birds Project: Sharing the Beauty." by the Animal Protection Foundation will match $15,580 to $5,060 in grant funds.
Ecuador. "Protection of Neotropical Migrants in Lowland Chaco Forest" by Jocotoco Foundation will match $135,000 to $45,000 in grant funds.
Mexico. "Western North American Migratory Landbird Project: Wintering Habitats in Mexico" by the Sonoran Joint Venture will match $339,350 to $100,000 in grant funds.
Mexico. "National Program for Managing & Monitoring Bird Populations in Natural Protected Areas" by the Manantlan Foundation for Western Biodiversity will match $374,563 to $24,850 in grant funds.
Mexico. "Management Plan for Bird Conservation in Cacaxtla National Park" by Pronatura Northeast - Sea of Cortez will match $468,181 to $80,000 in grant funds.
Mexico. "Protection & Restoration of a Grassland Ecosystem in Northwest Mexico" by Pronatura Northeast will match $890,810 to $250,000 in grant funds.
Mexico. "Protecting Black-capped Vireo & Golden-Cheeked Warbler" by Autonomous University of Nuevo Leon will match $205,404 with $68,468 in grant funds.
Mexico. "Conservation Project for Migratory Birds in Calakmul" by the Friends of Calakmul will match $303,000 to $101,000 in grant funds.
Panama. "Partnerships for Migratory Bird Conservation in the Canal Area" by the Panamanian Center for Research & Social Action will match $475,590 to $53,133 in grant funds.
Peru. "Reforestation in the Wakarpay Wetland" by the Nature Foundation will match $50,260 to $16,740 in grant funds.
Peru. "Management of Freshwater Wetland Habitat, Pacific Coastal Lowlands of Peru" by Association Naymlap will match $200,064 to $66,600 in grant funds.
Venezuela. "Neotropical Migratory Birds & Mangrove Restoration" by PROVITA will match $301,400 to $100,320 in grant funds.
Selected News Releases


text:
A Guest Post by AKUS
I am an admirer of both Hillary and Bill Clinton, and not only because both have been supportive of the American Jewish community and Israel.
Bill Clinton worked tirelessly trying to bring a peaceful resolution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Hilary Clinton may go down as one of the most successful and influential Secretaries of State the US has known and has also worked hard – and as fruitlessly – to try to bring some closure to that conflict. Their daughter is married to a Jewish man, son of friends of theirs.
But this week, they and the branch of the US administration that Hillary heads have failed the Jewish community in the UK, and, indeed, around the world.
When some Muslims rioted across the world following the 2005 publication (in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten) of Mohammed cartoons, Bill Clinton was swift to respond, and absurdly compared cartoons depicting Mohammed to deadly anti-Semitic cartoons depicting Jews:
[Former President Bill] Clinton: "Totally Outrageous Cartoons Against Islam"
DOHA (AFP) – Former US president Bill Clinton warned of rising anti-Islamic prejudice, comparing it to historic anti-Semitism as he condemned the publishing of cartoons depicting Prophet Mohammed in a Danish newspaper.
"So now what are we going to do? … Replace the anti-Semitic prejudice with anti-Islamic prejudice?" he said at an economic conference in the Qatari capital of Doha.
"In Europe, most of the struggles we've had in the past 50 years have been to fight prejudices against Jews, to fight against anti-Semitism," he said.
Clinton described as "appalling" the 12 cartoons published in a Danish newspaper in September depicting Prophet Mohammed and causing uproar in the Muslim world.
"None of us are totally free of stereotypes about people of different races, different ethnic groups, and different religions … there was this appalling example in northern Europe, in Denmark … these totally outrageous cartoons against Islam," he said.
The (George W. Bush-era) State Department also weighed in on the Europeans' cartoon controversy. It too hastened to reference anti-Semitism and claimed equivalence with the horrendously anti-Semitic cartoons that appear daily in Arab media:
Bush Administration on 2006 Danish Cartoons: "We Certainly Understand Why Muslims Would Find These Images Offensive"
The Muslim world erupted in anger on Friday over caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad published in Europe while the Bush administration offered the protesters support, saying of the cartoons, "We find them offensive, and we certainly understand why Muslims would find these images offensive."
… The State Department spokesman, Sean McCormack, reading the government's statement on the controversy, said, "Anti-Muslim images are as unacceptable as anti-Semitic images," which are routinely published in the Arab press, "as anti-Christian images, or any other religious belief."
Still, the United States defended the right of the Danish and French newspapers to publish the cartoons. "We vigorously defend the right of individuals to express points of view," Mr. McCormack added.
When some Muslims rioted over a film made by an Egyptian born Copt living in America that mocked Islam, Hillary Clinton showed understanding for their anger:
HILLARY CLINTON: Anti-Muslim Film Is 'Disgusting And Reprehensible'
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday called the film that helped provoke protestors to riot "disgusting and reprehensible."
"Let me state very clearly — and I hope it is obvious — The United States government had nothing to do with this video. We absolutely reject its content and message," Clinton said in a statement at a State Department.
Clinton said that the video's intended purpose seemed to be inciting violence.
So now I ask – where is the condemnation from either Bill or Hillary Clinton or the US State Department that Hillary heads over the rabidly anti-Semitic cartoon that appeared in the UK's Sunday Times on no other day than Holocaust Memorial Day?
Even if we agree that the concept of freedom of speech means that Scarfe can create and the Sunday Times publish anti-Semitism, why has Bill not found time to say something like this?
"None of us are totally free of stereotypes about people of different races, different ethnic groups, and different religions … there was this appalling example in Europe, in Great Britain … this totally outrageous cartoon directed at the Jewish people."
Why hasn't the State Department's issued a statement with criticism such as this?
"We find the Sunday Times cartoon offensive, and we certainly understand why Jews would find these images offensive … anti-Semitic images are unacceptable."
Why has Hillary not found the time to "absolutely reject" Scarfe's cartoon as "disgusting and reprehensible … with the intent of inciting violence"?
Hillary – if it takes a village to raise a child properly, what does it take in our global village to get your attention to the increasing anti-Semitism that has become such a staple of European media and as weighty a condemnation of this "typically robust cartoon" by Gerald Scarfe" as Bill, you, and the State Department have found for other cartoons and a poorly made and initially widely ignored film promo?
Related articles
- Outrage over a cartoon…and yet no one died (cifwatch.com)


text:
Officer Craig Wilson Subtext for header
Quick Facts
Fatal Crash June 2008
BART Officer
Knew John Kelly committed suicide on Vasco Road
Officer Craig Wilson
BART Police mourn death of officer killed in plane crash
Officer Craig Wilson Joined BART Police in August 2003
BART Police are wearing mourning bands on their badges as they grieve over the death of one of their own: 36-year-old Officer Craig Wilson.
BART Police Chief Gary Gee requested all police staff to wear the bands until after the funeral service of Officer Wilson and his 37-year-old wife Michele. The two died when the small plane they were passengers in crashed in the mountains of Nevada Saturday afternoon as they were returning home from celebrating their wedding anniversary in Las Vegas. The couple leaves behind three young children.
Wilson joined BART in August 2003. "This is a tremendous loss to the BART Police family," Chief Gee said. "Officer Wilson was a bright, dedicated and promising member of the force. Our heartfelt sympathies go out to his family in their time of grief."
The pilot of the small plane was Erik Nunn, Officer Wilson's neighbor as well as a candidate for supervisor of Contra Costa County District 5. Nunn's wife also died in the crash. Nunn and his wife were celebrating their anniversary with the Wilson's. BART has no details of the cause of the accident.
Eric Nunn BART Federal Glover Contra Costa County


text:
November, thus far, has been a whirligig of playfulness in the kitchen, experimenting with my new grill and warmer-weather fare. First up, I wanted to try making a buttery filling to go inside chicken, without having to resort to using chicken breasts. Solution - using whole chicken thighs, and wrapping in bacon!
Serves two hungry primal eaters.
4 free-range chicken thighs
4 slices of middle bacon
3 spring onions, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
2T butter, diced
8 stalks asparagus, halved
1 tomato, diced
Fresh basil, finely chopped
1t chili powder/flakes
Salt & pepper to taste
1. On a wooden board, lie out bacon strips and chicken thighs. Flatten the thighs with a rolling pin if they are on the small side.
2. Excepting the asparagus, combine all other ingredients in a bowl, mixing thoroughly. If your home is a bit chilly, you may wish to soften the butter first so that it will take up the spices.
3. Being the layering process: place the flattened thigh on the eye of the bacon, then add one quarter of the filling mixture in the centre of the thigh. Place asparagus across filling, perpendicular to the bacon.
4. Carefully roll the bacon, from eye to tail, pressing down the outer edges of the thigh as you go to secure the fillings in place.
5. When all thighs have been filled and wrapped, place into your grill (or barbeque, or onto a tray in a hot oven) and cook until chicken is completely done - around 15 minutes on my grill. Watch out for signs of burning bacon - reduce heat if the bacon is done before chicken is finished.
6. Serve with fresh salad or roast veggies - it works both ways!
Crunchy, moist, tangy, with a bit of a bite! Yum!


text:
"My Fathers house has many rooms..."
Love and Light.
Physicists Calculate Number of Parallel Universes
The strongest limit on the number of possible universes is the human ability to distinguish between different universes. Credit: Linde and Vanchurin.
(PhysOrg.com) -- Over the past few decades, the idea that our universe could be one of many alternate universes within a giant multiverse has grown from a sci-fi fantasy into a legitimate theoretical possibility. Several theories of physics and astronomy have hypothesized the existence of a multiverse made of many parallel universes. One obvious question that arises, then, is exactly how many of these parallel universes might there be.
Repair Your Aging Brain - 15 mins a day. 4 simple exercises whip your mind into shape. - www.PrimalForce.net
In a new study, Stanford physicists Andrei Linde and Vitaly Vanchurin have calculated the number of all possible universes, coming up with an answer of 10^10^16. If that number sounds large, the scientists explain that it would have been even more humongous, except that we observers are limited in our ability to distinguish more universes; otherwise, there could be as many as 10^10^10^7 universes.
To work these numbers out, Linde and Vanchurin looked back to the time shortly after the Big Bang, which they view as a quantum process that generated lots of quantum fluctuations. Then during the period of inflation, the universe grew rapidly and these quantum fluctuations were "frozen" into classical perturbations in distinct regions. Today, each of these regions could be a different universe, having its own distinct laws of low energy physics.
By analyzing the mechanism (called "slow roll inflation") that initially generated the quantum fluctuations, the scientists could estimate the number of resulting universes at 10^10^10^7 (a number which is dependent on the model they used). However, this number is limited by other factors, specifically by the limits of the human brain. Since the total amount of information that one individual can absorb in a lifetime is about 10^16 bits, which is equivalent to 10^10^16 configurations, this means that a human brain couldn't distinguish more than 10^10^16 universes.
Requiring that the human brain must be able to count the number of parallel universes may seem inappropriate, if not arrogant, but Linde and Vanchurin explain that dealing with the quantum world is different than our everyday lives in which quantum effects can be safely ignored. A crucial part of their calculation here is an investigation of quantum effects on supergalactic scales. In this kind of scenario, the state of the multiverse and observations made by an observer are correlated (similar to the Schrodinger cat experiment, where the outcome can be determined only after it is registered by a classical observer).
"When we analyze the probability of the existence of a universe of a given type, we should be talking about a consistent pair: the universe and an observer who makes the rest of the universe 'alive' and the wave function of the rest of the universe time-dependent," the scientists write.
As the scientists explain, the calculation of the number of universes is an important step toward an even larger goal: to find the probability of living in a universe with a particular set of properties. What are the chances that we live in a world in which the laws of physics are these laws that we currently observe? Answering this question requires finding probabilities that depend on knowing about other universes, among many other challenges.
More information: How Many Universes are in the Multiverse? arXiv:0910.1589v1
via: Technology Review© 2009 PhysOrg.com


text:
- This event has passed.
Wednesday Prayer
April 6, 2022 @ 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Join us every Wednesday Night for powerful time of prayer. During these nights we worship together, we are led into a time of prayer, we take communion together as a church family, and we make sure that anyone interested receives personal prayer.


text: LuxMark is a OpenCL benchmark tool. The idea for the program was conceived in 2009 by Jromang. It was intended as a promotional tool for LuxRender. The idea was quite simple, wrap SLG inside an easy to use graphical user interface and use it as a benchmark for OpenCL. After Anandtech adoption of SLG as OpenCL benchmark, the code was finally written and is now available at http://www.luxrender.net/wiki/LuxMark