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Onstock Items
This Brown Glitter PVC Vinyl Wipeclean Tablecloth unfortunately has been creased where it has been folded. Because of this, we have decided to present it to you with a 20% discount at £15.31. This would be perfect for any crafters out there in which you can make bags or purses and simply cut away the fault, or if you are not bothered by a small flaw it could even go on your table and fulfil its original purpose!
We do not accept returns on clearance items, therefore make sure that it is definitely something you would like. If you have any questions about this cloth, please do not hesitate to get in contact with us.
Not your style? Browse our other products to find the tablecloth that you have been searching for!
We want to make sure you get the correct size tablecloth. Therefore please follow this guide to ensure you get the correct sized tablecloth. If you can't see your size please contact us as we can do bespoke extra-wide oilcloth, PVC Vinyl or acrylic tablecloths to order. If you are still struggling why not use our calculator here: https://www.joleetablecloths.co.uk/measuring-guide
Round TableMeasuring the tablecloth for your round table couldn't be easier. To measure the diameter of your table simply measure from the centre from end to end. Once you have this figure you then need to choose your desired overhang. The general rule is to allow for 40-50cm (16"-20") overhang but this can be down to personal preference. Add both these figures together and you have the diameter you require. Square or Rectangle Table Measuring a square or rectangle table for your PVC or Oilcloth Tablecloth will take you about two minutes to do. Firstly measure the width of your table from edge to edge. Allow 40-50cm (16' to 20") overhang (20-25cm each side), you can have longer but this is down to preference and also the maximum width of the tablecloth (approx 135cm"). For example, if you are a family with young children you might want a shorter overhang or if you have a more traditional styled home you may want a longer drop. To measure the length just repeat the process as you did for measuring the width. Again allow for a 40-50cm overhang (20-25cm each side).


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- Fonds
- 1967 - 1984
Fonds consists of correspondence from Ross Parmenter and two article reviews discussing two of Mr. Parmenter's publications.
Ross Parmenter
Fonds consists of correspondence from Ross Parmenter and two article reviews discussing two of Mr. Parmenter's publications.
Ross Parmenter
Fonds consists of records created by Sheldon P. Zitner over the course of his career as a scholar, writer, and poet. Files include published and unpublished drafts of poetry, correspondence relating to his career as a poet, drafts of academic essa...
Zitner, Sheldon
Fonds consists of records relating to Dr Wilson"s academic career and administrative role in the departments of English at Trinity College and the University of Toronto as well as correspondence, including poetry, relating to his position as edito...
Wilson, Milton T.
Fonds consists of files relating to White"s professional life, including correspondence files of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and the Classical Association of Canada, manuscripts of speeches, lectures and publications, studen...
White, Mary Estelle
The collection contains records pertaining to George Whitaker's Provostship, as well as his final departure to England. It consists of vital records, correspondence, financial records, newspaper excerpts, tributes, manuscripts related to his theol...
Whitaker, George
Florence Elizabeth Westacott fonds
Fonds consists of an 18-page typescript enclosed in a paper cover, entitled 'Poems by Miss Florence Westacott, B.A. (Trin) '06'. The typescript includes editorial annotations.
Westacott, Florence
Hortense Wasteneys and Hardolph Wasteneys fonds
Fonds consists of the personal records of Hortense Wasteneys and those she accumulated over the course of her involvement with Trinity College as well as documents related to her research on community service organizations. It includes original so...
Hardolph Wasteneys
Fonds consists of handwritten and typed notes, addresses, sermons and newspaper clippings related to the Anglican Church and the debate over separate schools in Ontario.
Warren, George
Fonds consists of extensive correspondence from Dr Walters to his parents, his brother and sister from 1925 to 1945, when he wrote home every few days. They cover student life at Queen's University and more extensively at Trinity College, his...
Walters, J. Allan
Fonds consists of numerous newspaper clippings, notices, invitations, and other memorabilia on people and events dealing with Trinity College, St Hilda's College, and the University of Toronto (covering the years 1915-77) as well as material ...
Beatrice Mary Scott
Trinity Medical College Collection
This collection consists of administrative records, calendars, student academic records, and records of student life at Trinity Medical College. Administrative records include Minutes of Corporation, records related to the amalgamation of medical ...
Trinity Medical College
Trinity College Literary Institute Collection
Fonds consists mainly of administrative records of the Trinity College Literary Institute, including the Debates and Conversazione Committees. These records show the wide variety of activities in which the Trinity College Literary Institute has tr...
Trinity College Literary Institute
Trinity College Encounter Club Collection
The records of the Trinity College Encounter Club include minutes, lists of members and activities, financial records, and records of the Conference of African Affairs and the Conference on the Canadian Indian. Issues of The Encounter are also con...
Trinity College Encounter Club
Trinity College Dramatic Society Collection
This collection consists of scrapbooks, administrative records, and records of productions and events. Records of productions and events comprise the bulk of this collection and include programs, posters, scripts, newspaper clippings, sound record...
Trinity College Dramatic Society
Trinity College Faculty of Music Collection
Fonds documents all aspects of Trinity College's program of granting in absentia music degrees in Britain from its inception in 1885 to its demise in 1891. Included in this material is correspondence with practicing musicians, with those admi...
Trinity College, Faculty of Music
Robert Gordon Sutherland fonds
The fonds consists of typescripts of a journal of a trip across Canada written sometime after 1898 and of six lectures on Shakespearean plays and heroines, as well as of newspaper clippings, correspondence, and printed items.
Sutherland, Robert Gordon
The collection includes correspondence from every period of Strachan's life, official documents, notes, and writings.Contains series1. Early Life2. Life in Canada3. Notes4. Official documents
Strachan, John
Fonds consists of essays, documents, photographs and one artefact from Mary Stedman's time at high school and Trinity College.
Stedman, Mary
Fonds consist of personal documents, notebooks, correspondence, and official documents from Richard H. Steacy's student days at Trinity College, his time as Chaplain during the First World War, and his role in the church community following the wa...
Steacy, Richard H.
The fonds consists of documents and photographs related to Dr. Stanbury's education at the Trinity Medical College, and his later life in Chicago.
Charles E. Stanbury
St Hilda's Alumnae Association/St Hilda's College Council
This fonds is largely devoted to the minutes of the semi-annual and annual meetings of the St Hilda's College Alumnae Association (SHCAA) and the finances of the association as well as minutes of its executive committee meetings. The reports in th...
St Hilda's Alumnae Association/St Hilda's College Council
Fonds consist of letters written by Professor William Clark to J.M. Snowdon and his daughter, Kathleen.
Johnston McLelland Snowdon
Fonds consists of pencil drawings executed by Ellen Simon as designs for the stained glass windows on the east wall of Strachan Hall, Trinity College. At the time she was working for the Yvonne Williams Studio, and the work was commissioned by Ger...
Simon, Ellen
Fonds consists of administrative records of the Senior Common Room including agendas and minutes from general and committee meetings, communications from various secretaries to members, membership lists, newsletters, financial documents, and event...
Senior Common Room
Fonds includes agendas, minutes, and supporting documents of Senate meetings. Files also include correspondence and notices of meetings as well as reports and documents pertaining to the sub committees of the Senate: the Library, Media, and Academ...
Trinity College Senate
Reginald Sidney Kingsley Seeley fonds
The fonds consists of lectures, speeches (in person and on radio broadcasts), and sermons given by Seeley in his capacity as priest, religious leader, and provost. Files include programmes from services, events, and conferences, pamphlets written ...
Seeley, Reginald Sidney Kingsley
Fonds consists primarily of records kept by Professor Schieder to support his teaching of English literature, including notes, research, printed articles and offprints, biographies and bibliographies, sometimes relating directly to a specific cour...
Rupert M . Schieder
Ruth M. Bell and William K. Rolph fonds
This fonds consists of textual material and artefacts including correspondence, a draft of William Kirby Rolph's doctoral thesis, and drafts of articles. The fonds also contains newspaper clippings, certificates, pins and medals, and photographs r...
Bell, Ruth M.
Robert A. Spencer and the Atlantic Council of Canada fonds
Fonds consists mainly of files relating to both the administrative and public activities of the Atlantic Council of Canada during the years when Robert A. Spencer (RAS) was executive director of the Council. Also included are files relating to the...
Atlantic Council of Canada
The fond consists of photocopies of records that document her military career, and photographs pertaining to the life, education and military career of Ethel Blanche Ridley.
Ridley, Ethel
The fonds consists of records kept by Stephen Reynolds during the course of his adult life. These include correspondence with family, friends, and colleagues that illuminate his personal life, his Christian faith, and his various pastoral and inte...
Reynolds, Stephen James
Fonds consists primarily of research notes and typescript drafts of biographies and histories that Reed was either engaged in writing or was annotating. Fonds also contains photographs and printing plates with photographs and illustrations used in...
T.A Reed
Fonds contains files created by Carolyn Purden to support her writing about the ordination of women as priests within the Anglican Community worldwide. Documents include her correspondence, notes, interview transcripts, and draft articles. Also in...
Carolyn Purden
The fonds consists of a notebook, with the title "Notes on the 39 Articles of the Church of England, the Provost" (the provost was C. W. E. Body); a sermon, "Pastoral Theology"; and a letter from A. H. Young, registrar of Trini...
Pickford, Edgar W.
The fonds is comprised of material relating to Patterson's teaching activities at Trinity College, including correspondence, manuscripts of his writings and publications, thesis notes, materials for lectures and research materials. The fonds ...
Patterson, Graeme H.
Consists of records relating to the life and practice of Dr. Fred Parker of Stratford, Ontario.
Frederick Parker
Arthur Henshaw Packer Collection
The collection consists of material documenting Packer's professional work in the city of Toronto,including photographs, a report from the Toronto Historical Society Board, and his biography.
Packer, Arthur Henshaw
Fonds contains records of Derwyn Owen's career as a scholar, including subject notes, lecture notes, thesis materials, manuscripts, reading lists, and class lists from Owen's time as a fellow and lecturer at Trinity College as well as corresponden...
Derwyn Randolph Grier Owen
Office of the Dean of St. Hilda's College fonds
The fonds deals with records relating to St Hilda's College from its founding until 2004. Most of them are from the office of the head of St Hilda's College (whose title changed over the years from Lady Principal to Principal and Dean of...
Office of the Dean of St. Hilda's College
The fonds contains correspondence, pamphlets, newspaper clippings, and other items relating mainly to Convocation. The fonds further consists of ephemera and printed material relating to Trinity College collected by both M. Joyce Mudge and Gordon ...
Mudge, Marguerite Joyce
The fonds contains correspondence, financial records, a letter-book, and diaries of Charles White Mortimer and Arthur Beresford Mortimer.
Mortimer, Charles White
Fonds comprises handwritten and carbon copies of the manuscripts for two books: "A Study in the Idea of God" and "Civilization in the Making." As well, there is a Sign-List for Pre-Hammurabi Contract Tablets. There are some 100 lantern slides that...
Mercer, Samuel Alfred Browne
The collection consists of several diaries written during trips to the United States and England during the 1850s and 1860s in search of building funds for Trinity College. From his three trips to the United States in 1852 and 1853 there are five ...
McMurray, William
The fonds consists of records relating to the Larkin-Stuart Lecture on church furnishings, deliv-ered on 14 November 1978 including drafts, research materials and slides.
Machell, Margaret
Fonds consists of a notebook of lectures in medicine by Dr. W. B. Geikie, 1889-1892; a notebook of lectures in midwifery by Dr. A. Temple, 1889-1893; and a notebook on prescriptions, 1889-1890.
Macdonald, Robert Elgie
Fonds consist of correspondence with friends and Trinity associates, newspaper clippings, photographs, ephemera, and information on people such as Charles F. Pashler, George Ignatieff, and William Wright. Files include extensive information on the...
Frances Isobel Lawson
The collection consists mainly of material relating to Knight's theatrical performances and productions in Toronto and the United Kingdom, including theatre programs, review articles and newspaper clippings pertaining to the theatre, as well as a ...
Knight, George Wilson
The collection consists of miscellaneous correspondence, research notes and translations, publications and memorabilia relating to the Kirkwood family.
Mossie May Waddington
The fonds consists of notes of lectures by the provost of the University of Trinity College, delivered in 1859-1860 and notes of lectures on the catechism, including "Questions on Paley's Evidences of Christianity," as well as Jones...
Beverly Jones
Fonds consists of records pertaining to George Ignatieff's professional career and personal life. Genealogical information about the Ignatieff family documents their lives in Russia and immigration to Canada. Some records relate to the Parkin and ...
Ignatieff, George

subset: commoncrawl


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Andrewh needed a new other design and created a contest on 99designs.
A winner was selected from 37 designs submitted by 11 freelance designers.
Headrooms offers innovative bright and funky meeting rooms (space) where ideas can mingle, swap and create new forms. We find that good ideas normally come from the collision of smaller hunches that form to create something bigger than themselves. We are trying to create an environment that stimulates the creation and sharing of ideas.
Our target market is anyone that whats to innovate and speed up the idea generation process.
We are seeking someone to design two characters for us called hunch and hunch. These characters will be used for an animation on our website (i.e. run across the screen and collide - possible creating our logo) and on the wall in our space. They would also hold up the signs introducing our meeting room names (The snug, Green Room and Cabinet) and give directions to the loo.
We are trying to break up the 'corporate feel' of our space by having some funky characters. It would be desirable that these characters fit with our website (http://www.dejiogundairo.com/headro…heIdea.htm) and brand image/logo (attached).
The background behind the idea is that we find that good ideas normally come from the collision of smaller hunches (i.e. hunch and hunch) that form to create something bigger than themselves.


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Soaring Luxury-Goods Prices Test Wealthy's Will to Pay
Sales Growth Slows as Competition Heats Up; 'Prices Have Gotten Really Crazy'
Despite expanding into new markets, the luxury-retail business has been relying on price increases to drive sales. Now, even the very wealthy are nearing the limits of what they are willing to spend.
In the past five years, the price of a Chanel quilted handbag has increased 70% to $4,900. Cartier's Trinity gold bracelet now sells for $16,300, 48% more than in 2009. And the price of Piaget's ultrathin Altiplano watch is now $19,000, up $6,000 from 2011....


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Kashmir Hill
Every time you go shopping, you share intimate details about your consumption patterns with retailers. And many of those retailers are studying those details to figure out what you like, what you need, and which coupons are most likely to make you happy. TargetTGT +0.52%, for example, has figured out how to data-mine its way into your womb, to figure out whether you have a baby on the way long before you need to start buying diapers.
Charles Duhigg outlines in the New York Times how Target tries to hook parents-to-be at that crucial moment before they turn into rampant -- and loyal -- buyers of all things pastel, plastic, and miniature. He talked to Target statistician Andrew Pole -- before Target freaked out and cut off all communications -- about the clues to a customer's impending bundle of joy. Target assigns every customer a Guest ID number, tied to their credit card, name, or email address that becomes a bucket that stores a history of everything they've bought and any demographic information Target has collected from them or bought from other sources. Using that, Pole looked at historical buying data for all the ladies who had signed up for Target baby registries in the past. From the NYT:
[Pole] ran test after test, analyzing the data, and before long some useful patterns emerged. Lotions, for example. Lots of people buy lotion, but one of Pole's colleagues noticed that women on the baby registry were buying larger quantities of unscented lotion around the beginning of their second trimester. Another analyst noted that sometime in the first 20 weeks, pregnant women loaded up on supplements like calcium, magnesium and zinc. Many shoppers purchase soap and cotton balls, but when someone suddenly starts buying lots of scent-free soap and extra-big bags of cotton balls, in addition to hand sanitizers and washcloths, it signals they could be getting close to their delivery date.
Or have a rather nasty infection...
As Pole's computers crawled through the data, he was able to identify about 25 products that, when analyzed together, allowed him to assign each shopper a "pregnancy prediction" score. More important, he could also estimate her due date to within a small window, so Target could send coupons timed to very specific stages of her pregnancy.
One Target employee I spoke to provided a hypothetical example. Take a fictional Target shopper named Jenny Ward, who is 23, lives in Atlanta and in March bought cocoa-butter lotion, a purse large enough to double as a diaper bag, zinc and magnesium supplements and a bright blue rug. There's, say, an 87 percent chance that she's pregnant and that her delivery date is sometime in late August.
And perhaps that it's a boy based on the color of that rug?
So Target started sending coupons for baby items to customers according to their pregnancy scores. Duhigg shares an anecdote -- so good that it sounds made up -- that conveys how eerily accurate the targeting is. An angry man went into a Target outside of Minneapolis, demanding to talk to a manager:
Target knows before it shows.
"My daughter got this in the mail!" he said. "She's still in high school, and you're sending her coupons for baby clothes and cribs? Are you trying to encourage her to get pregnant?"
The manager didn't have any idea what the man was talking about. He looked at the mailer. Sure enough, it was addressed to the man's daughter and contained advertisements for maternity clothing, nursery furniture and pictures of smiling infants. The manager apologized and then called a few days later to apologize again.
(Nice customer service, Target.)
"On the phone, though, the father was somewhat abashed. "I had a talk with my daughter," he said. "It turns out there's been some activities in my house I haven't been completely aware of. She's due in August. I owe you an apology."


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Upon arrival, Northern Illinois Huskies feel larger than life
Northern Illinois' football team knew it had arrived for the Orange Bowl when its plane landed Wednesday morning. But players knew they had arrived when they got off the plane.
Men in orange jackets. Media. Bags of bowl swag. And the buses.
"Our picture on the sides of the buses," senior defensive lineman Nabal Jefferson said. "We were, 'Ooh, look at that! Did you see that?' Just shocked. You're on the side of the bus. That was awesome."
Said Northern Illinois coach Rod Carey: "They loved coming off and seeing their pictures on the bus. They came off and were snapping pictures of it, sending it, tweeting it, whatever they do now. Then, we got into the field and they snapped right back in and got to work. That's because of our seniors."
That brings up that the 11-1 Huskies shouldn't be considered bowl bumpkins. This is Northern Illinois' fifth consecutive bowl game, if the first near an ocean (17 players, including Lynch, haven't set foot in the Atlantic or the Pacific).
They played the International Bowl (27-3 loss to South Florida) in Toronto, a larger metropolitan area than Miami-Fort Lauderdale. They speak highly of Boise, Idaho, where they throttled Fresno State in the Humanitarian Bowl two years ago.
"We've been to a lot the last few years. These kids are used to this," Carey said. "This one's a little different."
In a major way.
"A BCS bowl is the best bowl you can get besides the national championship. It's different," said Northern Illinois redshirt junior quarterback Jordan Lynch, sixth in Heisman Trophy voting. "Just the way we got greeted coming off the plane, usually that doesn't happen at bowl games like that. The [police] escort, they shut down the whole highway. That was pretty cool."
"Cold" described DeKalb, Ill., on Wednesday morning — temperature in the 20s as the Huskies contingent boarded their planes at Chicago Rockford International Airport. They practiced at Barry University in 80-degree heat enhanced by typical South Florida humidity. A light rain fell for a few minutes early in practice, then gave way to the steamy sun.
"You definitely feel the thickness and the humidity," Jefferson said. "That was a little of an adjustment. I think we got better as practice went on."
Said Carey: "I pulled them off halfway through [practice] and said, 'You have a chance to have a really special practice,' and we did."
Lynch said, perhaps half-jokingly, he thought Northern Illinois' players from Florida had their best practice of the year. Of the Huskies' 11 Floridians, six come from Miami-Dade, Broward or Palm Beach counties (redshirt sophomore linebacker Jamaal Bass from Miramar High; sophomore wide receiver Tommylee Lewis from Palm Beach Gardens Dwyer; senior wide receiver Demetrius Stone from Miami American; fifth-year senior linebacker Victor Jacques from Miami Columbus High; redshirt freshman wide receiver Angelo Sebastiano from Coconut Creek North Broward Prep; junior defensive tackle Ken Bishop from Sunrise Piper).
"We always practice hard, but you don't get to come home too often, especially being from here," Stone said. "Up there, most people that I live near, their families' are able to watch them play, come watch practice, come around with ease. We finally get our opportunity where our family can watch us practice, a lot of family and friends can come to the game at the same time."


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Rumor: Rambis and coaching staff convenient scapegoat for Wolves?
What were the odds of Kevin Love's double- double streak ending at 53 Sunday with a reeking, 100-77, thud -- six points, a dozen rebounds in 33 minutes -- against an escort service like the pedal-to-the-metal Warriors? Can Kurt Rambis and the Timberwolves' ball handling play-callers rationally explain how Love merely managed to get six shots -- making one and 4-of-6 free throws? you would presume Rambis possesses the presence of mind and the coaching aptitude to get Love a few more field goal attempts, if not a couple more baskets.


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"Your house is paid off and you have some money in savings. Why not live a little?"
A friend of mine asked me this the other day when I said that our family vacation this summer was just going to be a camping trip in a national park, shortly followed by a mention of the fact that I loaded up my Kindle (that I received as a gift last year) with public domain novels for free, particularly Charles Dickens novels.
It's an interesting question, and it's one that left me thinking for the last few days. I've come to the conclusion that the spending path we're on is still the right path, regardless of how our financial picture has changed due to our debt paying diligence and careful spending over the past few years.
First of all – and this is the biggest reason – Sarah and I don't have an aching desire to buy a lot of expensive things. Sure, we could fly our family to Disneyworld or something for a summer vacation, but it's not what we want to do. We're looking forward to camping with our children for several days.
We are aware of some of the things we could buy, but we don't really strongly want any of those things. Honestly, I can't even think of a remotely expensive purchase I want to make in the next few years beyond unplanned replacements for things we currently use.
Instead, when I think of what I want to do with our current debt-free financial state and our savings, I just have to look around our house and think about the future.
As I write this, my three children are going to sleep in the bedroom that they share. We choose to have them share a bedroom for now to build up stronger sibling relationships, and it seems to be working. Almost every night, I can hear our two oldest children talking together for a while before they go to sleep.
I read them a book this evening about different places around the world. There was a page about Paris and France, a page about Egypt, a page about Japan, and pages about many other interesting and beautiful places. We talked a bit about the places we wanted to see, but right now, they're in there talking about those places some more.
My son has a strong burgeoning interest in martial arts. My daughter loves to sing and dance and is showing some beginning interest in playing music. All three of my children are inquisitive. It's hard for fifteen minutes to go by at our home without a barrage of questions about various things.
Equipment. Lessons. Travel. Education. These all cost money, but they don't cost money today.
On top of that, we're also watching the property listings and looking for the perfect piece of land in the country upon which to build the house we've always dreamed of.
Spending our money on things that we don't strongly want today sacrifices the things that we do strongly want tomorrow.
It is really easy to allow the temptations of today to drown out the bigger things we want in our lives. Eat out a few times a week, stop for Starbucks a few times a week, drive a new car on payments, go grocery shopping without a list and buy unnecessary things, have the latest and "greatest" cell phone, and you'll find yourself wondering how on earth the family down the block can afford to go to Norway on their vacation this year.
Well, the answer is that they don't eat out a few times a week, stop for Starbucks a few times a week, drive a new car on payments, go grocery shopping without a list and buy unnecessary things, or have the latest and "greatest" cell phone. I know that this actually describes us.
I recently saw a person standing outside a new Lexus in the parking lot and shouting into their iPhone at a bill collector. I'd far rather drive my eight year old fully-paid-for Pilot and talk into my freebie cell phone while knowing that I am going to have the freedom to dance with tomorrow.


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Marketing ReWired Part 3: Position
Being part of Kick Start Labs means I am never running my business on my own, never making guesses in the dark. My good ideas get discussed and expanded, and my bad ideas get called out before they get started. I work on my own, but Kick Start Labs puts me a whole team behind me.
-- Stephanie Alford
Founder & Designer of Space Cadet Creations
Business success comes from the interplay of strategy and incremental, daily decisions. Having access to the business brain trust known as Tara Gentile for both vantage points for the continuous forks on the small business path through Kick Start Labs is a small business owner's competitive edge and a huge sigh of relief.
-- Ali Shapiro
Creator of Truce With Food
As a new business owner, I really need good old fashioned brainstorming with talented people who understand the demands of trying to grow a small business.
-- Shawn Fink
Founder of The Abundant Mama Project
"I now understand far more about the ideal clients for my work and what makes my work a good fit for them, and as a result I'm not just guessing about what will work and hoping for the best when I market a new offering."
-- Kate Swoboda, Creator of The Coaching Blueprint
"I've realized that we as entrepreneurs all largely struggle with the same challenges and can learn a great deal from each other."
-- Nancy Sherr, Founder of Zestful Life with Nancy Sherr
"Tara Gentile is a brilliant business mastermind. Her insights are sharp, strategic and unique, and within just 30 minutes of speaking with her I had an arsenal of actionable ideas that would double my income."
-- Jenny Blake, author of Life After College
Tara Gentile is a business strategist, the creator of the Customer Perspective Process, and the ambassador of the You Economy. She helps small business owners capitalize on their big ideas. Her work has been featured on Forbes, US News & World Report, and in the NY Times bestselling book, The $100 Startup.


text: 71dB5A1iB-L._SY450_by Select MarbellaMay 13, 2017 Share this:PocketWhatsAppTelegramTweetEmailMorePrintShare on TumblrLike this:Like Loading... Leave a Reply Cancel reply Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *Comment Name * Email * Website Notify me of new posts by email. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.


text:
Behind The Scenes: Yelawolf - F.A.S.T. Ride
YelaWolf gives a behind the scenes look to the making of his latest record F.A.S.T. RIDE.
Trunk Muzik Returns out March 14th
Posted by @Worldstarvids
Please click the "Report" button below if the video on this page is not working properly.
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Why Anti-Circumvention Laws Are Evil: Hollywood Gets To Veto DVD Jukebox, Despite Complete Lack Of Infringement
from the why-do-we-let-this-happen? deptAs mentioned, it looks like Canada's new copyright law will include the "digital locks" provision, which is more accurately described as giving Hollywood a veto on any technology it doesn't like. If you haven't followed the specifics, the "digital locks" provision is an anti-circumvention rule that makes it against the law merely to break a "digital lock" (i.e., to route around any form of DRM, no matter how weak) even if (and this is the important part) you are breaking the digital lock for perfectly legal reasons. For reasons that I still cannot comprehend, Hollywood has insisted that anti-circumvention provisions -- even if there's no infringement -- are of utmost importance. If it was really about protecting against infringement, they would make it clear that the anti-circumvention provisions only apply in cases where copyright law is broken.
The real reason why they want anti-circumvention even when there's no copyright infringement is because it gives them a veto on any new technology. All they have to do is put in some sort of weak digital lock and suddenly the company has to "negotiate" a deal or they can be sued out of existence.
This is not theoretical. In fact, we now have yet another very real example of Hollywood's ability to kill a technology that only has legal uses thanks to the absolute nature of the DMCA's anti-circumvention clause (on which Canada's law was modeled). We've written about Kaleidescape a few times in the past. The company makes super high end DVD jukeboxes, that allow people to take the DVDs they own and store digital copies on a home (not internet-connected) server, to make it easier to watch those movies. The company has gone to amazing lengths to prevent its product from being used for infringement. Here, I'll let the company explain the details directly:
Kaleidescape has carefully designed its products to protect the rights of content owners. The hard-disk copy of each DVD retains all of the DVD CCA's scrambling and adds more encryption. The Kaleidescape System is a closed system that prevents DVDs from being copied to the Internet, to writable DVDs, or to computers or mobile devices. Furthermore, you cannot download a pirated movie from the Internet to a Kaleidescape System.At one point, the company even went to such ridiculous extremes that it required users to put the DVD in the jukebox any time it wanted to play a movie from it -- effectively taking away the device's entire purpose, just to appease Hollywood.
Every Kaleidescape customer must agree to copy only the DVDs that he rightfully owns, and must reaffirm this agreement upon copying each DVD. Kaleidescape Systems identify rental discs and prevent them from being imported. This combination of business practices and technology has been so effective that after years of searching for evidence that Kaleidescape's customers use their systems to steal content, the DVD CCA admitted in writing that Kaleidescape has done no harm to any of the motion picture studios, and was unable at trial to show any harm to the DVD CCA itself.
And, none of it mattered. A court has issued an injunction against Kaleidescape selling these devices (pdf and embedded below). The specifics of the case revolve around questions of whether or not Kaleidescape breached the specific CSS license agreement that covers the DRM found on DVDs (which, again, Kaleidescape not only retains but enhances in its product). But that license agreement only has force because of the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA.
In other words this product, which can only be used for legal means -- and for which there has been no proof presented (ever) that it was used to infringe -- has been killed by a court... thanks to Hollywood's veto on this technology.
And the amazing thing is that all this does is make things worse for Hollywood. Considering how much Hollywood has been whining about DVD sales falling lately, a device like this only serves to make DVDs more valuable, meaning they would sell more.
Kaleidescape was founded in 2001 to bring consumers a fantastic experience for enjoying their movie collections. The Kaleidescape movie server makes digital copies of DVDs and Blu-ray Discs to hard disk drives so families can play back their movies instantly from any room of their home. A movie starts directly from the beginning, without forcing the family to endure advertisements, trailers, and confusing menus. With the company's wide-ranging innovations, customers can jump directly to the greatest scenes and songs in movies and concerts, and small children can start their movies all by themselves.But thanks to digital locks and anti-circumvention rules, such a product got voted out of existence by the very industry it would help the most.
Over the years, Americans have amassed over 13 billion DVDs and Blu-ray Discs – about 110 per household. This means that many American families have a few thousand dollars tied up in a library of movies they hoped to enjoy over and over. However, with collections that size, families soon realize that it takes so long to find what they're looking for that it just isn't worth buying more discs. This frustration has led to a well-publicized 58% decline in revenues from the sale of DVDs since 2006.
The Kaleidescape System eliminates that frustration. Because it's so easy and fun for Kaleidescape customers to enjoy their movies, they start buying movies again, and with a bigger appetite. The average Kaleidescape family owns 506 movies on Blu-ray and DVD.
Filed Under: anti-circumvention, copyright, digital locks, dvd jukebox, dvds
Companies: kaleidescape, mpaa


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Although Moses wrote the book of Genesis approximately thirty-four hundred years ago, it has been in just the last couple of centuries that serious debate over the nature and date of creation has developed. Consequently, there are now a number of theories relative to the creation account and one of them is called the Day-Age theory. Basically, this is a belief that the "days" spoken of in the first chapter of Genesis are sequential periods and not literal 24-hour days. Each day, therefore is thought to represent a much longer, albeit undefined, period of time, such as a million or more years. Essentially, it is an attempt to harmonize Scripture with theistic evolution.
Science has never disproved one word of the Bible. Nevertheless, in the last century and a half the scientific community has done a remarkable job of indoctrinating us with their worldview, one that is very much opposed to the truth of Scripture. However, the truth is that the Bible is the supreme truth and it should be the standard by which scientific theory should be evaluated, not vice-versa. At the very core of most of these contrived theories is an attempt to remove God from the equation. And one of the unfortunate consequences of questioning the historicity of Genesis is that the floodgates burst open for man to question every part of God's Word that does not agree with our limited intellectual abilities. However, everything Scripture teaches about sin and death requires a literal interpretation of the first three chapters of Genesis. That being said, let's review some of the arguments made by the proponents of the Day-Age theory.
Adherents of this theory often point out that the word used for "day" in Hebrew, yom, sometimes refers to a period of time that is more than a literal twenty-four hour day. One scriptural passage in particular often looked upon in support of this theory is 2 Peter 3:8 where it says "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day." However, as with all biblical interpretation, one must look at the context of the entire passage. In 2 Peter 3:3–10 we see that Peter is talking about scoffers in the last days as they question the second coming of Christ. This passage simply reminds us that God stands outside of time and we should not doubt the occurrence of a future biblical event simply because it seems to be taking a long time from our limited human perspective. Accordingly, 2 Peter 3:8 has nothing to do with the length of the creation week, nor was it meant to turn "day" into a mathematical formula.
Each day in the first chapter of Genesis is described as having an evening and a morning. Indeed, these two words—evening and morning—are used extensively in the Old Testament and each time they refer to normal days. Moreover, outside Genesis yom is used with a number hundreds of times—i.e., "one day" and each time it means an ordinary day. If Moses wanted to convey a longer period of time he could have used either olam or qedem, in place of yom.
Another reason given for a metaphorical "day" as postulated by this theory is that with the sun not being made until day four, how could there have been ordinary days (i.e. day and night) before this? However, the sun is not needed for a day and night. What is needed is light and a rotating Earth. The "evening and morning" indicates a rotating Earth, and as far as light is concerned, recall that God's very first command was "Let there be light" and there was light (Genesis 1:3). Separating the light from the darkness was the very first thing our Creator did. Also, remember that in Revelation 21:23 we see that the New Jerusalem "does not need the sun or moon to shine on it" as the "glory of God" will provide the "light." At the beginning of creation, God's radiant light would have certainly been sufficient until the luminaries were created three days later.
Additionally, if the "days" of Genesis are really long periods of time such as millions or billions of years, then God's Word is completely undermined at its very foundation as we would then have disease, suffering and death before the fall of man, even though Scripture clearly indicates that "sin entered the world through one man (Adam), and death through sin" (Romans 5:12). Thus, it is clear that there was no death prior to Adam's act of disobedience in the Garden of Eden. If this theory were true, it would nullify the doctrine of the fall of mankind into sin. Furthermore, it would also render void the doctrine of the Atonement, for if there was no "fall" why would we need a Redeemer?
Martin Luther once said: "But, if you cannot understand how this could have been done in six days, then grant the Holy Spirit the honor of being more learned than you are … since God is speaking, it is not fitting for you wantonly to turn His Word in the direction you wish it to go." Instead of looking to science to tell us what God really meant, all we really need to do is study Scripture, daily and eagerly, just like the Bereans (Acts 17:11), as all of it was inspired by God (2 Timothy 3:16), and all of it is true (Psalm 119:160).
Christ Himself spoke of the importance of believing in Moses' writings (John 5:45–47). And in Exodus 20:11, this is what Moses had to say: "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day."[1]
[1] Got Questions Ministries. (2010). Got Questions? Bible Questions Answered. Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software.


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christian celebrities, christian celebrity, discipleship, evangelism, jeremy lin, linsanity, tebow, zac koo
In light of the firestorm over one Hong Kong pop celebrity turned preacher and his recent controversial (heretical to some) remarks and the new trend of celebrity testimony and overexposure for their "faith", I've got to come out of the woodworks to say something, simply because I'm known (to some "people") as the big mouth of HK theological circle.
I've read a recent blog about the fact that Augustine thought of conversion of Victorinus, a Roman Neoplatonic philosopher and intellectual, to be a real victory (no pun), and that this "influence" is necessary. I believe Augustine is wrong. My opinion differs radically and I'll talk about why in this blog.
The celebrity culture all over evangelicalism, whether it is in Asia or North America, whether it is about some defector from Tienanmen Square or a great athlete who prays after he scores, is killing the church at the moment. In the evangelical world, this logic is popular, "If so-and-so can be converted, he can influence so many for Jesus." This logic is flawed based on our results. Has there been significant church growth from so many celebrity conversion? No!
In my 49 years of life on this earth and having been raised as a Christian, I can honestly say that many celebrities have been propped up too early. Some have done well simply because they were not new converts, and have merely carried on living out their faith even after they became famous. Many new convert celebrities had been welcomed "all-access" into many pulpits just because of their status. When they mess up, people make excuses simply because they are celebrities. No one wants to see a hero (i.e. idol?) being propped up only to stumble and fall. According one blogger, if the same standard is applied to all baby Christians, the church would have been filled with heresies by now. The problem is deeper than the mere rise or fall of a celebrity.
I want to bring attention to a different and more positive take on this whole idea. I do not blame the celebrity! I think many are shocked at this statement. What do people expect from enthusiastic but immature and new believers (I'm talking about some celebrities, not all) who have been handed the spotlight immediately? We must not blame the newly born-again celebrity. I blame the pastors who led them to Christ. Yes, I do.
The problem is the leadership of the church and the kind of culture they have created or should I say, the kind of idols they create. The reason many fall is because they have not gone through the normal and humble life of a learner. Some have not even repented of any of the wrongs they've committed and, in some cases, continue to commit. Instead, they become teachers immediately, even before they learn anything about their faith. Since they're used to the public hanging on their every word, they continue to use that to influence others "for Christ" except they're unaware that their every word misrepresents their faith. It's like me switching profession from being an academic lecturer who has lectured only on Christianity to being a lecturer on computers. Do I expect others to listen to me about computers? I hope not, but maybe some will. I'll be doing a disservice to them if I talk about computers. If Madonna endorses Obama, should I listen to her? Only if she has a PhD in economics or political science. What does Madonna know about politics anyway. The same thoughtlessness is happening in Christianity. I do not deny that these people are influencing people for faith, but what kind of influence and what kind of faith though? I really shouldn't be blogging about this because what I'm saying is as basic as the food we eat but because the church has gotten away from the basics so far that I need to write.
How should we handle celebrity converts? Should we even ask such a question? I guess we should since we've gotten so far away from biblical idea of spiritual growth. I say to handle them in the same way we handle any new convert. Just because they're famous, it does not give them the convenient rights to speak publicly for the faith. They should go through learning and discipleship like everyone else. They need to get their theological foundation so that when they do influence, they can influence the right way rather than the way some Christian celebrities are influencing the society right now. Some are not even gifted teachers of their own faith. If we truly believe in the priesthood of all believers and discipleship, everyone should be treated equally in our churches. There is no "red carpet" in church (well, except for the picture I uploaded above)! I'm unsure which pastors are the ones who led this particular Hong Kong celebrity to Christ, but they are almost entirely responsible for the mess we're in right now. What then is the problem?
The problems are two. First, many pastors want to use celebrities to boost church attendance, exposure, and in many cases, to boost the financial bottom line. This happens both in some (not all) mega-churches in Hong Kong and in North America. Second, many think that conversion number is the basis for all success, no matter how we convert. Both problems are related and can be summarized into one single concept: quick-fix pragmatism. If it works, it must be right! Many think that the Church is very different from society, but we aren't. We are just as secular in our pragmatic mindset. Many churches are exactly like society. Are there exceptions?
People not only point to Augustine's example Victorinus, but they also point to Paul, as how celebrity influence was good for the gospel. This naive view misses the mark. First, we have no evidence at all that Victorinus' conversion was influential at all, other than Augustine's own words. Surely, his conversion probably represented more of the Christian victory over pagan intellectuals in Augustine's society rather than merely for evangelistic effects. Augustine's writing then was merely his own personal opinion. Why shouldn't Victorinus impress Augustine? After all, both of them had Neoplatonic leanings. Augustine's opinion can't be taken at face value no more than any text without its historical contexts. Even if Victorinus was influential, Augustine would surely scoff at the educational level of most of these Christian celebrities as societal influence. They're no Victorinus. Augustine was looking to change culture and remake society through intellectual change. Many of such celebrities lack the education necessary to change the culture, even when the media give them all access.
Regarding our interpretation of Augustine, we should also look a bit deeper. Augustine himself was no minor success as a prodigy of rhetoric and great learning even before he converted. He was a a huge influence in church history. Much of Augustine's success was probably not merely due to his worldly talent, but the mentorship Ambrose gave him as he grew into maturity of church leadership. Augustine is the positive example of proper discipleship needed even if a new convert seems fit to be leader.
Paul's case is very different than Augustine's Victorinus. While Victorinus' situation is merely an opinion of a respected (but surely flawed) churchman showing concerns of his time, Paul's call, according to his own letters and the early church witness, is exceptional. As a professional student of Paul (my PhD is in Paul), I dare say that Paul had studied Judaism from which so-called Christianity grew more than most people in his era. He was also a genius. His "conversion" (I hate that term because he was really "called") did not try to create a new religion. He was basically reforming what he knew. This sentiment is very clear in Galatians 1-2 (part of my PhD). He made it very clear that his call was a very unusual case. What he knew far surpasses what most of us know. He had enough knowledge for many geniuses today to write books about.
No one today can compare with Paul. Using exception as a rule has already ruined evangelicalism. I think we need to go back to basic instead of worshipping quick-fix pragmatism. We need to go back to the hard work of discipleship or risk losing any semblance of the gospel we have left. Or we can just stop pretending that discipleship really matters and just go the secular route. Hypocrisy, after all, is both repulsive to Christians, and especially to non-Christians. We can start there.


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The Bush Administration - The $3 Trillion War (Vanity Fair)
After wildly lowballing the cost of the Iraq conflict at a mere $50 to $60 billion, the Bush administration has been concealing the full economic toll. The spending on military operations is merely the tip of a vast fiscal iceberg. In an excerpt from their new book, the authors calculate the grim bottom line.
By Joseph E. Stiglitz and Linda J. Bilmes
On March 19, 2008, the U.S. will have been in Iraq for five years. The Bush administration was wrong about the need for the Iraq war and about the benefits the war would bring to Iraq, to the region, and to America. It has also been wrong about the full cost of the war, and it continues to take steps to conceal that cost.
In the run-up to the war there were few public discussions of the likely price tag. When Lawrence Lindsey, President Bush's economic adviser, suggested that it might reach $200 billion all told, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld dismissed the estimate as "baloney." Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz went as far as to suggest that Iraq's postwar reconstruction would pay for itself through increased oil revenues. Rumsfeld and Office of Management and Budget Director Mitch Daniels estimated the total cost of the war in the range of $50 to $60 billion, some of which they believed would be financed by other countries.
For fiscal year 2008 the administration has asked for nearly $200 billion to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. If Congress provides the money, as it almost certainly will, then the total appropriated for direct operations in these two countries (including reconstruction, embassy costs, enhanced base security, and foreign aid) since the wars began will come to roughly $800 billion. It is extremely difficult to disentangle the Iraq and Afghanistan numbers, but Iraq is by far the larger endeavor and accounts for about three-fourths of the total. By the administration's own reckoning, then, the cost of the Iraq war, counting only the money officially appropriated, will soon be some $600 billion, or more than 10 times Rumsfeld's original number.
The administration's estimates have been low—and wrong—from the start. Some of this is the result of its shortsightedness about every aspect of the war, beginning with its nature and duration. For instance, extensive use of reservists and the National Guard avoided the need to increase the size of the armed forces or resort to a draft—but at a heavy price, including reliance on highly paid contractors, people who in other contexts would have been called mercenaries. Another factor is the soaring price of fuel caused by the increase in the price of oil—which is itself, in part, a consequence of the war.
But even the $600 billion number is disingenuous—which is to say false. The true cost of the war in Iraq, according to our calculations, will, by the time America has extricated itself, exceed $3 trillion. And this is a deliberately conservative estimate. The ultimate cost may well be much higher.
Why the huge difference between our number and the administration's? One big reason lies in the misleading way the federal government does its accounting. Any publicly owned business, no matter how small, is required by law to use a method of accounting that takes future obligations into consideration. This is known as "accrual" accounting. But Defense Department accounting is done on a "cash" basis, which logs only what the government is actually spending day by day and ignores future obligations. In the case of the Iraq war, the future obligations are huge. They include the cost of replacing military equipment, which is being used up at 6 to 10 times the peacetime rate. They also include the cost of providing health care and disability payments for our returning troops. These costs will be especially high because of our improved ability to keep even the most horribly wounded soldiers alive.
The cash type of accounting also provides an incentive to make short-term savings. It was only in 2007, four years after the war began, and after roadside bombs had caused some 1,500 American fatalities, that the Pentagon decided to replace its vulnerable fleet of 18,000 Humvees with vehicles designed to withstand blasts from so-called improvised explosive devices (I.E.D.'s). The short-term savings have resulted in a great deal of long-term human suffering and have brought on higher-than-anticipated costs for medical care.
Another obstacle to estimating the true costs is that many of them are buried in other government accounts and therefore don't show up in the direct appropriations for the war. Further, some war-related spending has been pushed out of the government altogether and is borne by private parties. But just because it doesn't show up in the government ledger doesn't mean it isn't a cost—it means only that someone else pays it. For example, the failure to provide adequate budgetary support for the Veterans Health Administration has forced many veterans to buy private medical care. While this reduces government spending, there are no real savings for the country. Similarly, relying on the National Guard and the reserves to help fight the war removes hundreds of thousands of workers from the civilian labor force, imposing real costs on the economy as a whole—not to mention on the men and women who are suddenly called to active duty, and on their families.
Finally, we should point out that the procedure used by the administration to fund the Iraq war was chosen deliberately in order to deflect close attention. The administration has requested nearly all the money for the war in the form of "emergency" funding, which is not subject to standard budget caps or vigorous scrutiny. Emergency funding is intended for genuine crises, such as Hurricane Katrina, where the utmost speed is required to get the money to the field. The continued use of this emergency procedure—five years after the war began—is budgetary sleight of hand that makes a mockery of a democratic budget process.
The Other Surge
To understand why the true costs of the war are so much higher than the official estimates, we can start by looking at America's veterans. No one has suffered more from the administration's blindness and stinginess. To date, more than 1.6 million American troops have been deployed in the Iraq and Afghanistan operations. More than 4,000 have been killed. More than 65,000 have been wounded or injured, or have contracted a disease. Of the 750,000 troops who have been discharged so far, some 260,000 have been treated at veterans' medical facilities. Nearly 100,000 have been diagnosed as having mental-health conditions. Another 200,000 have sought counseling and re-adjustment services at walk-in vet centers.
No adequate preparation was made for casualties on this scale. The Department of Veterans Affairs (V.A.) and other agencies have been overwhelmed—both by the need for immediate medical care and by the demand for disability benefits. Already, a quarter of a million returning veterans have applied for disability benefits. Not surprisingly, many disability claims are complex: the average veteran cites five separate disabling medical conditions. The least fortunate among the veterans have suffered unimaginable horrors: brain trauma, amputations, burns, blindness, and spinal damage. Because a greater number of the injured are surviving today, the relative costs of long-term care will be greater than for any previous war. This is the surge the administration doesn't talk about.
In 2000, the V.A. had a backlog of 228,000 pending compensation claims. Today, owing in part to a rising tide of claims from newly injured military personnel, the number has mounted to more than 400,000. It is now taking the V.A. an average of six months to process an initial claim. About 14 percent of veterans appeal the initial decision, and it then takes the V.A. nearly two years to process the appeal. In the interim, many veterans are left in limbo.
As for medical care, the V.A. is stretched beyond capacity. It has run out of money, and in cities around the country V.A. hospitals are having trouble hiring enough doctors and nurses. In many areas, seriously wounded veterans are being forced to wait more than 30 days just to see a doctor. A study by the Government Accountability Office put its finger on one reason: the V.A. based its forecasts for health-care needs as late as 2005-6 on data for 2002, before the Iraq war began.
The administration's dishonesty when it comes to casualties and health care has been twofold. First, by failing to take into account the long-term burden of caring for veterans, it has vastly understated the true cost of the Iraq war—by hundreds of billions of dollars, as we'll see. Second, from the outset the administration has reported casualties in a way intended to downplay the human consequences of the war.
The Pentagon is highly secretive about the total number of casualties. While it reports deaths of service personnel from both combat and noncombat operations, the official tallies list only those wounded in combat. The military has considerable discretion in deciding how a particular case is classified. If the second vehicle in a convoy crashes into the first, which has been blown up by an I.E.D., is it an accident? Or should any killed and wounded be counted as combat casualties? If a helicopter crashes in a night flight because it is too dangerous to fly during the day, should we think of this, too, as just an accident?
The Pentagon has classified more than half of those who have had to be medically evacuated from Iraq as noncombat casualties. It maintains a separate, hard-to-find tally of military personnel wounded during noncombat operations, a figure that includes those injured during vehicle and helicopter crashes and training accidents, as well as those who become physically or mentally ill during deployment, or who succumb to the exotic diseases common in the region. We found this list almost accidentally, when the V.A. published a complete casualty tally in a fact sheet in September 2006. This report in turn was linked to the full Department of Defense tabulation. The Pentagon has since demanded that the V.A. release only the combat-casualty figures, and the Pentagon's newly reorganized Web site makes it hard to locate and interpret the full casualty report.
With a mind-set like this, it is little wonder that the administration was caught flat-footed.
The Reckoning
The calculations we used to arrive at the conservative $3 trillion estimate for the cost of the Iraq war are conceptually simple, even if sometimes technically complicated. The basic framework for the calculation can be divided into 10 steps:
1. Total appropriations to date. This is the simplest step: adding up the amounts that have been directly appropriated for the war. There have been more than two dozen separate appropriations, covering a variety of ongoing current operations. As noted, our estimated total for the Iraq war alone, including 2008 funding, comes to more than $600 billion.
2. Add operational expenditures hidden elsewhere in the defense budget. Between 2002 and 2007 the military budget outside of spending for Iraq and Afghanistan has grown by some $500 billion, cumulatively. This is faster than the rate at which defense spending has risen over the past 40 years. The increase cannot be attributed entirely to ordinary increases in spending. Working from discussions with defense analysts, we estimate that at least one-quarter of the additional money has been devoted in one way or another to fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. About $110 billion of this Pentagon spending over the past five years should be assigned to the Iraq conflict alone.
3. Correct for inflation and the "time value" of money. A dollar today is different from a dollar five years ago, and the difference is sufficiently large that it cannot be ignored.
These first three steps give us the value in 2007 dollars of what we have actually spent in Iraq so far—a number that approaches $800 billion, already much larger than the figure advertised by the Bush administration.
But the meter is still running.
4. Add future operational expenditures (both direct expenditures and those hidden elsewhere in the budget). Even if the new president orders a quick but orderly departure, it will almost surely require at least 12 months—taking us through the end of 2009. The more likely scenario is that there will be debate and discussion, consultation and deliberation, all of which will take time, and, in the end, the drawdown of our troops will be more gradual. Any realistic assessment of the cost of the war needs to consider what we will have to pay for U.S. military operations over the next few years, as well as the cost of bringing troops and equipment home and maintaining a smaller deployment or peacekeeping force into the future. We base our estimates on official projections, all of which assume that we maintain some presence in Iraq for at least another decade. We estimate that future operating costs will run to about $520 billion.
5. Add the full costs of health care and disability payments for returning veterans. This is one of the biggest long-term financial obligations we face. Under any realistic scenario at least 2.1 million individuals will have done a tour in Iraq before the war is over. Some 44 percent of veterans of the 1991 Gulf War—a war that lasted only a few weeks—have applied for disability compensation, and nearly 90 percent of their claims have been approved. (Today we still spend $4.3 billion per year paying disability compensation to veterans of that short war.) Judging from the number of claims that have been filed already, we project that at least a comparable percentage of Iraq veterans will be entitled to receive disability pensions as a result of the Iraq conflict—and the severity of their disabilities (and amount of monthly compensation) may well be higher. These costs can be considered "promissory notes" of the war—accrued liabilities that must be paid. Our estimate of the cost of these accrued liabilities comes to roughly $590 billion over the lifetime of our Iraq-war veterans.
6. Add the cost of restoring the military to its pre-war strength. We have already counted, under "operational expenditures," the ongoing amount spent on replacing ammunition, vehicles, and equipment. But in fact the Defense Department is increasingly in arrears—it's not replacing equipment and supplies as fast as they are being consumed by the war effort. We estimate that the net cost of restoring the U.S. military, including all reserve forces and the National Guard, to its pre-war strength will reach $280 billion.
7. Add budgetary costs incurred by other parts of government. The war has imposed costs across the entire breadth of government—not just at the Defense Department. Most of these costs are related to providing Social Security disability-compensation benefits to veterans of Iraq who can no longer work, which will amount to $38 billion.
Together, Steps 5, 6, and 7 allow us to calculate the total budgetary cost of the war to the federal government—about $2.2 trillion. However, this does not include another important cost—interest.
8. Add interest. The U.S. has borrowed most of the funds used to wage the Iraq war. We will have to repay this debt with interest. If we include in our tally the interest payable on what we are borrowing over only the next 10 years, this adds another $615 billion to the price tag, and brings the total budgetary cost of the Iraq war into the neighborhood of $2.8 trillion.
So far we have been looking simply at the effect on federal coffers—at the money that the government in Washington must pay out. The next two steps go beyond the federal budget and look at costs to our society in a larger sense.
9. Estimate the cost to the economy. There are many social and economic costs of the war outside the purely budgetary ones; although they may be large, they are hard to quantify. For instance, death benefits do not adequately reflect the loss in economic output that each death represents, and disability payments are far less than what disabled individuals would have earned had they been able to pursue a normal life. In at least one in five affected families, someone will have to give up a job to provide care. Many from the National Guard and reserves who are called to duty have careers interrupted and family life destroyed. The budgetary cost to the government is far less than the burden that these individuals end up shouldering. The estimated cost to the economy is $370 billion, in addition to the budgetary costs.
10. Estimate the macro-economic impact. This comes in two major forms. First, the war has diverted government expenditures from schools, roads, research, and other areas that would have stimulated the economy in the short run and produced stronger economic growth in the long run. We have financed the war with deficits, and the higher deficits, too, will impose a long-run burden on the economy. Second, higher oil prices, in large measure a consequence of the war, have weakened the American economy. A realistic but conservative estimate for the war's macro-economic impact is roughly $1.9 trillion.
Most economists would not count both interest and economic costs, because doing so introduces an element of double counting. Thus, the total cost of the war ranges from $2.8 trillion (in strictly budgetary costs) to $4.5 trillion (if one adds in the economic costs). These numbers reflect what we have called our "moderate" scenario. We also considered a "best case" scenario, in which the U.S. would withdraw all its combat troops much sooner, and fewer veterans would need medical care and disability pay. Even under this unlikely and extremely optimistic scenario, the total cost of the war comes to nearly $2 trillion.
Under the circumstances, a $3 trillion figure for the total cost strikes us as judicious, and in all likelihood errs on the low side. Needless to say, this number represents the cost only to the United States. It does not reflect the enormous cost to Iraq, or to the rest of the world.
Paying Full Price
The president and his advisers wanted a quick and inexpensive conflict. Instead, the Iraq war is costing more than anyone could have imagined. The only war in our history which cost more is the Second World War, when we had armed forces of 16.3 million fighting for four years at a total cost (adjusted for inflation) of about $5 trillion. Assuming we stay in Iraq another 24 months, the direct military costs alone, calculated in comparable dollars, are likely to be at least 50 percent higher than those of the Vietnam War, twice those of the Korean War, and four times those of World War I.
The chronic underestimation of costs, verging on outright deception, has continued. In January 2007, the administration estimated that it would cost $5.6 billion to deploy an additional 21,500 troops for the proposed "surge" in troop levels. But this estimate referred to the cost of deploying the combat troops alone, and for only four months. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the surge would also require deployment of at least 15,000 combat-support troops, a mobilization which would raise the cost to at least $11 billion (also for four months), reaching $27 to $49 billion if the surge continued for 12 to 24 months. Even this expanded estimate did not take into account the long-term health and disability costs for the extra veterans, or the cost of replacing the equipment that these additional troops would use.
Most Americans have yet to feel any of the costs of the Iraq war. The price in blood has been paid by members of the volunteer military. The price in treasure has been financed entirely by borrowing. Taxes have not been raised to pay for the war—in fact, taxes on the rich have actually fallen. Deficit spending gives the illusion that the laws of economics can be repealed. They cannot. Americans will have to pay for the war at some point—and when they do, they will be paying not the Bush markdown but the full price.
Excerpted from The Three Trillion Dollar War, by Joseph E. Stiglitz and Linda J. Bilmes, to be published this month by W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.; © 2008 by the authors. Available in the U.K. through Penguin Books.
Nobel laureate and economist Joseph E. Stiglitz is a professor at Columbia University in New York and was chair of President Clinton's Council of Economic Advisors. Budget and finance expert Linda J. Bilmes is a professor at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.


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After a very busy summer, I need a kick in the behind to get back into the blogging routine. Misi's display chain is always fun, and just what I need to get going again. Yes, this normally happens on Tuesday, but my scheduled post didn't appear yesterday. We'll say it was Blogger misbehaving again, not user error. Misi is graciously allowing me to link up a little late, being the sweet natured girl that she is. This week's theme is "Framed In".
Here is my take on this theme...
A giant key inside an empty antique mirror frame.
Some old quilt squares. Oops. One is crooked. Oh heck, they're all crooked.
A corkboard I made that hangs outside the pantry.
An empty vintage frame just propped behind to add a little somethin'.
An old oyster crate that "frames" some dried gourds on the mantle.
Soda crate on the hearth framing a painted basket.
The legs of this mustard table frame the grapevine pumpkin nicely.
I love frames! There are lots more around here, but that's it for now. Please be sure to stop by Misi's Gablehouse Musings blog to see all the other lovely Framed In displays this week.
Have a blessed day!


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According to the Statistics on the Swiss Abroad compiled by the Federal Statistical Office, in 2018 around 760,200 Swiss citizens were registered with Swiss representations abroad. The Swiss community abroad has grown in recent years. If it were a canton it would be Switzerland's fourth largest in terms of population.
Swiss nationals living abroad
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Alongside various Swiss associations abroad, the OSA promotes relations among Swiss nationals and between the latter and their home country. It represents their interests in Switzerland, publishes the periodical «Swiss Review» and provides a broad range of services (e.g. youth exchange programmes, emergency assistance fund).
Organisation of the Swiss Abroad


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All camp weeks for Fall '19 (Sep-Dec) have been filled and registration is now closed. If you would like to be added to the cancelation list for the Fall semester please send an email to request to email@example.com. Camp is for out of state/out of country students ages 7-adult. To be added to the cancelation list you must be a current HALO member and have submitted a "New Client"intake for your child.
The next opportunity to register for "camp" would be for Spring '20 semester (Jan-April) Check back on Oct 1,2019 and go to the "Calendar" page to review the "Spring '20 Registration Announcement" which is informational only . The registration announcement (Viewable on Oct 1,2019) will include date/time registration will open and other pertinent information regarding the registration process.
Prior to making an appointment for RPM sessions at HALO you must first become a member of HALO and then submit a New Client Intake form for your student/child ages 7-adult. To become a member, click on "Members," and then select "Become a Member." Once you are a member, click "Members" again, and select "New Client Intake." You may be as brief or detailed as you would like on your child's intake.
HALO's scheduling is based on 3 semesters throughout the year. The spring semester runs from January – April, the summer semester from May – August, and the fall semester from September – December. Further information regarding scheduling can be discussed once a New Client Intake has been submitted to HALO. Students are categorized into 3 groups. The 3 groups include: Campers, Texas Clients, and Local Clients. Campers are students who visit HALO from outside Texas. Campers (Age 7-adult) have the opportunity to attend a Soma® RPM camp up to 3 times a year based on the 3 semesters listed above. Camp week is 4 days and we do occassionally offer some 3 day ($600 and requires 1/2 deposit) which is $800.00 requires a non-refundable/non-transferable 1/2 deposit of *$400.00 to secure your camp week (Typically Tuesday-Friday). Campers attend 2 – 1:1 sessions daily (1-40 minute and 1-25 minute appointment).
Texas Clients are students who live in Texas but do not live in the surrounding Austin area (ex. Houston, Dallas, etc). Specific days and times are reserved for our Texas Clients, in which the student has a 65 min, 1:1 session with Soma ($195 is session fee, requires non refundable/non transferable deposit of $110 to confirm,balance of $85 due at appointment) . Appointment availability varies depending on the number of Texas Clients families enrolled in a given semester.
Local Clients attend 1 – 1:1 session (One-25 minute appointment $85) on a weekly or bi-weekly or monthly basis. Local Clients include those living in the Austin and nearby surrounding cities.


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I didn't learn much from DU practice today. Much-needed junior wing Dustin Jackson and freshman center Nick Shore are still wearing orange "no-crush" jerseys, and coach George Gwozdecky didn't have an injury update because he was in Toronto on Tuesday and hadn't met with trainer Aaron Leu.
Jackson has missed the entire season because of mono and Shore hasn't played since breaking his right wrist on opening night. Shore is still wearing a cast, but his older brother, Drew, said Nick was scheduled to see the doctor before this weekend's series against visiting Minnesota State.
As for Friday's starter between the pipes, Gwozdecky said he is "leaning towards" freshman Sam Brittain, who was pulled after allowing five goals in last Saturday's 9-2 massacre at Colorado College.
We'll have updates on both topics Thursday.


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Hotels & Accommodation in Kampung Sira
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If you're looking for a place to get away, look no further than Kampung Sira. Whether you're planning to stay for a night or for the week, the area around Kampung Sira has accommodations to fit every need. Search for hotels in Kampung Sira with Hotels.com by checking our online map. Our map displays the areas and neighborhoods around all Kampung Sira hotels so you can see how close you are from landmarks and attractions, and then refine your search within the larger area. The best Kampung Sira hotel deals are here with our lowest price guarantee.
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- • 9 4-star accommodations from USD 20 per night
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When is the best time to visit Kampung Sira?
- • Hottest months: April, May, February, March (average 89°F)
- • Coldest months: January, February, November, December (average 72°F)
- • Rainiest months: April, May, October, and November (average 8.74 inches of rainfall)


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Dance War Finale – New Dancing with the Stars Contestants
This week I got an email from someone trying to promote tonight's Dance War Finale. I'll take the bait and post the information they sent me. I must admit that I'm glad today is President's Day holiday so I can be home to see it live. Plus, I'm glad that they'll be presenting the new contestants for Dancing with the Stars tonight.
Here's the insider info for Dance War:
Drew Lachey will be singing the opening dance number for the finale episode.
* Contestants practice daily in separate locations by team
* All contestants have individual rooms in their hotel; Room curfew is 11 p.m.
* Unsupervised external field trips are not permitted
* All phone calls, emails and written letters are supervised
* Contestants do not have access to news outlets, television or Internet
Insider Contestant Information to Date:
* Elizabeth and Chris hang out together a lot. Usually spend time in each others room working on routines etc. The two of them have known each other for years. In fact, Chris's picture was on Elizabeth's MySpace profile from way back.
* Elizabeth loves Country music. She said that if she's eliminated before country week she'll just keep on showing up at the dance studio until that week has finished.
* Sara Evans is Elizabeth's idol.
* Elizabeth is the flirt of the group. She flirts with everyone (even the producers)
* Elizabeth is doing this show to give back to her adoptive family. This is her thank you.
* She has a huge crush on Jesse Hart (possibility of bringing him to a practice as a surprise)
* Chris has a really serious girlfriend that he doesn't want anyone to know about.
* Chris hates criticism. His feelings are easily hurt. Often times the others will try to correct him, and he takes it offensively.
* Chris hates school. His biggest fear is being voted off this show and going back to obscurity.
* Biggest ego of the group.
* Follows Elizabeth around like a puppy-dog. He has a huge crush on, but she treats him like a brother.
* He just found out that he made the Dean's list at Cal State Fullerton and is really excited about it.
* Zack is back on with Julianne Hough from DWTS. However, Elizabeth, Corina, Kelsey, and Charity all have a crush on him. Elizabeth has dreams about dating him.
* Elizabeth, Zack, Mariel and Lacey all take part in a bible study. Zack leads it.
* Charity has never had a boyfriend. She says boys never pay attention to her
* Charity and Lacey go way back. They used to travel and sing together. Lacey used to dance at the dance studio Charity worked at but claims she could never afford taking lessons there.
* Qui's and Corina used to date.
* Qui's is obsessed with the Lakers. It's been really hard for him to be without sports center, and he can't understand how the other guys in the group could care less.
* Phillip has plans to marry his girlfriend after the show is over. She's been in Minnesota for the last month, and in and out of the hospital for back surgery. He told me that fame will not change the way he thinks about her. He could care less about any other girls.
* Phillip has written songs about his girlfriend. He wrote the first song the day after they met.
* Philips is afraid of being known as "the hat guy". In fact, he never wears hats. The hat he wore the first day wasn't even his. He was just trying to have a better "hip hop look"
* Lacey is annoyed by Kelsey's cattiness. I've seen her roll her eyes at her several times.
* Lacey has a crush on Marqis
* Tony used to be Lacey's only true friend in the group, but they got in a huge fight during practice the week of 1/14 and he kicked the door on the way out.
* Lacy is very uncomfortable in the group.
* Kelsey is the diva of the group claiming "I've never gone this long without shopping in my life" she also spent $400 at Victoria Secret while on one of their shopping excursions.
* Kelsey and Charity have become really close. Often times they leave out both Corina and Elizabeth.
* Kelsey talks about money a lot. She talks about spending money constantly.
* Kelsey flirts with Zack; on 1/17 she was wearing his jacket. Zack was in her room past hours (11 p.m.) He did not speak about Julianne that day. All of the girls make comments that Zack and Kelsey would be good together.
* Kelsey is a huge Diva
* Qui's and Alyssa do not get along. They bicker constantly
* Alyssa gets on the nerves of the rest of the group
* Everyone loves Bradley; he is the chicken soup of the group. He constantly makes people feel better about themselves.
* Everyone in the group agrees Tony is the best dancer. Zack has made comments several times that Tony can win "So you think you can dance"
* Tony and Zack go back and forth making meals for the rest of the group.
* Mariel doesn't feel as sexy as the other girls. She is the tomboy, and is insecure around the other girls.
* Mariel has opened up more within the last week, and she feels really comfortable around Elizabeth and Lacey.
* The only party kids in the group are Corina, Charity, Kelsey, and Elizabeth. The rest drink rarely or never.
* Lacey and Zack are the group leaders. They go along with the rules, and they don't question them. The rest of the group is constantly looking for opportunities to stray. Zack is constantly motivating the group.
* The guys love Kim Kardashian as a whole; are not at all interested in Miley Cyrus


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Guangzhou Chuyan Cosmetics Co., Ltd. was established in 2004, a professional manufacturer of hair care products. The main products include shampoo series, hair treatment series, hair color dye series, hair styling series, hair perm series and skin care series, and any other beauty salon cosmetics. A 10000 square-meter workshop and an independent warehouse and possess advanced technology for scientific exploration, analysis and test. We integrate ISO9001 advanced management and international equipment with production process together to manufacture products. Southeast Asia Chemical Laboratory has established long-term technical cooperation with our company.We also undertake processing trade (OEM/ODM) as our every customers' requirements. Our products are welcomed by customers at home and abroad.
Our Service:
I. OEM or ODM are available,All products could be custom-made.
II. We can provide you best pre-sale and after-sale service.
III. With GMPC and ISO certification, also can do certification as customize
IV. Fast delivery. Our company have our own team for delivery.
V. A trial order and a sample order is welcomed for the goods in stock. Mix order also can be supported
1.Are you a factory or trading company?
We have our own factory.We are a cosmetics factory with export license.
2.Where is your factory located? How can I visit there?
Our factory is located in Baiyun District, Guangzhou City,China. You can fly to Baiyun airport No.25 Donghua Hua Road, Renhe Town, Baiyun,Guangzhou,Guang dong, China.
3.How can I get some samples?
We are honored to offer you samples.
4.How does your factory do regarding quality control?
Quality is priority. We always attach great importance to quality controlling from root to the end.Our factory has gained GMPC/GMP/ISO 9001 authentication.
5.Can you do the OEM?
Yes, We can do OEM products.It's no problem. Welcome OEM/ODM orders.


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Constant Technical Support and Services
We provide a pack of profound advisory services, resolving technical queries, and providing constant sales and after-sales expertise solutions over multiple mediums.
Bigcommerce to Magento Product Importer extension provides the ability to the users to import the products from Bigcommerce store to Magento. It provides the facility of importing products in bulk and allows to import simple and configurable types of products. It has the functionality to import images of the products. It's easy to use as the user can import his products just by a single click. The attributes are dynamically created and assigned to the products.
Have a look at CedCommerce Multi-Vendor Marketplace Extension
We provide a pack of profound advisory services, resolving technical queries, and providing constant sales and after-sales expertise solutions over multiple mediums.
Our extensions stand up with the Magento standards and are developed by our Magento Certified Experts, who even belong to the contribution team at Magento.
We provide Complete eCommerce Marketplace Solutions, Extensions, Integrations, Mobile app development, Importers, Marketing automation, Digital marketing services, Drop shipping and Much more.
The functionality to import images of the products of this extension is really nice and I am fan of it
The thing that I'm most impressed with CedCommerce is there availablity from a support standpoint, They seem available almost 24*7, So this was the reason we were impressed with CedCommerce , Then from Jet, we moved onto Walmart.com Extension then we moved to Sears/Kmart extension, Wish extension and now with Walmart-Canada. They are very reasonable on the programming cost. So If You are looking for a good company I'd definitely recommend CedCommerce
Just started using it less than a week ago but so far so good. Easy implementation with really good and proactive customer service. I also use their JET integration app...both app works technically well and have good features. I got sales on both marketplaces quickly after installing.
The App is great! What makes this App great is the customer service support. The support is very friendly and always trying to help, questions are answered very fast, and products uploaded very professionally.
We Are online retailers, Been In the Business for 8 Years Now. We Recently started working with CedCommerce and We have really enjoyed working with them. They have a terrific way of working there customers, They are always available, they're very very well trained and understand the problems that we have as online sellers with various marketplaces. Hence it is By far our best decision
We purchased integration to offer products on Jet.com and Walmart.com and the support executive has been very proactive and me and my supervisors are very happy. Since we had unique requirements, the support executive completed all our requirements. I highly recommend them.
We have been using (different) products of CedCommerce for a year now. They have been a great development partner for us (for Wordpress and Woocommerce). They helped us in developing plugins, programming for omnichannels, custom work to support B2B and B2C and most recently, they integrated our Woocommerce stores with several marketplaces.
We wanted to sell our products on different marketplaces but we had challenges of integrating our stores with those marketplaces. We turned to CedCommerce. They have been professional, responsive, and implemented all the features that we requested. Their support has been outstanding.
We have purchased Walmart Integration extension and Newegg extension. Installation was quick and easy and company have provided quick support to modify certain parts of integration extension to suit our business. Even though the company is situated in India, the time difference doesn't makes any difference to the support.
I searched for many extensions for Marketplace but only CedCommerce extensions fulfilled my requirements and they really made pricethon what it is. CedCommerce Customer Care if unbeatable, they would help you with everything and have solutions to all your queries. I recommend CedCommerce to everyone who deals with Ecommerce.
I recommend Multi-Vendor marketplace solution highly as it is very good and extremely customizable – especially support. It's round the clock available and guys – dedicated team - work tirelessly. We appreciate them and recommend them highly.
Express service
We purchased Multi-Vendor Marketplace and other Extensions from the CedCommerce. They are technically sound and professional. Support is great. They've helped us improve our performance. Highly Recommend.
To open my marketplace we considered several options like Shopify and Bigcommerce, however they don't offer the degree of the customization (in a pricing) that CedCommerce does. The customization is 360 degree. Most importantly the support is awesome. We recommend Cedcommerce highly for online marketplace solutions.