Tracing disease outbreaks down to individual cities via social networking could help track dengue’s spread
“MY MOTHER is suspected of having dengue,” tweets a woman in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. “I think I have dengue. Hopefully I’m wrong!” tweets a man in São Paulo, 350 kilometres away.
These short messages posted on Twitter might not seem much, but when the dengue season begins again in Brazil this November, tweets like this could help the country better control outbreaks of a virus that kills hundreds of people each year.
That’s thanks to software created by a collaboration between two Brazilian National Institutes of Science and Technology, led by Wagner Meira, a computer scientist at the Federal University of Minas Gerais. The team has used it to identify a high correlation between the time and place where people tweet they have dengue and the official statistics for where the disease appears each season.
Social media has been used in real-time surveillance of diseases before; Twitter was used to follow the 2009 swine flu pandemic, for example. But this is the first time it has been used to track dengue fever, and the first time data on the scale of individual cities has been collected in this way. It is also the first attempt to pick up on people tweeting about their personal experience of a disease.
Dengue outbreaks occur every year in Brazil, but exactly where varies every season. It can take weeks for medical notifications to be centrally analysed, creating a headache for health authorities planning where to concentrate resources. Using Twitter messages could mean a much faster response, says Meira. “It isn’t predicting the future but the present,” he says. “This means we aren’t weeks behind like we used to be.”
Using Twitter to track the incidence of dengue fever means the health response is no longer weeks behind
The approach – helped by increased access to the internet in Brazil – uses software to filter tweets for those that contain the word “dengue” and information on the user’s location. Tweets that express personal experience of the disease are identified using criteria such as sentence structure and wording. Those mentioning public campaigns, or telling jokes are all filtered out.
Testing the software on 2447 tweets containing the word “dengue” and a location sent between January and May 2009 shows “personal experience tweets” tightly correlated with the outbreaks identified by the Brazilian Ministry of Health. The work was presented at the Web Science Conference in Koblenz, Germany, last month.
The team now plan to analyse 181,845 tweets sent between December 2010 and April 2011, but are waiting for the ministry’s 2011 data before they do so. However, Meira says that the tweets mirror the trend seen in cities where changes in the dengue outbreak are known to have occurred.
Philip Polgreen, an infectious disease expert at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, and his colleague Alberto Segre, a computer scientist, recently published a similar study on the use of Twitter to track swine flu in different regions of the US. They say Meira’s work is significant. “They have included sentiment analysis and they have a fine degree of geography,” says Segre.
Miera says terms such as “bone pain” and “eye pain”, which are typical symptoms of dengue fever, are now being included in his team’s software. He adds that the tool will also get better as more Brazilians come online: “Every year we get more data.”
Last month, Google unveiled a Google Dengue Trends tool that records spikes in web searches for dengue fever, which taps into the fact that people who have dengue fever are likely to look for information about it.
Epidemiologist John Brownstein, at the Children’s Hospital Boston, who worked with Google on the project, published a paper setting out the underlying science last month (PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pntd.0001206). He says the Google and Twitter methods are complementary; while Google searches are more common, Twitter provides more context.
When this article was first posted, “Minas Gerais” was spelled incorrectly.


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Actor Vijay Sethupathi is teaming up with director Arun Kumar for the third time after ‘Pannaiyarum Padminiyum’ and ‘Sethupathi’.
Produced by Yuvan Shankar Raja’s YSR Films and K Productions, the film will star Vijay Sethupathi and Anjali in the lead for the second time after ‘Iraivi’.
Yuvan Shankar Raja will also compose the music foer the film which has Vivek Prasanna and Linga playing important roles in this untitled film. The pooja for the film happened yesterday and the shooting for this action entertainer will happen at Thenkasi and Malaysia. The rest of the cast is expected to be revealed soon.
2,467 total views, 1 views today

domain: entertainment


text: Hello Friends, my name is Hudson Anakin, the Border Sheepdog. I love to do pretty much everything my human is doing, she calls me her shadow...whatever that means. Going on walks, hikes, playing with my buddies at the dog park, swimming at the lake are always a blast, but my favorite thing is to snuggle with my human. Anywho, thank you for viewing my profile. Hope to see your vote!

domain: pet


Celtic explain why unexpected footage was included in unique angle video
Celtic’s unique angle videos that the club upload to YouTube usually on Mondays after a victory in the league show the goals that the team has scored in a game from a vantage point most fans don’t get to see – a camera behind the goal.
The videos have been going for a few years now, but interestingly the clip from Sunday’s 3-1 win over Kilmarnock featured perhaps some unexpected footage.
Opposition goal included
It included Kilmarnock winning a penalty, and taking the lead in the game.
The inclusion of the footage led one fan on social media to question Celtic TV about why the Kilmarnock goal had been shown.
“Do we really need to see the opposition goal” a Celtic fan argued.
The Celtic TV Twitter account had a brilliant answer, which makes a lot of sense.
“We feel it’s important”
“We feel it’s important to tell the story of Celtic’s win. In this case it was showing resilience, patience and class to come from behind and win. It would be different if opposition goal was a consolation goal near the end” the account replied.
We feel it’s important to tell the story of Celtic’s win. In this case it was showing resilience, patience and class to come from behind and win. It would be different if opposition goal was a consolation goal near the end
— Celtic TV (@CelticTV) February 24, 2020
That is the perfect answer to any complaints that any supporter could have over the inclusion of the Kilmarnock goal.
It was shown just to put Celtic in a better light. The fact that the team came from behind to win what could be a huge three points deserves to be highlighted.
The Hoops showed plenty of character to come back into the game, and it is no surprise that the club wanted to showcase that in as many avenues as possible.
As the Celtic TV account says, it wasn’t like it was a consolation goal, it was an important moment in the game. Therefore, there is no issue with the move to include Kilmarnock’s goal in the footage.
Do you agree with Celtic TV? Should Kilmarnock’s goal have been taken out of the video? Share your thoughts below with a comment in our new discussion forum…


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Ed Sheeran’s album X has overtaken Adele’s 21 to become the longest-charting UK top 10 album ever released by a British artist. X (pronounced “multiply”) was the fastest-selling album of 2014, and has now remained in the top 10 for 73 consecutive weeks, breaking Adele’s 71-week record. Sheeran’s album has sold over 10 million copies worldwide, and received 59 platinum certifications.
Reviewing Sheeran’s album when it was first released, The Telegraph’s Neil McCormick described it as “genuinely great” in a five-star review. He said, “Sheeran stays true to the essential artistic notions of the classic singer-songwriter genre by treating his music as a vehicle for emotional veracity, personal revelation and universal inclusion.” McCormick also offered a mathematical formula to explain the success of X. “Sensitive songwriting + hip-hop flow + pop sensibility x charismatic performance = something greater than the sum of its obvious parts.”
Today, the 24-year-old singer released a new “Wembley edition” of his second album, including five additional tracks and a DVD of Jumpers for Goalposts, the concert film shot during his sold out three-night run at Wembley Arena. Sheeran said, “2015 is definitely going to be one to remember. Wembley in the summer was such a big career highlight and now to hear that I’m the first British artist to land the longest run in the Top 10 has really put the cherry on top. To all my brilliant fans – thank you!”
The record-breaking success of the album follows several recent accolades for the Suffolk-born artist, including Q Magazine’s solo artist of the year award and a best live act trophy at the MTV EMA Music Awards in Milan, which he hosted. October also marked the singer’s soap-opera debut, as he serenaded the residents of Summer Bay in Home and Away. Sheeran said he was pleased to have appeared in the song-running Australian drama. “It’s always on in my local chip shop,” he explained.
X: Wembley Edition is out now on Atlantic

domain: news


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Lot 45 (Jewellery and Silver, 21st November 2017)
A cased early Victorian, gold, turquoise lariat necklace, c.1845,
with an adjustable knot centrepiece, rub set with oval cabochon turquoise to a hand engraved ground. Adjustable braided curb chain and tassels, each culminating in a chased pippin, drop, rub set with a turquoise cabochon to a lozenge-shaped box clasp. Fitted case by George Attenborough, 252 Regent St., London. Tested as approximately 9ct gold. 8.98g
Sold for £280
Tarnish, mostly to the drops and the clasp.
Chains slide through the tubes very easily.
May not stay in place when worn.

domain: design


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Rufaat Mando, MD, is an experienced gastroenterologist dedicated to providing top-notch care to patients at GI Associates of Maryland in Waldorf, Maryland. Originally from the vibrant city of New Orleans, Louisiana, Dr. Mando pursued his higher education at esteemed institutions.
He earned his degree in Psychology from the Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, before pursuing his medical degree at Saba University School of Medicine in the Caribbean Netherlands. Dr. Mando further honed his skills and knowledge through a rigorous residency in internal medicine at East Tennessee State University in Johnson City, Tennessee. He then completed a specialized Gastroenterology fellowship at the University of South Alabama in Mobile, Alabama.
With board certifications in internal medicine and gastroenterology, Dr. Mando demonstrates his commitment to maintaining the highest standards of expertise in his field. He is an esteemed member of several professional organizations, including the American College of Gastroenterology, the American Gastroenterology Association, the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, and the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.
Dr. Mando's leadership is evident as he actively participates in committees at a local hospital which showcases his dedication to driving positive change within the medical community and enhancing patient care. In addition, Dr. Mando places a strong emphasis on collaboration and communication with fellow doctors from diverse medical fields in the area. By fostering these connections, he ensures that his patients have maximum access to comprehensive and specialized care, ultimately prioritizing their well-being and treatment outcomes.
Dr. Mando is well-versed in the management of various gastrointestinal disorders. His particular areas of expertise and interest include inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), hemorrhoid ligation therapy, Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD), and implementing effective screening programs, such as colon cancer screening.
Patients value Dr. Mando not only for his extensive knowledge and skill but also for his compassionate and patient-centered approach. With a dedication to improving the quality of life for those he serves, he remains committed to delivering exceptional care and empowering his patients to achieve optimal gastrointestinal health.

domain: medical


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Whārangi 1: Biography
Administrator, runholder, politician, provincial superintendent
I tuhia tēnei haurongo e Alan Ward, ā, i tāngia tuatahitia ki Ngā Tāngata Taumata Rau i te 1990.
Donald McLean was a Scottish Highlander, born on 25 October 1820, the third son of Margaret McColl and her husband, John McLean, at Kilmaluag on Tiree, one of the Inner Hebrides. John McLean was a tacksman, holding a large lease from the Duke of Argyll, probably with sub-tenants of his own. The young Donald was born into gentry not peasant life, with a nurse and a tutor. But Argyll subdivided his estate and John McLean was dispossessed. From the age of about 11 Donald was educated by his mother's brother, the Reverend Donald McColl, for the Presbyterian ministry. Donald studied history, literature and divinity until 1838 when he sailed for New South Wales, accompanying relatives who had government connections. After a brief attempt at squatting near Bathurst, he took employment with the Sydney merchants Abercrombie and Company, the position carrying a modest salary and a house.
This firm sent him to the Auckland area, New Zealand, in 1840. He stayed on, cutting timber and managing a schooner on the Waihou River and the Firth of Thames for the trader John McLeod. Here he acquired a good knowledge of Māori, perhaps helped by his being already bilingual in Gaelic and English. In March 1844, through the influence of Andrew Sinclair, colonial secretary and a Scot, he was appointed to the Protectorate of Aborigines. Posted as sub-protector in Taranaki, McLean had to mediate in a diverse range of conflicts between Māori and settler, notably those caused by the damaging of Māori cultivations by settlers' stock. He had to calm the Taranaki tribes, angered by the land claims commissioner's recognition of the New Zealand Company's crude purchase of Taranaki land. At the meeting he convened for Governor Robert FitzRoy he would first have heard the vehement opposition of Wiremu Kīngi Te Rangitāke to the sale of land at Waitara. But McLean had also begun to develop a rapport with Taranaki settler families angered by FitzRoy's refusal to confirm the commissioner's award.
McLean acquired standing among Māori for his knowledge of their language and his respect for rank and protocol. He was also industrious and accessible, putting aside social engagements if Māori callers wanted his attention. He enjoyed bush travel, comparing the wild valleys and streams with those of Scotland and extolling the pleasures of a tent camp after a hard ride – the encircling fires and the songs and storytelling of his companions, Māori and settler.
He also clearly enjoyed the sense of being able to 'arrange' matters among Māori and between Māori and settler. When Governor George Grey abolished the protectorate in 1846, to bring about a more direct 'amalgamation' of Māori into British institutions, he recognised McLean's skill and retained him as a police inspector in Taranaki. McLean and his troop of Māori police administered firm and by and large fair justice, working with tribal leaders. He identified closely with hard-working bush settlers but was contemptuous of the 'drunken blackguards' and 'scum of the earth', who offended his Calvinistic morality or his gentry susceptibilities. He insisted on settlers' honouring agreements with Māori and making recompense for injury. But he also shared the settlers' loathing of Māori 'bounce' – the tendency of some to extort goods and services from settlers under threat of violence – and their aspiration to freehold title, not mere 'tenancy on sufferance' as McLean called the usual arrangements made with Māori.
For, notwithstanding his occasional romantic comment about robust Māori independence, McLean also considered their culture to be primitive and in need of improvement through the influence of British civilisation. He enjoyed meeting with other Highland settlers, swapping stories and songs and practising his Gaelic. But such touches of nostalgia, like his romanticism about the bush, were minimal compared with a more generally 'British' view of progress. He foresaw a time when the New Zealand 'waste' would be replaced by 'cottages with their smiling cheerful inhabitants gratefully acknowledging the advantages they and their smiling red faced healthy urchins may derive from the early pioneer of the land of their adoption'. This was also an exercise in self-glorification, for the 'early pioneer' was McLean himself.
Indeed McLean adapted himself quite strenuously to the conventions of patrons like Peter Wilson, colonial surgeon in New Plymouth, and his wife, Helen Wilson, who looked on the handsome young official as her son and tutored him in the manners of the society in which she was a leader.
In town McLean enjoyed the round of balls and dinners and the company of young ladies. He courted and on 28 August 1851 in Wellington married Susan Douglas Strang, daughter of Robert Strang, the registrar of the Supreme Court in Wellington and a lowland Scot. McLean's letters to her show the usual stiff formality of the Victorian gentry but also a degree of censoriousness and didacticism unusual even in a husband of those times. Yet her independent-mindedness and affection softened him and before long the earnest, self-righteous McLean loved her in a way which surprised himself. Her death in December 1852, soon after giving birth to their son, Douglas, robbed him of a humanising influence. Although he occasionally courted women with 'good amiable prudent qualities and some money in the bargain', he never remarried. About his son he wrote in terms of genuine affection, although to the boy himself he showed caring and concern rather than warmth. Only with his young sister, Annabella, whom he brought out to New Zealand in 1862 (following brothers Alexander and John and accompanying another sister, Catharene), did he display real affection. Shrouded in a generalised religiosity and a sense of duty, he was a lonely, self-reliant man.
Meanwhile his career prospered. In 1848 Grey began to use him in land purchase negotiations in Taranaki and Hawke's Bay. In 1854 Grey formally established a Land Purchase Department (although informally it had existed since 1850). In 1853 McLean had become chief land purchase commissioner on a salary of £600. He set about his task vigorously, prosecuting settlers holding extra-legal leases and pressing Māori to sell the freehold. His early acquisitions showed care to gain the consent of hapū in open dealings. But the rangatira knew the advantages of leasing and, by the mid 1850s, as their resistance to selling grew, McLean developed the practice of making payments to some hapū leaders, promising them Crown grants as individuals if the purchase was completed, and hoping that they would persuade a majority of the rightholders to sell. The practice provoked mounting tension and finally physical conflict between sellers and non-sellers.
When later his methods were denounced by Samuel Williams and William Williams, and McLean was called upon by Governor Thomas Gore Browne to explain his methods, he admitted the practice but wrongly attributed Māori resistance solely to the influence of a land league in Taranaki, or to the emissaries of the King movement. In the 1850s he himself became deeply involved in runholding and began to use his own staff for personal acquisitions of land; he saw no impropriety in this, since it was all part of the advancement of settlement.
McLean's dangerous complacency was reinforced by the confidence reposed in him by Governor Browne. In 1856, impressed by his expertise and apparent integrity, Browne made him native secretary as well as chief land purchase commissioner, not from any sinister motive but to bring Māori administration under one office and to avoid confusion among the Māori themselves. Together Browne and McLean withstood the pressure of the settler parliament and ministry to establish their authority over native policy, and secured the disallowance of the Native Territorial Rights Act 1858, which would have introduced direct purchase of Māori land by settlers, subject to buyers' paying a tax to the government.
But if such paternalism brought benefits in some areas, in Taranaki it brought disaster. McLean clearly carries the responsibility for permitting Browne to accept the offer of land at Waitara from Te Teira and to set aside Wiremu Kīngi's objections to the sale on behalf of Te Āti Awa. Previously, if established leaders like Kingi had intervened, he had backed off, leaving the purchase uncompleted. He had acknowledged in 1856, and even after war broke out in Taranaki in 1860, that senior rangatira did have 'a right of seigniority or mana' in such transactions. But he argued that Kingi had lost the right when he and other Te Āti Awa had fled the land in the 1830s after the attack by Waikato tribes. This is specious, because the Waikato tribes had not followed up conquest by occupation, and Te Āti Awa had begun to reoccupy, under Kingi's leadership, soon after British annexation. When in 1860 Browne and McLean convened a large meeting of Māori leaders at Kohimarama to rally support for the government's position, McLean's resolution placing the responsibility for the war directly on Kingi was greeted with embarrassment and confusion. But at no time did McLean admit error over Waitara. His letters in 1860 reveal smugness about compliments from Browne or the Duke of Newcastle on his zeal and ability.
McLean's intransigence over Waitara reflects his sharing of the attitudes of the settler community, of people like Helen Wilson, who abhorred the 'insolence' of 'ignorant savages' defiant of the Queen's authority. He was not as cavalier as those who cared not whether the government's title at Waitara was good or bad, but wanted the issue of sovereignty tested by force if necessary. As the designated expert, McLean could not admit error on the question of title. He saw the situation before 1860 as 'a smouldering volcanoe', with the Māori ready to resist further settlement 'by every means' and to reduce the settlers 'to submission or to recognition of the [Māori] King's rule'. He harped on the theme of the King movement (or the mythical land league) as the cause of the war, and hoped that a sharp lesson to those 'so infatuated as to hope that they can set up an independent nationality' would soon teach them the 'necessity of submitting to British rule'. He strongly supported Browne's policy of demanding submission from both Taranaki and Waikato.
But with the Anglican clergy and the settler ministry condemning his actions and Browne making room for other advisers on a proposed 'native council', McLean began to feel tired and isolated. Following an attack of rheumatic fever in late 1859 he had begun to think about taking leave in Britain. The war, arguments about his pension, and his increasing preoccupation with his Hawke's Bay sheep runs made him delay. When Grey returned to the governorship in December 1861 McLean hoped for renewed preferment, but Grey kept him occupied on specific tasks, notably the opening of the Thames goldfield against Kingite objections. Grey's decision to relinquish the Waitara purchase opened a rift between the two, which never healed.
In his Hawke's Bay land acquisitions McLean was heavily dependent on mortgages held by an English capitalist, Algernon Tollemache, who also became a mentor to Douglas McLean. In turn McLean advanced capital or backed the debts of smaller settler clients and rangatira such as Te Hāpuku. His associates in Hawke's Bay urged him to take the superintendency of the province and he was elected early in 1863.
When war was resumed in mid 1863 he was made general government agent, Hawke's Bay, an appointment which involved him in the East Coast war. McLean wrote, 'I am not bloodthirsty but I hope our enemies will now begin to feel our power and soon see the necessity of yielding to British prowess and skill'. McLean was skilful in diplomacy with the East Coast Māori leaders, working against Kingite influence. He also marshalled settler defence corps effectively. But he could not stop the incursions of Hauhau in 1865 and his response was again a hard one: to demand submission and cession of land. The adamant pursuit of this policy in Poverty Bay and the detention of Hauhau prisoners on the Chatham Islands led to their subsequent escape under Te Kooti and his onslaughts on the East Coast settlements.
In 1866 McLean was elected MHR for Napier. In his autocratic way he deplored democracy and hated going to the hustings, but he enjoyed parliamentary life. It was largely his political support and his reputation as a 'practical man', not a mere 'theorist', which led in 1867 to the provision for four Māori members of Parliament, the Native Schools Act (to set up primary schools teaching in English in Māori communities), and the clauses of the Resident Magistrates Act that continued the system of Māori assessors and police working with settler magistrates in rural districts.
The renewed fighting in 1868 and the realisation that the Māori could still threaten most North Island settlements brought a popular outcry against the Stafford government and calls for McLean to take charge of Māori affairs. He was at first reluctant to do so, because of his involvement with his sheep runs. Nevertheless, in 1868 he moved an opportunistic resolution against E. W. Stafford, made an opportunistic alliance with his old adversary, William Fox, and entered the Fox–Vogel government of 1869 as native and defence minister.
There was no real distinction between McLean's public and private lives. His heavily mortgaged estate, like many others, depended for its wellbeing on the peace and progress of the colony. He did not seek either the premiership or a lengthy political career. He sought only to pacify the Māori and expected to do so within a short time and then return to his Hawke's Bay estates.
However, he held almost unbroken office until December 1876. Three changes underlay his success in securing peace. First, McLean had at last learned the folly of land confiscation. In late 1869 he accepted the submission of Horonuku Te Heuheu Tūkino IV of Ngāti Tūwharetoa, without land confiscation, a step which, years later, bore fruit in the gift by Horonuku of the Tongariro area as a national park. Second, he secured from his network of resident magistrates and 'native agents' a constant and detailed flow of information about both Māori and settlers, and replied to them in equal detail, using the new telegraph service. Third, he streamlined the fragmented military command, using the Armed Constabulary and British regiments to garrison the frontier and to build roads rather than wage campaigns. McLean also agreed with the Kingite leaders not to pursue Te Kooti or other fugitives into the King Country, a policy he maintained despite periodic popular outcry. The colony was allowed to 'glide into a state of peace'. McLean hoped to ensure 'that outrage and crime may be repressed and the bitter feeling of race that is growing up arrested'.
McLean, like many settler leaders, considered that military action was directed only against those of the Māori people captious and misguided enough to take up arms. As he believed that European dominance was inevitable, he held that the best chance of the Māori (whom in 1868 he already considered to be 'fast passing away') lay in co-operation with settlement. He dealt with the Kingite leaders, but was careful not to recognise the King movement in a way which would entrench Māori separatism. In 1860 he had considered the movement 'too distinctive and national in character to admit of its being at present blended into any form which would recognize European direction or ascendency'. He still considered it so in 1870 when William Martin again proposed its recognition. He genuinely worked for the day when, in the words of his son, Douglas, 'the Māori race might become as one with the European, governed by the same laws, employed in the same occupations, using one common language, and sharing alike with the Europeans all the benefit of civilization'. His administration saw the rapid advance of native schools, of Māori involvement in public works and sheepfarming, and the participation of Māori leaders in local administration.
But the 1870s also saw the inexorable advance of the Native Land Court and irresistible pressure on those named on certificates of title to sell their signatures to deeds of transfer. McLean's Native Land Act 1873 required that all grantees, not just 10 trustees, be named on certificates of title, and it increased the checks on outright fraud. But his response to heated demands from Rāpata Wahawaha and other kūpapa that the whole system of Native Land Court awards exposed the Māori to pressure from 'the man with money in his hand', was to say that Māori were to be on the same footing as Pākehā and it was up to them to resist that pressure. Unfair pressure, or actual fraud, was alleged against McLean by the Repudiation movement in Hawke's Bay and then by Grey. However, the deeds to his Maraekakaho property were in order, and the Hawke's Bay commission of 1873 cleared him and his agents, though the Māori members of that commission submitted a dissenting report.
Though made KCMG in 1874, and fêted on a tour of south-east Australia, McLean was worn down by the struggle to keep the peace and advance settlement. He resigned ministerial office in December 1876 and talked again of going 'home'. However, an influenza attack threw further strain on a weakened heart and he died in Napier, aged 56, on 5 January 1877. His funeral reflected something of the ambiguity of his career, marked as it was by confusion about the role of the settler militia, by a wrangle between the English and Irish chapters of the Masonic Lodge, of which McLean had been a district grand master, and by complaints about 'the confusion of laws' in the eulogies delivered by Māori orators. He remains a controversial figure, denounced for his part in the Waitara purchase and the origins of the wars of the 1860s, and eulogised as the architect of peace after 1869. In the tradition of the Ringatū church he is remembered as 'Pharaoh', the one who held them in bondage and took away their lands.
On one plane McLean's career was highly successful. He left an estate worth over £100,000; his son and Scottish kinsfolk were well provided for. But his dedication to work had moulded an authoritarian and cold personality. Duty had prevented his attending his sisters' landfall in 1861 or seeing his son off to England in 1864 or welcoming him back in 1870. His letters are rich in practical detail about business matters, cliché'd and censorious on personal ones. In public life his ability to relate to Māori leaders through language and respect for Māori social conventions helped them to achieve in part the selective interaction they sought with the settlers. McLean stands in sharp contrast to the crassness and arrant racism of many settlers. Perhaps his Gaelic heritage contributed to this result.
But McLean too was strongly culture-bound. When Māori rejected his paternalistic programme for goals and methods of their own, McLean emphasised his Britishness, became as aggressive as any, and cloaked his aggression with self-righteousness. In the last resort, though a very senior official and politician, he was a servant of British colonisation, and his career depended on securing Māori land. Although in the 1870s a reformed McLean managed to keep the peace while supervising the leading kūpapa, he was still denounced at his death by the main Auckland daily newspaper for failing to open the King Country to settlement. This was a measure of the essential intransigence over the struggle for land, and for sovereign authority, between Māori and Pākehā which both established McLean's reputation and killed him.

domain: history


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The rise of a sleeping giant brings fear and panic, so was the state basic education when three unions merged forces to demonstrate against the government. It took the intervention of a court order to compel teachers to go back to the classroom.
The old adage “Prevention is better than cure” should advise the Ghana Education Service and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission to be proactive in resolving issues tabled by the teacher. Alas, that has not been the case.
Teachers may soon demonstrate and the impact may be managing than the previous demonstration when three teacher unions bared their teeth at the Ghana Education Service and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission for failing to respond appropriately to issues bothering teacher’s legacy arrears among others.
A month after, the lukewarm attitude to the demands of teachers and the resulting strike action has both the GES and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission seem to have gone to sleep. Another teachers’ strike looms and the writings are on the wall.
Trendit360 has sighted a letter dated 20th January from teacher unions in Ghana which indicated among other things that the two key stakeholders should respond to issues tabled in the said letter.
From the letter, it is clear that all promises made to the striking unions regarding the provision and publication of data of unpaid teachers legacy arrears have not been supplied.
Again, the legacy arrears have also not been paid. Teachers were promised and assured that their arrears were to hit their accounts latest 19th December 2019.
However, publications in the media indicated that the outstanding legacy arrears have been paid is not the reality. The letter further indicated that request for the review of the GES’ promotion processes has also not been tackled by the service.
An attempt by the teacher unions to help resolve outstanding issues on the new collective agreement with the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission has not been successful.
The tone of the letter is a clear indication that the teacher unions are not enthused about the lackadaisical approach to resolving their grievances.
The teacher unions have clearly indicated that failure of government, GES, and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission to resolve their issues will have negative consequences.
“Failure to do so would have the GES and the Fair Wages and Salaries blaming themselves since the Teacher Unions can no longer restrain their members.” The letter said.
The government has up to 31st January to ensure the GES and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission do the needful. Another teachers’ strike would make the government unpopular. The stakes are high and this is an election.

domain: law


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The title of my posting is Chris Williams'book about Australian Farmers,Conservation and the Land care movement in Australia, which are creating a new green wedge of improved bio diversity through private farmland of our immense continent.
Chris is also currently the Bush Protection Director for Trust for Nature in Victoria, an organisation whose objective is to preserve “Nature in Perpetuity” for all future generations. Trust for Nature assists private landholders set up legally binding covenants on private land by setting aside areas to be held in trust for nature. Larger acquisitions of entire properties are similarly covenanted.
His publication is of particular interest, representing the “cutting edge” into the parenial problem of mankind’s uneasy relationship with nature and how we might dream a new sustainable life on a fragile earth. A country boy at heart his infectious enthusiasm has him immersed at the “grass roots” level of research alongside the farmers and communities.
Before commenting more specifically on his findings I thought it would be helpful to provide some brief agricultural aspects about Australia.
Australia is one of the most urbanised countries in the world with dense populations on the eastern seaboard. The country is fragile, dry and one without the rich volcanic soil seen in many other parts of the globe, except for a few isolated pockets. This is the legacy of 4 billion years under the sea which washed out most of the soils nutrients. The aboriginals occupied the land prior to colonisation for 45,000 years but the early settlers shaped the landscape in the shadow of English and British farming practices, with extensive tree felling and overgrazing with sheep and cattle. The combination of tree felling and irrigation raised the water levels causing salination problems in many parts of the countryside.
Australia has not subsidised farming as occurs in Europe and North America, so farmers have become more experimental and adaptive than there counterpart’s overseas. Hence they are considered the most efficient and environmentally conscious in the world to day.
Old Land New Landscapes
Chris Williams introduces us to farming communities linked through a common vision. Their local Land Care groups ensure farms are not only sustainable, but set aside corridors of up to 12% of the land as sanctuaries for nature. Land Care was introduced in 1989 as a government funded imitative which enable groups to receive grants and technical advice to help better maintain the native landscape and set up the vital corridor sanctuaries which interlink the properties within each respective land care group. There are 4,000 community Land Care Groups currently engaged at many different levels.
One of the more exciting projects was the reintroduction of an endangered species, the “Bettong’, into a specifically designated sanctuary on one of the properties where their population quickly increased from 10 to 100. Land Care Groups continue to learn about nature and how to maintain their ecological system within their farm whilst making a farming living. The prospect of serving two masters might seem as if it would be adversarial but the long term benefits point to a much greater overall production if less of the land is used.
Naturally enough there will not always be general agreement between farmers as to the best way to farm alongside nature. There is the large scale technologically based farming that is more reliont on chemicals versus those in favour of a more bio diversified approach that relies more on nature for its sustainability.
The conclusion that Chris Williams reaches is for the communities and Nation to accept there is no common panacea or methodology going foreword. Rather what’s needed is a partnership approach with nature itself. We need to make a covenant with nature, to respect and learn at both the grass roots areas on the farm, in the communities and at the highest levels of society. The old landscapes will never reappear fully, but we can,in our dreaming, create a new landscape, one that will last for ever, but we will need to respect our partner, Mother Nature.
I would like to end on a positive note with the remarks by Jarred Diamond last year when he talked about Australia and what had changed from 40 years ago when he was last here. It was all about the Land, he said, the new spirit within the country that acknowledges it is not here for us to do with it whatever we please.
We have a responsibility to preserve it for ever. He saw grounds for cautious optimism.
I also see the same conclusions in Chris Williams inspiring Book “Old Land, New Landscapes”.
I think Old Land, New Landscapes is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the preservation of our natural environment. I recommend you read the book, which can be purchased on amazon

domain: agronomy


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Which is better 6 mb cache memory or 8 mb Tags: Nvidia Gtx Performance Cache Geforce Memory Graphics Last response: December 10, 2011 5:09 PM in Graphics & Displays Share rohan_gandhe December 10, 2011 4:09:53 PM Hello, Please tell me which is better GeForce GTX 560 Ti or GeForce GTX 550 Ti in performance and value for money?? More about : cache memory dleavitt December 10, 2011 4:31:46 PM Go with the 560 Ti. m 0 l nnorton44 December 10, 2011 5:09:16 PM dleavitt said:Go with the 560 Ti. +1 m 0 l Can't find your answer ? Ask ! Publish Related resources SolvedWho is better procesor Samsung Quad-Core processor (1.4 GHz) or Intel® Core™ i5-4200U Processor (3 MB Cache, 1.6 Ghz) Forum 2.0GHz/8-core/20MB vs. 2.9GHz/6-core/15MB ... which is better? Forum Solved16mb cache vs 64mb (which HDD is better for gaming?) Forum SolvedAMD FX-9370 8-Core Black Edition 4.4Ghz Socket AM3 vs Intel Core i7-4960X Extreme 3.6Ghz Six Core 15MB Cache - Socket LGA2011 Forum Solved6MB or 8MB CPU Cache for GAMING?? Forum Solved6MB Cache or 8MB Cache for GAMING??? Forum 6MB or 8MB Cache Forum 6 mb cache or 8 mb cache Forum What is better than Intel Core i7 930 Quad CPU 4 x 2 8ghz 8mb L2 Cache 45nm LGA1 Forum AMD Phenom II X3 720 2.8GHz 3 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM3 Forum 16MB cache on hdd...better than 8 even under RAID 0 ? Forum Is 8MB cache better than 2MB? Forum Which card works best with core i7 2600 3.4(8 mb cache)??? Forum Which one is faster- RAID 0 - 8MB/16 MB cache Forum Which 120gig 8mb cache SATA drives are best for RAID (on G.. Forum SolvedIntel 4th Gen i5 4440 3.0Ghz 6mb Cache Socket 1150 with G1 Sniper B5 Forum SolvedWD Caviar Blue 1TB 64MB Cache SATA III (6 Gb/s) on SATA II (3 Gb/s) Forum Solvedis a core i5(3570) 3.4GHz 6mb L3 cache 5GT/s bus compatable in a 775 socket / Forum Solvedhard drive cache 64MB to 128MB is it better? Forum Solvedintel 3.00/6mb cache prossesors Forum More resources Read discussions in other Graphics & Displays categories Ati GPUs Graphics Cards Gtx HD Monitors SLI Crossfire Tuner Cards Radeon Video Diamond Multimedia Matrox Nvidia Palit PowerColor Asus Games !


If a pro-abortion politician in California gets her way, women will be at greater risk when they go in for an abortion. According to The Los Angeles Times, State Senator Christine Kehoe is pushing for a law to allow nurses and midwives to perform abortions. Right now, only doctors and surgeons are allowed to do them. If this sounds to you like California is sliding more toward back-alley abortion procedures, you’d be right. But pro-abortion activists and politicians know fewer legitimate doctors want to kill unborn babies for a living. So they’re desperate to keep the lucrative abortion industry’s cash registers ringing. Unsuspecting women will go into these places expecting a trained doctor, but instead they’ll get a midwife who should limit her noble profession to protecting life, not killing it.
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Fuel cleaning partnership in pole position
Leighton O’Brien partners with TSG Ireland to deliver market-leading fuel cleaning solutions.
Leading fuel analytics and field technologies company Leighton O’Brien has expanded its global fuel cleaning operations into Ireland following an agreement with retail petroleum solutions provider, TSG Ireland.
TSG’s fully trained and safety certified technicians will deliver Leighton O’Brien’s patented tank cleaning and fuel restoration technology, supported by expert fuel data analysis and reporting by highly qualified analysts.
Paul Farren, general manager of TSG Ireland said: “We’ve been at the forefront of developing innovative solutions for oil companies for many years and this partnership with Leighton O’Brien enhances our solutions portfolio.
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Project will develop a 15-acre parcel
June 17, 2015, The Reflector
The Port of Woodland has been awarded Washington State CERB funding for the Guild Road Industrial Park design, engineering and permitting.
The project will develop a 15-acre parcel, referred to as the Old Rose Growers site, to build a three-to-five building complex for light industrial manufacturing, distribution and transport site. Located just one mile from Interstate 5 off exit 22, the site is ideal location for development as identified by the Port in 2000 when the site was purchased.
“The Port is appreciative to the CERB board for awarding funds for the Guild Road project that will provide future family wage jobs and support existing and emerging industries in the region,” said Port Commissioner Dale Boon.
The Port received Rural Development funds from the Board of Cowlitz County Commissioners on May 5 for $50,000. The Port is submitting a request to the Economic Development Administration and should receive notification in the late summer.
The Guild Road Industrial Park design, engineering and permitting is estimated at $200,000 with the overall project estimated at $5 million.
“The Port is at 100 percent capacity for our building lease space,” said Jennifer Keene, the Port’s executive director. “At least three times a week we receive inquiries about available building space. The Guild Road project is a great opportunity to develop 25,000 to 45,000 square foot buildings to attract new industries to Woodland, create family wage jobs, and support growth in the Woodland Port district. For some companies, these buildings can’t be built soon enough. Woodland is seeing a lot of interest, new businesses, new growth, and we do not anticipate that to change in the near future.”
The Port of Woodland was established in 1961 and has 425 acres of industrial and agricultural property. There are 18 companies and farms at the Port creating over 300 jobs. The Commission is committed to attracting and retaining family wage jobs, supporting the industrial development and providing recreational opportunities to the region.


Accelerating Asia's Clean Energy Transformation
WHO WE ARE
Tara Climate Foundation is a regionally-led philanthropic foundation with a vision of a just and thriving society in Asia powered by renewable energy. Our mission is to support a diverse group of partners to accelerate Asia’s energy transformation. Tara covers East, Southeast and South Asia excluding India and China. This region has more than 1.4 billion people and is home to some of the most climate vulnerable countries in the world.
Tara has a team of advisors based in the region with strong local networks who are responsible for identifying, vetting and supporting grantees We work with civil society organisations, businesses, think tanks and donors to craft compelling strategies to rapidly accelerate clean energy. Tara does not accept unsolicited proposals.Tara was initially established as an initiative of the European Climate Foundation (ECF). In 2022 Tara became an independent foundation based out of Singapore with the full backing of the ECF and a dozen global philanthropic foundations.
WHAT WE DO
Tara works closely with funders, foundations and philanthropists to align resources and re-grant funds to other organisations working to accelerate Asia’s energy transformation. We work in Southeast Asia, South Asia, and East Asia, excluding China and India. Tara does not accept unsolicited applications for funding.
Tara's team of regional experts supports and develops networks to encourage and drive collaboration between partners. Tara is also a hub for thought leadership, leveraging existing knowledge and expertise in Asia to interrogate and spearhead new ideas and collaboration between a wide group of stakeholders to accelerate Asia’s energy transformation.
Tara constantly engages in research and analysis to keep up with the latest news and to enable us to develop evidence-based strategies to achieve Tara’s mission.
WHY OUR WORK MATTERS
Climate change is a global emergency. The impact of human activity on greenhouse gas emissions and land use have compounded environmental harm and created an escalating crisis. The devastation to our planet and to humanity will be immense if we don’t move urgently to limit the damage. A drastic reduction in greenhouse emissions is needed if we are to stand a chance of staying below 1.5°C of warming relative to pre-industrial levels and prevent major climate disasters. The scale of the problem calls for a transformation of our energy systems and markets, and the creation of a zero-carbon society.
Asia is home to some of the world’s fastest growing economies: rising incomes coupled with a relatively young population is fueling rapidly growing energy demand. Ensuring a rapid decline in Asia's climate emissions is critical to the future health of our planet and all living systems within it.
It is also a region that showcases massive potential for renewable energy, resulting in new opportunities, jobs, economic development and a thriving Asia.
Contact Tara Climate Foundation
Get in touch with Tara to learn more about our work and how you can get involved.
Tara does not accept unsolicited applications for funding.
65 Chulia Street


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One of the main arguments on the web is that if one extends the volume trends shown by the PIOMAS they suggest that in summer the volume could reach zero by around 2016, e.g.
If you do the same with the winter trends you get a sea ice free state some time in the 2030s! Yet the sun still sets around September and rises in March, that will still happen in the 2030s, so during that cold winter period the ice will still freeze. Remember that this is a statistical extrapolation, so one can't support it by relying on changes one thinks will happen, e.g. Abbot & Tzipperman 2008. The statistics are based upon what's going in the period of data from which the trends are drawn. So for a start I think that if there's something fishy about what that technique says about winter, why trust it about the summer?
What I think(thought?) will happen is that as the ice thins and there is more open water at the end of the melt season, more heat will be vented to the atmosphere, and thence radiated to space. Furthermore
1) No rapid transition to a seasonally sea-ice free state: Because to a degree the enery lost due to atmosphere/space in winter will partially decouple the energy gains in preceding seasons. So whilst there may be drops ultimately there will be a long tail of lower rate of loss, i.e. gradual loss => rapid loss period => gradual loss. As seen in some climate model simulations e.g. Holland 2006.
2) A reduction of the trend in volume loss as the ice transitions to a mainly FY ice mass. i.e. the sea ice is in transition to a mainly FY sea ice state, this doesn't mean a transition to a sea-ice free state is imminent, even though it may seem so.
However I now see evidence which is causing me to doubt my position and wonder if we are indeed on a fast track to a sea-ice free Arctic sometime this decade.
I hate to rely once again on information from Ron Kwok, but his work of ICESat has been ground breaking and provides crucial information about what's going on in the Arctic. At present it seems to me that Cryosat is overstating sea-ice thickness, so I prefer not to use it.
This page from Kwok provides a neat summary of the key message from Kwok et al 2009 of the 2003. it's as well to click on the graphic to get a larger copy. Kwok et al 2009 "Thinning and volume loss of the Arctic Ocean sea ice cover: 2003–2008" is referenced in that page, and the publications page is excellent.
Basically what that page from Kwok shows is that the loss of volume has come from the loss of multi-year (MY) sea-ice, not first-year (FY) which has grown to replace the lost MY ice. From my previous post on sea ice thickness this is to be expected in light of the findings of Bitz & Roe: FY ice can grow more quickly than MY, so while MY ice has declined FY sea ice can grow back rapidly in the winter to take it's place. So most of the volume loss as shown by PIOMAS has been from the loss of MY ice volume.
Recently the PIOMAS model volume plot has shown an apparent increase in rate of volume loss.
Piomas Volume anomaly plot, Polar Science Center.
The most recent information from Kwok about MY sea ice is that the decline has levelled in 2008, 2009 & 2010, PDF. This levelling in the loss of MY sea-ice is what I had been expecting. But not at the same time as volume appears to be assuming a steeper rate of decline!
Then there is this year. I've downloaded all of the false-colour Bremmen AMSRE images for July, the critical month in the season as it sets up the ice pack for the rest of the melt. Running them as a slide show is staggering, even though I've followed previous years. The PIOMAS projection for 2011 uses 7 ensemble members that are hindcast with the weather of the past 7 years, the hindcast period runs up to the end of June, forecast from 1 July 2011. So that projection doesn't take into account the losses of July due to clear skies. Furthermore current forecasts imply that an Arctic Dipole type configuration may be about to replace the zonal high pressure, if so this will draw in warmer air from lower lattitudes into the Arctic Basin. A high rate of loss is to be expected now, and the rate will decline shortly: But the area rate will be acting upon a 'circle' of smaller and smaller radius. In terms of previous years we are currently closest to 2007.
Even allowing for the possibly imminent cloudier conditions, I now suspect that years of volume loss combined with the preconditioning of the first 2 weeks of July mean that the Arctic is now set up to meet or exceed the crash of 2007.
Abbott & Tzipperman, 2008, "Sea ice, high-latitude convection, and equable climates." PDF.
Holland, 2006, "Future abrupt reductions in the summer Arctic sea ice." PDF.

domain: geography


Party Start by Shatta Wale Week in, week out, Shatta Wale dishes tunes non-stop. Right now, the Ghanaian king of dancehall is out with a new one titled Party Start and this certified club banger is produced by RonnyTurnMeUp.
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Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels says he will decide on whether to run for president by the end of his state’s legislative session, which is scheduled by late April. "I think the decision has to come at the end of this General Assembly session, if not before. No later than that," Daniels told Indiana news radio station WANE, The Hill reports
He would face an uphill battle in what could be a crowded field with much more prominent names such as ex-Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.
"In fairness to people from all over the place -- many of whom I've only read about before -- who like this idea [of Daniels running for president], I owe them some kind of an answer," Daniels says.
© 2022 Newsmax. All rights reserved.


text:
Losing weight can seem impossible. The problem with losing weight is that it is often a lonely journey. A lot of people struggles with the fact that they are alone in it. It can get more difficult as time goes on. Because achieving weight loss is so difficult, it can seem impossible. However, there are ways to make it less difficult. One of them is joining a weight loss forum. Below we will discuss why joining a weight loss forum is beneficial.
By joining a weight loss forum, you will immerse yourself in a community that is all trying to achieve the same goal. You will be surprised at how far motivation can get you in your weight loss journey. When everything seems impossible, someone giving you the proper motivation can help you break through new goals. That is why joining a weight loss forum can have such a remarkable impact on your actual weight loss efforts. You will have people there to inspire you when you need inspiration the most.
2. Tips and Education.
Obviously, you are going to be entering a forum full of people that are trying to achieve the same goal. For this reason, you will constantly be immersed in new tips and ideas to help achieve that goal. In fact, many of the community might be attending nutritionist classes and/or a special trainer. For this reason, they will be able to share the best advice that these health care practitioners and trainers are giving. This means that you may be able to receive expert tips without paying for it. Not to mention, a lot of the times these forums have their own success stories. This means that you may be able to follow step by step a success story of someone that was in your exact situation. Perhaps they are still on the forum and giving advice to those seeking the same type of help.
A lot of the times these types of forums are free. You can get a ton of value and knowledge from a forum that is free! It is remarkable amount of information that is readily and freely available to just about anyone. The reason that these forums can do this is because they charge their advertisers money for advertising on the forum. That way, you do not have to pay for being apart of the actual forum itself. This is a huge benefit in itself because losing weight can already be expensive enough!
By posting your process and progress on a forum for weight loss, you will be holding yourself accountable. No one likes to be embarrassed in public or not achieve their goals in public. For this reason, you will have the factor of accountability pushing you to new heights and achieving new goals. This can be an extremely powerful thing to consider. We have seen it work on television shows such as “The Biggest Loser.”
60-Second Weight Loss Tip: Avoid Candidiasis | Care2 Healthy Living
At least 15 million American women suffer from candidiasis — a fungal overgrowth in the intestines. Yeast overgrowth is linked to an average weight gain of 32.5 pounds, along with other health problems. Learn more about … http://www.care2.com/greenliving/60-second-weight-loss-tip-eliminate-candida-albicans.html
Weight Loss Tips: Slow and Steady for a Healthy Loss
The truth is that there is no easy way to lose it and keep it off. Some of the best weight loss plans involve tips for a slow, steady and healthy loss. These tips come from the likes of the National Health Service (NHS), Weight … http://guardianlv.com/2014/01/weight-loss-tips-slow-and-steady-for-a-healthy-loss/

domain: health


text:
Utah Bryce Canyon Bryce Canyon National Park
The pictures on Max Pixel be freely distributed with a Creative Commons Zero - CC0.
Our photographer was create it by Nikon D7000 camera with shooting mode 40.0mm · ƒ/8.0 · 1/250s · ISO 250. Our photographer was tagging for this image: Bryce Canyon National Park, Bryce Canyon, Utah. It is our selection and stored in the category "Nature/Landscapes". size of photo 3672×2448 pixels, you can download it with JPG format.
Our team would like to recommend to you a few images in the same category:
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domain: artistic


text:
Now that we’re a bit more settled and the weather is getting better, it’s time for yard work! We made a lot of progress the end of last summer clearing out all the overgrowth and brush, and this year it was time to finish it up and start over.
- Torn down the old pool deck. It wasn’t a terrible deck, but since we don’t have a pool and aren’t planning on putting in a new one anytime soon it was just an eye sore.
- Started my first vegetable garden. I always am looking for ways to reuse things and do stuff on the cheap. So, the support posts for my new raised garden beds are the spindles from the old pool deck. The side frames are going to be wood pallets = completely free raised garden beds!
- We finished clearing out the branches and muck from the garden area on the left side of the yard. The difference is amazing and makes the yard look a lot bigger.
- Now it’s time to work on my landscaping skills. Starting from my old sink turned bird bath, I have lots of plans for this lovely area.


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Our take on Dia de los Muertos. The playful skulls colored in shades of crème, light blue, light pink and mellow yellow make this boot feminine and edgy -- our stance on infinitely wearable.
- Shorty boot with 6" shaft upper
- A Point toe
- Stacked leather heel measures approximately 2"
- Crème kidskin vamps with angel blue shaft uppers inlayed with light pink and mellow yellow skulls and detailing
- Crème Ear Pulls
- Leather lining and sole
- Handmade in Texas


text:
Timpson, N.J., Lawlor, D.A., Harbord, R.M., Gaunt, T.R., Day, I.N.M., Palmer, L.J., Hattersley, A.T., Ebrahim, S., Lowe, G.D.O., Rumley, A., and Davey Smith, G. (2005). C-reactive protein and its role in metabolic syndrome: Mendelian randomization study. Lancet, 366, 1954-1959.
Tybjaerg-Hansen, A., Steffensen, R., Meinertz, H., Schnohr, P., and Nordestgaard, B.G. (1998). Association of mutations in the apolipoprotein B gene with hypercholesterolemia and the risk of ischemic heart disease. New England Journal of Medicine, 338, 1577-1584.
Umbach, D.M., and Weinberg, C.R. (1997). Designing and analysing case-control studies to exploit independence of genotype and exposure. Statistics in Medicine, 16, 1731-1743.
Verma, S., Szmitko, P.E., and Ridker, P.M. (2005). C-reactive protein comes of age. Nature Clinical Practice, 2, 29-36.
Wacholder, S., Rothman, N., and Caporaso, N. (2000). Population stratification in epidemiologic studies of common genetic variants and cancer: Quantification of bias. Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 92, 1151-1158.
Wacholder, S., Rothman, N., and Caporaso, N. (2002). Counterpoint: Bias from population stratification is not a major threat to the validity of conclusions from epidemiological studies of common polymorphisms and cancer. Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, 11, 513-520.
Waddington, C.H. (1942). Canalization of development and the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Nature, 150, 563-565.
Weiss, K., and Terwilliger, J. (2000). How many diseases does it take to map a gene with SNPs? Nature Genetics, 26, 151-157.
Wilkins, A.S. (1997). Canalization: A molecular genetic perspective. BioEssays, 19, 257-262.
Willett, W.C. (1990). Vitamin A and lung cancer. Nutrition Reviews, 48, 201-211.
Willett, W.C. (2001). Eat, drink, and be healthy: The Harvard Medical School guide to healthy eating. New York: Free Press.
Williams, R.S., and Wagner, P.D. (2000). Transgenic animals in integrative biology: Approaches and interpretations of outcome. Journal of Applied Physiology, 88, 1119-1126.
Wright, A.F., Carothers, A.D., and Campbell, H. (2002). Gene-environment interactions: The BioBank UK study. Pharmacogenomics Journal, 2, 75-82.
Wolf, U. (1995). The genetic contribution to the phenotype. Human Genetics, 95, 127-148.
Wu, T., Dorn, J.P., Donahue, R.P., Sempos, C.T., and Trevisan, M. (2002). Associations of serum C-reactive protein with fasting insulin, glucose, and glycosylated hemoglobin: The Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, 1988-1994. American Journal of Epidemiology, 155, 65-71.


It’s a tale of two state pension reforms.
In France, it’s day 44 of a strike by trade unions opposing a Social Security reform which, despite some reporting suggesting it’s only government employees who are affected, will transform pension benefits for all workers in the country. In recent days, the government has proposed reducing the age for full pension eligibility from 66 to 64, and, as described at the Washington Post, “the worst of the transit strikes has ended, with train service by and large back up but at reduced capacity.
But, remarkably, the latest polling, released three days ago, shows little movement in public opinion since the strikes began on December 5th, as evidenced by the overall stability in support for the protests and strikes, here,
and the relatively slight movements in opinions on the pension reform itself.
This chart, to avoid its being too busy, combines into one grouping, “keep the pension reforms as-s” and “modify them a little” and into a separate grouping, “heavily modify” and “cancel entirely,” but the split within these groups has also been fairly stable. At present,
- 12% support keeping the reforms,
- 35% prefer small modifications,
- 26% support major modifications, and
- 27% support canceling the proposal.
The only significant movement since the first, pre-strike poll was a shift away from “major modifications” to “cancel” — these had been at 31% and 19% levels of support at that time.
At the same time, let’s pay a visit to the United Kingdom.
Readers who have followed my writing from my first articles here at Forbes will recall my early profile of the state pension system in the UK, in which I described the pairing of a flat benefit and an autoenrollment system for individual retirement accounts — which just so happens to be very similar to my preferred Social Security reform for the U.S., though, to be clear, I first proposed this some years before the UK’s reform, which was proposed in 2014 and went into effect in 2016.
Now, this was a dramatic change, as previously the system had been fairly similar to the American Social Security system, with benefits based on wages, but tilted towards lower earners. Did the British react to it in the same manner as the French, or as Americans are predicted to react if a wholesale reform of our Social Security system were to be attempted?
Eh, not so much.
To be honest, it was fairly difficult to find contemporaneous reporting about the change in the first place. An anti-poverty organization put together an interesting piece of analysis, but the mainstream news organizations didn’t seem to have much interest in this change at all, focusing instead on the “pension freedom” component to the legislation, in which workers with 401(k)/IRA-like retirement accounts were no longer required to buy annuities at retirement but could choose to spend down benefits no differently than Americans have been accustomed to all along. Another major change at that time was the end of “contracting out” in which an employer could keep the FICA taxes for themselves in return for providing pension benefits at a certain minimum level. Hence, the BBC reported, “Pension reform: Ten hidden consequences,” and the Financial Times, “Budget 2014: Pension reforms offer freedom to savers,” in both cases focusing exclusively on the “pension freedom” element of the changes.
Why did this legislation pass so invisibly in the UK? To be clear, one factor is obvious: in France, railway workers and other government employees in “arduous industries” are facing the loss of their very generous retirement benefits (though, again, for clarification, arduous-occupation workers won’t be thrown into the same benefits as everyone else, and all such workers, private- and public-sector both, will get boosts, but these public-sector workers won’t get the same unique and very generous benefits as now). Hence, a particular interest group has a particular motivation for striking — but their strike is receiving support from the majority of the population, and, again, only 12% support keeping the pension reforms as-is.
And, again, based on the (lack of) reporting, people in the UK seemed fairly indifferent to this wholesale change in their benefits.
Actuaries in the UK tell me that there were multiple factors for this. First, the state-provided pension in France is, for most people (that is, by and large, except for top executives) the entirety of their retirement benefit, whereas the amount of Social Security in the UK had been more along the level of the US, or lower, so the stakes weren’t as high. It was also just the latest in a series of changes to the retirement age and the benefit formula, so that it didn’t necessarily register with people that there was a significant change. The British accepted the “sales pitch” that it was a positive change because it simplified the system. And, as evidenced by the complaints of the Waspis, people just weren’t aware of the changes (though that admittedly begs the question).
What does this say about the prospects for major Social Security reform in the United States? On the one hand, as with the UK, Social Security replaces a relatively small share of income for middle-income families. But on the other hand, as with France, Americans have been told for year after year that Social Security’s benefit formula was well-nigh untouchable, as if its designers were geniuses, in the same manner as the French have tried to reform their system for years, without success. And in that respect, we may have been better off if there had been more tinkering with the core benefit formula over the years rather than preserving it virtually unchanged since 1935.
UPDATE: A twitter follower pointed me to a BBC article at the time the reform was implemented in 2016: “Winners and losers under the new state pension.”
The bottom line: “People born before 1980 can, on average, expect to do better out of the new system. People born after that date are likely to fare worse.”
And those Millennials and Zoomers are less likely to pay attention to issues like retirement system changes!
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text:
LEXINGTON, Ky. — A 12th former NFL player has admitted to participating in a multimillion-dollar scheme to defraud the league’s health care benefit program.
Former Washington Football Team and San Francisco 49ers cornerback Carlos Rogers pleaded guilty Monday in federal court in Lexington, Kentucky, to one charge of conspiring to defraud a program set up to reimburse former players for out-of-pocket medical expenses, the Lexington Herald-Leader reported.
Prosecutors allege the players targeted the Gene Upshaw NFL Player Health Reimbursement Account Plan. It provides tax-free reimbursement of out-of-pocket medical care expenses that were not covered by insurance and that were incurred by former players, their spouses and dependents.
Indictments say a group of former players defrauded the plan by submitting false claims for expensive medical equipment, including devices used on horses. In reality, they had never purchased or received the medical equipment, prosecutors said.
The charges were consolidated in Kentucky because the fraudulent claims were processed through an insurance data center in Lexington. authorities said.
In his plea agreement, Rogers admitted to helping recruit other former players to join the scheme and provided identifying information about them to others to use in claims.
Rogers played 10 seasons in the NFL and was selected for the Pro Bowl in 2011 while he was with the 49ers. He also played for the then-Oakland Raiders. Rogers is set to be sentenced in March.
Ceandris Brown, the only former player who has been sentenced for the scheme so far, has been ordered to serve about a year in jail and must pay more than $84,000 in restitution to the health fund.
Three other former players, including ex-Washington running back Clinton Portis, are scheduled for trial in April after they pleaded not guilty.

domain: sports


text:
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
May 22, 2006
“Thieves,” “vandals,” “These people steal; they’re greedy.” This is what Nigerian government and public health officials had to say about the 200 and some Nigerians who died when a gasoline pipeline exploded, igniting fires that quickly spread across the fuel slick and literally burned to death everyone nearby. The bodies were charred so badly they couldn’t be identified by family members and were buried in a mass grave.
The disaster happened last week in Abuja, a fishing village 30 miles from Lagos, a modern city and Nigeria’s commercial center.
Most Nigerians living in villages and farms are extremely poor. Two-thirds of the Nigerian population live on less than a dollar a day. Life expectancy averages only 47 years. When impoverished villagers saw gasoline leaking from a pipeline that ran through their village, they brought small jerrycans to collect it.
The government says there were vandals who tapped the pipeline to re-sell fuel and make a profit. But the majority were poor villagers, desperate for fuel. Even the small-time vandals who bring tools to crack open the pipeline are poor. The misery the population lives in is what pushes them to take such risks.
Tapping pipelines is a common practice in Nigeria, and tolerated by local police who often take their cut from the practice.
A network of pipelines runs through villages and farms and the lines are hardly covered or buried. Instead they are exposed ... making it hazardous and an accident waiting to happen, as well as easy targets for tapping.
There have been similar accidents in recent years. In 2004 a pipeline explosion near Lagos caused the death of 50 people. The worst was in 1998 in southern Nigeria where between 700 and 1000 people were killed.
Speaking of thieves and stealing, let’s set the record straight. Who are the big-time thieves? The real criminals? Hardly the Nigerian masses. It’s the top Nigerian government officials who get rich from the cut given to them by the foreign oil companies. In 2005, some 450 million dollars was “found” in bank accounts in Switzerland. The former dictator, Sani Abacha, who died in 1998, had stolen it. But the real beneficiaries of this oil wealth are the oil barons from the rich countries who siphon the oil out of Nigeria to be sold on the world market. The largest oil companies are installed in Nigeria, which is the fifth largest oil exporter in the world, to make profits off of Nigeria’s oil.
Oil-rich Nigeria brings enormous wealth to the imperialist and capitalist owners of oil production, while the Nigerian people, with gasoline and oil produced literally in their own backyards and villages, remain severely impoverished.
The profits of the oil companies are made in part with dramas such as the one which just took place. Behind these billions of dollars, there are cadavers found charred to the bone near pipelines, the bodies of poor people who fight to scratch out a little change in order to try to survive.

domain: economics


text:
Anyone else think it’s crazy that TLDs are being ‘auctioned off’ to the highest bidder?
The latest is .web, sold for $135m
No idea why Icann needs to raise cash - it makes enough from the sale/reg fee of m(/b?)illions of domains every year.
Also looks like .webs was sold for a whopping, 1 (yes one!) dollar


text: A popular classic that has been deployed for several seasons, a drop shoulder big shirt. Regular color with no collar, single cuffs. Over silhouette that creates plenty of drapes. Uses the check pattern provided by UNDERCOVER's archive to produce the original. The "REBEL FABRIC" tag placed on the left hem is specially designed by UNDERCOVER designer Jun Takahashi for N.HOOLYWOOD.


text:
The National Science Foundation supports the Ocean Drilling Program.
May 19, 2010
The National Science Foundation supports the Ocean Drilling Program. Using equipment like the drill pictured here, workers obtain geologic samples from the deep seafloor that provide scientists with new information about the Earth's history. Examples of information documented by these samples include a history of the ocean basins and evidence of drastically changing climates on earth, including more ice ages than were previously known.
Topics: Environment, Health Medical Pharma, Marine geology, Geophysics, Geology, Scientific drilling, Ocean Drilling Program, Integrated Ocean Drilling Program, Structure of the Earth, National Science Foundation