new genre on home gaming consoles, but DUST 514 has already shown it has all the tools and potential needed to reach the successful longevity of Eve Online while also implementing many of its innovative features to stand out in a crowded market of generic console shooters. Any fans of strategy games or first person shooters should definitely give DUST 514 an opportunity.

The development team behind Injustice: Gods Among Us are no strangers to the fighting game genre or to the DC Universe cast of super heroes and villains. NetherRealm Studios, formerly known as Midway Chicago, is the studio behind the popular and successful Mortal Kombat series. They were also the studio behind the crossover title, Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe and more recently, the 2011 re-boot MortalKombat. Following the success of those two titles, NetherRealm Studios decided to branch out and create a new fighting series specifically for the DC comics universe.

The story of Injustice starts off with the tragic destruction of the city of Metropolis and a grief stricken Superman that is pushed over the edge by the insane and maniacal Joker. Batman and the rest of the Justice League soon discover that this tragedy led to an alternate reality where an unknown Dictator took advantage of the tragedy to create a new world order. The Justice League are split up between both realities and must desperately uncover the mystery behind the alternate Earth so that they can prevent that same tragedy from occurring on their real Earth.

Much like the 2011 Mortal Kombat


the arcade style fights that play out the "battle" between them. The story itself is very well written and feels like a high quality story straight from the pages of the comic books. The overall graphics look amazing and the fighting mechanics feel very solid. Aside from standard attacks, each character also has special abilities specific to their gimmicks and can also fill up a power meter to unleash a devastating super combo attack. Players can also engage in wager battles known as the Clash system where each fighter gambles on the level of strength needed to win in a stand off against their opponents.

There is a large selection of Battle Arenas in the game to choose from including iconic locations within the DC universe like the Batcave,Fortress of Solitude, Metropolis, Gotham City, The Justice League Watch Tower and Wayne Manor. Each stage has specific environmental attacks that help inflict massive damage to enemy combatants. The background arenas are as beautifully designed as the characters themselves and feature many familiar non playable characters in the DC universe that make cameo appearances and in some cases even get involved in attacking players. Fans of the Batman Arkham series will even appreciate the extra Easter Eggs found in the Arkham Asylum arenas.

The game also features classic arcade style fighting options including Battle Mode, Versus Mode, King of the Hill and Survivor Mode. There is also a challenge mode known as S.T.A.R. Labs Mode which offers hundreds of different character specific challenges. Playing any of these modes, including


to infiltrate the floating city and learns it is being controlled by a man named Father Zachary Hale Comstack who has convinced the citizens of Columbia that he is a Prophet. When it is discovered that Booker is in Columbia attempting to free the young girl named Elizabeth from Comstacks control, Comstack has Booker labeled as a False Shepard leading Booker to have to fight his way through the city to reach Elizabeth. Once Booker reaches and rescues Elizabeth from her state of imprisonment, the two work together to fight their way through Columbia in search of a way to escape the floating city while avoiding the giant mechanical bird like guardian named Songbird.

For a game that was released in the later part of this current generations consolelifecycle, the graphics and visual scenery in Bioshock Infinite are beautiful and really help bring the city of Columbia alive. The gameplay is very similar to previous Bioshock games. You control a firearm in one hand and the powerful abilities known as Vigors with the other hand. Vigors in Bioshock Infinite work exactly like Plasmids and Tonics from the original Bioshock games. A few of these abilities include a fire attack, water attack, a possession ability and the ability to control a flock of attack crows. The gun fighting feels very solid and there is plenty of ammo laying around so you shouldn't feel too threatened going into any gunfight.

After you free Elizabeth from her state of imprisonment, she stays by your side throughout the rest of the


the story as it felt a little too forced in my opinion and was more confusing than it needed to be. It's never a good sign when the ending of a story has you going back to question the entire plot while trying to make sense of all the inconsistencies. I also felt the final boss battle was very anticlimactic. Overall though I will say Bioshock Infinite was a fantastic experience and is so far one of the best games of 2013.

Playstation 3 Exclusive: The PS3 version of Bioshock Infinite came with a couple of exclusive bonuses for PS3 gamers. Much like with the Dead Space and Assassin's Creed franchises that both included a free digital copy of the original games of their respective series, Bioshock Infinite alsoIcelandic video game company called CCP released an MMORPG game called Eve Online. Eve Online is a story about human civilizations in the far future colonizing the planetary solar system of a distant galaxy after the human race depleted all of the natural resources of our home planet. As generations evolved on the new planet system, the human race was divided into five different space faring cultures all competing for control of the new galaxy's resources. It's been ten years since CCP first launched Eve Online and it has become a long standing successful PC game with over 500,000 active players.

On August 18, 2009, CCP first made the announcement that they were developing DUST 514 exclusively for the Playstation 3. DUST 514 is directly related to and operates


on online bus ticket booking. Make some money and memories too!

About Hubli

Hubli, also known as Hubballi, is an agglomerating city in the state of Karnataka, India. It is the fastest growing city of the only after the capital, Bangalore. This city is situated at a distance of around 420 KM north of Bangalore, and 550 KM south of Mumbai. Hubli is a major city of this district and is a famous industrial town. This city has become an important commercial centre for trade in cotton and iron. The city is noted for its handloom textile units and cotton ginning and processing mills.non-adiabatic momentum coupling between excited and final states demonstrates the importance of including enough vibrational levels to model the full dynamics of the system and further shows the interplay of relaxation and charge transfer from the final state to the excited state. Larger electron transfer probabilities and longer lasting charge separation occur when oscillator strength into the intermediate state decreases, or when it increases into the final state, and when temperature increases. Longer lasting charge separation also occurs when the non-adiabatic momentum coupling decreases, a somewhat unexpected result which is due to the combined effect of population relaxation and transitions among many vibronic states.


2       for the Second Circuit, held at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan
 3       United States Courthouse, 500 Pearl Street, in the City of
 4       New York, on the 9 th day of August, two thousand ten.
 5
 6       PRESENT:
 7                JOSÉ A. CABRANES,
 8                DEBRA ANN LIVINGSTON,
 9                DENNY CHIN,
10          young for centuries. But one escapes: Shako, the chief’s fierce and beautiful daughter, who swears to avenge her people—a blood oath that spans more than five centuries. . .

When the source of the fountain is destroyed in our own time, the loss threatens Simon and his men, and the powerful, shadowy empire of wealth and influence they have built. For help, they turn to David Robinton, a scientific prodigy who believes he is on the verge of the greatest medical breakthrough of all time. But as the centuries-old war between Shako and Simon reaches its final stages, David makes a horrifying discovery about his employers and the mysterious and exotic woman he loves. Now, the scientist must decide: is he a pawn in a game of immortals. .


Terran Ring, Mars, the Jovian colonies, and all the way out to distant Titan. The supply, taken from the surface of the Moon, had once seemed endless. But that was long ago. Borealis, the glittering, fabulously rich city stretched out across the lunar North Pole, had amassed centuries of unimaginable wealth harvesting it, and as such was the first to realize that its supplies were running out.

The distant memories of the horrific planetwide devastation spawned by the petroleum wars were not enough to quell the rising energy and political crises. A new war to rival no other appeared imminent, but the solar system’s competing powers would discover something more powerful than Helium-3: the indomitable spirit of an Earth-born, war-weary mercenary and pilot extraordinaire.

After the Saucers Landed by Douglasout of the hole that imprisoned her, leaving her free to uncover the truth about what happened to her all those years ago.

Synopsis-War erupts in this bittersweet sequel to Of Metal and Wishes, inspired by The Phantom of the Opera and called “relentlessly engrossing” by The Romantic Times.

In the year since the collapse of the slaughterhouse where Wen worked as her father’s medical assistant, she’s held all her secrets close. She works in the clinic at the weapons factory and sneaks away to nurse Bo, once the Ghost, now a boy determined to transform himself into a living machine. Their strange, fragile friendship soothes some of the ache of missing Melik, the strong-willed Noor who walked away from Wen all those months ago—but it can’t quell her fears


for him.

The Noor are waging a rebellion in the west. When she overhears plans to crush Melik’s people with the powerful war machines created at the factory, Wen makes the painful decision to leave behind all she has known—including Bo—to warn them. But the farther she journeys into the warzone, the more confusing things become. A year of brutality seems to have changed Melik, and Wen has a decision to make about him and his people: How much is she willing to sacrifice to save them from complete annihilation?

Kitty Saves the World by Carrie Vaughn (Tor-August 4th)

SynopsisKitty Saves the World: the final novel in the New York Times bestselling Kitty Norville series by Carrie Vaughn

It’s all come down to this, following the discoveries made by Cormac in Lowgritty new urban fantasy series set in today’s seedy occult underworld in Nightwise.

In the more shadowy corners of the world, frequented by angels and demons and everything in-between, Laytham Ballard is a legend. It’s said he raised the dead at the age of ten, stole the Philosopher’s Stone in Vegas back in 1999, and survived the bloodsucking kiss of the Mosquito Queen. Wise in the hidden ways of the night, he’s also a cynical bastard who stopped thinking of himself as the good guy a long time ago.

Now a promise to a dying friend has Ballard on the trail of an escaped Serbian war criminal with friends in both high and low places–and a sinister history of blood sacrifices. Ballard is hell-bent on making Dusan Slorzack pay for


of Glitter and Blood by Hanna Moskowitz (Chronicle-August 18th)

Synopsis-Sixteen-year-old Beckan and her friends are the only fairies brave enough to stay in Ferrum when war breaks out. Now there is tension between the immortal fairies, the subterranean gnomes, and the mysterious tightropers who arrived to liberate the fairies. But when Beckan’s clan is forced to venture into the gnome underworld to survive, they find themselves tentatively forming unlikely friendships and making sacrifices they couldn’t have imagined. As danger mounts, Beckan finds herself caught between her loyalty to her friends, her desire for peace, and a love she never expected. This stunning, lyrical fantasy is a powerful exploration of what makes a family, what justifies a war, and what it means to truly love.

Hallow Point by Ari Marmell (TitanRelated Tags:

DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) – Mavericks Head Coach Rick Carlisle says Delonte West will be out “a few weeks” after the Mavericks guard had successful surgery Friday to stabilize the fracture in his right ring finger.

According to the team, once the finger is healed, West will need a subsequent procedure to remove the stabilizing pins before he returns to basketball activities.

West has averaged 8.3 points in 29 games (20 starts) in his first season in Dallas.

The Mavericks were also missing guards Jason Terry (quad) and Rodrique Beaubois (father’s death) when they played Philadelphia on Friday night. Jason Kidd, Vince Carter, and Dominique Jones were the only active guards on the roster.

Terry is expected back when the Mavs play Jeremy Lin and the Knicks in New York on Sunday afternoon.


smartphone menu rubriken

Somwhere between Art and Activism

How have Syria's independent artists been addressing the escalating violence in their native country since the start of the uprising against the Assad regime? For the first time ever, the ifa-Galerie in Berlin is showing videos and short films by Syrian artists inspired by the revolution in an exhibition entitled "Bewegte Bilder" (Moving Images). By Charlotte Bank

A figure rises up from a grey mass on the ground. It grows and grows until it lifts up off the floor and becomes a heavenly body, initially shining and then descending again. In the animated video A Sad Morning, Every Morning, Syrian artist Kevork Mourad describes his emotions in response to the recurrently bad news reports that reach him every morning in his US exile.

Foryears and then, to an increasing extent, the horror at the brutality with which the Assad regime defends its claim on power.

Overcoming fear

In the film Ibn Al Am Online by Mohammad Ali Atassi, opposition activist Riad al-Turk, one of the most prominent critics of the Baath regime, expresses his joy at the fact that the Syrian people have succeeded in overcoming their fear.

In the crosshairs of the Assad regime: Riad al-Turk "has paid a high personal price for his courage in rebelling against the regime, spending 17 years in prison, initially under Hafez al-Assad and latterly under his son Bashar. He is now in hiding in Syria"

Al-Turk has paid a high personal price for his courage in rebelling against the regime, spending 17 years in prison, initially under


Hafez al-Assad and latterly under his son Bashar. He is now in hiding in Syria. In the film, which was made earlier this year when there was still hope that the end of the Assad regime could be imminent, he tells of his relief at the uprising, the courage of the Syrian people and the fact that lone critical voices such as his had now been joined by many others.

His voice is no longer important, he says; now the entire population should speak out, above all young people. One of the points that the filmmaker discusses in a lively manner with al-Turk is the lack of a clear stance in support of the uprising. Just as al-Turk has been reticent – for reasons of modesty – other Syriandeclared goal of social mobilisation, others more closely resemble contemplative reflections. And despite the ongoing violence back home, these pieces repeatedly reveal a glimmer of hope, a hope that eventually, it will not be the inhumane brutality of the regime that will emerge victorious, but the desire of Syrians for freedom and a life in dignity.

Holding on to hope

It is almost as though these Syrian artists have made it their duty to cling to this hope and repeatedly remind people of it. For example, Syrian artist Khaled Abdulwahed, who like Kevork Mourad lives in the US, makes a child's ball the focal point of his short video, Tajj. Abdulwahed returned to Syria for a short time in the summer of 2012 to work on a film project, but


also to gain a better impression of the situation back home. On his return to the US he made Tajj, a film about a child's capacity to continue playing in the midst of battles and rubble.

The trauma of war: according to Charlotte Bank, children have borne the brunt of the violence since the start of the uprising

To a great extent, children have borne the brunt of the violence since the start of the uprising. After all, it was the arrest and torture of a group of children and youngsters in Daraa in the south of the country that triggered the first protests in March 2011, and there have been recurrent reports of the horrific treatment of children ever since.

In the films His Name was Hamzeh Bakkour by DaniAbo Louh and The Sun's Incubator by Ammar al-Beik, cases such as these play a key role. Abo Louh's work refers to one of the many photos of dead children that have been repeatedly circulated on the Internet. Hamzeh Bakkour lost the lower half of his face during an attack in Homs and bled to death in agonising pain. His photo, which was posted on Internet forums, came to symbolise the brutality of the Syrian regime.

Abo Louh contrasts the photograph of the child with layers of images – videos and snapshots – of regular facial expressions and gestures. Despite insistent attempts to restore the routines of everyday life, one image remains burned on the memory: the image of a child that lost his life in the bombardment of


the Baba Amr district. At the same time, the video appears to raise the question as to the impressions that remain in the daily flood of images generated by this media-saturated world.

Ammar al-Beik's film The Sun's Incubator was made in early 2011, in the wake of the Egyptian revolution, at a time when people in Syria assumed that the regime of Bashar al-Assad could be toppled as swiftly as that of Mubarak. Al-Beik interweaves the story of a young family with the demonstrations and protests on the street; hopes for a better future are closely bound up with the birth of a baby, hopes that are bitterly dashed by images of Hamza al-Khatib, the boy who was tortured to death.

With her video Demain l'adieu, the young artist MadonnaAdib presents a highly personal declaration of love for her nation, her city and her lover by playing out an imagined farewell that simultaneously becomes a promise never to give up the fight for freedom.

Like Madonna Adib, all the artists mentioned here now live outside Syria. Working and living conditions have in the meantime become too difficult back home. And the long list of murdered, detained and abused artists and intellectuals and those who have been forced to go into hiding offers all too clear evidence that if artists openly defy the regime, they are putting themselves in very real danger.

US foreign policy under Trump

Donald Trump′s victory in the US presidential election has stunned the world, with many – particularly US allies – feeling more than a little


to empower the central bank on corporate defaults (and thereby beef up India’s new insolvency code) was unconstitutional.Luckily, the companies failed in their broader attempt to overturn the new law. The judges ruled that it was good, and agreed that it did give the RBI greater scope to intervene on insolvencies. Nonetheless, they still decided that the bank had overreached with its February 2018 circular on the 180-day deadline. The Supreme Court found that under the new law, India’s government has to instruct the RBI on specific defaults it wants settled by the bankruptcy tribunal. As such, the regulator was wrong to take sweeping, general action of its own.The verdict reduces the RBI’s dwindling authority by another couple of notches. Urjit Patel, the former bank governor, saw theThree out of five members of the Interior Ministry's task force responsible for vetting asylum requests by Sudanese who fled the war-torn Darfur region have recently resigned, a government attorney informed the High Court of Justice on Monday.

The Interior Ministry’s Population, Immigration and Border Authority, which set up the task force in December following a court-ordered re-examination of Sudanese asylum requests, said all three staffers quit for their own personal reasons and will be replaced with others, "pending relevant training on Darfur."

>> State recognizes some Darfuris qualify as refugees but does not act ■ Interior minister refuses to grant Darfuri asylum seekers resident's visas ahead of election ■ Israel promised millions to rehabilitate south Tel Aviv, but the money is nowhere to be seen

At Monday's hearing, which dealt


The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Dahlia plant, botanically known as Dahlia variabilis and hereinafter referred to by the name ‘Fidahlouis’.
The new Dahlia plant is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the Inventor in Hillegom, The Netherlands. The objective of the breeding program is to create new pot-type Dahlia plants that have a freely branching and flowering habit, attractive ray floret coloration and good postproduction longevity.
The new Dahlia plant originated from an open-pollination in Hillegom, The Netherlands of an unnamed selection of Dahlia variabilis, not patented, as the female, or seed, parent with an unknown selection of Dahlia variabilis as the male, or pollen, parent. The new Dahlia plant was discovered and selected by the Inventor as a single floweringplant from within the progeny of the stated open-pollination in a controlled environment in Hillegom, The Netherlands.
Asexual reproduction of the new Dahlia plant by cuttings in a controlled environment in Hillegom, The Netherlands since 2007 has shown that the unique features of this new Dahlia plant are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations.


The Associated Press

BELGRADE, Serbia -- Thousands of people are blowing whistles and banging pots outside the Serbian government headquarters to protest the election of powerful Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic as the country's new president.

The protest on Saturday was the sixth in a row against Vucic's election triumph last weekend. The demonstrators joined hundreds of policemen and soldiers who were holding a separate rally over low wages and poor living standards.

The protests have been held every day since Sunday's election, in which Vucic polled 55 per cent of the votes and avoided a runoff election.

Government officials claim the demonstrations are organized by opposition leaders. They deny it.

The opposition alleges the vote was marred by irregularities, including muzzling of the media during the campaign, as well as voter intimidation andhour or so later, a plea goes out online : “Gaza blood bank urges citizens to donate blood urgently!” ( This is an ongoing plea to anyone in Gaza!)

As we are preparing to head to the Hospital to donate blood, a Massive explosion literally rocks our living area in our apartment, from the kitchen window we see a huge plume of smoke, we run to the roof and see another massive plume of smoke rising, this explosion was on the beach road ,report of 3 killed!

Medics report 1 martyr and a number of injuries including critical situations in the targeting of a motorcycle near a school in Rafah.All day the reports continue, bombings in the west or shelling in the south, explosions in Gaza city, rockets in the


north.The numbers of the dead and injured rise regularly as the families of those killed Friday begin to bury their dead.

But even here, in a time of grief and unimaginable pain, the attacks continue. As mourners were taking part in the funeral procession and burial ceremony of some of those killed in Israeli air raids, 4 Gazans were injured by Israeli gunfire near the Martyrs cemetery east of Gaza near the border fence. Gaza is not even allowed bury their dead in peace.

The funeral takes place of the martyr Ahmad Salem 24 years old, killed in tank shelling in Gaza……Ahmad had only been married for 2 days.

Israeli warplanes carry out mock air raids over Gaza. Drones are flying in the sky. The F16’s constantly break the sound barriercausing ” sonic booms: (A sonic boom is the sound associated with the shock waves created by an object traveling through the air faster than the speed of sound. Sonic booms generate enormous amounts of sound energy, sounding much like an explosion.)

For the rest of the day and into Sunday rockets fly from Israel to Gaza and from Gaza to Israel. Drones hover low in the skies, Planes break the sound barrier, apache helicopters open fire .

Sunday morning, 7 a.m, as Ayyoup Asaleyah and his 7 year old cousin were making their way to school in Jabalia camp, Ayyoup was killed by an Israeli raid and his cousin badly injured………..Ayyoup was 12 years old!

Since last Friday, Israeli warplanes have carried out 24 air strikes, killing 19 people and


government contractor), backed by the federal government, argued for a rule vesting title in the contractor university, implied from the structure of the Bayh-Dole Act that permits contractors to retain patents instead of having them to go to the United States. Roche (the beneficiary of a contract with the inventor) argued that the statute's traditional role applies "“ vesting title in the actual inventors or their assignees. Although the text pretty strongly favors Roche, Stanford and the United States (as amicus) presented a strong policy case for public ownership of publicly funded inventions.

On its surface, little is at stake in the case, which arises only because the contract Stanford used at the time of this invention was not written with sufficient precision to assign the invention to Stanford;an invention owned by the contractor (as opposed to one owned by the contractor's employees).

Responding to the concern that a holding permitting federally funded inventions to "vest" in private parties would wreak some earth-shattering change, the Court closed by emphasizing that existing practice is entirely consistent with its holding. If the inventions vest in the contractor in the first place, why do contractors (like Stanford) try so hard to get employees to transfer inventions to them? Most telling of all, citing an amicus brief from the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (authored by Bob Long at Covington and Burling), he emphasized the current practice of NIH, the agency at issue here (and surely one of the largest distributors of federal grant money): NIH tells its contractors that


Monday, January 28, 2008

Orch. Carte Blanche Du Zaire

Not many boot sales around yet so forced to dig deep into the archive for this one on the Flambeau label (1985)- Printed and designed in Nigeria it says but the music is very much the soukous we know and love from Zaire (formerly the Belgium Congo ).

Not much info. gleaned on the interent about Orch. Carte Blanche so here is a brief description I found of the early soukous scene in the Congo-

"During the 1950s, when they experienced rapid urbanization and a relatively booming economy, the two French-speaking colonies of the Congo area (capitals in Brazzaville and Kinshasa) witnessed the birth of an African version of the Cuban rumba played by small American-style orchestras (called "kasongo", "kirikiri" or "soukous") withFrance, Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and Japan have established regulatory frameworks for REITs. Other countries that already offer REIT-like structures include Canada (since 1993), Australia (since 1971), the Netherlands (since 1969), and Belgium (since 1995). Britain legalized REITs as of Jan. 1, 2007. Germany also is moving in this direction. as well.About a dozen REIT companies in the US have expanded their businesses to include international exposure. The largest player is ProLogis, with properties in Asia, Europe, and North America. Others include Kimco Realty Corp, Mills Corp., AMB Property Corp., Simon Property Group, and Shurgard Storage.According to NAREIT, American REITS have handily beaten all major benchmarks over periods of three, five, 10, and 15 years. But cold air is setting in. Current yields of domestic REITs


James Reilly, a certified financial planner with RegentAtlantic Capital LLC in Chatham, N.J. "Now they're adding international REIT funds."Altogether there are approximately 70 global real estate funds, according to NAREIT. Most of the growth has been recent. In 2006, AIM, DWS Scudder, Goldman Sachs, The Kensington Funds, Northern Funds, and Dimensional Fund Advisors launched foreign REIT funds. Cohen & Steers, a money-management firm specializing in REITs, started two such funds in 2005, and Fidelity opened one in 2004.Today, more financial planners are recommending that international REIT funds be part of investors' portfolios. Part of the allure is diversification on two counts: first, within mixed-asset portfolios and, second, geographically. Investors have the opportunity to broaden their portfolio exposure in REITs in other countries and on their exchanges as well.self-induced or with bad luck, as well as accusations that he is overtired by a hectic racing schedule by the time the end of Jan comes round. He is clearly hungry for another Worlds title and stung by the reticence of the Belgian public to class him with the greats at the moment because of his lack of rainbow success.

Lars Boom always set his sights on a World title, but he acheived it 1 year early in Treviso. This year (the year he originally wanted a title) is home turf year for extra motivation and he has not been quite as visible as Nys on the racing circuit, preferring to peak for certain races (Pijnacker, Niel etc). When doing so he has been untouchable and Hoggerheide will be


discount the old timer, though he may struggle when others are at the top of their game too.

Other possibles - Kevin Pauwels looks like the poor kid that got bullied at school but rides so elegantly (sehr elegant in Flemish!) and packs a mean sprint. He is also a superb bike handler - one of the best? Stybar has a riding style remiscent of an amphetamine enhanced 17 yr old at a hard house rave, but could do the business too? He was looking good at Milan. Vanthourenhout was also very active at Milan and clearly on form - would the other Belgians ride for him as he is Nys mate (a long involved stor for another post)? Klaas Vantornout has been sort of there all season, butpipped a disappointed defending champion Dave Brailsford who struggled with bad luck and perhaps(?) the big changes to his family situation last year. Well done Rob - we'll look out for some good results on the road now.

Mick Style retained his Vets title for the second year running, with Dave Headon breathing down his neck most of the season. Dave had the better ride at the Nationals though after peaking perfectly.

Lewis Burke was untouchable as first Junior and finished 3rd overall in the League. Chapeau!

Sean Beswick and Ray Pugh were V45 and V50 champions, Eric Taylor V60 and the evergreen Ian Small V70.

Oh and my club, Horwich retained the Team title for the 8th year running - my dream of being in the winning 3 counters is still


hopefully my opinion is worth something.

Dugast used to reflect it's founder - Monsieur Andre Dugast's little company in a shed, known amongst the pro cogniscienti and not many others. Famous (amongst those in the knowat least)in Europe on both the road and the cross scene, the best riders would beat a path to his door for their handmade weapons of choice, a situation which remains unchanged even in todays sponsor obligated pro circuit. Brother Nys and his adversaries still pay for their own tubs, though probably at a discount as long as they do not upset 'Old Man' Richard Groenendaal who part owns the company now!

Andre Dugast in his workshop

The other owner, who bought the name and the moulds for the treads is Richard Nieuwhuis, one time andheight and is clearly familiar with the concept of beautifully supple handmade tubs. I first came across FMB from cross impressario John Holmes who met Francois touting his brand new products in the pits at the Hooglede World Champs in Jan 2007. I have 'spy' shots from the pits at that Champs showing Sven Vanthourenhout's bike with a new Dugast like tub but with a different tread pattern. John began importing the tubs alongside the Dugast range and I plumped for some in lieu of some Dugasts that were slow in coming in. More on that later.

FMB have grown much bigger now but Francois has positioned the brand as artisan made, the only truly artisan tub manufacturer left. His tubs, though of superb quality have yet to seriously


were apparently 55cm and not regulation 40cm to add to the spectacle!

He didn't wipe out, just - for comparison Boom and Stybar are not far behind on the right, and Nys is further down the field in the all white of the World Cup Leader jersey. Boom and Stybar, 2 of the finest cross riders in the world, simply look slow in contrast. Enjoy the chaos in the pits afterwards.

Apologies for the watermark - having issues with the licence for the software.........

Last Sunday's (18 Jan) Wereldbekker Cross at Roubaix was a classic - close racing, monumental mud, a wild rollercoaster of a course that had the Elite men running down the steep and sketchy descents and an exciting finish. Those that were less cautious on the descents (includingagain. Chapeau Bart, still one of the most exciting riders for me.

I'll edit the video and post a clip of what I am talking about in a bit, but until then.........

Thursday, 15 January 2009

It had warmed up during Saturday night. In fact it did more than that as a howling gale blew in and helped remove all trace of frost or frozen ground from the course by Sunday morning. We arrived bright and early for the kids races - J and E were wired and fired and ready to race.

It was E's first cross race and she was impatient for the off. Lining up at the back of the grid, barriers stretching ahead down the road and the PA blaring it might have been a bit intimidating for


a 4 yr old but she wasn't fazed and had a look of steely determination. After the gun, there were the usual near misses you get with a bunch of u10s riding in close proximity, but then she was into a rhythm with a steady hand in the back as 12 inch wheels, a fixed gear and stabilisers were not much help into the fierce wind down the home straight. She made it round the lap in style, being lapped close to the finish and thereby avoiding subjecting her puffing Dad to a second lap. It was a great kids course and there was a real atmosphere because of all the people, course furniture and PA - she loved it and is keen to go back for more.J rode well after being a little overawed by it all at the start and finished in the top 20.

Unfortunately we missed most of the women's race and left for home before the men's - those races are well documented on the British Cycling website. However, Carolyn Wright from Horwich got 5th Ladies Vet and I suspect at least a silver in the V50 category, and Dave Haygarth http://3pcx.blogspot.com from here in Lancs rode a great race to finish 24th, backing up a Wheelbase Team win with Lewis C and Jebby. Paul Oldham, another of Lancashire's favourites also showed real class to get a silver but overall honours went to a Southerner that a certain blog writer had tipped the week before for a win.

There was indeed an


of minutes off a bronze medal. Ian Wright demolished the field to win easily in the Vet 50s with an illness affected Roy Hunt only managing token resistence before pulling out.

The Vets race was a corker - made all the more so by Steff from the club joining us in the pits to support his mate Noel Clough who was one of the big favourites for the title (who had arrived somewhat late after ending up in Halifax). The conditions had thawed a little and with traffic the course was becoming slightly softer - it was noteworthy that Chris Young and Cloughy amongst others had opted for Rhinos. Chris got the fastest start I had ever seen him have and there was consternation in the Clough pit ashe seemed a little off the pace in the opening lap. However he got going and me and Steff spent the rest of the race checking the gap which was pretty consistent at around 12 secs. Not even a late charge from Chris Young put Noel under pressure and he blazed around to a well deserved title.

Dave H also had a great race, benefiting from a Belgian extravaganza of racing over the New Year period, ending up 23rd, not far behind some classy riders from yesteryear and some good riders from the present.

NW local Johnny Mac had an unlucky race crashing twice in the U-23 as the conditions became really slick and simply couldn't get back on terms with David Fletcher. He was later rewarded though with a


a cousin who collected comics. He wasn’t able to visit super often, but when he did he brought a bunch of his books with him. We would sit around for hours talking about heroes and villains, and often he was able to fill in the story gaps of those issues I had missed. He also introduced me to Marvel titles I had no access to, a short list being: The Defenders, Strikeforce Morituri, Secret Wars, The Infinity Gauntlet, Avengers, Damage Control, Alpha Flight, What The–?!, and one of my favorites of all time—What If.

One of my favorite stories of all time.

This was the first time I felt like I understood what a comic universe was all about, with hundreds or thousands of characters existing in a shared continuity.next film?

And what is the friggin’ NAME of the next Avengers film, already?! The Russo Brothers have said the name of the next movie is a kind of spoiler in and of itself. What is the ultimate fate of Thanos? Of the Infinity Stones? Will Adam Warlock burst out of this golden chrysalis on Sovereign and swoop in at the end? What will a post-Avengers 4 MCU look like?

The Butcher’s Bill:

Since we lost so many characters in one movie (sixteen on-screen deaths), and there is so much to take in, here are the final statuses of our heroes when the credits roll.

First, the fallen:

– Heimdall

– Loki

– Gamora

– Vision

– Bucky

– Falcon

– Groot

– Scarlet Witch

– Black Panther

– Mantis

– Drax

– Star-Lord

– Spider-Man

– Doctor Strange

– Agent Maria Hill

– Director Nick Fury

Who’s left


a look at Gladiator and Beta Ray Bill as his former champions.

The Visuals – Much like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Doctor Strange, this movie is stunning to look at. The art direction, the set, and costume design are all fantastic. They give Thor a brand new look, new armor, short hair and (later) one eye, and it all sort of works. Waititi cites Jack Kirby as his inspiration for the look and feel of the film, and he NAILS it.

Hulk as a Big Toddler – We see far more of the Hulk in this movie than in anything previous. Before, it was mostly when there was fighting, but here we see him outside of combat. He’s like a big toddler with a limited vocabulary, andEvery year in April, The Portsmouth Invitational Tournament (PIT) kicks off the NBA draft process. For the 65th straight year, 64 of the best college seniors battled it out in a four-day tournament in front of scouts from every NBA team and representatives from top-tier international franchises. The road to the pro’s begins at the PIT.

The PIT is a destination spot for teams to find under the radar talent. The PIT alumni reads like an NBA history book: Rick Barry, John Lucas, Dave Cowens, Earl Monroe, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman, John Stockton, Tim Hardaway, Avery Johnson, Derek Fisher, Charles Oakley, and Ben Wallace. More recent players include: JJ Barea, Jeremy Lin, Wesley Mathews, Kent Bazemore and Jimmy Butler.

Over four days of intense competition, these elite college seniors put


their bodies and dreams on the line to compete at the NBA Combine in Chicago, summer league invites, and international contracts. In collaboration with the PIT selection committee of top NBA scouts, SLAM’S PIT Selects previews intriguing players to keep an eye on as they begin their quest to go pro.

Derrick White, 6-4, 191 pounds— University of Colorado

White is a unique story. He played only one year of Division I basketball. He transferred from University of Colorado at Colorado Springs—a Division II school—to the University of Colorado for his senior year. He wanted to test his skills at the D-I level with his last year of eligibility. He made the most of this daring move, earning First Team Pac-12 honors.

White is a tall guard who can also playforwards around, yet he can stay in front of guards. Teams will have to throw out the book, sit back, and observe what he can do on the court.

PIT Stats: Burton averaged 14.7 points, shot 51.4%, 2.7 rebounds, 3.7 assists for the tournament.

Tyler Cavanaugh, 6-9, 239 pounds—George Washington University

Cavanaugh is a combo forward from Syracuse, New York. Syracuse University passed on him and he ended up at Wake Forest. At Wake Forest, he was not the big strong player you see now. He was kind of thin and small-shouldered. He got a lot of playing time, but he was overmatched physically in the ACC. He couldn’t battle successfully around the rim. He tried, but he just wasn’t big enough. What he could do was shoot.

When they had a


is his improvement every year in college. Unless you closely followed him, this has been hard to track, because he started his career at Oregon and then transferred to Houston, making his progress trickier to track. At PIT he showed all his skills. He made his perimeter jump shots, hit some 3’s, got to the rim, made his free throws. He also showed his willingness to share the ball. He had 18 assists and just one turnover. He played with a steady confidence and showed a high shot selection IQ. He wasn’t anxious to get a shot off. If he didn’t have a good look, he made the pass.

He also showcased his ability to excel defensively and defend bigger players. He moves well laterally and he’s sneaky strong.feel for the game. He knows where all his players are, as well as all the defenders. At the tournament, he showed he can play with elite players and make them better. He’s a good athlete, not great. He’s a good shooter, not great. He is a great passer. This raises the intriguing question: does this pass-first mentality earn him a place in the NBA as a backup point guard.

PIT Stats: Perrantes averaged 9.0 points, shot 45.8, 3.7 rebounds, 8.7 assists for the tournament.

Jacob Wiley, 6-7, 215 pounds—Eastern Washington

Wiley took a unique path to Portsmouth. After one season at the University of Montana, he quit basketball and joined the track and field team. After a year of track, he decided to go back to basketball, transferring to Lewis


& Clark State College in Oregon, an NAIA school. He played two seasons at Lewis & Clark, becoming an NAIA superstar. His success inspired him to give D-l another shot. He transferred back to the Big Sky Conference, but this time playing for Eastern Washington, not Montana. His decision paid off. He became the Big Sky Player of the Year.

Wiley takes all his shots within 10 feet of the basket. He has the ability to pivot quickly and does flip shots that are very difficult to defend. On defense, he’s in perpetual motion and rebounds with speed and tenacity. His strategy is simple: he just gets there faster than everyone else. He’s just that fast. If you don’t box him out (an old school box out), he’ll beatin the NBA.

PIT Stats: Bird averaged 14.3 points, shot 60%, 3.3 rebounds, 1.0 assists for the tournament.

Canyon Barry, 6-5, 202 pounds—University of Florida

Barry had a strong showing at the PIT. He’s a solid athlete and a capable shooter. He scored high on the Combine tests in vertical jump, agility, and speed. Barry is part of a unique PIT trend this year, along with Derrick White and Jacob Wiley, he chose to upgrade to a high-profile university for his last year of eligibility. Barry joined the Florida Gators for the 2016-17 season (transferring from the College of Charleston).

Barry comes from a basketball family. He is the son of Hall of Famer Rick Barry, who also played at the PIT. This year Barry was named SEC 6th Man of the


JBL® Takes the LINK Series on the Road with JBL LINK Drive: Bringing the Google Assistant to Vehicles

JBL LINK Drive® is a car accessory optimized with the Google Assistant technology that improves voice interactions between smartphones and drivers on-the-road

CES 2019, LAS VEGAS – JANUARY 7, 2019 – JBL welcomes the latest addition to its LINK series with Drive, a device optimized with the Google Assistant, engineered specifically for automobiles. The JBL LINK Drive brings the Google Assistant on Android or Apple smartphones into the car for a seamless experience, allowing drivers to easily stay connected, get directions, and find information on-the-go with just their voice.

Whether accessing music or asking the Google Assistant to locate the nearest gas station or restaurant, the JBL LINK Drive solution makes it easyby the eccentric Blanc. At first, “the last of the gentlemen sleuths” stays in the background – his only contribution a few random ‘plinks’ on the piano.

Who done it? Take your pick from a motley crew of selfish and conniving relatives, who all have motive. Most had arguments with Harlan while attending his 85th birthday party on the night of his death. Was it eldest daughter Linda (Jamie Lee Curtis), or her Trumpish husband Richard (Don Johnson)? How about publisher son, Walt (Michael Shannon), peeved at Harlan’s refusal to sell film rights for his books to Netflix? Or lifestyle guru Joni (Toni Collette). Grandson Ransom is the black sheep of the family, who clashed with the old man before storming out – he seems like the obvious culprit.

Given


Better late than never ... barely

While the following titles were solid releases, they were unable to match the level of hype generated during the lengthy development process.

Alan Wake Xbox 360 83

6 years in development (2004-10)

Max Payne developers Remedy Entertainment first conceived of a story-driven thriller in 2004, and announced Alan Wake at 2005's E3 conference. Thanks in part to a lengthy false start -- in which Wake was first developed as an open-world adventure -- fans wouldn't get a chance to solve the Twin Peaks-influenced mystery until 2010. And some critics and gamers found the finished product lacking in the gameplay department.

Black & White PC 90

4 years in development (1997-2001)

Peter Molyneux, the god of god games, left Bullfrog Productions (where he created the genre's first hit, Populous) in1997 to found a new studio, Lionhead, where he and his team began work on their first release. But fans would have to wait four years to get their hands on Black & White, which promised to revolutionize the genre. Despite strong initial reviews, the game was a bit buggy, and soon came to be regarded as highly overrated.

Fable Xbox 85

4 years in development (2000-04)

One of the most hyped releases of its day, action-RPG Fable faced long odds if it was going to achieve everything that creator Peter Molyneux promised it would. And, indeed, despite four years of development, the finished product was relatively short, and failed to include some features that had been promised; nor was it "the best game ever," as its creator had suggested. Still,


Fable secured mostly positive reviews, and was a major hit, generating two sequels and plenty of related titles.

Final Fantasy XIII PS3 83 Xbox 360 82

4 years in development (2005-09)

One of the best-selling releases in the franchise, FF13 earned raves for its technical aspects, the result of four years of work. However, not everyone was a fan of the RPG's story and linear storytelling style. Still, the sequel (Final Fantasy XII-2) promises to be even better, and fans won't have to wait quite so long this time; it should arrive in Japan late this year and in the U.S. in early 2012.

Gran Turismo 5 PS3 84

5 years in development (2005-10)

Plagued by technical challenges and at least one missed release date, racing sequel GT5 not only had a lengthy developmentperiod, but is one of the most expensive games ever produced, with an estimated development cost of $80 million. Despite all that money and effort, critics found flaws in the game's graphics, and some people felt that GT5 felt unfinished and unpolished.

Heart of Darkness PC n/a PlayStation n/a

6 years in development (1992-1998)

The first game ever made with a full orchestral soundtrack, the "cinematic platformer" Heart of Darkness -- an unofficial follow-up to 1991's Out of this World -- also boasted cutting edge graphics, and received a fairly good reception from critics and gamers (especially for those technical accomplishments; less so for the story). Still, that six-year incubation period took its toll on developer Amazing Studio, which had to declare bankruptcy shortly after the game's release.

Perfect Dark Zero Xbox


360 81

5 years in development (2000-05)

A sequel to the 2000 Nintendo 64 hit Perfect Dark, Rare's first-person shooter Perfect Dark Zero was one of the original launch titles for the Xbox 360 in the fall of 2005. Too bad, much like the similarly delayed Kameo: Elements of Power, it was supposed to be a launch title for Nintendo's GameCube four years earlier, instead. Though the game disappointed some critics, it was a solid commercial performer for Microsoft.

Prey PC 83 Xbox 360 79

11 years in development (1995-2006)

Much like Duke Nukem Forever -- another project that at one time was being developed by 3D Realms -- the first-person shooter Prey was in development for over a decade. An early demo of the game, set on a massive spaceship, and featuringa score by KMFDM, earned raves when shown at E3 in the late 1990s, upping the anticipation factor for the game. It proved to be a false start, however, and it would be followed by several more over the ensuing years, until a new developer (Human Head Studios) took over and finally completed the project in 2006. While the finished product didn't live up to those early expectations, the game sold well enough to merit a sequel, though Prey 2, itself, has been in development for five years already (with an expected 2012 release on the horizon).

Splinter Cell: Conviction Xbox 360 85 PC 83

4 years in development (2006-10)

The fifth installment in Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell series of stealth action titles was originally scheduled to launch in the spring


of 2008, but was ultimately delayed a full two years while Ubisoft drastically reconfigured the game. The resulting game (well, at least the console version) was solid, but not as admired as previous installments in the series.

Spore PC 84

8 years in development (2000-08)

Rumors that legendary SimCity creator Will Wright was working on a new simulation game known colloquially as SimEverything first began to emerge in 2004, though Wright actually began work on the game back in 2000. When Spore was officially announced and demoed in 2005, the hype began in earnest. Unfortunately, the finished product that emerged a long three years later turned out to be, in effect, stripped-down versions of five other, better, games, vaguely linked together on a single disc with draconian DRM. The game's creaturethe traditional positive association between mental toughness and successful performance, as well as the negative relationship between mental toughness and stress levels, would be affirmed. The study consisted of five smaller studies, each aimed at addressing a subcomponent of mental toughness.

The first study focused on creating a composite definition of mental toughness that incorporated definitions and concepts from previous research. The researchers organized focus groups and polls with a combined 30 experts in fields related to mental toughness, including researchers, students, athletes, coaches, and businesspeople. The researchers used this consultation and sampling of experts to eliminate terms unrelated to mental toughness, and create a working definition of the term that was both face and content valid (meaning that it both seemed valid, and covered all of the theoretically


Pope Francis will meet with top executives in the oil industry and major investment firms next week at the Vatican to discuss the global effects of climate change, Axios reported.

Among the guests scheduled to attend are Larry Fink, the CEO of asset manager BlackRock, as well as Bob Dudley, CEO of BP, and Eldar Sætre of Norway's oil and energy company Equinor.

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Former U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz Ernest Jeffrey MonizOVERNIGHT ENERGY: Dems press Trump consumer safety nominee on chemical issues | Lawmakers weigh how to help struggling energy industry | 180 Democrats ask House leadership for clean energy assistance Lawmakers weigh how to help struggling energy industry The Hill's Coronavirus Report: Surgeon General stresses need to invest much more in public health infrastructure, during and after COVID-19; Faucihopeful vaccine could be deployed in December MORE, who served in the Obama administration, will also attend, according to a spokesperson.

Axios also reports multiple sources that say ExxonMobil would send a representative, but the company did not confirm those reports.

The effort is being organized by the U.S.-based University of Notre Dame.

A Notre Dame spokesman told The Hill in an email that the summit arose as a result of the university's compliance with Francis' 2015 letter urging better stewardship of the environment.

"After Pope Francis issued Laudato Si in 2015, Notre Dame president, Fr. John I. Jenkins CSC, directed all of Notre Dame's schools and departments to identify ways in which they could get on board," said Paul Browne, Notre Dame's vice president of public affairs.

"That resulted in everything from


the cessation of coal burning at the university power plant to the oil conference next week in Rome."

BP spokesman Geoff Morrell confirmed the meeting to Axios and stated that Dudley is “looking forward to the Vatican dialogue. He believes gatherings of this kind help develop a better understanding of the energy transition and the best ways for corporations, countries and wider society to participate in it.”

The efforts by the Vatican to raise global awareness of climate change come one year after Trump's announcement that the U.S. would pull out of the Paris Climate Accords, the largest international agreement dedicated to fighting climate change and reducing greenhouse gas emissions in history.

Since winning the White House, the Trump administration has questioned climate science and eliminated references to climate change from                            3
Committee approval and a building permit to renovate the House. The approved

renovations included rebuilding the House’s roof, siding, windows, and the porch, as

well as squaring the House so it would be level.

      During the renovation, the Nepas discovered damage to the House as a result

of puff beetles and fire. In February 2016, a rain storm caused water damage,

resulting in the back roof collapsing, and causing the Nepas to use chains to hold the

House in place.    Subsequently, the Nepas resumed construction on the House.

However, in addition to repairing the storm damage, the Nepas


                                           10
                        II. The Lewes Variance Ordinance

      I now turn to the Lewes Zoning Code. In 2011, the City of Lewes amended its

Zoning Code. The provision regarding variances, §197-92, states:

      A.     Definition: relief from the strict application of the provisions of
        issue is not the exemption of the machinery contained within the tower; certainly that is exempt. The question is the right of the tower itself to the exemption, as a machine.
The majority quote the testimony of one of the appellee's employees, who presumably put the matter in the light most favorable to his employer:
An evaporative cooling tower is really quite a simple machine that uses the laws of nature to do its work for it. It consists of a device which raises water to some elevation, allows it to fall back to the ground thereby engaging with air which is moving in the other direction and allowing the transfer of energy from the water to the air and heat in the form of energy is being transferred.
According to


extended component. At the second epoch (April 2010), the extended component appears in the blue wing and line center, and the red wing image does not exhibit the extended component. We have also found that the extended component became weaker in 2010. These results can be interpreted as a significant time variation in the atmospheric dynamics.

Our modeling suggests that the velocity field in the MOLsphere in 2009 is characterized by a large patch or clump of CO gas infalling at only 0–5   with the CO gas in the remaining region moving outwardly much faster at 20–30 . The data observed in 2010 are explained by a model in which a large patch of CO gas moving outwardly at 0–5  and the CO gas in the remaining region is infalling fasterthinking for a long, long time, how I would test this idea that fear makes a difference,” says David Phillips, a sociology professor at the University of California-San Diego. He learned from a student that many Chinese and Japanese people are superstitious about numbers, particularly the number four, which is considered unlucky because it sounds like the word for “death.” Phillips decided to crunch cardiac mortality figures for all Chinese and Japanese Americans who died from 1973 to 1998 on the fourth of each month. He found that cardiac deaths were seven percent higher than expected for Chinese and Japanese Americans on the fourth day of each month when compared to white Americans. That number rose to 13 percent for chronic heart disease deaths and was at its


Jaitley meets M M Joshi in bid to pacify BJP veterans

New Delhi, Nov 12: Union Minister Arun Jaitley today met senior BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi, in an apparent bid to pacify party veterans, who have attacked the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party chief Amit Shah following the Bihar debacle.

Jaitley called on Joshi, one of the four senior leaders including L K Advani who had issued a strongly-worded statement on Diwali eve, and spent some time at his residence. Details of their talks are not known but the Finance Minister, once an Advani protege, is believed to have been tasked with the responsibility to defuse the situation.

The meeting came a day after Jaitley's ministerial colleague and former party president Nitin Gadkari put up a strongMuncie man guilty in battery case

A Muncie man faces up to eight years in prison after a Delaware Circuit Court 5 jury on Wednesday found him guilty of battery resulting in serious bodily injury.

Chief Deputy Prosecutor Judi Calhoun presented evidence that Kevin R. Simmons, 24, attacked a then-friend in the victim's South Pinewood Drive home on May 11. Testimony indicated Simmons punched the man, knocking him down, and then stomped on his head. Police said they found the victim - who was unable to remember the attack, Calhoun said - unconscious in his bathtub.

Simmons told police the attack followed an alcohol-fueled disagreement, but during this week's trial claimed he had acted in self-defense. The Muncie man was convicted of burglary in 2012.


Related articles

What is the plot of Ghoul on Netflix?

Ghoul follows Nida Rahim (played by Radhika Apte), a military interrogator who is in charge of extracting a confession from a terrorist.

Nida is sent to an unknown, remote facility to carry out her task.

The terrorist being interrogated, Ali Saeed Al Yacoub (Mahesh Balraj), reveals his supernatural powers and demonic forces which trap the military staff inside the compound.

The official Netflix synopsis reads: “Ghoul, a horror series based on Arabic folklore, is set in a covert detention centre. Nida, a newly minted interrogator who turned in her own father as an anti-government activist, arrives at the centre to discover that some of the terrorists held there are not of this world.

“Written and directed by Patrick Graham, and starring Radhika Apte andChávez's Anti-Semitism

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and his followers have sought to harass and intimidate the Catholic Church, the media, university students, political opponents and multinational companies doing business in Venezuela, to name just a few targets. Thus it can hardly come as a surprise that Chávez would also attack the Jewish community. Indeed, it's an old, old story. The point, of course, is to bully and discredit institutions that have existed and thrived for years in Venezuela. Perhaps because of their vitality and independence, Chávez sees them as an intolerable threat.

The Venezuelan president has, of course, already turned public institutions into pawns of his regime. His political party controls the legislature, the vast majority of local governments, the trade unions and the electoral commission. Chávez has undermined the


and in newspaper articles and political cartoons.

Chávez has aligned Venezuela with countries and radical Islamic movements that are a verifiable threat to Israel and world Jewry, including Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; Hezbollah's secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah; and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He has also fostered relationships with convicted guerrilla terrorist Ilich Ramirez Sanchez (a.k.a. "Carlos the Jackal") and the now-deceased Holocaust denier Norberto Ceresole of Argentina. Leading international human rights organizations have reported on activities by the Venezuelan security forces such as torture, extrajudicial executions and unexplained disappearances. Kidnappings and contract killings, which are common in some parts of the country, go unpunished. There have also been reports of threats and intimidation directed at individuals who seek to vindicate the rights of Venezuelans against the government. Under theseconditions, democracy cannot thrive.

Throughout the ages, Jews have been the canary in the coal mine, with any downturn in their treatment or status as equal citizens signaling the decline of democracy within a society. History has taught us that when a government fosters intolerant attitudes and behavior among its people, democracy and civil rights are endangered and the society suffers. The people of Venezuela deserve better. The writer is national director of the Anti-Defamation League and author of "The Deadliest Lies: The Israel Lobby and the Myth of Jewish Control."


Dreaded terror group ISIS today claimed responsibility for a deadly attack on a bus carrying Coptic Christians that left 29 people dead in Egypt, the second major attack on the country's minority community in two months.

In a statement posted on its propaganda news agency, Aamaq, the terror group today said one of its unit targeted the bus the previous day and put the death toll at 32.

At least eight to 10 attacker wearing military uniforms and masks attacked the bus and other vehicles taking a group of Coptic Christians to Anba Samuel monastery in the Menya Governorate, 250km south of Cairo.

The victims had been on a pilgrimage to the St Samuel the Confessor monastery when the attack took place.

According to a statement by the Ministry of Interior, thegunmen were riding in three 4x4 vehicles when they opened fire randomly on the bus.

The ages of the victims ranged from children to over 60, the bishop of El-Minya told private-owned TV Channel DMC. Many victims were children, only three kids survived the attack.

The Egyptian army later launched intensive airstrikes, targeting terrorist hideouts in Libya.

The airstrikes came after the Army gathered information that confirms the terrorists' participation in the attack.

Egypt's President Abdel-Fatah El-Sisi has vowed to strike any training camp in Egypt or outside, where terrorists are trained for carrying out attacks against Egypt.

In his televised addresses, the president said that the army has already hit one of these camps following the earlier attack in Menya governorate.


administrator by judgment of the court signed on April 13, 1984. An oath of office was taken and filed, but no security for faithful performance was provided, as required by LSA-C.C.P. article 3112.
Shawn Turner Ingles, one of the children of the deceased, filed a rule to remove the provisional administrator on February 14, 1990 based on the provisional administrator's failure to post security and to complete the procedure outlined in the Code of Civil Procedure and properly qualify as the succession administrator. Ms. Ingles prayed that she be allowed to qualify as the succession administrator, that she be allowed to review "corporate records and bank accounts of any closely held corporations in which her deceased father had stock," that the provisional administrator be removed, and that the provisionaladministrator to post security and to properly qualify as the administrator under the Code of Civil Procedure articles, to file an accounting of the succession, and to allow a forced heir access to the various bank records and corporate records of companies in which the succession held stock. In other words, the provisional administrator's failure to complete the qualification process and to provide the heir with information formed the grounds for the first complaint.
The cause on which the second action is based is two-fold. The first basis is the administrator's duty to act as a prudent fiduciary and protect and reasonably preserve the assets of the succession. Ms. Ingles asks for removal of the administrator and damages because of the alleged breaches of that fiduciary duty. The second


At the start of 2015 President Obama had a goal: use the blunt force of taxation to effectively kill 529 college savings plans.

With great pride, Americans from all walks of life rely on 529 accounts to help put their kids, grandkids, nieces and nephews through college. Earnings grow tax-free and distributions are tax-free provided the funds are used for qualified college expenses. But this year Obama decided it was time to tax the earnings in 529s while pushing people toward a government program designed by his administration’s best and brightest central planners.

It was a spectacular failure. The public backlash against his proposal was immediate, heartfelt, and fierce. His extensive personal history praising and using 529s -- and the White House’s past strong support for 529s – was exposed.book The Audacity of Hope, Obama praised 529s, and in 2007 actually used book earnings to make a $240,000 contribution to his own family’s 529 accounts, according to financial disclosures. With his own 529s topped off, he tried to yank the ladder away for everyone else.

It was also revealed that in July 2010, during a lengthy interview on ABC's Good Morning America,Obama cited his own 529 accounts as an example of how he can identify with the middle class. He was asked, "Can you feel the pain directly that other Americans are feeling?" His answer:

"Well, part of it has, that part that is devoted to Malia and Sasha's college fund was in a 529, you know, that had been set up when I was still a state senator.


And, obviously, that goes up and down with the stock market and so it's lost value like everybody else."

The hits kept coming. It turns out the Obama White House was for 529s before it was against them.

On Sept. 9, 2009, President Obama’s White House Task Force on Middle Class Working Families issued adetailed report on 529s. The top conclusion from the report:

"529 plans are an attractive and convenient means of saving for college."

The report was released with great fanfare. Vice President Biden, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, and Education Secretary Arne Duncan shared a stage at the launch event at Syracuse University. Geithnerstrongly touted 529 plans:

“Today I want to highlight one program in particular, Section 529 savings plans.

These plans can be an immensely effective way for Americans to saveEnergy 10 – Veterans Administration 9 – EPA 8 – NASA 6 – USDA 5 – Dept. of Labor 2 – Dept. of State 2 – Nuclear Regulatory Commission 2 – Agency for International Development 1 – Dept. of Homeland Security 1 – Dept. of Justice 1 – Election Assistance Commission 1 – FCC 1 – Marine Mammal Commission 1 – Scientific and technical program advisory committees Source: FACA Database

The Trump administration, however, seems to be viewing advisory boards with a skeptical eye. In addition to the EPA news, the Department of the Interior this week announced plans to review the way it manages its own advisory boards, both scientific and otherwise. Skepticism of advisory boards, particularly the EPA’s, is nothing new. Since at least 2007, critics have


B.C. government's proposed temporary ban on bitumen export increases through B.C.

Arvay has been a participant in several headline-grabbing legal cases over the years.

In 2015, he successfully argued the Carter case, which led to the end of laws forbidding medically assisted death in Canada.

He has also represented prisoners' advocacy groups opposed to solitary confinement in a case that led to time limits on the use of segregation in prisons.

In years past, he has represented now-convicted polygamist Winston Blackmore, as well as student protesters during the APEC inquiry.

He was appointed to the Order of Canada in 2017.launched a humanoid robot into space on a rocket bound for the International Space Station (ISS). The robot Fedor will spend 10 days aboard the ISS practising skills such as using tools to fix issues onboard. Russia's deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin has previously shared videos of Fedor handling and shooting guns at a firing range with deadly accuracy. Dmitry Rogozin/Twitter Gadget and tech news: In pictures Google turns 21 Google celebrates its 21st birthday on September 27. The The search engine was founded in September 1998 by two PhD students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, in their dormitories at California’s Stanford University. Page and Brin chose the name google as it recalled the mathematic term 'googol', meaning 10 raised to the power of 100 Google Gadget and


tech news: In pictures Hexa drone lifts off Chief engineer of LIFT aircraft Balazs Kerulo demonstrates the company's "Hexa" personal drone craft in Lago Vista, Texas on June 3 2019 Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures Project Scarlett to succeed Xbox One Microsoft announced Project Scarlett, the successor to the Xbox One, at E3 2019. The company said that the new console will be 4 times as powerful as the Xbox One and is slated for a release date of Christmas 2020 Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures First new iPod in four years Apple has announced the new iPod Touch, the first new iPod in four years. The device will have the option of adding more storage, up to 256GB Apple Gadget and tech news:In pictures Folding phone may flop Samsung will cancel orders of its Galaxy Fold phone at the end of May if the phone is not then ready for sale. The $2000 folding phone has been found to break easily with review copies being recalled after backlash PA Gadget and tech news: In pictures Charging mat non-starter Apple has cancelled its AirPower wireless charging mat, which was slated as a way to charge numerous apple products at once AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures "Super league" India shoots down satellite India has claimed status as part of a "super league" of nations after shooting down a live satellite in a test of new missile technology EPA Gadget and tech news: In pictures 5G incoming 5G wireless internet is


expected to launch in 2019, with the potential to reach speeds of 50mb/s Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Uber halts driverless testing after death Uber has halted testing of driverless vehicles after a woman was killed by one of their cars in Tempe, Arizona. March 19 2018 Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A humanoid robot gestures during a demo at a stall in the Indian Machine Tools Expo, IMTEX/Tooltech 2017 held in Bangalore Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook MiraeTechnology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures The giant human-like robot bears a striking resemblance to the military robots starring in the movie 'Avatar' and is claimed as a world first by its creators from a South Korean robotic company Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Engineers test a four-metre-tall humanoid manned robot dubbed Method-2 in a lab of the Hankook Mirae Technology in Gunpo, south of Seoul, South Korea Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by


professor Atsuo Takanishi Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi and Kaptain Rock playing one string light saber guitar perform jam session Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures A test line of a new energy suspension railway resembling the giant panda is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A test line of a new energy suspension railway, resembling a giant panda, is seen in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A concept car by Trumpchi from GAC Group is shown at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Rex Gadget and tech news: In pictures A Mirai fuel cell vehicle by Toyota is displayed atthe International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A visitor tries a Nissan VR experience at the International Automobile Exhibition in Guangzhou, China Reuters Gadget and tech news: In pictures A man looks at an exhibit entitled 'Mimus' a giant industrial robot which has been reprogrammed to interact with humans during a photocall at the new Design Museum in South Kensington, London Getty Gadget and tech news: In pictures A new Israeli Da-Vinci unmanned aerial vehicle manufactured by Elbit Systems is displayed during the 4th International conference on Home Land Security and Cyber in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv Getty

The process apparently takes eight and a half minutes of blade-work per handset, and the result is a phone that shimmers


where any job action is immediately likely.

The Little Rock Education Association, an affiliate of the Arkansas Education Association, has been a bargaining agent for Little Rock teachers for more than a half-century. It has nobly stood for kids against many dark forces, ranging from the segregationists of the 1950s and 60s to incompetent and dishonest superintendents in recent years.

It is one of a very few union agreements with teachers in Arkansas. Evidence mounts that Education Commissioner Johnny Key, who serves as Little Rock "school board" since the district was taken over by the state in 2015, wants them gone.

This would be in keeping with the anti-union posture of both the governor and the powerful lobby of super-wealthy, led by the Walton family, intent on privatizing the Little RockSchool District. Teacher resistance was a key element in defeat of Walton-backed legislation in 2015 that would have allowed a state takeover of the district for parceling out to private operators, a process that is underway more slowly nonetheless. The latest news is that the Key administration is willing to allow a sale of a building next to the district's new middle school on Highway 10 for use as a charter high school. The Walton Family Foundation has ready cash to enable such a deal. It would leach still more teachers out of the district and likely draw heavily from the higher income, predominantly white surrounding neighborhood, to the detriment of the rest of the district. A new high school in that spot long been an aim of


the Walton's $237,000-a-year lobbyist stationed at a Little Rock-based nonprofit.

But a more immediate concern is the teacher contract, which expires Oct. 31. It is a product of a new agreement negotiated with Baker Kurrus, who spent a year as school superintendent before Key fired him for objecting to charter school proliferation. Kurrus rewrote a cumbersome contract, paring it down to a few pages. He won important concessions from the union on a reduction in pay and contract length and they've seen a retrenchment in jobs as district enrollment has dropped. They supported a tax vote that was controversial. Their thanks for a willingness to sacrifice in the name of the greater good? Not much.

An employee policy manual developed by district employees and the LREA has gone unsigned bywhose days weren't guided by a time clock, whose pocketbooks opened up for supplies and who embraced children of every color and need in the warmest of ways.

There ARE people who've permanently left the district and not all of the city lies in LRSD. So someone perhaps could make hay in the city race politically by taking an anti-union position. It would not be smart. If Little Rock is to grow as a city, it must have a cohesive true public school district, not a crazy-quilt of private schools operating with public money, as the Waltons desire. The LREA is a bedrock of that. If teachers aren't respected and valued, the schools will reflect the community view

The governor's race is a different matter. I'd hope, based on his


statements yesterday about lifting teachers, that Jared Henderson, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate, would object at a minimum to the Hutchinson administration using the LRSD as a whipping boy for its and the Waltons' anti-union agenda. Beating up on unions is popular in some quarters (not Missouri this week, where voters smashed a right-to-work law). An anti-union teacher group that has been supported on the national level by Walton money has lately been spending heavily on newspaper advertising to lure new members and throw criticism on the Arkansas Education Association and its affiliates. It's perhaps not coincidental that the anti-union teachers group is seeking to recruit members at a time the governor's office is seeking to decertify the LREA on the ground it doesn't represent enough people in thethan others.

It shouldn’t require saying, but Milano is not actually the six-way winner of the Intersectional Victimhood Olympics. She’s an extremely attractive woman with a successful career in an industry more cutthroat than most. If Milano has felt the Boot of Oppression at any time in the last 20 years, it was probably Gucci and she was probably wearing it.

I’m just old enough to remember when actors, at least the most-loved ones, were entertainers. That is, they had a public persona which conformed to their on-screen presence, and they maintained that persona 100% while in public.

Cary Grant never stopped being Archibald Alec Leach in private, but he was always Cary Grant on the screen, big or small. Johnny Carson was a cold, shy man in real life, but


Moon rocks, chunks of Mars on auction block in New York

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Several lumps of Mars and the biggest piece of the Moon ever offered for sale were unveiled on Sunday in New York in what organizers described as history's largest meteorite auction.

More than 125 meteorites were being auctioned in the private sale, including an iron meteorite resembling a howling face that was found in the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa and a slice of the Willamette meteorite from the American Museum of Natural History, estimated to sell for at least $85,000. The 4-pound (1.8-kg) Moon rock was expected to go for more than $340,000.

"We cover a very, very wide spectrum of material," said Darryl Pitt, the meteorite consultant for Heritage Auctions, which is conducting thetumors multiplying and growing faster. This went on for two years, with us questioning the dr and asking for a second opinion. He said he was doing what would help, but I reminded him the def of insanity( doing the same thing over and over and expecting diff results) and asked about mytomycin-c. He said that didn't work, but a friend of ours was given that for his first bladder tumor, which was cancer, and his was gone with only that and never came back. We insisted on an oncologist and that dr recommended the mytomycin-c. He had 1 a week for 6 weeks with no reoccurrence ,and had 3 more later and has been cancer free for over a year and a half after having treatment that


Gaza City - Living in what has been called the world's largest open-air prison did not deter astrophysicist Suleiman Baraka from turning his gaze to the cosmos.

"Astronomy is the science of everything. When you study astronomy, you study yourself, because you are part of this cosmos," Baraka told Al Jazeera from inside his lab at Gaza's Al-Aqsa University, a small room that he shares with two research students.

Papers and books are piled up next to several desktop computers arranged in a semicircle. A whiteboard is covered with scribbled formulas, while posters of celestial bodies hang on the walls and two telescopes sit in cardboard boxes nearby.

Although humble, the small Centre for Astronomy and Space Sciences aims to put Palestine on the map for research in the field.

"Because wedon't have advanced labs, our students use theory a lot, and they are very strong in it. I have a student who published a book," Baraka, 52, said proudly.

His own research, which won him a prestigious collaboration with French scientists, involves studying atypical events in the magnetosphere, the region within Earth's magnetic field.

Currently the holder of the Palestinian astrophysics chair for UNESCO, Baraka in 2010 brought the first telescope into Gaza - a donation from the International Astronomical Union. Since then, Birzeit University in the occupied West Bank, has also equipped its department.

"I cannot work to US standards while trapped like a prisoner in Gaza," said Baraka, who was banned from leaving the Gaza Strip to enter Israel and the occupied West Bank three decades ago. "December 16,


1987, was the last time I crossed Erez."

The decade-long Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip has severely curtailed freedom of movement for the territory's two million citizens, who must obtain permits from Israeli, Palestinian and Jordanian authorities in order to leave. Thousands of Palestinians in Gaza have consequently missed out on study, business and work opportunities.

According to the Gisha Legal Centre for Freedom of Movement, restrictions on travel increased in 2016, despite being eased somewhat at the Rafah border crossing with Egypt in the last few months of the year.

"Last time I went to the US to work for NASA, it took me seven months to leave and two months to come back, waiting for the border to open," Baraka said.

But the conflict with Israel has cost himdifferent perspectives. Suleiman Baraka, astrophysicist

It was this sentiment that led Baraka to organise stargazing evenings, which are open to the public. Each week last summer, astronomy students, aficionados and curious members of the public gathered on the roof of Al-Aqsa University to gaze at the universe through a telescope. Some of Baraka's students have also formed a group, the Gaza Ambassadors of Mars, that holds workshops for youth on modern and ancient astronomy.

As a young man during the first Intifada at the end of the 1980s, Baraka says that he never engaged in armed struggle, but instead taught children in underground classrooms after regular schools were shut down by the military.

"We moved students to houses, mosques and churches. I was working in my father's butcher shop from eight


to two o'clock. In the afternoon, I volunteered as a teacher," he recalled. "I taught physics and mathematics, geography and history. We taught the history of Palestine, which was forbidden by the occupation forces. Some of my students are now doctors and engineers."

Several years later, as the second Intifada broke out, Baraka once again found his life steered by the events shaping Palestinian history. For two years, he worked as part of the former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's diplomatic delegation, meeting foreign business representatives. But shortly after the signing of the Oslo Accords, he quit, disillusioned by the political process.

"The conclusion I came up with is that 'rights' have no meaning without power ... I decided not to be part of the system, because I came to theORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- Receiver Stevie Johnson is heading to his hometown San Francisco 49ers after being the odd man out in Buffalo.

The Bills traded Johnson to the 49ers on Friday in a deal made before the start of the second round of the NFL draft. In exchange, Buffalo announced it acquired an undisclosed pick in next year's draft. The pick is a conditional fourth-rounder that can become a third-rounder, sources told ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter.

The deal was made a day after the Bills traded up five spots to select Clemson receiver Sammy Watkins with the fourth pick in the NFL draft.

Watkins' addition was the latest in a series of moves the Bills have made to restock their receiver position, and it led to Johnson being expendable


after six seasons in Buffalo. The Bills also acquired receiver Mike Williams in a trade with Tampa Bay last month. Last year, Buffalo used second- and third-round picks to draft Robert Woods and Marquise Goodwin.

Johnson left Buffalo on Thursday, when he was spotted on a flight that landed in Las Vegas about an hour after Buffalo drafted Watkins.

"Today's decision was not an easy one to make, especially involving a player like Stevie, who leaves everything he has on the field and is an emotional leader in our locker room," Bills general manager Doug Whaley said. "All of the decisions we make are done so in the best interest of our team."

The 49ers, by comparison, had a need for receiver and were expected to address the position in thedraft. San Francisco instead gained an experienced player in Johnson after losing Mario Manningham in free agency.

Johnson spent the past four seasons as a starter in Buffalo. He became the Bills' first player to break 1,000 yards receiving in consecutive seasons in 2010-11, and extended the streak in 2012.

Johnson's numbers dropped last year, when he finished with 52 catches for 597 yards in 12 games. Aside from being slowed by an assortment of injuries, he was excused by the team for the final two games of the season following the death of his mother.


EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE SEASON'S BACK END: MANNY MACHADO'S CHASE FOR AN ANCIENT RECORD (AND MAYBE AN MVP), TRADE- DEADLINE MOVERS, THE VANISHING STEAL, PUIGMANIA AND, OF COURSE, OUR WORLD SERIES REFORECAST (STILL STICKING BY OUR PICK THAT THE NATS WILL REACH ... THE POSTSEASON)

First and Rising

For the Nationals and the rest of the NL East, the disturbing thing about the Braves' first half was not the six-game division lead they built by stringing together consistent month-by-month win totals (17 in April; 15 in May; 16 in June). The disturbing thing was that the Braves did so without fielding a roster that resembled, in performance or composition, the one that G.M. Frank Wren designed.

Atlanta's offense ranks third in the National League in runs scored despiteawful production from Jason Heyward and B.J. Upton, who hit No. 2 and No. 5 in their Opening Day lineup. Heyward, who was an All-Star as a 20-year-old rookie three years ago, is batting .227 with seven home runs and 21 RBIs. Upton, the former Ray who was signed to a five-year, $75.25 million contract last November, has been worse: .177, eight home runs, 20 RBIs. Among the 162 qualified players, Upton is last in OPS.

Heyward's production has been hampered by his health—an appendectomy put him on the disabled list from mid-April to mid-May—and he has been far from alone in his infirmity. The Braves have already endured stretches of 15 days or more without key cogs such as catcher Brian McCann, first baseman Freddie Freeman, out-of-the-blue rookie


phenom Evan Gattis, starter Brandon Beachy and top setup men Eric O'Flaherty and Jonny Venters.

O'Flaherty and Venters won't return this season—they have two structurally intact ulnar collateral ligaments between them, in neither case the one that counts—but everyone else is back or will be soon enough. That includes the 26-year-old Beachy, whose 2.00 ERA led the majors when he tore his UCL on June 16, 2012, and who should soon return as, at worst, a fortifying member of a bullpen that already leads the majors in ERA (2.62). At best he'll be an elite starting option in a rotation that ranks fifth in the majors (3.59).

Even Heyward and Upton have shown signs of life. Heyward's OPS was .533 at the end of May but is .809 since, and7:01 AM,
Apr. 17, 2013

The father of UW-Green Bay center Alec Brown, the player at right, has expressed his support for embattled coach Brian Wardle.

Written by

Rob Demovsky

A parent of a University of Wisconsin-Green Bay men's basketball player expressed support today for coach Brian Wardle, who is being investigated by the school after allegations he mistreated players.

Orrin Brown, the father of junior center Alec Brown, told Press-Gazette Media that his son has never had an issue with the way he has been coached or treated by Wardle.

"Alec has never reported any kind of abuse or mistreatment of any kind," Orrin Brown said. "He's always thought of coach Wardle as a very demanding and passionate coach but never complained about any treatment that he has ...


by pups, three (March, May and June) by immature seals and three (December, January and February) by mature seals. The December and January maxima were done by the same mature male (M56-09) and the September and November maxima were done by the same male pup (M25b-09).

![Time since previous haul-out event.\
Output from a GAMM model showing the mean number of days (±95% CI) since the previous haul-out period, plotted by month for the 60 harbour seals equipped with Satellite-Relay Data Loggers (SRDLs) in Svalbard, Norway in 2009 and 2010. The number at the top of the CI bar indicates the maximum time between haul-out events (days) for an individual seal and the number at the bottom of the CI bar indicates the number of seals transmitting data in thatseals showed similar haul-out probabilities and risks of ending haul-out events during most months, with a few notable exceptions. Mature seals had a higher probability of hauling out and a decreased risk of ending a haul-out event compared to immature seals in February and May. Pups generally had an increased probability of hauling out and a decreased risk of ending their haul-out events compared to the other age classes for most of the study period. Sex also had an influence on haul-out behaviour. Males had a higher probability of hauling out and a decreased risk of ending a haul-out event compared to females in February, March and May.

Haul-out substrate influenced the risk of ending a haul-out event. Seals using shore-fast ice or off-shore ice had a decreased risk


of ending a haul-out event compared to seals on land in November and May (when all substrates were available). Glacier ice pieces were not used often enough to explore details regarding patterns of use.

Year of tagging and latitude did impact haul-out behaviour but not in a consistent manner. Longitude affected haul-out probability, with an increased probability of hauling out as the seals moved east. The effect of the fraction of moon illuminated was highly variable among months with no general trend emerging. The time between haul-out events did not affect haul-out duration.

Discussion {#s4}
==========

This study is the first to investigate the haul-out behaviour of the harbour seal population within the High Arctic Archipelago of Svalbard, Norway during the arctic winter. Approximately one-third (n = 19) of the 60 tags deployed inof Facts)

“Dear Reichskanzler,
…
The Brooklyn headquarter of the Watchtower Society is pro-German in an exemplary way and has been so for many years. For that reason, in 1918, the president of the Society and seven members of the board of directors were sentenced to 80 years in prison, because the president refused to use two of the magazines published in America under his direction for war propaganda against Germany. These two magazines, “The Watchtower” and “Bible Student” were the only magazines in America which refused to engage in anti-German propaganda and for that reason were prohibited and suppressed in America during the war.

In the very same manner, in course of the recent months the board of directors of our Society not only refused to engage in propaganda against Germany,


but has even taken a position against it. The enclosed declaration underlines this fact and emphasizes that the people leading in such propaganda (Jewish businessmen and Catholics) also are the most rigorous persecutors of the work of our Society and its board of directors. This and other statements of the declaration are meant to repudiate the slanderous accusation, that Bible Researchers are supported by the Jews.

The conference of five thousand delegates also noted – as is expressed in the declaration that the Bible Researchers of Germany are fighting for the very same high ethical goals and ideals which also the national government of the German Reich proclaimed respecting the relationship of humans to God, namely: honesty of the created being towards its creator. The conference came to theof the Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit)…”. (KJV)

Stephen had a vision by means of Holy Spirit just before his death. After eloquently defending his faith in Jesus Christ before a mob who were about to take him out and stone him, this is the account of what he saw: Acts 7:55-60

55 “But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,

56 And said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.

57 Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord,

58 And cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and


of Jesus, but of John.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”. (KJV)

The John who wrote what is recorded as the Book of John is the same John who wrote what is recorded in the Book of Revelation. In reading the Book of Revelation it is quite obvious the John did not believe Jesus was God Almighty.

How is Jesus ‘godly‘?

Jesus is unique from all other creation. He is divine in that he is “begotten” of God. This mean God took of himself and formed His son. As your offspring are of your flesh, Jesus is of the same of what God’s body consist of and shares in this way godliness.

Jesus states himself as John records, what his relationship tothe “Living waters” of the River Jordan was perfectly within Jewish law and practice at the time.

The Essenes, a strict Jewish sect, were doing it too out in the Judean Desert. But why were Jewish people immersing themselves in water? Is baptism in the Jewish Scriptures? Well, sort of, yes.

Ritual Bathing in the Bible

“Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying: You shall also make a laver of bronze, with its base also of bronze, for washing. You shall put it between the tabernacle of meeting and the altar. And you shall put water in it, for Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet in water from it. When they go into the tabernacle of meeting, or when they come near the altar to minister,


to burn an offering made by fire to the LORD, they shall wash with water, lest they die. So they shall wash their hands and their feet, lest they die. And it shall be a statute forever to them– to him and his descendants throughout their generations.” Exod 30:17-21

The priests had to be ritually clean (tahor) in order to serve at the tabernacle, and Israelites who had become ritually unclean (tamay) had to restore their situation with the passing of time and bathing their whole body in fresh, ritually clean (tahor) water, according to Leviticus 15.

Later, when the temple had been built, it was necessary for everyone to be immersed in a mikveh to become ritually clean before entering the temple. There are many ancient mikva’ot (plural ofmikveh) to be seen in Jerusalem, and it is clear to see the two sets of steps for each one – a set of steps going down to the mikveh in an impure (tamay) state on one side, and on the other side, steps where the pilgrim will emerge fresh and ritually clean (tahor).

What did it look like in the time of Jesus?

Following the upheaval of the 1967 war, archaeologists were presented with the opportunity to excavate parts of the upper city of Jerusalem, giving a new window into daily life in ancient times. Many of the houses were grand and spacious, with their own water cisterns and ritual baths in the basements.[2] Some houses were found to have had several of these mikva’ot, since it is thought


deliberately points us back to the analogy of the man who trusts in God being like a tree beside plenty of water, and the one who leaves God ending up in dry, dusty shame.

A “Mikveh” of living water represents the bounty and resources of the new life that we can enjoy in God. Those who put their hope in God, choosing to align their lives with him, will never be dried out, but will always have fresh life in him.

Next time you see someone being immersed in water to signify their new life in Yeshua, the hope of Israel, the mikveh of Israel, call to mind all that he said about being the water of life, the well of living water that springs up to eternal life… becauseof Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace, loving your fellow-creatures, and drawing them near to the Torah.” This quality was highly visible and crucially instrumental following the rebellion of Korach, when it was Aaron who saved the people from the full extent of Divine wrath (see Numbers 17).

Because of their ability to invoke Heavenly influence, the sages even record that the priestly families possess distinctive character traits and qualities which are part of their special spiritual heritage: they are known to be joyful, giving, and driven by a loftier nature. In the era of the Temple, they were praised for their zeal and dedication to fulfill the commandments and give honor to the Creator.

Later, through the ensuing course of history, it was generally the tribe of Levi and