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There used to be a time when the philosophy was that contact had to be done before civilization eventually reached indigenous tribes and they all died. Isn't protecting isolated tribes just a way to postpone the inevitable assimilation and subsequent extinction?
I don't know if it is inevitable. Those things happen because of a desire from us civilized peoples to go there and make contact, whatever the reason: to conquer land, grow soybeans, build a road. Those motives can be controlled.
The prevalent ideology before FUNAI [the Brazilian agency charged with protecting the Indians] was the idea that we should go fetch the isolated peoples and bring them the benefits of civilization, since civilization was a good of mankind. It belonged to everyone, non-Indians and Indians alike. So all parts of mankind have the right to benefit from civilization—provided that they want to. When [the first sertanista, Cândido] Rondon (1865-1958), got old and left the service, the SPI [Indian Protection Service, the predecessor to FUNAI] entered a terrible phase. The organization got to the point of selling indigenous lands with the Indians inside.
Why would a protection service sell Indian lands?
By then, many of the contact expeditions were funded by local interests. People who have the rubber forests, the seringais, would call on the SPI and say: "Look, there's a bunch of Indians on my land—on my land—and they're bothering me, so you have to come down and take them away." That contact philosophy endured well into the 1970's. I've made contact with seven groups. And it was through those contacts that I came to realize how bad it was for them.
What does contact do to the Indians?
First the whole visual thing. When you are in an expedition, in the bush, you have to keep an eye on the guys who are there. The guys fight you with bows and arrows, they kill you, they speak up to you, they assault you. But you eventually make contact. One year later they are slack, emaciated, bowing their heads and begging for food and money by the roadside, more and more dependent on you and on the state. They come into contact with you and start to die off like flies. Everything, everything, everything plays against them. They become so subordinate to us, for we break up their education, their health, their means of work, their mythical system. They become outcasts. For how long? Well, some of them have been outcasts for 500 years. Please name to me a single tribe in the last 500 years that became better off after contact. There is none! So, seeing all that, I came to develop a new method of work, and to work for a decade before being eventually heard and creating within FUNAI a department dedicated to the protection of isolated peoples.
Was it a "Eureka!" moment when you realized that the best thing to do for the indigeous tribes was to avoid contact with them?
No, it wasn't quite like the road to Damascus, where Paul saw the light. It was a process in which I observed a lot, thought up a lot. Then I introduced a change in the way of doing things. We shouldn't go after those peoples to make contact. Contact is harmful to them. We are scourges on those peoples. So I proposed that we created a department for isolated peoples, because it can't be overstated how important this moment [first contact] is for them, and it should be done very carefully, by well-prepared people, and only as a last resort. We should avoid contact by all means, protect their environment, demarcate their lands and let them live their traditional lives.
And there are practical reasons for a policy of noncontact.
It's much cheaper for the government to fund the expedition and demarcate the land than to make contact just for the sake of it. This is one reason. The other reason is that they have no resistance against our germs. The third thing is that they lose their autonomy and become fully dependent on the state. We bring them manufactured good that they can't make and can't earn by themselves. They are not structured beings, whoo work from nine to five as we do. The guy is there working, soon a friend of his comes by and asks him if he wants to go fishing. He looks out, sees that it's a beautiful day out there and does go fishing. They are not inserted in our economic standards or submitted to the giants of our science. They live in another world, another time. That's why our economic projects don't seem to suit them.
You were fired last year from FUNAI. Famed sertanista Orlando Villas Bôas, your mentor, had also been fired shortly before his death, in 2002. Is there anything wrong with the old sertanistas?
Of course I side with the sertanistas here. Rondon was sued and prosecuted--as an Army general and as a sertanista too, but mostly as a sertanista. Apoena's father [Francisco Meirelles, the father of sertanista Apoena Meirelles, who was killed in a robbery in 2004] was arrested, charged with corruption. Then you had Orlando, who was just thrown away by the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso [Brazil's president from 1995 to 2003]. Then you have me. They just opened the window and "zup!"—tossed me away. I have always been very vocal. In 34 years of public service I have never been one of those nice workers who agree with everything the government does.
Orlando was not so stringent, but he sided with the Indians as much as I do. Rondon is much above us all. He was one of those very few national heroes, in a country that lacks them.
Your dismissal was caused by your reaction to a statement by FUNAI's then president Mércio Gomes
which was awful! Mércio was the only president of FUNAI—therefore the lawful protector of the indigenous peoples—to say that the indigenous peoples have enough land already. This is absolutely vital to them. I wasn't in the city, I was in the bush with the Zo'é Indians, and they got me on the radio. They asked me if I could comment, since no one wanted to comment. I said, "This is absurd! Everybody should comment. This is something you hear from loggers, from rubber tappers, not from the president of FUNAI."
So now you have a nongovernmental organization dedicated to helping the indigenous peoples. How did that get started?
In November 2005, I managed to organize the first international meeting on the isolated peoples of Amazonia and Gran Chaco. Among the meeting's several goals was to create an institution, a network, that got people together who dedicate themselves to the protection of those peoples in the seven South American countries that still have isolated Indians, meaning indigenous peoples whose language you don't know, whose numbers you don't know and who live naked in the jungle, just like they used to before the discovery of America. Of course there have been some changes—territorial restrictions and so forth—but they are basically unprotected and rely on the environment for everything.
Which seven countries have indigenous Amazonians?
Paraguay, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela and Brazil. Ecuador has a big Amazonian territory. Last year awful things happened there. Other indigenous groups killed isolated Indians and showed off their severed heads. Many of those peoples, particularly in Brazil, live in frontier areas. So it's no use for a country to protect them if the country across the border doesn't. I sensed there was the need for an agreement among those countries to make life easier for those folks, so that they can roam free across borders.
But how would this work in practice? Don't they already move across borders without being harassed?
It turns out that you have several different situations on both sides. If you know that you have Indians on this side, you protect this side. But on the unprotected side loggers may come in, so they get killed on the other side.
How did you get started in this business?
As a tick stuck to Orlando's neck. I'd even buy cigarettes for him and took pride in that. When I was a young man, the Villas Bôases were national heroes. I remember reading stories in O Cruzeiro magazine about their expeditions, and that was a permanent invitation to adventure. What took me to them at first was not any kind of historical awareness towards the indigenous peoples. It was merely the spirit of adventure that took over completely the mind of an 18-year-old.
When did you first go into the Amazon?
Orlando took me there. It was in 1959 or 1960. By then the air mail, the Correio Aéreo Nacional, had flights from São Paulo and Rio through Brasília to Manaus, and they used to land in the Xingu. I boarded one of those flights. And it was tragicomic. It was pouring with rain when we landed in the Capitão Vasconcelos outpost, now Leonardo Villas Bôas. The plane skidded off the airstrip and ended up with its nose in the mud. The load was unstrapped and fell all on my head.
Then I came out along with a fellow from the army, a sergeant, to try to tie a steel cable to the little wheel in the backside landing gear and have a tractor pull it, so that we'd be able to get the plane back into position. But the guy driving the tractor pulled right at the time when the sergeant was tying the cable to the wheel, so it tore his finger. Pow! Off the finger comes—it hits my chest and lands in the mud. So I ran to the outpost for help—there were Indians all around. But I stumbled and fell with my face in the mud. Then 100 Indians burst with laughter! I got up, wet and filthy, and thought: "Sons of a whore, I'd kill half a dozen of them!" But that didn't make me give up.
How do you think the Indians would feel about your noninterference policy?
Were I an Indian, I wouldn't want white people around. Not in my hut, not in my life. No sertanistas, no FUNAI. I would probably be dead, but I'd rather die with a bullet in my chest than live begging by the roadside.


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subset: commoncrawl


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One of my first blog posts back in 2009 featured a column about the Social Security Administration squandering $750,000 on a "conference" at a fancy golf resort in Arizona.
This is why I'm not surprised the GSA pissed away a lot of money at a Las Vegas resort. This is what people do when they spend other people's money. Heck, this cartoon shows it better than I can say it.
Here's a small sampling of similar outrages.
- A $423,000 study to find out that men don't like to wear condoms.
- Disability payments to a grown man who wants to wear diapers and live as an "adult baby."
- The Pentagon spent $900 on a $7 control switch.
- Harry Reid's subsidies for cowboy poetry.
- The Census Bureau's $2.5 million ad at the Super Bowl.
- A $100,000 library grant to a city without a library.
- The IRS squandering $15 million on a P.R. campaign to improve its image.
The bureaucrats involved in all these outrages should be fired, or perhaps even charged with crimes such as malfeasance, but this cartoon reminds us that the real problem is the political class which appropriates the money that is then wasted by bureaucracies.
This cartoon was authored by Michael Ramirez, and you may know he is one of my favorites. To understand why, see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
And this cartoon reminds us that every dollar of waste that gets publicized is just the tip of the iceberg.
I'm not familiar with Steve Breen, but he does lots of work like this, I'm sure I'll be featuring more of his cartoons.
Thinking about all this waste, fraud, and abuse is a bit depressing, so let's try to feel better by thinking about the ways that foreign governments squander taxpayer money, such as the UK government funding sex trips to Amsterdam, the Greek government rewarding pedophiles with disability handouts, or the European Commission financing penile implants for senior politicians and bureaucrats.


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Brazil's top modern artist gets Rio homecoming
She's the toast of New York and beloved in Paris and London, but Beatriz Milhazes thinks there's no place like home.
More than a decade after her last show in her native Rio de Janeiro, Brazil's highest-paid artist is gearing up for a homecoming of sorts, a major retrospective spanning most of her 30-year career. The exhibition, opening Thursday at the Paco Imperial Cultural Center in downtown Rio, brings together more than five dozen paintings, silk screens and collages covered in Milhazes' signature riot of saturated color, concentric circles, upbeat flowers and meandering arabesques.
"I've shown in places that are obviously very exciting for any artist, but in a way showing in your city — I was born here and still live and work here — kind of grabs you more, excites you more, stirs you up more," Milhazes told The Associated Press in a Friday interview as she supervised the installation of the exhibit, entitled "Meu Bem," Portuguese for "My Dear." ''It's being able to say, 'Mom, look what I've done.'"
Milhazes has plenty to show off. The 53-year-old has exhibited in the Venice Biennial, had a solo show at Paris' Fondation Cartier and has works in the Reina Sofia National Museum in Spain and New York's Guggenheim and Museum of Modern Art.
In 2008, her painting "O Magico," or "The Magician," sold for more than $1 million, or around four times what was expected, at a New York auction, making her Brazil's highest-paid living artist. She broke the record again last year when her "Meu Limao," or "My Lemon," went for $2.1 million at another auction in New York.
Though she once quipped it took her 25 years to become an overnight success, Milhazes said her slow path to international fame helped her cope with the spotlight.
"The first decade of my career, in the 1980s, was very local. It was only in the 1990s that I started showing work outside of Brazil, first in Latin America, Mexico, Venezuela, and then in New York. Then came Europe and Japan, but all very gradually, little by little," said Milhazes, running her fingers through curly locks that recall the wavy patterns of her work. "During that process, sometimes I would leave for a bit and spend time in these other countries. But I never cut my ties with Rio. And that was an important decision. I need to feel that link with home, that understanding of what home is."
Rio, a chaotic, coastal metropolis of 6 million, has informed Milhazes' work from the beginning. Early collages featured snippets of fabrics culled from the costumes worn in the city's world-famous Carnival celebrations, and her work still bursts with the swirly paisleys and arabesques that recall the its exuberant vegetation. There's also something very Rio in her eye-popping palette, with its fiery oranges and yellows that evoke the city's fierce summer sun, the blue of its limpid skies, the pinks and purples of ipe trees in lavish bloom.
So alive with colors and shapes, Milhazes' work seems to vibrate off the wall. "Havana," a large 2003-2004 acrylic that's part of the Rio exhibit, keeps viewers' eyes busy as they jump from the kaleidoscopic flower burst at the center to the peace sign camouflaged amid a patchwork of bright hues to the flitting butterflies, sagging bunches of grapes, droopy roses or piles of tropical fruit.
"Ilha de Capri," or "Capri Island," from 2002, explodes with superimposed flower burst and hypnotic bull's eyes of concentric circles against a background of vertical stripes. Tentacles unfurl from the red-hot core of the 2006 collage "Ginger Candy," made in part from the flattened wrappers of Chinese sweets.
Though she rejects the word "style," Milhazes defines her approach to art as geometric abstraction.
"I was always trying to bring together 'high art' painting with elements from my own culture here in Brazil. They are two very different worlds," she said. "To be a proper painter you obviously have to look at the tradition that comes from Europe but at the same time, I didn't want to stray from my life here in Brazil."
Instead of painting directly onto the canvas, Milhazes developed a technique in which she uses acrylics to paint shapes onto plastic and then transfer them onto canvas, building palimpsests of intricate layers.
In reproductions, her work can look so perfect it appears computer-generated. But up close, it's alive with little imperfections that make it even more irresistible to the eye. The paintings' resined surfaces are strewn with scraps of paint, and traces of lines and smudges of color are still visible beneath layer after superimposed layer.
Frederic Paul, curator of the Rio show, said that despite its festive appearance, Milhazes' work is fundamentally inscrutable.
"When you look at the paintings from up close, you don't understand them at all," he said. "You will never really know Beatriz' work. You will always discover it."
"Meu Bem" runs at Rio de Janeiro's Centro Cultural Paco Imperial from Aug. 29-Oct. 27.


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Superior Court Judge Lesley Green urged lawyers to reach an agreement that would allow three of Kasem's adult children to visit their father, who is suffering from advanced Parkinson's disease.
Kasem's children have said they are being blocked from seeing their father by his wife of more than 30 years, Jean. But her lawyer Marshall Grossman said the children have rejected a proposal to allow them to visit their father each month and on major holidays.
Green acknowledged there is "bad blood" in the family, but noted a doctor who has evaluated Kasem reported he wants to see his children.
Kasem's daughter Julie was seeking a temporary conservatorship for her father, but Green rejected that effort Tuesday. She cited reports by investigators and doctors who said Kasem was receiving by all accounts good medical treatment in his home.
The judge told lawyers to try to work out an agreement for visitation by Kasem's children and set another court hearing for Dec. 20.
Attorneys for both sides planned to try to negotiate a visitation agreement Tuesday.
Julie Kasem's attorney, Andrew Katzenstein, said his clients were pleased to learn that their father was being well cared for and hoped that a visitation arrangement could be worked out. He said the effort to have a conservatorship established was all about making sure Kasem was being properly looked after and to allow his children to see their father.
Grossman said he wants an accord that will end any further court action. "We're looking to bring peace, not piecemeal," he told Green.
Casey Kasem, 81, gained fame with his radio music countdown shows, "American Top 40" and "Casey's Top 40," and also was the voice of Shaggy in the cartoon "Scooby Doo."
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Texas Suspends Burro-killing Policy In State Park
LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) — The Texas wildlife agency said Tuesday it is suspending a policy that allows the killing of burros in a state park along the Mexican border after the Humane Society of the United States offered to devise a nonlethal plan to remove the destructive animals.
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department will contribute up to $10,000 toward a humane society aerial survey of the wild donkeys at Big Bend Ranch State Park this spring to establish baseline data, agency executive director Carter Smith said.
"We believe this could be valuable information to assess the problem with burros around the park," Smith said. "We still have a long way to go to see if a viable, long-term plan can be developed."
Officials estimate that only about 300 burros live in the 316,000-acre park on the Texas side of the Rio Grande, he said. Park rangers have killed 130 there since 2007, although not during the peak October-to-April tourist season.
"We are happy to work with the department and are pleased that they have halted lethal control of the burros while discussions are under way," Texas humane society director Nicole Paquette said.
The state, which says it doesn't have the money to capture or quarantine the burros, considers them destructive intruders, hogging forage and lapping up precious water in the drought-starved mountains. Officials say they threaten the survival of hundreds of other native species, including bighorn sheep which the state wants to re-establish in the park.
In Big Bend National Park, adjacent to the state-owned land, killing wild burros is prohibited by a 40-year-old federal ban that Congress said protects the "living symbols and pioneer spirit of the West."
Protesters rode three donkeys to the Texas Capitol in January to deliver 103,000 signatures asking Gov. Rick Perry to change the state policy and halt the shooting of the wild animals.
The humane society needs an accurate count of the burro population before it can begin to consider alternatives to killing them, Paquette said. The group recently airlifted 119 burros from Hawaii to a ranch in California, and it has a 1,300-acre rescue ranch in northeast Texas that is home to about 1,200 animals of various species.
"We'd have to look at the population (at the rescue ranch) and see how much more the acreage could stand," she said, adding that 300 burros rescued years ago already live there.
Wildlife department officials explored live trapping and consulted U.S. Department of Agriculture veterinarians and other experts on humane solutions. But efforts to trap the feral animals within the state park were unsuccessful.
With no obvious option to control the population, Big Bend Ranch State Park rangers began shooting burros in 2007. A public uproar ensued when news leaked that 71 had been killed and the state halted the shootings in 2008, allowing Peaceful Valley Donkey Rescue to try to help. But the nonprofit group failed to catch any burros in two years and the shooting resumed. Fifty-nine burros were killed between August 2010 and September 2011.
Smith, the parks and wildlife's executive director, then asked people or groups outside the department to solicit practical alternatives.
Wildlife officials say protecting the park's land and water is their highest priority and controlling feral burros is part of that. If nonlethal methods prove unfeasible, they made need to resume killing the animals.
Louis Harveson, professor of wildlife management at Sul Ross State University in Alpine, compared the burros to feral hogs that cause millions of dollars in damage annually in Texas. He said he hoped the humane society would devise a plan to at least reduce the burro numbers, which would take some pressure off native plants and animals in the park.
"We know that every exotic species has a negative impact," Harveson said "They didn't evolve within that system. They have an advantage in a system."
Associated Press writer Betsy Blaney can be followed on Twitter at:


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Over the counter: Sunscreen, Lyme disease and poison ivy
As we spend more time outdoors in the warmer months, we need to be mindful that it has risks.
Overexposure to the sun can damage the skin and even cause skin cancer; contact with ticks can lead to Lyme disease; and rubbing against poison ivy or items that have been in contact with the plant can result in a painful, itching and blistering rash.
Have fun outdoors, but make sure you take precautions and the proper actions to protect yourself first.
Sunny days
One fundamental precaution is to wear sunscreen. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports, "The sun's UV rays can damage your skin in as little as 15 minutes. Put on sunscreen before you go outside, even on slightly cloudy or cool days. Don't forget to put a thick layer on all parts of exposed skin. Get help for hard-to-reach places like your back."
A recent Wall Street Journal story on the importance of sunscreen carried a helpfully instructive title, "The Push for Daily Sunscreen." Readers of the story learned that, every day, they should apply a shot-glass-full of sunscreen to skin that will be exposed.
Contained in the story is this information about how many people are unaware concerning sun protection factor, or SPF:
"… a product's SPF indicates only its ability to defend against sunburn-causing ultraviolet-B rays — and not against ultraviolet-A, which penetrate deeper into the skin and cause premature aging. (Both types contribute to skin cancer.) For example, a person wearing SPF 50 could spend considerable time in the sun without getting burned. 'They think they're getting protected but they're getting the silent damage from UVA,' says Steven Q. Wang, director of dermatological surgery and dermatology at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center site in Basking Ridge, N.J."
The Food and Drug Administration will help consumers select sunscreen starting on June 18, according to the article, when they will require sun protection products to undergo more expansive testing and to have labeling that is clearer and easier to understand.
Into the woods
During the warmer and longer days, we get out more in the sun and along paths and through the woods and fields. Paths and woods and fields are where people come in contact with black-legged ticks (also called deer ticks) that transmit the bacterium that causes Lyme disease.
Lyme disease symptoms include fever, fatigue, headache and a skin rash. It responds well to antibiotics yet, if left untreated, it can result in serious health problems, including infection of the joints, heart and nervous system. Because of the general malaise that afflicts a person with Lyme disease, the disease is sometimes misdiagnosed as depression.
In order to avoid Lyme disease, it's crucial to be vigilant. When you are in the woods and in contact with tall grass, always wear socks and shoes or sneakers, and either wear long pants with a strap around the bottom of each pant leg or hiking shorts or Bermuda-style shorts with knee-high socks.
After you have been outdoors, do a thorough body inspection. And if you do find a tick, it is not necessarily a cause for immediate concern. It can be easily removed, and it takes 36 to 48 hours or more after a tick attaches itself to a host for it to transmit the Lyme disease-causing bacterium.
Use fine-tipped tweezers to remove the tick, and make sure you get all of it. It is also important to inspect pets that spend time outdoors. They can bring ticks into the home. Washing clothes thoroughly in hot water and detergent will help prevent ticks from spreading the disease.
Poisonous plants
Anyone who has had a poison ivy rash remembers the experience –– and not fondly.
Poison ivy –– more specifically, the sticky oil substance that the plant produces –– can render an immensely painful rash. The best way to avoid poison ivy is to know what it looks like so you can stay away from it.
It is smart to search the Internet and familiarize yourself with the appearance of the plant, which does have a varied appearance. It always has leaves of three, but those leaves can be green and shiny, green and dull or just red. Poison ivy grows on a vine on the ground and sometimes up a tree, and it can even sprout into a shrub.
Even if the plant is dead, the vine can still contain the irritating oil, which is called urishiol.
Some people are immune to catching a case of poison ivy, but this immunity is not necessarily a constant. Some people have immunity to poison ivy, and then it goes away. Other people do not have immunity, and then they acquire it.
Once urishiol touches the skin, it takes only about 10 minutes for it to start a rash, so you have to move fast if you have a hope of warding off its effects. The recommended treatment is to first swab the skin with rubbing alcohol, and then wash it with warm water and no soap (soap can move the urishiol around). After this, take a hot shower and wash with soap.
If you are unfortunate enough to get a poison ivy rash, there are wonderful natural and homeopathic remedies that have a strong track record of bringing relief.
Summer is meant to be enjoyed. With a little planning and remaining aware, we can stay safe and protect ourselves as we enjoy the weather and outdoors and have fun.
Steve Bernardi is a registered compounding pharmacist and Dr. Gary Kracoff is a naturopathic doctor at Johnson Compounding and Wellness Center in Waltham, Mass. (www.naturalcompounder.com) Readers with questions about natural or homeopathic medicine, compounded medications, or health in general can email email@example.com.


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Second-Order Filter
Implement second-order filter
Simscape / Electrical / Specialized Power Systems / Control / Filters
Based on the Filter type selected in the block menu, the Second-Order Filter block implements the following transfer function:
Low-pass filter:
High-pass filter:
Band-pass filter:
Band-stop (notch) filter:
The key characteristics of the Second-Order Filter block are:
Input accepts a vectorized input of N signals, implementing N filters. This feature is particularly useful for designing controllers in three-phase systems (N = 3).
Filter states can be initialized for specified DC and AC inputs.
It enables you to compute and plot filter response.
- Filter type
Specify the type of filter:
Bandpass(default), or
Bandstop (notch).
- Natural frequency fn (Hz)
Specify the natural frequency of the filter, in hertz. This value must be a scalar or a vector. Default is
- Damping ratio Zeta (Q = 1/(2*Zeta))
Specify the damping ratio of the filter. The damping ratio is typically a value between 0 and 1. Default is
The damping ratio is related to the filter quality factor Q:
For a bandpass or a bandstop filter, the 3 dB bandwidth is given by
- Sample time
Specify the sample time of the block, in seconds. Set to 0 to implement a continuous block. Default is
- Initialize filter states
When this check box is selected, filter states are initialized according to the AC initial input and DC initial input parameters. Default is selected.
- AC initial input: [ Mag, Phase (degrees), Freq (Hz) ]
Specify the magnitude of the initial AC component of the input signal, its phase, in degrees, and its frequency, in hertz. Default is
[0, 0, 60].
When the input is vectorized (N signals), specify an N-by-3 matrix, where each row of the matrix corresponds to a particular input.
The AC initial input parameter is visible only when the Initialize filter states parameter is selected.
- DC initial input
Specify the value of the initial DC component of the input signal. When the input signal is vectorized, specify a 1-by-N vector, where each value corresponds to a particular input. Default is
The DC initial input parameter is visible only when the Initialize filter states parameter is selected.
- Plot filter response
When this check box is selected, the filter step response and its Bode diagram (magnitude and phase of transfer function as a function of frequency) are plotted in a figure. Default is cleared.
- Frequency range (Hz): [Start, End, Inc.]
Specify the frequency range for plotting the filter Bode diagram. Specify a vector containing the starting frequency, the end frequency, and the incremental frequency, in hertz. Default is
[0, 500, 1].
The Frequency range parameter is visible only when the Plot filter response parameter is selected.
|Direct Feedthrough
|Sample Time
|Specified in the Sample Time parameter
Continuous if Sample Time = 0
|Scalar Expansion
|Yes, of the parameters
|Two states per filter
power_SecondOrderFilter example
shows the Second-Order Filter block using two Filter type parameter
settings (
Lowpass and
The model sample time is parameterized with variable Ts (default value Ts = 50e-6). To simulate continuous filters, specify Ts = 0 in the MATLAB® Command Window before starting the simulation.
Version History
Introduced in R2013a


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Posts Tagged Two Steps From Hell
The Undercover Soundtrack – Keira Michelle Telford
Posted by Roz Morris @Roz_Morris in Undercover Soundtrack on August 29, 2012
'Perfectly dark, tortured and ever so slightly angry'
Once a week I host a writer who uses music as part of their creative process – perhaps to open a secret channel to understand a character, populate a mysterious place, or explore the depths in a pivotal moment. This week's post is by Keira Michelle Telford @mylostanddamned
Soundtrack by Emilie Autumn, Lyriel, Two Steps From Hell
I listen to a lot of music, so it's no wonder that all of my characters have their own theme song. Each book has its own theme song, too, and I listen to music constantly while I write.
For Silver: Acheron, I was mostly listening to Victoriandustrial musician Emilie Autumn. Her Opheliac album is so perfectly dark, tortured, and ever so slightly angry. (Okay, quite a bit angry.) At this point in the timeline, Ella 'Silver' Cross has just been banished for treason. She's caught up in an emotional whirlwind, and Autumn's Opheliac encapsulates this turmoil perfectly.
The title itself (also the title of a track on the album), is named after Shakespeare's Ophelia in the play Hamlet, and is most well-known for her inability to cope with her emotional distress and broken heart, and for her suicide as a result of this. In this vein, the Emilie Autumn song Opheliac is filled with despair, and almost perfectly expresses Silver's growing depression and a battle against her own sorrow.
If I had to pick just one other song that inspired me the most from this album, I would choose I Want My Innocence Back. Every time I listen to it, I can imagine exactly what Silver's feeling in the book. I seem to recall putting this track on repeat, and listening to it for eight hours straight.
Another band that inspired me during the creation of Silver: Acheron was Lyriel. I love all of Lyriel's albums, and especially their style of mixing folk rock with gothic rock. One song on their recent album, Leverage (the title track), inspired me because it represents Silver's transition from her former life to her new life – that of a banished prisoner.
I often wonder what comes first: the music or the scene I'm writing. I tend to think that I'm attracted to songs/musicians whose work reflects the emotions I'm writing about, but every now and then, I hear a song and am immediately able to visualise a scene from a book I haven't even begun to write yet. Just the other day, I was listening to Two Steps From Hell—an instrumental group who do a lot of scoring for movies and trailers—and stumbled upon a track called Setting Sail. In an instant, I knew how the last book of my second series, The Legacy Trilogy, ends.
Keira Michelle Telford is a British ex-pat, now living in British Columbia, Canada. She is the author of a 10-book series of post-apocalyptic, dystopian science fiction books, centering on the character of Ella 'Silver' Cross. The first book (a novella), Acheron, was released in November 2011. The next, A New Age Dawns (the fourth book in the series), is due in September. Find Keira on Goodreads, Facebook (and also here on Facebook) and on Twitter as @mylostanddamned
authors, autumn song, Emilie Autumn, entertainment, fantasy, folk rock, gothic rock, Keira Michelle Telford, Lyriel, music, music for writers, music for writing, My Memories of a Future Life, Nail Your Novel, Roz Morris, Silver: Acheron, The Legacy Trilogy, The Silver Series, The Undercover Soundtrack, Two Steps From Hell, undercover soundtrack, Victoriandustrial, writers, writing, writing to music
- The Undercover Soundtrack is a series where writers - and occasionally other arty folk - reveal how music shapes their work.
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What is The Undercover Soundtrack?Sleeve notes here
For the soundtrack of My Memories of a Future Life, you'll need Chopin's Sonata in B Minor, Rachmaninov preludes, lashings of Grieg's piano concerto in A minor and The Clash's Rock the Kasbah (they go together well).
You'll also need Samuel Barber's Dover Beach on piano, although that doesn't actually exist so do the best you can.
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(MODIS satellite shot of the epic storms that drenched Texas on Tuesday. Extreme rainfall events of this kind are more likely in a warming atmosphere. Image source: LANCE-MODIS.)
For the US, it (global warming + El Nino) means an increasing likelihood of heavy precipitation events from the southern plains states through the desert southwest. Storm track intensification through the Pacific to North America means that extreme rainfall events are a distinct possibility for states like Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico. — robertscribbler blog's El Nino + Global warming forecast posted on May 15, 2015.
* * * * *
It's a summer of El Nino. And it's a summer when human-caused global warming is now hitting new record hot extremes. A combination that spells big trouble for severe weather in various regions around the globe, including in the center mass of the United States.
If it was only a summer El Nino, the Central US wouldn't have too much to be concerned about. Sure, the added Pacific Ocean heat would amplify the subtropical jet stream and assist in trough development over the region. Both factors that would somewhat intensify rainfall events during a typical summer.
But this is not a typical summer El Nino.
This summer El Nino is happening in conjunction with record low sea ice extents in the Arctic (see Baked Alaska graphic below) and record hot global temperatures in the range of +1 degrees Celsius above 1880s averages. The record low sea ice levels aid in ridge and trough development — spurring the formation of hot-cool temperature dipoles that feed storms. Extreme weather firing off in an essentially changed atmosphere. An atmosphere heated to levels likely not seen in all of the current Holocene interglacial and probably at least since the Eemian 150,000 years ago. It's an extra level of heat that loads the atmosphere with a substantially greater amount of moisture (amplifying the hydrological cycle by 7 percent for each 1 degree C of warming). So when the storms do fire, they are now likely to dump much higher volumes of rain than we are used to.
(Extraordinary hotter north, cooler south dipole anomaly pattern that helped to feed instability and storm development over the Central US this week. The extreme warming in the Northwest Territory, Alaska and near Arctic Ocean region is a signature of global warming related polar amplification and sea ice loss in the Northern Hemipshere polar zone. It also likely has a teleconnection with both the current El Nino and the warm 'blob' of abnormally hot water in the Northeast Pacific. Image source: Earth Observatory — Baked Alaska.)
Such was the case with Texas on Tuesday and Wednesday where hundreds of homes were flooded, numerous lives lost, and hundreds of water rescues performed. In some regions, all-time record rainfall amounts were shattered. In Houston on Tuesday, hourly rainfall accumulations exceed 4 inches per hour (11+ inches daily accumulation for that city) — an extraordinary rate of rainfall no drainage system is designed to accommodate. Residents were stranded in cars for hours due to washed out roads or watched on in horror as the first floors of their homes were turned into strange flood-fueled washing machines.
It was a deluge that many compared with past record rainfall events spurred by hurricanes. But this was no hurricane, just a wave of intense storms rippling down an extreme trough in the Jet Stream and encountering an equally extreme atmospheric moisture loading.
Make no mistake, it was climate change and related human heating of the atmosphere that provided the steroids that pumped what would have been garden variety moderate to strong storms into the monsters witnessed on Tuesday and Wednesday. A billion dollar flood that, without climate change, would almost certainly have just been another summer shower.
Most news coverage of the event was decidedly narrow — focusing only on the extreme instances of weather and not on the clear global warming context. On Tuesday, Bill Nye, who's been acting as a climate gadfly to an otherwise climate-change mum media posted the following tweet:
Billion$$ in damage in Texas & Oklahoma. Still no weather-caster may utter the phrase Climate Change. — Bill Nye
And as we've come to see time and again, the related climate change deniosphere led by the likes of Fox News and National Review had an epic meltdown as a result. Either denying climate change is happening at all or, as was the case with National Review, denying that policy action could have any impact to help what is an already worsening situation.
But the critical elements of the current event appear to have been lost in all the fuzz. The first is that it was predictable, if we just look at current weather (El Nino, insane trough development, and atmospheric moisture loading) in a climate change context. And the second is that if we continue to ignore climate change, people will not be warned in advance of events like the one that occurred last week. Events that we have proven are indeed predictable see here if looked at in the climate context (and if weather forecasters simply do the same).
Whether we respond rapidly through responsible policy action (which will certainly help to reduce the harm we are now causing, but not prevent all of it), or whether we listen to the voices of nonsense that helped get us into this mess in the first place and continue to delay action, there is certainly a degree of far worse weather in the pipe. And failing to report on climate change, as the media has largely done, increases risks for loss of life, property damage, and overall disruption.
So far, the flood death count for this week is 30 souls. If you're a weatherman who's ignoring climate change, or if you're a media organization that's preventing weather forecasters from talking about climate change, this should weigh heavily on your conscience.
Bill Nye Says Climate Change a Factor in the Texas Floods
Texas Flooding a Preview of Future Extreme Weather Events
Earth Observatory — Baked Alaska
How Global Warming Wrecks the Jet Stream, Amps up the Hydrological Cycle to Cause Dangerous Weather
Hat-Tip to Bruce


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Five-time UFC veteran Jorge Santiago (23-10) meets Nova Uniao product Leonardo Pecanha (14-7) in the main event of next month's Titan Fighting Championship 21 event.
The event marks Santiago's first action since his October release from the UFC.
"I can't wait to fight for Titan on March 2 and to show everybody that 'The Sandman' is back and more dangerous than ever before," Santiago stated in an official release. "I train with the best coaches and some of the best fighters in the world. I've never felt better or more ready, and at Titan Fighting 21, I'm going to make a fight nobody will forget – especially Leonardo Pecanha."
Titan Fighting Championship 21 takes place March 2 at Memorial Hall in Kansas City, Kan. The evening's main card airs live on HDNet.
Santiago, the former Sengoku middleweight champion, in 2011 returned to the UFC for the first time in five years. The Brazilian went winless in bouts against Demian Maia and Brian Stann and was released from the promotion.
Prior to the disappointing octagon stint, Santiago had put together an 11-1 run.
Meanwhile, Pecanha fought just once in 2011, earning a first-round submission win over Matias Ezequiel Lemon. That followed a busier 2010, in which the second-degree Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt went 3-1. The lone loss in that span came in a Bellator Fighting Championships 22 clash with Tyler Stinson.
Pecanha is 6-1 in his past seven overall fights.
The official Titan Fighting Championship 21 lineup currently includes:
MAIN CARD (HDNet)
- Leonardo Pecanha vs. Jorge Santiago
- Andrew Carrillo vs. Joe Wilk
- Joe Ellenberger vs. Jesse Zeugin
- Anthony Gutierrez vs. Brandon Pfannenstiel
- Kevin Croom vs. Ramiro "Junior" Hernandez
- Mirsad Bektic vs. Cody Carrillo
PRELIMINARY CARD (un-aired)
- Darrick Minner (a) vs. Cody Peterson (a)
- Emery McReynolds (a) vs. Issac Enriquez (a)
(a) – Amateur bout
For more on Titan Fighting Championship 21, check out the MMA Rumors section of MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com).
(Pictured: Jorge Santiago)


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Michelle Phan, queen Of YouTube beauty tutorials and former Seventeen Beauty Smartie, officially has solved any mental makeup roadblocks you may face heading back to school. Her new cosmetics line, 'em,' offers tons of different sorts of products—but the real superstars of the collection are her enormous "life palettes," which are full of 36 refillable shades of eye, lip, and cheek color that will basically be the only makeup you'll need to last the whole year.
Of course, since Michelle's real passion is pumping out gorgeous makeup tutorials, she wouldn't hand over all these new products then leave you stranded without a friendly pointer or two! The brand's site, emcosmetics.com, is packed with video how-tos for almost every single occasion imaginable. Plus, the six palettes come with handy face charts that go into serious detail on creating four different looks with the makeup inside!
You can snag all 250 em products now at emcosmetics.com, and, if you join the site, get free shipping through the month of August! Just in time to stock up on new makeup right before classes start!
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What's your favorite product from the new collection? Sound off in the comments below!
P.S. Want to be the next Michelle Phan? Enter to be a Seventeen Beauty Smartie right now!


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Boyd, Belle
Boyd, Belle, 1844–1900, Confederate spy in the Civil War, b. Martinsburg, Va. (now W.Va.). Operating (probably unofficially) in Martinsburg and Front Royal, she provided Gen. T. J. (Stonewall) Jackson with valuable information on Union activities in the Shenandoah Valley in 1862. In 1864, after being twice imprisoned and released, she went to England, supposedly with secret dispatches from Jefferson Davis to Confederate agents there. The first of her three husbands, a Union officer who had been her captor, followed her to England to marry her. After his death she began a career on the English stage (1866) and on her subsequent return to the United States toured widely, especially in the Middle West, giving dramatic talks about herself and sundry episodes of the Civil War. She wrote Belle Boyd in Camp and Prison (1865).
See biography by L. A. Sigaud (1945).
The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2023, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.
See more Encyclopedia articles on: U.S. History: Biographies


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When news of the Connecticut elementary school shooting broke early Friday, few could comprehend the horror that unfolded there.
By the time the ordeal was over, shooter Adam Lanza had killed 27 people, including his mother and 20 children – some as young as 6 years old. He then killed himself.
How do you wrap your head around a tragedy like that? More importantly, where do you begin?
There are no easy answers to those questions. But Chief Kim Raney of the Covina Police Department can probably come as close as anyone to answering them. Raney was among the first to respond to a 2008 Christmas Eve massacre in Covina that left nine dead.
"When you hear about something like the Connecticut shooting it takes you back to what you experienced in the past," Raney said.
And what Raney experienced in 2008 was horrific indeed.
Bruce Jeffrey Pardo, estranged husband of Sylvia Ortega, showed up at the Ortega home on east Knollcrest Drive at about 11:30 p.m. on Christmas Eve where a holiday gathering was under way. Dressed as Santa Claus, he pulled out a 9mm handgun and began firing.
When the rampage was over his ex-wife, her parents and six other family members were dead. Pardo later shot himself to death at his brother's Sylmar home.
"There are so many different complexities to an event like that," Raney said. "That night there were 25 people at the house and we had to find everyone who wasn't accounted for. It took two or three days to go through the burned out house, recover all the bodies and ID the victims."
And beyond the physical evidence, police were looking to explain why it happened.
"You look for motive and you look for co-conspirators," Raney said. "And there's lots of forensic evidence. You're trying to find a reason … an explanation for the inexplicable."
Raney said he arrived about 20 minutes after the shooting took place.
"It's an experience I'll never forget," he said. "We set up a command post and we had firefighters there trying to put out the blaze. The house was fully engulfed and there were rounds going off inside because there were four guns involved and he had dropped some and left them behind."
In the aftermath of the Covina tragedy, police were also tasked with helping family members, friends and neighborhood residents come to grips with the situation.
"There is no script or guide on how to do that," Raney said. "In this situation the Ortega family had a tremendous amount of character, and the neighborhood was very supportive. We brought in mental health professionals to help them try to heal."
Raney said the mental health support was crucial.
"We had one meeting two days after the event for the affected neighborhood and another meeting two days after that for the general public," he said. "We wanted to put those out as fast as we could so there were no rumors running around."
Raney said his department has stepped up patrols of area schools in the wake of Friday's school shooting in Connecticut.
"I'm sure schools will be evaluating their security plans," he said. "This is traumatic for parents. Kids should be off limits. The challenge is that we live in a free society. And if someone has enough conviction and they don't mind dying in the commission of a crime, it's hard to stop them."


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Chris Brown Flies into Violent, Chair-Throwing Rage at Good Morning America
Asked about his history of violence, Chris Brown flies into a violent rage. Rob Pattinson calls Justin Bieber a liar. Bam Margera calls a girl a whale and gets punched in the face. Tuesday gossip lacks impulse control.
[There was a video here]
Chris Brown reportedly had a violent meltdown in his dressing room at Good Morning America after Robin Roberts asked about his domestic violence case, the legal repercussions of which are ongoing (Rihanna just dropped the restraining order) and which inspired his new album, F.A.M.E. ("Forgiving All My Enemies").
Brown grew increasingly churlish, and when the cameras turned off he "freaked out, storming into his dressing room and screaming so loud, the people in hair and makeup became alarmed and called security… he smashed a window in his dressing room, and the glass shattered and some shards fell onto 43rd and Broadway. ABC security tells TMZ the window was shattered with a chair." Isn't the glass on those buildings reinforced and bullet-proof? I guess a chair could do it, though. After the rage, he tweeted, "I'm so over people bringing this past shit up!!! Yet we praise Charlie sheen and other celebs for there bullshit," only to delete it moments later. At some point in the midst of this, Chris ripped his shirt off and exited the building with his nipples showing and tongue out. At least he didn't have his dick out. [TMZ, @ChrisBrown, images via INF and TMZ.com, video via Gawker.TV]
- Speaking of violent male celebrities, Michael Lohan (does he count as a celebrity?) was arrested last night for three felonies: domestic violence, false imprisonment, and preventing a report of victimization. West Hollywood police say he "showed no signs of intoxication." Shortly after the arrest, he complained about chest pains and was admitted to Cedars-Sinai. Violent rages wear on the heart. [GMA, TMZ, People, Radar]
- Charlie Sheen has agreed to undergo psychiatric examination before he is allowed near his twin sons. This should be interesting. [Radar]
Prince William and Kate Middleton have selected their horse-drawn wedding carriage! Because they live in a world where horse-drawn wedding carriages exist. If it rains, they get to ride in a glass carriage from the nineteenth century. [Us]
- Bam Margera, Jackass, got punched in the face as SXSW for saying a girl "should be in Alaska laying on an iceberg because she's a beached whale." Apparently he was out cold for seven minutes and ended up with "covered in blood" and with a black eye. [TMZ]
- Evan Rachel Wood is nervous to go naked for Mildred Pierce, a depression-era HBO miniseries that requires full-frontal nudity. She plays Kate Winslet's daughter, and it just wouldn't feel real if Kate's daughter didn't go naked with Celine Dion keening in the background, you know? [Fancast]
- Ellen DeGeneres quizzed Selena Gomez about her relationship with Justin Bieber yesterday. Ellen reminded Selena that she characterized Justin as "like my little brother" last time she was on the show: "A little brother is not someone you want to date." Selena: "Well, no, that would be weird." Unless, of course, you never wanted to date him in the first place, but got pushed into it by meddling managers and career needs, in which case it will always be weird. But that's why they invented Scientology! Nothing unburdens the soul like an e-meter. [People]
Saturday Night Live star turned Tea Party activist Victoria Jackson's reaction to Glee's gay kiss: "Did you see Glee this week? Sickening! And, besides shoving the gay thing down our throats, they made a mockery of Christians—again!" How the hell did this lady ever survive in show business? [HuffPo]
- Hugh Hefner ex and reality fameball Holly Madison broke up with the boyfriend she met on Twitter. They got sick of talking in 140-character increments, I hear. [E!]
- You can listen to Britney Spears' new album here. It sounds like all her other albums, but I won't hold it against her. [AOLMusic]
- Rob Pattinson says a story Justin Bieber likes to tell about about R-Patz approaching him at a party and saying, "Hey, my name's Robert. Want to touch my hair?" is a lie. Maybe Bieber got him confused with some other wild-haired fellow who likes handsome young men to caress his head. Like, hmm, Wolverine? Graydon Carter? Leon Wieseltier? [ShowBizSpy]


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Your sense of smell is so important, almost as important as your taste buds. You can recall things instantly with your sense of smell, it is extremely powerful. You can be walking down the street, smell something, and suddenly you remember something you haven't thought of in years, just because it reminds you of the last time you smelled that scent. Half the enjoyment of eating for me, is smelling the beauty of the food.
My father was visiting this weekend, and I found out he has been having trouble with his sense of smell. He seems to be in good spirits about it, and hopefully it is just temporary. Fortunately when he walked up the stairs for dinner on Monday night, he could actually smell the smoky goodness of the Big Green Egg fired up in the back. Now that is heaven to your nose…let me tell you.
Tonight I came home from work to the worst smell ever…fish fertilizer and seaweed. I am telling you, it doesn't get much worse than that. I walked into the house, and the girls immediately started complaining about it. Yes, the men came today to fertilize the trees and shrubs. They use all natural and organic fertilizers, but that comes with a cost, and I am not just talking about money. The smell is so bad, it leaks into the house. Since I am allergic to fish, it is even worse for me. I feel completely sick. There was only one thing to do – start cooking. I needed something quick, and something fragrant, so I went to this recipe in Cooking Light (which I adapted slightly below). I was desperate for anything to saute on the stove. This dish is so delicious and easy – what a treat it was. The problem was the good smell didn't last long enough to wipe out the bad smell, and after dinner I found myself sick again. I couldn't even eat dessert. I am now hiding in the office with a Pound Cake candle lit next to me. I am dealing. Good thing it usually goes away pretty quickly – especially when it is raining. I am still thankful for my sense of smell, but looking forward to smelling rain soon.
- 1 teaspoon canola oil
- 1 tablespoon minced shallot
- 1/3 cup water
- 2 tablespoons creamy peanut butter
- 4 teaspoons hoisin sauce
- 1/8 teaspoon crushed red pepper
- 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
- 1 pound of ground turkey breast
- 1 tablespoon dark sesame oil
- 6 thinly sliced green onions (about 2/3 cup), divided
- 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro, divided
- 3 tablespoons lower-sodium soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
- 2 teaspoons sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon Sriracha (hot chile sauce, such as Huy Fong)
- 1 cup matchstick-cut cucumbers
- 1 cup matchstick-cut carrots
- 2 cups hot cooked brown rice
- 8 Bibb lettuce leaves
To prepare sauce, heat a small saucepan over medium heat. Add canola oil to pan; swirl to coat. Add shallot, and sauté for 2 minutes. Add 1/3 cup water and next 3 ingredients (through red pepper), and stir with a whisk. Bring to a boil; cook 1 minute. Remove from heat; stir in lime juice.
Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add sesame oil to pan; swirl to coat. Add 1/3 cup green onions; sauté 1 minute. Add ground turkey; sauté until browned, stirring occasionally. Add 2 tablespoons cilantro, soy sauce, ginger, sugar, and Sriracha; sauté 1 minute. Remove from heat; stir in cucumbers, carrots, and remaining green onions.
Spoon 1/4 cup rice into each lettuce leaf. Top with about 1/2 cup meat mixture; sprinkle with 1 tablespoon cilantro. Serve with sauce.
For a printer-friendly version of this recipe, please click here: Lettuce Wraps with Hoisin-Peanut Sauce


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Suspicious minds aside, relationships do matter
Elvis Dominguez had just been introduced as the new Bradley baseball coach. He had donned a red BU ballcap that fit perfectly, and now university President Joanne Glasser was helping him into a red Bradley jersey, which he would model over his white dress shirt and red tie.
At this point, Dominguez turned to the man seated next to the podium on the third-base concourse of O'Brien Field and said, 'See, I told you I look good in red.'
Jim Hendry, general manager of the Chicago Cubs, smiled up at Dominguez.
There is some bit of mumbling on the local baseball street about this hire. The focus, since I first heard Dominguez's name rumored as a candidate last week, has been on his relationship with Glasser. She came to Bradley last
summer from Eastern Kentucky, where Dominguez spent the past seven seasons as head baseball coach. You know, it's all about who you know.
Not to discount Glasser's role in this decision. She is, after all, the big boss at Bradley.
But I don't think this happens without Hendry.
Hendry coached Dominguez at Columbus High School in Miami, Fla. When Hendry left Florida to become assistant baseball coach at Creighton, Dominguez followed him to play shortstop. By the time Dominguez had graduated, Hendry was head coach, and he hired the young Cuban-American as an assistant. They remain close, and you get the idea there isn't anything Hendry wouldn't do for his protege, or that Dominguez wouldn't do for his mentor.
'You can't fault me for my relationships,' Dominguez said. 'People are going to talk, but that's OK. I'm here because of Jim Hendry. I'm everywhere because of Jim Hendry.'
Today, Dominguez will be at Wrigley Field in Chicago because of Jim Hendry. Dominguez will throw out the first pitch for the Cubs' game with the Baltimore Orioles and he'll be interviewed on Chicagoland television and radio because of Jim Hendry.
And that means Bradley baseball will be at Wrigley, throwing out the first pitch and chatting up Chicagoland media. Tell me the last time that happened and I might ask: 'That was before God made Adam, wasn't it?'
Relationships? Here's another one. For a time, Dominguez and Oneri Fleita were roommates at Creighton. Fleita is the Cubs' vice president of player personnel. He was here Tuesday, too.
'Life is a network,' Fleita said. 'That's why you work hard and treat people the way you want to be treated, because people remember the positives and the negatives. And Elvis has developed a whole lot of positive relationships.'
Among those, Fleita said, are scouts and high school coaches all over Illinois. Dominguez apparently puts them to good use: Seven of his players at Eastern Kentucky this spring are from Illinois high schools.
'After being in this business for almost 20 years, you're going to have relationships,' Dominguez said. 'You're going to have a network.' And then he brought this conversation right back to where we started: 'And obviously, having worked with President Glasser previously, that was the deciding factor because I know what her passion is, and what her vision is for athletics.'
For her part, Glasser insisted her friendship with Dominguez had no bearing on the decision. A hire based on friendship, she said, can too easily backfire. But she readily acknowledged the way life works.
'Life is about relationships,' she said. 'Life is about networks. Life is about friendships and building upon those relationships and friendships. I have experience working with Coach for six years, so I can testify up close and personal to his ability and talent. And then to hear Jim Hendry and Oneri Fleita substantiate, corroborate and validate those impressions, that speaks volumes.'
Over the next few seasons, we'll see if Dominguez lives up to the hype of his advocates. Although his career won-lost mark is mediocre, Dominguez's record indicates a commitment to strong academics and graduation rates, an ability to develop all-America players and pro draftees, a knack for producing some high-powered offense. We'll see.
'I don't think anybody gives you something for nothing,' Fleita said of Dominguez. 'Somebody can do you a favor, but you have to earn it. We all get opportunities in life, but then it's time to let your feet hit the ground and back up the words.'
KIRK WESSLER is Journal Star executive sports editor/columnist. He can be reached at email@example.com or 686-3216.


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After the NFL suspended Houston Texans punter Brett Hartmann for violating its performance-enhancing drug policy, the league has given him permission to use the very substance he was penalized for using.
Hartmann told KRIV-TV in Houston that he will serve a three-game suspension for taking Ritalin, a medication that addresses attention deficit disorder.
"It was just for ADD medicine, but now I have approval to take it from our doctors and the NFL doctors," Hartmann said this week. "I just made a mistake. Should have got that approved before. Just got to move on. Serve the three-game suspension."
Hartmann was initially suspended for four games. He appealed his case and expected the league to wipe his slate clean, but the suspension was only reduced by a single game. The lone upside for the second-year kicker: he'll have additional time to heal from knee surgery following a Week 12 injury that ended his rookie campaign. Veteran punter Donnie Jones was signed by the Texans to account for Hartmann's suspension.
"It's disappointing because it's kind of hard to sit here and wait on a punter that's got a suspension," coach Gary Kubiak told the TV station. "We got to put a team together, but it is what it is. (Hartmann's) worked hard to come back from his knee injury."


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Check out "Master of the Game" Peter Dinklage, on the cover of Rolling Stone. Notice that he's on the cover alone. No naked Danny clutching and wailing about her dragons, no King Joffrey slicing and dicing his people, not even the skinny hipster boy from The Wall Jon Snow — this cover is all Tyrion Lannister. Thus solidifying his position as coolest person on Game of Thrones, and in the world generally. We welcome our new overlord.
This cover will be on newsstands Friday the 11th.


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The Endorphin Rush: A Story by Dex Tooke
Dex Tooke is an incredible endurance cyclist and he's here today with a great little story based around the concept of "the endorphin rush".
Jonathan Livingston Buzzard
By Dex Tooke
I awoke at 1:00 p.m. Not much rest considering I had gotten to bed at 8:00 that morning. My thoughts quickly reminded me of the day of the week and that I wouldn't have to return to work that night. At least that was good.
I stumbled into the kitchen. Set the microwave on two minutes and started that most important first cup of coffee. Grabbed the half and half out of the refrigerator and went ahead and covered the bottom of my cup with the cream so not only would I be prepared the instant the two minutes had expired but I wouldn't even have to waste energy stirring.
I peered out the kitchen window to check the limbs on my favorite tree to see how bad the wind was blowing. Bent nearly double. Coming from the southeast again. Must be at least 20 m.p.h. and gusty. Doesn't the wind ever stop blowing in Del Rio? The countryside was parched brown in color and the temperature was already over 100 degrees. Another beautiful day in the neighborhood. The coffee was ready. 105 p.s.i. in my 23c tires. Water bottles filled. I put on my faded shorts and grabbed my unwashed, salt-caked, body-odored jersey. "Ah, smell that! Isn't cycling a glamorous sport?" Shoes, helmet, sunglasses, chaps tick. I'm out of here.
The first few miles went slow as I gradually worked the cobwebs out of this ill-treated old body. Living in the "land of manana" for seventeen years on the Texas/Mexico border had taught me it didn't pay to rush into anything. Easy spinning. 15-17 m.p.h. The wind hot and gusty. The desert hot and dry. The bunch grass brown and thirsty. A lone jack rabbit competing for a small area of shade beneath a mesquite tree.
That first bead of sweat began forming on my temporal region and slowly trickling down the side of my face. The heat rising off the pebbled asphalt as the tar began to melt. Pushing a little. Heart rate near the 150 range.
Then after about 30 minutes a strange transformation started to occur. The wind went dead calm. The temperature dropped. I was headed south toward Tlaloc, the Mexican rain god, and as I topped the railroad bridge near the International Boundary and Water Commission I could see a solid blanket of purple covering the countryside. A sea of purple waves. The Ceniza was in full bloom. And shooting out of the purple sage was the long slender arms of the brilliant red Ocotillo. The large yellow flowers of the prickly pear sprinkled the desert floor. The thick single shaft of a germinating Agave rose 18 feet into the blue sky. And the air was so clear I could see some of the white rock facing on the cliffs of the Sleeping Lady over 70 miles in the distance. The Chihuahuan Desert was at her best.
As I approached the riff-raff of the dam I noticed a small buzzard sitting atop the guardrail. Expecting him to fly off as I got close, he surprised me with his boldness and remained on the guardrail even as I passed. Then I saw several more buzzards ahead. Now believe me, seeing buzzards on Amistad Dam is not unusual, but I had never noticed this many. They were everywhere. And all seemed bold. They all stood their ground. I couldn't tell if it was in defiance or fear.
As I passed through American Customs and crossed the dam I observed something different about these buzzards. They were all small. No, young. Some of their feathers appeared immature. Baby feathers. As if they were molting. The pigment of their ugly faces was more pink than the dull red of an adult buzzard. These were fledglings.
It didn't take long to figure out the occasion. These young Jonathan Livingston Buzzards were perched atop this 200 foot dam looking down into the canyons and water of the Rio Grande trying to work up enough gumption to take their maiden plunge into the flight of life. They were there to learn for the first time about wind, lift, velocity, and atmospheric navigation.
It was neat. They were there to discover the essence of their existence, and I was there, too. It was as though I was a part of their world. A world that I had never been curious about or even thought about was suddenly unfolding before me.
I rode atop the dam. A mysterious metamorphosis transpired. My red taped aero bars seemed to grow a projection similar to that of a large ugly beak. My STI shifts expanded horizontally to form a wingspan and my helmet became a cock's comb. The dynamics of my cycling position molded into the image of my feathered friends. I was bonding with the buzzards.
And then suddenly, No friction! The silence. No longer the sound of chain and freewheel. No click of index shifting. I looked beside me. They were there. Soaring side by side. The wind beneath our wings. I was pack riding with buzzards. The flight. Dipping our wings first one way then the other. Learning navigational tricks. Confidence building. Tucking in close behind one of my compadres and utilizing his draft to gain velocity.
As our skills improved we began to dive down faster and faster, daringly close to the rock cliffs, then banking at the last second to glide back over open airspace. Then, pushing the envelope, we dangerously lowered our latitude and flew wing to wing inches above the cold water of the Rio Grande at speeds that kept the adrenaline flowing. I felt true freedom. I felt the rejuvenation of enthusiasm and passion long lost to the hectic life-style of mere man. I was a buzzard.
As I journeyed home and got within a couple of miles of my house I again felt the hot, gusty, 20 m.p.h. wind blistering my face. I gazed and saw the familiar brown of the thirst ridden desert. No brilliant colors. No cacti in bloom. Not even a jackrabbit stirred. Another dreary summer day.
I opened the refrigerator door, pulled out a 32 ounce grape Gatorade, grabbed two oranges, a banana, some chocolate chip cookies and an Eskimo Pie. The bennies of being a calorie burning tri-geek. I relaxed under the cool, refrigerated air. I picked up the latest edition of Runner Triathlete News and began reading an article entitled 'The Myths of Endorphins and the Runner's High'. An eerie presence swept over me. I glanced out the window. A young buzzard was perched on the fence post.
"Exercise physiologists and athletes have long debated the science vs. myth of the 'runner's high'. Some scientists stand behind the 'endorphin rush' while some athletes contend they have been running decades without ever achieving the runner's high. So I decided to lend my two cents worth."
– Dex Tooke
Dex Tooke is from Del Rio, Texas and is one of only six cyclists over age 60 to complete the Race Across America (RAAM)…and he's done it more than once. Dex is also the author of "Unfinished Business", an inspirational story about his attempt to conquer the RAAM. This October, he is holding the first ever No Country for Old Men bike race and continues to promote cycling and endurance sports. For more on Dex, visit his website at www.ultradex.net.


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Justice delays health care law's birth control mandate
Justice delays health law's birth control mandate
WASHINGTON - Only hours before the law was to take effect, a Supreme Court justice Tuesday blocked implementation of part of President Barack Obama's health care law that would have forced some religion-affiliated organizations to provide health insurance for employees that includes birth control.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor's decision came after a different effort by Catholic-affiliated groups from around the nation. Those groups had rushed to the federal courts to stop today's start of portions of the Affordable Care Act.
Sotomayor acted on a request from an organization of Catholic nuns in Denver, the Little Sisters of the Poor Home for the Aged. Its request for an emergency stay had been denied earlier in the day by a federal appeals court.
The government is "temporarily enjoined from enforcing against applicants the contraceptive coverage requirements imposed by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," Sotomayor said in the order. She gave government officials until 10 a.m. EST Friday to respond.
The law requires employers to provide insurance that covers a range of preventive care, free of charge, including contraception. The Catholic Church prohibits the use of contraceptives. That was not acceptable, said their lawyer, Mark L. Rienzi.
"The Little Sisters are an order of Catholic nuns whose religious faith leads them to devote their lives to caring for the elderly poor. Not surprisingly, they have sincere and undisputed religious objections to complying with this Mandate," Rienzi said.
The Obama administration crafted a compromise, or accommodation, that attempted to create a buffer for religiously affiliated hospitals, universities and social service groups that oppose birth control. The law requires insurers or the health plan's outside administrator to pay for birth control coverage and creates a way to reimburse them.
But for that to work, the nuns would have to sign a form authorizing their insurance company to provide contraceptive coverage, which would still violate their beliefs, Rienzi said.
"Without an emergency injunction, Mother Provincial Loraine Marie Maguire has to decide between two courses of action: (a) sign and submit a self-certification form, thereby violating her religious beliefs; or (b) refuse to sign the form and pay ruinous fines," he said.
Sotomayor's decision to delay the contraceptive portion of the law was joined by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which also issued an emergency stay for Catholic-affiliated groups challenging the contraceptive provision. But one judge on the three-judge panel that made the decision, Judge David S. Tatel, said he would have denied their motion.
"Because I believe that appellants are unlikely to prevail on their claim that the challenged provision imposes a 'substantial burden' under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, I would deny their application for an injunction pending appeal," Tatel said.


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Master Gardeners to appear at Boone County Fair
Staff Writer
Rockford Register Star
BELVIDERE — University of Illinois Extension Boone County Master Gardeners will operate a help desk during the Boone County Fair from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Aug. 5-10 at the extension tent at the Boone County Fairgrounds, 8791 Illinois Route 76.
The Master Gardeners will offer information on extension programs. They will also give away butterfly weed and swamp milkweed seeds.
For information: web.extension.illinois.edu/bdo.


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In my recent post from a few days ago, I asked all of you to voice your opinion on some photos pulled from the shot bag. There are a handful of lengthy comments as well as some short comments but there are some valid points being made. The feedback window is still open so take the chance to voice your short creative analysis–comment here–it helps and is greatly appreciated. After reading the comments I came across the word inspiration.
People often wonder what and who inspires creative folk the most.
Personally, I love to ask and to tell. I'm often curious to understand how the creative people whom we look up to, get inspired and how to apply it to the work we do. Just recently I was asked to name a few people who are of inspiration to me. I just began rambling off names of my most recent sources of designspiration…Chase Jarvis, Ffffound.com, Scott Hansen, Shepard Fairey, David Carson…whoa wait, let's back up here. I named David Carson and I'm not even that big of a fan of his work.
For those who don't know, David Carson is a graphic designer whose work is very subjective and experimental. My first glance at Carson's work was quick and right to the point. I didn't love it–I wasn't inspired, in fact it was the furthest thing from inspiration for me. I first felt was a crock and didn't understand how someone could be inspired by his work. That to me suggests that when I was first introduced to Carson's work, I was not given an insight to what others felt was the inspiration for them to like the work. They simply skimmed the surface by saying a name and proceeding to show the artwork. Month's later, by chance I came across the video posted above where Carson talks about design in a very open and humorous fashion. Note: He minimally shows his work throughout the piece.
I now see him as an inspiration, but why?
Carson's work is not the reason behind the inspiration. It's his willingness to talk of how he discovers design; it's his humor that I find inspiration in. This is the most important thing to understand when trying to find inspiration through someone else or when told an inspiration that someone speaks so passionately about yet you disagree. Find out just why they're an inspiration for that person–it could be something truly interesting.


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by David Crane [email protected] USSOCOM's Special Operations Forces Combat Assault Rifle (SCAR) program appears to be very healthy, at the moment, and the FN Herstal/FNH USA "S.O.F. Capable Assault Rifle" (FN SCAR Light 5.56x45mm carbine/subcarbine and FN SCAR Heavy 7.62x51mm carbine/subcarbine) functional/competition prototypes look interesting. DefenseReview received a spec sheet via email on the FNH USA "S.O.F. Capable Assault Rifle" …Read More »
Tag Archives: assault rifles
FN SCAR-L/SOFCAR-L Assault Rifle Update Pic: Large Image (Left-Side View)
by David Crane [email protected] If you'd like to see a large image of the new FN SCAR-Light (Special Operations Forces Combat Assault Rifle-Light), a.k.a. FN SCAR-L/SOFCAR-L assault rifle developed for SOCOM, click on this link. It's a left-side view. This FN SCAR-L/SOFCAR-L large image link was originally posted by "Gab" over at Airborne Combat Engineer on 12/05/04. Click on the …Read More »


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"We're doing things a little bit differently," Heather Champ told me.1
No, wait. That's not right. "We're trying to stay under the radar," is what she said, which I interpreted to mean she was doing something new and different that they didn't want anyone knowing about. We were sitting in my office, in a comfortable SAYL desk chair almost exactly two months ago. Or at least, I was sitting in the chair, alone, reading an email from Champ. I was about to learn about the hottest new service around. A highly-anticipated, stealth mode start up that I knew everyone would be talking about, and using, six months from now. The only question I had was, what is it?
I had been sent an email summons to preview the new thing from Caterina Fake, founder of Flickr and Hunch, and her team of incredibly talented developers, designers, and all around Web-based badasses (including Heather). I was to be under FrieNDA.2 This was new territory for me, and I think, for Fake. She is not exactly known for sharing details of as-yet-unannounced products. And of course, most people do not want to be my friend.
I knew it wasn't a new photo sharing site like Flickr. Or decision-making thingie along the lines of Hunch. Those had already been done. It was about Knotes, or, as Fake now calls it everywhere, Pinwheel.3
And then the reveal: Knotes—sorry Pinwheel—would be like a Flickr for geotagged notes. A service that lets you collect and share notes based on locations. I love location-based services and apps, and have a long-running interest in them. And Pinwheel is, very much, something I've always wanted. A way to transmit and receive information about particular locations that isn't tied to one action—like a checkin, or a game.
I've been using Pinwheel for two months, on my MacBook Air and iPhone. It's good, and I look forward to it getting better. It's a beta, incomplete and with bugs, but it feels solid and full of promise.
The notes are like little messages in bottles, carrying both current events and nostalgic messages out of the past. They give me insight into my friends' lives—their joys, their pains, their passions—and into those of strangers too. It's made me more aware of the world I live in, and given me the chance to share my world with my friends.
It's probably the best new thing I've used right out of the gate since I logged onto Instagram for the first time a little more than a year ago. I love it, straight up.
Major New Features:
- Pinwheel lets anyone leave a note tagged to a particular location.
- You can leave both text and images.
- You can tag notes so they are searchable.
- You can leave notes privately, or publicly.
You can leave them for all your friends to see, or the world to see, or for just one or two (or ten) select people. You can leave them so that only you can see them. ("Don't forget to buy that light your wife loved next time you are here without her.")
- People can leave notes for you to find.
Because you can enter location data on where you live and work into Pinwheel, without revealing it publicly, others can leave notes for you at your home or your office, without actually knowing where either of those are.
- You can follow other people, to see the notes they leave.
- Businesses can leave location-based advertisements. These are called "sponsored notes."
Fake has lots of notes. Most are articulate, precise, and rehearsed. Yet others are casual and spur of the moment. I find myself using it in the same way. I've written long travelogues about my time in Kuwait, and short inspired blasts about New Year's Day.
I leave a lot of private notes, and I like that. But the best part is reading other people's notes. There are at least three ways to wade in: by location, by friends, and by tags. And in the past few months, I've done all of those.
Location is serendipitous. I have a shortcut to the site on my phone's home screen—it works well as a mobile web app—and I pop it open in new locations, and bump into all kinds of new ideas that often feel like secrets. These stories have always been here, I just didn't know about them before. Sometimes people leave news-as-notes. The backstory of a house fire, which I can read while looking at the newly-charred structure in my neighborhood. Sometimes these are tips. ("The best hidden beach on Highway One.") And often, they are deeply personal.
When I look at the notes left by my friends, I get to see the people I know talk about the places they inhabit. It lends itself to storytelling, confession and advice. Births. Deaths. Dates. Triumphs and disasters.
Tags offer another avenue of exploration. Search for the food tag and drill down by location to see what's around. Or if I want to discover a new vacation spot, I can check out the beach tag.
But mostly, this is a service very much in development. The private beta just launched yesterday, and even that slow roll out has greatly expanded the user base. People are going to use Pinwheel for all kinds of unexpected things, in all kinds of unexpected ways.
They will pop open their laptops and phones and see what's around them, or better yet, describe it. They will use it to tell stories and play games and reveal themselves to the world, and use it to learn about the world themselves. It is as wonderful in an old haunt as it is in somewhere utterly unfamiliar. Because even those places we know best, we often know nothing about. In terms of approaching how to use location as a tool, and a toy, and a treasure chest, Pinwheel is, I say, exactly right.
And as it grows and grows, it's just going to get better and better. It will be useful, and fun. It will be the entire world—all of it—annotated.
Would you like to join Pinwheel? I have one invitation left. Whoever leaves my favorite note in the comments below, linked to map data, gets it. This is pretty open-ended, so as long as you don't violate our comment policy, go nuts.
1. Apologies to John Gruber
2. An N.D.A., or non-disclosure agreement, being the more or less standard contract one is often asked to sign before previewing a new product. The FrieNDA? It's just a more informal arrangement. It was basically a way of saying, "please be cool and don't blow this."
3. Before launching in private beta yesterday, the alpha of the product was called Knotes.