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On why Iraq keeps blowing up in the face of the Obama administration, and what it can do to prevent this from happening again. Opinion piece at the website of Foreign Affairs; full article here.
Archive for January, 2010
Blacklisted in Baghdad: Can Washington Fix Iraq's Election Crisis?
Posted by Reidar Visser on Thursday, 28 January 2010 18:03
Posted in Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues, Iraqi nationalism, Sectarian master narrative, Uncategorized, US policy in Iraq: Leverage issues | 12 Comments »
Decentralisation Bonanza in the Iraqi Budget
Posted by Reidar Visser on Wednesday, 27 January 2010 10:33
"Pork barrel" may perhaps come across as supremely insensitive in the Iraqi context and yet this very American expression may be the best way of explaining the political compromise that facilitated the passage of the 2010 budget in the Iraqi parliament yesterday.The key to understanding at least some of the underlying dynamic here is hidden in article 43 of the new budget law, which specifies special rates of added income for a number of Iraqi governorates according to their economic structure… Full story here.
Posted in Basra and southern regionalism, Iraq - regionalism - general, Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues, Oil in Iraq | 21 Comments »
The New De-Baathification Board?
Posted by Reidar Visser on Tuesday, 26 January 2010 16:26
The big news out of Iraq today is of course the passage of the 2010 budget, but since the final document (including the all-important annexes) has been a little slow to emerge, we might as well have a look at another interesting item in the meanwhile, published this morning by Sumaria TV.
Sumaria, which was also the first to publish the names of the 511 banned candidates for the 7 March parliamentary elections, claims to have obtained the revised list of candidates for the de-Baathification board that the government is eager to put in place in order to improve the legal façade of its de-Baathification process. According to the sources, the new names are Kamran Rasul and Bakhtiyar Umar from the Kurdistani list, Haydar Hanun of Daawa, Falah al-Shanshal of the Sadrist list (he has lately been the most outspoken parliamentary supporter of Lami/Chalabi's de-Baathification policy), Muhammad Salim and Mahdi Salih listed as Iraqi National Alliance (presumably ISCI or close to ISCI since the Sadrists are listed separately), and Abd al-Razzaq Hassan of Tawafuq.
The apparent removal of Walid al-Hilli, Maliki's preferred candidate to head the commission, is interesting. Other than that, it has to be said that with the exception of Shanshal, these aren't individuals about whom a great deal is known. But if the party affiliations are correct as reported (the candidature of Shanshal, at least, has been confirmed by other sources) then this is bad news indeed. Blunt, straightforward ethno-sectarian and party-based muhasasa with 4 Shiite Islamists, 2 Kurds, 1 token Sunni Islamist and, as usual, no one representing the secular nationalists. The board was reportedly not voted on today even though Shanshal had pressed for such a vote.
Posted in Iraqi constitutional issues, Iraqi nationalism, UIA dynamics | 6 Comments »
The Ghost of Paul Bremer Strikes Again: Nine Entities Banned with Reference to CPA Order 97
Posted by Reidar Visser on Monday, 25 January 2010 22:15
The Iraqi elections commission (IHEC) has earlier queried the constitutional court about the relationship between excluded party leaders and the entities they represent. Last December it asked whether it would be constitutional to ban an entity if its leader were excluded; the court replied it did not want to issue an opinion on this and said the matter rested with the IHEC. It was subsequently rumoured that the accountability and justice board wanted to exclude between 10 and 15 entities, and it was thought that there might be an attempt at linking the banning of entity heads and their entire parties.
Today, the IHEC has acted in a bolder fashion. Referring to section 5 of CPA order 97 from 2004, they have cancelled the approval of 9 entities previously slated to take part in the elections. CPA order 97 is an unmistakable Paul Bremer creation. It pompously begins, "Pursuant to my authority as Administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority…" The relevant section simply runs as follows, "All further matters regarding the regulation and certification of political entities lie with the Commission exclusively". Very general and wide-ranging powers indeed. The document was signed on 7 June 2004; the "commission" referred to is what was then the "Independent Electoral Commission", which later became the "higher commission".
The entities affected include two sub-entities within Iraqiyya (most famously the Hiwar front of Salih al-Mutlak); two parties within Unity of Iraq; the party of Nehru Abd al-Karim; one party within State of Law, and the rest smaller lists and independents. The commission does not spell out what the annulment of the approval of these entities will mean in practice. It says the candidates in the elections cannot use the names and logos of these parties. That may possibly mean that the practical implications are limited – the case of Iraqiyya is in any case more convoluted because the banned Hiwar technically merged with Wifaq to form a new movement or haraka last autumn, distinct from the coalition, and Ayad Allawi is the head of it.
What this whole issue shows is that once more the IHEC is acting in concert with the accountability and justice board. The reversion to a carte-blanche article in a law authored by Paul Bremer – no specific coherent legal justification for the exclusion is offered, just a brutal attempt at asserting boundless power – serves to highlight the murkiness of the waters that we are headed for with this election.
Postscript: Finally, one more detail. By highlighting the names of the party heads in the list of excluded entities, one gets the impression that the IHEC wants to focus on the de-Baathification status of the leader as basis for exclusion. But apparently, four of these leaders are not on the blacklist of the 511 excluded candidates, even though some expected them to be there! The only Arshad on the list is called Arshad Husayn Muhammad Yunis, and yet the party of Arshad Ahmad Muhammad Mustafa (Zibari, a Kurd) has been banned. Similarly, Jamal Nasir al-Karbuli and Saad Asim Abbud al-Janabi have had their lists banned, and yet the list of 511 contains only 4 Jamal and 4 Saad, none of whom have parental names that fits. That inevitably raises the question of whether there is any relationship between the de-Baathification status of the leaders and the banned parties at all, and whether the IHEC thinks that it can outlaw whatever list it bloody well wants to exclude, even for no good reason, as long as it is done in the name of Paul Bremer's sweeping edict from 2004.
Posted in Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues | 4 Comments »
Advantage Lami-Chalabi; Obama-Biden in Real Trouble in Iraq
Posted by Reidar Visser on Sunday, 24 January 2010 16:22
Indications are that Vice-President Joe Biden came up against a wall of resistance when he visited Baghdad yesterday in an attempt at dealing with the recent row over de-Baathification. Apparently, both Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki as well as the parliamentary speaker, Ayad al-Samarraie, went out of their way to defend the idea of "non-interference" in what they refer to as the Iraqi "constitutional" process. Also President Jalal Talabani, who had briefly indicated a position more compatible with the US preference for a delay of the whole de-Baathification process, seems to have fallen into line. At the end of the day, the three Iraqi leaders gathered for a meeting and settled for the worst possible outcome: Those excluded will simply have to await the outcome of their individual cases in the hastily-assembled special appeals tribunal for de-Baathification cases that came into existence only one week ago – the very solution advocated by Ali al-Lami and Ahmed Chalabi of the de-Baathification board all the way. Doubtless, "un-Baathifications" will be available for sale to those who can pay the right price (much in the way they were sold and bought last week) and may go some way to reduce the sense of marginalisation; after all, the aim behind this whole plot was probably just to secure a sufficiently sectarian climate before the elections, which has already almost been achieved. Before leaving, Biden expressed complete "confidence" in the Iraqi process.
Meanwhile, there are interesting reports to the effect that the Maliki government may still try to get a new board for the accountability and justice board appointed in the dying days of the current parliament. Back in December, the legislative assembly failed to approve the list of candidates submitted by the government, mainly due to Sadrist–Daawa disagreement about who should head the committee. Maliki supporters were visibly displeased at the rejection of their own candidate, Walid al-Hilli, and in December produced several documents and statements by Ali al-Allaq and others indicating their belief that the old accountability and justice board was "illegal" (these statements are the ones that have more recently been discovered by Iraqiyya and are now being used as ammunition against the legitimacy of the board). Yesterday, there were reports that a new, slightly revised list of candidates was on its way to parliament.
Importantly, this move should be seen as window dressing rather than substantial change as far as de-Baathification process is concerned. Added to the list of candidates is Falah al-Shanshal, the Sadrist head of the parliamentary committee for accountability and justice whom the Daawa party for a while tried to marginalise. He has been the most vocal supporter of Lami and Chalabi throughout this process, and so even if a new board is appointed this will not by any means represent any real marginalisation of Lami and Chalabi and the hardliner approach they personify, even if the two may possibly fade more into the background in the future. Rather, the latest developments suggest this is simply a cosmetic act aimed at making the committee look more in conformity with the legal framework adopted in January 2008. There is no suggestion that a new board will revisit the 511 existing cases of exclusion (but no one should be surprised if a new board will find grounds for adding some more cases in the last minute).
However much the Iraqi government tries to fix the facade, nothing can change the fact that the whole de-Baathification process is fundamentally flawed from the legal point of view. When pressed, Iraqi politicians tend to defend themselves with reference to "constitutional" procedure. Dusturi, dusturi, dusturi… It is a nauseating chorus. Most of the time this expression simply means "I know I am right but I am unable to provide a coherent argument in support of my position". It is a sad fact that a large number of Iraqi deputies haven't got the faintest idea about the contents of the constitution to which they so solemnly refer; those who do know tend to forget the parts of it they don't like (just to take the most notorious example: the Kurdish zest for article 140 and their indefatigable attempts at pretending article 142 does not exist). And when it comes to de-Baathification, the list of constitutional and legal breaches is indeed long, starting with small but significant breaches of the accountability and justice law (such as reducing the appeals period from thirty to three days and apparently also ruling against Baathists that were only at the firqa level of membership), via dubious attempts to generalise from the individual level to the level of political entities with reference to article 7 of the constitution, to a questionable attempt by the board to use that same constitutional article to act in a more general anti-Baathism watchdog role (even though the accountability and justice law from 2008 specifically sought to limit its prerogatives to a set of highly specific de-Baathification measures). Unsurprisingly, this kind of legal chaos has fostered an atmosphere of vigilantism at all levels: In the capital, Daawa politicians have abruptly invented new procedures for repentance that supposedly may reinstate excluded candidates; in Najaf and Diwaniyya Sadrists and Daawa leaders have declared that "Baathists" must "give up their arms" or even remove themselves from these areas within a specified time period! Interestingly, however, in an apparent admission of the legal vacuum, Ali al-Dabbagh has today asked parliament to create new legislation that would outlaw glorification of the Baath party.
Before leaving, Biden gave Maliki the extra bonus of a promise to appeal the Blackwater case. This will enable him to look "national" (unsurprisingly, most Iraqis tend to agree that Blackwater is just as scandalous as Abu Ghrayb), while conveniently deflecting attention from the deeper systemic problems of the so-called "State of Law" that he is running.
Posted in Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues, US policy in Iraq: Leverage issues | 5 Comments »
Some More De-Baathification Metrics
Posted by Reidar Visser on Friday, 22 January 2010 18:23
The party-level statistics of the fallout from the latest round of de-Baathiciation are now beginning to filter through. This information was not obtainable from the accountability and justice board or the IHEC, since the only document leaked from them was a consolidated list of 511 banned candidates without any party affiliations given. However, the individual parties received lists of their de-Baathification "results" in the various provinces.
As expected, it is the secular and nationalist parties that are hardest hit. The biggest of them, Iraqiyya, has reported that altogether 72 candidates across the country are on the banned list, 22 of them in Baghdad. The Ahrar list, a much smaller nationalist party but one that is even more critical of Iran , says 20 of its candidates are on the black lists. We already know that the Unity of Iraq alliance headed by Jawad al-Bulani, the Shiite interior minister, and Ahmad Abu Risha, the Sunni leader of the Anbar awakenings, has been disproportionately hit even at the highest level, with several entity heads banned. It is a fair guess, therefore, that their share of the outlawed candidates may be even bigger than what Iraqiyya has. Finally, the Coalition of National Unity – which defected from Unity of Iraq soon after its inception but is a similar Sunni-Shiite secularist set-up headed by Nehru Abd al-Karim, an Iraqi nationalist of Kurdish origin – is also widely seen as a main casualty. It is therefore likely that these four parties may account for as much as half of the banned candidates, with the rest being made up of independents plus some symbolic cuts in the Shiite-dominated State of Law and Iraqi National Alliance (reportedly in the region of no more than 10-30 each, perhaps a convenient range for removing internal enemies given that the latter party effectively controls the de-Baathification process).
At the same time, remarkable pieces of information about the utter capriciousness of the entire process keep popping up. Perhaps the most brazen one concerns the appeals process. According to the accountability and justice act of January 2008, those covered by the legislation are supposed to have 30 days to appeal. But without any explanation, that has now been reduced to three days! Surely even diehard supporters of the de-Baathification board must realise the flagrantly despotic nature of that kind of approach. Also, as already suspected, it does seem as if the accountability and justice board has tried to exclude former Baathist regardless of rank, since a good deal of members at the firqa level (who are explicitly OKed for public service under the law from 2008) have reportedly been blacklisted.
Unpredictability and imaginative interpretation of the legal framework are not the unique preserves of the accountability and justice commission either. Today, there is a lot of focus on statements by the Iraqi president, Jalal Talabani, to the effect that Salih al-Mutlak should not be subject to de-Baathification, because he was not a "Saddamist Baathist", meaning he left the party before Saddam became its leader in 1979. The move by Talabani to defend Mutlak is an interesting and positive one, perhaps finally reflecting some second thoughts in the Kurdish camp about the closeness of many of their Shiite Islamist partners to the most repressive corridors of power in Tehran. But again this is not particularly coherent in legal terms. The term "Saddamist Baath" occurs only once in the Iraqi constitution, in relation to the ban on Baathist revivalism (with regard to which it is questionable whether the de-Baathification committee has any mandate at all, since that paragraph is also part of a more general ban on racism and sectarianism). Conversely, the accountability and justice legislation from January 2008 – to which the whole de-Baathification process is supposedly linked – defines the entire period from 1968 to 2003 as Baathist, focusing instead on differentiation between various level of party membership.
Other creative proposals for dealing with the current crisis include a suggestion about public repentance and denunciation of the Baath by the affected candidates! Ali al-Dabbagh of the Daawa, among others, has said things that seem to go in this direction. But once more, this kind of ad hoc public parading of the accused without giving them a chance to explain their past in a wider context would be a contradiction of the general approach to de-Baathification followed by the powers that be in the post-2003 period, where public dialogue and "truth commissions" on the subject have been studiously – and, one suspects, conveniently – avoided. It is generally believed that a more systematic and public approach would show that the Shiite Islamist themselves have silently "un-Baathified" large numbers of former Baathists of their own sect, while publicly maintaining a fierecely anti-Baathist rhetoric.
Particular attention has been given to the alleged existence of a government-level document that declares the current de-Baathification board illegal following the failure by parliament to approve its new board on 12 December last year. This document – which of course only represents a point of view within the government and is not a ruling as such – has reportedly formed the point of departure for a move by Talabani and Tareq al-Hashemi (one of the vice-presidents) to obtain the views of the federal supreme court on the matter. This could be a promising avenue. The accountability and justice board is particularly vulnerable to legal scrutiny because the parliament in practice has cut and pasted those parts of the relevant January 2008 legislation that it liked, i.e. it has kept the old board without electing a new one in accordance with the procedures of the new law, but only weeks ago it super-imposed an appeals court where the procedures defined in January 2008 were adhered to (the old commssion had no appeals mechanism). It is, in other words, a half-finished job, and the inconsistency of the application of the accountability and justice law is therefore perhaps the most promising line of attack that could help solve this entire issue within the Iraqi framework. It would certainly be better to abolish the current de-Baathification board completely than to place much faith in the appeals process at the level of individual candidates. Two caveats, however: The federal supreme court did have a role in putting in place the appeals mechanism (it had already submitted candidates for the court to parliament several months ago and last week asked the council to approve them as a matter of urgency), and, like the current de-Baathification board, the FSC is itself a relic from the CPA area whose constitutionally-mandated replacement has yet to materialise due to the legislative logjam in the Iraqi parliament.
Posted in Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues | 3 Comments »
The 511 De-Baathification Cases: Sectarianism or Despotism?
Posted by Reidar Visser on Wednesday, 20 January 2010 17:36
Late Tuesday night, the Iraqi television station Sumaria published the full list of 511 Iraqis that have been barred from standing as candidates in the 7 March parliamentary elections with reference to the de-Baathification procedures. The list says a good deal about the nature of the recent decision by the de-Baathification board – what it is, what it isn't, and not least what it means in terms of unexpected complications for the Iraqi elections process at a time when many observers thought the institutional framework had been safely locked in place… Full story here.
Posted in Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues | 28 Comments »
The Ruling of the Accountability and Justice Board
Posted by Reidar Visser on Tuesday, 19 January 2010 20:16
The IHEC had promised a list of the candidates disqualified by the accountability and justice board; it then changed its mind and will now simply publish the candidate lists (i.e. those who qualified), fearing perhaps that the other approach would make the excluded candidates into martyrs. And so while parliament today has been told about the 511 persons that are barred from standing in the 7 March elections, the detailed information is still not in the public domain (as of Tuesday evening) and will probably filter through only gradually or in a media leak.
Meanwhile, while developments over the past weeks have amply demonstrated both the politicised nature of the de-Baathification bureaucracy as well as the legal impressionism of some of its decisions, it may be worthwhile to have another look at the general legal basis for its decision to exclude individual Iraqis from taking part in the next elections. What we do know from the parliamentary proceedings today is that altogether 511 candidates have been disqualified. 182 of them belonged to the secret and special security agencies of the old regime, 216 were members of the Baath, 105 were recipients of various medals of honour (including the "Mesopotamia" order), 5 had participated in repressing the 1991 intifada, while 3 were "propagandists" in favour of the Baath.
The obvious question here is whether the de-Baathification body is operating beyond its remit in its eagerness to cleanse the Iraqi public sphere of any trace of Baathism. There is much to suggest that that is exactly what is going on. A key concept here is to be "subject to the de-Baathification rulings", which according to the 2005 constitution would bar Iraqis from various kinds of high office, including running for parliament. But what does it mean to be "subject to the de-Baathification rulings"? Clearly, this is not the same as being a member of the Baath party. In that case, the following clause of the constitution (135/5) would be meaningless: "Merely being a member of the Baath party is not sufficient basis for transfer to the courts, and the Baath party member enjoys equality before the law and judicial protection, unless he is subject to the de-Baathification rulings (emphasis added)". In other words, the constitution clearly differentiates between the two.
A more reasonable place to start would be the procedures of the accountability and justice act of January 2008, which "de-Baathifies" the Iraqi bureaucracy by focusing on certain ranks of membership ("regional", "branch" or "section") or seniority in the bureaucracy (director-generals) – as well as on careers in the "repressive" components of the security forces (i.e. secret services and special forces). In this context – i.e. leaving for a moment aside the deeper questions about the legitimacy of the accountability and justice board – one cannot help wondering whether its leaders may have gone too far even in terms of the strictly legal criteria that are available. For example, apparently the board has this time disqualified people from running for office simply because of Baath membership, regardless of rank. Not only that, what about those who were recipients of medals? The fact that these are listed separately would seem to suggest that they were not party members at all, and after all some of these orders (the Rafidayn medal, for example) have apparently been issued since the days of the monarchy!
The separate group of those who participated in suppressing in the 1991 rebellion is particularly interesting, even if it is small. This probably relates to tribal leaders who were neither party members nor officers, but who opted to join the regime at the time of the 1991 uprising. As a matter of fact, by implication the 2005 constitution actually allows such participants to become deputies, because it is a special criterion for becoming member of the presidency council of Iraq that one should satisfy "the same conditions as those required for becoming a deputy, and also not have participated in repressing the 1991 uprising (emphasis added)". In other words, the constitution specifically envisages the possibility that a person may lawfully become a parliamentary deputy even if he took part in anti-insurgency activities in 1991. (The same logic applies to Baathist membership, by the way: a presidency council member also must not have been a Baathist member "for the last ten years prior to its fall"– meaning, of course, that a Baathist member who quit after 1993 may well become a parliamentary deputy, as long as he does not try to become a member of the presidency council.) And finally, there is the attempt to exclude "Baathist propagandists". This is apparently an attempt by the accountability and justice board to evoke article 7 of the constitution, which outlaws Baathist revival attempts. The only problem is that according to the new accountability and justice legislation of 2008, this is not the business of the committee to deal with. There is no specific reference to article 7 of the constitution in that law, other than a brief mention of it in the glossary of terms. All in all, then, even if these latter points affect just a handful of people, they serve to highlight the brazenness and totally arbitrary ways of a commission that does not even bother to create a semblance of legality for its decisions.
The apparent excesses of the de-Baathification committee are however unsurprising, since this whole process long ago abandoned any pretence of legalism. It may be useful therefore to add one more curiosity to the picture: The recently-formed three-man parliamentary sub-committee within the accountability and justice committee in parliament, apparently with authority to intervene in the work of the de-Baathification board. For a while, it actually seemed as if Washington was hoping this might constitute a possible alternate court of appeal; it now appears that the commitee has in fact approved the final report of the de-Baathification board (the committee report was read to the Iraqi parliament today; as has become usual lately, there was no quorum, but Abbas al-Bayati, a Maliki ally, lauded the committee's work nonetheless). In this context, however, it is the arbitrary procedure by which the three-man board came into existence that is interesting. The constitution, in its standard ambiguous way, says the de-Baathification committee should be "connected with (murtabita bi) the parliament". This is apparently the basis for the formation of the committee, but, again, no role for it has been defined in the relevant legislation that was passed in early 2008. It was filled on the usual muhasasa basis, with a (Shiite) Sadrist, a (Kurdish) PUK member and a (Sunni) representative of Tawafuq, except that the latter withdrew in protest just days after the committee had been invented last week!
The idea of postponing further de-Baathification until after the elections has been criticised for having no legal basis. But those Iraqis who advocate a "legalistic" and strictly "constitutional" approach in this matter should perhaps start by examining the judicial basis of their own position in a very critical way.
Posted in Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues | 5 Comments »
The Bloc That Has No De-Baathification Worries
Posted by Reidar Visser on Sunday, 17 January 2010 18:55
For weeks, we have been waiting for the formal release of the parliamentary candidate lists by the Iraqi elections commission (IHEC), at which point campaigning for the 7 March elections is expected to start in an official way. Pending the formal certification by the IHEC, Iraqi political parties have mostly refrained from discussing the details of their candidate lists in the various provinces. There is however one exception: The Shiite-led Iraqi National Alliance (often abbreviated as the Watani alliance), which last week began circulating its candidate lists in full.
How can the Watani list be so confident and go ahead with the publication of its candidate lists even before the IHEC has formally approved them? The explanation is very simple, and is contained in the Watani lists themselves: Its candidate number twenty-four in Baghdad is named Ali Faysal al-Lami and belongs to the Iraqi National Congress headed by Ahmed Chalabi. Sounds familiar? Yes, that's right, Lami is the director of the accountability and justice board that recently moved to bar several hundred candidates from taking part in the elections. No resistance was offered, and today no one in Iraq seems to be making a big point of the fact that he himself is a candidate in the elections! Little wonder, then, that the Watani leaders seem confident about proceeding with the release of their list: It is they who effectively control the vetting process for the entire elections process. They enjoy full support in this from Iran; meanwhile their leaders are being feted in Washington, where Adil Abd al-Mahdi has just been visiting.
As for the Watani lists themselves – summarised in a rough table below, where the party distribution of candidates is tabulated for the upper part of each governorate list corresponding to the number of available seats in each governorate – a number of interesting trends stand out.
- ISCI, including its close partners Badr and "Jihad and Reconstruction" (a new collective name for what was formerly "Hizbollah in Iraq", Sayyid al-Shuhada and various other southern entities with particularly close ties to Iran, now headed by Hasan al-Sari) is generally asserting its pre-eminence within the coalition, at the expense of the Sadrists. Of course, with the open-list system, voters may reverse this, but as a general tendency ISCI now has more top candidates than the Sadrists everywhere except Diyala and Kirkuk (ISCI is not particularly popular in the latter place given its propensity for listening to Kurdish demands, so it may be a strategic decision to stay in the background there). Interestingly, in at least some governorates, the female quota system (which in practice serves to override both party listings and the open-list system by promoting non-winning female candidates) may possibly serve to dilute ISCI dominance, since the female candidates seem more evenly distributed between the parties in certain governorates.
- The Watani list confirms its image as an essentially Shiite Islamist list, where secular and Sunni participation comes across as ornamental rather than substantial in character. This is seen at perhaps its clearest in Anbar, where except for the top three candidates (including Hamid al-Hayis), the list has been filled up with Shiite Islamists from other parts of the country who cannot possibly hope to win voters there (altogether ISCI won a couple of hundred votes in Anbar in 2005).
- Also in Nineveh, no attempt is being made to reach out to the dominant Sunni Arab majority. Instead the list is packed with Turkmen candidates in an apparent hope at maximising that segment of the vote. In Diyala, the only prominent candidate that might perhaps appeal beyond traditional Shiite Islamist audiences would be Najib al-Salihi, an ex-general of the Iraqi army.
- Much like Anbar, the Kurdish governorates appear to function as parking lots for Shiite politicians that are needed in the next parliament but who apparently do not want to compete (they themselves say they are simply "making room for others"). And just like in 2005, they will win seats not on the basis of popular votes but as part of the so-called compensation seats which under the Iraqi variant of proportional representation are simply awarded to party leaders for distribution to their own preferred candidates. On this basis, people like Rida Jawad Taqi and Hamid Muala "won" seats in 2005 on the basis of the 100-200 votes they received in Anbar and Sulaymaniyya respectively; in 2010 similar seats will go to such prominent ISCI leaders as Jalal al-Din al-Saghir (Dahuk) and Humam Hamudi (Sulaymaniyya), and potentially also to several less known Badr "candidates". These non-elected seats should be more correctly referred to as peerages – Lord al-Saghir of Dahuk, and so on.
- The candidature of Fawzi Akram, a prominent Sadrist, in Arbil, is however potentially controversial. In a number one position, and with the presence of Turkmen minorities in the governorate, he may well be placed there with the intention of actually capturing votes (unlike, say, Saghir in Dahuk). Akram has been a lot more vocally anti-Kurdish on Kirkuk than the ISCI leadership (who are generally considered pro-Kurdish on the issue), highlighting the centralism/federalism struggle within the Watani alliance and potential complications for the Kurdish–Shiite alliance that nevertheless once more seems to be in the making.
- Ibrahim al-Jaafari's Islah front is clearly reduced to a third position, with Fadila fourth, but Jaafari himself is prominently placed as the number one candidate in Baghdad (something that smells of prime ministerial ambitions), followed by Bayan Jabr of Badr/ISCI, Ahmed Chalabi of INC, and Maha al-Duri, a female Sadrist. Other top candidates across Iraq include Adil Abd al-Mahdi (ISCI/Dhi Qar, followed by the Sadrist Baha al-Aaraji and ex-governor Aziz Alwan), Hadi al-Amiri (ISCI/Badr/Diyala), Nassar al-Rubayie (Najaf/Sadrist; he is followed there by ex-deputy governor Abd al-Hussein Abtan of ISCI/Badr).
- Beyond the four big parties, a more fragmented landscape emerges. INC generally has one candidate in a potentially winning position in most governorates, as has the breakaway movement from Hizb al-Daawa (Tanzim al-Iraq) led by Abd al-Karim al-Anizi which now styles itself Hizb al-Daawa (Tanzim al-Dakhil) or "the domestic faction". The Tadamun bloc and other Islamist independent parties are not particularly well represented anywhere except Baghdad, and then there are scattered secularists, monarchists, ethnic parties (mostly Turkmens in the north and Fayli Kurds in Baghdad) as well as various local lists (including most prominently the "Justice and Unity" party led by the Shaykhi sect of Basra).
|ISCI & Badr
& other independ.
|Dhi Qar
|No information available at entity level
*** Rough tabulation showing approximate distribution of top candidates corresponding to the number of seats available in each governorate. The table is apparently best viewed with Firefox; other browsers may intefere with the columns.
As for the candidate lists for the rest of the parties that are not as lucky as the Watani coalition when it comes to controlling the system, it seems we will have to wait a few more days. The IHEC declared on Saturday that Iraqi newspapers would publish the lists of banned candidates on Sunday, which in turn would probably have paved the way for a release of the candidate lists. But who is the head of the "independent" IHEC to make such decisions? It emerged that Ali al-Lami wanted to de-Baathify just a little bit more, so Haydari was apparently ordered to hit the "stop press" button while another batch of last-minute exclusions are under consideration by the IHEC. The lists of those excluded are now expected for Monday instead.
Posted in Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues, UIA dynamics | 8 Comments »
Constitutional Disintegration (Part III): The IHEC Is Making Up the Law
Posted by Reidar Visser on Friday, 15 January 2010 13:34
One of the bewildering aspects of the recent decision to bar Salih al-Mutlak and some 500 other candidates from standing as candidates in the 7 March election is the apparent resolve of both the accountability and justice board as well as the Iraqi elections commission (IHEC) to enforce the ban also at the level of political entities, where some 15 parties are expected to be excluded. The rationale is the idea that an entire political entity should automatically meet the same fate as its political leader.
But where exactly is the legal basis for that approach? One would have thought that the source for such a momentous and far-reaching decision would be easily available. But it does not appear to be in the 2005 constitution. Nor is it included in what today remains of the 2005 elections law. It cannot be found in the series of amendments to that law that were adopted last autumn. Maybe it could be hidden in sections 6 and 7 of the provincial elections law from 2008, which were added to the parliamentary election law through a simple cross-reference in the amendments last autumn? No, it is not there either. Even a quick skimming of the various directives recently issued by the IHEC in relation to the upcoming elections fails to return an obvious reference of relevance.
The fact is that the legal basis does not appear to exist. Rather, it has apparently been made up. The reason we can make such a sweeping claim is that the IHEC itself revealed its uncertainty about the matter back in December last year, when it sent a query to the federal supreme court on the subject. Referring to article 7 of the constitution (which outlaws racist and terrorist parties etc., "and in particular the Baath party"), it asks precisely whether an entire political entity is automatically banned if its leader is affected by de-Baathification measures. The federal supreme court merely answers that this is outside its jurisdiction and is for the IHEC to decide.
So it appears that in this vacuum, the IHEC can make up the law as it pleases, and no force in the new Iraqi democracy feels any obligation to intervene. What is particularly remarkable in all of this is the timing. The request from the IHEC to the federal supreme court is dated 16 December 2009, just a little more than a week after the legal framework for the elections had been finalised in the Iraqi parliament after a second veto had been averted. On 7 January 2010, when the accountability and justice board announced its "bombshell" decision to bar certain candidates, it reproduced the exact language that had been used by the IHEC in its query to the federal supreme court, i.e. "14 entities would be excluded because their leaders were affected by de-Baathification measures". Subsequent to this, many players on the Iraqi scene appears to have taken this charade at face value, including even some in the Iraqiyya coalition who a few days ago circumvented the IHEC logic rather than protesting it, saying that Iyad Allawi was the formal "leader" of Iraqiyya and therefore the bloc should not be affected as a whole even if Mutlak were banned.
To his credit, Rashid al-Azzawi of Tawafuq has reportedly resigned from the parliamentary committee for accountability and justice, citing precisely the absence of a firm legal basis for the decision to exclude entire political entities. Just to confuse matters somewhat, another Tawafuq representative, Taha al-Luhaybi, today also portrays the IHEC decision as merely reflecting the personal ideas of its chairman (Faraj al-Haydari), but Luhaybi claims to have the federal supreme court on his own side! Also an IHEC spokesperson has said that the final decision on 11 out of the 14 entities has been postponed until next week. But other than that, there appears to be little resistance among the parliamentary forces to the highhandedness of the IHEC, which, it has to be said, has manifested itself on earlier occasions as well. Even more worryingly, the chronology of all of this suggests that there may have been close dialogue on the subject between the IHEC and the accountability and justice board dating back at least to mid-December 2009, and that the decision by the IHEC to go ahead with the exclusions may have been more carefully orchestrated than previously thought.
The big question now is how the political allies of Mutlak and other candidates will react. Are they going to stand up and protest effectively against a malfunctioning and unpredictable system where a shadowy and anachronistic committee whose origins go back to Paul Bremer five years ago (and is supported by Iran today) is still allowed to arbitrarily impose its will? Or will they opt for what some see as the more convenient option of turning Mutlak and the other banned candidates into sacrificial lambs that will make its easier for themselves to gain power and influence? Hopefully, the rest of Iraqiyya will see the futility and hypocrisy of just continuing to accept the current system without any vocal protest. A "democracy" that can be dictated by a partisan character like Ali al-Lami (the head of the accountability and justice board, who, believe it or not, will run as a candidate for the Shiite-led "Watani" list of Hakim/Sadr/Chalabi!) is a system where participation in itself is of limited value.
Posted in Iranian influence in Iraq, Iraq's 2010 parliamentary election, Iraqi constitutional issues | 22 Comments »


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Hi, I'm Kanika. I'm really pleased to welcome you to my blog. This blog is my desire to help myself and others around me create beautiful, happy and abundant lives.
Ahem!! Ok. Can you please explain a bit more? What do you mean that you are creating more beautiful, happy and abundant lives?
Sounds big, I know. I'm not saying that I know-it-all, far from it. I'm actually learning along the way, via my own life journey, through various courses, and with you all.
There are various useful techniques for living a happier and more fulfilling life that we can all benefit from. For example, we can use the Law of Attraction to manifest anything we desire, we can forgive and relieve ourselves of past pain, we can meditate to channel higher awareness into our lives, etc.
These are all easy to apply techniques that we can start practicing at any point in our lives to deal with issues that bother us. None of these have any side effects, except that they will truly bring a deep change in you and consequently in others around you.
So these are some tools and methods that should be known to all of us. In this blog, I want to share all that I know (and that I will learn in the coming times), so that we can all evolve and become more upgraded versions of ourselves.
Alright, I see. But why should I listen to you when there are so many other established speakers on similar subjects out there?
Well, you don't have to. By all means, please follow your heart, wherever it takes you.
When I was starting on my spiritual journey, I realized that I wasn't alone in a lot of the issues I was experiencing.
We all deal with some form of self-belief, relationship, money issues, etc. It's just different flavors. Someone might have more of relationship issues and another might have repeated patterns of finance issues. As we go through life, we all form our own strategies for dealing with stuff.
Because of my unique circumstances, I was propelled to rise up to a high vibration level fairly quickly. I had no choice but to progress quickly. But this gives me a great advantage. When I write my posts, the memory of my yesterdays is still crystal clear to me. So I write from that fresh perspective, remembering what I did then to move on to the brighter now.
My aim with this blog is to help everyone make their life better. It doesn't matter if they have been trying to change some habits for a decade or if they've just started. I want to explain as best as I can, every little step so that we can all advance forward. After all, this whole journey is little steps, turning into massive steps.
That's interesting. I'm curious. What are the unique circumstances that made you level up quickly?
It's not something really pleasant to talk about. But I guess I've come to terms with it.
At the time when I was getting on this journey, I was a mum to a toddler and I had a second one in my belly. We were expecting our little baby girl to arrive soon and all preparations were in progress
But that was not to be. One month before my due date, I woke up not feeling any movements in my tummy. And just like that, we had lost our beautiful darling daughter, Ayana.
The next few days involved giving birth to our precious little angel, seeing her for the first time, watching her lovely little face sleeping, holding her fragile body and then bidding her goodbye. I don't know how we did it.
We got all the support and love in the world, but this still wasn't easy. Nothing, just nothing, gave me any peace, except meditation. It was during meditation that I sought answers to questions that most deeply bugged me, such as, was Ayana ok after leaving her body, how do I cope with the loss, etc.
Slowly, this whole episode started me on a higher path. It was like learning to walk. I started a journey of stopping my negative chatter and being peaceful at most times, regardless of life. I learned to have more meaning in my life. Oh, so many things. I think I should write a post on this one day.
Oh dear! I'm at loss for words.
Yeah, I understand that. I was lost too for quite some time.
It's said that children don't come into our lives so we teach them, instead they come to teach us. I consider Ayana to be my biggest teacher of all.
She has been the front and center of my spiritual quest. With her leaving her physical body, I had a much stronger reason to find peace, to reconnect with my spiritual self, my purest form.
This meant listening to lots of lots of videos, completing various self-development programs, reading tons of spiritual books, and continuing to learn every day.
I'm glad to say that I have been able to find peace and that I smile and enjoy my life every day. Of course, I have my ups and downs, but I am on my path, I have the tools, and I can generally be happy and kicking, just as I was born to be.
That's reassuring…
I really hope it is. I've shared a very personal journey with you to say that life hasn't always been hunky-dory for me. I understand pain, I understand depression, I understand feeling alone, maybe not in the exact way you feel sometimes, but I can definitely relate to it.
And I know how to get out of all the pain and sadness.
That's why I want to help relieve it, for anybody that I possibly can. I want to help you live a better life and be truly, internally, blissfully happy.
As I share materials here, I hope these will inspire you as much as they've inspired me. I'd love to connect with you and to grow together with you to a higher spiritual level.
Love this! Thanks so much. I look forward to reading more.
Please do. And please leave a comment. That'll be a big boost and then I can make sure I'm sharing stuff that inspires you 🙂

subset: commoncrawl


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The first thing that love is is…a word, and the thing about words is that they mean whatever we say they mean. That's how words work.
In this case, we've assigned a LOT of meanings to these four letters. No wonder it gets a bit confusing!
It's kinda like the word "dog." Everybody THINKS they know what it means, but the word elicits very different images in people's minds.
Not only is there a LOT of variation between dogs in size, shape, color, and demeanor, but what happens when you see a reddish animal with a long, fluffy tail? Is that a fox or a dog? Or is a fox also a dog? And when a Great Dane walks up and it's as tall as you – shouldn't that be a horse?
Well, the word "love" is even more confusing that that.
This video explains a dozen distinct things we often call love, from "liking" a lot to sex to True Love. Watch and then decide which definitions are really love and which aren't.
Once you more clearly understand the many definitions of love, you may find it easier to understand your own feelings, motivations and personal experience of love.
Where do you fall on the "Love is a Word" love slider?
|1: Who cares? This website has nothing useful for me.
|3: Don't confuse me with words! I mean, don't clear up my confusion! I'd rather live with my illusions for as long as possible than grow up and face reality.
|5: I see your point, but I'm not 100% convinced. I like the thrill of romance better than the joy of true love.
|7: Sometimes I'm selfish or expect too much of my friends and romantic partners, but I'm learning to do better!
|10: True Love is my favorite motivation. Nothing makes me happier than seeing people (including myself) happy and growing.
11. Going to extremes: now that you're armed with some knowledge about love, don't beat everyone over the head with it. Don't expect that understanding these concepts should transform instantly into the ability to love perfectly. Growing up and learning to love takes time and practice, so be patient (which is one of the things love does so well!).
- How "mature" is your love for various people? How much do you care about their well being and progress vs. hoping to get something for yourself from the relationship?
- How much do you enjoy investing yourself for others? What results do you notice from your love efforts?
- Rewatch your favorite romance movie, or listen to your favorite songs about love, and identify evidence of various love types or stages. What do the characters seem to understand or misunderstand about love?
- Practice some of the Love Abilities from LOVE 110 and observe your feelings. How good are you at experiencing love's joy?


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Supre Skirt, Supre Top, Supre Sunglasses, Betts Shoes, Sportsgirl Bag
Guess what guys, I have finally finished my degree! Yes, those six torturous years of university have finally come to an end and it is so surreal. So to celebrate I thought I'd get back into my blogging! It's been way too long since my last post so here's a little summer themed outfit from Supre to get us in the summer and celebratory mood.
First of all, I'm obsessed with this crochet cropped top. It's so comfortable and so summery and I can see myself wearing it all summer long. This skirt is such a fun and bold colour and I'm loving it too. I can't wait to wear it to the beach soon paired with my white one piece from my previous post (now that I have all the time in the world!)
Anyway, I hope you have all been well and I hope to post more outfits, as well as some different types of posts on this blog very soon!


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ROANOKE, Va. — In the battle to improve patient outcomes, many facilities are trying out low-airflow beds. These beds are designed to pump air through the mattress and provide a cooler, dryer environment to improve the skin care for high-risk patients. These beds are extremely expensive, and the good news is that almost all the bed linens currently in use work well with this new bed.
The bad news is that traditional incontinent pads are not recommended for use on low-airflow beds. The traditional barrier backing inhibits air flow and creates a zone where there is no air movement. Bed manufacturers recommend the use of a special disposable pad that is designed to allow air to flow through the pad.
These beds came to my attention when staff on several floors suddenly requested that they no longer receive reusable incontinent pads because they had just gotten these new beds. I started immediately to research the beds, the disposable pads, and if there were any reusable incontinent pads accepted for use.
Since the purpose of these expensive beds is to improve the skin care of at-risk patients, it is imperative that they contribute to a noticeable improvement in patient outcomes. Because of this need to justify the expenditure of capital funds on new beds, the hospital staff will always follow manufacturer recommendations. Therefore, it was no surprise when they stopped using the normal incontinent pads.
The problem with disposable incontinent pads is that once moisture is added to the pad, they no longer allow air to pass through the pad. The fluid-absorbent gel in the pad creates an impenetrable barrier. Since there is normally a delay between the use of a pad and when it is changed, there is a period of time when the low air-flow bed is not providing an improved micro environment for the patient.
The disposable pads also do not provide a safe product to lift or reposition the patient. The absorbent material in the disposable pads will cause major problems for the laundry if they are not removed during soil sorting and they get into a washing machine. This problem is especially severe if you use a tunnel washer.
I checked with several major linen companies to see if they had developed a pad that would work on a low-airflow bed. I was looking for a pad that would provide the benefits on a continuous basis.
Key factors to be considered are:
- Is the pad commercially washable?
- Can it be effectively dried in a commercial dryer?
- Does it wick the moisture away from the patient?
- Does the airflow feature of the pad work under dry and wet conditions?
- Is it strong enough to be used to lift and reposition a patient?
Two linen companies said they have developed pads to use with these beds. Their documentation includes air permeability studies and some clinical studies. I will be field testing these pads in the near future. Nursing has realized the potential problems with the disposable incontinent pads and is willing to look at a more effective alternative.
Have a question or comment? E-mail our editor Matt Poe at [email protected].


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High Strung
High Strung (Also Known As: Free Dance) is a Drama, Music, Romance film directed by Michael Damian and written by Janeen Damian. It was released on 8 April 2016 (USA). It stars Nicholas Galitzine, Sonoya Mizuno. The film's content : When a hip hop violinist busking in the New York subway encounters a classical dancer on scholarship at the Manhattan Conservatory of the Arts, sparks fly…
Genre: Romance, Musical, Drama
Actor: Keenan Kampa, Nicholas Galitzine, Jane Seymour
Director: Michael Damian
Country: United States
Quality: HD
Duration: 1h 36m
Release: 2016
IMDb: 0.6/10


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Axie Infinity
- Play to Earn is here!
Axies are fierce creatures that love to battle, build, and hunt for treasure!
Build up a collection and use them across an ever expanding universe of games!
Axie Infinity is the birth place of play to earn gaming.
Software license
Development activity
116 events +52.63% (30d)
255 events (90d)
Active users
- Daily 1
- Weekly 5
- Monthly 29
- 1 day 1
- 7 days 6
- 30 days 37
Critic Reviews
Axie Infinity New Alpha Gameplay Review (Major Updates)
It was originally a browser-based idle game. But the developer made a major revamp on December 19, 2019 that turned it into an active, turn-based RPG with collectible trading card and monster breeding components. This article will go over the basic gameplay mechanics of Axie Infinity. We'll explain axie traits and parts, stats, battles, adventures, love potions, breeding, and more.
Axie Infinity - Raise Your Axies For Battle
Axie Infinity is one of my best crypto games. I have made a review on this awesome game three months ago, Axie Infinity (Game Review - Raise Your Axies For Battle Time.
Do you love fantasy creatures - you may want to check Axie Infinity Game
Axies are digital creatures which are fantastic and are inhabits of Lunacia which an open world owned by players, also it is controlled and they make their operations in this world. The goal here is to save the Princess to fight off the creatures called Chimera because the Lunacia world is under attack, so Kingdom has to bo strengthen by rebuilding it. Basically, each player creates their Kingdom and fights the creatures. For the creation of Kingdom there is a need to buy different Axies offered by the game with the Ethereum since this game also uses blockchain of Ethereum. The purchase happens in a safe way with MetaMask for the creation of the transactions.
Axie Infinity (Game Review) - Raise Your Axies For Battle Time
Having played some many games, I saw this awesome game yesterday, Axie Infinity. It is kinda of similar to quite a number of blockchain games like UnicornGo, CryptoKitties, & Pokemon and that's basically because blockchain games genre are kinda of limited as at now but I think there would soon be some varieties of new games genre on blockchain. Let's get back to Axie Infinity, although it's similar to some number of games, it still has some amazing new features, which I would let you guys in on soon. I would be sharing my honest review on this cool game as usual, which currently (as at the time of writing this article) ranks at number 37 on the State of the DApps ranking. I know some of you guys can't wait for some of the new features of this awesome game that made me rank it over the other games mentioned above, so I would kindly advice that you find somewhere quite and sit back and read through super awesome game review, that I made just for you.(smiles & winks)
This page had 720 views and 215 clicks (30% CTR) in the last 180 days


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Another Sega game? Yes, indeed, and I actually played it during the same gaming session as the game I played in my previous post, Golden Axe. I'm not that acquainted with Sega games in general, so I'd never heard of World of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck for Sega Genesis, and had been only vaguely aware of its predecessor, Castle of Illusion. The game is a co-op platformer, and, as you'd expect, the animation is top-notch. It's geared for younger players so it has unlimited continues as well as a password system, but the game is enjoyable due to the great graphics and varied locales.
As was usual for these earlier video games, World of Illusion goes beyond just being a basic platformer using a licensed property as is expected nowadays. Along with solid gameplay and a decent number of stages, it provides different stages or variations on stages based on if you're playing with Mickey solo or Donald solo, or if you're playing co-op. The co-op isn't completely mindless and we did end up having to use some continues, and it was pretty much consistently fun. (Although the mechanic whereby one player gets propelled to a higher platform via a seesaw and then has to use a rope to pull the other player up slows things down and gets tedious.) Also, the boss fights tend to be over before they've really begun. There are a number of fun cameos from classic Disney films such as Alice in Wonderland, although I'm sure more obsessed Disney fans would be able to catch more than I did. All in all this was a pleasant surprise and quite enjoyable, so much so that I would actually rank it pretty high amongst the platformers that I've played in a good while. I'll have to replay it solo at some point to see how my first impression stands up, but playing this game does make me want to check out the other classic Disney video games, which I've mostly ignored up to now.


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The coast of Cornwall has some of the best sailing in the UK, with the sea, estuaries, rivers and lakes providing a wide variety of challenges. There are several centres for water sports all around the coast or you can head inland on reservoirs and lakes if you'd rather not deal with waves and the tide. Whatever floats your boat, opportunities abound to try sailing in Cornwall.
If you are a competent sailor you can hire boats to take out alone, otherwise with an experienced skipper and crew. Sailing courses are also available for anyone wishing to take up the sport, or for those looking to develop their skills.
Here are a couple of our own suggestions for sailing nearby:
Penmarlam Quay
Penmarlam Quay is located just 2 miles (5-minute drive) from Valleybrook on the southern bank of Mixtow pill and provides storage and launching solutions to a wide range of boats. Pressure washing for boats is available. The winter storage rate includes one wash off.
Those who just want to trail their boats down and launch can use the site by either paying at the barrier or arranging a weekly or seasonal package. This can be done through the harbour office or via the Penmarlam caravan and camping office situated adjacent to the boat park barrier. For enquiries please call 01726 832471.
Siblyback Lake
Siblyback Lake near Liskeard is a picturesque lake surrounded by Bodmin Moor and offers excellent facilities for all manner of watersports, including rowing boat hire.
Wind-surfing, canoeing and sailing are all available with tuition and row-boats for hire. The lake is also stocked with Rainbow Trout and fly-fishing permits can be obtained on site.
If water sports aren't your thing, then there's plenty more to do at this scenic lake, including miles of walks, excellent bird watching, children's play areas and a tea-room overlooking the water offering delicious cakes and a variety of light lunches. Open April to October. For enquiries and bookings please call 01579 346522.


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Open Day – 22nd & 23rd June 2018 – 10am-4pm
Located just 20 minutes from central London is Gerald Culliford Ltd stocking and sourcing exotic and interesting materials from around the globe.
The open day at their Kingston-Upon-Thames site will provide not only an opportunity to view the mixture of man made, natural stones and surfaces but also to seek the expertise from the Gerald Culliford Ltd team to help source the perfect surface for interior and contract projects.
Gerald Culliford Ltd have earned its reputation for nearly half a century by offering personal service and an understanding of application within residential and commercial settings. From natural stones such as granite and marble to the Radianz™ Quartz range and Lundhs Real Stone.
Gerald Culliford Ltd can provide solutions for larger scale projects with sourcing and cut to size pieces for Architectural Practices and Contractors.
The open weekend is a unique opportunity for interior designers, architects and contractors to source for current and future projects with expertise on tap from the Gerald Culliford team. To find out more contact them directly on 0208 3904656


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Tours and Activities
All tours and activities can be arranged before your arrival. We can help set up your perfect vacation itinerary so you are sure to experience everything Manuel Antonio has to offer. We can arrange the best excursions to satisfy everyone in your group to maximize every day you're here with us at Jungle Creek. We only recommend the best tour operators based on personal experience, guest reviews, safety, and value. GOOD TO KNOW: Almost all the tours include transportation to and from Jungle Creek and most include either a snack or full meal.
Ask for current/seasonal pricing
Quepos/Manuel Antonio is one of the top fishing destinations in the world, especially for Sailfish, Marlin, Tuna and Mahi Mahi. We offer tours with boats ranging from 28 ft to 38 ft for offshore and inshore fishing.
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
Drive your own fully-equipped ATV into the hills and palm plantations where your professional bilingual guides lead you through rustic tropical settings. Visit a local waterfall as well.
Catamaran Cruise & Snorkel
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
This is an amazing experience sailing out on the Pacific. It includes snorkeling, dolphin/whale sighting, food and drinks. Jump off the top or waterslide off the back. This tour wins the "best bang for your buck" tour.
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
A superb tour through the quiet canals of the tropical mangrove forest of Damas Island Sanctuary.
You can travel either by boat or by kayak.
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
You start on the beach and end up in the air as the parasail allows you to view the spectacular Manuel Antonio scenery! You can choose either 15 min or 30 min rides and can go solo or enjoy it with a friend or two!
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
Enjoy being on the beautiful Pacific Ocean with options of in-shore or off-shore fishing. Sail fish, Marlin, tuna, Mahi Mahi (Durado), Rooster fish, Red snapper, snook, grouper and more.......
Waterfall Tours & Trekking
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
There are various ways of experiencing the waterfalls in the area. You can hike (choose your level of adventure), drive or ride horses.
Anyway you choose is bound to be breathtaking!
Paddle Board
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
There are many ways to enjoy the Paddle-boarding experience; a guided tour along the coastline, yoga, night-time tour or in the mangroves.
Jungle Night Tour
Ask for seasonal/current pricing
Experience the creatures of the jungle that thrive during the night.....
The best time to find, observe and photograph beautiful tree frogs, snakes, colourful insects, mammals and other rainforest creatures that only come out at night.
Call or Email to Book your stay today
cell: +011-506-8425-1924 Whatsapp
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email: firstname.lastname@example.com


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Beyond the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) digital data management requirements, the following additional guidance is provided for data management plans (DMPs):
- The principal investigator should determine which data should be the subject of the DMP and make sure that the DMP addresses which data should be shared and/or preserved in accordance with the requirements.
- In determining which data should be shared and preserved, researchers must consider the data needed to validate research findings as described in the requirements and are encouraged to consider the potential benefits of their data to their own fields of research, fields other than their own, and society at large.
- Researchers are encouraged to propose DMPs that reflect relevant standards and community best practices for data and metadata and make use of community-accepted repositories and publicly accessible databases whenever practicable.
- Costs associated with the scope of work and resources articulated in a DMP may be included in the proposed research budget as permitted by the applicable cost principles.
- To improve the discoverability of and attribution for datasets created and used in the course of research, EERE encourages the citation of publicly available datasets within the reference section of publications and the identification of datasets with persistent identifiers such as digital object identifiers (DOIs). In most cases, EERE can provide DOIs free of charge for data resulting from Department of Energy-funded research through the Office of Scientific and Technical Information Data ID Service. However, researchers are encouraged to first refer to their institution's internal processes for obtaining DOIs.
- View a list of suggested elements for a DMP.


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Could you live on $8 or $9 dollars an hour? A computer game made by the Urban Ministries of Durham in North Carolina and an advertising firm called McKinney lets you play out life with a low-wage job as a single mom. The objective is to make it a month, juggling getting a job, rent, a place to live, food and coping with the costs of repairs, things for your child, insurance, etc.. Actually a very hard game to play and full of reminders of the difficulties of life on that kind of salary.
Seriously, if you haven't played before, play it now. If you have played before, play it again. Especially important during this election season.
just playing this game alone made me really stressed and anxious


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(RNS) — Christmas Mubarak! A beautiful Christmas greeting from Muslims to Christians. In Arabic, mubarak means "blessed."
So I was taken aback when "Christmas Mubarak," a new play produced by my theater company in Chicago, unleashed right-wing anger on social media.
How can Muslims and Christians build bridges of understanding? So often conversations focus on that which divides us. I attempted to produce a conversation built on all that we share.
While those who attended the play found it both informative and inspirational, those commenting online didn't need to see the show to have an opinion.
Some thought the play, which presents the story of Mary and Jesus as told in the Quran with musical accompaniment by a Methodist church choir, to be the end of times as predicted in "Chronicles of Narnia": An attempt to create one world religion ("Chrislam") so as to eliminate differences between faiths and dilute their respective meanings.
Others thought it was blasphemous and anti-Christian. How could we stage a play that depicts Jesus as Muslims know him, a holy prophet and not the son of God? The divinity of Jesus comes shining through in the Christian songs we performed, yet the tired old trope of "War on Christmas" still got trotted out. It's odd to consider a play whose title means "Blessed Christmas" to be a war on Christ.
RELATED: A new play, 'Christmas Mubarak,' mixes Christian and Muslim stories of Jesus' birth
Others thought the play was an attempt to convert Muslims to Christianity. After all, our play is being produced in a building owned by a church.
If the deluge of anti-play sentiment had remained online, I'd be less worried. But when emails started being sent to the Methodist church that hosts our theater and to the organization that sends us volunteer ushers, it had gone too far.
All the emails we received were blatantly Islamophobic — almost as if these canned sentiments had been generated by professional Islamophobes.
In Islam, we recognize two significant miracles: One is the virgin birth of Jesus. The other is the revelation of the Quran to the Prophet Muhammad, a man who was illiterate. The first word of the Quran is "Read." The angel Gabriel who brought the Quran to Muhammad also had brought glad tidings to Mary.
How many people know that Mary is the only woman named in the Quran? And not just named, but mentioned more often in the Quran than in the New Testament? In fact, there's a whole chapter named after her.
How many people know that Jesus' miraculous birth is accepted in the Quran — and that it is incumbent on all Muslims to accept Jesus as a prophet if they are to be considered Muslim?
The Islamic world and Islamic literature are full of stories about Jesus and his numerous miracles. Yes, he walks on water. Yes, he heals the blind and the lepers. Yes, he can turn clay into a living bird.
These miracles signal for Muslims the miraculous nature of Christ as God's prophet and messenger.
Our play elucidates some theological differences: We Muslims believe Jesus ascended to God; he was not crucified. But what is wrong with us not thinking he died for our sins? We believe that God would not punish his elite prophet in such a way.
God says in the Quran, "We have created you from a single pair of male and female, and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know each other not that you may despise each other."
In today's America, that means we need to hear each other's stories.
Silk Road Rising, my theater company, believes its purpose is to unleash curiosity. Our core aim with each of our productions is to help viewers open up to a new possibility, to permit them to set aside their beliefs for a moment and consider something else.
When the anti-Muslim personalities began to perpetuate lies online against "Christmas Mubarak," I realized that God's word, "We have … made you into nations and tribes, that you may know each other not that you may despise each other," was revealed for this very moment.
For Muslims, as for Christians, the word of God is a continual revelation. It is not a historic text but one that continues to inspire the better person who resides within us.
As we approach Christmas, let us make a commitment to know each other. Hello, my name is Malik. I believe in the miraculous birth of Christ. Let me tell you more.
(Malik Gillani is the founding executive director of Silk Road Rising in Chicago. The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily represent those of Religion News Service.)


text:
It's time once again for A Month of Beautiful Giveaways, a very special annual feature here on The Beauty of Life! Throughout the month of August, I will be giving away an array of unbelievable beauty prizes from some of my all-time favorite brands. Check back for your chance to win each day!
You know whose fragrances just knock it out of the park time and time again? DKNY. I've never come across one I didn't immediately fall head over heels for, from pureDKNY and Iris to the many iterations of the Be Delicious collection. So I'm thrilled to offer FIVE WINNERS the chance to take home Be Delicious Eau So Intense today. The newest fragrance in the DKNY Be Delicious arsenal features notes of cucumber, grapefruit, magnolia, tuberose, muguet, rose, violet, sandalwood, tender skin accord, blonde woods, white amber, and, of course, the signature crisp apple extract found in all Be Delicious fragrances.
This giveaway has a retail value of $68! Here's how to enter.
Note: PLEASE ONLY LEAVE ONE COMMENT! Do not leave additional comments about Facebook and Twitter entries or mention them in your one comment -- those are counted separately and you do not need to mention them here. Thanks!
1) Leave a comment below.
Be sure your entry includes your email address or it will be disqualified.
2) Like The Beauty of Life on Facebook and leave a comment on the Facebook post about this giveaway telling me why you want to win this fragrance.
If you're already a Facebook fan, be sure to leave this comment on the Facebook post about the giveaway for your extra entry!
3) Follow me on Twitter and tweet: I seriously need DKNY Be Delicious Eau So Intense from @BeautyChick101! #amonthofbeautifulgiveaways
Be sure you are following me or your entry will be disqualified.
This giveaway ends on Wednesday, August 22 at midnight. One winner will be chosen AT RANDOM on Thursday, August 23. Maximum of THREE ENTRIES (one for each way listed above). Multiple entries will be disqualified. Giveaway is open to US residents only.
And here's something extra cool! Visit the "Be Delicious, Be Creative" tab on the DKNY Fragrances Facebook page and submit digital art inspired by Be Delicious. Your art might just inspire the next DKNY ad campaign!
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
A Month of Beautiful Giveaways: DKNY Be Delicious Eau So Intense Eau de Parfum
It's time once again for A Month of Beautiful Giveaways, a very special annual feature here on The Beauty of Life! Throughout the month of August, I will be giving away an array of unbelievable beauty prizes from some of my all-time favorite brands. Check back for your chance to win each day!
114 comments:
I want to Be Delicious!ReplyDelete
I love all the Be Delicious Perfumes, enter me please!ReplyDelete
laurasaurgates (@) gmail dot com!
Five winners? Awesome!ReplyDelete
Absolutely love the notes in this fragrance! DKNY has never steered me wrong in the fragrance department (& I'm a major perfume lover!) From cucumber to grapefruit to crisp apple (& everything in-between!, DKNY Be Delicious Eau So Intense seems like a totally winner! I'd be thrilled to try it! Thanks for offering this awesome giveaway!ReplyDelete
Would love to win this perfume!ReplyDelete
- Lynn N.August 21, 2012 at 9:34 PM
I LOVE this scent. Thanks for the chance to win!ReplyDelete
rawrms at gmail dot com
- AnonymousAugust 21, 2012 at 9:35 PM
You guys have the best stuff ! hope i win.ReplyDelete
Omg thanks for the giveaway! linduhlovesshopping(at)yahoo.comReplyDelete
I absolutely adore DKNY's Delicious collection!ReplyDelete
pochacco8p at gmail dot com
I love the DKNY Be Delicious fragrances! I'm so happy this contest will have 5 winners!! I REALLY hope to be one of them!ReplyDelete
ddpanda at aol dot com
- AnonymousAugust 21, 2012 at 9:56 PM
Have many of the fragrances from DKNY's Be Delicious line. Love them all!ReplyDelete
Wow 5 winneres! How awesome!: ) i really need a perfume and would also love to win this. I have once again not owned a DKNY perfume, and dnt knw the scent of this one but im sure it'll smell wonderful!: )ReplyDelete
One of my favorite fragrances. Not too aggressive, more light and fun.ReplyDelete
Five winners?!? Wow! I love this line!ReplyDelete
Please count me in; I am in dire need of a new scent and this sounds divine!ReplyDelete
shel704 at aol dot com
thanks for the chance! I'd love to win this!ReplyDelete
deeg131 at gmail dot com
Love DKNY. Love Be Delicious. Great scent. ctheno (at) gmail (dot) comReplyDelete
Wow, thank you for another great giveaway!ReplyDelete
mom22girlz at ymail dot com
- Valerie LAugust 21, 2012 at 11:55 PM
How generous 5 winners, I would love to put it onReplyDelete
favorite perfume but havent smelled this variety! want!ReplyDelete
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 12:10 AM
This is such a beautiful scent. DKNY scents are time less. I so hope to win.ReplyDelete
I love this!ReplyDelete
- A.OzairAugust 22, 2012 at 1:32 AM
Ooh..love all the DKNY fragrances!! :)ReplyDelete
aishajamal1 (at) yahoo (dot) com
Five winners... amazing! Count me in!ReplyDelete
Like on Facebook as Joshua Ryan
Following on Twitter as @JoshuaRyan_
My tweet- https://twitter.com/JoshuaRyan_/status/238192294065500162
JoshuaRyan863 (AT) yahoo (DOT) com
Omg Dying to be delicious!ReplyDelete
I'm a FB fan as Constanza Oller de Moore
I follow you on twitter as @connymoore
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 3:49 AM
thank you for the chance!ReplyDelete
pokergrl8 at gmail.com
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 4:38 AM
What a beautiful fragrance idea by DKNY!ReplyDelete
I love all of the DKNY fragrances I've tried so I bet I'd love this one too!ReplyDelete
kaleidoscopequeen at gmail dot com
A woman can never have too many perfumes.ReplyDelete
Thanks for all these giveaways!ReplyDelete
twotil at yahoo dot com
Oooh. I have the Be Delicious/Golden Delicious rollerball.ReplyDelete
vhurst007 @ gmail . com
I would love to Be Delicious smelling;)ReplyDelete
fishing4beauty at gmail.com
another great giveaway,thanksReplyDelete
galyettina at yahoo dot com
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 6:29 AM
I love this line from DKNYReplyDelete
love this perfumeReplyDelete
This sounds wonderfulReplyDelete
I'd love to try this scent. Thanks for all of the great giveaways!ReplyDelete
Would love to win this perfume.ReplyDelete
- Becki DavisAugust 22, 2012 at 6:42 AM
Great giveaway, and love that there are 5!ReplyDelete
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 6:56 AM
I <3 DKNY!ReplyDelete
I LOVE trying new perfumes. What a great giveaway!ReplyDelete
nippytay at gmail dot com
what a great giveaway! this would make a great giftReplyDelete
seriously my favorite fragrance ever! firstname.lastname@example.com
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 7:35 AM
Five winners.... wonderful. I'd love to try this scent. Thank you. Lethalinjectn at/ @ aol.comReplyDelete
- Mel GreenbankAugust 22, 2012 at 7:37 AM
My fav perfume brand, and would love a bottle!ReplyDelete
How wonderful! email@example.com
- Stephanie P.August 22, 2012 at 7:48 AM
I would love this! firstname.lastname@example.com
I really like the Be Delicious line of products. I have tried several.ReplyDelete
Sounds like a great perfume! Thanks for the chance.ReplyDelete
thisisme79 @ gmail dot com
This perfume sounds wonderful.ReplyDelete
Thanks so much for this giveaway.
I only have one scent so this would be a lovely treat firstname.lastname@example.com
this is uniqueReplyDelete
vmkids3 at msn dot com
- Yumsy L.August 22, 2012 at 8:47 AM
I wanna smell yumsylicious. lol.. ( email@example.com )ReplyDelete
great sign me up!ReplyDelete
tiramisu392 (at) yahoo.com
I love to try new perfume!ReplyDelete
I've been wanting to try this fragrance! I follow you on FB and Twitter, and I tweeted about the giveaway!ReplyDelete
Love this!ReplyDelete
blowens32 at hotmail dot cOm
I would love to win this!ReplyDelete
Thanks for such a great giveaway!!ReplyDelete
- Leslie PetersenAugust 22, 2012 at 9:57 AM
I sampled this fragrance and LOVED it! WOWEEEEE! Super duper prize!!! Thank you for the chance! :)))ReplyDelete
I would love to try this scent.Thanks for the chance.ReplyDelete
Would like to win.ReplyDelete
Thank you!
I love DKNY. Thank you for the chance to win.ReplyDelete
tmoyer6980 at charter dot net
Thanks so much for the great giveaway – I'd love to winReplyDelete
Would love to try thisReplyDelete
This will be a present for a friendReplyDelete
Thanks for the contest.
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 11:26 AM
Would love to win!ReplyDelete
Linda, email@example.com
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 11:27 AM
Thank youReplyDelete
rierie11booger (@) yahoo.com
wow what a great giveaway!ReplyDelete
- Viki DelrosaAugust 22, 2012 at 11:59 AM
Love these scents, would love a free one :)ReplyDelete
I love DKNY never smelled any of the fragrances would love to winReplyDelete
I'd love to try this. Be Delicious is already a favorite of mine. trinitygsd at yahoo dot comReplyDelete
I love the name and am really curious about the scent!ReplyDelete
kaytewatts AT aol DOT com
- BrittanyAugust 22, 2012 at 12:46 PM
I have been wanting a Be Delicious Perfume from DKNY FOREVER!!! Thanks for the giveaway!ReplyDelete
I would love to try this fragrance.ReplyDelete
chrystaljns at gmail dot com
- ShannonAugust 22, 2012 at 2:20 PM
I want to win!ReplyDelete
shannon_in_nm at yahoo dot com
I'd love to win.ReplyDelete
I'd love to win because this scent sounds great.ReplyDelete
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 2:46 PM
I love this perfume!! I would be over the moon to win it. firstname.lastname@example.com
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 2:52 PM
I would like to win this giveaway because I have not smelled a DKNY fragrance yet that I did not love Thank you, Jamie.ReplyDelete
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 2:53 PM
I really hope I can win this. firstname.lastname@example.com. 50 Carey St. Elberton GA 30635ReplyDelete
Thank you for the opportunity.ReplyDelete
rounder9834 at yahoo dot com
Sounds wonderful :)ReplyDelete
ktgonyea at gmail.com
Ahhh, I saw this the other day. It smells sooo good. Then was like darn, too expensive for me right now :-/ReplyDelete
prettypolishedpointers @ yahoo dot com
- Sarah SAugust 22, 2012 at 4:01 PM
Thanks for a great giveaway! s2inamug at aim dot comReplyDelete
i bet this smells amazing, i would love to winReplyDelete
susansmoaks at gmail dot com
WOW I'd love to win this!!! firstname.lastname@example.com
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 5:58 PM
Awesome giveaway. I would love to win this :) Follow on Twitter @brandyjoiner, FB as Brandy Curnutt-Joiner, e-mail is email@example.com
The fragrance sounds delish and I love the bottle.ReplyDelete
jryder416 at yahoo dot com
I love all types of perfumes. ThanksReplyDelete
ccboobooy at gmail dot com
Nice, I would love to win. TyReplyDelete
would love to win this for my wife!ReplyDelete
brich22 at earthlink dot net
I love your giveaways, hope I win someday :)ReplyDelete
I want to try this perfumeReplyDelete
dlatany at gmail dot com
I would love to try this DKNY fragrance. I bet it smells delicious! Thanks for the chance to win.ReplyDelete
This is my favorite perfume!ReplyDelete
I could use some new perfume!ReplyDelete
Thanks for the giveaway!ReplyDelete
bmweida at yahoo dot com
I would love to win this.ReplyDelete
Thanks for the giveaway...would love this for my wife, she loves DKNY clothes.ReplyDelete
senorpiero [at] yahoo [dot] com
I'd love this!!ReplyDelete
I'd love to try this! :)ReplyDelete
calidreamin87 (at) gmail (dot) com
I would love to win this!ReplyDelete
This would be a very great and needed winReplyDelete
chrissylea1979 (at)gmail(dot) com
- AnonymousAugust 22, 2012 at 8:30 PM
Ooh this truly does look delicious! Hope I win one :)ReplyDelete
sahairah at gmail dot com
I would like to win as I love new fragrances and DKNY makes the best ones in the world.ReplyDelete
lauraemerson17 at yahoo dot com
I would love to try this fragrance. It sounds fabulous. firstname.lastname@example.com
I love all the DKNY delicious perfumesReplyDelete
please enter me. sarahurick (at) comcast (dot) netReplyDelete
Thanks for having this giveaway, have a great day!
missbonniebelle (at) gmail (dot) com
I would love to try this perfume.Thanks forReplyDelete
the giveaway
I love DKNY's Delicious collection!ReplyDelete
- sona verAugust 22, 2012 at 9:24 PM
i would love to win this giveaway, ive smelled it in the past and looooved it but couldnt buy it for myself. thank you (email@example.com)ReplyDelete
I would love to try new perfume.ReplyDelete


text:
Peabody Energy Chairman And CEO Delivers China Development Forum Address On Economic, Environmental Benefits Of 21st Century Coal
Apr 02, 2013, 21:15 ET
ST. LOUIS, April 2, 2013 /CNW/ - In an address to the China Development Forum Economic Summit in Beijing, Peabody Energy Chairman and CEO Gregory H. Boyce shared his views on how 21st Century Coal can advance China's energy, economic and environmental objectives.
"As China's unprecedented urbanization continues, coal provides the holistic path that the nation needs to provide abundant, affordable energy that drives social and economic progress while meeting the nation's environmental goals," said Boyce.
The concept of 21st Century Coal was introduced by the governments of China and the United States in 2009 to advance the development of clean energy solutions from coal. Requested to provide his personal insights and policy recommendations related to China's development, Boyce made three key recommendations on how China can achieve its economic and environmental objectives through greater use of 21st Century Coal by:
- Continuing to assert its right to drive economic and social development, and the betterment of the lives of its people, through the use of the country's abundant coal resources.
- Following the model proven in the U.S. for solving urban air quality challenges, by increasing the intensity of efforts to deploy modern emissions control technology in China's coal-fueled generation fleet.
- Adopting the principles of 21st Century Coal by implementing the highest standards for worker safety, resource recovery, land restoration and water use in its mining sector.
Peabody's contribution on 21st Century Coal was included in the China Development Research Foundation's Energy & Environment Initiative, a report prepared by several multinational companies which was submitted last week to Chinese Premier Li Keqiang.
"China currently stands at a defining moment," said Boyce. "As unprecedented urbanization continues, the leaders of this great nation recognize that continued development must be matched by care in air and water quality."
"I applaud China for taking a comprehensive approach to energy policy ? one that advances energy access, economic growth and environmental protection. In the decades ahead, China is positioned to once again lead the world in providing the global blueprint for building a sustainable energy future built on 21st Century Coal."
Peabody Energy is the world's largest private-sector coal company and a global leader in sustainable mining and clean coal solutions. The company serves metallurgical and thermal coal customers in more than 25 countries on six continents.
Kirsty McDonald
(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20130402/CG87870)
(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20120724/CG44353LOGO)
SOURCE: Peabody Energy
For further information:
PRN Photo Desk, [email protected]


text:
Larrabee's Furniture + Design is Going Out of Business: LEARN MORE HERE
The average person spends one-third of his/her life sleeping. Considering your health, and ultimately your quality of life, the investment you make in how well you sleep is critical. This is why Larrabee's has contracted with Therapedic to create a line of customized mattresses based on the specifications and designs of the nation's premier manufacturers.


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Realize a financial and social return with high social impact.
Socially responsible investing is gaining traction as an investment strategy that combines the motivations of building wealth and creating social change. What could be better than creating positive impact in your community just by redirecting some of your investments? The way you invest can then help bring about positive change without neglecting your financial goals. Each dollar invested will allow your nonprofit do more. It's truly an impact investment that can be a WIN for all involved (you, your nonprofit, and the community).
Investor Process
Investor: FAQs, IRA's & 401k Rollovers
Where does my investment money go?
Your money goes to your nonprofit you support and elect to invest in.
Do I receive a return on my investment or is this essentially a contribution?
You are participating in an investor which means you will receive a return as the nonprofit makes payments on the loan you helped to fund.
Does my investment realize tax advantages like a nonprofit donation?
No, this is not a gift. Instead, you are making an investment and the interest earned is not tax-free. There would be no charitable deduction unless you elect to forgive a portion of the investment or give back some interest earned to the nonprofit.
What is the structure of the investment I would be making to fund my nonprofits loan?
The investment is a payment dependent promissory note investment. Payment dependent means that a return is directly tied to the nonprofit actually making the required payments on the loan.
How can I access information on my investment?
Each investor will have a private login to access information on their investment including the ability to generate statements on activities. Further, for investments held in taxable accounts, tax documents are mailed yearly.
Can I use retirement accounts to make my investment?
Yes, it is important to be aware of the fact that you can invest in your favorite nonprofit organization while receiving the tax advantages of participating through a self-directed IRA. As long as your retirement funds are held in an individual retirement account or can be transferred into one, those funds are viable.
How do I set up a self-directed IRA?
A. Depending on the nonprofit initiative, it is possible to work with any IRA custodian that will hold the nonprofit investment. The online lending platform is set up so you can easily be walked through the process of setting up a self-directed IRA account through Goldstar Trust Company (goldstartrust.com).
Who is Goldstar Trust Company?
GoldStar Trust Company is one of the nation's leading Self-Directed IRA custodians with over twenty years of experience. GoldStar specializes in allowing its account holders access to a wide range of investment options such as precious metals and other alternative investments.
NOTE: The duties of an IRA custodian are very limited, and include setting up the IRA account; ensuring assets are titled correctly, processing your instructions as directed, issuing periodic statements and fulfilling the IRS reporting requirements. An IRA custodian does not advise on investments or profit in any way from the investment decision you make.
Is there a cost associated with the using IRA funds to invest?
All IRA custodians typically charge fees for holding non-traditional investments in the form of an annual fee and/or service fees. Goldstar charges an annual fee of $65 per year which is very cost effective compared to other custodians.
How can I fund my IRA account?
There are two basic ways you can fund an IRA account. If you currently have retirement savings in either a 401(k) or IRA, you may be able to allocate funds from your current account to an IRA with the custodian services. Alternatively, you can fund your account directly with an eligible annual contribution.
For those who currently have a 401(k) or IRA with another financial institution:
•401(k) / 403(b) / 457 Rollovers – if you have a retirement plan with a previous employer, you can roll over those funds to a new or existing GoldStar Trust Company account.
•IRA Transfer – you can transfer funds from another IRA to fund a GoldStar Trust Company account.


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Four cups – happy home, wi th toothpaste holder, mouthwash cups and toothbrush hanger together, a suit for family.
Four mouthwash cups for families,double squeezing position can be used by adult children. The mouthwash cup is divided into two large cups and two small cups.
Children use small cups and do not have to fear that children can not catch mouthwash cups.
Use magnetic force to absorb water cup, let water cup upside down, can let water flow out.
The structure is easily disassembled and convenient for cleaning.
No nail, no rotation, hanging on the wall, saving toilet space, reasonable use of spare space.
Material: plastic
Gross weight: 743g
Net weight: 770g
Product size: 260*170*85mm
Package size: 270*180*95mm
Wipe the wall clean.
Tear off the protective film behind the indentation.
Stick to the wall and discharge the air.
Install the body to the traceless sticker.
Install the toothpaste to the top of the hole.
Extruding the toothpaste tube to discharge the air.
Place a toothbrush, water cup and other items.
First use, please push 3-5 times.
1. Due to the different monitor and light effect, the actual color of the item might be slightly different from the color showed on the pictures. Thank you!
2. Please allow 1-3cm measuring deviation due to manual measurement.


text:
How we think about where we should work is changing rapidly
Now is the most opportune time for us to consider what makes up the ideal workday. Do we need an office with a fancy oak wood desk? Must we have to commute every single morning at 6:00AM on a crowded train or in slow traffic? Why are we getting up in the morning, what is the purpose of our work?
For many of us, these times will be difficult. Not only are we being pressured to still perform at our best, but we are also being challenged to do this while stuck at home. We don't have a supervisor who is going to monitor our behavior. We have been given more responsibility and some of us aren't prepared for it. And yet, this new responsibility can give us the chance to design how we do our work.
The ideal workday will now be something that we can choose, rather than it be something that happens by chance. We can decide which tasks are most important, how often we need to communicate with our clients and our team, and when breaks are really appropriate. We don't need to tiptoe around others who may not be fond of our company, nor do we need to worry about our outward appearance or attire.
The work is what's most important. We can now enjoy the nuances, the small details of what we do. When things return to the norm, many of us will find it strange. At that moment when we don't recognize what we are doing, even though we've done it before, we must ask ourselves why do we feel this way.
We may begin to see that there are some benefits to working from home and from working remotely. It isn't for everyone but, there will certainly be a lot of us who may consider a change.
Image Credit: Unsplash


text:
WORTHY THOUGHT: God's heart holds a heavenly kingdom of wisdom, love, and joy that He wants to share with you if you will listen. Fix your mind on His Words, And the God of peace will be with you.
"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable— if anything is excellent or praiseworthy— think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me— put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you."~Philippians 4:8-9
~ Angela Lipe-Pattengill