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The 2017 BET Awards celebrated African American accomplishments in entertainment and sports Sunday night.
Hosted by "Saturday Night Live" fan favorite Leslie Jones, the live telecast aired from the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles.
Bruno Mars, Chris Brown, Big Sean and other artists performed during the show, and Chance the Rapper received the Humanitarian Award. New Edition took home the Lifetime Achievement Award.
U.S. & World
Who else won big? Take a look at the rest of the winners.
BET Awards 2016 Red Carpet Arrivals
Humanitarian Award
Chance the Rapper
Lifetime Achievement Award
New Edition
Best Female R&B/Pop Artist
WINNER: Beyonce
Mary J. Blige
Best Male R&B/Pop Artist
WINNER: Bruno Mars
Chris Brown
The Weeknd
Trey Songz
Viewers' Choice Award
The Weeknd ft. Daft Punk - "Starboy"
WINNER: Beyonce - "Sorry"
Bruno Mars - "24K Magic"
Rae Sremmurd ft. Gucci Mane - "Black Beatles"
Migos ft. Lil Uzi Vert - "Bad and Boujee"
Drake - "Fake Love"
Best Group
2 Chainz & Lil Wayne
A Tribe Called Quest
Fat Joe & Remy Ma
WINNER: Migos
Rae Sremmurd
Best Collaboration
Beyonce ft. Kendrick Lamar - "Freedom"
Chance the Rapper ft. 2 Chainz & Lil Wayne - "No Problem"
Chris Brown ft. Gucci Mane & Usher - "Party"
DJ Khaled ft. Beyonce & Jay Z - "Shining"
WINNER: Migos ft. Lil Uzi Vert - "Bad and Boujee"
Rae Sremmurd ft. Gucci Mane - "Black Beatles"
Musicians Performing Live on Stage
Best Male Hip-Hop Artist
Big Sean
Chance the Rapper
J. Cole
WINNER: Kendrick Lamar
Best Female Hip-Hop Artist
Cardi B
Missy Elliott
Nicki Minaj
WINNER: Remy Ma
Young M.A.
Video of the Year
WINNER: Beyonce - "Sorry"
WINNER: Bruno Mars - "24K Magic"
Big Sean - "Bounce Back"
Migos ft. Lil Uzi Vert - "Bad and Boujee"
Solange - "Cranes in the Sky"
Video Director of the Year
Benny Boom - Kehlani, "CRZY"
Bruno Mars and Jonathan Lia - Bruno Mars, "That's What I Like"
Director X - Zayn Malik, "Like I Would"
Hype Williams - Tyga, "Gucci Snakes ft. Desiigner,"
WINNER: Kahlil Joseph and Beyonce "Sorry"
Best New Artist
21 Savage
Cardi B
WINNER: Chance the Rapper
Khalid Young M.A.
Best Actress
Gabrielle Union
Issa Rae
Janelle Monae
WINNER: Taraji P. Henson
Viola Davis
Best Actor
Bryshere Y. Gray
Denzel Washington
Donald Glover
WINNER: Mahershala Ali
Omari Hardwick
Dr. Bobby Jones Best Gospel/Inspirational Award
CeCe Winans, "Never Have to Be Alone"
Fantasia ft. Tye Tribbett, "I Made It"
Kirk Franklin ft. Sarah Reeves, Tasha Cobbs and Tamela Mann, "My World Needs You"
WINNER: Lecrae, "Can't Stop Me Now (Destination)"
Tamela Mann, "God Provides"
Youngstars Award
Ace Hunter
Caleb McLaughlin
Jaden Smith
Marsai Martin
WINNER: Yara Shahidi
Best Movie
"Get Out"
WINNER: "Hidden Figures"
"The Birth of a Nation"
Sportswomen of the Year
Gabby Douglas
WINNER: Serena Williams
Simone Biles
Skylar Diggins
Venus Williams
Sportsman of the Year
LeBron James
Cam Newton
Odell Beckham Jr.
Russell Westbrook
WINNER: Stephen Curry
Centric Award
Fantasia's "Sleeping With the One I Love"
Kehlani's "Distraction"
Mary J. Blige's "Thick of It"
WINNER: Solange's "Cranes in the Sky"
Syd's "All About Me"
Yuna ft. Usher with "Crush"
Album of the Year
"24K Magic" - Bruno Mars
"4 Your Eyez Only" - J. Cole
"A Seat at the Table" - Solange
"Coloring Book" - Chance the Rapper
WINNER: "Lemonade" - Beyonce
Best International Act: Europe
WINNER: Stormzy
Giggs Craig
David Wiley
Best International Act: Africa
WINNER: Wizkid
Mr. Eazi
Nasty C
Babes Wodumo
The 2017 BET Awards aired Sunday night at 8 p.m. on BET.


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The Seattle career of receiver Sidney Rice could be ending not with a bang or a whimper but the snapping of an ACL.
With Rice suffering in late October a multi-month knee injury that necessarily will limit him through the offseason and into 2014, the Seahawks could decide to move on, unless Rice will agree to a major reduction in his big-money deal.
Rice is due to earn a base salary of $8.5 million in 2014, an amount that his past performance and current health won't justify. With a post-June 1 designation, the Seahawks could shed the contract with a $1.2 million cap charge in 2014 and 2015, according to a source with knowledge of the deal.
Given that cornerback Richard Sherman surely will want a new contract after the coming season and that quarterback Russell Wilson's mega-deal is looming after 2014, it makes sense to move on from Rice — especially with the investment made during the offseason in receiver Percy Harvin.
Rice had 15 catches for 231 yards and three touchdowns in eight games this season. Last year, he had 50 catches for 748 yards and seven scores in 16 starts.
It seems that Rice will be sticking around only if he agrees to significantly reduce his pay for next year, and beyond. Given that no one else will be paying him $8.5 million for 2013, it could make sense to take the best offer Seattle eventually makes.

subset: commoncrawl


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It's February in Green Bay, but there still seems to be some thawing going on.
Current Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers and former Packers quarterback Brett Favre made a joint appearance in New Orleans at the NFL's postseason awards show, a surprise to the audience given the history of tension and animosity that's existed between the two of them since General Manager Ted Thompson chose to trade Favre after Favre's late decision to play in 2008 so Rodgers could ascend to the top job. Rodgers said that he thought it was time to move forward so Favre could be recognized for his place in Packers history.
Favre seems to be feeling the same way, at least when it comes to Rodgers. He said that there's no issue with the guy who took over the Packers offense.
"It wasn't awkward," Favre said, via the Green Bay Press-Gazette. "We had some laughs about it prior to going out. Aaron has up to this point an unbelievable career. That goes without saying. You know, I'm proud of what I've done. There is no ill feelings. There isn't. There might be from other people."
We're not sure if Favre's lack of ill feelings extend to the guys who decided on playing Rodgers over him. If they do, Favre's return to the Packers fold for a celebration of what he achieved for the team might not be far off.


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New formula predicts how people will migrate in coming decades
Nearly 200 million people now live outside their country of birth. But the patterns of migration that got them there have proven difficult to project. Now scientists at Rockefeller University, with assistance from the United Nations, have developed a predictive model of worldwide population shifts that they say will provide better estimates of migration across international boundaries. Because countries use population projections to estimate local needs for jobs, schools, housing and health care, a more precise formula to describe how people move could lead to better use of resources and improved economic conditions.
The model, published in the Sept. 29 online Early Edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, improves existing ways to estimate population movement between individual countries and is being considered by the United Nations as an approach all nations can utilize, says the study's lead investigator, Joel E. Cohen, Abby Rockefeller Mauzé Professor and head of the Laboratory of Populations.
"From year to year, it has been difficult to calculate how the world's population ebbs and flows between countries other than guessing that this year will resemble last year. But that is critical information in so many ways, and this model offers a new and unified approach that, we hope, will be of global benefit," Cohen says.
Formulas used until now were so flawed that they sometimes estimated that net emigration away from a particular country was greater than the country's original population, Cohen says, with a result that a nation was left with a predicted population of fewer than zero. "This has been a very inexact science," Cohen says.
To minimize such problems, Cohen and his colleagues used 43,653 reports from 11 countries of migration, which included 228 origins and 195 destinations reported from 1960 to 2004. The data on population and migration were provided by coauthor Marta Roig of the United Nations' Population Division. Cohen then added other geographical data. He and the other coauthors, Daniel Reuman, a former postdoctoral researcher at Rockefeller who is now at Imperial College London, and Cai GoGwilt, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology undergraduate who was a summer intern at Rockefeller, determined how to weight each variable.
The variables they selected were the populations and areas of countries receiving and sending people, the trend over time and the distance between locations. They then added "indicator" variables to account for differences in how nations report their data and used off-the-shelf computer software to estimate coefficients of a mathematical model of migration patterns.
"Our model accounts for roughly 60 percent of the variation in annual numbers of migrants from any country or region to any other, based on historical data, and nothing has come close to this," says Cohen. "This is only a first step, but it is a step that had not been made before. I hope this stimulates countries to come together and improve the standards by which they collect migration data. The data available to us are incomplete, inconsistent and in some cases contradictory. Better data in the future will help to improve models like this."
Understanding international migration has become more important in recent years because fertility worldwide has dropped, Cohen says. "That means the relative importance of migration as a factor in population change is accentuated, particularly for the countries that are the big receivers." For example, significant numbers of workers leave Southeast Asia for work in the Middle East, and migration continues from Turkey to Germany, Pakistan to England and Mexico to the United States.
Source: Rockefeller University
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2008 Whos Who honors 50 UH Hilo studentsUniversity of Hawaiʻi at Hilo
University Relations
The 2008 edition of Who's Who Among Students in American Universities and Colleges will include the names of 50 students from the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo who have been selected as national outstanding campus leaders.
Campus nominating committees and editors of the annual directory have included the names of these students based on their academic achievement, service to the community, leadership in extracurricular activities and potential for continued success.
They join an elite group of students from more than 2,000 institutions of higher learning in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and several foreign nations.
Outstanding students have been honored in the annual directory since it was first published in 1934.
UH Hilo students named this year are: Brianne Kay Adams, Hyung Sang An, Kari Anne Andrew, Amanda Arce, Ashley L. Benson, Rahad Jalil Bilal, Natalie N. Brown, Brian J. Cama, Isaac Jason Crosson, Curtis A. DeLima, Justin A. Dobson, Britany Danielle Dock, Frederick C. Duerr, Manuel Edghill, Marc Fournier, Jason M. Frederick, Dustin Gilmore, Ryan G. Hamamoto, Kristen Chiemi Kehau Higa, Vladimir K. Ivanov, Hyun Ji Lee, Malea M. Joel, Rocky Louis Jorgensen, Heather Kaluna, Christeena Kelley, Yekaterina K. Kharitonova, Akimi Kifune, Jaimie Kihara, Jonathan B. Koch, Geary Gavin Krueger, Celeste Manuia, Lucas Mead, Aurora Ministero, Yuko Miyazato, Drew Morehouse, Stephen Colin Morrison, Nichole J. Rahberg, Alexander P. Reed, Abraham N. Robison, Akira Ruddle-Miyamoto, Atlantis Russ, Tracy M. Ryan, Roxane Salen, Chantelle M. Schieven, Zoie Sevilla, Susan Souksavath, Elsha Tivera, Kiera H.K. Yabusaki, Chelsea Yasuda, Andrew P. Zdyrski.
For more information, visit: http://www.uhh.hawaii.edu


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Something has been bugging me about the report from the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram
The suspect, identified as Eddie Ray Routh, 25, was pursued to a house in Lancaster by officers, including a local SWAT team. Routh again try to flee in a vehicle but was stopped about 9 p.m. after spikes were laid across a road, Bryant said.
"The suspect has been caught and is in custody in Lancaster," the sheriff said. Erath County sheriff's investigators and Texas Rangers were securing a capital murder warrant, he said.
Witnesses told sheriff's investigators that the gunman opened fire on the two men around 3:30 p.m., then fled in a pickup truck belonging to one of the victims. The sheriff's department didn't get a call until around 6 p.m.
Why the 2-and-a-half hour delay in the police getting a call? Something does not add up about that. Again, details are somewhat sketchy, and I am still looking, and re-reading everything I can find. More updates when I can


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Throwback Interview Of The Week: Sam Cassell Feeling Hurt When Asked About Cassidy Making Fun Of His Ugliness On A Track! "Who's Cassidy???" + Azzhole Tries To Disrespect Him
2007 Interview
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DWTS Kym Johnson To Host New Fitness Show On BeFit, Dmitry Chaplin Tango Workout
Heads up Kym Johnson fans! According to Monsters and Critics, the Dancing With The Stars pro will host a new celebrity fitness tabloid-style show called "StarFit" premiering August 10th on the BeFit channel. You can read all about the new show and Kym here. The premiere episode will feature guest star Brian Orosco.
Speaking of the Befit channel….below is Dmitry Chaplin showing a Tango dance workout which BeFit is currently featuring at their You Tube Channel. Come on All. Let's do this with him and be sure to tune in Friday to see Kym!


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When Julia Yacker doubled in the bottom of the 10th inning for the winning run in the Division I championship game last spring, it was the first time Torrey Pines High had won a San Diego Section softball title.
And 5-foot-8 Rachel Nasland, who pitched all 10 innings in the 1-0 win over Carlsbad at UC San Diego, was one of the first Falcons to reach Yacker to start the celebration.
It was the culmination of a dream that started when Nasland, now 17, was just 5 and her mom saw a flier and signed her up to play softball.
She found her passion two years later when she began pitching.
Q: How did the championship celebration start for you?
A: I was on the field before the outfielder even picked up Julia's hit. My mind just went blank. I couldn't believe it. We had just won CIF for the first time ever.
Q: How long did the partying last that night?
A: No one wanted to go home and do homework. The next morning everyone knew what we had done. It was a great day in school.
Q: There isn't much room left in the Torrey Pines gym for your banner, is there?
A: If I have to climb up there myself, our banner is going up in the rafters. My kids won't believe that's my banner when I show it to them. They certainly won't take my word for it without the banner as proof.
Q: Why did you opt to become a pitcher?
A: I liked being the center of attention in a game. I've always liked to entertain people. I'm a little louder personality in the real world anyway, so being the center of attention in softball really isn't anything new.
Q: Your first three years have been marked by some great moments like being named Pitcher of the Year in the Palomar League as a freshman and winning a section title as a junior as well as some not-so-great moments, right?
A: Sophomore year was really hard to just sit down and not play until the very end. I had overused my elbow and rest, a lot of rest, got rid of all the swelling. I tried to be involved like being in charge of playing music between innings or keeping the scorebook.
Q: But for someone who loves the attention, didn't that hurt?
A: At the time, yes. Fortunately, I knew I still had two years left. Had that been my senior year, I don't know what I would have done.
Q: Can you describe what last year was like when your team went 31-2 and won a title?
A: Great season. It was awesome from start to finish. The playoffs were wild. I was so pumped up for the finals and then to have them postponed because of a power failure and then come back two days later was strange. We were bummed, but we rejuvenated. Did you see how many fans were there when we finally did play? It was amazing.
Q: Where do you go from here, especially this year?
A: I understand the game so well now. I love watching it. When I go to a college game, for instance, I watch the pitcher to see how she approaches hitters, how she sets them up. I also watch how hitters work at the plate.
Q: What was the hardest thing to learn about pitching?
A: How to let it go. When you make a bad pitch, forget about it. Or you lose a game. I can't let it go right away. I use it as motivation for next time. I can't sulk out there. My teammates' energy comes from me. If I show that I'm mad or down, they'll go down, too.
Q: Was it difficult to learn all this?
A: There's no manual, so you learn by watching. There's a ton to learn about pitching beyond what pitch to throw. You have to read batters, read the base runners, worry about location and finding a batter's weakness and then you pitch your best pitch to their weakness. Sounds easy, but it's not.
Q: Are you still excited about going to Notre Dame since you committed to the Irish two years ago?
A: I'm excited about seeing different seasons, snow and non-Californians for four years. I've seen little snow because my family always vacations in sunny places, but I can't wait to get to South Bend. It always seemed so far away. Now it's right around the corner.
School: Torrey Pines
Sport: Softball
Born: 1995 in San Diego
Year: Senior
Nickname: Nazzy
Accomplishments: Avocado League Pitcher of the Year in 2010, Palomar League Pitcher of the Year and first-team All-San Diego Section in 2012
Favorite pizza: Hawaiian
Sport you would never watch: Cricket
If you could have a last meal: Starbucks
Dream vacation: Spain
If you had three wishes, what would you wish for: Travel around the world, play professional softball and get more wishes
What three things would you want on a deserted island: cellphone, some books, tanning oil
Talent you'd love to have: Juggle
If you could time travel, would you go to the past or the future: Past
Favorite restaurant: Brigantine
Best moment in athletic career: Winning 16-and-under national title in travel ball in 2011 and winning San Diego Section Division I title last year
What do you want to be when you grow up: Psychologist
Favorite class: English
Your ideal car or truck: '65 Mustang
Favorite athlete: Jenny Finch
Favorite reality TV show: "America's Next Top Model"
Favorite sports movie: "League of Their Own"
Favorite cartoon as a youngster: "Ariel"
Biggest pet peeve: Slow drivers
Biggest fear: Not reaching my goals


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It's hard to believe that Resogun was only shown off a few months ago because it feels like a game people have been hyped up about for much longer. Housemarque made a name for themselves with the Super Stardust twin-stick shooters on the PS3 and Vita, and Resogun looked like the most beautiful twin-stick shooter ever made with a fairly unique visual style to set it apart. Everything in the world is made up of voxels – 3D pixels that are basically the same kind of thing as in 3D Dot Game Heroes, and they break apart like LEGO blocks in that series by scattering all across the screen.
Resogun's premise also helps it stand out. While your core goal is to destroy all of the on-screen enemies (or at least enough to fill three phase bars on the screen) before fighting a boss, the addition of people change things up a bit. Throughout each of the six levels, you'll have ten people you can possibly save. While you don't have to, like in Zombies Ate My Neighbors, it's to your benefit to do so. There, you'd just get a point bonus. Here, if you pick people up from being killed by the enemies and send them off to safety, you might get points – or better yet, items. If you luck out, you'll be able to get an extra life, an extra bomb, a limited-time shield that can withstand a single hit, or an overdrive power-up. The overdrive function gives you a super-powered blast that only lasts a little while, but can save your ass in a boss battle.
One neat little thing is that the bar you've been filling up the whole time at the bottom of the screen throughout each of a stage's phases actually winds up being the boss's life bar – so you must destroy the thing you sort of helped create. In order to destroy it and its many underlings, you'll use the left stick to move in any direction and the right stick to shoot either right or left. At first, it takes some time to get used to a twin-stick shooter with such limited shooting functionality, but it makes you think about each shot before you take it.
The shoulder and trigger buttons give you some additional things to aid you. L1 gives you a boost that can make you invincible against smaller foes as you dash through them to possibly send a person off to safety, or you can use L2 to send a person skyward in case you sense they're in immediate danger. You run the risk of them getting killed, but it's preferable to a guarantee of that happening if you foresee danger. Beyond that, R1 activates the overdrive power-up which varies in overall usefulness depending on the ship you pick. There are only three, so it doesn't make too big a difference, but if you go with the slowest ship, you'll also gain the longest-range overdrive weapon which can allow you to do massive damage from about halfway across the screen. The blast radius on the R2 bomb is the same no matter what ship you choose, and can be a life-saver in tough boss battles – it was for me in the final boss battle where I was one hit away from death.
The circular nature of the environment is an interesting little gimmick. It reminds me a bit of the recent Burgertime game on XBLA, so it was pretty easy to get used to – and leads to the HUD immediately standing out due to its orientation following suit. The best way to imagine the gameplay is to think of a coffee or oatmeal can and then cut it in thirds – you're doing battle on about 2/3 of its circumference. This means that the battlefield can get a bit cramped and you'll have to hope your bullet hell skills come in handy as you dodge enemy fire and the enemies on a short, but wide area. The orientation reminds me a lot of a vertical shooter that is just turned horizontal with how confined it feels and that adds a lot of tension to things.
As a shooter, it's an exciting game and the controls are perfect. The revamped trigger system is much easier to use than the awkward L2 and R2 buttons on the PS3 pad, while the sticks are far more comfortable to use and feel easier to move exactly where you want with ease due to that. The difficulty ramps up gradually, but even if you're a twin stick veteran, start on rookie and then move up because you can easily get swamped trying to start on normal or hard.
Visually, Resogun is a stunning game even if it doesn't look like something that is too far beyond current-gen hardware. Seeing all of the voxels explode and cover the screen and environment is impressive, and the heavy lighting effects and shading deliver some gorgeous graphics. Death is something you may hate in most games, but may wind up welcoming here after getting a trippy game over screen. The bomb visual effect is also amazing, while the overdrive lighting effect fills the screen with color that naturally reflects off of everything in the world and will impress as much the tenth time you see it as it does the first.
Resogun's audio doesn't quite stand out as much as Geometry Wars, but the pulse-pounding soundtrack does get your blood pumping and makes you want to either shoot enemies in a twin-stick shooter or consume Jello shots at a club. It's kind of like Eurotrash music at times, but can also get really epic. It's a strange mix in theory that winds up working in execution. The sound effects for shots and explosions are wonderful and make each upgrade seem more devastating while also making the bombs sound even more destructive. There's a bit of voice worth thrown in as well that makes perfect use of the controller's speaker to relay information to you about humans needing to be rescued or new enemies approaching. For whatever reason, hearing it without the game's audio on the same track makes it seem a bit ominous – something that the robotic-sounding voice effect doesn't need much help with.
With Resogun becoming a PS+ freebie, the issue of the game being worth its full price tag is a bit of a moot point for right now – it's easily worth the cost of a PS+ subscription to check out, and doing so also gets you Contrast now and a truncated version of Drive Club if you stick around. However, it won't be free forever, and it's worth noting that it is worth the full price tag of $15. It's one of the best-playing and easily the most fun experience on the PS4. It controls like a dream on the Dual Shock 4 and makes great use of the speaker too. Resogun has definitely lived up to the hype and is one reason everyone who buys a PS4 early will be glad they did so. It's a short, but sweet game that is well-worth replaying on numerous difficulties and in online co-op.
Reviewed By: Jeremy Peeples
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Rating: 95%
This review is based on a digital copy of Resogun for the PlayStation 4 provided by Sony Computer Entertainment.


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I'm not a historian: I'm interested mainly in the timeless task of understanding the Bahai teachings, leaving history to those able, and crystal-ball gazing to those interested. But those who don't know their history, will repeat mistakes in understanding quite needlessly, so sometimes we need to look back at the history of an idea in the Bahai community, especially where it is a mistaken idea that keeps resurfacing. In this case I am looking at some words attributed to Abdu'l-Baha, Read the rest of this entry »
Posts Tagged 'Bahai Administration'
'You can never organize the Bahai Cause'
Posted by Sen on December 16, 2010
Posted in Community, Theology | Tagged: Abdu'l-Baha, Administrative Order, Agnes Parsons, Annie Boylan, Baha'i Faith in America, Bahai Administration, Bahai lore, bahai theology, Helen Goodall, House of Justice, Isabel Fraser, Louis Gregory, Mariam Haney, Mason Remey, Mirza Ahmad Sohrab, Mountfort Mills, North Shore Review, Oliver Scharbrodt, organisation, Percy Woodcock, Peter Smith, pilgrim's notes, Remey, Robert Stockman, Ruth White, Sen McGlinn, Shoghi Effendi, Sohrab, Sohrab's diary, Spiritual Assembly, Thornton Chase, Y.S. Tsao, سن مک گلین | 10 Comments »


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Seating Chart
Unfortunately, we do not currently have a seating chart for Happy Hollow Park & Zoo.
Upcoming Events at Happy Hollow Park & Zoo
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"Thanks SeatGeek for making this event the greatest experience I have ever had. Next time I need tickets I will be calling you, you made a customer for life."
Aimee S.
"We were able to buy the seats as we were on our way to the game. Easy and convenient!"
Bryan N.
"Easy to use, usually best deal compared to other sites."


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Sunday, August 7, 2011
Richard Heinberg and the limits to growth
A recent video, scripted and narrated by Richard Heinberg and based on his book "The End of Growth"
Heinberg's thesis is that the end of growth has started in 2008 and that the so called "recovery" is only a sleight of hand to mask, for a while, the unavoidable decline. Among many interesting considerations, the video contains a reference to the 1972 book "The Limits to Growth" (see it at minute 2.10) which is described as having been "attacked by mainstream economists using nasty rhetorical tricks."
It seems that we are seeing, finally, the gradual death of the old legend that has that "The Limits to Growth" was just a set of "wrong predictions" invented by a group of lunatic scientists. We are beginning to understand that the study never made the mistakes that critics attributed to it; it is only the result of those "nasty rhetorical tricks" played out in the 1970s and 1980s.
Now, if the end of growth started in 2008, as Heinberg says, it is a stunning success for "The Limits to Growth" study and, in particular, for the "base case" scenario that generated the start of the decline of the industrial system within the first two decades of the 21st century. Exact "predictions" never were the objective of the study and the ongoing crisis may not necessarily be the end of the cycle that started with the industrial revolution, more than two centuries ago. Nevertheless, it is impressive that the authors of the study had understood, already in 1972, how a combination of resource depletion and accumulation of persistent pollution was going to slow down, and then reverse, the growth of the world's economy. It is, clearly, the phenomenon that we are seeing today and that Heinberg describes.
On this point, you may also see my book "The Limits to Growth Revisited".
10 comments:
There are two unfortunate aspects to the new video:ReplyDelete
1)It is above John Q. Public's comprehension level, and
2) It fails to provide a new economic paradigm that can replace the collapsing capitalist system
- AnonymousAugust 8, 2011 at 3:41 AM
And you think that if they do 2) that 1) will be solved?ReplyDelete
We haven't entered the stage of solutions and new economic paradigms yet. First, enough people have to realize that there are many global problems, AND that these are mainly caused by the dominant economic theory of infinite growth. Once enough people realize that business-as-usual is not an option, we as a society can start discussing solutions.
And I believe this video is very good at making that clear. Because it's as simple as can be. John Q Public's comprehension level isn't too low, it's just that he has been brainwashed for 3-4 generations. The crisis will break through that.
Nevertheless, it is impressive that the authors of the study had understood, already in 1972, how a combination of resource depletion and accumulation of persistent pollution was going to slow dawn, and then reverse, the economic growth of the world's economy.
I'm amazed every time I see someone from the 70's already understanding back then what was wrong with the system and what it would lead to. In the past two years I have read books by Howard T. Odum, Herman Daly and am now reading a book by Ivan Illich called De-schooling Society where he sometimes says things along the lines of 'schools are there to turn individuals into consumers and producers to satisfy the need of everlasting growth'. Amazing. Spot on.
The next books I'm going to read were suggested by John Michael Greer on his blog and in his book The Ecotechnic Future: E.F. Schumacher's Small is Beautiful and a book called Muddling Toward Frugality.
Of course, before we already had great thinkers like Aldous Huxley who already had a bit of a premonition of what was happening in the 50's and early 60's, but it was in the 70's that all of the thinking on limits to growth was done. Awe-inspiring, IMHO.
Oh, yes, "Deschooling society". A great book by Ivan Illich; I remember it perfectly; I read it in 1982!ReplyDelete
- AnonymousAugust 8, 2011 at 7:05 AM
It's not written very smoothly in my opinion, and you can clearly sense that it's written from an leftist viewpoint (I'm allergic to ideology), but what I particularly like is the idea of a web of educational exchange, and as mentioned, the fact that he so clearly sees what compulsory schooling is meant to do (stimulate economic growth by shaping the way our youngest think).ReplyDelete
With regards to education: I often think that instead of teachers for every subject taught in schools it would be much better if they picked the best teachers, let them do their thing, record it and put it on Internet, so kids can watch it in their own time and get the very best and passionate explanation of a certain subject. The teachers would then have much more time assisting the children and giving them personal attention.
But of course, the best thing of all, would be no more school in the traditional sense. Ivan Illich shows very clearly that school as an institution always ends up reinforcing the dominant dogma. Which in our current age is infinite economic growth.
In about 10 year's time I'll let my daughter watch some Youtube videos of you, Ugo! And Albert Bartlett. And Bill Mollison. And so on. She will hopefully understand much more, much sooner than I did. :-)
Indeed, "Deschooling society" is somewhat ideological; it was one of the first books by Illich. You may consider to add to your list a later one; "In the mirror of the past," which I still consider one of the deepest books I've ever read.ReplyDelete
Step Back; I think Heinberg is doing something like what I said about Marcus Aurelius: you can't beat entropy, but you must behave as if you could.ReplyDelete
- AnonymousAugust 8, 2011 at 2:42 PM
Thanks, Ugo. It's on my wish list.ReplyDelete
And then of course, we have Growth Busters, new documentary:ReplyDelete
Hooked On Growth
- AnonymousAugust 9, 2011 at 11:48 AM
Finally. I kept donating to that one to see it finished. :-)ReplyDelete


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By now, you have probably read that Tor Books (along with the other divisions of Tom Doherty Associates) will be releasing all their eBooks DRM-free by July of this year. But some of you have wondered what that means for my upcoming novel Redshirts, which comes out June 5. Will it have DRM on it when it comes out? Or will it be DRM-free from the very moment of its release? Here comes the official notice:
Yes, the Redshirts eBook will be DRM-free from the day of release.
Therefore, you eBook lovers will have absolutely no reason not to buy the book the very second it is available, thus driving my sales through the stratosphere, making my publisher very happy and showering me with precious, precious coin that I can convert into my daughter's college education, and also maybe a hot tub. For the cats. Hey, some cats like hot tubs. This is what I hear.
(My thanks to Hillary Veith and all the other cool cats at Macmillan Digital for letting me get just a tiny bit ahead of the curve here. You guys rock.)
Also: The print edition will be DRM-free, too! So that's an option for you as well, don't forget. We like the stores that have the physical version as well. They make great gifts, as well as objects for me to sign when I am on my book tour this June (the dates of which are being finalized as I type this). Camp out at your favorite local bookstore! It's not too early to get in line!
Point is: No matter in which medium you buy Redshirts, it will be totally yours to do with as you will.
And there you have it.


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I'm trying to interpolate between coordinates, as a step in that process I convert latlong to UTM so I can work in metric.
I don't get the expected latlong when converting back, reproduced below:
>>> import pyproj
>>> pyproj.__version__
>>> p = pyproj.Proj("+proj=utm +zone=33 +north +ellps=WGS84 +datum=WGS84 +units=m +no_defs")
>>> p(58.4, 15.6)
(5579373.890337878, 2328887.997220567)
>>> p(*p(58.4, 15.6), inverse=True) # Should return (58.4, 15.6)
(58.284316956873305, 15.63501250163002)
Is there a good explanation for this? How do I do what I want without this issue?


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The Power of Using our G-d Given Talents (and Helping Our Children Recognize Theirs.)
There are twelve months in the Jewish calendar. The talent of TOUCH is the seventh, corresponding to the month of Tishrei (September - October.)
People who have this talent are great connectors. Whether it is through sensory perception, physical touch, or spiritual connection, they have an intuitive sense of how to reach out in the way that will be most effective. They can reach out and touch in a myriad of ways. They love to bond and create meaningful friendships and relationships. This talent draws people to them. Their touch can often be transformative or healing. Their desire to be close and to create deep connections with others needs to be channeled so that it is expressed appropriately.
When we have children with this talent, we can help them to experience expansiveness by giving them opportunities to experiment with tactile games. When they feel sand running through their fingers, or the joys of finger painting or molding clay, they feel touch as a gateway to a deeper connection to themselves and then to others.
A touch on the arm or on the cheek lets this child know that there is a loving parent nearby. We can be role models to our children by showing an example of appropriate touch. When we don't touch what is not ours, they learn that this sense (as with all the senses) has boundaries.
Tools For Developing Your Sense of Touch:
1. Recognize that how and whom we touch can bring harmony or the opposite.
2. Develop boundaries to be "in touch" with appropriateness in relationship.
3. Develop the desire for closeness with family and good friends by keeping in touch.
4. Being in close touch with a friend helps us to give as well as to receive. This creates intimacy in friendship.
5. Sometimes it's necessary to wait for the right time to touch or to be in touch.
The Kabalah of Touch:
The talent of Touch is based on the desire for closeness. It is really a desire for spiritual union. The hands can reach above the head (the mind) to reach for connection with what is Above, for G-d.
The month of Tishrei is full of holidays which connect us to G-d and to our people. The first two days of Tishrei are Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. This is a time to pray for a blessed year and to recognize G-d as our King and the ruler of the Universe. The tenth of Tishrei is Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year. It is a day of fasting and deep essential union with G-d. Soon after is the week of Sukkot in which we dwell in a sukka (see chabad.org for more information about Tishrei its many holidays), shake lulov and esrog and celebrate with great joy. Simchat Torah is the holiday when we complete the yearly cycle of Torah reading of the Five Books of Moses (the BIble) and then begin again. On this holiday we dance with the Torah scrolls and rejoice in our legacy of the Torah that guides us.
The tribe connected with this month and talent is Ephraim, whose name is related to fruitfulness.
Chana Rachel Schusterman is a Jewish spiritual counselor and coach. If you would like to contact her, please email me at email@example.com.


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How The Video Game Industry Was Launched 40 Years Ago... Thanks To Infringement
from the well-look-at-that deptChris Stokel-Walker, over at Buzzfeed, has an absolutely fantastic feature article all about the creation of the video game Pong by Atari. 40 years ago, this week, Atari delivered the first 12 Pong machines (outside of a prototype at a local bar that proved how addictive the game was). The full article is wonderful, with tons of well-researched details. You should absolutely go read it. But one bit that might be interesting to folks around here: this game, which nearly everyone agrees launched the entire video game industry (now pushing $80 billion per year), was based on infringement. Actually, it looks like Atari's founding was basically based on copying games. Before Pong, it had a different video game console, called Computer Space, which was basically a copy of Spacewar!, a game created by MIT student Steve Russell in 1962.
However, it was Pong that set the world on fire. And... it was almost entirely based on Nolan Bushnell copying someone else's idea:
Meanwhile, the first TV-based home console, the Magnavox Odyssey, designed by gaming-industry forefather Ralph Baer, was being released. The Odyssey was demonstrated in Burlingame, California, on May 24, 1972. "It turned out that Al started at Atari almost exactly the same day I went up to see the Magnavox game," says Bushnell. Around the same time, Baer was at Tavern on the Green in Central Park, sitting amongst the 30 or so East Coast retailers to whom his employers were trying to sell his creation. Beaming with pride, Baer could barely sit still. "The entire Magnavox product line for 1972 was displayed there," he explains. "That included the Odyssey game, which was the hit of the show." One of the games on the Magnavox console was a version of tennis.Boom. Bushnell had someone on his team: re-create that basic tennis-like game for arcade machines. And that's what they did. But, they made some improvements. This is, of course, the nature of how innovation works. Two key steps: build on the idea that you see elsewhere... and figure out a way to make people love it. And that's what happened. This, once again, highlights the difference between invention and innovation in a fairly striking manner. And, while the creator of the Magnavox tennis game, Baer, wasn't thrilled about it, the article makes it clear he grudgingly admires Bushnell's ability to take that silly game and turn it into a giant industry.
"I thought the game was kind of crappy," Bushnell says. Yet people were lining up to play it, "and they were kind of having some fun. I thought, If they can have fun with this shite" — Bushnell breaks off into a hearty laugh — "if it can be turned into a real game, that'd be great." On the drive back from the demonstration, "I got thinking of ways it could be improved."
Baer, the inventor of the Odyssey, is to this day ambivalent about his competitor. "Mr. B. didn't 'invent' anything," Baer, now 90, told me via e-mail, "but he started a whole industry, the arcade video game industry. Give the man credit for that achievement. He just simply didn't invent anything."So here's the quick question: which action here was more valuable? Baer's or Bushnell's? This is one of the issues that we've tried to make for a while. For all the talk of how infringement "harms" the inventor, if someone else can build a massive market where the originator failed, isn't that better for society and the economy?
Oh, and part of the reason that the industry itself became so big, was because tons of others jumped into the market as well, often copying Atari (and, eventually, figuring out how to do it better -- which is why consoles today are from Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony... rather than Atari).
Other developers, big and small, saw the runaway success of the game and brought out their own clones to take a slice of Pong's pie. Allied Leisure released around 20,000 cabinets of Paddle Battle in March 1973. Nutting Associates, the company Bushnell and Dabney had worked with to release Computer Space, ended up releasing Computer Space Ball, which was strikingly similar to Pong. There was Paddle-Ball from Williams Electronics, and Rally from For-Play. Midway Manufacturing, then a pinball machine company, dipped their toe into the waters of arcade games with Winner in 1973.In fact, as various studies have shown, with a developing market, it actually helps quite a bit to have lots of copying going on, because it basically cuts the marketing costs of developing that market a ton. That was clearly true with the video game market:
These manufacturers doubled down on their advantage: Not only could they piggyback on Pong's PR success, they did not have to take into account the cost of developing the game: They could simply lift its internal machinery wholesale.Yes, the article highlights that eventually Bushnell had to pay off Magnavox, after they pulled out a broad patent "regarding interaction between machine-controlled and player-controlled elements on the screen," but Bushnell insists that he only paid out because the settlement costs were half of what it would have cost to have won in court (sound familiar?). Once again, the article quotes Baer admitting that even if he invented the game, credit has to go to Atari:
"That's the business," he says. "Most inventions are based on some prior history. Al Alcorn knew absolutely nothing about the existence of the Odyssey game — he deserves the major credit for getting Atari started successfully."The thing is, this isn't a unique story by any stretch of the imagination. Look into the histories of lots of developing industries and you see the same basic thing. Lots and lots of copying and building off of each other... and quite frequently it's that very fact that leads to those industries being so successful. Yet, we look to shut off that possibility due to an over-reliance on things like intellectual property, which hinders that kind of market development.
Filed Under: infringement, innovation, invention, nolan bushnell, pong, video games


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On to the BUZZ -
* Bruce has moved his THE TAX GUY blog – click here for his new "address". I like the new look of the blog.
His post "This Week Started Off Bad. .", under the "Tax something" heading at the end, reminds taxpayers that "No matter who prepares the return, the taxpayer is ultimately responsible for the accuracy of the return."
* Professor Jim Maule of MAULED AGAIN continued his discussion of the new additional Standard Deduction for real estate taxes in the post "Is This How Tax Laws Are Created?". {aside – if I had written the original posting I would have titled it "Why God Why" or "Why God, Why This Provision" – a Broadway musical connection} This time he includes the comments of two of his readers, Andrew Oh-Willeke (?) and a veteran tax pro from Jersey City.
Oh-Willeke agrees with Jim and I that the tax provision "doesn't make much sense from a tax complexity or economic necessity perspective", and agrees with me about the major beneficiary of this deduction being senior citizens who do not itemize
Jim's bottom line - "If Congress truly cared about the impact of rising property taxes on elderly low-income homeowners, it would do something other than enact a provision that benefits a fairly small proportion of them. It would examine the reasons for those property tax increases, and if it did so properly, it would discover that it, yes, the Congress, is responsible for a substantial portion of the increase."
Jim also takes on another provision of the ill-conceived housing bill – the refundable credit for "first-time" home buyers – in his subsequent post "Yet Another Questionable New Tax Provision".
In commenting on the concept of the refundable credit he says –
"This nation has had an educational experience with refundable credits targeted toward low-income taxpayers. The earned income tax credit has spawned so many schemes, many fraudulent, and has caused such havoc among taxpayers and tax return preparers, that the Congress should beware of imitating it without taking steps to minimize the temptations it presents to the schemers who would manipulate it to their advantage. Will the IRS end up directing even more of its resources toward audits of low-income home purchasers as it has had to direct a disproportionate amount of its resources toward auditing the earned income tax credit?"
While I agree, as Jim points out, "A useless credit isn't much of an incentive whether or not one agrees with the incentive", I am against any type of refundable credit. I am especially against the refundable Earned Income Credit – and have written about it on various occasions (click here for one of them).
* Joe Kristan of the ROTH AND COMPANY TAX UPDATE BLOG has introduced us to a new tax blog – THE TAX LAWYER'S BLOG – written by Peter Pappas, "a Certified Public Accountant and Tax Attorney with over 25 years representing taxpayers before the Internal Revenue Service, United State's Tax Court, United State's District Court and Bankruptcy Court", who Joe thinks is from Orlando, Florida.
The blog has a comprehensive posting on the famous Cohan (as in George M) ruling, and has begun a series of posts on "Absurd Tax Protester Arguments".
* The Small Business Tax and Management website's "Tip of the Day" for last Wednesday (8/13) advises "Received a notice from the IRS about an AMT discrepancy on your return? Don't assume the IRS is right." According to the item, "The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) has done a study and found the complexity of the AMT causes errors in determining and computing the tax."
Just another reason why when you receive a notice from "Sam", or any of your other "uncles" (i.e. state tax authority), you should send it to your tax preparer ASAP! At least half of all such notices I have seen over the years have been incorrect.
* Kay Bell provides an update on state sales tax holidays in "Sales Tax Holidays, Take Two" at DON'T MESS WITH TAXES.
* The Tax Foundation's TAX POLICY BLOG reported in "Thursday Video: Social Security (and Payroll Taxes) Turn 73 Years Old Today" that this past Thursday was -
"the 73rd birthday of the Social Security system in the United States. Signed into law in 1935, the first payroll taxes were collected in 1937 and the first payment made in 1940. Although initially the system was designed to pay out benefits from a reserve fund, it was changed in 1939 to "pay-as-you-go"—payroll taxes that are collected are immediately paid out to current retirees. Taxes are split, with half deducted from employee paychecks and the other half paid by the employer. Consequently, early retirees enjoyed a large windfall: the first recipient, Ida May Fuller of Vermont, for example, paid $22.54 in payroll taxes but collected $22,888.92 in benefits before her death at age 100."
When I first started doing payroll in the mid 1970s the maximum wages subject to both Social Security and Medicare tax was $14,100 and the combined withholding rate was 5.85% each for employee and employer (maximum withholding = $824.85)! Just about every full time employee that I did maxed out on FICA tax. Click here for historical FICA tax info.
* Read TAX GIRL Kelly Phillips Erb's lips – "The Check Is NOT In the Mail: A Second Stimulus Package Has Not Been Approved". Thank God!
* This has nothing to do with taxes (it probably belongs in ANYTHING BUT TAXES – and may still end up there in some form), but I just had to mention it. There is a great line in the trailer for the new Oliver Stone biopic "W." (about, of course, the life of Dubya). The elder George Bush is chastising his young son, the future President, for his wild drunken behavior. "Who do you think you are – a Kennedy?"


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- Home
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Our students are engaged in a wide range of academic pursuits that include degree programs in 160 undergraduate and graduate fields delivered by 6 different colleges.
Visit the Office of Academic Affairs & Research >>
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Marking its first hundred years, Arkansas State University continues to expand in exciting ways.
Dr. Paul Mixon, P.E.
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ABET Coordinator
- Ph.D., University of Memphis (Engineering)
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- B.S.E.E., University of Memphis (Electrical Engineering)
Professional Credentials
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Dr. Mixon has been with the College of Engineering at ASU for 15 years. He was previously employed as the Utility Engineering Supervisor with the Arkansas Public Service Commission. He currently serves as the Associate Editor of the Paper Review Subcommittee for the Rural Electric Power Conference (REPC).
Contact Information
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Precious coral is a deep water coral that forms in rocky seabeds with low levels of sedimentation, typically in dark environments of over 500 feet deep, including caverns and crevices.Since the beginning of the 1st millennium, precious coral has been highly prized as a gem believed to be endowed with mysterious, powerful and sacred properties. The Romans hung branches of coral around the necks of their children to protect them from danger. In the early 20th century, the people of Italy used coral for protection from the 'evil eye' and many Italians used it for infertility.
No Fire: Set after firing. Grade A.Natural gemstones can vary in thickness. If you need to know the vertical dimension of a specific gemstone, please contact customer service.


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Cycle this Sunday (9th. Oct) with me at India Cyclothon, New Delhi.If you need any help registering, please get in touch with me on 9891658223.Alternatively you can log on to www.indiacyclothon.com. Or come to the Expo at FICCI, Federation House, Tansen Marg, New Delhi on Friday, 7th October and Saturday, 8th October 2011, between 10:00 am and 7:00 pm.Looking forward to riding with you on Sunday.
Carl Fonseca.
It's India Cyclothon time in Delhi next Sunday (11 Sept 2011) and it's time for all committed cyclists to take to the streets.
I am taking part and am hoping to see you there. The entry fee is only Rs 300 and, as usual, there's a goody bag and a helmet for free.
In case you need any help in registering, I would be glad to help. Get in touch with me at 09820791167.
For more details you can log on to www.indiacyclothon.com.
You can also register at the Expo at FICCI, Federation House, Tansen Marg, New Delhi, on Friday & Saturday, 9th and 10th September 2011, between 10:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. (Lunch Break: 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m.)
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Rays Walk It Out to Victory
It was suggested in today's St. Petersburg Times, that the Rays might back off the November 2008 proposed election referendium and set their sights on a 2010 renewal of the stadium proposal.
I am not sure if the POWW has that kind of political power to supress this referedium, but the Rays might be doing it more for future public and civic approval than anything else right now.
If you remember in the past, the city of Seattle was about to lose their fair Mariners' to the Tampa Bay ownership group. They had asked for a better arena then the outdated and decaying Kingdome, and were met with heavy resistance from local leaders.
Then the Tampa Bay ownership group came in with a price, stadium in place for instant credibility, and the finances to move and refit the teams' image to suit the Florida enviorment.
Seattle moved quickly and secured the land and the stadium money to execute theconstruction of Safeco Field. They saved their team and their civic pride by getting a updated and positively breathtaking venue, both in views and overall stadium construction.
Do not forget, that a large Japanese company came out and bailed the civic leaders in the last moment and became the new home-based ownership group.
Nintendo was a huge player in the gaming industry at the moment, and could easily bypassed the Mariners and gotten a bigger name team for their coffers. But, Seattle fit the Nintendo need and also gave them a foothold in the AL.
Who knows what will play out in the coming weeks concerning the new proposed stadium. Hopefully the Rays are using this time to regroup the parking situation, re-configure the building complexes and entertainment areas, and secure a better positive public opinion in the local community.
Just remember, if the Rays put a stadium on either the Toytown, or the present site, they do not need voters' approval………keep that in the back of your mind.
Trivia Fact of the Night:
Hank Aaron, Stan Musial and Willie Mays played the most All-Star games with 24 each.
First off, Congratulations to Akinora Iwamura for hitting his 200th HR of his professional career.
Aki , with a 3-2 count,hit a 2-run blast to right to score Andy Sonnanstine in the 3rd inning to put the Rays up 2-1. Aki also scored two runs to go with his 2 RBI's for the night.
Aki also went 3-5 on the night and missed cycle by only a triple. Aki also got a single to right in the 8th inning, and a double to deep center in the 9th inning. Aki is currently hitting .273 for the Rays in the lead-off position.
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Aki is in unique company this season. Aki is only the second player in the last 75 years to play over 100 games at 3rd as a rookie, and over 100 games at second the following year. The other was Cub's immortal Ryne Sandberg in 1982-83.
The Rays took a very unique way to win this ballgame down at Dolphin Stadium. They used the walk as an offensive weapon in the 8th inning.
The Rays' batters took advantage of Marlin's reliever Joe Nelson's wildness and turned it into a positive for the night. Nelson came on in relief with no outs in the 8th inning for Renyel Pinto.
Nelson continued the rough inning by having 4 straight batters ( BJ Upton, Dioner Navarro, Evan Longoria, Eric Hinske) sitting at the plate with either a 3-1,or 3-2 count.
Nelson did have two outs before walking Navarro and Hinske with the bases loaded to put the Rays up 4-3.
Nelson did not last the inning and was replaced by ex-Rays Justin Miller, who got Jason Bartlet to ground out for the final out of the inning.
Evan Longoria had a long night South Florida. Earlier in the game, he was blinded by the lights over the Marlins bench on two pop-ups down the third baseline, one behind third, and the other in foul territory and could not execute the outs.
Evan was seen waving his hands and hoping that either Navarro or Bartlett could complete the plays for the Rays.
To complicate the matter, outfielders' Carl Crawford and B J Upton could not hal in two long drive to the gap in left-center that both fell in for doubles in the inning. It was not a great defensive night for the Rays, with Carl Crawford getting an error on one of the catches off the wall in left.
Rays starter, Andy Sonnanstine did not have a great beginning to his night either for the Rays. If you remember his last start against the Marlins, Andy gave up 3 straight hits to start the game before settling down and pitching a great game.
Tonight was more of the same for Sonnnstine as he gave up a double to Hanley Ramirez to open the contest, and he scored on the single to Jeremy Hermida to put the Marlins up 1-0 in the 1st inning. Sonnanstine then had two wild pitches to the backstop before gaining his composure and ending the inning striking out Dan Uggula.
Andy went 5 innings and gave up 6-hits and 2-runs for the Rays. Sonnanstine had faced 23 batters in the game and ended with 5 strikeouts. J P Howell came on the the 6th for Sonnanstine.
J P pitched 2 innings and gave up a hit and a run to the Marlins, but the Rays scored 1 run in the top of the inning to put him in line for the victory. Howell leads the A L in innings pitched in relief with 52.2 innings.
Howell is the leader among MLB relievers' with 6 wins and is 1 win shy of the Rays club record for wins by a reliever. J P has posted a 0.92 ERA since May 8th, going 6-0 for the team.
Before this year, he had only been used in relief in the minors with Rookie-level Idaho Falls for 2 appearances in 2004.
I enjoy watching Troy Percival pitch. I actually like to watch him just before taking the Bullpen mound as he does his military push-ups and stretches like a Yoga instructor to get his back ready for the torque of pitching. He also starts his throwing with long throws ( for a Bullpen area) and even tries and "pops" the glove in warm-ups.
But when he goes out to the mound in that determined walk, and his eyes show no mercy in them, you know he is ready for battle.
But lately, he hs not been the "lights out" Troy we came to expect before his short stint on the DL after a hamstring incident in Oakland.
I really believe that he is still smarting a bit, but is playing through the pain. He showed evience of that in his pitching performance last night against the Marlins.
At one point, Percival seemed to fall by the wayside of the mound and Rays Manager Joe Maddon and Rays Trainer, Ron Porterfield came out to talk with Percival. Troy tried to wave them off before they got to the mound, but they still came out and evaluate the situation with Troy.
Troy went on and had an ackward first few batters by his standards. He came out and got pinch-hitter Luis Gonzalez to strikeout.
Then issued walks to Ramirez, Hermedia, and Jorge Cantu. Percival then got Josh Willingham, fresh offthe DL himsef, to ground to third and Evan Longoria got the force at second for the 2nd out.
Percival then walked Dan Uggla to put men at 1st and 2nd for the Marlins. Troy then got Mike Jacobs ground out to second to end the game.
The save was Percivals 18th in 20 chances for a 90 percent rating for the year. Opponents are batting .140 aainst him this year, second in the majors. Last night's save was also number 342 of his career.
That number is huge, because it put's him im sole posession of 9th place on the All-Time saves list. Last night, Troy went past the legendary Rollie Fingers to now own 9th place.
Troy also saved all 3 games in the sweep agains the Toronto Blue Jays in May, the first time a Rays reliever has ever saved all 3 games in a series. Lifetime, opponents have batted .184 against him, the lowest among any pitcher with at least 400 appearances in his career.
Again, congrats Troy, it could not have happened to a better guy. And to think, last year a this time you were retired.


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23 January 2013 at 4.32pm | 2 Comments
Australian baritone Peter Coleman-Wright has withdrawn from singing the role of Sir Robert Cecil for all performances of Gloriana. The role will now be sung by British baritone Jeremy Carpenter, marking his debut with The Royal Opera.
Jeremy's previous roles include Gérard in Andrea Chénier and Escamillo in Carmen for Royal Swedish Opera, Belcore in L'elisir d'amore for Angers-Nantes Opéra and Talpa in concert performances of Puccini's Il tabarro with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra.
Richard Jones's new production of Gloriana runs from 20 June - 6 July


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"It's just a fun day on the beach with a bunch of kids surfing and competing against each other," said Rick Anthony, director of the Atlantic Surfing Federation, who was running the surf competition. "There are some good surfers, I just wish we had some better waves to prove it today."
Despite the infrequency of breaking waves, surfers like Chris Stone, who has surfed nearly every day for the past five years – even in the winter – and competed in the under 16 and under 18 heats, found ways to make the most of the situation.
"I was always at the beach all the time and it's just something that people did out here in the Rockaways, so I got into it, too," Stone said. "It was kind of hard to surf out there, but I guess I got it done."
There were several divisions of competition, including the boys under 12 won by Sandon Herinski; under 14 boys won by Patrick Murphy; under 18 long board girls won by Erin Koehler; under 14 girls won by Summer Edgeness; under 16 girls won by Dakota Edgeness; men's 18 to 30 division won by Christian Rojas; the open division won by Alexander Dumont; and the women's division won by Grace Lee.
Stone walked away the winner of both heats he entered after his back-to-back, no-nonsense attack on the few cresting waves that showed face while he and his friendly competitors were in the water. Stone has been competing for the past three years and hopes to go to college in California, where he plans to surf, but promised his mother that he wouldn't skip class to do it.
In shore and about a block down the beach from the competition, a decent crowd gathered around two live music stages and several booths occupied by locals like three-year-old Locals Surf Lessons and End of the A, a mobile fashion boutique that opened this spring in the Rockaways.
"We've been surfing and teaching pretty much all our lives," said Locals co-owner Mike Reinhardt after demonstrating one of the school's tools, a board on a sort of rolling pin that helps new riders learn to balance. "We have a kid's camp that runs in the summer time for about nine weeks. That's really fun and we're super stoked to be teaching the kids. We also teach adults year-round."
Stretching as far as could be seen in either direction down the beach was a long, rusty pipe with the words "KEEP OFF" scrawled in graffiti every 50 feet or so, along with a ticker tape of red plastic flags.
These flags, though they seemed to fit right into the festive atmosphere of Rockstock, actually were meant to ward off would-be swimmers, since there were no lifeguards on duty.
After the festival, it was learned that this was part of an Army Corps of Engineers project, and that the beach was reportedly shut down by the city, though the onsite Parks Department employees seemed not to be aware of this.


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Welcome to Kondi Musik's website.
Fellow brothers & sisters, DJs, followers, affiliates,I am pleased & proud to welcome you all to my official home where I get to express my pure love and appreciation for Deep House Music.
This website is aiming at highlighting all my work as Kondi Musik.
The website will be the platform to keep all my fans/followers in the loop with all the latest Kondi Projects/Mixtapes/Gig-Guide/ Events/ Music-Production
Site by shudumo technologies


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We've heard a lot about self-assembling structures, but we rarely get to see a cool visual demonstration. This video shows several shapes and even complex, interlocking structures being assembled through "microfluidic channels."
As an accompaniment to a paper published in Nature, a video was made of a group of microstructures self-assembling through fluid movement and guided microchannels. We see arrow-like structures fit into notches in boxes. We see human skeletons jump around. And we even see what looks like a ladder come together. How does this work? According to the paper, it works by guiding tiny components along railways, like trains.
The guided movement of microstructures in microfluidic channels was achieved by fabricating grooves ('rails') on the top surface of the channels and also creating complementary polymeric microstructures that fit with the grooves. Using the rails as a guiding mechanism, we built complex one- and two-dimensional microsystems in which all the microstructures initially involved in the fabrication method were incorporated as components in the final product. Complex structures composed of more than 50 microstructures (each sized smaller than 50 m) were fluidically self-assembled with zero error.
Yes, yes. Science is very cool. Make the skeleton dance again.
Via Nature.


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The eight-month-old Akhilesh Yadav led Samajwadi Party (SP) government has been rapped by the Allahabad High Court (HC) for moving to release the accused of the 2006 serial bomb blasts in the temple city of Varanasi.
A bench of justices R.K. Agarwal and R.S.R. Maurya Thursday observed: Today you are releasing them, tomorrow you may give them the Padma Bhushan.
The court further said that whether those arrested were terrorists or not would be decided by the court and not by the state government.
The bench also asked the state government under what grounds were the cases being withdrawn.
The petition against the government's move was filed by social activist Rakesh Srivastava and advocate Nityanand Chaubey.
The bench also asked the state government on whether this move of its will not encourage criminals and terrorism.
The petition challenges the Akhilesh government move to withdraw the cases against persons involved in the March 7, 2006 bomb blasts in Sankatmochan temple, Dashwashmegh Ghat and Cantt railway stations.
The state government had issued notification Oct 31 seeking withdrawal of the cases against those accused in the blasts.
Lawyers of the petitioners A.K. Gupta and Shiv Shanker Tripathi said that the court has taken a serious view of the government move and had said that releasing those who are slapped with stringent sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) including 302, 307, 323, 427 and 120B, would not only send a wrong message but would also encourage terrorists.


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It is absolutely beautiful and wonderful that I got so great an experience in spite of my terrible English and very small previous experience in yoga and age! Thanks a lot!
Very good experience. I feel like I have learned a huge amount in a very short period of time. I've pushed myself out of my comfort zone and really grew from it. It is a fantastic opportunity to look within myself with a supportive group of people. I would 100% recommend this teacher training.
I really enjoyed the program. Thanks for this beautiful experience.
My experience at Shree Hari Yoga school was beyond any expectation! The teachers are amazing, kind, and knowledgeable. The place, Kudle Beach, is a paradise on Earth. The accommodation is perfect. Nice, small huts with shower and a relaxing view. The program was very intense with a lot of theoretical and practical information, and great guidance on all aspects of the yoga path. Asanas, pranayama, meditation, art of teaching, philosophy, and anatomy. I absolutely loved this yoga teacher training and I will definitely be back to Shree Hari Yoga school in the future. Thank you Hari <3
I just did my 300 hours TTC at Shree Hari School in Kudle Beach and I can easily say it has been a life-changing experience, as well as a big game changer to my personal yoga practice.
The location is amazing, just 100 meters away from the beautiful beach and all its amazing energies.
The teachers are all highly qualified with great knowledge about asanas, philosophy, Ayurveda and anatomy. They are people who dedicated their lives to the practice and discipline of yoga and their passion is so contagious and inspiring!
Everybody love to serve in the institute, from the teachers to the wait staff and the cooks (who have been accommodating us with three delicious and abundant meals a day!).
It is more than just a school to get a yoga alliance certificate. It is a community to be part of, a yoga legacy of people passionate about making a positive impact and I am very happy to be part of it now!
Namaste and Much Love!
I did the 100h YTTC in Dharamsala and loved it. Amazing teachers, inspiring and very resourceful, open to questions and feedback at all times. The greatest and nicest staff ever, super-polite and so attentive. Food was delicious (thank you Charles), rooms were OK, activities, contents of the course, school material and resources also. Loved the fire puja at the beginning.
Namaste and thank you for this very good course. Will come back for more, maybe to Gokarna next time?
I did my Yoga teacher training course with Yoga Yugas in Gokarna in February this year and I must say it was a truly wonderful and life-changing experience. I was really impressed by the passion and knowledge of the teachers. Each of the teachers had their unique style and art of teaching. There was time to interact on an individual level as well, which I really liked. And not to forget the beautiful location in Gokarna right at the beach. I'm very happy with my decision to do the course with Yoga Yugas and would happily recommend to anyone who is looking for a TTC in India!
Had a very great time here & Hariji is one the best Yoga Teacher I have ever met I should say once you should visit awesome experience . Under the guidance of Hariji there are many Asanas which I am able to practice. They have well experienced teachers. One class will give all the answers to satisfaction level.
This is one of the best yoga school near goa. Hariji is best ashtanga teacher around Goa. If you are looking for a peaceful yoga vacation, I must say you should visit Yoga Yugas at kudle beach near goa.
I loved the classes with Hariji especially his Ashtanga classes. Its full power. He is my best Yoga Teacher as of now. 😀
Thank you Hari
I thank myself also for choosing Yoga Yugas for this wounderful experience of yoga. Professional and profounde experience that i had here, so beautiful nautre around and great flexible teachers here - in body and in mind 😉
Just perfect joy for my journey. And will remember it for my life time :)))
Namaste everybody.
I've completed my YTTC with Hari and the team, now i'm teaching yoga in my country and around the world. I'm very thankfull to the multistyle yoga because it gives you tools in many different kind of Yoga such as Ashtanga, Vinyasa, Hatha, Yin yoga, Pranayama, Mantra, Meditation.
The atmosphere was of good sadhana but in a happy and family mood, the kitchen guys they are very funny and best cooks. Always some crazy yogui teacher its coming and giving us a surprise of knowledge. The most of teacher they have a Indian clasic education in yoga what gives the true essence in the practice.
I'm very greatfull to my teachers and specially to Hari for give the opportunity to have a true experience on Yoga. I highly recommend this school to everybody.
I did the YTT training course in Gokarna with hari and his school. It was such an incredible experience for me. The whole teaching team were so supportive and enthusiastic. It was clear that everyone was very passionate about what they are doing.
It was one of the only YTT course in India that I found that was Mutli-style and offered so much teaching practice. You leave the course with skills as well as knowledge. And honestly I couldn't have asked for me.
Also, the location is phenomenal. Gokarna really is such an incredible place to have the good fortune to visit!!
Thanks to everyone on the team!
I would like to warmly recommend Yoga Yugas, for drop in classes and teacher training.
I have met a lot of yoga teachers around the world in the last decade, and Hari is really exceptional teacher and an inspiring person.
The teaching quality is great, and in one month they transform you from a good practitioner to a really good teacher.
I strongly recommend to apply for the 200 YTTC only if you have sufficient yoga experience (at least 1-2 years). Some of the participants in my class were beginners, and the course was too much for them (you can read an average review of one of them above).
Overall an amazing experience. Thank you Hari
Greet enregy . Greet teacher . Make you want to do yoga all the day ! Very Recomend! I learn alot and very enjoy.
The team of Yoga Yugas is very nice and experianced Yoga teacher. Morning classes are proper structured and also you will learn everything what is important of Pranayama, meditation, philosophy and anatomy etc. ... In 200h, 4 weeks, you will change so much, not only that the body through different asana (postures) improve, also you can learn so much about real indian culture and your mind becomes much stronger. Of course it will be challanging, but that is good, only through that we will learn about us. You need to know also proper english, otherwhise it will be difficult to study nicely. All in all, if you don`t want a wellness holiday, but a proper yoga school, this school is very good!
Hari is a very skilled teacher. I went to 10 classes and each class was different from the other. He has a infinite amount of excercises and goes around the class from pupil to pupil ensuring they are doing it correctly. It was a real pleasure and I cant wait to go back again next year.
Hari is very skillfull teacher with an amazing insight about human body, also about the subtle body, and he has the potential to show you what yoga really is and to change your life. I can warmly recommend.
Yoga Yugas School in Gokarna is a wonderfull place to learn Yoga. Hari is a very good teacher and help you to bring you to a next level Yoga practise. I highly recommand this school. Hari OM
I spent a wonderful 28 days at the dharamshala yoga school park taking in the 200 hr yttc. We had a relatively small class with 7 girls who came with great attitude. The school teaches multi style yoga, with very nice Hatha practice to begin the day, and slowing implementing Yin Yoga and Iyengar through out the month. The main focus I would say is Ashtanga. Most of the girls have not done or very little experience in Ashtanga, but we all left with a good confident in series one poses ( mostly haha) and a routine after graduation to bring back home for everyday practice. To my surprise,I was able to get more flexible than ever within a very short time. Hari and Akira were great teachers and I was very lucky to have them.
They have well trained instructors and have a very big yoga family. Hari Ji is the lead trainer and master in Ashtanga and Vinyasa and Hatha Yoga. This school also provides Teacher Training certification courses of 200 hours and 500 hours which is affiliated with Yoga Alliance USA
Hari's positive energy and good skills makes you enjoy his classes. He makes you experience that yoga is a never ending journey, and makes you try and elaborate challenging poses or hand balances in a playful manner. I would definitely want to come back for more!
I studied with five different yoga teachers in India and Harry was the best. Teacher with professional knowledge smile human and energetic one,supporter and creative teacher who adapted me the right the exercises according to my abilities.
. Strongly recommend taking private lessons or as part of a small group.jacob. israel.
I've been training with Hari for the past month and have been feeling wonderful! He is a great teacher and an amazing person! I highly reccomend him!
Thank you so much for this great time together. The 200h YTT was really an awesome experience. The teachers were all really authentic, helpful and funny and I really learned a lot from them. I signed in for this course to deepen my own practice, learn more about the philosophy of yoga and to learn how to teach students. And I have to say, that Yoga Yugas really fulfilled all my expectations. The atmosphere was lovely and very light. We were a small group of 7 woman, which I really liked. This teacher training is a very holistic course and we covered all aspects of Yoga, such as the practical exercise, meditation, mantra chanting, the art of teaching, anatomy/physiology, philosophy and different workshops. As a multistyle school we had classical Hatha classes as well as Ashtanga and also Iyengar. Ashtanga was for me quite new, but I really started to love it during the course, because it really gives me focus and quietness of mind. Of course it is an intense course and everybody may get to his/her limit, but that makes it also a very changing experience. You discover sides of yourself you maybe didn't know before. And at the end of the course everybody had a big smile on the face. 🙂
I would definitely recommend Yoga Yugas School for everybody looking for a deep insight of yoga, wanting to deepen the personal practice or to become a yoga teacher.
Get a chance for FREE Scholarship worth $5000
Signup Today & Get 2o% Flat Early Bird Discount On Shree Hari Yoga School 200, 300, 500 Courses.


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One of my partner's only vices is that she loves Mexican food, and that's just an understatement. When I say love, I mean an obsession, an infatuation. My partner made a statement that she was no longer go to eat Taco Bell with her friend, who is also a teacher right next her classroom. I call them double trouble. They both enjoy Mexican food. If it's not burritos and tacos from the Mexican restaurant down the street from their work place, then it's Taco Bell.
I'm on this healthy food, and diet kick, which was inspired by my partner (she asked that I give her credit for this). She, too, is on a diet kick and eats healthy for the majority of the time. Well, I just about died when I heard they went to Taco Bell for lunch yesterday.But my partner rationalized it saying she ordered a chicken taco off their "Fresco menu." I don't care how fresco it is off their "Fresco menu." It's still Taco Bell. It's still fast food. It's still unhealthy. So I made a deal with my partner that if she would stop eating Taco Bell, I'd make her some healthy Mexican food. Deal. Done.
I wanted to wean her off of Taco Bell, and restaurant-made Mexican food, and replace it with healthy homemade Mexican food. So I set off to the grocery store for some items, and the first item on my list was green enchilada sauce. I headed to the "Asian / Hispanic" aisle, and found a big can of the green enchilada sauce. I looked at the nutritional content and freaked out. For a serving size of 1/4 cup contained 330 milligrams of sodium. WHAT?! Exactly. I immediately put the can down, got on my iPhone, and set out for a search on a healthier, homemade chile verde sauce. I thumbed through a few recipes, and found one that was suited to my liking.
I immediately started on the recipe when I got home from the grocery store. The recipe was extremely easy to follow, and didn't require a lot of time to make. Once the ingredients started to simmer, the fragrant aroma of chile verde sauce filled the entire house.
For those who like a good chile verde sauce, make it yourself. It was so easy, a caveman… nevermind. You get the point. It's not time consuming. It's healthy. And it's not laden with sodium like a can of store bought sauce. Just make it. Enough said.
Tomatillo Chile Verde Sauce (adapted from Our Best Bites)
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, minced
8 cloves garlic, minced
3 roasted, peeled green chiles (New Mexico, Anaheim or California or poblano chiles)
3 jalapenos (remove the seeds if you would like a mild sauce)
2 pounds tomatillos, husked and quartered
1/2 bunch cilantro, coarsely chopped
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1/4 teaspoons black pepper
2 teaspoons cumin
5 cups chicken broth
Place tomatillos and peppers under a broiler for about 5-7 minutes to lightly blacken the skin. Remove from oven, let cool enough to handle. Remove the skin from the green chiles, not the tomatillos.
Combine tomatillos, green peppers, jalapeno peppers, and cilantro in your blender. Process until smooth.
In a large saucepan or stock pot, heat olive oil over medium-high heat. Saute onions and garlic until tender and fragrant. Pour the tomatillo mixture over the onions and garlic. Add chicken broth, salt, pepper, and cumin. Simmer for about one hour, or less, depending on the consistency you want. I like the sauce thick, so I usually turn the heat to a medium to medium-high heat for about one hour.
Serve over tacos, as an enchilada sauce, inside burritos, or simmer with some pork shoulder for chile verde carnitas. Yum.


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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Five U.S. soldiers based at Fort Riley, Kan., and one based in Europe were killed in a helicopter crash this week in southern Afghanistan, Army officials said Thursday.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Five U.S. soldiers based at Fort Riley, Kan., and one based in Europe were killed in a helicopter crash this week in southern Afghanistan, Army officials said Thursday.
The Army confirmed the soldiers died when their Black Hawk UH-60 went down Tuesday during a mission. One soldier survived the crash.
The five Fort Riley soldiers were identified as Chief Warrant Officer 2 Randy L. Billings, 34, of Heavener, Okla.; Chief Warrant Officer 2 Joshua B. Silverman, 35, of Scottsdale, Ariz.; Sgt. Peter C. Bohler, 29, of Willow Spring, N.C.; Sgt. 1st Class Omar W. Forde, 28, of Marietta, Ga.; and Spc. Terry K.D. Gordon, 22, of Shubuta, Miss.
A sixth soldier, based in Vilseck, Germany, was identified as Staff Sgt. Jesse L. Williams, 30, of Elkhart, Ind.
Fort Riley confirmed that a seventh soldier was injured in the crash, although officials there said they could not release a name because of privacy reasons. Military officials said the cause of the crash remained under investigation.
Maj. Gen. Paul Funk II, commanding general of the 1st Infantry Division and Fort Riley, offered condolences to the soldiers' families and friends.
"We stand ready to support them and I urge our community and the nation, while remembering their sacrifices this holiday season, to do the same," Funk said in a statement.
The deputy governor of southern Zabul province said Wednesday that a NATO helicopter crashed in the remote district of Shajau and U.S. officials later confirmed that Zabul was the location of the U.S. crash.
"The loss of six U.S. troops in a helicopter crash on Tuesday is a heartbreaking reminder of the sacrifices" the men and women serving in Afghanistan continue to make, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Thursday during a Pentagon press conference that covered a range of issues. "And our thoughts and prayers go out to their families."
The 1st Division Combat Aviation Brigade sent some 2,000 soldiers to Afghanistan in August for a nine-month deployment, replacing the 3rd Infantry Division's Combat Aviation Brigade. According to a brigade news release in September, the soldiers are responsible for providing air support over a mountainous and desert region roughly the size of Montana.
Associated Press writer Pauline Jelinek in Washington contributed to this report.


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Staying ahead of client demands in the annuity product game is no simple feat for even the most informed of financial advisors, and the latest trend may prove even more crucial to successful advising—it involves not a new product or rider, but an entire market for annuities.
Newly developed uniform transfer standards and increased availability have caused so-called "secondary market annuities" to surge in popularity amongst clients in their quest to find financial products with above-average interest rates to supplement retirement income. What once was a niche market is gaining traction with the ordinary investor, and it is time for all advisors to get up to speed.
A Primer on Secondary Market Annuities
Most secondary market annuities (also known as "factored" structured settlements) are annuities that were originally issued pursuant to structured settlements, meaning that the defendant in a lawsuit (often a personal injury suit) is found liable and, rather than pay damages to the plaintiff up front, reaches an agreement with the court so that the plaintiff receives the right to guaranteed annuity payments over time. In many cases, however, the plaintiff ends up needing the funds immediately and, through a court-approved process, transfers the right to guaranteed payments under the annuity to a third-party buyer for a lump sum.
The court approval process is necessary because, while the plaintiff has received the right to income under the annuity, the defendant technically owns the annuity contract. Through this process, the parties enter into an assignment agreement that is presented to the court, which will approve or deny the transfer based on whether it is in the transferring plaintiff's best interests.
It is important to note that failure to comply with this court approval process can result in imposition of a tax equal to 40% of the discount at which the product is sold. In recent years, however, nearly all states have developed a standardized process that has made obtaining court approval much more simple.
Why Secondary Market Annuities?
A secondary market annuity is often able to provide the client with a higher-than-average interest rate because the selling plaintiff typically must sell his income rights at a discount. The interest paid out under the contract, however, is governed by the original contract terms, which may provide for a rate that is much higher than today's market averages.
Because interest rates on guaranteed financial products have remained relatively low despite recent market success, these products, which are typically issued by large and well-known insurance companies, are often attractive to clients who are otherwise wary of locking themselves into a low interest rate.
Further, secondary market annuities have only recently become widely available to individual clients—prior to the latest financial crisis, these products were most commonly purchased by large, institutional investors. Today's economic conditions, coupled with the newly streamlined court approval process, have opened the door for everyday clients to invest in the secondary market for annuities.
Secondary market annuities are not without risk—interest rates could rise during the annuity's term and the insurance carrier's financial health, as always, is critical to the success of the transaction. Because of these risks, and the fact that the market has been an unknown to many until recently, it is important that advisors are fully informed before recommending the strategy to any client.


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Commemorating the 150th Anniversary of the Civil War in North Carolina, 2011-2015
N.C. License Plate Initiative - Learn More About It
"What a Cruel Thing is War" - Register Now
A Civil War Symposium focusinng on Sacrifice and Legacies of the Civil War
February 27-28, 2015
The final Civil War Sesquicentennial symposium, co hosted by the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources and the University of North Carolina-Wilmington, will be held in the Lower Cape Fear, February 27-28, 2015.
On Friday, February 27, participants will enjoy on-the-hour tours of Fort Anderson State Historic Site between the hours of 1-4 p.m. Keynote William C. "Jack" Davis will speak at Murrow Hall in Southport at 7 p.m., following, the NC Maritime Museum at Southport will host a wine and cheese reception.
The University of North Carolina-Wilmington will host the Civil War Sesquicentennial symposium on Saturday, February 28, with lectures from noted Civil War historians and authors focusing on the theme of Sacrifice and Legacies of the Civil War.
Registration will begin at 7:45 a.m. Welcome and introduction of the keynote begins at 8:30 a.m. Craig Symonds, our keynote speaker begins at 9 a.m.There will be two sessions before lunch, a lunch break, and a final session after lunch with closing remarks by James Leutze. The event will conclude with a night-time cannon fire at Fort Fisher State Historic Site.
The full agenda is available online.
Registration fees:
- Friday Only: $10.68
- Friday and Saturday: $26.29
Sesquicentennial Photography Exhibit
In preparing for the anniversary of the war, some states have formed legislatively authorized and funded commissions. North Carolina has not. In light of uncertainty as to whether a commission would take shape, the North Carolina Office of Archives and History, part of the Department of Cultural Resources, in 2006 formed an in-house committee to guide and promote agency-sponsored observances. Organizers, with the counsel of a panel of academic advisers, endorsed a wide range of programs intended to appeal to diverse audiences. The themes of Freedom, Sacrifice, and Memory encompass a wide range of topics and points of view.
This website and the projects described herein are products of that in-house committee. Use of the logo on this page is restricted to programs sponsored or co-sponsored by the Department. North Carolina's residents and visitors are invited to join us in the observance or to plan local or privately sponsored commemorations. While the committee encourages other groups to plan their own events to commemorate the sesquicentennial, it cannot endorse or promote them as its focus is restricted solely to Department activities. Members of the committee gladly will advise local parties as time and circumstances allow.Our programs include an ambitious three-part series of panels:
- Memory: North Carolina Museum of History, Raleigh, May 20, 2011
- Freedom: "'Lay My Burden Down': Freedom and the Legacies of the Civil War," Winston-Salem (Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem State University, and Old Salem), October 17-18, 2013. Videos from the conference available here.
- Sacrifice: "What a Cruel Thing is War: Sacrifice and Legacies of the Civil War," Southport and Wilmington (UNC-Wilmington), February 27-28, 2015
- Bennett Place
- Bentonville Battlefield
- Brunswick Town/Fort Anderson
- CSS Neuse
- Fort Fisher
- State Capitol
- Zebulon B. Vance Birthplace
- Duke Homestead
- Historic Edenton
- Somerset Place
- Historic Stagville
- Tryon Palace
- Roanoke Island Festival Park
Exhibitions and Special Events The North Carolina Museum of History will build upon previous exhibits and highlight aspects of the war over the course of the anniversary period. Several works of art related to the Civil War period are on view at the North Carolina Museum of Art
New Ventures The Division of Historic Sites and Properties will initiate a broad-based educational program geared toward eighth grade students. The Historical Publications Office will publish new books and posters, a series of reprints, and will continue the volumes in the ongoing North Carolina troop roster series. A North Carolina Civil War Atlas, conceived by Mark A. Moore, will be published online. Also being discussed are placement of one or more monuments, establishment of a speakers bureau, and heritage tourism-based marketing efforts.
Committee Dr. Jeffrey J. Crow, Deputy Secretary, Archives and History, established the Commemoration Committee. He noted that the department long has had a commitment to projects associated with the Civil War and, during the anniversary, those efforts will intensify. The Cultural Resources team is co-chaired by by Keith Hardison, Director of the Division of State Historic Sites and Properties, and Michael Hill, Research Branch Supervisor. An advisory panel of leading Civil War historians will consult with staff and guide development and execution of programming.
Our sunburst logo is derivative of a button worn by North Carolina soldiers, 1861-1865.With all programming, the committee wishes to reach the widest possible audience, extending the reach of the Office of Archives and History geographically, thematically, and demographically.