Aftermath of Flight 1549
The Middle Seat Terminal - is reporting today that more than a dozen passengers from the flight have contacted a well-known aviation accident law firm, Kreindler & Kreindler, to “learn more about their rights after the accident.” Andrew Maloney, a lawyer at the firm said the firm wasn't necessarily filing a suit. "Right now we're trying to do the responsible thing and investigate the incident," Maloney said. "And that's what we've told people who've contacted us." US Airways has ponied up a little already. The airline sent passengers $5,000 checks--plus reimbursing airfare--the weekend after the accident. The carrier also upgraded all passengers on board to "Chairman's Preferred" status, entitling them to automatic upgrades, exemptions from baggage fees and bonus miles for a year.
See a recent story in the National Law Journal. Several top schools are retooling their grading policies, moving away from letter grades or, short of that, allowing professors to give out more grades at the top end of the curve. Harvard Law School and Stanford Law School, for example, are switching from the traditional grade and letter policies to pass/fail systems. At the same time, New York University School of Law now allows professors to give more A's.
According to this LA Times story, it's the latest example of how prosecutors and police around the country are rethinking their strategies in the age-old battle against prostitution. The class offers first-time offenders leniency in exchange for a promise that they will change their ways.
Federal authorities in Boston have accused Forest Laboratories of improperly marketing its antidepressant drugs Celexa and Lexapro for use in children, and of paying kickbacks to encourage doctors to prescribe the drugs for such use. The government's civil complaint, originated by whistleblowing former company officials as a false-claims or “qui tam” action, was unsealed February 25. The suit alleges that Forest failed to disclose a medical study that determined the company's antidepressant drugs were ineffective for pediatric use. That study also found that the drugs could cause suicidal thoughts in children. Click here for the WSJ story; here for the NYT's; click here for the complaint. WSJ Law Blog February 26, 2009
Featured American poet: Marcus Jackson of Toledo, graduate of Start High School, University of Toledo and New York University (MFA)
http://www.bloodlotus.org/marcusjackson.htm
http://www.thedrunkenboat.com/marcusjackson.html
I learned of Marcus one night after meeting his sister, Jessica, at Calvino’s in Toledo.
Criminals plotted to steal Abraham Lincoln’s remains from his tomb in Springfield, Ill., in 1876, 11 years after he was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth. The plan, hatched in a Chicago bar at 294 West Madison Street called The Hub, was to take the coffin from the tomb, put it in a wagon, haul it 200 miles north to the Indiana Dunes and hold it until the state of Illinois paid $200,000 ransom to get it back. There was no night watchman, and the custodian of the tomb lived two or three miles away, The only security was a single padlock. As for Lincoln's body, it was above ground, inside a sarcophagus sealed, not with cement, but plaster of Paris. When the robbers broke into the tomb and opened the sarcophagus, the Secret Service moved in. The crooks got away and were picked up a couple days later.
None of this made much of a splash because it took place on the night voters cast their ballots in the presidential race between Rutherford Hayes and Samuel Tilden--a hotly contested race that wasn't decided until the next year. Lincoln’s body was moved seventeen times between the warm May afternoon in 1865 when it was first placed in the temporary receiving vault at Oak Ridge Cemetery and the day it reached its current resting place in 1901. http://www.libertycountybodyshops.com/ http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1982/3/1982_3_76.shtml
From the Article:
What’s Wikileaks, the net’s foremost document leaking site, supposed to do when a whistle-blower submits a list email addresses of the site’s confidential donors as a leaked document? That’s exactly the conundrum Wikileaks faced after someone from the controversial whistle-blowing site sent an emergency fund-raising appeal to previous donors. But instead of hiding email addresses from the recipients by using the bcc field, the sender put 58 addresses into the cc field, revealing all the addresses to all the recipients.
"Pleonasm," which stems via Late Latin from the Greek verb "pleonazein" ("to be excessive"), is a fancy word for "redundancy." It's related to our words "plus" and "plenty," and ultimately it goes back to the Greek word for "more," which is "pleōn." Pleonasm is commonly considered a fault of style, but it can also serve a useful function. "Extra" words can sometimes be helpful to a speaker or writer in getting a message across, adding emphasis, or simply adding an appealing sound and rhythm to a phrase--as, for example, with the pleonasm "I saw it with my own eyes!" M-W Word of the Day
Friday, February 27, 2009
Thursday, February 26, 2009
President's Address to Congress
Remarks of President Barack Obama – As Prepared for Delivery Address to Joint Session of Congress, Tuesday, February 24th, 2009
Rupert Murdoch has personally apologised for the New York Post cartoon that critics labelled as racist for likening a violent chimpanzee shot dead by police officers to Barack Obama. The News Corporation chairman and chief executive issued a statement on February 24 in which he said the cartoon was intended only to mock Obama's economic stimulus bill, which the Post considered to be a badly written piece of legislation, but that it had turned out to be a mistake because it had offended so many.
"As the chairman of the New York Post, I am ultimately responsible for what is printed in its pages. The buck stops with me," added Murdoch. "Last week, we made a mistake. We ran a cartoon that offended many people. Today I want to personally apologise to any reader who felt offended, and even insulted."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/feb/24/rupert-murdoch-sorry-chimpanzee-cartoon
FY 2009 Omnibus Appropriations Act
Press Release: Congressman Dave Obey (D-WI), Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, has introduced a $410 billion bill to wrap up work on the fiscal year 2009 appropriations bills. “Last year, President Bush refused to work with Congress to come up with compromise to finish these nine bills, instead insisting on unacceptable cuts to energy research, healthcare, education, law enforcement and biomedical research."
Bill Text and Explanatory Statements
Summary: Agriculture
Summary: Commerce, Justice, Science
Summary: Energy and Water Development
Summary: Financial Services
Summary: Interior and the Environment
Summary: Labor, Health and Education
Summary: Legislative Branch
Summary: State and Foreign Operations
Summary: Transportation, Housing and Urban Development
A group of wealthy American clients sued UBS in Swiss court on February 24, in an effort to prevent the disclosure of their identities as part of a tax-evasion investigation by the DOJ. Click here for the NYT story. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of nearly a dozen American clients, accuses UBS and Switzerland's financial regulator of violating Swiss bank secrecy laws and of conducting what Swiss law considers illegal activities with foreign authorities. Tax evasion is not considered a crime in Switzerland. Disclosing client names under Swiss law is a criminal offense and can expose bank executives and officers to fines, prison terms and other penalties. WSJ Law Blog February 25, 2009
Google Book Search Settlement - New Commercial and Access Models Await Readers
Timothy B. Lee: "Speaking at Princeton on Thursday, Richard Sarnoff, chairman of the Association of American Publishers, discussed the landmark settlement in the Google Book Search case. Sarnoff speculated that the agreement could effectively give Google and Amazon a "duopoly" in the online book market."
Richard Sarnoff - Reinventing Access to Books: The Landmark Settlement among Authors, Publishers, Libraries, and Google. Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University, February 19, 2000
Tax Provisions in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
IRS: "Congress has approved and the President has signed new economic stimulus legislation, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The IRS is implementing tax-related provisions of this new program as quickly as possible. Here are some key highlights:
Payroll Checks Increase This Spring. The Making Work Pay Tax Credit will mean $400 to $800 for many Americans. The IRS has issued new withholding tables for employers.
$250 for Social Security Recipients, Veterans and Railroad Retirees. The Economic Recovery Payment will be paid by the Social Security Administration, Department of Veterans Affairs and the Railroad Retirement Board.
Money Back for New Vehicle Purchases. Taxpayers who buy certain new vehicles in 2009 can deduct the state and local sales taxes they paid."
Feedback from A.Word.A.Day
From: Rock Currier (rockcurrier cs.com)
Subject: fool's gold
Def: Something that appears valuable but is worthless
Pyrite or fool's gold has caused many prospectors to foolishly think they have found gold. Sometimes pyrite speciens can be very beautiful. About three years ago one specimen not much larger than a hand sold at auction for more than $40,000, probably not far from its weight in gold. Here are many pictures of pyrite crystals from all over the world.
From: Michael Sharp (mja29way aol.com)
Subject: fool's gold
The fool may be the one who skips the fool's gold. Real gold is sometimes found mixed in with or existing in the same area as fool's gold.
From: Rudy Rosenberg (rrosenbergsr accuratechemical.com)
Subject: sword of Damocles
Def: An ever-present threat; an impending disaster
In the vernacular of Brussels, Belgium, it is most often referred to as the sword of Madame Ocles. Although most people know the correct spelling, it is more fun to use the popular version.
Marbury v. Madison: 206 Years Old and Still Going Strong
The case established a notion fundamental to the workings of the U.S. government: that the Supreme Court is empowered to strike down laws passed by Congress.
Cliff Sloan, a litigation partner in Skadden's D.C. office, thought this wasn't good enough, that people needed to know more about the case. So he, along with co-author David McKean, wrote a book, which comes out next week, called “The Great Decision: Jefferson, Adams, Marshall and the Battle for the Supreme Court.”
Ever heard of “dead peasant” insurance policies? In a nutshell, they're often secret insurance policies taken out by companies on unwitting employees, which can yield sizable corporate tax breaks. They're also, it turns out, spawning a good deal of litigation. The National Law Journal recently ran a piece on lawsuits related to the policies. And in today's WSJ, reporter Ellen Schultz weighs in - focusing largely on an odd Texas lawsuit.
WSJ Law Blog February 24, 2009
On February 26, 1919, Congress approved acts to establish two national parks. Lafayette National Park on the coast of Maine was the first national park east of the Mississippi—ten years later, it was renamed Acadia And in northwestern Arizona, more than 1 million acres were set aside as Grand Canyon National Park. That year it received 44,173 visitors. Today there are almost 5 million visitors each year.
February 26 is the birthday of Victor Hugo, (books by this author) born on this day in Besançon, France (1802). We know him as the author of The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831) and Les Misérables (1862), but he became famous in France as a poet. When he turned 80, France created a holiday in his honor. The senate declared him a national legend. As he lay dying, the press recorded every word he said and every decision he made. More than 2 million people joined his funeral procession through the streets of Paris. The Writer’s Almanac
Remarks of President Barack Obama – As Prepared for Delivery Address to Joint Session of Congress, Tuesday, February 24th, 2009
Rupert Murdoch has personally apologised for the New York Post cartoon that critics labelled as racist for likening a violent chimpanzee shot dead by police officers to Barack Obama. The News Corporation chairman and chief executive issued a statement on February 24 in which he said the cartoon was intended only to mock Obama's economic stimulus bill, which the Post considered to be a badly written piece of legislation, but that it had turned out to be a mistake because it had offended so many.
"As the chairman of the New York Post, I am ultimately responsible for what is printed in its pages. The buck stops with me," added Murdoch. "Last week, we made a mistake. We ran a cartoon that offended many people. Today I want to personally apologise to any reader who felt offended, and even insulted."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/feb/24/rupert-murdoch-sorry-chimpanzee-cartoon
FY 2009 Omnibus Appropriations Act
Press Release: Congressman Dave Obey (D-WI), Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, has introduced a $410 billion bill to wrap up work on the fiscal year 2009 appropriations bills. “Last year, President Bush refused to work with Congress to come up with compromise to finish these nine bills, instead insisting on unacceptable cuts to energy research, healthcare, education, law enforcement and biomedical research."
Bill Text and Explanatory Statements
Summary: Agriculture
Summary: Commerce, Justice, Science
Summary: Energy and Water Development
Summary: Financial Services
Summary: Interior and the Environment
Summary: Labor, Health and Education
Summary: Legislative Branch
Summary: State and Foreign Operations
Summary: Transportation, Housing and Urban Development
A group of wealthy American clients sued UBS in Swiss court on February 24, in an effort to prevent the disclosure of their identities as part of a tax-evasion investigation by the DOJ. Click here for the NYT story. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of nearly a dozen American clients, accuses UBS and Switzerland's financial regulator of violating Swiss bank secrecy laws and of conducting what Swiss law considers illegal activities with foreign authorities. Tax evasion is not considered a crime in Switzerland. Disclosing client names under Swiss law is a criminal offense and can expose bank executives and officers to fines, prison terms and other penalties. WSJ Law Blog February 25, 2009
Google Book Search Settlement - New Commercial and Access Models Await Readers
Timothy B. Lee: "Speaking at Princeton on Thursday, Richard Sarnoff, chairman of the Association of American Publishers, discussed the landmark settlement in the Google Book Search case. Sarnoff speculated that the agreement could effectively give Google and Amazon a "duopoly" in the online book market."
Richard Sarnoff - Reinventing Access to Books: The Landmark Settlement among Authors, Publishers, Libraries, and Google. Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University, February 19, 2000
Tax Provisions in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
IRS: "Congress has approved and the President has signed new economic stimulus legislation, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The IRS is implementing tax-related provisions of this new program as quickly as possible. Here are some key highlights:
Payroll Checks Increase This Spring. The Making Work Pay Tax Credit will mean $400 to $800 for many Americans. The IRS has issued new withholding tables for employers.
$250 for Social Security Recipients, Veterans and Railroad Retirees. The Economic Recovery Payment will be paid by the Social Security Administration, Department of Veterans Affairs and the Railroad Retirement Board.
Money Back for New Vehicle Purchases. Taxpayers who buy certain new vehicles in 2009 can deduct the state and local sales taxes they paid."
Feedback from A.Word.A.Day
From: Rock Currier (rockcurrier cs.com)
Subject: fool's gold
Def: Something that appears valuable but is worthless
Pyrite or fool's gold has caused many prospectors to foolishly think they have found gold. Sometimes pyrite speciens can be very beautiful. About three years ago one specimen not much larger than a hand sold at auction for more than $40,000, probably not far from its weight in gold. Here are many pictures of pyrite crystals from all over the world.
From: Michael Sharp (mja29way aol.com)
Subject: fool's gold
The fool may be the one who skips the fool's gold. Real gold is sometimes found mixed in with or existing in the same area as fool's gold.
From: Rudy Rosenberg (rrosenbergsr accuratechemical.com)
Subject: sword of Damocles
Def: An ever-present threat; an impending disaster
In the vernacular of Brussels, Belgium, it is most often referred to as the sword of Madame Ocles. Although most people know the correct spelling, it is more fun to use the popular version.
Marbury v. Madison: 206 Years Old and Still Going Strong
The case established a notion fundamental to the workings of the U.S. government: that the Supreme Court is empowered to strike down laws passed by Congress.
Cliff Sloan, a litigation partner in Skadden's D.C. office, thought this wasn't good enough, that people needed to know more about the case. So he, along with co-author David McKean, wrote a book, which comes out next week, called “The Great Decision: Jefferson, Adams, Marshall and the Battle for the Supreme Court.”
Ever heard of “dead peasant” insurance policies? In a nutshell, they're often secret insurance policies taken out by companies on unwitting employees, which can yield sizable corporate tax breaks. They're also, it turns out, spawning a good deal of litigation. The National Law Journal recently ran a piece on lawsuits related to the policies. And in today's WSJ, reporter Ellen Schultz weighs in - focusing largely on an odd Texas lawsuit.
WSJ Law Blog February 24, 2009
On February 26, 1919, Congress approved acts to establish two national parks. Lafayette National Park on the coast of Maine was the first national park east of the Mississippi—ten years later, it was renamed Acadia And in northwestern Arizona, more than 1 million acres were set aside as Grand Canyon National Park. That year it received 44,173 visitors. Today there are almost 5 million visitors each year.
February 26 is the birthday of Victor Hugo, (books by this author) born on this day in Besançon, France (1802). We know him as the author of The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831) and Les Misérables (1862), but he became famous in France as a poet. When he turned 80, France created a holiday in his honor. The senate declared him a national legend. As he lay dying, the press recorded every word he said and every decision he made. More than 2 million people joined his funeral procession through the streets of Paris. The Writer’s Almanac
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
There could be trouble in U.S.-Swiss relations, judging from an article in today's WSJ by Carrick Mollenkamp. The issue concerns the U.S. government's recent court filing asking UBS AG to turn over the identities of 52,000 private accountholders. The filing was made on Thursday, a day after UBS agreed to settle a parallel criminal inquiry and cough up information on 250 U.S. citizens who used the bank to evade taxes.
On Friday, UBS responded (click here), arguing that the U.S. government's filing puts it in a pickle. Swiss law, UBS argued, “strictly prohibits UBS and its employees from disclosing to the [IRS] the account information located in Switzerland.” The bank said the U.S. government's petition “simply ignores the existence of Swiss law and sovereignty.” UBS also argued in the filing that the IRS's demand would require the rewriting of tax treaties between the two countries
WSJ Law Blog February 23, 2009
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to take up a fascinating case called Salazar v. Buono, on appeal from the Ninth Circuit. Initially, the lower courts--first a federal judge in San Francisco and then the Ninth Circuit--had ordered the federal government to take down an 8-foot cross mounted on federal land in California as part of a war memorial because, they held, the maintenance of the cross violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. This opinion was handed down by the Ninth Circuit in 2004. However, while the first appeal was pending, Congress passed a law transferring the land into private hands. The lower court ruled the maneuver violated its original ruling, and in a 2007 opinion penned by Judge Margaret McKeown, the Ninth Circuit ruled: That land exchange . . . would leave a little donut hole of land with a cross in the midst of a vast federal preserve. The issue we address today is whether the land exchange violates the district court's permanent injunction. We conclude that it does, and affirm the district court's order permanently enjoining the government from effectuating the land exchange and ordering the government to comply with the original injunction. Click here for the Bloomberg story; here for the AP's take; here for the Ninth Circuit's 2007 opinion.
WSJ Law Blog February 23, 2009
If we had it to do all over again, would we appoint Supreme Court justices for life? Allow the chief justice to keep the job forever? Let the court have the final word on which cases it hears and those it declines? That's the lead to an interesting article out today in the Washington Post. A group of prominent law professors and jurists thinks 'no' is the answer to all of the above questions, and in a letter to congressional leaders says that Congress could rethink the way the Court does its job.
WSJ Law Blog February 23, 2009
Will electronic legal information be permanently available? Will online information be removed and some libraries not have its print equivalent?
http://www.law.com/jsp/legaltechnology/pubArticleLT.jsp?id=1202428344754
Interesting words from novels:
snowlight, starshine, starglasses, starburn (think sun for star)
Authors whose nonfiction works read like fiction: Tracy Kidder and John McPhee. Can you think of others?
UNESCO designates Iowa City as the world's third City of Literature
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has designated Iowa City, Iowa, the world's third City of Literature, making the community part of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network. Iowa City joins Edinburgh, Scotland, and Melbourne, Australia, as UNESCO Cities of Literature. Other cities in the Creative Cities Network--honoring and connecting cultural centers for cinema, music, crafts and folk arts, design, media arts and gastronomy, as well as literature--include Aswan, Egypt; Santa Fe, N.M.; Berlin, Germany; Montreal, Canada; Popayan, Colombia; Bologna, Italy; Shenzhen, China; and Seville, Spain. Since 1955 graduates and faculty of the University of Iowa have won more than 25 Pulitzer Prizes in literature.
More than 1,200 emerging and established writers from more than 120 countries have been in residence at the University of Iowa's International Writing Program, which has enjoyed long-standing support from the U.S. Department of State. Iowa City is home to 11 literary presses as well as several literary blogs. The highly respected Center for the Book preserves and extends the art of bookmaking.
http://www.news-releases.uiowa.edu/2008/November/112008unesco.html
The Writing University: http://writinguniversity.uiowa.edu/
UI Pulitzer Prize winners: http://www.iowalum.com/pulitzerPrize/winnerTimeline.htm
On Friday, UBS responded (click here), arguing that the U.S. government's filing puts it in a pickle. Swiss law, UBS argued, “strictly prohibits UBS and its employees from disclosing to the [IRS] the account information located in Switzerland.” The bank said the U.S. government's petition “simply ignores the existence of Swiss law and sovereignty.” UBS also argued in the filing that the IRS's demand would require the rewriting of tax treaties between the two countries
WSJ Law Blog February 23, 2009
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to take up a fascinating case called Salazar v. Buono, on appeal from the Ninth Circuit. Initially, the lower courts--first a federal judge in San Francisco and then the Ninth Circuit--had ordered the federal government to take down an 8-foot cross mounted on federal land in California as part of a war memorial because, they held, the maintenance of the cross violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. This opinion was handed down by the Ninth Circuit in 2004. However, while the first appeal was pending, Congress passed a law transferring the land into private hands. The lower court ruled the maneuver violated its original ruling, and in a 2007 opinion penned by Judge Margaret McKeown, the Ninth Circuit ruled: That land exchange . . . would leave a little donut hole of land with a cross in the midst of a vast federal preserve. The issue we address today is whether the land exchange violates the district court's permanent injunction. We conclude that it does, and affirm the district court's order permanently enjoining the government from effectuating the land exchange and ordering the government to comply with the original injunction. Click here for the Bloomberg story; here for the AP's take; here for the Ninth Circuit's 2007 opinion.
WSJ Law Blog February 23, 2009
If we had it to do all over again, would we appoint Supreme Court justices for life? Allow the chief justice to keep the job forever? Let the court have the final word on which cases it hears and those it declines? That's the lead to an interesting article out today in the Washington Post. A group of prominent law professors and jurists thinks 'no' is the answer to all of the above questions, and in a letter to congressional leaders says that Congress could rethink the way the Court does its job.
WSJ Law Blog February 23, 2009
Will electronic legal information be permanently available? Will online information be removed and some libraries not have its print equivalent?
http://www.law.com/jsp/legaltechnology/pubArticleLT.jsp?id=1202428344754
Interesting words from novels:
snowlight, starshine, starglasses, starburn (think sun for star)
Authors whose nonfiction works read like fiction: Tracy Kidder and John McPhee. Can you think of others?
UNESCO designates Iowa City as the world's third City of Literature
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has designated Iowa City, Iowa, the world's third City of Literature, making the community part of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network. Iowa City joins Edinburgh, Scotland, and Melbourne, Australia, as UNESCO Cities of Literature. Other cities in the Creative Cities Network--honoring and connecting cultural centers for cinema, music, crafts and folk arts, design, media arts and gastronomy, as well as literature--include Aswan, Egypt; Santa Fe, N.M.; Berlin, Germany; Montreal, Canada; Popayan, Colombia; Bologna, Italy; Shenzhen, China; and Seville, Spain. Since 1955 graduates and faculty of the University of Iowa have won more than 25 Pulitzer Prizes in literature.
More than 1,200 emerging and established writers from more than 120 countries have been in residence at the University of Iowa's International Writing Program, which has enjoyed long-standing support from the U.S. Department of State. Iowa City is home to 11 literary presses as well as several literary blogs. The highly respected Center for the Book preserves and extends the art of bookmaking.
http://www.news-releases.uiowa.edu/2008/November/112008unesco.html
The Writing University: http://writinguniversity.uiowa.edu/
UI Pulitzer Prize winners: http://www.iowalum.com/pulitzerPrize/winnerTimeline.htm
Monday, February 23, 2009
Comet Lulin pairs up with Saturn
Comet Lulin probably won’t be high enough in the east for decent viewing until 8:30 or 9:00 p.m. on February 23. Later at night is even better. At mid-evening, two respectively bright starlike points of light bedeck the eastern sky. The higher of these two lights is the star Regulus, the brightest star in the constellation Leo the Lion. Saturn is to the lower left of Regulus, its golden color contrasting to that of sparkling blue-white Regulus. Comet Lulin and Saturn will remain within each other’s vicinity all night long, until morning dawn finally washes them from the sky. Look for Comet Lulin and Saturn to swing highest up for the night around 1 a.m. on February 24, at which time they’ll be due south. f you’re up before dawn on February 24, look for Comet Lulin and Saturn in your western sky. Astronomers believe this is Comet Lulin’s first trip into the inner solar system. If you miss Comet Lulin by Saturn on February 23-24, try again on the night of February 27-28. See sky map at:
http://www.earthsky.org/article/comet-lulin-saturn-pair-up-on-february-23-24
Government Information, OGR
OpenTheGovernment.org and the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) recently launched a new Web site (http://www.showusthedata.org/) to allow the public to decide what government information is not available on the Internet that should be.
Show Us the Data gives the public the opportunity to share what documents they think should be made available and to vote on the documents that others have submitted. The deadline to participate is March 9, 2009. http://www.wo.ala.org/districtdispatch/?p=1954
NOAA: Seventh Warmest January for Global NOAA: Seventh Warmest January for Global Temperatures News release : "The combined global land and ocean surface average temperature for January 2009 was the seventh warmest since records began in 1880, according to a preliminary analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center
Annex – U.S.- Canada clean energy dialogue, 19 February 2009, Ottawa, Ontario: "...The United States and Canada are collaborating on energy research related to advanced biofuels, clean engines, and energy efficiency. In order to address the energy and environmental challenges that we face together, the two nations agreed to expand collaboration in these and other key areas of energy science and technology...The United States will draw from the $3.4 billion for carbon capture and sequestration demonstrations in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Canada’s Economic Action Plan establishes a $1 billion Clean Energy Fund which builds on Canada’s previous investments in carbon capture and sequestration."
Collisions in sky and sea
On February 10 at approximately 1656 GMT, the Iridium 33 and Cosmos 2251 communications satellites collided over northern Siberia. The impact between the Iridium Satellite LLC-owned satellite and the 16-year-old satellite launched by the Russian government occurred at a closing speed of well over 15,000 mph at approximately 490 miles above the face of the Earth. The low-earth orbit (LEO) location of the collision contains many other active satellites that could be at risk from the resulting orbital debris. http://www.stk.com/corporate/mediaCenter/news/iridium-cosmos/
In the Atlantic Ocean, on the night of February 3-4, nuclear submarines HMS Vanguard and Le Triomphant collided. The submarines are equipped with sonar to detect other vessels nearby but our correspondent said it might be the case that the anti-sonar devices, meant to hide the submarines from enemies, were "too effective". http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7892294.stm http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/defence/4640673/British-and-French-nuclear-submarine-collision-as-serious-as-sinking-of-Kursk.html
sword of Damocles (sord uhv DAM-uh-kleez)
noun: an ever-present threat; an impending disaster
After Damocles of Greek legend. Damocles was a courtier who flattered the ruler Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse, to excess. The fulsome praise so annoyed the king that he decided to teach him a lesson. He held a banquet in honor of Damocles but when Damocles saw the sword hanging by a single horse-hair over his head, he lost all taste for the lavish feast. He realized that even those who appear to enjoy great fortune face fears and worries. By the way, the word impending literally means hanging over.
A.Word.A.Day
To your health: encyclopedia, finder, personal health tools, news
http://healthfinder.gov/
Scholastic Inc., the children’s publisher of favorites like the Harry Potter, Goosebumps and Clifford series, may be best known for its books, but a consumer watchdog group accuses the company of using its classroom book clubs to push video games, jewelry kits and toy cars. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/books/10scho.html?_r=1
Comet Lulin probably won’t be high enough in the east for decent viewing until 8:30 or 9:00 p.m. on February 23. Later at night is even better. At mid-evening, two respectively bright starlike points of light bedeck the eastern sky. The higher of these two lights is the star Regulus, the brightest star in the constellation Leo the Lion. Saturn is to the lower left of Regulus, its golden color contrasting to that of sparkling blue-white Regulus. Comet Lulin and Saturn will remain within each other’s vicinity all night long, until morning dawn finally washes them from the sky. Look for Comet Lulin and Saturn to swing highest up for the night around 1 a.m. on February 24, at which time they’ll be due south. f you’re up before dawn on February 24, look for Comet Lulin and Saturn in your western sky. Astronomers believe this is Comet Lulin’s first trip into the inner solar system. If you miss Comet Lulin by Saturn on February 23-24, try again on the night of February 27-28. See sky map at:
http://www.earthsky.org/article/comet-lulin-saturn-pair-up-on-february-23-24
Government Information, OGR
OpenTheGovernment.org and the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) recently launched a new Web site (http://www.showusthedata.org/) to allow the public to decide what government information is not available on the Internet that should be.
Show Us the Data gives the public the opportunity to share what documents they think should be made available and to vote on the documents that others have submitted. The deadline to participate is March 9, 2009. http://www.wo.ala.org/districtdispatch/?p=1954
NOAA: Seventh Warmest January for Global NOAA: Seventh Warmest January for Global Temperatures News release
Annex – U.S.- Canada clean energy dialogue, 19 February 2009, Ottawa, Ontario: "...The United States and Canada are collaborating on energy research related to advanced biofuels, clean engines, and energy efficiency. In order to address the energy and environmental challenges that we face together, the two nations agreed to expand collaboration in these and other key areas of energy science and technology...The United States will draw from the $3.4 billion for carbon capture and sequestration demonstrations in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Canada’s Economic Action Plan establishes a $1 billion Clean Energy Fund which builds on Canada’s previous investments in carbon capture and sequestration."
Collisions in sky and sea
On February 10 at approximately 1656 GMT, the Iridium 33 and Cosmos 2251 communications satellites collided over northern Siberia. The impact between the Iridium Satellite LLC-owned satellite and the 16-year-old satellite launched by the Russian government occurred at a closing speed of well over 15,000 mph at approximately 490 miles above the face of the Earth. The low-earth orbit (LEO) location of the collision contains many other active satellites that could be at risk from the resulting orbital debris. http://www.stk.com/corporate/mediaCenter/news/iridium-cosmos/
In the Atlantic Ocean, on the night of February 3-4, nuclear submarines HMS Vanguard and Le Triomphant collided. The submarines are equipped with sonar to detect other vessels nearby but our correspondent said it might be the case that the anti-sonar devices, meant to hide the submarines from enemies, were "too effective". http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7892294.stm http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/defence/4640673/British-and-French-nuclear-submarine-collision-as-serious-as-sinking-of-Kursk.html
sword of Damocles (sord uhv DAM-uh-kleez)
noun: an ever-present threat; an impending disaster
After Damocles of Greek legend. Damocles was a courtier who flattered the ruler Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse, to excess. The fulsome praise so annoyed the king that he decided to teach him a lesson. He held a banquet in honor of Damocles but when Damocles saw the sword hanging by a single horse-hair over his head, he lost all taste for the lavish feast. He realized that even those who appear to enjoy great fortune face fears and worries. By the way, the word impending literally means hanging over.
A.Word.A.Day
To your health: encyclopedia, finder, personal health tools, news
http://healthfinder.gov/
Scholastic Inc., the children’s publisher of favorites like the Harry Potter, Goosebumps and Clifford series, may be best known for its books, but a consumer watchdog group accuses the company of using its classroom book clubs to push video games, jewelry kits and toy cars. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/books/10scho.html?_r=1
Friday, February 20, 2009
A WSJ piece cites recent studies that show discrimination plaintiffs lose at a higher rate in federal court than other plaintiffs and more often get tossed out of court on summary judgments. But the fact that more workers have standing to sue doesn't mean they will be warmly received in court, if previous patterns hold steady. From 1979 through 2006, federal plaintiffs won 15% of job-discrimination cases. By comparison, plaintiffs in other cases not involving alleged job discrimination enjoyed a 51% win rate, according to this study due to be published later this month by the Harvard Law & Policy Review, the official journal of the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy. Defense lawyers say that companies are quick to settle discrimination suits that appear credible. Cases that aren't settled, they claim, often are frivolous and should be dismissed. Says Lawrence Lorber, a partner at Proskauer Rose: "If it's a real case, they settle. Employers aren't dumb."
Many companies, looking to avoid costly and drawn-out litigation battles in this era of economic uncertainty, are looking to get rid of their litigation portfolios through any means possible. And that largely means settling. But this doesn't appear to be the case out at Google, where the number of patent challenges against Google rose to 14 last year, from 11 in 2007 and three in 2006. According to this Bloomberg story (HT: AmLaw Lit Daily), the company is going on the offensive to fight patent claims, a strategy it hopes will deter frivolous lawsuits.
UBS has agreed to immediately provide the U.S. government with the identities and account information of some U.S. customers . The bank will pay $780 million. Click here for the WSJ story; click here for the NYT article. Click here for a copy of the deferred-prosecution agreement. WSJ Law Blog February 19, 2009
The New York Post apologized, sort of, for its controversial editorial cartoon that many saw as portraying President Barack Obama as a chimpanzee. The paper posted a statement on its Web site under the heading "That Cartoon" reiterating its support for the cartoon's content, while apologizing "to those who were offended by the image." http://www.newsday.com/news/printedition/longisland/ny-popost206042290feb20,0,4987794.story
Descendents of Geronimo are asking a secret society at Yale called Skull and Bones to give back Geronimo's, well, skull and bones. Here are stories from Fox News and the Yale Daily News. According to reports, the complaint (not yet available), filed in federal district court in Washington, D.C., alleges that members of Skull and Bones long ago invaded Geronimo's grave to steal his skull for, as Fox puts it, “fraternal” (and, it seems, skull-related) “rituals.” A handful of others, including Yale, are reportedly named in the complaint. The descendents say they are investigating claims that in 1918, members of Skull and Bones, including Prescott Bush, the father of George H.W Bush and grandfather of George W. Bush, invaded Geronimo's grave at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma, and stole his skull, some bones and other items buried with him.
WSJ Law Blog February 18, 2009
The Internet Public Library (IPL) is maintained by students from a consortium of colleges and universities with programs in information science. http://www.ipl.org/
Example of information at IPL:
Q: Which Presidents lost the popular vote but still became President?
A: There have been four cases of this happening thus far. In 1824, John Quincy Adams was awarded the presidency by the House of Representatives, despite not having won the popular vote or the electoral college vote (neither he nor opponent Andrew Jackson had an electoral college majority). In 1876, Rutherford B. Hayes became President despite losing the popular vote to Samuel J. Tilden, because Hayes had a one vote advantage in the electoral college. In 1888, in a much more clear-cut example of a candidate losing the popular vote but winning the electoral college vote, Benjamin Harrison was elected President over Grover Cleveland. Finally, in 2000, George W. Bush became president after losing the popular vote to Al Gore, but winning the electoral vote.
http://www.ipl.org/div/farq/POTUSFARQ.html#question9b
1824: John Quincy Adams received more than 38,000 fewer votes than Andrew Jackson, but neither candidate won a majority of the Electoral College. Adams was awarded the presidency when the election was thrown to the House of Representatives.
1876: Nearly unanimous support from small states gave Rutherford B. Hayes a one-vote margin in the Electoral College, despite the fact that he lost the popular vote to Samuel J. Tilden by 264,000 votes. Hayes carried five out of the six smallest states (excluding Delaware). These five states plus Colorado gave Hayes 22 electoral votes with only 109,000 popular votes. At the time, Colorado had been just been admitted to the Union and decided to appoint electors instead of holding elections. So, Hayes won Colorado's three electoral votes with zero popular votes. It was the only time in U.S. history that small state support has decided an election.
1888: Benjamin Harrison lost the popular vote by 95,713 votes to Grover Cleveland, but won the electoral vote by 65. In this instance, some say the Electoral College worked the way it is designed to work by preventing a candidate from winning an election based on support from one region of the country. The South overwhelmingly supported Cleveland, and he won by more than 425,000 votes in six southern states. However, in the rest of the country he lost by more than 300,000 votes.
2000: Al Gore had over half a million votes more than George W. Bush, with 50,992,335 votes to Bush's 50,455,156. But after recount controversy in Florida and a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Bush was awarded the state by 537 popular votes. Like most states, Florida has a "winner takes all" rule. This means that the candidate who wins the state by popular vote also gets all of the state's electoral votes. Bush became president with 271 electoral votes. http://people.howstuffworks.com/question4721.htm
Shakespeare wrote in The Merchant of Venice, "All that glisters is not gold." Fool's gold is another name for pyrite, also known as iron pyrite or iron sulfide. Its shiny yellow luster has many fooled into believing they have struck gold while holding a mineral of little value. The name pyrite is from Greek pyrites (of fire), from pyr (fire) because it produces sparks when struck against a hard surface. Some related words are fire, pyre, pyrosis (heartburn), pyromania (an irresistible impulse to set things on fire), and empyreal (relating to the sky or heaven, believed to contain pure light or fire.). A.Word.A.Day
With a reported one third of the currency in circulation being counterfeit, the U.S. Secret Service was commissioned on July 5, 1865 in Washington, D.C. as the "Secret Service Division" of the Department of the Treasury and was originally tasked with the suppression of counterfeiting. The legislation creating the agency was on Abraham Lincoln's desk the night he was assassinated. At the time, the only other federal law enforcement agencies were the United States Park Police, U.S. Post Office Department - Office of Instructions and Mail Depredations, now known as the United States Postal Inspection Service, and the United States Marshals Service. The Marshals did not have the manpower to investigate all crime under federal jurisdiction, so the Secret Service was used to investigate everything from murder to bank robbery to illegal gambling. After the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901, Congress informally requested Secret Service presidential protection. A year later, the Secret Service assumed full-time responsibility for protection of the President. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secret_Service
Keepers (books I would read again)
The Child Buyer by John Hersey
“All’s fair in love, war and free enterprise.”
Life: a User’s Manual by Georges Perec
Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson
Many companies, looking to avoid costly and drawn-out litigation battles in this era of economic uncertainty, are looking to get rid of their litigation portfolios through any means possible. And that largely means settling. But this doesn't appear to be the case out at Google, where the number of patent challenges against Google rose to 14 last year, from 11 in 2007 and three in 2006. According to this Bloomberg story (HT: AmLaw Lit Daily), the company is going on the offensive to fight patent claims, a strategy it hopes will deter frivolous lawsuits.
UBS has agreed to immediately provide the U.S. government with the identities and account information of some U.S. customers . The bank will pay $780 million. Click here for the WSJ story; click here for the NYT article. Click here for a copy of the deferred-prosecution agreement. WSJ Law Blog February 19, 2009
The New York Post apologized, sort of, for its controversial editorial cartoon that many saw as portraying President Barack Obama as a chimpanzee. The paper posted a statement on its Web site under the heading "That Cartoon" reiterating its support for the cartoon's content, while apologizing "to those who were offended by the image." http://www.newsday.com/news/printedition/longisland/ny-popost206042290feb20,0,4987794.story
Descendents of Geronimo are asking a secret society at Yale called Skull and Bones to give back Geronimo's, well, skull and bones. Here are stories from Fox News and the Yale Daily News. According to reports, the complaint (not yet available), filed in federal district court in Washington, D.C., alleges that members of Skull and Bones long ago invaded Geronimo's grave to steal his skull for, as Fox puts it, “fraternal” (and, it seems, skull-related) “rituals.” A handful of others, including Yale, are reportedly named in the complaint. The descendents say they are investigating claims that in 1918, members of Skull and Bones, including Prescott Bush, the father of George H.W Bush and grandfather of George W. Bush, invaded Geronimo's grave at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma, and stole his skull, some bones and other items buried with him.
WSJ Law Blog February 18, 2009
The Internet Public Library (IPL) is maintained by students from a consortium of colleges and universities with programs in information science. http://www.ipl.org/
Example of information at IPL:
Q: Which Presidents lost the popular vote but still became President?
A: There have been four cases of this happening thus far. In 1824, John Quincy Adams was awarded the presidency by the House of Representatives, despite not having won the popular vote or the electoral college vote (neither he nor opponent Andrew Jackson had an electoral college majority). In 1876, Rutherford B. Hayes became President despite losing the popular vote to Samuel J. Tilden, because Hayes had a one vote advantage in the electoral college. In 1888, in a much more clear-cut example of a candidate losing the popular vote but winning the electoral college vote, Benjamin Harrison was elected President over Grover Cleveland. Finally, in 2000, George W. Bush became president after losing the popular vote to Al Gore, but winning the electoral vote.
http://www.ipl.org/div/farq/POTUSFARQ.html#question9b
1824: John Quincy Adams received more than 38,000 fewer votes than Andrew Jackson, but neither candidate won a majority of the Electoral College. Adams was awarded the presidency when the election was thrown to the House of Representatives.
1876: Nearly unanimous support from small states gave Rutherford B. Hayes a one-vote margin in the Electoral College, despite the fact that he lost the popular vote to Samuel J. Tilden by 264,000 votes. Hayes carried five out of the six smallest states (excluding Delaware). These five states plus Colorado gave Hayes 22 electoral votes with only 109,000 popular votes. At the time, Colorado had been just been admitted to the Union and decided to appoint electors instead of holding elections. So, Hayes won Colorado's three electoral votes with zero popular votes. It was the only time in U.S. history that small state support has decided an election.
1888: Benjamin Harrison lost the popular vote by 95,713 votes to Grover Cleveland, but won the electoral vote by 65. In this instance, some say the Electoral College worked the way it is designed to work by preventing a candidate from winning an election based on support from one region of the country. The South overwhelmingly supported Cleveland, and he won by more than 425,000 votes in six southern states. However, in the rest of the country he lost by more than 300,000 votes.
2000: Al Gore had over half a million votes more than George W. Bush, with 50,992,335 votes to Bush's 50,455,156. But after recount controversy in Florida and a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Bush was awarded the state by 537 popular votes. Like most states, Florida has a "winner takes all" rule. This means that the candidate who wins the state by popular vote also gets all of the state's electoral votes. Bush became president with 271 electoral votes. http://people.howstuffworks.com/question4721.htm
Shakespeare wrote in The Merchant of Venice, "All that glisters is not gold." Fool's gold is another name for pyrite, also known as iron pyrite or iron sulfide. Its shiny yellow luster has many fooled into believing they have struck gold while holding a mineral of little value. The name pyrite is from Greek pyrites (of fire), from pyr (fire) because it produces sparks when struck against a hard surface. Some related words are fire, pyre, pyrosis (heartburn), pyromania (an irresistible impulse to set things on fire), and empyreal (relating to the sky or heaven, believed to contain pure light or fire.). A.Word.A.Day
With a reported one third of the currency in circulation being counterfeit, the U.S. Secret Service was commissioned on July 5, 1865 in Washington, D.C. as the "Secret Service Division" of the Department of the Treasury and was originally tasked with the suppression of counterfeiting. The legislation creating the agency was on Abraham Lincoln's desk the night he was assassinated. At the time, the only other federal law enforcement agencies were the United States Park Police, U.S. Post Office Department - Office of Instructions and Mail Depredations, now known as the United States Postal Inspection Service, and the United States Marshals Service. The Marshals did not have the manpower to investigate all crime under federal jurisdiction, so the Secret Service was used to investigate everything from murder to bank robbery to illegal gambling. After the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901, Congress informally requested Secret Service presidential protection. A year later, the Secret Service assumed full-time responsibility for protection of the President. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secret_Service
Keepers (books I would read again)
The Child Buyer by John Hersey
“All’s fair in love, war and free enterprise.”
Life: a User’s Manual by Georges Perec
Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson
Thursday, February 19, 2009
New GAO Reports: Embassy Construction, Clean Air Act
Embassy Construction: Additional Actions Are Needed to Address Contractor Participation, GAO-09-48, January 16, 2009: "To provide safe and secure workplaces for overseas posts, the Department of State (State) has built 64 new embassy compounds (NEC) and other facilities since 1999, has 31 ongoing projects, and plans to build at least 90 more. In 2007, State reported the U.S. contractor pool for building NECs had reached its limit and proposed legislation to amend the criteria to qualify for NEC awards."
Clean Air Act: Historical Information on EPA's Process for Reviewing California Waiver Requests and Making Waiver Determinations, GAO-09-249R, January 16, 2009: "Emissions from mobile sources, such as automobiles and trucks, contribute to air quality degradation and can threaten public health and the environment. Under the Clean Air Act, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates these emissions. The act generally allows one set of federal standards for new motor vehicle emissions and pre-empts states from adopting or enforcing their own standards. However, it also authorizes the EPA Administrator to waive this provision to allow the state of California1 to enact and enforce emission standards for new motor vehicles that are as protective, in the aggregate, as federal government standards. Other states may also adopt California's standards if they choose."
Another New Obama Administration Website: Recovery.gov Goes Live
"Recovery.gov is a website that lets you, the taxpayer, figure out where the money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is going. There are going to be a few different ways to search for information. The money is being distributed by Federal agencies, and soon you'll be able to see where it's going- to which states, to which congressional districts, even to which Federal contractors. As soon as we are able to, we'll display that information visually in maps, charts, and graphics."
C-SPAN Historians Survey of Presidential Leadership
News release: C-SPAN has released the results of its second Historians Survey of Presidential Leadership, in which a cross-section of 65 presidential historians ranked the 42 former occupants of the White House on ten attributes of leadership. As in C-SPAN's first such survey, released in 2000, Abraham Lincoln received top billing among the historians, just as the nation marks the bicentennial of his birth. George Washington placed second, while spots three through five were held by Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, and Harry Truman, in that order. Based on the results of historians surveyed, George W. Bush received an overall ranking of 36. Among other recent Presidents, Bill Clinton who was ranked 21 in the 2000 survey, advanced six spots in 2009 to an overall ranking of 15; Ronald Reagan moved from 11 to 10; George H.W. Bush went from 20 to 18, and Jimmy Carter's ranking declined from 22 to 25."
White House Posts American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
This White House Web page links to the final version, published in the Congressional Record version (PDF) - The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, inclusive of an online "form on the right to leave your comments, thoughts, and ideas." Required data: email address and name. Comments are limited to 5,000 characters.
Q. Who was the first president to visit the West Coast while in office, first to graduate from law school, lost the popular vote but became president, signed the act that permitted women to plead before the Supreme Court, has the first presidential library, and was nicknamed “Dark-Horse President”?
A. Rutherford B. Hayes, member of U.S. House of Representatives, 1865-1867, governor of Ohio, 1868-1872 and 1876-1877, 19th president of the United States. http://www.potus.com/rbhayes.html
E-Discovery Update: Revisiting ESI Agreements and Court Orders - Conrad J. Jacoby focuses on the new requirement that litigants must meet early in a dispute to discuss the scope of discovery work to reach agreement on how best to proceed with the discovery of potentially relevant electronically stored information (“ESI”).
Oscars will be announced February 22 at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood and will be televised in the United States by the ABC network.
To your health There are actually different kinds of fat—unsaturated, saturated, and trans fats. In general, avoid saturated and trans fats. While unsaturated fats are high in calories, they are considered "good" fats because they are important to your health. Not all fat is bad for you. Some fat is very good for you. The trick is to choose healthy fats and eat in moderation. healthyroads.com
Journal of Legal Analysis: New Open-Access Law Journal Launched
"...the Journal of Legal Analysis (JLA) is a new open-access law journal co-published by Harvard University Press (HUP) and the John M. Olin Center for Law, Economics, and Business at Harvard Law School. For the record, this is the first new journal we've published in thirty years...articles will be posted, for free, as soon as they are ready for publication. In addition, we're hoping the journal fills a gap in the legal publishing landscape by providing a peer-reviewed, faculty-edited journal that covers the entire academy."
Quote
You should eat to live, not live to eat.
You should work to live, not live to work.
Embassy Construction: Additional Actions Are Needed to Address Contractor Participation, GAO-09-48, January 16, 2009: "To provide safe and secure workplaces for overseas posts, the Department of State (State) has built 64 new embassy compounds (NEC) and other facilities since 1999, has 31 ongoing projects, and plans to build at least 90 more. In 2007, State reported the U.S. contractor pool for building NECs had reached its limit and proposed legislation to amend the criteria to qualify for NEC awards."
Clean Air Act: Historical Information on EPA's Process for Reviewing California Waiver Requests and Making Waiver Determinations, GAO-09-249R, January 16, 2009: "Emissions from mobile sources, such as automobiles and trucks, contribute to air quality degradation and can threaten public health and the environment. Under the Clean Air Act, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates these emissions. The act generally allows one set of federal standards for new motor vehicle emissions and pre-empts states from adopting or enforcing their own standards. However, it also authorizes the EPA Administrator to waive this provision to allow the state of California1 to enact and enforce emission standards for new motor vehicles that are as protective, in the aggregate, as federal government standards. Other states may also adopt California's standards if they choose."
Another New Obama Administration Website: Recovery.gov Goes Live
"Recovery.gov is a website that lets you, the taxpayer, figure out where the money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is going. There are going to be a few different ways to search for information. The money is being distributed by Federal agencies, and soon you'll be able to see where it's going- to which states, to which congressional districts, even to which Federal contractors. As soon as we are able to, we'll display that information visually in maps, charts, and graphics."
C-SPAN Historians Survey of Presidential Leadership
News release: C-SPAN has released the results of its second Historians Survey of Presidential Leadership, in which a cross-section of 65 presidential historians ranked the 42 former occupants of the White House on ten attributes of leadership. As in C-SPAN's first such survey, released in 2000, Abraham Lincoln received top billing among the historians, just as the nation marks the bicentennial of his birth. George Washington placed second, while spots three through five were held by Franklin D. Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt, and Harry Truman, in that order. Based on the results of historians surveyed, George W. Bush received an overall ranking of 36. Among other recent Presidents, Bill Clinton who was ranked 21 in the 2000 survey, advanced six spots in 2009 to an overall ranking of 15; Ronald Reagan moved from 11 to 10; George H.W. Bush went from 20 to 18, and Jimmy Carter's ranking declined from 22 to 25."
White House Posts American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
This White House Web page links to the final version, published in the Congressional Record version (PDF) - The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, inclusive of an online "form on the right to leave your comments, thoughts, and ideas." Required data: email address and name. Comments are limited to 5,000 characters.
Q. Who was the first president to visit the West Coast while in office, first to graduate from law school, lost the popular vote but became president, signed the act that permitted women to plead before the Supreme Court, has the first presidential library, and was nicknamed “Dark-Horse President”?
A. Rutherford B. Hayes, member of U.S. House of Representatives, 1865-1867, governor of Ohio, 1868-1872 and 1876-1877, 19th president of the United States. http://www.potus.com/rbhayes.html
E-Discovery Update: Revisiting ESI Agreements and Court Orders - Conrad J. Jacoby focuses on the new requirement that litigants must meet early in a dispute to discuss the scope of discovery work to reach agreement on how best to proceed with the discovery of potentially relevant electronically stored information (“ESI”).
Oscars will be announced February 22 at the Kodak Theater in Hollywood and will be televised in the United States by the ABC network.
To your health There are actually different kinds of fat—unsaturated, saturated, and trans fats. In general, avoid saturated and trans fats. While unsaturated fats are high in calories, they are considered "good" fats because they are important to your health. Not all fat is bad for you. Some fat is very good for you. The trick is to choose healthy fats and eat in moderation. healthyroads.com
Journal of Legal Analysis: New Open-Access Law Journal Launched
"...the Journal of Legal Analysis (JLA) is a new open-access law journal co-published by Harvard University Press (HUP) and the John M. Olin Center for Law, Economics, and Business at Harvard Law School. For the record, this is the first new journal we've published in thirty years...articles will be posted, for free, as soon as they are ready for publication. In addition, we're hoping the journal fills a gap in the legal publishing landscape by providing a peer-reviewed, faculty-edited journal that covers the entire academy."
Quote
You should eat to live, not live to eat.
You should work to live, not live to work.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Treasury Announces New Restrictions On Executive Compensation from ProPublica Stimulus Bill Limits TARP Exec Pay: "...tucked into the 1,071-page bill [H.R. 1, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009] is a twelve-page section that goes much further than any limits imposed by the Bush administration or even contemplated by the Obama administration" [on executive compensation and corporate governance].
Free WSJ chart: Where the Money Goes | Selected programs from the $789.2 billion bill: Spending - 24% | Aid 38% | Tax Cuts 38%
Pacer, the government-run Public Access to Court Electronic Records is a system designed in the bygone days of screechy telephone modems. Cumbersome, arcane and not free, it is everything that Google is not. Recently, however, a small group of open-government activists teamed up to push the court records system into the 21st century—by simply grabbing enormous chunks of the database and giving the documents away, to the great annoyance of the government. “Pacer is just so awful,” said Carl Malamud, the leader of the effort and founder of a nonprofit group, Public.Resource.org. “The system is 15 to 20 years out of date.” Worse, Mr. Malamud said, Pacer takes information that he believes should be free—government-produced documents are not covered by copyright—and charges 8 cents a page. Most of the private services that make searching easier, like Westlaw and Lexis-Nexis, charge far more, while relative newcomers like AltLaw.org, Fastcase.com and Justia.com, offer some records cheaply or even free. But even the seemingly cheap cost of Pacer adds up, when court records can run to thousands of pages. Fees get plowed back to the courts to finance technology, but the system runs a budget surplus of some $150 million, according to recent court reports.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/13/us/13records.html?_r=1&ref=technology
Alfred Whital Stern (1881-1960) of Chicago presented his collection of Lincolniana, to the Library of Congress in 1953. His collection, which he began to assemble in the 1920s, documents the life of Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) both through writings by and about Lincoln as well as a large body of publications concerning the issues of the times including slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction, and related topics. The collection contains more than 11,100 items. This online release presents more than 1,300 items with more than 4,000 images and a date range of 1824-1931. It includes the complete collection of Stern’s contemporary newspapers, Lincoln’s law papers, sheet music, broadsides, prints, cartoons, maps, drawings, letters, campaign tickets, and other ephemeral items. The books and pamphlets in this collection are scheduled for digitization at a later date. Direct to Digitized Collection via American Memory
Source: Library of Congress
Feedback from A.Word.A.Day
From: Hanns Ewald (hanns.ewald verizon.net)
Subject: columbarium
The name of the town Colmar in Alsace, France derives its name from this word. The place is popular with tourists for the regional food and wine, architecture and art (Isenheim altar). Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi, creator of the statue of liberty, was born there in 1834.
From: Meredith McQuoid (mcquoidm si.edu)
Subject: pied
In the vocabulary of equine lovers, a horse that has a coat of large patches of black and white is referred to as piebald (can be a noun or adjective); correspondingly, if the patches are white and any other color but black, it is called skewbald.
From: Kitty Rieske (kitrieske aol.com)
Subject: pied
I love the word "pied". I first met the word in regard to horses, but the very best memory I have of the word is Gerard Manley Hopkins poem, Pied Beauty. The descriptions of nature and the world make me happy to have experienced this world in all its many colors.
From: Bill Barker (billb11 alltel.net)
Subject: pied
This word back in the days of hand set type meant different fonts of movable type that were mixed. At the school I attended in California vandals pied all the type in the school print shop. As a student learning the trade I spent about a week unpieing it.
February 17 is the birthday of the Queen of Crime, novelist Ruth Rendell, (books by this author) born in London, England (1930). Her career as a writer did not start out on a promising note—she was fired from her first job as a journalist after she wrote a story about a Tennis League dinner without actually attending it, which was obvious since she failed to mention in the story that the keynote speaker had died in the middle of the speech. But she went on to become a best-selling author of more than 50 books, many of them under the pseudonym Barbara Vine. Her novels include A Judgment in Stone (1977), King Solomon's Carpet (1991), and her most recent, Portobello (2008). Every morning she writes for four hours, and then she eats the exact same lunch: bread, cheese, salad, and fruit.
February 17 is the birthday of the poet, journalist, and songwriter Banjo Paterson, (books by this author) born Andrew Paterson in Narrambla, Australia (1864). He was a lawyer who wrote poetry on the side—his family and friends called him "Barty," and his readers knew him as "the Banjo." For a while, he was the second-most popular poet writing in English in the world, after Rudyard Kipling. But we remember him best for writing the lyrics to "Waltzing Matilda." The words have changed slightly in the years since he wrote these original lyrics:
Oh there once was a swagman camped in the billabong,
Under the shade of a Coolibah tree,
And he sang as he looked at the old billy boiling,
Who'll come a waltzing Matilda with me?
Who'll come a waltzin' Matilda my darling,
Who'll come a waltzin' Matilda with me?
Waltzing Matilda and leading a water bag,
Who'll come a waltzing Matilda with me?
A "swagman" is someone who travels around the countryside, looking for work—the name comes from "swag," the big bundle of cloth or blanket a swagman would keep his belongings in. To "waltz Matilda" meant to travel around with a swag.
The Writer’s Almanac
Free WSJ chart: Where the Money Goes | Selected programs from the $789.2 billion bill: Spending - 24% | Aid 38% | Tax Cuts 38%
Pacer, the government-run Public Access to Court Electronic Records is a system designed in the bygone days of screechy telephone modems. Cumbersome, arcane and not free, it is everything that Google is not. Recently, however, a small group of open-government activists teamed up to push the court records system into the 21st century—by simply grabbing enormous chunks of the database and giving the documents away, to the great annoyance of the government. “Pacer is just so awful,” said Carl Malamud, the leader of the effort and founder of a nonprofit group, Public.Resource.org. “The system is 15 to 20 years out of date.” Worse, Mr. Malamud said, Pacer takes information that he believes should be free—government-produced documents are not covered by copyright—and charges 8 cents a page. Most of the private services that make searching easier, like Westlaw and Lexis-Nexis, charge far more, while relative newcomers like AltLaw.org, Fastcase.com and Justia.com, offer some records cheaply or even free. But even the seemingly cheap cost of Pacer adds up, when court records can run to thousands of pages. Fees get plowed back to the courts to finance technology, but the system runs a budget surplus of some $150 million, according to recent court reports.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/13/us/13records.html?_r=1&ref=technology
Alfred Whital Stern (1881-1960) of Chicago presented his collection of Lincolniana, to the Library of Congress in 1953. His collection, which he began to assemble in the 1920s, documents the life of Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) both through writings by and about Lincoln as well as a large body of publications concerning the issues of the times including slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction, and related topics. The collection contains more than 11,100 items. This online release presents more than 1,300 items with more than 4,000 images and a date range of 1824-1931. It includes the complete collection of Stern’s contemporary newspapers, Lincoln’s law papers, sheet music, broadsides, prints, cartoons, maps, drawings, letters, campaign tickets, and other ephemeral items. The books and pamphlets in this collection are scheduled for digitization at a later date. Direct to Digitized Collection via American Memory
Source: Library of Congress
Feedback from A.Word.A.Day
From: Hanns Ewald (hanns.ewald verizon.net)
Subject: columbarium
The name of the town Colmar in Alsace, France derives its name from this word. The place is popular with tourists for the regional food and wine, architecture and art (Isenheim altar). Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi, creator of the statue of liberty, was born there in 1834.
From: Meredith McQuoid (mcquoidm si.edu)
Subject: pied
In the vocabulary of equine lovers, a horse that has a coat of large patches of black and white is referred to as piebald (can be a noun or adjective); correspondingly, if the patches are white and any other color but black, it is called skewbald.
From: Kitty Rieske (kitrieske aol.com)
Subject: pied
I love the word "pied". I first met the word in regard to horses, but the very best memory I have of the word is Gerard Manley Hopkins poem, Pied Beauty. The descriptions of nature and the world make me happy to have experienced this world in all its many colors.
From: Bill Barker (billb11 alltel.net)
Subject: pied
This word back in the days of hand set type meant different fonts of movable type that were mixed. At the school I attended in California vandals pied all the type in the school print shop. As a student learning the trade I spent about a week unpieing it.
February 17 is the birthday of the Queen of Crime, novelist Ruth Rendell, (books by this author) born in London, England (1930). Her career as a writer did not start out on a promising note—she was fired from her first job as a journalist after she wrote a story about a Tennis League dinner without actually attending it, which was obvious since she failed to mention in the story that the keynote speaker had died in the middle of the speech. But she went on to become a best-selling author of more than 50 books, many of them under the pseudonym Barbara Vine. Her novels include A Judgment in Stone (1977), King Solomon's Carpet (1991), and her most recent, Portobello (2008). Every morning she writes for four hours, and then she eats the exact same lunch: bread, cheese, salad, and fruit.
February 17 is the birthday of the poet, journalist, and songwriter Banjo Paterson, (books by this author) born Andrew Paterson in Narrambla, Australia (1864). He was a lawyer who wrote poetry on the side—his family and friends called him "Barty," and his readers knew him as "the Banjo." For a while, he was the second-most popular poet writing in English in the world, after Rudyard Kipling. But we remember him best for writing the lyrics to "Waltzing Matilda." The words have changed slightly in the years since he wrote these original lyrics:
Oh there once was a swagman camped in the billabong,
Under the shade of a Coolibah tree,
And he sang as he looked at the old billy boiling,
Who'll come a waltzing Matilda with me?
Who'll come a waltzin' Matilda my darling,
Who'll come a waltzin' Matilda with me?
Waltzing Matilda and leading a water bag,
Who'll come a waltzing Matilda with me?
A "swagman" is someone who travels around the countryside, looking for work—the name comes from "swag," the big bundle of cloth or blanket a swagman would keep his belongings in. To "waltz Matilda" meant to travel around with a swag.
The Writer’s Almanac
Monday, February 16, 2009
Today, February 16, is Presidents' Day, a holiday that began as a tribute to the first U.S. president, George Washington. In fact, in some places it is still called Washington's Birthday, and that is the official name still recognized by the federal government. The day became a government holiday in 1885. It was celebrated on Feb. 22, which is Washington's actual birthday. In 1971, the holiday was moved to the third Monday in February. Though it's still officially Washington's Birthday, the day has become known as Presidents' Day to recognize both Washington and Lincoln. Barack Obama is the 44th president of the United States (though he is the 43rd man to be president, because Grover Cleveland was the 22nd and 24th). See suggestions for learning names of presidents in order at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/15/AR2009021501546.html
Obama will sign ARRA, the $787 billion economic stimulus bill, on Tuesday in Denver.
Free Searchable Database of Barack Obama Speeches - 2002-2009
askSam: "Search the full text transcripts of more than 200 speeches by United States President and former Senator, Barack Obama. Search keywords and phrases, search by speech title, speech date, or speech location in more than 200 Obama speeches."
The librarian who operates The Wall Street Journal's news research library--which is set to close with the elimination of her job and another staffer's--said in a memo to other librarians that the shutdown is both a personal difficulty and a hit to news coverage.
"When I asked who will do research for the reporters, I was told, 'No one,'" the memo from Leslie A. Norman, posted on a librarian list serve last week, stated. "The reporters will probably be using a Lexis product called Due Diligence Dashboard . . .
lisnews.org February 11, 2009
The word "lexicon" can be used as a synonym of "dictionary," and the word "lexicography" refers to the practice of dictionary making. Both of these words, as well as "lexical," derive from the Greek word "lexis," meaning "word" or "speech." A fourth descendant of "lexis" is "lexiphonic," an adjective describing one who uses pretentious words for effect. "Lexis" should not be confused with the Latin "lex," or "law," which is used in legal phrases such as "lex non scripta," meaning "unwritten law." http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/mwwod.pl
Definitions of lexis: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:lexis&ei=SL-SSZzZCaH4NL_ozPkL&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
In order for some small birds to survive and maintain a core temperature far exceeding the 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit of humans, they must consume about three times their body weight, on a daily basis. http://www.wgbh.org/cainan/article?item_id=2625828
To your health
Red beans, berries, and vegetables are in the high antioxidant ranking of a 2004 USDA study. The researchers found that Russet potatoes, pecans and even cinnamon are all excellent, although lesser-known, sources of antioxidants, which are thought to fight cancer, heart disease and Alzheimer's. See chart at http://hdlighthouse.org/treatment-care/care/hdltriad/diet/updates/1116antioxidant.php
crestfallen (KREST-fo-luhn)
adjective: Dispirited or disappointed by having one's hopes dashed
From allusion to the drooping crest or comb of a bird, such as a rooster
From Latin crista (tuft) A.Word.A.Day
February 16 is the birthday of historian and philosopher Henry Adams, (books by this author) born in Boston, Massachusetts (1838). His grandfather was John Quincy Adams, and his great-grandfather was John Adams. He did a lot of writing about politics and history, but he's most famous as the author of The Education of Henry Adams, one of the first modern American memoirs. It was privately printed in 1907, and no one paid attention to it. But when it was republished in 1918, after Adams' death, it won the Pulitzer Prize. The Writer’s Almanac
Obama will sign ARRA, the $787 billion economic stimulus bill, on Tuesday in Denver.
Free Searchable Database of Barack Obama Speeches - 2002-2009
askSam: "Search the full text transcripts of more than 200 speeches by United States President and former Senator, Barack Obama. Search keywords and phrases, search by speech title, speech date, or speech location in more than 200 Obama speeches."
The librarian who operates The Wall Street Journal's news research library--which is set to close with the elimination of her job and another staffer's--said in a memo to other librarians that the shutdown is both a personal difficulty and a hit to news coverage.
"When I asked who will do research for the reporters, I was told, 'No one,'" the memo from Leslie A. Norman, posted on a librarian list serve last week, stated. "The reporters will probably be using a Lexis product called Due Diligence Dashboard . . .
lisnews.org February 11, 2009
The word "lexicon" can be used as a synonym of "dictionary," and the word "lexicography" refers to the practice of dictionary making. Both of these words, as well as "lexical," derive from the Greek word "lexis," meaning "word" or "speech." A fourth descendant of "lexis" is "lexiphonic," an adjective describing one who uses pretentious words for effect. "Lexis" should not be confused with the Latin "lex," or "law," which is used in legal phrases such as "lex non scripta," meaning "unwritten law." http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/mwwod.pl
Definitions of lexis: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:lexis&ei=SL-SSZzZCaH4NL_ozPkL&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
In order for some small birds to survive and maintain a core temperature far exceeding the 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit of humans, they must consume about three times their body weight, on a daily basis. http://www.wgbh.org/cainan/article?item_id=2625828
To your health
Red beans, berries, and vegetables are in the high antioxidant ranking of a 2004 USDA study. The researchers found that Russet potatoes, pecans and even cinnamon are all excellent, although lesser-known, sources of antioxidants, which are thought to fight cancer, heart disease and Alzheimer's. See chart at http://hdlighthouse.org/treatment-care/care/hdltriad/diet/updates/1116antioxidant.php
crestfallen (KREST-fo-luhn)
adjective: Dispirited or disappointed by having one's hopes dashed
From allusion to the drooping crest or comb of a bird, such as a rooster
From Latin crista (tuft) A.Word.A.Day
February 16 is the birthday of historian and philosopher Henry Adams, (books by this author) born in Boston, Massachusetts (1838). His grandfather was John Quincy Adams, and his great-grandfather was John Adams. He did a lot of writing about politics and history, but he's most famous as the author of The Education of Henry Adams, one of the first modern American memoirs. It was privately printed in 1907, and no one paid attention to it. But when it was republished in 1918, after Adams' death, it won the Pulitzer Prize. The Writer’s Almanac
Friday, February 13, 2009
Librarian’s Muse is just over a year old
The first issue was called News, but a reader suggested Librarian’s Muse, and that’s what it has been since the second issue. A few months after the start, I noticed that a reader had a blog on blogspot, and then placed the muse on blogspot as well. The list is up to 73 readers in 8 states now. Remember, if you want to be removed—just reply with remove on the subject line.
Will the $789 Billion Stimulus Plan Bring Economic Recovery?
New York Times: Deal Reached in Congress on $789 Billion Stimulus Plan - "The package of spending increases and tax relief, intended to spur an economic recovery and create jobs by putting money back in the pockets of consumers and companies, ended up smaller than either the House or Senate had proposed."
Will the $800 Billion-Plus Stimulus Plan Bring Economic Recovery? National Center for Policy Analysis, February 10, 2009, by Gerald W. Scully: "Banker greed and Wall Street are blamed, but government policies over the last 25 years are the root cause of the current financial crisis."
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (aka ARRA or economic stimulus bill)
The House version of the ARRA would provide $14 billion for K-12 construction and $6 billion for higher education construction and specifically mention libraries as an allowable use of funds. The K-12 construction funds would create 300,000 jobs. The education construction funds are eliminated from the Senate version of the ARRA.
If you support libraries and would like the House version to prevail, please contact conferees on this legislation who control what stays in and what will be taken out. If you have other opinions, such as retaining funding for the arts and eliminating it for casinos and golf courses, this is the time to make your thoughts known. Find contact information for elected officials at http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml
Appropriations Chairman Obey (D-WI)
Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel (D-NY)
Commerce Chairman Waxman (D-CA)
Appropriations Ranking Member Jerry Lewis (R-CA)
Ways and Means Ranking Member Dave Camp (R-MI)
Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)
Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT)
Appropriations Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
Finance Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-IA)
Appropriations Ranking Member Thad Cochran (R-MS)
Wikileaks Posts Database of 6,780 Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports
"Wikileaks has released nearly a billion dollars worth of quasi-secret reports commissioned by the United States Congress The 6,780 reports, current as of this month, comprise over 127,000 pages of material on some of the most contentious issues in the nation...Nearly 2,300 of the reports were updated in the last 12 months, while the oldest report goes back to 1990. The release represents the total output of the Congressional Research Service (CRS) electronically available to Congressional offices." [As noted by Michael Ravnitzky, "there are additional reports and briefings prepared for specific offices that are not included in that electronic output."]
Alphabetical list of reports
Chronological list of reports
These reports have also been merged into OpenCRS.
Torrent: WikiLeaks Document Release: CRS Reports, Feb 2009 (full pack, incl. metadata for indexing). Where applicable we have also categorized the reports according to country and attached them to our general country index.
Note: See also the FAS directory of links to topical CRS Reports
Oakland, Calif., attorney Dana Sack is glad he didn't deposit that $360,400 check he got in the mail Jan. 30. Since the start of the year, the real estate attorney has been contacted "out of nowhere" by eight companies, most from East Asia, asking for help collecting money they claimed to be owed by U.S. businesses. About a week after signing those fee agreements, "Tomen" and "Matila" separately let him know by e-mail that Eagle Power Equipment had agreed to pay each of them through his firm, and though he had done no work, Sack should expect a check in the mail, from which he could deduct his retainer. One $360,400 check arrived by UPS from Ontario, "looking absolutely genuine." But when a call to Citibank proved this check was invalid, Sack called Eagle Power Equipment. He said he got a laugh from that company's controller, who said he was not only not paying any debts to Tomen, but that he'd been getting calls from small firm lawyers across the country.
Maryland attorney Jerome Feldman, of four-lawyer Bernstein & Feldman, said his firm was also contacted and retained via e-mail and received a real-looking check from Eagle Power for more than $300,000 made payable to the attorneys. He presumes that his firm was meant to put the money into an escrow account, after which the client in Asia would give the go-ahead for Feldman's firm to subtract its fee and send the balance on. Feldman said he went only so far as to contact Eagle then sent the matter to the Internet fraud division of the FBI.
In Alabama, solo Steven Brom said he was solicited by an individual claiming to represent Japan's Nippon Industries. A week after he received his retainer agreement, he, too, got the great news that the debtor had decided to pay. "It's usually a long drawn-out process, not based on one phone call," Brom said. The client told him that he could expect a check from Eagle Power. When he received the package--delivered by UPS--from Canada, Brom said the check for $348,540 was "highly professional looking."
In Brom's case, the scammers went so far as to fake an "800" phone number claiming to be Citibank's. Out of curiosity, he dialed it and got an automated phone system that asked for the account number and check amount, then told him his check was confirmed. He's sent his fake check to Citibank to handle any potential investigation.
http://www.law.com/jsp/law/sfb/lawArticleSFB.jsp?id=1202428041836
Harlequin is a large check pattern that is turned 45 degrees to form a diamond in two or more contrasting colors, set of chairs that are similar but do not match, pattern with patches, movie, fictional character, and athletic team. See these and other meanings at http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:harlequin&ei=kLqSSZGGBJzgM6W3mfQL&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
Etymology: ultimately from Italian arlecchino, from Middle French Helquin, a demon
Date: 1590 http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/harlequin
Pied is two or more colors in blotches or wearing or having a parti-colored coat and dates from the 14th century. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pied
Etymology: 1382, as if it were the pp. of a verb form of M.E. noun pie "magpie" in ref. to the bird's black and white plumage. Earliest use is in reference to the pyed freres, an order of friars who wore black and white. http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=pied+&searchmode=none
The first issue was called News, but a reader suggested Librarian’s Muse, and that’s what it has been since the second issue. A few months after the start, I noticed that a reader had a blog on blogspot, and then placed the muse on blogspot as well. The list is up to 73 readers in 8 states now. Remember, if you want to be removed—just reply with remove on the subject line.
Will the $789 Billion Stimulus Plan Bring Economic Recovery?
New York Times: Deal Reached in Congress on $789 Billion Stimulus Plan - "The package of spending increases and tax relief, intended to spur an economic recovery and create jobs by putting money back in the pockets of consumers and companies, ended up smaller than either the House or Senate had proposed."
Will the $800 Billion-Plus Stimulus Plan Bring Economic Recovery? National Center for Policy Analysis, February 10, 2009, by Gerald W. Scully: "Banker greed and Wall Street are blamed, but government policies over the last 25 years are the root cause of the current financial crisis."
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (aka ARRA or economic stimulus bill)
The House version of the ARRA would provide $14 billion for K-12 construction and $6 billion for higher education construction and specifically mention libraries as an allowable use of funds. The K-12 construction funds would create 300,000 jobs. The education construction funds are eliminated from the Senate version of the ARRA.
If you support libraries and would like the House version to prevail, please contact conferees on this legislation who control what stays in and what will be taken out. If you have other opinions, such as retaining funding for the arts and eliminating it for casinos and golf courses, this is the time to make your thoughts known. Find contact information for elected officials at http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml
Appropriations Chairman Obey (D-WI)
Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel (D-NY)
Commerce Chairman Waxman (D-CA)
Appropriations Ranking Member Jerry Lewis (R-CA)
Ways and Means Ranking Member Dave Camp (R-MI)
Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)
Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT)
Appropriations Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
Finance Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-IA)
Appropriations Ranking Member Thad Cochran (R-MS)
Wikileaks Posts Database of 6,780 Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports
"Wikileaks has released nearly a billion dollars worth of quasi-secret reports commissioned by the United States Congress The 6,780 reports, current as of this month, comprise over 127,000 pages of material on some of the most contentious issues in the nation...Nearly 2,300 of the reports were updated in the last 12 months, while the oldest report goes back to 1990. The release represents the total output of the Congressional Research Service (CRS) electronically available to Congressional offices." [As noted by Michael Ravnitzky, "there are additional reports and briefings prepared for specific offices that are not included in that electronic output."]
Alphabetical list of reports
Chronological list of reports
These reports have also been merged into OpenCRS.
Torrent: WikiLeaks Document Release: CRS Reports, Feb 2009 (full pack, incl. metadata for indexing). Where applicable we have also categorized the reports according to country and attached them to our general country index.
Note: See also the FAS directory of links to topical CRS Reports
Oakland, Calif., attorney Dana Sack is glad he didn't deposit that $360,400 check he got in the mail Jan. 30. Since the start of the year, the real estate attorney has been contacted "out of nowhere" by eight companies, most from East Asia, asking for help collecting money they claimed to be owed by U.S. businesses. About a week after signing those fee agreements, "Tomen" and "Matila" separately let him know by e-mail that Eagle Power Equipment had agreed to pay each of them through his firm, and though he had done no work, Sack should expect a check in the mail, from which he could deduct his retainer. One $360,400 check arrived by UPS from Ontario, "looking absolutely genuine." But when a call to Citibank proved this check was invalid, Sack called Eagle Power Equipment. He said he got a laugh from that company's controller, who said he was not only not paying any debts to Tomen, but that he'd been getting calls from small firm lawyers across the country.
Maryland attorney Jerome Feldman, of four-lawyer Bernstein & Feldman, said his firm was also contacted and retained via e-mail and received a real-looking check from Eagle Power for more than $300,000 made payable to the attorneys. He presumes that his firm was meant to put the money into an escrow account, after which the client in Asia would give the go-ahead for Feldman's firm to subtract its fee and send the balance on. Feldman said he went only so far as to contact Eagle then sent the matter to the Internet fraud division of the FBI.
In Alabama, solo Steven Brom said he was solicited by an individual claiming to represent Japan's Nippon Industries. A week after he received his retainer agreement, he, too, got the great news that the debtor had decided to pay. "It's usually a long drawn-out process, not based on one phone call," Brom said. The client told him that he could expect a check from Eagle Power. When he received the package--delivered by UPS--from Canada, Brom said the check for $348,540 was "highly professional looking."
In Brom's case, the scammers went so far as to fake an "800" phone number claiming to be Citibank's. Out of curiosity, he dialed it and got an automated phone system that asked for the account number and check amount, then told him his check was confirmed. He's sent his fake check to Citibank to handle any potential investigation.
http://www.law.com/jsp/law/sfb/lawArticleSFB.jsp?id=1202428041836
Harlequin is a large check pattern that is turned 45 degrees to form a diamond in two or more contrasting colors, set of chairs that are similar but do not match, pattern with patches, movie, fictional character, and athletic team. See these and other meanings at http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:harlequin&ei=kLqSSZGGBJzgM6W3mfQL&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
Etymology: ultimately from Italian arlecchino, from Middle French Helquin, a demon
Date: 1590 http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/harlequin
Pied is two or more colors in blotches or wearing or having a parti-colored coat and dates from the 14th century. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pied
Etymology: 1382, as if it were the pp. of a verb form of M.E. noun pie "magpie" in ref. to the bird's black and white plumage. Earliest use is in reference to the pyed freres, an order of friars who wore black and white. http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=pied+&searchmode=none
Thursday, February 12, 2009
More on economic stimulus bill
Side-By-Side Chart of Notable Differences Between Senate-Passed and House-Passed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
Follow up to related postings on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, from the Senate Finance committee, this Side-By-Side Chart of Notable Differences Between the Senate-Passed and the House-Passed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
Joint Committee on Taxation - Estimated Budget Effects Of The Revenue Provisions Contained In The “American Recovery And Reinvestment Tax Act Of 2009,” As Amended And Passed By The Senate On February 10, 2009
Estimated Budget Effects Of The Revenue Provisions Contained In The Collins-Nelson Amendment (# 570) In The Nature Of A Substitute To The “American Recovery And Reinvestment Tax Act Of 2009,” Under Consideration By The Senate
CFTC Launches New Monthly Online Report
News release: "The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced that it has launched, on a six-month trial basis, a new monthly report: This Month in Futures Markets. The report, produced by the Commission’s Office of the Chief Economist, will add transparency to the information the Commission provides the public concerning regulated futures markets by providing graphical and tabular displays on the Commission’s website."
This Month in Futures Markets – January 2009 - posted February 4, 2009 - OCE, Commodity Futures Trading Commission. This report is based on the Commitment of Traders (COT) report released on January 30th, 2009. Up to date COT reports can be accessed here".
When a widely shared photo of one of the world’s most public figures is turned into art by someone else, who owns the image? That question punctuates an unusual copyright spat pitting an international news service against a Los Angeles street artist over a president’s image. Artist Shepard Fairey acknowledges using a 2006 Associated Press photo of then-senator Barack Obama as the basis for his iconic red and blue “Hope” poster, reproduced on buttons and banners through the campaign. When the AP pressed Fairey for credit and compensation, Fairey sued the AP in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. His lawyers said the artist transformed the image that “conveys a radically different message” and thus, falls into fair-use territory. If the AP prevails, would there be a domino legal effect? Could Fairey go after other groups that borrowed his work and tweaked it? One comes to mind: organizers of the annual Big Shoulders Swim race in Lake Michigan handed out t-shirts to participants last September in Chicago. It featured a Fairey-like Obama wearing goggles with the word “SWIM” printed beneath (Click here and scroll down for pictures). WSJ February 10, 2009
Unique flavonoids in hops and beer
Over 4,000 flavonoids have been identified, many of which occur in fruits, vegetables and beverages (tea, coffee, beer, wine and fruit drinks). The flavonoids have aroused considerable interest recently because of their potential beneficial effects on human health--they have been reported to have antiviral, anti-allergic, antiplatelet, anti-inflammatory, antitumor and antioxidant activities.
http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/f-w00/flavonoid.html
The reopening of Ford’s Theatre after an 18-month refurbishment coincides with a celebration of the 200th anniversary of Lincoln’s birth. John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln there during a performance of “Our American Cousin” on the evening of April 14, 1865.
The theater unveiled a videotape, to be shown at its museum, in which the four living past-presidents--George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter--recited Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, accompanied by Matthew Brady’s Civil War images. The event was a retrospective of Lincoln’s life, from his humble beginnings described by James Earl Jones’s baritone to Vereen’s impassioned reading of the Emancipation Proclamation without the prompter, which broke mid-show.
The highlight for the audience of about 650 was classical violinist Joshua Bell’s “Variations on Yankee Doodle,” which was by turns playful and mournful.
Broadway singer Cheryl Freeman gave an electrifying rendition of a song from the play “The Civil War,” followed by Audra McDonald, Jessye Norman and Joshua Bell for “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” which earned a standing ovation.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=abNBZFgX8vls&refer=muse
The in vitro fertilization industry has doubled in size in the decade since the C.D.C. started collecting data in 1996. That year, 64,681 procedures were performed in 330 clinics. At last count, the number of procedures was up to 134,260 and there were more than 483 clinics across the country. More than 50,000 children a year are born as a result of in vitro fertilization in the United States. Nationwide, it is a more than $1 billion business. California has more doctors performing in vitro fertilization than any other state, with many concentrated in the Los Angeles area. The competition means that sales pitches are not unusual. The Huntington Reproductive Center offers a refund for some women. No pregnancy? You get 90 percent of your money back.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/health/12ivf.html?ref=health
pied (rhymes with pride) adjective
Having patches of two or more colors; multicolored
From pie (magpie), referring to a magpie's black and white plumage, from Latin pica (jay or magpie). The Pied Piper of legend owes his moniker to his multicolored attire.
"The pair of women came first, one strangely dressed, in pied clothes of three or four eras." Michael Chabon; The Mysteries of Pittsburgh; William Morrow; 1988.
A.Word.A.Day
Side-By-Side Chart of Notable Differences Between Senate-Passed and House-Passed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
Follow up to related postings on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, from the Senate Finance committee, this Side-By-Side Chart of Notable Differences Between the Senate-Passed and the House-Passed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
Joint Committee on Taxation - Estimated Budget Effects Of The Revenue Provisions Contained In The “American Recovery And Reinvestment Tax Act Of 2009,” As Amended And Passed By The Senate On February 10, 2009
Estimated Budget Effects Of The Revenue Provisions Contained In The Collins-Nelson Amendment (# 570) In The Nature Of A Substitute To The “American Recovery And Reinvestment Tax Act Of 2009,” Under Consideration By The Senate
CFTC Launches New Monthly Online Report
News release: "The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced that it has launched, on a six-month trial basis, a new monthly report: This Month in Futures Markets. The report, produced by the Commission’s Office of the Chief Economist, will add transparency to the information the Commission provides the public concerning regulated futures markets by providing graphical and tabular displays on the Commission’s website."
This Month in Futures Markets – January 2009 - posted February 4, 2009 - OCE, Commodity Futures Trading Commission. This report is based on the Commitment of Traders (COT) report released on January 30th, 2009. Up to date COT reports can be accessed here".
When a widely shared photo of one of the world’s most public figures is turned into art by someone else, who owns the image? That question punctuates an unusual copyright spat pitting an international news service against a Los Angeles street artist over a president’s image. Artist Shepard Fairey acknowledges using a 2006 Associated Press photo of then-senator Barack Obama as the basis for his iconic red and blue “Hope” poster, reproduced on buttons and banners through the campaign. When the AP pressed Fairey for credit and compensation, Fairey sued the AP in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. His lawyers said the artist transformed the image that “conveys a radically different message” and thus, falls into fair-use territory. If the AP prevails, would there be a domino legal effect? Could Fairey go after other groups that borrowed his work and tweaked it? One comes to mind: organizers of the annual Big Shoulders Swim race in Lake Michigan handed out t-shirts to participants last September in Chicago. It featured a Fairey-like Obama wearing goggles with the word “SWIM” printed beneath (Click here and scroll down for pictures). WSJ February 10, 2009
Unique flavonoids in hops and beer
Over 4,000 flavonoids have been identified, many of which occur in fruits, vegetables and beverages (tea, coffee, beer, wine and fruit drinks). The flavonoids have aroused considerable interest recently because of their potential beneficial effects on human health--they have been reported to have antiviral, anti-allergic, antiplatelet, anti-inflammatory, antitumor and antioxidant activities.
http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/f-w00/flavonoid.html
The reopening of Ford’s Theatre after an 18-month refurbishment coincides with a celebration of the 200th anniversary of Lincoln’s birth. John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln there during a performance of “Our American Cousin” on the evening of April 14, 1865.
The theater unveiled a videotape, to be shown at its museum, in which the four living past-presidents--George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter--recited Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, accompanied by Matthew Brady’s Civil War images. The event was a retrospective of Lincoln’s life, from his humble beginnings described by James Earl Jones’s baritone to Vereen’s impassioned reading of the Emancipation Proclamation without the prompter, which broke mid-show.
The highlight for the audience of about 650 was classical violinist Joshua Bell’s “Variations on Yankee Doodle,” which was by turns playful and mournful.
Broadway singer Cheryl Freeman gave an electrifying rendition of a song from the play “The Civil War,” followed by Audra McDonald, Jessye Norman and Joshua Bell for “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” which earned a standing ovation.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=abNBZFgX8vls&refer=muse
The in vitro fertilization industry has doubled in size in the decade since the C.D.C. started collecting data in 1996. That year, 64,681 procedures were performed in 330 clinics. At last count, the number of procedures was up to 134,260 and there were more than 483 clinics across the country. More than 50,000 children a year are born as a result of in vitro fertilization in the United States. Nationwide, it is a more than $1 billion business. California has more doctors performing in vitro fertilization than any other state, with many concentrated in the Los Angeles area. The competition means that sales pitches are not unusual. The Huntington Reproductive Center offers a refund for some women. No pregnancy? You get 90 percent of your money back.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/health/12ivf.html?ref=health
pied (rhymes with pride) adjective
Having patches of two or more colors; multicolored
From pie (magpie), referring to a magpie's black and white plumage, from Latin pica (jay or magpie). The Pied Piper of legend owes his moniker to his multicolored attire.
"The pair of women came first, one strangely dressed, in pied clothes of three or four eras." Michael Chabon; The Mysteries of Pittsburgh; William Morrow; 1988.
A.Word.A.Day
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
New Web 2.0 Tools on USA.gov
Visit Government 2.0 for the latest tools available on USA.gov and other federal websites. With these tools, USA.gov hopes to engage the public and improve access to government information and resources. Here are just a few of the Web 2.0 tools you can find on USA.gov:
Blogs – Check out our library of active federal blogs.
Word Cloud – See a visual representation of the 75 most popular search terms on USA.gov.
Videos – Find government videos on health topics, space travel, food preparation, and more.
News – Get the latest RSS feeds from across the federal government!
Gadget 2.0 – Find government gadgets or widgets developed and maintained by one agency and shared across the web.
Report: Citizen Satisfaction with Federal e-Government Hits All-Time High
American Customer Satisfaction Index E-Government Satisfaction Index, February 3, 2009 and related Excel Score Chart
"The truth is that even before Obama became President, the government was doing a remarkable job satisfying citizens with e-gov initiatives—in fact, as the following report attests, citizen satisfaction with e-government was at its highest point in more than five years at the end of 2008 (the study’s surveys were conducted on more than ninety-four federal websites from October 1-December 31, 2008). However, we’ve only scratched the surface of e-gov’s potential, and a new President with a commitment to technology and the Internet is the perfect choice to implement new policies, executive orders, funding, and legislation that will improve the ability of federal departments, agencies, and programs to serve citizens online."
On February 6, the Senate voted 73-24 to adopt a measure by Tom Coburn, R-Okla., to place tighter restrictions on facilities that can be built with money from the H.R. 1, the economic stimulus bill. The amendment would bar spending on casinos, aquariums, zoos, golf courses, swimming pools, stadiums, community parks, museums, theaters, art centers, and highway beautification projects. That's broader than a prohibition in the House-passed bill, which applied only to casinos, aquariums, zoos, golf courses and swimming pools. http://news.yahoo.com/s/cq/20090207/pl_cq_politics/politics3027043
See how your senator voted at: http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00136 The fastest way to find your state is go to the bottom of the page. Above that is a handy guide by yea, nay and not voting.
Music and sport derive from French. In Middle English, sport meant broadly "hobby" or "entertainment"; it came from the French word disport. English music is from Old French musique via Latin from Greek for the "art of the Muses." The root is also the basis for amuse, bemuse, mosaic, and museum. The Writer’s Almanac
The nine muses in Greek mythology were daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne. Calliope is the Muse of Epic Song and is shown with a wax tablet. See pictures of all nine and their attributes at:
http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/mgodsandgoddesses/tp/Muses.htm
Quote
I think that children’s fiction, more than anything, has the capacity to change lives.
Neil Gaiman, British-American author, and winner of the 2009 Newbery Medal for The Graveyard
A.Word.A.Day feedback
From: Kate Wellspring (kwellspring amherst.edu)
Subject: minor correction
On the Origin of Species was published Nov 24, 1859 rather than on Feb 12 (Darwin and Lincoln's birthday).
From: Stuart Showalter (showalter.stuart gmail.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--conduce
Def: To lead to or contribute to a particular result.
Being a lover of the law and an admirer of Justice Oliver Wendel Holmes, Jr., I have always remembered his use of this beautiful, uncommon word. It seems Holmes had a standing desk where he did much of his work. "Doesn't it tire you?" his wife asked, watching him write one day. "Yes," the Justice replied. "But it's salutary. Nothing conduces to brevity like a caving in of the knees."
Muse reader feedback on moving a house over ice
My father and grandfather moved their cabin on their island using logs--three times! Till they found a spot that didn't flood.
Visit Government 2.0 for the latest tools available on USA.gov and other federal websites. With these tools, USA.gov hopes to engage the public and improve access to government information and resources. Here are just a few of the Web 2.0 tools you can find on USA.gov:
Blogs – Check out our library of active federal blogs.
Word Cloud – See a visual representation of the 75 most popular search terms on USA.gov.
Videos – Find government videos on health topics, space travel, food preparation, and more.
News – Get the latest RSS feeds from across the federal government!
Gadget 2.0 – Find government gadgets or widgets developed and maintained by one agency and shared across the web.
Report: Citizen Satisfaction with Federal e-Government Hits All-Time High
American Customer Satisfaction Index E-Government Satisfaction Index, February 3, 2009 and related Excel Score Chart
"The truth is that even before Obama became President, the government was doing a remarkable job satisfying citizens with e-gov initiatives—in fact, as the following report attests, citizen satisfaction with e-government was at its highest point in more than five years at the end of 2008 (the study’s surveys were conducted on more than ninety-four federal websites from October 1-December 31, 2008). However, we’ve only scratched the surface of e-gov’s potential, and a new President with a commitment to technology and the Internet is the perfect choice to implement new policies, executive orders, funding, and legislation that will improve the ability of federal departments, agencies, and programs to serve citizens online."
On February 6, the Senate voted 73-24 to adopt a measure by Tom Coburn, R-Okla., to place tighter restrictions on facilities that can be built with money from the H.R. 1, the economic stimulus bill. The amendment would bar spending on casinos, aquariums, zoos, golf courses, swimming pools, stadiums, community parks, museums, theaters, art centers, and highway beautification projects. That's broader than a prohibition in the House-passed bill, which applied only to casinos, aquariums, zoos, golf courses and swimming pools. http://news.yahoo.com/s/cq/20090207/pl_cq_politics/politics3027043
See how your senator voted at: http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00136 The fastest way to find your state is go to the bottom of the page. Above that is a handy guide by yea, nay and not voting.
Music and sport derive from French. In Middle English, sport meant broadly "hobby" or "entertainment"; it came from the French word disport. English music is from Old French musique via Latin from Greek for the "art of the Muses." The root is also the basis for amuse, bemuse, mosaic, and museum. The Writer’s Almanac
The nine muses in Greek mythology were daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne. Calliope is the Muse of Epic Song and is shown with a wax tablet. See pictures of all nine and their attributes at:
http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/mgodsandgoddesses/tp/Muses.htm
Quote
I think that children’s fiction, more than anything, has the capacity to change lives.
Neil Gaiman, British-American author, and winner of the 2009 Newbery Medal for The Graveyard
A.Word.A.Day feedback
From: Kate Wellspring (kwellspring amherst.edu)
Subject: minor correction
On the Origin of Species was published Nov 24, 1859 rather than on Feb 12 (Darwin and Lincoln's birthday).
From: Stuart Showalter (showalter.stuart gmail.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--conduce
Def: To lead to or contribute to a particular result.
Being a lover of the law and an admirer of Justice Oliver Wendel Holmes, Jr., I have always remembered his use of this beautiful, uncommon word. It seems Holmes had a standing desk where he did much of his work. "Doesn't it tire you?" his wife asked, watching him write one day. "Yes," the Justice replied. "But it's salutary. Nothing conduces to brevity like a caving in of the knees."
Muse reader feedback on moving a house over ice
My father and grandfather moved their cabin on their island using logs--three times! Till they found a spot that didn't flood.
Monday, February 9, 2009
Street artist will get day in court for pasting up his art
Shepard Fairey is scheduled to face charges in a Boston courtroom on February 9 for allegedly pasting art without permission on two local sites that police discovered last month--one under the Boston University Bridge and the other above Storrow Drive.
Fairey was arrested February 6 just as he was about to enter the Institute of Contemporary Art for a scheduled performance. The artist, who lives in Los Angeles, rose to national fame last year for creating the red, white, and blue image of Barack Obama emblazoned with the word HOPE, iconography that was adopted and popularized by campaign supporters. http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/02/08/street_artist_will_get_day_in_court_for_pasting_up_his_art/
Book ban upheld
According to this account in the Miami Herald, the 11th Circuit ruled Thursday that the Miami-Dade School Board did not violate the Constitution in 2006 when it removed a controversial children’s book about Cuba from the public schools’ library system.
In a 2-1 decision, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta said the board did not breach the First Amendment, and ordered a Miami federal judge to lift a preliminary injunction that had allowed the book, called Vamos a Cuba to be checked out from school libraries. WSJ Law Blog February 6, 2009
The 2008 Bank Performance Scorecard: America's Top 150 Banks
Bank Direct Magazine: "There is not much flash and glitz among this year’s crop of top-performing U.S. banks and thrifts. But given all that’s occurred in the last six months, maybe slow and steady really is the name of the game. In fact, over a recent 12-month period, as the credit and financial markets came unhinged and some of the country’s best-known depository financial institutions teetered on the brink of collapse, “steady at the helm” was the governing mantra for the highest-ranked banks. That is just one salient feature of this year’s class of top performers among banks and thrifts, according to our annual Bank Performance Scorecard. Based on measurement criteria and analysis compiled by Sandler O’Neill & Partners L.P., a New York-based investment banking firm that specializes in the financial services industry, the scorecard features the institutions that maintain top standing in good times and bad—often with recurring high scorers."
2008 Bank Performance Scorecard Highlighting America’s Best Banks
The Financial Services Fact Book 2009, Insurance Information Institute, The Financial Services Roundtable: "The 2009 edition includes a host of new material to shed light on this challenging environment, including -
Trends in bank insolvencies
Data on credit default swaps
Information on the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, Congress’s landmark $700 billion rescue plan for the financial services industry
Expanded information on mortgage defaults
New data on mortgage-backed securities"
Newseum--daily newspaper front pages from around the world in their original, unedited form. http://www.newseum.org/todaysfrontpages/flash/default.asp
Quote
Some people love to love and some people love to loathe.
Some people love to praise and some people love to blame.
Book linked to JFK is decades overdue--Lincoln biography borrowed in '50s
The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum said it will display, as part of a weeklong celebration of Presidents' Day, a 1930 biography of Abraham Lincoln that was apparently borrowed by Kennedy, or a member of his staff, when he was serving in the Senate in the 1950s. The Library of Congress book, "A. Lincoln" by Ross F. Lockridge, was found in Kennedy's pre-presidential papers. It has been listed as missing in the Library of Congress online catalog, and will be returned to its collection after the display.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/02/04/book_linked_to_jfk_is_decades_overdue/
Have you ever seen a house moved over ice? A muse reader shares the story:
http://www.startribune.com/local/south/38530692.html?elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O:DW3ckUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUnciaec8O7EyUsl
Shepard Fairey is scheduled to face charges in a Boston courtroom on February 9 for allegedly pasting art without permission on two local sites that police discovered last month--one under the Boston University Bridge and the other above Storrow Drive.
Fairey was arrested February 6 just as he was about to enter the Institute of Contemporary Art for a scheduled performance. The artist, who lives in Los Angeles, rose to national fame last year for creating the red, white, and blue image of Barack Obama emblazoned with the word HOPE, iconography that was adopted and popularized by campaign supporters. http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/02/08/street_artist_will_get_day_in_court_for_pasting_up_his_art/
Book ban upheld
According to this account in the Miami Herald, the 11th Circuit ruled Thursday that the Miami-Dade School Board did not violate the Constitution in 2006 when it removed a controversial children’s book about Cuba from the public schools’ library system.
In a 2-1 decision, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta said the board did not breach the First Amendment, and ordered a Miami federal judge to lift a preliminary injunction that had allowed the book, called Vamos a Cuba to be checked out from school libraries. WSJ Law Blog February 6, 2009
The 2008 Bank Performance Scorecard: America's Top 150 Banks
Bank Direct Magazine: "There is not much flash and glitz among this year’s crop of top-performing U.S. banks and thrifts. But given all that’s occurred in the last six months, maybe slow and steady really is the name of the game. In fact, over a recent 12-month period, as the credit and financial markets came unhinged and some of the country’s best-known depository financial institutions teetered on the brink of collapse, “steady at the helm” was the governing mantra for the highest-ranked banks. That is just one salient feature of this year’s class of top performers among banks and thrifts, according to our annual Bank Performance Scorecard. Based on measurement criteria and analysis compiled by Sandler O’Neill & Partners L.P., a New York-based investment banking firm that specializes in the financial services industry, the scorecard features the institutions that maintain top standing in good times and bad—often with recurring high scorers."
2008 Bank Performance Scorecard Highlighting America’s Best Banks
The Financial Services Fact Book 2009, Insurance Information Institute, The Financial Services Roundtable: "The 2009 edition includes a host of new material to shed light on this challenging environment, including -
Trends in bank insolvencies
Data on credit default swaps
Information on the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, Congress’s landmark $700 billion rescue plan for the financial services industry
Expanded information on mortgage defaults
New data on mortgage-backed securities"
Newseum--daily newspaper front pages from around the world in their original, unedited form. http://www.newseum.org/todaysfrontpages/flash/default.asp
Quote
Some people love to love and some people love to loathe.
Some people love to praise and some people love to blame.
Book linked to JFK is decades overdue--Lincoln biography borrowed in '50s
The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum said it will display, as part of a weeklong celebration of Presidents' Day, a 1930 biography of Abraham Lincoln that was apparently borrowed by Kennedy, or a member of his staff, when he was serving in the Senate in the 1950s. The Library of Congress book, "A. Lincoln" by Ross F. Lockridge, was found in Kennedy's pre-presidential papers. It has been listed as missing in the Library of Congress online catalog, and will be returned to its collection after the display.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/02/04/book_linked_to_jfk_is_decades_overdue/
Have you ever seen a house moved over ice? A muse reader shares the story:
http://www.startribune.com/local/south/38530692.html?elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O:DW3ckUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUnciaec8O7EyUsl
Friday, February 6, 2009
Follow-up to “A or AN?” using example of an herb People in England pronounce the H in herb. For some reason, when Americans speak the word, they drop the H. When people learn English as a second language, they probably pronounce the H because it makes sense. Some people may be returning to the English way of pronouncing herb—just as theater and center (American spellings) are being supplanted by English spellings: theatre and centre.
House Passes DTV Delay Act
Follow up to previous postings on digital television transition, "by a vote of 264 to 158, the House of Representatives approved S. 352, the DTV Delay Act, which will postpone the transition to digital television until June 12, 2009.”
See also - Over Two Million Households on DTV Coupon Waiting List: "On February 4, Energy and Commerce Chairman Waxman and Subcommittee Chairman Boucher sent a letter to their colleagues with an updated list of households on the waiting list, organized by congressional district."
Report - TARP Recipients Paid Out $114 Million for Politicking Last Year
"The struggling companies whose freewheeling business practices have contributed to the country's economic woes are getting a lucrative return on at least one of their investments. Beneficiaries of the $700 billion bailout package in the finance and automotive industries have spent a total of $114.2 million on lobbying in the past year and contributions toward the 2008 election, the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics has found. The companies' political activities have, in part, yielded them $295.2 billion from the federal government's Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).
Copyright battle over Obama image
No-one disputes that the poster was based on AP's photograph. The Associated Press is claiming compensation for the use of one of its photographs to create the most iconic image of Barack Obama. The red, white and blue portrait by Shepard Fairey appeared on thousands of posters and T-shirts and is now in Washington's National Portrait Gallery. Lawyers for AP and Shepard Fairey are reported to be holding talks. Mr Fairey's attorney says it was a case of "fair use", which allows exceptions to copyright law.
The Los Angeles-based street artist has acknowledged that the image is The Los Angeles-based street artist has acknowledged that the image is based on a photograph taken in April 2006 by Mannie Garcia, a photographer on assignment for AP. AP's director of media relations Paul Colford says that because it was an AP photograph, its use by Shepard Fairey "required permission" and AP should have been credited.
Fair use considerations:
Purpose of the use: was the image used in a commercial or non-commercial way?
Nature of the copyrighted material: how creative or factual was the original?
Transformation of the work: was the original changed giving it new meaning or value?
Amount copied: how much of the original was copied and was it a central to the original?
Effect on the market of the original: could it supplant demand for the original?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7872253.stm
February 12 this year marks the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln's birth. On the same day Charles Darwin was born. The day also marks the sesquicentennial of the publication of his book, The Origin of Species. A.Word.A.Day celebrates the three anniversaries by selecting words from Lincoln's and Darwin's writing and speeches.
propinquity (pro-PING-kwi-tee)
noun: Nearness in space, time or relationship
From Latin propinquitas (nearness), from prope (near).
"I believe that ... propinquity of descent, -- the only known cause of the similarity of organic beings, -- is the bond, hidden as it is by various degrees of modification, which is partially revealed to us by our classifications."
Charles Darwin; On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection; 1859.
conduce (kuhn-DOOS, -DYOOS)
verb intr.: To lead to or contribute to a particular result
From Latin conducere (to lead, bring together), from com- (together) + ducere (to lead). Ultimately from the Indo-European root deuk- (to lead) that led to other words such as duke, conduct, educate, duct, wanton, and tug.
"We find ourselves under the government of a system of political institutions, conducing more essentially to the ends of civil and religious liberty, than any of which the history of former times tells us." Abraham Lincoln; Lyceum Address; Jan 27, 1838.
A.Word.A.Day
WSJ Overview Charts on Auto Sales
Wall Street Journal: What's Hot Off the Lots | Top 20 vehicles | The U.S. Market | Sales and Share of Total Market by Manufacturer
On February 6, 1937 John Steinbeck published his novel Of Mice and Men. It was a short book, just 186 pages, the story of two migrant farm workers: George Milton and his simple-minded friend, Lennie Small. He took the title from lines by the Scottish poet Robert Burns: "The best-laid schemes of mice and men / Gang aft a-gley," or, "The best-laid plans of mice and men / Often go awry." Steinbeck was almost finished when his dog tore the manuscript to shreds. But he rewrote the novel, and it was published on this day in 1937 and made into a play later the same year.
On February 6, 1894 lexicographer Eric Partridge, (books by this author) born on a farm near Gisborne, New Zealand. When he fought in WWI, he was fascinated by British soldiers' slang. And since slang wasn't included in dictionaries, he decided that somebody should study it and write it down. He wrote books about the history of slang and clichés, and he even wrote a book about the slang used in Shakespeare's plays.
The Writer’s Almanac
House Passes DTV Delay Act
Follow up to previous postings on digital television transition, "by a vote of 264 to 158, the House of Representatives approved S. 352, the DTV Delay Act, which will postpone the transition to digital television until June 12, 2009.”
See also - Over Two Million Households on DTV Coupon Waiting List: "On February 4, Energy and Commerce Chairman Waxman and Subcommittee Chairman Boucher sent a letter to their colleagues with an updated list of households on the waiting list, organized by congressional district."
Report - TARP Recipients Paid Out $114 Million for Politicking Last Year
"The struggling companies whose freewheeling business practices have contributed to the country's economic woes are getting a lucrative return on at least one of their investments. Beneficiaries of the $700 billion bailout package in the finance and automotive industries have spent a total of $114.2 million on lobbying in the past year and contributions toward the 2008 election, the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics has found. The companies' political activities have, in part, yielded them $295.2 billion from the federal government's Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).
Copyright battle over Obama image
No-one disputes that the poster was based on AP's photograph. The Associated Press is claiming compensation for the use of one of its photographs to create the most iconic image of Barack Obama. The red, white and blue portrait by Shepard Fairey appeared on thousands of posters and T-shirts and is now in Washington's National Portrait Gallery. Lawyers for AP and Shepard Fairey are reported to be holding talks. Mr Fairey's attorney says it was a case of "fair use", which allows exceptions to copyright law.
The Los Angeles-based street artist has acknowledged that the image is The Los Angeles-based street artist has acknowledged that the image is based on a photograph taken in April 2006 by Mannie Garcia, a photographer on assignment for AP. AP's director of media relations Paul Colford says that because it was an AP photograph, its use by Shepard Fairey "required permission" and AP should have been credited.
Fair use considerations:
Purpose of the use: was the image used in a commercial or non-commercial way?
Nature of the copyrighted material: how creative or factual was the original?
Transformation of the work: was the original changed giving it new meaning or value?
Amount copied: how much of the original was copied and was it a central to the original?
Effect on the market of the original: could it supplant demand for the original?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7872253.stm
February 12 this year marks the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln's birth. On the same day Charles Darwin was born. The day also marks the sesquicentennial of the publication of his book, The Origin of Species. A.Word.A.Day celebrates the three anniversaries by selecting words from Lincoln's and Darwin's writing and speeches.
propinquity (pro-PING-kwi-tee)
noun: Nearness in space, time or relationship
From Latin propinquitas (nearness), from prope (near).
"I believe that ... propinquity of descent, -- the only known cause of the similarity of organic beings, -- is the bond, hidden as it is by various degrees of modification, which is partially revealed to us by our classifications."
Charles Darwin; On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection; 1859.
conduce (kuhn-DOOS, -DYOOS)
verb intr.: To lead to or contribute to a particular result
From Latin conducere (to lead, bring together), from com- (together) + ducere (to lead). Ultimately from the Indo-European root deuk- (to lead) that led to other words such as duke, conduct, educate, duct, wanton, and tug.
"We find ourselves under the government of a system of political institutions, conducing more essentially to the ends of civil and religious liberty, than any of which the history of former times tells us." Abraham Lincoln; Lyceum Address; Jan 27, 1838.
A.Word.A.Day
WSJ Overview Charts on Auto Sales
Wall Street Journal: What's Hot Off the Lots | Top 20 vehicles | The U.S. Market | Sales and Share of Total Market by Manufacturer
On February 6, 1937 John Steinbeck published his novel Of Mice and Men. It was a short book, just 186 pages, the story of two migrant farm workers: George Milton and his simple-minded friend, Lennie Small. He took the title from lines by the Scottish poet Robert Burns: "The best-laid schemes of mice and men / Gang aft a-gley," or, "The best-laid plans of mice and men / Often go awry." Steinbeck was almost finished when his dog tore the manuscript to shreds. But he rewrote the novel, and it was published on this day in 1937 and made into a play later the same year.
On February 6, 1894 lexicographer Eric Partridge, (books by this author) born on a farm near Gisborne, New Zealand. When he fought in WWI, he was fascinated by British soldiers' slang. And since slang wasn't included in dictionaries, he decided that somebody should study it and write it down. He wrote books about the history of slang and clichés, and he even wrote a book about the slang used in Shakespeare's plays.
The Writer’s Almanac
Thursday, February 5, 2009
I just realized I can’t name our senators, but I can remember every word of the “Beverly Hillbillies” theme song. Real Life Adventures cartoon, February 3, 2009
If you can’t remember your senators or representatives, search here: http://memberguide.gpoaccess.gov/
CWE/SANS TOP 25 Most Dangerous Programming Errors
News release: "...experts from more than 30 US and international cyber security organizations jointly released the consensus list of the 25 most dangerous programming errors that lead to security bugs and that enable cyber espionage and cyber crime. Shockingly, most of these errors are not well understood by programmers; their avoidance is not widely taught by computer science programs; and their presence is frequently not tested by organizations developing software for sale. The impact of these errors is far reaching. Just two of them led to more than 1.5 million web site security breaches during 2008--and those breaches cascaded onto the computers of people who visited those web sites, turning their computers into zombies."
The Top 25 Errors are listed below in three categories:
Category: Insecure Interaction Between Components (9 errors)
Category: Risky Resource Management (9 errors)
Category: Porous Defenses (7 errors)
Harvard Prof. on Google and the Future of Books
Follow up to previous postings on the Google Book search project, from the New York Review of Books, Google & the Future of Books, by Robert Darnton
"How can we navigate through the information landscape that is only beginning to come into view? The question is more urgent than ever following the recent settlement between Google and the authors and publishers who were suing it for alleged breach of copyright. For the last four years, Google has been digitizing millions of books, including many covered by copyright, from the collections of major research libraries, and making the texts searchable online. The authors and publishers objected that digitizing constituted a violation of their copyrights. After lengthy negotiations, the plaintiffs and Google agreed on a settlement, which will have a profound effect on the way books reach readers for the foreseeable future.
In rhetoric (as defined by Cicero and by the first century Latin text, Rhetorica ad Herennium), the five overlapping offices or divisions of the rhetorical process:
inventio (Greek, heuristics), invention
dispositio (Greek, taxis), arrangement
elocutio (Greek, lexis), style
memoria (Greek, mneme), memory
actio (Greek, hypocrisis), delivery
http://grammar.about.com/od/rs/g/rhetcanterm.htm
Cat colonies of Rome—about 300,000 cats roam the Roman ruins, some in packs, some fed by Gattara (“cat women”).
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0203/p17s01-hfes.html
http://goeurope.about.com/cs/rome/a/rome_cats.htm
Quote: When life kicks you, let it kick you forward.
Kay Yow, North Carolina State University women’s basketball coach, born in 1942 and died January 24, 2009
http://www.wbca.org/upload/KayYowQuotes.pdf
A or AN? Why do we say a university, a union--an herb, an hour? It’s too hard to close the n in university and union after using AN, so we substitute A. In the case of herb and hour, the Hs are silent. Let your ear be the guide. See more at: http://www.auburn.edu/communications_marketing/askaubie/042705.html
A gamelan is a musical ensemble of Indonesia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamelan
You may hear them on YouTube, or at a program near your home. Below is a link to groups in the states where our muse readers reside. You will find more complete information at the Web site.
Michael B. Bakan School of Music Florida State University
Friends of the Gamelan The University of Chicago
Consulate General of the Republic of Indonesia in Chicago
Charles Capwell Raharja, dir. School of Music University of Illinois
Judith Becker Music Department University of Michigan
Tamara Fielding 1 Sir Kenneth Court Northport, NY 11768 Phone: (631) 754-5035
Department of Music CB #3320 Hill Hall University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
David Harnish College of Musical Art Bowling Green State University
Jackson Hill Department of Music Bucknell University
Co-directed by I Nyoman Suadin and Tom Whitman Tom Whitman Department of Music and Dance 500 College Ave. Swarthmore College
http://www.embassyofindonesia.org/education/docpdf/KelompokGamelandiAmerikaSerikat.pdf
If you can’t remember your senators or representatives, search here: http://memberguide.gpoaccess.gov/
CWE/SANS TOP 25 Most Dangerous Programming Errors
News release: "...experts from more than 30 US and international cyber security organizations jointly released the consensus list of the 25 most dangerous programming errors that lead to security bugs and that enable cyber espionage and cyber crime. Shockingly, most of these errors are not well understood by programmers; their avoidance is not widely taught by computer science programs; and their presence is frequently not tested by organizations developing software for sale. The impact of these errors is far reaching. Just two of them led to more than 1.5 million web site security breaches during 2008--and those breaches cascaded onto the computers of people who visited those web sites, turning their computers into zombies."
The Top 25 Errors are listed below in three categories:
Category: Insecure Interaction Between Components (9 errors)
Category: Risky Resource Management (9 errors)
Category: Porous Defenses (7 errors)
Harvard Prof. on Google and the Future of Books
Follow up to previous postings on the Google Book search project, from the New York Review of Books, Google & the Future of Books, by Robert Darnton
"How can we navigate through the information landscape that is only beginning to come into view? The question is more urgent than ever following the recent settlement between Google and the authors and publishers who were suing it for alleged breach of copyright. For the last four years, Google has been digitizing millions of books, including many covered by copyright, from the collections of major research libraries, and making the texts searchable online. The authors and publishers objected that digitizing constituted a violation of their copyrights. After lengthy negotiations, the plaintiffs and Google agreed on a settlement, which will have a profound effect on the way books reach readers for the foreseeable future.
In rhetoric (as defined by Cicero and by the first century Latin text, Rhetorica ad Herennium), the five overlapping offices or divisions of the rhetorical process:
inventio (Greek, heuristics), invention
dispositio (Greek, taxis), arrangement
elocutio (Greek, lexis), style
memoria (Greek, mneme), memory
actio (Greek, hypocrisis), delivery
http://grammar.about.com/od/rs/g/rhetcanterm.htm
Cat colonies of Rome—about 300,000 cats roam the Roman ruins, some in packs, some fed by Gattara (“cat women”).
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0203/p17s01-hfes.html
http://goeurope.about.com/cs/rome/a/rome_cats.htm
Quote: When life kicks you, let it kick you forward.
Kay Yow, North Carolina State University women’s basketball coach, born in 1942 and died January 24, 2009
http://www.wbca.org/upload/KayYowQuotes.pdf
A or AN? Why do we say a university, a union--an herb, an hour? It’s too hard to close the n in university and union after using AN, so we substitute A. In the case of herb and hour, the Hs are silent. Let your ear be the guide. See more at: http://www.auburn.edu/communications_marketing/askaubie/042705.html
A gamelan is a musical ensemble of Indonesia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamelan
You may hear them on YouTube, or at a program near your home. Below is a link to groups in the states where our muse readers reside. You will find more complete information at the Web site.
Michael B. Bakan School of Music Florida State University
Friends of the Gamelan The University of Chicago
Consulate General of the Republic of Indonesia in Chicago
Charles Capwell Raharja, dir. School of Music University of Illinois
Judith Becker Music Department University of Michigan
Tamara Fielding 1 Sir Kenneth Court Northport, NY 11768 Phone: (631) 754-5035
Department of Music CB #3320 Hill Hall University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
David Harnish College of Musical Art Bowling Green State University
Jackson Hill Department of Music Bucknell University
Co-directed by I Nyoman Suadin and Tom Whitman Tom Whitman Department of Music and Dance 500 College Ave. Swarthmore College
http://www.embassyofindonesia.org/education/docpdf/KelompokGamelandiAmerikaSerikat.pdf
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
In the Financial District, Wall Streeters have developed an appetite not only for McDonald's hamburgers, they're gobbling up its stock, as well. McDonald’s net income increased a whopping 80 percent from 2007 to 2008--and its shares rose 11.22 percent from January 2008 to January 2009, while the rest of the market tanked. "You hear all the news going on [about the economy], and you want to save money. This is good value," said lunchgoer Mark Drapala, 29, a sales-account exec who works near Astor Place.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/01282009/news/regionalnews/unhappy_meal_152342.htm
An extract from grape seeds forces laboratory leukemia cells to commit cell suicide, according to researchers from the University of Kentucky. They found that within 24 hours, 76 percent of leukemia cells had died after being exposed to the extract. "These results could have implications for the incorporation of agents such as grape seed extract into prevention or treatment of hematological malignancies and possibly other cancers," said the study's lead author, Xianglin Shi, Ph.D., professor in the Graduate Center for Toxicology at the University of Kentucky. "What everyone seeks is an agent that has an effect on cancer cells but leaves normal cells alone, and this shows that grape seed extract fits into this category," he said. http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/134016.php
The New Quebec Crater (previously known as Chubb Crater), now known as Pingualuit Crater (which means "where the land rises" in the local Inuit language), is a young meteorite crater, by geological standards, located in the Ungava Peninsula of Quebec, Canada. It is 3.44 km (2.14 mi) in diameter, and is estimated to be 1.4 ± 0.1 million years old (Pleistocene). The crater is exposed to the surface, rising 160 m (520 ft) above the surrounding tundra and is 400 m (1,300 ft) deep. A 270 m (890 ft) deep Pingualuk Lake fills the depression, and is one of the deepest lakes in North America. The lake also holds some of the purest fresh water in the world, with a salinity level of less than 3 ppm (the salinity level of the Great Lakes is 500 ppm). The lake has no inlets or apparent outlets, so the water accumulates solely from rain and snow and is only lost through evaporation. In terms of transparency, it is second only to Lake Masyuko in Japan. The lake-filled crater had long been known to local Inuit who knew it as the "Crystal Eye of Nunavik" for its clear water. World War II pilots often used the perfectly circular landmark as a navigational tool. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pingualuit_crater
To your health
News, tips, recipes: http://www.everydayhealth.com/
News, reports, links to health sites: http://www.healthcentral.com/
The Circus Maximus was founded by King Tarquinius Priscus in the 7th Century BC. Its size was increased under successive rulers but at its greatest it measured some 2000 feet in length and 450 feet in width (650m x 125m). This made it fit snugly into the marshy Murcia valley between the Palatine and Aventine hills which king Tarquinius had specially drained for the job. The shape of the whole building was like a stretched oval with a flat end called the "officium" which contained the starting blocks called "carceres" from which the chariots would enter the track when metal barriers were lifted. (Carcere in Italian now means prison).
The seats around the track were initially made of wood up the valley sides but these were subsequently replaced with stone seating. The Circus Maximus was rebuilt by Caesar and the seating was increased to 150,000. It was then covered in marble by Trajan in the first century AD and the seating increased to the full 250,000. As in the Colosseum, the track was called the "arena" on account of the sand it was covered with. At the time of the Republic there was an average of about 17 days of "ludi" (circus games) a year, each of which included 10 or 12 actual races. Each race was called a "missus" (meaning to "launch" or "disperse"). Several hundred years later there might be as many as two months worth of races (60 days) lasting from sunrise to sunset. The general average was to hold 24 or 25 races in a day each made up of four contestants. The last races of Rome were held almost a hundred years after the fall of the last Roman emperor Romulus Augustulus. After more than 1100 years of racing tradition an end was put to them during the reign of the invading barbarian chieftain Totila in the 6th century.
http://www.mariamilani.com/ancient_rome/circus_maximus.htm
The Latin word circus, which comes from the Greek word kirkos, "circle, ring," referred to a circular or oval area enclosed by rows of seats for spectators. In the center ring a variety of events, including chariot races and gladiatorial combats, were held. The first use of circus recorded in English, in a work by Chaucer written around 1380, probably refers to the Circus Maximus in Rome. Our modern circus, which dates to the end of the 18th century, was originally an equestrian spectacle as well, but the trick riders were soon joined in the ring by such performers as ropedancers, acrobats, and jugglers. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Circus
When is a square not a four-sided figure having equal-length sides meeting at right angles? When it is an open area for public use such as St. Peter’s in Rome and St. Mark’s in Venice. See many definitions, including mathematical ones at:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:square&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
Google Ocean, which will be included in the newest version of Google Earth, will allow users to swim around underwater volcanoes, watch videos about exotic marine life, read about nearby shipwrecks, contribute photos and watch unseen footage of historic ocean expeditions. The world's oceans cover more than 70 per cent of the planet's surface and contain 80 per cent of all life on Earth, yet humans have only ever explored around 5 per cent of that space.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/technology/google/4434916/Google-Ocean-launched-as-extension-of-Google-Earth-to-map-the-seabed.html
On February 3, 1870, the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution was ratified, guaranteeing all male citizens the right to vote regardless of their race. In 1913, the Sixteenth Amendment was ratified, which imposed a federal income tax.
February 3 is the birthday of the epic novelist James A. Michener, (books by this author) born in Doylestown, Pennsylvania (1907), the author of Tales of the South Pacific. He said, "I'm not a very good writer, but I'm an excellent rewriter."
February 3 is "the day the music died," the day in 1959 when Buddy Holly was killed in a plane crash in Clear Lake, Iowa, along with Ritchie Valens (who sang "La Bamba") and J.P. Richardson (known as "The Big Bopper"). Buddy Holly's career as a rock star only lasted a year and a half, but he recorded "Peggy Sue," "Everyday," "That'll Be the Day," "Oh, Boy!" and many more hits. The Writer’s Almanac
http://www.nypost.com/seven/01282009/news/regionalnews/unhappy_meal_152342.htm
An extract from grape seeds forces laboratory leukemia cells to commit cell suicide, according to researchers from the University of Kentucky. They found that within 24 hours, 76 percent of leukemia cells had died after being exposed to the extract. "These results could have implications for the incorporation of agents such as grape seed extract into prevention or treatment of hematological malignancies and possibly other cancers," said the study's lead author, Xianglin Shi, Ph.D., professor in the Graduate Center for Toxicology at the University of Kentucky. "What everyone seeks is an agent that has an effect on cancer cells but leaves normal cells alone, and this shows that grape seed extract fits into this category," he said. http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/134016.php
The New Quebec Crater (previously known as Chubb Crater), now known as Pingualuit Crater (which means "where the land rises" in the local Inuit language), is a young meteorite crater, by geological standards, located in the Ungava Peninsula of Quebec, Canada. It is 3.44 km (2.14 mi) in diameter, and is estimated to be 1.4 ± 0.1 million years old (Pleistocene). The crater is exposed to the surface, rising 160 m (520 ft) above the surrounding tundra and is 400 m (1,300 ft) deep. A 270 m (890 ft) deep Pingualuk Lake fills the depression, and is one of the deepest lakes in North America. The lake also holds some of the purest fresh water in the world, with a salinity level of less than 3 ppm (the salinity level of the Great Lakes is 500 ppm). The lake has no inlets or apparent outlets, so the water accumulates solely from rain and snow and is only lost through evaporation. In terms of transparency, it is second only to Lake Masyuko in Japan. The lake-filled crater had long been known to local Inuit who knew it as the "Crystal Eye of Nunavik" for its clear water. World War II pilots often used the perfectly circular landmark as a navigational tool. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pingualuit_crater
To your health
News, tips, recipes: http://www.everydayhealth.com/
News, reports, links to health sites: http://www.healthcentral.com/
The Circus Maximus was founded by King Tarquinius Priscus in the 7th Century BC. Its size was increased under successive rulers but at its greatest it measured some 2000 feet in length and 450 feet in width (650m x 125m). This made it fit snugly into the marshy Murcia valley between the Palatine and Aventine hills which king Tarquinius had specially drained for the job. The shape of the whole building was like a stretched oval with a flat end called the "officium" which contained the starting blocks called "carceres" from which the chariots would enter the track when metal barriers were lifted. (Carcere in Italian now means prison).
The seats around the track were initially made of wood up the valley sides but these were subsequently replaced with stone seating. The Circus Maximus was rebuilt by Caesar and the seating was increased to 150,000. It was then covered in marble by Trajan in the first century AD and the seating increased to the full 250,000. As in the Colosseum, the track was called the "arena" on account of the sand it was covered with. At the time of the Republic there was an average of about 17 days of "ludi" (circus games) a year, each of which included 10 or 12 actual races. Each race was called a "missus" (meaning to "launch" or "disperse"). Several hundred years later there might be as many as two months worth of races (60 days) lasting from sunrise to sunset. The general average was to hold 24 or 25 races in a day each made up of four contestants. The last races of Rome were held almost a hundred years after the fall of the last Roman emperor Romulus Augustulus. After more than 1100 years of racing tradition an end was put to them during the reign of the invading barbarian chieftain Totila in the 6th century.
http://www.mariamilani.com/ancient_rome/circus_maximus.htm
The Latin word circus, which comes from the Greek word kirkos, "circle, ring," referred to a circular or oval area enclosed by rows of seats for spectators. In the center ring a variety of events, including chariot races and gladiatorial combats, were held. The first use of circus recorded in English, in a work by Chaucer written around 1380, probably refers to the Circus Maximus in Rome. Our modern circus, which dates to the end of the 18th century, was originally an equestrian spectacle as well, but the trick riders were soon joined in the ring by such performers as ropedancers, acrobats, and jugglers. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Circus
When is a square not a four-sided figure having equal-length sides meeting at right angles? When it is an open area for public use such as St. Peter’s in Rome and St. Mark’s in Venice. See many definitions, including mathematical ones at:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&defl=en&q=define:square&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
Google Ocean, which will be included in the newest version of Google Earth, will allow users to swim around underwater volcanoes, watch videos about exotic marine life, read about nearby shipwrecks, contribute photos and watch unseen footage of historic ocean expeditions. The world's oceans cover more than 70 per cent of the planet's surface and contain 80 per cent of all life on Earth, yet humans have only ever explored around 5 per cent of that space.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/technology/google/4434916/Google-Ocean-launched-as-extension-of-Google-Earth-to-map-the-seabed.html
On February 3, 1870, the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution was ratified, guaranteeing all male citizens the right to vote regardless of their race. In 1913, the Sixteenth Amendment was ratified, which imposed a federal income tax.
February 3 is the birthday of the epic novelist James A. Michener, (books by this author) born in Doylestown, Pennsylvania (1907), the author of Tales of the South Pacific. He said, "I'm not a very good writer, but I'm an excellent rewriter."
February 3 is "the day the music died," the day in 1959 when Buddy Holly was killed in a plane crash in Clear Lake, Iowa, along with Ritchie Valens (who sang "La Bamba") and J.P. Richardson (known as "The Big Bopper"). Buddy Holly's career as a rock star only lasted a year and a half, but he recorded "Peggy Sue," "Everyday," "That'll Be the Day," "Oh, Boy!" and many more hits. The Writer’s Almanac
Monday, February 2, 2009
Tampa, FL (AHN) - Florida-based deep-sea explorers have reportedly found remains from the wreck of the most famous ship in British naval history that sank in the English Channel 264 years ago. Odyssey Marine Exploration, a company that found millions worth sunken treasure in 2007, is expected to announce on February 2 that it has located the HMS Victory, a warship known as the finest ship in the world. The mightiest Royal Navy warship of its time, which was considered to be unsinkable, went down in 1744 off the Channel Islands and since then its exact location has remained a mystery. Its brass cannon are considered to be worth up to 20,000 pounds ($29,000) each. It was also reportedly carrying four tons or around 100,000 gold coins. http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7013913040
The Financial Times, reports Elizabeth Holmes at the WSJ’s Digits blog, is suing the Blackstone Group for multiple use of a single online subscription, alleging the private equity firm shared a user name and password to avoid paying for multiple accounts.
The suit, filed in federal court in Manhattan (click here for the complaint), says that a senior Blackstone employee distributed login information to other employees. That account accessed thousands of individual articles between February 2006 and June 2008. The suit describes the use as massive and far more than an individual would normally access. Online subscriptions to the FT cost $179 to $299 a year.
For years, companies in many industries—automotive, cell phones, computers—have required customers to agree to arbitrate their disputes and to waive their right to pursue claims on a class-wide basis. On January 30, the Second Circuit struck down an arbitration clause drafted by American Express that banned any type of class litigation. The ban, according to the court, would have made it impossible for plaintiffs to pursue their antitrust claims against AmEx. Here’s a copy of the ruling and here’s a report on the decision from Public Citizens Consumer Law & Policy Blog.
Other courts, though, have gone the other way. Here is a January 29 posting from the ADR prof blog about a federal judge in New Jersey who upheld a Verizon Wireless class-action waiver, all the while acknowledging that the holding would kill the Verizon customers claim. WSJ Law Blog January 30, 2009
Energy in Brief — Who are the major players supplying the world oil market?
January 29th, 2009 Source: Energy Information Administration
From the Brief:
Governments of oil-rich countries have a major influence on the world supply of oil through ownership of national oil companies and, for some governments, their membership in OPEC.
See Also: Other Energy in Brief Articles
CBO: The State of the Economy and Issues in Developing an Effective Policy Response
Testimony, CBO, Statement of Douglas W. Elmendorf, Director, The State of the Economy and Issues in Developing an Effective Policy Response before the Committee on the Budget, U.S. House of Representatives, January 27, 2009.
"The economy is currently enduring a recession that started more than a year ago. CBO projects that, in the absence of any changes in fiscal policy, economic activity will contract more sharply in 2009 than it did in 2008 and the economy will grow at only a moderate pace in 2010. Under that projection, the shortfall in the nation’s output relative to its potential would be the largest—in terms of both length and depth—since the Depression of the 1930s. Lost output would represent nearly 7 percent of the estimated potential output in both 2009 and 2010—amounting to about $1 trillion in each year—and almost 5 percent of the potential in 2011. Payroll employment declined by 2-1/2 million jobs last year, and CBO projects that, without further policy actions, even more jobs will be lost this year. The unemployment rate increased by more than 2 percentage points last year, reaching 7.2 percent, and is projected to peak at above 9 percent early next year."
The Washington Post is dropping Book World as a separate Sunday section and moving its coverage of books and publishing elsewhere in the paper. In dropping one of the few remaining stand-alone book sections in American newspapers, Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli said that the coverage will be shifted to the Style section and a revamped Outlook section. Editor Rachel Shea said that The Post would publish about three-quarters of the roughly 900 reviews it has carried each year. The change will take effect February 22 . http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012802208.html
As traditional publishers look to prune their booklists and rely increasingly on blockbuster best sellers, self-publishing companies are ramping up their title counts and making money on books that sell as few as five copies, in part because the author, rather than the publisher, pays for things like cover design and printing costs. In 2008, Author Solutions, which is based in Bloomington, Ind., and operates iUniverse as well as other print-on-demand imprints including AuthorHouse and Wordclay, published 13,000 titles, up 12 percent from the previous year. In 2008, nearly 480,000 books were published or distributed in the United States, up from close to 375,000 in 2007, according to the industry tracker Bowker. The company attributed a significant proportion of that rise to an increase in the number of print-on-demand books. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/books/28selfpub.html?_r=3&em
Cool pictures of rare clouds shared by a muse reader
http://www.collthings.co.uk/2008/06/10-very-rare-clouds.html
January 31 is the birthday of the man who holds the European record for reciting pi from memory, Daniel Paul Tammet. (books by this author) It took him five hours and nine minutes to recite 22,514 digits of pi (the number that begins 3.14).
He was born in London in 1979, and he grew up autistic, epileptic, and with synesthesia, a rare condition in which a person has unique sensory experiences. He wrote a memoir called Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant (2007). It begins, "I was born on January 31, 1979—a Wednesday. I know it was a Wednesday, because the date is blue in my mind and Wednesdays are always blue, like the number 9 or the sound of loud voices arguing." Tammet describes synesthesia as "a visual, emotional experience of numbers, a neurological mixing of the senses, which most commonly results in the ability to see alphabetical letters and/or numbers in color." Vladimir Nabokov was also a synesthete, and documented his perspectives and experiences in the memoir Speak, Memory. Daniel Tammet said, "Numbers are my friends, and they are always around me. Each one is unique and has its own personality."
February 2nd is a "cross-quarter" day in the solar calendar, which means that it falls exactly between a solstice and an equinox. It's the ancient Celtic celebration of Imbolc, in honor of Brigit, the goddess of fire, poetry, healing, and childbirth. Brigit brings the healing power of the sun back to the world on Imbolc, a day that carries the first promise of spring. Imbolc comes from the Old Irish i mbolg, meaning "in the belly," because this is the time when ewes became pregnant to deliver spring lambs. The Christians took over the Celtic celebration and made February 2nd into a Christian holiday, Candlemas Day. Candlemas Day celebrates the presentation of Jesus at the Temple exactly 40 days after Christmas.
There are many old sayings about February 2—about the emergence of animals from their winter dens and omens that predict the season ahead. One English saying goes:
If Candlemas day be fair and bright,
Winter will have another flight.
But if Candlemas day bring clouds and rain,
Winter is gone and won't come again.
There was a tradition in many European countries of watching animals—especially badger—to see how they acted on this day. If they returned to their dens, it meant that there was still a long winter ahead. German immigrants in Pennsylvania found that there weren't a lot of badgers in America, but there were a lot of groundhogs, so the holiday evolved into Groundhog Day. The first reference to Groundhog Day is from 1841, in the diary of a storekeeper in Morgantown, Pennsylvania. He wrote: "Last Tuesday, the 2nd, was Candlemas day, the day on which, according to the Germans, the Groundhog peeps out of his winter quarters and if he sees his shadow he pops back for another six weeks' nap, but if the day be cloudy he remains out, as the weather is to be moderate."
The Writer’s Almanac
The Financial Times, reports Elizabeth Holmes at the WSJ’s Digits blog, is suing the Blackstone Group for multiple use of a single online subscription, alleging the private equity firm shared a user name and password to avoid paying for multiple accounts.
The suit, filed in federal court in Manhattan (click here for the complaint), says that a senior Blackstone employee distributed login information to other employees. That account accessed thousands of individual articles between February 2006 and June 2008. The suit describes the use as massive and far more than an individual would normally access. Online subscriptions to the FT cost $179 to $299 a year.
For years, companies in many industries—automotive, cell phones, computers—have required customers to agree to arbitrate their disputes and to waive their right to pursue claims on a class-wide basis. On January 30, the Second Circuit struck down an arbitration clause drafted by American Express that banned any type of class litigation. The ban, according to the court, would have made it impossible for plaintiffs to pursue their antitrust claims against AmEx. Here’s a copy of the ruling and here’s a report on the decision from Public Citizens Consumer Law & Policy Blog.
Other courts, though, have gone the other way. Here is a January 29 posting from the ADR prof blog about a federal judge in New Jersey who upheld a Verizon Wireless class-action waiver, all the while acknowledging that the holding would kill the Verizon customers claim. WSJ Law Blog January 30, 2009
Energy in Brief — Who are the major players supplying the world oil market?
January 29th, 2009 Source: Energy Information Administration
From the Brief:
Governments of oil-rich countries have a major influence on the world supply of oil through ownership of national oil companies and, for some governments, their membership in OPEC.
See Also: Other Energy in Brief Articles
CBO: The State of the Economy and Issues in Developing an Effective Policy Response
Testimony, CBO, Statement of Douglas W. Elmendorf, Director, The State of the Economy and Issues in Developing an Effective Policy Response before the Committee on the Budget, U.S. House of Representatives, January 27, 2009.
"The economy is currently enduring a recession that started more than a year ago. CBO projects that, in the absence of any changes in fiscal policy, economic activity will contract more sharply in 2009 than it did in 2008 and the economy will grow at only a moderate pace in 2010. Under that projection, the shortfall in the nation’s output relative to its potential would be the largest—in terms of both length and depth—since the Depression of the 1930s. Lost output would represent nearly 7 percent of the estimated potential output in both 2009 and 2010—amounting to about $1 trillion in each year—and almost 5 percent of the potential in 2011. Payroll employment declined by 2-1/2 million jobs last year, and CBO projects that, without further policy actions, even more jobs will be lost this year. The unemployment rate increased by more than 2 percentage points last year, reaching 7.2 percent, and is projected to peak at above 9 percent early next year."
The Washington Post is dropping Book World as a separate Sunday section and moving its coverage of books and publishing elsewhere in the paper. In dropping one of the few remaining stand-alone book sections in American newspapers, Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli said that the coverage will be shifted to the Style section and a revamped Outlook section. Editor Rachel Shea said that The Post would publish about three-quarters of the roughly 900 reviews it has carried each year. The change will take effect February 22 . http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012802208.html
As traditional publishers look to prune their booklists and rely increasingly on blockbuster best sellers, self-publishing companies are ramping up their title counts and making money on books that sell as few as five copies, in part because the author, rather than the publisher, pays for things like cover design and printing costs. In 2008, Author Solutions, which is based in Bloomington, Ind., and operates iUniverse as well as other print-on-demand imprints including AuthorHouse and Wordclay, published 13,000 titles, up 12 percent from the previous year. In 2008, nearly 480,000 books were published or distributed in the United States, up from close to 375,000 in 2007, according to the industry tracker Bowker. The company attributed a significant proportion of that rise to an increase in the number of print-on-demand books. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/books/28selfpub.html?_r=3&em
Cool pictures of rare clouds shared by a muse reader
http://www.collthings.co.uk/2008/06/10-very-rare-clouds.html
January 31 is the birthday of the man who holds the European record for reciting pi from memory, Daniel Paul Tammet. (books by this author) It took him five hours and nine minutes to recite 22,514 digits of pi (the number that begins 3.14).
He was born in London in 1979, and he grew up autistic, epileptic, and with synesthesia, a rare condition in which a person has unique sensory experiences. He wrote a memoir called Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant (2007). It begins, "I was born on January 31, 1979—a Wednesday. I know it was a Wednesday, because the date is blue in my mind and Wednesdays are always blue, like the number 9 or the sound of loud voices arguing." Tammet describes synesthesia as "a visual, emotional experience of numbers, a neurological mixing of the senses, which most commonly results in the ability to see alphabetical letters and/or numbers in color." Vladimir Nabokov was also a synesthete, and documented his perspectives and experiences in the memoir Speak, Memory. Daniel Tammet said, "Numbers are my friends, and they are always around me. Each one is unique and has its own personality."
February 2nd is a "cross-quarter" day in the solar calendar, which means that it falls exactly between a solstice and an equinox. It's the ancient Celtic celebration of Imbolc, in honor of Brigit, the goddess of fire, poetry, healing, and childbirth. Brigit brings the healing power of the sun back to the world on Imbolc, a day that carries the first promise of spring. Imbolc comes from the Old Irish i mbolg, meaning "in the belly," because this is the time when ewes became pregnant to deliver spring lambs. The Christians took over the Celtic celebration and made February 2nd into a Christian holiday, Candlemas Day. Candlemas Day celebrates the presentation of Jesus at the Temple exactly 40 days after Christmas.
There are many old sayings about February 2—about the emergence of animals from their winter dens and omens that predict the season ahead. One English saying goes:
If Candlemas day be fair and bright,
Winter will have another flight.
But if Candlemas day bring clouds and rain,
Winter is gone and won't come again.
There was a tradition in many European countries of watching animals—especially badger—to see how they acted on this day. If they returned to their dens, it meant that there was still a long winter ahead. German immigrants in Pennsylvania found that there weren't a lot of badgers in America, but there were a lot of groundhogs, so the holiday evolved into Groundhog Day. The first reference to Groundhog Day is from 1841, in the diary of a storekeeper in Morgantown, Pennsylvania. He wrote: "Last Tuesday, the 2nd, was Candlemas day, the day on which, according to the Germans, the Groundhog peeps out of his winter quarters and if he sees his shadow he pops back for another six weeks' nap, but if the day be cloudy he remains out, as the weather is to be moderate."
The Writer’s Almanac
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