rocky squirrel: November 2012

Saturday, November 10, 2012

2012/2013 La Manzanilla School Supply Drive ? VisitLaManzanilla ...

Heading down to La Manzanilla this winter? I invite you to check out the below list of items our local schools could us this year. Each August La Manzanilla?s school children head back to school and many of them lack the school materials they need. Not unlike students in North America, each student is required to provide their own notebooks, pencils, erasers, pencil sharpeners, glue, and crayons. However, many of the children in La Manzanilla come from large families who may not be able to provide school supplies when they are faced more pressing needs like food, medicine and clothing for the family. VisitLaManzanilla.com and La Catalina Foundation have partnered to support local school children and help them succeed in school.

Want to help a child succeed in school?

Please considering bringing some of the following items with you, or support local businesses and buy the items here.

All items can be dropped off with me and they will be distributed in January.? Contact me at june@visitlamanzanilla.com with questions.

La Catalina Education Foundation:

Books in Spanish or bilingual Spanish/English books for Rural Literacy Project (RLP) ?https://sites.google.com/site/ruralliteracyproject/home/rlp-la-catalina
English Storybooks (all levels)
ESL teaching materials
CD?s with songs for English classes (suitable for children through adults)
Portable CD player
Colored Markers
Pencils
Erasers that fit on the back ends of pencils
Dry erase pens
Tape
Pencil sharpeners
Colored Construction Paper
Paints (acrylic & water color)
Photocopy Paper
Stickers
Arts & Crafts supplies for children?s summer Arts & English Camp
Sports equipment (volleyball, all purpose balls for games, jump ropes)
30 white kid?s shirts (assortment of sm, med and lg) and 5 large adult white t-shirts for Summer Camp
Donations for ?A Night under the Stars? Auction Fundraiser held annually in February (art pieces, new & used merchandise, and gift certificates for services)
Gifts for teacher appreciation bags (for 30 gift bags for the public school teachers and staff in La Manzanilla every January).? Items needed include small gifts such as office supplies, small personal gifts such as candles, soaps, candies, etc.

Guardaria

crayons
White paper
Plasticine
Colored chalk
Foamy shapes
Finger paint
Glue
Tape
Watercolor paint
Pencils
Poster paper
White out
Scissors
Paint brushes
Colored paper
Educational games
Balls
Outside games
Children?s books
Children?s songs on CD

Kinder

2 ceiling fans
Metal Security for cafeteria
Window for cafeteria
Keyboard (musical instrument)
Laptop
Large size lego
Puzzles with large pieces
Colored paper
Plastic fruits and vegetables
Plastic farm, desert and jungle animals
Asembly figures
Tangrams (shapes puzles)
Puppets
Coloring books
Colored pencils
Dolls
Action figures
Crayons
Face paints
Animal costumes
Building blocks

P rimaria- Manuel Lopez Cotilla

Highlighters
Electric pencil sharpener
Markers
Tape
Scissors
School supplies to be distributed by school to underprivileged children (crayons, pencils, rulers, erasers, notebooks, etc.)
Office supplies for principal?s office (white out, post it notes, paper clips, pens, stapler, tape, etc.)
Copy machine paper
White boards for two newly built classrooms (large or medium in size)
Dry erase board markers

Middle School - Jose Maria Morelos y Pavon

White copy paper
Folders (normal and legal size)
Envelopes (regular and full sheet sizes)
Black and blue markers for White boards
White out
Guitars
Guitar strings
Volleyballs
Soccerballs
Basketballs
Volleyball nets
Whistles
Pump for balls
Recorders (instrument)
Poster board
Pencils
Pens
Erasers
Pencil sharpeners
White board markers
Glue
Oil paint stick pens
Papel Revolucion
Shiny colored paper
Scissors
Whiteboard erasers
Tape
Masking tape
Staplers
Staple removers
Laboratory scale
Shelves for classrooms
English dictionary
Wooden Geometry Sets for teachers
Paint (vinilica and esmalte)
Lightbulbs
Locks
Hammer
Screwdriver
Pliers
Adjustable crescent wrenches
Electrical pliers
Locking pliers
Fabuoso for cleaning
Wastebaskets
Ladder
Wheelbarrow
Brooms
Mops
Dustpans
Cleaning cloths
Buckets
Pruning shears
Weed eater
Large plastic garbage bins
Plastic gloves
Scrubbing pads
Detergent
Shovels
Picks
Hoes
Machetes
Rakes
Post hole digger
300 m hose
To finish the school kitchen:
Finish the electrical system (Labor)
Connections for water and sewer (labor and materials)
50 m floor tiles (labor and materials)
8 m tiles for the kitchen counter (labor and materials)
1 door
Security for the kitchen window
8 bags of cement

By Category

Cleaning and Maintenance

Brooms
Buckets
Cleaning cloths
Detergent
Dustpans
Fabuloso for cleaning
Donations for ?A Night under the Stars? Auction Fundraiser held annually in February (art pieces, new & used merchandise, and gift certificates for services)
Large plastic garbage bins
Lightbulbs
Machetes
Hammer
Mops
Plastic gloves
Pruning shears
Rakes
Screwdriver
Scrubbing pads
Hoes
Ladder
Wastebaskets
Weed eater
Wheelbarrow

Music

CD?s with songs for English classes (suitable for children through adults)
CD?s with children?s songs
Guitar strings
Guitars
Keyboard (musical instrument)
Recorders (instrument)

Sports

Balls
Basketballs
Outside games
Pump for balls
Sports equipment (volleyball, all purpose balls for games, jump ropes)
Volleyball nets
Volleyballs
Whistles

Construction

Connections for water and sewer (labor and materials)
1 door
2 ceiling fans
300 m hose
50 m floor tiles (labor and materials)
8 bags of cement
8 m tiles for the kitchen counter (labor and materials)
Adjustable crescent wrenches
Finish the electrical system (Labor)
Security for the kitchen window
Shelves for classrooms
Locking pliers
Metal Security for cafeteria
Locks
Paint (vinilica and esmalte)
Paint brushes
Picks
Pliers
Post hole digger
Window for cafeteria

Art Supplies

Colored pencils
Coloring books
Colored Markers
Colored paper
Colored chalk
Erasers
Erasers that fit on the back ends of pencils
Arts & Crafts supplies for children?s summer Arts & English Camp
Action figures
Face paints
Finger paint
Dolls
Foamy shapes
Oil paint stick pens
Paints (acrylic & water color)
Papel Revolucion
Plastic farm, desert and jungle animals
Plastic fruits and vegetables
Plasticine
Puppets
Stickers
Tangrams (shapes puzzles)
Watercolor paint

Office Supplies

Copy machine paper
Envelopes (regular and full sheet sizes)
Folders (normal and legal size)
Gifts for teacher appreciation bags (for 30 gift bags for the public school teachers and staff in La Manzanilla every January).? Items needed include small gifts such as office supplies, small personal gifts such as candles, soaps, candies, etc.)
Highlighters
Laptop
Office supplies for principal?s office (white out, post it notes, paper clips, pens, stapler, tape, etc.)
Photocopy Paper
Staple removers
Staplers
Tape

Classroom Supplies

Building blocks
Children?s books
Colored Construction Paper
Crayons
Dry erase board markers
Educational games
Electric pencil sharpener
Electrical pliers
English dictionary
English Storybooks (all levels)
ESL teaching materials
30 white kid?s shirts (assortment of sm, med and lg) and 5 large adult white t-shirts for Summer Camp
Animal costumes
Assembly figures
Books in Spanish or bilingual Spanish/English books for Rural Literacy Project (RLP) https://sites.google.com/site/ruralliteracyproject/home/rlp-la-catalina
Glue
Laboratory scale
Large size lego
Pencil sharpeners
Pencils
Pens
Portable CD player
Poster board
Puzzles with large pieces
School supplies to be distributed by school to underprivileged children (crayons, pencils, rulers, erasers, notebooks, etc.)
Scissors
White boards for two newly built classrooms (large or medium in size)
Wooden Geometry Sets for teachers
White out
White board markers

Donations for ?A Night under the Stars? Auction Fundraiser held annually in February (art pieces, new & used merchandise, and gift certificates for services)

VisitLaManzanilla.com

A guide to La Manzanilla, Mexico. Vacation rentals, restaurants, things to do, events and more!

VisitLaManzanilla.com

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Source: http://www.visitlamanzanilla.com/blog/20122013-la-manzanilla-school-supply-drive

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Reese Witherspoon baby, Obama Moms and more: Our parenting news roundup.

Reese Witherspoon's baby 'debut' is just one of this week's spotlighted stories. We also have Obama moms, the New Gerber Baby and a pregnant voter who went above and beyond. (And remembered to breathe.)

By Stephanie Hanes,?Correspondent / November 9, 2012

Reese Witherspoon's baby boy, Tennessee James Toth, was spotted out and about in Los Angeles today with his mom. The celebrity press went crazy. This and other stories are part of our weekly news roundup. (Here, Witherspoon poses during a photo call for Mud at the 65th international film festival, in Cannes, southern France, in May.)

Joel Ryan/AP

Enlarge

It?s Friday, so time for our parenting news roundup.?

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Default Tricks ? Low Cost Internet Hosting Gives On The World Wide ...

Internet website traffic on this day and age is admittedly not all that needed, precise? Providing you?ve got a wonderful world-wide-web internet site which has an advanced product or service furnishing that differentiates you from the levels of competition you need to be good. Improper. Lifeless improper!

You could hold the most tremendous innovative page with goods which might be cutting-edge, distinct and very attractively priced. You?ll possess the most persuasive revenue webpages with jaw-dropping graphics. You?re able to have lots of self confidence and an unwavering opinion into your services and you may have invested massive time, energy and little doubt a large amount of cash with your online site also, but when you don?t have net targeted traffic you don?t have a company, regardless of how audacious or primary you believe your website is. If no-one understands your internet site exists, no-one will discover you. It will likely be like you need to do not exist.

Not surprisingly it goes devoid of declaring which you might need a powerful internet page with captive solutions, but anything you really need many of all is world wide web potential customers. A normal web page with regular solutions, but with superior volumes of web site potential customers will offer significantly a little more goods than the usual breathtaking page with extraordinary programs, but bad inbound visitors quantity.

On the motion picture ?Field of Dreams? the most crucial character frequently hears a voice in his head that drones ?If you create it, he?ll come?. Any time you have viewed the motion picture you can are aware that he sooner or later does arrive, and with him arrives a large number of enthusiasts. Regrettably website web pages may not be film scripts and of course it is easy to develop it, but your opportunity potential customers will not likely magically surface outside of a cornfield and get there of their droves. They just simply will never occur. Regardless how a lot of voices you listen to, regardless of what smoke and mirrors you utilize, it doesn?t matter how highly you visualise it, the possible shoppers will not likely get there, at any time.

The online market place in any case is not any extended one thing uncovered inside a guide inside a bookshelf, it can be ubiquitous and exists throughout us, and you?ll notice basically incredibly handful of elements of our lives that aren?t impacted by it. We want to generally be cognisant of that inescapable fact and we want to adapt to accommodate engineering, particularly 24/7 using the net solutions. In order for you a prosperous web-based organisation you ought to align on your own to engineering and web based users. In fact, your via the web internet marketing business successes is predicated on attracting and constructing website website traffic, and naturally changing that customers into some type of the sale. Go serious or go house, and with no world-wide-web website visitors family home may be a reputable selection.

Basically it?s essential to make available an answer to your customer?s complication, but similarly it?s good to make sure you use a pink Cadillac to obtain her or him to the method. No girl, no cry. No Cadillac, no client. No net website traffic, no sale. The highway perhaps absolutely does turn into significantly less travelled if you don?t have got a standard approach set up to produce website potential customers.

But precisely what is this mystical word wide web site visitors, this sort of 21st century type of on line hieroglyphics that plenty of would-be entrepreneurs desire of, this sacred software application language thru which research engines decide on to speak? Search engine optimization looks to contend with Black Ops and to the normal guy within the road the cyber chaos appears to obtain alot more puzzling.

Essentially there?s two conceptual techniques to world-wide-web targeted traffic, one particular may be to build and put into play your personal system, alternatively you utilize a specialist to grow a method in your behalf. The previous is undoubtedly the more affordable with the two, but without doubt quite possibly the most time-consuming and demanding, while the latter will include a value, but will preserve time. During the previous method you employ your very own talent (or absence thereof), while inside latter procedure you outsource the initiative to anyone by using a resident ability. Both way, the basic ideas of productively driving site visitors in your online site stay exactly the same and encompasses a mixture (or all) in the subsequent methods:

Acquire a web site that may be content-rich and employs legitimate and different materials that is definitely very easy to examine and published in a very seamless, free-flowing fashion
Goal two or 3 particular major term phrases for every page
Range your main term phrases. When you focus on the exact same essential phrase phrases continuously applying differing articles or blog posts, you operate the danger of simply being penalized by research engines
Use strange, catchy, impactful guide titles
Avert too much repetition of solution phrases and maintain your major term density underneath 2%
Generate within an proper contact to motion with the conclude of each and every review
Include new content articles with refreshing articles and other content on an on-going foundation
Utilize RSS (In fact Relatively easy Syndication) feeds on your own webpage
Give absent 100 % free things on your own resource site, by way of example a mini-course or an book, thus creating have faith in using your possibilities people
Produce as a lot of incredibly good high quality backlinks to other appropriate web sites as is possible (prevent bad premium inbound links)
Evade damaged one-way links by any means fees
Launch a weblog and website a minimum of when every week
Lots of people are visible. Publish a collection of explanatory video clips with your internet page and on YouTube linking back again on your internet page
Produce a month to month mailing checklist with particular subject matter
Grasp what look engines like and dislike and make sure you optimize the things they like and limit the things they will not like
Assure your web site is joined in towards primary social networking sites, one example is Experience guide, Twitter, Flickr and MySpace
Get well-known on any applicable discussion boards or dialogue boards
Fork out for visitors by utilizing the assorted alternate options accessible to you, by way of example Fork out For each Click on adverts (PPC)

Overwhelming of course, hard definitely, frustratingly perpetual, but unquestionably gratifying! Online page views to your effective via internet internet business is just like a nutritious coronary heart to an athlete. It merely stays a non-negotiable requirement.

Internet Hosting The New Technique To Look For A Good Web Hosting provides superb content concerning Significance Of Web Hosting Evaluations To Get Finest Internet Hosting Service. Visit the website link for additional information!

Source: http://www.defaulttricks.com/low-cost-internet-hosting-gives-on-the-world-wide-web-2/

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Friday, November 9, 2012

Website editor faces legal action | Media | guardian.co.uk

Lawyers acting for the principal of a Catholic college are to apply for a court order demanding that a website editor reveal the identity of a letter-writer.

It concerns the publication of an anonymously written letter on a site called Independent Catholic News about St Mary's University College, Twickenham.

According to lawyers cited in a story about the legal action in The Tablet, the letter is alleged to defame the college principal, Philip Esler, and two other members of its senior management.

The not-for-profit website is edited by Josephine Siedlecka, who was named in June as one of the Catholic women of the year. She has taken down the letter, which was published on 3 October.

But lawyers are pressing for her to name the author. Jennifer Agate, of the London law firm Wiggin, said that it was responsible journalism for authors to be named.

Siedlecka has told The Tablet she will not reveal the writer's identity in keeping with long-established protocol that journalists do not reveal their sources, and are willing to face to prison for refusing to do so.

Sources: The Tablet/ICN

"); jQ('a.report-abuse:not(.no-abuse-popup)').live('click', function(ev) { ev.preventDefault(); loading_box.dialog({ title: "Abuse report", draggable: false, modal: true, width: 400, minHeight: 320, resizable: false, beforeclose: function(event, ui) { var readOnly = jQ('.report-abuse-ajax-readonly').length; if(readOnly == 1) return true; var reason = jQ('.report-abuse-ajax-form textarea#id_reason').val(); var thanksPage = jQ('.report-form-loading p[data-abuse-report-accepted-for-comment]').length; if (thanksPage == 0) { thanksPage = jQ('.report-form-loading p[data-abuse-report-accepted-for-profile]').length; } if(thanksPage == 0) { if(reason == 0) { return true; } else { return confirm("Closing this window without pressing \"Report\" will result in your words being lost. Are you sure?"); } } else { return true; } }, close: function(ev, ui) { loading_box.remove(); } }); abuse_report_url = this.href.replace('report-abuse', 'report-abuse-ajax'); abuse_report_url = fix_domain_for_careers(abuse_report_url); jQ.ajax({ url: abuse_report_url, success: function(data){ loading_box.html(data); } }); }); jQ('body').delegate('.report-abuse-ajax-form form', 'submit', function(ev) { ev.preventDefault(); var form = jQ(this); var url = fix_domain_for_careers(form.attr('action')); jQ.post(url, form.serialize(), function(html) { form.parents('.ui-dialog-content').html(html); // Has the abuse report been accepted? var el = jQ(html); var comment_id = el.attr('data-abuse-report-accepted-for-comment'); var profile_id = el.attr('data-abuse-report-accepted-for-profile'); if (comment_id) { jQ('ul#comment-' + comment_id).find('li.abuse-report').remove(); } else if (profile_id) { jQ('p.report-abuse').remove(); } var is_successful_submission = (comment_id || profile_id); if (is_successful_submission) { if(guardian.r2.omniture.isAvailable()) { // track with omniture s.linkTrackVars = 'events,eVar37'; s.linkTrackEvents = 'event37'; s.eVar37 = 'Comment:Report Abuse'; s.events = 'event37'; s.tl(true, 'o', 'Comment report abuse'); } window.setTimeout(function() { loading_box.dialog("close"); }, 3000); } }); }); // make sure submit button is enabled onReady. jQ('#newcommenting-form input[type=submit]').removeAttr('disabled'); var newFormURL = window.location.protocol + '//' + window.location.host + window.location.pathname + '?#post-area'; jQ('div#login-container form.post-your-comments').attr('action', newFormURL); jQ('div#signup-container input').click(function(){ urlStack.clearUrlStack(); urlStack.pushUrlOntoStack(newFormURL); document.location = 'http://users.guardian.co.uk/signup/tr/1,,-720,00.html'; }); jQ('.recomended').show(); jQ('#newcommenting-form').submit(function(){ jQ('input[type=submit]', this).attr('disabled', 'disabled'); }); }); //end jQ ready function openAbuseBox(commentId) { jQ("#abuse-report-comment-id").val(commentId); var loading_box = jQ('

'); loading_box.dialog({ title:"Abuse report", draggable: false, modal:true, width:400, minHeight:320, resizable: false, beforeclose: function(event, ui) { var reason = jQ('textarea#id_reason').val(); if (reason != "") { return confirm("Closing this window without pressing \"Report\" will result in your words being lost. Are you sure?"); } else { return true; } } }); } function recommendComment(commentId) { var guardian_domain_thing = 'foo'; var post_url = "http://www.guardian.co.uk/discussion/handlers/recommendComment"; post_url = fix_domain_for_careers(post_url); jQ.post(post_url, { comment_id: commentId }, function(data) { if (data == "OK") { var span = jQ("#recommended-count-" + commentId); span.prev('a').contents().unwrap(); span.text(parseInt(span.text(), 10)+1); } else { var span = jQ("#recommended-count-" + commentId); span.prev('a').contents().unwrap(); } }); }

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/greenslade/2012/nov/08/stmarysuniversitycollegetwickenham-medialaw

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Huawei MediaPad 10 review: test-driving the company's first 10-inch tablet

More Info

Toward the end of Huawei's Mobile World Congress press event this past February, company executives made a brief mention of an upcoming 10-inch, quad-core tablet. For the media in attendance, it was a coup d'oeil at best and a dangling hardware carrot, for sure. At the time, the company kept curious journalists at bay, but did confirm some high-end specs: a 1,920 x 1,200 IPS display, 8-megapixel rear camera, LTE (Cat 4) / DC-HSPA+ radios and a proprietary, quad-core K3V2 CPU buffered by 2GB of RAM. It wouldn't be until CTIA in New Orleans three months later when we'd actually get some hands-on time with device.

Now that we're at the tail-end of the year and the MediaPad 10 is on sale in Europe, much of the buzz has evaporated in the wake of some high-profile product launches (think: Google's Retina-searing Nexus 10, or the recently refreshed iPad). But is there a reason to give the MediaPad 10 a second look anyway? Will a price of 424 euros and limited regional availability mar its chances in the marketplace? Answers to those questions and more after the break.

Gallery: Huawei MediaPad 10 review

Continue reading Huawei MediaPad 10 review: test-driving the company's first 10-inch tablet

Filed under: Tablets

Huawei MediaPad 10 review: test-driving the company's first 10-inch tablet originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 08 Nov 2012 15:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/GNVXKbNYDNk/

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Hurricane Sandy: beware of America's disaster capitalists - OpEdNews

Less than three days after Sandy made landfall on the east coast of the?United States, Iain Murray of the Competitive Enterprise Institute blamed New Yorkers' resistance to Big Box stores for the misery they were about to endure.?Writing on Forbes.com,?he explained that the city's refusal to embrace Walmart will likely make the recovery much harder: "Mom-and-pop stores simply can't do what big stores can in these circumstances," he wrote. He also warned that if the pace of reconstruction turned out to be sluggish (as it so often is) then "pro-union rules such as the Davis-Bacon Act" would be to blame, a reference to the statute that requires workers on public works projects to be paid not the minimum wage, but the prevailing wage in the region.

The same day, Frank Rapoport, a lawyer representing several billion-dollar construction and real estate contractors, jumped in to suggest that many of those public works projects shouldn't be public at all. Instead, cash-strapped governments should turn to public private partnerships, known as "P3s" in the US. That means roads, bridges and tunnels being rebuilt by private companies, which, for instance, could install tolls and keep the profits. These deals aren't legal in?New York?or New Jersey, but Rapoport believes that can change. "There were some bridges that were washed out in New Jersey that need structural replacement, and it's going to be very expensive," he told the Nation. "And so the government may well not have the money to build it the right way. And that's when you turn to a P3."

The prize for shameless disaster capitalism, however, surely goes to rightwing economist Russell S. Sobel, writing in a New York Times online forum. Sobel suggested that, in hard-hit areas, Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) should create "free-trade zones -- in which all normal regulations, licensing and taxes [are] suspended." This corporate free-for-all would, apparently, "better provide the goods and services victims need."

Yes, that's right: this catastrophe, very likely created by climate change -- a crisis born of the colossal regulatory failure to prevent corporations from treating the atmosphere as their open sewer -- is just one more opportunity for further deregulation. And the fact that this storm has demonstrated that poor and working-class people are far more vulnerable to the climate crisis shows that this is clearly the right moment to strip those people of what few labor protections they have left, as well as to privatize the meagre public services available to them. Most of all, when faced with an extraordinarily costly crisis born of corporate greed, hand out tax holidays to corporations.

The flurry of attempts to use Sandy's destructive power as a cash grab is just the latest chapter in the very long story I have called the The Shock Doctrine. And it is but the tiniest glimpse into the ways large corporations are seeking to reap enormous profits from climate chaos.

One example: between 2008 and 2010, at least 261 patents were filed or issued relating to "climate-ready" crops -- seeds supposedly able to withstand extreme conditions such as droughts and floods; of these patents close to 80% were controlled by just six agribusiness giants, including Monsanto and Syngenta. With history as our teacher, we know that small farmers will go into debt trying to buy these new miracle seeds, and that many will lose their land.

In November 2010, the Economist ran a climate change cover story that provides a useful (if harrowing) blueprint for how climate change could serve as the pretext for the last great land grab, a final colonial clearing of the forests, farms and coastlines by a handful of multinationals. The editors explain that droughts and heat stress are such a threat to farmers that only big players can survive the turmoil, and that "abandoning the farm may be the way many farmers choose to adapt." They had the same message for fisherfolk occupying valuable ocean-front lands: wouldn't it be so much safer, given rising seas and all, if they joined their fellow farmers in the urban slums? "Protecting a single port city from floods is easier than protecting a similar population spread out along a coastline of fishing villages."

But, you might wonder, isn't there a joblessness problem in most of these cities? Nothing a little "reform of labor markets" and free trade can't fix. Besides, cities, they explain, have "social strategies, formal or informal." I'm pretty sure that means people whose "social strategies" used to involve growing and catching their own food can now cling to life by selling broken pens at intersections, or perhaps by dealing drugs. What the informal social strategy should be when superstorm winds howl through those precarious slums remains unspoken.

For a long time, climate change was treated by environmentalists as a great equalizer, the one issue that affected everyone, rich or poor. They failed to account for the myriad ways by which the super rich would protect themselves from the less savory effects of the economic model that made them so wealthy. In the past six years, we have seen in the US the emergence of private fire fighters, hired by insurance companies to offer a "concierge" service to their wealthier clients, as well as the short-lived "HelpJet" -- a charter airline in Florida that offered five-star evacuation services from hurricane zones. Now, post-Sandy, upmarket real estate agents are predicting that back-up power generators will be the new status symbol with the penthouse and mansion set.

For some, it seems, climate change is imagined less as a clear and present danger than as a kind of spa vacation; nothing that the right combination of bespoke services and well-curated accessories can't overcome. That, at least, was the impression left by the Barneys New York's pre-Sandy sale -- which offered deals on sencha green tea, backgammon sets and $500 throw blankets so its high-end customers could "settle in with style."?

So we know how the shock doctors are readying to exploit the climate crisis, and we know from the past how that story ends. But here is the real question: could this crisis present a different kind of opportunity, one that disperses power into the hands of the many rather than consolidating it the hands of the few; one that radically expands the commons, rather than auctions it off in pieces? In short, could Sandy be the beginning of A People's Shock?

I think it can. As I outlined?last year, there are changes we can make that actually have a chance of getting our emissions down to the level science demands. These include re-localizing our economies (so we are going to need those farmers where they are); vastly expanding and reimagining the public sphere to not just hold back the next storm but to prevent even worse disruptions in the future; regulating the hell out of corporations and reducing their poisonous political power; and reinventing economics so it no longer defines success as the endless expansion of consumption. ?

Just as the Great Depression and the second world war launched movements that claimed as their proud legacies social safety nets across the industrialized world, so climate change can be a historic occasion to usher in the next great wave of progressive change. Moreover, none of the anti-democratic trickery I described in?The Shock Doctrine?is necessary to advance this agenda. Far from seizing on the climate crisis to push through unpopular policies, our task is to seize upon it to demand a truly populist agenda.

The reconstruction from Sandy is a great place to start road-testing these ideas. Unlike the disaster capitalists who use crisis to end-run democracy, a People's Recovery (as many from the Occupy movement are already demanding) would call for new democratic processes, including neighborhood assemblies, to decide how hard-hit communities should be rebuilt. The overriding principle must be addressing the twin crises of inequality and climate change at the same time. For starters, that means reconstruction that doesn't just create jobs but jobs that pay a living wage. It means not just more public transit, but energy-efficient, affordable housing along those transit lines. It also means not just more renewable power, but democratic community control over those projects.

But at the same time as we ramp up alternatives, we need to step up the fight against the forces actively making the climate crisis worse. That means standing firm against the continued expansion of the fossil fuel sector into new and high-risk territories, whether through tar sands, fracking, coal exports to China or Arctic drilling. It also means recognizing the limits of political pressure and going after the fossil fuel companies directly, as we are doing at?350.org?with our "Do The Math" tour. These companies have shown that they are willing to burn five times as much carbon as the most conservative estimates say is compatible with a liveable planet. We've done the maths, and we simply can't let them.

Either this crisis will become an opportunity for an evolutionary leap, a holistic readjustment of our relationship with the natural world. Or it will become an opportunity for the biggest disaster capitalism free-for-all in human history, leaving the world even more brutally cleaved between winners and losers.

When I wrote?The Shock Doctrine, I was documenting crimes of the past. The good news is that this is a crime in progress; it is still within our power to stop it. Let's make sure that, this time, the good guys win.

Source: http://www.opednews.com/articles/Hurricane-Sandy-beware-of-by-Naomi-Klein-121107-644.html

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Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Sweet diesel! Discovery resurrects process to convert sugar directly to diesel

Public release date: 7-Nov-2012
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Contact: Robert Sanders
rsanders@berkeley.edu
510-643-6998
University of California - Berkeley

Long-abandoned bacterial fermentation process resurrected to feed catalysis into fuel mixture

A long-abandoned fermentation process once used to turn starch into explosives can be used to produce renewable diesel fuel to replace the fossil fuels now used in transportation, University of California, Berkeley, scientists have discovered.

Campus chemists and chemical engineers teamed up to produce diesel fuel from the products of a bacterial fermentation discovered nearly 100 years ago by the first president of Israel, chemist Chaim Weizmann. The retooled process produces a mix of products that contain more energy per gallon than ethanol that is used today in transportation fuels and could be commercialized within 5-10 years.

While the fuel's cost is still higher than diesel or gasoline made from fossil fuels, the scientists said the process would drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transportation, one of the major contributors to global climate change.

"What I am really excited about is that this is a fundamentally different way of taking feedstocks sugar or starch and making all sorts of renewable things, from fuels to commodity chemicals like plastics," said Dean Toste, UC Berkeley professor of chemistry and co-author of a report on the new development that will appear in the Nov. 8 issue of the journal Nature.

The work by Toste, coauthors Harvey Blanch and Douglas Clark, UC Berkeley professors of chemical and biomolecular engineering, and their colleagues was supported by the Energy Biosciences Institute, a collaboration between UC Berkeley, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, and funded by the energy firm BP.

The linkage between Toste, whose EBI work is in the development of novel catalysts, and Clark and Branch, who are working on cellulose hydrolysis and fermentation, was first suggested by BP chemical engineer Paul Willems, EBI associate director. The collaboration, Willems said, illustrates the potential value that can come from academic-industry partnerships like the EBI.

The late Weizmann's process employs the bacterium Clostridium acetobutylicum to ferment sugars into acetone, butanol and ethanol. Blanch and Clark developed a way of extracting the acetone and butanol from the fermentation mixture while leaving most of the ethanol behind, while Toste developed a catalyst that converted this ideally-proportioned brew into a mix of long-chain hydrocarbons that resembles the combination of hydrocarbons in diesel fuel.

Tests showed that it burned about as well as normal petroleum-based diesel fuel.

"It looks very compatible with diesel, and can be blended like diesel to suit summer or winter driving conditions in different states," said Blanch.

The process is versatile enough to use a broad range of renewable starting materials, from corn sugar (glucose) and cane sugar (sucrose) to starch, and would work with non-food feedstocks such as grass, trees or field waste in cellulosic processes.

"You can tune the size of your hydrocarbons based on the reaction conditions to produce the lighter hydrocarbons typical of gasoline, or the longer-chain hydrocarbons in diesel, or the branched chain hydrocarbons in jet fuel," Toste said.

The fermentation process, dubbed ABE for the three chemicals produced, was discovered by Weizmann around the start of World War I in 1914, and allowed Britain to produce acetone, which was needed to manufacture cordite, used at that time as a military propellant to replace gunpowder. The increased availability and decreased cost of petroleum soon made the process economically uncompetitive, though it was used again as a starting material for synthetic rubber during World War II. The last U.S. factory using the process to produce acetone and butanol closed in 1965.

Nevertheless, Blanch said, the process by which the Clostridium bacteria convert sugar or starch to these three chemicals is very efficient. This led him and his laboratory to investigate ways of separating the fermentation products that would use less energy than the common method of distillation.

They discovered that several organic solvents, in particular glyceryl tributyrate (tributyrin), could extract the acetone and butanol from the fermentation broth while not extracting much ethanol. Tributyrin is not toxic to the bacterium and, like oil and water, doesn't mix with the broth.

Brought together by the EBI, Blanch and Clark found that Toste had discovered a catalytic process that preferred exactly that proportion of acetone, butanol and ethanol to produce a range of hydrocarbons, primarily ketones, which burn similarly to the alkanes found in diesel.

"The extractive fermentation process uses less than 10 percent of the energy of a conventional distillation to get the butanol and acetone out that is the big energy savings," said Blanch. "And the products go straight into the chemistry in the right ratios, it turns out."

The current catalytic process uses palladium and potassium phosphate, but further research is turning up other catalysts that are as effective, but cheaper and longer-lasting, Toste said. The catalysts work by binding ethanol and butanol and converting them to aldehydes, which react with acetone to add more carbon atoms, producing longer hydrocarbons.

"To make this work, we had to have the biochemical engineers working hand in hand with the chemists, which means that to develop the process, we had learn each other's language," Clark said. "You don't find that in very many places."

Clark noted that diesel produced via this process could initially supply niche markets, such as the military, but that renewable fuel standards in states such as California will eventually make biologically produced diesel financially viable, especially for trucks, trains and other vehicles that need more power than battery alternatives can provide.

"Diesel could put Clostridium back in business, helping us to reduce global warming," Clark said. "That is one of the main drivers behind this research."

###

Coauthors of the study include former post-doctoral fellow Pazhamalai Anbarasan, graduate student Zachary C. Baer, postdocs Sanil Sreekumar and Elad Gross and BP chemist Joseph B. Binder.

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Sweet diesel! Discovery resurrects process to convert sugar directly to diesel

Public release date: 7-Nov-2012
[ | E-mail |

Share ]

Contact: Robert Sanders
rsanders@berkeley.edu
510-643-6998
University of California - Berkeley

Long-abandoned bacterial fermentation process resurrected to feed catalysis into fuel mixture

Tests showed that it burned about as well as normal petroleum-based diesel fuel.

"It looks very compatible with diesel, and can be blended like diesel to suit summer or winter driving conditions in different states," said Blanch.

"Diesel could put Clostridium back in business, helping us to reduce global warming," Clark said. "That is one of the main drivers behind this research."

###

Coauthors of the study include former post-doctoral fellow Pazhamalai Anbarasan, graduate student Zachary C. Baer, postdocs Sanil Sreekumar and Elad Gross and BP chemist Joseph B. Binder.

[ | E-mail |

Share ]

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-11/uoc--sdb110612.php

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Factbox: Obama's plans for fixing the economy

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama, who has convinced Americans to give him another four years in office, now faces the tough task of getting the U.S. economy to grow more quickly.

Gross domestic product has struggled to expand by more than 2 percent a year since the 2007-09 recession and unemployment remains high at 7.9 percent. About 23 million Americans are either unemployed, working part-time because they can't find full-time work, or want a job but have given up the search.

Here are Obama's key plans for the economy:

JOBS

Obama has said his jobs plan would strengthen manufacturing, help small businesses, improve the quality of education and make the country less dependent on foreign oil.

He envisions 1 million new manufacturing jobs by 2016 and more than 600,000 jobs in the natural gas sector, as well as the recruitment of 100,000 math and science teachers.

Repairing and replacing old roads, bridges, airport runways and schools are part of his plan to put Americans back to work. Half of the money saved from ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would be used to fund infrastructure projects.

Unlike at the start of his first term, when a Democrat-run Congress approved Obama's $840 billion in stimulus, the president will struggle to get any new major spending plans approved by the House, which remains under Republican control.

FISCAL POLICY

Obama has proposed cutting the government budget deficit by more than $4 trillion over the next decade by allowing tax cuts for upper-income Americans enacted during the George W. Bush administration to expire, and by eliminating loopholes. The goal is to balance the budget down the road.

Obama backs cutting the top corporate income tax rate to 28 percent from 35 percent. He has offered a long list of corporate tax breaks to end, ranging from inventory accounting to interest on overseas profits and tax provisions benefiting oil and gas companies. He wants to eliminate tax breaks for companies that send jobs and profits overseas.

Half of the money saved from ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would be used to reduce the deficit.

THE FEDERAL RESERVE

Obama may want to offer Ben Bernanke a third term in charge of the central bank but Fed watchers say the former Princeton professor has probably had enough after eight grueling years in the job. Bernanke's term as chairman expires on January 31, 2014.

Fed Vice Chairwoman Janet Yellen is viewed as a leading candidate to succeed Bernanke and would be at least as ready to keep monetary policy ultra-stimulative until the labor market has improved substantially.

REGULATION

Obama is likely to stick to the path he laid out in his first term, which included a broad reform of Wall Street in response to the financial crisis that blew up in 2008. Regulators are due to put in place the small print of the so-called Dodd-Frank financial reform law.

HOUSING

Obama has promoted efforts to help troubled borrowers refinance their mortgages and benefit from record low interest rates but far fewer American homeowners have been helped than originally planned.

Obama has locked horns with the regulator of government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Edward DeMarco, failing to convince him to allow the mortgage finance firms to reduce principal for borrowers who owe more than their homes are worth. Resolution of the standoff is unlikely any time soon.

Democrats and Republicans agree that the government's outsized presence in the U.S. mortgage market through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac needs to be curtailed. Fannie and Freddie account for about 60 percent of the mortgage market.

(Reporting by Lucia Mutikani, Alister Bull, Margaret Chadbourn and Sarah Lynch; Editing by Jim Loney)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/factbox-obamas-plans-fixing-economy-063246101--business.html

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Saturday, November 10, 2012

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Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Long-abandoned bacterial fermentation process resurrected to feed catalysis into fuel mixture

Long-abandoned bacterial fermentation process resurrected to feed catalysis into fuel mixture