Honeywell to invest $10M in Greer’s aerospace facility – Upstate Business Journal

Posted on by

Honeywell plans to invest more than $10 million and create at least 30 jobs at its aerospace facility in Greer over the next five years.

On Tuesday, the company announced its plans to add up to 5,000 square feet of manufacturing space to the facility, which is located on South Buncombe Road.

The newly announced expansion, which begins later this year, has an estimated completion date of 2019. It will create about 30 skilled high-tech jobs.

The South Carolina Department of Commerce has also committed additional tax incentives over the next 20 years to help the company develop, maintain, and expand the facility, according to a press release.

The aerospace industry is one of the most competitive industries in the world, and South Carolina in particular hosts nearly 200 aerospace-related companies. Our facility expansion means that we not only increase our capabilities, but Honeywell continues to contribute to South Carolinas burgeoning aerospace economy, said Jason Lewandowski, senior director for the Honeywell Aerospace Greer site.

This investment positions our manufacturing network for future growth to help us maintain leadership and drive innovation. We will benefit greatly from South Carolinas wealth of engineering and manufacturing talent to strengthen our technical capabilities and provide production support from Greer,Lewandowski added.

Honeywell first established manufacturing operations in Greer in 1982.The facility is a major center for the companys machining, special processes, and maintenance, repair, and overhaul services for both commercial and military aircraft. The company employs more than 1,000 people in South Carolina.

To provide advanced manufacturing capabilities and enhance capacity, an Anderson appliance company will invest an

With seven existing sites around the Midwest and Southern United States, Plastics Products Inc. (PPC)

Waste and recycling collection company Sutera USA LLC is investing $2 million and creating 20

Ranger Aerospace plans to invest in Easley-based ACL Airshop to spur the companys growth with

Follow this link:

Honeywell to invest $10M in Greer's aerospace facility - Upstate Business Journal

Southern Research taps engineering veteran for aerospace role – Birmingham Business Journal

Posted on by

Birmingham Business Journal
Southern Research taps engineering veteran for aerospace role
Birmingham Business Journal
Mark Patterson has joined Southern Research's engineering division and will lead business development efforts focused on the aerospace industry. Patterson, who has been in the industry for 30 years, has made technical contributions to climate change ...

See the rest here:

Southern Research taps engineering veteran for aerospace role - Birmingham Business Journal

Aerospace Engineer Arrested in Hyderabad for Peddling Drugs – News18

Posted on by

Hyderabad: An aerospace engineer was one among two people arrested, along with 16 units of LSD seized, following a police crackdown against drug abuse in the city.

Dundu Anish, a 29-year-old aerospace engineer from United States, had worked with NASA earlier.

Mahender Reddy, Commissioner of Police, Hyderabad, said, "Youngsters are found smoking in these hookah centres and then getting addicted to other bad habits. To ensure our children remain healthy, we aim to make Hyderabad a hookah-free city. We have asked all zonal police officers to crackdown on illegal hookah centres which are operating in the city.

The arrests by the Excise Department recently exposed the harsh reality about school and college going students being addicted to high-end narcotics like LSD.

Taking a serious note, the police, schools and the government are taking all steps to curb the menace.

Vasireddy Amarnath, Educationist & Director of Slate school chains in Hyderabad, said, Teenagers going to pubs, hookah centres and even consuming drugs has been going on for last five years. Its very easy for young minds to get induced into wrong acts. These days drinking and smoking has become acceptable and if you are not part of the group, you are considered outdated. This is a very dangerous trend."

Couple of years back, an incident was reported in an international school where students were getting vodka to school, mixing with water and drinking during breaks. Last year, even we got to know an instance where our student was visiting hookah parlour. We immediately took corrective measures and counselled our students. We reported the problem of Hookah centres to city police also," he added.

Experts say it's peer pressure that drives youngsters into smoking or drinking activities. It starts with one person and then multiplies. The drug rackets have been operating on the principle of multi-level marketing. When one person gets addicted, they are asked to bring more people by offering discounts or commission.

Concerned over the issue, the schools have issued advisories to parents to watch out for erratic behaviour in children. Schools are also appealing parents to track the expenditures of their children and their social media activities. Many schools have taken up counselling sessions to sensitise students, parents and teachers about the issue.

Stressing on the need of sustained campaign and action against drug abuse, Amarnath said, "Schools should not just promote elitism but also impart good education and moral values. Regular counselling must be conducted in schools to ensure our kids dont fall prey. The prime responsibility lies with the schools but equal support of parents is also needed. Parents should behave like friends and share every emotion of their child. Parents have to be alert about their kids' activity."

Notices have been sent to various people in the Telugu film industry, after names from the industry came forward during investigation. Leading Telugu film producer, Suresh Babu, said, "We do not want negative image for our industry. We will create awareness and do whatever is needed. Because of few people, industry is getting a bad name. Its our responsibility to save the future generation."

Read more:

Aerospace Engineer Arrested in Hyderabad for Peddling Drugs - News18

20 years after ‘Contact’ came out, the rest of pop culture still hasn’t caught up – Washington Post

Posted on by

We all have our own gatewayformative blockbuster. For me, first contact came during the hot summer of 1997 when a summer-camp trip to the movies sent me down a wormhole with Jodie Foster. Contact, Robert Zemeckiss sprawling, melancholy movie about Ellie Arroway (Foster), the scientist who first detects a signal from another world, may not be a box-office champ or a pure classic. But the movie, which came out 20 years ago today, set a marker for what smart, emotionally compelling science fiction can look like. And thinkingback on it as a professional critic, I see that Contact is one of the Rosetta stones that helps me understand why I love what I love today.

In Contact, Ellie (played as a little girl by Jena Malone) grows up with a father who teaches her to monitor shortwave radio frequencies and nurtures her love of the stars before dying, leaving her an orphan at age 9. As an adult, she becomes a talented scientist whose peers believe she is wasting her time and energy on the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. But after she receives funding from a reclusive billionaire (John Hurt), Ellie discovers unambiguous evidence that someone is out there, and decodes the message they have sent, which turns out to be schematics for a mysterious machine.

Unlike in most movies about contact with aliens, the extraterrestrials inContact are almost peripheral. Its the conflicts between humans that matter.

Ellies opponents are people like David Drumlin (Tom Skerritt), who favors applied science and pulls her funding in an effort to push her onto what he sees as an appropriate career path; national security adviser Michael Kitz (James Woods), who wants to militarize the work on Ellies discovery; and Richard Rank (Rob Lowe, weaponizing his handsomeness), the leader of a Christian Coalition-type organization who tries to stymie Ellies work on the grounds that aliens might not share human morality. The things that divide them are not how seriously they take an obvious alien threat, the tension in so many first-contact movies, but what counts as a worthy goal in science, who should control major advances and once the machine turns out to be a transport who should represent humanity to the stars. The big explosion, when it comes, is not the result of an alien attack, but a suicide bomber who believes we should stay here on Earth.

Its not so much the hard science fiction in Contact that has stayed with me as the films sense of whats important. Whats most realistic and compelling about the movie is its understated curiosity about how humanity would respond to a discovery of this magnitude. Contact, like Kim Stanley Robinsons Mars trilogy, is a sharp argument that by skipping to the most dramatic, conflict-oriented outcome, pop culture is leaving dozens of promising stories on the table. There are more things in our arcane policy debates about heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in action filmmakers philosophy.

Ellie herself is a character type thatremains relatively rare: a brilliant scientist who is passionate, enthusiastic, occasionally girly. Contact is a movie that doesnt think female characters have to be only one thing.

While the characters in the movie sometimes punish Ellie for being emotional, Contact itself never does. Of course it makes sense that she would have strong reactions to the degradation of the scientific research she believes in, or to Drumlins tendency to run her down and then claim credit for her work. Her alternately quavering and furious response to the panel that has convened to select the first passenger to another part of the universe doesnt demonstrate weakness. Instead, Ellies response reveals the hypocrisy of Palmer Joss (Matthew McConaughey), who exposes her agnosticism because he wants to keep her safe on Earth, and the scheming of Drumlin, who fakes a piety he doesnt really feel to outflank her. Fosters limpid eyes and quivering chin are some of Contacts best special effects.

In keeping with that confident approach to emotion, Contact isnt afraid to be a sweeping romance in whichbig ideas fuel chemistry. Ellie and Palmers meet-cute involves his research on the impact of technology on indigenous communities; the first thing that attracts her to him, beyond McConaugheys laconic charm, is Palmers defense of pure rather than merely applied science. Ideas, particularly Palmers conviction that aliens first contact should be with someone who believes in God, keep them apart for much of the movie, which is realistic: Ellie would be hopelessly compromised if she threw over her lifes work for the theologian who blocks her from her dearest ambition, even if he is drawling and cute. Palmers big romantic gesture is to show up and supportEllie when she gets the opportunity to be the one to make first contact after Drumlin is killed in a terrorist attack. Intellectual arguments dont substitute for sexual heat in Contact theyare the heat.

Fosters performance as Ellie isnt aggressive or extravagant; it doesnt loom over the movies that have followed it.But I think of her every time I watch Amelia Brand (Anne Hathaway) head off into the abyss to try to save humanity in Interstellar, or Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) struggle to save herself in Gravity. Ellies cerebral, optimistic quest to prove we arent alone in the universe is a counterpoint to Ellen Ripleys (Sigourney Weaver) ferocious battle for survival in the Alien franchise, an argument that in space, no one can hear you scream, but someone just might introduce you to the greatest secrets of the universe.

Original post:
20 years after 'Contact' came out, the rest of pop culture still hasn't caught up - Washington Post

The Most Catholic of Catholic Families – Commonweal

Posted on by

A danger of having a priest for a dad: he just might write a homily about you. At nineteen, shortly after running away with a man she met on an online poetry forum, Patricia Lockwood found herself sitting in church one Sunday, listening to her dad preach a homily titled The Prodigal Daughter.

Lockwood took it in stride. At the time my reaction alternated between embarrassment and amusement, but now I see it must have been prophetic, she writes in her memoir, Priestdaddy. All these years I have been tending the pigs of liberalism, agnosticism, poetry, fornication, cussing, salad-eating, and wanting to visit Europe, but I am back home now, and the pigs can't come with me.

Twelve years after she first leaves the rectory, a series of misfortunes leaves Lockwood and her husband, Jason, jobless and broke. With nowhere else to go, the couple pack up their belongings and moves into the Kansas City rectory shared by Lockwoods mother, Karen, and her father Greg, a Roman Catholic priest.

Lockwoods situation is improbable in a lot of ways, the least of which is having a married Catholic priest for a father; as she puts it, the mercy of the church exists for me on this earth in an unusually patriarchal form. And although she never attended college, Lockwood has published poetry in The New Yorker and the London Review of Books, amassed over sixty-seven-thousand Twitter followers, and earned a significant cult following for her dark, subversive sense of humor.

Lockwood had previously published two books of poetry, Balloon Pop Outlaw Black and Motherland Fatherland Homelandsexuals, but living with her parents inspired her to try a new writing project: recording life with her irrepressible and quirky family. The result is Priestdaddy, a wry, observant, and funnyif ultimately unevenaccount of growing up in possibly the most Catholic of Catholic families.

Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, Lockwood was raised in all the worst cities of the Midwest, moving each time her father was assigned to a new parish. In an interview with the New York Times Magazine, Lockwood recalls living in five different rectories and attending six different schools. Growing up, her life (unsurprisingly) revolved around the Catholic Church. She sang in a choir and attended a youth group called Gods Gang that was 40 percent shag carpet and 60 percent Bible verses.

After a whirlwind internet courtship, Lockwoods husband Jason proposed to her in the parking lot of a Krogers grocery store (the most matrimonial of all grocery stores) the first time they met in person. They spent the next twelve years roaming the country while Jason worked as a newspaper editor and Lockwood wrote poetry. After she left home, Lockwood also quietly left the Catholic Church. It was like forgetting a language you spoke a long time ago, when you were a child, she says. During the eight months they live in her fathers rectory, Lockwood isthrown out of the bohemian, free-wheeling life she and Jason created for themselves and back into a world where dinner with the bishop is the social event of the month.

Lockwood is in a unique position to rediscover this world, and she generally does so with astuteness and a wicked sense of humor. She hasnt forgotten the language of her former homeland so much as turn[ed] it inside out, repurpose[ed] it, and occasionally use[d] it to tell jokes. Her poetry experiments with explicit sexual humor and religious imagery, but Priestdaddy is more concerned with rediscovering a world Lockwood chose to leave, and finding her new place in it. Back again in that world, Lockwood reexamines her upbringing, her family, and her former church. She treats her eight-month stay in the rectory as an anthropological mission of sorts, reexamining the terrain of her childhood. Everyone gets a window. This is what mine looks out at, she writes.

Priestdaddy jumps seamlessly back and forth between past and present. Memories from the authors Midwestern childhood are interrupted by sketches of daily life at the rectory: Karen reading about demonic rosaries on the internet or Greg playing his electric guitar with a tone-deaf enthusiasm that sounds like a whole band dying in a plane crash in 1972.

According to his daughter, Fr. Greg doesn't have a conversion story; he has an origin story, like Superman or Batman. This tells you everything you need to know about Greg Lockwood and his larger-than-life personality. Greg met Karen in high school, married at eighteen, and joined the Navy. Onboard the nuclear submarine the USS Flying Fish, he experienced what he calls the deepest conversion on record. His daughter attributes his conversion to the seventy-two times the crew watched The Exorcist over the course of the patrol. You're a drop of blood at the center of the ocean. All of a sudden you look up at a screen and see a possessed twelve-year-old with violent bedhead vomiting green chunks and backwards Latin, Lockwood writes. You would convert too, I guarantee it.

View post:
The Most Catholic of Catholic Families - Commonweal

Face to faith – Open Democracy

Posted on by

It is better to be united in our ignorance than divided in our certainties.

Credit: Flickr/SteveRhodes. Some rights reserved.

From time to time stories appear in our newspapers of priests or ministersmaybe even a bishopwho have lost their faith. Such headlines are misleading and far too simplistic. It is not faith which is lost, but beliefs: by contrast, faith is transformed.

Beliefs can be naturally outgrown and discarded during our lives as we fulfill St Pauls eloquent prophecy: When I was a child I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man I put away childish things.

Although this process ought to continue throughout life, for a priest or minister it is most comfortably achieved after one is retired. Working clergy may regard it as their duty to defend the system, to loyally justify the church, to be sensitive to the feelings of its people, and to take care not to destroy another persons faith.

But all of these things can make us more cautious than we would like to be. That is important, because spiritual growth and development must be continuous, even if that means leapingnot lapsinginto agnosticism, recognizing that there is much of mystery in life and that we do not know all the answers.

At the heart of this process we come to see Christianityalong with Judaism and Islammore as historical religions than simply faith-based; man-made rather than divinely created. As such, they have to be judged by the evidence of history, and their scriptures scrutinized just like any other historical document.

History may then indicate that all ancient religionsand maybe some modern creeds toohave arisen largely out of pre-scientific mythologies in which what is called the supernatural lies at the center. An essential aspect of growing up demands that we reject the idea of the supernatural and recognize that the natural is wonderful enough.

Few people can deny that Christianity has often been a form of blessing to many people, and that the church has sometimes been beneficial to the improvement of human society. In the realm of the arts, in music, painting and literature, religious belief has inspired incomparable beauty and innovation; and in human behavior, incredible heroism and self-sacrifice.

But there is a darker side which, in our growing, we increasingly come to see as outweighing the lighter on the scales of human judgment. Dogma has dominated reason. Superstitions have been encouraged as facts. Charity and love have been subordinated to inquisition and cruelty. Fear has governed where hope should have reigned. The wisdom and experience of half of humankindwomenhas been ignored and belittled.

A distorted picture has emerged and prevailed over the original teachings of the guru of Christianity: Jesus. Growing up entails re-evaluating the one who saw himself as the son of man, rather than the son of God.

In no area of life can this process of transformation be seen more clearly than in the realm of morality. So it is not surprising that this subject has come to the fore, and that the issues involved have received more attention in the 20th and 21st centuriesespecially in the aftermath of the Second World War during which human immorality was exposed in all its naked horror. It really did seem possible that after 1945 that humankind might come of age.

In the years that followed, the issue of sexuality in particular came to dominate both thought and practice. Liberation became the buzzword in theology, in personal and social relationships, in race relations and in national aspirations. Andif at times this led in destructive or uncomfortable directions for someso be it, for we have come to realize that it is better to be united in our ignorance than divided in our certainties.

That, surely, is a sign of maturity.

Read more:
Face to faith - Open Democracy

Trump's CDC Pick Peddled 'Anti-Aging' Medicine to Her Gynecologic Patients – New York Magazine

Posted on by

Brenda Fitzgerald. Photo: Branden Camp/AP

On first glance, the most startling thing about Donald Trumps pick to lead the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Prevention was its propriety: Brenda Fitzgerald is a trained obstetrician-gynecologist who worked for three decades in private practice before becoming Georgias public health commissioner in 2011. In her time in the post, Fitzgerald won the respect of her peers in other states, and they recently elected her president of the nonprofit group that represents Americas state and territorial public-health agencies. Her appointment was praised by Barack Obamas former CDC director Tom Frieden.

Fizgerald is a staunch believer in the mission of her agency, and has said that the private sector is incapable of performing its core functions. While she has longstanding ties to the Republican Party having twice run unsuccessfully for Congress she has proven willing to subordinate conservative orthodoxy to her convictions as a medical professional: In her first House run, Fitzgerald argued that decisions about abortion should be left to women and their doctors.

Finally, as the first female OB/GYN ever tapped to run the CDC, Fitzgerald brings a unique (and historically marginalized) perspective with her to the federal government.

All this makes her a bizarre addition to the Trump cabinet. Thus far, the president has evinced a deep commitment to stocking his administrations domestic agencies with appointees who are eithercomically unqualified for their assignments (Ben Carson), hostile to the very purpose of the department theyre meant to direct (Scott Pruitt, Betsy DeVos), or rich, white men who bring ethical baggage and/or flagrant conflicts of interest to their posts (Tom Price, Rex Tillerson, Wilbur Ross, Gary Cohn, etc.).

But fear not the fundamental laws of our political universe have not been rewritten. Once you read this dispatch from Forbess Rita Rubin, everything will fall back into place:

Dr. Brenda Fitzgerald, appointed Friday as director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is a board-certified obstetrician/gynecologist who saw patients for 30 years in private practice.

Unlike any OB/GYN I know, Fitzgerald treated men as well as women. Thats because besides being board-certified in obstetrics and gynecology, she is a fellow in anti-aging medicine.

Among her credentialslisted on [her gynecological practices] website: board certification in Anti-Aging and Regenerative Medicine by theAmerican Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine. However, the American Board of Medical Specialties, made up of the specialty boards that certify physicians,doesnt recognize the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine(A4M), which promotes the use of intravenous nutritional therapy, bioidentical hormone replacement therapy (BHRT) and pellet therapy, in which tiny pellets that contain hormones are placed under the skin.

[B]ioridiculous is how Dr. Nanette Santoro, chair of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, described the use of bio-identical hormones in a recent guest post on the North American Menopause Societys MenoPause blog. Santoro described a patient whose hair had fallen out because she had been rubbing testosterone cream into her skin every day and overdosed. Another patient, age 52, had estrogen levels higher than when she was pregnant, due to estrogen pellets that had been inserted under her skin months earlier.

Now, a snake-oil saleswoman fits perfectly into the Trump cabinet. The president and secretary of Housing and Urban Development have both dabbled in peddling scientifically dubious supplements, while the secretary of Education owes her fortune to one of the most successful pyramid schemes in world history.

Fitzgerald wasnt shy about her antiaging expertise, touting that rsum item in her bio on the Georgia Department of Public Health website. Further, her private practices old homepage included the following frequently asked questions.

What is anti-aging medicine?

It is a new specialty of medicine that studies the changes that occur in all of us as we age. It is dedicated to treating the cause of problems, not just the symptoms.

How do I know I am taking the right supplements?

We can now measure the vitamins, antioxidants, necessary fats and proteins in your cells with a simple blood test. If you like the supplements you are taking (Juice Plus, for example), we can tell you what you need to add.

Can you treat my husband?

I have taken additional training in male hormones so that I may treat male hormone deficiencies as well as female deficiencies.

Why did you become interested in anti-aging medicine?

I got older! The life expectancy for women in 1900 was 48. The majority of women never reached the hormone depleted state of menopause just 100 years ago. Now most of us can expect to live half of our lives without natural optimal hormone production.

The Food and Drug Administration has warned that it has no evidence that the bio-identical hormones central to anti-aging medicine are safer or more effective than other hormone products.

All that said, even with her scientifically dubious side-hustle, Fitzgerald is still among the most defensible appointments Trump has made. Whatever her unorthodox views on the virtues of antiaging hormone therapy, she does have a significant body of experience in managing public health. It seems likely that the former will have more bearing on her capacity to combat the threat that Ebola, Zika, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and other infectious diseases pose to the country and globe.

Which is to say: At least we arent relying on Ben Carson to coordinate the federal governments response to the next pandemic.

More concerning than Trumps appointment of Fitzgerald is his administrations proposal to cut the CDCs budget by $1.2 billion.

Heres hoping that bubonic plague doesnt emerge from melting Siberian ice anytime soon.

The money, included in a Homeland Security spending bill, is likely to set up a shutdown fight with Democrats.

The administration is already brainstorming how they can spin this into a conversation about Clintons mishandling of sensitive intelligence.

Will the extra time enable Republicans to come up with a health-care bill 50 senators support? Or deals on taxes and the budget?

Kushner attended a meeting that was explicitly framed as an opportunity to benefit from Russian meddling. And he still has a security clearance.

Weve gone from evidence of collusion to proof.

A man of many talents.

GOP base voters have long regarded the media as biased allies of their enemies. Its taken Trump to convince them any bad news is just made up.

This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its governments support for Mr. Trump.

The first rule of Tautology Club is the first rule of Tautology Club.

Protesters promised to greet him if he made his official state visit.

An unedited Q&A with the prominent climatologist, who took issue with New Yorks latest cover story for being overly doomist.

The Kremlin-linked lawyer who met with Donald Trump Jr. claims that he was desperate for dirt on Clinton but she had none to give.

Hua Haifeng was investigating factories where the First Daughters shoes we
re made before his arrest.

In their desire to see Trump banished, theyve embraced some unusual bedfellows, like Benjamin Wittes.

It involves a beauty pageant, a Russian pop star, and Trumps decades-old dream of building in Moscow.

Sources say before meeting with a Kremlin-connected lawyer, he was told the dirt she had on Hillary Clinton was part of a larger Russian effort.

The pro-Trump local-news giant has tripled the number of Boris Epshteyn segments that all its affiliates must air each week.

He could tap McConnells favorite Luther Strange or Hannitys favorite Mo Brooks. Theocrat Roy Moores in the mix, too.

See the article here:
Trump's CDC Pick Peddled 'Anti-Aging' Medicine to Her Gynecologic Patients - New York Magazine

Vitals – Axios

Posted on by

Good morning ... The Senate is back in Washington this week after a weeklong recess, with a new goal of trying to pass a health care bill before the next recess in August.

What to expect this week: Everything in this process in constant flux, but for now, our colleague Caitlin Owens' sources aren't expecting to see an updated bill or CBO score this week. The Congressional Budget Office is still working through some of the policy options Majority Leader Mitch McConnell sent over before the break, and the two can exchange more information privately this week as long as the bill is still private, too.

The latest: CBO is taking a look at a handful of possible amendments, including Sen. Ted Cruz's proposal to let insurers sell policies that don't comply with the Affordable Care Act he's calling them "freedom plans" as long as they also sell plans that do comply with the law's coverage requirements.

The outlook: It certainly didn't get any sunnier over the recess.

Data: Kaiser Family Foundation; Graphic: Lazaro Gamio / Axios

Every time you hear the Trump administration or Congress fight about rising ACA premiums, or what will happen to people with pre-existing conditions, just remember we're talking about issues that affect 7% of the population. That's how many people are in the individual health insurance market, or the "non-group" market.

The graph above, put together by Axios' Lazaro Gamio with data from the Kaiser Family Foundation, shows what the rest of the population looks like including the much larger employer health insurance marketplace, Medicare, and Medicaid.

Why it matters: This shows how much time we're spending on a relatively small portion of the market. The ACA was supposed to fix the problems of the individual market, which was dysfunctional for anyone with the slightest health problem. In doing so, it created other problems, including rising premiums. But when you hear about those sky-high rate hikes because of "Obamacare," chances are, they're not your sky-high rate hikes unless you happen to be in that market.

Yes, but: The spending limits that have been proposed for Medicaid really do matter, and they affect a larger group 20% of the population. So every minute Washington spends on the smaller group is time that could have been spent talking about Medicaid changes that will affect more people.

There's another piece of Cruz's proposed change to the Senate health care bill that may be accepted more easily than his ideas on insurance deregulation. He wants to let people use health savings accounts to pay for their health insurance premiums. Conservatives have been pushing to expand HSAs, which allows people to set aside tax-free money to spend on certain health expenses.

Yes, but: Not all conservative health care wonks are impressed. Tom Miller of the American Enterprise Institute calls it a "symbolic move," and not the best way to achieve the conservative goal of equalizing the tax treatment between the individual market and employer-sponsored insurance. But Arnold said it would be more powerful in combination with other changes already in the bill, like increasing the annual contribution limits for HSAs.

Bob Herman has a deep look this morning at "upcoding" the practice where doctors and hospitals bill for more expensive services than they actually provide. The payment system gives them lots of incentives to do that, and numerous settlements between health care companies and the Department of Justice indicate it's a widespread problem.

Why it matters: Upcoding affects everyone it saps money from the taxpayer-funded Medicare and Medicaid programs and could lead to higher premiums for people with commercial insurance. But there's no evidence the health care system is fighting upcoding effectively, or that the problem will go away. More here.

Fun fact: No one forced Bob to include the name of one coding webinar: "Keeping up with the Code-ashians." He did that on his own. Send your complaints to him.

Cerner, one of the nation's leading providers of electronic health records, lost its CEO to cancer yesterday. The company announced that Neal Patterson, who co-founded the company, died from complications from a recurrence of the disease (the Kansas City Star identified it as a soft-tissue cancer). Cliff Illig, vice chairman of the board and another co-founder of the company, has been named chairman and interim CEO.

What we're watching this week: Are we really going to have to start hitting "refresh" on the CBO website again? Also, House Energy and Commerce health subcommittee hearing on medical product manufacturer communications, Wednesday; Employee Benefit Research Institute health policy forum, focusing on health savings accounts, Wednesday.

What else are you watching? Let us know: david@axios.com, baker@axios.com.

See the article here:
Vitals - Axios

Mega NFC Medical10: Beauty- and Anti-Aging Laureate Celebrates Fifth Anniversary – Digital Journal

Posted on by

MEGA NFC medical10 is laureate of the 4th ANTI-AGING & BEAUTY TROPHY 2016/2017 and receives further development of its formula and technology

Hamburg, Germany - July 11, 2017 - (Newswire.com)

For years, MEGA NFC medical10, an exclusive German detox product, has been an established brand with the users of some the most expensive wellness clinics and spas in Europe. In the recent past, it has experienced a further development as a consequence of changes in management and an investment of an international holding. In the summer of 2015 NANOBLE HEALTH CONCEPT has acquired all patents and invested in the further development of the product. The improvements concern the origin of the raw material, which is from now on extracted from different pure sources all over the globe. By combining different clinoptilolites the products quality and purity could be further improved. At the same time, the patented manufacturing process HENA was further optimised so that a higher degree of activation could be achieved. In addition, calcium and magnesium carbonate was added to optimise the gastric pH value and to promote healthy muscle, nerve and bone metabolism. The product has also been adapted to the stricter requirements for medical devices, resulting in new fields of application for the users. As a result, MEGA NFC medical10 can be used to reduce histamine levels, support the intestinal wall and remove aluminum, cadmium, and cesium from the body.

MEGA NFC medical10 has celebrated its five-year anniversary with the brand new slogan Better life should last longer. Soon after it had been introduced for the first time in 2011, the product has become popular in numerous renowned clinics across Europe. Since then, it has been used on a regular basis for anti-aging and aesthetic medical purposes. MEGA NFC medical10 is a medical product produced and certified in Germany. It is made from natural clinoptilolite which is modified and activated by the worldwide patented HENA system (High Energy Natural Activation). As a result, the effective surface of the mineral is increased and its reactivity enhanced. The potential of this product has recently been recognized by the international congress AMEC 2016 in Paris (Aesthetic & Anti-aging Medicine European Congress): MEGA NFC medical10 was the laureate of the 4th ANTI-AGING & BEAUTY TROPHY 2016/2017.

What doctors particularly enjoy about our premium product are the consistent and convincing results, that can be achieved with such a simple application, explains CEO of NANOBLE HEALTH CONCEPT Alrich Kruse. What is more, MEGA NFC medical10 can be used effectively alongside other treatments and cosmetic procedures because it actually supports their effects." The bright grayish powder is dissolved in a glass of water and taken on an empty stomach. It is used in prestigious clinics like the SHA WELLNESS CLINIC and the BAD RAGAZ MEDICAL RESORT.

Being a leader and maintaining this position is a challenge that can only be met with a team of highly professional scientists, innovative manufacturing processes, integration of new technologies and continuous progress," says Alrich Kruse. Also in 2017, the company finally received the approval for the Russian market.

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:

Mr. Alrich Kruse, CEO Tel: +49 40 808 093 140 Email: kruse@nanoble-germany.de http://www.meganfc.eu to find out more information

Press Release Service by Newswire.com

Original Source: Mega NFC Medical10: Beauty- and Anti-Aging Laureate Celebrates Fifth Anniversary

Originally posted here:
Mega NFC Medical10: Beauty- and Anti-Aging Laureate Celebrates Fifth Anniversary - Digital Journal

Do Psychedelic Drugs Cause the ‘Prophetic Effect’? – Breaking Israel News

Posted on by

And Nadav and Avihu, the sons of Aharon, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before Hashem, which he commanded them not. Leviticus 10:1 (The Israel Bible)

Photo: Shutterstock

In their search for possible benefits of psilocybin Magic Mushrooms, researchers at Johns Hopkins University put out a call for clergy from different faiths to determine if this natural psychedelic can help man connect with God. Rabbis, even those who have benefitted in the past from this experience, are reluctant, highlighting that the true God experience cannot be confined to a laboratory.

After nearly 50 years of a ban on studying psychedelic drugs and marijuana, scientists are beginning to discover that psychoactive substances bear many physiological and psychological benefits for mankind. Two researchers at Johns Hopkins Bayview, Roland Griffiths and Matthew Johnson, have been studying the powerful effects of psilocybin for over a decade. They discovered the natural substance is effective in reducing depression and end-of-life anxiety associated with terminal cancers. Psilocybin was also found to be effective in helping end addiction.

Many of the studys participants reported feelings of unity an interconnectedness of all things sacredness of life, and over 60 percent reported it as the most meaningful experience of their lives. Significantly, those with the most success quitting smoking or resolving symptoms of depression all reported high levels of this mystical aspect. The researchers expanded their study and are now investigating whether psilocybin has another potential use: to deepen the spiritual experience. The experiment involves clergymen ingesting psilocybin in a relaxed and controlled setting and reporting on their experience.

Their call for clergymen received a lukewarm response. Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld, the rabbi of Ohev Shalom Synagogue in Washington DC, was contacted by the researchers. For two reasons, he chose not to participate in the study.

I had concerns about the long term effect of putting those substances into my body, Rabbi Herzfeld told Breaking Israel News. More importantly, I dont need drugs to enhance my spirituality. Psychedelics are a shortcut that doesnt last. The only way to have a meaningful relationship with God is to choose a path in life that brings us closer to Him.

The connection between psilocybin and spirituality has a long history. Psilocybin is a naturally occurring psychedelic compound produced by more than 200 species of mushrooms. Anthropologists believe that its mind-altering effects have been used in a religious context for thousands of years, and it is still being used for this purpose in many South and Central American cultures. Though there is no source for psychedelics being used in Judaism as a means of coming close to God, it is not expressly forbidden.

Rabbi Yom Tov Glaser, a Torah teacher and lecturer, grew up in a secular environment in Hollywood California. Rabbi Glaser acknowledges the benefits of psilocybin, but states that it has no relevance to Judaism.

There is a real spiritual benefit to psilocybin, Rabbi Glaser conceded. God put this in nature to give clarity to spiritual leaders from other cultures.

But Rabbi Glaser emphasized that this is clearly not a spiritual path for Jews.

It is significant that natural psychedelics dont grow in Israel and it is not part of our tradition, he noted. That is because we are a nation of prophets, and the real prophetic experience makes LSD look like kiddie vitamins. Because of that powerful ability, we dont have a need for that immediate personal contact with God like those cultures.

Rabbi Yisroel Finman, an American living in Albania, was a teacher and prayer leader in Rabbi Shlomo Carlebachs synagogue in San Francisco called The House of Love and Prayer. In the 1960s the synagogue was successful at attracting young, non-affiliated Jews with an approach inspired by the American counterculture movement. Rabbi Finman, now 65 years old, stated that using psychedelic drugs, including psilocybin, was once an essential part of his spiritual journey. He considered taking part in the Johns Hopkins study but decided against it.

At this stage in my life, that would be going backwards Rabbi Finman told Breaking Israel News. It would have been a nice mental vacation, but I am at the point in my life when I am looking forward, asking myself what is my tikkun (fixing).

Rabbi Finman also feels that the social environment has changed, making the psychedelic experience less relevant today.

When I began taking LSD in 1965, it was not used as a recreational drug, he explained. Using it as a recreational drug is disrespecting what it is. We used it solely as a spiritual experience, and we were careful in how we approached it. For us, LSD was a teacher and it definitely served that purpose. My awareness of Hashem today is absolutely a result of my experiences with LSD.

I would not encourage other people to use it today even for spiritual purposes, Rabbi Finman said. Incorporating it into everyday ritual cancels its benefits. Taking LSD is like walking around in Gan Eden (Garden of Eden), and when you are in Gan Eden, you arent davening. God wants to hear us pray.

Continue reading here:

Do Psychedelic Drugs Cause the 'Prophetic Effect'? - Breaking Israel News

I Know Your Next Move: Game Reveals How the Brain Strategizes – Live Science

Posted on by

Anyone who has played a competitive game knows their own actions are affected by their opponent's moves. A baseball pitcher, for instance, might start throwing curveballs if he thinks the batter is ready for a fastball. Now, researchers in Switzerland have identified the part of the brain that's involved in those calculations the place where our "theory of mind" gets worked out.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and a simple strategy game, the scientists found that an area called the right temporoparietal junction, or rTPJ, (located toward the back and side of the head, behind the right ear) becomes active when people try to figure out another person's beliefs and possible actions. The rTPJ connects two regions of the brain: one area that allows us to imagine other people's mental states (the theory of mind), and another that governs our sense of value, or how important that information is.

The finding could help researchers "probe deeper into disorders where the person has deficits in theory of mind," Christopher Hill, a doctoral student at the University of Zurich and the lead author of the study, told Live Science. Some people on the autism spectrum have this kind of problem, he said. [10 Things You Didn't Know About the Brain]

The rTPJ helps us update our own thoughts with information about what another person may be thinking in response to our actions, Hill told Live Science. For example, when person A wants to respond to something person B has done, it first estimates what person B will do in response to that.

The team tested the idea using a simple psychology strategy game called "Work/Shirk," which has two players, a manager and an employee.

The person playing the employee must decide whether to do their work, and the manager must decide whether to inspect the employee's work. If the manager decides not to inspect the work but the employee works anyway, the manager gets 100 points and the employee gets zero. But if the manager does not inspect it and the employee shirked their work (did not complete it), the employee gets 50 points (since they escaped notice) and the manager gets zero. If the manager decides to look in on the worker and the employee is working, that's 50 points for the employee and zero for the manager. If the manager looks in and catches the employee shirking, the manager gets 25 points while the employee gets zero.

Over several iterations, players can maximize their points if they correctly guess what their opponent is doing. A manager who decides not to inspect because they know the employee is working has guessed right. Similarly, employees would try to be working when inspected and shirking when not, and managers would try to catch the employees not working.

In the experiment, Hill and his colleagues used fMRI imaging scans and a technique called transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). They divided the 120 study participants into two groups, and the participants worked in pairs. For one group, the researchers used TMS while they scanned the brains of the players in the "employee" role. TMS involves inducing a current in a part of the brain with an electromagnet. That current can temporarily disrupt the functioning of specific brain regions. For the control group, the researchers scanned the participants' brains with an fMRI machine but did not use TMS.

It turned out that the group that received the TMS had more difficulty anticipating their opponent's moves, suggesting that the rTPJ is important in the process of that anticipation. [5 Interesting Facts about Human Cooperation]

Further, the fMRI scans revealed that the rTPJ became active as people played the game and started calculating how they could beat their opponent. The researchers saw increased activity of the brain as people tried to figure out what the other person was thinking.

"We had these neural effects if we looked for a correlation between the magnitude of disruption and how much weight people gave," to their thoughts about what other people believe, Hill said. The more that communication occurring between the rTPJ and the areas of the brain that govern how much we value something was disrupted, the less people tried to use their beliefs about opponents to win.

Both Hill and Christian Ruff, a professor of neuroeconomics at the University of Zurich who supervised the study, acknowledged that the data is a bit "noisy." For example, some people are very good at strategy games such as this one (rock-paper-scissors is another example), and some people are not, so the researchers tried to make sure the participants they chose were of roughly similar ability. In the future, the researchers want to do a more extensive study with more people, to confirm the findings.

"One thing that's interesting is that during strategic interactions, people play at different levels of complexity, and people who play at more complex levels beat those who play at lower levels," Ruff said. "The question is, can you teach this? Can you learn it?"

The study is published in the July 10 issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience.

Originally published on Live Science.

Go here to read the rest:

I Know Your Next Move: Game Reveals How the Brain Strategizes - Live Science

Posted in Tms

North American Bancard Holdings Closes on Acquisition of Total Merchant Services – PR Newswire (press release)

Posted on by

"Today's milestone signifies an important step in driving strategic priorities forward for NAB, while providing merchants industry-leading payment solutions," said Marc Gardner, president and CEO of NAB. "During this transformational time in the payments industry, NAB is solidifying its commitment to helping businesses prosper by delivering innovative payment solutions and outstanding customer service."

In the short term, NAB realizes an immediate increase in its merchant base and revenue through the addition of TMS' more than $12 billion in credit and debit card transactions processed annually.

TMS gains access to NAB's industry-leading processing capabilities; its dynamic merchant and sales partner portals; extensive suite of onboarding tools; and additional operational resources.

The combined entity realizes the opportunity to expand product offerings, pursue strategy into high-growth channels and enhance payment capabilities for businesses of all sizes.

"This acquisition enables TMS to accelerate its development of fully integrated and secure payment solutions, continue its commitment to exemplary customer service for merchants and partners, and gain access to NAB's broad platform of capabilities," said Ed Freedman, chairman and founder of TMS. "Guided by strategic-thinking and leadership focused on innovation and service, the combined entity is poised for tremendous success in the near future and well beyond."

Credit Suisse Group, a leading financial services company, served as financial advisors to NAB during the acquisition process.

About North American Bancard HoldingsHeadquartered in Troy, Michigan, North American Bancard Holdings, LLC. (NAB), is an award-winning leader in credit card processing - administering merchant services for client companies of all sizes. NAB executes solutions for payment processing including credit, debit, EBT, check conversion and guarantee, gift/loyalty cards and mobile purchasing. Founded and accredited as an MSP/ISO in 1992, NAB is committed to setting the benchmark for client service, competitive pricing, and the latest in technology to its client companies. With more than $36 billion in payments processed in 2016 for more than 250,000 businesses, North American Bancard is dedicated to providing superior solutions for American businesses. For more information, please visit http://www.nabancard.com.

About Total Merchant ServicesFounded in 1996, Total Merchant Services has helped more than 500,000 businesses with their payment processing needs and currently processes more than $12 billion in credit and debit card transactions annually. The company is committed to providing small businesses with easy and affordable payment processing solutions. For more information, call 747-888-9000 or visit http://www.totalmerchantservices.com.

View original content with multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/north-american-bancard-holdings-closes-on-acquisition-of-total-merchant-services-300485502.html

SOURCE North American Bancard

http://www.nabancard.com

Link:

North American Bancard Holdings Closes on Acquisition of Total Merchant Services - PR Newswire (press release)

Posted in Tms

If You Like Art, Don’t Take the Bechdel Test – National Review

Posted on by

Suppose your favorite film critic started sprinkling his reviews with references to the Cowboy Test and made it clear that he was factoring into his appraisal of a work of art whether it contained cowboys. La La Land? Manchester by the Sea? Moonlight? All problematic, as these benighted films contain no cowboys. On the other hand, Cowboys and Aliens, Armageddon, and the Village People movie Cant Stop the Music, each of which contains cowboy characters, would easily pass the Cowboy Test and receive a hearty blessing.

You would think this approach to movies a bit odd. It is. But no odder than the Bechdel Test, a feminist litmus test that is currently being thrown around by movie critics as an important way to assess the quality or at least the political correctness of a film.

Assuming youre a normal person, and not a film critic, you may never even have heard of the Bechdel Test. Named for the lesbian cartoonist Alison Bechdel, it first appeared in an underground comic called Dykes to Watch Out For in 1985, in which it was called the rule. The rule is that a movie must have at least two (named) female characters who talk to each other about something other than a man. One Bechdel character sniffed that she would go only to movies that pass this test.

Today Bechdel is an over-ground artist, a very big deal. In 2014, she won a MacArthur genius award. A show based on her graphic novel Fun Home had a successful run on Broadway and won a Tony for Best Musical. She is regarded as a feminist savant by the left-leaning cultural cognoscenti.

In the past few years, the Bechdel Test has begun popping up casually in reviews like a feminist Good Housekeeping Seal of approval. Take this appreciation last month of the 1992 film A League of Their Own, published by Katie Baker on the site The Ringer: It is, in my possibly blinded by love but also correct opinion, one of the best sports movies there is. And it is an honest ode to women and sisters and friendships, with a story that breezes through the Bechdel test by the end of the opening scene.

Hey, and you know what? Tom Sellecks Matthew Quigley appears almost immediately in Quigley Down Under. Hurrah, this film breezes through the Cowboy Test by the end of the opening scene!

Neither of these two tests gives you any hint as to the worth of a film, and furthermore neither of them tells you anything about a films general feminist wokeness. It doesnt even tell you whether the film is entirely about a woman. Lots of films that have female protagonists fail the Bechdel Test notably Alien 3; Run, Lola, Run; Breakfast at Tiffanys (there is actual heated debate on this one, but if it passes it barely does so); and Gravity. The Princess Bride fails the Bechdel Test, as does Finding Nemo, and some argue that The Little Mermaid does, too. (Again, it might barely earn a passing grade.) Lots of blockbusters with beloved female characters fail the Bechdel Test, including the original Star Wars trilogy, Avatar, and all of the Lord of the Rings films. So do many classic Hollywood films, from Citizen Kane to The Godfather, and lots of films directed by women, including Kathryn Bigelows The Hurt Locker, not to mention most of the Harry Potter movies adapted from J. K. Rowlings novels. Showgirls, on the other hand, passes the test. Do feminists look at Showgirls and chalk that one up as a big win?

To give you some inkling of how little the Bechdel Test matters when it comes to filmmaking, consider that Sofia Coppola had never heard of it when asked about it in a recent interview. Coppola is one of todays most accomplished and acclaimed female directors, and all of her seven films prominently feature women, usually in the main roles. Yet her latest movie, The Beguiled, passes only incidentally. Although seven out of the eight main characters in the film are female girls and women living at a girls school in Virginia in 1864 they spend almost the entire film discussing a man, a wounded Union soldier they nurse back to health.

Some promoters of the Bechdel Test, stung by the many writers who have pointed out its utter vapidity and uselessness, say it isnt meant to be a litmus test but rather a strategy for drawing attention to the general way women are sidelined in Hollywood. But movies arent intended to be a proper demographic cross-section of America. Movies (at least Hollywood movies) are about people on the extremes of society cops, criminals, superheroes. These extreme characters tend to be men, and men tend to be the ones who create them. Women enjoy much more prominence in the milieu of low-budget independent movies, where the stories are more focused on ordinary people with real-world problems, but those movies usually attract small audiences.

It might be true that there would be more women prominently featured in movies if more women were writing and directing more movies. But it might also be true that the reason there arent as many women making films is that womens movie ideas arent commercial enough for Hollywood studios. To be slightly less reductionist than the Bechdel Test, women tend to write movies about relationships, and men tend to write movies about aliens and shootouts. Have a wander through the sci-fi and fantasy section of your local bookstore: How many of these books authors are female? Yet these are where the big movie ideas come from. If a woman wants the next Lord of the Ringsstyle franchise to pass the Bechdel Test, then a woman should come up with a story with as much earning potential as J. R. R. Tolkiens.

READ MORE: Artists Against Theater In Chicago, Thought-Police Brutality Elizabeth Banks: Wrong on Diversity

Kyle Smith is National Review Onlines critic-at-large.

The rest is here:

If You Like Art, Don't Take the Bechdel Test - National Review

First Gene-Edited Dog Cloned in China Raises Ethical Concerns – Sixth Tone

Posted on by

A beagle puppy recently born in a Chinese laboratory is the first dog in the world to have been successfully cloned from a gene-edited parent, state-owned newspaper Science and Technology Daily reported Thursday.

Longlong was born on May 28 from a surrogate mother, but a test proved on Wednesday that he is genetically identical to another dog, 2-year-old Apple.

The dogs birth marks a breakthrough in cloning research that will potentially allow for cheaper medical research, but it also raises ethical issues. When Apple was an embryo, his genes were modified so he would develop atherosclerosis, a disease that causes blood clots. Genetically identical Longlong will, too.

The cloned puppy was born at Sinogene, a biotech company in Beijing. Lai Liangxue, the companys head scientist, told Sixth Tone that Longlongs birth means China will now be able to rely on its own clones for biomedical research to test disease treatments, for example. Moreover, cloning the animals will be more cost-effective than editing their genes, the company said.

In 2005, the worlds first cloned dog, an Afghan hound called Snuppy, was born in South Korea, and named Invention of the Year by Time magazine. Since then, the country has been the world leader in the science of cloning dogs, which are especially difficult to clone compared with other mammals. Dolly the sheep, the first cloned mammal, was born in 1996.

I believe that we have achieved a cloning success rate close to that of the South Korean teams, Lai said. Half of the surrogate dogs were successfully impregnated during their experiment, and of these, two have given birth to a total of three puppies, with Longlong being the very first. Sinogene invested 10 million yuan ($1.5 million) into the project, the companys deputy general manager, Zhao Jianping, told Sixth Tone.

Sinogene plans to apply the technology to medical research, as well as to the cloning of police dogs and pets. Zhao said some dog owners have already reached out to his team, asking for their deceased or sick dogs to be cloned. In South Korea, cloning a pet dog currently costs around $100,000. Our price will be half of that, he said. We hope to popularize [such cloning] for the public.

Zhou Yujuan, a professor at Hebei University who has been experimenting on a cure for atherosclerosis using mice, told Sixth Tone that she would prefer dogs as research subjects because they are more genetically similar to humans. But, she added, this would require more funding. Usually, we use rats or mice because they are cheaper, she said. A gene-edited mouse with atherosclerosis costs 250 to 450 yuan, while a dog with similar symptoms does not yet have a price tag.

Environmental activists have not responded to the genetic breakthrough with likeminded enthusiasm. Cloning is unethical, said Guo Longpeng, the China press officer for the Asia division of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, the worlds largest animal welfare organization. Like any other laboratory animal, these animals are caged and manipulated in order to provide a lucrative bottom line.

Guo said protection for animals is lacking under Chinese law, and, as a result, horrible treatments are possible in those laboratories. A regulation on lab animals published in 1988 and modified in 2011 regulates the feeding and accommodation standards for the animals but does not set guidelines for experiments.

Lai said he believes animal cloning is ethically permissible, though human cloning is not.

Currently, there are only a few companies providing cloning services in China. Boyalife Group, a company that aims to become the biggest cloning factory in the world, performs dog cloning in cooperation with the Sooam Biotech Research Foundation, a South Korean company led by the scientist who cloned Snuppy. And Beijing Genomics Institute, a biotech company headquartered in Shenzhen, proposed to sell genetically modified mini pigs as pets beginning in 2015, but shelved the plan for unknown reasons.

Editor: Kevin Schoenmakers.

(Header image: The cloned puppy Longlong sleeps on a blanket in Beijing, May 2017. Courtesy of Sinogene)

The rest is here:

First Gene-Edited Dog Cloned in China Raises Ethical Concerns - Sixth Tone

Firm acts against cloning attack from Russian hackers – Law Gazette

Posted on by

Cybersecurity experts have praised a firm for its quick response when its website was partly cloned by hackers apparently based in Russia.

East of England firm Ashtons Legal posted its own scam warning after elements of its website were copied and amalgamated into another website with a similar domain name for a firm referred to as Ashton Partners LLP. No such firm exists.

The cloned website lists the names of five of the real Ashtons Legal fee earners and one support staff member. It gives contact details for an address in Leeds which is the base of another firm, Ashton Solicitors. Attempts have been made to send correspondence from someone purporting to be one of the named fee earners.

Ashtons Legal said the domain name for Ashton Partners LLP appeared to have been registered in Russia two days before it came to the firms attention through one its fee earners. Efforts are being made to have it taken down, including instructing Russian lawyers.

Meanwhile, Ashtons Legal has notified the Solicitors Regulation Authority and placed announcements on its social media pages to inform clients and other firms, as well as highlighting the matter in Google searches.

Law firms are facing increasing threats from online scams and attempted frauds. The SRA issued 25 scam alerts in June alone, mostly involving scammers sending emails impersonating solicitors and their firms.

Phil Edwards, managing director of legal indemnity insurance broker QPI Legal, who advises firms on how to protect themselves from cyber-attacks, said Ashtons Legal had responded well to the attempted cloning.

'Firms are vulnerable when it comes to this type of cyber-attack and the reality is there is not a great deal they can do to protect themselves from it happening, however, what is crucial is that they act accordingly, responding rapidly and appropriately, he said.

Edwards said this type of attack was not the most common cybersecurity breach; in his experience it has cropped up just once in the past five years.

He said cyber-attacks are on the rise within the legal profession and firms need to remain vigilant, although he sounded a downbeat note about the chances of stopping incidents.

'The biggest problem with these types of security breaches is that because its not a direct attack on the firm it could be some time before the firm finds out that it has actually happened, he added.

'Very often the cloned site is domained outside of the UK. It can prove very difficult therefore for the the firm affected to get the site taken down, as has happened as well in this case.

Read more from the original source:

Firm acts against cloning attack from Russian hackers - Law Gazette

Evolution Craft Brewing Adds Distribution in Japan – Brewbound.com

Posted on by

Salisbury, MD Now Available internationally, for the first time ever, Evolution Craft Brewing Company has partnered with Five Good Inc. to distribute in Tokyo, Japan and then to the broader markets of Japan.

Its always been a dream of ours to have our product distributed internationally. Our partnership with Five Good Inc. was a logical fit, as they are industry pioneers in the Japanese craft beer market bringing beer from the US East Coast to Japan. John Knorr, co-founder of Evolution Craft Brewing.

The import craft beer market in Japan has grown 26% in the last five years, as the demand for better beer has grown exponentially. Currently the majority of American exports in the Japanese market are from west coast breweries. Five Good Inc.s choice to collaborate with Evolution came after sampling craft beers from all over the east coast. Evolution is one of the first four chosen breweries from Five Good Inc. to distribute in Japan.In the near future, Evolution anticipates expanding its domestic and international footprint and continuing concentrated growth in existing markets of Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, West Virginia, Virginia and Washington, D.C.

ABOUT EVOLUTION BREWERY

Evolution Craft Brewing Co., the leader of the Culinary Craft Beer movement, was founded by Tom and John Knorr in 2009. The brewery started in Delmar, Delaware and moved to Salisbury, Maryland in 2012 to meet growing demand. Evolutions inspiration was born out of the Knorr brothers passion for pairing the great food at their restaurants with great craft beers.

Now, Evolution craft beers are available for consumers at both retail and restaurants to enjoy ever-better beer with ever-better food. Evolution has nine mainline beers: Primal Pale Ale, Lot #3 IPA, Exile Red Ale, Lucky 7 Porter, Lot #6 Double IPA, Delmarva Pure Pils, Rise Up Stout, Pinehople IPA and Hops Limon IPA and a full lineup of seasonal specialities in both bottle and draft. In addition, Evolution also has big bottle barrel aged beers released throughout the year: the Migration Series,Menagerie Series and Nouveau Rouge Project. For more information, please visithttp://www.evolutioncraftbrewing.com/.

Link:

Evolution Craft Brewing Adds Distribution in Japan - Brewbound.com

EXCLUSIVE: AfterShock’s Animosity Expands with New Ongoing Series – CBR (blog)

Posted on by

Led by the creative team of writer Marguerite Bennett and artists Rafael de Latorre and Rob Schwager, Animosity has been the breakout hit of AfterShock Comics early days as a publisher. The series has already grown to include multiple one-shots spinning out of the main series, and in October, AfterShock will launch a second Animosity ongoing series. CBR has the first details.

RELATED: Bennett & de Latorres Animosity Explores Intelligent Animals Out For Revenge

Animosity: Evolution will also be written by Bennett and colored by Rob Schwager, with art by Eric Gapstur. Bennett describes Evolution as the Star Trek to Animositys Star Wars the ethical and philosophical exploration to Animositys dark adventure.

Animosity: Evolution is about the rise of that supposed safe haven the city by the sea, unlike any other where, during the chaos, the Animals peacefully took power with minimal loss of life, Bennett said in a statement to CBR. Set in the first weeks and months after this apocalypse begins, the Animals and the surviving humans try to build and rebuild a functioning society where they all might live.

Animosity is a darkly comedic post-apocalyptic tale that explores a world where animals suddenly develop the intelligence of humans and the ability to speak, leading to an uprising against humanity. The series premiered in August 2016, and has received acclaim including a spot on CBRs Top 100 Comics of 2016. Animosity: Evolution, Bennett shares, is set to explore the bigger questions posed by the main series.

How do they eat? Carnivores cant digest grass, though herbivores can digest meat, and meat is now truly murder, Bennett said. Where do they live? A city of 1 million people just became a city of 3 billion, counting every human, pet, bird, rat, fish and insect inside. How can they have children we all know rabbits breed like, well, rabbits, but sunfish can lay 300 million eggs in a single year. How can they defend their city from the increasingly frantic remains of the human governments, when their limbs are not shaped to the use of human technology? How can they learn to live with each other, treat each other, train each other?

Animosity: Evolution #1 is scheduled for release on Oct. 18. Solicitation text, plus covers and black-and-white interior art from the debut issue, can be found below.

Animosity: Evolution #1 cover by Elizabeth Torque.

NEW SERIES!

A new, additional ongoing ANIMOSITY series!

One day, the animals woke up. They started thinking. They started talking. They started taking revenge. Now, theyve started building. In a city by the sea, a new power is on the riseand theyre making an animal kingdom all their own.

From the brilliant mind of creator/writer Marguerite Bennett (INSEXTS, Bombshells and Batwoman) with artwork by Eric GapsturANIMOSITY: EVOLUTION is an exciting new series that expands upon this already amazing world!

Animosity: Evolution interior art by Eric Gapstur.

Animosity: Evolution interior art by Eric Gapstur.

Animosity: Evolution interior art by Eric Gapstur.

Animosity: Evolution interior art by Eric Gapstur.

Animosity: Evolution #1 cover by Mike Rooth.

ShareOn Facebook

Pint It

Email

View post:

EXCLUSIVE: AfterShock's Animosity Expands with New Ongoing Series - CBR (blog)

Ceremony marks start of church’s evolution into Youth House | Local … – The Register-Guard

Posted on by

Sunlight filtered through stained glass windows at the former Cascade Presbyterian Church on Monday morning as community leaders and other attendees gathered to bid farewell to the churchs former role and welcome its new function as a place for homeless teens.

St. Vincent de Paul of Lane County broke ground Monday on its Youth House at the site. In coming months, the nonprofit organization will remodel the church to provide housing and social services for homeless girls ages 16 to 18.

The Youth House will be as much like a home as possible, according to St. Vincent de Paul spokesman Paul Neville.

A manager will live on-site, and the girls will be able to remain, rent free, for up to two years as long as they remain in high school and until they graduate. The house will include a community space, kitchen, laundry, counseling office and computer lab. Each student-resident will be assigned a mentor. A full-time caseworker will help the students connect to social services and work with mentors and school officials to create individualized plans for steps after high school.

The remodel will cost an estimated $1.85 million, but the organization already has raised about 70 percent of the overall construction cost via donations grants from the Oregon Community Fund, as well as the Collins, Chambers and Autzen foundations.

Earlier this year, local philanthropist and community activist Tom Bowerman announced a $50,000 challenge grant from the OCFs Barbara Bowerman Fund, and donors since have fully matched the grant. Banner Bank has approved a construction loan for the project.

Mondays event which officials described as a ground shaking instead of a groundbreaking was emotional. About 100 people attended the event at the former church at 33rd Avenue and Willamette Street in south Eugene.

The hourlong event included remarks from community leaders, including Eugene Mayor Lucy Vinis, Springfield Mayor Christine Lundberg, Bethel School District Superintendent Chris Parra and Dave Williams, the executive director at Hosea Youth Services.

It was not a typical groundbreaking ceremony; there were no shovels, no dirt and no sledgehammers. Instead, it featured musical instruments a guitar, a cowbell, a tambourine and maracas.

Following a series of short speeches, local musician Rich Glauber played guitar and led the group in a song that featured some key phrases and ideas expressed by those who spoke at the ground shaking event:

Put the suitcase down/youre home in this town, Glauber sang. This is a ground shaking/hope is in the making/its earth-changing.

St. Vincent took on the project in the summer of 2016 after the south Eugene-area neighborhood association contacted the nonprofits executive director, Terry McDonald. The neighborhood association wanted St. Vincent to acquire the former church to serve the communitys growing homeless population.

St. Vincent bought the building in December 2016 for $585,000 after the Eugene-Springfield Home Consortium provided a $625,000 federal HOME grant. Although St. Vincent spearheaded the effort, it had some help from several other organizations, including Hosea Youth Services, which will operate the Youth House; the Eugene, Springfield and Bethel school districts; The 15th Night Coalition; and the Eugene-Springfield Home Consortium in an effort to address one of the areas largest issues: homelessness.

On any given night in the Eugene-Springfield area, nearly 400 homeless high school students ages 16 to 18 struggle to find a place to sleep, according to Neville.

Many of them end up couch-surfing with acquaintances, and some end up on the streets, where they are vulnerable to violence, drugs and a thriving human-trafficking trade the along the Interstate 5 corridor, he said.

The most recent data, for the 2015-16 school year, indicated a higher number of K-12 homeless students in Oregon than during the Great Recession, according to data from the state Department of Education.

Last school year, 21,340 homeless students were enrolled in K-12 public schools, or about 3.7 percent of Oregons public school population.

The Department of Education reported the number of homeless pre-kindergarten students in Oregon as 1,929.

Just imagine for a second that youre a 15- or 16-year-old kid, carrying suitcases of your bedding and clothing, and then your backpack with a couple of books, said Janet Thorn, a homeless-student liaison for the Springfield School District. How are you supposed to concentrate on schoolwork?

Thorn said the people gathered at the former church on Monday who have made the Youth House possible have increased the odds of a better future for homeless youth.

This is going to give them an opportunity to change that cycle, Thorn said.

Follow Alisha on Twitter @alisharoemeling. Email alisha.roemeling@registerguard.com .

More Local News articles

Excerpt from:

Ceremony marks start of church's evolution into Youth House | Local ... - The Register-Guard

Taha, Young Vic, London, review: the evolution of a Palestinian poet … – The Independent

Posted on by

This delicate, deeply affecting piece is an introduction to the life and work of the Palestinian poet Taha Muhammad Ali (1931-2011), written and performed by Amer Hlehel. Its staged with a charged simplicity by Amir Nizar Zuabi who has translated this English-language version of the one-man show. For 75 minutes, with no props other than a bench and a briefcase, Hlehel stumbles round a dimly lit yellow rectangle and pulls us into the story of how this humble, engaging man evolved into one of the most celebrated Palestinian writers of the past half-century against all the odds.Its a tale of loss, borne with resilience, hope and humour.

Taha was born in the Galilean village of Saffuriyya, near Nazareth. His father, a powerful personality with a talent for presiding over salons, suffered from polio and Taha left school after just four years to support the struggling family with his precocious business schemes such as selling eggs in Haifa and opening a kiosk for cigarettes and chocolate.At the age of 17, he was forced to flee to Lebanon with his family after their village came under heavy bombardment during the Arab-Israeli War of 1948.

After nine months, they slipped back through the forests across the disputed border and there is a quietly devastating moment in this piece when Taha asks the smuggler when they will arrive in Palestine. We already did an hour ago, is the reply.Hlelel beautifully communicates Tahas dazed recognition that even the air now smells different in this land where everything has gone the village bulldozed along with his grandfathers bakery with its perfume of fresh olive oil, thyme and bread.There is no going home.

He wound up operating a souvenir shop near the Church of the Annunciation in Nazareth, describing himself with characteristic playfulness as a Muslim selling Christian memorabilia to Jews.By night, he fed his autodidacts voracious hunger, schooling himself in classical Arabic poetry and learning how to read English.He was 52 by the time his first book was published.

The narrative is interspersed with extracts from the poems, performed in Arabic with English surtitles projected onto a screen at the back.Some of these are addressed to Amira, the cousin to whom he was betrothed when he was fourand to whom he remained heartbreakingly devoted for decades after they were separated in the turmoil of 1948.

Taha likened his poetic method to billiards (You aim over here... to strike over there) and when he approaches politics, it tends to be from the oblique angle of personal experience rendered with wry, unflinching candour. Hlehels moving performance conjures up a man who doesnt seem to have a dishonest bone in his body. Its as though Tahas felt duty to preserve the bygone world in sensory evocation and to trace the emotional lineaments of loss have left him no room for hatred and histrionics.

The impact of the poetry is all the more powerful for the wiliness and self-deprecation of the treatment. The boy, who had always thought that he was a disappointment to his father, grows into the person who eventually appreciates why it was admiring rather than hurtful of himto refuse to dispense death-bed advice: Taha, your dream is bigger than any last words I can give you.

The final sequence here finds Taha on stage at a poetry festival in London.The audience, rocking with laughter because of a farcical mishap with his briefcase, is silenced by the rendition of his poem Revenge. Its a poem whose twists exemplify the authors admirable determination to follow a feeling all the way through, however awkward the outcome.At first the speaker dreams of fighting a duel with the man who killed my father and razed our home, expelling me into a narrow country. Then he imagines that his rival might himself have a network of loved ones, including a father who worriedly puts his hand over his heart when his son is even a quarter of an hour late and so resolves not to kill him, even if he could. Instead of a reversal at this point and a killer blow, the piece ends with the poet trying to convince himself that ignoring his enemy and leaving him with the pain of aloneness would in itself be a kind of revenge. Yes and no.

An inspiring piece that will play at theSummerhall in Edinburgh during August and is warmly recommended.

More:

Taha, Young Vic, London, review: the evolution of a Palestinian poet ... - The Independent