via Dan Lewis of Now I Know.

Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roche Gilbert du Motier, better known as the Marquis de Lafayette, was a French nobleman who famously served as a major general for the Continental Army in the American Revolution. Lafayette was integral to France's support of American troops in the war as well.

These contributions did not go unacknowledged; roughly two dozen states have towns named after him amongst a host of other honors. But the most impressive acknowledgement came on December 28, 1784 -- roughly a year after the American Revolution officially ended under the Treaty of Paris. On that date, the state of Maryland passed a resolution, making Lafayette a "natural born citizen" of the state. The resolution also did the same for all of Lafayette's male heirs, extending to and beyond the present day.

In 1919, the New York Times (pdf of article here) concluded that this designation is likely unconstitutional under our present framework -- as the power to define "natural born citizen" resides with Congress, per Article I Section 8 Clause 4 of the U.S. Constitution. But, as the Times notes, Maryland's grant of citizenship to Lafayette and his heirs predates the Constitution, and comes from a time when states were empowered to define who was a citizen.

Why is Lafayette's designation as a "natural born citizen" notable? Because Article II Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution states, in part "[n]o person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President[.]"

Lafayette's male heirs -- whomever and wherever they may be -- have met the first prong required to be eligible to be President of the United States, in a manner unique to them.

• Scot wins fourth title in 18-15 thriller against 21-year-old
• 'This is far and away the biggest and best of my titles'

A BBC audience of 6.4m, one of the highest snooker has attracted, saw John Higgins win his fourth world title by holding off the invigorating challenge of Judd Trump. ¬

"I've never sampled anything close to that in a snooker match because he's bringing an army of fans to the game with the way he plays," said Higgins of the 21-year-old Trump after his 18-15 victory. "We've got a new star, he's the future, he's great."

Higgins, at 35 the oldest champion since Dennis Taylor in 1985, is eyeing the future as well, particularly in relation to his place in the game's pantheon. Mindful of Steve Davis's six Crucible triumphs and Stephen Hendry's seven, Higgins said he "wants to get to seven because I've won three in the last five years".

It was not just the quality of his opponents – Ronnie O'Sullivan, Mark Williams and Trump in the last three rounds – that made this "far and away the biggest and best" of his titles. A year earlier, virtually to the day, Higgins was embroiled in allegations of match fixing in the News of the World entrapment in Kiev.

A World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association disciplinary hearing in September fined him £75,000 for failing to report an illegal betting approach and imposed a six-month suspension, most of which had already been served. He did have a reputation to rebuild, but his previous unblemished record and unanimous regard for his professionalism assisted this. In five months he won five tournaments on his way to Sheffield, despite the death of his father, John senior, the linchpin of this very close family, in February. ¬

He left Sheffield for a brief holiday in Italy with his wife and three children, having earned £471,970 in prize money since his return to the circuit – as he needed to in order to recoup his fine, legal and other expenses and lost earnings. But if it was Higgins' title, it was Trump's tournament as the former junior prodigy followed his breakthrough capture of the China Open five weeks ago with a series of exceptional performances.

Ronnie O'Sullivan tweeted that he had never seen long potting like it; Neil Robertson, whose title defence Trump ended in the first round, said that "Judd's taken attacking snooker to a place where there's no right or wrong shot. Great to watch."

His potting, fluency and dazzling array of positional shots made him, in 17 days, a new English sporting hero, exuding enjoyment of the challenge, yet, in his unassuming nature, the sort of son every viewing mother would like to have. "I loved it out there," said Trump. "You only get nerves when you're scared of missing. I went for my shots. Some went in, some didn't.

"I've tried to make the game more popular with younger people. There are a lot of people who don't really watch snooker and have started watching because of me in these last two weeks, so I've got to keep doing my thing and keep a new generation coming through and making kids want to play the game."

He is, nevertheless, aware of the realities of professional sport, saying it was "obviously nice" to hear himself described as snooker's new superstar, before adding : "But you're only really remembered when you win titles. You're not remembered as a loser. Next year there's going to be a lot of expectation on me. There will be a lot of players who will want to bring me back down to earth."

Following snooker's transition more than three decades ago from low-profile folk sport to British television phenomenon, it lost some of its public appeal. Under a succession of unimaginative administrations and beset by incessant internal political strife, the circuit progressively contracted.

The dwindling number of tournaments meant that young prospects like Trump could not obtain the only thing they were lacking – experience – quickly enough: "I got practising but you only had six or seven tournaments a year so it was impossible to get a rhythm going. You'd play in one tournament and have two or three months off."

Everything changed when Barry Hearn took the helm a year ago with a 51% stake in World Snooker. February's inaugural German Masters in Berlin was a spectacular success; the World Cup is to be revived in Bangkok in July, immediately followed by a new ranking event in Melbourne. September's Brazilian Masters is the circuit's first venture into South America. China is pressing for a third ranking event in company with those established in Shanghai and Beijing. A key element in Hearn's strategy is the new Players Tour Championship, which ran this season with seven events in England, five in continental Europe – the one in Furth won by Trump – with the play-offs in Dublin, all carrying scaled down ranking points.

The PTC is designed to keep all players busy with earning opportunities and to give venues not quite ready for a full ranking event a step towards one. Germany and Belgium staged such events this season and Denmark, Hungary and Poland (who have a 16 year-old European under-21 champion) are also under consideration for next season.

By increasing prize money from last season's £3.5m to £5m this with a confidently expressed intention that next season's will top £6m, Hearn's benevolent despotism has succeeded where more conventional approaches have failed.

The Bangor Daily News has a story and pictures of a new tombstone being installed at the grave of Benjamin Gross. The new headstone replaces the original one that had cracked in two, due to age. According to pension records, Benjamin Gross was born on Cape Cod, Mass., and got his first taste of battle when he enlisted in the Continental Army and took part in Gen. Philip Schuyler’s invasion of Canada in 1775. Afterward he was one of the 2,400 soldiers of George Washington’s army that crossed the Delaware River on Christmas night in 1776 and surprised and captured...

A year ago today the Deepwater Horizon exploded and gave us the worst man-made environmental disaster ever.  I'm re-publishing one of the posts I wrote about a month after the initial blast  - it includes a lot of links that give us some historical context.

"It is impossible to say and we will mount, as part of the aftermath, a very detailed environmental assessment. But everything we can see at the moment suggests that the overall environmental impact will be very, very modest."

(BP CEO Tony Hayward, May 18, 2010)

I was planning to write the obligatory "what the oil spill means for social media" blog post but that's really just ridiculous.  To be honest this is as close to a 20th-century media crisis scenario as we've seen in some time.  The public is heavily reliant on professional journalists to get the story, a very large company is doing its best to control the flow of information (and compounding the damage to its own reputation in the process), the federal government is flailing about, and Members of Congress are threatening to write very sternly-worded letters if things don't improve eventually.  Oh, and there's a CEO out there saying some profoundly stupid things.  Sure there are some nice tech tools in play here - obviously - but this is a straight-up, mainstream media-driven story.

But as always the real story is the actual debacle, not the PR debacle. And we're learning the scope of this EPIC FAIL one merciless drip at a time.

• Eleven people are missing and presumed dead.
• Estimates of the flow of oil were wildly understated at the outset, and the current "official" estimate prompts scientists to laugh in disbelief.  Now when asked the company and the government simply evade the question.
• The company has to dig a "relief" well to stop this flow, and that won't be ready until late summer.
• The "best minds in the world" haven't been able to staunch the flow in over a month.
• The first hugely technical and scientific idea to fix this was a big metal box.  It didn't work. (but remember - this idea didn't "fail," it just didn't succeed yet.  Or something.) 
• The second big idea was a smaller box.  It failed before it started.
• The third big idea was a tube. It really didn't work either.
• The fourth big idea is to dump mud and stuff in the hole.  Like a cork. Even if it "works" I think won't completely stop the flow of oil.
• Because remember, none of this stuff has ever been tried a mile below the ocean surface.
• And we're dumping "dispersants" (i.e., moderately toxic chemicals) into the oil flow to diffuse it.
• Even though there are more effective and less toxic chemicals available.  No there aren't.  Yes there are.  So stop.  No.  OK, slow it down.  No.  Seriously, slow it down or I'll think about saying stop again.
• But hey, it's not like this is a big deal or anything.  In fact, it's tiny.
• And BP will reimburse people whose claims BP considers "legitimate."
• And at least we know exactly who is at fault here - someone else. BP says it's Halliburton and Transocean's fault.  Halliburton says it's Transocean and BP's fault.  Transocean says it's BP and Halliburton's fault.

Meanwhile, in the government...

• The White House issues a moratorium on new outer continental shelf drilling permits.  But I don't think "moratorium" means what they think it means.
• Then we learn the government agency that regulates this industry is the one with the Bush-era folks who were having sex with the lobbyists, snorting crystal meth on toasters, getting plastered at lobbyist-sponsored parties and sleeping it off in lobbyist-paid hotel rooms because they were too drunk to drive.  
• Oh, and they were letting the companies fill in their own inspection reports in pencil which they would later trace over in pen.
• But not to worry, because the White House has assembled a(nother) blue ribbon panel of outside-the-box scientific thinkers.  Like the climate change denier / "proud homophobe" guy.  Oh, wait.
• And the guy who assembled the panel of experts - the Secretary of Energy - is apparently learning the details by reading about them in the papers. 
• But it's BP's responsibility.
• But we're putting boots on throats and will push people out.
• But we don't know what we would do differently if we were in charge, so we're not in charge.
• But we're in charge. 
• And we think BP should pay for everything. 
• Except we don't.

Meanwhile, the politicians and beltway clowns jockey for soundbites and political advantage.  The Republican governor of Louisiana who likes the idea of small government and refused that stimulus package money is nowdemanding more money from the feds and wants the Army Corps of Engineers all over the place STAT.  The Senate Assistant Majority Leader istrying to come up with two-word catch-phrases that begin with the letters B and P.  And the Chatty Kathy's of the very serious Washington punditry club were first falling over themselves to call this "Obama's Katrina," then when that didn't stick they were wondering aloud "where is the oil?" and now thatthe oil is all over marshlands and pelicans and stuff it's the liberals who are all pissed. 

And Gulf Coast fishermen are wondering if they'll ever work again.

Tomorrow is the 235th anniversary of the Battles of Concord and
Lexington.and in commemoration of that event I'm once more
posting the names of my Revolutionary War ancestors.

The italicized names are those whose Pension Files I've found.
If any one reading this shares my descent from these men, I'll be
glad to share the files with you if you don't already have them.: 


 
Jonathan Barker Jr.
Was a Minuteman from Methuen Ma with the rank of Sergeant. He
was at Lexington and Concord with his sons Jonathan (see below)
and Samuel. Served in Captain Samuel Johnson's Company in
Colonel Titcomb's Regiment for 2 months in 1777 in Rhode Island
and then with Nathaniel Gage' Company in Colonel Jacob Gerrish's
guards from Dec 1777 until April 1778 guarding the captured
troops of General Burgoyne.


Jonathan Barker 3rd
Enlisted on 19 Apr 1775 in Continental Army, Capt. John Davis'
Company, Col. James Frye's Regiment, in the Massachusetts line
for 8 months in Cambridge, Ma. At the conclusion of the term, he
reenlisted for another 3 months in Capt John Allen's Company,
Colonel John Waldron's Regiment, General Sullivan's Brigade in
the New Hampshire Brigade at Charlestown, Ma. He then enlisted a
third time in June 1778 at Methuen, Ma., joining Captain Samuel
Carr's Company, Col. James Weston's Regiment, in General Lerned's
Brigade at White Plains, N.Y. and serving for another 9 months.


John Ames
Was a Minuteman under Capt. Asa Parker on April 19th, 1775. He
subsequently enlisted in the Continental Army under Captain Oliver
Parker, Col. William Prescott's Regiment and in the Brigade that
was commanded in turn by Generals Putnam, Lee, and Washington.
and served for 8 1/2 months.


Asa Barrows
 A member of the militia from Middleborough , Ma. (south of
Boston) in the Company of Captain Joshua Benson, in Colonel
Cotton's Regiment, and General William Heath's Brigade for
8 months during the siege of  Boston.  In December 1776 he
joined a militia Company  commanded by Captain Joshua
Perkins and marched to Barrington, R.I. and was stationed there
for 6 weeks. In July 1780 he again enlisted, this time in a militia
company commanded by Captain Perez Churchill that marched
to Tiverton, R.I.


Moses Coburn
 Moses Coburn got into the War late and by reason of being
"hired by a certain class of men in the then town of Dunstable
to go into the Continental Army in the summer of  1781." When
he reached Phillipsburgh in New York he was placed in Captain
Benjamin Pike's Company, in the Regiment of the Massachusetts
line commanded by Lt. Colonel Calvin Smith in which he served
for nearly two years until it was broken up. He then transferred to
the Company of Judah Alden in the Regiment commanded by
Colonel Sprouts until his discharge in 1783.


Samuel Haskell
Samuel served in Captain Joseph Elliott's Company in Colonel
William Turner's Regiment and then under Captain Hezekiah
Whitney in Colonel Josiah Whitney's Regiment.


Amos Hastings
Amos  responded to the Lexington Alarm as part of Captain
Richard Ayer's Company and Colonel William Johnson's Regiment.
He later served in Captain Timothy Eaton's Company in Colonel
Edward Wigglesworth's Regiment and was at the taking of  the
British General Burgoyne at Ticonderoga.



Elisha Houghton
Enlisted at Harvard Ma as a Private in May of 1777in the
Massachusetts militia and was at the Battles of Bunker Hill
and Stillwater. He then enlisted for three years in the infantry
company commanded by Captain  Joshua Brown in Colonel
Timothy Bigelow's 15th Regiment of the Massachusetts line.
and took part in the Battles of Monmouth and Newport and was
at Valley Forge. He twice was promoted to Sergeant and  twice
was busted down to the ranks.


Amos Upton
Responded to the Lexington Alarm and marched there from his
home in Reading. He later joined the militia company commanded
by Captain Asa Prince as an orderly sergeant and then enlisted
for eight months in the Continental Army under Colonel Mansfield
He was at the Battle of Bunker Hill and was discharged in October
of 1775.


John Griffith
Enlisted in 1781 as a Matross (he swabbed out the barrel of the
cannons after they fired, or so I've been told) in Captain William
Treadwell's Company  in Colonel John Crane's Artillery Regiment.



Reuben Packard
A Sergeant in Captain Josiah Hayden's Company in Colonel Bailey's
militia. They marched to Lexington at news of the Alarm. He also
responded several more times as a Minuteman for a total of nearly
8 months duty.


Jonathan Abbot
Served as a Sergeant in the Militia under Captain Henry Abbott
and responded to the Lexington Alarm

Besides those direct ancestors, these other relatives fought
in the Revolution:

Moses Barrows, brother to Asa Barrows.

Samuel, Jesse, and Benjamin Barker, sons of Jonathan Barker,
Jr. and brothers to Jonathan Barker 3rd.

James Swan, brother in law to Jonathan Barker 3rd.

Last month, the remains of U.S. Army Sgt. Jerome Firtamag, 29, arrived at Yap International Airport on Continental Micronesia Flight 935.

An historian has purported to solve an enduring mystery: Whether General Warren, heroically depicted in John Trumbull’s painting in the MFA, was charging or retreating when struck by a fatal bullet at the Battle of Bunker Hill. The evidence suggests he was charging. Score one for the Continental Army.

An historian has purported to solve an enduring mystery: Whether General Warren, heroically depicted in John Trumbull’s painting in the MFA, was charging or retreating when struck by a fatal bullet at the Battle of Bunker Hill. The evidence suggests he was charging. Score one for the Continental Army.

HUNTSVILLE, Ala., April 12, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The Directorate of Emergency Services and the Directorate of Plans, Training, Mobilization and Security at Fort Benning, Georgia the third largest Army base in the continental United States, will deploy a suite of integrated public safety and security

*Rules* 1) You pay, I ship. Regardless of feedback. 2) I take Paypal and MO. 3) Buyer pays for shipping and any PP fees 4) I ship UPS ground. 5) I don't ship out of the continental U.S. 6) PM me for a quick response. 7) Prices *DO* include shipping. 8) *NO TRADES* 9) Don't flame or spam.

The dream of making the port of Gwadar an economic hub has been destroyed by a superpower struggle for influence

Miles away from the war on terror being fought in Pakistan's north on the border with Afghanistan is another insurgency whose hub is the port city of Gwadar, located near Iran on the Makran coast. Unlike the battle against the Taliban, this uprising receives little international attention, although it is set against the backdrop of competing superpower interests, reminiscent of the Great Game when Russia and the British empire fought for control over this region.

Eight years ago, the dream was for the small fishing port of Gwadar in Pakistan's Balochistan province to be transformed into a duty-free port and a free economic zone. The hope was that Gwadar would become a regional hub of shipping, commercial and industrial activities, providing a link between Pakistan and the vast oil and gas reserves of central Asia.

A real estate frenzy followed as land was bought from locals at exorbitant prices. Billboards proclaiming future housing estates and resorts were put up overnight and work began on the port with Chinese help. A two-lane highway linking Gwadar with Karachi was completed in record time. Today, the port has been finished and is ready for ships but Gwadar looks more like a ghost town than a gold-rush town. Empty plots of land still await the buildings that were promised but never built. Oddly enough, instead of handing the port over to the Chinese government, it was leased out to the Singapore government three years ago. It is only used at half its capacity and the cranes are already getting rusty from lack of use.

Located near an important shipping lane, the deep seaport was built by the China Harbour Engineering Company Group. The Chinese government invested heavily in this project, up to $200m some say, so that landlocked western China could benefit from access to the sea. As an emerging superpower hungry for energy, China needs access to the oil and gas rich Central Asian states. The Chinese have also been keen to assist Pakistan in building other roads to acquire a 3,500km link between Kashgar (near the border with Pakistan) and Gwadar.

They are currently helping the Pakistan government to widen the Karakoram highway that connects Islamabad to China through Pakistan's high mountain ranges. It appears that there is a long-term plan to eventually connect the Karakoram highway with Gwadar. This is upsetting the other emerging superpower of the region, India, who does not want China's security establishment to have safe passage to the Arabian Sea. The fear they have been articulating is that Gwadar might become a naval outpost for the Chinese.

The local people, who hoped to benefit from the construction of the port, are crushed by the disappointing turn of events. "We were expecting change to come," says Asghar Shah, a local resident who works for an NGO. "But it was a big let down – we are victims of the new Great Game." The government of Pakistan was allegedly pressured not to hand the port over to the Chinese. In fact, the Americans eye Gwadar as a potential military base, given the proximity of Iran. The locals are reluctant to criticise their government's handling of Gwadar, though. "People disappear in Gwadar – their bodies are found dumped in a remote area a few days or weeks later. No one knows who is behind it," says Asghar Shah, refusing to speculate further.

There is a more immediate problem at present. The Baloch nationalists are opposed to any development in Gwadar because they say these mega projects will marginalise the local Baloch population. Balochistan's development record is dismal. Covering nearly 350,000 square kilometres, it is by far the largest province in the country but houses less than 7% of Pakistan's population. The basic quality of life indicators are abysmal. On-tap drinking water is available to less than 5% of the population. The female literacy rate is under 15%.

The Baloch people are demanding more autonomy for the province. For decades, Pakistan's Balochistan province has been the scene of sporadic clashes between government troops and guerrillas who are fighting for autonomy. In the past few years, the rebels have again stepped up their attacks. Government troops and installations across the province have come under rocket attack and bombings, especially Gwadar town. Last month, seven army personnel and three labourers building a road near the Iranian border were killed by unidentified gunmen. The Baloch nationalists fear that if Gwadar grows into a modern city, the Baloch people will become a minority in their own province. No one is quite sure who is funding them, but there are rumours that they get support from India.

Gwadar is today a deserted town where outsiders are looked upon with suspicion. Most of the educated young people have moved out to look for jobs in the other big towns and cities of Pakistan. The new and luxurious Pearl Continental Hotel built on a cliff overlooking the port and the town below is empty – it has been closed down for "renovations". The road leading to the small airport outside the town is heavily guarded by security forces. There are no tourists now – most have been scared off by the attacks. Foreigners do not dare to venture here either.

For centuries, Gwadar has also been a smuggler's paradise – it was once infamous for its human trafficking in slaves and it is still a place where illegal immigrants are smuggled into the Middle East and beyond. The idea had been to capitalise on its location, but the dream of Gwadar remains just that. Pakistan's strategic location as a gateway to the oil and gas riches of central Asia means that it will remain a battleground for competing interests for the foreseeable future. The Great Game continues well into the 21st century.

From a post at Ben Smith’s blog at Politico titled Wrong Army?:

[Referring to the image above] We live in an age, as Michele Bachmann illustrated recently, in which veneration of the Founders isn’t always matched by a profound grasp of historical fact.

And an amused reader forwards on an email he got from the Louisville Tea Party, under the image above.

Those are, he was surprised to note, Redcoats.

And so, Ben Smith, ever the dutiful stenographer makes another entry in his “conservatives are stupid” file.

It is always fun to laugh and point at your opponents. Fortunately, on the right we have many more opportunities to do that than does the left. (H/T Zombietime)

The left, immune to any sense of ridiculousness, is relegated to trying to convince each other they are smarter than anyone on the right. Naturally, this often leads to hilarious results. When Sarah Palin told a Tea Party crowd to “party like it was 1773″ the leftosphere went positively orgasmic until someone pointed out that the Boston Tea Party occurred in 1773, not in whatever year the left thought it did.

This brings us back to the Ben Smith blog post and associated image. This was one of those stories that always scares me because it is too good to check and it fits just exactly with my image of the person/organization/event I am writing about. Rather than avoid a tragic self-beclowning by doing just a little due-diligence, Smith elected to run with his favorite meme: conservatives are stupid. In this case, a Tea Party organization was so ill informed about American history, he believed, that it didn’t even know the Continental Army wore blue coats. And they believe they are defending the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. What a hoot! It was just too good to pass up. It was especially too good for a Journolist member like Smith.

Let me digress for a few paragraphs.

During the 18th and early part of the 19th century infantry and cavalry regiments were identified by the colors of the cuffs. lapels, and turnbacks of their coats, there were other things, to be sure, like whether braid was gold or silver, type of lace around buttonholes, etc., but coat facings were the primary means of regimental identification. Each regiment also had a contingent of musicians. A standard line regiment had fifers and drummers (German regiments liked oboes, go figure), cavalry had trumpets and kettle drums, highlanders their bagpipes, etc. It was de rigueur for musicians to be outfitted in the reversed colors of their regiment. So, if we look at a musicians of the British 10th Regiment of Foot during the American Revolution we see:

they are wearing yellow coats with red facings, in the background you can see the line companies of the regiment in red coats with yellow facings.

Using that as a point of departure we can go to the uniforms worn by the Continental line of Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey:

From this, what uniforms do we suppose the musicians for those regiments wore? Probably something very like those worn by the Fife and Drum Corps of the 3d United States Infantry:

which, oddly enough, is what is represented in the image.

The point here is not to provide Ben Smith with a tutorial on military uniforms of the 18th and 19th century, though I could certainly do so, but to point out the obvious. Smith didn’t know the uniforms in the advertisement were wrong. What he did know was he was smarter than any dozen Tea Partiers and if he thought the red coats were British regulars it meant that’s what they were and the Tea Party folks, being idiots, didn’t know squat about American history. And so he ran with the blog post.

He’s since been called out he’s done a halfway walk back:

UPDATE: Readers say the image is accurate, as the military band typically wears the opposite colors of the army. So, esoteric, but not wrong.

But even here he is being dishonest. Being right isn’t esoteric just because Ben Smith didn’t know it. He should have apologized for poking fun at the organization without bothering to check the story out or at least admitted that some rightwingers knew something that he didn’t know.

But he can’t do that because we are all, you know, stupid. And if he has to credit that freakin’ Tea Partiers, of all people, might be right and he wrong on this then what else might they be right about? And his self image crumbles and his world view is up for grabs.

Contributors to Been there have built up a wealth of tips on Spain – from where to find the tastiest tapas to the best fincas to lay your head

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TAPAS BARS

Bar el Tigre, Alhama de Granada

Bar El Tigre is a wonderful, fun and very traditional Spanish tapas bar in the centre of Alhama de Granada, about 50km from Granada. The boss Antonio is a very lively, friendly host. He prepares simple but exquisite food – jamon iberico is a must, as are his tostadas – toasted bread with tasty toppings: tomato, anchovy and jamon, all with lashings of olive oil and black pepper. There is a wonderful aromoa of coffee and red wine as you enter the bar. Feel the warm friendly atmosphere as you sit by the bar or find your seat on the large terrace and watch the locals meander around this dreamy little town .
• Plaza de la Constitución
Wolfee

Peña Pies Plombo, Seville

If you are looking for the classic combination of tapas and flamenco in Seville (without being surrounded by hoards of tourists), then head to Peña Pies Plombo. Food is authentically Andulacian – we tried the chorizo, potaje (the chickpea-based stew), pringá (a meat feast for pork lovers), plus the seasonal potao dish, papas aliñas, which even has its own song. Only open to the public in the evenings, there is a small stage for live flamenco performances; photographs of Spanish greats Cameron and Paco de Lucía cover the walls. The bar is hosted by enthusiastic Loli, who is always keen to start dancing, especially when accompanied by her husband, Paco. Reassuringly, his Spanish guitar playing is more convincing than his wig.
• Calle Dársena 22A
Otumba

La Higuera, Granada

This is a great little tapas bar/restaurant within a cool walled garden perched at the top of the hill in the Albaicín in Granada. It is quite difficult to find, tucked away in a little side street, but is well worth it if you can find it. Fantastic tapas free with every drink, and eating off the menu looked pretty good as well.
• Albaicín alto, Calle Horno de Hoyo, granadainfo.com/higuera/english.htm
SteveMcCann

Bar Hermanos Teresa, Zaragoza

Wonderful and well presented local tapas for the connoisseur. Opens at 8.30pm, it's small and perhaps you'll have to queue up – it's difficult to find too.
• Calle General Ricardos 11
panosx

Pizarra Café, Oviedo

Pizara Café was the best value tapas and wine we had in the Asturias. Try the montaditos – slices of freshly cooked pork on bread, delicious. The sausages are also very good and go with the glasses of dry white wine. Just ask the bartender for a recommendation and you wont be disappointed.
• Plaza de la Catedral 3, pizarracafe.com
Sintra

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RESTAURANTS

Abastos 2.0, Santiago de Compostela

It's a bit on the tiny side – only 12 people can squeeze in to sit on high chairs around the narrow and high table. The sense of exclusivity is quickly confirmed when food and wine arrives. The tasting menu has so many small courses that I lost count; the wines are from small producers and excellent matches for the food. Courses are "announced" on the discreet flat screens at either end of the table. The price is around €40 per person all included, which must count as one of the great bargains in this city.
• Rúa das Ameas, +33 (0) 981 576 145, abastosdouspuntocero.es
york137

El Vegetariano de la Alcazabilla, Málaga

This charming restaurant in a rustic alley, conveniently placed for a break from sightseeing in the Alcazaba and the Teatro Romano, serves vegan and vegetarian meals. We had the vegan plate: an appetising and generous selection of vegan finger food and salads. The decor is cheerful and quirky, with comments from previous customers written on the walls, mobiles of tin jugs and colourful mirrors.
• Calle Pozo del Rey 5, +34 (0) 952 214 858
Happyyetpoor

Restaurante Mirador El Tajo, Grazalema

Here you can choose from a range of sit-down meals and enjoy a fantastic view of the surrounding slopes. If it is a bit nippy, warm up with sopa de Grazalema (Grazalema soup, a broth with chorizo and pieces of bread). Next, my favourite paté de perdiz (partridge paté), and then if you really want a feast a revuelto (scrambled egg) with seasonal veg (mushroom, asparagus, etc) and a meat of your choice (we opted for the leg of lamb, which could feed an army, not just two people).
• Avenida Juan de la Rosa, +34 (0) 6 6650 2957, eltajo.com
BecomingSevillana

La Pizza del Born, Barcelona

In the heart of the trendy neighbourhood of El Born, just minutes away from the chaos of Las Ramblas, is a great pizzeria run by a group of young friendly Argentinians. The offering consists of a wide variety of delicious crusty deep-base pizza by the slice made with quality ingredients. I recommend the pineapple, bacon, anchovy and tomato. They also have savoury tarts and empanadas. Each item costs a very reasonable €1.80. If you feel like something sweet, they have a range of typical Argentinian desserts that are worth a try. The place is quite small, catering mainly to locals, and is usually packed – a good thing because it means the pizza is always fresh.
• Paseo del Born 22, +34 (0) 933 106 246, lapizzadelborn.com
CoolandBright

Restaurante Ponsa, Barcelona

One of the few remaining traditional family restaurants where you can see three generations sitting down to Sunday lunch. They serve traditional Catalan food, the prices are reasonable and the décor classic. Expect to pay about €35 per head.
• Carrer d'Enric Granados 89, +34 (0) 934 531 037
Wilfredbcn

Mesón Los Gemelos, Tenerife

A top-quality restaurant in the heart of Puerto de la Cruz. Serves a range of fantastic food, including lots of Canarian cooking. The steaks are particularly good and reasonably priced. I'd recommend their queso asado (toasted goat's cheese with Canarian sauces); the house steak with bacon, apple and onion; papas arrugadas con mojo (small potatoes boiled and wrinkled in sea salt with local garlic and chilli sauce); and half a litre of local wine.
• Calle El Peñón, Puerto de la Cruz, +34 (0) 922 370 133
Farolita

La Migueria, Zaragoza

If you've never had migas, this is the place to be! Migas, an original Spanish dish of breadcrumbs fried with chorizo and olive oil, etc, is served with various toppings, including grapes. Another dish to try here is callos, but I will let you find out what it is. Accompany your meal with Viña Urbezo 2009 red wine which Luis the friendly proprietor – a former tax officer – will surely suggest, and you are bound to have a delicious traditional dinner in this family-run restaurant.
• Calle de los Estébanes 4, +34 (0) 976 200 736
Panosx

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ACCOMMODATION

Corral del Rey, Seville

A small, family-run hotel in the heart of Seville. It's a 17th-century house that was sensitively restored by an Anglo-Spanish family, maintaining all the beauty of the original ruin, complete with a small but impressive contemporary art collection. There are great breakfast and tapas, and a plunge pool on the roof if you feel like a break from exploring the incredible Barrio Alfalfa its set in.
• Corral del Rey 12, +34 (0) 954 227 116
corraldelrey.com. Doubles from €280
florenceknightingale

La Seguiriya, Alhama de Granda

La Seguiriya is a delightful little guesthouse owned (and run with considerable warmth) by flamenco singer Paco Moyano and his wife. Six comfortable, well-appointed rooms are dotted around an 18th-century townhouse. Downstairs, there's a lounge area/bar and an excellent restaurant. Best of all, though, is the extensive terrace area out the back, which boasts stunning views of the town's famous gorge.
• Calle Las Peñas 12, +34 (0) 958 360 801, laseguiriya.com
thebackpacker

Hotel Masia Sumidors, Sitges, Barcelona

A beautiful rustic hotel a few minutes drive from lively Sitges – you can't fail to have a relaxing stay here. Ian and Neil, the owners, are perfect hosts who offer great suggestions on places to visit and provide evening meals Monday to Saturday and lovely continental breakfast every day. The setting is delightful and it's not far from the sea, vineyards and quaint villages to visit. And the beds are incredibly comfortable.
Carretera de Vilafranca, +34 (0) 938 962 061, sumidors.com. Doubles from €75
YVA123

Finca al-Manzil, Extremadura

Finca al-Manzil is a wonderful place to stay in the Sierra de Montánchez of Extremadura, the most undiscovered region of Spain. It's near three world heritage towns, Trujillo, Mérida and Cáceres. The finca is set in beautiful scenery with great walking, birdwatching and sightseeing possibilities. Very comfortable, with a great atmosphere. I stayed in the barn, which is self-catering, a lovely space with views over the olive groves, no neighbours, just peace and beauty. Spring was spectacular.
• +34 (0) 670 743 296, finca-al-manzil.com. Minimum four-night stay at €110 a day.
indigo100

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ACTIVITIES

Aire de Sevilla Arabic Baths, Seville

Tucked down one of the many narrow streets in the Santa Cruz district is this jawdropping 16th-century palace built by an Indian viceroy. The vast baths are vaulted, with stuccoed Mudéjars, antique lanterns and Roman seating. Float around in the incense-filled chambers - it's a truly magical experience. All this and fragrant tea!
Calle Aire 15, +34 (0) 955 010 025, airedesevilla.com
Mrsfifties

Maravillas market, Madrid

In Madrid's biggest and budget-priced food market you can find stands with exotic, sun-ripened fruits and veg, also fresh fish from Spain's coasts and spices for every combination of ingredients. It makes cooking for every occasion a pleasure!
Calle Bravo Murillo 122
Kathabel

El Hammam, Málaga

The hammam in Málaga is the antithesis of the Costa del Sol. Calm, dimly lit, it is as authentic as I have found outside of Turkey. You can have a steam – no time limit - or book a massage as part of a package. The massage takes place either in the hammam itself on a marble slab, or (for more privacy) in a separate room. Afterward you can rest on the outside terrace with herbal tea. One of the most memorable moments in Málaga for me, apart from the Picasso Museum which is close by.
• Calle Tomás de Cózar 13, +34 (0) 952 212 327, elhammam.com
kateduignan

El Refugio del Burrito, Antequera

This tranquil sanctuary with signed paths, a shop and picnic tables is home to around 100 rescued donkeys. Some were taken in injured, some had been mistreated or simply abandoned, and others were exhausted after a life as taxi donkeys or rescued from poorly managed zoos. The spacious sanctuary covers several acres and the donkeys look so happy. An ideal day out for children who can adopt a donkey (but not take it home, of course) for as little as €20.
• Apartado 25, 29520 Fuente De Piedra, +34 (0) 952 735 077, elrefugiodelburrito.com
hispanofile

Cosmocaixa, Barcelona

Among Barcelona's many museums, the most entertaining one is Cosmocaixa. The science museum has a lot of things to experiment with – very impressive.
• Isaac Newton 26 , +34 (0) 932 126 050, fundacio.lacaixa.es
Trobfr

Casa de la Memoria, Seville

Genuine flamenco at Casa de la Memoria - great guitar playing, dancing and singing, all without the touristy food and drink. As a family, we thoroughly enjoyed the experience and it's a must if you visit this fantastic city.
• Calle Ximenez de Enciso, 28, Santa Cruz district, +34 (0) 954 560 670, www.casadelamemoria.es
Sintra

Luna Mora, Guaro

A Moorish festival held over the first two weekends of September in Guaro in Málaga province. The streetlights are turned off and the beautiful village is lit by 20,000 candles. It's incredible. The streets are lined with North African inspired stalls selling everything from incense to spices to trinkets. Lots of street-side bars and food stalls stay open until the early hours, and there's music as well as other performances. It's really popular with the Spanish who come from far and wide, but not many tourists seem to know about it. I'd recommend staying in the village to avoid the transport chaos.
• lunamora.org/intro.php
iheartholidays

Commander of the Continental Army which won the American colonies independence from Britain, first president of the United States and principal architect of the new country's system of government: there's no doubt George Washington is one of the key figures who shaped the world we live in.

Fort Hill, historic site of the Roxbury High Fort that the Continental Army erected under Henry Knox’s guiding hand in June 1775 to defend Boston against British siege, now has something else of fortitude to boast: 39 Hawthorne St., a 1,623-square-foot, 3-bed, 2-bath townhouse condominium with all the comforts of a single-family home for only $339,000. The living room alone shows how well-built this townhouse is. Solid walls, sizable windows, hardwood floors and a classic fireplace combine to create a sense of security, serenity and sunshine. Ditto for the dining room, where another double window brightens the evening meal and a deep blue wall brings it a feeling of calm and safety. Another of this unit’s strengths is something a lot of single-family homes don’t have: a full-size breakfast room — not just a breakfast corner or nook or alcove — that is convenient to the deck for summer morning coffee and contiguous with the kitchen for quick food service and quick bites. A granite counter wrapping around into a deep cantilevered bar defines the open but self-contained kitchen and gives it more food prep space than many single-family homes have. The kitchen also features classic custom cabinetry, a stainless steel sink with gooseneck faucet by the window, and state-of-the-art appliances, including a four-burner gas range with self-cleaning oven. The master bedroom gives you the sleep-tight security of generous solid wall area for creative arrangement of artwork and furniture. The unit’s quiet wooded lot is outcropped with the area’s trademark geological feature, Roxbury puddingstone. The neighborhood is landmarked with the historic Cochituate Standpipe, which marks the site of Roxbury High Fort and signifies the historical significance of Fort Hill from miles away.     Neighborhood amenities are significant as well: Highland Park, Marcella Playground, Melnea A. Cass Swimming Pool, Roxbury YMCA, City On a Hill Charter School, Boston Latin Academy, Orange Line subway service at Jackson Square Station, and much more. For more information on 39 Hawthorne St., or to arrange a private showing, call one of CondoDomain’s Boston agents at 617-314-7704. To meet our agents, visit http://boston.condodomain.com/meetus

The Dec. 19 front-page article " ' Don't ask' is repealed in historic vote " heralded the end of a policy that "for decades" has made being gay grounds for discharge from the military. The policy really precedes the birth of our nation , since the Continental Army was formed on June 14, 1775.

Throw out the implications. Negate the BCS or non-BCS factor.

When it comes right down to it, what are the most intriguing, watchable, entertaining games on the bowl game schedule for this holiday season?

Here is how I see them breaking down with my 2010-11 bowl game rankings, from the worst to the best of what to watch for the next month.

35. New Orleans Bowl: Ohio vs. Troy

The bowl game may be approaching some kind of unofficial record of having the longest streak of having the worst bowl game matchup. And why does the game that draws some of the worst bowl-eligible teams of all time get to be played in the Big Easy? They should move the New Orleans bowl to Boise, Idaho.

34. New Mexico Bowl: BYU vs. UTEP

This game gets bonus points for kicking off our bowl season—just not enough bonus points to be ranked higher than 34th. I understand letting 6-6 teams compete in bowl games, but why against each other, and why in New Mexico?

33. Little Caesars Pizza Bowl: Florida International vs. Toledo

Part of the player’s gift bundle for this game is a commemorative football. Because if you are from Florida International, why would you not want to commemorate being forced to spend Christmas in Detroit, Michigan, playing in the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl against Toledo?

32. Military Bowl: East Carolina vs. Maryland

Points are immediately lost for somehow not landing a single service academy in a bowl called the Military Bowl. This game is played at RFK Stadium, so at the very least the game serves as a reminder that the stadium is still standing, even though no one else uses it.

31. Armed Forces Bowl: Army vs. SMU

The Armed Forces Bowl got it right. If you are going to call your bowl game such, you better have an inside track on Army, Navy or Air Force. After watching the ESPN documentary Pony Excess, can you imagine a better matchup of a program as sleazy as SMU and as un-sleazy as Army?

30. BBVA Compass Bowl: Pittsburgh vs. Kentucky

What exactly is a BBVA Compass? I am pretty sure the Pitt offense couldn’t even find the end zone using one. If you really need a reason to watch this debacle, it will be your last chance to gaze at Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt’s mustache.

29. Beef ‘O’ Brady’s Bowl: Southern Mississippi vs. Louisville

Beef ‘O’ Brady’s is a restaurant franchise originally founded in Brandon, Florida in 1985. It currently boasts 240 locations in 23 states, mostly in the Southern and Midwestern United States. Now you know more about Beef ‘O’ Brady’s than you do about either team playing in its bowl.

28. GoDaddy.com Bowl: Middle Tennessee vs. Miami (Ohio)

Turn this dud of a game on to see if former Miami (Ohio) coach Michael Haywood is or isn’t on the sideline (he was just hired by Pitt) and to see what Danica Patrick is or isn’t wearing.

27. Humanitarian Bowl: Northern Illinois vs. Fresno State

The definition of "humanitarian," according to Merriam-Webster, is “promoting human welfare.” If anybody had any care about human welfare, specifically the humans who play football for Northern Illinois and Fresno State, they would not send them to Boise, Idaho, to play football on blue turf in the dead of winter.

26. Independence Bowl: Air Force vs. Georgia Tech

This game is more of a personal preference. It could be ranked as high as five or as low as 35, depending on your preference of offense. This game is a match made in Woody Hayes heaven. Both teams run the triple-option—and by "run" I mean run the ball every single play.

25. Insight Bowl: Missouri vs. Iowa

How is Missouri ranked 12th? How is Iowa 7-5? How is Iowa favored? How is anyone going to watch this?

24. Music City Bowl: North Carolina vs. Tennessee

North Carolina is not the only scandal-ridden program in the NCAA. They are just the only one that does not win. Their prize for going 7-5 with half of their roster suspended at some point in the season is a trip to Nashville, Tennessee to play, who else, Tennessee.

23. Pinstripe Bowl: Kansas State vs. Syracuse

Play this game anywhere but Yankee Stadium, and the 13 people who would watch this game probably wouldn’t.

22. Meineke Car Care Bowl: South Florida vs. Clemson

The bowl game changes names more than Puff Daddy. After a few years as the Queen City Bowl, then the Continental Tire Bowl and then the Meineke Car Care Bowl, Charlotte’s newest bowl game will be dubbed the Belk Bowl starting next season. So crack your muffler jokes now and get one last chance to see George Foreman hand out a trophy.

21. Liberty Bowl: Georgia vs. Central Florida

Turn this game on in time for the final whistle, when Georgia wide receiver A.J. Green is finally free to declare for the NFL draft and sell whatever used paraphernalia he wants to.

20. Ticket City Bowl: Northwestern vs. Texas Tech

Ticket City is a secondary ticket market that specializes in selling hard-to-find tickets for big-time games. Needless to say, this matchup of 7-5 teams is neither a hard-to-find ticket nor a big-time game.

19. Poinsettia Bowl: Navy vs. San Diego State

This game has traditionally had some great matchups, including Boise State vs. TCU in 2008 and Utah and California in 2009. This is not one of them.

18. Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl: Nevada vs. Boston College

Somebody said it best when writing to a newspaper columnist asking the simple question, “With the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl, the Outback Bowl and the Chick-fil-A Bowl, why do we need a Fight Hunger Bowl?”

Reasons to watch: It is played in a baseball field (AT&T Park), it’s the day before the National Championship Game, so if you’re lucky they’ll talk about Oregon vs. Auburn, and most importantly, it starts at 9 p.m. EST, which means the only people watching it on the East Coast will be gamblers, insomniacs and gambling insomniacs (are there any other kinds?).

17. Champs Sports Bowl: North Carolina State vs. West Virginia

If not for a 52-yard Connecticut field goal, it would be West Virginia in the BCS saving the Big East from embarrassment. Instead the Mountaineers are here and with a unique, to say the least, coaching situation. Bill Stewart is the fired-coach-in-waiting, while former Oklahoma State offensive coordinator Dana Holgorsen is the head-coach-in-waiting once he takes over as offensive coordinator starting Jan. 1. Got it? Good.

The Mountaineers have the weapons to put on a show, and North Carolina State has quarterback Russell Wilson, a homeless man’s Cam Newton.

16. Texas Bowl: Baylor vs. Illinois

Looks like a good old-fashioned shootout. The "over/under" is 63, and both teams boast dynamic playmakers. Baylor has Robert Griffin III at quarterback, and with a name that sounds like a Texas Marshal, Illinois has tailback Mikel LeShoure.

15. Alamo Bowl: Oklahoma State vs. Arizona

Oklahoma State just lost its offensive coordinator, but with Kendall Hunter running the ball and Justin Blackmon catching the ball, who needs one? The Cowboys are 10-2 and No. 14 in the country. They probably deserve better than a 7-5 Arizona team, but that’s what you get for not playing defense.

14. Holiday Bowl: Washington vs. Nebraska

The game is being hyped as Jake “Hurt” Locker, Washington’s top NFL prospect at quarterback, vs. the Nebraska Blackshirt defense. Considering that is an 11-on-1 mismatch, maybe that explains why Nebraska is favored by two touchdowns.

13. Sun Bowl: Notre Dame vs. Miami

Turn the clocks back 20 years and this game is tops on the list. In 2010—not so much. The firing of Randy Shannon gives the watchability a boost, plus there’s always the fun factor of watching just how few South Beach residents decide to spend their New Year's in El Paso, Texas.

12. Chick-fil-A Bowl: South Carolina vs. Florida State

The game is on New Year’s Eve and kicks off at 7:30 p.m. EST, so it gives you something to do if your NYE plans suck. Other than that, South Carolina fans cannot be happy with this trip back to Atlanta. Last time they were here, four weeks ago, Auburn rolled over them 56-17.

11. Gator Bowl: Mississippi State vs. Michigan

Remember when the Gator Bowl used to be a major bowl game? Now it is laced with an awful Michigan team and a Mississippi State team from which you cannot name a single player. It could possibly be Rich Rodriguez’s last game as Michigan’s coach, so there’s that to watch for.

10. Capital One Bowl: Alabama vs. Michigan State

Michigan State is ranked No. 9. Alabama is ranked No. 16. Michigan State is 11-1 and Big Ten co-champions. Alabama is 9-3 and did not even get to play for an SEC title. But Alabama is favored by 10. The game will be fun to watch just to see how much more college football handicappers know than everyone else.

9. Cotton Bowl: LSU vs. Texas A&M

The best thing about the Cotton Bowl is that it’s only one of two bowl games not on the ESPN mafia family of networks. FOX will air this showdown scheduled at a new time, Friday night, Jan. 7, in Cowboys Stadium. This bowl game is probably the best chance to see January football at Cowboys Stadium.

8. MAACO Bowl Las Vegas: Utah vs. Boise State

The game is in Las Vegas, it features the biggest favorite of bowl season (Boise State by 17), two teams who are a combined 21-3, two prolific offenses and one incredibly ticked football squad. The Broncos thought they would be playing in early January. Instead, because of a missed chip shot field goal, they’ll be playing Dec. 22. Poor Utah.

7. Hawaii Bowl: Hawaii vs. Tulsa

They should rename this “The perfect television event to hold you over from Christmas Eve dinner until Midnight Mass.” The annual Christmas Eve tradition, the Hawaii Bowl, kicks off at 8 p.m. EST, Dec. 24. Of the 119 teams who play Division I football, 118 would love to be in this game. Hawaii is not one of them.

6. Outback Bowl: Penn State vs. Florida

Maybe I am overreacting for a matchup of 7-5 teams, but consider the following: The game is on New Year’s Day. Florida has a hotshot new coach, Will Muschamp, who may or may not be there. The Gators are unveiling new Nike uniforms for the game. Most importantly, Urban Meyer is 46 years old. Joe Paterno has been coaching 45 years. Meyer is the one retiring after this game.

5. Fiesta Bowl: Connecticut vs. Oklahoma

There is always that one David vs. Goliath game in the BCS, and Oklahoma usually gets stuck playing as Goliath. However, in this case calling UConn David is an insult to David. The point spread is 17, and ESPN is not even treating it like a BCS game. They are dispatching Sean McDonough and Matt Millen to call this bloodbath, although it is one of a few bowl games to be broadcast in 3D.

If I were a Connecticut fan, I would stick to watching the beatdown in 2D, or maybe just listen on the radio, or maybe just pick up a newspaper Jan. 2, or maybe just watch Connecticut basketball. Women’s, that is.

4. Sugar Bowl: Ohio State vs. Arkansas

Ohio State in a BCS bowl game is getting to be like listening to a broken record. However, they get to face some new BCS blood with Arkansas. The game also features big-time quarterbacks with Terrelle Pryor and Ryan Mallett.

3. Orange Bowl: Stanford vs. Virginia Tech

In the past a matchup between teams like this would be called the Catholics vs. the Convicts. Since Stanford is not a Catholic school, we’ll just settle with the Cardinal vs. the Convicts. All moral issues out of the way, this should be wildly entertaining.

2. Rose Bowl: TCU vs. Wisconsin

Stanford vs. Wisconsin would be a heck of a game here, and it’s likely what the old guard of the Rose Bowl wants, but tradition be darned, the undefeated Horned Frogs are a lot of fun to watch, and everybody wants to know how they would hang with a perennial Big Ten power. On New Year’s Day we finally find out.

1. BCS National Championship Game: Oregon vs. Auburn

Any argument for a college football playoff gets hurt when the best game of the bowl season is the National Championship Game. Does anybody really need a round of 16 or a plus-one or some other hokey playoff idea to figure out that Auburn and Oregon need to play and need to play now? The "over/under" is 74.5—first to 40 points is your next national champion.

USmax Announces Contract Award for U.S. Army ODC

PR Newswire — December 20, 2010

GAMBRILLS, Md., Dec. 20, 2010 /PRNewswire/ — USmax Corporation (“USmax”), a leading provider of Information Technology (IT) services, is excited to announce today it has been awarded a Prime Contract by U.S. Army to support the efforts of the Office of Defense Cooperation (ODC) – France and the Defense Trade Exhibition Program. USmax will provide Outside Continental United States (OCONUS) IT and event planning support.

“The award demonstrates our reach and capability to perform work outside United States to further the mission of U.S. Army,” said Habib Nasibdar Director of Technology Services. Our services will involve coordination between ODC-France, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA), the United States European Command (EUCOM), the Aerospace Industries Association and other defense trade groups on Defense Trade Exhibitions in preparation for the Paris Air Show 2011.

About USmax Corporation

USmax Corporation is an information technology firm that specializes in Cyber Security, Infrastructure Management, and Enterprise Applications. Since our founding in 1995, we support hundreds of customers in government, commercial and non-profit organizations. Our services are consistent in high quality and delivered through a set of repeatable processes and frameworks. We pride ourselves to be always on time, budget, and easy to work with. Our professionals are well qualified and carry various industry certifications such as Project Management Professional (PMP), Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) Practitioner/Manager, Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED) Accredited Professional (LEED AP), Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA), and many more.

SOURCE USmax Corporation

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Big Government: Sunday Open Thread: Valley Forge Edition: Today, in 1777, the Continental Army went into winter’s quarters at Va... http://bit.ly/gUeRA0

(By @BigGovt - Blog Feed - Politics, Big Government)

The Congolose side have shown in reaching Saturday's Club World Cup final that there is talent still thriving in Africa

TP Mazembe's journey to Saturday's Club World Cup final could hardly have had a more inauspicious beginning. Bad enough was the fact that the reigning Congolese and African champions kicked off the defence of their continental crown in March by losing to the Rwandan army club APR FC but, even though Mazembe won the return leg to progress to the next round, worse Rwanda-related woe was to follow. Two months later Mazembe returned to Kigali to participate in an inter-club tournament organised by the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame – and there they renewed hostilities with APR in such spectacularly bad-tempered fashion that many commentators accused them of sabotaging their own season.

Opponents of APR complain that the army club benefits from generous refereeing when playing at home and Mazembe felt they were being kicked with impunity. When the referee denied the visitors a penalty, the perceived injustice got a bit too much for some Mazembe players. Their captain and prolific striker, Trésor Mputu, protested so furiously that he was sent off and he did not, alas, go quietly.

Instead he and several team-mates chased the referee around the pitch; the midfielder Guy Lusadisu was the first to catch up with the official ... and laid him out with a flying karate kick. Oh dear. The match and then the whole tournament were abandoned and Fifa banned Mputu and Lusadisu for a year. Mazembe's hopes of retaining the African Champions League seemed doomed. The loss of Mputu, who last year was voted the best player playing his club football in Africa, was considered especially debilitating.

Mazembe went on to demonstrate, however, that they are a team of bountiful resources. That should perhaps not have come as a surprise – after all, the Democratic Republic of Congo won the inaugural African Championship of Nations last year (which differs from the Africa Cup of Nations in that it features only players who play their club football in Africa) and their squad featured 12 players from Mazembe.

The strength of Mazembe's squad reflects the depth of their chairman's pocket. The club is based in the city of Lubumbashi in the mineral-rich Haut-Katanga province and the chairman, Moise Katumbi, made his fortune in mining before branching out into an array of other activities, including fishing, transport and television.

Now a powerful politician as well as a businessman – he is the governor of Katanga – he has funded the renaissance of the local team, which until his involvement had endured three decades of decline since its golden age in the 1960s (they were African champions in 1967 and '68 and had added the prefix Tout-Puissant, meaning 'almighty', to the club's name after going unbeaten for the entire 1966 season on their way to the domestic title).

The difference between Mazembe and, say, Chelsea or Manchester City is that, although they have signed a smattering of players from elsewhere in Africa, Katumbi has generally not used his wealth to recruit players from abroad but rather to keep top talent at home. Mputu has been courted by several European clubs and had trials with Arsenal in 2007 but, used to picking up players from Africa for the sort of pittance that would not tempt Mazembe, none has been prepared to pay the lavish fee it would take to prise him away and potential suitors have also been put off by Mputu's temper. His meltdown in Rwanda was not entirely out of character.

Nor does Mputu particularly need a move, as Mazembe's players are well remunerated – Mputu is reported to earn around £8,000 per month at Mazembe, plus extravagant win bonuses. For their two victories this week in the World Club Cup each member of the squad will be rewarded with tens of thousands of pounds, as they were after winning the African Champions League for the second successive year in October.

Mazembe's conquest of Africa was emphatic. They may have struggled through their group, their campaign having been disrupted not only by the fallout from events in Rwanda but also by increasing frailty in defence, but they got back on track after changing managers in September. The Frenchman Diego Garzitto was replaced by the former Senegal international Lamine N'Diaye.

The new manager restored defensive rigour as well as introducing a tempo and audacity that, when allied to the attacking flair that the team always had, has taken many opponents by surprise. Espérance de Tunis finished ahead of Mazembe in this season's Champions League group stages but, when they met again in the first leg of the final seven weeks after N'Diaye's arrival, the Congolese destroyed them 5-0, and then showed commendable solidity in the second leg to cap a 6-1 aggregate triumph.

In last year's Club World Cup Mazembe arrived with high hopes but shoddy defending let them down, leading to humiliating defeats by Auckland City and Pohang Steelers. This week, by contrast, they have kept clean sheets against Pachuca of Mexico and the South American champions Internacional, though the Brazilians did manage to pick their way past Mazembe's defenders several times, only to be thwarted by the inspired goalkeeper, Muteba Kidiaba.

Internacional's defence, on the other hand, could not cope with the skill and speed of Mazembe on the break, as evidenced by the excellent goals by Mulota Kabangu and Dioko Kaluyituka.

Whether Mazembe win or lose in Saturday's final, against either Internazionale or the Korean side Seongnam Ilhwa Chunma, they have demonstrated that there is playing, organisational and managerial talent beyond the familiar leagues of Europe and South America.

George Washington was the commander in chief of the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War and served as the first President of the United States. He died on December 14th, 1799 at his home Mount Vernon in Virginia. A reenactment of George Washington’s funeral took place in December of 1999 to mark the 200th anniversary of Washington’s death.
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Published: Today at 2pm (ET)

Poland is an oft-neglected destination for travelers to Europe and this bodes well for those of you who do make the trip. Poland has had its ups and downs since leaving the cold grip of the Soviet Union in 1990, but the economy is stable and the tourism infrastructure is more than adequate for the casual traveler and yet rustic enough to provide for those magic moments far away from home. Poland is still an inexpensive place to shop and travel and there are great opportunities for lake-side vacations in the north, mountain retreats in the south, seaside respites on the Baltic and rich urban life in the cities of Krakow, Warsaw and Gdansk.

Passports & Visas

Passports are required to enter and leave Poland. Visas are not required for US citizens for visits of less than 90 days. For longer visits, contact the nearest Polish embassy.  Poland is a party to the Schengen Agreement, which allows for free travel among 25 different European countries.

See the US Department of State fact sheet on Poland for travelers:

“Polish immigration officials may ask travelers for proof of sufficient financial resources to cover their proposed stay in Poland, generally viewed as 100 zloty per day. Additionally, citizens of non-EU countries, including the United States, should carry proof of adequate medical insurance in case of an accident or hospitalization while in Poland. Polish immigration officials may ask for documentation of such insurance or proof of sufficient financial resources (at least 400 zloty per day) to cover such costs.”

Obtaining a US passport
The US Government Website is where to start.

Visa information

Embassy of the Republic of Poland
2224 Wyoming Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20008
tel. (202) 234-3800
or the Polish consulates in Chicago, Los Angeles, or New York.

American Offices
The U.S. Embassy Warsaw
Aleje Ujazdowskie 29/31.
Tel:  (48) (22) 504-2000 
This number can be called 24 hours/day. 
For emergencies after business hours, press “0.”
Fax:  (48)(22) 504-2688

The U.S. Consulate General Krakow
Ulica Stolarska 9.
Telephone:  (48) (12) 424-5100;
Fax:   (48) (12) 424-5103
After-hour Emergencies:  601-483-348.

Consular Agency Poznan
Ulica Paderewskiego 8
Telephone:  (48) (61) 851-8516
Fax:  (48) (61) 851-8966.

Poland Tourist Information

Culture and History of Poland
Poland’s origins are hidden in the mists of the early Iron Age when the peoples of Central Asia and the Middle East migrated into modern Europe and mingled with the existing tribes. The first recorded history of Poland begins with the conversion to Christianity of Poland’s first king, Mieszko I, in 966. The dynasty he founded survived, flourished and led to a union 500 years later with Lithuania, Poland’s longtime ally. This Commonwealth became one of the greatest nations in Europe from the late 14th century to the late 17th century, before internal strife and repeated attacks from longtime enemy Russia and invasions by Sweden broke the Commonwealth and led to the first partition of Poland.

During this first Golden Age, the Commonwealth made vassals of the Teutonic Knights, repeatedly repelled Russian and Tatar incursions, occupied much of Eastern Europe and saved Western Europe from Muslim conquest at the Battle of Vienna in 1683. Opportunistic and ungrateful neighbors – Prussia, Russia and Austria – partitioned and occupied Polish territory from 1795 to 1807 and then again from 1815 to 1918. After WWI, the American President Woodrow Wilson demanded that Poland be re-instated as a sovereign state and the Europeans agreed, except for Russia who had to be convinced through a crushing defeat at the hands of the Polish Army. It wasn’t long before the Germans and Russians once again schemed to wipe Poland off of the map: in 1939 the Nazis and the Red Army invaded Poland and destroyed the Polish Army. During the occupation, Polish rebels inflicted and suffered horrible casualties on the battlefield. Six million Poles died in that war, including as many as 3 million Polish Jews.

After WWII, the Polish nation was re-configured along Soviet and NATO lines, losing 20% of its original territory in the process. The Poles were on the frontline of the Cold War and it was in Poland that the Solidarity Movement grew and eventually helped to topple the Soviet Regime. Since the end of Communist rule, Poland has become a member of the EU and has experienced an economic boom as well as a brain drain. Things are stabilizing now that the initial wave of young people who left Poland in the early 1990s are now returning to live and/or invest in their home country.

Currency and Money in Poland
Poland uses the Zlotych

Driving in Poland
Poland is part of that illustrious group of nations that has gained riches very recently, which means roads are under construction and/or narrow and/or poorly lit. Drivers may not adhere to the rules of road and, some might also be drunk. There has been a rapid increase of drivers on the road and not all of them know or care to know what they are doing. Having said that, the situation is improving rapidly and the government is enforcing the rules and punishing violators as best they can. In order to drive legally in Poland, US citizens must have a US driver’s license accompanied by an International Driver’s Permit, which are only issued by the American Automobile Association (AAA) and the American Automobile Touring Alliance (AATA).

Electricity in Poland
Electricity in Poland is run off of 230V, 50Hz, so American travelers should bring converters or use local appliances.

Emergency Numbers in Poland
Ambulance: 999
Police: 997
Fire: 998
General Emergency for Mobile Phone Users: 112

Etiquette in Poland
Polish life still revolves around family and church. The traditional values of family first and devotion to Catholic matters holds sway for many households and, even if modernism has crept in, is widely respected. Poles like to drink vodka and will toast at least 2-3 times during a family style meal with a guest (such as you.) Naturally, urban Poles and rural Poles have different ideas about the Church as do older Poles and younger Poles; but stay on the safe side, at least  initially, and respect the traditions.

Public Hours in Poland
Traditional business hours in Poland are from 7am to 3pm with a long lunch after 3pm, but those hours are beginning to shift. Currently, public offices and banks are open Monday thru Friday, from 8am to 4pm and banks also stay open on Saturdays from 9am to 1pm.

Safety in Poland
Poland has a very low rate of violent crime, according to the US State Department, but there are definitely thieves and pickpockets as in every country. Take standard precautions with your money, wallets and valuables and be aware of your surroundings at night and you should be fine. Poland is influenced by neighboring Russia, so Russian gangs and organized crime is something to be aware of. Also, Poland is quite homogeneous and quite white, so racism might be an issue here more so than in other European countries.

Time Zone
Poland is in the Central European Time Zone (GMT/UTC + 1).

Tipping in Poland
Tipping is not expected in Poland. A 10% tip for cab drivers is normal, but restaurants usually include a 10% service tax in the bill.

Weather in Poland
Poland’s weather can be fickle and extreme. Summers can be abnormally hot or just temperate, then change suddenly. Same goes for the duration and severity of winter. The lakes in the north often freeze over in winter.  

 Wunderground has excellent information for daily forecasts and StayPoland has good background information.

Getting Around in Poland

Air
LOT is Poland’s national carrier with service all over Continental Europe, to North America, to the Middle East and East Asia as well. LOT has extremely cheap flights from NY and Chicago during the down season (NOT June to August or Christmas). Virtually every other small-time operator in Europe has entered the Polish market and is offering cheap rates from within Europe, including CentralWings, EasyJet, GermanWings, Ryanair, SkyEurope and WizzAir, to name a few.

Boats and Ferries
There is a ferry that runs from the Scandinavian countries to Poland’s northern coast called Polferries — it might be a fine option if you are making a circuit through the north on your way to the east.

Rail and Bus

Poland is a huge country in the center of Europe, so the connections via rail and bus with its neighbors are well-established. You can get to Poland via any major city in Europe with Eurolines Polska (bus) or a Eurorail Pass. You can catch a train from any city in Europe headed east and end up in Poland. Rail connections are especially good between Germany and Poland, but it is also possible to board a train in Madrid or London and travel to Warsaw without having to change trains.  

Car Rental and Taxis
You have to be 21 years old and have insurance to rent a car in Poland. Car thieves make a good living in Poland shipping cars east to Russia, so be careful with your rental car and your belongings.  All major companies have a presence in major Polish cities like Krakow and Warsaw.

Health Care in Poland 

Hospitals in Poland have adequate care, but may not be what you are used to at home. You should have no problem obtaining medicine as long as you have a prescription and the only real difference you will notice in terms of care is the environment: hospitals in the old “Eastern Bloc” still retain some of their Communist-Era “charms,” but for all basic ailments, the care should suffice. Doctors might speak English, but also might not. We recommend checking out the World Health Organization site for Poland for more information.

Personal Medications
No permit is required to carry medication in your luggage. However, you should pack your medication in its original containers and/or have your doctor’s prescription with you. Customs officials will have to be satisfied that you are not importing more than would be necessary for your personal use, taking into account the drug type and length of stay (for no more than three months).

Lodging in Poland

There are a host of sites that offer booking information for hotels, hostels and B&Bs. Look to  our booking site for hotels, B & Bs and hostels. For “agrotourism”  style lodging, check out Agritourism Poland.

Main Sights in Poland

Gdansk -  Former seat of the Teutonic Knights and bastion of the Prussian Empire, now an historic city on the Baltic.

Krakow  – One of the few Polish cities not destroyed during WWII, it features beautiful architecture that is is some of the oldest in Poland.

Lake District – The northern parts of Poland are dotted with lakes and forests — some developed for tourism, others not — that are great for any type of traveler

Wroclaw — a cultural center in Poland and an exciting urban spot.

For a lot of good information on sights and other travel information for Poland, visit  Poland Official Tourism site .

Public Holidays in Poland

Poland celebrates the Catholic holidays as well as certain national holidays, such as Independence Day (November 11) and Constitution Day (May 3).
January 1, New Year’s Day         
Sunday in Spring (movable) Easter Sunday          
Monday following Easter Sunday Easter Monday          
May 1,  Labor Day This holiday is not officially called Labor Day (see below), but it is commonly called that and coincides with Labor Day as celebrated internationally on May 1.
May 3, Constitution Day     
7th Sunday after Easter Pentecost Sunday As this holiday always falls on a Sunday it is not widely known.
9th Thursday after Easter Corpus Christi  This is a Catholic Church Holiday
August 15,  Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary This is also the day of the Polish army celebrating the battle of Warsaw in 1920
November 1,  All Saints’ Day         
November 11,  Independence Day     
December 25,  Christmas Day         
December 26,  Boxing Day

Telephones in Poland

Dialing Procedures

You can make international calls from a variety of places in Poland, shopping centers, pay phones, the post office and your hotel. It is a good idea to buy a calling card for international and national calls.

Useful Country Codes:
USA and Canada 1
UK 44

Returning to the US

Customs,VAT & Duty Free
For Americans going to or returning from Poland, TravelDocs has information on customs allowances, but you should always check the Polish Embassy site for more information.

Value Added Tax (VAT or IVA) Refund Information
For information regarding taxes in Poland and how to refund your VAT, visit KrakowInfo. VAT is normally between 20 -25% in Poland. It is important to keep your receipts for any purchases and any currency exchanges you do.

Duty Free
If you are a U.S. or Canadian resident, you may qualify for a personal exemption which allows you to bring goods of a certain value into the country without paying customs duties, excise taxes, or Value Added Tax.

Written By Sascha Matuszak for EuropeUpClose.com

George Washington was a very important man in United States history. Known as “The Father of his country” he was the first president of the United States and was unanimously chosen for the role by his peers. He was also the dominant military and political leader of the country from 1775 to 1797. George Washington was responsible for leading the continental army to victory over Britain in the American Revolutionary War. He also supervised the writing of the American constitution in 1787. George Washington worked hard to establish a government that was well-financed and stable. He believed in avoiding war and suppressing rebellion. Along with Abraham Lincoln, George Washington is a central icon of what America stands for.

Cable exposes deep regional and international concerns about volatile situation in Lebanon following 2006 war

Lebanon's western-backed government warned its friends that "Iran telecom" was taking over the country two years ago when it uncovered a secret communications network across the country used by Hezbollah, according to a US state department cable.

The discovery in April 2008 came against a background of mounting tensions between the Beirut government and the Iranian-backed Shia organisation, which escalated into street fighting in the capital just weeks later.

The US document, classified secret/noforn (not for foreign eyes) exposes deep regional and international concerns about the volatile situation in Lebanon amid fears of a new clash with Israel following the 2006 war.

Information on the Hezbollah fibre optics network, allegedly financed by Iran, was immediately passed to the US, Saudi Arabia and others by Lebanese ministers. The French president, Nicolas Sarkozy was "stunned" by the discovery, the US embassy reported.

The Lebanese are bound to assume that the information also went to Israel, for whom Hezbollah is a significant enemy and priority intelligence target.

The US cable is one of several that have been published in Beirut by the leftwing al-Akhbar newspaper which has apparently been leaked as part of the WikiLeaks cache obtained by the Guardian, the New York Times and three continental European publications.

Al-Akhbar has highlighted contacts between the March 14 movement led by the current prime minister Saad al-Hariri, the US and the Saudis, prompting denials or defensive reactions from those named.

Marwan Hamadeh, the Lebanese minister of communications, warned the US charge d'affaires of the risks involved after Hezbollah indicated it would see any action against the telecoms network as "equal to an Israeli act of aggression".

Hamadeh also reported interference with Lebanese mobile communications by Syria and Israel.

The discovery of the telecoms system was linked to the demand, anchored in UN resolution 1701 but never implemented, that Hezbollah disarm after the 2006 war with Israel. Hezbollah told Lebanese intelligence that the communications network was "a key part of its arsenal".

Hamadeh told the Americans that the network ran from Beirut, into the south below the Litani river and back up through the Bekaa valley to the far north, covering Palestinian camps, Hezbollah training camps and penetrating deep into Christian areas. He cited the Iranian Fund for the Reconstruction of Lebanon as the source of the funding. This group had been rebuilding roads and bridges since the 2006 war and had been accused of installing telecommunications lines in parallel with new roads.

Other leaked US cables underline the nervousness of the Lebanese government over the fibre-optics affair: "A … public accusation against Hezbollah would beg the same question as to why the government of Lebanon did not remove Hezbollah's tanks, and entailed military risks for the government," the embassy reported later.

"Hamadeh highlights the system as a strategic victory for Iran since it creates an important Iranian outpost in Lebanon, bypassing Syria," Washington was told. "He sees the value for the Iranians as strategic, rather than technical or economic. The value for Hizballah is the final step in creating a nation state. Hizballah now has an army and weapons; a television station; an education system; hospitals; social services; a financial system; and a telecommunications system."

Hamadeh has described the US cable quoting him as "a story full of slanders and fabrications" and declined to comment further to Lebanese media.

Lebanon's defence minister, Elias Murr – reported in other leaked documents as telling US officials that the army would not involve itself in a future Israeli attack on Lebanon – said the allegations sought to cause unrest. "The information posted by WikiLeaks is not complete and is not accurate," said an aide, George Soulage. "The aim behind this is to sow discord in Lebanon."

'When Oil Peaked' argues for alternative energy sources — soon

Fans of John McPhee's 1981 book "Basin and Range" will remember Kenneth S. Deffeyes, the longtime Princeton professor who helped guide the reader through what was then called the "New Geology." "Deffeyes," McPhee wrote, "is a big man with a tenured waistline. His hair flies behind him like Ludwig van Beethoven. He lectures in sneakers."

Deffeyes doesn't lecture anymore — he retired in 1998 — but his hair still tends to get unruly.

Likewise, the findings in Deffeyes' latest book might cause oil executives — even those not affiliated with BP — to go gray overnight.

Crude Oil Trades Near a One-Week High After U.S. Jobless Claims Decline

“Oil has established a new trading range between $82.50 and $89.50 as the demand side gets a little stronger,” said Christopher Bellew, senior broker at Bache Commodities Ltd. in London. “A lot of the strength today can be attributed to short-covering before the U.S. holiday.”

Oil to Enter Backwardation `Rapidly' on Rising World Demand, Barclays Says

Oil markets are poised to enter backwardation, with prompt-delivery prices higher than those for later supply, as demand for crude increases, according to Barclays Plc.

“Global spare crude capacity has fallen this year and is likely to end the year at only a little above 5 percent,” a team led by Paul Horsnell, head of commodities research at Barclays Capital in London, wrote in a report dated Nov. 24. “We expect a more volatile and backwardated market to emerge rapidly.”

Gold and oil part ways

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Gold and oil prices have been joined at the hip in recent months, but that all changed in the days leading up to Thanksgiving.

OPEC is central bank for world's oil, says UAE official

The UAE's envoy to OPEC today compared the organisation to a central bank for the world's oil supply.

"Whenever the market is running short or is oversupplied and prices are going through huge volatility, they call on OPEC to step in and make the right adjustment or intervention," said Ali al Yabhouni, the UAE's OPEC governor. "OPEC is acting as a central bank."

ANALYSIS-Indonesia struggles to hold down oil imports

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Indonesia's crude imports will keep rising over the next few years as its economy rebounds and a delay in getting peak output from the giant Cepu field defeats efforts to cut dependence on overseas crude.

Indonesia's need for crude imports for its simple refineries will feed competition among top Asian buyers such as China and India for sweet grades as regional supplies from matured fields dwindle while strong dated Brent prices may curb arbitrage flows from the Atlantic Basin.

Oil pipeline bypassing Hormuz is completed

Construction of a pipeline from Abu Dhabi's largest oilfields to Fujairah, allowing crude to bypass the Strait of Hormuz, has been completed.

The pipeline to the Arabian Sea promises greater security in the event that the narrow waterway is closed, and promises to help cut the costs of exporting oil from the UAE.

Shell restoring Nigerian oil output, fixes pipeline

LONDON (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell Plc said on Thursday it was restoring production of Nigerian crude oil after repairing a pipeline damaged by oil theft in Africa's top exporter last week.

Shell's Nigerian venture on Friday had declared force majeure (FM) on Bonny Light exports -- freeing the company from contractual deliveries due to actions beyond its control -- after the pipeline was damaged.

China to build more gas reserves in 11 areas

China has recently decided to build a number of natural gas reserve facilities in 11 areas, namely Pingdingshan and Wenliu in Henan Province, Changchun in Jilin Province, Liaohe in Liaoning Province, Daqing in Heilongjiang Province, Ordos in Inner Mongolia, Yanling in Hebei Province, Huai'an in Jiangsu Province, Qianjiang and Yingcheng in Hubei Province, and Anning in Yunnan Province.

At present, China has altogether four gas storage projects that are newly built or still under construction, located in Tianjin, Beijing and Jiangsu, which are slated to start operation by 2012.

China to develop unconventional gases in 10 years: Woodmac

(Reuters) - China will start developing unconventional gas sources within 10 years to fuel its massive economy, possibly bringing down global liquefied petroleum gas prices, a senior energy consultant said on Thursday.

The expanding country faced with flat to declining production of normal gas sources in 20 years aims to do geologic tests and approve projects within a decade for resources such as shale gas, said Gavin Thompson, China gas research director with the UK-based consultancy Wood Mackenzie.

Those developments could impact world liquefied petroleum gas prices as China demands less, a change welcomed by other Asian countries that still depend on it, Thompson told Reuters.

China Unconventional Gas Development Faces Unique Challenges, WoodMac Says

China, the world’s biggest energy user, will take a different course from the U.S. in unconventional gas development because of “unique” geological, technical and commercial reasons, consultant Wood Mackenzie said.

China to Meet Five-Year Energy-Saving Target by Year-End, Daily Cites NDRC

China will likely meet its five-year energy-reduction targets by the end of the year after energy consumption per unit of gross domestic product declined by 3 percent in the first three quarters on a year earlier, China Daily cited Xie Zhenhua, vice chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, as saying.

Enbridge's planned rate hike fuels anger

Enbridge Gas announced on Tuesday plans, that If approved, would cause residential customers to see their delivery fees rise by as much as 27 per cent.

The largest commercial, institutional and industrial customers would see delivery costs jump by 180 per cent.

Gas prices not following routine

After gas prices rose dramatically in 2008, A.J. Bryant said he got used to paying more at the pump and budgeting accordingly.

Thus, he said he hasn't noticed that gas prices in Jackson and elsewhere are in the unusual position of being higher now than during summer, when prices usually reach their peak each year.

Russia to cut oil exports via Kozmino Q1 '11-sources

Oil traders said Russia may have to re-route come oil flows from the West to the East, as from January 2011 it will need resources to feed a spur that links Russia to China.

Russia Energy Min against higher oil products tax

(Reuters) - Russian Energy Minister said on Thursday he does not support the idea of an increased oil products export duty in order to plug the country's budget deficit.

Korea fund buys stake in Canada oil sands developer

CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) - Osum Oil Sands Corp, a small privately-owned oil sands development company, said on Wednesday it will sell C$100 million ($99 million) worth of its shares to Korea Investment Corp, marking the sovereign wealth fund's second investment in Canada's oil sands.

Developing nations embrace stronger oil standards

Developing countries are embracing an initiative to develop international health and safety standards for the oil and gas industry, with Gulf states among the most enthusiastic supporters.

The finding has emerged from a study commissioned by the Offshore Petroleum Industry Training Organisation (OPITO) to explore how the globalisation of the industry is affecting its safety requirements.

Three Dead After Gas Leak at Oil Refineries Haifa Plant, Israel Police Say

Minister of Industry, Trade and Labor Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said he had warned about the plant’s safety risks and called for it to be relocated.

“The facility is like a nuclear bomb and I have for years warned about its dangers,” Ben-Eliezer told Israel’s Army Radio. “If we arrive at the conclusion that the facility poses a threat to life, we will shut it.”

E-mails show struggle to guess size of Gulf spill

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration struggled behind the scenes to determine how much oil spilled in the Gulf of Mexico from a BP well this year and defended estimates that for months were inaccurate, according to thousands of government e-mails.

Feinberg paying oil spill claims faster than BP did

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Kenneth Feinberg said that he would get checks out quickly to economic victims of the BP oil spill, and so far, he has been sticking to his word. Thus far, Feinberg's Gulf Coast Claims Facility is paying out claims faster than BP did.

Section of Gulf of Mexico closed to shrimpers after tar balls found

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric administration said yesterday that it had closed 4,200 square miles of federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico to royal red shrimping after a commercial shrimper discovered tar balls in his net.

Chevrolet Volt's official MPG: 60 mpg (sort of)

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The U.S. government has finally decided what fuel economy figures to put on the Chevrolet Volt, General Motors said Wednesday.

The final figure is 60 miles per gallon, but because it can run on electricity, gasoline, or a combination of both, the EPA fuel economy label is going to look a little different from the ones used on other cars.

Power Premium Shrinking as France Converges With Germany

The extra cost to buy French electricity compared with Germany’s is shrinking as the European Union moves toward a single power market for the continent.

Most recommended: Energy saving device

Designed like a standard extension socket, this gadget can detect the change in power when you switch your television on or off. Put your TV on standby as normal using the remote and the smart socket will wait a few seconds before switching it off completely. It will also switch off other devices like set-top boxes and DVD players at the same time.

IntelliPlug also includes a remote sensor, so when you want to switch the TV back on, you just hit the standby button and the system will restore power to all your devices.

Demand and supply in the post-peak oil world

An inter-governmental agency is bound to be cautious. But last year, the IEA almost doubled the oil fields’ depletion rate to 6.7 per cent. The rate of 3.7 per cent assumed in 2007 was changed after a study of 800 fields. Robert Hirsch, who led a study on peak oil for the US Department of Energy, considers a 4 per cent decline catastrophic. He believes that US administrations have discouraged the research into ‘peak oil’ after he delivered the bad news.

Further, IEA expects Saudi production to rise five million bpd or 50 per cent. Energy investment banker Matthew Simmons, who died in August, suggested that Saudi production could be tapering off soon. British geologist Colin Campbell has contended that true oil reserve figures would set off panic on the stock markets, ‘that at the end would suit no one’. So we have forecasts of oil prices much above what the IEA is predicting.

Economic growth: a zero sum game

Understandably growth, growth and more growth is the mantra of politicians, economists and media commentators the world round. However, what if future growth is just not possible? The recently released World Energy Outlook (WEO) from the International Energy Agency (IEA) did not go so far as to say that future growth is no longer possible, but it does suggest that at the global level future economic growth is now a zero sum game. In short, China and India’s gain is the OECD’s loss.

Ag plan gears up for education process

Small scale farming in the West Kootenay cannot compete with the massive farming operations in California where most of our food is imported from, says one of the authors of a coming Area Agricultural Plan.

Russell Precious said what exists currently in the West Kootenay is not abundant enough, nor priced competitively enough to persuade people here to buy local.

However, with education and the advancement of peak oil, what is grown here could become more affordable — in economies of scale — and more desirable, he explained.

Westinghouse Expects Additional AP1000 Nuclear Reactor Orders From China

Westinghouse Electric Co., owned by Toshiba Corp., expects additional orders for its third- generation AP1000 reactors from China after selling four units three years ago to the world’s fastest-growing nuclear market.

The world's largest wind farms

Driving out of the dusty little town of Sweetwater, the climb up to the High Plain reveals a few small clumps of wind turbines, the odd row of them, nothing special.

I've seen plenty of wind farms and I wonder if I'm the victim of Texan bragging: the claim to host five of the largest wind installations in the world.

But the higher I get, the further I can see and soon there's an extraordinary vista: ridge after rolling ridge crowded with thickets of turbines.

How to prevent an Arctic Cold Warhttp://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item;_no=400663&version;=1&template;_id=46&parent;_id=26

Russia, the United States and Canada, among others, have vital interests in the Arctic region. Russia can benefit enormously if it safely develops northern energy and mineral reserves, much of which lie in shallow water on its continental shelf. Moscow’s emerging Arctic strategy gives great weight to protecting this resource.

EU May Ban Some UN Offsets to Stop `Windfall' Profits

The European Union proposed banning some credits linked to industrial-gas projects in its carbon program from the start of 2013, limiting the options available to the continent’s emitters to cut pollution costs.

Japan says extending Kyoto pact is "meaningless"

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan opposes extending the Kyoto Protocol binding only rich nations to limit carbon emissions and will fight for a broader deal even if it finds itself isolated at U.N. talks, a senior official said on Thursday.

Small islands seek 2011 deadline for climate deal

(Reuters) - Small island states want U.N. climate talks in Mexico next week to set an end-2011 deadline for agreeing a new treaty as a step to slow the rise in sea levels, a spokeswoman said.

Many other nations, including the United States, fear that setting a time limit may be counter-productive after the U.N.'s Copenhagen climate summit failed to meet a 2009 deadline for a binding deal.

If you're in the U.S. : Happy Thanksgiving! For everyone: happy fifth anniversary of peak oil.

The Flint Journal - MLive.com

Salvation Army kicks off Christmas campaign York Daily Record York, PA - York's Salvation Army will kick off its 2010 Christmas campaign at noon on Continental Square in York today. ... Christmas Toy Appeal is launchedBurnley Express Salvation Army kicks of Christmas Kettle DriveKKCO-TV Salvation Army's red kettle Christmas campaign goes mobileDaily Press Lynchburg News and Advance -Clarksville Leaf Chronicle -Panthers.com all 73 news articles »

This Veterans Day, Discovery News honors American military service personnel with a look back at some of the great battles throughout our nation's history.

We start with the American Revolution. In the painting on the first page of the article, General George Washington leads the Continental Army on Christmas Day across the Delaware River to confront Hessian forces. The ensuing battle between the two sides would be known as the Battle of Trenton and would lead to a key victory for American forces in their struggle for independence.

Full story at Discovery News.

More news from Discovery Communications.

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Today marks the 235th celebration of the United States Marine Corps. This is definitely a Big Deal. Every single November 10th will be a big deal until the sun goes nova.

All over the world, Marines are celebrating the occasion. There must a cake, of course. A Marine Corps-sized birthday cake is preferable but under battle conditions, something out of one of the sergeant’s MREs with maybe a cigarette for a candle. That’ll do. If it’s too small to share with everyone, then the youngest and the oldest Marines present give one another a piece of whatever is supposed to pass for “The Cake”.

Think of U.S. Marines as the Roman Catholics of American military. Surviving boot camp creates a bond one never forgets. A kind of Baptism by Fire complete with rituals, traditions, and esprit de corps.

I remember one fellow who told us great stories about his Drill Instructors at Parris Island. It seems George’s group had a tendency to find everything hysterically funny. Probably the emphasis here should be on “hysteria”. When you’re nineteen and being ummm…molded…yeah that’s it, molded into a Marine, hysterical laughter could be a normal reaction.

Well, George’s D.I.s weren’t able to control the outbreaks of hysterical laughter which seemed to occur randomly in this group.

So what they did was…

… they told these jarheads-to-be that if they were going to cackle like hens, then they could roost like hens. Thus every day in which there was an outbreak of hysteria, the “hens” would have to roost in the rafters that night instead of hitting the sack. After a day of marching and close order drill, that roost in those drafty rafters must’ve made a deep impression. George said that by the end of the week, the laughing had died out. Funny thing was, while he told us this tale, he couldn’t stop laughing.

Of course today the D.I.s couldn’t get away with such cruel and unusual discipline. Being creative, however, I’m sure they’ve come up with some p.c. remedy for hysteria. (Like maybe paper bags over the heads of the offenders? Hey, it works for hyperventilation; I saw a doctor use this remedy in the Emergency Room one time when a Gypsy woman became hysterical when accused of stealing all the staffs’ wallets. Yeah, she did eventually return them.)

So back to the history of the Leathernecks:

…the Continental Congress resolved on November 10, 1775, “That two battalions of Marines be raised consisting of one Colonel, two Lieutenant-Colonels, two Majors, and other officers, as usual in other regiments; that they consist of an equal number of Privates with other battalions; that particular care be taken that no persons be appointed to offices, or enlisted into said battalions, but such as are good seamen, or so acquainted with maritime affairs as to be able to serve by sea when required; that they be enlisted and commissioned to serve for and during the present war with Great Britain and the Colonies, unless dismissed by order of Congress; that they be distinguished by the names of the First and Second Battalion of Marines.”

Its first commandant, Samuel Nicholas, was commissioned by the Continental Congress to find enough good men to fill those positions mentioned above. In a brilliant move -- considering what was required -- Commandant Nicholas convened his headquarters in Tun Tavern in Philadelphia. By January 1776 he had sufficient numbers of new Marines ready to man the few vessels that comprised the Continental Navy.

The Heritage blog points out the difference (or one of them, anyway) between the Marines and the other services:

[Unlike] the Army and Navy, there is no mention of the Marine Corps in the U.S. Constitution and no mandate for Congress to fund the service. America’s elite expeditionary amphibious assault force is supported by Congress not because it has to, but because it wants to…

In other words, as Marines would say, “ooH Rah!” which is what follows after “Semper Fi!” Yes, they do talk in exclamation points sometimes. It’s a jarhead thing.

Speaking of jarheads, be sure to take a look at Jarhead wine, especially Jarhead Red, which was reviewed by our Gates of Vienna oenologist. Our own oenologist, mind you, and a fellow who holds his Marine Corps friends in special esteem. Which is why he was willing to test the wine for them.

Birthday cake and Jarhead wine and then maybe some cadenced running?


Yes, I could’ve given you the Marine Corps Hymn, but these cadences sound mighty fine. And this is a nice G-rated version.


There are thousands of American military deployed around the world. We got an email today reminding us that Thanksgiving is coming up soon. We’ll pass on the information about the food boxes for those in Iraq and Afghanistan. They’re packing them with everything but the turkey.


You can go here if you want to donate a package.

And if you’re the praying type, say one for Trey who is now in his 3rd week of boot camp. His momma tears up when she thinks about it. Her boy is going to return to his momma a different person, which I suspect is one of the reasons for her tears. I’m sure he’ll say to her at least once, “Aw, Ma. Cut it out. I’m a man now. Believe me, Ma, I am one heckuva man”. Which will show he’s made the transition back, however briefly, to civilian conversation. That in itself may be harder than boot camp.

You might want to visit also the open thread at Newsbusters for this occasion. Two hundred and thirty-five years old and counting. The country may be going to hell in a hand basket, but the Marines are, as always, the Faithful Few.

The Army motto of a few years back (I hope it’s been gently retired by now) used to blare in a musical commercial, “Be All You Can Be”. An old gunny heard that and snorted, All you can BE??? Where do they get this #@$%^%$ ‘stuff’?? How about we’ll make your *&^%$* self into a MAN, boy. WE’ll decide what you can BE, by ^&%^$*#” and then we’ll tell you what it is!” Like I said, 235 years of that. Enjoy what’s left of this special day.

Come to think of it, you could just stay up carousing all night and transiition right into tomorrow celebrating Veterans Day . President Obama hasn’t issued an executive order banishing it. Yet.

Relieved on November 10, 1778 from the Main Continental Army and assigned to the Middle Department. [More]

In the Continental US, the iPhone is now more popular than the Blackberry -- but both handsets are being overrun by the combined forces of the Android Army.

In reply to Eleganza:

Doubt the government plans to impose martial law and round up dissidents and other malcontents? Well, the Army National Guard is advertising for qualified personnel to work as Corrections Officers and Internment/Resettlement Specialists.

As an Internment/Resettlement Specialist for the Army National Guard, you will ensure the smooth running of military confinement/correctional facility or detention/internment facility, similar to those duties conducted by civilian Corrections Officers,” a classified ad posted on the web states. “This will require you to know proper procedures and military law; and have the ability to think quickly in high-stress situations. Specific duties may include assisting with supervision and management operations; providing facility security; providing custody, control, supervision, and escort; and counseling individual prisoners in rehabilitative programs.”
Rex 84 was created in the United States for basically the same reason. “The Rex-84 Alpha Explan (Readiness Exercise 1984, Exercise Plan; otherwise known as a continuity of government plan), indicates that FEMA in association with 34 other federal civil departments and agencies, along with other NATO nations, conducted a civil readiness exercise during April 5-13, 1984. It was conducted in coordination and simultaneously with a Joint Chiefs exercise, Night Train 84, a worldwide military command post exercise (including Continental U.S. Forces or CONUS) based on multi-emergency scenarios operating both abroad and at home. In the combined exercise, Rex-84 Bravo, FEMA and DOD led the other federal agencies and departments, including the Central Intelligence Agency, the Secret Service, the Treasury, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Veterans Administration through a gaming exercise to test military assistance in civil defense,” writes Diana Reynolds. “The exercise anticipated civil disturbances, major demonstrations and strikes that would affect continuity of government and/or resource mobilization. To fight subversive activities, there was authorization for the military to implement government ordered movements of civilian populations at state and regional levels, the arrest of certain unidentified segments of the population, and the imposition of martial law.”

http://www.infowars.com/army-national-guard-advertises-for-internment-specialist...

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As chancellor, George Osborne has redrawn the line between state and private responsibility – in the direction of growth

The intensity of the battle raging over "the cuts" makes it easy to lose sight of what has been agreed by all parties. Most important is that the deficit level is unsustainable, and that some reduction in total spending is necessary. Deficit reduction, it also seems to be agreed, can be obtained in its entirety from neither efficiency gains nor tax increases and economic growth.

That's the easy part. The harder question is whether the magnitude of the reductions in spending targeted by the coalition is necessary as a matter of fiscal prudence. That is less clear, but the weight of evidence seems to be on the side of the coalition. The alternative – to ameliorate the cuts by tax increases greater than those now contemplated – seems more rather than less likely to drive business from these shores, and to inhibit growth. Studies by Christina Romer, who recently resigned as chair of Barack Obama's council of economic advisers, seem to prove that tax increases have a greater negative effect on growth and employment than do spending cuts. And growth is the key to the success of George Osborne's four-year plan for the UK economy.

Adding to the argument in favour of cuts, reductions would be in order even if the fiscal condition were not so dire. The boundary between state and private sectors has not been re-examined systematically since the Beveridge report laid out sound reasons for expanding the state. Since then Britain has grown richer and the underclass has changed in character – and many of the then unmet needs of citizens are now being catered for by a private sector finding profit in providing health, education and transport services: services that it did not provide when the line was last drawn with the public sector.

It would be excessively kind to say that the chancellor conducted such a rethink, but he has willy-nilly moved the boundary between state provision and individual responsibility in the direction needed for sustainable growth. Clearly, the private sector – even not counting the civil institutions the prime minister plans to conjure up in a secular society where churches are not up to the job – can be assigned a far larger role than the approximately half of GDP left for it by a government that has increased its own share by 10 percentage points since Margaret Thatcher's days. Even if the government does implement all its cuts, and reap all the savings it seeks, the share of GDP claimed by government will shrink only to about the level prevailing when Gordon Brown turned on the spending spigots.

Which leaves two questions: the pace of cuts, and the distribution of pain. The latter, generally referred to as "fairness", I leave to others. As to pace, there is room for honest disagreement. Economists at the European Central Bank are calling for Osborne-style austerity, while their counterparts at the IMF, backed by Ed Balls and Nobel laureates Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman, believe that fiscal tightening at the pace and of the magnitude the chancellor proposes will abort fragile recoveries and produce the dreaded double-dip recession.

The ECB argues that the reduction in the deficit will reassure the markets, keep interest rates down, and restore private sector confidence, unlocking private sector investment and job creation. The IMF says that Keynes was right, that cutting spending now is the wrong medicine for an economy suffering from insufficient demand.

But don't spend much time sorting out who is right. The chancellor's plan will not survive the inevitable events, dear boy, events, for the entire life of this parliament. If the private sector, which now provides 23 million jobs, proves able to absorb the 490,000 public sector workers to be displaced, leaving the total 200,000 above when Gordon Brown strolled into No 11 – and if, despite the reductions in personal income resulting from benefit cuts, the economy grows at the 2.5% rate the chancellor projects; if the coalition can finally figure out how to encourage business start-ups (tax cuts, anyone?) – the plan will hold, and the coalition will go into the next general election on a "we told you so" platform. If not, there will be irresistible pressure to move in the direction of the IMF-laureates-Balls approach. Osborne will have lost what Ed Miliband this week told the CBI is the chancellor's "gamble with growth and jobs".

Broadly, then, the government is close to getting things right, except that it has paid for ringfencing a bloated NHS and £3.7bn in foreign aid by sounding a retreat from global responsibilities: aircraft carriers with no aircraft; a nuclear deterrent that is obsolete or rapidly becoming so; a pared-down army soon to withdraw from continental Europe. We Americans mourn the loss of an effective ally.

Post by Brittny Drye

Charlie Sheen ended up creating about $7,000 worth of damages in his Plaza hotel room after his little "allergic reaction." Unfortunately, he is certainly not the first, nor the last, celebrity to trash a hotel room. Whether they're high, drunk, crazy, or a mixture of all of the above, celebrities have a tendency to use their five-star rooms as punching bags.

Here are the 11 of the craziest celebrity trashers the hotel industry has ever seen:

Courtney Love: This shouldn't come as a shocker. The troubled rock star made headlines last year at the immature age of 44 for flooding a New York hotel room and leaving it trashed with dirty needles and used feminine hygiene products. You'd really think she would have settled down by now.

Amy Winehouse: Hotels be warned if crazy Amy (aka Courtney Love in training) orders room service. She once hurled a plate of spaghetti Bolognese at the wall of her Munich, Germany hotel room. Before that, she racked up $18,000 worth of damage at London's Sanderson Hotel after a fight with her former husband. They had to get an outside firm to come clean blood off the walls. Yikes!

Keith Moon: The Who's drummer was a hotel manager's nightmare. He began his 21st birthday back in 1967 with a bang -- literally. He blew up the hotel's toilets with dynamite. Following the explosion, he hurled a five-tier cake, prompting a food fight in his hotel room, and partiers set off the fire extinguishers down the hall. By the time the police arrived, Moon was in his underwear, in which he jumped into his car and drove through a fence and into the hotel pool.

Billy Idol: Toward the end of his glory days, Billy Idol wanted one last hurrah and took a tour of destruction through Thailand. Three weeks and $250,000 worth of hotel damages later, the government had had enough and sicced the national army on his ass.

Aerosmith: This band was professional trashers, actually travelling with props so they could properly get the trashing job done -- chainsaws for furniture and extension cords for throwing TVs out the window.

Led Zeppelin: They would literally rent floors in hotels just so they could have a full playground for destruction. Their most famous shenanigan included John Bonham, tour manager Richard Cole, a pair of motorcycles, and a flair for indoor racing.

Edie Sedgwick: The "IT" girl in the '60s, Edie was the muse for both Andy Warhol and Bob Dylan. But she was also afraid of the dark. To combat her fears, she'd fall asleep surrounded by lit candles and, after causing an apartment fire, she temporarily moved into Hotel Chelsea in NYC. She obviously didn't learn her lesson, because the very same thing happened. None of the hotel's guests were hurt, but sadly her cat (who was ironically named Smoke) was killed in the fire.

Johnny Depp: Don't let that pirate charm fool you, this hottie has a reputation for destroying hotel rooms. The weirdest incident was back in 1994 with then-girlfriend Kate Moss. Neighbors in the New York Mark hotel overheard the couple having a very loud argument over the size (or lack thereof) of his manhood (say it isn't so!) along with shattered glass and furniture. When the cops arrived the two were sitting in a pile of debris and what did Depp blame the destruction on? An armadillo.

Marilyn Manson: In 1998, the scary rocker set his hotel room carpets on fire in Poughkeepsie, New York.

Rolling Stones: If you ever wondered where the whole "hurling the TV out the window" thing started, it began at what is now The Hyatt West Hollywood in L.A. (formerly known as the Continental Hyatt House, aka Continental Riot House). In 1972, Keith Richards flung a TV out of the 10-story window, which received so much publicity that it created a damaging trend. Now, you're not a true rocker until you've thrown a television set out of a hotel room.

Britney Spears: Actually, it's not the pop princess herself, it's her two heathen children Sean Preston and Jayden James. They've already launched themselves into rock star status by completely destroying a hotel room last year. They demolished the curtains and drew all over the tables and walls with crayons. Tame those sons, Brit!

What's the craziest hotel trashing story that you've heard? Think it's okay for these celebs to trash the rooms as long as they pay for it?

 

Image via Ali/Flickr, Viernest/Flickr, ChrisGamput/Flickr, ATempletonPhoto.com/Flickr

 

First the Koran-burning scandal shook already dangerously volatile global Muslim/non-Muslim relations, leading to U.N. consideration of an international approach to curbing Islamophobia.

Now, some radicals in the American Tea Party movement are starting to build ties with even more radical anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim groups in the U.K. and their continental European counterparts, creating a transnational hate movement symptomatic of our polarized times.

The British English Defence Leaugue (EDL), whose members literally wear painted masks reminiscent of the Friday the 13th horror flicks, are vehemently against what they see as the "Islamification" of Europe, a paranoia akin to some of the punditry on the U.S.-based Fox News.

But do not mistake this for a Halloween gag. EDL radicals are serious, so serious in fact that that in a broad effort to build transnational ties their leaders have reached out to others in continental Europe, notably to globally infamous Dutch anti-Islam leaders; to Pamela Geller, a prominent U.S. activist who leads Stop Islamization of America; and to Rabbi Nachum Shifren, a Tea Party speaker and candidate for the California legislature. They have also reached out to domestic Jewish, Christian, Hindu and Sikh sympathizers. "It's a grass roots social movement," says Guramit Singh, an EDL spokesman.

The British groups are scattered across the country, in a way similar way to growing, armed and military-trained U.S. militia groups. What they each lack (for now) is leadership capable of organizing and mobilizing a large, transnational movement around their macabre ends. On the American end of the pond is the Oath Keepers led by Stewart Rhodes, a former U.S. Army paratrooper and staffer of Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas). On the British side is businessman Alan Lake, who has been bankrolling the English Defense League.

"The benefit of joining with these other organizations is logistical and political, but also emotional," Lake said. "It's such a relief to find people in other countries who feel the way you do."

University of Nottingham professor Matthew Goodwin, an expert on extremism, has identified the new ties as the emergence of a transnational anti-Islam movement.

Like U.S. militias, the English Defense League is armed and has used violence to pursue their ends. Indeed, some argue that Al-Qaeda is no more extremist and dangerous than these organizers of hate. U.S. federal prosecutors have brought weapons charges against several Midwest militia members, who are accused of conspiring to wage war against the United States.  On the European side, hate crimes against Muslims have been increasing year by year. Yet there are no international inquiries into the global links such groups are developing, and nowhere near enough action by national governments or international bodies, nor local efforts to stop and disarm these terrorists.

A global, action-oriented anti-Islam movement makes a lone preacher seeking to burn a Koran seem like a mere torchbearer. If we don't stop the already considerable momentum of this emerging transnational anti-Islam movement in its tracks now, the consequences for this and the next generation are dire.

Photo Credit: lionheartphotography

Kind of creepy, no? It gets creepier:

Ann --

Two years ago, I met 10 of you.

10 of me? An army of Althouses — is that really what you want?

Actually, as his "10 of you" locution suggests, his view of me is completely generic. He wants me to give $3 and be entered in a raffle be one of 3 winners of trips to Las Vegas (of all places) to meet him. That's not what I call "want[ing] to meet Ann."

"I want to meet three supporters like you backstage at a rally in Las Vegas." I don't think you even what to meet "supporters like [me]." That would be sad.

Click to read the whole email.

Ann --

Two years ago, I met 10 of you.

Just before I accepted our party's nomination in front of 80,000 people in Denver, I spoke with 10 grassroots supporters who had won a trip to meet me backstage.

I still remember the time we spent together -- because these are the people, like you, who stood with me in 2008, and got me through the tough fights since.

But we face another test on November 2nd that will say a lot about our future -- and I need you by my side again.

A Supreme Court decision I strongly disagree with has shifted the balance of power in our elections from folks like you to giant corporations. Their massive spending on attack ads could have a real impact on who represents you at all levels of government. Only supporters like you -- and all the work you are doing -- are standing in their way.

This may be our toughest fight yet.

So next week, just 11 days before the elections, I want to meet three supporters like you backstage at a rally in Las Vegas -- one of the last big rallies of this campaign.

Will you make a $3 donation now to be automatically entered to win a trip to be at my side at the rally in Vegas?

This movement has always been about more than me. It's about change, and the kind of future we envision for this country.

The folks I met backstage in Denver told me they wanted health reform, a clean-energy economy, and a resolution to the war in Iraq. They wanted a new kind of politics, and a new kind of leader.

It was their hope and expectation that together we would move beyond the status quo, that we would counter the special interests and corporate influence in Washington -- that we would do what was right and necessary for all Americans.

With your help, we have made historic progress, but there is much left to do -- and it will not happen without your involvement. I need strong allies in Congress who will stand with us in the tough fights ahead, and I need you to give it all you've got through November 2nd to make sure they can.

Your donation today will provide critical support to our Vote 2010 campaign as we reach out to millions of voters who will decide the closest races across the country.

It will determine if we pass this test, and win our toughest fight yet.

Please donate $3 or more to be automatically entered to win a trip to Las Vegas to meet me backstage:

https://donate.barackobama.com/Backstage

I hope to see you out there,

President Barack Obama

P.S. -- Making a donation automatically registers you for the sweepstakes. You may also enter the sweepstakes without making a contribution either online or via text message -- click here to enter online or here for instructions on how to enter via text message. No minimum contribution is necessary to be registered.

No purchase or contribution necessary to enter. Void where prohibited. You can enter the contest without making a contribution by clicking here. Only U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents over the age of 18 who are residents of the 50 states or D.C. are eligible to enter. Entries must be received by 11:59 p.m. on 10/15/10. Three winners will receive one round-trip ticket within the continental U.S. to Las Vegas, NV; hotel accommodations for one; and a meeting with President Obama at a rally event on 10/22/10 (approximate combined retail value $1,200.00). Odds of winning depend on number of entries received. Promotion is subject to Official Rules, available here, including restrictions on eligibility.

The following essay was written by the community group Friends of Lāna‘i. LANA‘I—In 2008, real estate development company Castle and Cooke announced its intention to build a 400 MW industrial wind power plant on the island of Lāna‘i. This was quickly hailed by the State of Hawai‘i as a significant step toward the voluntarily agreed-upon Hawai‘i Clean Energy Initiative’s goal of meeting Hawai‘i’s energy needs of 70 percent renewable by 2030. Many residents on Lāna‘i, however, call this proposal, conceived by billionaire David Murdock (who has owned most of the land on Lāna‘i since 1985) and Gov. Linda Lingle a simple case of “green greed.” The original development plan was to study the wind force for two years, place up to 200 turbines in the Ka‘a ahupua‘a, then cash in on substantial State and federal tax subsidies, as they have with the recent La Ola Lāna‘i solar farm. First Wind, the developer of Kaheawa and O‘ahu’s recently-approved Kahuku industrial power plants, soon announced it wanted to compete by developing a similar project on Moloka‘i. To avoid the inevitable litigation that would have ensued by the party not selected to supply the power, HECO brokered a compromise: Each developer would be permitted to provide 200 MW each, and if either party failed to perform, the other could pick up the balance. Regardless of which developer, or both, gets a piece of this pie, the State would then connect those turbines to a 70-mile undersea cable to send all the wind-generated power to O‘ahu ... and only O‘ahu. None of the power generated would feed into Lāna‘i’s grid—thereby delivering 10 percent of O‘ahu’s current electrical power needs. Lāna‘i currently uses only 5 MW per day, O‘ahu uses approximately 1400 MW per day. Murdock initially wanted to build and own the undersea cable as well, but the State nixed this plan in favor of financing, through rate and taxpayer funds, the $1 billion needed for the cable alone. The footprint of this proposed project for Lāna‘i is huge: It could consume over 22,000 acres of land and would permanently alter one-quarter of the island. After feeder roads are graded and leveled along Lāna‘i’s north end ridge, mammoth holes would be dug to plant about 170 turbines—each as tall as Oahu’s First Hawaiian Bank building. Each turbine will be built on a concrete pad 60 feet in diameter, and will use over 3 million pounds (1125 cubic yards) of cement. Short term construction jobs (about 250 for around 18 months) and long term jobs (about 20) may utilize some Lāna‘i workers. But the effects on the island is astronomical. Contrary to the Castle and Cooke’s characterization of Ka’a ahupua’a, the designated quarter of Lāna‘i is an area rich with cultural, historical, and archeological resources, and is a prime hunting and fishing area, not only for Lāna‘i residents, but for statewide hunters and fishermen. Hawaiian Electric Company (HECO) prepared this illustration to demonstrate how much land would be needed for a comparable industrial wind power plant on O‘ahu (in green): Cost and effect The prolem. Hawai‘i depends on fossil fuels to meet over 90 percent of its energy needs. Of that, 30 percent is used for generating electricity. The rest is mostly for transportation needs. The Lingle administration set a target of having 70 percent of Hawai‘i’s energy needs come from renewable sources by 2030. How is Hawaii going to do it? The State Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism (DBEDT) recently contracted with continental U.S. firm AECOM to develop the inter-island cable EIS. This will include the required Federal EIS (NEPA), along with a Programmatic EIS that integrates the three independent EISs put together by the developers—Castle and Cooke for Lāna‘i, First Wind for Moloka‘i, and HECO for O‘ahu. How much is it going to cost? Two years ago, DBEDT estimated that the inter-island cable would cost taxpayers and/or ratepayers $1 billion. Castle and Cooke and First Wind have estimated that components of the project would cost between $750 million and $1 billion on each island—or $2,300 for every Hawaii resident before a single shovel touches Hawaiian soil. Who are the players? The State will likely end up owning the inter-island cable and be named on the permit applications. Mineral Management Services of the Department of Interior, the agency that granted the permits to BP for their Gulf oil well, is the federal permitting agency vested with the authority to issue an Ocean Floor Right-of-Way grant to lay the transmission cable in federal waters. The Army Corps of Engineers has permitting authority in State waters. Finally, using the publicly announced figures for the recently approved Kahuku wind farm, if Castle and Cooke were to build all 400 MW of wind-generated power, David Murdock’s privately held, California-based company’s annual revenue would exceed $250 million dollars. The big green monster The questions everyone must consider are: Is this a good project for the State? Is it for Lāna‘i? Is it the best way to spend $3 billion dollars?  Assuming an average cost of $40,000 for installing photovoltaic panels on the average Hawaii house, $3 billion dollars could cover 75,000 homes (about one-fifth of O‘ahu’s total) thereby saving about 400,000 barrels of imported oil every year. Or, every household on O‘ahu could have solar hot water, saving about 525,000 barrels of imported oil every year. More questions: What about natural and environmental impacts? What about the endangered birds that live up on Lāna‘i Hale and fly through the proposed project area?  One preliminary study estimated that annual movement rates for the endangered species U‘au (Hawaiian petrel) through the North End area, which is slated to house about 170 turbines, numbers in the thousands. It is also estimated that virtually all of the U‘au are flying at altitudes low enough to interact with these turbines. There has been no study conducted to date that understands how the U‘au will behave when they fly in and around 250′ tall towers, each with 3 rotating wings of 150’ lengths. The proposed oceanic cable will also be laid right through the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary. Lāna‘i is the only Hawaiian island completely surrounded by the sanctuary. The people factor A group called Friends of Lāna‘i was recently formed to give voice to residents who strongly oppose the O‘ahu industrial wind power plant on Lāna‘i, many of whom are fearful for their jobs and can’t speak out for themselves. Friends of Lāna‘i is not opposed to renewable energy, and despite comments from O‘ahu critics, this is not a simple NIMBY protest. It’s a realistic examination of the project’s substantial weaknesses and significant challenges.  The project provides no benefits to Lāna‘i residents in exchange for permanently altering, possibly destroying, and certainly disfiguring one-quarter of the island. The project runs right through an important cultural and archaeological site, rich with Hawaiian history and artifacts. The project provides no economic benefits to Lāna‘i residents, despite Castle and Cooke’s claims. There is no guarantee that any of the enormous profits created by a project of this scale would stay in the state, or on Lāna‘i. The project simply encourages more supply for O‘ahu electricity users, rather than encouraging conservation and managing demand. The project sets a precedent for using the “Neighbor Islands” as an industrial park for O‘ahu. What would prevent O‘ahu from planting additional wind generators—or storing garbage—on Lāna‘i? Is providing 10 percent of Oahu’s electrical needs sufficient to offset the destruction of one of Hawai‘i’s last untouched landscapes? Think about it.

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By Carlton Larson, professor of law, UC Davis School of Law. Professor Larson is author of the chapter, "Legacy Preferences and the Constitutional Prohibition of Titles of Nobility," in The Century Foundation book, Affirmative Action for the Rich: Legacy Preferences in College Admissions.  

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In a recent book, Affirmative Action for the Rich, a number of authors address various aspects of the problem of legacy preferences in college admissions. My chapter, entitled, "Legacy Preferences and the Constitutional Prohibition of Titles of Nobility," makes an argument that many people will initially find quite startling. The Constitution flatly prohibits the states from granting any "title of nobility." I argue that public universities violate the prohibition of titles of nobility when granting preferential admission to applicants based on their ancestry.

At first blush, this argument might seem a bit nutty. The prohibition would seem to be about creating dukes and earls, not about distinguishing among 17-years olds applying to college. But this perception is simply wrong. To see why, imagine a simple hypothetical. Suppose that a state decided to create a new position called "Distinguished Citizen." Each person selected as a "Distinguished Citizen" would receive a coat of arms, a large country estate, and would be entitled to serve in a state "Council of Distinguished Citizens" that would replace the state senate. The title of "Distinguished Citizen" would be hereditary, descending to the individual's eldest child or other heir at law. In this case, no prohibited "title" of nobility has actually been used - nobody was formally declared a duke or an earl. But, functionally, this system is virtually identical to the English House of Lords - precisely the type of aristocracy that the Constitution was meant to prohibit. If this proposal did not violate the prohibition of titles of nobility, then the prohibition could be easily evaded by simply using certain words rather than others - "Distinguished Citizen," rather than "Earl."

As this example suggests, the prohibition of titles of nobility is not primarily about words - it is about the substance of nobility. To know whether a governmental practice violates the prohibition, one must know functionally how it actually works, not whatever label it happens to be wearing. So what, then, is the substance of nobility? One of the core features of nobility is a set of hereditary privileges with respect to institutions of the state. This feature, more than anything else, animated the constitutional prohibition.

My chapter spends a fair amount of time exploring how revolutionary Americans understood the term "title of nobility." This evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that revolutionary Americans viewed hereditary privileges as flatly prohibited by the Constitution's prohibition of titles of nobility, and by the predecessor clause in the Articles of Confederation. As one proponent of the Constitution pointed out, American political leaders would "have none of the peculiar follies and vices of those men, who possess power merely because their fathers held it before them, for they will be educated (under equal advantages, and, with equal prospects) among and on a footing with the other sons of a free people." Revolutionary Americans repeated, insistently (with the notorious exception of slavery), that any form of hereditary privilege be purged from American life. When a group of former Continental Army officers formed a hereditary society, an outraged people demanded that it be abolished as a violation of the fundamental principles of equality the nation was founded on. Many of America's most distinguished lawyers concluded that this society violated the prohibition on titles of nobility in the Articles of Confederation, even though no formal titles such as "earl" or "duke" had actually been employed.

Once we understand that the constitutional prohibition of titles of nobility is not limited to specific titles, but extends to all hereditary privileges granted by the state, it is easy to see why legacy preferences in public universities cannot be sustained. These preferences augment the candidacies of certain applicants for no other reason than their ancestry. It is hereditary privilege, pure and simple, entirely unrelated to any personal quality of the applicant. This is precisely the type of privilege with respect to state institutions that the revolutionary generation was most concerned to eliminate. Indeed, so successful was the American Revolution in this respect that is impossible to think of any other area of American life in which public institutions routinely favor certain people solely based on ancestry. Would we give bar examinees a few extra points because they happen to have a lawyer parent? Or issue hereditary hunting licenses? Of course, not. The very idea is absurd. And it's just as absurd in the context of college admissions. Although created in the 1920's to reduce the number of Jewish students at elite institutions (prior to the 1920s, elite institutions did not limit their class size; they took every applicant who passed the rigid entrance requirements), legacy preferences are more properly viewed as a relic of a monarchical, aristocratic era. They have no place in 21st century America.

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-- Things are shifting into high gear in the Forest as the book tour approacheth. The suitcase is semi-packed and the washing machine is busy. Hotel and airplane reservations have all been made. More chickens have decided to lay eggs. Ok, that last bit it not exactly tour-related. But this is. The Horn Book has given FORGE it’s third starred review! “Chains (rev. 11/08) ended with slave girl Isabel escaping from 1776 New York with fellow slave Curzon, who takes over the narration in this sequel. Only fifteen, he enlists in the Continental Army in late 1777. His experiences as a young runaway slave during the American Revolution differ greatly from Isabel’s; though he lives in fear of discovery, he befriends a white soldier boy named Eben and even gains a sense of patriotism and camaraderie serving alongside other soldiers encamped for the winter at Valley Forge. Unfortunate circumstances bring Curzon and Isabel back together, and it is the struggle to mend their friendship and continue their quest for freedom that drives the latter half of the novel. Anderson seamlessly weaves her fictitious characters into history in a cohesive, well-researched narrative about the Revolutionary War that still focuses foremost on developing characters and their interpersonal relationships. Relevant historical quotes at the beginning of each chapter add authenticity, as does Curzon’s firsthand account of daily life at Valley Forge; his detailed narration of privations, inequalities, and hard work compellingly conveys the plight of the common soldier. As one man in Curzon’s regiment explains, Valley Forge “is a forge for the army; it’s testing our qualities. Instead of heat and hammer, our trials are cold and hunger. Question is, what are we made of?” With this riveting sequel, Anderson certainly passes the test. ” —(Oct.) Horn Book, starred review

In the final extract from his new book, Blair's former aide Jonathan Powell describes how General Sir Richard Dannatt's attack on the Iraq deployment echoed around the world

It is crucial that a chief of staff comes to know the leader's mind and can make lesser decisions for him. I was a point of contact for ministers and senior civil servants, and of course the staff of No 10, when they needed a decision taken rapidly.

Of course I made mistakes. When Mike Jackson retired as chief of the general staff in August 2006, the MoD sent over to No 10 the CV of his proposed successor, asking for the prime minister's agreement.

Tony's foreign policy and defence adviser Nigel Sheinwald came to see me and we agreed that it wasn't worth consulting Tony about such a trivial subject.

A few months later we faced a serious problem with the new chief, Richard Dannatt, when he chose to attack the government through the pages of the Daily Mail while we were in St Andrews engaged in crucial Northern Ireland peace talks. Tony complained about him to me, and I, forgetting what had happened earlier, said that it was his fault as he had appointed him. He denied that he had and said he had never been consulted. I went back to the files and discovered that he was right and had to confess to Tony.

Politicians do not enter into wars lightly. It is usually the military themselves who are keener to become involved. In the case of Iraq in 2002, the chief of the defence staff told us that the forces wanted to participate on the ground at division strength with their own command and that it would damage morale if they were restricted to a mere supporting role from sea and air while the Americans and others carried out the ground campaign. Indeed, the army had welcomed the original plan to invade Iraq from Turkey and to occupy Tikrit, Saddam's heartland, rather than the easier target of Basra. In Afghanistan later on, it was the military chiefs who argued for going into Helmand in strength once we lost the command in Kabul, although both Tony and John Reid, who was then defence secretary, were reluctant. In the end, it is the politicians, not the military, who have to make these difficult decisions and take responsibility for them.

Gen Dannatt's attack on the deployment of British forces in Iraq caught us completely unawares. When we were told the news of the interview he had given to the Mail in October 2006, saying that the presence of British forces in Iraq made things worse and they should get out soon, we couldn't get hold of anyone.

Des Browne, who had succeeded John Reid as defence secretary, was in a plane on his way up to Scotland. The chief of the defence staff was in Australia and unreachable. And Dannatt himself was refusing to return calls. We thought for a moment about sacking him but concluded that that would just make him into a martyr. His comments certainly didn't help our troops in Basra; Muqtada al-Sadr's JAM militia leaders celebrated, claiming that his comments proved that their efforts were working and that they should redouble their attacks on British forces. We immediately received complaints from the Nato secretary general, the Americans, Australians and other countries with forces serving in Iraq. Although some of the responses in the military internet chatrooms were favourable, his fellow chiefs were furious with him.

In the aftermath, we arranged for Tony to have a sandwich lunch with the service chiefs in Jock Stirrup's office at the MoD. Dannatt insisted on talking, and after a few minutes it was quite clear to me that he was unsuited to his job. Tony explained to those present that politicians would not support maintaining a first-division army if they were caused too much political pain by serving generals speaking out against their mission. It was always easier for politicians not to risk soldiers' lives. But I fear he was too subtle for Dannatt, who was divinely convinced of his own rightness.

The sort of surprise attack that Dannatt launched will make political leaders think twice if military action is proposed in future, certainly if the military engagement is likely to be sustained over a year or more. Our armed forces will no longer be deployed so regularly and will lose their cutting edge. We will gradually become more like Germany and other continental countries, unable to put our armed forces in harm's way. That is a choice, but one we should make consciously and not just stumble into it. It would be another step towards losing the ability to control our destiny as a country, a far more important one than sharing our sovereignty in Nato or the EU. Already we have lost the capacity to fight major operations by ourselves. We could no longer muster a taskforce like the one Britain sent to the Falklands.

There seems to be a sense in the British media that prime ministers enjoy going to war. They do not. The decision to send British soldiers into battle is the worst and most stomach-churning senior politicians have to take. It makes them wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat worrying if they have done the right thing.

For prime ministers it is a lonely moment. They can't really confide in their fellow ministers or aides; it is a decision they have to make by themselves. In the run-up to Kosovo, Tony spoke to Mrs Thatcher on the phone and then a few days later asked me to invite her in to talk to him about deploying troops. She too had been in the lonely position of having to decide on war. I took her to the flat. She told me on the way up that my job must be very exciting. Her advice to Tony was not to try to fight a war through a committee.

But sometimes war is necessary. After 9/11 it was clear that military action was essential, but we were all a bit hazy about Afghanistan and the Taliban, neither of which had been high on our radar screen till then. The day after the attack I walked up Whitehall to Waterstone's on Trafalgar Square and bought all the books I could find on the Taliban. By far the best was Ahmed Rashid's Taliban: The Story of Afghan Warlords, and I sat at my desk and read it right through. Tony and Alastair were keen to borrow it once I had finished. I thought the sensible thing to do was to send the Taliban an ultimatum. We should give them the chance to avoid an invasion if they would part company with al-Qaida, but, if they did not, we should be absolutely clear that they would be toppled. The purpose of an ultimatum is twofold. First, it gives the other side an opportunity to comply, as we did with Saddam in mid-March setting certain specific conditions from Hans Blix's "Clusters document", which if he met them would lead to the invasion being called off. The second purpose is to provide the casus belli if the conditions of the ultimatum are not met. And if they are not met, you need to be ready to act swiftly. But the most important thing of all, of course, is to mean it. If you make a threat, you must have every intention of carrying it out and the means for doing so. Machiavelli observes: "To threaten to shed blood is, in fact, extremely dangerous: whereas to shed it is attended with no danger at all, for a dead man cannot contemplate vengeance."

President Bush accepted Tony's idea of an ultimatum requiring the Taliban to break with al-Qaida four days after we had proposed it, but when it was put to the Taliban they turned it down. There were reports that Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader, might have been prepared to surrender Osama bin Laden, but they came to nothing.

We asked our military for a plan for an invasion, and Mike Boyce, the chief of the defence staff, told us what it would take to mount. We were taken aback. He suggested instead deploying aircraft carriers, submarine-launched missiles and marines, which puzzled me given that Afghanistan is landlocked. Then I remembered he was an admiral. In the event, the Taliban were driven out of Kabul by the Northern Alliance supported by US special forces and a bombing campaign.

This is an edited extract from The New Machiavelli: How to Wield Power in the Modern World, by Jonathan Powell, published by the Bodley Head on 14 October

On Oct. 13, 1775, in Philadelphia, the Continental Congress authorized a resolution to purchase two armed vessels for the purpose of intercepting ships that served to supply the British Army in America. Within a few days of the vote, the Naval Committee was established to oversee the new Navy operations. Because of these events, the Navy officially considers that date ...

James Buchan enjoys an encyclopedic account of Germany's 'idealism with efficiency'

For a while in the 1980s, I used to spend my Sundays in the Old Cemetery in the town of Bonn in the Rhineland. Wandering amid the provincial tombs, I was forever coming across some stupendous intellectual celebrity. Here were Beethoven's mother and Schiller's wife; Clara and Robert Schumann; August Wilhelm Schlegel; Mathilde Wesendonck, for whom Wagner wrote his most beautiful music; FWA Argelander, who mapped three hundred thousand stars. These Sunday excursions were for me an exercise in mental recuperation. Bored by the Third Reich and its uptight little successor republics in West and East Germany, I sought an afternoon's peace in an older and, as I thought, more German Germany.

Peter Watson's colossal encyclopaedia, The German Genius, might have been written for me, but not only for me. A journalist of heroic industry, Watson is frustrated by the British ignorance of Germany, or rather by an expertise devoted exclusively to Adolf Hitler and the Holocaust. Watson wonders not just why the nation of thinkers and poets came to grief between 1933 and 1945 but also how it put itself together again and, in 1989, recreated most of the Wilhelmine state without plunging Europe into war or even breaking sweat.

Watson has not simply written a survey of the German intellect from Goethe to Botho Strauss – nothing so dilettantist. In the course of nearly 1,000 pages, he covers German idealism, porcelain, the symphony, Johann Joachim Winckelmann, telegraphy, homeopathy, strategy, Sanskrit, colour theory, the Nazarenes, universities, Hegel, jurisprudence, the conservation of energy, the Biedermeyer, entropy, fractals, dyestuffs, the PhD, heroin, automobiles, the unconscious, the cannon, the Altar of Pergamon, sociology, militarism, the waltz, anti-semitism, continental drift, quantum theory and serial music.

His approach is purely biographical, which may sacrifice depth but makes for clarity. Watson is better at the end than at the beginning, more at home with Georg Simmel than Immanuel Kant. He is never not good company, and two mannerisms irritate because there might have been none. The first is a phrase to describe the German Enlightenment or Aufklärung as coming "between doubt and Darwin", which doesn't mean enough for one use let alone 20. The other is the word "raft" as a noun of multitude (50 uses). Umlauts are sometimes accorded and sometimes withheld, without system, like honours in some petty German dukedom.

So, is there a German genius? Of course there is. Even Borges never suggested that Goethe's Die Leiden des jungen Werthers could have been written in Spanish, or Einstein's "Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper" in English. Of all the answers assembled by Watson, the clearest comes from the American philosopher John Dewey in 1915, who summed up German civilisation as a "self-conscious idealism with unsurpassed technical efficiency and organisation". By idealism, he meant a belief that behind appearances or phenomena is some super-reality, sometimes called Geist, sometimes called Wille, sometimes even Musik. Whatever it is called, it speaks accurate German. The efficiency is for all to see. When I lived in West Germany, the Bundeswehr or federal army used to pretend to be a slovenly rabble, but nobody was taken in. When the Greens came into parliament in 1983, their wild costumes and warring ideologies could not disguise the most punctilious office habits. As for German self-consciousness, a British brigadier in Bielefeld once put it to me, in his staff-college drawl: "Vey do make wather a meal of being German, don't vey?"

Watson derives the German genius from deep springs. Germanness as a notion long predated an all-German state. German protestantism, high literacy, well organised universities and a Jewish citizenry devoted to German high culture all played their role. How all that ended in Hitler is one of the questions of historiography. Watson devotes many pages to German soul-searching over the Third Reich, and the "treason" of a cultured middle class in voting him in and turning against the Jews and the west. When the German state finally arrived in the late 19th century, it was late and military and profoundly demoralising to that class. For what it is worth, I never thought the Third Reich either inevitable or particularly surprising.

For Germany's postwar success, Watson rounds up the usual philosophical suspects, including the famous Unfähigkeit zu trauern, or "inability to mourn". He argues (rightly, I am sure) that in western Germany the student revolt of 1968 was a sort of re-Germanisation of the state created by the western allies and the beginning of a reckoning with Hitler and the Holocaust.

The long detour of the '68ers from street demonstration to terror or its fringes and finally, after 1983, constitutional government is given its due. Here the biographical treatment works well: the life of a man such as Joschka Fischer is exemplary. What Watson ignores is the unrelenting Soviet campaign to destablise West Germany and, in 1983, to provoke a civil war over American nuclear weapons in the country. To make up, there are admirable chapters on how German refugees from Hitler revolutionised intellectual life in the US and Britain.

For Watson, it appears that the "fourth generation" of postwar Germans is coming out from the shadow of the Third Reich. Though he does not say so, a haunted country grown prosperous from the export of precision machine tools may have a brighter future than Britain, for all its clear conscience and financial wizardry.

James Buchan's Gate of Air: A Ghost Story is published by Quercus.

Two historians, Mara Farrell and William “Bill” Sandy, will discuss what life was like in the Continental Army during the War for Independence on Oct.

1. What was France's condition for forming an alliance with the colonies? (1 point) winning a battle that captured the Mississippi River raising a set amount of money through taxes a formal declaration of independence from Great Britain a formal declaration of war against Spain 2. What battle provided a morale boost to the Continental Army? (1 point) Washington Heights Long Island Valley Forge Princeton 3. Why was the Battle of Saratoga important? (1 point) The victory motivated the French to form an alliance. After the victory, the British controlled the Hudson River. Benedict Arnold committed treason, but escaped to Great Britain. Benjamin Franklin invented a weapon that secured victory for General Gates. 4. Why did Cornwallis surrender at Yorktown? (1 point) He was tricked into surrendering by George Washington. The Spanish had conquered his backup forces. King George ordered him to surrender immediately. He was trapped on all sides by the Americans and French. 5. Which battle proved a turning point in the war in the South? (1 point) Kings Mountain Charleston Appalachian Mountains Williamsburg

DALLAS, Texas: Implementation of an updated point-of-sale system that leverages the technological advances available through "smart" Common Access Cards is streamlining the identification process for age-restricted items at Army and Air Force Exchanges. AAFES new point-of-sale system, which rolled out to continental U.S. locations on Sept. 22, prompts associates to check identification when a restricted item [...]

Exchange ID check goes hi-tech is a post from: DefenceTalk | Defense & Military News - Forums - Pictures - Weapons

Implementation of an updated point-of-sale system that leverages the technological advances available through "smart" Common Access Cards is streamlining the identification process for age-restricted items at Army and Air Force Exchanges.

AAFES new point-of-sale system, which rolled out to continental U.S. locations on Sept. 22, prompts associates to check identification when a restricted item is scanned.

Scanning the bar code on the front of the shopper's ID card allows the exchange's system to determine the customer's age and quickly complete the transaction. The system does not print the customer's birth date on a receipt or store the information in any way.
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A U.S. Army regulation (pdf) issued yesterday requires Army personnel to report any incident on a newly expanded list of possible indications of “espionage, international terrorism, sabotage, subversion” as well as “leaks to the media.” “The Army is a prime target for foreign intelligence and international terrorist elements… from within and OCONUS [outside the continental [...]

The Middendorf Foundation of Baltimore has given a $60,000 grant to Maryland's archives to build a case to display the handwritten speech George Washington held as he resigned from the Continental Army in 1783.