News for today's 2018: 09/06/12

CRIME, CORRUPTION AND THE POLITICAL SYSTEM (Part 1)

6:32 PM Tukiyooo 0

<br /> <br /><div class="xl"><br /></div><div class="gray" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>CRIME AND CORRUPTION ARE TWO OF THE WORLD'S LARGEST MULTINATIONAL INDUSTRIES</b></span></span></div><div class="gray"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcXx7kZ3R5uAoU_Oa9FXCGNEK8HtZkEyOgTfyK7ihJAK9e3CpYPPgKv5XeqcE8yI8R5qQ5ANvlpGVOPL-XiubQ-0SeZeNgMAdHfEaxiXwKd9TXZ4I4rh9wxam3QL0HAw2xvgvqpk34_Nl2/s1600/image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="253" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcXx7kZ3R5uAoU_Oa9FXCGNEK8HtZkEyOgTfyK7ihJAK9e3CpYPPgKv5XeqcE8yI8R5qQ5ANvlpGVOPL-XiubQ-0SeZeNgMAdHfEaxiXwKd9TXZ4I4rh9wxam3QL0HAw2xvgvqpk34_Nl2/s400/image.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="gray" style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="gray"><span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>CORRUPTION AND THE FLOUTING OF RULES IS HARDLY A NOVEL OR UNIQUE EVENT</b></span></span></div><div class="gray"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> </b><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">By Dr. Gary K. Busch</span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><b> </b></b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The world press is full of the terrible problems which a rogue banking system has caused. The actions of the banks in the fall of <b>Lehman Brothers</b> and the corrupt fixing of the <b>LIBOR</b> rate in London by <b>Barclays</b>and other banks has been presented by journalists and analysts as a breakdown of the system. This may well be true but corruption and the flouting of rules is hardly a novel or unique event. Much of all international economic life, under capitalist, socialist, communist or despotic systems which utilises the abstraction of currency to express value and as a means of exchange has always been full of variations on the same theme.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span style="color: blue;"><b>ONE OF THE MOST SIGNIFICANT ASPECTS OF THE INTERACTION BETWEEN BUSINESS AND SOCIETY HAS BEEN THE GROWTH AND SPREAD OF CRIME AND CORRUPTION AS A MAJOR INDUSTRY</b></span></span><span style="color: blue;"> <span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggzMMeteDxPIp3ctNmOrp8Qbv1Q6LDf2bz_sGHv5pPLT-aYNQ91UzxGQM5WJoYlsVh3p4oaFaENBUNzBCWpFLvkkMjYZhhrmLK0tFYYwY_uPi38y7FkIi-h3gw-28EwiKUqsAYh3YBqTWa/s1600/analyticalmodeloc.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="272" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggzMMeteDxPIp3ctNmOrp8Qbv1Q6LDf2bz_sGHv5pPLT-aYNQ91UzxGQM5WJoYlsVh3p4oaFaENBUNzBCWpFLvkkMjYZhhrmLK0tFYYwY_uPi38y7FkIi-h3gw-28EwiKUqsAYh3YBqTWa/s400/analyticalmodeloc.gif" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Organized Crime Analytical Model</td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Corruption is often conducted on such a massive scale that it involves sums greater than the <b>Gross National Product</b>of major industrial nations. <br /><br />Theoretically, when one country has a balance of payments debt another country or countries have an equivalent credit. The system is constructed as a zero-sum game where each debit is balanced by an equivalent credit. By 1970, this system had developed what the </span><span style="font-size: large;"><b>International Monetary Fund</b> called an "asymmetry"; the sums did not cancel each other out. By 1980 the world was missing over $100 billion. By 1990 this "asymmetry" was over $320 billion. Current figures are in the trillions. These are the official figures relating to national debts and the official exchange of goods and services among nations. The true sums, reflecting both official and unofficial transactions, are certainly many multiples of these.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>LAUNDERING EFFECT </b></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWKzXCsE2T8jAl9IfKGAg1H3XF2NFh8x02vjFGw0PiMvG4FSdGJKBCAlp6RUXO7iTXKwrdT__owsmMWpmKDqqkd9PiH3mnTK4N5gKT6Ya8LOIb_dwUNs5WH5Q7CyQ5ge3bcHK8AJri_Nm0/s1600/cresseymodel.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="247" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWKzXCsE2T8jAl9IfKGAg1H3XF2NFh8x02vjFGw0PiMvG4FSdGJKBCAlp6RUXO7iTXKwrdT__owsmMWpmKDqqkd9PiH3mnTK4N5gKT6Ya8LOIb_dwUNs5WH5Q7CyQ5ge3bcHK8AJri_Nm0/s400/cresseymodel.gif" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Some of these missing funds disappeared as "flight capital", fleeing fiscal authorities in the Third World. Some left home as "black money" to be laundered and returned clean. Some of these funds "leaked" from foreign aid schemes in a web of corruption involving suppliers, shippers and government officials. Some left as overpayments of invoices for goods and services with the excess reimbursed to the payer overseas; some disappeared as insurance payments on phantom goods loaded aboard sunken ships or supposedly destroyed in "friendly fires" in empty factories and warehouses; some vanished as unjustified depreciation of assets claimed by giant corporations or in their accountants' creative use of transfer pricing; some vanished as export subsidies on goods that never left the domestic economy. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Some left as <b>unvouchered cash donations to ethnic, religious and cultural organizations</b>. Some were transferred by invoice; some by documentary credits; some by matching bank deposits; some by cash; and a great deal by the exchange of illicit goods (<b>arms, drugs, high technology intellectual property</b>) whose import and export never are accounted for in official trade statistics. Some were just made up by national treasuries in what was euphemistically called “quantitative easing” </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>THE EUROPEAN UNION’S EURO SYSTEM, A FANTASY-LAND OF VIRTUAL MONEY?</b></span><br /><br />These international transfers financed the growth of banks, legal practices, accounting firms, inspection agencies and financial institutions dedicated to institutionalizing, enhancing and preserving national or regional accounts, </span><span style="font-size: large;"><b>establishing liquidity for illiquid currencies and some</b> <b>to preserve corruption. </b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>A substantial portion of these funds were handled directly by the internationally-integrated world of organized crime operating in symbiotic alliance with politicians and military figures in governments across the world</b>. The bulk of the money, from all these sources, however it entered circulation, ended up in the respectable banks and trading houses which control the stock, bond and commodity markets of the world. These funds have financed 'institutional trading', fiscal anomalies like the junk bond industry, legitimate corporate lending and, most importantly, further criminal activities.<br /><br /><span style="color: blue;"><b>CRIME AND CORRUPTION ARE TWO OF THE WORLD'S LARGEST MULTINATIONAL INDUSTRIES</b></span></span><span style="color: blue;"> <span style="font-size: large;"> </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>Most people are generally aware that crime and corruption are part of their national or local scenes to one degree or another. They know that 'criminals' or 'corrupt politicians' run or tolerate illegal gambling clubs; brew illegal whisky; 'arrange' planning permission for commercial property; sell or auction votes in local and national assemblies; maintain illegal cartels or 'rings' which distort prices in the construction, transport and art businesses; and generally conduct those extra-legal activities which fill the tabloid newspapers with juicy stories every morning</b>. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">They sometimes catch a glimpse of more sophisticated crimes when men like Boesky are brought before the courts or when cases like the “Maxwell Affair” and the BCCI scandal are reported in the press or banks are caught faking documentation of junk mortgage paper to assist their foreclosures. They are forced to be aware of the existence of a web of organized crime which is behind the trade in illicit substances and in the <b>'protection rackets' of the urban slums</b> because these are all shown and discussed in television's endless police series or brought to the big screen in blockbusters like the 'Godfather' or the 'French Connection'.<br /><br /><span style="color: blue;"><b>A PROPER DEFINITION OF CORRUPTION IS ESSENTIALLY 'INSTITUTIONALISED UNPROSECUTED CRIME'</b></span></span><span style="color: blue;"> <span style="font-size: large;">, </span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">comprising activities engaged in by one or more persons in contravention of the laws governing their legal environment which go unpunished or unprosecuted. These unpunished acts may be petty in nature or may be major delicts with international implications. In either case they represent unpunished and unpursued violations of the law. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>What is vital to the understanding of what constitutes corruption is not the criminal act itself, but why this act is unpunished</b>. <span style="color: red;"><b>In most cases these criminal acts go unpunished because they derive from a strong element of abuse of power, privilege or status</b></span>. Someone or some organization or group wielding political, economic, social or religious power has used this power to deflect the ordinary course of justice. This aspect is crucial to understanding what makes 'crime' turns into 'corruption'. There is a lot of unpunished crime which is not corruption (often depending on lack of prosecutable evidence or triviality) but <b>there is no corruption without criminality</b>. It is the abuse of power which is exercised in the avoidance of prosecution which distinguishes corruption from mere criminality.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKcG5a9XXfUMPaemV6Ugtt20Ek2QV_FMs0KC-jw33Ovcf0fuG4FeVBkYBOa2M4kJpVYURYs8zNSZCqwMJhSoYFrRBQwaa6eP7mLvPbNAOKRJFUXxOqCJJ7bWLt1nav4vMWRha-95Mrs8ew/s1600/169219266.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="518" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKcG5a9XXfUMPaemV6Ugtt20Ek2QV_FMs0KC-jw33Ovcf0fuG4FeVBkYBOa2M4kJpVYURYs8zNSZCqwMJhSoYFrRBQwaa6eP7mLvPbNAOKRJFUXxOqCJJ7bWLt1nav4vMWRha-95Mrs8ew/s640/169219266.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>CRIME AND CORRUPTION ARE BOTH MASSIVE, PERVASIVE AND MULTINATIONAL</b></span><br /><br />What is difficult for many to understand is that crime and corruption are both massive, pervasive and multinational; conducted on a scale which defies one's ability to manipulate numbers; and which </span><span style="font-size: large;"><b>plays such an important role in one's own political and economic life even though one may be oblivious to its influence</b>. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">However, the fundamental reason why crime and corruption thrive and prosper is the most difficult for anyone to accept; it goes against everything one has been taught or led to believe. The reason is both simple and obvious. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>CRIME AND CORRUPTION ARE NOT ANOMALIES OR SIGNS OF A BREAKDOWN IN OUR ECONOMIC OR POLITICAL SYSTEMS; THEY ARE VITAL AND INTEGRAL PARTS OF THOSE SYSTEMS</b></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b> </b></span> </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Quite simply, our national and international political and economic systems have developed so that they do not work without them. Crime and corruption is so massive and sophisticated an industry that most analysts cannot comprehend its sheer scale and the level of its integration into the international system or its symbiotic relationship with power and influence.<br /><br />People and corporations with power abuse their power to influence, buy and pursue political aims with an impunity which derives from the learned helplessness of those set up to control them, or as a result of their complicity in the abuse.</span><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><br /><span style="color: blue;"><b>THE SOCIOLOGY OF CORRUPTION</b></span></span><span style="color: blue;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: blue;">:</span><br /><br />One missing ingredient in the learned studies of crime, </span><span style="font-size: large;"><b>criminality and corruption is the controlling variable of time or '<span style="color: red;">time horizons</span>'. The poorer the person the shorter his time horizon</b>. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>A GOVERNMENT</b></span> can plan and function on a relatively long time horizon. It has a five-year plan; a series of three-year pilot projects, regional development schemes, etc. Its time horizon stretches out into the distant future. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>MOST MAJOR INTERNATIONAL CORPORATIONS</b></span>operate on a similar time scale. They can make 'long-term' investments; position themselves to take advantage of a market which is emerging over the medium term; build in 'loss leaders' for the short-term to buy long-term market share. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>MIDDLE CLASS PROFESSIONALS, CIVIL SERVANTS AND WHITE-COLLAR WORKERS</b></span> can plan their lives and career prospects in years. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>BLUE COLLAR EMPLOYEES</b></span> can plan in units of years, quarters or months. </span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: red;"><b>POORER PEOPLE</b></span> on the dole or receiving supplementary assistance can plan in weeks. <br /><br />The truly poor can only plan on days or even shorter intervals. The shorter the time horizon, the more immediate the need for satisfaction of basic needs - food, shelter and protection. </span><span style="font-size: large;"><b>It is this time horizon disparity which has been the seed bed of corruption in societies across the globe.</b></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b> </b></span> </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Governments, political parties, aid and social welfare agencies cannot minister effectively to the needs of the poor because they do not and cannot operate in the same time zone as the poor. <span style="color: red;"><b><span>Those who can deliver in the short term - deliver money, extend credit, provide food or craved illicit substances, protect households or shops from attack, arrange employment opportunities, and punish enemies - are almost exclusively criminal organizations and often receive in exchange for their assistance the control of the political, religious and economic powers of those whom they assist.</span></b></span> Those who take these political powers in exchange for material goods trade them for more valuable considerations with governments, corporations or international agencies. This exchange is the beginning of the trail from criminality to corruption.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span> </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>THE MAJORITY OF THE WORLD'S POPULATION HAS BEEN AND REMAINS UNDER WHAT IT CONSIDERS FOREIGN OR AT LEAST EXOGENOUS DOMINATION</b></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b><br /></b>A second dimension often missed out in the academic analysis of corruption is that for the large majority of the world's population most governments, including their own, are foreign governments or run by strangers. The majority of the world's population has been and remains under what it considers foreign or at least exogenous domination. Throughout history, the nations of EUROPE, LATIN AMERICA, the MIDDLE EAST, AFRICA and ASIA have been ruled by foreign powers - potent military occupiers stretching in a long line from the PERSIANS, the MOGHULS, the HAN CHINESE, ALEXANDER'S MACEDONIANS, the ROMANS, BYZANTIUM, the HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE, the FULANI, the ZULUS, the OTTOMANS, NAPOLEONIC FRANCE, the AUSTRO-HUNGARIAN EMPIRE, the BRITISH EMPIRE, the THIRD REICH, the GREAT EAST ASIAN Co-Prosperity Scheme, the USSR to name but a few. Even today, many of the peoples of the world, in developed as well as less-developed nations, although freed from the shackles of colonialism or occupation, still feel alienated from their governments which are led by a single tribe, ethnic group or powerful social or caste or religious elite not their own.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>CRIMINAL ORGANISATIONS INSTITUTIONALISED CRIMINALITY ON THE BASIS OF A POLITICAL AND ETHNIC MESSAGES</b></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirOhHBqQ-Vd30qG_vUnGDcIPc-H3OMsYlZ7hS27yJB7CJzJ7dQvqQjaKQVJ00dV_URSiZ_KwA9m2ejkps-qhoRNm_qMVlddVrLd3kosMG3tBYjDh-J12O2FsKHCBygt2LW0SZu6o-j1Otu/s1600/tumblr_laawi0amAE1qz7tiao1_500.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirOhHBqQ-Vd30qG_vUnGDcIPc-H3OMsYlZ7hS27yJB7CJzJ7dQvqQjaKQVJ00dV_URSiZ_KwA9m2ejkps-qhoRNm_qMVlddVrLd3kosMG3tBYjDh-J12O2FsKHCBygt2LW0SZu6o-j1Otu/s320/tumblr_laawi0amAE1qz7tiao1_500.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">see  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakuza</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">There is a social, ethnic, political and economic distance between the leaders and the led. What this has meant in terms of crime and corruption is that there is a certain legitimacy which attaches to acts against a foreign occupying or dominant power and against those in power that represent a different ethnic group, religion, caste or class. Under these circumstances, criminal acts are not considered criminal; they are a tolerated subversion of an inequitable system. Many of the most durable of the <b>world's criminal societies</b>, the <b>Mafia</b>, the <b>Camorra</b>, <b>14-K</b> ,the <b>house of Hung</b>, the <b>Sun Yee On</b>, the <b>Wo Hop To</b>, the <b>Yamaguchi-Gumi</b>, the <b>Union Corse</b>, the <b>IRA,</b> the <b>Sendero Luminosa</b>,, the <b>Sons of Liberty</b> and <b>Black September</b> arose directly out of this maelstrom of criminality cum nationalism and the struggle against foreign domination. Some end up as the new governments with their own enemies. Other preferred to continue their preference for more profitable criminal activities. What is important is that these criminal organisations institutionalised criminality on the basis of a political and ethnic message and spawned political parties, created political alliances, generated giant legitimate and semi-legitimate corporations as part of their service to the disenfranchised and, by so doing, created a symbiotic relationship with governments.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>Background Information:</b> World Criminal Societies<br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camorra">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camorra</a></span> </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/14K">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/14K</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Yee_On">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Yee_On</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wo_Hop_To">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wo_Hop_To</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamaguchi-gumi">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamaguchi-gumi</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Corse">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Corse</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sendero_Luminosa">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sendero_Luminosa</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sons_of_Liberty">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sons_of_Liberty</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"> <a href="http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/organized-crime/index.html">http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/organized-crime/index.html</a></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div>

CRIME, CORRUPTION AND THE POLITICAL SYSTEM (Part 1)

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Starbucks Salted Caramel Mocha

6:08 PM Tukiyooo 0

Alright buds, I did the research today on the Starbucks Salted Caramel Mocha (SCM), and here's what I came up with....<br /><br />First off, it's always important to give credit where credit is due.  WE ALL have <a href="http://www.nothankstocake.com/" target="_blank">Kelly @ No Thanks to Cake</a> to thank for this concoction.  Let me make that clear! Sometimes you have these moments in life where you're like, "Why didn't I think of that?"... and Kelly does that a lot for me.  She tends to make the obvious even more obvious for myself :).  Case in point - if you're trying to enjoy some 'bucks, but you don't want to splurge on the full drink recipe/calories, why not modify it?  We do it with food, so why not beverages?  There's clearly no better place to do this than at a Starbucks, where customizing your drink is the norm.  Still, I would have never thought to ask my barista to go easy on the pumps.  Duh!  Thank God someone is a genius out there!<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE06UAtZYcZwZUWSSSkbPaOUglZ_kmW35WTSrKVGqeyT3i6o5P6KJBXIuRg6mKo8vv18HLr_Li8Jr2MBGOQBENT0JDNa3_fih-r28x-IeADmFDjicHUG-qd1aM6Dt7xWkHeVyNGVRtRsk/s1600/starbucks+syrups+nutrition.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="282" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE06UAtZYcZwZUWSSSkbPaOUglZ_kmW35WTSrKVGqeyT3i6o5P6KJBXIuRg6mKo8vv18HLr_Li8Jr2MBGOQBENT0JDNa3_fih-r28x-IeADmFDjicHUG-qd1aM6Dt7xWkHeVyNGVRtRsk/s400/starbucks+syrups+nutrition.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br />So, with that being said, I took the research that <a href="http://www.nothankstocake.com/2011/09/16/two-airport-finds-and-the-truth-about-the-salted-caramel-mocha/" target="_blank">Kelly has already generously done</a>, and added on to it.  She learned that your baseline tall, nonfat SCM contains 3 pumps each of the mocha and toffee nut syrups.  Based on the nutri-stats, that is 25 calories per pump of the mocha syrup, and 20 calories per pump of the toffee nut (reference chart above).  That means, in a tall SCM, you're swallowing 135 extra calories just in syrups. However, when you only do <b>1 pump mocha + 2 pumps toffee nut in a tall (no whip!)</b>... NOW we're talkin'!<br /><br />What the NTTC queen discovered is that the SCM is simply a prettied up version of a caffe mocha.  That's great!  Why?  Because not all that long ago, Starbucks debuted a SKINNY version of the caffe mocha, which is good news for us!<br /><br />Still, here is where things get a <i>little </i>hairy, and we learn why this is only an estimate.  At this time, I'm not 100% certain that the mocha syrup they use in the skinny version is totally sugar-free and totally calorie free.  So, for now, I am accepting that<i> the baseline tall skinny mocha's nutri-stats already has 3 pumps of the skinny syrup included in their calculations</i> <i>below</i>.  In order to get our estimated PointsPlus, just add on 2 pumps-worth of nutri-stats of the toffee nut and you can achieve a close estimate of your PointsPlus value.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYkg9KPwknYScn3kvQ2WP7o8-YVN9shUDf5M8anhUYC7TUOxH2VZdacV8aOgbZG8J26feeyW4ycGZJjwrB2miWQMAtuuS9AoiGWjxUdQXwijAwyaQRDwM-v7gmyzZvbq614bLZWyMyy3o/s1600/SCM+tall.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYkg9KPwknYScn3kvQ2WP7o8-YVN9shUDf5M8anhUYC7TUOxH2VZdacV8aOgbZG8J26feeyW4ycGZJjwrB2miWQMAtuuS9AoiGWjxUdQXwijAwyaQRDwM-v7gmyzZvbq614bLZWyMyy3o/s400/SCM+tall.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">Calories - 165</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999;">(110 cals from skinny mocha + 40 cals of 2 pumps toffee nut + 15 cals caramel drizzle)</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Fat - 1.5g</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999;">(no fat in syrup + 0.5g fat in caramel drizzle)</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Total Carbs - 26g</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999;">(14g from skinny mocha + 10g from toffee nut + 2g caramel drizzle)</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Dietary Fiber - 3g</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999;">(no fiber in syrup)</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Protein - 11g</div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999;">(no protein in syrup)</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>Total PointsPlus = 4</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999;">(I calculated a grande at 5 PointsPlus - </span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: #999999;">2 pumps skinny mocha + 3 pumps toffee nut)</span></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">In conclusion, if the mocha syrup is sugar free, then the PointsPlus total would stand as is because it would not affect the nutrition stats based on the other sugar free syrups (refer to chart above).  However, if the mocha syrup is "light", and we're only doing 1 pump of it versus the 3 pumps for the baseline drink, then we've most likely over-estimated our PointsPlus value, but I'm sure not by much, even if at all.  I'd rather estimate more than less in this case!</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>And by the way, I tried the SCM today and fell immediately in love.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6k8uMFzMuQd8jiBKsSBJ0MpYXTRCmxzunIWwMlydZtBK8sVsz4xURRGGm_BOzdLV7lKC4R73cyEsfFWnMR3KnVMaOq8a2b1PH392FhtPwXw9y8khvdR_xvobSW6r5hSnu550PwrAVCyk/s1600/skinny+scm.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6k8uMFzMuQd8jiBKsSBJ0MpYXTRCmxzunIWwMlydZtBK8sVsz4xURRGGm_BOzdLV7lKC4R73cyEsfFWnMR3KnVMaOq8a2b1PH392FhtPwXw9y8khvdR_xvobSW6r5hSnu550PwrAVCyk/s400/skinny+scm.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />And I won't lie to you when I say this: I enjoy it <i>more </i>than my beloved pumpkin spice!  The SCM has a lot of nice flavors melding together.<br /><br />The PSL.... well, let's just say we've "separated" for now!<br /><br />

starbucks Starbucks Salted Caramel Mocha

Alright buds, I did the research today on the Starbucks Salted Caramel Mocha (SCM), and here's what I came up with....First off, it's always important to give credit where credit is due. WE ALL have Kelly @ No Thanks to Cake to thank for this concoc…

Prix vs. Chipperfield

12:30 PM Tukiyooo 0

In case you haven't seen Wolf D. Prix's criticism of the David Chipperfield-directed <a href="http://www.labiennale.org/en/architecture/">13th International Architecture Exhibition</a> in Venice and Sir Chipperfield's response, here they are, without comment.<br /><br /><b>Wolf D. Prix press release (<a href="http://www.archnewsnow.com/features/Feature401.htm">source</a>):</b><br /><blockquote><i>Praise be to Nero’s Neptune.</i><br /><i>The Titanic sails at dawn.</i><br /><i>And everybody’s shouting</i><br /><i>“Which Side Are You On?”</i><br />(Bob Dylan: “Desolation Row,” 1966)<br /><br />If one did not know that the media constantly exaggerates, one could almost conclude – as the <i>Süddeutsche Zeitung</i> has – that the Venice Biennale of Architecture really is the world’s most important architecture exhibition.<br /><br />However, I believe that the word “exhibition” is not intended to describe an exhibition in this case, but rather that the notion only designates the event per se. In other words, an industry meeting, like a product fair. Other critics fail to even question the purpose of the exhibition; instead they immediately conclude that the coming together, the meeting, the networking is the key aspect. That’s that!<br /><br />I would like to maintain at this juncture that the meaning of the Venice Biennale of Architecture, for theoretical arguments, has been increasingly losing significance since its beginnings with the “Strada Novissima” by Paolo Portoghesi in 1980. Even the personal significance for the participants is very low when compared to the Art Biennale. So let us not deny the truth. This event is an expensive <i>danse macabre</i>. In a city of plunder (an exhibition of plunder) hordes of tourists (architects) roll along broken infrastructure in order to satisfy their <i>petit bourgeois</i> desire for education (in the case of the architects: vanity, envy, <i>schadenfreude</i>, suspicions). Even the glamour that the visitors are supposed to feel is staid and faked by the media for whom a star architect is like a film star.<br /><br />In truth it is all hollow, arduous, exhausting, bleak, and boring. It is no longer about lively discussion and criticism of topics in contemporary architecture, but rather about empty, conservative, and perhaps populist shells that are charged with feigned meaning. What a great Architecture Biennale it would have been had they established forums and put out themes which would have provided a chance to look behind the scenes at the decision-making, instead of boring exhibitions. Take, for example, the dispute about the train station in Stuttgart. Or the reasons for the cost explosion for prominent buildings such as the Elbe Philharmonic Hall. Or the political arguments about mosques and minarets – in other words, the disputes about the localization of an idea. Why the market for single-family homes in the U.S. has collapsed and how power politics is conducted through settlement architecture. These topics would be worthy of discussion – not who is and who is not a star architect.<br /><br />However, instead of that we face: “People Meet in Architecture,” and now “Common Ground.” In other words: compromise. It cannot get any worse!<br /><br />This situation conjures an image of the Venetian carnival – one can imagine all the architects in Pierrot costumes surrounded by masked critics and dancing the <i>Dance Banale</i>. Or, even better, the architects are playing on a sinking gondola like the erstwhile orchestra on the Titanic playing their last song, while outside in the real world our leaky trade is sinking into powerlessness and irrelevance. This is because politicians and project managers, investors and bureaucrats have been deciding our built environment for a long time now. Not the architects.<br /><br />While in Russia artists are stubbornly resisting the authoritarian regime, the current director of the Architecture Biennale considers these characteristics to be obstacles for our profession, and he explains in an interview that space must be taken from the genius. One would have to show him Pussy Riots in order for him to finally understand our society.<br /><br />Furthermore, I consider that the Venice Biennale of Architecture needs to be reorganized.<br /><br />Wolf D. Prix / COOP HIMMELB(L)AU  24.08.2012</blockquote><b>David Chipperfield's response (<a href="http://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/news/daily-news/aj-exclusive-chipperfield-counters-prixs-venice-biennale-criticism/8635216.article">source</a>):</b><br /><blockquote>I am disappointed that our British architectural press should give so much coverage to the destructive opinions of a Viennese architect about the Biennale, even though he hadn’t even visited Venice.<br /><br />My concerns are not about the criticism, which I didn’t understand, but that this statement and the ensuing "controversy" stimulated by its publication reinforce the negative attitudes of our architectural culture. Wolf Prix demonstrates no interest in the position of others and only imagines that architecture can conform to his own priorities and preconceptions.<br /><br />This year’s Biennale, with all its weaknesses and mistakes, was above all conceived and realised in a spirit of generosity, optimistically proposing that there is an architectural culture bound together by shared intentions, influences and disappointments and that even the most celebrated protagonists of our profession are capable of engaging in such a dialogue.<br /><br />When I began to formulate the theme of this Biennale, paradoxically I had Wolf Prix in mind, as only a few months before he had publicly pronounced (again through a press release) that my building in Vienna for Peek & Cloppenburg was a "piece of shit".<br /><br />Beyond the fact of the criticism itself was the fact that an architect should be so drawn to criticise a "colleague" through the medium of the press. How can our profession be regarded as anything more than a soap opera if the personalities of architects dominate all reporting and serious critique is abandoned not only by the media but also by architects themselves?<br /><br />It is a shame that Mr Prix seems incapable of defining his own position except in opposition to others, and that our press doesn’t deem us capable of being interested in any discussion about architecture unless it is laced with controversy.<br /><br />David Chipperfield, 03.09.12</blockquote>

Prix vs. Chipperfield

In case you haven't seen Wolf D. Prix's criticism of the David Chipperfield-directed 13th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice and Sir Chipperfield's response, here they are, without comment.Wolf D. Prix press release (source):Praise be to…

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock 09/06/2012

12:30 PM Tukiyooo 0

<ul class="diigo-linkroll">      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://blog.walls360.com/periodic-table-wall-graphics-from-yiying-lu-plus-free-periodic-table-design-downloads/">WALLS 360 BLOG » Periodic Table Wall Graphics from Yiying Lu. Plus FREE Periodic Table Design Downloads!</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">Free periodic table downloads with QR codes to use in your classroom. </p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/education">education</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/qrcode">qrcode</a></p>                                        </li>      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://grandparentsday.org">Grandparents Day</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">For Grandparent's Day, this organization is asking people to committe to do something grand. Here are some ideas.</p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/education">education</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/grandparents">grandparents</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/lessonplans">lessonplans</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/grandparentsday">grandparentsday</a></p>                                        </li>      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://www.youtube.com/cyberseniorscorner">Cyber-Seniors Corner - YouTube</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">Here's the Cyber Seniors corner where Grandparents teach others how to do things. Consider filming your grandparents and sending it to them. This is a neat idea.</p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/education">education</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/grandparentsday">grandparentsday</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a></p>                                        </li>      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://www.cyberseniorsdocumentary.com/grandparents-day.html">Grandparents Day! | Cyber Seniors Documentary</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">This organization has created a YouTube channel called "Cyber Seniors corner" - film your grandparents and their wisdom and share it with this site to have it posted on YouTube. What a great idea to help grandparent's share their legacy. You're preserving this for your children and children's children and beyond. </p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/education">education</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/news">news</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/youtube">youtube</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/grandparents">grandparents</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a></p>                                        </li>      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://pinterest.com/Artsy_momma/make-for-moms-or-grandmas/">Make for Moms or Grandmas</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">Also from @artsy_momma - things you can make for Mom's or Grandmas. Over 100 ideas on this pinterest board to get you started.</p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/education">education</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/pinterest">pinterest</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/grandparents">grandparents</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/grandparentsday">grandparentsday</a></p>                                        </li>      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://pinterest.com/Artsy_momma/make-for-dads-or-grandpas/">Make for Dads or Grandpas</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">Grandparent's Day is Sunday. Here's a lovely Pinterest board from @artsy_momma about things you can make for grandpas or Dad's. </p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/education">education</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/grandparents">grandparents</a></p>                                        </li>      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://www.nfpa.org/itemDetail.asp?categoryID=1439&itemID=34426&URL=Safety%20Information/Fire%20Prevention%20Week/About%20Fire%20Prevention%20Week&cookie%5Ftest=1">NFPA :: Safety Information :: Fire Prevention Week :: About Fire Prevention Week</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">Here is the official Fire Prevention week website. Remember to plan now to help children learn about fire safety. The odds are you ARE saving a life. Plan ahead.</p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/education">education</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/fire">fire</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a></p>                                        </li>      <li>      <p class="diigo-link">                <a href="http://www.nfpa.org/itemDetail.asp?categoryID=2495&itemID=58071&cookie_test=1">NFPA :: Safety Information :: Fire Prevention Week :: Sparky's Wish List</a>      </p>      <p class="diigo-description">Fire prevention month is in October. This wish list will help fire departments get information and materials to local schools for October 9 (commemoration of the great Chicago fire.)</p>              <p class="diigo-tags">          <span>tags:</span>                      <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/october">october</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/teaching">teaching</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/fireprevention">fireprevention</a>            <a href="http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher/safety">safety</a></p>                                        </li>  </ul><p class="diigo-ps">Posted from <a href='http://www.diigo.com'>Diigo</a>. The rest of my favorite links are <a href='http://www.diigo.com/user/coolcatteacher'>here</a>.</p>

Teach This! Teaching with lesson plans and ideas that rock 09/06/2012

WALLS 360 BLOG » Periodic Table Wall Graphics from Yiying Lu. Plus FREE Periodic Table Design Downloads! Free periodic table downloads with QR codes to use in your classroom. tags: …

Assistant Director, Administrative Services - Fairfield Public Library

10:48 AM Anonymous 0

<strong>Assistant Director, Administrative Services - </strong><span style="color: #48286d;"><strong>Fairfield Public Library</strong></span> is seeking qualified candidates for the position of Assistant Director-  Administrative Services.  As a member of the Fairfield Public Library  Team you will assist in the execution of the Long Range Plan. You will  be an active listener, a team player who thinks quickly on their feet  and engages well with others. Your responsibilities include:   supervision of the custodians and Senior Circulation Coordinator,  enhancement of administrative systems including some budgetary and  payroll responsibilities, collection and program development. You are  responsible for the daily oversight of the physical plant of the Main  Library, the technology plan, management and promotion of some library  collections, program execution and any other related duties. You must  have 5 or more years of supervisory experience including a proven record  working cooperatively with staff, patrons and other community  stakeholders.  Your familiarity with all aspects of library service will  allow you to be proficient at initiating more efficient library  processes and procedures. You are a problem solver who is an effective  communicator and active listener. You must have experience working with  budgets and payroll. Your knowledge and experience working with  integrated library management systems and library information technology  applications is thorough. You are a great reader who enjoys developing  ways to promote library collections. This is a 35 hour per week  position, one evening on a public service desk until 9:00 pm and one  Saturday a month. Attending meetings, programs or workshops for  professional development and community outreach is expected. An MLS from  an ALA accredited university and five years of supervisory experience  and progressively responsible administration experience. Salary range:  $65,700 - $92,441. Good benefits package. 401K deferred compensation  plan. Please send cover letter and resume to: Karen Ronald, Town  Librarian, Fairfield Public Library: <a href="mailto:kronald@fplct.org">kronald@fplct.org</a>.  Review of applications will begin September 18th.

Assistant Director, Administrative Services - Fairfield Public Library

Assistant Director, Administrative Services - Fairfield Public Library is seeking qualified candidates for the position of Assistant Director- Administrative Services. As a member of the Fairfield Public Library Team you will assist in the executi…

If a country neglects to improve its infrastrucuture

5:06 AM Tukiyooo 0

<h2 class="ff_g fs30 mb10"><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">America facing infrastructural collapse </span></span></h2><div class="publishinfo"><br /></div><div class="galleryes"></div><div class="articlevideo mb10"><div class="mainimagevideo"><div id="MainImageVideo"><img alt="A view under the Julia Tuttle causeway bridge in Miami, Florida (Reuters/Carlos Barria)" height="277" src="http://rt.com/files/usa/news/america-infrastructure-us-billion-459/florida-miami-julia-tuttle.n.jpg" width="370" />     </div></div><br class="clr_all" /></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">The US has been neglecting its infrastructure, putting lives at  risk and weakening the economy as pipelines, bridges, roads, dams, and  water mains fall apart.  </span><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Natural disasters like this month’s Hurricane Isaac shed the  spotlight on America’s poor infrastructure as 100,000 people were left  without power for a week and 2,800 checked into shelters to escape the  flooding in their homes.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: large;">The American Society of Civil Engineers  recently gave the US a grade of “D” for its infrastructure on an A-F  scale. The group recommended that America spend $2.2 trillion on repairs  and maintenance to bring the crumbling country back up to standard.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: large;">After  Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans in 2005, the US government was  forced to spend $14.5 billion to build flood defenses, levees and pumps  to prevent another catastrophe. While no levees fell apart after  Hurricane Isaac this year, the US is still suffering the deterioration  of many of its other infrastructure elements.</span><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><i>“America has  scrimped on taking care of the public furniture, endangering people and  weakening the economy as bridges rust, roads crumble, dams weaken and  water mains leak,”</i> writes David Cay Johnston, author of<i>The Fine Point</i>, in an article for the Daily Beast.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: large;">The  worst infrastructure is corporate-owned, writes Johnston. High-pressure  oil and natural-gas pipelines can easily explode without warning,  electric power poles need to be replaced, and the telecommunications  system is gradually getting worse. Of 2.5 million miles of pipeline in  the US, one third are older than 40 years – which played no small role  in the 10,483 reported pipeline accidents or explosions in the past  decade. Many high-pressure pipelines have almost 70 percent of their  walls corroded, but have still been granted safety-inspection waivers by  the Department of Transportation – even though the National Academy of  Engineering warned about these dangers in 2004.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: large;">In 2010, a natural-gas pipeline explosion caused the deaths of 8 people and the destruction of 38 homes near San Francisco.</span><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Crumbling  infrastructure can also be found in the US transportation system. Each  year, traffic jams caused by insufficient infrastructure waste a total  of 4 billion hours of commuters’ time and 3 billion gallons of gasoline. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Overall, a decaying transportation system costs $78 billion annually in  lost time and fuel. Additionally, one in four US bridges are unstable or carrying more traffic than designed for.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-size: large;">This  summer’s record-breaking drought that plagued most US states has also  left its mark on the country’s infrastructure. A US Airways jet become  stuck in melted asphalt. A subway train derailed after the heat  stretched its tracks. From highways to homes, infrastructure has been  shrinking and cracking, causing billions of dollars in damages. Nuclear  power plants have been forced to shut down because the heat raised the  temperature of their cooling water.</span><br /><span style="font-size: large;">And in a struggling economy,  each additional natural disaster will take its toll on the already-weak  US infrastructure, putting American lives and finances further at risk.</span>

If a country neglects to improve its infrastrucuture

America facing infrastructural collapse The US has been neglecting its infrastructure, putting lives at risk and weakening the economy as pipelines, bridges, roads, dams, and water mains fall apart. Natural disasters like this month’s Hurrica…

guest post - the vintique object

4:00 AM Anonymous 0

<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Ugly </i></span><span style="font-size: x-large;">is Contextual:  The Story of the Orange Sofa</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Hello, readers of The Little Black Door.  I'm Camille of <a href="http://thevintiqueobject.blogspot.com/">The Vintique Object</a> and delighted to be here today to guest post for one of my favorite funny and talented bloggers. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: small;">So here's the story of the orange sofa. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: small;"> If you saw this baby, what would you think?</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJrRbclv8RKCjqOTO8gm9lnU2fIs0f11M-_t7A1mj2-HjexHegQ7At08RGme4EjI95loTEocUS2EO5LUDgstUihF21plih0ZVxb58KaBm1azcM0d7jU-1uomTBN18NkCg1Y9QEYXtH0cU/s640/photo(10).JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJrRbclv8RKCjqOTO8gm9lnU2fIs0f11M-_t7A1mj2-HjexHegQ7At08RGme4EjI95loTEocUS2EO5LUDgstUihF21plih0ZVxb58KaBm1azcM0d7jU-1uomTBN18NkCg1Y9QEYXtH0cU/s640/photo(10).JPG" width="478" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Yeah, that's orange corduroy you see there.  </span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Would you think it's ugly?  I did.  But my shopping partner-in-crime Lane, of <a href="http://www.urbanorchardinteriors.com/">Urban Orchard Interiors</a>, and I pride ourselves in being able to look past the ugly. We saw the above sofa with its nice lines and dreamed of transforming it into something like this:</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://media-cache-ec4.pinterest.com/upload/153544668515780297_UQHcR8pM_f.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://media-cache-ec4.pinterest.com/upload/153544668515780297_UQHcR8pM_f.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></i><a href="http://www.wisteria.com/Linen-European-Furniture-Natural-Linen-Settee/productinfo/W2506/"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: small;">Wisteria's Natural Linen Settee </span></span></a><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><i> </i>So, on a whim, we bought it, planning to reupholster the thing for our shared booth at the once-a-month Alameda Antiques Faire in the San Francisco Bay Area.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">But as luck would have it, not long after we purchased the sofa, one of my clients pinned this photo to our shared board on Pinterest:</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://media-cache-ec4.pinterest.com/upload/280138039291787490_3DBpjgIq_f.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://media-cache-ec4.pinterest.com/upload/280138039291787490_3DBpjgIq_f.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.jonathanadler.com/Templeton-Apt-Sofa/?cat=360&initial=">Jonathan Adler's Templeton Apartment Sofa</a></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: center;">And I thought, <i>Wow, our orange sofa could be that!  </i>So I went off in search of 'orange sofa' pictures on Pinterest and found some pretty amazing photos which you can see in a post <a href="http://thevintiqueobject.blogspot.com/2012/06/orange-sofa.html">here</a>.  </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Lane saw that post and we both knew we'd just need to clean it up and <i>try</i> to sell it as is.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.urbanorchardinteriors.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Flea-Market-Wide-1-1024x575.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="358" src="http://www.urbanorchardinteriors.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Flea-Market-Wide-1-1024x575.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">You can see her on the left there in all her orange glory at our booth at the antiques flea market.  (<a href="http://claremontfinderskeepers.blogspot.com/">Claremont Finders Keepers</a> is my other blog and business.)</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I tell you, I shook my head as we hoisted that thing into Uhaul the night before.  I was sure we'd be loading it back up at the end of the day.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">But you wouldn't believe how much interest our orange sofa got.  And about half way through the day it sold for a healthy profit.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Since the customer who bought it lived nearby, we agreed to deliver the sofa for a fee.  On the way over, I tried to imagine what her house would look like. It was really anybody's guess.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Well, here's what it looked like:</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.urbanorchardinteriors.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Sofa-in-house-2-1024x575.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="358" src="http://www.urbanorchardinteriors.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Sofa-in-house-2-1024x575.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.urbanorchardinteriors.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Orange-Sofa-House-3-575x1024.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.urbanorchardinteriors.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Orange-Sofa-House-3-575x1024.jpg" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I tell you, if I had tried, I wouldn't have been able to imagine a more perfect place for our ugly-duckling-sofa-turned-swan to live.  (Get a load of those gorgeous curtains!)</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">If you are a reader of The Little Black Door, I'm betting you've got the thrifting/DIY gene somewhere in you.  Which is why I've told you this story.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">The more of The Orange Sofa story is this:  Sometimes we spend so much time looking for things to transform -- to make beautiful, that we fail to imagine them in a different context.   That was certainly the lesson I learned with our little ol' orange sofa.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">However...sometimes things are just ugly.  </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.allaboutprops.com/images/inventory/inventoryph-resid/Chair%20-%20Recliner%20Brown%20Plaid_md.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.allaboutprops.com/images/inventory/inventoryph-resid/Chair%20-%20Recliner%20Brown%20Plaid_md.jpg" width="258" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Elizabeth, hope you are having a restful and fun time while you are gone. Thanks for having me!</div>

guest post - the vintique object

Ugly is Contextual: The Story of the Orange SofaHello, readers of The Little Black Door. I'm Camille of The Vintique Object and delighted to be here today to guest post for one of my favorite funny and talented bloggers. So here's the story of the …