title: Environmental policy

text: Environmental impact assessments (EIA) are conducted to compare impacts of various policy alternatives. Moreover, although it is often assumed that policymakers make rational decisions based on the merits of the project, Eccleston and March argue that although policymakers normally have access to reasonably accurate environmental information, political and economic factors are important and often lead to policy decisions that rank environmental priorities of secondary importance.


title: Environmental policy

text: The decision-making theory casts doubt on this premise. Irrational decisions are reached based on unconscious biases, illogical assumptions, and the desire to avoid ambiguity and uncertainty.


title: Environmental policy

text: Eccleston identifies and describes four of the most critical environmental policy issues facing humanity: water scarcity, food scarcity, climate change, and the population paradox.


title: Environmental policy

text: Synergic to the environmental policy is the environmental research and innovation policy. An example is the European environmental research and innovation policy, which aims at defining and implementing a transformative agenda to greening the economy and the society as a whole so to achieve a truly sustainable development. Europe is particularly active in this field, via a set of strategies, actions and programmes to promote more and better research and innovation for building a resource-efficient, climate resilient society and thriving economy in sync with its natural environment. Research and innovation in Europe are financially supported by the programme Horizon 2020, which is also open to participation worldwide.


title: Environmental policy

text: UNFCCC research shows that climate-related projects and policies that involve women are more effective. Policies, projects and investments without meaningful participation by women are less effective and often increase existing gender inequalities. Women's found climate solutions that cross political or ethnic boundaries have been particularly important in regions where entire ecosystems are under threat, e.g. small island states, the Arctic and the Amazon and in areas where people's livelihoods depend on natural resources e.g. fishing, farming and forestry.


title: Environmental policy

text: Though the Clean Air Act 1956 in response to London's Great Smog of 1952 was a historical step forward, and the 1955 Air Pollution Control Act was the first U.S. federal legislation that pertained to air pollution, the 1960s marked the beginning of modern environmental policy making. The stage had been set for change by the publication of Rachel Carson's New York Times bestseller Silent Spring in 1962 and strengthened the Environmental movement. Earth Day founder Gaylord Nelson, then a U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, after witnessing the ravages of the 1969 massive oil spill in Santa Barbara, California, became famous for his environmental work. Administrator Ruckelshaus was confirmed by the Senate on December 2, 1970, which is the traditional date used as the birth of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Five months earlier, in July 1970, President Nixon had signed Reorganization Plan No. 3 calling for the establishment of EPA. At the time, Environmental Policy was a bipartisan issue and the efforts of the United States of America helped spark countries around the world to create environmental policies. During this period, legislation was passed to regulate pollutants that go into the air, water tables, and solid waste disposal. President Nixon signed the Clean Air Act in 1970 which set the US as one of the world leaders in environmental conservation. The world's first minister of the environment was the British Politician Peter Walker from the Conservative Party in 1970. The German "Benzinbleigesetz" reduced Tetraethyllead since 1972.


title: Environmental policy

text: In the European Union, the very first Environmental Action Programme was adopted by national government representatives in July 1973 during the first meeting of the Council of Environmental Ministers. Since then an increasingly dense network of legislation has developed, which now extends to all areas of environmental protection including air pollution control, water protection and waste policy but also nature conservation and the control of chemicals, biotechnology and other industrial risks. EU environmental policy has thus become a core area of European politics. The German Umweltbundesamt was founded in Berlin 1974.


title: Environmental policy

text: Overall organizations are becoming more aware of their environmental risks and performance requirements. In line with the ISO 14001 standard they are developing environmental policies suitable for their organization. This statement outlines environmental performance of the organization as well as its environmental objectives. Written by top management of the organization they document a commitment to continuous improvement and complying with legal and other requirements, such as the environmental policy objectives set by their governments.


title: Environmental policy

text: The concept of environmental policy integration (EPI) refers to the process of integrating environmental objectives into non-environmental policy areas, such as energy, agriculture and transport, rather than leaving them to be pursued solely through purely environmental policy practices. This is oftentimes particularly challenging because of the need to reconcile global objectives and international rules with domestic needs and laws. EPI is widely recognised as one of the key elements of sustainable development. More recently, the notion of ‘climate policy integration’, also denoted as ‘mainstreaming’, has been applied to indicate the integration of climate considerations (both mitigation and adaptation) into the normal (often economically focused) activity of government.


title: Environmental policy

text: Given the growing need for trained environmental practitioners, graduate schools throughout the world offer specialized professional degrees in environmental policy studies. While there is not a standard curriculum, students typically take classes in policy analysis, environmental science, environmental law and politics, ecology, energy, and natural resource management. Graduates of these programs are employed by governments, international organizations, private sector, think tanks, advocacy organizations, universities, and so on.


title: Environmental policy

text: Academic institutions use varying designations to refer to their environmental policy degrees. The degrees typically fall in one of four broad categories: Master of Arts, Master of Science, master of public administration, and PhD. Sometimes, more specific names are used to reflect the focus of the academic program.


title: Environmental policy

text: Notable institutions include the Balsillie School of International Affairs, SIPA at Columbia, Sciences Po Paris, Graduate Institute Geneva, University of Oxford, University of Warwick, and University of British Columbia, among others.


title: Environmental policy

text: Incentives for compliance with environmental policy is a way to encourage the population to be more sustainable. The article," Dynamic incentives by environmental policy instruments - a survey", covers that if the government can issue regulatory policies by virtue of administered prices (taxes), then this will be just as equivalent as companies issuing tradable permits. This means that if there is policies that directly tax unsustainable company practices, this will encourage them to become more sustainable and have them transition from tradable permits.


title: Environmental policy

text: Incentives can affect the decision to eco-innovate. The article,"The innovation effects of environmental policy instruments - A typical case of the blind mean and the elephant", mentions that based on studies made by Cleff and Rennings different environmental policy instruments in Germany, survey data noted that environmental policies encouraged many to eco-innovate. These studies revealed that if a population is faced with a policy that brings them a problem, they must adapt to the point where the policy isn't a problem. In this case, in Germany, environmental policies imposed taxes and regulations for waste, energy, etc. As a result, people changed their habits so that they wouldn't be taxed. Also, when there is incentives on the line, it is more beneficial to eco-innovate and benefit, rather than acquiring no incentive and still being taxed.


title: Environmental policy

text: Environmental policies can increase environmental sustainability when implemented. The article," British Columbia's revenue-neutral carbon tax: A review of the latest 'grand experiment' in environmental policy" states that in 2012 the effect of the gasoline sales tax in British Columbia caused a reduction in gasoline sales of 11% to 17%. What is obtained from this information is that people are willing to find alternatives in transportation in save money. This could mean that the implementation of stricter environmental policies, could draw higher percentages of sustainability.


title: Environmental policy

text: Environmental policies promote can promote innovation in many different ways. The text," Content analysis of China's environmental policy instruments on promoting firms' environmental innovation", China's environmental policy form promoted innovation through notices, measures, 'opinions', 'law', regulations, announcements, decisions, regulations, and rules. Pushing environmental policies in such ways can reach a population in many different ways. Like opinions brings the public voice into the matter, but regulation sets a standard for what needs to be done.


title: Uí Ímair

text: The Uí Ímair (; meaning ‘"scions of Ivar’"), also known as the Ivar Dynasty or Ivarids was a royal Norse-Gael dynasty which ruled much of the Irish Sea region, the Kingdom of Dublin, the western coast of Scotland, including the Hebrides and some part of Northern England, from the mid 9th century.


title: Uí Ímair

text: The dynasty lost control of York in the mid 10th century, but reigned over the other domains at variously disputed times, depending on which rulers may be counted among their descendants. This has proved a difficult question for scholars to determine, because reliable pedigrees do not survive. Additionally, for between three and four decades, the Uí Ímair were overkings of the Kingdom of Scotland itself, distinct from the Kingdom of Strathclyde, of which they may also have been overkings, and later briefly the Irish province of Munster, dominated from Waterford, and later still, briefly the English kingdom of Mercia. In the west of Ireland, the Uí Ímair also supplied at least two kings of Limerick, from which they may have attempted to conquer Munster again.


title: Uí Ímair

text: Two members are styled queens of Ireland in the Irish annals (they were also queen of Mide and queen of Munster, respectively), while another was queen of Leinster (and Osraige). In the Norse sources, another was queen of Norway. Finally, another may have been queen of Brega. The name "Uí Ímair" in Old Irish means "grandchildren" or descendants of Ivar, but the dynasty includes its progenitor and his sons. The Irish annals describe Ivar as the brother of Amlaíb Conung and of Auisle, and the Annals of Ulster record his obituary under the year 873, reading: "Imhar, rex Nordmannorum totius Hibernie & Brittanie, uitam finiuit" ["Ivar, king of all the Norse of Ireland and Britain, ended his life"]. Probably the senior leader of the Great Heathen Army, Ivar may thus have become the inspiration for the legendary Ivar the Boneless (fl. 865–860), son of Ragnar Lodbrok. In any event, Uí Ímair dynasts may also have exercised power as overkings of East Anglia during their career in Britain.


title: Uí Ímair

text: Alex Woolf points out it would be a mistake to view the lordship as a "unitary empire"; it was, rather, a collection of lordships ruled by the same kindred, with only varying degrees of unity depending on the political circumstances of the moment and the charisma of individual leaders. Especially in the early period, a great portion of the dynasty's wealth, probably the majority, came from the international slave trade, both as slavers themselves and from the taxation of it, for which they were infamous in their time. In this role they star as the principal antagonists in the early 12th-century Irish epic political tract "The War of the Irish with the Foreigners", although the account is exaggerated.


title: Uí Ímair

text: One of the greatest dynasties of the Viking Age, the Uí Ímair were at their height the most fearsome and wide-reaching power in the British Isles and perhaps beyond. Like the contemporary Rurikids in the East they ultimately integrated with the native population but their impact on the histories of Scotland and Ireland are still visible through the cities they founded and the Norse-Gael descendants they left behind.


title: Uí Ímair

text: Some historians believe Ímar and Ivar the Boneless to be identical, others claim they are two different individuals. According to Irish annals, Ímar was the son of Gofraid (also Goffridh, Gothfraid or Guðrøðr), who was the king of Lochlann. The Norwegians at this point were often referred to as Lochlanns by the Irish. Lochlann was widely accepted among scholars as being identical to Norway; recently, however, this has been questioned by Donnchadh Ó Corráin and other. His and others' theory is that Lochlann was the "viking Scotland" (Norse/Norwegian settlements on the Scottish islands and northern mainland). Whether the Irish annals used the term Lochlann to refer to Norway or to the Norse settlements in Scotland is still a matter of debate; however, by the 11th century the term had come to mean Norway. According to Donnchadh Ó Corráin, there is no evidence that any branch of the royal Danish dynasty ruled in Ireland. He also claims that Ímar's brother, Amlaíb Conung (the name "Conung" is from the Old Norse konungr and simply means "king"), who often has been identified as part of the royal Norwegian dynasty (Ynglingene), was in fact not. He argues that both Ímar and his brothers were part of a Norse dynasty centered in and around the Scottish mainland.


title: Uí Ímair

text: The Norwegian historian Kim Hjardar and archaeologist Vegard Vike claim that Ímar is the same person as the Dane Ivar the Boneless, and that he and the Norwegian chieftain Amlaíb Conung (Olaf the White) arrived in Ireland as leaders of a coalition of Vikings whose goal was to take control over the Viking settlements in Ireland. When the Irish annals describe Ímar and Amlaíb Conung as brothers, Hjardar and Vike claims that this has to be interpreted as a metaphor for "warrior brothers" or "brothers in arms".


title: Uí Ímair

text: The following list contains only members mentioned in the Irish annals and other reliable and semi-reliable sources, such as the "Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib", and among those only the ones who can be placed in the pedigree with relative confidence. Thus it is by no means complete. Among recent developments in scholarship it has been argued that the historical king of Northumbria contributing to the character of Eric Bloodaxe was actually an Uí Ímair dynast.


title: Uí Ímair

text: First proposed by James Henthorn Todd in 1867, and most recently considered by Alex Woolf and Clare Downham, it is possible the Uí Ímair were peculiar in that some early members, and possibly the entire known later dynasty, descended from the founder via the female line.


title: Uí Ímair

text: After various authors. Birthdates are unknown. "mac" = son of; "ingen" = daughter of; "ua" = grandchild of; "Ua (h)Ímair" = surname (descendant of Ímar).


title: Uí Ímair

text: The precise lineage of one of the last widely agreed upon members of the dynasty, Echmarcach mac Ragnaill, is uncertain. He was either a descendant of Ivar of Waterford (died 1000) or Gofraid mac Arailt (died 989). That of Cacht ingen Ragnaill, Queen of Donnchad mac Briain, may or may not depend upon Echmarcach's.


title: Uí Ímair

text: The independent dynasty of Waterford founded or continued by Ivar of Waterford (died 1000) cannot be linked genealogically to the 'central' line of Dublin kings, but James Henthorn Todd gave him a descent from Ragnall ua Ímair, who never ruled there. Their claim to Dublin and the names of their dynasts suggest they did belong to the dynasty.


title: Uí Ímair

text: Like in the case of the late Waterford dynasty, the pedigree of the last Norse to rule in Limerick is also uncertain. Ivar of Limerick (died 977), and surnamed Ua hÍmair, features prominently in the early 12th century saga "Cogad Gáedel re Gallaib", although he appears less in the annals, which are lacunose and in general poorer for western Ireland. In any case he and/or the Waterford dynasty are probably survived today through intermarriage with the O'Donovan family, verifiably associated with both and known for their use of Uí Ímair dynastic names in medieval times. A notable sept of the O'Donovans known as the Sliocht Íomhair or "Seed of Ivor" survived into early modern times. It is also periodically claimed that some of the family may even be male line descendants of Ivar of Waterford, a variant of which (through his son Donndubán) actually appeared in the "Encyclopædia Britannica" for a few decades. This remains unverified and the family do not make this last claim themselves. All (surviving) septs profess a Gaelic lineage.


title: Uí Ímair

text: How long the Uí Ímair remained in Dublin after losing it to the Uí Cheinnselaig in 1052 is unknown. Following the death of Diarmait mac Maíl na mBó in 1072 the kingship appears to have been held by one Gofraid mac Amlaíb meic Ragnaill, who may or may not have been a candidate supported by Toirdelbach Ua Briain. While it has been argued he was installed by Toirdelbach, the annals themselves make no such statement, which but for one only briefly report Gofraid's death in 1075, and variously style him King of the Foreigners and King of Dublin. But according to the Annals of Inisfallen "Gofraid grandson of Ragnall, king of Áth Cliath, was banished over sea by Tairdelbach Ua Briain, and he died beyond the sea, having assembled a great fleet [to come] to Ireland." So Gofraid, regardless of how he took the throne, thought he had some chance of reestablishing the dynasty independent in Dublin in spite of the Gaels. Godred Crovan may have been successful for a period after him.


title: Uí Ímair

text: The Uí Ímair dynasty was the precursor of a number of families in Ireland, both Gaelic and Norse speaking.


title: Uí Ímair

text: However, the Norman invasion of Ireland led to the destruction of a vast majority of the medieval Norse-Irish and Gaelic aristocracy alike. This destruction was completed with the later Tudor conquest.


title: Uí Ímair

text: Nevertheless, dense clusters of given names strongly associated with the Norse dynasty can be found in notionally Gaelic families, in the great genealogical compilations of Dubhaltach Mac Fhirbhisigh and Cú Choigcríche Ó Cléirigh, and in various other sources. And, while the dynasty was concentrated in Dublin, Waterford and Limerick, and thus in the southern half of Ireland, Gaelic families later using their given names with great frequency are found mainly in the northern half of Ireland: their pedigrees associate them with the Connachta, Uí Maine, and Northern Uí Néill. None of these northern dynasties have a documented history of willing association with the Uí Ímair, or in the case of the first two any association at all. Of the Irish dynasties, the Uí Ímair are documented intermarrying only with the Osraighe (the FitzPatricks), Laigin, O'Brien dynasty, the Southern Uí Néill Clann Cholmáin and Síl nÁedo Sláine and the aforementioned O'Donovans. In any event, the one long surviving source that might have contained pedigrees of surviving septs of the Uí Ímair themselves was a section in the Great Book of Lecan. This section, specifically focused on the pedigrees and doings of the Norse families of Ireland, was still in existence in the 17th century, as reported by Mac Firbis himself, but has since become lost.


title: Uí Ímair

text: Descendants of the Dublin Uí Ímair most likely persisted into the 13th century in the line of Godred Crovan, King of Dublin and King of Mann and the Isles, even though his ancestry is not completely agreed upon. He was most likely the grandson of Ímar mac Arailt above, one of the last certain Uí Ímair kings of Dublin and a grandson of Amlaíb Cuarán. Godred's descendants, although vassals of the Kings of Norway, continued to rule into the 1260s, the last being Magnús Óláfsson (to 1265), or briefly his son Guðrøðr (1275).


title: Uí Ímair

text: Although their descent from Godred Crovan is through the female line, Alex Woolf believes the Clann Somhairle (Clan Donald and Clan MacDougall) or the Lords of the Isles can be regarded as a "cadet branch" of the Uí Ímair, as they apparently based their claim to the Isles on this descent (according to Woolf). Their founder Somerled married Ragnhild, daughter of Olafr Godredsson, King of Mann and the Isles and son of Godred Crovan. This of course assumes these dynasts belonged to the Uí Ímair. Sir Iain Moncreiffe attempted to reconstruct a male line descent from Echmarcach mac Ragnaill himself to Somerled, but Peter Kurrild-Klitgaard has demonstrated that the proposed line is problematic in several respects.


title: Uí Ímair

text: Amlaíb mac Sitriuc (Ólafr son of Sigtrygg Silkbeard, King of Dublin) became an ancestor of the Kings of Gwynedd through his daughter Ragnhild, wife of Cynan ab Iago and mother of the famous Gruffudd ap Cynan.


title: Hand pump

text: Hand pumps are manually operated pumps; they use human power and mechanical advantage to move fluids or air from one place to another. They are widely used in every country in the world for a variety of industrial, marine, irrigation and leisure activities. There are many different types of hand pump available, mainly operating on a piston, diaphragm or rotary vane principle with a check valve on the entry and exit ports to the chamber operating in opposing directions. Most hand pumps are either piston pumps or plunger pumps, and are positive displacement.


title: Hand pump

text: Hand pumps are commonly used in developing countries for both community supply and self-supply of water and can be installed on boreholes or hand-dug wells.


title: Hand pump

text: One sort of pump once common worldwide was a hand-powered water pump, or 'pitcher pump'. It was commonly installed over community water wells in the days before piped water supplies.


title: Hand pump

text: In parts of Britain and Ireland, it was often called "the parish pump". Though such community pumps are no longer common, people still used the expression "parish pump" to describe a place or forum where matters of local interest are discussed.


title: Hand pump

text: Because water from pitcher pumps is drawn directly from the soil, it is more prone to contamination. If such water is not filtered and purified, consumption of it might lead to gastrointestinal or other water-borne diseases. A notorious case is the 1854 Broad Street cholera outbreak. At the time it was not known how cholera was transmitted, but physician John Snow suspected contaminated water and had the handle of the public pump he suspected removed; the outbreak then subsided.


title: Hand pump

text: Modern hand-operated community pumps are considered the most sustainable low-cost option for safe water supply in resource-poor settings, often in rural areas in developing countries. A hand pump opens access to deeper groundwater that is often not polluted and also improves the safety of a well by protecting the water source from contaminated buckets. Pumps such as the Afridev pump are designed to be cheap to build and install, and easy to maintain with simple parts. However, scarcity of spare parts for these type of pumps in some regions of Africa has diminished their utility for these areas.


title: Hand pump

text: Suction and lift are important considerations when pumping fluids. Suction is the vertical distance between the fluid to be pumped and the centre of the pump, while lift is the vertical distance between the pump and the delivery point. The depth from which a hand pump will suck is limited by atmospheric pressure to an operating depth of less than 7 meters. The height to which a hand pump will lift is governed by the ability of the pump and the operator to lift the weight in the delivery pipe. Thus the same pump and operator will be able to achieve a greater lift with a smaller diameter pipe than they could with a larger diameter pipe.


title: Hand pump

text: In addition to their use in drawing water from shallow groundwater sources for water supplies, another version of the hand-powered suction pump, with low lift and high delivery, was developed in the later 19th century for use as a ship's bilge pump (for smaller coastal vessels) and as a building site contractor's pump. It was known as a deluge pump. One manufacturer who illustrated this product from the late 1880s onwards into the early 20th century was Goulds Manufacturing Co.


title: Hand pump

text: Where it is necessary to raise water to a height above that to which a suction or lift pump will operate effectively (about 7 metres), or to raise the pressure so that it will exit a nozzle with a strong force, such as through a fire hose, a force pump may be used. As with a suction pump, in its manual form it relies on an operator to pump a handle. The difference is however that after the water is sucked through the lower valve (as a result of raising the piston that is attached to the handle), its means of exit is via a pipe or nozzle in the side of the main cylinder. The water, once it has been drawn up above the lower valve and trapped there, is forced out the exit when the piston or plunger is pushed down again on the next stroke.


title: Hand pump

text: A siphon (or syphon) at its simplest is a bent tube, with one end placed in the water to be moved, and the other end into the vessel to receive the water. The receiving vessel must be at a lower level than the supplying vessel. Water will always try to find its lowest level. Using this principle, very simple pumps with plastic or rubber bulb with flap valve at each end are used for emptying fuel or water cans into tanks. Once the bulb is full, the fluid will flow without further effort from the higher to the lower container. Many hand pumps will allow the passage of fluid through them in the direction of flow and diaphragm pumps are particularly good at this. Thus where the levels are correct large volumes of liquid such as swimming pools can be emptied with very little effort and no expensive energy use.


title: Hand pump

text: A chain pump is made of an endless chain carrying a series of discs that descend into the water, and then ascend inside a tube, carrying with them a large quantity of water. They are a simply made,


title: Hand pump

text: Direct action hand pumps have a pumping rod that is moved up and down, directly by the user, discharging water. Direct action handpumps are easy to install and maintain but are limited to the


title: Hand pump

text: maximum column of water a person can physically lift of up to 15 m. Examples of direct action pumps include the canzee pump and the EMAS pump.


title: Hand pump

text: Deep well hand pumps are used for high lifts of more than 15 m. The weight of the column of water is too great to be lifted directly and some form of mechanical advantage system such as a lever or flywheel is used.


title: Hand pump

text: High lift pumps need to be stronger and sturdier to cope with the extra stresses. The installation, maintenance and repair of deep well hand pumps is more complicated than with other hand pumps.


title: Hand pump

text: A deep well hand pump theoretically has no limit to which it can extract water. In practice, the depth is limited by the physical power a human being can exert in lifting the column of water, which is around 30 m


title: Hand pump

text: Diaphragm pumps have the advantage that they pump relatively lightly due to the lack of pulling rods and are corrosion resistant. Their disadvantage is that they need a specific length of tubing and high quality rubber diaphragms, which are costly and are relatively inefficient due to the extra work needed to deform the diaphragm.


title: Hand pump

text: Rubber diaphragms will eventually leak and need to be replaced. Because this is usually complicated and costly, diaphragm pumps operating in poor rural areas are often abandoned once the diaphragm wears out.


title: Hand pump

text: Progressive cavity pumps consist of a single helix rotor inserted into a double helix stator. As the rotor is turned, the voids in the stator are screwed upwards along the axis of rotation. Progressive cavity pumps can have complicated gearing mechanisms and are difficult for local


title: Hand pump

text: In November 2002, the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights asserted that access to clean, safe water goes beyond the classification of water as an economic commodity. The committee stressed the fundamental right of sufficient access to clean water for both domestic and personal use. “The human right to water is indispensable for leading a life in human dignity.” With this in mind, manufacturers of water pumps, like those produced by GOAZ Development in Malaysia, have a wide range of potential customers: governments, non- governmental organizations, women’s groups, community groups and other organizations of various types interested to developing access to groundwater.


title: Hand pump

text: VLOM, meaning Village Level Operation and Maintenance, is a term first used during the UNDP and World Bank Rural Water Supply Hand Pumps Project. This project lasted from 1981 to 1991, and studied the availability and maintenance of hand pump systems. 40 kinds of hand pumps were analyzed in laboratories, and the performance of 2700 hand pumps was analyzed in the field. The study established that centralized maintenance structure was a cause of many problems in hand pump programs, and that maintenance at the village level is best.


title: Hand pump

text: The VLOM concept was initially applied to hardware, with the following aims: the possibility of maintenance by village workers, having spare parts manufactured within the country to make sure spare parts are available, endurance in the field, and cost effectiveness. With time, more emphasis was placed on maintenance management. Thus, the “M” came to represent “management of maintenance.” Therefore, greater community choice of service, who will service, and financial accountability by the community to the caretakers of the pump have gained more importance within the VLOM concept.


title: Hand pump

text: The Swiss Centre Resource Centre and Consultancies for Development, Skat, continues to work on design and support structure for hand pump development as the host of Secretariat of the Rural Water Supply Network (RWSN).


title: Hand pump

text: An example of a Bank funded project that highlights many issues of hand pumps is the 1992 Mali Rural Supply Project. The project brought approximately 230 rural villages inclined towards periods of drought, and 228,000 people access to safe water. The project is notable in its attempt to bring responsibility for the upkeep of the pumps to the villages themselves. The complexity of the pumps is a fundamental problem for all programs of this kind, as well as the quality of the pumps given the heavy demands of a village. A 1994 study, also Bank funded, of the endurance of hand pumps in Africa showed that only 41 to 51 percent of hand pumps were still functioning. The Mali Rural Supply Project did positively affect the longevity of hand pumps by doing the following: establishing local depots of spare parts, training individuals to maintain pumps, scheduling inspections from officials of the project, forming local committees and recruiting volunteers.


title: Hand pump

text: Much attention has been given to the benefits of the use of hand pumps in developing nations, as opposed to more traditional methods. In communities reliant on groundwater, through a borehole or well, the utilization of a bucket and rope system has hygienic issues. The bucket and rope system is not compatible with the use of a cover slab, which can prevent pollution of groundwater. In addition, unwashed hands can contaminate the bucket and rope. Hand pumps avoid these issues and are therefore preferable.


title: Hand pump

text: However, villagers did not stop using traditional means of gathering water during this project. This was especially true when rain provided villagers with shallow water sources. These shallow wells were often easier to access than the wells with hand pumps. When faced with the option of using near surface water or traveling to the hand pumps, many villagers chose the former.


title: Hand pump

text: In addition, animal contamination and the mixing of groundwater and surface water were factors in sub- par sanitation.


title: Hand pump

text: Another issue that faced the project was the fact that the pumps could only provide a maximum of 20 liters of water per person day, which required an unrealistic staggering of water retrieval. In addition, many depots withdrew support after the donated inventory ran out, the contracts given to consultants eventually closed, and maintenance was not kept up to a high standard.


title: Hand pump

text: A June 2008 study, conducted by the World Bank, Review of Effectiveness of Rural Water Supply Schemes in India, showed that approximately 45 percent of rural piped water projects focused on breakdown maintenance instead of scheduled maintenance. In addition, about 20% were reported to be in “serious or somewhat serious neglect of maintenance.”


title: Hand pump

text: Whether or not a project to use hand pumps in a developing country is an affordable alternative certainly depends on who or what organization pays the bill. However, the example of a 1992 Ethiopia aid project illustrates what the cost would be for the locals who benefit from the project. This example relates to isolated, rural communities in the rural South.


title: Hand pump

text: 165 Afridevs hand pumps were imported from India. Each cost approximately US$700, including clearing, transportation and installation. These pumps serve around 55 households each. At that time, the World Bank established that the average per capita income in Ethiopia was $120. A hand pump, first produced by researchers at the University of Waterloo and then refined at the University of Malaya, has been designed with local access to parts in mind. Materials readily available, like a rope covered in chicken fat or leather belt, can be used to ensure maintenance. GOAZ Development sells these pumps from $160 to $300. Therefore, 11% of one’s annual income would go towards accessing clean water. This is over twice as much as the 5% that the World Bank stated should be the maximum amount paid by a family.


title: The Righteous Mind

text: The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion is a 2012 social psychology book by Jonathan Haidt, in which the author describes human morality as it relates to politics and religion.


title: The Righteous Mind

text: In the first section, Haidt demonstrates that people's beliefs are driven primarily by intuition, with reason operating mostly to justify beliefs that are intuitively obvious. In the second section, he lays out his theory that the human brain is organized to respond to several distinct types of moral violations, much like a tongue is organized to respond to different sorts of foods. In the last section, Haidt proposes that humans have an innate capacity to sometimes be "groupish" rather than "selfish".


title: The Righteous Mind

text: In the first part of the book, Jonathan Haidt uses cross-sectional research to demonstrate social intuitionism, how people's beliefs come primarily from their intuitions, and rational thought often comes after to justify initial beliefs. He cites David Hume and E. O. Wilson as thinkers who gave reason a relatively low estimation, as opposed to more popular thinkers who give reason a central place in moral cognition, such as Lawrence Kohlberg and his stages of moral reasoning.


title: The Righteous Mind

text: In the second portion of the book, he presents moral foundations theory, and applies it to the political beliefs of liberals, conservatives, and libertarians in the US. Haidt argues that people are too quick to denigrate other points of view without giving those views full consideration, and attempts to reach common ground between liberals and conservatives. He makes the case in the book for morality having multiple foundations (more than just harm and fairness), and said in an interview that morality "is at least six things, and probably a lot more than that" and "[religion and politics are] ... expressions of our tribal, groupish, righteous nature." In his book, he compares the six aspects that people use to establish morality and take into consideration when making judgment to six taste receptors in the mouth. These aspects of morality are defined as care/harm, fairness/cheating, loyalty/betrayal, authority/subversion, sanctity/degradation, and liberty/oppression. He goes on to establish that republicans and democrats tend to focus on different morality receptors and this leads to between and worse political tactics and decision making. Haidt himself acknowledges that while he has been a liberal all his life, he is now more open to other points of view.


title: The Righteous Mind

text: In the third part of the book, Haidt describes a hypothetical "hive switch", which turns a selfish human "chimp" into a "groupish" human "bee", Cultures and organizations have techniques for getting people to identify with their groups, such as dancing, moving, and singing in unison.


title: The Righteous Mind

text: William Saletan wrote in "The New York Times" in 2012 that the book is "a landmark contribution to humanity’s understanding of itself".


title: The Righteous Mind

text: The book received two reviews in "The Guardian": in 2012, Ian Birrell called the book a "compelling study of the morality of those on the left and right [that] reaches some surprising conclusions"; and in 2013 Nicholas Lezard wrote that he was "in the odd position of being wary of a book I am also recommending. It's entertaining, snappily written and thought-provoking. It might even help Labour win the next election. But it still doesn't explain the gang running the country at the moment [the UK Conservative Party]."


title: The Righteous Mind

text: Journalist Chris Hedges wrote a review of "The Righteous Mind" in 2012 in which he accused Haidt of supporting social Darwinism.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The politics of Sweden take place in a framework of a parliamentary representative democratic constitutional monarchy. Executive power is exercised by the government, led by the prime minister of Sweden. Legislative power is vested in both the government and parliament, elected within a multi-party system. The judiciary is independent, appointed by the government and employed until retirement. Sweden is formally a monarchy with a monarch holding symbolic power.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Sweden has a typical Western European history of democracy, beginning with the old Viking age Ting electing kings, ending with a hereditary royal power in the 14th century, that in periods became more or less democratic depending on the general European trends. The current democratic regime is a product of a stable development of successively added democratic institutions introduced during the 19th century up to 1921, when women's suffrage was introduced. The Government of Sweden has adhered to parliamentarism — "de jure" since 1975, "de facto" since 1917.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Since the Great Depression, Swedish national politics has largely been dominated by the Social Democratic Workers' Party, which has held a plurality (and sometimes a majority) in the Swedish parliament since 1917. General elections are held every four years.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The Economist Intelligence Unit rated Sweden a "full democracy" its report for 2020. Sweden is also ranked a liberal democracy by the V-Dem Institute (2021) and scores 40/40 for protection of political rights according to Freedom House (2020).


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The Constitution of Sweden consists of four fundamental laws. The most important is the Instrument of Government of 1974 which sets out the basic principles of political life in Sweden, defining rights and freedoms. The Act of Succession is a treaty between the old Riksdag of the Estates and House of Bernadotte regulating their rights to accede to the Swedish throne. The constitution differs from most other Western countries in aspects such as having a unicameral parliament, limited municipal autonomy, and the lack of a supreme court with power to overturn legislature. Instead of checks and balances the executive power is entrusted to the politicians.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The prime minister of Sweden is nominated by the speaker of the Riksdag and elected through negative parliamentarism. In practice, this means that the prime minister nominee is confirmed if fewer than 175 members of parliament vote 'no', regardless of the number of 'yes' votes or abstentions.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Following a lengthy government formation process as a result of the general election held on 9 September 2018, Stefan Löfven of the Swedish Social Democratic Party was re-elected prime minister of Sweden for a second term by the new parliament on 18 January 2019, after initially being ousted by parliament. Together with the Green Party, Löfven presided over a minority government which relied on confidence and supply from the Centre Party and Liberals.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: In August 2021, Prime Minister Stefan Lofven announced his resignation and Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson was elected as the new head of Sweden's ruling Social Democrats in November 2021. On 30 November 2021, Magdalena Andersson became Sweden's first female prime minister. She formed a minority government made up of only her Social Democrats. Her plan for forming a new coalition government with the Green Party was unsuccessful because her budget proposal failed to pass.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: On 18 October 2022, Ulf Kristersson of the Moderate Party became the new Prime Minister of Sweden. Kristersson's Moderates formed a centre-right coalition with the Christian Democrats and the Liberals. The new government will be backed by the biggest right-wing party, Sweden Democrats (SD) led by Jimmie Akesson, meaning tougher immigration policies as a crucial part of a policy deal with the SD.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The highest executive authority of the state is vested in the government, which consists of a prime minister and roughly 22 ministers who head the ministries.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The ministers are appointed at the sole discretion of the prime minister. The prime minister is nominated by the speaker and appointed following a vote in the Riksdag itself. The monarch plays no part in this process. The only way to get rid of a government is through a motion of no confidence ("misstroendevotum") in the Riksdag. This motion must get a majority of the total number of votes in the Riksdag (at least 175). Another example of the power the legislature has given the government is the adoption of the budget in the Riksdag. The government's proposition to budget is adopted, unless a majority of the members of the Riksdag vote against it. This is to make it possible to govern even in minority.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The unicameral Riksdag has 349 members, popularly elected every four years. It is in session generally from September through mid-June.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Legislation may be initiated by the Cabinet or by members of the Riksdag. Members are elected on the basis of proportional representation for a four-year term. The Riksdag can alter the Constitution of Sweden, but only with approval by a supermajority and confirmation after the following general elections.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: The Swedish Social Democratic Party has played a leading political role since 1917, after Reformists confirmed their strength and the revolutionaries left the party. After 1932, the Cabinets have been dominated by the Social Democrats. Only five general elections (1976, 1979, 1991, 2006 and 2010) have given the centre-right bloc enough seats in the Riksdag to form a government. This is considered one reason for the Swedish post-war welfare state, with a government expenditure of slightly more than 50% of the gross domestic product.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: A general election is held alongside local and regional elections every four years. The last election was held on 11 September 2022.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Swedish law, drawing on Germanic, Roman, and Anglo-American law, is neither as codified as in France and other countries influenced by the Napoleonic Code, nor as dependent on judicial practice and precedents as in the United States.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Government policy is carried out by the administrative authorities ("förvaltningsmyndigheter") and government agencies of Sweden. These bodies are state-controlled and are formally headed by government-appointed directors-general but act independently from the executive and legislative branches of government. Ministerial governance ("ministerstyre") is illegal; in accordance with 2 §, chapter 12 of the Instrument of Government, no member of the Riksdag or government may interfere in the day-to-day operation of an agency, nor in the outcome of individual cases.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Sweden has a history of strong political involvement by ordinary people through its "popular movements" ("folkrörelser"), the most notable being trade unions, the women's movement, the temperance movement, and – more recently – sports movement. Election turnout in Sweden has always been high in international comparisons, although it has declined in recent decades, and is around 87%, (87.18% in the general election of 2018).


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Some Swedish political figures that have become known worldwide include Joe Hill, Carl Skoglund, Raoul Wallenberg, Folke Bernadotte, Dag Hammarskjöld, Olof Palme, Carl Bildt, Hans Blix, and Anna Lindh.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: According to a survey investigation by the sociologist Jenny Hansson, Swedish national parliamentarians have an average work week of 66 hours, including side responsibilities. Hansson's investigation further reports that the average Swedish national parliamentarian sleeps 6.5 hours per night.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Sweden is divided into 21 counties. In each county there is a county administrative board and a county council. Each county contains several municipalities, in total 290. Stockholm is the capital of Sweden. The king, the Riksdag and the government have their permanent seat in Stockholm. Up to 1968 when the Overgovernor's Office was incorporated into Stockholm County, it had a special status.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: As of the 1974 constitutional revision, the number of municipal divisions was reduced from several thousand to 290, while also removing most of the previous lol enjoyed by the municipal governments (such as local laws, local law enforcement, and more).


title: Politics of Sweden

text: After the 1973 oil crisis, the energy politics were determined to become less dependent on the import of petroleum. Since then, electricity has been generated mostly from hydropower and nuclear power. Sweden wants to be independent of petroleum use by 2020. The Three Mile Island accident (United States) prompted the Swedish parliament in 1980 after a referendum to decide that no further nuclear power plants should be built and that a nuclear power phase-out should be completed by 2010. Following the recommendation of the 1980 referendum, two nuclear power reactors were closed by government decision in 1999 and 2005, respectively. However, in February 2009, the Swedish centre-right wing government announced that new nuclear power stations may be constructed if they replace old ones, thus ending the previous de facto phase out policy.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: , the use of renewables amounted to 26% of the energy supply in Sweden, most important being hydropower and biomass. In 2003, electricity from hydropower accounted for 53 TWh and 40% of the country's production of electricity with nuclear power delivering 65 TWh (49%). At the same time, the use of biofuels, peat etc. produced 13 TWh of electricity. Sweden was the highest ranked country in the Climate Change Performance Index until 2022, when it was displaced by Denmark.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: In March 2005, an opinion poll showed that 83% supported maintaining or increasing nuclear power. Since then however, reports about radioactive leakages at a nuclear waste store in Forsmark, Sweden, have been published. This does not seem to have changed the public support of continued use of nuclear power.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Throughout the 20th century, Swedish foreign policy was based on the principle of non-alignment in peacetime, neutrality in wartime. This principle has often been criticised in Sweden, allegedly being a facade, claiming that the Swedish government had an advanced collaboration with western countries within NATO.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: During Cold War era politics, Sweden was not under the Warsaw Pact and received only minimal aid from the Marshall Plan. In 1952, a Swedish DC-3 was shot down over the Baltic Sea while gathering reconnaissance. It was later revealed that the plane had been shot down by the Soviet Union. Another plane, a Catalina search and rescue craft, was sent out a few days later and shot down by Soviets warplanes as well.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Sweden is also very active in international peace efforts, especially through the United Nations, and in support to the Third World.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: In 1995 Sweden, together with Finland and Austria, joined the European Union which extended the number of member countries from 12 to 15. Membership and its issues are among the most important questions in Swedish politics. Apart from the European Union, Sweden is also an active member of the United Nations and several other organisations such as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and International Monetary Fund.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: In May 2022, Sweden formally applied to join the NATO alliance. The public opinion in the Nordic region had changed in favour of joining NATO since Russia's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine.


title: Politics of Sweden

text: Soon after his appointment in October 2022, new foreign minister, Tobias Billström, announced that Sweden will renounce "feminist foreign policy", implemented by the previous left-wing government.


title: Crime in Japan

text: The yakuza existed in Japan well before the 1800s and followed codes similar to the samurai. Their early operations were usually close-knit, and the leader and his subordinates had father-son relationships. Although this traditional arrangement continues to exist, yakuza activities are increasingly replaced by modern types of gangs that depend on force and money as organizing concepts. Nonetheless, yakuza often picture themselves as saviors of traditional Japanese virtues in postwar society, sometimes forming ties with traditionalist groups espousing the same views and attracting citizens not satisfied with society.


title: Crime in Japan

text: Yakuza groups in 1990 were estimated to number more than 3,300 and together contained more than 88,000 members. Although concentrated in the largest urban prefectures, yakuza operate in most cities and often receive protection from high-ranking officials. After concerted police pressure in the 1960s, smaller gangs either disappeared or began to consolidate in syndicate-type organizations. In 1990, three large syndicates (Yamaguchi-gumi, Sumiyoshi-kai, Inagawa-kai) dominated organized crime in the nation and controlled more than 1,600 gangs and 42,000 gangsters. Their number has since swelled and shrunk, often coinciding with economic conditions.


title: Crime in Japan

text: The yakuza tradition also spread to the Okinawa Island in the 20th century. The Kyokuryu-kai and the Okinawa Kyokuryu-kai are the two largest known yakuza groups in Okinawa Prefecture and both have been registered as designated bōryokudan groups under the Organized Crime Countermeasures Law since 1992.


title: Crime in Japan

text: Beginning in 2013, the National Police Agency re-classified the Chinese Dragons, Kanto Rengo, and "bōsōzoku" biker gangs as "pseudo-yakuza" organizations.


title: Crime in Japan

text: In 1989 Japan experienced 1.3 robberies and 1.1 murders per 100,000 population. In the same year, Japanese authorities solved 75.9% of robberies and 95.9% of homicides.


title: Crime in Japan

text: In 1990 the police identified over 2.2 million Penal Code violations. Two types of violations — larceny (65.1 percent of total violation) and negligent homicide or injury as a result of accidents (26.2%) — accounted for over 90 percent of criminal offenses.


title: Crime in Japan

text: In 2002, the number of crimes recorded was 2,853,739. This number decreased to less than one-third by 2017 with 915,042 crimes being recorded. In 2013, the overall crime rate in Japan fell for the 11th straight year and the number of murders and attempted murders also fell to a postwar low.


title: Crime in Japan

text: According to the 2013 UNODC statistics, Japan's rate of intentional homicide per 100,000 population was one of the lowest in the world at 0.3 per 100,000 inhabitants.


title: Crime in Japan

text: Of particular concern to the police are crimes associated with modernization. Increased wealth and technological sophistication has brought new white collar crimes, such as computer and credit card fraud, larceny involving coin dispensers, and insurance fraud. Incidence of drug abuse is minuscule, compared with other industrialized nations and limited mainly to stimulants. Japanese law enforcement authorities endeavor to control this problem by extensive coordination with international investigative organizations and stringent punishment of Japanese and foreign offenders. Traffic accidents and fatalities consume substantial law enforcement resources. There is also evidence of foreign criminals traveling from overseas to take advantage of Japan's lax security. In his autobiography "Undesirables", English criminal Colin Blaney stated that English thieves have targeted the nation due to the low crime rate and because Japanese people are unprepared for crime. Pakistani, Russian, Sri Lankan, and Burmese car theft gangs have also been known to target the nation.


title: Crime in Japan

text: The Okinawan prefecture is home to 74% of all US bases in the country and around 26 thousand military personnel. This heavy military occupation is the cause of a rise in crime on the island. The prefecture saw from, 1972 to 2011, 5,747 criminal cases involving US military personnel, most often of a sexual nature, and often geared towards local high-school girls, whose main perpetrators were US military soldiers.


title: Crime in Japan

text: Local government and treaties, such as Status of Forces, turn a blind eye to crimes perpetrated by US forces, especially of this type and against women. Policies surrounding the punishment of these crimes and the protection of Okinawan women are few and far between, trials are most often handled by military court-martials, leading to unfair rulings. State-led initiatives did not offer much to help face and punish these aggressions, civilians took matters into their own hands, in 1995 a group of women-led protests of over 85,000 people in the capital of the prefecture and started their own organization to protect themselves from these crimes: the Okinawa Women Act Against Military Violence. International actions were taken that same year, following the subsequent political ruckus the organization created, the Special Action Committee of Okinawa with representatives from Washington, Okinawa, and Tokyo, decided on a referendum, whereby 21% of military occupied areas should be returned to Okinawa, in the hope of improving diplomatic relations.


title: Crime in Japan

text: As Okinawa's importance continues to increase, as political tensions in the region rise, further compromisation by the US military to improve diplomatic relations with the prefecture and Tokyo, through policies to protect Okinawan women, and punish military criminals, can be expected.


title: Crime in Japan

text: Japanese and foreign women and girls have been victims of sex trafficking in Japan. They are raped in brothels and other locations and experience physical and psychological trauma.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: Distributed Denial of Secrets, abbreviated DDoSecrets, is a non-profit whistleblower site for news leaks founded in 2018. Sometimes referred to as a successor to WikiLeaks, it is best known for its June 2020 publication of a large collection of internal police documents, known as BlueLeaks. The group has also published data on Russian oligarchs, fascist groups, shell companies, tax havens and banking in the Cayman Islands, as well as data scraped from Parler in January 2021 and from the February 2021 Gab leak. The group is also known for publishing emails from military officials, City Hall in Chicago and the Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police Department. , the site hosts dozens of terabytes of data from over 200 organizations.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: The site is a frequent source for other news outlets. The site's leaks have resulted in or contributed to multiple government investigations, including the second impeachment of President Donald J. Trump. During the Russo-Ukrainian War, they were considered one of the best public repositories of all the Russian files leaked since the invasion began.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: Distributed Denial of Secrets was founded by Emma Best, an American national security reporter known for filing prolific freedom of information requests, and another member of the group known as The Architect. According to Best, The Architect, who they already knew, approached them and expressed their desire to see a new platform for leaked and hacked materials, along with other relevant datasets. The Architect provided the initial technical expertise for the project. At its public launch in December 2018, the site held more than 1 terabyte of data from many of the highest-profile leaks. The site originally considered making all of the data public, but after feedback made some of it available only to journalists and researchers.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: Best has served as a public face of the group, which lists its members. In February 2019, they told "Columbia Journalism Review" there were fewer than 20 people working on the project. According to Best, several early members of the project were driven to radical transparency work by their past background with the state, which they compared to Chelsea Manning and other whistleblowers. In the February 2019 interview Best said, “Those associations all ended well prior to DDoSecrets coming together and were internally disclosed early on.” In April 2021, their website listed 10 members and advisors.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In December 2019, Distributed Denial of Secrets announced their collaboration with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. In May 2020, DDoSecrets partnered with European Investigative Collaborations and the Henri-Nannen-Journalistenschule journalism school. In June 2020, the DDoSecrets Twitter account was suspended in response to BlueLeaks, citing a breach of their policies against "distribution of hacked material" in a move that was criticized as setting a "dangerous precedent."


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In December 2020, the group announced their affiliation with Harvard University's Institute for Quantitative Social Science.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: DDoSecrets and the people behind the project have been described by "Wired" as a "transparency collective of data activists" and a successor to WikiLeaks, by the Congressional Research Service, Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, Human Rights Watch and "The Nation" as a "transparency collective", by "The Hill" as a "leaktivist collective", by "Columbia Journalism Review" as a "journalist collective", by Brookings Institution as "a WikiLeaks-style journalist collective," by the "New York Times" as a "watchdog group", and "Business Insider" as a "freedom-of-information advocacy group", as an "alternative to WikiLeaks" by "Columbia Journalism Review", "Krebs On Security", "ZDNet", and "Forbes," and as "the most influential leaking organization on the internet" by VICE News."


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In 2019, the Congressional Research Service recognized Distributed Denial of Secrets as a transparency collective. In 2020, the U.S. counterintelligence strategy described leaktivists and public disclosure organizations like Distributed Denial of Secrets as “significant threats,” alongside five countries, three terrorist groups, and “transnational criminal organizations.” A June 2020 bulletin created by the Department of Homeland Security's Office of Intelligence and Analysis described them as a "criminal hacker group". Elements of the report were challenged as inaccurate by media such as "The Verge".


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In December 2018, DDoSecrets listed a leak from Russia's Ministry of Internal Affairs, portions of which detailed the deployment of Russian troops to Ukraine at a time when the Kremlin was denying a military presence there. About half of the material from that leak was published in 2014; the other half emerged in 2016. WikiLeaks reportedly rejected a request to host the full cache of files in 2016, at a time when founder Julian Assange was focused on exposing Democratic Party documents passed to WikiLeaks by Kremlin hackers.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In January 2019, DDoSecrets published hundreds of gigabytes of hacked Russian documents and emails from pro-Kremlin journalists, oligarchs, and militias.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In November 2019, DDoSecrets published over 2 terabytes of data from the Cayman National Bank and Trust. The files were provided by the hacktivist known as Phineas Fisher, and included lists of the bank's politically exposed clients. The leak was used by researchers to study how elites use offshore banking. In December 2019, DDoSecrets published "#29 Leaks" in partnership with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. The 450 gigabytes of data came from Formations House (now The London Office), a "company mill" which registered and operated companies for clients included organized crime groups, state-owned oil companies, and fraudulent banks. The release was compared to both the Panama Papers and the Paradise Papers. Belgian tax authorities initiated an investigation based on the Cayman bank and Formations House leaks.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In December 2019, DDoSecrets published "PacoLeaks" and "MilicoLeaks": data from Chilean military police and military. PacoLeaks revealed police personnel data, extensive police files on activist groups and leaders, and evidence that the police had infiltrated activist groups MilicoLeaks included details on Chilean army intelligence, including operations, finance and international relations.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In 2020, DDoSecrets published a copy of the Bahamas corporate registry. DDoSecrets partnered with European Investigative Collaborations and the German Henri-Nannen-Schule journalism school to create the Tax Evader Radar, a project to review the dataset of almost one million documents. The project exposed the offshore holdings of prominent Germans, the tax activities of ExxonMobil, as well as offshore business entities belonging to the DeVos and Prince families.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In March 2020, DDoSecrets published 156 gigabytes of data hacked from the Myanmar Investment Commission. The leak also revealed how millions of dollars allegedly flowed from Mytel subscribers to Myanmar military generals, and exposed business dealings of family members of prominent military leaders.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In April 2020, DDoSecrets published almost 10million messages from more than 100 Discord servers used by neo-Nazi and QAnon conspiracy theorist groups. The leaked chats showed threats of violence and attempts to influence the 2018 United States midterm elections.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: On June 19, 2020, DDoSecrets released BlueLeaks, which consisted of 269 gigabytes of internal U.S. law enforcement data obtained from fusion centers by the hacker collective Anonymous. DDoSecrets called it the "largest published hack of American law enforcement agencies." Betsy Reed described BlueLeaks as the U.S. law enforcement equivalent to the Pentagon Papers.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In July 2020, DDoSecrets released documents relating to the United States' case against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The release also included chat logs and letters between Assange and various sources.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In January 2021, DDoSecrets made videos scraped from Parler available to journalists. Some of these videos were later used as evidence during the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In February 2021, DDoSecrets gave journalists access to hundreds of thousands of financial documents from the Myanmar Directorate of Investment and Company Administration (DICA). Justice For Myanmar called the release "biggest leak in Myanmar history."


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: On February 28, DDoSecrets revealed "GabLeaks", a collection of more than 70 gigabytes of data from Gab, including more than 40 million posts, passwords, private messages, and other leaked information. The group said that they would not release the data publicly because it contained a large amount of private and sensitive information, and instead shared the data with select journalists, social scientists, and researchers.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In April 2021, Distributed Denial of Secrets made donor information from the Christian crowdfunding site GiveSendGo available to journalists and researchers. The information identified previously anonymous high-dollar donors to far-right actors including members of the Proud Boys, many of whose fundraising efforts were directly related to the 2021 United States Capitol attack.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: Also in April 2021, DDoSecrets published a cache of emails from Chicago City Hall. The emails revealed that the city's handling of fatal shootings by police officers violates state law and a federal consent decree. The emails also exposed the Mayor's secret lobbying for qualified immunity, a secret drone program funded with off-the-books cash, and the city's problems with police chases and the George Floyd protests.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In May 2021, DDoSecrets republished the leak of Washington D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department, including over 90,000 emails. Among other things, the files revealed details of surveillance of right-wing extremists and the response to the 2021 United States Capitol attack.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In September 2021, DDoSecrets publicly released emails and chat logs from the American far-right Oath Keepers organization to the public. They also provided member and donor data to the press. This exposed hundreds of members in law enforcement, over a hundred members with ties to the military and dozens in political office.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In November 2021, DDoSecrets released 1.8 terabytes of police helicopter surveillance footage from the Dallas Police Department and the Georgia State Patrol.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: In February 2022, after many anonymous donors supported the 2022 Freedom Convoy, DDoSecrets began providing journalists and researchers with a hacked list of donors' personal information from GiveSendGo. Later that month, GiveSendGo was hacked again, exposing donors for every campaign in the site's history, which DDoSecrets gave to journalists and researchers.


title: Distributed Denial of Secrets

text: During the Russo-Ukrainian War, DDoSecrets published more than 40 datasets of Russian leaks, totaling at least 5.8 terabytes. Emma Best estimated that the group had published over six million Russian documents in under two months after the war began. "NBC News" reported that the site "might be the single best public repository of all the Russian files purportedly leaked since the start of the invasion", and "The Intercept" wrote that it had become the "de facto home" for Russian leaks.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: Charlotte, Princess Royal (Charlotte Augusta Matilda; 29 September 1766 – 5 October 1828), was Queen of Württemberg as the wife of King Frederick I. She was the eldest daughter and fourth child of King George III of the United Kingdom and his wife, Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: Princess Charlotte was born on 29 September 1766 at Buckingham House, London, to British monarch, King George III and Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. She was christened on 27 October 1766 at St James's Palace by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Secker, and her godparents were her paternal aunts Caroline Matilda and Louisa and Caroline Matilda's husband King Christian VII of Denmark. The Duke of Portland, Lord Chamberlain, and the Dowager Countess of Effingham, stood proxy for the King and Queen of Denmark.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: Charlotte was officially designated as Princess Royal on 22 June 1789. After the birth of three sons in a row, her parents were delighted to have a Princess in the nursery. Like all of her siblings, Charlotte was inoculated, in her case, in December 1768 along with her brother William. As the eldest daughter of the monarch, Charlotte was assumed to be destined for an important marriage on the continent, and her education was considered to be of the utmost importance, beginning when she was only eighteen months old. Since French was the official language in every European court, the little Princess was given a Frenchwoman to be her tutor, in order that she should have no accent. Her memory was another of her early subjects. She was taught to recite little verses and stories, and as a result had an almost uncanny ability to recall detail for the rest of her life. Her early childhood, however, was not only focused on scholarly pursuits. When she was almost three years old, she took part in her first tableau dressed like Columbine, where she danced with her seven-year-old brother George, Prince of Wales. She was not a naturally musical child and later abhorred such displays of children, declaring that they made children vain and self-important. This did not stop her parents from continuing to show her off. In late 1769, she and the Prince of Wales were once again displayed, this time to the public in a "junior drawing room" in St James's Palace. Charlotte was dressed in a Roman toga and lay on a sofa. Though this type of thing was common in German courts, it was considered vulgar in England, where in reaction a London mob drove a hearse into the Palace courtyard. Afterwards, the Prince of Wales told Lady Mary Coke that the whole event had made Charlotte "terribly tired". Wisely, the King and Queen decided to never repeat the experience.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: Though she was the eldest daughter, Charlotte was constantly compared to her sister Augusta Sophia, only two years younger than she. When Augusta was a month old, Lady Mary Coke called her "the most beautiful baby I have ever seen" while Charlotte was "very plain". Passing judgement once again three years later, Charlotte was now "the most sensible agreeable child I ever saw, but in my opinion far from pretty" while Augusta was still "rather pretty". Although the Princess Royal was never as beautiful as her younger sister, she did not share in Augusta's primary flaw: painful shyness. Charlotte also had a stammer that her attendant Mary Dacres tried to help her young charge manage. In 1770, the cluster of the three eldest princesses was completed with the birth of Princess Elizabeth, the seventh child. For the time being the family remained comparatively small (there were fifteen royal children in all), and Charlotte was fortunate in having parents who preferred spending time with their numerous children to spending all their time at court and took her education seriously. However, given the frequency with which children were being produced and the troubles that plagued George III's reign, Charlotte's childhood was not as utopian as her parents planned it to be.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: Like her siblings, the Princess Royal was educated by tutors and spent most her childhood at Buckingham House, Kew Palace, and Windsor Castle, where her wet nurse was Frances, wife of James Muttlebury.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: On 18 May 1797, the Princess Royal was married at the Chapel Royal, St James's Palace, London, to Frederick, Hereditary Prince of Württemberg, the eldest son and heir apparent of Frederick II Eugene, Duke of Württemberg and his wife, Margravine Sophia Dorothea of Brandenburg-Schwedt.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: The younger Frederick succeeded his father as the reigning Duke of Württemberg on 22 December 1797. Duke Frederick II had two sons and two daughters by his first marriage to the late Princess Augusta (3 December 1764 – 27 September 1788), the daughter of Duke Karl II of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and Princess Augusta of Great Britain (the elder sister of George III) and thus Charlotte's first cousin; Princess Augusta was also the elder sister of Caroline of Brunswick, the estranged wife of the future George IV (then Prince of Wales). The marriage between Duke Frederick and the Princess Royal produced one child: a stillborn daughter on 27 April 1798.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: In 1800, the French army occupied Württemberg and the Duke and Duchess fled to Vienna. The following year, Duke Frederick concluded a private treaty that ceded Montbéliard to France and brought him Ellwangen in exchange two years later. He assumed the title Elector of Württemberg on 25 February 1803. In exchange for providing France with a large auxiliary force, Napoleon recognized the Elector as King of Württemberg on 26 December 1805. Electress Charlotte became queen when her husband formally ascended the throne on 1 January 1806 and was crowned as such on the same day at Stuttgart, Germany.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: Württemberg seceded from the Holy Roman Empire and joined Napoleon's Confederation of the Rhine. However, the newly elevated king's alliance with France technically made him the enemy of his father-in-law, George III. George III, incensed by his son-in-law's assumption of the title and his role as one of Napoleon's most devoted vassals, accordingly refused to address his daughter as "Queen of Württemberg" in correspondence. In 1813, King Frederick changed sides and went over to the Allies, where his status as the brother-in-law of the Prince Regent (later George IV) helped his standing. After the fall of Napoleon, he attended the Congress of Vienna and was confirmed as king. He died in October 1816.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: The Dowager Queen of Württemberg continued to live at the Ludwigsburg Palace, near Stuttgart, and received visits from her younger siblings, the Duke of Kent, the Duke of Sussex, the Duke of Cambridge, the Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg, and Princess Augusta Sophia. She was a godmother (by proxy) at the christening of her niece, Princess Victoria of Kent (the future Queen Victoria), in 1819.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: In 1827, Charlotte would return to Britain for the first time since her wedding in 1797. By that time, the sixty years old princess was very heavy and wanted to have surgery for dropsy in England. Steam propulsion had just been introduced on the Rhine, and ensured that the voyage back home would be convenient. On 31 May she embarked on the new steamboat "Friedrich Wilhelm". After descending the Rhine the steamboat arrived at Bath on the Western Scheldt. Due to her weight, Charlotte had to be lifted aboard "Royal Sovereign" on a chair that was hoisted. Due to bad weather, "Royal Sovereign" then had to leave Bath, and anchor near Vlissingen. On 5 June Charlotte was in Greenwich.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: In London, Charlotte resided at St James's Palace. Here she had made many visits from her family, and as a royal she was also introduced to the authorities. The king made a final goodbye visit from Windsor Castle on 6 October. On Tuesday 9 October Charlotte left England on board "Royal Sovereign", but a storm forced her back into Harwich. On the 14th, "Royal Sovereign" anchored before Klundert on the Hollands Diep. After spending the night on board, Charlotte embarked on the steamboat "Stad Nijmegen". On 19 October she arrived in Frankfurt, where she met the king and queen of Württemberg and the Duke of Cambridge. On 24 October she was back at Ludwigsburg Palace.


title: Charlotte, Princess Royal

text: As a daughter of the sovereign, Charlotte had use of the arms of the kingdom, differenced by a "label argent of three points, the centre point bearing a rose gules, the outer points each bearing a cross gules".


title: United States Secretary of the Air Force

text: The secretary of the Air Force, sometimes referred to as the secretary of the Department of the Air Force, (SecAF, or SAF/OS) is the head of the Department of the Air Force and the service secretary for the United States Air Force and United States Space Force. The secretary of the Air Force is a civilian appointed by the president, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate. The secretary reports to the secretary of defense and/or the deputy secretary of defense, and is by statute responsible for and has the authority to conduct all the affairs of the Department of the Air Force.


text: The secretary works closely with their civilian deputy, the under secretary of the Air Force; and their military deputies, the chief of staff of the Air Force and the chief of space operations.


text: The first secretary of the Air Force, Stuart Symington, was sworn in on September 18, 1947, upon the split and re-organization of the Department of War and Army Air Forces into an air military department and a military service of its own, with the enactment of the National Security Act.


text: On July 26, 2021 the United States Senate confirmed Frank Kendall III as the next Secretary of the Air Force. On July 28, 2021, Kendall was sworn in as the 26th Secretary of the Air Force.


text: The secretary is the head of the Department of the Air Force. The Department of the Air Force is defined as a "Military Department". It is not limited to the Washington headquarters staffs, rather it is an entity which includes all the components of the United States Air Force and United States Space Force, including their reserve components:


text: The exclusive responsibilities of the secretary of the Air Force are enumerated in of the United States Code. They include, but are not limited to:


text: By direction of the secretary of defense, the secretary of the Air Force assigns military units of the Air Force and Space Force, other than those who carry out the functions listed in , to the Unified and Specified Combatant Commands to perform missions assigned to those commands. Air Force and Space Force units while assigned to Combatant Commands may only be reassigned by authority of the secretary of defense.


text: However, the chain of command for Air Force and Space Force units for other purposes than the operational direction goes from the "president" to the "secretary of defense" to the "secretary of the Air Force" to the "commanders of Air Force and Space Force Commands". Air Force and Space Force officers have to report on any matter to the secretary, or the secretary's designate, when requested. The secretary has the authority to detail, prescribe the duties, and to assign Air Force and Space Force service members and civilian employees, and may also change the title of any activity not statutorily designated. The secretary has several responsibilities under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) with respect to Air Force and Space Force service members, including the authority to convene general courts martial and to commute sentences.


text: The secretary of the Air Force may also be assigned additional responsibilities by the president or the secretary of defense, e.g. the secretary is designated as the ""DoD Executive Agent for Space"", and as such:


text: The secretary of the Air Force's principal staff element, the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force, has responsibility for acquisition and auditing, comptroller issues (including financial management), inspector general matters, legislative affairs, and public affairs within the Department of the Air Force. The Office of the Secretary of the Air Force is one of the Department of the Air Force's three headquarter staffs at the seat of government, with the others being the Air Staff and the Office of the Chief of Space Operations.


title: Incretin

text: Incretins are a group of metabolic hormones that stimulate a decrease in blood glucose levels. Incretins are released after eating and augment the secretion of insulin released from pancreatic beta cells of the islets of Langerhans by a blood-glucose–dependent mechanism.


title: Incretin

text: Some incretins (GLP-1) also inhibit glucagon release from the alpha cells of the islets of Langerhans. In addition, they slow the rate of absorption of nutrients into the blood stream by reducing gastric emptying and may directly reduce food intake. The two main candidate molecules that fulfill criteria for an incretin are the intestinal peptides glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) and gastric inhibitory peptide (GIP, also known as: glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide). Both GLP-1 and GIP are rapidly inactivated by the enzyme dipeptidyl peptidase-4 (DPP-4). Both GLP-1 and GIP are members of the glucagon peptide superfamily.


title: Incretin

text: Several long-lasting GLP-1 analogs having insulinotropic activity have been developed, and several, including dulaglutide (Trulicity), exenatide (Byetta), liraglutide (Victoza), semaglutide (Ozempic, Wegovy and Rybelsus) and exenatide extended-release (Bydureon), have been approved for use in the U.S.


title: Incretin

text: Another approach is to inhibit DPP-4, the enzyme that inactivates GLP-1 and GIP. Several DPP-4 inhibitors that can be taken orally as tablets have been developed.


title: Incretin

text: The incretin effect describes the phenomenon whereby oral glucose intake elicits a higher insulin response compared to intravenously introduced glucose that produces the same levels of serum glucose levels.


title: Incretin

text: In 1932, Belgian physiologist Jean La Barre used the word "incretin" for a gut hormone, which stimulates the endocrine pancreas including insulin release. He also proposed that such incretins could be used as a treatment for diabetes mellitus.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Rémy Cabella (born 8 March 1990) is a French professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder for Ligue 1 club Lille.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: He had two spells each at Montepellier and Saint-Étienne, winning the Ligue 1 title with the former in 2011–12. He also represented Arles-Avignon, Marseille and Lille in the top flight, making over 200 total appearances and scoring over 50 goals. He also played for Newcastle United in the Premier League and Krasnodar in the Russian Premier League.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Cabella was born in Ajaccio, Corsica, to an Italian father and a Corsican mother. He started his youth career at local club Gazélec Ajaccio before joining Montpellier's academy at the age of 14, winning the 2009 Coupe Gambardella with their under-19 team.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Cabella signed a three-year professional contract with Montpellier in July 2009. He injured the cruciate ligament in his right knee during training in September and was ruled out for the season.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: He was sent on loan to Arles-Avignon for the 2010–11 Ligue 1 season, where he scored three goals in 17 league appearances.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Cabella signed a two-year extension to his contract in January 2012, which would keep him at the club til 2016. In a 1–0 win over Brest on 4 February 2012, Cabella struck a volley from a cross that struck the back of his teammate Geoffrey Dernis and went into the opposition's net for a goal. Cabella was credited with the assist. On 11 February 2012, in a 3–0 victory over AC Ajaccio, Cabella scored with a right-footed shot across Ajaccio's goalkeeper after being put away by Olivier Giroud. On 20 May 2012, Montpellier won the league title for the first time in its history.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: On 13 July 2014, Cabella signed for Premier League club Newcastle United on a six-year contract, for a reported £8 million transfer fee. He made his competitive debut on 17 August as Newcastle began the season with a 2–0 defeat at home to Manchester City, playing the full 90 minutes. Cabella's only Newcastle goal came on 31 January 2015, opening a 3–0 win away at Hull City. He was subsequently awarded Player of the Month for January by Newcastle fans. During his time with Newcastle, Cabella made 34 appearances in all competitions, scoring just one goal.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: On 19 August 2015, Cabella returned to France, signing with Ligue 1 side Marseille on a season-long loan as part of a deal that saw Florian Thauvin transfer to Newcastle. He made his club debut on four days later, starting in the 6–0 Ligue 1 home victory over Troyes. he scored his first goal for Marseille on 3 December in a 1–0 win over Rennes, and another goal three days later in a 2–2 draw with his former team Montpellier.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Although Cabella's loan spell at Marseille had ended, he spent the pre-season with the French club, appearing in some friendly matches. On 11 August 2016, Newcastle announced that Cabella's loan switch to Marseille had become permanent ahead of the 2016–17 season. On 1 March 2017, he scored two goals to level the score twice (to 2–2 and 3–3) in a 4–3 extra-time home loss to Monaco in a 2016–17 Coupe de France round of 16 match.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: On 31 August 2017, Cabella joined Saint-Étienne on a season-long loan. He made his debut ten days later, scoring in the first minute of a 1–1 home draw with Angers.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: On 16 August 2018, Cabella joined Saint-Étienne permanently on a four-year contract. The following 5 May, he scored a goal and provided two assists in the 3–2 away win over Monaco, reaching 50 Ligue 1 goals.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: On 25 July 2019, Cabella joined Russian club FC Krasnodar for a fee of €12 million. He made his debut on 3 August in a 1–1 draw at FC Zenit St Peterburg, being substituted for Magomed-Shapi Suleymanov after 58 minutes. On 21 August 2019, in the first leg Champions League qualifier against Olympiacos, he suffered an ACL rupture.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Cabella missed almost a year during recovery, making his return appearance for Krasnodar on 1 July 2020 in a match against FC Rostov. The 2019–20 Russian Premier League season had been extended due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Russia.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Cabella scored twice in Krasnodar's first league game of the season, a 3–0 victory at FC Ufa on 9 August 2020.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: In September, Cabella scored in each leg of Krasnodar's play-off round 4–2 aggregate win against PAOK for qualification to the group stage of the UEFA Champions League. It was the first time ever that the club had qualified for the group stage of Europe's premier knock-out competition. Cabella missed the first group stage match of the competition away to Rennes on 20 October as he was forced to self-isolate following a positive COVID-19 test. He scored his side's goal in their 1–1 draw away to group winners Chelsea in the final match of the group stage, having already been parachuted to the Europa League Round of 32.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: On 3 March 2022, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Krasnodar announced that Cabella's contract was suspended and he will not train with the team, but it was not terminated and remained valid. Six days later, it was terminated by mutual consent.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: On 6 April 2022, Cabella returned to Montpellier until the end of the season. On 10 July, Lille announced his arrival on a free transfer, on a one-year contract, with an option to extend for another year.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Between 2010 and 2012, Cabella played seventeen times for the France national under-21 football team, scoring four goals.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: As well as the French national side, Cabella also qualified for the non-FIFA affiliated team of Corsica. He made his début for the team in 2011 against Bulgaria. He was again called up to the "Squadra Corsa" in 2016, while at Marseille, to face the Basque Country. He started the match, playing the full 90 minutes. On 2 June 2019, he equalised in a 1–1 draw away to neighbours Sardinia.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: Cabella was named on the stand-by list for France's 2014 FIFA World Cup squad. He made his international debut coming on as an 80th-minute substitute for Yohan Cabaye in a 4–0 friendly match win over Norway on 28 May 2014 at the Stade de France. On 6 June, Cabella replaced the injured Franck Ribéry in France's 2014 World Cup squad. The team lost to Germany in the quarter-finals on 4 July, and Cabella did not enter the field of play in all of their five matches in that tournament.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: After signing for Newcastle, Cabella picked up three more caps for France in September and October 2014, in friendly matches against Spain, Serbia, and Armenia.


title: Rémy Cabella

text: A profile of Cabella by Simon Osborn of "Metro" in 2013 described him as a "fast, agile and creative midfielder who can play on the wing or behind a striker".


title: Mekhi Becton

text: Mekhi Becton (born April 18, 1999) is an American football offensive tackle for the New York Jets of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football at Louisville and was selected by the Jets in the first round of the 2020 NFL Draft.


title: Mekhi Becton

text: Becton attended Highland Springs High School in Richmond, Virginia. He was regarded as a three-star prospect, ranked as the No. 43 offensive tackle and No. 405 overall recruit in the 247Sports Composite. Becton was recruited by 31 schools to play football, but by February 1, 2017, National Signing Day, he had narrowed the choice to five schools: Louisville, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Michigan, and Oregon. While he had been heavily recruited by Virginia, he ultimately chose Louisville on signing day.


title: Mekhi Becton

text: Becton played as a freshman in the 2017 season. During his freshman year, Becton played in 13 games and started 11 for the Cardinals at the tackle position. During the first 4 games of the season, Becton was the highest rated freshman in the country by Pro Football Focus, and during the 7 he was the best pass-blocker in the ACC, allowing only 6 pressures in 312 snaps.


title: Mekhi Becton

text: Becton was named a starting tackle for the 2018 season and started every game, bringing his total number of games started to 23 by the end of the season. Becton was again named a starting tackle for the 2019 season. He received first team All-ACC honors after the conclusion of the regular season. Becton decided to forgo his senior season and sit out Louisville's bowl game, and declared for the 2020 NFL Draft.


title: Mekhi Becton

text: On September 12, 2021, Becton suffered an apparent knee injury and was carted off the field. It was revealed that Becton had suffered cartilage damage, which required surgery, putting him out for 4–6 weeks. He was placed on injured reserve on September 14, 2021.


title: Mekhi Becton

text: On August 8, 2022, during training camp, Becton was diagnosed with an avulsion fracture of his right kneecap. Eight days later, the Jets placed him on injured reserve.


title: Rupert Spira

text: Rupert Spira (1960) is an English spiritual teacher, philosopher and author of the Direct Path based in Oxford, UK.


title: Rupert Spira

text: Just prior to beginning his formal spiritual exploration, Spira attended an exhibition by the studio potter Michael Cardew at Camberwell Arts Centre in London. Spira’s encounter with the arts and spiritual traditions inspired him to abandon the scientific path he was on and begin his art studies with Henry Hammond at West Surrey College of Art and Design in 1997 and take an apprenticeship with Michael Cardew, then aged eighty, at Wenford Bridge Pottery from 1980 to 1982.  Spira graduated from West Surrey College of Art and Design with a BA in 1983.


title: Rupert Spira

text: In 1984, Spira opened his own studio at Lower Froyle in Hampshire, then moved his studio to Shropshire in 1996. Spira’s pieces can be found in private and public collections around the world.


title: Rupert Spira

text: Spira's early wheel-based pottery work reflected these early influences being in a very traditional Bernard Leach utilitarian style. This work is mostly practical in nature, taking the form of teapots, vases, vessels, plates and other culinary ware.


title: Rupert Spira

text: In 1996, he set up his own pottery at Church Farm in Shropshire where his style changed from a functional to a more minimalist, finer, more complex style ranging in size from miniature to large-scale. While he continues to make and sell functional pottery he is now known for this more recent studio pottery. His best and most recognizable work contains poems, both self-written and by Kathleen Raine the celebrated British poet. The poems are either scratched into the glaze in the sgraffito style or written as embossed letters either in a square block or in a single line across the surface of the vessel. These works vary in size from small prayer bowls only a few centimetres across through to huge, open bowls 50 cm or more in diameter. He is also known for his cylinders which are often made as part of a series and while each stands alone, are meant to be exhibited as a group. These also vary in scale from a few centimetres high through to the largest being a meter or more tall. He works in a limited palette, mainly simple white, off-white and black monochromes but he does also occasionally make deep, red-glazed bowls and bright yellow tea sets.


title: Rupert Spira

text: Spira's considers that his spiritual journey started on reading the poetry of Rumi at age fifteen. Following in his parents' footsteps, he studied at Colet House, London under Dr Francis Roles, himself a student of mystic-philosophers Ouspensky and Gurdjieff and the mantra meditation of Swami Shantananda Saraswati. This also led him to an interest in classical Advaita (non-duality) while he also continued to investigate Sufism through the art of Mevlevi Turning, a form of sacred movement combining prayer and meditation. He also read teachings of Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj and Ramana Maharshi and, in the late 1970s he attended Krishnamurti’s last meetings at Brockwood Park.


title: Rupert Spira

text: In the mid-1990s meetings with Robert Adams and Francis Lucille led Spira to the Direct Path teachings of Atmananda Krishna Menon which forms the basis of his own 'no-nonsense' Direct Path approach to spiritual awakening.


title: Rupert Spira

text: In essence Spira teaches that ‘The greatest discovery in life is that our essential nature does not share the limits or the destiny of the body and mind'. He suggests that a form of happiness, a satisfying if unexotic 'enlightenment', can be found if one can identify with the I that lies behind the imagined I of feelings and thoughts.


title: Tableau vivant

text: A ' (; often shortened to '; plural: ), French for "living picture", is a static scene containing one or more actors or models. They are stationary and silent, usually in costume, carefully posed, with props and/or scenery, and may be theatrically lit. It thus combines aspects of theatre and the visual arts.


title: Tableau vivant

text: A tableau may either be 'performed' live, or depicted in painting, photography and sculpture, such as in many works of the Romantic, Aesthetic, Symbolist, Pre-Raphaelite, and Art Nouveau movements.


title: Tableau vivant

text: In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, tableaux sometimes featured ('flexible poses') by virtually nude models, providing a form of erotic entertainment, both on stage and in print.


title: Tableau vivant

text: Tableaux continue to the present day in the form of living statues, street performers who busk by posing in costume.