Welcome back to Behind the Glass. In this final episode for season two, we sat down with the team here at Sportsman to talk about the Sportsman design language.


The attacks on Belgorod left Russia with a difficult choice. The Russian leadership is facing a dilemma due to the actions of underground resistance forces near the Russian border town of Shebekino. It is whether to deploy additional forces to the front line or strengthen its border's defence, as the British Defence Intelligence believes. The report points out that on the 1st of June, resistance forces calling themselves the Russian Volunteer Corps and the Freedom of Russia Legion broke into the territory of the Russian Belgorod Oblast for the second time in the last 10 days. At the same time, a drone hit the Russian city of Belgorod 35 km from the border. The evacuation of Russian civilians from the border town of Shebekino began after the Ukrainian attacks. The UK Ministry of Defence notes that this time, Russian security forces apparently managed to contain the raiders more quickly than in the previous one. At the same time, as the Russian Ministry of Defence admitted in its own press release, they had to deploy the entire range of heavy equipment on their own territory, including attack helicopters and the TOS-1A flamethrower system. Russian commanders now face an acute dilemma of whether to strengthen defences in Russia's border regions or reinforce their lines in occupied Ukraine. The UK Defence Intelligence stated.


And another one. What's up people? Manu here coming to you with a video. This time we're going to be unboxing and Also reviewing an everyday item That is a must-have In a kitchen a bathroom or in any wardrobe that item being Even in They're really popular movie hitchhiker guide to the galaxy the thing that they say is don't forget to bring a towel With a further ado pretty straight forward first of all pretty nice packaging I think this can be used if you're going camping hiking that way your towels are staying dry pretty nifty designing idea Ziploc design that way nothing Gets wet if you've been camping if you're going hiking the value of Really good dry towels can be experienced when you're soaking wet and you're freezing. This is the manufacturer's name And it's made of fine cotton. So it is ultra absorbent and very nice and soft It is not like one of those microfiber Towels it is a really good cotton towel and as far as The length is concerned. It's about three feet. Actually, it's about three feet by one feet Very soft very soft and subtle to touch Definitely a good purchase can be used in the bathroom can be used in the kitchen My me personally I'm going to be putting it in my bug out bag Just because I go camping quite a bit having Ziploc bag in which the towels can be dry Definitely comes in handy. Not only that in the state of Florida We do get head by severe weather. So when you're drenched when you're soaked once you are in a Shelter, you definitely want to have a towel in your backpack. And this is the product UPC code You can pick that up if you like Overall definitely a really good purchase Definitely a must-have for any household and a must-have travel and camping accessories Really a big thumbs up for me as always Thank you so much for watching and I will see you guys and girls on the next video. Take care people. Bye


This time, we're going to look at what happens when we have a couple of simple crosstalk faults. A stuck-at-zero or a stuck-at-one fault occurs when you have some crosstalk between wires. We've got all sorts of wires that are running all over the place. And if two of them are too close together, then there may be some leakage between them. A stuck-at-one or a stuck-at-zero fault occurs when that leakage is fixed to a specific logical value, sort of like it would be with a power line. The power always has a constant voltage, so that would be interpreted as having a constant logical value. In this case, the result is that some line gets stuck at either the value of zero or one. We'd like to be able to detect when this happens and also determine whether or not our processor is still usable. So for our first example, we'll consider what would happen if the source register one field had bit zero stuck. So this is the least significant bit in this field. This is the five bits that are coming in on our RS field. And we're going to say that the least significant bit there is always stuck at zero or always stuck at one. And we're going to look at what happens. If we begin with the case where this value is stuck at zero, then that will tell me that I can only put in even numbered registers for source one. I can't get any odd numbered registers because those would require that I assert that least significant bit. That's the plus one bit, so that's the one that's going to convert any even number into an odd number. I can detect this by using an operation that has two potential inputs, where the input that I'll get from either of those registers will be different depending on what I get. So I might start by setting the value of, say, register one, the assembler temporary to the value of one, and then doing a simple add instruction. Now I could read off the value of t zero. If t zero is one, then my operation completed successfully. I had one in a t, I have zero and register zero, so one plus zero should give me one. But if I have a stuck at zero fault here, this assembler temporary would turn into another dollar zero. That least significant bit would get changed, so instead of referencing register dollar at, it would end up referencing dollar zero for the first source register. Then zero plus zero would be zero, and I'd be able to detect that I had the stuck at zero fault. Now if I had a stuck at one fault instead, then the least significant bit going into source one would always be odd, and in this case I could do about the same thing to check for this. I can put one into my assembler temporary again, and then add register dollar zero to register dollar zero. If the hardware is working properly, zero plus zero gives me zero, and I end up with zero and t zero. But if it's not, then the least significant bit in this register zero gets set to the value of one. That means that this hardware would then be looking at register one instead of register zero, so it would pull in the one from the assembler temporary, and then one plus zero would give me one. So now we'd probably like to know if this hardware is still usable if we have either the stuck at zero or the stuck at one fault. So in this case, having a stuck at zero or a stuck at one fault means that I'm not going to be able to access half of my registers as the first source register. At first this seems like it might not be too big of a problem. It means I can't access half of my registers as the first source, but I could always use them as the second source. But we should also consider instructions that only use the RS field as a source register. So is this a problem if perhaps a load word instruction can only access even numbered registers or odd numbered registers? That doesn't seem to be too big of an issue. We can just make sure that their data is an even numbered register or an odd numbered register. What if we want to implement a return instruction? So normally I'd have jump register $RA, but $RA is always an odd numbered register. Can I get around that? If I can only access odd numbered registers, then I don't have any problem. If I can only access even numbered registers, then I can't just pull the address out of the $RA register. But I could perhaps put it into a different register. Maybe I can stick it into $8. So in that case I could do an add instruction where my second source is the return address. And I'm just copying it over to t0 because I know I can access t0 from source 1. So in this case it doesn't look like it's going to be a problem whether I can only access even numbered registers or odd numbered registers. But that's not always going to be the case.


All right, everybody, welcome back to the channel for those of you who are new around here and just tuning in for the first time. My name is Michael, aka Dr. Cellini, and I'm an interventional radiologist based out of New Jersey. We probably saw by the title that I lost $250,000 and that's partly true. I didn't lose it per se, but I did go in debt for $250,000 and you probably know why if you've been around my channel for a little bit now. So on today's video, we're going to be talking about student debt and student loans and more specifically, medical student debt. And make sure you watch till the end because I will be talking about my student debt and how I plan on paying it off now that I am an attending physician. So let's get into the video. All right, so before I get into this video, I just want to give a quick disclaimer because this is not financial advice. Do not take all this information completely as it is. I just did a little bit of research. This is what I think. This is my process of handling student loans. This is not financial advice. Do not take financial advice from some random guy on YouTube. Do your own research. So with that being said, let's get into the video. All right, so now that we got that disclaimer out of the way, let's go ahead and talk a little bit about student debt and like I said, more specifically on medical student debt. I'm going to read a few statistics here that I found on educationdata.org. So this says as of 2021, 76 to 89% of medical school graduates leave school with an average debt of $215,900 and that only includes medical school debt. So if you add a little undergraduate debt on top of that medical school debt, the average debt for med students, including undergrad debt is $241,000, which is ironic because that is very close to the amount of debt that I have. And if you did a little further on this data, it's actually more interesting because the average debt has almost doubled in the last 20 years and for some reason, the salaries of physicians have either stayed the same or even decreased over time. And also reimbursement rates have been going down year after year and physicians are working twice, sometimes three times as hard for the same amount of money or even the less money. So you can see how this just isn't panning out already, but we knew that, right? Furthermore, this website has a list of the highest debt per school. So it listed the schools with the highest amount of debt for the students graduating down to the lowest. But ironically, you'll notice something about these schools with the medical students graduating with the most debt. A lot of them are osteopathic med schools or DO schools, which is what I went to. That's also very ironic because DO schools are very much pushing for primary care physicians and training the next generation of primary care, rural medicine physicians. But it's even more ironic because those specialties, family men, primary care specialties, rural medicine, those specialties make the least out of any specialty in medicine and these schools that are promoting going into those specialties are charging you the most. Does it really add up? No, it doesn't. And another interesting fact I noted while reading this is that the average length of time it takes for physicians to pay off their loans after graduating medical school, finishing residency and becoming an attending physician is 13 years. 13 years after becoming an attending physician is how long it takes for the average doctor to pay off their debt. That seems problematic to me. But again, we knew that, right? Fly in there. So why then does it take physicians 13 years to pay off their loans when we know that they make a pretty decent living? I thought about it for a little bit and this is what I came up with. Many physicians don't make as much as other physicians. And what I mean by that is, say, a neurosurgeon makes quite a bit more money than a primary care physician. Sometimes three, four times, five times more than a primary care physician. And there's a pretty wide gap between sub-specialized physicians and non-sub-specialized physicians. You know, it kind of makes sense because sub-specialized physicians like myself go through a lot more training, sometimes twice as much training in some instances than the non-sub-specialized doctors. And I see how there's a gap in those salaries and I understand why it takes the longer for someone who makes a lower salary compared to a high-paying sub-specialist to pay off those loans. The second reason I came up with why it takes physicians so long to pay off their loans is something we in the business like to call delayed gratification. Any physician knows what this means. We basically spend our entire 20s. We spend our early 30s making no money, living paycheck to paycheck, eating crackers in the hospital, working our butts off for 10 years like myself. When it's all said and done, you finally get that first big paycheck and what do you want to do? You want to go out and buy something.  That's very frowned upon and I don't think you should do that. I don't recommend you do that. But that's why they do that is because they've essentially been pushed down for so long that once they finally have access to money for the first time in their lives, for a lot of them, they finally go out there and spend it. And when you buy something like that and you start spending that high income very quickly, you run out of money to pay for your student loans and that's why it takes the longer to pay them off. Going along with that, a lot of physicians weren't really taught anything in med school or during their pre-medical science courses on how to manage their money and a lot of physicians are not smart with their money because of that. And to generalize a little bit more, most people in medicine, whether it be doctors, PAs, nurses, pharmacists, et cetera, never got taught anything about money either. So I think all of these things kind of come together and are reasons why it takes physicians, for instance, so long to pay off their loans. So now let's get into a little bit about my loans. So fortunately, I was a collegiate athlete and had a scholarship to college, which means I didn't have to pay any tuition while I was there. However, I did do some post-baccalaureate courses, my pre-med courses before going to med school and I obviously had to pay a little money for those, but it was at an in-state school and luckily the tuition was super cheap in Georgia. I probably ended up paying like 10 or $12,000. It was less than $15,000 for sure, but the overwhelming bulk of my student loan debt comes from medical school, as you probably guessed by watching this video. So my total is somewhere around $250,000. That's why I lost $250,000 that I'll never get back. But it was worth it, and I'll tell you why later. The good thing about being, well, there's not really anything good about being a debt, $250,000, but when you finish med school, at least you're making good money. You can start paying that debt off, right? Not quite. So let's do a little calculation here to explain what I'm talking about. So say you have a loan balance of $250,000 that say 7% interest like many government loans are. And say your loan term is around 30 years, which it may be less, it may be more, but for this example, we're going to use 30 years. These are all just rough numbers.  Mine's 12 year term, blah, blah, blah. Just go with it here. These are rough numbers, okay? Just for demonstration purposes. So say we have a $250,000 loan at a 7% interest rate for a 30 year term. All said and done, that comes out to $598,000 at the end of those 30 years. Thank you, interest. And if you divide that by 12 over 30 years, it comes out to $1,663 a month. And given the fact that some loan terms are actually like 10 years from the government, it may actually be substantially higher than this, but we're gonna use $1,663 for this example. When you're in residency, can you afford a $1,663 loan payment every single month? Let's find out. Now during my radiology residency, for example, most residents made it anywhere from $55,000 to $62,000. So we'll just cut it in the middle somewhere and make it $60,000 to make it even. So let's take $60,000, divide it by 12, and it comes out to $5,000 a month. So say we pay a little less than 30%, and that comes out to around $3,600 a month post tax money. So I made $3,600 a month in residency. Let's go ahead and talk about my expenses. We'll subtract from that. $1,500 a rent is what I paid in North Carolina while I was in residency. So say I had anywhere from another $5 to $700 of expenses, including insurance and all that stuff. So let's ballpark it and say $22 to $2,500 I paid in expenses, including rent and everything all said and done. So let's subtract that from $3,600, and it gives you anywhere from $1,100 to $1,400 a month extra after expenses. So if you had $1,100 to $1,400 left over after all of your expenses, how then would you be expected to pay $1,663 every single month for your student loan payment? And the short answer is you probably wouldn't. So luckily there are other routes you can take to lower your monthly payment. And this is what I did while I was in residency because I sure as heck couldn't afford $1,600 a month extra on top of everything I was doing. And what about during the first few years of residency when Adriana wasn't living in North Carolina with me and I wanted to take a flight to New York to go see her. There's no way I could pay my loan. So obviously I chose a different path and we're gonna talk about it now. So luckily there are alternatives to paying these high monthly payments. There are other ways you can reduce your monthly payments which is what I end up choosing. So what did I end up choosing? I chose the PSLF with IDR route. What'd he say? The Public Service Loan Forgiveness or PSLF and the Income Driven Repayment or IDR. I used both of those simultaneously and we're gonna talk about them briefly so you know what the heck I'm talking about. So let's talk about the Income Driven Repayment Plan or the IDR first. So the Income Driven Repayment Plan is something you can do when your loans are higher than what you can afford. So I'll read you the definition off of the student aid website, studentaid.gov for more information. An Income Driven Repayment Plan sets your monthly student loan payment at an amount that is intended to be affordable based on your income and family size. There are four different types of IDR. Repay which is the revised Pay As You Earn Payment Plan. There is the Pay or the Pay As You Earn Repayment Plan. There is the Income-Based Repayment Plan which is what I did and there is the Income Contingent Repayment Plan. So I did the IBR or the Income-Based Repayment Plan because some of my loans didn't qualify. They were a bit older since I'm a bit older and I was a nontraditional student. So I ended up paying 15% of my income divided by 12 and I paid that per month and ended up coming out to like $150 per month while I was in residency which was completely affordable compared to like $1,663, right? So obviously you'll have to do your own research to see if one of these plans is right for you but the reason I did it is because I actually went to a very long residency program. So those four options are basically a way to lower your payment if you cannot meet the payment requirements to pay those large sums of money like pretty much anybody in residency. So I did that and then I also paired it with the PSLF tract or the Public Service Loan Forgiveness tract. And I'll go into that a little bit here. So again, I'll read you the data from studentaid.gov. So if you are employed by a US federal state local or tribal government or nonprofit organization you might be eligible for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. So the PSLF program forgives the remaining balance on your direct loans after you have made 120 qualifying monthly payments under qualifying repayment plan while working full-time for a qualifying employer. Got all that? So basically what this says is you have to work full-time. You have to make 120 payments or 10 years worth of payments every single month on time for the correct amount. You have to recertify every single year. You have to continue to work for a nonprofit or federal hospital. After that, 10 years are up. You can say goodbye to that remaining balance your loans because the government will refund it supposedly. It doesn't really have a good tract record so far because I think for the most part a lot of people screw it up and don't work for these nonprofit organizations but luckily pretty much anybody who does a residency is working at a nonprofit hospital and therefore you qualify because almost all academic hospitals where you do your residency at or your training qualify for these nonprofit exemptions. So I did the income driven repayment plan plus the public service loan forgiveness track and it's a way to keep your payments low for 10 years mostly while you're in training and at the end of those 10 years you can have the remaining balance of your loans for given by the government if you meet all those requirements and again, you'll have to do your own research. So I obviously keep mentioning that you have to do your own research because it is very important and I remember when I was first finishing med school and I was like, oh my God, I have to like figure all this stuff out and I read so much.  I'm not paying off this debt. I'm having to forgive it and I'm gonna do whatever it takes and that's kind of what you have to do and as physicians and anybody in medicine we're not really for the most part interested in learning this stuff because it's not very exciting. It's pretty dry and boring but it's important for you to just read it, know it, know it cold because it'll benefit you going for it. So the reason I did this income-driven repayment plan plus the PSLF is because I was in a long residency. My residency was six years long. That's six years of paying a low payment per month and then at the end of those six years my payment would bump up to the 15% of my attending physician salary which substantially increases from the $150 payment I was making in residency but nonetheless, you can afford it as an attending physician because the way they calculate these monthly payments is based off your prior year tax return. So essentially my new physician salary wouldn't be included until year seven which means I would only have to pay the three years of it instead of four but nonetheless, I'll do a calculation for you so you know exactly what I'm talking about. So say I finished residency and I got a job making $400,000 divide that by 12 that equals around $33,000 per month pre-tax multiply that by 10% and that comes out to $3,333 per month over a three year period which comes out to $120,000. If you add that $120,000 to the panties you paid in residency over six years say it's $150 a month times 12 times six equals $10,000 that's like nothing compared to what you're paying now ends up being around $130,000. If you see if you owed $250,000 like me and you end up paying $130,000 that means you get $120,000 forgiven by the government at the end of your 10 years and that's pretty much a win in my book. And at the end like I said you really need to do your own research because this isn't as easy as you think it is unless you actually spend time digging through it, reading it and understanding it. There's little nuances like for instance I had to file separately from my wife during residency because I made no money she was a working position assistant working two jobs making way more money than I did and if I were to file jointly on my tax return her income would be included in that income-based repayment plan. Obviously we didn't want that so we had to file separately which increased our taxes but in the long-term it actually saved us money. And this is just one of the few downsides to doing these income-based repayment plans and there are some downsides but in the interest of time I'm not going to get into them basically some of them include increased debt long-term repayment plans, et cetera, et cetera you can do your own research on those. So I was all geared towards doing this six year IDR plus PSLF and then I got the opportunity to join a private practice and everything I just did for the past six years has been completely thrown out the window because now I work for a private practice or a for-profit organization not a non-profit hospital we're contracted through the hospital and I don't work for the hospital I work for the private practice and most private practices are not non-profit so I no longer qualify for the public service loan forgiveness because I don't work for a non-profit hospital so what do I do now? Well, if you've seen my video up here I did academics versus private practice and I weighed the options I really did and it turns out if I were to stay in academics my salary wouldn't be as high as it is in private practice and yes I could have stayed and worked in an academic institution working for a non-profit hospital for those three years which would save me $130,000 that would be forgiven by the government however I would make more than $130,000 over those three years working in private practice because the private practice salary is much higher in some instances than academia so basically everything I did for six years has been thrown out the window but that's okay because this is my plan going forward what I plan on doing is refinancing my $250,000 to student loans for you the lower interest rate which is way lower than the 7.8% I'm paying to the government right now a lot of companies like SoFi and forgot these other ones there's so many companies out there that will refinance your loans and they give you pretty good interest rates sometimes in the two to 3% range which is significantly better than the 7 to 7.8% paying to the government especially when you're dealing with such a large sum of money so essentially in the next month or so I'm going to refinance my loans and start paying them off at a lower interest rate and my goal is to pay them off between two to three years and I'm not kind of giving myself a timeline because I know I can pay them off because I'm fortunate enough to have a higher salary now I made money from this side job on YouTube and all that stuff so I know I can pay them off but I'm allotting myself a little wiggle room because you never know what kind of investment is going to come across your desk that you may need some capital for so that's pretty much it hope you all learn something on this student loan breakdown here but again, I want you all to do your own research because this stuff is pretty in-depth and it's easy to get lost if you don't pay attention so I really, really, really strongly encourage you all to go to at least studentaid.gov learn something, talk to somebody there's other good companies out there that you can actually pay for that'll give you some good advice that I've come across I don't know any off the top of my head but they're out there and I'm not going to give them a free shout out all right so that officially concludes this video on student debt and how I lost $250,000 hope you all enjoyed this video if you want to see more videos like this let me know in the comments below if you have any questions about student debt also let me know in the comments and I'll probably do more financially related videos as they pertain to medicine because I think it's important for us physicians and anybody in the medical field to pay attention to finances because that's not something we're taught about in school so make sure you subscribe to my channel like this video, share it and follow me on Instagram and TikTok if you don't already and I'll see you all on the next video bye


Okay, let's try this one here. So this, first of all, it says calcium iodide, we don't know the physical state, plus sodium phosphate, we don't know the physical state. We want to know, we want to eventually write the molecular, the total ionic and net equations, identifying, also identifying the spectator ions. In order to do that, we need to do a few more things to analyze this equation. Like first, the thing we need to do is balance the equation and figure out what our products are going to be, okay? So the first thing we need to do, remember, on these types of problems is to identify, you know, what's going to precipitate out with anything, okay? So calcium iodide, sodium phosphate, and then what would be the other things? Well, it would be calcium phosphate and sodium iodide, right? So sodium iodide is going to be NaI, right, because I is normally minus one and Na is plus one. And the other thing is going to be calcium phosphate, okay? That's the harder one to figure out what the equation should be, or the molecular, the chemical formula should be. So how do we figure this out? Well, we know that calcium has the what charge plus two, right? Everybody should know that by now. It has a plus two charge. And phosphate, well, even if you didn't know, yeah, it's going to be a negative three, but even if you didn't know, you could look at this compound here and it gives you, it tells you what it is, right? Since sodium is plus one and there's three plus ones, you want the whole thing to equal zero, it's got to be negative three, okay? So now we've got to figure out a way to combine a negative three ion with a positive two ion, okay? So the way you want to always be able to do this or think about doing this is to find what we call the common factor of the two, okay? In this case, it's going to be six, right? You can think of it that way and you can add these up to six, each one of them to six if you want to do that. Or you can just think of them, okay, how many plus twos do I need to get to plus three? Okay, that's a, well, they don't go one to one together, so we've got to figure something else out. So let's write another CA two plus. Can I do four, because two plus two is four, can we get that to three? No, right? Well, let's try this. We'll put another PO four, three minus. Well, we've got six over here now. Can we get six to four? No, but if we add another calcium, right? That gives us an overall six here, overall six there, right? Does that make sense? That's the way you always want to do it, okay? So now we say, okay, well, how many calcium do I have? Three of them, right? So we've got three CA two plus, and how many phosphates? Two, two PO four, three minuses, okay? So let's erase all of this work. So now, we don't write compounds like this, we kind of combine everything together. So this compound is going to be CA three, PO four, two, like that, okay? Because why? Because we have three calciums and two PO fours. Now we've got to ask ourselves, well, what's the physical state of these things, okay? Well, we've got to remember our physical state rules, whether something precipitates or not, okay? So it says here, for calcium iodide, it says all common chlorides, bromides and iodides are soluble, except for silver, lead, copper, and mercury. So that's an iodide, calcium iodide is an iodide, and it's not combined with silver, lead, copper, or mercury, right? It's combined with calcium, so we know this has to be aqueous. Also, we look over here, and we see that all common group 1A ions, lithium, sodium, potassium, and ammonium ion are soluble, right? So in that case, we say, well, this is a sodium one, right? It's got to be soluble. This is a sodium one, it's soluble. This is also an iodide, so it's soluble, doubly soluble from our rules. And what about phosphates? Well, all common carbonates, phosphates, and are insoluble. All common carbonates, phosphates are insoluble, except those of group 1A and ammonia. Well, this is a phosphate, but it's paired with a group 1A, okay? This is a phosphate, is that a group 1A? No, so it's going to be insoluble, okay? Or a solid. Okay, so now that we figured that out, right? Let's go ahead and put the equation together before it's balanced, okay? So we've got AQ there, AQ there, CA3PO4 solid, right, plus NAI AQ, okay? So is everybody cool with that? So erase this work down here, and erase this over here just so we don't confuse ourselves. Okay, now we need to balance the equation, okay? So let's look at this equation. We see we've got calcium over here, we've only got 1, but we've got 3 over here, okay? So we need to put a 3 in front here. Just here, we've got 3 sodiums and only 1 sodium over there, right? But also, we've got 6 iodide, right? And we've only got 1 iodide over there. So in order to get 6, we're going to have to put a 6 in front of that thing. So our calciums are balanced, our iodides are balanced, right? Now let's look at our sodium. Here we have 6 sodium. Here we have only 3 sodium. This should be a 2 anyway, sorry. Yeah, if we put a 2 there, right, then we've got 6 sodiums, okay? So we've got 3 calciums, 6 iodide, 6 sodium. 3 calciums, 6 iodide, 6 sodium. How many phosphates do we have here? 2. How many phosphates do we have here? 2. Okay? So our equation is balanced. Yeah, it's about to be a double replacement reaction, okay? So now we've ridden the molecular equation. Let's write the total ionic equation. I fully expect you guys to be able to do this on your own by now. So what I'll let you guys do is try to do it on your own while I'm doing it up here, okay? So remember, everything that says aqueous break apart. So in this case, we've got 3 calciums, we've got to put aqueous, 3 times 2 iodide, 3 times 2 is 6, I minus aqueous. Then we move on to sodium phosphate. 2 times 3, 6 sodiums, aqueous, phosphate, right? How many do we have? 2 phosphates, aqueous, okay? So those are all our reactants. Let's write our products. Calcium phosphate, it's a solid, we don't break it up, right? And sodium iodide, aqueous, so we break it up. 6 sodiums plus 6 iodide, aqueous. So that's our total ionic equation. Now let's go back and figure out what our net ionic equation is and our spectator ions. So remember, with the net ionic equation, what did we do? We looked at both sides, saw what was the same on both sides, and cancelled those things out. Calcium, not the same on both sides. Iodide ion, same on both sides, and we have the same amount, 6, so we're going to cancel that out. 6 NA pluses on this side, 6 NA pluses on that side, cancel out. All the rest is different from both sides, right? So we're going to write our net ionic equation as 3CA2 plus aqueous plus 2PO4 3 minus aqueous goes to CA3PO4 2. Sorry, I keep missing that up. So that's the net ionic equation there. And then if I asked you what are the spectator ions, what would you say? 6 I minus and 6 NA plus. You know, honestly, if you would have just said, if I just asked for spectator ions and you just put I minus and NA plus, that'd be fine. Any questions on this? Pretty straightforward, huh? So this is everything that we learned today, and in the last couple of days as a matter of fact.


At Audiology Associates of Prestonsburg, you can live your life the way you want and find the freedom of better hearing. You'll experience patient care that is specific to you with exceptional follow-up care that ensures your hearing and balance needs are being met. Audiology Associates at 1428 Northlake Drive in Prestonsburg. Pike County Relief Services are continuing to plan ahead for long-term solutions to the problems created by the July flooding. They are currently in the process of transitioning from emergency needs to future reparations. Mountain Top News spoke with co-chair Randy Johnson to learn more. We really are moving from the emergency needs that come directly after a flood or a crisis like this to assessing what's going on, what the needs are to help people get back into their homes and if they can be repaired, and then finding the funding to repair those homes. The group is officially now a little over a month old. We have a name, we are Pike County Relief Services. We'd love for the community to know that there's going to be a number of part-time jobs that pay well in helping us do the case management and assessment and working to help people on a day-to-day and face-to-face basis. The Relief Service Group is stressing the importance of additional aid outside of what people have requested from FEMA. They are looking to hire part-time workers with the talent needed to fulfill the demand. Most of us don't realize that over 16,000 families have applied for FEMA assistance. That's a lot of people in southeast Kentucky that have to be hurt. So the task is large. Maybe you'd like to be a volunteer. Come and check us out on Mondays at 11.30 to 1 o'clock at First Christian Church. Ask questions. We'd be happy to plug you in where you have gifts and talents or resources that can help. It's going to take everybody coming together as well as the funding that we're able to raise to be able to get this done. So we look forward to working with people in the community. Don't be afraid to call me<PHONE_NUMBER>. Reporting for Mountain Top News, I'm Nick Collum.


Welcome inside the state's Emergency Operations Center at Cal OES headquarters outside Sacramento. Inside this room, many of the state's top emergency managers and leaders from dozens of agencies have been working around the clock to coordinate response and recovery operations for more than a dozen wildfires currently burning across California. We've got the very latest coming up next. Hi, I'm Brian May at the state's Operations Center at Cal OES headquarters. Today the third day in a row that this room has been activated around the clock. Dozens of local, state and federal agencies working together to help those affected by the wildfires and at the same time fire officials coordinating the massive and ever-changing effort to get resources where and when they're needed. California's mutual aid system now requesting and getting help from all across the country. We already have crews on incidents from outside states including Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, South Dakota and Wyoming and en route to California now, Florida, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, New Mexico and Oregon here as well. There are 17 major wildfires currently burning in California. Here's the numbers on just the top four of those and these numbers are changing all the time. We will start south and work our way north across the state that cranched in fire. That's in Riverside County sitting at 100 or 13,000 acres, 29% contained. The Ferguson fire in Mariposa County. This is the one that's been blanketing Yosemite Valley for a week now. 53,000 plus acres also 29% contained. The Mendocino complex fire and this is actually two separate fires. It's the river and ranch fires, two fires being coordinated as the Mendocino complex. This fire has exploded. The number you see there 24,000 acres plus, but it is doubled today. It grew almost 15,000 acres overnight containment at 10% and evacuations all across the area. The entire city of Lakeport evacuated late this afternoon. And then the largest and deadliest fire in the state, the car fire in Shasta County. It grew another 5000 acres overnight, now approaching 90,000 acres containment still at just 5%. Earlier this afternoon, local and state officials held their daily press conference, updating residents with the latest on the firefighting efforts for the car. And for a change, their message was one of increasing hope. We're feeling a lot more optimistic today as we are starting to gain some ground rather than being in the defensive mode on this fire. All the time we're starting to make some good progress out there. I think you can see that as we move around the fire. We're going to continue to work hard to get direct line on this thing. I think by tonight you'll start seeing containment percentages increase. Well, that was this afternoon. Last night, local and state leaders held a community meeting in Reading. You can imagine one of the first questions that they got from the audience. What's the timeframe for us to be allowed to go back home? Safety is first and foremost. Oftentimes the infrastructure, roads and the utility power lines have been damaged. We have to get those back up or the utility companies do. When we come to the decision with our fire cooperators to repopulate an area, we do so in a controlled process and it's done in stages. Usually a section of a community will be repopulated so that we're just not dropping the green flag and everybody's rushing in at the same time. Some 38,000 people have been evacuated in Shasta County since the car fire began and officials saying at that press conference this afternoon they are hopeful to begin repopulation soon. Now in the meantime, here are the shelter locations in Shasta County and there are again a lot of people in these locations. Shasta College in Reading is full. They're redirecting their evacuees to the Crosspoint Community College in Reading. They have about 150 spots available. At Simpson University on College Drive in Reading, they've got also about 60 spots available. Grace Baptist Church in Reading, now with a capacity of 200 and just opened, Foothills High School, 300 spots available. If you are a resident of Shasta County, you are urged to register your cell phone to get emergency alerts and in Shasta County, the notification system is known as Code Red. The Sheriff's Department, the local police and fire departments all feed into Code Red. That website is Shastcom911.com. That's Shastcom911.com. Again, I want to show you a live look inside the state's Emergency Operations Center at Cal OES headquarters in Sacramento. This room has been staffed 24-7 for the past three days. And while the fires are managed from the incident command posts on location, it is the overall coordination of state resources and logistics that takes place here in this room. You want to focus, top priority is getting the fires out, you know, saving lives and keeping people out of harm's way and getting the fires out. This is a challenge because, as I mentioned earlier, the weather conditions make it such that, you know, it's ever changing. And, of course, we don't have just one fire. We've got 17 major fires going throughout the state. And so resource management and coordination is very, very important. And we're constantly here in this center moving the chess pieces around to ensure that we've got adequate amount of resources in the right place at the right time. For more information on any of the large wildfires burning across the state, you can go to the Cal Fire Incident page that is fire.ca.gov. There are links there for each of the major fires, including the latest information and the latest maps. For all of us at Cal OES and all of our local, state and federal partners, I'm Brian May. Thanks for watching.


Good afternoon, everybody. You're all very welcome, whether here in the room or taking part through the live stream. Is that okay, Lorcan? My name is Alex White. I'm Director General of the Institute here. As I say, everybody's very welcome. I think we can all agree that the question of EU enlargement has sort of hortled up the political agenda across the Union, most especially since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. And it's become an ever more important topic in that context. And there is much debate and discussion about the various questions associated with enlargement, perhaps the challenges in some cases. In other cases, maybe obstacles, arguably, to accession, but also opportunities, also part of that discussion, part of that debate. And with eight candidate countries and two applicable countries, many have also argued on the need for reforms in how the European Union operates before there could be a 37 member state Union. In her address to us this afternoon, we're delighted to have Jessica Roswell, Minister for EU Affairs of Sweden, and the Minister will give, I think, a timely survey of the Swedish government's view on the topic of EU enlargement and overall generally the future of the European Union at this time. Jessica Roswell is the Minister of EU Affairs at Nordic Cooperation in Sweden, having held that role since 2022. She's been a member of the Swedish parliament since 2010. Prior to her current ministerial role, Minister Roswell was chair of the modern party in Uppsala County. She also served as a member of the advisory councils of the Swedish Agency for Work Environment Expertise, the Uppsala County Administration Board, and the Swedish Consumer Agency. And I'm pleased to say that prior to entering politics, Ms Roswell was a practicing lawyer for many years. Here, here, exactly. Yeah, so a few of us left. I want to note the critical indispensable support of the Department of Foreign Affairs for this talk and indeed for the series that it's part of. And in fact, it is we're kind of engaged in a mini series this week on the question of enlargement because we have three talks in all the course of the week. Minister Roswell's talk obviously today, starting off the discussion as it were or continuing the discussion but starting it for us here this week. And tomorrow, we're delighted to say that we'll be hosting Peter Burke, Minister Peter Burke, who is responsible for European Affairs, to provide an Irish perspective on the question. And on Thursday, we're going to be joined by Lawrence Meredith, who's director in DG near the Commission to give the Commission's perspective on this important topic. And so as I say, first of all, we're going to have Minister Roswell, and she's going to speak to survive 20 minutes or so, and then we'll have a Q&A. And you can take part in that either in the room is most easily by simply putting up your hand. And if you're watching us online, you can use the Q&A function on your laptop or computer. And you'll see that there and you're very well familiar with it this time reminder that the presentation and the Q&A are both on the record. If you want to use Twitter or X or whatever you like to call it now, please do so. The handle is at IEA. And as I mentioned, we're also live streaming live streaming this afternoon's discussion. So once again, warm welcome to everybody, including those of you tuning in on YouTube. And it's my great pleasure now to hand over and give the floor to Minister Jessica Roswell for her presentation. You're very welcome. So thank you. Thank you, Alex. And thank you for the introduction. Yes. In some rooms, it's good to be a lawyer, not always. But thank you very much for having me to have this speech today on this topic that is very, very often on my mind at the moment, enlargement and the future of EU. Let me start with a quote. The constitution does not copy the laws of neighbouring neighbouring states. We are rather a pattern to others than imitators ourselves. It's administrations favours the many instead of the few. This is why it's called a democracy. These sentences are from one of the most famous speeches in history. This speech was held more than 2,400 years ago, but part of it could have been written today. Because the struggle for democracy for a system of government that favours the many instead of the few is not ancient history. It's an ongoing battle. And I do think that the battle is the right choice of word. Because battles are literally what the people of Ukraine are going through to preserve their democracy. The Ukrainians are fighting despite cruel war crimes, despite ecological destruction and despite nuclear threats. Despite all that, Ukraine is still ruled from Kiev and not from Moscow. Ukraine needs to win this war, but they also need to win the peace. And that is where enlargement comes in. Because enlargement is about making sure that Europeans can live in peace and prosperity. It's about spreading European values, democracy, rule of law, freedom, equality, human dignity and human rights across our nation. And it's about making sure that free democratic Europe stretches all the way from Dublin to the province and to Kiev. And with the war raging on EU's doorstep, enlargement is not abstract anymore. Now it's a concrete and urgent issue. Now it's not a question of if it will happen, but how. And today I would like to provide you some of the Swedish perspective on the questions that the future enlargement raised for the EU. And perhaps I will also ask a few questions myself along the way, since I don't have all the answers and I will try to have the survey but also cross out questions. First, let me answer the question, why enlargement? Why do we need to make the EU ready for future with more member states? I think there is an obvious answer to this question. It's about making Europe safe for democracy. Today we live in a world of great power competition. China is repressive at home and assertive abroad. And I don't need to repeat myself about Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine. And for a smaller country like Ireland and Sweden, EU membership is extremely valuable in this era of great power of competition. With almost 450 million citizens, the EU has become a force to be reckoned with on the world stage. And with 27 member states combined, it matters if you have trade agreement with us. And if we impose sanctions against you. Having more countries to join a democratic integrated Europe can also make us all safer and richer. Just take a country like Estonia, which is one of Sweden's closest neighbors. And 30 years ago, there were Russian troops based in Estonia. Now there are world leading tech companies based in Estonia instead. That's the difference that European integration makes. And when we speak about enlargement, let's remind ourselves that one of the best examples of successful enlargement is Ireland. This year, Ireland celebrates 50 years as a member states. And I was taking part in the European Parliament this spring during the Swedish presidency when we celebrated there. And 50 years ago in that time, Ireland has gone from one of the poorest members to the second richest in terms of GDP per capita. Many will seek advice from you on how to success in Europe, and they should. Thanks to previous round of enlargement, countries like Ireland and Sweden have benefited greatly. Our economies have been able to grow thanks to the expansion of the single market and we have more democratic friendly countries in our neighborhood. And with the bigger EU, we will have also been able to expand our influence in the world. And if we do this right, I am convinced that future enlargement can have similar effects. But of course, doing it right will be hard. It will require reforms that in the candidate countries, and it will also require reforms on how the EU itself works. And these reforms have to be anchored and accepted by our citizens. So let us be honest to with our citizens about the work that we need to do to turn a bigger EU also to a better EU. And this brings me to my second question. How do we enlarge? And this was a question I wanted to raise during the Swedish presidency this spring. So therefore I invited my colleagues in the Informal General Fair Council in Uppsala to discuss three main issues. How will enlargement affect our policies? How will it affect our budget? And how will it affect our institutions? These discussions are still ongoing, but I would like to share with you a few key observations so far. First, we cannot have enlargement without proper protection of the rule of law. This is not just because we want the EU to become a democratic role model on the world stage, but also because our cooperation rests on mutual trust. Trust is trust that our common rules are respected all across the union. Trust that our citizens and our companies will be treated fairly by courts in other member states. Trust that our common resources, our tax pays money will be spent well spent and not end up in wrong pockets. And if we cannot trust these things, the foundation of our cooperation will fall apart. And this is why the rule of law was one of Sweden's priorities during the presidency this spring. Among other things we held hearings with both Poland and Hungary under Article 7. We also organized a rule of law symposium that provided recommendation for the EU institutions and future presidency. We did this because going forward we need to do two things at the same time. We need to hold candidate countries to a high standard while also getting our own house in order. So this is why Sweden support using conditionality and clear demands on member states that they respect the rule of law to access to EU funds. And I'm sure that the rule of law will continue to play a key role in the enlargement debate. In fact, I think that this is essential to gain public acceptance for a bigger reformed EU. Second, in the discussion on EU reforms to make us ready for enlargement, we have to focus on what is politically possible. And this is why Sweden believes that we should focus on our efforts on policy reforms, not treaty changes. We all know that we have a big chance on how we have to do big changes on how the EU works. For example, Ukraine's farmland cover an area that is greater than Italy. And therefore we will have to reform the common agriculture policy. This will of course have difficulties. This will be difficult enough in a lot of countries. Thus we don't need to add a treaty change process on top of that. We might risk to sow seeds for a political backlash like the one we saw in Ireland before the Lisbon Treaty was ratified when a majority voted no in the first referendum. And the second reason why we don't need a treaty changes is that the Lisbon Treaty is enlargement proof. For example, it is already possible to make more decisions by qualified majority. And Sweden is open to do so in a limited number of areas within the common foreign and security policy when it comes to sanctions, human rights and civilian missions. And moving to QMV or qualified majority voting in these areas would also allow us to EU to speak with one voice. And this is especially important in times of a democratic backsliding worldwide. In other areas, however, such as taxes, Sweden believes that unanimity remains important to protect national interests, especially for smaller member states. And frankly unanimity hasn't stopped the EU from taking quick and decisive actions in the last few years. Despite Brexit, despite the pandemic and despite the war in Ukraine, the EU has still managed to be united. So when we talk about how we should make decisions in the future, I think that we also should keep those experiences in mind. Third, what should the end goal of enlargement and the EU's internal reforms be? On this question, the view from Stockholm is that we should strive forward in united Europe with respect for the rule of law and its heart. Sweden is open to idea of gradual integration for candidate countries to make sure that they receive some benefits from European integration on the road towards full EU membership. But the end goal should still be full membership. Countries that live up to the EU's high democracy and rule of law standard should not remain in some concentric circle or waiting room. If they are ready to join the EU, the EU has to be ready to let them in. In this geopolitical situation, we cannot afford to have to let countries that are able and willing to remain on the outside. If we don't offer them partnership, China and Russia will be happy to do so. If the candidate country sees this momentum, so must we. Finally, if a big EU has to be firm when it comes to our fundamental values, perhaps we need more freedom and flexibility when it comes to some of our own regulations. Harmonizing our rules and standards is often a good thing. For instance, having the same product standards for goods is a good thing if you want to have a single market. However, other things are more difficult to draft detailed laws about in a diverse union. Just to take one example, the local environment looks very different in northern Sweden than in say Cyprus. Therefore, we should focus more on the results and allow for greater freedom and flexibility on how these results are achieved. Moreover, we need better regulation because the EU is facing a competitiveness crisis. For many years, the EU has been losing grounds to the major economies such as the US and China. And one of the most common complaints from companies in the EU these days are that regulatory burden is too big. So when we enlarge, we have to keep this in mind too. The regulatory burden should not expand just because the EU does. Instead, a bigger EU must build on the strength that we already have to tackle future challenges such as enlargement. We need to boost our competitiveness in a general and in a single market in particular. To conclude, I think that the war in Ukraine has shown us how strongly people actually want to live in a free, democratic Europe. If it wasn't already clear at the Maidan protest in Kiev today 10 years ago, it is definitely clear now. As the discussions on enlargement and the future of the EU moves on, I think we should remember that and not lose the sight of the bigger picture. And the bigger picture is that as much as we will argue about internal reforms such as whether we should have more QMV or not, an EU membership is very attractive. It offers access to the biggest single market in the world to what will be the world's first climate neutral group of countries and to the union that has actually kept the peace between member states for more than 70 years. As long as we stick to our principles, strive to keep the EU's unity and allow member states some freedom and flexibility to achieve our common goals, I believe that we can make future enlargement a success. That way we can extend government that favors the many instead of the few, even to more Europeans. So thank you very much for listening. I'm looking forward to answer your questions. Thank you very much, Minister, for that. And I noticed quite a few things in what you had to say, but one or two of them I think will be met with some certainly relief. I'm sure agreement in Dublin, in political circles anyway in Dublin, what you said about treaty change and also what you said about decisions on taxation that you didn't see the basis for that changing. I wonder though, how you evaluate or how you think about the Franco German position and the paper that was published into the paper on institutional reform published earlier this year, I think in September. I don't think there's much there in relation to necessarily treaty change being required, but some quite radical proposals in there in respect of institutional change. Do you think that those proposals have value or what's your general approach or what's Sweden's general approach to what's set out there. I think that is one good example to put interest in ideas and have the on the table. So, when we have this informal General Affairs Council meeting in Uppsala Stockholm during the Swedish presidency was one first step to have this discussions as I said but I think that the German Franco paper also puts into this discussion. And also from the Swedish Institute of European Studies we have a book from the whole fit for 35 which also is very interesting reading if you want to have this discussion so I think, of course, we have not the Swedish government has not taken pro if you say yes and no to different suggestions in the paper, but I think there are things that are really interesting example, for example, the the suggestions about the rule of law and how we can implement these things. So I think all of these papers and discussions and panels are very important when we are now in this movement of future of enlargement. So, both yes and no in the context of suggested because they also don't, all of them don't have the necessary speaks on the necessity, necessity to have treaty changes. I'm interested if there are any questions or observations in the room or indeed online and be delighted to to entertain them. So, I'm here in a marrow the back. Hold on for the microphone. And if you're asking a question making observation. Tell us who you are, even though we know I just mentioned. I'm a retired lawyer and member of the Institute, and I was very interested in remarks made by the Minister regarding the Lisbon Treaty. I completely agree. It is very flexible treaty, and it has left the even a very strong position to go forward. For example, if you look at the last four years, at the amount of legislation that the commission has proposed, and has been adopted by the parliament, and week by week we're seeing the green transition and all kinds of legislation going through by qualified majority voting. I'm always amused it's about a cynical when I see, I look at a commission proposal to see the legal base for the proposal, and it's surprise surprise invariably by qualified majority voting, it's a single market measure, so on, even though it doesn't appear to be anything much to do with the single market. So I agree with you that the Lisbon Treaty is very flexible. But there's one treaty area that does worry me, which is, if you have 10 more member states, and you have 10 more commissioners, and you end up with 37 commissioners. I just wonder at what point do you devalue the commissionership of each member state by having so many do you informally turn the commission into a two tier inner sanctum and outer sanctum, or what happens, and I just think that might be the core problem going forward with have to find some way to deal with the commission size. Very good. Thank you. Good question, I think it's legitimate legitimate sorry that's a difficult word to say Swedish and English, but obviously it's very good questions about how big should the commission be how big how many people should be in the European Parliament how should the Court of Justice look like. And all of these questions are important to discuss. I avoid the word that I obviously not cannot pronounce. And I think from a Swedish perspective not for so far I think it's important to have one commissioner per state is small country like Sweden this is important. I think it's also important for the EU was the legitimacy to have representatives in all countries, but I understand that this will be difficulty in the future so I'm not ready to see that solution yet but so you raise a very important question. I thought it's also balanced course on the legitimacy from from both sides. So, so far I think it's very important for us to have our own commissioner. But of course how will it function. I don't have all the answers yet so as I said, it's a lot of questions but that is one way question that we need to raise. When we had this discussion in Sweden we had the policy discussions the budgetary questions questions, but also how will our institutions work, and you leave the commission so that's one of the parts. Interesting. Yes. My question is related to you mentioned the rejection of the Lisbon Treaty here in Ireland, and the nervousness about treaty change. And I just want to get your thoughts on how we can bring the public with us on institutional change but also on enlargement is an enlargement new member state. So I'm just wondering how across Europe we can bring governments can bring public along these big changes. That is the question that I think a lot. I don't in that I don't have the answers also but that's one question that I raise along with my colleagues often. I raise it when I meet the Swedish parliament, my colleagues in the government in Sweden, because this is really we have to have the pub, the people on board on this enlargement. So far, and I was in on the panel last week, when there were figures out on how the support within the European Union is from from citizens on enlargement which is high I think there were 52% or 53 something. I think actually in Sweden is higher because we have always been in favor of enlargement. And we I think also after the full scale evasion of Ukraine, I think, when I meet people, most in Sweden known a everybody see the reason that when it comes to enlargement today it's the geopolitical situation the security issue is the main target. And I think that is one thing is that it's been obvious now, but also, because I also speak and spoke about the, the economical reason why this is important. And this is something that we have to speak about a lot what as often as possible so my eyes, I will, I hope that the election to European Parliament next year will be one opportunity to speak about a lot of the future EU with our citizens. And I will absolutely do so and I hope that the lot of other EU ministers and all ministers and all parties around the European Union will have this on the top agenda when we when we meet, we meet the voters. But this is a really important question that I think a lot about. Isn't it one of the, I suppose challenges that kind of coming back to a point that Karen or Mara made about the size of the commission and these become complex institutional questions and how would you know would would would a new would a smaller commission be more effective and so on and what about countries then who wouldn't end up having a voice at the table as aware that that is how inevitably that issue will be discussed in a referendum, for example, or even in parliaments where enlargement. If we look at the sort of the potential negative side of this debate and public opinion is if we if any individual country Ireland Sweden any country would be likely to lose clout or lose effectiveness or you know it's that it's impact would be less. And that's the kind of headline point that does grab attention, I think in the broader public. So I remember certainly that was the case here and in one or other either the more recent referendum or the one just before I think the more recent where we're losing our commissioner. So no matter how it's, it's presented, even if there is a clever way of having, you know, commissioners who are not necessarily in the College of Commissioners all the time, it still will be seen as a loss of a voice or loss or a diminution of the voice. No, exactly. And that is why I think so far I think it's important to have one commissioner per per members date but of course it will constitute maybe other bureaucratic discussions. But I think when it comes to public, the citizens wanting to do enlargement I think one of the things that is important that we have efficiency. And we have the money spent on the right things and we don't see it in wrong pockets, as I said, these questions are also very very important for people. Gentlemen there. Yes, yes, yourself. Yep. Paul King is my name. I am a practicing lawyer, but I'm also for full disclosure I'm the American General of Sweden. And you've mentioned elsewhere and you touched on it here today, and the risks of member states acting in a manner against the fundamental values that underlie the EU. And I think one of the concerns is that we have a further enlargement and that there could be the possibility of some states acting in concert, who might not not comply with the fundamental values. And how do we protect ourselves against that. Perhaps through qualified voting but are there other measures that you have in mind that might be an effective sanction and protection against that risk. Against interva amongst member states. Yeah member states who basically don't behave themselves and who don't respect the rule of law. And I think, yes, as I said, we have seen a backsliding across the world but also within the within the EU on this and that is why I think we have had the EU has a lot of tools. We have the article seven we have the dialogue, but we also now have the conditionality mechanism. And I think these are tools that we need to use. And I think here is also Sweden and Ireland very like minded on how can we exchange our views and because these are really important values that we cannot. And that has to be in the core, especially when it comes to enlargement. And that is why I push so very hard on these questions, especially when it comes to enlargement on these 10 countries that are now a candidate or applicants. That this is something that when we talk about merit based this is really the first step when it comes to merit based. And I think that one of the things in the German friend German French paper is on how to move forward on different parts of the rule of law internally. I have not the answers yet but I think there are interesting suggestions in that paper that you can might see the news but also I think the conditionality mechanism is really one thing that we need to also stick to which is only being in force for a couple of years. Barry and then yeah. Thanks very much, Minister and welcome to Dublin again. I totally struck by some of the things that you said. So you spoke about in Estonia 30 years ago there was Russian troops and now we have some the leading tech firms in the world. I have a question about what you said also about the country seeking partnership from the EU that if I think to to hopefully not miss quote you said that if we don't offer them partnership China and Russian China and Russia might. So my question for you it kind of builds on what you said to Alex and to Dylan. The questions are the, the risks of non enlargement from a geopolitical perspective so thinking of citizens in Uppsala or in Dublin, not talking about the important questions of do you have a commissioner or voting weights in the council. In terms of their security, the economy and society. What are the costs to them of non enlargements if the EU stays the same size. Thanks, Minister. Thank you thank you very relevant question. And that is because I think this is true. What I said, of course, and you quoted me correctly. And I think. And that is the thing that you have to have in mind when you discuss the enlargement what is the cost of the, not doing this. My point in having this first discussion in Uppsala was that you cannot hinder or stand in the way for enlargement we have, we cannot, you know, we cannot end up in in long discussions on, are we ready or not have the do we have enough room for 36 commissioners or not. The question is, we need to do this. Otherwise, someone else will do it. So absolutely. And the cost will be severe, I suppose, and that is also why I want to mention again and again and again, Ukraine is not fighting for themselves only if they are but they also fighting for security. And they need to win the peace. And because it's our, our democracy that they are also fighting for so absolutely the cost is there. So, so my point is absolutely don't let us not focus only on internal question this is important also we need to do our homework. When I speak with my colleagues and also that the, the, the leaders and level, the discussion is ongoing on how to make EU ready for enlargement, which is really good. And my other point is that to the candidate countries, the momentum is now you have to also do the reforms, but the EU cannot hinder or stop due to our own that we have not done the homework. John. Thank you very much minister john O'brennan I'm a professor who specializes in enlargement policy, you were admirably clear in everything you said so I thank you for that especially about treaty reform. The current conversation about enlargement actually is very similar to the 1990s and the early 2000s and Sweden played an incredibly positive role in facilitating enlargement at that time. My question to you is about the blockages in the council in particular because these have become more and more problematic over time we have individual members states objecting to particular candidate states for particular reasons. And it means that the candidate state just cannot make progress North Macedonia, having solved the problem with Greece, then was confronted with this other problem by the Bulgarian objections which are all about identity culture and history and have no place in my view in these negotiations. It's difficult to see Croatia having problems for example with some of the Western Balkan states at some point in the future. So, I would just wonder about the thinking in Sweden about this, about how we overcome those kinds of obstacles in the council and what kind of measures might be taken that might facilitate genuine breakthroughs, whether necessary. Thanks. I do a lot of thinking about that also and I'm afraid I don't have the perfect answer because these are really difficult questions and you've seen also the evaluation in these discussions on in the council on different matters. Now, I think I see some problems on the road, absolutely, but overall, I would say that all member states when we meet ministers, if I recall the meeting in Uppsala in spring, or we had all the ministers that maybe not all ministers all countries were was represented. And I will say that everybody, we will have the same opinion that enlargement is not about if it's about how. So this is good. But then I'm not pretending this will not be easy. We need to, I'm very clear of that. But still, I think that we have the same goal and the reason more that I've been talking about. So, but when it comes to different, also a reflection on when you speak about North budget Macedonia and and other countries in the Western Balkans are also reflected I was in Slovenia when on the blood conference. And, and Shawn Michelle was there speaking, and also is mentioned this 30s 2030 anyway. He also mentioned that we cannot take into the EU conflicts that are in different regions. So this is also an aspect on on on the other call. So I think it's, you asked me also almost two questions on the same time. So, the candidate countries need to do their reforms, we cannot take conflicts into the EU, and the parallel processes within the EU we the Council, we need to also make these important decisions. I'm positive that we will do it and we'll have the possibility and the capacity and the will to do it. But of course I see some very difficult discussions on that will be raised during the process. Absolutely. And people just picking up on that Valerie Hughes, who's an IAA member and asks a kind of almost anticipating this question of regional differences. I mean you mentioned obviously been concentrating on rule of law questions but occasionally the one manifest as the Valerie says, in the context of the rule of law and Western Balkans and EU enlargement. And would you care to comment on the Serbian president of book chiefs openly irredentist policies as Valerie describes them towards Bosnia, Kosovo and Montenegro. The question almost illustrates the point that a regional conflict or a regional difference may not be seen that solely that way by everybody. They also be seen in the context of broader philosophy or your rule of law questions. Exactly. And that is one of the points that you cannot have these, you cannot bring those conflicts into the unit, these needs to be handled before. But I think during the Swedish presidency, I, I visit me and the Minister of Foreign Affairs from Sweden to be at least to restore the countries on Western Balkans. And both to give our support and Sweden has for a long time been supportive in different ways in all countries to do the reforms in different ways. But also to say but you need to do your homework. Because this is a merit based process and that is very important for both Sweden and Ireland and a lot of other countries, of course. So, I really, I know that there is conflicts and different member states, different kind of different states have different difficulties. So speak so absolutely linked to that. I mean, Junker Kenny is a professor at Trinity College Dublin asks, or I suppose it's a comment or a question, whichever way you like to treat it. Ukraine may not become a member state if Hungary and Slovakia oppose it. Due to their ties with Russia and the additional Hungarian interest in the Hungarian speaking minority in Ukraine. What means could the EU use to mitigate this kind of same submersible. Yeah, absolutely. And I know that the Ukrainians, because I met during the Swedish presidency again that we had a lot of Ukrainian ministers on board on the informal meetings and have a lot of discussions. So I had a lot of the discussions with Mike and Pausla Olga's definition of, and I know that there is a lot of discussion bilateral between Ukraine and Hungary on the minority question. And so what can you do? Yeah, but because this is a process that is, is following kind of not a schedule, but it's, it's ordinary or it's everybody knows the process, so to speak. And now the Ukraine had these seven reforms that they need to do and then the commission's report came two weeks ago on start and negotiations, if and when in March, then they have fulfilled this. And I think the commission and the EU is doing the, not maybe the mitigation but the demands that we ask the US that you have to do this. And when it comes to minorities is one example that we have this criteria for all new member states. And this is the decision on all these questions are unanimity. We all know this and we need to move forward but as I said to earlier, I think the goal is we need, we know we need to, we want this enlargement and the process might be take some time absolutely but it's important and I feel that we know we have the same goal. Question at the front. Minister I'm Fergal like tomorrow I co chair the energy and climate group here at the Institute and thank you very much for your talk. I was interested in your mark about harmonization and the need for it or I think you put it that maybe results based outcomes were just as good as harmonization and the job is in the energy markets and electricity markets and we were very particular about harmonization inverse standardization in our particular field. And I suppose the more harmonization that bigger the equate a harder the accession negotiations so I just wondered if you could share some more your thoughts on how that plays out or what could be done different or how it should be organized thank you. For example when I say this is because comes a little bit maybe also come to the public, the citizens, having the citizens aboard on board. And one of the discussions that we have over very often in Sweden is about forestry. And if I make it simple, I can say left I can that maybe we Swedes don't think that the EU always understands how we think about forestry. So this has been a discussion on going and that is one of the examples that I took up when I think we need a regulation that is more focused on goal rather than detailed because we have different possibilities and the situation looks very different. So, so and but on the other hand I have of course understand and I know and I want to have that a lot of regulations and is also have to be the same in the whole union. So it's a double, double things to talk about, of course, then when it comes to the energy. No, but that's the example I would say that this is one of things that then it comes to better regulation I always and I meet a lot of companies that they don't only complain about EU they also complain of the government in Sweden, no matter what color it is maybe because it's too much heavy regulations so that is something that we have to have in mind. And during Swedish presidency we put competitiveness high on the agenda, and one of the points that we pointed out was that we have to have better regulation and a lesser burden and less reputable reporting. So, sometimes EU is very good on regulating, which is sometimes good, because we are frontline when it comes to making the climate goals for child examples, but sometimes we need to also have. That's why I use the word better regulation not more regulation. Sometimes that means less regulation but sometimes they just need better regulation. And when it comes to the keys when it comes to enlargement. I visit, I have an example from Albania, which I visited also when the Swedish support and we have we are engaged in one of the reform work when it comes to making the climate goals. And so this is something that we because I think the Sweden and other countries and also very good in the green transition and our companies are so we export our way of doing the green transition and that was one thing that EU members and other countries can help to support candidate countries to also that we all can reach the climate to go from so to speak.  Thank you, Minister Maricross a member of the Institute. We've been talking about enlargement up to about 37. But I just wanted to ask you about your close neighbor Norway, who will be very much an outlier in terms of Europe. European Union. If we do achieve the enlargement. Do you feel that this will put any pressure on Norway, the this major extension to rethink their application under just a second one. There's been a lot of destabilization by Russia on the finish border. Would you expect that the Nordic countries would find themselves under pressure, underneath any of the other countries with Russia, increasing activity to try to destabilize any enlargement activity. So, yes, I'm a minister of your first but also minister of Nordic cooperation. So the question is very, very good. No, but I, I of course, never ever comment other countries decisions, but this is not a secret. Sometimes when I meet with my colleagues in Norway also doesn't matter what color the politician is. I always ask you, when will you come to be a member when you really have your application to member states in the European Union. And, and, well, that's up to them, but I don't see any movement at the moment and now there is, we have also Iceland. So, but on the other hand, I will say this in the north when it comes to Nordic countries we have a very good cooperation and we work very closely also when it comes to EU laws and how to implement them also in all these countries, even they are not members. And so, well, it's up to them of course but of course I would gladly have them in the EU. And also I said, and when it comes to the, what we have seen last week on the reference migrants outside the Finnish border. Of course we follow it closely we are in close contact with our finish the Finnish government and, and see we have seen similar movements in Poland for one and two years ago. So it's worrying, and we will support Finland with whatever we can do of course but so we follow it closely. Absolutely, it's question at the back. I'm a member of the Institute. I want to raise a question about popular understanding of what the European project is all about. And that's in the context of another part of perfectly speech, where I think he was quoted as saying that, although we're a few are only able to originate a policy, we can all understand it. The current way we consider Europe we only talk about Europe once every five years when they're European elections. However, the European Parliament Constitutional Affairs Committee which is basically an institution looks at institutions that hearings in 2012. This presentation by a then Swiss MP, Dr Andy Gross who at the time was chairman of the social democratic group in the Council of Europe. And he said that in Switzerland, we get to talk about what it means to be Swiss four times a year. That's because of the way they have constitutional, they have referendums four times a year referendums on either local issues, cantonal issues or national issues. Surely that is something that the EU must now consider if we, the ordinary citizens who are not insiders or incumbents, not bureaucrats or politicians are to try to develop a common understanding of what it means to be Europe. And that understanding as, as we change. And bear in mind that Switzerland is a country with two major religious divides, four languages, and a big divide on, on how they cook potatoes. So, if I start with, if I, if I understood correctly, like that we discussed EU issues only every five years when it comes to European elections in practice. Yeah, yeah. So, no, no, no. No, I tried to tell everybody, of course, and I think that I speak from for a lot of ministers who you have as that we think that I agree that we speak too little about EU issues. My prime minister last week when he did the EU declaration in speech in parliament, had said several times that EU politics is national politics. And I, of course, totally agree. And I have repeated this since this and I and I spend also around in the Swedish media because I think this is the issue.  We all have the figures on on on the agenda in a new municipalities council that I don't know how this figure is not is like 5060 80% that is actually have started in the in some EU policy. I'm, I try actually to do my part of the job. Of course, and I spend a lot of time and on schools on different discussions because I think this is a problem that we don't discuss it more. And I'm afraid also that you, you could, you could argue on the next if you have a say again that even when it's come to European election European Parliament elections, they tend to be national elections. Even so, so this is also so sorry so I really hope that this election can focus on EU issues like enlargement, and maybe be a little bit naive but I would do my best to my part of this and also the parliamentarians. I'm not in favor of referendum, not even on the national level and I don't think that that is the way that we do policy in Sweden we have representative democracy and I think something that I defend every day. But that doesn't mean that we need to have the big discussions on EU affair questions. And that is also a question that I can I try to speak with the journalist in Sweden. And because sometimes I feel that people that I made think that EU matters is difficult. Which it of course is if we only talk about files that are far away but if we actually break them down to what it is. It is not difficult so I think and it's important for us. So, I understand what you say, but I hope that we can move to that we all discussed EU questions more, what it really because it's really important for us. It remains a challenge though doesn't it always that certainly 10 years ago here or 10 or 10 years ago during the crisis I remember one time Herman Herman von Rumpuy, kind of making the opposite point. Instead of the EU politics being national, he said something along the lines of that national parliaments for essentially now EU institutions. That was the reverse point and much more problematic, particularly in the context in which it was said, historic, you know, in terms of the crisis that was happening and that the parliaments the I was present when he said it that the parliaments were institutions of the European Union. That's it. I'm slightly misquoting them but not, I think violently misquoting and it was something like that. And I suppose that then just gives does, you know, it recalls that whole debate about democracy and so called democratic deficits and so on. That's just a constant challenge, I suppose, but you've you've addressed that. Yeah, a question here. Thanks very much Minister my name is Brian Kavanaugh, Maggie Tat. We are positioning Europe as a moral and democratic opposition to Russia. And I get that my concern is the ambiguity on many member states around particularly issue of immigration, and the sense that some from some perspective Europe's is looking like a fortress Europe, rather than power in Europe. We've enjoyed the speech of rural law, but with so many xenophobes and influential state governments, how does to use your term how does Europe clean up his own act in terms of ensuring that rural law and behavior all of us are talking about hungry and so back in others. That's the first question is a situation says shaping ideas and policy. How do we reach out to civil society, not the people in this room that you're calling said about insiders, because I suspect that commitment to Europe is very thin and wide. We need to be deepened equal as our commitment to national parliaments. So how is Europe helping civil society in the new emerging candidate countries as well as holding the line on our existing countries thank you. So, the first question was about fortress and not migration. No, yeah. I think that one or one. The migration question is of course a very it's a top it's on the agenda. I met with Peter Burke was coming from here tomorrow and and we can discuss that migration is on the European Council agenda every time. At least since my government come into office, because it is a question that is important. And from Sweden, we have for us it's really important we have had a very high number of migrants and we have not, we have not been successful when it comes to integration. So, coming to a conclusion on the migration pack during Swedish presidency on the in the Council was a great achievement from us, or our point of view and we, we surely work hard and during Spanish and the Belgium presidency to reach an agreement with the European Parliament on that. And because it is important for the European Union, when it comes to how can we live up to the rule of law, as you said within the union and I think I tried to answer a little bit earlier because I think the union has these different tools. And of course you can criticize some of them, like article seven does have it really have effect. I think in one way it has, because we have I've been attending the, the General Affairs Council for one year now and I think the discussions is is good and that the thing that it's moving forward in in these countries. Forward when I mean, doing reforms to also the article seven, but of course, at some and some point you have to discuss what will, what would be the next step. And that is why one thing that I think that this German French paper has some ideas. And also we have put forward a new tools like the conditionality mechanism, which is important. So of course, as I said, you need to also take these questions really serious but because EU is built on values, and we need to have the trust amongst us to remember between member states so this is really really important, not only because of the us people but also for our companies and our single market to function so these are this is essential of course. So I don't have all the answers but I think you are on something really important. Then you had another question that I forgot now because I didn't write it out. Sorry. Yeah, it'll probably be the final the handles but question because I have one from down or Brian here also very much minister. My name is Francis Jacobs member of the Institute. You mentioned several times the Franco German paper and obviously it's a really important contribution. And yet about a year and a half ago, there was a conference on the future of Europe, which made a number of recommendations involved lots of citizens national parliaments, and yet its recommendations seem to have disappeared completely. I just like your view on that. My second question you did mention in the context of enlargement, the importance of looking at the budget. Back for so long with a very small EU budget obviously miniscule compared to national budgets. Don't you think that enlargement poses for question, should there be a substantially larger budget than there is present for the EU. Yeah, and before you answer that that's exactly down or Brian is the chief economist of the IAA. He heard what you said as well about national vetoes on tax issues. I wondered, does that also mean that Sweden favors maintaining the EU budget at its current level of around 1% Yeah, the national veto question. Does that mean that you favor maintaining 1% the MFF. Yeah, so now I wrote down both questions. So let me start with a yes I mentioned the Franco German paper because you asked me about it but I also mentioned it's a lot of other papers coming out. I think one will come out this today tomorrow and the Swedish Institute have had this fit for 35 paper for a month ago something so it's a lot of good thinking around which is really, I think very helpful and good. The Conference of Future of Europe was had a lot of discussions a lot of suggestions but and some, a lot of them was has been taken care of within the Council and and some of them are also still discussing ongoing discussions in the European Parliament. So, from a Swedish perspective and this is also the previous government and also including my government is that we were quite. I just said another question we. It was a lot of citizens included but not that many actually was included. So are Swedish citizens they don't know about the Conference of Future of Europe, I will say so. That doesn't mean it was not important question raised. But still, I think we really need to work on having the people the citizens on board and that is not the answer is not the Conference of Future of Europe. I think that's another homework that we all need to do together to be honest. Yes, I recall and maybe I'm not exactly right with the figures but I think like 80% of the suggestions were taken care of within the council in different councils of course. And so is still when it comes to budget question this will be one of the difficult questions.  But I think we have argued for a modernized budget for a long time in Sweden. And what is modernized, of course they can discuss that but I think this is an important question that will absolutely be necessary to discuss because due to enlargement. The Ukraine with this is a large country which that would probably need to have the difficulties for a lot of countries when it comes to the cop. And will it have substantial will it increase will the budget increase, I don't know but I think if you ask Sweden, Swedes, we don't want to raise the budget. So we need to have a more much, we need to use, well how do we spend money but of course enlargement will have effect on all of us, I realize that so this is, and I will, I think that it's important to not. We need to speak about this this is difficult and how can we do it don't don't shy away this is important questions, and I'm not afraid to have the discussions, but I don't have the answer so it's easy at the moment maybe. Well that's what we do here we foster discussion we don't necessarily always get to the answers so thank you very much. Thank you, Jessica Roswell for being with us this afternoon, and for your first of all for your presentation for responding to so many questions and for your insights and observations. I think that enlargement is going to be a big preoccupation between now and the elections and next summer and beyond, obviously, and probably for the first time really the focus is coming back that kind of debate for the first time in 20 years as the last big sort of series of accession so it's a big question and you've addressed this afternoon in a very insightful way so our warm thanks for being here, and thank you all for your attendance, either in person or otherwise and for your questions, and thank you again in particular to our colleagues in the Department of Foreign Affairs for their close and continuing support for this series so thank you all very much. Thank you very much, thank you.