The recent flooding in Dumfries and Galloway and north England has been high on the media agenda. Given the levels of coverage you could be forgiven for thinking that Armageddon was nigh.

On the face of it looks like a national disaster. But is it really? One fatality. No towns swept away.

Two weeks ago 158 people died in El Salvador as massive flooding occurred in the provinces of San Salvador and San Vincente. You would have had to search hard to find much of a mention in the UK press. 

Historically flooding is the most widespread and devastating natural disaster known to man. The death-toll can be astronomical. The four worst floods in history have all occurred on the Huang He (Yellow) River in China.

In 1931 its banks burst and the floodwaters and related conditions such as disease and starvation killed an estimated 900,000 people. 

You have to go much further back in history to see the last time England was inundated to such a massive scale. In 1099 the country suffered its worst ever flood.

High tides and stormy conditions contributed to the deaths of an estimated 50,000 people as the level of the Thames rose and flooded London’s congested slums.

Paul Beck is the Operations Manager of Operations Mobilisation, a company that provides aid relief to disaster areas in the Third World.

He was recently in the Philippines reacting to September’s flooding that saw 80% of the capital, Manila, covered in water.

Mr Beck explained about the contrasts between Scotland and Philippines in terms of flooding.

He said: “The first things we must look at are the environmental differences such as degradation and deforestation that lead to differences in the in the severity of flooding in the Philippines and Scotland. The taking down of trees in the Philippines affects the ability of the land to drain water.

“Another major difference is that building permission and planning permission are much weaker in the Philippines than here. The poorest people are those most affected as slums are built on the sides of rivers. No permission has been sought and they are built illegally and never pulled down.”

Mr Beck added: “The slum dwellers build shacks that are not meant to keep out heavy amounts of water. Our buildings in Scotland may get flooded but rarely anything worse. In the Philippines buildings are simply swept away.”

The recent flooding was a result of tropical storm Ketsana that struck the capital. The death toll reached 1,100 with thousands more missing.

Manila saw its heaviest rainfall in over 40 years and emergency services were swamped as the city disappeared underwater.

photo by ABS-CBN News Online’s Photostream

According to Mr Beck this year has been especially harsh as typhoons of great frequency and high severity batter the northern Philippines.

In Scotland we see a very prompt and efficient response to flooding despite its relative passivity compared to the tragedy in the Philippines. The response there is disjointed and chaotic in comparison.

Paul Becks explains why: “We see many differences in the government response of Scotland and the Philippines.

“The primary factor is in the amount of finances available. The second factor is in the ability of the relief effort to reach affected areas and to identify exactly where aid is required.

photo by cheltenhamborough@flickr

“In Scotland we have complete records. We know where people live and who has been affected.  In the Philippines it is much more difficult.”

He added: “There are no real records and relief efforts have no idea how many people live in each area or where those groups most at risk are.”

Flooding affects people all over the world but it would appear that we are luckier than most, but it is all relative, and flooding does have a big impact on our country.

Richard Brown, Head of Hydrology at the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, said: “It may not seem as severe on a global scale but flooding does cause huge problems for Scotland.

“Last week the Inverness and Aberdeen rail-links were closed down and we see many trunk roads closed due to landslides.”

Mr Brown also defended the media’s coverage of UK floods: ”The media dosen’t over-react and it is needed to publicise the floods and make people aware. We have seen fatalities in the past. I don’t think that we over-react as a nation due to the scale of the problems facing us.”

The recent flooding in Dumfries and Galloway and north England has been high on the media agenda. Given the levels of coverage you could be forgiven for thinking that Armageddon was nigh.

On the face of it looks like a national disaster. But is it really? One fatality. No towns swept away.

Two weeks ago 158 people died in El Salvador as massive flooding occurred in the provinces of San Salvador and San Vincente. You would have had to search hard to find much of a mention in the UK press. 

Historically flooding is the most widespread and devastating natural disaster known to man. The death-toll can be astronomical. The four worst floods in history have all occurred on the Huang He (Yellow) River in China.

In 1931 its banks burst and the floodwaters and related conditions such as disease and starvation killed an estimated 900,000 people. 

You have to go much further back in history to see the last time England was inundated to such a massive scale. In 1099 the country suffered its worst ever flood.

High tides and stormy conditions contributed to the deaths of an estimated 50,000 people as the level of the Thames rose and flooded London’s congested slums.

Paul Beck is the Operations Manager of Operations Mobilisation, a company that provides aid relief to disaster areas in the Third World.

He was recently in the Philippines reacting to September’s flooding that saw 80% of the capital, Manila, covered in water.

Mr Beck explained about the contrasts between Scotland and Philippines in terms of flooding.

He said: “The first things we must look at are the environmental differences such as degradation and deforestation that lead to differences in the in the severity of flooding in the Philippines and Scotland. The taking down of trees in the Philippines affects the ability of the land to drain water.

“Another major difference is that building permission and planning permission are much weaker in the Philippines than here. The poorest people are those most affected as slums are built on the sides of rivers. No permission has been sought and they are built illegally and never pulled down.”

Mr Beck added: “The slum dwellers build shacks that are not meant to keep out heavy amounts of water. Our buildings in Scotland may get flooded but rarely anything worse. In the Philippines buildings are simply swept away.”

The recent flooding was a result of tropical storm Ketsana that struck the capital. The death toll reached 1,100 with thousands more missing.

Manila saw its heaviest rainfall in over 40 years and emergency services were swamped as the city disappeared underwater.

photo by ABS-CBN News Online's Photostream

According to Mr Beck this year has been especially harsh as typhoons of great frequency and high severity batter the northern Philippines.

In Scotland we see a very prompt and efficient response to flooding despite its relative passivity compared to the tragedy in the Philippines. The response there is disjointed and chaotic in comparison.

Paul Becks explains why: “We see many differences in the government response of Scotland and the Philippines.

“The primary factor is in the amount of finances available. The second factor is in the ability of the relief effort to reach affected areas and to identify exactly where aid is required.

photo by cheltenhamborough@flickr

“In Scotland we have complete records. We know where people live and who has been affected.  In the Philippines it is much more difficult.”

He added: “There are no real records and relief efforts have no idea how many people live in each area or where those groups most at risk are.”

Flooding affects people all over the world but it would appear that we are luckier than most, but it is all relative, and flooding does have a big impact on our country.

Richard Brown, Head of Hydrology at the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, said: “It may not seem as severe on a global scale but flooding does cause huge problems for Scotland.

“Last week the Inverness and Aberdeen rail-links were closed down and we see many trunk roads closed due to landslides.”

Mr Brown also defended the media’s coverage of UK floods: ”The media dosen’t over-react and it is needed to publicise the floods and make people aware. We have seen fatalities in the past. I don’t think that we over-react as a nation due to the scale of the problems facing us.”

C'est encore plus beau quand on y voit rien.

l’International Dark-Sky Association basé à Tucson, en Arizona, a décerné médaille d’or de l’obscurité à la forêt de Galloway en Écosse.

Ce parc naturel de 480 kilomètres carrés où quelques dizaines de familles vivent est l’endroit dans le monde industrialisé où la pollution lumineuse est la plus faible.

Galloway a reçu une note de 23 sur 24, 24 étant la note d’une chambre noire de photographe.

Pour Martin Morgan-Taylor, membre du conseil de l’International Dark Sky Association a déclaré à la BBC que ce type de ciel noir et non-polué par la lumière est en train de disparaitre et que moins de 10% des habitants du Royaume-Uni peuvent voir la Voie-Lactée (“Such skies are rapidly disappearing and less than 10% of people in the UK can now see the Milky Way from where they live)”.

Roseanna Cunningham la ministre écossaise de l’environement en a profité pour faire un jeu de mot en déclarant que ce prix donne à la forêt un coup de projecteur (“…firmly in the spotlight”).

Le parc de “Galloway Forest”, fut créé en 1947; il est actuellement le plus etendu de tout le royaume.

Liens:

Le Parc naturel de Galloway

Accés au parc de Galloway http://www.travelinescotland.com

Plan du parc (Multimap)

Autres liens

International Dark-Sky Association

Martin Morgan-Taylor

Roseanna Cunningham

Waterfall

Where better to spend Friday 13th than one of the darkest, most isolated places in the UK, in the middle of some of the worst flooding in the UK, 300 miles from home, in a tent.

Accompanied by my little brother, Adam, 23, I headed for Galloway Forest Park, near Dumfries, Scotland, armed with nothing more than a tent, some tins of Asda Value macaroni cheese, a torch and a woolly hat – one each in fact.

The torch was undoubtedly the most important item in our arsenal of necessities – the macaroni cheese coming in a close second – as we were officially in darkest place in the British Isles.

The International Dark Sky Association have agreed that Galloway Forest Park registers at Bortle 2 on the international darkness scale – Bortle 1 is reserved for the deepest parts of the ocean where light can no longer penetrate.

Clatteringshaws Loch

It is one of the most beautiful places I have ever visited and despite the torrential rain, howling winds and jet black evening we bravely pitched the tent on a small plot for a reasonable fee of £13, made payable to a grubby little Scottish chap named John, who owned the land.

After a six hour drive from Leicester, and what felt like even longer erecting the shelter, we treated ourselves to a tin of corned beef and some macaroni – this was real outdoors living – and a few beers later we headed for bed.

However, we decided that due to Adam’s unnatural capability for thunderous snoring he would sleep in the car and I would take the tent. But it didn’t make much difference, the wind and pounding rain kept me up anyway.

The 300 square mile park, made up of mountains, hills, valleys and lochs, has become one of the first places outside the US to be named as a Dark Skies Park – and it’s Gold Status has ranked it among only four other sites around the world. They include Utah, Pennsylvania and Ohio.

Despite the accolade, I prefer it in the day when you can see things.

Cold, wet, misty but beautiful

Anyway, the next morning we ate more low-priced tinned delights and went wandering…

After a wet trek around the forest, and another tin of macaroni, we agreed that another night in John’s field battling the element was madness and we’d done enough to prove ourselves as true survivalists (and England were playing Brazil at 5pm), so we threw the muddy assortment of camping gear back in the car and went home.

But the little time we did spend in the darkest place in the UK was awe-inspiring (during the day at least)… the macaroni was not.

I was really pleased to see the Dark Skies award given to Galloway Forest Park the other day, it’s agreat example of local action with a gobal perspective.  Given that it is the only award outside of the US so far, it does feel a little like the “World Series” of baseball though.  I really hope that there is enough so called “Astronomical Tourists” out there, but I suspect not.

On the other hand though, it may well drive a small wave of PR that draws attention to the broader destination around the Forest Park, this area of Scotland does not get a lot of national play when it comes to promoting Scotland.  I recently worked with a group of tourism businesses based in this area who were looking for a small, quality led destination website and marketing programme.

And although it’s early days, the new website for Holiday Southern Scotland certainly looks the part, again this is another example of local Scottish tourism businesses working collaboratively using the web and new technologies to get their message out there.

I didn’t expect the decision over the Dark Sky award bid for the Galloway Forest Park to come quite so swiftly after the assessment, but all went well, and the forest has now been officially unveiled as the first Dark Sky Park in the UK.

The award was announced by the International Dark Sky Association, and has confirmed Galloway as one of the best places for stargazing in the world.

It seems that the selection process includes a measurement of the darkness of the sky using a sky quality meter, the higher the reading the better the viewing conditions. The darkest reading, as might be found in a photographer’s dark room (if you could find one now that digital photography has seen off most of the film based work), is rated 24. Big cities such as Glasgow or Edinburgh return readings in the region of 15 or 16, but Galloway Forest Park managed a result of 23, giving it the highest status available – gold.

Galloway Forest Park sees about 850,000 visitors per annum, and Keith Muir, Forestry Commission Scotland’s head of tourism and recreation in Galloway, said: “We have big plans to double this over time”.

Of course, they don’t want to be too successful now, attract thousands of new visitors, build loads of visitor centres, and all the other places that support these, bring more buildings, people… and light.

Link

- November 4, 2009

A must-watch speech by George Galloway MP at the War Crimes Conference & Exhibition that took place at the Putra World Trade Center in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia on 28th October 2009.

Link

- November 4, 2009

A must-watch speech by George Galloway MP at the War Crimes Conference & Exhibition that took place at the Putra World Trade Center in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia on 28th October 2009.

I like to run…a lot

I wasnt always that way though. I thought I could never be a runner, that was for those healthy people right? It wasnt untill I found the Galloway method of running did I truly fall in love with the sport.

What is the Galloway Method you may ask?

The Galloway Method is a way of running in which you take small breaks. The interval of running to walking can be anywhere from 2 minutes running/ 1 minute walking to 1 mile running/ 1 minute walking. The goal of this method is to provide walk breaks to recover a little bit over the course of the run

Why is this method so great for new runners?

Using the Galloway method, running becomes a lot less intimidating. Instead of telling yourself you have to run a mile, tell yourself to run 2 minutes. Everyone can run two minutes! This method is so successful even some elite runners use it! Pretty soon you will be running 5, 10, or even 15 miles no problem.

I still use the galloway method to this day! Even though my walk breaks are shorter and my running segments are longer, I have found this method to be very beneficial to me in all my training runs and races!

So get out there and do it!

In Chapter 1 of Gaming: “Gamic Action, Four Moments,” Alexander Galloway explores video games as a mass medium. He does this without delving specifically into the more creative comports of gaming or the social and specific significance of the playing of video games, but focusing on the semantic makeup of the video game design as a whole and play as medium-specific actions.

First, he explores the differences between video games and previous media. “If photographs are images, and films are moving images, then video games are actions” (2). This is not the same as “active audience” media, where an audience can apply their own subjectivities to media, such as an interpretation of a film. While films and images are passive in our intake of them, in that we cannot affect them directly in how they affect us, video games are an “action-based medium” which requires our input to engage us (3). This concept can be compared to children’s toys.

First, there is the image, the photograph—or in children’s toys, the action figure. Think specifically of the action figure that you are not supposed to play with, or one of the shoddier type you get in Happy Meals: the one that doesn’t have moveable bits, where you must invest your own interpretations into the toy. This could range from anything to fighting aliens to having a tea party, but the main point is that while the toy might look like Iron Man or Barbie, it doesn’t have to be played with in a certain way.

Next, there is the moving image, the film—or the active toy, like the Furby. Furbies were these toys from the early 2000s. If you don’t remember, here’s a commercial:

However, once bought, one quickly realized that while when you turned them on, they would warble and giggle and move their eyes in a semi-terrifying way, there wasn’t much else left after that. Certainly, you could hug them (they were furry), but the mechanics inside got in the way. Otherwise, there wasn’t much you could do but watch them, or have them wake you up in the middle of the night when they suddenly decided to talk (as it was extremely difficult to fully turn them off.)

Finally, there is the video game, the action—one could see this sentiment echoed in a coloring book, or a board game, or legos. You can’t just look at these toys, because there is no fun at looking at a coloring book. These toys are essentially useless unless you act upon them, and it is that action that is its purpose.

Then, Galloway goes into the “Four moments” of gaming action. First, he writes about the diegesis of video games:  “[It] is the game’s total world of narrative action. As with cinema, video game diegesis includes both onscreen and offscreen elements. It includes characters and events that are shown, but also those that are merely made reference to or are presumed to exist within the game situation” (7).

Then, throughout the chapter, he breaks down the four moments, actions, suggestions of the video game thus:

First, there is the diegetic machine act, which he describes as an informational and atmospheric process, specifically the “ambience act” (10). This is when the player has temporarily ceased playing, but it is the “inverse of pressing pause” because while the game is going unplayed, certain acts are still going on. The trees might rustle, a bird might caw, and your character is still there, usually bobbing up and down in an uncomfortable fashion. The game is still within the created universe, allowing it to live and breath mechanically while it waits for you to pick it up again. This can be seen in more cinematic video games, such as Myst, or Ico, in which the “experience of ambience, of nonplay,” is more desirable to the actual game (18). However, Galloway feels that “formally speaking, cinematic interludes are a type of grotesque fetishization of the game itself as machine” (11).

In the following video, game review Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw deliberates on why cinematic gameplay does not work.

(Disclaimer: Ben uses some NSFW language, but he has several good points nonetheless.)

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/981-Wet

Second, Galloway describes the nondiegetic operator act as a “subjective algorithm,” in which the action is material and subjective (37). This is about pausing the game, or gathering cheats to flout the game’s original intentions to win. This is applicable to gameplay heavy games, where one seeks to buck the system and skip ahead, or even just freeze the game because there is little time for rest in the actual game.

Then there is the diegetic operator act, which is simply the gameplay: shooting, running, climbing trees, etc. He calls it “ritualistic dromenon” and refers to Huizinga’s ideas of gameplay as “an activity that is (1) free, (2) separate, (3) uncertain, (4) unproductive, (5) unregulated, and (6) fictive” (20). Huizinga also calls out Jodi (remember them?) as “spoilsports” because “their games intentionally deviate from the enchanting order created by the game” (28). Huizinga, Galloway explains, see video games as perfect order in an imperfect world.

Finally, there is the nondiegetic machine act, which are simple actions that are coded within the machine: the disabling or enabling of gameplay (which could be simple shutting off the game via a button or cutting off the play via death) which is based in the “play of structure” (37). A game in connection to this would be DDR, or Guitar Hero. Here I’d like to return to Yahtzee when he reviews the new Guitar Hero 5 and Beatles Rock Band (same disclaimer applies):

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/941-Beatles-Rock-Band-and-Guitar-Hero-5

You’ll notice that at the end Yahtzee mentions that he realized that after a while it wasn’t about the music anymore, it was about how quickly he could press a bunch of buttons.

One last point: when I was reading about video gaming, I wanted to see if it was cybertext or hypertext. It seems to me that video games are cybertext in general, in that they are supposed to be linear (in terms of levels and advancement) and are also set up to be orderly. However, within the game’s frame, one could see it as hypertext. In the diegesis of video games, one does not need to follow the set rules. For example, when my friend would play Fable 2, he would often ignore the game’s hero aspects (save this village, avenge your sister, etc.) and do things like kick people to see if they noticed, or marry one woman per town, and have children with each of them, and see if he could fight the children with his sword (he couldn’t).

I’m not sure where to begin with this post considering the material that Galloway discusses: protocol. He defines protocol in two parallel way. First, the word ‘protocol,’ before computing, “referred to any type of correct or proper behavior within a specific system of conventions” (7). As it relates to computing,  “A computer protocol is a set of recommendations and rules that outline specific technical standards” governing the use of the Internet (6). In general, for you to understand this post, we need to have a shared understanding of the use of language protocols and you have to have some sort of knowledge of the protocols required to access this blog posts. Galloway see these protocols as a part of what Deleuze calls ’societies of control,’ which comes after Foucault’s ‘disciplinary societies. That is, control is spread out horizontally in the era of the Internet instead of the hierarchical (vertical) control of pre-computer/Internet control.

While some contemporary critics may “describe the Internet as an unpredictable mass of data – rhizomatic and lacking central control,” I’m not sure that I would agree with the  position that this implies that we are “witnessing a general disappearance of control as such” (8). But Galloway’s view that “protocol is how technological control exists after decentralizaion” (8) is a good point, one that echoes a point Kittler makes in an essay (one I can’t recall the name of) that we need to begin learning the code to be better able to interact with and understand these protocols. This distributed network is decentralized in the sense that there is no one location in which control trickles down (to use a Reagan-era term). Along those same lines, Galloway makes the claim that “[a] decentralized network [...] has multiple central hosts, each with its own set of satellite nodes” (11), which makes sense in the context of where website and sets of data are contained, but not in the sense that the code is centralized. Yes, there are a variety of different coding language that is translated by the web browsers that we use and the website building software used to create Internet content. However, it is this code that allows the distribution of various sets of data and that allows us to use the available software to break apart the original code. In addition, anyone that can learn the codes and protocols of those codes can find ways to disrupt those protocols – think of hackers and people who create viruses. In the disciplinary societies, to disrupt and interact with the protocols of the dominant culture, one had to be willing to play the disciplinary game to be disruptive. In a decentralized system, the protocols can be learned and used without ever having to engage in the disciplinary game and the train/ing that comes along with it.

Then, there is an odd turn around page 19: “In my estimation, it makes little sense to try to fit non-protological and nondistributed media such as film and video into this new context.” In a very basic sense, film and video do require proto/logical thinking, such as how the camera filming/recording makes copies of what it is pointed at. At this point, each of these media may be treated as ‘mere tools’ for some sort of function, especially with the advent of decentralized video (and photo) editing software. Understandably, there is a danger of being unaware of the protocols that manage our interactions with the Internet. Galloway acknowledges this danger, but then turns to Castells’ term “network societies” that is not dominated by economies or industrial sectors, but “by ‘interactive networks’ and flexible accumulation’” (24). G. continues and claims that it is this decentralization that makes the protocological control of the network so easy (25). In the sense of the king(doms) of pre-enlightenment eras, this claim is intriguing. Like Kittler’s claim that the year 1900 marked an age of the ‘algorithm,’ the protocol of what must happen in a specified order does constitute a society of control. For Galloway, it is this decentralization that give protocol its power: “if protocol dared to centralize, or dared to hierarchize, or dared to essentialize, it would fail” (26). It seems, in other words, that the decentralization of protocol(s) helps ’societies of control’ to avoid mass movements (such as protests in a place that has centralized power). The greater the difference among the public, for Galloway, the fewer binaries that create conflict – and with less conflict, control may be easier to attain.

To conclude, I would like to introduce Walter Ong to this concept of protocological thinking: “Machines can take over – not in the sense that they will direct human society, an idea which is nonsense if not paranoid, but in the sense that we may, and often do, regard ourselves as machines, taking a mechanical device as a model for the human being” (Interfaces of the Word 300). As a way to avoid this sort of mechanical/technological thinking, recent media theorists have positioned art practices as a way to disrupt the control of these protocols (not in the same words). Even Galloway has expressed this tendency: “…the history of avant-garde artistic production, from modernist painting to conceptual art, significantly influence my perspective vis-a-vis work being done today” (19).

I’ve rambled on a bit about Dark Skies before, and mentioned Dark Sky Scotland, and the subject has made it into the news with the announcement that Forestry Commission Scotland (FCS) has applied to the International Dark Sky Association (IDSA) for such an award to be made to the area of Galloway Forest Park.

Only three areas have achieved this status to date, and all are in the US: Utah, Pennsylvania and Ohio.

The forest park will be visited by two members of the IDSA UK board, who will carry out an assessment and decide if the area meets the required criteria, and if it does, if it merits silver or gold status. The application has been supported by the assistance of the Wigtownshire Astronomical Society and students from Glasgow University.

The IDSA will meets on November 14 and 15,  and a decision on the Galloway Forest Park application should follow soon after.

It would be something of a notable achievement if this award could be brought here, as light pollution is something of an anathema in these days when we are supposed be environmentally aware. Instead of working towards the potential energy saving which would be gained by switching off unnecessary lighting, there seems to be a concerted effort by anyone with money to add some sort of public illumination to their possessions, and draw attention to them. This ranges all the way from my neighbours, who now take delight in having illumination installed on their homes, paths and in their garden, all the way to the bottomless pockets of corporate giants, who signal their success with floodlighting of their buildings. Both seem free to spill as much light as they wish, with some lighting units pointing straight into the sky, and not even being dispersed by washing up the surface of a wall or building. Even public streets now have uplighters installed at ground level, in pedestrian precincts, firing straight into the sky above.

Councils seem to be the “good guys” these days, and now lighting they install seems to generally conform to rules that demand no direct sky illumination, and lighting units that deliberately direct their illumination downwards, or towards their subject.

I live on the outskirts of the city, and there’s little chance of seeing anything low in the sky these days, but I have spent nights driving through the forests of Galloway, and the sky view there is amazing, with a detail and clarity which a city dweller will never see and enjoy.

Here’s hoping that drive won’t have to extend to Lapland, Sweden, in future.

Fury at rise in winter deaths

Oct 16 2009
by Julie Watt, Dumfries Standard Friday

THE NUMBER of winter deaths in Dumfries and Galloway has hit an all time high.

From December 2008 to March 2009 a total of 140 people in the region died – 50 more than the previous year.

And campaigners for the elderly are warning that, unless action is taken now, the situation could get even worse this winter.

Carole Williams, from the region’s Seniors’ Forum, has slammed the figures and called on politicians to help protect vulnerable people in the community.

She said: “All our politicians should be ashamed of these figures. They are a shocking indictment on what seems to be an unwillingness or inability on the part of both the Scottish and Westminster governments to face up to the facts.

Struggling

“Much of the older population is struggling to pay essential bills.

“We acknowledge that other factors such as flu and health inequalities need to be taken into account. However, huge price increases for gas, electricity and solid fuels over the last year have had a disproportionate impact on older peoples’ cost of living.”

The sharp rise in the number of deaths has also concerned Dumfriesshire MP David Mundell and he is hoping that a review of the winter allowance scheme will help.

He said: “I believe we need to have more localised information used to decide cold weather payments.

“I contacted the Department for Work and Pensions earlier in the year calling for a review of weather stations used locally to ensure payments are being made on the basis of local weather conditions and not conditions miles away.

“I have received an undertaking from the Minister that this will be done in time for this winter’s scheme.”

The Seniors’ Forum has warned that they will be monitoring the situation closely.

Carole added: “Addressing any contributing factors, be it health, income, fuel prices, means-tested benefits, or means-tested central heating programmes, should be cross-party priorities. The senior electorate will be looking for solutions and will be looking for them soon.”

Margaret Syme, aged 85, has been a member of the forum for many years.

The Lochfoot pensioner, said: “Many elderly people in Dumfries and Galloway are in a dreadful situation when the winter months come along. I know for a fact that there are a lot of old people who will sit in cold houses because they cannot afford to turn their heating on. It is a terrible shame.”

The health board is hoping that further deaths will be avoided if there is a better uptake of the flu jab this year.

A spokesman said: “NHS Dumfries and Galloway acknowledges that last winter there was a rise in the winter deaths figure.

“Many of these additional winter deaths can be due to respiratory and circulatory diseases and the cold winter weather can make those with chronic conditions even more vulnerable.

“We would urge everyone who is entitled to the flu vaccination to make sure they get the flu jab.”

Source

The trembling earth quake that hit the streets of Tower Hamlets in 2005 will occur again according to some experts

Galloway’s victory was not just a jammy number-8 ball that knocked the Pro-Zionist, Pro-War MP Oona King who left very little legacy after serving 2 terms in office. Little do you hear of the good things she done for the residents of this borough. She done jack.

Galloway broke a dead lock which many Labour opportunists are so grateful for. Yet, little did they think that a new girl in town would parachute her way in and take the prize – a parliamentary candidacy for the Labour machine within the ‘goldmines’.

I feel sorry for them to be honest. How can all 80+ nominees be so naïve and stupid to let Ali just slide through like that? And they say they know politics. Fools.

Once again, a battle has commenced.

Source: J Post

‘Galloway raised funds for Hamas in US’

The University of California, Irvine, has launched an internal probe and contacted law enforcement authorities over a student-organized event that may have raised money for Hamas.

The investigation is in response to allegations made by the Zionist Organization of America, which also alerted local law enforcement officials last week about the May event.

Organized by the Muslim Student Union at UCI, the event featured British politician George Galloway, who reportedly solicited funds for “Viva Palestina,” his organization that brings aid to Gaza.

British MP George Galloway, center, flashes a V-sign as he waits with other members of his entourage at the Rafah border crossing. Photo AP

ZOA officials said evidence shows Viva Palestina monies may have ended up in Hamas hands. ZOA officials said Galloway visited Gaza in March, when he donated 100 vehicles and some $1.4 million.

“We are giving them to the elected government of Palestine,” Galloway reportedly said at the time.

Upon his return, he launched a Viva Palestina speaking tour of the United States, making stops at college campuses, including UCI’s event, billed as “Israel: The Politics of Genocide.”

In July, Galloway returned to Gaza with more aid.

“One concern is whether our universities or college campuses are being used as a base for fund-raising for terrorism, which is a violation of federal law,” said Susan Tuchman, director of the ZOA’s Center for Law and Justice. “It has to be investigated.”

This is not the first time Galloway and his Viva Palestina campaign has raised suspicions. The Anti-Defamation League last spring took its concerns to the US Attorney-General’s Office. In late March, Canadian immigration officials refused to allow Galloway entry on national security grounds.

A spokesman for Canadian Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said at the time that the ban was in accordance with an immigration law that protects citizens from people who fund, support or engage in terrorism.

The Jewish Defense League of Canada wrote an open letter urging the Canadian government to keep Galloway away.

“We’re going to uphold the law, not give special treatment to this infamous street-corner Cromwell who actually brags about giving ‘financial support’ to Hamas, a terrorist organization banned in Canada,” the ministry’s spokesman, Alykhan Velshi, told The Guardian in March.

“I’m sure Galloway has a large Rolodex of friends in regimes elsewhere in the world willing to roll out the red carpet for him. Canada, however, won’t be one of them.”

“This idiotic ban shames Canada,” Galloway said in a statement at the time.

In the UCI matter, university officials have pledged to investigate whether the group organizing the event violated campus policies by holding a fund-raiser.

In asking for permission to hold the event, the Muslim Student Union said it would not be a fund-raiser, and publicity around the event indicated it would not be a fund-raiser. But according to those present, collection boxes were distributed.

“We have initiated an internal review of these matters, and will proceed as expeditiously as possible,” Diane Fields Geocaris, chief campus counsel and associate general counsel, wrote to ZOA officials in a letter dated September 30. “UC Irvine takes very seriously all allegations of wrongdoing. We appreciate your bringing this to our attention.”

The May event featuring Galloway disturbed Jewish groups concerned with Galloway’s anti-Israel rhetoric. During his talk, Galloway referred to Gaza as a “concentration camp” and called Israel an apartheid state.

“Why are you making the Palestinian people pay in 2009 for what European fascists did in 1941?” he reportedly asked.

Prior to his trip to Gaza in July, the ADL expressed concern about whether Viva Palestina was providing material aid to Hamas. On its Web site, the ADL details Galloway’s spring speaking tour in the United States.

“Galloway spoke brazenly about giving material support to Hamas, a US-designated terrorist organization, asserting, ‘Who else would you give it to if not the elected government?’” the ADL said, referencing an event at Columbia University on March 23.

In May, the organization wrote to US Attorney-General Eric Holder, expressing concerns about the Viva Palestina campaign’s intentions.

“It is not verifiable that this ‘committee’ will function independently of the Hamas leadership in Gaza, and Galloway, who plans to lead the American convoy, has already demonstrated his willingness to directly support Hamas,” the letter said.

In another letter to UCI administrators dated September 22, the ZOA questions whether the conduct of Galloway and the student group violated campus policies.

ZOA officials said school administrators at the event overlooked the collection and did not reporting the fund-raising to senior university officials.

Martin Migdall, who lives near the university and attended Galloway’s speech in May, described escalating anti-Israel rhetoric on campus in recent years.

Migdall first became aware of the problem when he attended a lecture at UCI several years ago and was greeted by anti-Israel protesters.

“Here’s a hotbed of anti-Semitism in my own neighborhood,” he recalled thinking.

Several years ago, he was part of a community task force that investigated and found anti-Semitism on campus.

After Migdall observed the collection boxes at the Viva Palestina event and learned the event had not been billed as a fund-raiser, he contacted the ZOA. He said most troubling is that school officials and campus police chose to overlook blatant violations of campus policy.

ZOA officials said for years UCI’s Jewish students have grappled with anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rhetoric accusing Zionist Jews of being Satanic, among other things. In recent years, “two students left UC-Irvine because they couldn’t tolerate the hostility any more,” the ZOA’s Tuchman said.

In 2004, the ZOA filed a complaint on behalf of Jewish students with the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights. The complaint was dismissed, and the ZOA is currently appealing the ruling.

“What wasn’t different about this event” in May, “was the kind of hateful rhetoric that was being promoted,” Tuchman said. “But what was different about this event was the possibility that funds were being raised for Hamas, and Hamas is a foreign terrorist organization, designated as such by the US State Department.”

She said a second concern is the reaction of UCI administrators, during this and other contentious interactions between Jewish and Muslim students.

“The administration’s silence in response to the hate and bigotry is almost as bad as the hate and bigotry itself,” Tuchman said.

To lose one Red Panda, as Lady Bracknell might have observed, may be regarded as a misfortune. To lose both, as Galloway Wildlife Park in Kirkcudbright did last February, looks like carelessness.

The adult female, Pichu, was recovered two months later. Her cub Isla remained at large until last Thursday, BBC News reports.

Sadly, last week Isla was found injured by the side of the road between Kippford and Dalbeattie in Kirkudbrightshire. She was taken to a vet, but later succumbed to her injuries.

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At the time of the escape, park owner John Denerley expressed cautious optimism for the future of the pandas, telling the BBC: “To cope with the lack of food during the winter months, red pandas have evolved several ways of meeting their energy demands. They … have a very low metabolic rate – almost as low as sloths – and can slow their metabolism even further in colder temperatures.”

Last week Denerley said: “Amazingly, Isla survived in the wild for such a long period and was in good condition since she escaped … We are devastatingly upset over her death.”

The Red Panda, also known as the Lesser Panda, or Firefox, is of uncertain phylogenetic affinity. Scientists have reached some agreement on what it is not: a cat, a raccoon, a fox or a bear. Indeed it may not even be a panda. But what it is remains a contentious issue.

A recent discussion of the phylogeny of this Asian curiosity can be found in Flynn et al. (DOI: 10.1006/mpev.2000.0819), who place it among the badgers.