tagged w/ Netherlands
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By Reuters
Saturday, January 28, 2012 10:01 EST
(Reuters) – Supporters of legalizing marijuana for recreational use have submitted enough signatures to put the matter to voters in Washington state in a bold move that, if successful, could put Olympia on a collision course with the federal government.
The group New Approach Washington submitted nearly 278,000 valid signatures for the measure, more than required to put it on the November ballot, David Ammons, a spokesman for the Washington Secretary of State’s office, said in a statement.
The move comes as federal prosecutors have sought to crank up pressure on several mostly western states, including Washington, that have legalized medical marijuana even as cannibis remains classified as an illegal narcotic under federal law.
The proposal, if approved by voters, would allow marijuana sales to people 21 and older, permit state taxes to be collected on the drug, ban pot advertising and prohibit driving under the influence of cannabis.
Supporters of legalizing marijuana, who include acting Seattle city attorney Peter Holmes, say the federal prohibition on the drug has not curbed use and that it enriches drug cartels.
“This is the grown-up approach to regulating a relatively harmless drug,” Holmes said.
Opponents of legalization say it would lead to more abuse of the drug, including by young people, and that underground sales would continue.
“There will always be a black market. That’s been proven with cigarettes with the tobacco industry,” said Calvina Fay, head of the Florida-based Drug Free America Foundation. “Even though tobacco is legal and it’s regulated, there’s still a huge global black market.”
Washington is one of 16 states that, along with the nation’s capital, have decriminalized medical marijuana. But federal agents have raided medical marijuana dispensaries in several states, including Washington, in recent months.
Under state law, the recreational legalization initiative next heads to the Washington State Legislature, which has the option of avoiding a popular vote by itself enacting the proposal to legalize marijuana, Ammons said.
The legislature could also allow the measure to go to the ballot alongside an alternative from lawmakers, Ammons said.
Alison Holcomb, campaign director of New Approach Washington, has said she did not expect the legislature would enact the proposal on its own, but would leave the issue for voters to decide.
In 2010, a measure to legalize marijuana in California lost at the ballot box when less than 47 percent of voters approved it.
No modern, affluent nation has ever legalized commercial production and distribution of marijuana, according to research organization RAND Corp.
In the Netherlands, famous for its Amsterdam cafes where guests buy and smoke marijuana, authorities allow adults to buy the drug but the country officially has a policy that commercial production of it is illegal, said Beau Kilmer, co-director of the RAND Drug Policy Research Center.
(Reporting By Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Cynthia Johnston)
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/01/28/washington-state-marijuana-legalization-headed-for-ballot/
"I have yet to see a case of Lung Cancer that was due to marijuana use!!!"By Reuters
Saturday, January 28, 2012 10:01 EST
(Reuters) – Supporters of... more
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14 days ago
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"Hasan Küçük, Hague councilor for the Islam Democrats, says dogs should be banned as pets in the city, reports De Telegraaf. The Muslim party says that the animals belong in nature, not inside the house. Küçük says that keeping dogs is animal abuse and should therefore be criminalized.""Hasan Küçük, Hague councilor for the Islam Democrats, says dogs... more
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Kizzy McHugh is a Dutch born recording artist, singer-songwriter, actress, and TV host.
This multi-talent is a Berklee College of Music graduate.
"There are many examples of Jazz-Pop and Soul music these days.
Kizzy McHugh combines all of these influences in her music."
The production of her debut album is in the hands of Piet Souer and Robert Jansen.
video:
Kizzy McHugh singing and dancing "Don't Waste Your Time" (by Rachelle Ferrell) in Boston
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjazkStnPdwKizzy McHugh is a Dutch born recording artist, singer-songwriter, actress, and TV... more
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hat339
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1 month ago
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The Dutch government is considering plans to use mobile medical teams which would administer euthanasia to people in their homes.
The units, dubbed 'grim reapers on wheels' by critics, will be called in to kill patients when their own GPs refuse to administer lethal drugs.
The mobile teams of doctors and nurses would be sent out from a clinic following a referral from the patient’s doctor.
The proposals were revealed by Dutch Health Minister Edith Schippers during a debate on euthanasia in the Dutch parliament.
In answer to questions from Christian Union MPs she said that mobile units 'for patients who meet the criteria for euthanasia but whose doctors are unwilling to carry it out' was worthy of consideration.
'If the patient thinks it desirable, the doctor can refer him or her to a mobile team or clinic,' the minister wrote.
The mobile units are being aggressively promoted by Dutch euthanasia campaign groups who want to expand the eligibility criteria for euthanasia and also to open facilities specifically for euthanasia along the pattern of the Dignitas centre in Switzerland.
They claim that 80 per cent of people with dementia or mental illnesses were being 'missed' by the country’s euthanasia laws.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2070662/Mobile-euthanasia-teams-planned-Holland.html#ixzz1ftssbd1q
Reminds me of the mobile execution vans in China (posted article 1-2 years ago) or Nazi Germany, Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and soon to be FEMA Camps in US. Welcome to government health care!The Dutch government is considering plans to use mobile medical teams which would... more
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"An unauthorized third party (hacker) has been active on the CA server that is used for issuing qualified certificates... The integrity of the data on the [DigiNotar] server that is used for production and issuance of qualified certificates is therefore impossible to guarantee...""An unauthorized third party (hacker) has been active on the CA server that is... more
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Educational miracle worker Sugata Mitra doesn’t take on small challenges. His original breath-taking discoveries overturned everything we knew about early self-teaching. He’s back with enough equally shocking, more recent findings to justify you watching for fifty minutes.Educational miracle worker Sugata Mitra doesn’t take on small challenges. His... more
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BY ALEX ESPINOZA - SUN STAFF WRITER
2011-07-12 22:48:00
If it weren't for a baseball coach from Aruba, standing on a field half the world away, Tiffany Brooks would have never been sitting in the dugout at Desert Sun Stadium on Tuesday.
The events of that fateful afternoon in the Netherlands were borne out of a juvenile gaze and a concise conversation. The Spokane, Wash., native was in the Netherlands to play professional softball, but she was still interested in that smaller sphere with the red laces. As she watched the local men's baseball team take groundballs during practice, Brooks couldn't help but feel envious.
“I must of looked like one of those little kids saying, ‘Oh please, come on, let me come out and play,'” Brooks said. “The coach — he speaks very little English — says to me, ‘You. You catch.'”
Brooks looked around and pointed at herself.
“Me catch? Yeah, I can catch,” Brooks said.
She eventually practiced and pitched for the team in 2007, and has been playing baseball ever since.
The people, the culture, the opportunity — the Netherlands still holds a special place in her heart. Listed at 6-feet-2-inches, 195 pounds, Brooks usually sticks out in a crowd. But not in Holland, home to one of the world's tallest populations.
“I love the Dutch,” she said.
Initially, entering the realm of professional baseball was an experience that tested her character. Brooks became self-conscious and didn't know how to portray herself to her male teammates. The key, she said, was simply self-acceptance and being comfortable with the situation.
This week, she's even become a source for guidance from fellow players, who pepper her with questions on what to expect from a league like the Arizona Summer League.
“It's getting less weird,” Brooks said with a laugh. “It started our really weird. ... I was really tentative, especially tentative with locker rooms and how do I present myself — ‘Who do I be to fit in.' Now, I'm just myself. Just a ballplayer.”
The four-team ASL starts play today, with a short season running through the end of the month. Brooks will serve as a reliever for Team Canada, and is one of just four pitchers on the team so she figures to get plenty of work. Games will be played at 9 a.m. and noon each day until July 30, with the exception of July 18 and July 25. Games will be played at the Ray Kroc Baseball complex.
Brooks will be quick to tell you, she doesn't view herself as a gimmick or a marketing ploy. She's a player and she's a student of the game.
Brooks went so far as to call Jamie Moyer one of her heroes. The ex-Major Leaguer played at the game's highest level until he was 47, relying on the art of deception throughout his career. With a fastball that tops out at 80 mph, Brooks has adapted her game, too.
She features a six-pitch arsenal with three arm angles to choose from — overhand, her natural 3/4 motion and a submarine pitch.
“But on any given day, it's a roulette wheel as to which four or five pitches will work,” Brooks said.
If only her parents could be around to see her success. Unfortunately, they both passed away before Brooks' professional baseball career launched.
“They were both heavy, heavy smokers. My mom passed first and then my dad,” Brooks said. “My dad would be tickled pink. I don't know how my mom would feel, I think she wanted a girly girl.”
Though she's enveloped in a man's world of baseball, Brooks will still throw on a nice shirt and skirt if she wants to go out to a nice dinner. No heels, though, saying she's too tall. Sounds like an excuse from a woman who spent her childhood trading Barbies for baseballs.
When Brooks pitched for the Big Bend Cowboys in May 2010, she became the first woman in a decade to play in an American men's professional league. Brooks said she enjoys the responsibility that comes with her position as a pioneer in the sport.
“I'm not naive enough to think that somebody isn't going to try and capitalize on the notoriety that comes with having a female baseball player,” Brooks said. “I don't want to sign with anybody as a publicity stunt. There's absolutely no way. That's not what I'm here for, I'm here to be seen as a legitimate player.”
According to Brooks, 1,037 girls played varsity high school baseball in America last year, something inconceivable in Brooks' high school days. In fact, Brooks herself was barred from trying out for her prep team.
But she knows she's making a difference. At a recent tryout for the Rio Grande Valley WhiteWings, a team in the North American Baseball League, Brooks had her own fan section.
Waiting patiently in her baseball uniform, 12-year-old Emily Michki and her family watched as Brooks worked on the mound, trying to earn a job. Though Brooks didn't do enough to woo the Rio Grande Valley front office, Michki was honored to meet her after the tryout. The Michki family and Brooks still keep in contact to this day, and it's clear she's served as an inspiration.
Now Michki plays for a traveling all-girls outfit called the Dream Team, which plays exclusively against boys teams in tournaments across the country. Michki was recently struck by a line drive, which broke her arm, but she can't wait to get back on the mound.
Every time Brooks gets in between the lines, she thinks of the Michki and the thousands of other girls watching from afar.
“It's very, very cool,” Brooks said. “The only thing I would say, is that for every small thing I can give back to them, they give even more to me.”BY ALEX ESPINOZA - SUN STAFF WRITER
2011-07-12 22:48:00
If it weren't for a... more
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“Blik” is a charming animated short film directed by Bastiaan Schravendeel at Polder Animation Studio. Do you remember way back to the very first time you fell in love? It can be a very difficult time, especially when the person with whom you fall in love is much older than you are and doesn’t have the first clue about how profoundly and utterly you’re smitten with her.
In this beautifully sweet film, a young boy moves to a new neighborhood in town, where he meets and falls with the much older girl next door. But his feelings are so completely new to him that he’s never quite sure what to do with them.
This piece includes colorful pictures, as well as the wonderful animated short film.
http://disembedded.wordpress.com/2011/07/06/blik-a-very-young-boys-first-love/“Blik” is a charming animated short film directed by Bastiaan Schravendeel... more
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“Melvin the Magical Mixed Media Machine” (or just Melvin the Machine) is a wild four-minute short film created by members of the design studio HEYHEYHEY. Art space MU asked HEYHEYHEY to design their show for the Dutch Design Week, Holland’s major design event. Mu gave them complete freedom on one condition: the show wasn’t to be a show of new products, but it should rather be a moment. Since they like a challenge, they decided to build a massive chain reaction with an identity.
Melvin is best described as a Rube Goldberg machine with a twist. Besides doing what Rube Goldbergs do best, performing a simple task as inefficiently as possible, often in the form of a chain reaction, Melvin has an identity. Actually, the only purpose of this machine is to promote its own identity. Melvin takes pictures and makes videos of his audience, which he instantly uploads to his blog, Facebook and Twitter account. Besides that he makes his own merchandise. All of this within 4-minutes of craziness, which you just have to witness yourself.
This piece includes a number of colorful photographs, as well as the crazy short film.
http://disembedded.wordpress.com/2011/06/30/melvin-the-magical-machine-a-machine-with-its-own-identity/“Melvin the Magical Mixed Media Machine” (or just Melvin the Machine) is a... more
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The Netherlands was trying to come to grips with a deadly shooting in a small town over the weekend. Church bells tolled for the victims as questions began to be asked as to how such violence could have occurred.The Netherlands was trying to come to grips with a deadly shooting in a small town... more
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3 naughty and dirty minded Japanese girls, now living in the Netherlands, decided to make some music. Just for fun. The result: Dance-House music with a smile and with a naughty touch. Bandmembers: Toy Ota Toy Oto Toy Oti..... http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/electro/35463-zinoeki3 naughty and dirty minded Japanese girls, now living in the Netherlands, decided to... more
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12 months ago
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“Night Tales” is a stunning series of photographs by the Belgium photographer Tim Corbeel. Taking pictures at night is truly an art; you need to have full control over your camera, equipment and the night itself. Corbeel’s nighttime photographs passionately capture the emotions, atmosphere and beautiful moments of darkness.
This piece includes a number of high-resolution black-and-white photographs, a slide show and a music video.
http://disembedded.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/photos-of-the-evening-night-tales/“Night Tales” is a stunning series of photographs by the Belgium... more
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“Sugar” is an award-winning short film, a very racy black comedy directed by Jeroen Annokkeé at Amsterdam’s Lev Pictures. In the film, young Bert’s scantily dressed, buxom neighbour, Klaasje, comes by to borrow a cup of sugar. When the cup accidentally slips from her hands, they both try to catch it. Disaster strikes as their heads bang together, and Klaasje falls downstairs. From that point on, things just keep getting worse and worse for poor Bert.
This piece includes a number of color photographs, as well as the very humorous short film.
http://disembedded.wordpress.com/2011/02/19/sugar-an-unexpectedly-pornographic-catastrophe/“Sugar” is an award-winning short film, a very racy black comedy directed... more
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Even if the planet doubled the amount of solar and wind power available tomorrow, there would still be a shortage of clean electricity. We need to grab energy from wherever we can find it, which is why piezoelectricity—the charge that gathers in solid materials like crystal and ceramic in response to strain—has recently begun to pique the interest of entrepreneurs and scientists alike. A number of materials are piezoelectric, including topaz, quartz, cane sugar, and tourmaline. That means a charge begins accumulating inside these materials when pressure is applied. http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/your-details/30439-electricity-generating-dance-floors-and-piezoelectric-roadwaysEven if the planet doubled the amount of solar and wind power available tomorrow,... more
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worrg
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1 year ago
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In a significant development, the Netherlands has severed all ties with Iran after a Iranian-Dutch woman was hanged to death there for drug trafficking. The woman, Zahra Bahrami was earlier arrested for being part of the anti-government protests.
link:http://www.breakingnewsonline.net/world/6650-netherlands-severs-ties-with-iran-after-hanging.htmlIn a significant development, the Netherlands has severed all ties with Iran after a... more
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New York Film Academy Information Sessions in The Netherlands!
The New York Film Academy will be conducting open house information sessions in three cities in The Netherlands in January and February 2011!
Visit www.NYFA.edu and come to an event Utrecht, Voorburg, or Rotterdam to meet a NYFA representative to get all of your admissions questions answered.
Utrecht - On Monday, January 31
Meetings by subject will be conducted throughout the day from 11:00 to 17:00 at KILROY education Netherlands! Contact KILROY education for an appointment at education@kilroyworld.nl or call 030 2303 557.
KILROY education Netherlands, Vinkenburgstraat 15, 3512 AA Utrecht
Voorburg - On Tuesday, February 1
Join us for an information session from 13:00 to 14:30 at UStudy in Voorburg. Contact Marina Meijer at info@ustudy.nl to make a reservation, or call 070 3851 473.
UStudy - Educational Services for the USA, Wilgendreef 83, 2272 EN Voorburg
Rotterdam - On Saturday, February 5
Join us for an information session at INTERLANGUAGE Study Abroad in Rotterdam, on Saturday, February 5 from 10:00 to 11:30. Contact Jet Spanjers at study@interlanguage.nl to make a reservation, or call 010 47.77.455.
Interlanguage, Heemraadssingel 137, 3022 CD Rotterdam, www.interlanguage.nl
The New York Film Academy is recognized as one of the most innovative and dynamic film and acting conservatory schools in the world, offering specialized, hands-on programs in New York City; Universal Studios, Los Angeles; Abu Dhabi, UAE; and at summer satellite locations at Harvard University; Disney Studios, Orlando; London, England; Paris, France; Florence and Rome, Italy. Visit www.NYFA.edu. The Academy is honored to be the film and acting school of choice of many Hollywood filmmakers’ families, including Steven Spielberg, Al Pacino, Robert Downey Jr., Jamie Foxx, Jodie Foster, Kevin Kline, Pierce Brosnan, Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins, Bono, and the directors Stephen Frears, Peter Bogdonavich, Roger Donaldson and James L. Brooks among others.
You can bring your completed NYFA application and drop it off, or just come and find out more about NYFA.
We’ll see you in The Netherlands!
Jack Newman
Director of Outreach and Development
jnewman@nyfa.edu
+1-212-674-4300New York Film Academy Information Sessions in The Netherlands!
The New York Film... more
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Three suspects arrested after forming an international team which included six members of Dubai police.
Dubai Police arrested three suspects, between December 10 and December 12 accused of drug trafficking and money laundering, the three suspects are connected to an international gang that spans across the UAE, South Africa, United Kingdom, and The Netherlands and communicated through cryptic messages via telecommunication methods.
"We haven't found any drugs here but the involvement of the three suspects with drug trafficking crimes overseas is not acceptable and punishable according to the penal code article number 21," said Major General Khamis Mattar Al Mazeina, Deputy Chief of Dubai Police, during a press conference on Monday.
Dubai Police arrested the three suspects after forming an international team which included six members of Dubai police. The investigation took over a year in order to track the gang's modus operandi and their activities.
Three suspects were arrested in Dubai, (A.S) who is considered the mastermind and his accomplices (M.A) and (K.A). According to police sources, A.S who is of Asian origin but carries an European passport and other undisclosed passports which might be partially-forged was arrested in a European country and jailed for five years in drug-related crimes before coming to the UAE and resuming his activities.Three suspects arrested after forming an international team which included six members... more
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