Why Texas State Got A 16th-Place Vote In The AP Poll [Texas State Bobcats]

For the time being, the Texas State Bobcats are the only team to be undefeated in their FBS history. Sure, they're just 1-0 all-time, joining the WAC this season after 23 years in the I-AA/FCS Southland conference. But that one was a stylish one. It was a 30-13 walloping of Houston, in Houston, that forced the immediate resignation of the Cougars' offensive coordinator. According to Pregame.com, Texas became only the seventh underdog of 34 points or more to win since 1980, and the first ever 34-or-more dog to win by double digits.

Good enough for 16th in the nation?

Ray Ratto thinks so. The CSN Bay Area writer submitted his Week 2 ballot, and there are the plucky Bobcats, sitting pretty at No. 16. This, despite none of the other 59 polled writers even ranking Texas State.

Polls are Serious Business, and with every ballot being public, it was only a matter of time before people got upset. We received a couple emails from fans angry at Ratto's votes, and someone's already changed his Wikipedia page to reflect his support of the Bobcats. Ratto addressed some of his Top 25 selections, but we figured we'd ask him for some more clarification. Texas State? Really?

Ratto writes in an email:

"My rationale, which I would assume will be dismissed as the ravings of an idiot, is that of all the upsets Saturday, the one foreseen by the fewest people was this one. Texas State dominated the game away from home against a team that averaged nine wins over the last six years in its first FBS game ever. Outgained them by more than 100, had the ball for 43 minutes - that kind of dominated. In fact, it went over so well that Houston fired its offensive coordinator the next day. Is 16 too generous? Probably. Could they disappear next week against Texas Tech? Hell yes they could. It's Week 2. But for one night, with so little data in what is always the worst week of the year for drawing conclusions, I'm fine with them where they are."

That's...actually more thought than probably goes into 95 percent of votes. Is Texas State the 16th best team in the nation? No, and Ratto concedes that. ("Don't steal their moment," he wrote. "It doesn't hurt you any.") But the AP Poll is for fun. For entertainment purposes only. It doesn't factor in to the BCS standings. Think of it like a power ranking, a barometer of the college landscape, calibrated by people who presumably watch a lot of football.

Of course, any power ranking is a lightning rod for misplaced vitriol from commenters who are convinced the voters are biased. The AP voters aren't, of course. But you know who is? The coaches, because they actually have a stake in the results. And for all the flaws and hypocrisy of the Coaches' Poll, guess which one actually helps determine which teams make the postseason?

All of which is to say, who gives a crap if the AP has Texas State 16th, or first, or unranked, or if USC drops to No. 2 despite winning by 39. It doesn't matter. None of this matters. Ratto again:

"Anyone who gets their delicates in a wad over the first week of a non-binding poll probably shouldn't be allowed to watch other people operate heavy machinery."

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/deadspin/excerpts/~3/hWYGc-G95hs/why-texas-state-got-a-16th-place-vote-in-the-ap-poll

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Dawn craft to depart asteroid for dwarf planet

An undated artist rendering released by NASA shows the NASA Dawn spacecraft in orbit around the giant asteroid Vesta. After spending a year examining Vesta, Dawn is poised to depart and head to another asteroid, Ceres, where it will arrive in 2015.(AP Photo/NASA)

An undated artist rendering released by NASA shows the NASA Dawn spacecraft in orbit around the giant asteroid Vesta. After spending a year examining Vesta, Dawn is poised to depart and head to another asteroid, Ceres, where it will arrive in 2015.(AP Photo/NASA)

This undated image released by NASA and taken by the NASA Dawn spacecraft shows the south pole of the giant asteroid Vesta. After spending a year examining Vesta, Dawn was poised to depart and head to another asteroid Ceres, where it will arrive in 2015. (AP Photo/NASA)

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? One asteroid down, one to go.

After spending a year gazing at Vesta, NASA's Dawn spacecraft was set to cruise toward the most massive space rock in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter ? a voyage that will take nearly three years.

Firing its ion propulsion thrusters, Dawn had been slowly spiraling away from Vesta for more than a month until it was to pop free from its gravitational grip. Since its antenna was pointed away from Earth during this last maneuver, engineers would not know until Wednesday how it went.

The departure was considered ho-hum compared with other recent missions ? think Curiosity's white-knuckle "seven minutes of terror" dive into Mars' atmosphere.

"It's not a sudden event. There's no whiplash-inducing maneuver. There's no tension, no anxiety," said chief engineer Marc Rayman of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages the $466 million mission. "It's all very gentle and very graceful."

Launched in 2007, Dawn is on track to become the first spacecraft to rendezvous with two celestial bodies in a bid to learn about the solar system's evolution.

Dawn slipped into orbit last year around Vesta ? about the size of Arizona ? and beamed back stunning close-ups of the lumpy surface. Its next destination is the Texas-size Ceres, also known as a dwarf planet.

Vesta and Ceres are the largest bodies in the asteroid belt littered with chunks of rocks that never quite bloomed into full-fledged planets. As cosmic time capsules, they're ideal for scientists trying to piece together how Earth and the other planets formed and evolved.

During its yearlong stay at Vesta, Dawn used its cameras, infrared spectrometer, and gamma ray and neutron detector to explore the asteroid from varying altitudes, getting as close as 130 miles above the surface.

Dawn uncovered a few surprises. Scientists have long known that Vesta sports an impressive scar at its south pole, likely carved by an impact with a smaller asteroid. A closer inspection revealed that Vesta hid a second scar in the same region ? evidence that it had been whacked twice within the last 2 billion years.

The collisions spewed chunks of debris into space; some fell to Earth as meteorites.

With its rugged exterior ? complete with grooves, troughs and pristine minerals ? and iron core, Vesta acts more like an "almost planet" than garden-variety, lightweight asteroids.

Vesta was "on its way to planethood if it continued to grow," said chief scientist Christopher Russell of the University of California, Los Angeles.

Asteroids have received renewed attention of late. President Barack Obama canceled a return to the moon in favor of landing astronauts on a yet-to-be-selected asteroid as a stepping stone to Mars. A private company headed by space entrepreneurs wants to mine precious metals from near-Earth asteroids.

After racking up 1.7 billion miles journeying to Vesta, Dawn has another 930 million miles to reach Ceres, where it will arrive in early 2015.

Such a trip is possible because of Dawn's futuristic ion propulsion engines, which provide gentle yet constant acceleration. Once confined to science fiction, the technology has been tested in space and is more efficient than conventional rocket fuel that powers most spacecraft.

Scientists expect a different world at Ceres. Unlike the rocky, pockmarked Vesta, the nearly spherical Ceres has a dusty surface with an icy interior. Some think it may even have frost-covered poles.

"Almost everything we see at Ceres will be a surprise and totally different from Vesta," Russell said.

___

Online:

Dawn mission: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/dawn/main/index.html

___

Follow Alicia Chang at http://twitter.com/SciWriAlicia

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-09-05-Asteroid%20Mission/id-09617079011448dd9a9cc64f1dc42fab

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Ajman Real Estate Regulatory Agency signs agreement with Cubic ...

The agreement was signed by H.E. Yafea Eid Al Faraj, ARRA Executive Director and Eng. Rami Abu Hayeh, Managing Director of Cubic Art Technologies at ARRA's headquarter in Ajman.

"This move comes in line with the directives of His Highness Sheikh Humaid Bin Rashid Al Nuaimi, Member of the Supreme Council and Ruler of Ajman, and Crown Prince Sheikh Ammar Bin Humaid Al Nuaimi, Chairman of Executive Council, to develop the e-Government in the Emirate," said Yafea Al Faraj.

He stressed, "ARRA's plan to switch from currently manual operations to automated electronic operations through the implementation of the latest modern technologies capable of providing faster, more convenient and efficient services to customers and employees alike."

On his part, Mr Rami Abu Hayeh noted, "Cubic Art Technologies is proud to work in strategic partnership with (ARRA) to develop its real estate and land management system as part of the e-transformation process of the Agency, noting that Cubic Art Technologies is one of the leading providers of Business Process automation and eGovernment solutions, and has successfully implemented a wide range of eGovernment solutions in the UAE and GCC Region."

He stressed, "The company's methodology is based on building strategic partnership with its customers in order to provide the best Business solutions assuring the highest quality standards."

Source: http://www.ameinfo.com/ajman-real-estate-regulatory-agency--310628

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Randy Johnson Lives High on DNC, Union Dime, After Bain 'Devastated His Family'

During Wednesday night?s convention coverage, the Democratic National Convention decided to roll out a trio of workers allegedly kicked to the curb by Bain Capital, the??private equity firm co-founded by Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney.???One of them was Randy Johnson.??According to Adam Kredo?s?August 28 column in The Washington Free Beacon, Johnson ?worked at American Pad & Paper (Ampad) after Bain purchased the company in the early nineties? and ?maintains that the investment firm callously managed the mill with an eye only towards profits.?

But as Kredo reports, Johnson has essentially been a professional liberal flak for the past few months, traveling on the DNC dime to lambaste Romney at every possible turn. Don?t expect, of course, for Kredo?s reporting to find its way into any network ?fact checking? about the Democratic Convention's speakers:

Bain?s business tactics ?devastated my family,? said Johnson, who earned $104,974 from United Steelworkers union in 2011. ?Though he billed himself as a blue-collared fighter, Johnson has been living in the lap of luxury courtesy of the DNC for months, according to reports. ?The DNC has paid for Johnson?s airfare to various partisan events across the country and had footed the bill for his hotel rooms, according to the New York Observer. ?Johnson has even forced the DNC staffer who constantly shadows him to pay for his meals and highway tolls, the Observer noted. ?

In addition, this isn?t the first time Johnson has slammed Romney.??

?

In what appears to be hollow vindictiveness, he ?has been excoriating Romney publicly since 2002, when he ran to become governor of Massachusetts.When Romney ran for president in 2008, "Johnson again popped up in the media landscape, feeding the Boston Globe similar talking points to those he touted in Tampa Tuesday."

It appears that the staffers within the DNC know that his credibility is shoddy.??Kredo concluded his column stating ?when approached by a Free Beacon reporter about his partisan affiliations, DNC staff quickly swooped in to escort Johnson away, claiming that he was incapable of answering further questions.?

Randy Johnson is a de facto Democratic operative who claims to have been ?destroyed? by Bain Capital, but who now travels on the DNC dime and makes a six-figure salary with the United Steelworkers union. The network ?fact checkers? should note that, but I?m not holding my breath that they will.

Source: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/matt-vespa/2012/09/06/randy-johnson-makes-100000-year-and-lives-high-dnc-dime-despite-bain-des

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GOP convention helps Univision win viewers 18-49

NEW YORK ?

Univision can thank the Republicans for a milestone week in the television ratings.

Nielsen said the Spanish-language network topped prime-time ratings last week among viewers ages 18 to 49. It was only the fourth time in Univision's history that it achieved that feat and the first time it happened twice in the same year. It also happened in early July.

ABC, CBS and NBC each televised three hours of the Republican National Convention last week, and that was a turnoff to the young viewers prized by advertisers. Sixteen of Univision's one-hour telenovela episodes did better in the ratings among that demographic than any hour of convention coverage.

During the otherwise quiet week before Labor Day, NBC's "America's Got Talent" was the most-watched program.

CBS averaged 4.9 million viewers for the week in prime time (3.3 rating, 6 share). NBC was second with 3.9 million (2.6, 5), ABC had 3.9 million (2.6, 4), Fox had 3.4 million (2.1, 4), ION Television had 1.2 million (0.8, 1) and the CW had 740,000 (0.5, 1).

Among the Spanish language networks, Univision led with a 3.4 million average (1.8 rating, 3 share). Telemundo had 1.2 million (0.7, 1), TeleFutura had 550,000 (0.3, 1), Estrella had 160,000 and Azteca had 90,000 (both 0.1, 0).

NBC's "Nightly News" topped the evening newscasts with an average of 7.9 million viewers (5.4, 11). ABC's "World News" was second with 7.2 million (4.9, 10) and the "CBS Evening News" had 6 million viewers (4.3, 8).

A ratings point represents 1,147,000 households, or 1 percent of the nation's estimated 114.7 million TV homes. The share is the percentage of in-use televisions tuned to a given show.

For the week of Aug. 27-Sept. 2, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: "America's Got Talent" (Tuesday), NBC, 9.89 million; "NCIS," CBS, 8.38 million; "America's Got Talent" (Wednesday), NBC, 8.34 million; College Football: Michigan vs. Alabama, ABC, 7.92 million; "NCIS: Los Angeles," CBS, 7.2 million; "60 Minutes," CBS, 6.96 million; "Hell's Kitchen" (Monday), Fox, 6.87 million; "2 Broke Girls" (Monday, 9 p.m.), CBS, 6.63 million; "Master Chef" (Tuesday), Fox, 6.59 million; "The Big Bang Theory" (Monday, 8:30 p.m.), CBS, 6.51 million.

---

ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is owned by CBS Corp. CW is a joint venture of Warner Bros. Entertainment and CBS Corp. Fox and My Network TV are units of News Corp. NBC and Telemundo are owned by Comcast Corp. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks. TeleFutura is a division of Univision. Azteca America is a wholly owned subsidiary of TV Azteca S.A. de C.V.

---

Online:

http://www.nielsen.com

Source: http://feeds.seattletimes.com/click.phdo?i=00acd1801dd9790ae37a5523164b9184

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Travel agents may not automatically include insurance ? Library of ...

?Chris2 (Custom Licence)
http://www.sxc.hu

A travel agent may not automatically include travel insurance when selling airline tickets. Such ?optional extras? may only be offered on an ?opt-in? basis.

The EU Court of Justice followed its advocate-general, Jan Maz?k, in the presentation of his conclusion in the case (C-112/11) which opposed a German consumer protection association and?ebookers.com, which operates an online travel portal, where it offers airline tickets.

The problem with their offer was that the prices listed automatically included travel insurance. It was only at the bottom of the webpage, ie it is only upon the completion of booking, that the customer received information?on how to opt out of the insurance. This meant that with ebookers, not taking out an insurance could only be the result of an explicit opt-out. This was unlawful, according to the advocate-general, who said that such price supplements should be specifically opted in to. In other words, customers should tick the box to activate the travel insurance, rather than untick the box to remove it.

Maz?k?s conclusions found that automatically including travel insurance in the price listed at the beginning of the booking was contrary to?Regulation 1008/2008, whose objective is to ensure a greater transparency of flight prices. According to this regulation, ticket sellers must indicate from the start the definitive price of the ticket, including all the applicable taxes and charges and fees.

However, the Advocate General considered that the requirement that optional price supplements must be on an??opt-in? as opposed to ?opt-out? basis?serves a different purpose than ensuring price comparison, namely that of consumer protection. It prevents customers from being induced when booking a flight to pay for unnecessary extra services, unless they actively and expressly choose to accept such additional offers and the prices to be paid for them. The Court?finds that ?optional price supplements? relate to services which supplement?the air service itself. Those services are neither compulsory nor necessary for the purposes of the?flight and the customer may choose either to accept or refuse them. It is precisely because a?customer is in a position to make that choice that EU law requires such price supplements to be?communicated in a clear, transparent and unambiguous way at the start of each booking process,?and that their acceptance must be on an opt-in basis.

More information:

Press release on the?Judgment in Case C-112/11?ebookers.com Deutschland GmbH

The full text of the judgment is published on the CURIA website.

Pictures of the delivery of the Opinion are available from ?Europe by Satellite?

Regulation (EC) No 1008/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 September 2008 on common rules for the operation of air services in the Community (OJ 2008 L 293, p. 3).

Background:

Pauschalreisen und europ?isches Internationales Verbrauchersch?tzrecht?by Mankowski, Peter (published in:? Transportrecht, Vol. 34, No 2 (2011), p. 70-74 (available in EP library))

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Source: http://libraryeuroparl.wordpress.com/2012/09/05/travel-agents-may-not-automatically-include-insurance/

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"Back to School" Home Improvement - Blue Sky Painting - Fulton ...

Now that your kids are back at school, has some order returned to your lives? For many homeowners in the DC and Baltimore areas, back to school means a return to normalcy, the start of football season and time to work with professionals on home improvement projects.
You probably know what projects need to get done around your home, so we?ll refrain from putting together a list of ideas and, instead, share a few of the reasons why other local homeowners have been ringing our phone this season:

• Powerwashing of decks and other surfaces to remove the film and gunk that grew during the warm, moist summer months
• Trim repair and replacement for trim that?s sagging, aging or rotting
• Whole-house exterior painting to protect and beautify their largest investment: their home

Before you know it, the holidays will be here, so don?t delay on getting your fall ?back to school? projects done. Contact us today to discuss your projects and how we can help you shrink your list!
Wishing you a great fall season,
Tom Chervek
Owner
Blue Sky Painting & Carpentry

Source: http://www.blueskypaintingpros.com/back-to-school-home-improvement.html

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Source: http://fultonnicky.typepad.com/blog/2012/09/back-to-school-home-improvement-blue-sky-painting.html

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