Links to sites about solar flares and propagation

Here are some sites about the recent solar flare and storm and other sites about radio propagation and solar activity.

Solar flares: Earth hit by biggest space storm in almost seven years

Videos show giant solar flares, ensuing aurora borealis

Huge solar storm to shower Earth with radioactive particles

Solar radiation storm sweeps over Earth

M8.7 Solar Flare and Earth Directed CME from NASA

NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center

Space Weather.com

Radio Propagation : Space Weather : Sunspot Cycle Information

Space weather aurora gallery

Solar Ham.com

NASA Solar Physics

Aurora Polar Cap Display :: Propagation Resource Center :: HFRadio.org

 

Aurora Borealis at Tromvik Norway

NASA SDO – M2.6 Solar Flare on January 19, 2012

Solar Flare NASA SDO – Lovely Loops

Really Cool K3AS International Space Station Tracker

View a real-time depiction of the track of the International Space Station. K3AS International Space Station Tracker

Link: Heroin’s siren song: A force that’s stronger than will or reason

According to local police heroin has made a come-back and surpassed crack here in New Kensington.

Their life circumstances, by many measures, couldn’t be more different — he’s a middle-aged black man from a hardscrabble Mon Valley steel town; she’s a young white woman originally from an affluent suburb of Austin, Texas.

But what they have in common — heroin addiction early in life — trumps what they don’t. That’s because heroin is as nondiscriminatory as it is destructive.

Theirs are cautionary tales of the all-mighty power of the drug. And with heroin’s low prices, high potency and widespread availability hereabouts — from the inner city to tony suburbs — the threat has never been more manifest.

via Heroin’s siren song: A force that’s stronger than will or reason.

Link: Six Conversations That Matter: A Quick Review (07-05-2011) – Abundant Community

From Abundant Community:

To open the community to an alternative future, start with the invitation conversation. Since all the other conversations lead to one another, sequence is not all that critical. It’s important to understand that some are more difficult than others, especially in communities where citizens are just beginning to engage with one another. Certain conversations are high-risk and require a greater level of trust among people than others to have meaning. A good meeting design begins with less-demanding ones and ends with the more-difficult ones.

via Posts: Six Conversations That Matter: A Quick Review (07-05-2011) – Abundant Community.

Link: Reject Apathy – Who Are “the Bottom Billion”?

Great article. I have seen the poor in Nepal and can agree with the author:

3. Compared to the poor, I’m lazy, arrogant and have no creativity.

So much of my preconceived notions about the poor was that they weren’t smart and didn’t work hard. But when I dug deeper, I saw them as the exact opposite. They have a lot to offer—except they live under a system that systematically, unfairly and brutally keeps them down.

via Reject Apathy – Who Are “the Bottom Billion”?.

Link:The Agricultural 99 Percent – Institute Notes: A Dialogue on Overcoming Hunger and Poverty

Quote from article:

2011 was a record year for U.S. farmers, with farm income topping $100 billion. This includes sales of $22 billion in fruits and nuts and $21 billion in vegetables and melons – crops that rely on immigrant farm labor.

But even as U.S. farmers prospered in 2011, those working on farms had less to celebrate.

The nation’s agricultural mecca – Fresno Country, California – had the state’s highest agricultural sales ($5.9 billion) and its highest poverty rate – 27 percent. More than 36 percent of the county’s children were poor, also the highest rate in the state. As one agricultural expert puts it, “High farm sales and high poverty rates often go together.”

via The Agricultural 99 Percent – Institute Notes: A Dialogue on Overcoming Hunger and Poverty.

Link : ACTION ALERT: Stand Up for Poor Pennsylvanians – Tell Gov. Corbett to Drop the Food Stamp Asset Test!

Click the link below and find out how to help over-turn this heartless proposal.

 

Saving money is critical in helping people transition from poverty to self-sufficiency. Forcing a family to drain their savings before receiving help is counterproductive, making it harder for people to move off of government assistance. A family with less than $2,000 in savings would be ill-prepared to pay for emergency medical expenses, let alone afford the first and last month’s rent usually required to rent an apartment on their own.

via ACTION ALERT: Stand Up for Poor Pennsylvanians – Tell Gov. Corbett to Drop the Food Stamp Asset Test!.

Link: The food stamp asset test would be a disaster for poor Pennsylvanians

Here is an op-ed editorial discussing the burden and poor logic of instituting the assets test on food stamps. Here is a quote from the article.

Seniors like myself will never be able to rebuild our savings: The asset test will doom us to lasting poverty. To families with less than $2,000 in savings, the message the asset test sends is: “Don’t save for a home, education or medical crisis. If you do, you will lose the food stamps your kids depend on for regular meals.”

via The food stamp asset test would be a disaster for poor Pennsylvanians.

Link:MLK Spent His Last Days Fighting Poverty – Madison News Story – WISC Madison

But few will remember how King lived his last birthday, as he turned 39 on January 15, 1968.

According to accounts of the day retold by Jesse Jackson and Martin Luther King III, King spent the day working on a campaign that he hoped would force Washington and the American public to acknowledge and resolve the problem of poverty for people of all races, religions and backgrounds in the United States. The Poor People’s Campaign was the agenda for the day, with a short break for birthday cake.

via MLK Spent His Last Days Fighting Poverty – Madison News Story – WISC Madison.

Link: In the Fight Against Poverty, Time for a Revolution – NYTimes.com

This is one of the most important articles I have read on the issue of poverty in a long time. Circles and Getting Ahead tie in nicely to this.

But that’s what’s required. Many Americans struggling in poverty today need more than financial assistance; they need help figuring out how to plug into a changing economy. They need help devising a plan forward. One of the most innovative organizations working to re-imagine poverty alleviation along these lines is called LIFT. It was founded by college students in 1998, and most of the work is still conducted by student volunteers. Last year, LIFT mobilized 674 volunteers who contributed 126,000 volunteer hours and assisted about 10,000 families. If the American Dream is to be resuscitated for many of nation’s poor, there is a great deal that we can learn from them.

LIFT’s approach is grounded in the principle that change happens through relationships. “The sheer act of two people coming together, sharing their strengths in a trusting relationship, is the most important first step in creating transformation,” explains Kirsten Lodal, LIFT’s chief executive and co-founder. “It’s the portal from which people are able to access opportunity in all its many dimensions.”

via In the Fight Against Poverty, Time for a Revolution – NYTimes.com.

Great Website on Social Entrepreneurship

This site was started by Daniel Bornstein the author of “How to Change the World”.

Dowser.Org

Video: Overview of the Children’s Defense Fund

Link: The Archive | The Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change

This is a digital archive of the documents of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. A tremendous resource.

There are nearly a million documents associated with the life of Martin Luther King Jr. These pages will present a more dynamic view than is often seen of Dr. King’s life and times. The documents reveal the scholar, the father, and the pastor. Through these papers we see the United States of America at one of its most vulnerable, most honest and perhaps most human moments in history. There are letters bearing the official marks of royalty and the equally regal compositions of children. You will see speeches, telegrams, scribbled notes, patient admonitions and urgent pleas. This spotlight shows you a glimpse of the remarkable history within this collection.

via The Archive | The Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change.

Link: The capacity to aspire

Why does culture matter for development and for poverty reduction? The capacity to aspire is a future-oriented cultural capacity. This book chapter from Stanford University Press argues that strengthening the capacity to aspire could help the poor to contest and alter the conditions of their poverty. Culture is a dialogue between aspirations and sedimented traditions. Traditions, linked to issues of social class, can conflict with development goals. Policymakers must approach the creation of a culture of aspiration through capacity building.

via GSDRC: display.

Link: Wellbeing in Developing Countries (WeD): ESRC Research Group

Sounds like a good idea for here in the US also.

Wellbeing is increasingly recognised as the ultimate goal of community and development programmes and public policy. This poses questions not only about what is good for individuals and communities, but also the nature of the good society. Its distinctive orientation is:

Positive

Holistic

Person-centred

via Wellbeing in Developing Countries (WeD): ESRC Research Group.

Link: The power of one person’s obedience | World Vision blog | WORLD VISION BLOG

The Nobel Peace Prize last year went to three women who fought for change. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf opposed the Liberian dictator Charles Taylor and then became the first democratically elected female president in Africa. Leymah Gbowee, also from Liberia, led women through the streets of Monrovia in a campaign to disarm fighters who had been raping women. And Tawakkol Karman is the first Arab woman and youngest person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize. She has worked for the rights of women and journalists in Yemen. Each of these women have had long, difficult struggles, but each has made an enormous difference in our world.

via The power of one person’s obedience | World Vision blog | WORLD VISION BLOG.

Link: Jeffrey Sachs: Libertarian Illusions

Yet the error of libertarianism lies not in championing liberty, but in championing liberty to the exclusion of all other values. Libertarians hold that individual liberty should never be sacrificed in the pursuit of other values or causes. Compassion, justice, civic responsibility, honesty, decency, humility, respect, and even survival of the poor, weak, and vulnerable — all are to take a back seat.

via Jeffrey Sachs: Libertarian Illusions.