 should note, prominent officials in the U. S. government who are vehemently opposed to torture and they have made their objections known to Cheney and company. Most notable of these are Senators John McCain (himself a victim of torture) and Dianne Feinstein.
The Geneva Conventions prohibit combatants (or anyone else) from inflicting “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment.” So I have a question for Mr. Cheney and others of the Bush administration who seem so enthusiastic about using their “enhanced interrogation techniques.” When you all advocate waterboarding captives, the placing of them in narrow boxes for extended periods, etc., do you tell yourselves that you are not doing anything that could be considered “humiliating and degrading?” I am sorry to be the one to tell you this, but you need to face facts: to normal Americans your very existence is both humiliating and degrading.
OK, I’m not really sorry to be the one to tell you that.
Even if torture does work, decent people should oppose it and so should Dick Cheney. And, though I congratulate Ms. Bigelow for having made a compelling film, I object to her film’s implication about the usefulness of torture and am concerned that it will strengthen the hand of those who want it to become a permanent part of “the American way.”One of the world's largest gold mining company Gold Fields [JSE: GFI] sees earnings nearly doubling due to the increasing price of gold.
The group on Wednesday issued a trading update for the six months ended 30 June 2020.
Basic earnings per share are expected to nearly double to between 294.81c and per share and 325.84c, compared to the previous year. Headline earnings per share are expected to increase nearly four times to 336.18c and 353.42c per share.
"The increase in earnings for the period is driven largely by the increase in the gold price received," it said.
The commodity has increased more than 30% since a year ago. The market volatility brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic has contributed to investors flocking to it as a safe haven.
Gold production during the period has increased marginally, as increased production days and contributions from the newly opened Gruyere mine were offset by Covid-19 stoppages at South Deep and Cerro Corona mines. The lower copper price at Cerro Corona, resulted in lower gold equivalent ounces, the statement read.
The group's all-in sustaining costs, of which 2% are attributed to Covid-19, increased 11% year-on-year.
The increasing costs for the first half of the year have led the group to increase its cost guidance for the year, the group said potential further Covid-19 related disruptions would increase the risk to production and cost guidance.
Gold Fields is expected to release its half-year earnings on Thursday 20 August.One fateful day, life as she knows it comes to a grinding halt. There was a fire. Her mother is gone. But something is not right... The Greek Mafia may be involved. Vivid dreams of ancient deities consume her sleep. A maze of clues leads her to believe that her mother is still alive... She must go to Greece.
And who knows, maybe the Greek gods and goddesses are on her side... or maybe not.
Noteworthy experiences while reading this book: Pretty cover but the synopsis pretty much tells you everything about the book which leaves nothing for you to read.
Notes and Opinions: When I saw this book for review I was hoping it was going to be a great new fantasy to read. But what I found was a book that needed a lot of help. I never read the first copy of this book but this one still needs some help. The description pretty much tells you everything that happens in the book so you almost don't even need to read it at all. The character's relationships in this one were very very bad and pretty cringe worthy. The love triangle (yes there is one!) was very predictable which made the book lose some of what it had going for it. The story left me very confused, I didn't care for the main character and everyone else was pretty one dimensional. This is one book that needs some help and I hope that it gets another try.Last month, 236-year-old English auction house Christie's rented out its plush New York office to a mere youngster from back home: 112-year-old law firm Withers.
The gala event, attended by more than 300 bankers, accountants, lawyers and clients, was held to introduce Withers-a firm that focuses exclusively on serving the rich-to New York. Withers, which represents 15% of Britain's wealthiest families, opened a Park Avenue office in October following its acquisition of Connecticut-based Bergman Horowitz & Reynolds in January.
The stock market plunge and the recession may have dented the fortunes of the superrich, but no matter, say officials of the firm.
"There is no lack of work," notes Ed Granski, who heads the New York office for the firm, known in the United States as Withers Bergman. "The families we represent are still phenomenally wealthy: The difference between having $300 million and $220 million doesn't stop the need for careful planning."
The law firm assists such clients on matters like setting up tax shelters, making the best estate planning decisions and protecting assets against creditors.
Luring Mr. Granski in January to head up the new office gave Withers a jump start on its goal of increasing revenues by 15% this year, from about $56 million.
Mr. Granski, a seasoned tax attorney from Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft, brought with him a number of rich clients from all over the world. Now he is aiming to fill out his new firm's ranks, hiring as many as eight more lawyers by the end of this year to join the nine already on board.
Helping wealthy clients with their problems has paid generations of Withers partners handsomely. Mr. Granski, whose tasks include helping families set up trusts in places such as the Cayman Islands and Bermuda, charges $500 per hour for his insights.
In seeking its fortune in New York, the firm faces competition from long-term local players. Large Manhattan firms such as Mr. Granski's former employer, Shearman & Sterling and Katten Muchin Zavis Rosenman are all in the game.
While there is an almost unlimited supply of lawyers in the city, there are few who focus on wealthy international clients and their needs. Jones Perry, a partner in the private client group at Shearman & Sterling, estimates that there are no more than 75 partners in New York who specialize in this field. Withers Bergman hopes it can capitalize on that shortage.
One problem that the London-based firm has in cracking the New York market is that it can't exactly rent a billboard in Times Square to trumpet its arrival. In the rarefied world of the wealthy, silence is golden, and marketing is limited to word-of-mouth recommendations and exclusive parties such as the event at Christie's.
"The work is very confidential and very discreet," says Mr. Perry. "You don't go and do a lot of marketing in the conventional sense."
To speed things up a bit, Withers began with the acquisition of Bergman Horowitz & Reynolds, a 40-year-old law firm specializing in estate planning and tax law. Now Withers lawyers hope that the news is spreading and that some of the new hires in New York will bring business with them, as Mr. Granski did.1Terra-IQ Ltd., Calgary, AB, Canada.
2Devon Canada Corporation, Calgary, AB, Canada.
The present tectonic stress can be completely characterized by the magnitudes and directions of the three principal stresses (vertical, maximum horizontal and minimum horizontal). For crustal rocks, stresses are composed of two parts: one caused by the pressure of the water in the pore space (formation pore pressure), and one caused by the stress between solid particles (effective stress). In-situ stresses affect both elastic and mechanical rock properties.
In the Athabasca Oil Sands basin, the Lower Cretaceous McMurray Formation reservoir is overlain by the Clearwater Formation. The formation shales form the reservoir caprock and have the role of blocking the vertical migration of the steam by confining the stresses and the deformations induced during the thermal oil recovery process.
We present a new method for the prediction of the pre-production anisotropic stress, by integrating dipole sonic logs, pore pressure data and elastic properties obtained from multicomponent seismic inversion. This new method combines the generalization of Terzaghi’s law of effective stresses with the Schoenberg and Sayers linear-slip elastic stiffness matrix and the anisotropic stress correction estimated from Backus averaging the elastic properties recorded at wells.
The pore pressure is modelled from local pressure measurements which show values below the normal hydrostatic regime indicating abnormal pressure in the Clearwater Formation. The predicted total and effective magnitudes of the three principal stresses indicated correctly that the Clearwater Formation is under a normal stress regime. There is excellent consistency between the minimum horizontal stress calculated with this method and minifrac values. This good agreement shows that, for the case study, this new method successfully aids in a deeper understanding of the in-situ anisotropic stress field, which is critically important for the assessment of caprock integrity.Being trained as an Architect and Architectural Technologist, Dallas possesses the rare mix of excellent client skills, design focus, and technical expertise that makes him a valuable asset to the team. Dallas has