Monday, December 30, 2013

Things that Make You Laugh: Off to Antarctica to Freeze in the Warmth

Ah, politics. Politically correct politics, in particular. Is nothing safe from their grasp? Guess not. 

We all know how politics, especially the politically correct kind that denies reality in the name of some cultish belief, can ruin an economy, and a society. They incite violence and start wars all over the world. They also ruin science. Science defined as the "observation, identification, description, experimental investigation, and theoretical explanation of phenomena." If anybody is supposed to pursue The Truth it is the scientist, or so we have all been taught to believe. Not true, not true.

The readers of this little blog don't need me to come up with examples of science bending to politics either because of persecution, e.g., Galileo, or playing to the dictator, e.g., Lysenko. History is full of other morsels of scientific "unscientificness," e.g., the various "epidemics" that are supposed to have wiped us all out by now. The greatest ongoing one, however, must remain the global warming/change hoax.

I have written so much about this hoax, both on this blog and on an earlier one of some years ago, that I bore myself writing about it. Suffice it to say that a real scientific theory summarizes a hypothesis or group of hypotheses that have been supported with repeated testing. In other words, different experimenters can do the same test, and get the same results. If I remember my two years of chemistry, biology and physics at UCLA, a theory remains valid only as long as there is no evidence to dispute it, or better said, disprove it. Above all else a scientific theory must be falsifiable. The various models of climate change have paraded around for years as theory; the popular press, and the politicians have accepted the "theory" and begun to pump money into the "study" of climate change or global warming or whatever it is called at any particular time. Some scientists, not being fools, have seen there is money in "studying" alleged climate change. Well, not really in studying it but in rigging data to conform with the politically convenient and expected results, to wit, that the earth is warming, that it is doing so because of human activity, and "something" must be done--e.g., taxation, regulation--to "combat" it.

The fact that the "theory" has failed to predict anything or to explain past climate events is irrelevant to its promoters. The failure, however, has become so blatant, leading to growing public skepticism, that the "theory" has been gradually modified from "predicting" warming to just predicting "change." Any change, therefore, which takes place in the weather or the climate--and the proponents use those words interchangeably when convenient--has been "predicted!" Wow! These "accurate predictions," however, invariably are ex post facto. The warming "theory," for example, initially predicted more and stronger hurricanes these past few years because of warming; it turns out, of course, that we have had fewer and weaker ones. As noted, the warming "theorists" changed the theory to one predicting "change," and reply, "See, that's change! We predicted it!" And on and on. They, of course, cannot tell us what the temperature of the earth should be, or why the earth has been both warmer and colder than now, or why there "has been a seventeen year pause" in warming despite the increase in CO2. In other words, not only can it not predict, it cannot explain. The "warmists" are now reduced merely to saying there will be "change," an unfalsifiable prediction since there is and always has been "change." No matter what happens, there is "change." You can think of dozens more holes in the thing, I won't bore you (or me) with it all, again.

Sorry for the tangent. Where was I? Oh, yes, in Antarctica. I am sure that by now all of you have read about a "research" vessel trapped in the ice in Antarctica and how various rescue efforts have run afoul of "bad weather" and ice. At least two ice breakers have had to give up efforts to rescue the trapped ship because of the thick ice. The media, of course, is downplaying the real nature of the trip by the "research" vessel, the Russian flagged MV Akademik Shokalskiy. Aboard this ship is an expedition led by well-known Australian global warmist "scientist," Chris Turney. Who is he? Just so happens he has a website where he lays out his views on climate change. He also happens to be a founder of Carbonscape, a company which helps "fix" carbon, and bills itself as "carbon negative" and all sorts of other greenie mumbo-jumbo (read it for yourselves). So he, like Al Gore, has a vested interest, a vested financial interest in promoting the global warming hoax. Do you expect balanced scientific research from Professor Turney? Hmmm . . ..

Anyhow, he got funding from the UK's BBC and Australia's ABC to charter a ship and head for the Antarctic where he would report on the declining sea ice. Just as the warmists make assumptions, I think we can make some, too. He intended to provide all sorts of moving testimony of how manmade global warming is ruining Antarctica--conveniently skipping over that it is summer in Antarctica. He would have given us some touching film of a baby penguin drifting off to sea on a melting chunk of ice, crying for his parents as the poor chick broils in the merciless heat caused by my Chevy Tahoe.  He, however, found something else. He found what even the Washington Post  had to acknowledge, to wit, that Antarctic sea ice has reached a record level.

Now the warmists are busy trying to explain it all away, and you can read in the cited Post piece various convoluted explanations of why warming means more ice because there is less ice and the winds are doing things they should not be doing and, and, and . . . Give it up guys, and realize that we "deniers" are right and that we are going to gloat over Turney's predicament.

Progressives, if they weren't so destructive they'd be funny . . .

53 comments:

  1. Since it is summer in that region, I wonder if the crew took plenty of sun screen for themselves and the floating baby penguin?

    Arkie free zone :)

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    1. Thanks for the opening Whitewall, but I don't think I should take it, having my comments deleted on so many and sundry blogs gives me pause.

      It's gotten so that soon as my IP shows up on a "Warmering" site I get a This page can't be displayed - I simply can't explain it.

      I'm figuring the earliest snow on record (since 1894) for the state of Arkansas is the likely culprit. Personally I liked the Hope a lot more than the actual & Change.

      Ark

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    2. Here's what I meant by Change.

      "As the event ended during the afternoon of the 6th, snow and sleet accumulations were impressive across the northern/western counties. Calico Rock (Izard County) was buried under a foot of pellets and powder, with 11 inches at Marshall (Searcy County), 10 inches at Oakland (Marion County) and Salem (Fulton County), and 9 inches at Harrison (Boone County) and Jasper (Newton County). At least an inch of sleet was measured as far south as the Little Rock (Pulaski County) area.

      As snow/sleet piled up in Harrison (Boone County), the temperature only managed to reach 20 degrees. This was the coldest high temperature locally so early in the season."

      http://www.nws.noaa.gov/climate/getclimate.php?wfo=lzk

      Ark

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  2. There were, of course, a lot of Lysenkoist scientists who played to the dictator, but I don't think we can count Lysenko himself as a scientist.

    "Morganism" (after Thomas Hunt Morgan) was politically incorrect.

    It is parochial in me to note that a curiously high proportion of the "Morganist" geneticists sent to the Gulag had obviously Jewish names, like Аронович.

    As usual--yet "my idiot people" (I quote Laura Rosen Cohen) have been prominent in all the lefty movements, except Fascism, National Socialism, and possibly Juche. Sigh. The Troskys make the revolutions and the Bronsteins pay the price.

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  3. I seem to recall that back when I was a teen (late '60's, early '70's), we were supposed to be heading into a new ice age, or that we'd all run out of oxygen by this time. When I was a college student, there was the Ehrlich-Simon bet (which Ehrlich lost).

    Now, speaking as the resident Christian fundamentalist, I can assure you all that apocalypticism is a great way to fire up the rank and file of a movement. Get them thinking that we don't have much time left, and they'll get busy as beavers getting the word out. In the circles I move and worship in, all this noise about the battle of Armageddon and a kind of wild Christian Zionism with all eyes on 'Eretz Yisroel is carrying on from a wave of Christian apocalypticism launched by an Anglo-Irish preacher by the name of John Nelson Darby back in the latter half of the 19th century. Unfortunately, with a theological position, we really won't know until the Last Judgment happens (which, according to Jesus, is a secret safely locked away in Heaven).

    As for global warming, I'd look forward to a time when we can raise dairy cattle and their fodder in southern Greenland (as the Norse apparently did in the 900's and 1000's. If bananas would fruit in Virginia and Maryland, that would be good, too (alas, they're only ornamentals around these parts).

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    1. Oh, yes - I was a teen at the time, and remember very well all this farrago of scientific idiocy. Fortunately, I was inoculated against the worst of it by my dear Dad - the professional research biologist - who inculcated in his children (well, I am still worrying about my little brother, who has married an Obamabot of the worst kind - she's a public school administrator in So-Cal) an appreciation for the strict and pure scientific method... and I was very logical, even in high school. I recall demolishing a great many arguments which depended on pop-science...
      I also look forward to farming dairy cattle in Southern Greenland and cultivating wine grapes in England...

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    2. About 1970 I think it all started as Earth Day? Then as was mentioned the Ehrlich-Simon bet. Somewhere it morphed into climate change-global warming.

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    3. One of the very few things I miss about California is the avocados. If I could grow them at my home in Idaho, that would be wonderful. Go Global Warming!

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    4. Nuclear Winter was one of the titles if I recall correctly.

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  4. It also strikes me that down in Antarctica, it's SUMMER, for Pete's sake!

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  5. Don't you just love it when it turns out good.

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  6. Last night it was dark. Today it is light. That's change, too! The model predicted it!

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  7. It's a pity AlGore wasn't aboard. After his run of global-warming speeches on exceptionally cold days, and other stuff not really to his credit, the irony couldn't even escape the Democratic operatives with bylines. Probably.

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    1. Al of Gore is somewhere on a beach with about 100 million $$ and a couple of Arab babes bringing him tea.

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    2. More likely a couple of babes releasing his chakra!

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    3. Can a chakra be re-released?

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  8. For once nothing I can think of is funnier than the reality. You're right a6z, where is bigfoot?

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  9. The icebreaker, too, is stuck in the ice. And a third icebreaker fails to reach the stranded vessel. Odd warming we're having.

    As Glenn Reynolds asks, "Fallen Angels is just a science fiction novel, right? right?"

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  10. 2014 is going to be even funnier than 2013.

    Sadder, too.

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  11. Turney admitted in a Guardian story that he went to Antarctica to document the melt waters as further "proof" of AGW. Knowing most people will not realize that it is summer in the southern hemisphere.
    In short, the man tried to perpetrate a fraud by claiming the melt was due to AGW and the fact he did his study at the height of local summer would not be disclosed.

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  12. G'day All,

    Down here in Oz the sceptics, moi included, are near paralysed with mirth at the poor little dears led so ably by warmist Turney being trapped in the summer sea ice.

    The [previously] intended purpose of the journey was to match the current data against that of Mawson a century ago and show how we are all going to hell in a hand basket as the planet warms.

    The irony is that this ship of fools couldn't even get into the bay that Mawson used to off load his supplies three years in a row due to it then being relatively ice free. Why? Because the sea ice now extends so far.

    Suddenly the reason for the voyage has changed. No more mention of gerbil worming from the doomsayer Turney and a deadly silence from the left leaning, warmist loving press.

    Personally I think we should stop our Antarctic Supply Ship from even attempting to rescue them and save some money. At least leave them there until we sceptics stop laughing at them which could be a long time.

    New Year's Eve here in Oz so a Happy 2014 to you Dip and the rest of the habitués of this site.

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    1. Thanks, David, and I am still jealous that you folks downunder get to see the future several hours before I do . . .

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    2. ah, but they see the past sooner too!!

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  13. Anyone find "odd" these 100-year-old negatives just got "discovered"?

    http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/discovered-film-negatives-reveal-1910-expedition-to-antarctica-000455705.html

    Ark

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  14. Oh yeah. I've just become aware of the NYT thing ... as I understand it, what happened if Benghazi isn't to be, construed to be AQ linked because, LIFG repudiated all that nonsense after getting released from Gitmo into Gaddafy's son's The Sa'Id Rehabilitation Twelve-Step Program:

    http://www.ctc.usma.edu/posts/lifg-revisions-posing-critical-challenge-to-al-qaida

    It's not Antarctica but then again, it's not the NYT either.

    Arkie

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  15. To name this farce "The spirit of Mawson" is to defame the original expedition who endured real hardship, death and deprivation.

    Go to the website and look at this collection of dweebs http://www.spiritofmawson.com/our-legacy/
    who could not organize the proverbial piss-up in a brewery. Their financiers deserve all the approbation they get, but really it is the taxpayer paying the full freight that should be incensed, because after all the BBC, ABC and various universities and societies are all heavily subsidized by the public.

    These watermelon stunts continue even after the global warming farce has been comprehensively disproved by observed data and professional exposition of their faulty and falsified data, and yet this group set out on an expensive jaunt to attempt to tie observed data to plant and tree proxy data-they learn nothing, achieve nothing but continue to waste. It is a major scandal.
    Similar stunts were encouraged in the Canadian Arctic this year when foolish sailers, jet skiers and rowers thought they could traverse the NorthWest passage because some morons had predicted that the Arctic would be ice-free, as it happens I know the moron who made that prediction, the BBC reported it (of course). His prediction is still available on the net, he (of course) is employed by a watermelon advocacy group.
    It is time that these expeditions were left to their own devices, like the original Franklin and Mawson expeditions, a few deaths would be a small price to deter further imbecilic antics.
    Dave says it well a "ship of fools".

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    1. And, of course, according to the Oracle of Gore, the Arctic was supposed to be ice-free this year.But then maybe he made a typo; maybe he meant rice-free . . .

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    2. Well, there you go. You don't see those awful deniers proving that there's rice int the Arctic circle.

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  16. This all makes me pretty sad because I know a number of very good physicists doing high quality research in atmospheric sciences that are tied to this wackiness through no intent of their own. Yeah, their research gets dollars that are part of the extortion racket, but they don't participate in any of that fear mongering themselves.
    There's so much crap being bandied about with regards to the scientific method, that even many skeptics tend to get it all screwed up. It was refreshing to see Mr. Dip actually recognize that a *theory* must be *falsifiable*. We end up with sound bites like: "It's just a theory."
    Um... no... it's not even a theory.
    There simply is no way to falsify global warming. As a fellow physics student decades ago said to me: "Proof by assertion."

    In my own experience, one of the most key points at which I smelled smoke in this disaster was hearing about Gore's pitch of a non-linear effect supporting his assertion of global warming: "The sun melts the ice, which creates water, which lowers the reflectivity, which increases absorption. Therefore, there's a tipping point that we're going over."

    Such non-linear concepts tend to be the mainstay components of junk science or pseudoscience. Before that being cited, I was pretty uninterested in the whole thing, thinking it was just harmless overselling of actual scientific results.

    No... nobody can derive the earth's temperature from first principles and available measurements of primary components of the system. Basic thermodynamic derivations get *very close*. But note that this is *very close* in the sense of *compared to absolute zero*. "Off by ten Kelvins" is *very close* in such context, but totally wrong by anybody with a jacket. I've perused several attempted derivations around the webs, and all of them resort to heuristic arguments at some point: "Well, since we're off by 10 degrees from the real temperature, we adjust this factor here, and we get the real result...." That's utter BS for engineering (policy) purposes, of course.

    The land of science also has become full of sacred cows. A buddy of mine responds with "The vast majority of the science of global warming is good science!" whenever I mention anything that might possibly offend his liberal leanings. I, of course, respond: "Yes, it is almost entirely 'good science', but 'good science' simply isn't even close to 'enough'"
    "Good science" + $5B gets us the National Ignition Facility, which is a heap of junk that can't achieve even the most basic fusion, let alone realistically model weapons.
    "Good science" is a very good way for a scientist to build his career: Operate on building upon or testing the limits of the *best* theories available at the time. "Good science" doesn't need to be right or wrong, it's simply "doing the best that we can".
    But there's a huge gulf between "the best that science knows about the earth's climate (and some of these scientists fall WAY short of even this standard, but most don't)" and "useful information for setting policy".

    At some point, the backlash to this is going to go *very* poorly for physics researchers in the field of atmospheric sciences. A lot of them don't deserve it. And to be honest, if they were to speak out, they'd be committing the same abrogation as the cult leaders. Being a real scientist is not letting politics get involved with your science or vice versa.

    - reader #1482

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    1. I disagree, they absolutely deserve any backlash coming their way (I don't see enough backlash) they also deserve a poor reputation for truthfulness.

      Climate "science" at this point is thoroughly discredited, that's not to say all climate scientists are charlatans-just most of them. What they have been spouting (or even worse, staying quiet about while drawing a good salary) was obvious junk science at least a decade ago. Bjorn Lomborg for one was pointing to the horrific costs of CO2 reduction for miniscule benefits; all based on poor computer projections that disagreed with the satellite temperature observations. And then ignoring that CO2 is mostly beneficial to mankind and there is NO correlation of CO2 to temperature variances.

      A major problem in "government" and the multitude of government funded agencies and universities is a greed for funding and a willingness to provide reports that support the funder's aims, that this is cloaked as "science" is laughable. As long as funding continues, your friends (and the moron I reference above) are enablers and deserve to be exposed as charlatans. The world would be a better place if they were digging ditches or changing diapers rather than doing their brand of "science".

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    2. Is it not the responsibility of an honest scientist to expose pseudo-science in his area of expertise?

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  17. Oh, here's a case in point:
    I occasionally teach physics at a local state university. In a physics-for-pre-medical-students course, a student basically requested that I agree with him that global warming was a real and obvious problem that we should all be concerned about. I responded that it wasn't part of our syllabus and that I wouldn't go further than saying: "I believe the section in our textbook on it is accurate."

    He gave me the most enormous frowny face.

    I had already read the textbook's section, and it indeed contained the proper couching remarks around the concept. So there are still textbooks out there which haven't been infiltrated with this cult-crap.

    If a scientist strongly feels that his results imperils the populace, he should work directly with policy makers, not use scare tactics to appeal to the populace.

    Apologies for the spam.. the lack of scientific ethics among many scientists is a pet peeve of mine.

    - reader #1482

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    1. !482--Great comments, much appreciated. You should do a science blog.

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    2. What is wrong with your student that he *expects* political validation in a physics course?

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    3. I am currently re-reading the body of work of Immanuel Velikovsky who in his day was vilified for having an innovative theory of the history of the Earth and the Solar system. The revelations coming from the Mars rovers tend to validate his theories. The man was viciously attacked for positing a theory that fit the geological discoveries being made but didn't fit with the prevailing theories. Anyone who wanders off the faith-based reservation in any age gets "the treatment" by the orthodoxy.

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  18. You are exactly right 1482. The damage to the "science community" and the concept of science is devastating and mostly overlooked by everyone. I think we will see a rise of "know nothings" and Ludditism such as never before. This will set back true science for a long time.

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    1. James, you are predicting the present; you are right that the future will be worse.

      Such periods have occurred in the past. None has lasted forever, yet.

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    2. a6z,
      "None has lasted forever" yeah, I know. That's the great thing about life nothing good or bad lasts forever, just predicting length of time or living through it can really suck. As for as "predicting the present" I'm not sure what you mean, a little help maybe.
      Otherwise I'm an optimist at heart glad to be here, alive and in the fight with these people.

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    3. Predicting the present: we *already* see--if we are looking--a rise of "know nothings" and Ludditism such as never before.

      What did the Luddites do that even compares to destroying life-saving medical research because it involves animals?

      As to "know-nothings", I could point you to a hundred cases. Oh, take the Zimmerman/Martin affair, for example. Or the urban legend that the Constitution's three-fifths clause means the founders thought a black was worth three-fifths of a white. Or ... well I have to stop, or I'll go on forever. I write too much on this blog anyway, which after all is not mine. But a list of know-nothingism cases really writes itself.

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    4. Oh, okay I see what you mean.

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  19. My prediction for 2014:
    Nemesis is going to get very busy in the coming year.

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  20. Happy New year Mr. Mad and your family and environs of this great place (you too, Arkie)! To 2014 and making the "you know who" squeal with more righteous and funny key strokes!

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    1. Thank you Sir. And The Best to you and yours (and all y'all) in this New Year!

      Ensure you have your blackeyed peas today James - give you a leg up on deciphering "Hillbilly Syntax."

      Arkie

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  21. Happy new year to all fans of Diplomad 2.0, and of course to our esteemed and distinguished blog host as well. However, Uncle Kepha takes this opportunity to gloat that having Jewish and Chinese connections as well, he gets three New Year's Days every year!

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  22. Here on the wet coast of North America it is not yet 2014, however it is not too early to wish the host, his family and his well-informed throng and their loved ones a better 2014 than 2013 proved to be.

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  23. Happy New Year Bob and all DiploMad posters. For extended coverage of the current Antarctic Idiocy, dripping with scorn, dive into Tim Blair's blog via the link here. He is merciless.

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  24. We stuffed ourselves on black-eyed pea cassoulet. We' re likely to need a great deal of luck in 2014. The rats are feeling cornered.

    Michael Adams

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    1. But. Not everybody is cornered Mr. Adams. Just takes awhile to clear the field. Should things go alright "offshore" as I suspect- you'll be hearing.

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    2. Thanks. Hope to hear, and soon.

      MFA

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