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OVERTIME--March 2003 issue
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Dedicated to reflecting the collective wisdom of enlightened workers.

Linda Featheringill
4651 West 41st Street, Down
Cleveland, OH 44109
(216) 661-0794

lfeatheringill@hotmail.com

March 2003
Volume 3, Number 9

Greetings!
The weather is still very much with us. Winter apparently has developed a real affection for Cleveland and just won’t let us go. On the other side of the world, Nature seems determined to hang Australia out to dry. In between, there’s a lot of wind everywhere. Wherever you are, I hope you take care of yourself and have a very pleasant month of March.--Linda Featheringill

To everyone who worked against the war with Iraq:

All of you have worked tirelessly and courageously and I am very proud of you. I have seen how much of your mind, body, and spirit you have devoted to the cause. I appreciate you efforts.

The question of whether the US should go to war with Iraq is out of your hands now. You are not in control of the situation. Perhaps you never were. But you had to do something, you had to take a stand. And you did.

I realize that you are struggling to deal with feelings of anger, disappointment, and powerlessness. This internal angst is understandable and it is to be expected. As the New-Agers would say, these feelings are okay. Just remember, there is no shame in trying to do a good thing.

You have accomplished some good things. You have spread the idea that it is not a bad thing to openly disagree with the government. You have used the internet and wireless messaging to create a movement that is fluid, flexible, and leaderless. You have learned how to mobilize people without dominating them. You have forged coalitions with a lot of people who may not just like you but are good people nevertheless. You have crossed over a generation gap. You have expanded the concepts of companions and comrades.

You might take comfort in this thought: All wars are temporary, all political conspiracies are temporary, and all empires are temporary. Unfortunately, it seems that peace is also temporary. Right now, they are fighting over oil. In a few years, they’ll be fighting over water. We can look forward to conflicts over pollution, farmland, and refugees.

You and I know that all this antagonism is not necessary. With cooperation and mutual support, we could solve these problems, meet everyone’s needs, and still live in peace.

We need to keep talking about using cooperation instead of competition. We need to continue to teach the world that there is another way. We need to get the word out - today and tomorrow and the next day. We need to do this until it is no longer a new and radical idea.

So you who have worked against the war, of whom I am enormously proud, still have work to do. Go ahead and rest. Take care of yourself. But don’t quit. Linda Featheringill

State of the Union

On January 28, 2003 US President George W. Bush delivered a speech to the US Congress on the “State of the Union.”

Bush wants to create a new Terrorist Threat Integration Center “to gather and analyze intelligence from a wide array of agencies working at home and abroad.” He asked Congress for $6 billion, to be spent over a ten-year period to make available vaccines and treatments against bio-weapons. He wants $15 billion, to be spent over five years, to combat AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean. He proposed that $400 billion be spent over the two-year period to make changes in Medicare and to offer older Americans a choice of programs that include prescription drug benefits. He proposed spending $1.2 billion to speed development of fuel-cell vehicles that use hydrogen for fuel and emit only water (instead of carbon monoxide and unburned hydrocarbons).

In answer to critics who point out that his tax-cut proposals would make the deficit worse, he claimed that resulting economic growth would bring in more tax revenues. Also, he wanted Congress to exercise “spending discipline.”

And, of course, he said that if Saddam Hussein does not disarm, we (i.e., the United States) will disarm him - even if our allies don’t want to go along with us.

More notable was what Bush didn’t say and what issues were not addressed.

--Bush did not say one word about what should be done to provide the millions of Americans, now homeless, with adequate housing.

--He did not mention the large number of people, many with full-time jobs, who cannot buy enough food and depend on food banks to meet their basic nutritional needs. He also didn’t talk about the diminished donations to food banks because of the current economic situation.

--In view of the extensive dry spell over many square miles of the western states in 2002, which contributed to many forest and brush fires, there is clearly a need for high-level reservoirs and water pipe lines to deliver enough water to potentially dry areas to prevent forest and brush fires. Nothing was said about this.

--For long time the US has had the worst passenger railroad system of all the industrialized nations. Bush said nothing about trying to improve this system.

--Bush did not say one word about the cost of the present military buildup in the Gulf region in preparation for war. Newsweek (February 3, 2003, page 27) says, “The Congressional Budget Office calculates that the cost could reach $12.5 billion, plus a billion for every month troops . . . await action.”

---Bush did not say one word about how millions of Americans have been ripped off by a few exceptionally avaricious capitalists (such as Enron and Dynergy) who took advantage of certain laws that allowed them to control the availability of electrical energy and natural gas to force consumers to pay the highest possible prices.

--He failed to point out the terrible cost of the Gulf War of 1991, including postwar sickness of 250,000 veterans and even deformities among some babies who fathers were veterans of that war.

--Bush failed to point out that a tax cut enacted during the Reagan years was made possible only because many Japanese capitalists were willing to buy US government bonds, thus providing enough money for our federal government to continue to pay its bills. If Bush insists on his tax reduction proposal, how will the federal government pay its bills this time?

--He failed to point out that only a few short years ago the US was providing arms to Iraq, when Iraq was fighting Iran for control of the region that includes the border between those two countries.

--He said nothing about the danger of leaks from old oil and gas pipelines all over the country and what should be done about this. People have already been killed by explosions and fires that resulted from ruptured pipes.

As for the Democratic Party response, given by Gary Locke, it was a very timid statement.

It should be obvious that neither the Republicans nor the Democrats can do anything to help us, the American workers. With each passing day, the normal activities of capitalist commercial activity are making our existence every more difficult and the avaricious nature of the capitalist class threatens us with war, with war’s horrible and inevitable consequences. [C.T., Washington, USA.]

More on war

We hear little about the aftermath of war in Iraq. In the absence of plans, speculation abroad is rife.

Will we seize Iraq’s oil fields, becoming an occupying power that controls the price and supply of that nation’s oil for the foreseeable future? To whom do we propose to hand the reigns of power after Saddam Hussein?

Will our war inflame the Muslim world, resulting in devastating attacks on Israel? Will Israel retaliate with its own nuclear arsenal? Will the Jordanian and Saudi Arabian governments be toppled by radicals, bolstered by Iran, which has much closer ties to terrorism than Iraq?

Could a disruption of the world’s oil supply lead to a worldwide recession? Has our senselessly bellicose language and our callous disregard of the interests and opinions of other nations increased the global race to join the nuclear club and mad proliferation an even more lucrative practice for nations that need the income? [US Senator Robert Byrd, February 12, 2003. Contributed by L.W.R., Ohio, USA.]

Public Opinion in West Australia [Letters to the Editor, while the USS Abraham Lincoln was in Australian water.]

I think it’s grand to see a small American armada here. What with the USS Abraham Lincoln with its 6000 crew and other sundry destroyers here for my stay, that relaxed and comfortable feeling I’ve been experiencing makes a lot more sense now. And it would certainly seem that our PM’s message of support seems to be getting through to the White House. I think it makes sense to seriously consider a permanent base for them here to make that feeling last.

How is it, my fellow Australians, that I can, in this current climate, write the above with such sarcasm, yet many would seriously agree with the sentiment? Have we changed that much? -- D. W., Duncraig.

I, too feel frustrated and helpless regarding the situation in Iraq. My frustration is a little different. I am frustrated that, at 70 I am too old to go to fight against the oppressors of freedom.

I welcome the protection of the Abraham Lincoln. I want the world to be free of threats, either in the name of terrorism or in the type of regime that Iraq offers. I am a patriot and I want to live in peace - not a threatened peace where people with faulty memories try to stop the peace effort.

I’m ready to go. -- R.D., North Yunderup.

While I agree that Saddam Hussein is no choirboy, I hope the Yanks find at least one “smoking gun” to hold up to the world as concrete evidence that they have weapons of mass destruction before they go into Iraq and destroy the place.

Perhaps the Australian Federal Police and ASIO could go in and have a poke around Iraq. After all, they rounded up the Bali bombing suspects in 5 minutes flat, whereas the US is still looking for Osama bin Laden. -- M.S., Ballajura. [Printed in the West Australian, January 18, 2003. Contributed by Gogglesworth.]

The Ecology
Lake Hume, Australia
[A weir is dam placed in a stream to raise the water level. In the US, we would probably just call it a “dam.”]

Gone are the water skiers, who for decades have zigzagged above the hundreds of submerged trees on Lake Hume. With the lake only 5% full and trees no longer submerged, skiing has been banned. Boat ramps are so far from they water’s edge they look ridiculous.

Water skiers have switched to the Murray River, which is running full with water for irrigators and South Australians. Boat traffic on the river has jumped 50%, causing huge problems for the NSW Waterways Authority, the river’s safety police. Tempers have flared, boat ramps are congested, and the authority has sent extra officers from Sydney to help. There are 5 investigations into boat collisions and 4 boats sank this summer.

“We have found that some of these (speedboat drivers) are not used to how narrow the river is and the drivers run their boats into trees and snags, causing injury to the people they are towing,” said the authority’s Roy Cornwall.

But this is just one negative effect of the dry Hume Weir. There is a more serious threat from blue-green algae. The lake is under high blue-green algae alert, which means people cannot drink or touch the water and livestock risk death by drinking it. Given that water from the Hume flows into the Murray, a 1400-kilometre [840 miles] stretch of the river to Wentworth, near Mildura, is now on a medium alert for blue-green algae.

Towns around the weir, such as Lake Hume village, Bellbridge and Tallangatta, have had to truck in water. Towns and cities below the dam that rely on the river for drinking water, such as Albury and Wodonga, are having to treat their water with activated carbon or find another source.

Between 2000-2001, the Hume, the main regulating storage for irrigation and water supply releases in the Murray system, was so full it spilled over. But now, only a few seasons later, the drought and irrigation demands have left it dangerously low, even though water allocations for NSW and Victorian irrigators are the lowest ever.

Water managers are worrying about next year. Water in the Dartmouth reservoir, built as a buffer against droughts, could fall to 20% by the end of April. Goulburn-Murray Water’s Graeme Hannan, who manages Victorian allocations, said that with a severe drought and finite dam capacity, “at some stage we are going to have to face the pain.” [Melissa Fyfe, The Age (Canberra, Australia), February 5, 2003.]

Water in Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia may sit atop the world’s largest oil reserves, but the other side of the geological coin is that the country also sits atop on of the world’s smallest reserves of water. It does not have a single lake or river. Its only renewable water source is in shallow aquifers, 100-150 feet [30-45 meters] underground, which are replenished by brief, infrequent rainfalls. Wells dug deeper than 1300 feet [400 meters] draw from ancient reserves trapped in layers of porous rocks, where the water is no more renewable than the country’s oil.

Yet, like oil-short American with its gas-guzzlers, Saudi Arabia wastes plenty of its scarcest resource: fountains spew, swimming pools slop over and irrigation sprinklers seem to spray everywhere, letting water evaporate into the dry desert air.

Muhammed H. al-Qunaibet, a hydrologist and government adviser, estimates that the country uses 6.34 trillion gallons [24 trillion liters] of water a year for agriculture, with only a third of that being replaced through rainfall. The rest simply disappears.

According to Ghazi bin Abdulrahman al-Qusaibi, the water minister, cities use 581 billion gallons [2.2 trillion liters] a year. About half of this comes from the world’s biggest seawater desalinization complex on the country’s eastern coast. The other half comes from the deep aquifers.

How much is left? No one knows. The last survey, in 1984, estimated that the country’s fossil water reserved totaled about 132 trillion gallons [500 trillion liters], but at the current rate of use, more than half of that has probably disappeared by now.

Water may soon be the most volatile flash point in a region now preoccupied with religion and oil. The Middle Eat and North Africa contain about 5% of the world’s population but less than 1% of the world’s fresh water. The population is growing and the supply of water is shrinking. The shortage is already creating tension between neighbors because, while each country pumps from its own land, many rivers and aquifers cross borders. Iraq and Syria feel threatened by Turkey’s talk of damming the Tigris and Euphrates rivers [Note: more than 90% of water in the upper Euphrates and more than 50% of the water in the Tigris comes from rain that originally fell in Turkey]. Egypt is worried about uses of the Nile in Ethiopia and Sudan. Israel and its neighbors continue to argue over the use of rivers and aquifers, control of which was partly responsible for the 1967 war.

Saudi Arabia is pumping from its eastern aquifers, leaving less water for neighboring Bahrain and Qatar. Jordan, meanwhile, has accused the Saudis of draining the Qa Disi Aquifer, which lies beneath the countries’ border.

As the aquifers are depleted, the water becomes increasingly laden with salts and metals that must be filtered out before it can be used, even for farming because the impurities stunt the growth of plants. The wells must also be lined with expensive, corrosion-resistant bonded metals because the salt-laden water becomes so caustic. Already in some places, a quart of potable water costs more to produce than a quart of oil. [From an article by Craig Smith for The New York Times, January 26, 2003.]

Some good news for a change - Butterflies

[Every year, monarch butterflies (the orange and black striped variety] migrate from southern Canada and northern US to northern Mexico. I’ve seen them travel in small “clouds” that probably contain several hundred individuals, a few feet above the ground. If you are fortunate enough to be in the right place at the right time, they will flutter around you with no fear, as if you were merely a tree or some other inanimate object.]

A little more than a year after the largest known die-off of monarch butterflies occurred in the mountains of Mexico, researchers say the monarchs that migrate there appear to have recovered to near-normal population levels. The finding was announced jointly by the Mexican government, the World Wildlife Fund, and the Monarch Butterfly Sanctuary Foundation, all of which financed or otherwise assisted the research.

In January 2002, a severe winter storm killed most of the butterflies that had flown from the US and Canada to spend the winter in the mountains of Mexico. More than 200 million dead butterflies rained from their roosts in the towering fir trees.

This winter, researchers found that monarch roosts covered nearly 20 acres of forest in the mountains of Mexico, close to the average over the past decade, around 24 acres of roosts. After the storm last year, the roosts of surviving monarchs covered only about 5 acres. [Carol Yoon, NY Times, February 14, 2003.]

Intermission - this and that

Zimbabwe

The crisis in Zimbabwe is pathetic and shameful. Fortunately, I was there in mid August. I was shocked - people literally don’t have anything to eat.

Like you said, the donated food, if any, is given to those loyal to the present government. Those who oppose are starved, brutalized, and at times locked up. At times, food is available from the shops but people cannot afford it because they don’t work for wages and so have no money. Also, the drought makes it impossible to grow anything. [V.D., Swaziland.]

Religion in the US

The US is steeped in religious belief so it is easy for its rulers to persuade the population that it is not fighting over Middle East oil but for “Christian Values,” making this war a kind of modern crusade. Creationists are becoming strong and assertive but do they really believe that Eve was invented out of a man’s rib but ruined paradise by eating an apple given to her by a talking snake? Do they really believe that Methuselah lived 969 years, that Moses split the sea, and that when Jonah was burped up by a whale he was OK, if a little shaken?

There are 1350 sects in the US. A recent Gallup poll on evolution and creationism revealed that (1) 45% believed that God created people in their present form within the last 10,000 years, (2) 37% believed that evolution occurred over millions of years and was guided by God, and (3) only 12% believed that evolution occurred without interference by a god. Another 68% believed that creationism should be taught in schools.

In America at least, Darwin’s followers are an endangered species. [Colin Green, Norfolk, England, UK.]

Public Debt - US

The US government is expected to hit the $6.4 trillion ceiling on the national debt about February 20, the Treasury Department said yesterday, renewing its call for Congress to boost the government’s borrowing authority……..If Congress doesn’t boost the government’s borrowing authority, the Treasury can juggle funds for a while at least to dodge a default on the national debt.

The Treasury moved billions of dollars around to do that on two occasions last year. Such shifting of funds would allow the government to pay its bills through the beginning of April, the department said.

Boosting the debt limit is more a matter of politics than economics. Economists and others believe that Congress will eventually raise the limit.

A federal default is considered unimaginable because it would rattle the bond markets, force interest rates higher, weaken the world economy and deliver a jarring political blow to President Bush. [Jeannine Aversa, Associated Press, February 6, 2002.]

Down and out in America

[The state of Ohio, like other states, is cutting funding for education at all levels and benefits for the poor across the board, including medical care.]

How does the [Bush] administration justify the scale of spending on an Iraq attack when state and local services are being slashed?

All US states, except Vermont, must balance their budgets each year. If federal support drops, they have to raise taxes or make cuts. The bulk of state budgets go on education, medication, and incarceration, and that is where the cuts are being made. State spending will need to fall by some 37 billion [English pounds] over the next year.

The White House says that its grants are increasing. But city mayors say the 2004 budget is nearly 2 billion pounds short of what Bush’s own plan for school teaching and curriculum demands. It offers more for “homeland security” while cutting support for regular policing.

One result of the states’ penury is the most un-American spectacle of prisoners being released from jail in order to save money. While soldiers and ships are concentrating in the Gulf, the state of Washington - facing a 2.4 billion pounds gap between spending and revenue over the next two years - is dropping 60,000 people from its health insurance for the working poor. Class sizes are rising. 1,200 prisoners are being released and 2,900 offenders on parole or probation will no longer be supervised. In Oregon, where voters have rejected a 5% increase in state income tax, state troopers are being sacked and medical help for poorer citizens cut. College fees for students are being raised in Kentucky, Florida and Ohio. [From an article by D. Walker for The Guardian (London), February 5, 2003. Contributed by P.E.N., Colchester, England, UK.]

Land of the Free?

The USA Patriot Act, signed into law on October 26, 2001, gave law enforcement officials broader authority to conduct electronic surveillance and wiretaps and gives the president the authority, when the nation is under attack, to confiscate any property within US jurisdiction of anyone believed to be engaging in such attacks. It also tightened oversight of financial activities in an effort to disrupt terrorist finances.

The Bush Administration is now preparing a sequel to the Patriot Act (sometimes called Patriot II). The Center for Public Integrity has obtained a draft, dated January 9, 2003. Some of the key provisions of Patriot II include:

--Section 201, “Prohibition of Disclosure of Terrorism Investigation Detainee Information.” The proposed legislation would enhance the Justice Department’s ability to deny releasing material on suspected terrorists in government custody.

--Section 202, “Distribution of ‘Worst Case Scenario” Information.” This subtitle would muddy up an established level of transparency between private industry and the public.

--Sections 301-306, “Terrorist Identification Database.” These sections would authorize creation of a DNA database on “suspected terrorists.”

--Section 312, “Appropriate Remedies with Respect to Law Enforcement Surveillance Activities.” This section would terminate law enforcement consent decrees that limit agencies from gathering information about individuals and organizations. It would also place substantial restrictions on future court injunctions.

--Section 405, “Presumption for Pretrial Detention in Cases Involving Terrorism.” This provision would create a law for holding anyone suspected of terrorist activity before their trial, without bail.

--Section 501, “Expatriation of Terrorists.” This provision allows the government to expatriate a US citizen if he is involved in any activities (legal or otherwise) associated with a group that the Attorney General declares to be a “terrorist organization.”

[From information found at www.publicintegrity.org]

Iraqi casualties of war

Summary

Civilian deaths - 7,200 to 86,000
Troop deaths - 3,200 - 80,000
Made homeless - 3.6 million
Displaced inside Iraq - 2 million
Forced into refuge abroad - 900,000
Needing “therapeutic feeding” - 3 million
Needing medical treatment - 500,000

[Population of Iraq is about 26 million.]

With as much secrecy as the Pentagon, the United Nations has been busily counting the likely casualty toll of a war on Iraq. While the Pentagon focuses on its troops, the network of UN specialist agencies is trying to estimate what would happen to Iraqis. The assessments are dramatic, though for reasons of internal diplomacy or because of US pressure, the UN is unwilling to go public with the figures.

But a newly leaked report from a special UN taskforce that summarizes the assessments calculates that about 500,000 people could “require medical treatment to a greater or lesser degree as a result of direct or indirect injuries,” according to the World Health Organization.

WHO estimates that 100,000 Iraqi civilians could be wounded and another 400,000 hit by disease after the bombing of water and sewage facilities and the disruption of food supplies.

The UN children’s fund says, “The nutritional status of some 3.03 million people will be dire and they will require therapeutic feeding.” About 4/5 of these victims will be children under five. The rest will be pregnant and lactating women.

Although Iraq’s population at 26 million is almost the same as Afghanistan’s, UN agencies say the effect of war in Iraq would be far worse. Afghanistan is largely rural, so people have long traditions of coping mechanisms.

By contrast, Iraq has “a relatively urbanized population, with the state providing the basic needs of the population.” Some 16 million (over 60% of the population) depend on the monthly “food basket” of basic goods - rice, sugar, flour, and cooking oil - supplied for free by the Iraqi government.

The UN estimates that at least 900,000 Iraqi refugees will go to Iran. No figures have been given for those who may go to Kuwait, Syria, Jordan, or Turkey. Another 2 million could be displaced inside the country. It estimates that 3.6 million will need “emergency shelter.”

The report makes no estimate of likely Iraqi war deaths.

No distinction was made on whether the war is authorized by the security council or not, since a bomb is just as lethal whoever orders it to drop. It is taken for granted that the US will be in charge of targets and the UN will not have any influence.

Other NGOs have been conducting their own assessments. Oxfam, which sent water specialists to the region, says half of Iraq’s sewage treatment plants already do not work because of shortages of spare parts caused by sanctions.

Medact, the UK affiliate of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, estimates casualties could be five times higher than in the 1991 Gulf war. “The avowed US aim of regime change means any new conflict will be much more intense and destructive, and will involve more deadly weapons developed in the interim,” it says on a report available on the internet (address below).

After the first Gulf war, the UN calculated that between 3500 and 15,000 civilians died during the war (plus between 100,000 and 120,000 Iraqi troops). A new war of the kind projected by the US could kill between 2000 and 50,000 in Baghdad and between 1200 and 30,000 on the southern and northern fronts in Basra, Kirkuk, and Mosul. If biological and chemical weapons were used, up to 33,000 more people could die. [If nuclear weapons were used, the death toll would be much higher, of course.]

Medact examines detailed recent analyses by other specialists on the various tactics the US may use. The wide range of figures comes from different estimates of the degree of Iraqi resistance and the length of the war.

The leaked UN report is at www.casi.org.uk
Medact web address is www.medact.org

[Taken from an article by J. Steele, The Guardian (London), January 29, 2003. Contributed by P.E.N., Colchester, England, UK.]

Nature’s Little Rule Book

Life on Earth is a web, not a pyramid. Humans like to think that they are on “top of the heap” but that “heap” is imaginary, not real.

Evolution of life on Earth has no inherent direction or “purpose” that directs it to develop supposedly “higher” forms of life.

We as humans are a part of evolution, not the end goal.

Life on Earth is infinitely subtle, complex, and inter-related.

Everything is connected to everything else and these connections make life itself possible.

Death is an essential part of life on Earth. You will die. Extinctions of species are also a part of life, including your own species.

Variety - lots of it - is the spice of life. Biodiversity is not only good for you, it also improves the quality of your life.

You are allowed to compete with other species for food, but not to wage war on them.

“Extermination of pests” (wolves, raccoons, etc.) is genocide and wrong.

Earth’s ecosystems are not designed to withstand a species that goes gallivanting around the world and willy-nilly introducing species from one place to another.

Stay put. Stop moving and trading things all over the place.

[Yes, you’re right. Capitalism would never tolerate such measures.]

To see what a sustainable lifestyle would be like, look around you. There are millions of life forms that live without creating havoc.

And last but perhaps most important: There is much more to life than meets the human eye.

[Earth Crash Earth Spirit, at www.eces.org] I print this web address in larger letters because I highly recommend it for anyone who loves our planet. Lots of good stuff there. L.F.

A couple of web sites for you to check out, both English-language Arab news sites:

www.arabicnews.com From Syria. A bit chauvinistic: Arab states are always righteous and non-Arab states are not. But the analysis is sharp and thought provoking.

www.gulfnews.com From UAR. This site features a surprisingly wide range of opinion, including one of the best arguments I’ve read anywhere for the US going to war with Iraq (“Something must be done to save Iraq”).

Next month: We’d love to know what you think. These are our usual classifications:

-- Open - questions, comments, tirades, etc.
-- RSVP. React to previous statements.
-- The ecology.
-- Clippings from newspapers, etc.

Money. Overtime is free, but there are expenses and any help with these would be appreciated. Please make checks payable to Linda Featheringill and mail to me at 4651 West 41st Street, Down, Cleveland, OH 44109. Contributions will be acknowledged in the next issue, or you can remain anonymous if you wish.

Finances at the end of February 2003:

Balance 4.66

Contributions 56.00

Supplies and stationary
Copying 28.60
Postage 24.53

Total expenses 53.13

Balance 7.53
Contributions: L. Holmdahl, 20.00; K. Hofstatter, 6.00; Anon., 5.00; M. McKinney, 25.00. And, to Everyone, thank you, thank you, thank you. Linda Featheringill.