Thousands pack downtown Ocean Springs for Cruisin

If you wanted to see classic cars, listen to some old time rock and roll, and just have a good time, downtown Ocean Springs was the place to be Friday night. The city hosted a sock hop for Cruisin' the Coast, and thousands showed up to take part in the fun.

As the sun was setting on classic cars, and the temperatures cooled down, the streets of Ocean Springs were just starting to heat up.

Dennis Landry was one of the stars of the show with his burn-out truck.

"Wow, I got all the traffic shut down. Where's the fire department when you need them?" Landry asked. "I hope the cops love me."

Baby Charlie was another star. Mom Lauren Russell believes in starting them young.

"He's gonna be a cruiser with his dad and his grandpa," Russell said. "He's enjoyed it. It's been a pretty day."

Thousands of people and hundreds of cars made for a spectacular show. First time cruisers from Texas summed up the experience perfectly, praising the beaches, the hospitality, and all the t-shirts.

No matter where you looked, people were swinging to the music, including a little girl in a tiny poodle skirt.

Speaking of poodles and other dogs, they were part of the act as well. There's just something about Cruisin' that all party animals love.

Percy Lott and Genelle Rick are planning on tying the knot soon. But Cruisin' puts the wedding on the back burner for now. Other things take priority.

"I like all the old cars and I love Ocean Springs and I just like all the people, the music, the food, just all the excitement," Rick said.

And what would Cruisin' be without making a few classic memories of a time that never seems to get old. The cameras were out in force capturing the cars and special moments.

For first time cruisers like Tia Gordon, here with her dad who's been cruisin for seven years, it's a day she won't forget anytime soon.

"It's real nice, lovely really," Gordon said. "When it comes to all these classics, I love classic cars."

Visit our Cruisin' the Coast-Ocean Springs Photo Gallery to see more from the downtown party: http://oceansprings.wlox.com/photo-gallery/events/51588-cruisin-coast-ocean-springs

The fun continues in Ocean Springs Saturday as the city hosts the third and final day of the Cruisin' venue throughout downtown. To see the full schedule, visit http://www.cruisinthecoast.com/Schedule.html.

Source http://www.wlox.com/story/15646183/thousands-pack-downtown-ocean-springs-for-cruisin

USTA invests $1.3 million in tennis program for youngsters

The United States Tennis Association has expanded its efforts to get more kids playing tennis.

Last week it announced a $1.3 million investment to help introduce 10 and Under Tennis in 26 communities across the country. Each community will receive $50,000 grants over a three-year-period to build new courts, adapt current ones and create programming in schools, parks and other areas.

The program, 10 and Under Tennis, provides young players a chance to play a scaled-down style of the game, and the USTA aims to bring it to more than 100 American markets during the next five years.

"Imagine if an 8-year-old tried to play baseball on the same sized field and with the same distance from the pitching mound to home plate as the New York Yankees play," said Kurt Kamperman, the USTA's chief executive of community tennis. "Unlike other sports, we've been forcing young kids to play by the same rules as the pro stars, and it really isn't conducive to getting them in the sport."That's where 10 and Under Tennis differs. It's played on a smaller court with lighter racquets and slower balls.

Earlier this month, the USTA announced it will offer free USTA junior memberships to children ages 10 and under. On Wednesday, it announced that Andre Agassi and Steffi Graf would partner with the USTA and will be featured in an upcoming advertising campaign promoting 10 and Under Tennis.

Kamperman said 10 and Under Tennis has already seen good results.

Said USTA Chairman of the Board and President Jon Vegosen: "The scaled-to-size equipment and smaller playing area allows kids to rally and play the kid early on increasing the likelihood that they'll have success and return to the court and continue to have fun."

Source http://www.usatoday.com/sports/tennis/2011-07-21-usta-10-and-under-tennis_n.htm

Sarah Palin's Bus Tour May Not Reach Iowa and South Carolina

When Sarah Palin said that her bus tour would not only hit New Hampshire, but Iowa and and South Carolina, too, it was taken as a sign that she was serious about a presidential campaig after all. But when she'll actually venture to those latter two states is uncertain, Real Clear Politics' Scott Conroy reports. The bus schedule was never formalized, but her aides indicated the Palins would hit those critical early voting states sometime in June. Instead, Conroy writes, the Palins are back in Alaska, enjoying the summer's 19 hours a day of sunlight.

Conroy elaborates:

As Palin enjoys her sojourn to the 49th state, she has not reconnected with key early-state figures like Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad and South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, and she may have jeopardized whatever political momentum she gained from her recent reemergence in the 2012 discussion. Her political action committee's website still greets visitors with a stale banner, announcing the nationwide bus tour beginning "[t]his Sunday, May 29th."

Last week, she shot down a report that she'd decide on a presidential campaign within a week. So right now, the only thing Palin's actually in the running for is an Emmy. TLC has submitted Sarah Palin's Alaska for consideration in four Emmy categories--cinematography, picture editing, music composition, and best reality program. As Christian Heinze notes, "If the show wins in any of those categories, Palin herself gets an Emmy, because she's listed as an executive producer of the show."

Source  http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2011/06/sarah-palins-bus-tour-may-not-reach-iowa-and-south-carolina/39116/

Need for protection of child rights stressed

Growing cases of violation of child rights should be a matter of grave concern for every responsible individual. Government, civil society and media should join hands for checking these violations.

These views were expressed by speakers at a seminar titled “Violation of Child Right-Media Responsibilities” organised by Hameed Nizami Press Institute of Pakistan (HNPIP) in collaboration with Sahil and Actionaid on Tuesday. The seminar was presided over by Justice (r) Nasira Javed Iqbal. MPA Arifa Khalid Pervez was the chief guest while Director HNPIP Absar Abdul Ali conducted the meeting.

The speakers stressed the need for improving child rights situation in the country.

The speakers included Taseer Mustafa (Journalist), Shoib Mirza (Editor Phool Magazine), Dawood Saqlain (Provincial Manager Actionaid), Iftikhar Mubarik.(Sahil Coordinator), Akmal Awaisi and Sajjad Cheema. While speaking on the occasion, Nasira Javed said the US, despite claiming so called champion of human rights, was still avoiding to sign the UN Child Rights Convention.

“The Convention on the Rights of the Child (an international treaty that recognises the human rights of children) is the most widely and rapidly ratified human rights treaty. Only two countries, Somalia and the United States, have not ratified this celebrated agreement”. She said the teachings of Islam are the best source of guidance for the solution of every problem.

She also highlighted the need for family planning, which in her view, had become a forgotten idea for Punjab government. However, she hoped for the good future regarding overall human right situation in Pakistan. “No need to worry as many individuals, NGOs has been working to improve child rights situation in the country”, she added.

HNPIP Director, earlier, told the participants of the event that over 1.2 million children have become street children in society, having no roof to sleep under and passing their life without any care. The speakers expressed their grave concern over increasing number of street children in Pakistan. The speakers said the cases of violation of children’s right were reported almost on daily basis.

“Trafficking, torture and abuse of children is rife in many parts of the country,” they observed. They regretted hundreds of thousands of children were engaged in forced child labor, while the number of street children was also on a constant rise. They stressed free education, healthcare and shelter to citizens including children was the responsibility of the state. The speakers appreciated the HNPIP for organising the seminar on important issue, saying, when the huge number of children were working in hazardous, it was need of the hour that the government, the civil society and the media work jointly for improving the child rights situation in the society.

Source http://nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Regional/Lahore/06-Apr-2011/Need-for-protection-of-child-rights-stressed/1

Supreme Court skeptical about Arizona’s campaign finance law

The Supreme Court majority that in recent years has struck down campaign spending restrictions as assaults on free speech seemed ready Monday to do the same with Arizona’s public financing plan.

Under Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. , the court’s conservative majority has declared unconstitutional major portions of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance act. And the court’s loosening of spending constraints on corporations and unions in last year’s Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission roiled the midterm elections.

“Do you think it would be a fair characterization of this law to say that its purpose and its effect are to produce less speech in political campaigns?” Justice Anthony M. Kennedy asked the lawyer for groups challenging Arizona’s Citizens Clean Elections Act.

“I believe that that is a goal, and I believe that’s the effect,” answered William R. Maurer, a lawyer for the Institute for Justice, which represented independent groups objecting to the law’s restrictions.

The case raises a new issue for the court. After a wave of political corruption in the state capital, Arizona voters in 1998 approved a public financing system for statewide and legislative candidates. It grants qualified candidates an initial sum and then provides “matching funds” based on the spending of their privately financed opponents who spend more. Candidates also are granted money if an independent group spends against them or for their opponents.

Maurer told the court that the case was governed by a 2008 Supreme Court decision, in which the court by a 5 to 4 vote struck down the “millionaire’s amendment” in the McCain-Feingold campaign finance act. That provision allowed a congressional candidate to raise money in excess of contribution limits if his or her opponent was spending large sums of personal wealth.

The Arizona law similarly burdens a privately funded candidate, Maurer said, because it turns “my act of speaking into the vehicle by which my political opponents benefit with direct government subsidies.”

Maurer received strong resistance from Justice Elena Kagan. She had argued the Citizens United case as President Obama’s solicitor general and was on the losing side of the court’s 5 to 4 decision.

Kagan challenged Maurer’s contention that the purpose of Arizona’s law was to level the electoral playing field — something the court has said is not sufficient for restricting political spending and speech — rather than to combat corruption.

“That’s what the purpose of all public financing systems are,” Kagan said. She added that for 40 years such systems “have been based upon the idea that when there is a lot of private money floating around the political system, that candidates and then public officeholders get beholden to various people who are giving that money and make actions based on how much they receive from those people.”

Kagan’s support of campaign finance restrictions seemed as strong as that of the justice she replaced, John Paul Stevens. But that does not change the balance on the court.

The justices who have voted to strike down spending restrictions sharply questioned Bradley S. Phillips, a Los Angeles lawyer representing Arizona, after his opening statement that the law results “in more speech and more electoral competition and directly furthers the government’s compelling interest in combating real and apparent corruption in politics.”

Roberts, who did not ask Maurer a question, seemed particularly concerned that the law seemed to discourage spending by independent expenditure groups. “If you knew that a $10,000 expenditure that you would make that would support a candidate would result in $30,000, $40,000, $50,000, depending on how many opposition candidates there were available for them, wouldn’t you think twice about it?” Roberts asked.

“I think thinking twice is not a severe burden,” Phillips responded.

“Well, if you’re thinking twice and one way you’re thinking is not to do it, that sounds like a sufficient burden,” Roberts replied.

Roberts and Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. also disputed the idea that the goal of the act was not to level the playing field. It even says so on the election commission’s Web site, Roberts said.

The Obama administration is supporting Arizona, and Assistant Solicitor General William M. Jay told Roberts that whatever is written on a Web site “isn’t dispositive of what the voters of Arizona had in mind when they passed this initiative.”

Jay also said that while publicly funded candidates are subjected to a ceiling on their spending, privately funded candidates and independent groups have no such limit.

The court in 1976 held that public financing of campaigns did not violate the Constitution, and Maurer said the challenge of the Arizona law went only to the matching funds portion. A handful of other states have similar laws.

A decision in the combined cases of Arizona Free Enterprise v. Bennett and McComish v. Bennett will come sometime before the court adjourns at the end of June.

Source http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/supreme_court_skeptical_about_arizonas_campaign_finance_law/2011/03/28/AF2xXIrB_story.html?wprss=rss_homepage

State HFAs Urge Congress To Protect and Support Vital Federal Housing Programs, Launch Faces of Home Campaig

Life -changing stories of working families benefiting from a range of federal housing programs will be at the forefront of this week’s annual Legislative Conference of the National Council of State Housing Agencies (NCSHA).

The Faces of Home campaign illustrates the “life-changing impact HFA programs have across the spectrum of housing need, from making first-time homeownership possible for working families, to developing affordable rental housing in partnership with the private sector, to providing safety net rental assistance for the most vulnerable among us,” said Barbara Thompson, executive director of NCSHA.

“These success stories, along with the hard facts on the country’s scarce supply of affordable housing, are what HFAs will carry with them as they petition Congress this week to support and protect the vital federal housing programs HFAs administer.”

Consider the situation of 71-year-old Jennie, who lost her home to foreclosure after her husband of 38 years passed away and she couldn’t afford the payments on her own. “I didn’t want to leave, but I didn’t have a choice,” she said. “I didn’t know what would happen to me. I was afraid I would end up homeless.” But Jennie was one of the lucky ones. Her children helped her find an affordable apartment at Bethel Ridge Estates, a development for seniors that was financed with Low Income Housing Tax Credits issued by the Missouri Housing Development Commission.

In the desert Southwest, Marjorie Delgarito and her family were living in a small trailer with no running water or electricity on the Navajo Nation when she heard about a new apartment complex being built nearby. “We [used to have] five five-gallon jugs of water we hauled into the house for washing and bathing,” Marjorie said. “We gathered and chopped wood for heat. The kids had to hurry and finish their homework outside before dark.” The family now lives in the Chaco River Apartments, one of the first rental housing developments ever to be built on the Navajo Nation. The New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority financed the development in part with HOME funds. “The kids…are all on the honor roll now,” Marjorie said. “We are very happy.”

In Florida, Tamela Nelloms, a working mother of three who grew up in public housing as one of nine siblings, never thought her homeownership dreams would come true. She didn’t know anyone who had ever bought a home and had no idea how the process worked. Now, thanks to the Florida Housing Finance Corporation and its federal housing bond-supported low-cost mortgage program, Tamela is a proud first-time homebuyer with a monthly payment well within her economic means. “I wanted my kids to have what I didn’t,” Tamela said. “My boys will grow up knowing that anything in life is possible. This home has changed all of our lives.” (These and other stories of transformation are available on NCSHA’s official Faces of Home website at www.ncsha.org/faces-of-home.)

Thompson stressed that future funding levels and tax incentives for a wide range of housing programs could all be in jeopardy as Congress debates cuts in the current federal budget and considers tax reform, the future of the housing finance system, and long-term deficit reduction strategies.

“Housing Bonds, Low Income Housing Tax Credits, HOME, and Section 8 are time-tested programs that effectively provide affordable housing around the country,” said Thompson. “HFAs have successfully administered these programs for decades, and nothing demonstrates the importance of that work like the powerful stories of transformation and hope chronicled in the Faces of Home campaign.”

The Faces of Home web exhibit features stories of people from every state who have received housing help from their HFA. Stories are searchable by state or by program, and offer a glimpse into the larger story of the integral role HFAs play in affordable housing, and why that role matters so very much—to the people whose lives are changed, the communities they live in, and to the economy.

HFAs are state-chartered housing agencies that operate in every state, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. Though they vary widely in their characteristics, including their relationship to state government, HFAs have in common their public purpose mission to provide affordable housing to the people of their states who need it.

NCSHA is a national, nonprofit organization created by state HFAs to assist them in increasing housing opportunities for lower income and underserved people through the financing, development, and preservation of affordable housing.

About 200 HFA leaders are expected to meet with members of Congress during NCSHA’s three-day Legislative Conference.

Source http://www.realestaterama.com/2011/03/07/state-hfas-urge-congress-to-protect-and-support-vital-federal-housing-programs-launch-faces-of-home-campaig-ID08747.html

Meanings of flowers

Q Every year for Valentine's Day I gave my sweetheart red roses. However this year I would like to give her some different kind of flowers.

Could you give me some ideas on different flowers. Also would you be able to tell me the meaning of these flowers? -Jessie, Windsor

A Roses are traditional, but other flowers are becoming increasingly popular as Valentine's Day gifts for that special person in your life. For years I gave my sweetheart red roses also.

Then a couple years ago I switched for a different flower.

My choice for my wife, was a dozen long stem red carnations which symbolizes love, pride and admiration. A few years ago my wife gave me a card for Valentine's Day and that card had the meanings of many different flowers. Some examples are:

Roses: The love language of different coloured roses have many meanings.

Red roses say, quite simply, "I love you" and are the traditional roses for Valentine's Day because they represent beauty and perfection. Orange roses might make the boldest statement on Valentine's Day. They represent desire and enthusiasm, symbolize passion and anticipation and definitely articulate pensioned romance. If you are newlyweds, give your husband or wife white roses. They mean innocence and purity and are traditionally associated with marriages and new beginnings.

Carnation: Symbolizes pride and beauty. A red carnation symbolizes love, pride and admiration; a pink carnation symbolizes the love of a woman or a mother.

A purple carnation symbolizes capriciousness. A yellow carnation symbolizes disdain, rejection or disappointment while a white carnation symbolizes innocence and pure love. A striped carnation conveys refusal.

Alstroemeria: Wealth, prosperity, fortune and friendship.

Amaryllis: Splendid beauty. It is used to indicate worth beyond beauty.

Anemone: On a darker note indicates fading hope and a feeling of having been forsaken. On a positive note it symbolizes anticipation.

Anthurium: Hospitality, happiness and abundance.

Aster: Patience, elegance and daintiness.

Bird of Paradise: Joyfulness, magnificence, and wonderful anticipation.

Calla Lily: Symbolizes magnificence and beauty. White Calla lilies combine these two attributes with purity and innocence.

Chrysanthemum: Symbolizes fidelity, optimism, joy and long life. A red chrysanthemum conveys love; a white chrysanthemum symbolizes truth and loyal love while a yellow chrysanthemum symbolizes slighted love.

Daffodil: Symbolizes regard and chivalry. It is indicative of rebirth, new beginnings and eternal life. It also symbolizes unrequited love. A single daffodil foretells a misfortune while a bunch of daffodils indicate joy and happiness.

Daisy: Symbolizes innocence and purity. It conveys loyal love and "I will never tell."

Delphinium: Symbolizes big-heartedness, fun, lightness and levity. It also indicates ardent attachment.

Forget-me-not: Which blooms in white, blue and lavender, means true love, hope, and of course, remembrance or memories, which may reflect on wonderful times together.

Freesia: Symbolizes innocence and thoughtfulness.

Gardenia: Symbolizes you're lovely, secret love, joy, sweet love, good luck.

Gerbera: Belongs to the daisy family and therefore assumes the symbolism associated with the daisy flower. Gerbera specifically conveys cheerfulness.

Gladiolus: Symbolizes strength of character, faithfulness and honour. The Gladiolus flower signifies remembrance.

Heather: While white heather symbolizes protection and indicates that wishes will come true.

Hyacinth: Playfulness and a sporty attitude and in its extreme rashness and constancy. Blue hyacinth stands for constancy, purple for sorrow, red or pink for play, white for loveliness and yellow for jealousy.

Hydrangea: Heartfelt emotions. It can be used to express gratitude for being understood. In its negative sense hydrangea symbolizes frigidity and heartlessness.

Iris: Symbolizes eloquence. Purple iris is symbolic of wisdom and compliments. Blue iris symbolizes faith and hope.

Yellow iris symbolizes passion while white iris symbolizes purity.

Jasmine: White symbolizes amiability, while yellow symbolizes grace, elegance

Larkspur: Symbolizes levity or lightness. It is also indicative of fickleness and haughtiness.

Flowers are looked upon as a very personal, intimate or cherished gift, so it matters not which flowers you may choose, to give on Valentine's Day.

Also as long that you remember your sweetheart for any or all occasion or just when your thinking of your loved one, flowers are very nice to receive or to give.

Send a question to the Master Gardener hotline, (519) 561-6328 or email essexwindsor@mastergardeners. fastmail.fm

Source http://www.windsorstar.com/life/Meanings+flowers/4230029/story.html