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In This Week’s Issue
Cool Links, Inspiration, Information, The Healing Power of Laughter, and these articles:
· News-Personal Interest: Daily Life
· News in Pictures: In flight
· Politics: Government Subsidized
· Politics: Obama Underwrites Offshore Drilling
· Politics: Down With the Presidency
· Investing: Taxes and Price Inflation Can Eat Your Investment Income
· Education & Back to School: 50 College Tips For Freshmen
· Education & Back to School: Save Money On Back To School Textbook Shopping
· Global Warming Scam: “It’s The Sun!” – ‘Many Hurricanes’ In Modern Times
· Business: We Perform Best When No One Tells Us What To Do
· Personal Finance – Income Tax | CRA: Montreal Stripper Keeps $2 Million in Untaxed Gifts
· Personal Finance: Average Rich or Median Poor?
· Travel: Bora Bora Pictures
· Health: Glamour Magazine Features a Picture of a “Normal” Woman
· Health: Beer A Health Booster?
· FREEDOM: The Philosophy of Liberty
· Computers: Steve Jobs Is Laser Focused on the Apple Tablet
· Computers: Movement
· Computers: Seven Crimes That Will Get You a Smaller Fine than File-Sharing
Books & Recordings available at davidvoth.com
§ FREEDOM BLUEPRINT: The Ultimate Plan For Escaping Big Brother’s Matrix And Creating Your Own World of Freedom & Wealth
§ The 10 Secrets Revenue Canada Doesn’t Want You To Know! One of the best selling business books of all time
§ INVEST OFFSHORE for Privacy, Protection & Profit!
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
“A short saying oft contains much wisdom.” ~Sophocles (496 BC - 406 BC)
“The formula is simple, and it’s reduced to four words every kid in the world knows: Tell me a story. It’s that easy.”
—Donald Shepard Hewitt (1922-2009) American television news producer and executive, best known for creating 60 Minutes. Author of Tell Me a Story: Fifty Years and 60 Minutes in Television
“Always look at what you have left. Never look at what you have lost.”
—Robert Schuller
“Truth never damages a cause that is just.”
—Gandhi
“All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.”
—Arthur Schopenhauer
INSPIRATION
212° The Extra Degree™
§ At 211 degrees, water is hot.
§ At 212 degrees, it boils.
§ And with boiling water, comes steam.
§ And with steam, you can power a train.
One degree. Applying one extra degree of temperature to water means the difference between something that is simply very hot and something that generates enough force to power a machine - a beautifully uncomplicated metaphor that ideally should feed our every endeavor - consistently pushing us to make the extra effort in every task, action and effort we undertake. Two-twelve serves as a forceful drill sergeant with its motivating and focused message while adhering to a scientific law - a natural law. It reminds us that seemingly small things can make tremendous differences.
One degree more = Exponential results
Watch the movie NOW or click on the link and bookmark it for later viewing:
http://tinyurl.com/7a7k8k
THE HEALING POWER OF LAUGHTER
We don’t stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing!
What Have We Done? - Black Woman Doesn’t Like Obama No-More
Excellent satire from a black woman having regrets that she pulled the lever for Obama
YouTube Video (1:26)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9SPdh4Nzy4
Extreme Pool Jump
YouTube Video (0:44)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LmMTCUWK8U
Time it takes your pet to care that you’ve fallen over and can’t get up
http://graphjam.com/2009/08/20/song-chart-memes-pet-care/
The Post Office
There was a man who worked for the Post Office whose job was to process all the mail that had illegible addresses. One day, a letter came addressed in a shaky handwriting to God with no actual address. He thought he should open it to see what it was about.
The letter read:
Dear God,
I am an 83-year-old widow, living on a very small pension. Yesterday someone stole my purse. It had $100 in it, which was all the money I had until my next pension payment. Next Sunday is Christmas, and I had invited two of my friends over for dinner. Without that money, I have nothing to buy food with, have no family to turn to, and you are my only hope. Can you please help me?
Sincerely,
Edna
The postal worker was touched. He showed the letter to all the other workers. Each one dug into his or her wallet and came up with a few dollars. By the time he made the rounds, he had collected $96, which they put into an envelope and sent to the woman. The rest of the day, all the workers felt a warm glow thinking of Edna and the dinner she would be able to share with her friends.
Christmas came and went. A few days later, another letter came from the same old lady to God. All the workers gathered around while the letter was opened.
It read:
Dear God,
How can I ever thank you enough for what you did for me? Because of your gift of love, I was able to fix a glorious dinner for my friends. We had a very nice day and I told my friends of your wonderful gift. By the way, there was $4 missing. I think it might have been those bastards at the post office.
Sincerely,
Edna
NEWS – PERSONAL INTEREST
Daily Life – August 24, 2009
Here’s a look at daily life in a variety of locations around the world through the lenses of Associated Press and Getty Images photographers.
(20 images)
NEWS IN PICTURES
In flight – August 24, 2009
Just over 100 years since the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight, flying machines are now commonplace, used for transport, freight, warfare, rescue and pleasure just for starters. Aerospace technology is still the realm of both big business and entrepreneurs - Moscow recently hosted an airshow in which contracts totaling $10 billion were signed, and Virgin Galactic is still working toward a private spaceliner business. Collected here are recent photographs of various flying machines in action or on display around the world.
(40 photos total)
POLITICS
Government Subsidized
By David M. Voth | August 25, 2009
Time and time again we see news articles of the government subsidizing or “funding” projects. The stupidity of this is so obvious for a free minded individual. Consider a few things. First, there is no such thing as government money. The money that government uses (wastes) is money forcefully expropriated from the people. Government does not create or produce anything; therefore, it does not make any of its own money, save the printing of it. All government money is forcibly obtained from people.
Second, one needs to ask why is the government subsidizing the project in the first place. If it were a viable project the free market would “fund” it. Therefore, we must always ask, when we see one of these stories, what’s wrong with the project? How come it needs some of “our” money to continue?
I read a news article recently that brought me to write this article. The title of the article was: Natural Resources Canada: Government of Canada Invests in Manitoba Biofuels. Read carefully: “Government of Canada Invests.” There’s misinformation right in the title. As I wrote, the government has no money of its own, so it can’t “invest.” Wouldn’t it be illegal for you to steal money from your neighbor to “invest” in a project? How then can it be different for government?
Just because something is the established norm doesn’t make it right. “When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.” –Frederic Bastiat
I read more of the news article because I was curious. The first sentence of the news article says, “Husky Energy’s Minnedosa plant will receive up to $72.8 million to support the production of ethanol, thanks to an investment by the Government of Canada.” The truth is that it’s an “investment” they will likely never see a return on. I’m sure they don’t even expect to see a return. Therefore, it’s not really an investment. Every time you invest your money you expect a reasonable return on your investment, don’t you? Let’s be honest here. This is just another government give away of your money. It’s time to stand up to these idiots and demand fiscal responsibility.
Let’s consider the viability of this so-called investment. Although biofuels have become politically correct, they are not the right way to reduce carbon emissions and/or oil consumption, provided that these objectives are necessary anyway. When farmers grow crops for fuel it increases our cost of food and these biofuels represent such a small percentage of our total fuel supply anyway. A report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), says that biofuels will only account for 13 percent of liquid fuels by 2050.
But here’s the really big kicker, while our dishonest politicians extol the virtues of ethanol they fail to tell you the truth about why it needs to be subsidized. The government forces oil companies to use ethanol in our fuel and then they subsidize it, why? The number one reason is that using ethanol is not cost effective. It takes about as much energy to produce ethanol as is generated when it is burned.
It takes a lot of gasoline, diesel, and natural gas to run the tractors, farm implements, grain dryers, trucks, and processing plants. Furthermore, ethanol can’t be moved in pipelines, because it deteriorates. Therefore, it must be trucked, again costing more in fuel and pollution. The true fact is that the net energy production from corn is basically ZERO!
And now the incompetent Canadian government throws away another $72.8 million dollars of your money on another bad project that could not survive without political help. First they steal your money (taxation) then they “fund” a looser project. Don’t celebrate this, but instead challenge it for the stupidity that is.
I believe that there is no rational alternative to free markets, limited government, and individual liberty. “The common man is the sovereign consumer whose buying or abstention from buying ultimately determines what should be produced and in what quantity and quality.” –Ludwig von Mises
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Obama Underwrites Offshore Drilling
Too bad it’s not in U.S. waters.
You read that headline correctly. Unfortunately, the Obama Administration is financing oil exploration off Brazil.
The U.S. is going to lend billions of dollars to Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance exploration of the huge offshore discovery in Brazil's Tupi oil field in the Santos Basin near Rio de Janeiro. Brazil's planning minister confirmed that White House National Security Adviser James Jones met this month with Brazilian officials to talk about the loan.
Read the Article
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Down With the Presidency
By Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
The following is the opening remarks of Lew Rockwell’s speech delivered at a meeting of the John Randolph Club in Arlington, Virginia, on October 6, 1996.
The modern institution of the presidency is the primary political evil Americans face, and the cause of nearly all our woes. It squanders the national wealth and starts unjust wars against foreign peoples that have never done us any harm. It wrecks our families, tramples on our rights, invades our communities, and spies on our bank accounts. It skews the culture toward decadence and trash. It tells lie after lie. Teachers used to tell school kids that anyone can be president. This is like saying anyone can go to Hell. It’s not an inspiration; it’s a threat.
The presidency–by which I mean the executive State–is the sum total of American tyranny. The other branches of government, including the presidentially appointed Supreme Court, are mere adjuncts. The presidency insists on complete devotion and humble submission to its dictates, even while it steals the products of our labor and drives us into economic ruin. It centralizes all power unto itself, and crowds out all competing centers of power in society, including the church, the family, business, charity, and the community. I’ll go further. The US presidency is the world’s leading evil.
READ THE WHOLE SPEECH
INVESTING
Taxes and Price Inflation Can Eat Your Investment Income
Written by Keming Liang, American Institute for Economic Research | August 26, 2009
Price inflation plays a major role when it comes to the value of money, particularly in the long term. In fact, according to AIER’s most recent CPI (Consumer Price Index) update, it now takes about $1.30 to buy what $1 bought 10 years ago.
When it comes to investments, however, taxes also play a powerful role in eroding returns.
The first chart shows the impact of price inflation and taxes on the yields of 10-year Treasury securities since the 1950s. Ten-year Treasuries’ nominal (or apparent) yields escalated through the 1970s and peaked in 1981. They have decreased since then to 4 or 5 percent for most of this decade.
Read the full article
EDUCATION & BACK TO SCHOOL
50 College Tips For Freshmen
From xatal.com | August 24th, 2009
A few of my friends are nervous about starting school this upcoming year, and they asked me if I had any tips. After taking some time to think through my freshman year carefully, I came up with these 50 suggestions to help you make the most of college, both socially and academically:
Here’s the first three:
1. Keep an open mind to different lifestyles and viewpoints. People in college come from all different walks of life, don’t rule them out just because their hobbies and views are different than yours. Make friends of all different types.
2. Live the way you want to. If you want to have Nerf gunfights in your dorm hallway, then do it! You live away from home now, and it’s up to you to dictate how you want to live. Go to bed when you want to. Get up at a time that works best. This extends to everything — including your academics.
3. Take a few chances. College is the time to branch out and discover yourself. Take a few risks, do things that you normally wouldn’t, and watch as you have the time of your life.
Get all 50 tips
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Save Money On Back To School Textbook Shopping
BY Jennifer Wagner, NY Parenting Teens Examiner | August 25, 2009
If you have teens in college then you know how expensive it can be to buy all the books they need for just one semester. Does your son or daughter just head straight to the campus bookstore and buy everything there? There is a much better way.
There are textbook comparison websites that are extremely simple to use. They compare the price of any textbook at many online book sales websites. Here are 3 that will help you save money:
1. AddALL
2. BigWords
3. TextBook Hunting
On all of the sites, all you have to do is type in the name or ISBN number of the book into the search bar in the middle of the page. If there is more than one book with the same name, they will all be listed with all relevant details so that you can select the correct book.
After you choose the correct book, the tools will list all sellers, from lowest price to highest, with the condition of the book, availability, shipping price and total price including shipping. There is also a "buy it now" link to each seller to make things quick and easy for you. The main difference in the websites is how many sellers that they search.
Source
GLOBAL WARMING SCAM
“It’s The Sun!” – ‘Many Hurricanes’ In Modern Times
“Latest BBC /Nature report is more BBC Global Warming hype and cover-up”
says astrophysicist Piers Corbyn from WeatherAction.Com | Monday, August 17th 2009
“There is no evidence that CO2 has any influence on hurricane activity. Tropical storm formation and development around the world is now regularly forecast in detail using solar activity”–Piers Corbyn WeatherAction.com
In response to the BBC/Nature report (‘Many hurricanes’ in modern times by Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News) 16th August, Piers Corbyn, astrophysicist of WeatherAction.com long range weather & climate forecasters said “These reported researches which may show high levels of hurricane activity in the USA in the early Medieval warm period 1,000 years ago are reported in an ideologically loaded manner by the BBC to promote Global Warming hype. They add speculation that assumed projected ocean warming supposedly to be caused by man’s CO2 could drive more dangerous storm formation in future.
Read the Article
BUSINESS
We Perform Best When No One Tells Us What To Do
By Andrea Kuszewski, scientificblogging.com | August 24th 2009
How can companies get the best possible performance out of their employees? Let them do whatever they want! And furthermore, don’t offer incentives. Sound counter-intuitive? Not if you look at what research has shown regarding the economics of motivation.
According to Dan Pink (lawyer, speech writer, author, and career analyst), the way to get the best original ideas out of people is to cut back on restrictions and rules regarding output, and stop offering incentives for work produced. This may sound a little backwards, but science has shown that sometimes when we offer rewards for output or production, it effects the quality of the ideas or work as opposed to offering no incentive.
In his TED Global 2009 talk last month, Pink says…
PERSONAL FINANCE – INCOME TAX | CRA
I love reading news stories of the Canada Revenue Agency losing its case. This one came out just after I published last week’s edition of the Voth Report:
Montreal Stripper Keeps $2 Million in Untaxed Gifts
CBC News | Thursday, August 20, 2009
A former Montreal stripper has won her case against the Canada Revenue Agency, convincing a Tax Court that nearly $2 million from a client was a gift and so couldn't be taxed.
With Thursday's decision, Martine Landry won the first round of her battle to keep all of the $1.3 million in cash, two cars, a bar, a home, furs and jewels — a total value of $2 million — she received from a businessman she knew for 11 years.
READ MORE
Related story from The Canadian Press:
Federal Taxman Gets Caught With Pants Down In Battle Against Montreal Stripper
(CP) – Thursday, August 20, 2009
MONTREAL — In its legal showdown against a tax-wary stripper, it's the Canada Revenue Agency that's been caught with its pants down.
The legal saga over $2 million in undeclared revenue began at Chez Paree - a pricey Montreal strip club patronized over the years by scores of wealthy executives and visiting athletes, including some very prominent hockey Hall of Famers.
READ MORE
PERSONAL FINANCE
Average Rich or Median Poor?
Thomas J. Stanley Ph.D. | August 25th, 2009
Most people today in America are not wealthy, far from it. However, don't be confused when you learn that the average net worth of an American household is $434,782. You may be thinking that even if an average American worker loses his job he will be able to live off of his wealth for five maybe even 10 years. However, there is a major problem with this wealth figure. When it comes to expressing the net worth/wealth of a household the average figure is very misleading. The presence of high net worth households, billionaires like Buffet and Gates, for example, highly skews the distribution and thus the average in an upward direction.
The median measure of household net worth paints a much more accurate picture of the character of wealth in America than does the average. The median is that of the typical household, the mid point range of all of the more than 115,000,000 households ranked from bottom to top along the net worth scale.
In 2000, the ratio of the average net worth of an American household to the median figure was 3.3 to 1. Today, the ratio is about 5 to 1. This means that in terms of the distribution of wealth, the wealthier are getting wealthier. But it also means that most Americans live way beyond their means. Today the median net worth of an American household is $91,304. It now costs more than this amount for a one year stay, drugs excluded, in a high-grade nursing home. Therefore, less than one half of the households in this country do not have enough to pay for such a service even if they sold everything they owned and worked for.
The $91,304 net worth figure also is indicative of something else. The typical American worker who becomes unemployed today has only about two years of wealth to live on before he hits economic ground zero.
READ MORE
TRAVEL | PHOTOGRAPHY
Need a break? How about Bora Bora?
Bora Bora Pictures
By pirate, opentravel.com | August 25th 2009
That's what you call the sunny side of life. Bora Bora combines the sheer elegance of French Polynesia with the laid-back atmosphere of a Pacific island to produce a whole one can call nothing but stunning.
With emerald waters gently lapping the sparkling shores, dazzling coral within sight, breakfasts served to your over-the-water bungalow, and a hammock stretched everywhere you look, this speck of pristine land has everything to whiz you into paradise on Earth. No words can give it justice, so just feed your eyes with beauty in its purest form.
Take a 14-picture vacation right now
HEALTH
Glamour Magazine Features a Picture of a “Normal” Woman
A photo used for an article on self-confidence in September's issue of Glamour magazine has caused a buzz in the modeling world. The photo depicts Lizzi Miller: a 20-year-old, 180-pound, 5-foot-11 woman whose size 12-to-14 body matches that of the average American female. After she was captured smiling and showing a bit of a tummy, the Glamour website was immediately overrun with positive comments, inspiring editor-in-chief Cindi Leive to reconsider the models shown in the magazine’s pages.
Read Leive’s blog post on the photo and the model
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Beer A Health Booster?
Appears to Benefit Heart, Bones, Research Shows
From cbsnews.com | July 31, 2009
Downing a beer or two may actually help you stay healthy!
Research has linked moderate beer consumption to healthier hearts and bones. CBS News Medical Correspondent Dr. Jennifer Ashton pointed out on "The Early Show" Friday.
The American Heart Association considers 12 ounces one drink of beer, and a drink or two a day moderate intake for men and a drink a day morderate for women.
The AHA also cautions people NOT to start drinking alcoholic beverages if they don't already, and urges them to consult their doctors on the subject.
Read more about the benefits on blood pressure, artery disease, and bones
FREEDOM MESSAGE:
“Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people.”
—John Adams (1735-1826) U.S. Founding Father, 2nd US President
Life is a gift; Freedom is a responsibility!
The Philosophy of Liberty
By David M. Voth
You’ve heard me talk about freedom and read my writings on Freedom and Liberty. Some people still don’t get it. What are we all going on about? Well, at the end of my brief introduction you’ll find a link. Please watch this short (8 minute) animated video and it will give you the philosophy of liberty in a nutshell.
First, the difference between liberty and tyranny…
“Every variety of tyranny rests upon the belief that some persons have a right—or even a duty—to impose their wills upon other people. Tyranny may be fastened upon others by the mere whim of one man, such as a king or dictator under various names. Or tyranny may be imposed upon a minority “for their own good” by a democratically elected majority. But in any case, tyranny is always a denial—or a misunderstanding—of the mandates of an authority or law higher than man himself.” –Rev. Edmund A. Opitz
In contrast to tyranny, the philosophy of liberty is based on self-ownership.
“The basic axiom of libertarian political theory holds that every man is a self-owner, having absolute jurisdiction over his own body. In effect, this means that no one else may justly invade, or aggress against, another’s person. It follows then that each person justly owns whatever previously unowned resources he appropriates or ‘mixes his labor with’. From these twin axioms– self-ownership and ‘homesteading’–stem the justification for the entire system of property rights titles in a free market society.” –Murray N. Rothbard, “Law, Property Rights, and Air Pollution,” Cato Journal, Vol. 2 (1982): 60-61.
If you’ve never heard of or been introduced to the concept of self-ownership, it can be hard to understand—even though the concept is quite simple. By conditioning many people erroneously believe we have a master. The first thing everyone must do to be free is to truly understand the philosophy of liberty. To become fully conscious.
“Liberty is not a goal; it is a way of life. Liberty is not a battle that requires the conversion of others in order to win. Liberty is won when you accept the idea that you are the sole mater of your life, when your life is subordinate to none, and no other life is subordinate to yours. When you accept that idea, you are liberated. There will always be those who will claim to be your master but you will know otherwise.” –Louis E. Carabini
The link below will take you to a simple but elegant and hard-hitting animation that will explain exactly what the philosophy of liberty and self-ownership is all about. It’s a great tool anyone can use to educate children and adults about our right to life, liberty, and the property we create – and our responsibility to think, speak and act.
I encourage everyone to watch this short video and recommend it to everyone who wants to understand the philosophy of true personal liberty. Remember: “None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.”
–Johann W. Goethe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muHg86Mys7I
For more info and/or to download a free DVD version of this video, see:
http://www.philosophyofliberty.blogspot.com/
“To be governed is to be watched, inspected, directed, indoctrinated, numbered, estimated, regulated, commanded, controlled, law-driven, preached at, spied upon, censored, checked, valued, enrolled, by creatures who have neither the right, nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so.”
–Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
BOOKS
FREEDOM BLUEPRINT
The Ultimate Plan For Escaping Big Brother’s Matrix And Creating Your Own World of Freedom & Wealth
Have you ever wished there was a detailed course of action that would enable you to achieve more personal and financial freedom and to live the sort of life you’ve always dreamed of? David MacGregor shares his story and strategy is his E-Book Freedom Blueprint.
Learn all about it and get a copy of David MacGregor’s Freedom Blueprint now:
VALUABLE INFORMATION
“Know where to find the information and how to use it – that is the secret of success.”
--Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German physicist and Winner of the Nobel Prize for physics in 1921
COMPUTERS AND INTERNET
Steve Jobs Is Laser Focused on the Apple Tablet
By Adam Ostrow, mashable.com | August 24th, 2009
We know Steve Jobs is back working as Apple’s CEO. We also are fairly confident that the company plans to launch an Apple Tablet device soon, although likely not at an upcoming event in early September. And now, we have one of the more concrete reports to-date about the importance of the device to Apple.
According to The Wall Street Journal, “since his return in late June, [Jobs] has been pouring almost all of his attention into a new touch-screen gadget that Apple is developing.” That in and of itself isn’t surprising – a Tablet would represent a huge new product launch for Apple, which means Jobs would be intimately involved, per usual.
Mashable Article
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Movement
Arranging your iPhone apps shouldn't take all day
http://www.movementapp.com/
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Seven Crimes That Will Get You a Smaller Fine than File-Sharing
by Andrew Winistorfer, prefixmag.com | August 21, 2009
Thinking about file-sharing? Don't. You'll get fined, and crime doesn't pay. Take it from Jammie Thomas, who was fined $2 million for downloading 24 songs.
Read the article
TOYS, GEAR & STUFF:
Some of the Craziest Homes in the World
Who has not wanted a one-of-a-kind home to call their own? Some people, however, take this desire to extremes most of us would never go to - even if we could afford it. From houses shaped like shells and flying saucers to structures made entirely of steel or lofted up into the trees, here are eight of the most unique, unusual and amazing homes on the planet.
8 Offbeat One-of-a-Kind Houses
COOL LINKS:
How Many People Are In Space Right Now?
http://www.howmanypeopleareinspacerightnow.com/
Wedding Proposal with Toronto Magician Dan Trommater
Toronto magician Dan Trommater helps Arvin propose to Cindy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXtWN69Af-s
Have a great week.
Sincerely,
David M. Voth
Best Selling Author
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