Go tell it on the Mountain-Bob Marley and the Wailers
Kwanzaa
Kwanzaa is a unique African American celebration with focus on the traditional African values of family, community responsibility, commerce, and self-improvement. Kwanzaa is neither political nor religious and despite some misconceptions, is not a substitute for Christmas. It is simply a time of reaffirming African-American people, their ancestors and culture. Kwanzaa, which means "first fruits of the harvest" in the African language Kiswahili, has gained tremendous acceptance. Since its founding in 1966 by Dr. Maulana Karenga, Kwanzaa has come to be observed by more than 18 million people worldwide, as reported by the New York Times.
Kwanzaa is based on the Nguzo Saba (seven guiding principles), one for each day of the observance, and is celebrated from December 26th to January 1st.
The seven principles of Kwanzaa are:
- Umoja (Unity)
- Kujichagulia (Self-Determination)
- Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility)
- Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics)
- Nia (Purpose)
- Kuumba (Creativity)
- Imani (Faith)
Dancers from Wesley Praise Dancers celebrate the second day of Kwanzaa, Kujichagulia, representing self-determination. (Baltimore Sun photo by Chiaki Kawajiri / December 27, 2008)
Members of the Imani Edu-Tainers African Dance Company perform at a Kwanzaa celebration in the Capitol East Wing Rotunda, Harrisburg,Pa. 12-29-08
Joyous Celebration - I Love The Lord (Live In Cape Town)
When we change our self,
Then We can change our community,
Then We can change our city or town,
Then We can change our state,
Then We can change our country,
This will bring change to our world!!!
We Are The Ones to make this change happen..........
______________________
Love is the answer, A active love that makes us stand for justice, push for truth and shows Gods Power through the Love he gave us to share in this World.
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Jackson 5 - Give Love on Christmas Day
Give Love on Christmas Day People making lists, buying special gifts, Taking time to be kind to one and all. It's that time of year when good friends are near, And you wish you could give ...
Mista Vybe Little Drummer Boy (A Caribbean Soul Christmas)
Ambassador ft. S.O.U.L.~Came Down
Ron's American World
http://camron46.blogspot.com/
On September 3, 2009, Lionsgate announced it had acquired the distribution rights to Tyler Perry's 34th Street Films adaptation of the play, with principal photography originally scheduled to take place in Atlanta, Georgia in November and December 2009. The film, which was retitled "For Colored Girls", will be released on November 5, 2010 and was written, directed and produced by Perry. The cast includes Loretta Devine, Kimberly Elise, Whoopi Goldberg, Janet Jackson, Phylicia Rashad, Anika Noni Rose, Jill Scott, Jurnee Smollett, Kerry Washington, Tessa Thompson, Michael Ealy, Macy Gray and Omari Hardwick and Thandie Newton.
Perry's decision to make the book into a film was not met without controversy, with some, such as Oprah Winfrey, having expressed doubts over whether the book should be made into a film at all. Others had reservations based on Perry's position at the helm of such an important book in African American literature, particularly considering the controversies raised by Precious, a film he lent his name to.
For Colored Girls - Official Trailer [HD]
For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf is a 1975 play by Ntozake Shange. Initially staged in California, it has been performed Off-Broadway and on Broadway, and adapted as a book, a television film, and a theatrical film. The 1977 Broadway production was nominated for a Tony Award for best play.
Structurally, For Colored Girls is a series of 20 poems, collectively called a "choreopoem." It is performed by a cast of seven women characters, each of whom is known only by a color: "Lady in Yellow," "Lady in Purple," etc. The poems deal with love, abandonment, rape, and abortion, embodied by each woman's story, i.e. Lady in Blue's visceral account of a woman who chooses to have an abortion, and Lady in Red's tale of domestic violence. The end of the play brings together all of the women for "a laying on of hands," in which Shange evokes the power of womanhood as the Lady in Red begins the mantra "I found God in myself/and I loved her/I loved her fiercely.
First performed at the Bacchanal, a woman's bar outside of Berkeley, California, it was first produced in New York City at Studio Riobea in 1975; produced Off-Broadway at the Anspacher Public Theatre in 1976; and produced on Broadway at the Booth Theatre that same year.
According to Hilton Als in The New Yorker's "Critic's Notebook" of March 5, 2007, "...all sorts of people who might never have set foot in a Broadway house — black nationalists, feminist separatists — came to experience Shange's firebomb of a poem. ...The disenfranchised heard a voice they could recognize, one that combined the trickster spirit of Richard Pryor with a kind of mournful blues."
The play was published as a book in 1977 by Macmillan Publishing, followed by a Literary Guild edition in October 1977 and Bantam Books editions beginning in 1980. Segments from the play were performed in-studio on WGBH-TV's Say Brother (now known as Basic Black) television series in December of 1977, with actresses Paula Larke and Barbara Alston . A heavily edited version of the play was made into an American Playhouse TV movie in 1982 featuring Shange, actresses Laurie Carlos and Tony Award winner Trazana Beverley from the stage production, dancer Sarita Allen, and with early performances by Alfre Woodard and Lynn Whitfield.
Ntozake Shange was born Paulette Williams in Trenton, New Jersey on October 18, 1948. In 1971 she changed her name to Ntozake Shange which means "she who comes with her own things" and "she who walks like a lion" in Xhosa, the Zulu language. Her father was an Air Force surgeon and her mother was an educator and a psychiatric social worker. The Williams were upper middle class African Americans whose love of the arts contributed to an intellectually stimulating childhood for Shange and her three siblings. Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Chuck Berry, and W. E. B. Du Bois were among the frequent guests at her parents' house.
In 1966 Shange enrolled at Barnard College and separated from her husband, a law student. She attempted suicide several times. Nonetheless, she graduated cum laude in American Studies in 1970 and entered the University of Southern California at Los Angeles, where she earned a master's degree in American Studies in 1973.
While living in California and teaching humanities and women's studies courses at Mills College in Oakland, the University of California Extension, and Sonoma State College, Shange began to associate with poets, teachers, performers, and black and white feminist writers who nurtured her talents. Shange and her friends began to perform their poetry, music, and dance in and around the San Francisco Area. Shange also danced with Halifu Osumare's company. Upon leaving the company she began collaborating with Paula Moss on the poetry, music, and dance that would become for colored girls Moss and Shange left California for New York and performed for colored girls in a Soho jazz loft and later in bars in the lower East Side. Producer Woodie King Jr. saw one of these shows and helped director Oz Scott stage the choreopoem Off-Broadway at the New Federal Theatre where it ran for eight months, after which it moved to the New York Shakespeare Company's Anspacher Public Theatre, and then to the Booth Theatre.
In addition to her plays, she has written poetry, novels, and essays. She has taught at California State College, the City College of New York, the University of Houston, Rice University, Yale, Howard, and New York University. Among her many awards are an Obie, a Los Angeles Time Book Prize for Poetry, and a Pushcart Prize.
A person's name and phone number are going to come up on the screen. You'll see where this person's from -- it'll likely be a town somewhere in your state -- and how old they are.
Right now, all across the country, thousands of us are doing what you just did. Then, we're picking up our phones, and we're dialing the number beneath the name. And then -- along with those reaching out to folks from the doorsteps and the sidewalks -- we're starting a conversation. It's incredibly powerful.
We're calling today "Change by the Million" -- because we know this is absolutely the most effective way we can reach people. And together, we'll reach out to folks 1 million times before the day ends. But to do that, we all have to pitch in. Click here now to get started.
At first, the name that appears is just that -- letters on a screen. Look harder.
This person could be a college student who voted for the first time in 2008 -- and has lost interest since then. Not currently planning on making it to the polls in 17 days.
It might be a single mom who isn't sure if she'll have time to get out of work, pick up her kids from school, and still make it to her polling location on Election Day. No one's really talked to her about why it's worth it.
Maybe it's an electrical worker who recently lost his job. He voted for President Obama -- but hasn't been feeling engaged the past year. He's frustrated -- and no one's talked to him about why his vote matters.
Right now, you can be the person who makes sure each of them is committed to vote. You can be the person who reminds them why their vote matters. And you can be the person who ensures that they're standing in line at the polls on November 2nd.
The votes may be counted on Election Day -- but that's not when elections are won. They're won right here, on days like today -- with conversations on doorsteps and on the phones. Conversations like the one you're about to have. Conversations that determine who shows up at the polls -- and who stays at home.
So, please -- don't linger on the sidelines. Don't take a pass and assume there might be a better time you can pitch in, or another way you can be effective.
This is the best time -- and this is the best way.
So jump on the phone -- there's someone who needs to hear from you.
Barack Obama has to be one of the smartest, eloquent, calm and cool and psychologically well-balanced (think of Bill Clinton, George W. Bush or Richard Nixon) American presidents of modern times.
He’s also one of the toughest, although he neither sounds it nor looks it. Shrewdly, and surprisingly candidly, an aide has recently described him as “the most unsentimental man I’ve ever met.” Ruthlessness comes easily to Obama, that’s to say, which is what it took for him to beat a presidential nomination rival as tough as Hillary Clinton.
And yet his popularity is dragging down toward 40 per cent and by all the omens his Democrats are about to get trounced in the November congressional elections.
Obama does have some serious problems. He’s black.
Unquestionably, a lot of Americans hate their national leader being black, and, worse yet, a black who is the smartest man around. It’s a variant, incomparably uglier, of the widespread loathing of John F. Kennedy for making people feel bad by being so handsome and sophisticated, sort of a presidential Clark Gable.
Then there’s the economy. The lack of jobs is serious and perhaps even more so is the widespread insecurity among those who do have jobs. A double-dip recession is a real prospect.
Yet the truth — admittedly a near-irrelevancy in politics — is that Obama headed off a near-depression caused by Bush and corporate greed and arrogance and stupidity, and by his stimulus package brought the economy back at least to consciousness.
Included in this was financial regulatory reform and reform of the auto companies (it’s working unexpectedly well). Also health-care reform.
Now he’s attempting a second stimulus package. It’s been blocked by the Republicans, who are insisting that planned tax cuts be extended to the wealthy (incomes above $250,000) as well as to the middle class.
This blockage of a second stimulus is being cheered on by the populist Tea Party movement. Go figure that, other than that many Tea Partiers undoubtedly can’t stand the fact that he’s black.
This is the point. Obama’s problem, which indeed is sizeable, doesn’t reside in himself, although he needs to learn the art of faking sincerity that Clinton , with his “I feel your pain” pitch. was so good at. Obama’s problem resides in America . It’s become a near-dysfunctional society.
The Tea Party, which is a genuine grassroots movement, confirms it. It stands for “freedom.” No more big government. No more meddling in people’s lives. But instead, Sarah Palin.
That a sizeable number of people should want Palin for president is irrefutable evidence their society has gone dysfunctional. She’s a third-rater, except in demagoguery (and in faking sincerity). Paris Hilton would do the job as well, probably better.
Why should this be so? My guess is that Tea Party members and a lot of others, including that Florida evangelical minister who wanted to burn the Qur’an, even though it would have put a lot of American soldiers at risk, have actually got onto something important.
That something is that the U.S. today is clearly in decline. This shouldn’t be exaggerated. Americans have an astounding capacity for resilience. Once there was humiliation in Vietnam . Once all the experts were saying Japan was about to become No. 1. Both are now history.
The U.S. will always be powerful and wealthy. But it will never again bestride the world like a colossus towering above all others. It will be, rather, a big guy in a crowd.
America’s conceit of “exceptionalism,” or of being better than anyone else and fundamentally different from all other societies and countries, can no longer be sustained. It’s exhausted its quota, a very large one indeed, of bright, confident mornings.
Obama’s problem thus is stark and simple: He’s the right guy at the wrong time.
I've always said that 2008 was an amazing journey. But nothing from that election struck me more than seeing so many giving their time and lending their voices because they were ready for change.
Two years ago, in state after state -- no matter where I went -- I saw grandmothers out canvassing, college kids traveling to swing states and sleeping on gymnasium floors, and people using their lunch breaks to make a few more calls. So many got involved for the very first time, each one bringing others along with them.
It was inspiring to witness.
Now, Barack and I need you to help show that energy again. Because this is such a critical moment, a group of grassroots donors are ready to match any contribution you can give.
-- You choose the amount you are able to give and another supporter willing to match that amount doubles it.
-- You can choose to write a note to the individual who matched your donation and tell them why you decided to own a piece of this movement.
Since the day Barack announced his plan to run for office, supporters like you have made everything we've achieved possible.
That's as true now as it was on Election Day in 2008.
You're the reason we reformed a health care system that was broken, progress that means so much to so many. You're the reason we reined in Wall Street banks that were out of control.
But Barack can't keep making progress without strong allies in Congress. And now the same people who've opposed us at every turn are targeting the folks who voted to make change real. They think we can't do it again.
But they're wrong.
If the folks who I saw in 2008 -- those of you who packed up your bags and slept on floors and made calls and talked to voters day after day -- are ready to stand with us again, then I'm ready for any challenge that lies ahead.
That's why we're asking you to help grow this movement once again.
The plan for this election is based on the lessons we learned two years ago. Our organizers and volunteers are knocking on doors every weekend, making calls every night. Your support will help to fund this work.
Another supporter is asking you to join them today -- and has pledged to match whatever you can give. Please donate $5 or more to help grow this movement before November 2nd: https://donate.barackobama.com/MichelleMatch
One Nation Working Together: Breathing New Life Into The American Dream The Weekly Challenger
Originally posted 10/1/2010
By Benjamin Todd Jealous
NAACP President and CEO
We are living through a very particular moment in American history, one where diversity is increasing, with prosperity decreasing. Barring great social movement, this is a formula for a battleground.
Since the dawn of the nation’s worst economic crisis since the 1930’s, progress has been made. We have expanded healthcare coverage to tens of millions of Americans, cut sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine by more than 80 percent, and saved more than 150,000 teachers’ jobs.
Yet, what was a recession for most Americans remains a depression for too many. Black American unemployment is nearly twice that of whites. Eight million jobs have been lost and more than 2.5 million Americans have lost their homes, with millions more in danger of foreclosure. Schools are closing at unprecedented rates, while Americans are being imprisoned at alarming rates. In each case, people of color suffer more.
A strong workforce is the answer to this economic crisis. Families with jobs spend money and as consumers, their buying power increases, allowing businesses to expand and hire more employees. Rather than a trickledown economy, where the rich get richer, we need to create new jobs and financial security for the middle class; only then can the economy grow. We have seen the impact of a top-heavy economy, reliant on prosperity trickling down to the masses, and the result is a nation where the top 1/10 percent of Americans hold 976 times more income than the bottom 90% of our nation’s families.
Good and fair jobs must be the top priority, yet we face a Congress where a fringe minority rebuffs measures to do just that. The Miller Bill – legislation that would create one million jobs – is stalled in the House. Anything that could help, whether it was the extension of unemployment benefits during the July 4th holiday or efforts to prevent the firing of thousands of teachers nationwide are met with a chorus of “NO”.
Simultaneously, far-right extremists have found their way back into the national dialogue, helping drive a regressive agenda. From the Voting Rights Act, to the Civil Rights Act, to the 14th Amendment; the very pillars of democracy are under attack.
Now is the time to get everyone off the benches and back onto the field.
We must be bold and aggressive in turning this situation around. We cannot remain quiet in the face of such clear and imminent danger. Tradition teaches us to run and not get weary, walk and not faint. We have made real progress and great strides, but we must press forward because our work is not simply for us, rather for future generations to come.
As humans, we possess the ability to imagine the future and its possibilities, to look forward with anticipation for a new tomorrow. But we cannot achieve that new day without putting boots on the ground and seeing to fruition the change that millions voted for in 2008. We have to say “no” to a country divided and “yes” to a country united.
On October 2nd, we will stand together as One Nation Working Together, a broad multi-racial coalition of advocates and activists. We will come together in the name of putting our nation back to work, educating each other and our children, ensuring justice for all Americans.
Critically important to putting the nation back to work and bolstering our economic outlook is a commitment to ensuring that every child has access to a good school and a quality education. Until our children are given an opportunity to get the best education available, we will never be able to compete in the new global economy, where far too many of our corporations are leaving our shores and relocating to get both cheap and skilled labor.
Far too many schools throughout our nation are failing our children. In North Carolina, the state is adopting measures to re-segregate schools, returning to the era of separate and unequal. The state’s anti-diversity caucus has dismantled a nationally recognized socio-diversity student achievement policy, which will re-segregate bodies, budgets, and the basic building blocks of a quality education.
We are the people who will decide whether our country stays in this valley of joblessness, foreclosures and despair, or fuel the hope and determination of the One Nation campaign, rise toward the mountaintop, and breathe new life into the great American dream.
Our voices cannot be consigned to a whisper nor can we stand passively on the sidelines, waiting invisibly for change. Join us in Washington, D.C. on 10-2-10 as we harness our multiracial majority and make our narrative of hope and unity a renewed battle cry for change.
A woman in a hot air balloon realized she was lost. She lowered her altitude and spotted a man in a boat below.
She shouted to him, "Excuse me, can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don't know where I am." The man consulted his portable GPS and replied, "You're in a hot air balloon, approximately 30 feet above ground elevation of 2,346 feet above sea level. You are at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100 degrees, 49.09 minutes west longitude. She rolled her eyes and said, "You must be an Obama Democrat." "I am," replied the man. "How did you know?" "Well," answered the balloonist, "everything you told me is technically correct. But I have no idea what to do with your information, and I'm still lost. Frankly, you've not been much help to me." The man smiled and responded, "You must be a Republican." "I am," replied the balloonist. "How did you know?" "Well," said the man, "you don't know where you are -- or where you are going. You've risen to where you are, due to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise you have no idea how to keep, and you expect me to solve your problem.
You're in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but somehow, now it's my fault." COMMENT: You are hearing from political pundits that the party of President Obama, the Democratic Party will not do well during the upcoming election. It's an easy call based on historical fact (the party in power always loses seats).
A big reason according to a poll by the Pew Research Center is that we (minorities) tend to not vote in mid-term elections. Let's change thatIt's clear that the Republican Party has no interest in helping the President fix the economy or anything else and if they regain power the country will be in far worse shape.
We all know that the withering attacks that this President faces daily are really racially motivated. In spite of how the media couches their words we know that white (tea party) America does not believe he should be President under any circumstances. The President has done some good things and he deserves our support. This could be the most important midterm of our generation, encourage your family and friends to participate; the party that got us into this mess are trying to compound what they did, do not allow this to happen. If the Democrats lose control of the Congress the Republicans will not help Obama to govern, thus he becomes a lame duck and the country will be headed over the cliff. REMEMBER POLLS DO NOT VOTE
If my life was a credit report and I was trying to obtain salvation, based on my score I wouldn't get it.
My history shows that I've been delinquent in praise, past due in prayer, my worship has been in collections and I've missed a few payments (tithes) or only paid half (you know how we put $20 in the basket and feel like we've done God a favor).
Not to mention that my debt (sin) to income (blessings) ratio is too high.
BUT I thank God that I was able to file bankruptcy (repentance) and it cleared me of all of my debt (sin). Now I have a co-signer (Jesus) whose score is FLAWLESS... Not one blemish (sin) on his report.
So now.... I QUALIFY for EVERYTHING! Most importantly I've inherited eternal life and I didn't have to put one penny down.
All of my closing costs were covered when Jesus laid down His life for me!!!! I hear that my future home has all of the upgrades too.
Hardwood floors? Please!! I'll be walking on gold! : - )
Thank You Lord for Your unmerited mercy, grace & favor!!
BE ALL THAT YOU CAN BE...FOR THAT IS ALL THERE IS!! I'm just sayin'...
The man that sent this information is a computer tech. He spends a lot of time clearing the junk off computers for people and listens to complaints about speed. All forwards are not bad, just some. Be sure you read the very last paragraph.
_________________________________________
He wrote:
By now, I suspect everyone is familiar with snopes.comand/or truthorfiction.com for determining whether information received via email is just that: true/false or fact/fiction. Both are excellent sites.
1) Any time you see an email that says "forward this on to '10' (or however many) of your friends", "sign this petition", or "you'll get bad luck" or "you'll get good luck" or "you'll see something funny on your screen after you send it" or whatever --- it almost always has an email tracker program attached that tracks the cookies and emails of those folks you forward to. The host sender is getting a copy each time it gets forwarded and then is able to get lists of 'active' email addresses to use in SPAM emails or sell to other spammers. Even when you get emails that demand you send the email on if you're not ashamed of God/Jesus --- that is email tracking, and they are playing on our conscience. These people don't care how they get your email addresses - just as long as they get them. Also, emails that talk about a missing child or a child with an incurable disease "how would you feel if that was your child" --- email tracking. Ignore them and don't participate!
2) Almost all emails that ask you to add your name and forward on to others are similar to that mass letter years ago that asked people to send business cards to the little kid in Florida who wanted to break the Guinness Book of Records for the most cards. All it was, and all any of this type of email is, is a way to get names and 'cookie' tracking information for telemarketers and spammers -- to validate active email accounts for their own profitable purposes.
You can do your Friends and Family members a GREAT favor by sending this information to them. You will be providing a service to your friends. And you will be rewarded by not getting thousands of spam emails in the future!
Do yourself a favor and STOP adding your name(s) to those types of listing regardless how inviting they might sound! Or make you feel guilty if you don't! It's all about getting email addresses and nothing more.
You may think you are supporting a GREAT cause, but you are NOT!
Instead, you will be getting tons of junk mail later and very possibly a virus attached! Plus, we are helping the spammers get rich! Let's not make it easy for them!
ALSO: Email petitions are NOT acceptable to Congress of any other organization - i.e. social security, etc. To be acceptable, petitions must have a "signed signature" and full address of the person signing the petition, so this is a waste of time and you are just helping the email trackers.
(1)The three little words are: 'Hold On, Please...'
Saying this, while putting down your phone and walking off (instead of hanging-up immediately) would make each telemarketing call so much more time-consuming that boiler room sales would grind to a halt.
Then when you eventually hear the phone company's 'beep-beep-beep' tone, you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset, which has efficiently completed its task.
These three little words will help eliminate telephone soliciting..
Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end?
This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone.
This technique is used to determine the best time of day for a 'real' sales person to call back and get someone at home.
What you can do after answering, if you notice there is no one there, is to immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine that dialed the call, and it kicks your number out of their system. Gosh, what a shame not to have your name in their system any longer!!!
(3) Junk Mail Help:
When you get 'ads' enclosed with your phone or utility bill, return these 'ads' with your payment. Let the sending companies throw their own junk mail away.
When you get those 'pre-approved' letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and similar type junk, do not throw away the return envelope.
Most of these come with postage-paid return envelopes, right? It costs them more than the regular 44 cents postage, 'IF' and when they receive them back.
It costs them nothing if you throw them away! The postage was around 50 cents before the last increase and it is according to the weight. In that case, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little, postage-paid return envelopes.
One of Andy Rooney 's (60 minutes) ideas.
Send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express. Send a pizza coupon to Citibank. If you didn't get anything else that day, then just send them their blank application back!
If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you send them.
You can even send the envelope back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! It still costs them 44 cents.
The banks and credit card companies are currently getting a lot of their own junk back in the mail, but folks, we need to OVERWHELM them. Let's let them know what it's like to get lots of junk mail, and best of all they're paying for it...Twice!
Let's help keep our postal service busy since they are saying that e-mail is cutting into their business profits, and that's why they need to increase postage costs again. You get the idea!
The work is not over we MUST continue to build for real change.
We need to stay involved and pushing in our local communities.
Helping others areas all over the country. This will not be a short term effort, THE PROBLEMS ARE MASSIVE ,so must
our effort be. We must continue to build local and regional group to register new voters and inspire old ones to come back in. We need to organize around local issues and candidates.
The work is not over we MUST continue to build for real change.
We need to stay involved and pushing in our local communities.
Helping others areas all over the country. This will not be a short term effort, THE PROBLEMS ARE MASSIVE ,so must
our effort be. We must continue to build local and regional group to register new voters and inspire old ones to come back in. We need to organize around local issues and candidates.
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