Sand, surf and sunshine are only a fraction of the true California esthetic. The remainder: Easy, breezy fashion.
And in order to master that unique Sunshine State style, one needs look no further than to the casual-yet-luxe designs of native California girl Heidi Merrick.
“I really try to get that West Coast vibe,” Merrick said. “It has got to wear cool.”
Merrick designs that California ‘cool’ vibe with a delicate mix of luxury.
“When you put on clothes, you want them to be luxurious,” she said. “Those are my goals: cool and luxe.”
The colourful designer offered these tips to help fashion fans grab a piece of the in-demand, seemingly always in-style West Coast look:
Come back to Earth: Sky-high heels are great – but not always. Bring a down-to-Earth vibe to virtually any outfit with a great pair of ballet flats.
“Flats take anything back down,” Merrick said. “The tendency is to throw on heels … but what about something that’s super gorgeous – with flats? I feel like that’s super California.”
Be transparent: Dabble in the see-through trend with button-up blouses in summery shades such as yellow, and flowy skirts in berry bright.
“I love the sheer,” Merrick said.
Skip the match-y match-y: Unless the pieces are designed as a set … experiment with colour, whether complimentary or contrasting.
“Don’t match too much,” Merrick said.
Not sure where to start? Try colour-blocking – a popular trend in the designer’s new spring/summer line.
“I’ve done really well with the Huntington dress,” Merrick said. “I think that’s because it’s an easy shift (dress) with long sleeves.”
Go long: Stand tall in a to-the-floor dress. Feeling timid? Try a monotone version to avoid a possibly overbearing look.
“A maxi is something every woman can wear,” Merrick said.
Think you’re too short to wear a maxi? Think again.
“If you’re short … you get it hemmed.”
Simple tips to get that simple California style. Heidi Merrick designs are now available exclusively in Vancouver at the boutique Oliver and Lilly at 1520 West 13th Avenue or online at http://www.oliverandlillys.com/.
Source: blogs.vancouversun.com
California Assembly approves bill for Ronald Reagan statue - Inside Bay Area
SACRAMENTO -- The state Assembly on Friday unanimously approved a bill that would authorize a Ronald Reagan statue inside the Capitol.
Republican Assemblyman Curt Hagman, of Chino Hills, told fellow lawmakers that Reagan deserves a special place inside the Capitol because he is the only California governor to become president. The actor-turned-politician is buried at his presidential library in Simi Valley.
Hagman and Assemblyman Martin Garrick, R-Solana Beach, authored AB2358. The bill passed 55-0 and moves to the Senate.
While past governors have portraits throughout California's Capitol, the bill would allow the first statue of a governor. It would be paid through private donations.
Hagman said former President Jimmy Carter has a memorial in Georgia's Capitol, and a Lyndon Johnson statue stands at the Texas Capitol.
California also honors Reagan in the U.S. Capitol's National Statuary Hall. In 2006, the state Legislature voted to remove a statue of Civil War abolitionist Thomas Starr King and replace it with a bronze statue of Reagan.
King's statue has been returned to California and placed in a garden outside the Capitol. The state's other statue is of Father Junipero Serra, the Franciscan missionary.
Source: www.insidebayarea.com
California Water Service Group's President & CEO Peter C. Nelson to Succeed Retiring Chair Robert W. Foy - Yahoo Finance
SAN JOSE, CA--(Marketwire -05/22/12)- California Water Service Group (CWT) today announced its Board of Directors' plan to combine the roles of Chairman and President & Chief Executive Officer and have President & Chief Executive Officer Peter C. Nelson succeed retiring Chairman Robert W. Foy, effective May 22, 2012. Douglas M. Brown will continue to serve as lead director.
Foy, a 35-year Board veteran who has reached retirement age for directors, expressed confidence in the decision: "Pete has demonstrated his leadership ability and we are confident that he will do a fine job as President, Chief Executive Officer, and Chairman of the Board. It makes good business sense to streamline decision-making and capitalize on Pete's extensive experience and expertise."
Nelson was elected President & Chief Executive Officer of California Water Service Group in 1996. Prior to joining the company, he had increasingly responsible positions in engineering, construction management, marketing, corporate and diversification planning, finance, operations, and general management at Pacific Gas & Electric Company.
Nelson holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Davis, and a Masters of Business Administration from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He serves as director of the California Chamber of Commerce and chairs the organization's Water Resources Committee. He is also a director of the California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy, a senior fellow of the American Leadership Forum, and an advisory council member at the Center for Public Utilities, New Mexico State University. Past affiliations include president of the National Association of Water Companies, director of the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency, and founding director of the Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Leadership Group.
Douglas M. Brown, who joined the California Water Service Group Board of Directors in 2001 and is currently the Dean of the Anderson School of Management at the University of New Mexico, will continue to serve as lead director.
California Water Service Group is the parent company of California Water Service Company, Washington Water Service Company, New Mexico Water Service Company, Hawaii Water Service Company, Inc., CWS Utility Services, and HWS Utility Services, LLC. Together these companies provide regulated and non-regulated water service to approximately 2 million people in more than 100 California, Washington, New Mexico and Hawaii communities. Group's common stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "CWT."
This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning established by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 ("Act"). The forward-looking statements are intended to qualify under provisions of the federal securities laws for "safe harbor" treatment established by the Act. Forward-looking statements are based on currently available information, expectations, estimates, assumptions and projections, and management's judgment about the Company, the water utility industry and general economic conditions. Such words as expects, intends, plans, believes, estimates, assumes, anticipates, projects, predicts, forecasts or variations of such words or similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance. They are subject to uncertainty and changes in circumstances. Actual results may vary materially from what is contained in a forward-looking statement. Factors that may cause a result different than expected or anticipated include but are not limited to: governmental and regulatory commissions' decisions, including decisions on proper disposition of property; changes in regulatory commissions' policies and procedures; the timeliness of regulatory commissions' actions concerning rate relief; new legislation; changes in accounting valuations and estimates; the ability to satisfy requirements related to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and other regulations on internal controls; electric power interruptions; increases in suppliers' prices and the availability of supplies including water and power; fluctuations in interest rates; changes in environmental compliance and water quality requirements; acquisitions and our ability to successfully integrate acquired companies; the ability to successfully implement business plans; changes in customer water use patterns; the impact of weather on water sales and operating results; access to sufficient capital on satisfactory terms; civil disturbances or terrorist threats or acts, or apprehension about the possible future occurrences of acts of this type; the involvement of the United States in war or other hostilities; restrictive covenants in or changes to the credit ratings on our current or future debt that could increase our financing costs or affect our ability to borrow, make payments on debt or pay dividends; and, other risks and unforeseen events. When considering forward-looking statements, you should keep in mind the cautionary statements included in this paragraph. The Company assumes no obligation to provide public updates of forward-looking statements.
1720 North First Street
San Jose, CA 95112-4598
Shannon Dean
(310) 257-1435
Source: finance.yahoo.com
Zuma's racist painting: Time for the ANC leadership to wake up! - New Zimbabwe.com
WHAT on earth is going on in South Africa and what does it tell the rest of the continent about the state of the African in that country?
Make no mistake about it, and this is quite sad, but the time has come for black Africans to understand and do something about the tragic fact that while South Africa’s de jure leadership is black, the de facto control of that country is a white minority which owns and runs the economy, the judiciary and the media, all which are racist to the core.
The uncomfortable bottomline is that South Africa is a white-controlled black country and the dysfunctional consequences of this tragedy are yet to fully play out with very worrying signs everywhere that all hell is about to break loose.
It is a shame that the white minority which has de facto control of South Africa is taking full advantage without let or hindrance of self-serving and false claims to human rights, governance and anti-corruption in the false name of international law not only to halt but also to reverse the gains that black South Africans made in 1994 when democracy was allegedly won or achieved in that troubled country.
While this is bad enough, what is worse is that the same self-indulgent white minority whose numbers include die-hard racists who converged in South Africa from fallen white settler regimes in Rhodesia, Portuguese Mozambique and Angola and South West Africa (now Namibia) are using their new apartheid base through organisations such as Afriforum and the so-called Southern African Litigation Centre to reverse the gains of liberation throughout Southern Africa under the cover of phoney claims to human rights and good governance.
So it is that as Africans at home and in the Diaspora celebrated the 2012 edition of Africa Day, there was utter mayhem triggered by the display in the vulgar name of art and corrupt freedom of expression at some racist gallery and the website of a racist newspaper of a pathetic painting of President Zuma with his genitals exposed styled as a spear.
It is frankly staggering to imagine, let alone to think, that this mayhem unfolded as it is still unfolding in the one country whose black leadership never lose a moment to pretend that it should by entitlement lead the rest of Africa and that it has the solutions to all African problems ostensibly because its country has the biggest economy on the continent on the basis of which South Africa’s black leadership is seeking a permanent seat at the outdated and increasingly irrelevant UN’s Security Council and on the basis of which the same leadership is hoping, with customary Sadc support, its respected and quite able former minister of foreign affairs now in charge of home affairs — Nkosazana
Zuma — should be elected at the forthcoming AU summit in Malawi in July as the continental body’s next chairperson to replace the widely unpopular Jean Ping whose treachery in favour of Europe — especially France — against Africa has mobilised critical votes against him beyond recovery.
There’s no need to waste time belabouring the question whether the patently offensive and unAfrican phallic painting of President Zuma constitutes acceptable artistic expression or is defendable as freedom of expression.
Those among us who have invoked artistic expression of freedom of expression to defend that painting are either racists who know exactly what they are saying against African leadership and the human dignity of Africans or are just Uncle Toms who do not know what they are saying in the vain hope of winning praise and acceptance from the very same white racists who are behind the offensive painting.
The fact of the matter is that self-righteous whites in South Africa would be outraged beyond description if a painting of Helen Zille, the racist leader of the DA, were to be done by a black artist and depicted in the pose of the late celebrated American prostitute — Linda Lovelace — with Zille’s genitals fully exposed and captioned “Fight back like Deepthroat”.
While pundits in South Africa who are clear victims of apartheid propaganda can continue fooling themselves about the offensive Zuma painting under a false discourse about artistic expression and freedom of expression, Africans around the world who celebrated Africa Day last Friday know only too well that the real issue in South Africa is about who controls what and therefore who shall govern on the basis of what they control.
There’s an urgent need to unpack, understand and to do something about the tragedy that is unfolding in South Africa’s tragic governance whose implications are far-reaching for the African state.
It is a common cause that the colonial state in Africa immediately reproduced itself through neo-colonialism through which Western imperialists took control of the economies of the newly independent states during decolonisation.
The neo-colonial idea was that independence meant the Africans would control their politics while the commanding heights of the economy remained in the white hands of imperialists.
While this neo-colonial façade appeared to be the case in countries that did not have white settler communities such as are found in the Southern African countries of Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Angola, Namibia and especially South Africa whose white population numbers some astounding millions, the post-apartheid situation with regard to the balance of forces that have now emerged clearly show that there’s something new and dangerous about neo-colonialism which for want of a better term is best described as post-neo-colonialism.
Whereas neo-colonialism sought to hijack the control of the economy from black independence, the essence of post-neo-colonialism that is best characterised by the tragedy that is unfolding in South Africa highlighted by the offensive Zuma painting is to hijack not only the economy from black independence but also to hijack the entire political landscape of black independence by controlling and subjugating the politics of black majority rule through the manipulative instruments of the judiciary, the media and the economy dominated under the guise of artistic expression, freedom of expression, human rights, good governance and anti-corruption driven by the very same white minority that was supposed to have been deposed by the independence struggle with the assistance of the so-called international community.
The dynamics of the post-neo-colonial state are particularly pronounced in the Southern African countries that had entrenched white settler communities but they are not limited to these countries as the evidence of post-neo-colonial politics is now palpable, for example in Malawi where that country’s sovereignty is taking quite some battering following the as-yet-unexplained demise of President Bingu wa Mutharika under very controversial circumstances that are now the subject of an official inquiry ordered by President Joyce Banda.
But back to the mayhem in South Africa caused by the offensive and totally unacceptable display of the phallic painting of President Zuma which injured his human dignity and that of all Africans, it was instructive to note that the South African state under its black leadership was left clueless about what to do. In the end the ANC resorted to court action whose consequence was not only to further embarrass President Zuma but also to confirm who, in fact, is in charge of Azania otherwise known as South Africa.
In the first place the court obviously controlled by the white minority took its sweet time to set down the hearing of the matter which had been filed on an urgent basis. Then the court, presided over by white judges who had no difficulty showing their sympathy for the offending painter, Brett Murray, who hides his shocking racism under the silly claim that he is a satirical artist who used to be but is no longer a supporter of the ANC, made it clear that it did not understand how the painting could be said to be racist and that in any case banning it would be difficult because “the image is already out there on the internet”.
Strangely but tellingly the same court did not have any qualms about ordering a belated international blackout of the footage showing the ANC lawyer — Gcina Malindi — in a sea of tears in response to some racist questioning by the presiding judge Claasen when the fact is that the court proceedings were being screened live and could not be blocked after the fact.
It was telling that Judge Claasen found it easy well after the fact to black out a live broadcast of a black lawyer he cruelly made to weep with racist questioning in order to protect himself but he did not find it within him to interdict the offensive phallic painting of President Zuma because the judge was clearly part of the post-neo-colonial control of African politics by abusing the law to humiliate African leaders in the hope of breaking the African spirit for freedom with dignity.
Africans following the latest court battle in South Africa over Zuma’s dehumanising painting have been comparing the case with that of the former president of ANC youth league, Julius Malema, whose singing of a liberation song “shoot the Boer” was said to be “incitement to murder” by a white judge, Leon Halgryn, who in a case brought before him by a racist NGO called Afriforum astonishingly ruled that “the publication and chanting of the words ‘dubula ibhunu’ prima facie satisfies the crime of incitement to murder”.
The substance of the political message from Judge Halgryn in the Malema “dubula ibhunu’’ case is not different from that of Judge Claasen in the case of President Zuma’s offensive painting, save for the obvious double standard rooted in the new racism that clearly poses a serious, clear and present danger to South Africa’s so-called 1994 democracy which is not the same as independence.
But where is all this coming from and where is it going?
On May 29 1998, then South Africa’s Deputy President Thabo Mbeki made a seminal “two-nations speech” at the opening debate in Parliament in Cape Town entitled “Reconciliation and Nation Building” in which he said “we therefore make bold to say that South Africa is a country of two nations.
One of these nations is white, relatively prosperous, regardless of gender or geographic dispersal.
It has ready access to a developed economic, physical, educational, communication and other infrastructure. This enables it to argue that, except for the persistence of gender discrimination against women, all members of this nation have the possibility to exercise their rights to equal opportunity, the development opportunities to which the Constitution of ’93 committed our country.
The second and larger nation of South Africa is black and poor, with the worst affected being women in the rural areas, the black rural population in general and the disabled. This nation lives under the conditions of a grossly under-developed economic, physical, educational, communication and other infrastructure.
It has virtually no possibility to exercise what in reality amounts to a theoretical right to equal opportunity, with that right being equal within this black nation only to the extent that it is equally incapable of realisation.
The reality of two nations, underwritten by the perpetuation of the racial, gender, and spatial disparities born of a very long period of colonial and apartheid white minority domination, constitutes the material base which reinforces the notion that, indeed, we are not one nation, but two nations. And neither are we becoming one nation. Consequently, also, the objective of national reconciliation is not being realised”.
Nothing has better dramatised South Africa’s two nations than Brett Murray’s phallic painting of President Zuma and the reaction to it from South Africa’s white-controlled media, judiciary and business community run by white racists who apparently think their prejudices are equal to artistic expression and freedom of expression. God help South Africa.
Professor Jonathan Moyo is MP for Tsholotsho North (Zanu PF)
Source: www.newzimbabwe.com
California is a Romney home state too - Los Angeles Times
The driver could not negotiate the steep turn onto Dunemere Drive, a narrow cul-de-sac with no sidewalks.
"Wouldn't it be funny if Mitt Romney jumped out?" they joked, moments before Romney jumped out of the driver's side of the cab.
"We probably talked for 15 or 20 minutes," David Sear, a financial advisor, recalled recently. "We welcomed him and cautioned him that it was a blue neighborhood. He introduced me to his son Matt, and told me that he had quite a bit of fine art that he was uncomfortable having shipped, so he thought he and his son would spend some father-son time and go on a road trip from Utah to La Jolla."
Since that day a few years ago, the Romneys have become intermittently familiar sights around La Jolla. They have been spotted in shops along Girard Avenue in the Village shopping area; at the Jewel Salon, where Mitt got a $25 haircut in near anonymity; in local restaurants; and at Vons, where real estate agent Sue Nystrom Walsh bumped into Mitt a couple of times.
"He was very nice," she said. "It wasn't any big deal."
Though the Romneys are associated with several states — Michigan, where they grew up; Massachusetts, where he was governor; New Hampshire, where they own a magnificent lakeside retreat; and Utah, where he led the 2002 Winter Olympics — the family has multigenerational, if less well known, connections to California.
The presumed Republican presidential nominee spent his freshman year at Stanford, where in 1966 he picketed against a sit-in by demonstrators who opposed the draft.
His mother, the former Lenore LaFount, appeared as a bit player in several Hollywood films and nearly signed an MGM contract that could have paid $50,000 before she was wooed into domesticity by future Michigan Gov. George Romney, whom she met in high school.
In her brief Hollywood career, she was a stand-in for Lily Damita in 1931's "Fifty Million Frenchmen" and played a "chic French girl" in a Greta Garbo film and an "ingenue" in another 1931 film, "A Tailor Made Man," George Romney biographer T. George Harris wrote.
Stung at the thought of losing her, the elder Romney asked his employer, Alcoa, to transfer him to Los Angeles, where he also took night classes at USC, according to Harris, and picked her up at the studio each night.
She didn't like the seedy side of Hollywood and didn't want to have to pose for the cheesecake shots the studio required. But mostly, she fretted for George's male ego. "He'd come out there and didn't want to be known as my date," she told Harris. "In an acting career, I would have been upstaging him, and he couldn't stand that."
One of Mitt's older sisters, Jane Romney, 74, who lives in Beverly Hills and has earned modest success as an actress, said her mother was "unprepared for Hollywood. She was young and raised in a very moral family, and Hollywood was pretty dicey in those days."
In a brief interview, she recalled seeing her mother's screen test when she was a teenager. "She was so very kind of dreamy and wonderful," Jane said.
According to family lore, Jane said, George Romney "followed her out from the East Coast on his white horse and talked her into not signing the contract." She added: "He tried to save me from Hollywood, too, but he wasn't successful." (Jane Romney, who donated $250 to Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer of California in 1997, has supported her Republican brother's presidential campaign, giving $2,500 in 2011 and $2,100 in 2008.)
George Romney told The Times in 1964 when he was governor of Michigan that he felt at home in Los Angeles because he attended kindergarten there and "had started housekeeping with his wife in Santa Monica." Harris, the biographer, wrote that the Romneys rented a house in downtown Los Angeles, at 21st and Main streets.
The family's more contemporary California connections include a stint by Mitt Romney's eldest son, Tagg, as chief marketing officer for the Dodgers. He left after a season to work on his father's first presidential campaign in 2007.
Two other sons, Matt and Craig, live 20 minutes inland from La Jolla near Rancho Bernardo, where their million-dollar-plus homes are nestled on private streets with heavy wooden gates that bar outsiders. Matt is an executive with Excel Trust, a publicly traded real estate investment trust in San Diego that focuses on retail centers, according to its website. Craig once worked as music producer for a New York ad agency but is now in real estate.
The Romney campaign did not allow any of the Romneys or their associates to speak to The Times about any aspect of the family's life in California. A Romney spokeswoman had asked for a list of questions, and then sent back a statement: "Gov. and Mrs. Romney enjoy the time they are able to spend in California and enjoy spending time with family and friends there. When they are in California, Mrs. Romney takes the opportunity to ride horses as much as possible."
Source: www.latimes.com
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