Liberty Newspost Aug-27-2012 by Liberty Newspost

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- 27/08/12

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Ron Paul refuses to speak at RNC to avoid endorsing Romney RT (News RSS : Today)

Christian Science Monitor. Another one of his supporters, 26 Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:35:37 AM -year-old Antonio Rivera, said the Ron Paul.(AFP Photo / Mladen congressman “enlightened” him Atonov) on health-care policy, As 77-year-old Ron Paul retires immigration and workings of the and brings his campaign to an Federal Reserve. end, he is refusing an opportunity “A lot of people say it’s the end of to speak at the Republican the Paul movement,” Rivera National Convention to avoid said.“But I think it’s just the endorsing Mitt Romney. beginning.” The 12-term libertarian Texas Before leaving the spotlight, Paul congressman staged a valedictory said he wanted to bring his rally on Sunday before 10,000 principles to college campuses supporters at the University of with his “We Are the Future” South Florida, before ending his r a l l y a n d e m p h a s i z e t h e campaign. Paul won 177 importance spreading his delegates to this year’s RNC, m o v e m e n t ' s i n f l u e n c e . beating all other contenders aside Since Paul finished second to from Romney and Rick Santorum. Romney in the New Hampshire While Paul didn’t reach the primary, he is not able to address numbers needed to make it to the the convention. But the Romney White House, he is still leaving c a m p a i g n o f f e r e d h i m a n behind a movement of believers opportunity to give a speech – as in the policies he preached. long as it was approved by “He was talking on a deeper level, Romney’s staff and endorses the and that opened my eyes. I feel Republican nominee for president. like we’re his voice, we’re his Paul rejected the offer on the legacy,” Paul activist Ashley basis that it wouldn’t align with N i c o l e Y o r k , 2 6 , t o l d t h e his beliefs.

“It wouldn’t be my speech,” he said in an interview with the New York Times. “ That would undo everything I’ve done in the last 30 years. I don’t fully endorse him for president.” Even without giving a final speech at the RNC, Paul is leaving his policy beliefs and ideas with a number of successors. His son, Sen. Rand Paul, is likely to continue some of his father’s fights in Congress. In Tampa, 21-year-old Paul supporter Ashley Ryan told the Times she will take over as M a i n e ’ s n a t i o n a l committeewoman after sitting as Paul’s delegate at the RNC. He has also garnered increasing support from American voters. This election, Paul received two million voters at Republican nominating contests, which is five times the number he received in 1988. This is a significant number considering that only 10 percent of registered voters are libertarians. Additionally, half of his votes

were from people under the age of 45. “ The young people have to start connecting with the older people,” he said. As Paul leaves the stage standing true to his beliefs and refusing to endorse Romney, his supporters are optimistic about carrying on the movement he started many years ago. "We used to say most people found libertarianism by reading Ayn Rand," David Boaz of the Cato Institute told the Times."In the last five years, most people have found libertarianism by listening to Ron Paul." This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

India, China to set up joint working group The Hindu (china - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:08:28 AM

The Hindu India, China to set up joint working group The Hindu India and China, on Monday, agreed to set up a joint working group (JWG) to look into not only trade-related issues but also investments. The working group is expected to come out with a report within 90 days. The working group is set up even as India... India, China press each other for market access Reuters India India- China agree to have 5-year economic cooperation plan TwoCircles.net The Week Ahead: India- China Trade Meet, PM in Iran, GDP Data Wall Street Journal (blog) Livemint all 58 news articles » [unable to retrieve full-text content]

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Syrian helicopter down under fire in Damascus (Reuters: Top News)

in the eastern suburbs. "The rebels had been trying to hit it for about an hour," he said. "Finally they By Khaled Yacoub Oweis and did." Oliver Holmes Video footage carried the sound AMMAN/ALEPPO| Mon Aug o f p e o p l e c e l e b r a t i n g t h e 27, 2012 11:52am EDT helicopter's dive with shouts of (Reuters) - A Syrian military "Allahu akbar" (God is great). helicopter came down under fire Although rebel commanders have and in flames in Damascus on asked foreign allies for antiMonday as President Bashar al- aircraft missiles, Western nations Assad's air force strafed and are unwilling to supply such bombarded rebel-held districts in weapons for fear of them falling the capital and in Aleppo. into hostile hands. There was no State television confirmed a indication fighters in Damascus h e l i c o p t e r h a d c r a s h e d i n had used any missiles. Damascus but gave no details. MORNING BATTLE Opposition activists said rebels Army helicopters had been had shot it down. Opposition rocketing and strafing crowded video footage showed a crippled working class suburbs on the aircraft burning up and crashing eastern outskirts of the city since into a built-up area, sending up a Sunday. Generally seen as rebel pillar of oily black smoke. strongholds, they came under A day after his enemies accused renewed assault early on Monday. Assad's troops and sectarian "The sound of gunfire and mortar militia of massacring hundreds of shells exploding hasn't stopped," people in the town of Daraya near an opposition activist, Samir alDamascus, the possible shooting Shami, said from the area. "I see down of the helicopter, the latest smoke rising everywhere." of several such successes claimed Another activist based in the by lightly armed rebel fighters, eastern suburbs, Mohammed bolstered morale. But, witnesses Doumany, said: "There are said, even more intense army constant explosions and blasts bombardments followed. from mortars. The rebels are "It was flying over the eastern part a t t a c k i n g s e c u r i t y f o r c e of the city and firing all morning," checkpoints in the suburbs." an activist calling himself Abu At least 32 people were killed in Bakr told Reuters from near the area on Monday, opposition where the helicopter came down a c t i v i s t s s a i d . V i d e o f r o m Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:46:37 AM

campaigners showed 20 bodies on the floor of a mosque, including three children. On Sunday, opposition activists said they had found about 320 bodies, including some of women and children, in Daraya, just southwest of Damascus. Most had been killed execution-style, they said. Videos on the Internet showed rows of bodies wrapped in sheets. Most seemed to be young men, but at least one video showed several children who appeared to have been shot in the head. The body of one toddler was soaked in blood. Due to restrictions on non-state media in Syria, it was impossible to verify the accounts independently. The uprising, which began as peaceful protests, has become a civil war. United Nations investigators have accused both sides of war crimes but laid more blame on government troops and pro-government militia than on the rebels. The killings in Daraya, a working class Sunni Muslim town that sustained three days of bombardment before being overrun by the army on Friday, pushed the daily death toll to 440 people on Saturday, one of the highest since the uprising began, an activist network called the Local Coordination Committees

said. The official state news agency said: "Our heroic armed forces cleansed Daraya from remnants of armed terrorist groups who committed crimes against the sons of the town." The death toll for the following day, Sunday, was about 200, including civilians and fighters, according to another activist network, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. ALEPPO Clashes are raging across Syria as the 17-month-old rebellion grows increasingly bloody, particularly in Aleppo, Syria's biggest city and its economic hub, where the army and rebels appear stuck in a war of attrition. Fighting in the northern city on Sunday was the heaviest in the past week, according to Reuters journalists there. Helicopters were circling and firing occasionally on Monday. Reuters journalists saw a fighter jet fire on an eastern neighbourhood of the city for two hours. Activists said southern districts of Aleppo were also repeatedly attacked on Monday. "The front line has not changed. We cannot progress due to a lack of ammunition," said Abu Walid, a rebel commander in Aleppo. "All we can do is hold our positions."

Rebels say they control at least half the city of 2.5 million, but their hold is fragile since Assad's forces can unleash their air power and artillery against fighters who are comparatively lightly armed. Assad, who met an Iranian parliamentary delegation in the capital on Sunday, said the crisis was the result of Western and regional states trying to crush Syria's role in the "resistance" against Western and Israeli domination in the region. The United Nations says more than 18,000 people have been killed in the conflict that pits a mainly Sunni opposition against a ruling system dominated by the Assad family and other members of the Alawite faith, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. Diplomatic efforts to stop the violence in Syria are stalled by a stalemate between Western countries, Sunni-led Gulf Arab states and Turkey - which all support the opposition - and Shi'ite Iran, which backs Assad, as do Russia and China. With veto-wielding Russia leading resistance to action against Assad, the U.N. Security Council remains deadlocked. Egypt is seeking to arrange a four -way meeting with Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran, the main regional SYRIAN page 7

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Tropical Storm Isaac slogs toward U.S. Gulf Coast (Reuters: Top News)

The governors of all three states have declared states of emergency as a hurricane warning went into By Kathy Finn effect for the northern Gulf Coast NEW ORLEANS| Mon Aug 27, from Louisiana to the Florida 2012 11:58am EDT Panhandle. (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Isaac That included New Orleans, churned across the Gulf of d e v a s t a t e d w h e n H u r r i c a n e Mexico on Monday, disrupting Katrina swept over the city on U.S. offshore energy production August 29, 2005, killing more and threatening to hit Louisiana than 1,800 people and causing on the anniversary of devastating billions of dollars of damage Hurricane Katrina in 2005. along the coast. The storm swiped south Florida "It is difficult to realize that to the on Sunday before moving into day - seven years after Katrina warm Gulf waters, where it is another hurricane is headed our expected to strengthen into a way," Mississippi Governor Phil hurricane. Bryant said. On its current track, Isaac was Late Monday morning, Isaac was due to slam into the Gulf Coast about 310 miles southeast of the anywhere between Florida and mouth of the Mississippi River Louisiana by Tuesday night or with top sustained winds of 65 early Wednesday, the seventh mph and moving northwest at 14 anniversary of Katrina hitting mph. New Orleans, the U.S. National It was expected to be centered Hurricane Center (NHC) said. over the Gulf Coast no later than "The weather is going to go early on Wednesday. Evacuation downhill well in advance of that orders for some low-lying parts of and that's why today is the day of the Gulf Coast already were in preparation," said NHC director effect Monday morning. Richard Knabb. Energy producers in the Gulf Speaking in an interview with worked to shut down some of CNN, Knabb said coastal flooding their operations ahead of what or storm surge up to 12 feet was could be the biggest test for U.S. the biggest threat posed by Isaac, energy installations since 2008, with mandatory evacuations when Hurricanes Gustav and Ike possible across southeastern disrupted offshore oil output for L o u i s i a n a , M i s s i s s i p p i a n d months and damaged onshore Alabama. natural gas processing plants, Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:58:41 AM

pipelines and some refineries. Gulf residents started stocking up on supplies and securing their homes. In New Orleans, long lines formed at some gas stations and in Gulfport, Mississippi, people crowded supermarkets to buy bottled water and canned food. "I sense a high level of anxiety," said New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu. "The timing, as fate would have it, on the anniversary of Katrina has everybody in a state of alertness, but that is a good thing." Isaac is forecast to become a hurricane on Tuesday. In its latest advisory, the NHC said the storm was not expected to strengthen beyond Category 1, the weakest type on the five-step SaffirSimpson scale of hurricane intensity. But Knabb said very warm water temperatures in the Gulf, currently ranging between 86 to 87 degrees Fahrenheit (30-30.5 Celsius) could help trigger strengthening beyond Category 1. "The Gulf of Mexico is almost always plenty warm in August and September to support strengthening tropical storms and hurricanes," he said. NHC meteorologist Jessica Schauer said the hurricane warning area included "quite a few oil rigs" but not perhaps the

heart of the U.S. offshore oil patch, which produces about 23 percent of U.S. oil output and 7 percent of its natural gas. Despite the threat to offshore oil infrastructure and Louisiana refineries, U.S. crude oil prices were off in late morning trading after being up earlier in Asia. U.S. oil prices were down about $1.15 at $95. SHUTTING OIL PRODUCTION Meteorologists at Weather Insight, an arm of Thomson Reuters, predict the storm will spur short-term shutdowns of 85 percent of the U.S. offshore oil production capacity and 68 percent of the natural gas output. Once ashore, the storm could wreak havoc on low-lying fuel refineries along the Gulf Coast that account for about 40 percent of U.S. refining capacity. That could send gasoline prices spiking just ahead of the U.S. Labor Day holiday, analysts said. "It's going right in the heart of refinery row," Phil Flynn, an analyst with Price Futures Group in Chicago, said on Sunday. London-based BP Plc, the biggest U.S. Gulf producer, said it was shutting production at all of its Gulf of Mexico oil and gas platforms and evacuating all workers on Sunday. Issac's westward track meant the

worst of its weather would miss Tampa, Florida, where the Republican National Convention was to open its four-day meeting on Monday. Official convention events were delayed until Tuesday because of the storm. Tampa, located on Florida's west coast, still faces total rain accumulations of about 15 inches between Sunday and Monday evening, forecasters said. In south Florida, winds from Isaac forced cancellations of hundreds of flights in and out of Miami, Fort Lauderdale and other south Florida airports on Sunday. Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez reported more than 500 cancellations affecting Miami International Airport alone. The storm killed at least 20 people and caused significant flooding and damage in Haiti and the Dominican Republic before sweeping across the southern tip of Florida on Sunday. (Additional reporting by David Adams and Kevin Gray in Miami, Emily Le Coz in Tupelo, Matthew Robinson in New York and Kristen Hays in Houston; Writing by Tom Brown; Editing by Bill Trott) This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it TROPICAL page 6

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Syrian helicopter downed in Damascus clashes - Businessweek (Top Stories - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:31:27 AM

BEIRUT (AP) — A Syrian military helicopter went down in a ball of fire Monday after it was apparently hit during fighting between government forces and rebels in the capital Damascus, activists said. A video posted on the Internet showed the chopper engulfed in flames and spinning out of control shortly before it hit the ground amid bursts of gunfire near a mosque. Rebels shout "Allahu Akbar!" or God is great, as the helicopter goes down. The authenticity of the video could not be independently verified. Syria's lightly armed rebels have grown bolder and their tactics more sophisticated in recent months. There have been claims of fighters shooting down helicopter gunships in the past, though the government has never confirmed it. With its forces stretched thin by fighting on multiple fronts, Assad's regime has been increasingly using air power against the rebels — both helicopters and fighter jets. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which along with other activists reported the chopper crash, said there was intense fighting

between troops backed by helicopter gunships and rebels in the western Damascus neighborhood of Jobar. State-run media confirmed the crash in the district of al-Qaboun, which is near Jobar and a hotbed of Sunni Muslim rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Assad. But the reports gave no details about the cause of the crash The rebels are not known to have any answer to the regime's warplanes except anti-aircraft guns that they mostly use as an anti-personnel weapon. Last month, rebels claimed to have shot down a Russian-made MiG fighter, but the government blamed the crash on a technical malfunction. The military has for more than a month been fighting major battles against rebels in Damascus and its suburbs while engaged in what appears to be a stalemated fight in the north against rebels for control of Aleppo, the nation's largest city and commercial capital. The government has recently intensified its offensive to recapture districts in Damascus and its suburbs that have fallen into rebel hands. Over the weekend, evidence mounted of mass killings by government forces in the Damascus suburb of Daraya. Activists reported that regime

forces went on a days-long killing spree after they seized Daraya from rebels Thursday. Reports of the death toll ranged from more than 300 to as many as 600. It was impossible to independently verify the numbers because of severe restrictions on media coverage of the conflict. Video posted on the Internet by activists showed rows of bodies, many of them men with gunshot wounds to their heads. During mass burials on Sunday, bodies were sprayed with water from hoses — a substitute for the ritual washing prescribed by Islam in the face of so many dead. The gruesome images appeared to expose the lengths to which Assad's authoritarian regime was willing to go to put down the rebellion that broke out in March last year. In the north, thousands of Syrians fleeing violence were stuck at the border with Turkey after Turkish authorities blocked access to any more refugees while they rushed to build more camps to accommodate the deluge. The refugee crisis is just one of many examples of how the civil war is spilling across borders into neighboring countries such as Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan — all of which have seen a massive influx of Syrians. A Turkish official said the

refugees still stuck on the Syrian side will be allowed in "within a day or two" when a new camp near the border is ready. Another official said Turkey was also carrying out more stringent security checks on the refugees, adding to the delays in crossing. Turkey fears that Kurdish rebels fighting for self-rule in southeast Turkey may be coming in through Syria. There are also concerns that foreign jihadists are moving in and out of Turkey to fight the Syrian regime. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of government rules that bar civil servants from speaking to the media without prior authorization. The official Syrian News Agency, SANA, also reported that authorities released 378 people detained for participation in peaceful street protests. It said those freed were never involved in acts of violence, an indirect admission that scores of people were detained for simply taking part in peaceful anti-government protests. The prisoners were released at the police headquarters in Damascus and the central city of Homs. Authorities have issued similar pardons in the past, a practice apparently designed to isolate the rebels and create the image of a compassionate regime.

Vice President Farouk al-Sharaa said Syria approved of an initiative Iran plans to present at a world gathering of nonaligned nations that will be held in Tehran later this week. Iran says it plans talks on a peace plan to end Syria's civil war, but hasn't provided any details. Any Iranian initiative proposing dialogue between the government and the opposition would be a nonstarter because rebels refuse to talk to Assad and because of Tehran's close bonds with his regime. Al-Sharaa, in a statement issued by his office, said the way to settle the conflict without preconditions is by "achieving a ceasefire by all parties and launching a national dialogue." ___ AP writer Suzan Fraser contributed to this report from Ankara. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Isaac churns in Gulf along Katrina's path - CBS News (Top Stories - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:28:49 AM

Play CBS News Video Last Updated 12:44 p.m. ET (CBS/AP) KEY WEST, Fla. Tropical Storm Isaac targeted a broad swath of the Gulf Coast on Monday and had New Orleans in its crosshairs, bearing down just ahead of the seventh anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. La. Gov. Bobby Jindal said Monday that 23 parishes in Louisiana have declared states of emergency. "Today is the day for folks in that area to get out of harm's way," he said. "Pack up your stuff and get out of harm's way." The potential for a landfall as a Category 1 hurricane as soon as Tuesday prompted evacuations along a wide area of the Gulf Coast and sent people out to stock up on staples. "I gassed up -- truck and generator," John Corll, 59, a carpenter, said as he left a New Orleans coffee shop Monday morning. He went through Katrina in 2005 and was expecting a weaker storm this time, adding that he thinks the levee system is in better shape to handle a storm surge than when Katrina hit. "I think the state and local governments are much better

SYRIAN continued from page 2

heavyweights. Iran, a Shi'ite power, is Assad's main backer, while Saudi Arabia is believed to be supplying weapons to the rebels. Syria's minister for national prepared for the storm surge and Chihuahuas -- from a home on a reconciliation was quoted by an emergencies," Corll said. peninsula in Gulf Shores. Canon, Iranian news agency as praising The storm that left 10 dead in who has lived on the coast for 30 Tehran's support and saying: "We Haiti and the Dominican Republic years, said he thinks the order to face armed parties acting within blew past the Florida Keys with evacuate Monday was premature. the framework of an Americanlittle damage, and rolled "If it comes in, it's just going to be Israeli conspiracy, and we will northwestward over the open Gulf a big rain storm. I think they destroy them, because they are of Mexico on Monday. The overreacted but I understand trying to degrade Syria by causing National Hurricane Center where they're coming from. It's internal and tribal wars. predicted it would grow to a inches of rain is dumped over the safety," he said. 23 Photos "America and Israel have plans hurricane over the warm water, region, the National Weather Tropical Storm Isaac View the which are carried out through with winds of between 74 and 95 Service warned. Full Gallery » Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey," mph. It is predicted to hit At 11 a.m. EDT on Monday, Although Pensacola seemed less the minister, Ali Heidar, said. s o m e t i m e T u e s d a y a l o n g a Isaac remained a tropical storm likely to get a direct hit, the He urged Egypt, now led by a roughly 300-mile stretch of with top sustained winds of 65 owners of a Ferris Wheel-like Sunni Islamist president after c o a s t l i n e , f r o m t h e b a y o u s mph. Its center was about 310 beach attraction were busy decades of Western-backed southwest of New Orleans to the miles southeast of the mouth of Monday removing passenger military rule, to distance itself edge of the Florida Panhandle. the Mississippi River, and it was cabins and readying for a storm from those states hostile to Tropical Storm Isaac's projected moving northwest at 14 mph. they hoped would not prove too Damascus if it wanted to broker a path will bring it ashore in the Seven years after Katrina, New disruptive. peace. New Orleans area late Tuesday or Orleans braces for Isaac "We just want to get back open (Additional reporting by Marwan e a r l y W e d n e s d a y . ( C r e d i t : Tropical Storm Isaac turns and get the people back out Makdesi in Damascus and Erika NOAA.gov) That would be one northwest after soaking Florida there," said one of the owners, Solomon in Beirut; Writing by day shy of seven years after WFOR Miami's interactive storm Todd Schneider. Erika Solomon and Alastair Katrina struck catastrophically in tracker Macdonald) 2005, although Katrina was a The size of the warning area and • 1 This entry passed through the much stronger Category 5 storm the storm's wide bands of rain and • 2 Full-Text RSS service — if this is with winds above 157 miles per w i n d p r o m p t e d e m e r g e n c y • Next Page » your content and you're reading it hour. Isaac is expected to have top declarations in four states, and on someone else's site, please read winds of around 90 mph when it hurricane-tested residents were This entry passed through the the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contenthits land. boarding up homes, sticking up on Full-Text RSS service — if this is only/faq.php#publishers. Five But Isaac could pack a watery food and water or getting ready to your content and you're reading it Filters recommends: Incinerating double punch: If it hits during evacuate. on someone else's site, please read Assange - The Liberal Media Go high tide, floodwaters as deep as On the Alabama coast, Billy the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentTo Work. 12 feet could be pushed ashore in Cannon, 72, was preparing to only/faq.php#publishers. Five L o u i s i a n a , M i s s i s s i p p i a n d evacuate -- with several cars Filters recommends: Incinerating Alabama, and up to six feet in the packed with family and four Assange - The Liberal Media Go Florida Panhandle, as up to 18 To Work.

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Cain calls for support of ‘ABC—America’s Black Conservatives’ John Gizzi (» Today’s Top News)

applause line from the man most of them refer to with reverence as “Mr. Cain.” Submitted at 8/27/2012 7:08:21 AM Insisting on referring to “black TAMPA, Fla. — Although they people” instead of “Africancheered on a number of speakers Americans” (“I’ve only been to i n c l u d i n g R e p . M i c h e l e Africa once and I’ve been in Bachmann (R.-Minn.), the tea America all my life”), Cain partiers and their sympathizers dismissed a recent poll showing who gathered for what was billed “zero percent of black voters for as a “Unity Rally” Sunday Mitt Romney.” He said the evening gave their loudest cheers pollsters had obviously not talked — and clearly, their hearts — to to him or other blacks in the another former nomination rival audience, that “I’m not a zero,” of Mitt Romney. and that polls such as that were Forced out of the primaries “distractions, distortions, and earlier this year, Herman Cain diversions” designed to help made it clear to a standing-room- President Obama win re-election. only crowd at the River Church “And four more years of President that he will be soon be on a new Obama is a nightmare!” thundered n a t i o n w i d e t o u r b e f o r e t h e Cain. election and working for the The former GOP presidential e l e c t i o n o f f e l l o w b l a c k hopeful also made it clear that he conservatives. is going to play an active role in “I’m still on a mission to defeat politics. He announced his Barack Obama,” said Cain. The upcoming “Truth Tours,” in audience cheered, hanging on the which, with the help of Home former pizza mogul’s every word, Depot founder Bernie Marcus, he and cheered just about every will tour the U.S. discussing the

importance of the presidential election. His message will be focused, Cain said, on audiences of black children and black ministers. He also called for support of candidates such as Utah’s GOP nominee for U.S. House Mia Love, who will be featured as a primetime speaker when the national convention commences. Love, he said, is one of the candidates he supports who are “ABC—America’s Black Conservatives.” Is Cain himself disappointed he wasn’t tapped to address the convention? No, he said, answering his own question, “it’s not about me. It’s about our grandkids.” This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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profit down 53 pct excluding oneoff items. * Says steel prices unlikely to rebound much in H2. TheBull.com.au By Ruby Lian and Fayen Wong. China's Baosteel sees steel prices SHANGHAI, Aug 27 (Reuters) staying under pressure Baoshan Iron & Steel, China's... Reuters China set for record crude steel Baosteel Q2 profit 8.39 bln yuan, output MarketWatch boosted by asset sales. * H1 net all 38 news articles » Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:01:23 AM

Fusione fredda: l'E-cat industriale ha completato le certificazioni - NextMe (andrea rossi e-cat - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:26:13 AM

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E-Cat: presentazione ufficiale l'8 Settembre a Zurigo e le ultime notizie ufficiali WebMasterPoint.org (andrea rossi e-cat - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 6:30:43 AM

WebMasterPoint.org E-Cat: presentazione ufficiale l'8 Settembre a Zurigo e le ultime notizie ufficiali WebMasterPoint.org

Ci siamo, la prossima settimana sarà presentato l' E-Cat. La macchina per la fusione fredda (china - Google News) realizzata dall'italiano Andrea Rossi è al centro dell'evento di Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:00:42 AM Z u r i g o d e i p r o s s i m i 8 e 9 China AIDS patients topple gate settembre. All'Auditorium del of gov't office Technopark saranno spiegati la... CBS News China AIDS patients topple gate of gov't office. BEIJING —

Rossi to Dovi: Good Luck, Pal. You're Going To Need It. - SuperbikePlanet.com (Andrea Rossi - Google News)

Hayden and Marco Melandri each have in the last five years: Italy Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:15:36 AM and Japan may be 6,000 miles Rossi to Dovi: Good Luck, Pal. apart on the map, but they're a You're Going To Need It. million miles apart on their design SuperbikePlanet.com and engineering of a Grand... Andrea Dovizioso is about to and more » learn what Valentino Rossi, Nicky

Hoops outranking Jobs, Housing at Atlantic Yards so far in Brooklyn NorthJersey.com (blog) (housing - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:06:09 PM

Hoops outranking Jobs, Housing at Atlantic Yards so far in Brooklyn NorthJersey.com (blog) Looking back in my archives, I

China AIDS patients topple gate of gov't office - CBS News

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Sushma Swaraj says Congress got 'mota mal' in coal allocation 'scam' Indian Express

(Nation - Google News) About 300 AIDS patients and their relatives tore down the main Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:52:03 AM gate of a government office in The Hindu central China during a protest Sushma Swaraj says Congress Monday over unmet demands for got 'mota mal' in coal allocation financial assistance. Protester Li... 'scam' and more » Indian Express Stepping up its attack on the government, the BJP on Monday alleged that the Congress party got huge bribes in the allocation of 142 coal blocks and asserted they would continue to disrupt Parliament till Prime Minister I am a value investor through and Manmohan Singh resigns. through, so it is extremely rare Nothing less than PM's that a stock trading at 52 times r e s i g n a t i o n w i l l , s a y s B J P next year's expected earnings H i n d u s t a n T i m e s would grab my attention. The PM's statement 'deeply company would have to be seeing disappointing', cancel all 142 coal extraordinary growth and be a licences: Advani Times of India market leader in an industry... Coal controversy: PM rejects allegations of wrongdoing Livemint Economic Times- Firstpost all 903 news articles »

The Housing Recovery is Happening -- Here's how to Profit Before it's too Late - StreetAuthority (housing - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:03:03 PM

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BII MOBILE INSIGHTS: Microsoft May Be Winner In Apple Victory Over Samsung Heather Leonard (Business Insider)

Million Units A Year By 2016(BII Research) We're updating our global tablet forecast, which continues to call for explosive growth of the tablet market over the next 5 years. Here are the key points: • We're modestly reducing our unit forecast because "mini" tablets are now cannibalizing ereaders faster than we expected. We think this will lead to fewer ereaders being sold. • We project that global tablet revenue will grow at a 45 percent compound annual growth rate between 2012 and 2016. • We project that average selling prices will continue to fall rapidly, from about $420 this year to $290 in 2016. • We project that tablets will be a $130 billion market by 2016

second quarter 2012 Video Monetization Report reveals that video views on smartphones, Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:06:00 PM tablets, and game consoles Mobile Insights is the new daily doubled, hitting a record of more newsletter from BI Intelligence than 1 billion video views. The that collects and delivers the top proportion of those watching to mobile strategy news. Mobile the end of ads rose to 91%, Insights has replaced Business suggesting viewers are happy to Insider's investor newsletters. It is exchange ads for mobile viewing. delivered first thing every JoAnna Foyle Abel, the vice morning exclusively to BI president of marketing at Intelligence subscribers. Sign up Freewheel says, "It's all about here for a free trial of BI striking the right balance... The Intelligence today. trick is to monetize your content Microsoft May Be Winner In without disastrously eroding the Apple Victory Over Samsung( viewer experience." WSJ) Mobile Consumer Survey: What Apple victory over Samsung You Need To Know( Adobe) further cements the company's Digital marketers have been dominance of the wireless challenged to understand how industry and could accelerate the consumers engage with 2 new push by a variety of players to categories of mobile devices: 1) popularize a third alternative to smartphones and 2) tablets. Here the iPhone and to the Android Tablets are a disruptive media are some insights: ecosystem. It may provide a new consumption technology, not just • For consumers who own both a boost to Microsoft's effort as it a pleasure device for the wealthy. smartphone and a tablet, the seeks to win support from carriers Mobile Video Ads Moving p r i m a r y d e v i c e i s s t i l l t h e and device manufacturers. The T o w a r d T h e T V smartphone (88%). future of the Android ecosystem M o d e l ( F r e e w h e e l v i a • Facebook is the dominant social is now tinged with uncertainty, M o b i l e M a r k e t i n g ) network accessed via mobile at with other Android hardware and Consumers watching video 85%, followed by Twitter at 35%, software designs seen to be content on mobile devices are and Google+ at 21%. vulnerable to lawsuits. To add moving towards the model tried- • Mobile ads presented in both insult to injury, the iPad Mini has and-tested on TV: the ad break sites and apps have a high clickbeen confirmed for an October over the pre-roll. The research, by through rate (42% and 37%, release. Freewheel, shows that viewers respectively). TABLET M A R K E T can tolerate up to eight ads per 20 • Location services are on the rise FORECAST: Sales Will Top 450 minutes of video. Freewheel's and are being driven by consumer

incentives to check in. Younger demographics are more likely to check in (35%) versus senior at 18%.

• • • •

Minimize the use of images Do not rely on Javascript Optimize download speed Horizontal and vertical layouts

Over 42% have clicked-thru on mobile advertising, displayed on mobile websites? That's noteworthy. Traffic To Corporate Sites Hits High Of 11% In July(Investis) Mobile traffic to corporate websites reached a high of 11.1% in July 2012. These statistics come from corporate website analytics only as opposed to more general web traffic data gathered from search engines, consumer sites, social media platforms etc. These results indicate that the use of mobile has more than doubled from the same month the year before, for over a year. In July last year, mobile visits stood at 4.8%; they now top in at 11.1% and look to be growing all the time. Not surprising but the iPad continues to extend its lead over rival mobile handsets. The Most Important Guidelines O f M o b i l e W e b Development(Smashing Hub) Development in the world of mobile devices has made things a lot easier for mobile users. Here are the most important mobile web development guidelines: • Initiate with analytics • Visitor profiling

And much more but the most important guideline for mobile web development is to focus more on functionality and speed. Shopping On Mobile Devices This Holiday Will Be Like Nothing We've Seen(Retail Online Integration) The impact that mobile will have on holiday shopping this year will be unlike anything we've ever seen. According to comScore, more than 234 million Americans own mobile devices. Even more staggering is Cisco's prediction that the number of Internetconnected mobile devices on the planet will outnumber humans in 2012. Smartphones and tablets offer a level of accessibility and user engagement that can't be matched by any other platform, which is why brands and merchants need to make mobile their priority. Merchants need to pay close attention to industry trends if they hope to succeed in an increasingly competitive marketplace. Mobile Users Of The Future(CircleID) There are 953 million BII page 14

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Travelers Are Getting Really Steamed Over Airline Dress Codes AP (Business Insider)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:05:30 PM

Airlines give many reasons for refusing to let you board, but none stir as much debate as this: How you're dressed. A woman flying from Las Vegas on Southwest this spring says she was confronted by an airline employee for showing too much cleavage. In another recent case, an American Airlines pilot lectured a passenger because her T-shirt bore a four-letter expletive. She was allowed to keep flying after draping a shawl over the shirt. Both women told their stories to sympathetic bloggers, and the debate over what you can wear in the air went viral. It's not always clear what's appropriate. Airlines don't publish dress codes. There are no rules that spell out the highest hemline or the lowest neckline allowed. That can leave passengers guessing how far to push fashion boundaries. Every once in a while the airline says: Not that far. "It's like any service business. If you run a family restaurant and somebody is swearing, you kindly ask them to leave," says Kenneth Quinn, an aviation lawyer and former chief counsel at the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration. The American Airlines

passenger, who declined to be interviewed by The Associated Press, works for an abortion provider. Supporters suggested that she was singled out because her T-shirt had a pro-choice slogan. A spokesman for American says the passenger was asked to cover up "because of the F-word on the T-shirt." He says that the airline isn't taking sides in the abortion debate. Last week, Arijit Guha, a graduate student at Arizona State University, was barred from a Delta flight in Buffalo, N.Y., because of a T-shirt that mocked federal security agents and included the words, "Terrists gonna kill us all." He says the misspelled shirt was satirical and he wore it to protest what he considers racial profiling. "I thought it was a very American idea to speak up and dissent when you think people's rights are being violated," Guha says. The pilot thought it scared other passengers. American and Delta are within their rights to make the passengers change shirts even if messages are political, says Joe Larsen, a First Amendment lawyer from Houston who has defended many media companies. The First Amendment prohibits government from limiting a person's free-speech rights, but it

the same airline repeatedly allowed a middle-age man to travel wearing women's underwear and not much else. "You can't let someone repugnant like that (the cross-dresser) on the plane and single out this kid because he's black, wearing dreadlocks, and had two or three inches of his underwear showing," says the lawyer, Joseph D. O'Sullivan. "They can't arrest him for what someone perceives to be inappropriate attire." US Airways spokesman John McDonald says no passengers complained about the crossdresser until his photo in women's underwear circulated on the doesn't apply to rules set by airlines, which already rate near I n t e r n e t a f t e r t h e M a r m a n private companies, Larsen says. the bottom of all industries when incident. He says the airline He notes that government security it comes to customer satisfaction. doesn't have a dress code but that screeners didn't challenge Guha; Critics complain that airlines e m p l o y e e s m a y t a l k t o a private Delta employees did. e n f o r c e c l o t h i n g s t a n d a r d s passenger if other people might be In short, since airlines and their inconsistently. The lack of clear offended by the way he's dressed. planes are private property and rules leaves decisions to the "It's not an issue of a dress code, not a public space like the judgment of individual airline it's one of disruption," like watching pornography within courthouse steps, crews can tell employees. you what to wear. Last year, a passenger was pulled s i g h t o f o t h e r p a s s e n g e r s , In the early years of jet travel, off a US Airways jet and arrested M c D o n a l d s a y s . p a s s e n g e r s d r e s s e d u p a n d at San Francisco International An informal survey of passengers confrontations over clothing were Airport after airline employees at Dallas-Fort Worth International unimaginable. They're still rare â&#x20AC;&#x201D; say he refused to pull up his low- Airport found much support for there aren't any precise numbers h a n g i n g p a n t s . T h e l o c a l limits on clothing. â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but when showdowns happen, prosecutor declined to file charges "Curse words on shirts always they gain more attention as a g a i n s t D e s h o n M a r m a n , a bother me," says John Gordon, aggrieved passengers complain on U n i v e r s i t y o f N e w M e x i c o who just graduated from film the Internet about airline clothing f o o t b a l l p l a y e r . TRAVELERS page 15 cops. It's unwelcome publicity for Marman's lawyer complained that

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BII continued from page 12

smartphone subscriptions globally, but 6.1 billion voice (and text) mobile phone subscriptions. We're just skimming the surface of potential mobile Web users. So imagine the good news that will mean for potential sales when leads grow at an exponential rate. And while the U.S., China and Japan have the most mobile Web users today, it looks like Brazil, India and Vietnam are where mobile technology adoption is occurring the most rapidly. If you're responsible for your organization's IT infrastructure, these numbers matter. Mobility continues to grow and, more than ever, mobile-accessible sites are expected for businesses of all sizes. 4G Is Being Hailed As The Holy Grail Of Mobile Internet(Daily Mail) Doubtful. Very few phones currently in use will be able to actually take advantage of 4G because their software and radio receivers are not compatible with the new system. Not a single iPhone in the land (U.K.), for example, is 4G compatible. This may change with the advent of the iPhone 5, which happens coincidentally one day after the U.K. 4G network goes live, but it is looking quite possible that although this machine may be 4G compatible in the U.S. it won’t be here as a different part of the spectrum will be used. Apple’s

iPads won’t work on 4G either. Questions With An NFC Expert(Blackberry) Near Field Communications is a short-range wireless technology. According to Geoffrey MacGillivray, Manager, Services Security, Payments & NFC at RIM, there has been a lot of publicity around the introduction of NFC technology in mobile phones. And more and more companies and manufacturers are getting onboard with NFC. This is a new technology and will be adopted over the next several years. The vision of having NFC as a part of your daily life is one that we all should subscribe to. It’s going to take a little while to get there, but we’re pretty excited about how things are moving. Smartphones Overtake Feature Phones In China(IDC via The New Web) IDC‘s latest figures for China’s mobile market are out and the research firm has revealed that smartphone shipments outnumbered that of feature phones for the first time. The company reported that 44 million smartphones shipped during the period (April - June), that’s 51% of the total number of devices that IDC estimates were shipped during the period. Shipments of Apple devices dropped by one half during the quarter, but that lull is largely unsurprisingly given that consumers are holding out for the iPhone 5. What is significant,

however, is the rise of alternative options for Chinese smartphone users. Chinese Mobile Internet Is "Backward"(The New Web) China Ministry of Industry Vice Minister Liu Lihua candidly admitted that technology in his country’s mobile Internet industry, such as core devices and operating systems, have been “relatively backward” and have left overseas OS-makers like Apple and Google space to flourish in the market. Chinese Internet industry has developed its own titans, namely Tencent(IM, social networking), Baidu(search), Sina (Web portal, social n e t w o r k i n g ) a n d Alibaba(ecommerce). However, critics have accused domestic players, big and small, of failing to innovate and instead resorting to cloning successful overseas businesses. Nook Usage Jumps, Different Web Behavior Than Kindle Users( Chitika) According to Chitika, between June and August, the Barnes & Noble Nook’s Web usage increased 25.8% while the Kindle Fire’s increased by a meager 3.8%. Nook users are much more active online than the Kindle Fire users. While Amazon reported a 29% increase in sales of the Kindle Fire during the last quarter, there is no apparent correlation between the sales figures and actual Web usage. On

the other hand, Barnes & Noble reported a 10.38% loss in Nookrelated revenue during the last quarter, while its tablet’s Web usage increased significantly. With both devices having substantial user bases, this data indicates Nook users having very different usage habits as compared to Kindle Fire owners. Blackberry Web Usage Drops 25% From Last Year(Chitika) According to Chitika, Apple’s success with both the iPhone and iPad have led its devices to command a staggering 63% of all mobile traffic, up nearly 35% from slightly under year ago. RIM’s devices, despite the launch of the company’s long-developed BlackBerry Playbook tablet, control just over 1% of all mobile traffic after dropping almost 25% from last September. If RIM is to survive, it is either going to need to integrate its hardware and software to create a stunning, unique device, or change its business model to focus only on creating the hardware or software for smartphones. Please follow SAI on Twitter and Facebook. Join the conversation about this story »

West Coast franchise: FirstGroup defiant amid rail row - BBC News (Nation - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:07:15 AM

BBC News West Coast franchise: FirstGroup defiant amid rail row BBC News FirstGroup Chief Executive Tim O'Toole has accused Virgin of crying "crocodile tears" after it lost the franchise to run the West Coat Mainline contract for the next 13 years. Critics fear FirstGroup will not be able to afford the £5.5bn it is paying... Virgin lawyers prepare legal challenge to halt West Coast Mainline deal The Independent Branson's last-ditch plea on rail deal goes unheeded Reuters UK Labour MP calls for Parliamentary debate on rail bid Telegraph.co.uk Financial Times- ITV News- The Guardian all 529 news articles »

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VMware's Paul Maritz Just Turned The Company Over To New CEO Pat Gelsinger (VMW, EMC) Julie Bort (Business Insider) Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:02:32 PM

During the opening keynote at the VMware's customer conference in San Francisco, the outgoing CEO, Paul Maritz, officially turned the company over to the new chief executive, Pat Gelsinger. When the company announced this move last month, it came as a shock. But it may turn out to be a positive for VMware and EMC, the enterprise-hardware company which owns a controlling stake in it. Maritz is moving over to EMC s chief strategist. Gelsinger, who was EMC's president and COO, took on the CEO role at VMware. Many viewed this as setting up Maritz as heir apparent at EMC. Meanwhile, Gelsinger's move could be viewed as a promotion, too, since he's now running a publicly traded company. Gelsinger was responsible for much of EMC and VMware's success, managing critical partnerships such as the one with Cisco. "Pat is a passionate guy," said Maritz. "No one will accuse him

of being laid-back." Attendees cheered as Maritz took a seat offstage to watch the keynote. Maritz, who came from Microsoft, grew VMware from a young public company that was under attack by his former employer into one of the most important enterprise vendors in the world. Some 60% of Intel servers are now using virtualized servers, a technology that VMware helped popularize, according to market

TRAVELERS continued from page 13

school in Florida and was dressed in khaki shorts and a T-shirt. "It's an unspoken rule that when you go out in public, you should be respectful." But Leigh Ann Epperson, a corporate lawyer who had just flown in from Tokyo, says she wouldn't be bothered if another passenger's shirt bore the F-word. "If people are paying the price for their tickets, they should be able to wear what they want," says Epperson, who wore a black sweater over a low-cut blouse, black slacks and wedge-type heels. Airlines say they refund the passenger's fare if they deny boarding for inappropriate attire. Clashes over clothing and other flash points seem to be increasing, says Alexander Anolik, a travellaw attorney in Tiburon, Calif. He blames an unhappy mix of airline employees who feel underpaid researchers. Of those, 80% use and unloved, and passengers who V M w a r e . I t h a s 4 0 0 , 0 0 0 are stressed out and angry over customers—large, medium-sized, extra fees on everything from and small. In other words, VMware has won its market under Maritz. Gelsinger's job will be to find the next big growth area. Please follow SAI: Enterprise on Twitter and Facebook. Join the conversation about this (TREND HUNTER - The Latest story » Trends)

checking a bag to scoring an aisle seat. Anolik says that passengers should obey requests from airline employees. If passengers don't, they could be accused of interfering with a flight crew — a federal crime. He says passengers should wait until they're off the plane to file complaints with the airline, the U.S. Department of Transportation or in small-claims court. "They have this omnipotent power," Anolik says of flight crews. "You shouldn't argue your case while you're on the airplane. You're in a no-win scenario — you will be arrested." Now see how flight attendant uniforms have evolved over 80 years > Please follow Getting There on Twitter and Facebook. Join the conversation about this story »

Pendant-Inspired Lighting - The Ruskii + Ruskii Twist Lamps by Enrico Zanolla are Extravagant (TrendHunter.com) Submitted at 8/27/2012 7:33:03 AM

( TrendHunter.com) The Ruskii + Ruskii Twist Lamps by Italian designer Enrico Zanolla are

influenced by the St.Basil Cathedral in Moscow. The Designer created this impressive collection after a visit to Moscow,...

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World Politics Review Will Return Sept. 4 (World Politics Review: Articles)

examinations of single subjects, including Features, Special Submitted at 8/27/2012 4:02:00 AM Reports, and Strategic Posture World Politics Review will not Reviews. be publishing Aug. 27 through * Trend Lines provides daily Sept. 3. We will return with new expert viewpoints on current articles Tuesday, Sept. 4. In the events and issues, including our meantime, we invite subscribers "Global Insider" interview series. to explore our archives and to To help you closely follow catch up on in-depth content that international affairs: you may have missed. *A daily Media Roundup to help Nonsubscribers can sign up for a you track the stories that you must free trial now. Those who sign up f o l l o w t o s t a y i n f o r m e d . for a free trial by Sept. 2 will P u b l i s h e d a t automatically have their two- www.worldpoliticsreview.com/ week trial extended to Sept. 17, media-roundup and sent out by eguaranteeing two weeks of access mail every weekday morning during our active publishing (U.S. Eastern time). schedule. *A daily Leading Indicators To help you better understand service to alert you to emerging i n t e r n a t i o n a l a f f a i r s , W P R stories from obscure sources provides: before they become mainstream *Daily five-minute reads. news. Also published at Briefings are written by our www.worldpoliticsreview.com/ g l o b a l n e t w o r k o f e x p e r t media-roundup and sent out by econtributors, on matters of current mail every weekday afternoon importance. Columns provide a (U.S. Eastern time). different authoritative take on *A video section where we international affairs every day of regularly post video reports by the week. some of the world's top news *In-depth, full-length reports outlets, including Reuters, AFP, p r o v i d i n g c o m p r e h e n s i v e the Associated Press, and more.

Tools to support your research and give you background information: *Access to our entire searchable archives is included in each subscription, and institutional subscribers also get access to the World Politics Review database on EBSCOhost. *WPR's Media Roundup, Leading Indicators and Video sections are all individually searchable, so subscribers can find reports on topics of interest from dozens of international news sources. Photo: Beach reading (photo by Flickr user chintermeyer, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic agreement). This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Crime branch seeks death penalty for Arun Gawli in murder case - Business Standard (Nation - Google News)

crime branch said it was a case in which... Gawli, 11 others, convicted for The Hindu Sena corporator's murder Times Crime branch seeks death penalty of India for Arun Gawli in murder case Arun Gawli, 11 others may be Business Standard sentenced today Hindustan Times PTI / Mumbai August 27, 2012, Gawli sentencing today Indian 22:05 City crime branch today Express demanded capital punishment for Daily News & Analysis- The gangster-turned-politician Arun Hindu Gawli, who was convicted in Shiv all 69 news articles » Sena corporator Kamlakar Jamsandekar murder case. The Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:41:15 AM

Gairloch canoe capsize: Brothers named by police - BBC News (Nation - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:41:44 AM

BBC News Gairloch canoe capsize: Brothers named by police BBC News Two children who died after a canoe capsized on a west Highland sea loch, and their father who is still missing, have been named by police. Two-year-old Jamie Beaton and his five-year-

old brother Ewen were among six people in the boat when it... Hopes fade for missing man after his sons drown in loch canoe accident stv.tv Canoe Tragedy: Brothers And Missing Dad Named Sky News Loch Gairloch canoe tragedy family 'utterly devastated' Metro Channel 4 News- The Independent all 820 news articles »

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Essex lion hunt called off as police search finds no evidence of big cat - The Independent (Nation - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:03:34 AM

The Guardian Essex lion hunt called off as police search finds no evidence of big cat The Independent Police have called off a search for a lion reportedly on the loose in Essex. Officers have spent almost 24 hours combing the countryside around Clacton-on-

Newman gives Labor a lift Brisbane Times

Sea after a group of residents yesterday claimed to have seen the king of the jungle near Earls... Picture emerges of the '100 per cent lion' Telegraph.co.uk Essex lion: Police helicopters and (Nation - Google News) firearms officers continue search Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:08:14 AM Metro Essex 'lion': Police call off St Brisbane Times Osyth animal search BBC News Newman gives Labor a lift Brisbane Times Washington Post- Sky News Sydney Morning Herald chief all 1,009 news articles » political correspondent Phillip Coorey says shifting opinion on Queensland Premier Campbell Newman could be helping Labor federally. Fancy an elected leader likening people's jobs to dog poo.

Boil it down and that's what the... Abbott supports state financial cuts: Newman The Australian Twelve LNP MPs would go due to Campbell Newman's declining popularity, poll... Herald Sun Galaxy Research shows two out of three people believe Newman's job cuts going... Courier Mail Sydney Morning Herald- ABC Online all 212 news articles »

Police slammed over Court discharges three in death inquiry - Sydney Azad Maidan violence case - Business Standard Morning Herald (Nation - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:11:19 AM

Sydney Morning Herald Police slammed over death inquiry Sydney Morning Herald NSW Police are under new scrutiny over their failure to respond to findings of a cover-up in the investigation of a failed police operation that resulted in the shooting death of a mentally

(Nation - Google News)

ill Sydney man. The Police Integrity Commission heard... Police account of killing disputed The Australian NSW police face more questions on cover-up The Canberra Times Sydney police questioned over death of mentally ill man ABC Online NEWS.com.au- BigPond News all 113 news articles »

August 11 Azad Maidan violence after the crime branch moved an application saying the... IBNLive.com Jamiat-ul-Ulema protests Court discharges three in Azad custodial beatings of Azad Maidan violence case Maidan violence accused India Business Standard Today PTI / Mumbai August 27, 2012, Court discharges 3 in Azad 22:05 The esplanade metropolitan Maidan violence case Daily m a g i s t r a t e ' s c o u r t t o d a y Bhaskar discharged three of the 51 accused all 7 news articles » arrested in connection with the Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:41:16 AM

Report finds illegal drug use is rampant in Aussie jails Herald Sun (Nation - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:48:13 AM

NEWS.com.au Report finds illegal drug use is rampant in Aussie jails Herald Sun AUSTRALIAN jails are still rife with illegal drugs despite efforts to curb supplies, a report says. The nation's prison population grew by 30 per cent in the seven years to 2009, the Australian National Council on Drugs (ANCD) says. Billions failing to stem jail drug flow The Australian Advisers hail jail needle 'stand' The Canberra Times all 24 news articles »

AP source: Bills acquire QB Tarvaris Jackson (Sports News Headlines Yahoo! News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:36:54 AM

The Buffalo Bills have a new backup quarterback in Tarvaris Jackson, and they have cut Vince Young.

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Apple And Samsung Are Both Losers Dan Rowinski (ReadWriteWeb) Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:00:00 PM

The fallout from Apple’s win over Samsung in a California patent court has been an extension of the rhetoric that took place within the court. Apple, smug afterh its billion-dollar settlement, claims the whole case was about values. Samsung still holds to the line that Apple’s design patents are frivolous and the real loser is the consumer. Neither side is wrong. As much as Apple and Samsung want everybody to believe that one is on the side of good while the other is completely evil, the reality is that that is just not true. It is possible to not be right while not precisely being wrong. Apple’s “Values” Apple’s CEO Tim Cook called the victory a triumph of values. “For us this lawsuit has always been about something much more important than patents or money. It’s about values. We value originality and innovation and pour our lives into making the best products on earth. And we do this to delight our customers, not for competitors to flagrantly copy,” Cook wrote in a memo leaked to 9to5 Mac. Cook is not wrong, but he is not correct. Apple is right to defend itself against copying. But, it is not like Apple was defending the invention of fire. It was defending design patents based on the size

and shape of the iPad and iPhone as well as utility patents used in iOS. None of the patents that Apple fought tooth and nail over in the name of values are particularly innovative. The utility patents may have some functions specific to iOS, but the Android manufacturers have already figured a way around most of those because it was not the function that Apple patented so much as how the function is performed. Companies like HTC, Samsung and Motorola have been working on ways to circumvent those patents through design and functional updates to their devices, and Apple will have little grounds in court to sue the Android manufacturers over these same functions again. The patents themselves are just weapons against Samsung and other Android manufacturers. The settlement money is also of no concern to Apple. This is a company that is one of the most valuable in the history of the world, sitting on a $100 billion in liquid assets. But taking a billion dollars from Samsung was a reward in itself. Cook’s comments about values is public relations. Most journalists, analysts and tech enthusiasts have a better understanding of Apple’s motivations under the surface. Apple's two biggest motivations were to set a precedent for all its upcoming patent cases and to

rectangles with rounded corners, slow the Android ecosystem's or technology that is being growth. The more Apple can improved every day by Samsung hobble Android, the more iPhones and other companies.” and iPads it can sell. With It is difficult to believe both Apple’s extraordinarily high companies. Samsung says that margins, there is a lot of money Apple’s win is bad for innovation. Apple said it is good for on the table. The effect on Samsung is i n n o v a t i o n . A g a i n , n e i t h e r marginal in the short term. This company is right, but neither is case was mostly about Samsung’s wrong. When Apple speaks of long product tail, with devices innovation, it is not talking about that had been on the market a year or more running software that has the broad scope of technology been completely overhauled to innovation. Apple is talking about a v o i d t h e s e s p e c i f i c A p p l e its own innovation. Innovation that has been called into question patents. Samsung will likely appeal the many times over the years. Apple judgment, mostly to avoid the is seen as a company that makes precedent that the case sets. This technologies better and sexier and is not the last time these two prices its devices higher than the companies will meet in court over competition to pad its margins. patents. Apple’s win makes it Samsung is essentially saying more likely that its similar patent that Apple’s designs and its legal cases against Samsung and other claims are frivolous. It is implying Android manufacturers will result that if Apple can improve on in injunctions against Android technologies and not be found devices. Samsung needs to negate guilty of copying, then so can we. that precedent. Samsung: “Loss Samsung certainly has a high opinion of itself. By calling the for the American Consumer” After the announcement of the verdict “a loss for the American v e r d i c t , S a m s u n g i s s u e d a consumer” it is saying that its products are so good that the U.S. statement: “Today’s verdict should not be consumer will suffer for the loss. viewed as a win for Apple, but as It is the same tactic that Samsung a loss for the American consumer. has used in most of its court cases It will lead to fewer choices, less against Apple across the world. innovation, and potentially higher “This bully is bad for us, bad for prices. It is unfortunate that patent you, bad for everybody.” law can be manipulated to give Samsung itself is a bit of a bully. one company a monopoly over It has the manufacturing might to flood the mobile market with so

many devices at so many price points that it is squeezing not just Apple, but the other Android manufacturers. Motorola’s market presence is almost non-existent at this point and HTC is flailing. Samsung, not Apple, is the biggest culprit behind Nokia’s fall from grace. Samsung’s shotgun strategy works and cannot (or, cannot without great difficulty) be replicated by any other Android manufacturer. Samsung’s own rhetoric is as hypocritical as Apple’s. While Samsung claims it did not copy Apple in the slightest way (and it has a case for that, despite the jury’s verdict), there is no question that some of Samsung’s smartphones do look very similar to the iPhone. The Winner? Nobody In the end, the outcome was predictable. Can anyone say that Samsung could win a case with a Californian jury in the shadow of Cupertino? Samsung never really stood a chance. The battle of rhetoric does neither company justice. Apple comes off with a morality play that is almost laughable. Samsung sounds like a whining, arrogant twit that insists it did nothing wrong. With this decision, all Android manufacturers lose, not just Samsung. In the end, that is how the American consumer loses too.

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Apple vs Samsung Amended verdict form released Chris Burns (SlashGear)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:47:57 AM

In the first of what may very well be a long line of “amended” verdict forms in the Apple vs Samsung case here in the USA, a full list of damages has been displayed with each of the smartphones and tablets at hand listed aside their amount. Samsung has been quite vocal thus far on how little they agree with the charges, of course, and this first amended list will certainly be strengthening their case for the entire trial to be rethought. This set of changes sits aside comments over the weekend by the jury that have led the public to wonder how solid their deliberations were as well. Some of the un-changed rulings sit in this document as well, including the ruling that said Apple was unable to keep their “trade dress” for the iPhone and iPad, but that the iPhone 3GS trade dress would stand. This ruling allows Apple to continue to seek damages against manufacturers that create smartphones with a look that’s significantly similar to the shape of the iPhone 3GS. It also sets a prescient for Apple’s next devices in the iPhone 5 and possible iPad mini / iPad Air of the future. As for damages changed in this

ruling, they are as follows (in $ USD): Captivate . . . . . . . . . .80,840,162 Continuum . . . . . . . . . .16,399,117 Droid Charge. . . . . . . . .50,672,869 Epic 4G. . . . . . . . . . .130,180,894 Exhibit 4G . . . . . . . . . .1,081,820 Fascinate. . . . . . . . . .143,539,179 Galaxy Ace . . . . . . . . . . . . . .0 Galaxy Prevail. . . . . . . .57,867,383 Galaxy S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .0

Galaxy S 4G . . . . . . . . .73,344,668 Galaxy S II (AT&T). . . . . .40,494,356 Galaxy S II (i9000). . . . . . . . . .0 Galaxy S II (T-Mobile). . . .83,791,708 Galaxy S II (Epic 4G Touch).100,326,988 Galaxy S II (Skyrocket) . . .32,273,558 Galaxy S (Showcase) . . . . .22,002,146 Galaxy Tab . . . . . . . . .

.1,966,691 Galaxy Tab 10.1 WiFi . . . . . .833,076 Galaxy Tab 10.1 4G LTE . . . . . . . .0 Gem. . . . . . . . . . . . . .4,075,585 Indulge . . . . . . . . . . .16,011,184 Infuse 4G . . . . . . . . . .44,792,974 Intercept. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .0 Mesmerize . . . . . . . . . .53,123,612 Nexus S 4G . . . . . . . . . .1,828,297 Replenish. . . . . . . . . . .3,350,256

Transform. . . . . . . . . . . .953,060 Vibrant . . . . . . . . . . .89,673,957 Several of these devices were originally costing Samsung quite a bit more than zero – not a mistake that Samsung is taking lightly. Check out the full first amended verdict form here in PDF format. Per Groklaw, there’ve been some comments from the jury that the following was true once the first ruling was APPLE page 25

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7 Pearls Of Startup Wisdom From Investors and Innovators Who Matter Taylor Hatmaker (ReadWriteWeb)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 7:30:00 AM

From the art of the pitch to a smooth sale and everything in between, these seven tenets come straight from the annals of successful startups. Last week, Vancouver's GROW 2012 conference convened some all-stars of the startup scene, stirring together corporate leads from Indiegogo, Eventbrite, Zite, Paypal, Cheezburger Inc. and more with infamous super angel Dave McClure and a smattering of high profile venture capitalists from firms like Bessemer and the Founders Fund. We crunched it all up into seven bits of bite-sized startup wisdom that bear repeating: 1. Don't Be F*cking Boring Pitch with emotion. This is obvious, but you'd be surprised how often it's ignored. If you don't believe in your product, how can you possibly expect an investor or reporter to care? In the sage, profanity-laced words of super angel Dave McClure, "You should totally be dancing your f*cking balls off." 2. Building A Great Product Is Not. Good. Enough. Know your business model from the get-go. Too many startups create a great product and try to

red pants if you have to. Grow 2012 attendees listen intently to a keynote with Vancouver Harbour at their backs 5. Get It All On Paper Don't be naive. Unless you want the bottom to drop out, get it all in writing. Zite CEO Mark Johnson (who recently sold the company to CNN for more than $20 million) stressed that when it comes to acquisitions, you don't want to be empty handed with a bunch of unfulfilled promises if management changes or if there's less follow-through than you'd expected. 6. Hire Hackers, Hustlers And Hipsters Focus on building a team, when it comes to skills and personalities. McClure suggests bringing together three main types: hackers, hustlers and hipsters. The hackers build the product, the hustlers sell it, and the hipsters figure out a revenue model later, SharePoint, the market leader. Fighter- pranced around the entire make the design look good. But says Urban Airship's Scott The media picked it up as a David conference in rooster red pants, beyond their immediate skillsets, Kveton. That is putting the cart vs. Goliath story, and sure spouting phallocentric double the personalities that converge before the horse - even if it enough, it became true. Create the entendres. He barely had to early on will set the tone for your doesn't seem like it. 3. Fake It 'Til perception that you're a market explain his product to make it to company's climate, especially if it You Make It leader too - but don't forget to the final round of Grow's Startup explodes. 7. Look Beyond The If you say you built it, they will deliver on the promise. 4. Dont Be Smackdown competition. He Valley come. When Box COO Dan Levin Afraid To Be Ridiculous didn't drum up buzz because his If the conference proved took the stage, he drove home the At Grow 2012, everyone was product raised a huge round of anything, it was that Silicon power of turning perception into b u z z i n g a b o u t a n u n l i k e l y capital, or had a business model Valley doesn't have the market r e a l i t y w i t h s o m e s t r i k i n g Facebook game in which you that was particularly lucid - it just c o r n e r e d o n i n n o v a t i o n o r anecdotes. In its earlier days, Box battle roosters against one another made for a good (if easy) joke. investing. Among Portland, asserted that it belonged in the (presumably to the death). The Obnoxious, sure. Memorable? PEARLS page 21 same league as Microsoft's creator of the game - called Kawk Definitely. Wear the proverbial

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Brain Hacking: Scientists Extract Personal Secrets With Commercial Christian Hardware Gregory Ferenstein (TechCrunch)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:46:27 AM

Chalk this up to super-creepy: scientists have discovered a way to mind-read personal secrets, such as bank PIN numbers and personal associations, using a cheap headset. Utilizing commercial brain-wave reading devices, often used for hands-free gaming, the researchers discovered that they could identify when subjects recognized familiar objects, faces, or locations, which helped them better guess sensitive information. Security interrogators could benefit most immediately from the new brain hacking technique, since it would reveal when suspects are actually familiar with the face of a potential accomplice. As for bank information, scientists could guess the first PIN number only 40% of the time. But, as brain-controlled devices become more common, the

researches warn that viruses could discretely display images on a screen and help tech-savvy thieves narrow down their search for private information. Brainwave-reading devices, which control computers handsfree, have become increasingly popular for entertainment, control of prosthetics for paralyzed individuals, and military application. The latest commercial versions of brain-reading devices, often used by researchers and software developers, can cost as little as $300 (the product pictured above is the “ Emotiv“). So, in the eerily titled, “On the Feasibility of Side-Channel Attacks with Brain-Computer Interfaces,” a team of researchers from Oxford, Berkeley, and Geneva tested the liklihood that hackers could hijack the device and attempt to uncover sensitive information. “More specifically, we are interested in understanding how easily this technology can be

PEARLS continued from page 20

Seattle and Vancouver, the Pacific Northwest corridor is bustling with ideas, investors and fledgling companies well beyond the

solipsistic forcefield of technology's startup-glutted beating heart.

turned against its users to reveal their private information, that is, information they would not knowingly or willingly share,” wrote the researchers. Participants were outfitted with commercial-grade brain-wave reading devices and shown a list of people, possible PIN numbers, and the likely location of their home. Often, when the researchers stumbled upon the actual information they were seeking, they saw an expected spike in brain-wave P300, which is known to activate when presented with familiar information. Researchers could guess the correct answer for participants’ first PIN number 20% of the time, the regional location of their home 30%, birth month 60%, and the bank branch of their ATM 30%. With refinement, the researchers imagine that the brain-hacking technique will get more accurate. For instance, when trying to identify a persons home, “we

envision possible future attacks in which the true geo- graphic location of a user is leaked by showing maps or landmarks with increased accuracy.” For now, the most immediate benefit is for law enforcement interrogation (which is essentially a guessing game). This new technique would reveal, with higher probability, when a subject actually recoginizes the face of a potential accomplice. But, of course, the applications are endless. Brands could use it to identify the mass-market awareness of a particular product. Facebook could identify whether users actually know the people they recommend under the “people you may know” section. As brain-wave reading technologies become more pervasive, it appears we will inadvertently leave ourselves vulnerable to a new security threat: mind hacking.

World Adoption noreply@blogger.com (Ad ServeRSS) (AdServRSS Feed)

Christian World Adoption is one of the largest international adoption agencies in the United States. Since 1991, Christian World Adoption has placed thousands of children from Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America. These children now enjoy the love and security of a forever family. Christian World Adoption currently offers adoption programs in Bulgaria, China, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Ukraine. Explore our website to learn more about international adoption. Then, when you’re ready, call our friendly adoption counselor, toll free, at 1.888.97ADOPT.

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Google Glass team grabs ex-Rdio and Danger engineer Chris Davies (SlashGear) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:01:35 AM

Google has snatched up ex-Rdio software engineer Ian McKellar to bolster its growing Google Glass wearable computing team, as the company readies its first “Explorer Edition” hardware for developers in early 2013. McKellar formerly worked on the API for streaming music service Rdio, but has a history in developing social-integrated browsers and for Danger, supporting the Sidekick smartphone later acquired by Microsoft. At Danger, McKellar was responsible for a webpage server that “transcoded web pages to Danger’s hiptop smartphones” among other things, helping trim the bandwidth fat from sites and make sure they’d display correctly on the handsets themselves. That experience could well be of interest to the Glass team, since regular webpages are likely to require some reformatting to suit the wearable eyepiece of the Google headset. Eyes-on reports from those who

have tried out Google’s current prototypes suggest the userexperience as it stands sees floating iconography and other information superimposed at the top of the wearer’s line-of-sight. Glass will not only need a way to parse online data to suit that minimized display segment, but to trim the information fat so as to avoid lag or huge tethering bills. One way around that could be

heavy server-side processing, crunching the data for each individual user – whether alerts, Twitter or Google+ pings, messenger requests or websites – and then squirting it over to their eyepiece. That would reduce the amount of processing power the Glass wearable itself would require, thus cutting down on power consumption. McKellar also worked on the

Flock social networking and media sharing browser, which had heavy integration with Facebook and other services. Google is likely to focus on Google+ integration in Glass initially, but is unlikely to ignore Facebook, Twitter and other third-party services in the long term. The first Google Glass Explorer Edition units went on sale to developers at Google IO, and are

expected to be shipped out early in the new year. A consumer version is planned for within a year of that point. Story Timeline • Google Glass Explorer Edition ships 2013 for $1,500 • Google IO 2012: Project Glass wrap-up • Are $1,500 Google Glasses a bargain? • Consumer Google Glasses due less than 12 months after developer version • Google IO 2012: Jelly Bean, Nexus 7, Google Glasses and Nexus Q • No 3G/4G for Google Glass • Sergey Brin talks Project Glass at IO 2012 • Google Glass controls and Artificial Intelligence detailed • Google Glass grabs developer outreach chief from Gmail • Google Glass Explorers brings VIP flavor to the AR tech Google Glass team grabs ex-Rdio and Danger engineer is written by Chris Davies& originally posted on SlashGear. © 2005 - 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Elizabeth Warren Aide Knocks Around Republican Cameraman Michael Warren (The Weekly Standard)

An aide to Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, appears to have

knocked the video camera of a Republican tracker after an event this weekend in Martha's

Vineyard. Watch the video below:

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Scientists start hacking minds with cheap EEG gear Tim Hornyak (CNET News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:02:13 AM

The Emotiv EPOC headset sells for $299.(Credit: Emotiv Systems) Are the deepest secrets of your mind safe? Could thieves trick you into revealing your bank card PIN or computer passwords just by thinking about them? Theoretically, it could happen. Ivan Martinovic of the University of Oxford and colleagues at the University of Geneva and University of California at Berkeley describe research into that question in a paper entitled "On the Feasibility of SideChannel Attacks With BrainComputer Interfaces" presented earlier this month at the 21st USENIX Security Symposium. The research was inspired by the growing number of games and other mind apps available for lowcost consumer EEG devices such as Emotiv's EPOC headset, which lets users interact with computers using their thoughts alone. Malicious developers could create a "brain spyware" app designed to trick users into thinking about sensitive information, which it would then steal.

The research focused on the P300 brain signal, often emitted when something meaningful is recognized. It has been considered in the design of recent lie detectors. Twenty-eight subjects using Emotiv headsets were shown images such as numbers, bank cards, ATMs, and people's faces while being asked specific questions that target specific

information. Their brain waves, specifically the P300, were treated with signal processing software. The private info extracted from the tests was 15-40 percent less random, or uncertain, compared to guessing alone. "The captured EEG signal could reveal the user's private information about, e.g., bank cards, PIN numbers," the

researchers conclude. "This is still very noisy data signal, (and the) devices are not made for detecting these kinds of patterns," Martinovic told the conference, "but it was possible to see that in any of these experiments, we could actually perform better than a pure random guess." He noted that the quality of the EEG devices and the signals they produce is bound to improve, and attackers could exploit that increased accuracy. "There's a question about whether there is a potential for more sophisticated attacks -- can we embed these attacks in videos, online games?" In the future when you're playing Professor X and controlling things your thoughts, have a care for who might be eavesdropping. (Via CBS Seattle) This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Psychedelic Rebel Photoshoots Click Clash by Teneshia Carr for Kurv is Wild and Badass (TrendHunter.com) (TREND HUNTER - The Latest Trends) Submitted at 8/27/2012 7:54:03 AM

( TrendHunter.com) Click Clash by Teneshia Carr for Kurv Magazine is an eccentrically patterned series photographed for the upcoming fall and winter 2012 issue. The photographer Teneshia Carr has captured the models...

Unilever sees 'return to poverty' in Europe Szu Ping Chan (Finance News Business news from the UK and world) Submitted at 8/27/2012 8:25:55 AM

Unilever will adopt marketing strategies used in developing countries in order to drive future growth in Europe, as the head of its European business warned that poverty will rise in the region as a result of the debt crisis.

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Gems Eyes A Who Will Have The Biggest Pocket Younger Female Audience Impact On Your Wallet With Tap Campus Life Obama or Romney? Kim-Mai Cutler (TechCrunch)

value will come from making new things,” said chief operating officer Ben Liu, who pointed to Christina Ortiz (ReadWriteWeb) President. (It's important to note Pocket Gems, a Sequoia Capital- All Talk, a charades-like game backed mobile gaming startup, is where players have to describe an Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:00:00 AM Co-founders Nikita Bier and that the maps on the national e y e i n g a y o u n g e r f e m a l e object without actually saying the l e v e l , w h i c h a r e a l m o s t Jeremy Blalock, along with their Politify is a recently launched team, used IRS and Census data completely blue, don't take into demographic with a new game out word to another player. He added, web application that uses IRS and to find how household income is account population density.) It's today — Tap Campus Life. It puts “Maybe the Facebook game Census data to show a simulation generated and what government no surprise that areas of the the company in more direct industry is sunsetting, but mobile of how President Obama and Mitt services those households use. country that are more affluent competition with rivals like is going to be huge.” Romney's economic plans will Based on this information, the benefit from Romney's plan. Crowdstar, which is behind In Tap Campus Life, players impact areas of the country by zip web app creates a simulation of However, according to Poltify's fashion-focused Top Girl and have to recruit other women to code, even allowing users to zoom how President Obama and Mitt findings, rural areas of the country Social Girl. Tap Campus Life is a join their sorority. Each of them sorority and fashion game where has a different type of character. in on their own neighborhood. Romney's economic plans will that usually vote Republican, players have to build up a house For example, a “Sporty” girl will Last year, during primary season, affect specific areas of the would benefit most from the by recruiting new members and level up through doing physical Politify began as a web app that country. To find out the personal Obama plan. activity. There are quests like offered a simple way to decide impact of the separate plans, The group says they are non- decorating. w h a t p r e s i d e n t i a l p r i m a r y potential voters can input their partisan, Bier told The Next Web Like other freemium gaming hosting “wine-tasting parties” and candidate would be best for voters annual income, filing status and this week that he describes companies, Pocket Gems should doing yoga. Each girl also has a economically. Now that the dust other information to see which himself as "radically moderate" be facing some heat or downward set of jobs that she progresses has cleared and we're down to two candidate would benefit them. and says he has no personal pressure on valuations after through. A girl who starts out as a candidates, the app has been Locally, users can zoom over motivation for any particular Zynga’s tumultuous decline from “ditch digger,” can level up to upgraded, thanks in large part to their city's zip codes on a map to outcome. However, he hopes that a $14 billion valuation before its a plant nursery cashier then to a grants from UC Berkley and the see what candidate's plan benefits using the web app will encourage IPO to its current $2.5 billion gardener and eventually all the Sunlight Foundation. Previously, their community most. On a people to vote for a candidate market capitalization. In theory, way up to a landscape architect. it was a tax calculator, now it national level, graphs of the based on what's best for them and that should dampen valuations for The monetization model is pretty shows how each candidate's potential change in deficit and their community, rather than venture-backed companies that standard for this genre of game. economic plan will affect voters impact on households are shown. f o c u s i n g o n c r i t e r i a l i k e are comparable to Zynga across There’s an earned currency that the board. But Pocket Gems says gets picked up as the women work in personal, local and national B o t h c u r r e n t l y f a v o r t h e a p p e a r a n c e o r m o r a l s . it has had its best month ever in on their jobs, and then there’s a figures. terms of revenues, particularly paid currency that can go toward with games like Tap Paradise buying clothes. Cove. Pocket Gems had the Pocket Gems, which is up to 140 distinction of having two of the employees, raised $5 million in top 10 highest-grossing iOS Sequoia Capital back in 2010, and games last year, so it has a very t h e n t h e r e w a s a d d i t i o n a l Jonathan Wynne-Jones BP has been forced to recall more cars. high bar to live up to. financing from Redpoint (Finance News - Business news than 2 million gallons of petrol “We’re in a space of all fastVentures. from the UK and world) after thousands of motorists followers but long-term lasting complained of problems with their Submitted at 8/27/2012 8:53:47 AM Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:00:29 PM

BP recalls two million gallons of petrol after thousands complain of problems

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SlashGear Morning Wrap-Up: August 27th, 2012 Chris Burns (SlashGear)

comment“we will continue until our arguments have been accepted.” Samsung is seeking As we ramp up for IFA 2012, permission to keep selling the several companies are prepping a Galaxy Tab 10.1 in the USA. One collection of devices that will be surprise beneficiary of this whole revealed for Autumn, including situation is Nokia as their stock quite visibly LG, Samsung, and a springs up almost 11 percent. set of camera-slinging groups. P e r h a p s t h e m o s t d a m n i n g Have a peek first at the LG moment post-verdict thus far has Optimus Vu II for universal been a comment from a jury remote goodness. Next you’ll member saying that they’d aimed want to have a look at what very to“punish” Samsung – this being well may be the specifications for a direct affront on what penalties the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 as for patents are supposed to be. well. Those of you that have no There’s been a refresh of the idea what IFA is, you’ll want to Belle interface for Symbian see this nutshell guide before you devices, believe it or not. There’s dive in. a Samsung Android camera The Apple vs Samsung trial may coming to IFA 2012. The HTC have had a verdict, but it’s far device called “proto” so far has from over. Start with Samsung’s been renamed HTC Desire X.

Hip-hop artist will.i.am is set to premiere his newest audio track on Mars via the NASA Curiosity rover. The new iPhone – codenamed iPhone 5 for now – has been spotted sporting NFC

You’ll want to check out the column by Philip Berne entitled Fixing the Deadliest Gadget all about gun rights. Don’t forget also to see the specs that have been released thus far for a very nondangerous gadget by the name of LG Optimus G. Also don’t forget to check out our hands-on with the recently released Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 4G LTE from Verizon – and ask any and all questions you might have about it! SlashGear Morning Wrap-Up: capabilities – right behind the August 27th, 2012 is written by camera up top. There’s a Samsung Chris Burns& originally posted on hybrid tablet with keyboard SlashGear. headed for IFA with Windows 8. © 2005 - 2012, SlashGear. All Dropbox now has two-step right reserved. verification for security strength.

results of this trial to be quite long -lasting as well! Story Timeline • Samsung damages over 1 billion dollars vs Apple • Apple damages vs Samsung: ZERO • Samsung's damages decrease slightly as Koh sets date for injunction hearing • Values vs. Choice: Apple and Samsung speak on $1bn verdict • Apple jury didn't want to give Samsung 'just a slap on the wrist'

• Apple vs. Samsung: Everything Changes, Everything Stays the Same • Apple Samsung jury speed doubts raised after "punishment" ruling • Samsung down, Nokia up, Google glib: The Apple fallout continues • Samsung demands Galaxy Tab 10.1 US sales permission plus Apple damages • Samsung: "We will continue

Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:46:22 AM

APPLE continued from page 19

found to be incorrect: The jury appears to have awarded damages for the Galaxy Tab 10.1 LTE infringing — $219,694 worth — but didn’t find that it had actually infringed anything….A similar inconsistency exists for the Intercept, for which they’d awarded Apple over $2 million. Intercept: “The jury found no direct infringement but did find inducement” for the ’915 and

’163 utility patents. If a device didn’t infringe, it would be rather hard for a company to induce said non-existant infringement. These quotes are also listed on live coverage of the reading of the events from The Verge who sat in on the trial. Stay tuned to our coverage of the trial as it continues on well past the reading of the verdict. Expect Samsung and Apple to stay at war for months to come, and for the

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Samsung to demo new Windows 8 hybrid tablet next week Lance Whitney (CNET News)

Computex in June, the Series 5 can function as both tablet and notebook, letting users snap the Samsung will take the wraps off 11-inch tablet onto the dock with its new Windows 8 hybrid tablet keyboard and touchpad. at the IFA 2012 trade show in Samsung has been teasing the the Berlin. new tablet with a video offering a The company's Facebook page few quick peeks at its exterior. A displays a photo of the new tablet few key details were revealed in with the tagline "Ready to be June. smart" and the phrase "IFA 2012, Equipped with an Intel chip, the Berlin." Samsung is also telling its tablet will run the full flavor of Facebook followers "Don't worry, Windows 8, not the Windows RT it's just around the corner..." version. An 8-megapixel camera IFA 2012 gets off the ground this graces the rear with a 2-megapixel Friday and runs until September camera in front. Samsung put the 5. battery life at around 10 hours and The photo itself portrays the noted that the tablet is charged W i n d o w s 8 t a b l e t i n t h e while docked. foreground with its keyboard dock Windows 8 tablet makers will p a r t i a l l y r e v e a l e d i n t h e have to compete with Microsoft's b a c k g r o u n d . U n v e i l e d a t own Surface tablet. Trying to Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:32:10 AM

outduel the iPad and Android tablets, Surface will offer a kickstand and an attachable keyboard, allowing it to function in part as a notebook. Some Windows 8 tablet vendors

have expressed concerns over Microsoft's entry into this new market. Acer chairman JT Wang publicly pleaded with Microsoft not to sell the Surface too cheaply. Lenovo

CEO Yang Yuanqing said recently that he's not happy about Microsoft getting into the Windows 8 hardware business, but he vowed to produce a better product. Samsung will now join that list of companies producing Windows 8 hybrid tablets aiming to give Surface a run for its money. (Via The Verge) This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Apple to open first Swedish retail store Mike Schramm (TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog) Submitted at 8/27/2012 1:00:00 PM

A visit to a mall in Sweden by Swedish site IDG.se has confirmed (by the familiar black covering and the Apple logo) that there is indeed a new store opening up near Stockholm. The Täby Spectrum shopping center will host that country's first Apple Store, starting on September 15.

Apple's been laying the groundwork in Sweden for a while now, filing a business registration certificate last November, and hiring for the store earlier this year. But the company is now getting closer than ever to actually selling items in the store. And there are more stores on the way: Apple is also planning to open stores in the Harbour Street district of Stockholm, as well as

Apple to open first Swedish retail store originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Source| Permalink| Email this| Comments in a brand new mall location near the southwestern city of Malmö. We've heard a lot in the past about how quickly Apple trying to

expand in China, but that's not the only foreign land Apple is aiming to open up for business. [via MacRumors]

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Boom Town: Tech Jobs Have Europe Regurgitates Its Schrodinger Monetary Tripled In San Francisco Bazooka Policy Since The Start Of 2012 Tyler Durden

Colleen Taylor (TechCrunch) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:48:27 AM

The visual evidence of boom times returning to San Francisco is all around the city: Apartments are nearly impossible to find, rents and home prices are shooting up, fancy new restaurants are popping up daily, and the transit system is packed. Now, actual data is backing it up. Tech jobs in San Francisco have tripled since the start of 2012 — from 13,000 to 44,000 — according to new figures released by San Francisco AssessorRecorder Phil Ting’s office. Seems that all the hiring activity, along with established companies and startups moving from the

South Bay into the city proper, are really adding up when it comes to tech employment. The top neighborhoods for tech jobs are South of Market, South Beach, and Mission Bay. The job growth is directly impacting the real estate market, pushing home values higher, according to Ting’s office. According to a report on the figures by Bay City News published by the online newspaper SF Appeal, Ting said: “Our city serves as a model for growing and attracting 21st Century businesses that offer good, high-wage jobs. We can look to San Francisco to set an example when it comes to technology, life sciences, biotech

and also a quality of life that attracts the best and brightest workers in the world.” It’s not an accident that San Francisco is seeing this boom. Politicians in the city, led by Mayor Ed Lee, have been actively courting techies to set up shop in the urban center, rather than in the suburbs that have historically made up “Silicon Valley.” Other cities, notably New York led by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, are looking to follow suit. A few months back, TechCrunch TV had the opportunity to chat with Mayor Lee about his tech push in San Francisco — you can watch that interview in the video embedded below:

Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:09:18 AM

It seems the 'we -really-want-itbut please-don't-blame-us-when-it -all-goes-pear-shaped' meme continues in Europe as ECB's Asmussen adds his own peculiar mix of talking out of both sides of his mouth, (via Bloomberg): • *ASMUSSEN SAYS DOUBTS ABOUT EURO'S SURVIVAL UNACCEPTABLE FOR ECB • *ASMUSSEN SAYS ECB STAFF STILL WORKING ON DETAILS OF BOND PLAN, WILL ADDRESS SENIORITY CONCERNS • *ASMUSSEN: ECB WILL STRICTLY SEPARATE MON. POL., SUPERVISION ROLES • *ASMUSSEN SAYS GREECE NEEDS TO MAKE FURTHER REFORM EFFORTS but • *ASMUSSEN SAYS ECB

Golf-PGA Tour money list (Sports News Headlines Yahoo! News)

$4,989,158 2. Rory McIlroy (Northern Ireland) $4,962,192 3. Jason Dufner $4,548,104 4. Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:03:37 AM Bubba Watson $4,178,997 5. Aug 27 (Reuters) - Leading Zach Johnson $4,143,284 6. money winners on the 2012 Hunter Mahan $3,720,793 7. Matt PGATour on Monday (U.S. Kuchar $3,638,525 8. Keegan unless stated): 1. Tiger Woods Bradley $3,606,658 9. Carl

Pettersson (Sweden) $3,352,496 10. Justin Rose (England) $3,318,330 11. Brandt Snedeker $3,224,939 12. Ernie Els (South Africa) $3,140,173 13. Steve Stricker $3,064,421 14. Webb Simpson $2,997,505 15. Phil Mickelson $2,980,621 16. ...

CAN'T PAY FOR FISCAL POLICY MISTAKES • *ASMUSSEN: WE WON'T TAKE SUPERVISOR RESPONSIBILITY WITHOUT TOOLS • *ASMUSSEN SAYS HE PREFERS BAILOUT FUND TO BUY BONDS BEFORE ECB Clearly there is still ongoing uncertainty and confrontation within the governing council - and it is obviously not just Weidmann. Market response - not a blip in ES or EURUSD! Average: Your rating: None This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Square Enix's World Ends With You: Solo Remix arrives on iOS Mike Schramm (TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog) Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:00:00 PM

Square Enix dropped a surprise on the App Store this weekend: a specially-formulated for iOS version of its really inventive RPG The World Ends With You. The game was first created for the Nintendo DS (and made extensive use of that device's lower touch screen), and the newly released "Solo Remix" brings the title to iOS, adding completely redrawn art compatible with Retina Displays, the ability to share items socially, Game Center integration, and new songs added to the already wild Japanese pop-styled soundtrack. This is an big release in a lot of different ways -- not only has Square Enix made sure that this

iOS version is specially created just for Apple devices, but it's also decided to stand by the game as a premium app, selling the iPhone version for $17.99 and the iPad version for $19.99. Square Enix has stood by a lot of its classic titles on the store (Final Fantasy

Tactics is a hugely popular title that still sells for $17.99), both because the game are still available for the DS and other systems for higher prices, and because the company believes in the high quality of the games. And The World Ends With You

is of course no different -- it's a great RPG set not in a fantasy or sci-fi land, but a magical reality world of the shopping districts of Tokyo. It's a complicated game, where you use graffiti, fashion, and Japanese teen culture to try and do battle against various types of demons across the touch screen. The World Ends With You is certainly a very original game, and now iOS has a version of the title to call its very own. Square Enix's World Ends With You: Solo Remix arrives on iOS originally appeared on TUAW The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Source| Permalink| Email this| Comments

The Bleeding Edge Ain't As Bloody As It Used to Be [Betas] Alan Henry (Lifehacker) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:00:00 AM

Is it worth it to live on the cutting edge of every beta, running the dev build of your browser, the pre -release version of your operating system, or first to grab a brand new gadget? Sure, it sounds great, and it's tempting to think that new is obviously better, but when function is paramount, it may not be worth it to jump on every new release. More »

Test prep adds brawn to brain connections (Holy Kaw!)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:07:00 PM

Studying for the LSAT actually changes the microscopic structure of the brain, physically strengthening connections between brain areas key to

reasoning. “A lot of people still believe that you are either smart or you are not, and sure, you can practice for a test, but you are not fundamentally changing your brain,” says senior author Silvia Bunge, associate professor in the

department of psychology and the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute at University of California, Berkeley. “Our research provides a more positive message. How you perform on one of these tests is not necessarily predictive of your

future success, it merely reflects your prior history of cognitive engagement, and potentially how prepared you are at this time to enter a graduate program or a law school, as opposed to how prepared you could ever be.” Full story at Futurity.

More research news from top universities. Permalink| Leave a comment »

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Dropbox two-step verification available for testing Kelly Hodgkins (TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog)

Effectively Delegate Tasks with an Expectations and Deadline List [Productivity]

Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:00:00 AM

As reported by Techdows, Dropbox is allowing users to enable two-step verification on their accounts. Two-step verification requires users to enter a six-digit security code along with their password when they login to Dropbox, or add a new computer, phone or tablet to their account. Users need to install the latest beta forum build of Dropbox (version 1.5.12) to their computer and then visit Dropbox's website to activate two-step verification. Customers can choose between receiving their security code via text messaging or an authentication app like Google Authenticator(free). Commandline savvy Mac users can also use the Terminal-based OATH Tool

Thorin Klosowski (Lifehacker) Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:30:00 AM

to generate a code if needed. Dropbox also provides an backup code that customers can save for emergency access to their account if they lose their phone. Though it my be inconvenient to enter in both a password and a variable code each time you login to Dropbox, some users may feel that it's worth it for the extra security. You can follow the

instructions in Dropbox's forum post and on its website to get started. Interest in two-factor auth and other "enhanced security" settings for cloud services has stepped up dramatically in the weeks since Wired's Mat Honan got hacked. Honan details the process of getting his data back in this recent post.

[Via The Verge] Dropbox two-step verification available for testing originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Source| Permalink| Email this| Comments

Dishing out work to other people is a great way to cut down your list of tasks, but since you still hold responsibility for the outcome you want to make sure it's done right. To help outline the task, productivity blog Day-Timer suggests you always hand off work with an expectations and deadline list. More Âť

Rock Band Blitz review: Original score JC Fletcher (Joystiq)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 1:00:00 PM

Rock Band Blitz is basically criticism-proof. No matter what qualms I may have about the XBLA/PSN game, they'll end with a recommendation that you

should, without a doubt, purchase it. The value proposition of 25 new Rock Band DLC songs, including Queen's "Death on Two Legs," cannot be argued. However, the same people to whom I'd recommend this DLC enthusiastically - people who have bundle (and game) most

already played a bunch of Rock Band- are going to be the most confused by Rock Band Blitz. It's different. Disorientingly so. Gallery: Rock Band Blitz (PS3, Xbox 360) Continue reading Rock Band Blitz review: Original score

Rock Band Blitz review: Original score originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Prismatic Is a Personalized News App Built Around Your Interests That Strips Away the Clutter [IPhone Downloads] Thorin Klosowski (Lifehacker) Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:00:00 AM

Folding cutting board travels well Brian Krepshaw (CNET News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:53:04 AM

The design of this folding cutting board allows for easy transportation. Space is always a concern in the kitchen; it can also be an issue in the great outdoors. While that might not make much sense at first considering that the great outdoors is both great and outdoors, people who enjoy their

time in nature tend not to want to get bogged down with stuff. But getting away from it all doesn't have to mean getting away from everything. No matter if hiking or camping, everybody has to stop sometime to eat. And that means, cutting, slicing, and dicing. For those looking to trek beyond gorp, the Snow Peak Set M Chopping Board consists of a folding wooden cutting board that houses

a surprise. Tucked away inside of the prep tool is a chef's knife that fits snugly inside a custom-cut recess. Weighing in at 16.6 ounces, the backpacking accessory provides a safe and easy way to transport an always useful utensil. When the cutting board is unfolded and the knife unleashed, eaters get about a 10x8-inch surface to work with, which translates to new eating opportunities. And that is

certainly more appetizing than a diet consisting solely of good old raisins and peanuts. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

iPhone/Webapp: Filtering through the news is tough enough as it is, but finding topics relevant to you is even tougher. Prismatic is an iPhone app and webapp that solves this by analyzing your social networks and location to find news that's relevant to you. More Âť

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Magical Thinking - By Nellie Bowles NELLIE BOWLES (Foreign Policy) Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:24:22 AM

A rare look inside Swaziland's mysterious annual kingship ceremony and brewing protest movement. BY NELLIE BOWLES| AUGUST 27, 2012 MBABANE, Swaziland â&#x20AC;&#x201C; King Mswati III, one of the world's last absolute monarchs, is a powerful man -- precisely because many think he isn't a man at all. "He believes he is divine, believes he is magic," his former speechwriter, Musa Ndlangamandla, told me one evening. "And so do his people." The paunchy young king, typically sporting a goatee and traditional Swazi garb, has made himself one of the richest royals in the world by controlling an estimated 50 percent of the economy. His Swazi kingdom is a tiny, mountainous region between South Africa and Mozambique, but there's still big business: it's home to a Coca-Cola concentratemanufacturing plant(the company's biggest on the continent), a new iron-ore reprocessing plant, and one of the largest man-made forests in the world. Over all this lords Mswati III, but for one month a year, he has different business to attend to. Last winter, a few weeks after I arrived in Swaziland to study traditional healers, the country shut down for the month-long witchcraft and kingship ceremony

known as Incwala. The annual event is taken very seriously. Shops close, police take off work, and warriors camp outside the king's palace while he goes into seclusion to perform elaborate rites -- eating traditional herbs, dancing -- under the supervision

of inyangas, or witch doctors. A month later, he emerges from Incwala invincible, cleansed from the past year, and reaffirmed of his divinity. Many Swazis call Incwala "our national prayer month" -- the deity being Mswati III.

Some people -- including U.S. diplomats and even the king's former speechwriter -- are beginning to suggest that King Mswati's belief in his own divinity blurs his vision. In a 2010 cable obtained by WikiLeaks, the U.S. embassy in Swaziland, citing

a local businessman, described the king as "imbalanced" and heavily influenced by "witchcraft." While traditional culture ought to be celebrated, the stakes of Mswati's mental balance are high. MAGICAL page 32

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MAGICAL continued from page 31

For Swazi women ages 30 to 34, the HIV rate is 54 percent, the highest in the world. Life expectancy fell from 61 years in 2000 to 32 years in 2009. Belief in his own divinity may allow Mswati to disconnect himself from these realities. In April of last year, he stirred anger by demanding cows and presents from his impoverished subjects to accompany government funding for his $652,000 40th birthday party ( 70 percent of the country lives on less than two dollars a day, and yet the royals are wealthy enough to skew World Bank statistics, making it seem a lot less bad.)In May, he flew to England for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee and let one of his 13 wives spend$60,000 at a South African hotel. Such decadence shouldn't be significant, but it becomes so when such a tiny and ailing populace must shoulder it. Later that month, the International Monetary Fund pulled an advisory team out of the country because it did not have faith in the government's commitment to rein in spending (not surprising when the government spends 17 percent of its budget on unnecessary security, funds lavish royal birthday parties, and then asks for loans). "The rest of the world keeps saying we should have democracy, and we agree," Vusie Majola, who runs a nonprofit, said. "But what they don't understand is that the king, he can point a stick at you and you die. We are dealing with someone

whose power the world can't understand." Swazis fear the king and fervently believe in his power. Their reverence for Mswati is, to a foreigner, jarring. I wanted to see the ceremonies for myself, and so I bought a traditional Swazi dress from Mr. Cheapies, a crowded fabric shop in downtown Mbabane, and hopped in my Toyota SUV to drive to the palace. Everyone, Swazis and expats alike, said I couldn't go -- that the Incwala was too tightly guarded and that I ought to wait until the big touristfriendly dance that marked the public-facing end of the festivities. But I didn't have a day job at the time, and trying to break into Incwala seemed as good an activity as any. I showed up at the palace gates and offered the guards some chocolates. Spinning their AK47s, they asked if I was a virgin (only virgin girls can enter the barracks where the Incwala warriors stay) and let me in. Through the gates, I drove by a field of makeshift tents -- nothing more than torn blue tarps roped around trees -- and police officers napping on blankets spread across the browning lawn. I passed the barracks, a cluster of thick-walled beehive houses made of long, bent branches, and arrived at the palace. Inside the low-lying whitewashed complex was a minister, Thandiso, eating biltong(dried meat) with his two wives. "The king's just right in there," Thandiso explained, pointing to

some buildings within the complex. "In isolation with his maidens. And the inyangas." Thandiso's leopard loincloth cut tight into his belly as he led me back out to the barracks and introduced me to the warriors and princes. This sort of access was remarkable, I was later told -- a tribute more to Swazi curiosity and friendliness than any skill on my part (though it might have helped that I said I was open to the idea of a Swazi husband). The king's young son, silent and confident, crossed his arms and waited for one of the soldiers to dress him. I saw the marks of fresh muti, or witch magic, everywhere. The warriors had thin scabs up and down their arms where they had rubbed herbs into their blood, and brightly colored strings around their necks for protection. I also saw the marks of untreated HIV. Police uniforms hung loose, decorating the sagging shoulders of emaciated captains. After a few hours of watching a boy's induction into one of the regiments, I heard the high-pitch blare of police escorts. The royal coterie of wives, cousins, and attachĂŠs arrived -- an intimidating parade of armored BMWs and security forces. They emerged from the vehicles in stilettos, sunglasses, and leopard-skin cloths and paraded past the three regiments of Swaziland (soldiers, police officers, and traditional warriors) onto the palace's the main dancing field. There, with the regiments, they formed an

enormous circle, danced a slow dance, and sung a quiet, repetitive chant for two hours (King Sobhuza II sang the same ancient war song, Inqaba Kanqofula, when Swaziland achieved independence from the British). When the dance concluded, the royals got back in their cars and the regiments returned to their barracks and tents. I returned to Incwala every day for a week and got to know the royal healers -- quiet, deeply feared figures who stay near the palace while the king is in isolation. These are not the herbcollecting healers you call to cure a stomach ache but rather the ones you summon for luck and power, the ones who deal in animal parts, the ones albinos fear because their speckled white flesh is considered magic. The healers themselves are constantly poisoning one another in Mswati's competitive royal court. I caught up with one, Mabuzo, in northern Swaziland after he ran away from the palace. "Mswati is not like his father [the revered Sobhuza II, who expelled the British from Swaziland]," he told me. "They all used us, but you only go to Mswati if you want to die. If one healer thinks you are becoming too powerful, he will kill you." When I asked if Mswati used human parts as muti, Mabuzo got very quiet and whispered something to my translator who smiled and winced. The interview was over. The last night of Incwala, after the tourists left and the gates closed, I met Sydney (many

Swazis go by Anglicized names), one of the king's personal guards. He was standing at the entrance to Mswati's Incwala kraal, or cow pen, made of thin 20-foot-high logs and covered by a layer of branches. The king was inside. Sydney was a lean young man with a clean face. He stepped closer to me, and I smelled the cow's blood before I noticed that it drenched the pants and shirt of his uniform. He informed me that I couldn't explore the kraal. Earlier, I'd been told that if a girl enters the king's kraal she'll have her period for the rest of her life, which I didn't dare risk. Still, I asked Sydney why I couldn't just look. "You don't understand," he said, cradling his AK-47, "no one can go in there now.... Not even me. In there is the king, the bulls, a very few warriors and," he pauses, "and the inyangas." I'd seen a dozen bulls enter the kraal minutes ago but couldn't hear anything inside save for chanting -- a soft shush-shushshush. "Are you a Christian?" asked Sydney. "I am a Christian," he said. "And I hate what is happening in there." The secret ceremonies of Incwala are steeped in mystery. But on Nov. 28, 2011, Pius "unSwazi" Rinto (aka Pius Vilakati), the founder and spokesperson of the banned Swaziland Solidarity Network(SSN), released a document that contained a Swazi MAGICAL page 33

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MAGICAL continued from page 32

man's alleged confessions about the true nature of the ceremony. The SSN, which coordinates democracy campaigns from South Africa, claimed that the report came from a former member of the Royal Army who had defected to the democracy movement. The report was picked up by major news organizations, even making it into the New York Times. It contained a number of wellknown facts about Incwala -royal advisors spend the month wandering Swaziland and fining people for violating traditional codes (women wearing pants are commonly apprehended), bulls are killed, young (ideally virgin) boys move onto the palace lawns ( 80,000 came this year, and all received new sneakers). But the document included some strange revelations as well, which are harder to verify. The author claimed that a snake licks the king all over his body -and quite a bit more. In December, the Johannesburgbased Southern African Report summarized the report as follows: Among [Incwala's] highlights is a symbolic demonstration by the king of his power and dominance in a process involving his penetration of a black bull, beaten into semi-conscious immobility to ensure its compliant acceptance of the royal touch. The royal semen is then collected by a courtier and stored, for subsequent inclusion in food to be served at Sibaya -traditional councils -- and other national forums. Afterward, the document claims,

Mswati has public sex with two of his wives, ejaculating into a horn like he did after engaging in intercourse with the bull. Then a bucket of water is poured on his head and he washes himself on the women. These wives are the sesulamsiti, which means, per Sydney's translation, "after I dirty I must clean my hands." They are used only for traditions and are not allowed to get pregnant. Whether this account is true or not -- some people I met swore its veracity, others scoffed when I brought it up -- is irrelevant. What's more interesting is the reaction to the account in Swaziland. The kingdom's most prevalent religion is Zionism, a precarious balance of Christianity and traditional beliefs. Several Zionist pastors have declared Incwala evil -- a lurch too far toward the pagan. The Times of Swaziland, a paper owned by a white Swazi named Paul Loffler who allows the editorial team to function freely, ran weeks of letters to the editor calling for boycotts of Incwala and for parents to bring their sons back from the palace. Mswati made some attempts to punish the critics, though they were largely futile. The royal newspaper-- the Swazi Observer-asked if anyone had information that could help the police arrest those individuals who "distributed pamphlets containing malicious and misleading fabrications aimed at tarnishing the country's customs and traditions," citing laws banning defamation of the king.

Yet no culprit was caught. One man was arrested for selling Grated video recordings of last year's Incwala and asked to get each one back-- an impossible task. Journalists and photographers -- even Swazi nationals -- were banned from all the Incwala events. The only news outlet permitted to cover the last day of the festival was Swazi TV, the king's propaganda station. Yet I managed without any trouble to bring a video camera into the event. A couple of months ago, the government announced a new lèse majesté law that will make insulting the king via social media sites a crime. But again, enforcing this law might be difficult. The account of Incwala published by Pius "unSwazi" Rinto isn't the only source of anxiety about witchcraft influencing Mswati. In 2011, WikiLeaks released a cable from U.S. Ambassador Earl Irving entitled, " Witchcraft and More: A Portrait of Influences On King Mswati III." In a kingdom of 1.4 million people, where U.S. embassy officials and Swazi royalty basically all go to one of two real restaurants, comments by U.S. Ambassador Irving made for a very awkward morning after and a public relations nightmare for the embassy. "What we can say with confidence," Irving concluded in the cable, "is that shamanism pervades Swazi culture, and even the king, who is above the law and constitution of Swaziland and ostensibly a Christian, is not exempted from its grip."

The cable quoted Mandla Hlatshwayo, a former Mswati advisor and sugar company CEO, as telling U.S. officials that the king regards any attempts to use muti to attack him seriously. Hlatshwayo, who later founded the People's United Democratic Movement, the kingdom's banned opposition party, has gone into self-imposed exile in South Africa. "They want me dead," Hlatshwayo titled his Swazi Observer column in October 2011, shortly after the cable was released. Since 2008, he wrote, he'd been hearing rumors that authorities wanted to assassinate him. Swaziland's four-decade " state of emergency" -- the world's longest- gives the king absolute power to punish dissent. And yet there is a quiet, watchful protest movement brewing. One day during Incwala, I took an afternoon off to meet the nation's foremost democracy activists. Majola, the Swazi nonprofit manager, led me to a meeting in a large, old building in downtown Manzini. There around a dusty, wooden conference table in a dimly lit room, I listened as they planned a teacher's union strike, debated whether to merge with another union group, and discussed how many lawyers might actually show up to a march.Afterwards, in the lobby outside, their conversation turned to Mswati's power. The king "can turn into a cat or an ant," Majola said quietly. "He

can be invisible right next to us right now. I have had friends die this way." Majola is a large, intelligent businessman with a degree in systems management from a South African university. "Swazis have a secret you cannot beat," Majola observed. "They believe in God. But they also believe in the ancestors. The ancestors make the king as powerful as a god." "I had a friend, one of us [in the democracy movement], and he entered the royal grounds wanting to discuss the labor movement," said one short man with a silver tooth. "Walking out of the palace he looked weak. He died two weeks later." "You know what happens," added a young man in a New York Yankees T-shirt. "The king had his inyangas sprinkle a circle of powder around the palace. You cross that line and you die." Come now, I said, you're all smart and youthful and fighting for democracy. You can't believe King Mswati is really a god. The young man in the Yankees shirt shook his head. "This is why the revolution in Swaziland will be so hard," he said. "Maybe impossible." This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating MAGICAL page 34

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MAGICAL

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continued from page 33

Republican Convention to Highlight Debt Clock

Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Daniel Halper (The Weekly Standard) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:59:00 AM

The Republican convention will

highlight a debt clock, the party announced: Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus will unveil tomorrow a national debt

clock mounted inside the convention hall of the Tampa Bay Times Forum – a compelling visual reinforcing the desperate need for new fiscal leadership in

the White House.

Guest Post: Protect The Banks At All Costs Tyler Durden

rob a bank. Give a man a bank, and he can rob a country.” Occupy Easton reports on their Submitted by John Aziz of Facebook page that Gorczynski Azizonomics “was at the bank protesting the Protect The Banks At All Costs theft of our tax dollars, our Give a man a gun, and he can rob homes, and our economy by the a bank. Give a man a bank, and he criminal banksters.” can rob a country. Welcome to the new America — Those are the very true words where banks must be protected at that two weeks ago had a man in all costs. Whether it’s a bailout or P e n n s y l v a n i a a r r e s t e d . H i s a trumped up charge to silence a purported crime? Terroristic protestor, if the banks want it, threats, and the attempted robbery they get it. of the bank he was protesting! The district attorney in the case From CBS: has dropped the charge of An Occupy Easton protester attempted robbery. However, a faces an attempted bank robbery terroristic threat charge remains. charge following an arrest at an Meanwhile, the economic organized event at a bank – during e v i d e n c e i s m o u n t i n g t h a t which the “Occupier” was holding countries that want to recover a sign that reportedly read need to tell the banks to take a “You’re being robbed.” hike. According to The Express-Times, Joe Stiglitz notes: Dave Gorczynski allegedly held What Iceland did was right. It cardboard signs outside a Wells would have been wrong to burden Fargo Branch that read, “You’re future generations with the being robbed,” while the other mistakes of the financial system. said, “Give a man a gun, he can And Paul Krugman writes: Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:19:44 AM

Krugman, it seems — after years of defending bank bailouts — is learning. But what hope is there of telling the banks to take a hike when law enforcement, politicians and courts will gladly arrest, charge and try an anti-bank protestor exercising their constitutional right to free speech? Law enforcement, politicians and courts have it upside down. It isn’t banks that need protection from protestors. It’s citizens that need protection from the banks. Average: Your rating: None Average: 4.7( 18 votes) W h a t I c e l a n d ’ s r e c o v e r y out the bankers and made the This entry passed through the demonstrated was the case for public pay the price, Iceland let Full-Text RSS service — if this is letting creditors of private banks the banks go bust and actually your content and you're reading it gone wild eat the losses. expanded its social safety net. on someone else's site, please read A funny thing happened on the Where everyone else was fixated the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentway to economic Armageddon: on trying to placate international only/faq.php#publishers. Five Iceland’s very desperation made i n v e s t o r s , I c e l a n d i m p o s e d Filters recommends: Incinerating conventional behavior impossible, t e m p o r a r y c o n t r o l s o n t h e Assange - The Liberal Media Go freeing the nation to break the movement of capital to give itself To Work. rules. Where everyone else bailed room to maneuver.

Economy/

Curated News Edition

Merkel Pushes Convention to Draft New EU Treaty; United States of Merkel? noreply@blogger.com (Mike Mish Shedlock) (Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:24:00 AM

Will Merkel get her wish for a Unites States of Europe led by nannycrats in Brussels? I suspect not because a vote would likely go up in flames. Nonetheless, Merkel Pushes for Convention to Draft New EU Treaty Chancellor Angela Merkel's plans for a new treaty governing the European Union are becoming more concrete. SPIEGEL has learned that the German leader wants the EU to begin working on a draft this year, with the aim of providing Brussels with greater power to monitor budgets. But many countries are deeply opposed to the idea. A date for the beginning of the convention is expected to be fixed at an EU summit in December. Merkel has been pushing for some time now to complement the recently approved fiscal pact, which harmonizes budget policies within 25 of the EU's 27 countries, with a political union. Germany would like to see, for example, a legal basis that would give the European Court of Justice the jurisdiction to monitor the budgets of member states and to punish deficit offenders. So far, though, the German proposal has found few supporters

in the other EU member states. During a meeting of the so-called Future Group, an informal gathering of 10 foreign ministers from EU countries, the majority opposed a call by German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle for a new treaty convention. Other countries, including Ireland, do not want to take the risk of a national referendum, which a new EU treaty would entail in some member states. When Merkel previously brought up the subject during a December EU summit meeting, many people reacted with indignation. Initially, the other EU countries were unwilling to go along with the calls from Merkel and thenFrench President Nicolas Sarkozy for automatic sanctions for repeat offenders of budget rules. In the end, the Germans and French found a common position, saying they would push forward with a new EU treaty -- either with the entire bloc or with the 17 members of the euro zone if other countries were unwilling to go along with it. United States of Merkel Do the German people want a centralized authority over budgets led by bureaucrats in Brussels or is is it primarily Merkel? I suggest the latter. Merkel wants as her legacy a United States of Merkel (which I define as a

United States of Europe in which she gets primary credit for building). She does not care what it costs Germany as long as it gets her in the history books forever and a day. Numerous Problems The problems should be obvious. Many countries, especially the club-med states, do not want austerity or loss of sovereignty. They want printing. Also note that Holllande wants to continue his tax the rich policies while lowering the retirement age and preventing businesses from firing workers. Will Hollande's ideas work in a United States of Merkel? Let's assume they will work. Indeed that should be Germany's big fear. Put a bunch of nannycrats together and they are likely to decide anything. And whatever rules they decide will apply to every country in the nannyzone that foolishly signs the treaty. If the treaty is a simple majority rule treaty, Germany would be at risk of being overruled by the club -med states. If the treaty is by percentages, the club-med states would be at risk of being dominated by what is good for Germany and France (assuming of course Germany and France can agree). No matter how a treaty is

structured, some countries are guaranteed not to like it. Mathematically Impossible

nannyzone, but citizens of many countries would not, and I strongly suspect that includes Germany. • The Bundesbank said there Recall that France and Germany should be no banking union until pushed through a treaty in there is a fiscal union. December (still not ratified). Also • Angela Merkel said that there recall that Hollande ran on a should be no fiscal union until platform of renegotiating the there is political union. treaty. • François Hollande said that Germany and France are still there should be no political union bickering. How's that supposed to until there is a banking union. work? Does Merkel think an • The German supreme court will agreement now is likely? not allow a political union nor a I think not. Instead, her proposal fiscal union, nor a banking union is simply a matter of do-or-die without a German referendum. political expediency and her one last chance to push for the United Assume the Bundesbank will be States of Merkel. ignored. Further assume Germany Mike "Mish" Shedlock puts this to a vote and it passes. h t t p : / / There still remains a big rift globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. between the viewpoints of France com and Germany as well as a big rift Click Here To Scroll Thru My between Northern and Southern Recent Post List Mike "Mish" Europe. Shedlock is a registered In Italy sentiment to leave the investment advisor representative euro is very strong. So is the f o r S i t k a P a c i f i c C a p i t a l sentiment in Germany. Would Management. Sitka Pacific is an Germans really vote for this asset management firm whose b o o n d o g g l e ? W o u l d t h e goal is strong performance and Netherlands? Austria? low volatility, regardless of The next election in Italy may market direction. Visit http:// very well seal the fate against a w w w . s i t k a p a c i f i c . c o m / new treaty idea even if Merkel account_management.html to and Hollande can work out major l e a r n m o r e a b o u t w e a l t h differences. management and capital Do-or-Die Political Expediency MERKEL page 38 Finally, politicians might want a

Economy/

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Why S&P Just Raised The Debt Outlook For New York State Joe Weisenthal and Eric Platt (Money Game)

credit analyst David Hitchcock. New York State has, in our opinion, lowered projected future Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:29:00 AM year general fund S&P has lifted the debt outlook budget gaps due largely to recent for New York State from stable to restraint in school aid and positive, meaning an actual Medicaid upgrade is possible if trends expenditure growth. We believe continue. spending restraint will also be The announcement explains the aided in the move. Basically, the state is long term by the recent m o v i n g t o w a r d s b a l a n c e d establishment of a new pension budgets, and has adopted schemes tier for new employees t h a t w i l l r e d u c e f u t u r e that will slow growth in pension expenditures on school aid and costs. Should New York State Medicaid. continue to Below the line is the full maintain largely structurally announcement. balanced budgets in the next two ----years, we could NEW YORK (Standard & Poor's) raise the rating. Aug. 27, 2012--Standard & Poor's The GO rating reflects what we Ratings Services view as New York State's: revised its outlook to positive Strong and diverse economy of from stable on New York State's 19.4 million people, with income general levels obligation (GO) and state above the national average, but appropriation secured debt. w i t h a h i g h e r - t h a n - a v e r a g e At the same time, Standard & p r o p o r t i o n o f Poor's affirmed its 'AA' rating on state income derived from the New York financial sector; State's state GO debt and its 'AA-' History of what we consider rating on the state's appropriation conservative budgeting, quarterly secured debt rating. updated "We base the outlook revision on budget forecasts, active expense what we view as the state's management in economically movement toward weak periods, structurally balanced budgets in and an established rainy-day the past two years," said Standard fund, although it has not always & Poor's been fully

toward structural budget balance, following two years of essentially on-time adoption. In addition, New York State projects what we see as modest general fund projected budget gaps in future years. For example, the state only had to close a $3.5 billion budget gap as part of its fiscal 2013 budget adoption, compared with the projected $14.9 billion budget gap it had projected for fiscal 2013 when it began closing its fiscal 2012 budget. The lowering of projected outyear gaps is, in our opinion, largely funded; New York State's budget was due to recent restraint in school Cyclical finances and strong approved by the legislature before aid and surpluses in the immediately the start of Medicaid expenditure growth, preceding the 2012 and 2013 fiscal years which have been major cost years. At the same time, the and signed by the governor drivers over time. general fund has been largely shortly after the Should the state continue to balanced on a fiscal years commenced. In maintain structural alignment cash basis; and previous periods of fiscal stress, between revenues Solid debt, swap, and capital the state and expenditures over the twoplanning management policies sometimes had late budget year rating outlook horizon, we balanced adoptions, although even at that could raise the against moderately high debt time we believe it rating one notch. However, levels and large unfunded other made midyear budget corrections should structural balance prove p o s t e m p l o y m e n t b e n e f i t s , when necessary to preserve elusive or although the state's pension minimum levels of financial performance system is cash flow, such as the multiple deteriorates due to economic or relatively well funded on a midyear corrections in fiscal federal funding changes, generally accepted accounting 2010. principles The positive outlook reflects WHY page 38 basis. what we view as movement

Economy/

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Nomura's Geopolitical Guru Can't Stop Worrying About These 10 Issues Mamta Badkar (Money Game)

could send the U.S. into a recession in the first half of 2013, according to the Congressional Markets have been quiet for a Budget Office. few weeks now. • Iran/Israel "Serious or sabreBut various economic and geo- r a t t l i n g " - T h e r e i s a l o w political market moving events probability that Israel will strike are expected to make September Iran and markets are more much more volatile. concerned about such an attack N o m u r a ' s S e n i o r P o l i t i c a l than they should be. Yet, "we do Analyst Alastair Newton has not totally rule out a strike before highlighted 10 key risks in his the US presidential election on 6 latest report: "Issues Which Keep November, eg if Iran ramped up M e A w a k e A t N i g h t . " W e activity at its Fordow enrichment summarize here: plant". • Europe"EU in September"- • China "From fourth to fifth Spain and Italy are likely to get generation"- "We expect to see external help in bond markets but incremental policy easing to drive w i t h c o n d i t i o n a l i t y . B u t a pick-up in growth through Q3 governments of both countries and into Q4, consistent with the face domestic challenges that authorities’ lower tolerance for a c o u l d " t r i g g e r p o l i t i c a l slowdown during the leadership instability". While a Grexit transition." continues to be likely, Italy and • East Asia maritime borders Spain pose a greater risk of break- "Renewed tensions"- Tensions are up. The eurozone itself is under- rising between China and Japan, threat as "bail-out fatigue" is and Taiwan over the disputed growing in the Netherlands and Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands. Both Germany. governments are however • United States "Elections and expected to calm tensions quickly taxes"- "We still see the election given their political cycles. as President Obama's to lose". Meanwhile, South Korea and Irrespective of the outcome of the Japan are locked in a dispute over election though, the post-election the Takeshima/Dokdo Islands and period will be dominated by China is in a dispute with the negotiations on fiscal issues and a Philippines over the Spratly debate on raising the debt ceiling. Islands. Failure to reach an agreement • Korean peninsula "Turbulent Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:22:00 AM

Pakistan-based group looking to distract the army by means of another terrorist attack in India." • Venezuela "A third time for Mr. Chavez" Hugo Chavez is expected to secure a third term in the October election, and Chavez supporters in the military have said they won't accept a victory by opposition candidate Henrique Capriles. "We expect domestic political tensions and social conflict to continue to dog the cities in particular; and for the economy’s performance to remain sclerotic and overly dependent on oil." • Russia "Plus ca change?"Without a major external shock times"- The recent changes in the shouldn't threaten oil output for instance a drop in energy North Korean military are part of a c r o s s t h e r e g i o n . I n I r a q , prices, Russia is unlikely to push K i m J o n g - u n ' s e f f o r t s t o Kurdistan's regional government through crucial reforms. But such "consolidate his grip on the is in dispute with Baghdad over a shock could cause political country and possibly to wrest energy policy and could limit i n s t a b i l i t y a n d i n v e s t o r back power from the army to the investment in oil extraction and uncertainty. Civil discontent is expected to rise leading up the Workers’ Party of Korea". This processing. could be to control the country's • Pakistan "Political and security 2015 elections. mineral resources, and this could uncertainty"- Pakistan is ramping c a u s e " b a d b e h a v i o u r i n up efforts to squash Islamic Don't Miss: 9 Wars That Were Pyongyang" - the capital of North militancy and this could cause Really About Commodities > Korea spurred by the South Washington to give indiigenous Please follow Money Game on Korean presidential election in forces more responsibility over Twitter and Facebook. December. s e c u r i t y i n A f g h a n i s t a n . Join the conversation about this • MENA "Oil and more turmoil"- "However, in our view it could story » Markets are increasingly worried also risk a further escalation in about the war in Syria and its terrorism in Pakistan itself and impact on oil output. But this increase the possibility of a

Economy/ Featured/

Mario Draghi Needs Greece Out Of The Eurozone Bruce Krasting (Money Game)

resulting fallout is contained. Draghi is a market savvy guy. He knows he can’t stand in front of Merkel said that Greece was the capital markets and succeed going to stay in the Euro on unless he has a credible position Friday: that can be defended. Greece is Hollande said the same thing on the broken wheel of his cart. It has Sunday: to be jettisoned before the other Merkel added that all of the folks wheels have a chance to prove who have a seat at the table just they can roll on their own. He shut up about Greece (This was a says he wants to reverse the weird one to me): market psychology on I don’t get it. convertibility risk, that can’t To “fix” Greece, Greece must ever since he drew a line in the IMF) agrees that sustaining the happen until Greece is gone. decouple from the Euro. There is sand with these carefully chosen Greek Euro link is impossible The EU political leaders are no other option. It is only a words: (and harmful to all). screaming,“It’s all, or nothing!” question of when, how much it Risk premia that are related to As long as Merkel and Hollande That stance takes the cards out of will cost and whom will pay. The fears of the reversibility of the talk nice about Greece, the Draghi’s hands. EU deciders know that this is true; euro are unacceptable, and they convertibility issue will hang in Note: My long held position is they just don’t admit to the reality n e e d t o b e a d d r e s s e d i n a the air. The market will continue that the best course of action is for in public. An important question fundamental manner. The euro is to fret: a Grexit. I do not believe that to ask: irreversible. “What happens when Greece Grexit necessarily means Spaxit What are the implications to Draghi shouts out: goes?” (or Itaxit). Too many years have M a r i o D r a g h i / t h e E C B o f “Don’t worry! No current member or passed in this story for a “crisis” “Merkande’s” public support for of the EU will leave! There will “When Greece goes, does that to happen when the final chapter Greece staying with the Euro (and be no Euro breakup! mean Spain will too?” for Greece is written. It’s in the dying) for a few more years? How can Mr. Draghi eliminate The issue of Greece’s status must ‘print’ already. Draghi changed the game on 8/2 the risk of convertibility in the EU be resolved before the question of Please follow Money Game on w h e n h e p u t t h e i s s u e o f when the weakest sister in the EU convertibility for the rest of the Twitter and Facebook. “convertibility” (the risk of a has to be kicked out for its own EU members can be laid to rest. Join the conversation about this return to legacy currencies) on the good?“He can’t”, is the answer. Draghi can’t eliminate the risk story » table. Markets have been reacting Not when everyone (including the until Greece is out, and the

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WHY continued from page 36

we could revise the outlook back to stable. Please follow Money Game on Twitter and Facebook. Join the conversation about this story »

Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:37:38 AM

MERKEL continued from page 35

preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific.

Levity vs racism (Dave Winer) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:26:47 AM

The Romney "joke" about his birth certificate was no accident. It got birtherism back into the conversation about the election. It had dropped out, and had been replaced with the abortion discussion around Congressman Akin. No doubt Romney felt it was unfair to tag him with that (arguable, he did pick Ryan as his VP). So he hit back with birtherism. Democrats treat it as a moral issue. An appeal to Republican reasonableness, which does not exist. The best response is to not take the bait. Accept it as a joke. No more discussion. Change the subject.

Economy/

Curated News Edition

When It All Goes Bidless: What Losing $1 Billion In 100 Milliseconds Looks LIke Tyler Durden

Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:45:46 AM

It's quiet out there; too quiet. But if you were watching carefully this morning, everyone's favorite government-subsidized bank Citigroup - flash-crashed to the tune of a $1.2bn market-cap loss in a fraction under 100

milliseconds. A 1.3% micro-crash on absolutely massive volume so perfectly visualized thanks to Nanex. When does this 'liquidityproviding' fiasco stop? August 27, 2012 at 10:27:50.900 Citigroup (symbol C) dropped 1.3% (from 29.80 to 29.42) in about 100 milliseconds. 1. One second interval chart

showing trades color coded by exchange. 2. One second interval chart showing best bids and offers color coded by exchange. 3. One second interval chart showing all bids and offers color coded by exchange. The following chart shows trades and bid/ask spreads for one of the

reporting exchanges. ISO trades are color filled, while all other trade conditions are empty (white). Note, trades from NYARCA (red) began dropping about 20ms before NYSE (blue) where the price fell apart. Average: Your rating: None Average: 5( 5 votes)

This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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One Astrobiologist's Plan to Save the Search for Alien Life Dave Mosher (Wired Top Stories) Submitted at 8/27/2012 5:30:00 AM

A conceptual illustration of the Europa Jupiter System Mission, or EJSM, which consists of an orbiter for both Europa and Jupiter. Image: NASA/Michel Carroll Jupiter’s moon Europa hides an ocean of water beneath its icy crust that might harbor extraterrestrial life. Unfortunately, big dollar signs have kept alive the fictional decree in Arthur C. Clarke’s Space Odyssey series to leave Europa alone: No robot has ever landed on, drilled into or orbited the chilly world. Only a handful of spacecraft have flown by. A panel of scientists determined in 2011 that NASA’s plans to explore the moon with a single spacecraft, called the Jupiter Europa Orbiter, or JEO, would cost about $4.7 billion. That amount of cash, they wrote, “is so high that both a decrease in mission scope and an increase in NASA’s planetary budget are necessary to make it affordable.” But even before the panel slammed the mission’s financial feasibility, astrobiologist Pabulo Henrique Rampelotto of Brazil’s Federal University of Pampa was plotting to save exploration of

Europa.

ONE page 42

Culture/

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Making Water Wigs With Lasers, Microphones and High-Speed Strobes Jakob Schiller (Wired Top Stories) Submitted at 8/27/2012 5:30:00 AM

| Next >> • • • • • •

• • • • • • • • • | Next >> View all

It’s not the newest hair-loss solution for men. But it is cool photography. In a recent series of photos called Water Wigs, L.A. photographer Tim Tadder captures photos of bald men getting pounded with water balloons on the head. The water flowing around their shiny jugs looks like their missing hair might if they were driving with

their heads out the window. “I got tired of repeating the same thing all the time,” says Tadder, a successful commercial photographer who has become known for his edgy ads for companies such a Gatorade and Adidas. “I wanted to find a visual concept that I’d never seen before.” Water was on Tadder’s mind

because he had recently finished another creative project called Fish Heads where he photographed people just as they stuck their heads underwater in a fish tank. Water Wigs seemed like a logical progression. The technical aspects of the wig photos are tricky. Capturing the MAKING page 44

Gaming/

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ONE continued from page 40

In a study published July 13 in Astrobiology, Rampelotto argues that nixing one large orbiter and instead sending three small spacecraft — two orbiters and a probe carrying surface impactors — could spread out both the cost and the risk while hitting all of JEO’s science goals, and then some. “[T]he main advantages are the complete access to the habitability of Europa, simpler mission design and low cost for each mission,” Rampelotto wrote in an e-mail to Wired. “Europa is considered the prime candidate in the search for life in our solar system. Its ocean may be in direct contact with the rocky mantle beneath, where the conditions could be similar to those on Earth’s biologically rich sea floor.” Both NASA and the European Space Agency hope to explore Europa and Ganymede, another of Jupiter’s moons, sometime in the next two decades because both bodies may hide a liquid ocean. In the joint space exploration plan, called the Europa Jupiter System Mission, NASA would launch JEO within this decade. Around the same time that spacecraft launches, Europe would rocket its own Jupiter Ganymede Orbiter into deep space. Budget hawks, however, aren’t buying into NASA’s $4.7 billion dream. Accounting for other

higher-priority missions, JEO would stretch further NASA’s shrinking annual planetary science budget of $1.5 billion. “I believe you will not find someone who continues to support the $4.7 billion … mission concept,” Rampelotto said. “And that is interesting because before the release, no one was considering the possibility of an alternative mission concept.”'Europa is considered the prime candidate in the search for life in our solar system.'— Pabulo Henrique Rampelotto Rampelotto beat the panelists to the punch by proposing his three-spacecraft mission. If built and launched within the next few years, mission one — an orbiter to measure the thickness of Europan ice and see how deep its oceans go — could reach Europa between 2020 and 2025. A second orbiter would launch a few years later, map the surface in visible and infrared light, and determine if any organic chemicals are present. “Mission two is technically easier than mission one and could be launched very soon too,” Rampelotto wrote. “After we have those results from missions one and two, mission three would be mature enough to be launched.” That mission would pound the surface with impactors, penetrate between 3 and 33 feet of ice, and

then beam data about the ice’s composition to Earth. It’s unlikely any impactor would reach the subsurface ocean, however, because the thinnest ice may be 1.8 miles thick. Even below that depth, only lakes of water far above the ocean may be locked in the icy crust. “But, if delivered in potential landing sites where liquid water from the ocean could have recently reached the surface or near surface, we could analyze indirectly the ocean composition, including signals of life,” Rampelotto wrote. Rampelotto’s plan to barnstorm Europa offers no concrete costs for each mission, which he said would require “advanced studies” to determine. So the idea isn’t without its critics. “NASA team leaders … have advised me that penetrators are difficult and risky to deliver and the best option continues to be a lander,” Rampelotto wrote. Bob Pappalardo, a planetary scientist who studies Europa and is helping NASA develop future missions to the moon, said Rampelotto’s scheme is a logical one during tight budgetary times. But he noted saving money by splitting up a big mission into smaller ones brings about another issue: fear of commitment. “The reality is that NASA is not going to want to fund or begin a

program of missions, based on the reaction to the Mars sample return suggestion,” said Pappalardo, who wasn’t involved in Rampelotto’s study. “That went over like a lead balloon [at the White House], in terms of being a long-term budgetary relationship.” Pappalardo hopes that, if there are signs of a recovering U.S. economy in the next few years, they will spur the current presidential administration to open its tight wallet. “Right now the goal is to do anything at Europa,” he said. “I really hope we’ll come back to our senses soon. I don’t see the vision for planetary science that was present in the past.” “We need to be planning on the future,” he said. “As it stands, in a few years, we won’t be launching anything. We’re in danger of losing our leadership in planetary science.” This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

What we wish Skyrim's Dawnguard was like Alexander Sliwinski (Joystiq) Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:40:00 PM

Skyrim's Dawnguard downloadable content appears as a can't-miss experience based on Tyrannicon's amazing "Great Battle of Dawnguard" video, but the reality is quite different. Even if it isn't based in the actual experience of the DLC, this is great machinima work. Continue reading What we wish Skyrim's Dawnguard was like What we wish Skyrim's Dawnguard was like originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 12:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments

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Canada Will Beat U.S. to Cashless Economy Marcus Wohlsen (Wired Top Stories) Submitted at 8/27/2012 5:30:00 AM

Interac, a nationwide not-forprofit debit system, is the preferred way to pay in Canada. Photo: nicolasnova/Flickr Single-payer health care may make Canada a socialist pariah in the eyes of U.S. conservatives. But when it comes to keeping money flowing out of consumers’ pockets and into merchants’ coffers — a key characteristic of any thriving capitalist economy — Canada has its neighbor south of the border beat. Few in the U.S. likely know, or would seem to have any reason to know, about Interac, Canada’s nationwide not-for-profit debit system. Interac accounts for more than half of all purchases Canadians make using any card, credit or debit — about 4 billion transactions annually. And it puts Canada ahead of the U.S. in the push to create a truly cashless economy. Interac started in 1984 when five Canadian banks decided to link up their separate ATM networks (or ABMs — automatic banking machines — as they’re known in Canada, where they also put gravy on their fries). Within 10 years, Interac’s PIN-based debit system was available nationally. In 2000, Interac says its debit cards surpassed cash as Canadians’ preferred way to pay. Canadians can assume that any

merchant that takes a card takes Interac, and for good reason. As a not-for-profit association made up of banks and other cogs in the electronic transaction infrastructure, Interac only charges enough to cover its costs. That amounts to less than a penny per transaction, compared to several cents per transaction charged by standard for-profit systems, says Allen Wright, Interac’s vice president of product and services.

As with health care, Interac taps into Canada’s apparently greater comfort level with creating systems on a national scale that exist more to serve citizens and less to make money. Among the advantages of such a setup: A single, unified system makes rolling out new payment tech easier than in the U.S. “In the U.S. you’ve got many sort of regional debit networks. We’re one domestic debit network that covers the entire country,” says

Wright. As a result, Interac began moving away from magnetic-strip cards toward cards embedded with more secure chips back in 2007. The technology, known as EMV, went national in Canada a year later. In the U.S., by comparison, credit card networks are pushing for merchants and banks to adopt EMV by 2015, according to the research firm Forrester. Merchants who take EMVequipped cards will also be able to

accept payments via NFC, the technology behind Google Wallet and one of the platforms vying to become the standard way customers pay at the store with their smartphones. Interac doesn’t have its own mobile payment app yet, but that’s well in the works, Wright says. In the meantime, several major retailers, including McDonald’s, are starting to accept CANADA page 47

Featured/ Food/

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MAKING continued from page 41

difference between a balloon exploding in the right place and the wrong place comes down to just milliseconds. Even the minuscule amount of shutter delay on the Nikon D800 Tadder was using could interfere with capturing the peak action, so he decided to use a bulb exposure with the shutter left open. To do this, however, he had to make his studio completely dark and freeze the action with a highspeed flash firing at one tenthousandth of a second. Not surprisingly, it took a while to get things right. “You can only throw a water balloon at [a model's] head so many times,” he says. To make it work, Tadder had an assistant up on a ladder with the balloon in hand. The assistant would then shine a flashlight on the model’s head, figure out their aim, turn the flashlight off and get ready to throw. For Fish Heads, Tadder used a laser trigger that shot a beam of light across the fish tank, triggering the camera as soon as the person’s face crossed the plane — just like a cliché heist movie. He tried the same thing for Water Wigs, but found it didn’t

work well. He aimed the laser just above the model’s head and set a slight delay on the flash, hoping the balloon would cross through the laser and the flash would fire milliseconds later as the explosion happened. The problem was that working in milliseconds can be tricky, and too often the flash would fire just as the balloon hit the model’s head but before the actual explosion. “We had to get lucky to capture the explosion,” he says. The fix came in the form of a sound trigger that uses a microphone to capture the noise made by the explosion. Once it detected that noise it would fire the flash, guaranteeing that some form of the explosion was captured in every frame. To get the shots where the models look like they have a water mohawk or halo, Tadder says they used the kind of long narrow balloons that clowns use for balloon animals. Him and his assistants would fill the balloons with water and then place them on the model’s head. An assistant with a stick that had a small spike on one end would then sit on the ground out of the camera frame,

reach up and pop the balloon. In the halo shots, for example, the assistant reached up behind the model’s head, which hid the stick, and popped the balloon. Remember, however, that this all had to happen in the dark, making it slightly dangerous for the models. “It was totally precarious,” Tadder says. ” I was psyched that no one beat me up and no one got hurt.” The final touch came in the form of the color palette Tadder used to saturate the pictures. He says that instead of positioning the models against a white or gray backdrop he wanted to make it more interesting so he placed a series of colored gels over his flashes. As a commercial photographer, he’s become known for the darker, contrast-y shots he produces, so adding color changed things up. That, and Tadder says he has two young daughters who are obsessed with colors like pink, magenta and yellow. “Your visual identity is often based on what you’re around right?” he says. So far the shots have been well received, spreading quickly across the internet. The response has

been positive, but Tadder says he’s gotten quite a few requests that women be included in the next series if he’s going to continue with bald models. “How awesome would that be?” he says. All Photos: Tim Tadder Jakob Schiller is a writer and photographer at Raw File. Read more by Jakob Schiller Follow@jakobschiller on Twitter. Tags: Gatorade, Los Angeles, Tim Tadder, Under Armour • Post Comment| • Comments| • Permalink Back to top This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Chris Matthews Accuses Republicans of Playing the Race Card, Causes MSNBC to Squirm Daniel Halper (The Weekly Standard)

On TV this morning, Chris Matthews accused RNC chairman Reince Priebus and Republicans

of playing the race card, causing clear discomfort on the set of MSNBC's Morning Joe:

Favorite Veggie Burgers (Cooking Light: Editor's Picks) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:42:15 AM

Veggie burgers can be made with chickpeas, black beans, white beans, potatoes, lentils, and pretty much any other vegetable that can be mashed and formed into a patty. And made right, they're delicious—but fragile. Even with binders like breadcrumbs, oats, egg whites, or farina, veggie burger patties tend to be delicate things that don't fare well on the grill. Unless you're using whole portobello mushrooms as the "patties," you're likely to have more success cooking your veggie burgers on the stovetop or under the broiler, then flipping them very carefully when the time comes. Commercial patties tend to be more robust, of course, but we're talking about homemade versions here. Click through the slides to find recipes for 10 of our all-time favorite veggie burgers. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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CP World Report: Empire State Building Shooting, Syria, Neil Armstrong, Palestinian Authority (The Christian Post)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 8:58:40 AM

By World Report, The Christian Post in partnership with Crossroads, WEA August 27, 2012| 9:58 am Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' accused Israeli forces of trying to "rob Muslims and Christians of their holy shrines" and that Jerusalem would….. quote…. " forever be Arabic, Islamic and Christian." The Orthodox Union in New York City called the Palestinian president's remarks "outrageous" for denying Jewish ties. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shared the rabbi's sentiment, saying he was "disappointed" to hear Abbas "also echo outrageous conspiracy theories concerning the Temple Mount. The Palestinian authority does not recognize Israel's right to exist Syria's Vice President Farouk AlSharaa has made his first public appearance in weeks, ending rumors that he defected. Al-

Sharaa was last seen at the funeral of four top Syrian government officials…..killed in a blast in Damascus ….. July 18. Speculation circulated that he defected to Jordan , which would be a blow to the al- Assad's regime. AND…..Syrian first lady--Asma Al-Assad---used to be very outspoken on human rights issues. She had a lot say about Israel's vigorous response to months of Palestinian rocket attacks. But now in the face of the opposition uprising in her own country, Asma has remained mostly silent throughout 18 months of strife and violence….that has left over 17-thousand dead. Her own parents came from the battered city of Homs. Here's a look back at her day of human rights activism long gone….. There has been a rising pattern of hostility toward Christians in America over the past decade. This is the finding of a new report by the Family Research Council and the Liberty Institute . The 140 -page report entitled: "Survey of

Religious Hostility in America, gave over 600 examples…. characterized as religious animosity shown by judges, government bureaucrats, schools and secular groups. From ObamaCare mandates that force religious entities to pay for abortion and contraception, to children being punished for uttering prayers in school,the report's findings shocked even those who commissioned it. The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) has published a report warning the American government that it should not be ignorant of the terror threat growing in Indonesia, the largest Muslim nation in the world. Jemaah Islamiyah is the largest terrorist group in South East Asia linked to Al-Qaida .Currently there is massive economic growth in the region, likely to affect U.S. foreign policy soon. Because of this, the World Evangelical Alliance notes that the U.S. may feel hesitant to upset officials in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital, because it's directly competing

with China over economic opportunities. But the Alliance says that should be no excuse to undermine the seriousness of the threat of growing extremism. Follow us The global hero that made one giant leap for mankind has died at 82. Neil Armstrong , the first man on the moon suffered complications from cardiovascular procedures. Armstrong commanded Apollo 11 that landed on the moon July 20, 1969. In all, 12 American astronauts walked on the moon between 1969 and the last moon mission in 1972. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Easy Quinoa Combos (Cooking Light: Editor's Picks) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:42:15 AM

Ready in about 20 minutes, whole-grain, and gluten-free. Here's how 2/3 cup (the amount of quinoa you'll use for the combos) compares to other whole grains. Quinoa 148 calories, 5.4g protein, 3.5g fiber Brown Rice 144 calories, 3.4g protein, 2.3g fiber Farro 133 calories, 5.3g protein, 4.7g fiber Barley 129 calories, 2.4g protein, 4g fiber Bulgur 101 calories, 3.7g protein, 5.5g fiber This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Listening to Negative People Will Make You Dumb (The Christian Post)

same effect even if you are passively listening to them. Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:37:51 AM What's a Leader to Do? Featured Posts Those in leadership positions are Opinion Why Anger Is Essential in a dilemma it would seem. In a world that has been terribly Every position of leadership will broken by sin, where nothing always be exposed to negative operates as was ... and critical people. It goes with August 27, 2012| 11:37 am the responsibility. Brain Studies and Negative Follow us People Though leaders cannot avoid Minda Zatlin reports in Inc. negative people entirely, we can magazine that new research in incorporate some tactics that will neuroscience demonstrates how help us deal with the matter more negative and critical people affect effectively. us. She notes that "being exposed •Discern the difference between to too much complaining can the negative critic and the a c t u a l l y m a k e y o u d u m b . constructive critic. You really Research shows that exposure to want to hear the latter person. 30 minutes or more of negativity You want to avoid the former if at – including viewing such material all possible. on TV – actually peels away •Avoid negative media. Many n e u r o n s i n t h e b r a i n ' s leaders are drawn to negative hippocampus. That's the part of television, radio, print media, and your brain you need for problem blogs like an onlooker is drawn to solving." a car wreck. We just want to look. So what is the result of exposure Before you begin reading or to negative and critical people? listening to the negativity next "Basically it turns your brain to time, just remember that you will mush," the article notes. It has the walk away dumber.

•Have a spirit of rejoicing. The Apostle Paul writes this imperative in Scripture: "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!" (Philippians 4:4). The mandate is not only to rejoice, but to rejoice at all times. If we are allowing thoughts of rejoicing into our minds, we don't allow the words of negative persons and critics to enter. •Choose your friends wisely. Avoid friends who are negative and embrace those who are not. You are likely to spend a lot of time with your friends. Make certain the time is well spent. •Be a positive person. You will attract other positive people. And you may dissuade the negative person from being so negative. Leadership Requires Focus One of the greatest dangers a leader faces is to lose his or her focus. Much is expected of leaders. Indeed much is demanded of leaders. A constant barrage of negativity can prove to be extremely harmful to the leader and to the organization he or she

leads. And now we have medical and scientific evidence that shows the detrimental effects of negativity on the brain. It's not a pretty picture. So next time you are confronted with a negative or critical person, consider practicing some of the tactics noted above. You might come away a happier person. You might come away a better leader. And you might even come away a bit smarter or, at the very least, not any dumber. Dr. Thom Rainer is president and CEO of LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Our Most Pinned Recipes (Cooking Light: Editor's Picks)

we love to see what goes viral on Pinterest. Click through Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:42:15 AM the following slides to see what's From phyllo-wrapped asparagus getting pinned and repinned from to a collection of forty fast meals, CookingLight.com.

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Mayor Landrieu: Prepare to Shelter at Home (The Feed) Submitted at 8/27/2012 8:19:40 AM

Via Times Picayune: With Tropical Storm Isaac expected to strengthen, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu has declared a state of emergency and urged residents to begin preparing their homes as shelters through the storm. Landrieu said the storm is moving along at about 16 miles an hour, and if it stays at that pace, it could reach the city in the next 34 hours, putting it ashore late Tuesday or early Wednesday. Landrieu emphasized that there will be no shelters of last resort, so people need to be prepared to evacuate, should it come to that. . . Because sheltering at home worked out so well the last time? This is the politics of hope — i.e., I hope Isaac doesn’t get bigger and the levies levees hold.— Greg Pollowitz This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Ron Paul Says 'I Don't Fully Endorse' Romney (The Christian Post)

Paul, who still has several hundred delegates pledging support to him due to his smallgovernment views, earned 177 • (Photo: Reuters/Eric Miller) delegates through primaries and U.S. Republican presidential c a u c u s e s , a c c o r d i n g t o a n candidate Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) A s s o c i a t e d P r e s s c o u n t . appears at a rally in Golden While GOP officials delayed Valley, Minnesota, February 7, RNC activities until Tuesday 2012. afternoon because the approaching tropical storm Isaac August 27, 2012| 12:05 pm was expected to turn into a "It wouldn't be my speech," Paul hurricane, Paul decided to go said in an interview with The New ahead with his own rally on York Times. "That would undo Sunday. Many delegates from everything I've done in the last 30 Minnesota, who accuse the years. I don't fully endorse him Romney campaign and the RNC for president." of a power grab, attended the Paul, who effectively ended his rally. presidential bid in May, said Follow us convention planners offered him "I think this storm is to Tampa the chance to speak under the like a blizzard might be to conditions that he deliver a speech Minnesota," Marianne Stebbins, p r e - a p p r o v e d b y R o m n e y ' s the chairwoman of the Minnesota campaign, and that he give a "full- RNC delegation, told Minnesota fledged" endorsement of the Public Radio while on her way to former Massachusetts governor. the event. "You kind of prepare While Paul will not likely speak and look out for it, but the sense a t t h e R N C , t h e R o m n e y I'm getting from the locals here is campaign has reportedly agreed to they're not too concerned about a request from Paul's supporters to it." pay tribute to the congressman in Stebbins said she expected Paul a short film that will be screened supporters to fill the Sun Dome's during the convention. 11,000 seats to celebrate his Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:05:38 AM

campaign. "This is the culmination of the campaign because Ron won't be allowed to speak at the national convention itself," she said. "This is the opportunity for America to hear him in context with the national convention, for him to talk about his issues which are not going to get aired at the national convention." The libertarian congressman's campaign had earlier threatened to bring as many as 500 supportive delegates to Tampa to make his presence noticeable and influence the direction of the Republican Party. Paul believes in a noninterventionist foreign policy and decriminalizing drugs, and says government should not have a role in some of the conservative social causes. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

CANADA continued from page 43

Interac’s new “contactless” card, which customers simply scan at the checkout counter and don’t require a PIN. While the technology for contactless payments is nothing new, Interac’s unified reach seems more likely to succeed in making the method widespread. Compare that to the U.S., where Forrester says adoption has been stymied by “a classic chicken-or-egg dilemma between retailers and card issuers” in which merchants have resisted investing in new point-of-sale terminals that could accept contactless payments because they don’t see customer demand, while issuers have resisted issuing contactless cards because not enough merchants have terminals that can take them. Wright doesn’t believe Canada will go truly cashless in his lifetime. But he believes it’s the right goal to aim for. He says countries benefit from a cash-free

economy because the flow of money can be traced. The ability to follow the money leads to greater transparency, which Wright believes leads to improved decision-making and greater efficiency. “It’s easier. It’s better,” he says. “I’d argue it’s actually in the best interest of the economy.” (Hat tip to commenter LoudRambler for the tip on Interac.) This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Spanish MP apologises after saying he has a 'tough time' living on €5,100 a month Telegraph Staff (Finance News - Business news from the UK and world) Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:53:34 AM

A Spanish lawmaker's hardship tale of barely scraping by on

€5,100 euros (£4,000) a month has prompted a deluge of derision in recession-hit Spain.

Culture/ News Photos Social Media/

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Opening day for Sports on Earth (Holy Kaw!)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:57:00 AM

If reading great sports writing is your thing, it’s time to create a new bookmark for the site Sports on Earth, which launches today. Joe Posnanski explains his inspiration in starting another site devoted to the American obsession that is sports as follows: In some ways, that charge at first pitch, at tipoff, at kickoff, at teeoff, faceoff, at the goosebumps that rise when someone yells “Gentlemen, start your engines,” when the starter fires the gun, when the bell rings and the gates open and umpire says simply, “Play” … all of that is what I love most about sports. That start is the instant when the hype ends, when the experts cease to matter, when the critics leave the arena, when the endless possibilities begin to take shape. Anything can still happen. Most of the time, you won’t see Rulon Gardner beat the unbeatable Russian or Kobe Bryant score 81 or Bo Jackson

I Know You’re 60, Pee-wee, But What Am I? [PICS] Christine Erickson (Mashable!) Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:01:11 PM

turn the corner or King Felix throw a perfect game. But sometimes, you will. And that’s enough. Today, we start up here at Sports on Earth, and we feel that electricity of the opening bell. The idea here is to build a sports website around great writing. That’s not exactly a new idea. There is a lot of great sports writing out there and has been pretty much since people carved

sports figures on cave walls. But we think it’s a timeless idea. There are so many ways to enjoy sports in today’s high-definition, fantasy-sports, Twitter-saturated, 3-D-glasses world. And reading a great story, laughing at a fun analysis, getting angry at an opposing opinion, picking up a small insight that helps you enjoy the game more, joining in with the community of sports believers and storytellers and jokers -- we

believe these are all a big part of the fun. One never knows if a website will take off or not, but they seem to have a strong cast of writers from the get go and, let’s face it, can sports fans ever really get enough? Full story at Sports on Earth. All about sports. Permalink| Leave a comment »

PHOTOS: Nudestock 2012 - Seattle Post Intelligencer (blog) (news photos - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:51:51 AM

PHOTOS: Nudestock 2012

Seattle Post Intelligencer (blog) seatlepi.com · Home · Local · U.S./World · Business · Sports · A&E · Life · Comics · Photos·

Blogs · Forums · Traffic · Shopping · Real Estate · Index · David Nelson. David teaches a variety of courses for the Seattle

Community Colleges. Prior to...

1. "Tequila" Image courtesy of DKNG Studios Click here to view this gallery. Paul Reubens, better known as the fictional character Pee-wee Herman, celebrates his 60th birthday on Monday. Between Pee-wee's Big Adventure and Peewee's Playhouse, Reubens entertained us in the '80s with talking furniture and the ultimate comeback: "I know you are, but what am I?" SEE ALSO: Pee-wee Herman Joins Cast of ‘Dark Knight Rises’ [VIDEO] To celebrate Reubens' big 6-0, we've collected some of the finest Pee-wee Herman fan artwork and GIFs created over the years. More About: Movies, Watercooler, artwork, humor, pics

Culture/ Politics-Right/ Politics

Curated News Edition

The jet-pack wedding and 5 other extreme nuptials (Holy Kaw!)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:49:00 AM

"Most brides choose to have their dad walk them down the aisle on their wedding day," says Katie Kindelan at ABC News. But Amanda Volf "chose a jet pack instead," flying across the water before landing at her wedding ceremony on the shores of Newport Beach, Calif. Her husband-to-be, Grant Engler, also flew to the ceremony with one of the $90,000 gadgets, in what is "being billed as the first jet-pack wedding in history." But Volf and Engler are not the only bride and groom to think outside the box when it comes to their nuptials. Here, five other couples who scoffed at the traditional wedding and went extreme: 1. The bungee wedding

When they got hitched in November 2008, Sandra Eens and Jeroen Kippers took a big step — off a 150-foot platform. The couple was the first to patronize Marriage in the Sky, a company that allows people to get married while bungee jumping. Eens and

Kippers "took their vows in front of a minister before going over the side and locking lips upside down," says Britain's The Telegraph. 2. The underwater wedding "We've all seen wedding day meltdowns, when things just don't

go exactly the way the bride and groom plan," says David Moye at The Huffington Post. "The stakes are raised slightly, however, when everyone in the wedding party is wearing a snorkel." That's what Alberto Dal Lago and Karla Ysunza did off the coast of Mexico in July 2011, inviting more than 200 guests to attend their underwater ceremony. Dal Lago and Ysunza had hoped to break the record for the most people at an underwater wedding, but fell just short of the record of 261 set in 2010 by Francesca Colombi and Giampiero Giannoccaro in Italy. Full story at The Week. All the top stories from The Week. Permalink| Leave a comment »

Laying the Groundwork of Obama's Second Term (American Thinker) Submitted at 8/27/2012 1:04:06 AM

Barack Obama has great plans for his second term: to bring his golf handicap down to single digits and finally beat the pants off John Boehner. Considering that Obama's handicap right now is generously estimated at 17 -- i.e., on a good day he scores in the upper 80s to the lower 90s -- it is a very ambitious goal, but it's doable. Electoral victory would obviate the need for Obama to waste a lot of time shaking down star-struck Hollywood stars and credulous (or frightened) Wall Street tycoons, allowing the president to devote more attention to the all-important tasks of improving his golf game, LAYING page 50

Chicago Police Try New Crimefighting Tool: Arrests (The Feed) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:03:36 AM

Via the Chicago Sun-Times: Chicago police arrested more than 300 people and confiscated over 100 guns when they busted

street gang drug sales operations in 10 police districts across the city over the weekend, officials said. But the police sweeps did not stop the bad guys from posting some big numbers too: wounded from Thursday through Nine killed and at least 47

Sunday. . . Now, let’s keep this up. . .— Greg Pollowitz This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read

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LAYING continued from page 49

watching basketball, and partying. But won't golf, basketball, and entertainment, while obviously consuming the lion's share of the president's schedule, leave him enough time for less enjoyable pursuits? Like building on his first-term successes in destroying the economy, undermining the American dream, and knocking America down a peg or two in the international arena. No problem. Obama loves to delegate the more tedious components of his duties (i.e., work), and plenty of his enthusiastic allies are only too happy to pick up the slack. Indeed, as reported by Aaron Klein and Brenda J. Elliott in their New York Times bestseller Fool Me Twice, progressive strategists are already busy at work, developing detailed blueprints of Dear Leader's program for his second term. Having perused thousands of documents developed by the network of progressive think-tanks, Klein and Elliott describe in detail their plans designed to further their century-old dream of destroying America as we know it and converting it into a socialist paradise. Some highlights of their blueprints: a massive governmentfunded jobs program -- in effect, a remake of FDR's Works Progress Administration; a green "stimulus" and the founding of a federal "green" bank to provide low-cost financing to privatesector "clean energy" companies (Solyndra, anyone?); an overhaul of the immigration policy; an

electoral reform; a national energy policy; and drastic defense spending cuts. The animating principle of the progressive platform is the concept of "economic fairness" tirelessly touted by Obama. It would be achieved through a twoprong approach. One is a federal "living wage" program, under which all private-sector employers would be forced to pay their employees enough to meet their "basic needs" such as housing, food, utilities, transportation, health care, and recreation. And who is going to determine these needs? Why, government bureaucrats, of course. The other prong is the progressives' age-old wet dream: "equal pay for equal work." It would be achieved by the requirement that all people should be compensated on the basis of their jobs' "value" rather than through the workings of the free market. And again, federal bureaucrats would establish the "value" of each job as well as police the private sector to ferret out bias and all manner of discrimination. Progressives also propose mandatory 12-week paid time off for medical needs and another hike of the minimum wage, notwithstanding the disastrous results of all previous minimum wage increases, which have basically destroyed the entry -level jobs market. This thinking marks a significant deviation from the classic Marxist theory. While Karl Marx touted

the "working class" as the gravedigger of capitalism, his modern acolytes have been disenchanted with the "proletariat" and no longer trust its revolutionary impulses. Accordingly, they have transferred their hopes to a new force: a gigantic welfare class wholly dependent on government largess for its livelihood and thus eager to vote for its progressive benefactors, perpetuating them in power. Reading about their plans, I had an eerie sense of dĂŠjĂ vu...but of course! In his 1944 State of the Union address, Franklin Delano Roosevelt articulated the "Second Bill of Rights," a set of proposals regarding what the government must do for its citizens, adumbrating Barack Obama's complaints that the U.S. Constitution covers only "negative rights" ( thou shall not s). The positive rights annunciated by FDR included: The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation; The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation; The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living; The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;

The right of every family to a decent home; The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health; The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment; The right to a good education. It doesn't take a genius to see the patent absurdity of the ideas advanced by the 32 nd U.S. president. What is a "decent" home? "Adequate" medical care? "Good" education? But it is doubtful that FDR took his own proposals at face value. He had little understanding of basic economics, as attested by the disastrous record of his New Deal, but he possessed keen political instincts. From the viewpoint of elementary common sense, his "Second Bill of Rights" is as absurd as the communists' inane concept of " reasonable needs." But as sheer demagoguery, a politician's recipe of perpetuating himself in power it is a stroke of genius. As Heinrich Heine said, "[n]ightingale, I recognize you by your hooves." One shudders to think what FDR, flushed with victory in World War Two, would have done to the country had he lived longer. But to the chagrin of all progressives, he died at the relatively young age of 63. Yet his ideas did not perish with him. One of Obama's most important advisers, Cass Sunstein, who has only recently departed the administration to return to his perch at Harvard Law School, in

2004 published a book under the title The Second Bill of Rights: FDR's Unfinished Revolution and Why We Need It More than Ever. Another of Obama's allies, Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), speaking at a 2008 Obama campaign rally, demanded the implementation of a "Second Bill of Rights." Granted, the plans being laid down by the progressive strategists represent merely their thinking, not Obama's explicit plans. But considering that the very same people developed the blueprints for his first term -which he tried to implement to the letter, in some instances even using their exact wording -- there is every reason to believe that their cerebrations are an all but official template for the next four years of Obama's rule. And if Obama succeeds in bamboozling enough voters to eke out a victory by hook or by crook, he will be ready to hit the ground running and pick up where he left off in his first term. So the flame is kept alive; the beat goes on. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Pitchfork Protest Farmer Confronts Government Corruption and Retribution (American Thinker)

concocting some charge against Martha for giving away her veggies without a permit. No American Thinker was the first to tomato is beyond the reach of r e p o r t a b o u t h o w F a u q u i e r tyrants. County, Virginia attempted to fine One local newspaper editorial farmer Martha Boneta for hosting claimed that Martha could have a birthday party for eight 10-year- saved herself a lot of trouble and old girls without a special events money had she just gotten the permit. She was also fined for $150 administrative permit to sell selling her farm produce without a her farm products. The message special administrative permit, from a few purveyors of free even though she had a business advice is that had Martha just license that allowed those sales. lacked principles and done what As also reported here, Martha the h e r m a s t e r , a n u n e l e c t e d farmer lost her appeal before the government bureaucrat, had c o u n t y ' s B o a r d o f Z o n i n g dictated to her, she'd be in a better Appeals. What has not been place. But beware of free advice reported is that Fauquier County, from statists. without explanation, refused to Martha had a business license to renew her business license just operate a tiny farm store that sits days before her appeal hearing. scenically amid her farm animals She has been forced to shut down and organic vegetables. In 2011, her small farm store where she however, Fauquier County added sells organic vegetables, fiber, and a new requirement for farmers, feather products from her farm w h i c h i t c a l l e d a " s p e c i a l animals (she has over 160, most administrative permit." The of which are rescued), as well as county's board of supervisors beeswax candles, goats milk touted this new permit as an soaps, and other products from i m p r o v e m e n t o n a n d a her farming activities. clarification of what farmers Because she could not sell her c o u l d s e l l o n t h e i r p r i v a t e organic vegetables in this critical p r o p e r t y . P u h - l e a s e . part of the harvest season, Martha One local environmental group donated them to a local food bank with an unusual amount of before they rotted. Fauquier influence over Fauquier County County zoning administrator and officials was assuredly behind the bureaucratic bully Kimberley 2011 administrative permit. This J o h n s o n i s p r o b a b l y b u s y group touted the county's recent Submitted at 8/27/2012 1:04:16 AM

controversial winery ordinance as a balance of interests. The ordinance forces wineries to close at 6 p.m., defines and limits "personal private gatherings" allowable at wineries, and is a gross affront to property rights and civil liberties. The interests being balanced seem to be statism and revenue. The administrative permit that Martha the farmer rejected in the name of fighting for liberty is highly restrictive of the rights of farmers. The permit is vague and open to selective enforcement. For example, it limits farms sales to only agricultural products, at least 50 percent of which must be grown at the farm, and anything not grown at the farm must be labeled as such. The permit therefore makes it

illegal for farmers to sell ice-cold water and other beverages. Under the permit, farmers may not sell books with pictures of the county, home-spun art, farming artifacts, or even any literature authored by the farmers themselves on farming, animal husbandry, and the like. Even when conditions demand it, farm stores are limited in supplementing their produce by bringing in vegetables from neighboring farms, making mortgage and property tax payments more difficult than they already are. And the permit is not clear: is it 50 percent of each type of vegetable, or 50 percent cumulatively of all the vegetables that you sell? Only zoning czar Kimberley Johnson knows for sure. The administrative permit also restricts what may take place at corn mazes, pumpkin patches, and other farm events for children. Fauquier County obviously doesn't want children to get the full farm experience -- oh, but we already knew this, since the county penalized Martha for that birthday party. Perhaps dumbest on the new list of don't s is that farmers must keep dust from their driveways. You read that right: Fauquier County wants dust-free farms. The permit provides no guidance

about how much dust is illegal. Farmers typically don't pave their driveways because -- well, because they live on farms. Kimberley Johnson wrote to one person that farmers should water their driveways. This means that during hot, dry spells, farmers would need to divert scarce water from crops and livestock, or face fines. Martha could have opted into the new, more restrictive permit requirement. She instead opted to use the phrase from Herman Melville's Bartleby, the Scrivener: "I would prefer not to." In doing so, she has made herself a hero in the fight against government that breaks the law, and the antiliberty faux environmental groups that use government for their own corrupt agendas. What has not been reported is that in March, zoning tyrant Johnson sent her assistant Andrew Hushour, without probable cause or a judge-signed warrant, to investigate Martha's farm for a "boarding house" violation. Martha, you see, had college students staying at her home near the farm. The students were volunteering during their spring break to learn about organic farming. Hushour, coincidentally, had four PITCHFORK page 52

Politics

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If the Birther Issue Comes Up in Debate (American Thinker)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 1:04:53 AM

"No one has ever asked to see my birth certificate," said Mitt Romney at a rally last week in a Detroit suburb. "They know this is the place that we were born and raised." This remark created a major stir on the left, a minor stir in the media, and a petit frisson on the right, and it touched the great empty middle of "undecided" America not at all. For better or worse, the undecideds have other things to worry about. Later, Romney adviser Kevin Madden seemed to temper the remark, telling the media, "The governor has always said, and has repeatedly said, he believes the president was born here in the United States. "He was only referencing that Michigan, where he is campaigning today, is the state where he himself was born and raised." Although some on the right were disappointed that Romney did not pursue this, he was wise not to. This was not the right time. The right time is during a debate. At

least one moderator will find Romney's bait irresistible, and I am guessing it will be CNN's Candy Crowley. What follows is a proposed strategy for the Hofstra University debate on October 16. My guess is that Romney has pretty much figured it out already, thus the remark in Michigan: CC: Governor Romney, in Michigan you told a crowd of supporters, "No one has ever asked to see my birth certificate." Don't you believe that the birth certificate President Obama presented last year is valid? MR: I have questions about its validity, but that is not why I raised the issue. CC: Why did you, then? Weren't you afraid that some people, minorities and immigrants especially, will see that as a subtle attack on President Obama because of his race? MR: Candy, not at all. No one ever asked to see Jesse Jackson's birth certificate when he ran for president or Al Sharpton's when he ran. And they are both black, both proud representatives of the president's party. I raised that

issue because of the unique uncertainty surrounding Obama's early years. I know I was born and raised in Michigan. I said as much. I would ask you or the president himself to tell us where he spent the first year of his life. CC: Mr. President? BO: Um, um, I am not sure I understand why this question is relevant. CC: Governor? MR: It is relevant because President Obama built his 2008 campaign, indeed his very persona, around the fact that he was born into a happy multicultural home in Hawaii and that he lived there until he was six. That is not true, and he knows it. BO: Candy, haven't we spent enough time on this question already? MR: No, Mr. President. We have not spent nearly enough time. Would you please confirm to the American people that your mother and father never lived together and that you spent your infancy in the state of Washington? CC: Mr. President, is that true? BO: There is some uncertainty

about that first year. MR: The uncertainty did not end with year one. It was Barack Obama himself who claimed a Kenyan birth in the promotional material his literary agent, Jane Dystel, sent to prospective publishers. CC: Is that true, Mr. President? BO: (testily) As the agency explained, that was a clerical error. MR: A clerical error is saying you were born in Kansas City, Kansas when you were really born in Kansas City, Missouri. Secretaries don't say "Kenya" when they mean "Hawaii." It doesn't happen. CC: Governor, do you believe he was born in Kenya? MR: No, I don't. I believe that the president misrepresented himself to make his book more marketable. He has a habit of doing that. Do I have time for one more point, Candy? CC: Please make it quick. We're on the clock. MR: Can you or the president please explain how he came up with an 042 prefix on his Social Security card? That is a

Connecticut number. How did he get it? BO: I can assure you that Osama bin Laden did not ask to see my Social Security number when we raided his compound in Pakistan. MR: Speaking of Pakistan, Mr. President, why did you refuse to mention your trip there in 1981 until soon after an employee of your current deputy national security adviser, John Brennan, was caught breaching your passport file in 2008? BO: Um, Candy... CC: Yes, Mr. President, now is the time for a quick commercial message. When we come back, we have a question for the governor on why he and Rep. Todd Aiken want to ban contraceptives. Candy Crowley, CNN News. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

would be illegal for anyone to disclose it to him. Thousands of times per day, government violates the law, bullies its citizens, and compounds its grab of our property rights and individual

liberties. We don't hear about most of these incidents because most people fear government retribution and decide to cave in. Martha's cause, it seems, will help expose more than just government abuse of zoning laws

in Fauquier County. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five

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PITCHFORK continued from page 51

armed county law enforcement officials with him. Days before the pitchfork protest for Martha, one county official told me that Martha is under a tax audit. I told this official that whether this is true or not, it

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School bus tips for motorists Consumer Reports News (Consumer Reports)

day. As a driver, it is crucial for the community to be extra cautious Submitted at 8/27/2012 6:59:59 AM during the school pick-up and School bus tips for motorists drop-off hours, and to treat school Riding the big yellow school bus buses as something best seen from is a safer mode of transportation a distance, rather than up close. for children than driving or Here are some rules to make walking to school, but the real sharing the road with buses safe risk for injury is from motorists for everyone: who do not follow the proper laws • Never pass a school bus that is and procedures when driving near s t o p p e d t o l o a d o r u n l o a d a bus. children. It is illegal in all 50 Putting figures to the obvious states. Also, never pass a school risks, the National Highway bus on the right -- it is illegal and Traffic Safety Administration dangerous.• If you are traveling (NHTSA) reports there is an in the same direction as a stopped average of 139 fatalities per year school bus, you must stop as involving school transportation- well.• Yellow flashing lights related crashes. Most of these indicate that the bus is preparing fatalities aren't to the children on to stop to pickup or drop off the buses, but rather to occupants children. If you are driving, slow of other vehicles involved in the down and prepare to stop. Red crashes (72 percent) or to other flashing lights and an extended non-occupants of the buses, such stop arm indicate that the bus is as those who are walking and stopped, and that children are biking to school (20 percent). getting on or off. This, of course, And the dangers aren't just in the means that you have to stop as morning going to school. In fact, well.• When waiting with your NHTSA points out that more own child, teach them to wait school-age pedestrians have been until the stop arm is fully killed between the hours of 3 p.m. extended and the bus door opens and 4 p.m. than any other time of before moving toward the bus.•

sidewalks. Also be aware of children playing or waiting around bus stops.• Be alert and aware on the road. While children are typically taught about looking both ways, they could dart into the street without looking if they are late or distracted. The area ten feet around a school bus is at the highest risk for child being hit, so stop your car further than that to allow space for children to enter or exit. Most states have distance requirements, and they may be much further away than you may think.• When backing out of a driveway or leaving a garage, watch out for children walking or bicycling to school. Better yet, walk around your car or out to the sidewalk to check for any children walking in your path before you get in.• Be aware that roads that pass close schools may have slower speed limits during arrival and dismissal times than during non-school hours and that those limits are often more strictly enforced.• Drive slowly and watch for children walking in the street, especially if there are no

For more on child safety, see our kids and car safety guide. Related: Back-to-school transportation safety for children School bus safety tips for drivers and children Subscribe now! S u b s c r i b e t o ConsumerReports.org for expert Ratings, buying advice and reliability on hundreds of products. Update your feed preferences

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Music Monday: Girl Groups (Woot)

More female-centric rock and pop comin' up, along with our Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:00:00 AM Spotify playlist, right after the Happy Music Monday! It's a jump. crisp, new day, and everyone's Before we move forward, full of joy and excitement. Sorta r e m e m b e r o u r n e w S p o t i f y makes you want to sing, right? playlist will be featuring a great And when you think of singing, selection from last week's Music you think ofâ&#x20AC;Ś girl groups! Or at Monday comments. The theme of least Scott does. Today you're the mix this time is Summer gonna rock out with girl groups Romance and boy, it'll break your throughout the aged. And here's heart. But you'll be stronger for it his first choice to start things off! in the end. Just please check out The Dum Dum Girls - He Gets our current Music Monday before Me High you recap those old memories. Welcome to the 21st Century, And speaking of which... where girl groups can play The Pipettes - Pull Shapes guitars! The Dum Dum Girls Of course this 2003 band is combine the old-fashioned girl wearing their references on the group melody (check out that sleeves they don't have, but that glorious soaring chorus!) with the doesn't make them any less electric fire of biker rock. Not to c h a r m i n g . T h e m i x o f mention, if you can improve on tunesmithing and cheerleading The Smiths you're already a offers the same atmosphere as freakin' rock star. Well done, those classic girl groups from the ladies! You've taken the "girl '60s, though perhaps a little more group" to a higher level. Spice Girly than most of the

century before. (Be aware that in the video above there's a pixeledout body part showing up a few times, if that sort of thing would make your boss uneasy.) The Go-Gos - Vacation Even today, hearing a few notes from this song calls up a magical time of weird hair and synthesizers. This song brings new meaning to the words "radiofriendly" but it also doesn't sacrifice quality. Hold your head high, women of rock! And we'll just overlook most of the solo stuff. The Ronettes - Walking In The Rain Hands down my favorite Phil Spector production. The fake thunder, the in-your-face Wall of Sound, the backup singers that seem to be out in the hall, and Ronnie Spector's heartbreaking voice. Not to mention, it's not as overplayed as some other girl group hits. No disrespect, The

Crystals. The Pointer Sisters - Yes We Can Go on, stomp along at your desk. This song was made for groovin' to. You might be more familiar with some poppier hits from these real-life sisters, but back when their style was still "what we found at the thrift store that morning" and they had nothing their voices and their talent and their hope... Well, this song isn't so much a song as a conversation with the audience. And it's great. So maybe you've got a favorite female-focused group of your own. And maybe you'll want to throw that in the comments below. Then maybe you'll just us in our Turntable.fm room for the regular Music Monday enjoyment. Hey, we can dream, can't we? Also, let us just remind you: some images come from the corresponding Wikipedia page and are here under fair use.

Republican National Convention 2012: Big GOP Names Convene In Tampa ... Huffington Post (news photos - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:37:48 AM

RT Republican National Convention 2012: Big GOP Names Convene In Tampa... Huffington Post Judy Griffin, of Georgia, takes photos while wearing a hat with Republican Party buttons during the 2012 Tampa Bay Host Committee's welcoming event for the delegates of the Republican National Convention on Sunday, Aug. 26, 2012 at Tropicana Field in... Photos: Republican National Convention, August 27, 2012 News in photos Tropical Storm Isaac scares both GOP delegates and protesters in Tampa RT PHOTOS: Marylanders at GOP Convention in Tampa Patch.com all 9,059 news articles Âť

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Don't let Tropical When Hospital Systems Acquire Private Practices, We Storm Isaac catch you with a subpar generator All Pay More For Health Care Chris Morran (The Consumerist)

same equipment, the same room," explained the patient. "I was very upset." Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:15:56 AM For the doctors, it's a good deal, A growing number of private as they generally make more health care practices are being being part of a hospital system purchased by hospitals. And even than they do on their own. But if that practice remains changed in those tests and services that cost all other ways, you can expect less to perform outside a hospital that the costs for procedures and system will likely now be billed at visits will increase dramatically. hospital rates. Since 2000, the percentage of The insurance companies place specialty physicians actually some of the blame for recent rate employed by the hospitals in increases on the growing number which they see patients has soared o f p r i v a t e p r a c t i c e s b e i n g from 5% to nearly 25%. For absorbed into hospitals. Some primary-care physicians, that believe that these higher costs are number has jumped during the also to blame for an increase in same time period from around Medicare spending. 20% to 40%. From the Journal: The Wall Street Journal looks at Medicare pays substantially more the impact that this trend has on for certain services if they are everyone from the patients to the performed at hospital facilities. A insurance company to employers. 15-minute doctor visit, for One patient tells the Journal that instance, cost the program about after his cardiologist was snapped $70 last year at a free-standing up by a hospital, the cost for an practice, but the same visit ran echocardiogram jumped from about $124 if it was billed as $373 to $1,605. And even though hospital-outpatient, according to the insurance company foots some the Medicare Payment Advisory of the bill, the patient's deductible Commission. That difference can left him with around $1,000 in out bump up reimbursements after an of pocket payments. acquisition, if a hospital system "Nothing had changed, it was the upgrades a clinic to become an

outpatient facility, or moves services into a hospital site. Insurance companies see similar increases. Blue Shield of California tells the Journal of a private practice whose rates increased by 140% after being bought by Sutter Health, while another group of formerly private doctors had their rates jump up 95% after becoming part of the UCLA Health System. The journal points to a letter from insurance giant WellPoint to Nevada physicians that lists the cost of a spine MRI at anywhere from $319 to $742 at an independent service, while the same scan costs between $1,591 and $2,226 at a hospital-owned facility. Same Doctor Visit, Double the Cost[WSJ.com] This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:44:59 AM

Don't let Tropical Storm Isaac catch you with a subpar generator Gulf Coast residents are facing the biggest risk as Tropical Storm Isaac builds to the 96-mph-plus winds that define a Category 2 hurricane. But Consumer Reports' latest tests of 15 portable and stationary home generators confirm that some models could leave other homeowners in other states with less power than they thought as the hurricane season heats up. And if you think a trusted name and a higher price guarantee a better generator, think again. We focused on models that produce the 5,000 to 7,000 watts should power most home needs. Three midsized portable generators—the $850 All Power APG3560, $1,250 Gentron GG3203, and $700 Briggs & Stratton 30468—slipped when it came to delivering the higher surge wattage needed when air conditioners, refrigerators, and pumps cycle on. Two others could shorten the lives of fridges and other motorized appliances by making them run hotter than they should under heavy load. The portable

$1,200 Generac XG7000E 5798 proved shy of the 120 volts home circuits typically need. And the stationary Briggs & Stratton EmPower 040301 was also low on voltage and fell short of the even power delivery we got from the best generators we tested. A better bet: Generac's portable GP5500 5939, a CR Best Buy at $670. It's one of four portable generators and two stationary models that delivered the smooth, consistent power you'll need when the lights go out. Before buying any home generator, check out our video—and use this guide to help you decide how much you want to power and how many watts you'll need. Subscribe now! S u b s c r i b e t o ConsumerReports.org for expert Ratings, buying advice and reliability on hundreds of products. Update your feed preferences

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Kroger Manager Fired For Allegedly Attacking Man Who Handed Out Food In Parking Lot Chris Morran (The Consumerist)

allowed to sell food there," the man tells the Atlanta JournalConstitution. "I told him that I Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:45:04 AM wasn't selling food." After you buy food at the grocery The manager was not convinced, store, it's pretty much yours to do even though the septuagenarian with as you wish, right?But a had been working with this Kroger manager in Georgia didn't particular Kroger since starting believe that an elderly customer his operation more than a decade would just want to hand out food ago. to hungry people, and allegedly "He asked me to show him proof attacked the man, losing his job in of my business," recalls the man, the process. who says he got a card from The incident occurred last inside the vehicle and gav it to the Thursday, when the 73-year-old, manager. "Then he snatched the who operates a non-profit that [card] from me and turned to walk d o n a t e s p e r i s h a b l e f o o d t o away." families in need, was was trying When the man tried to get the to help a young woman who could card back from the manager, that's not afford all the groceries she when witnesses say the manager needed to buy. "knocked [the 73-year-old] down He asked her to follow her out to in the parking lot and just busted the parking lot so he could look his head open." through the food he had available In addition to requiring stitches to hand out to see what he could for the cut over his eye, the older offer her. man reportedly reinjured a rotator "The manager came outside with cuff tear that he'd recently had a security guard and told me to surgery to repair. leave the property and I wasn't The manager was charged with

simple battery and released on $1,000 bond. Kroger HQ calls the incident, "a terrible thing. This never should have happened and we deeply regret that it did.... After an internal investigation, we have decided to terminate [the manager's] employment with Kroger." Because of his injuries, the man says he hasn't been able to hand out food since the incident. "I don't think I could stop," he explains. "But there are places that I go everyday that I haven't been able to go to." Kroger manager fired after attack on senior[AJC.com] This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Best Buy Finally Agrees To Let Founder Schulze Poke Around All Up In Its Business Mary Beth Quirk (The Consumerist)

that says he needs the board's final approval before he makes a formal bid and doesn't have to Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:00:46 PM deal with an 18-month standstill He begged, he pleaded, he wrote period that was included in an passionate letters asking for Best earlier deal. Instead, if the board Buy to let him back in, and now it says no, he only has to wait to try appears founder and former again four months later. chairman Richard Schulze is This could be bad news for the finally getting his way. Or he's at newly-announced but currently least going to be allowed to check visa-less Hubert Joly, as it's out the information he needs to expected that Schulze would make a bid to buy the company. designate his own choice of CEO Of course, this doesn't mean that to helm the struggling company. it'll be all green lights on That'll be fine for Joly we bet, as Schulze's road toward acquiring he'll get at least $6.25 million no Best Buy. This just means he's matter what. been given permission to form an Best Buy agrees to open books to investment group and go about Schulze group[Reuters] doing due diligence. As Reuters This entry passed through the reports, this agreement is a Full-Text RSS service â&#x20AC;&#x201D; if this is nonexclusive deal, one that your content and you're reading it Schulze says he's pleased with. on someone else's site, please read Now that he's in the door, Shulze the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentwill get a gander at Best Buy's only/faq.php#publishers. Five private information in order to get Filters recommends: Incinerating his bid together properly within Assange - The Liberal Media Go 60 days. He's also got a golden To Work. ticket to bypass a Minnesota law

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How our high-tech What I wanted lightbulb tests identify the best bulbs (Dave Winer)

think. I wanted to hear from the software developer what he wanted to accomplish with his I wonder if they recorded the talk software. I knew this was needed I gave in Madison because I think because I was having trouble it might make a good podcast. communicating about my own A question came up -- what did I software. I was reduced to the h o p e t o a c c o m p l i s h w i t h ideas that I could convince blogging. I gave an answer that I reporters to pass on. I learned lots would like to amend. of tricks, and as a result my I said Democracy. That by giving products were successful. But I people their own platforms to wanted to eliminate the trickery speak on that there would be more and talk directly to users. listening and better government. And where I was a user, someone By implication, I was saying that who read a book, or watched a it had failed. But that's not all I movie, bought a car, went for a hoped to accompish. trip, needed medical care, I I wanted to disintermediate wanted to hear directly from journalists. I had learned that the people who knew what was going j o u r n a l i s m s y s t e m w e h a d on. required intermediaries who I felt However, I did not want to forgo were not trustworthy. They what the journalists add. I want to created the stories based on their emphasize that point. I just own filters, instead of finding out wanted to give them more sources what was actually happening. and honestly, some competition Of course this is an illusion. from people who know what Because my view of what was they're talking about, to encourage actually happening was just as them to be better at learning and wrong as theirs. really listening. What I really wanted, and knew Anyway, that's what I would like it, was to arm creative people with to have said when answering that tools to communicate with people question. who wanted to know what they Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:25:43 AM

Consumer Reports News (Consumer Reports)

based on 3,000 hours of testing and show that LEDs outshine CFLs. In fact, a 60-watt Submitted at 8/27/2012 7:59:59 AM replacement EcoSmart CFL from How our high-tech lightbulb tests Home Depot scored the lowest of identify the best bulbs that group. LEDs and CFLs use about 75 Some LEDs earned near perfect percent less energy than standard scores, but not all are good and incandescent bulbs, but that won't they can be expensive. The good matter much if the lightbulbs are interfering and captures all the news is LED prices are dropping. dim or give off a weird color. To light generated from the bulb," We just spotted a top-scoring find CFLs and LEDs that outshine says John Banta, an engineer for Philips 60-watt replacement LED the rest, our experts head straight Consumer Reports. Put another for $15 at a nearby Home Depot. to the integrating sphere in our way, the integrating sphere is very That's $10 less than a month ago. lightbulb lab. That's how we know cool. And our lightbulb tests show that that an EcoSmart LED from The sphere sends data to our t h e r e a r e p l e n t y o f f i n e , H o m e D e p o t i s t h e b e s t computers and the engineers inexpensive CFLs to choose from. r e p l a c e m e n t f o r a 6 0 - w a t t analyze it. Meanwhile in a lab Before you shop, check our incandescent that we've tested. down the hall racks and racks of Ratings to find the best bulbs for We place one lightbulb at a time CFLs and LEDs cycle on and off, your sockets. Subscribe now! inside the big hollow sphere to and after 3,000 hours they're put S u b s c r i b e t o determine the bulb's brightness back in the sphere to learn how ConsumerReports.org for expert while monitoring its energy use r e g u l a r u s e a f f e c t s t h e i r Ratings, buying advice and and determining whether the light performance. Then it's on to more r e l i a b i l i t y o n h u n d r e d s o f color is warm or cool. The sphere and more testing as we work to products. Update your feed also shows us how accurately a find out how LEDs, which have a preferences bulb reveals the colors of objects. very long claimed life, perform at "The integrating sphere prevents 12,000 hours. light from other sources from Our latest lightbulb Ratings are

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Apple Stock Hits AllTime High as Samsung Shares Slump

SpyParty redesign: The new art of espionage Jessica Conditt (Joystiq)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:10:00 PM

Last year, animator John Cimino turned down a cushy position at Zynga, pre-IPO, to work out of Chris Hecker's garage redesigning Hecker's ambitious, notorious indie game SpyParty. Cimino worked in secret since September 2011 to transform the primary colors and block-based skeletons of SpyParty's characters into the artistic, realistic designs revealed

today. Hecker calls the new style "illustrative," and he's extremely pleased with it. "We spent a ton of time trying to figure out the best possible art style for the game," Hecker tells Joystiq. "We really wanted the art style to reflect the same level of subtlety that the gameplay has. I didn't want it to be too realistic or too exaggerated, and I think we hit it on this really nice, call it naturalistic or illustrative - they

look like illustrations. I'm super excited." Gallery: Spyparty (new graphical style; 8/27/12) Continue reading SpyParty redesign: The new art of espionage SpyParty redesign: The new art of espionage originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 12:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments

Lauren Indvik (Mashable!)

The Calif. court ruling was announced around 4 p.m. PT on Friday after a three-week trial. Shares of Samsung Electronics The jury validated almost all of fell 7.5% Monday, decreasing the Appleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s claims that Samsung had company's market value by more copied the design of its devices, than $12 billion. A San Jose, including several iterations of its Calif. court judge ruled Friday iPhone, iPod touch and iPad that the South Korean tech devices. The jury found that manufacturer owed Apple$1.05 Samsung also infringed upon an billion in damages on several arâ&#x20AC;Ś incidents of patent infringement. Continue reading... Meanwhile, shares of Apple More About: apple, patent stock hit an all-time high of lawsuit, patent lawsuit theater, $ 6 8 2 . 0 7 p e r s h a r e M o n d a y samsung morning. Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:20:51 AM

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Respect (Dave Winer)

BigCo's any more than they listen to independent developers. People who have the guts to make their I started this thread called own software and put their name Scripting News back in the mid- on it. This is a mistake a lot of 90s with the theme of Respect. It entrepreneurs make. I've seen wasn't the only topic, but it was at them do it over and over. A the core of everything. I had just random guy at a big company has been through a collapse of an no more sway than you do. But industry because it didn't do you do what they tell you to do in enough listening. I wanted to the hope that their company will share what I had learned in the help you be successful. It does hope that we wouldn't have to happen sometimes, but not very repeat the lessons again. Back often. Only in special times. then I tried to say what respect Another one is that you can do means to me. And I wanted to much better at listening to others learn to practice it. if you learn to listen to yourself. To me, respect means listening to At all levels. First the gripes, then what someone is really saying. It's underneath that, what are you hard to do. It requires you to quiet really trying to accomplish. What your mind, and accept that the do you want to do with your time. world looks different from every Who do you want to co-create point of view. You can do with, and on what terms? exercises in listening. Sit across That's why long trips by yourself from someone, they talk, you are good for respect. don't lean in, or tune out. No hugs, In software what I respect more n o d s o r h e a d - s h a k e s . N o than anything is this. interruptions. Hear them out. I respect people who ship Completely. software that's open to I find that when I get stuck it's competition, and then write specs because I don't listen. to show people how to compete There are lots of corollaries that with them. fall out from this view. People It's just like the web. People don't listen to people who work at come back to places that send Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:01:17 AM

I spoke at a conference in Madison last week about venture capital, among other topics. The panel that was up before I spoke were talking about how to get VCs to love you and respect you and treat you well (by giving you money to begin with of course). I thought most of it was bullshit, and said so (in a nicer way of course). People treat you well when you have power. Otherwise, don't count on it. It's a hard lesson to learn, but it's mostly true. When you have power, you can decide to change the rules. But my guess is that people won't like you or respect you for doing it. That's why the people who show people them away. how to compete with them are so The last decade has been one of incredibly gutsy and special. It people not pointing outward with probably won't profit them their code. Or even worse, immediately or directly. It might pointing out and then when lead to their downfall. But it will people build on it, pulling the rug make the world greater. And if out from under them. From this that's what you're into, then I want must come a better appreciation to work with you, because I'm for trust. Don't be blind with it. into it too. Don't give your trust without These are not easy ideas to thinking it through, without really understand. I know that. listening. We're back in the mid-90s again. Will we do any better this time? I hope!

More Photos Could Emerge in Prince Harry Naked Pic Scandal - ABC News (blog) (news photos - Google News) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:39:47 AM

E! Online More Photos Could Emerge in Prince Harry Naked Pic Scandal ABC News (blog) The U.K.'s Daily Mail reports Prince Harry, 27, is “terrified” that more photos will be leaked, possibly from a booze-filled party that began a few hours after the strip billiards party inside his suite at the Wynn Las Vegas and Encore Resort Hotel... Prince Harry's Naked Vegas Photos Defended by Rupert Murdoch Despite... E! Online Just wild about photos of Harry Philadelphia Inquirer Prince Harry photos released in the U.K. Examiner.com CBS News- Gather.com- First Coast News all 1,634 news articles »

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Cage Match Matthew Shaer (Popular Science - New Technology, Science News, The Future Now)

Evans in almost every aspect of the fight. Al Bello/Zuffa LLC/ Zuffa LLC via Getty Images At the start, the two men stood a few feet apart. Jackson drew a Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:49:10 AM How science is transforming the circle. The node had three edges, sport of MMA fighting or moves that Jackson was Greg Jackson, the single most training Jones to use. He could successful trainer in the multiexecute a leg kick, or a punch, or billion-dollar sport of professional he could shoot for a takedown mixed martial arts fighting, works (attempt to grab Jordan by the out of a musty old gym in backs of his legs and drive him Albuquerque, New Mexico, not into the ground). But the initial far from the base of the Sandia node was not "optimal," he said, Mountains. On a recent morning, because it allowed Jordan to the 38-year-old Jackson, who has swing freely with both fists. the cauliflowered ears and Although it seemed bulbous nose of a career fighter, counterintuitive, the fast track to watched two of his students what Jackson calls the "damage" square off inside the chain-link node (in this case, Jones's walls of a blood-splattered ring advantageous position following called the Octagon. his hard knee) was to move in One of them was Jon Jones, the close, where Jordan would not be light heavyweight champion of able to fully wind up. Another the Ultimate Fighting circle, representing Jones's inside Championship (UFC), the premier position, and a series of edges, MMA league. In four weeks, you." Jordan threw a flurry of short arc. The kick missed. Jordan In a traditional game tree, each r e p r e s e n t i n g h i s p o t e n t i a l Jones would be defending his title blows. To me, the exchange threw again. This time Jones circle, or node, represents the decisions from there, appeared on against Rashad Evans, an expert a p p e a r e d d i s o r g a n i z e d , dropped down, flicked his head to point at which a decision can be the notepad. fighter and his former training nonsensical-a blur of flesh, sinew the side, and, leaping off one foot, m a d e . E a c h l i n e , o r e d g e , "From inside," Jackson said, "he partner. To prepare him, Jackson and the red flash of Jordan's launched a flying jab followed by represents the decision itself. can do a knee, he can do an a knee to Jordan's midsection, Game trees eventually end in a uppercut, he can do elbows. He had set up a sparring session with mouth guard. To Jackson, it was a logical w h i c h l a n d e d w i t h a w e t terminal node-either a tie or a win could have done anything there, Shawn "The Savage" Jordan, a sequence, one with only one whoompf. Jordan groaned and for one of the players. This game and done it effectively." heavyset fighter from Baton possible effective response. crumpled onto the mat. tree, Jackson told me, showed the Since 1992, when he opened his Rouge. Jones and Jordan met in the "Jones," he said, "move inside." "Goddamn, Jones!" Jackson exchange between Jones and first gym, Jackson has been using Jordan from Jones's perspective. math to inform his training middle of the ring. Jordan threw The fighter seemed to hesitate. If yelled. "Exactly correct." he moved within range of Jordan's Producing a notepad from his The Breakdown: Jon Jones (in techniques. Unlike other MMA first. Jones backpedaled and protected his face with his fists, he risked catching a glove back pocket, Jackson sketched a red) makes a series of moves in coaches, he continually collects square in the face. spiderweb of circles and lines. It h i s l i g h t h e a v y w e i g h t data while watching live bouts, forearms. "Go on," Jackson said. was a game tree, he explained-a championship match against logs old fight videos to determine "Look for that space, Jones!" Jones ducked under one fist and graph game theorists use to Rashad Evans. FightMetric data Jackson hollered. "You. Do. Not CAGE page 61 let him close those angles on whipped his right leg out in a analyze a sequence of decisions. showed that Jones dominated

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which moves work and when, and fills notebooks with game trees to determine the optimal nodes for various situations in a match. "I've always seen the ring like a lab," he says. "I've tried to think rigorously, logically." "I've always seen the ring like a lab," Jackson says. "I try to think logically." Jackson's attempts to impose some measure of order on the primal, violent world of MMA mirror a larger movement within the sport. Science may not be civilizing cage fighting, but it is refining it. Specialty firms compile detailed statistics on matches. MMA pros appear on ESPN rigged head to toe with sensors and monitors that measure their striking power and speed. Academics are writing peerreviewed articles on subjects such as the physiology of top fighters and the role that fear plays in the Octagon. And now fighters, most of them trained by Jackson, are beginning to use this data and analysis to become ever more brutally effective in the ring. Total Beatdown: Al Bello/Zuffa LLC/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images The very first UFC event took place before a crowd of about 7,800 in a Denver auditorium in 1993. It was an odd spectacle. Karate masters clashed with boxers. Kickboxers dueled with sumo wrestlers. There were few real rules. Over the next decade, in an effort to placate critics and state athletic commissions, the UFC introduced a comprehensive set of regulations that outlawed

especially dangerous moves such as low blows and hair pulling. The campaign was largely successful, and by the mid-2000s, dozens of states had agreed to sanction MMA events. TV networks, meanwhile, noticed the UFC's large following and began to broadcast highlights from the big bouts. A popular reality show called The Ultimate Fighter debuted, and a mixed martial artist appeared for the first time on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Ticket prices kept increasing. So did the size of the sport's fan base. Among the many die-hard UFC fans was Rami Genauer, a journalist based in Washington, D.C. Genauer had read Moneyball, Michael Lewis's best seller about Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane and his statistics-driven approach to player evaluation. He dreamed of analyzing mixed martial arts in the same way. "There were no numbers," Genauer says. "You'd try to write something, and you'd come to the place where you'd put in the numbers to back up your assertions, and there was absolutely nothing." In 2007 Genauer obtained a video of a recent UFC event, and using the slow-motion function on his TiVo, he broke each fight down by the number of strikes attempted, the volume of strikes landed, the type of strike (power leg versus leg jab, for instance) and the finishing move (rear naked choke versus guillotine,

and so on). The process took hours, but the end result was something completely new to the sport: a comprehensive data set. Genauer titled his data-collection project FightMetric and created a website to house the information. Some UFC fans registered their disapproval on Web forums. "â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;We don't need math with our fighting,' people would say. I disagreed," Genauer says. Jones v. Evans: In 2008 he managed to persuade the UFC to use FightMetric data from past matches to support a televised event in Minneapolis. "The idea was that this would be good for the producers, who could use the numbers to illustrate the story," he says. "It'd also be good for the broadcaster-they'd have ammunition, something to rely on just like they do in other sports." Officials liked having Genauer's fight data, and when the UFC began spiffing up its broadcasts with more graphics and statisticspart of an effort to make MMA seem like a real sport instead of a series of cage brawls-it hired FightMetric as its statistics provider. Genauer quit his job and opened an office in D.C. Today FightMetric has five fulltime staffers and a rotating cast of 15 specialists who collect a large data set for each fight using a video feed, proprietary software and a video-game controller with which they can record every type of strike. Among the statistics they track: each fighter's number and type of strikes, number of significant strikes (defined as all

strikes landed from a distance, as well as power strikes landed from close range) and the accuracy and location of kicks and punches. The FightMetric team collects the strike and location statistics in real time. The UFC uses some of the data for graphics during broadcasts and on its website. FightMetric goes into even greater detail on its own website, presenting statistics over outlines of a human body. Colored lines indicate the accuracy of each type of strike, and boxes show which ground move, whether arm bar, kimura lock or triangle choke, each fighter used to try to induce a submission. The analysis is strangely disconnected from the violence of the Octagon-a savage fight broken down into simple, neat figures. Greg Jackson: Jackson's fighters have won 80 percent of their matches. Esther Lin As the available body of data from FightMetric (and its main competitor, CompuStrike) grows, Genauer and others are attempting to analyze it in new ways. Already Genauer and his colleagues have identified some clear trends in MMA matches. For instance, the number of fights that end in decisions, especially at the lower weight classes, has risen from a third in 2007 to half today. That's a significant change from the wilder early days of the UFC, when fighters swung crazily and the vast majority of bouts ended in knockouts. It points to increasing skill levels among UFC fighters (knockouts usually

happen when one fighter is obviously superior to the other), a factor that could affect fighters' styles and training methods. A lighter-weight fighter, expecting now to go the distance in his next fight, might accordingly develop his aerobic threshold (so he can wear out bigger opponents) rather than his ability to throw firstround knockout blows. Earlier this year, John Ruggiero and Trevor Collier, economists at the University of Dayton, and Andrew L. Johnson, an engineering professor at Texas A&M, released a study called "Aggression in Mixed Martial Arts: An Analysis of the Likelihood of Winning a Decision." With data from FightMetric, the researchers estimated the probability of winning based on fighter characteristics like height and age. From a sample of 946 matches, they measured dozens of variables, including blows attempted versus blows landed, stand-ups, knockdowns and slams. Next they ran that data through a binary response model (a kind of algorithm) to determine which characteristics or approaches most affected a fighter's chances. Some of the study's conclusions were surprising. For example, in fights that end in decisions, the number of strikes thrown appears to be more important than the number of strikes landed. This may have something to do with CAGE page 62

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the vantage point of the judges, who can't always see the fighters clearly, and so occasionally in error mark a thrown strike as a landed one. Or it may be that a high number of thrown punches simply contributes to the appearance of dominance. Either way, the study is something a fighter can use: The more punches you throw, the more fights you'll win. Researchers studied matches to determine which variables most affected a fighter's chances of winning. Genauer says he is constantly working to improve both the hardware and software used to collect fight data. As collection methods improve, the data will become richer, analysis will become more granular and the results more useful. That's been the case in other sports such as baseball, which have changed as statistical analysis of in-game strategies has become more sophisticated (as Moneyball first highlighted). Stats have suggested, for example, that sacrifice bunting is not as useful as previously thought, leading many teams to attempt it less frequently. In MMA, trainers might find demonstrable proof that certain moves, like sidekicks or flying punches, are less effective than others, like knees or arm triangles. They might see the consistent success of a shoulder lock or the repeated triumph of the arm bar. They might rely on that data to engineer a better approach to MMA fighting-one, as FightMetric's website

advertises, "rooted in data and demonstrated effectiveness rather than in gut feelings and bandwagon jumping." *** "Data and demonstrated effectiveness" is something that Greg Jackson has stressed for years. Unlike other MMA coaches, Jackson holds no belt in any martial art and has no allegiance to any guru. In fact, he had hardly any formal training at all. He opened his first gym at the age of 17. In the absence of a particular fighting style, he experimented with practically all of them: aikido, karate, Jiu-Jitsu, Muay Thai, kickboxing, straightup boxing. "All I was doing was looking for empirical evidence," he says. "I'd form a hypothesis and I'd try it out in a fight. If it didn't work I'd get rid of it, and if it did I kept it. It was science at its purest. It was driven by need." Jackson would have two evenly matched fighters spar 10, 15, even 20 times in a row. Waiting nearby, notepad in hand, he would assiduously track which moves worked in the greatest number of situations. Unlike most trainers, he held no sentimental attachment to any specific moves. If he found that a flying sidekick didn't consistently do enough damage, he'd stop teaching it. Battle Lines: How FightMetric breaks down the strike stats from the UFC light heavyweight title match. Click here to see this amazing image even larger. Daniel Schumpert and Jason Briney; via FightMetric

By the early '90s Jackson had incorporated his results into his own homegrown martial art, which he dubbed Gaidojutsu"way of the street," roughly, in Japanese. Gaidojutsu combined rudimentary striking with grappling and wrestling. At the time, it was rare to blend fighting styles-most fighters trained in a single discipline. But Jackson's students relished the chance to play mix-and-match, and his stable of trainees grew. A few of them persuaded him to let them compete in bare-knuckle tournaments, where they dominated their undisciplined opponents. By the time the UFC came around, Jackson says, he was completely addicted to winning competitions. But he knew the UFC would be a far cry from the bare-knuckle bouts. He'd need to further refine his methods. One person he relied on for help was Jim Dudley, a close friend and mentor who also happened to be a mathematics lecturer at the University of New Mexico. Dudley gave him private math lessons in the desert, giving him assignments from books on subjects such as discrete mathematics and discussing how he might apply math in an MMA match. "My first memory is Greg asking me about fractals," Dudley says. "Then it was game theory. I had no idea at first that all of this pertained to fighting. When he finally told me, I thought, â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;OK, that's odd.' But then again, I knew [math] could be applied to very

surprising topics. It made sense that Greg would be finding these interesting patterns in fighting." The patterns that Jackson found were sequences of moves and positions that most consistently led to success in the Octagon. "I saw these certain positions over and over again: the side-mount, for instance, or the full-mount," he says. "And I started thinking of them in terms of edges. Judging from the data, which positions offered the most opportunities? Which left the fighter in trouble? And which allowed him the quickest path to victory?" What Jackson was developing was a new way of thinking about fighting, one informed by mathematical and logical frameworks rather than gut instinct. Crucial to that was constant data collection. Where other coaches might drift in and out of the gym, catching snippets of training rounds here or there, Jackson almost never leaves the apron of the Octagon. He is responsible for approximately 60 professional fighters, some champions and some up-andcomers, and every day he watches almost all of them spar for hours on end. When he is not watching training bouts or traveling with his team, he is clicking through clips of older matches on his iPhone, on the TV, on one of the scarred laptops that sit in his cluttered office alongside a photograph of Albert Einstein and one of his personal heroes, the famous logician Kurt GĂśdel. His desk spills over with handwritten

logs of successful fights, hastily scrawled game trees of sparring sessions, points about form and function and technique. All of these notes contain usable data. Analyzing his game trees shows him the best moves to make at different points in a match, while logs of his fighters' and their opponents' past matches help him predict how long an upcoming fight is likely to last, when in each round the opponent will strike and what moves he'll make. It's an advantage no other trainer yet has. *** In early April Jon Jones defended the light heavyweight belt against Rashad Evans. The fighters were once friends who trained together under Jackson, but they'd had a falling out. In the weeks before the bout, they spent plenty of time trash-talking each other in the media. The fight was a true grudge match, as the UFC billed it, and by the time Jones and Evans climbed into the Octagon at Philips Arena in Atlanta, anticipation (and the noise level) was at a peak. The fight opened slow. The fighters danced around each other warily. Evans, shorter and stockier than Jones, snapped away with his jab. Jones slipped around him, throwing a mix of "superman" punches (a punch executed while leaping forward) and flying knees. Near the end of the first round, Evans caught Jones with his foot, CAGE page 63

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sending him off balance. The bell rang. Jackson was waiting for Jones in the corner, a red cap pulled over his shaved head. His gaze was intent. He knew Evans had a superb defense and fast hands, limiting Jones's options. He began constructing a game tree in his mind. In the first node, the two men were squared off against each other. Jones could punch away, but Evans would block most of the blows. He needed to move to another node, one with more edges. One node appeared optimal: If Jones could manage to get in position to effectively neutralize both of Evans's hands, he might be able to land at least one big shot. Jackson shouted in Jones's ear. His student nodded. Toward the end of the next round, Jones, heeding Jackson's advice, squared up against Evans and extended both hands, opengloved. Evans matched him, and for a moment it looked as if the two men were about to play pattycake. This was the node that Jackson was looking for. Evans was momentarily exposed. In dazzlingly quick succession, Jones threw a right elbow, then a left, then another right. Evans wobbled, and Jones surged

forward with a knee and a left hook. Kings of the Cage: Greg Jackson gives a lesson to Jon Jones, the UFC light-heavyweight champion. Esther Lin By the third round, Jones had his opponent on the defensive. Evans turned one way, and Jones was there. Turned another, and there he was again. In the fourth, Jones buried his knee in Evans's stomach, and the crowd, more than 15,000 strong, roared its approval. At the end of the night, Jones was awarded a unanimous decision. He would keep his belt. But it was the work of the FightMetric data collectors, not the judges' decision, that revealed how truly dominant Jones had been. Their report showed that he'd landed 116 strikes, 105 of which were deemed significant. Evans, by comparison, landed only 49 strikes, 45 of them significant. Jones not only ran Evans ragged around the ring, but he also doubled his output, continually finding the node where he could throw the most blows. A few days after the fight, I spoke to Jackson by phone. Already he was dissecting what had happened, picking out the

things that Jones had done right to further hone his fight strategies. But he realizes that a time will come when other trainers, eager to gain any advantage they can, will begin to emulate his methods. Eventually more and more mixed martial artists will base their training and match plans on statistical probabilities instead of instinct and tradition, raising the quality of competition. That means Jackson will have to work harder than ever to stay on top of the sport. But when I asked him how important winning is to him, he got quiet. "Never put a node for victory," he said finally. "That doesn't mean we don't want to win. I want my guys to be thinking about trying to get to the strongest position they can, with the most edges, over and over. Like any science, it's more about the process than it is the outcome." Matthew Shaer is the author of the book Among Righteous Men.

Young Job Seekers Prefer to Work at Startups [STUDY] Samantha Murphy (Mashable!) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:59:21 AM

Young job seekers today would rather work for startups than big corporate companies, a new study suggests. The study was conducted by software provider PayScale, Inc. and research management firm Millennial Branding. It found that millennials -- also known as Gen Y, a group currently between the ages of 18 and 29 -- are more drawn to smaller companies that offer flexibility, embrace the entrepreneurial spirit and don't restrict social media use. "This report confirms that Gen Y is an entrepreneurial group, highly

versed in social media, and prefers freedom and flexibility over big corporate policies," said Dan Schawbel, founder of Millennial Branding, in a statement. SEE ALSO:â&#x20AC;Ś Continue reading... More About: Facebook, Google, Social Media, Startups, Twitter, small businesses

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Biocompatible Transistors Wired Into Living Human Tissue Rebecca Boyle (Popular Science - New Technology, Science News, The Future Now)

has tried to incorporate electronic sensors into these scaffolds, but they have been limited to twodimensional flat planes, with cells growing on top of transistors or Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:58:59 AM Cyborg Scaffold This is a 3-D electrodes. r e c o n s t r u c t e d c o n f o c a l This time, scientists led by MIT fluorescence micrograph of a professor Robert Langer and tissue scaffold. Charles M. Lieber Harvard chemistry professor and Daniel S. Kohane Charles Lieber set out to build a 3 A new material developed at -D scaffold that more closely Harvard and MIT adds a distinctly resembles real tissue. The team cybernetic element to the science wanted to build sensors that of tissue engineering. The 3-D would let them monitor how the mesh of transistors and cells, tissue responds to drugs in real which can support tissue growth time. while monitoring its health and The scaffold is made from epoxy progress, could even be a step embedded with silicon nanowires, toward prosthetic devices that which can carry electrical signals connect directly to the nervous to and from the cells. The mesh system. was folded or rolled into a Tissue scaffolds have been used structure resembling either tissue successfully for some time to or vasculature. The nanowires can coax cells to grow, and they can detect voltages lower than oneeven be used to grow artificial thousandth of a watt, according to blood vessels. Previous research MIT News-- that's the level of

electricity that might be seen in a cell. The mesh was porous enough for the team to seed it with cells and coax them to grow. The system thereby supports cell growth while simultaneously monitoring it. In their study, the authors used

nanowires and heart cells, said this could be a step toward engineered muscle: "It brings us one step closer to someday creating a tissue-engineered heart, and it shows how novel nanomaterials can play a role in this field," he said. Lieber said the system will allow scientists to work with tissue without disturbing it. "Ultimately, this is about merging tissue with electronics in a way that it becomes difficult to determine where the tissue ends and the electronics begin," he said in a statement. The study appears this week in the scaffold to grow cardiac, Nature Materials. neural and muscle tissue. They [ MIT] monitored heart tissue cell's response to a stimulant called noradrenalin, which increases heart rate. Langer, who has published several groundbreaking studies on artificial tissue,

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Artificial Intelligence Predicts and Combats Crop-Destroying Fruit Flies Colin Lecher (Popular Science New Technology, Science News, The Future Now) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:16:19 AM

Barcelona Fruit Stand Flickr/ zoetnet Oriental fruit flies are one of the biggest scourges to farmers around the globe, often forcing officials to put crops into quarantine just to keep Bactrocera dorsalis shut out. In Taiwan, where the situation is especially dire, scientists are using artificial intelligence tech that can determine, with uncanny accuracy, where and when an outbreak is about to happen. The current method for detecting

the pests is simple: lay down chemically enticing traps and hand-count the bugs every 10 days. The Taiwanese scientists are doing it a better way: automating the process with infrared lasers

weather sensors to help keep track --high levels of humidity or other changes would increase the likelihood of an infestation. So far they've set up 240 traps to regularly monitor the flow of fruit flies. When a trap counts more than 1,024 fruit flies in 10 days, it sets off an alert. But algorithms help it learn what's normal for the area and current weather, letting it adjust to specific situations. By that scan the traps. Every time the testing that system on data from beam is broken, add one to the past traps, they found it could tally. That number is radioed to a predict an outbreak with 88 local station every 30 minutes, percent accuracy. where officials can monitor it. [ New Scientist] The traps are also fitted with

Sleepless Nights May Put The Aging Brain At Risk Of Dementia Patti Neighmond (Shots Health Blog) Submitted at 8/27/2012 2:24:00 AM

[4 min 2 sec] Download mrsmuckers/ iStockphoto.com If you're having trouble sleeping, researchers say you should resist SLEEPLESS page 66

Epoch Times | National, World, China, Sports, Entertainment News (Epoch Times | National, World, China, Sports, Entertainment News)

Top Stories The Epoch Times Chinese website has been repeatedly attacked over the last week by

hackers based in China, according to the company’s technical personnel. Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa said Sunday that the U.K. has given up on its threat to enter the country’s embassy in London and arrest WikiLeaks founder

Julian Assange. A U.S. jury on Aug. 24 awarded more than $1 billion in damages to Apple Inc. in its smartphone patent-dispute with rival Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea. Minorities in Turkey are directly affected by the violence in Syria.

A prominent Tibetan monk received a seven-year jail sentence in China for spreading information in Tibetan regions, which according to reports this week, has been in the midst [...] This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is

your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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the urge to keep checking the time. As we age, our sleep patterns change. We've all heard the complaints: "I wake up in the middle of the night and can't get back to sleep!" Some sleep experts estimate that as many as 40 percent of older adults suffer sleeping problems such as sleep apnea and insomnia. Now, researchers have found a link between disrupted sleep and cognitive decline. Psychiatrist Kristine Yaffe of the University of California, San Francisco, runs a memory disorders clinic and studies people who are at risk of developing dementia and cognitive impairment. She says many of her older patients "either have difficulty falling asleep, waking up on and off throughout the night, or feeling tired in the day" and have to nap a lot. Yaffe recently conducted a series of studies evaluating more than 1,300 adults older than 75, initially assessing their sleep patterns and, five years later, their cognitive abilities. She found that those with sleep-disordered breathing or sleep apnea had more than twice the odds of developing dementia years later.

Those who developed disruptions of their circadian rhythm were also at increased risk. So were those who awoke throughout the night, tossing and turning. The findings were presented at the annual conference of the Alzheimer's Association. It's critical to note that Yaffe's findings show only an "association" between sleep problems and dementia. Far more study is needed to confirm these findings and investigate possible reasons for this connection. In the meantime, Yaffe says there is something of a silver lining. Older adults can be routinely screened for sleep problems. And, if diagnosed early, treatments can help them sleep better and possibly, down the line, reduce the risk of cognitive decline. Psychologist Sonia Ancoli-Israel studies sleep and aging at the University of California, San Diego. Ancoli-Israel points to a variety of techniques to help people literally relearn how to go to sleep. "We want to take a person who has negative associations with the bed — 'Oh, my God, I know I'm not going to be able to sleep' — and turn them around so that they look at the bed and they go 'Ah, sleep,' " she says.

One of the most effective strategies is to actually restrict the amount of time people sleep, starting with very little time — say, five hours — and slowly adding 15-minute increments until the recommended eight hours is reached. It's a slow process, says Ancoli-Israel, taking up to one month. But "it's very, very effective and lasts for years," she says. Then, there's "stimulus control," in which, as she puts it, "you're not allowed to do anything in bed but sleep — sleep and sex, that's it." "You can't pay bills in bed, you don't take your computer or your iPhone or iPad to bed, you don't watch TV in bed, you don't read in bed." If you don't fall asleep in 20 minutes, get out of bed and do something relaxing. "Don't watch a suspenseful movie or read a suspenseful book," she says. "Watch something a little more boring, read something a little more boring, so that when you get sleepy, you're willing to set it down and go to bed." As for the clock, get rid of it. "The first thing you do when you wake up at night, you look at the clock," Ancoli-Israel says. "And in order to look at the clock, you

have to lift your head, open your eyes, but, more important, you have to take yourself from transitional sleep to full awakening to comprehend that its 1:10 in the morning and you want to be asleep." Full awakening, of course, makes it difficult to get back to sleep. If you need the alarm, cover the clock, she says, or put it under the bed. You'll still hear it go off. Now, there's another sleep difficulty faced by older adults. Natural circadian rhythms change. Sleep is controlled in part by our core body temperature, which drops at night when we get sleepy and rises in the morning, and that's when we wake up. These patterns change throughout our lives. Teenagers' body temperature drops late in the evening, so they don't get tired till around midnight and don't naturally wake up till late morning, causing many a parent to complain that their teen is sleeping the day away. In fact, they're simply following their biological clock. For older adults, it's the opposite. Their body temperature drops really early in the evening, around 8 p.m., and rises really early in the morning, around 4 a.m. If your lifestyle allows it, Ancoli-Israel

says it's just fine to go to bed early and get up at 4 a.m. But for many people, evening social events take precedence. In that case, Ancoli-Israel suggests light. "Light is the strongest cue our body has to know when to go to sleep and when to get up. Lots of light exposure during the day helps us have a strong biological clock," she says. And the best source of light is the sun. Ancoli-Israel says a late afternoon or early evening walk, when the sun is still out, is best. That delays the circadian rhythm and helps people stay alert later in the evening and sleep longer in the morning. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Lack Of Sleep, Genes Can Get Sleepwalkers Up And About Michelle Trudeau (Shots Health Blog)

characteristic of a state called non -rapid eye movement (non-REM) sleep. It's the first stage of sleep as Submitted at 8/27/2012 2:23:00 AM a person drifts off, and Avidan [4 min 27 sec] Download Victoria says this is when sleepwalking Alexandrova/ iStockphoto.com typically occurs. "As they Though scientists have identified experience the behavior, the s l e e p w a l k i n g t r i g g e r s , t h e sleepwalking, you'll start seeing condition is still a bit of a the brain partially awakened, mystery. while the patient is still asleep," Miranda Kelly, a 14-year-old he says. from Sykesville, Md., says she's Though a sleepwalker's brain been sleepwalking since she was might be partially awake, most 6 or 7. The first time, she says, "I sleepwalkers have no memory of woke up on the couch on a school their episodes, and that's a key day. And I'd gone to bed in my feature, says Russell Rosenberg, bed." chairman of the National Sleep Since that first episode, Kelly Foundation and CEO of Neural now sleepwalks every couple of Trials Research in Atlanta. Some months. "I wake up in weird r e s e a r c h s u g g e s t s t h a t t h e places, randomly. I have once sleepwalker's frontal cortex — the woken up in the kitchen, and on brain's center for decisionthe floor of the bathroom wrapped making, judgment and short-term in my sheet," she says. memory — is not fully online Alon Avidan, director of the during sleepwalking. University of California, Los Rosenberg says the fact that 10 Angeles, Sleep Disorder Center, is percent to 20 percent of children a n e u r o l o g i s t w h o s t u d i e s occasionally sleepwalk shouldn't s l e e p w a l k i n g . " W e d o n o t cause parents to worry. "It's a understand the reason why people perfectly normal developmental sleepwalk," he says. phenomenon in which a child's B u t a t t h e b a s i c l e v e l , brain has not fully developed or is sleepwalking is the brain's immature, and the ability to inability to fully wake up. "When arouse or awaken completely has you place electrodes on the not occurred just yet," he says. sleeping brain, what you will see And usually, as their brains is a person going into very slow mature, kids will grow out of [brain wave] sleep," he says. sleepwalking. S l o w b r a i n w a v e s a r e For some, though, sleepwalking

continues into adulthood. This is the case for Steve Kelly, Miranda's dad. Steve is now 52 years old and has been sleepwalking since his early teens. And it's not surprising that Miranda is a second-generation sleepwalker: Researchers say there is a strong genetic component driving sleepwalking. If one parent sleepwalks, a child has a 45 percent increased risk of

being a sleepwalker, too. If both parents are sleepwalkers, a child has a 65 percent chance of being a sleepwalker. There are also environmental triggers for sleepwalking, such as not getting enough sleep, drinking too much alcohol or a sleep apnea diagnosis. One of the most common triggers, stress, is what usually precipitates Steve Kelly's sleepwalking.

"When I was going to college for my master's degree, every semester around exams, I would start sleepwalking again," he says. Experts says this is probably because stress causes you to lose sleep, and sleep debt is another powerful trigger. However, unlike Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth — who would sleepwalk from guilt and madness — sleepwalkers do not typically sleepwalk because of psychological problems. Sometimes, however, the medicines prescribed for anxiety or depression, or even for sleep itself, such as Ambien, can spur a sleepwalking episode. Sleep experts advise that the best thing a spouse or parent can do for sleepwalkers is quietly, gently guide them back to bed and keep them safe. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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David Frum (David Frum)

Andrew Sullivan complained yesterday that I had engaged in a “McCarthyite” attack on Ron Paul by writing the following: A politician isn’t answerable for the antics of every one of his supporters. But there’s surely a reason, isn’t there, that racists, anti-Semites, 9/11 Truthers, and Holocaust deniers are so strongly attracted to the Paul campaign. They hear something. They continue to hear it too, no matter how firmly Ron Paul’s more mainstream supporters clamp their hands over their own ears. Andrew’s riposte: Notice how pure the smear is, enabled and not diminished by the first sentence. Notice the key concept of Beltway ideological policemen: there is a mainstream and a non-mainstream. Dabble with the latter at your peril. Since David has perished by the cult of the “mainstream”, it’s odd he should deploy it against others. But to throw in “Holocaust denial” and 9/11 Truthers for good measure! Really. And notice how particularly cheap and easy it is to use such tactics against a libertarian. The traditional left is often based on collective associations, building a movement out of oppressed groups and their grievances, whether it be class or race or even

sexual orientation. Libertarianism is the opposite. It’s about dis associating. When you listen to Paul saying he will not turn anyone away from supporting his platform regardless of their motives or beliefs, you are hearing a reflection of his libertarianism, not his bigotry. He will accept support from any quarter and compared with the corporate money flowing into the other candidates’ coffers, he is about as independent as a presidential candidate can be. Because he is a radical individualist, he doesn’t even understand why he should somehow explain the belief of others, or justify their support. You should ask them, not him. This kind of gotcha-association game is particularly easy because libertarians favor liberty above all, and that will necessarily mean liberty for bigots as well as others. A principled belief in states’ rights will doubtless lead to more racist and homophobic policies in many states – but also, of course, more enlightened and successful inclusive states like Oregon or New York or Massachusetts or California. A rejection of statism might lead to more discrimination in the private sector. But it doesn’t mandate it. And it need not encourage it. A noninterventionist foreign policy will allow evil to triumph elsewhere in

the world, because it believes it’s none of our business or too riddled with unintended consequences to try extirpating. That may be right or wrong, but it is not an approval of the evil of Assad or Ahmedinejad or the North Korean junta. And again, it is actually much deeper an American tradition than permanent warfare. But if you can trot out David Duke or Ayatollah Khamenei as potential Paul supporters, you have a very easy, cheap and essentially McCarthyite target. It saddens me that this kind of tactic works. I still believe that the newsletters, because they were in Paul’s name, require a clearer explanation from Paul than the muddled ones he has given. He should not be left off the hook. And his proposals deserve a thorough vetting and discussion. But there is something awry when a candidate is assessed not on his arguments and proposals but on the shadiness and ugliness of some of his fringe supporters. Ron Paul’s supporters ask that their candidate not be judged by his associates. Or by the people he chose to employ. Or by the newsletters he published. Or by the book he wrote. Or by the way he earned the largest part of his living when out of office in the 1990s. Or by his purchase of the mailing list of the Holocaust-

denying Liberty Lobby. Or by the radio shows he chooses to appear on. Or by his strategic decision to reach out to racist voters. Or by the conspiracy theories to which he lends credence, from government creation of AIDS to Israeli culpability for the 1993 bombing to a putative 9/11 “coverup.” And here I thought that libertarianism was a doctrine of personal responsibility? May Ron Paul at least be judged by the words he has spoken with his own mouth within the current campaign? The supporters say “no” again. When Ron Paul tells an interviewer that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 made race relations “worse,” we’re not supposed to consider what he might mean by “better.” When Ron Paul warns that a border fence would be used to prevent fleeing American citizens from exiting the country, we’re not supposed to conclude that he’s a paranoid crank. Andrew deploys what might be called the ontological defense of Ron Paul, as follows: 1) Ron Paul is a libertarian. 2) Libertarians espouse individualism. 3) Racism is a form of antiindividualism. 4) Therefore Ron Paul cannot be a racist. That is a demonstration of what

might be called the deductive method of reasoning. But there’s another way to study reality: induction. Like this: 1) Ron Paul has again and again exploited bigotry, paranoia, and hate as fundraising devices. 2) Ron Paul is a libertarian. 3) So yes, I guess it is possible for a libertarian to do that. Here’s my question for Ron Paul supporters: why the denial of the undeniable? Perhaps you like Paul’s message of legalized marijuana? Why not just say so? You don’t think it’s important to stop Iran from gaining nuclear weapons? Argue it forthrightly. If you regard Social Security and Medicare as literally the moral equivalents of slavery, go ahead, make your case. But all this excuse-making, special pleading and jiggering of the rules of evidence so as to exculpate Ron Paul from the record of his whole political life? For what? This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Downsizing America: The Obama Doctrine in Action Helle Dale (The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation) Submitted at 8/27/2012 9:27:51 AM

A poorer, smaller, humbler, less influential America—that is Barack Obama’s vision for America as presented by Dinesh D’Souza, who spoke at The Heritage Foundation last Tuesday about his new book on this

country’s 44th President, Obama’s America: Unmaking the American Dream. The book’s incisive analysis arrives at many conclusions similar to those of The Heritage Foundation’s papers on the Obama Doctrine. Many of Obama’s actions and policies can seem incomprehensible coming from

the leader of the most powerful nation in the world. They are therefore often attributed to bungling and ineptitude. However, according to D’Souza, this is a President who did not seek the highest office in the land to preserve American greatness and leadership. Instead, Obama’s core motivating philosophy is deeply rooted anti-colonialism.

D’Souza sees the President as successfully pursuing a vision concealed by political rhetoric from most Americans who voted for Obama. From Obama’s perspective, says D’Souza, America is too rich, consumes too many of the world’s resources, is militarily too strong, and has to be reduced to its proper place among the eight or so major nations of

the world. “He wants…an America in decline so that other nations might rise.” In domestic terms, this explains why the President doesn’t even break a sweat as the national debt skyrockets by the trillions. If this crushing debt burden causes national decline, he is all for it. In DOWNSIZING page 71

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Back to School: Some Surprising Education Numbers Lindsey Burke (The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation) Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:25:19 AM

As children head back to the classrooms, let’s look at two important figures to consider this school year: 308,000 and $11,400. 308,000: Number of members lost by the National Education Association. Education special interest groups, such as the teachers unions, are experiencing a decline in membership. As Stephen Sawchuck reports in Education Week, “by the end of its 2013–14 budget, NEA [the National Education Association] expects it will have lost 308,000 members and experienced a decline in revenue projected at some $65 million in all since 2010. (The figures are expressed in full-time equivalents, which means that the actual number of people affected is probably higher.)” While the decline in membership appears to have shocked the NEA, the remarks of one of the union’s top officials, treasurer Becky Pringle, are even more shocking:

We’re living with a recession that just won’t end, political attacks that have turned brutal, and societal changes that are impacting us—from stupid education “reform” to an explosion of technology—all coming together to impact us in ways that we had never anticipated. Pringle is likely referring to the reforms that Governor Scott Walker (R–WI) put into place in his state last year, giving teachers the choice to join the union or not. And it’s no surprise that the unions fear the “stupid” reforms that are underway, namely, online learning and school choice. As former New York City Schools chancellor Joel Klein wrote in The Atlantic last week: [T]oday’s entrepreneurs know they can harness emerging technologies to reimagine teaching and learning. It’s a story as old as change itself. The candlemaker’s union wasn’t cheering Edison on. Those reforms are even more crucial considering the amount of taxpayer dollars that will be

poured into the public system this year. $11,400: Average per-pupil, per year spending in public schools. Students headed back to school this fall will have historically high levels of dollars spent on them in the public school system. Nationally, average per-pupil spending exceeds$11,400 this year, meaning a child entering kindergarten today can expect to have no less than $148,000 spent on his or her education by the time the child graduates high school. In all, more than$570 billion will be spent on public K12 education this year. Sadly, continual increases in the money spent per child and in overall spending haven’t led to increases in academic achievement. That’s due in large part to the fact that most parents still do not have control over where or how that money is spent. We continue to fund institutions—sending that money to schools—instead of actually funding children. Imagine if a child could put those dollars in a funding “backpack”

and take that $11,400 to any school—public, private, or virtual. As in every other sector of American life, we would likely see outcomes improve as a result of competitive pressure placed on the government school system. Children would have access to schools that meet their unique learning needs. Parents would be able to harness the possibilities that online learning and customized education hold for tailoring their children’s educational experiences. For all of those reasons and more, funding portability and school choice is an important assignment for policymakers to undertake as the school year begins. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Want Cheaper Gasoline? Waive Regulations Rich Tucker (The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:15:25 AM

Even as the summer travel season is winding down, drivers have certainly noticed that gas prices are marching back up. Since the law of supply and demand hasn’t yet been repealed (or even suspended by executive order) the answer seems simple enough: increase the amount of gasoline available. A recent Wall Street Journal article shows that the White House realizes its policies have been reducing the supply (and thus increasing the price) of gasoline. Here’s the story. Last year, Sunoco announced it would have to either sell or close its refineries near Philadelphia. The Carlyle Group, a private equity firm, has agreed to buy the refining business, even though Sunoco has lost $1 billion running the refineries over the previous three years. WANT page 71

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foreign policy terms, such an analysis explains questions such as: • Why does Obama frequently seem to side with America’s rivals as opposed to its allies? A striking example is the Obama Administration’s decision to cancel the missile defense deal struck with Poland by the Bush Administration. Meanwhile, the President was caught on camera telling Russian President Dmitry Medvedev that he would have “more flexibility” after the November election. Another is the Administration’s backing of Argentina in its dispute with Britain over the Falkland Islands, a 180-degree reversal of standing U.S. policy. Dictators in the Middle East have been toppled, but enemies like Iran and Syria receive hands-off treatment. • Why does the Administration seek to eviscerate the U.S. nuclear arsenal while other nations are

continued from page 70

either failing to reduce theirs or actively building them? The President sees our nuclear arsenal as the biggest global threat—not Russia’s, North Korea’s, or Iran’s. The President’s Nuclear Security Summit in 2010 was a gathering of only U.S. allies—Iran and North Korea weren’t even invited.

the real world, which certainly will not be a safer place as a result of downsizing American power. The period of American preeminence is one of the most stable and certainly most prosperous the world has known. This country is exceptional, its alliances are worth preserving, and its moral stance against international A s d e s c r i b e d b y H e r i t a g e aggression and oppression has to Foundation scholars and others, remain a beacon to the world. the Obama Doctrine grows This entry passed through the naturally from this anti-colonial Full-Text RSS service — if this is worldview. Its tenets include a your content and you're reading it more humble engagement with on someone else's site, please read the world and more reliance on the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentt r e a t i e s a n d i n t e r n a t i o n a l only/faq.php#publishers. Five organizations to deal with global Filters recommends: Incinerating crises and threats to our security. Assange - The Liberal Media Go It emphasizes “soft power” To Work. instruments such as international aid over military power, and it aims for a more restrained international role for the U.S. The problem is that the Obama Doctrine does not have its roots in

How is it possible for a company to lose that much money in the refining business when gas has been stuck at more than $3 per gallon for years? There are several reasons, but a big one is the cost of federal regulation. “A key issue Carlyle identified was a 2005 consent decree with the Environmental Protection Agency under which Sunoco agreed to limit emissions at its refineries,” the Journal reports. “Carlyle wanted to work on the refinery without triggering costly environmental reviews. The White House referred the issue to the EPA [Environmental Protection Agency], which along with state and local environmental officials agreed to modify the decree, allowing Carlyle to transfer emissions credits from the Marcus Hook refinery, in effect giving the Philadelphia refinery greater leeway to pollute.” That’s one way to put it. One could also say that the EPA is giving the Philadelphia refinery greater leeway to produce gasoline, which can “protect consumers from higher prices at the pump and keep people from losing their jobs,” as an Obama Administration spokesman admitted to the Journal. There are other benefits to this deal. Carlyle says it plans to

reduce emissions over time by making the refinery more efficient. It also plans to refine more domestic oil instead of imported crude, since as Reuters reported last month, “the surge in U.S. oil and gas production from non-conventional sources such as shale has redefined energy markets and refining in the world’s biggest economy, providing a cheap source of crude for domestic plants.” But this wouldn’t have happened without the EPA agreeing to ease up on regulations. There’s a lesson here: Private industry is ready to step up and produce the fuel and jobs America needs. But the government remains a major roadblock to progress. In Philadelphia, the EPA has agreed to get out of the way. Let’s see if this sets a precedent. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Will debt hit $16 trillion as Romney delivers his acceptance speech? Ed Morrissey (Hot Air » Top Picks)

America can and must do better,” said Priebus in a statement. “Every American’s share of the Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:01:51 AM national debt has increased by posted at 12:01 pm on August 27, approximately $16,000 during the 2012 by Ed Morrissey current administration.” Later today, the Republican “Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan are National Convention will unveil a the right leaders at the right time potent visual reference for voters for America. They will turn this across the country. They will fiscal mess around, get people erect a national debt clock that back to work and set our country constantly updates as the federal on a strong foundation for government spends money it generations to come,” he added. doesn’t have, a reminder of four The convention debt clock will straight trillion-dollar-plus deficits begin counting at $15.9 trillion. under Barack Obama: CNS News does a little Republican National Committee calculating, and reports that the (RNC) Chairman Reince Priebus next milestone of $16 trillion may will introduce a “national debt arrive Thursday evening — not clock” when he opens the GOP too long before Romney takes the convention in Tampa Fla. on stage: Monday. The federal government’s debt T h e c l o c k , w h i c h w i l l b e could hit an unprecedented $16 mounted inside the hall at the trillion this week while the Tampa Bay Times forum will be Republican Party is holding its activated at 2 p.m. EDT when the national convention in Tampa, GOP meet convenes and count the Fla. … growth in the nation’s debt during At the close of business on the convention. Thursday, Aug. 23, according to “ T h i s c l o c k r e m i n d s e v e r y the U.S. Treasury, the federal delegate and every American why government’s debt stood at we are here in Tampa – because $15,976,519,029,144.14. That left

it $23,480,970,855.86 short of the $16 trillion mark. So far in this fiscal year (from Oct. 1 through Aug. 23), the debt has grown by an average of $3,616,398,477.40 per calendar day ($1,186,178,700,586.99 divided by 328 days). Were the debt to grow at that pace in the week following last Thursday’s close of $15.976 trillion, it would hit $16 trillion this Thursday–the day Mitt Romney is scheduled to give his speech accepting the Republican presidential nomination. In real terms, though, this isn’t a linear progression: However, the debt does not grow in a steady, unbroken daily pace. Instead, it expands and retracts from day to day during the business week depending on the value of the bonds the U.S. Treasury sells and redeems. On a day that the Treasury derives more revenue from selling bonds than it pays out to redeem bonds, the debt increases. Last Wednesday, for example, the debt actually declined by almost $9.7 billion–from

$15,970,134,937,605.00 to $15,960,468,522,111.20—as the Treasury redeemed bonds of greater value than it sold. However, on Thursday, the debt increased by slightly more than $16 billion, ending that day at $15,976,519,029,144.14. For the purpose of calculation, though, the RNCC debt clock will probably use a linear formula. According to USA Debt Clock, the current level of national debt is $15.991 trillion, leaving less than $9 billion to go in three days. With that in mind, it’s possible that the debt clock will spin to $16 trillion early on Thursday. If that happens, expect the GOP to catch that on video and replay it often on Thursday evening. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

Video: Did GEICO fire spokesman for criticizing Obama? Ed Morrissey (Hot Air » Top Picks) Submitted at 8/27/2012 10:21:51 AM

posted at 11:21 am on August 27, 2012 by Ed Morrissey By coincidence, I just happened to be watching Full Metal Jacket when I read this post from Noel Sheppard at Newsbusters. R. Lee Ermey, who delivered a masterful — and mostly improvised — performance as a Vietnam-era Marine Corps drill instructor in the film has built an impressive career with his tough-as-nails persona, including a memorable GEICO commercial as a less-than -sympathetic counselor. TMZ caught up with Ermey at an airport, and he says that GEICO fired him shortly afterward for criticizing Barack Obama: After being asked about his GEICO commercial wherein he played a psychiatrist calling his patient a “jackwagon,” Ermey said, “GEICO fired me because I had, I wasn’t too kind about speaking with the, about the administration, so the present administration. So they fired me.” “So they fired you because of political reasons?” asked the TMZ representative. “Yeah,” Ermey answered. “If VIDEO: page 73

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Palin: Time to give Romney a shot Ed Morrissey (Hot Air » Top Picks)

me a favor. If this go-around you don’t know who you dislike more or like more, Romney or Obama Submitted at 8/27/2012 11:41:41 AM — this go-around, give Romney a posted at 12:41 pm on August 27, shot. We don’t want to repeat the 2012 by Ed Morrissey failed policies of President This is one clip it pays to watch Obama. That’s insanity, to repeat to the very end. Sarah Palin the same failures over and over a p p e a r e d o n F o x S a t u r d a y again and expect a different evening to talk about the Tea result. Obama has proven himself P a r t y a n d c h a l l e n g e t h e that he doesn’t get it, he doesn’t Republican Party to stick to its get the free market, he doesn’t get platform ideals, warning at one American exceptionalism, and he point that the GOP could go the won’t work toward that American way of the Whigs if they don’t exceptionalism. He had his respond to the will of the voters. chance — no hard feelings, thank She also took questions from you for your service, Mr. Obama. Twitter, including one which This go-around, though, let’s give asked whether she’d run for Romney that chance. G o v e r n o r i n A l a s k a a g a i n . This is an excellent answer for (Answer: She’d rather work on those Romney skeptics who still policy to unlock Alaska’s natural believe that sitting out the resources.) But it’s near the seven presidential race will work out as - m i n u t e m a r k w h e n P a l i n a positive action. Like most expresses frustration when a general elections, this race is a viewer asks if it isn’t better not to binary choice rather than a wishvote when one doesn’t like either list selection. The two men who candidate (via the Sarah Palin can win this race are Barack Journal): Obama and Mitt Romney. Any PALIN: No no no no! Please go potential Romney voters that vote! Let me ask you — man, do don’t cast a vote strengthen

Obama’s chances for re-election. That is why Obama has spent the summer trying to toxify Romney with independents and conservatives — in order to depress turnout on the Right. After the conventions are over, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Team Obama start raising Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson’s profile as another distraction on the Right, especially if Romney gets a big polling boost out of the next fortnight. Palin obviously isn’t passionate about Mitt Romney as a GOP nominee, which surprises no one. But she does see the practical issue of the election in clear precision. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

VIDEO: continued from page 72

you’re a conservative in this town, you better watch out.” Noel dug up what appears to have been the issue for GEICO: R. LEE ERMEY: I got to tell you, folks, we’re having a big problem this year. The economy really sucks. Now I hate to point fingers at anybody, but the present administration probably has a lot to do with that. And the way I see it, they’re not going to quit doing it until they bring this country to its knees. So I think we should all rise up, and we should stop this administration from what they’re doing, because they’re destroying this country. They’re driving us into bankruptcy so that they can impose socialism on us, and that’s exactly what they’re doing. And I’m sick and damn tired of it, and I know you are too. But I know the Marine Corps is going to be here forever – this administration won’t. Semper Fi. God bless you all. Hey, it’s GEICO’s money, and they can hire or fire whomever they want as their spokespeople. But I don’t think it’s going to look very good to have dumped Ermey for speaking his mind on politics,

in an obviously passionate but hardly objectionable manner. The ad he cut, which Noel has on his site, was hilarious, and had some potential for a series of ads that would certainly have been no less entertaining than pigs that go “Wheeeeee.” How much do you want to bet that Ermey got fired by phone rather than in person? Update: To be fair, commenters remind me that they fired the voice of the gecko, too, over his political expression. In that case, though, it was significantly weirder and targeted at potential customers rather than a politician. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Incinerating Assange - The Liberal Media Go To Work.

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Seven Years Later, Isaac Following Track of Katrina (FOXNews.com)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:10:59 PM

• • • Key West drying out from brush with Isaac • Isaac to Hit New Orleans on 7th Anniversary of Katrina KEY WEST, Fla. – Tropical Storm Isaac targeted a broad swath of the Gulf Coast on Monday and had New Orleans in its crosshairs, bearing down just ahead of the seventh anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The potential for a landfall as a Category 1 hurricane as soon as Tuesday prompted evacuations along a wide area of the Gulf Coast and sent people out to stock up on staples. "I gassed up -- truck and generator", John Corll, 59, a carpenter, said as he left a New Orleans coffee shop Monday morning. He went through Katrina in 2005 and was expecting a weaker storm this time, adding that he thinks the levee system is in better shape to handle a storm surge than when Katrina hit. "I think the state and local governments are much better prepared for the storm surge and emergencies," Corll said.

Isaac blew past the Florida Keys and was rolling northwestward over the open Gulf of Mexico on Monday. The National Hurricane Center predicted it would grow to a hurricane with winds of between 74 and 95 mph over the warm water and possibly hit sometime Tuesday somewhere along a roughly 300-mile stretch from the bayous southwest of New Orleans to the edge of the Florida Panhandle. That would be one day shy of seven years after Katrina struck catastrophically in 2005, although Katrina was a much stronger Category 5 storm with winds over 157 miles per hour. Isaac is expected to have top winds of around 90 mph when it hits land. At 11 a.m. EDT on Monday, Isaac remained a tropical storm with top sustained winds of 65 mph. Its center was about 310 miles southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River, and it was moving northwest at 14 mph. The size of the warning area and the storm's wide bands of rain and wind prompted emergency declarations in four states, and hurricane-tested residents were boarding up homes, sticking up on food and water or getting ready to evacuate. On the Alabama coast, Billy Cannon, 72, was preparing to evacuate with several cars packed

with family and four Chihuahuas from a home on a peninsula in Gulf Shores. Canon, who has lived on the coast for 30 years, said he thinks the order to evacuate Monday was premature. "If it comes in, it's just going to be a big rain storm. I think they overreacted but I understand where they're coming from. It's safety," he said. Although Pensacola seemed less and less likely to get a direct hit, the owners of a Ferris Wheel-like beach attraction were busy Monday removing passenger cabins and readying for a storm they hoped would not prove too disruptive. "We just want to get back open and get the people back out there," said one of the owners, Todd Schneider. The storm that left eight dead in Haiti blew past the Florida Keys with little damage and promised a drenching but little more for Tampa, where the planned Monday start of the Republican National Convention was pushed back a day in case Isaac passed closer to the bayside city. Isaac could pack a watery double punch for the Gulf Coast. If it hits during high tide, Isaac could push floodwaters as deep as 12 feet onto shore in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama and up to six feet in the Florida

Panhandle, while dumping up to 18 inches of rain over the region, the National Weather Service warned. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal called a state of emergency, and 53,000 residents of St. Charles Parish near New Orleans were told to leave ahead of the storm. Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant, Florida Gov. Rick Scott and Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley also declared states of emergency. The oncoming storm stopped work on rigs that account for 24 percent of daily oil production in the U.S. potion of the Gulf of Mexico and eight percent of daily natural gas production there, the federal Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement said in its latest update Sunday. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for 23 percent of total U.S. crude oil production, 7 percent of the nation's natural gas and more than 40 percent of refining capacity. Several regional governors altered their plans for this week's GOP convention in Tampa. Bentley has canceled his trip, and Jindal said he's likely to do so unless the threat from the storm subsides. Scott gave up a chance to speak. Amtrak cancelled train service in Louisiana for Tuesday and Wednesday. The route than runs from New York to New Orleans

would end in Atlanta, while its route from Los Angeles to New Orleans would stop in San Antonio. Amtrak was also suspending part of its rail line between Miami and Orlando, Fla. Grocery and home improvement stores as well as fuel stations in Louisiana reported brisk business as residents sought to prepare for Isaac. Some gas stations were running out of supplies. Even though the storm was moving well west of Tampa, tropical storm-force winds and heavy rains were possible in the area because of Isaac's large size, forecasters said. A small group of protesters braved rainy weather Sunday and vowed to continue despite the weather, which already forced the Republicans to cancel Monday's opening session of the convention. Instead, the GOP will briefly gavel the gathering to order Monday afternoon and then recess until Tuesday. The Gulf Coast hasn't been hit by a hurricane since 2008, when Dolly, Ike and Gustav all struck the region. Before reaching Florida, Isaac was blamed for eight deaths in Haiti and two more in the Dominican Republic, and downed trees and power lines in Cuba. SEVEN page 76

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Texas Man Admits Plot To Kill Internet 'Bride' (FOXNews.com)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:10:59 PM

• David Sartin claims he fell in love with Elena Barykina, whose website details her entertainment career. (Elenabarykina.com) A seemingly mild-mannered Houston man is awaiting sentencing in what authorities say was a bizarre international murder -for-hire plot whose target was a would-be Ukrainian Internet bride. David Sartin, 49, was so incensed when he found out the Ukrainian beauty he'd met through a website had taken him to the cleaners that he tried to have her kidnapped and shipped to his home, according to the Houston Chronicle. The unemployed man planned to keep Elena Barykina imprisoned in a fortified room in his house while he slowly killed her with lead poisoning, according to authorities. Last week, Sartin pleaded guilty to attempted kidnapping and brandishing a firearm in connection with the case. Taped conversations between Sartin and an undercover Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent recorded in January and February captured Sartin agreeing to pay $50,000 to

the agent to abduct Barykina in Kiev and have her "shipped in a crate" to the U.S. He told the agent he would "take care of her," killing her with "lead poisoning," according to authorities. "It was all a fraud from the beginning." - David Sartin, who pleaded guilty to attempted kidnapping of Internet 'bride.' Sartin's father told the paper he doesn't think his son was ever going to kill anyone, but Sartin did express his heartbreak and anger last year in a letter to the w e b s i t e InternetScamsWatch.com, in which he named Barykina and detailed the jewels and cash he'd given her on a half-dozen trips to see her in the Ukraine. "I have learned that all during this two years I have been sending her money by wire transfer as she as requested she is also doing the same to many other men," Sartin wrote. "It was all a fraud from the beginning." Sartin, who lived in a trailer in Hankamer, 25 miles east of Houston, first came across Barykina in 2009, when he found a website called dreammarriage.com, that touts itself as the place to meet "beautiful Russian women and sexy Ukrainian brides to be." He was instantly attracted to Barykina’s

profile and made contact with her even though his father warned him not to. "But my son was lonely, and she was prettier and could talk sweeter than me," Cecil Sartin told the Chronicle. Barykina could not be reached for comment. Calls and an email to dream-marriage.com were not returned. But the site, which claims to be legitimate, has a section warning that con artists can use it to dupe the lovelorn and warns visitors to be careful. "A scammer is any member, whether male or female, who intentionally uses our site for ulterior purposes," a warning on the site states. "A scammer has no intention of engaging in a meaningful relationship with the other members on our site. In short, a scammer is a deceiver and only communicates with the other members to fulfill some other need. Unfortunately, this need is usually some type of personal and /or financial gain." Over the next two years, after making contact with Barykina, Sartin, who lived off disability checks and a divorce settlement, claims he made nearly half-adozen trips overseas to see Barykina, showering her with $15,000 worth of jewelry and spending thousands more taking her on lavish trips and funding her

living and school expenses as well as her attempts at a singing career. During one trip, he claims he discovered Barykina, who had refused to consummate their relationship, had a boyfriend in the Ukraine. Sartin, who claimed in his letter to InternetScamsWatch.com that he spend more than $57,000 on Barykina, told the site he considered suicide. "I had no idea I was being scammed, as I believed in this girl with all of my heart and she knew this," he wrote. "This is a very cruel thing to do to a person. My first thought upon arriving back home was to put an end to myself, but I was feared of not hitting the right spot and the pain would be bad." Instead, authorities say, he plotted revenge. Court records show he asked the undercover agent to deliver Barykina to him and said he wanted to "eliminate" her Russian boyfriend, too. In March, Sartin bought supplies he used to build a fortified room onto his trailer and paid the undercover agent a $25,000 down payment for the kidnapping, records said. Two weeks later, Sartin went to meet the agent in a Beaumont parking lot, where he expected Barykina to be turned over to him. Federal agents arrested him, federal prosecutor Joe Batte told

the Chronicle. In his truck, they found an envelope with the final $25,000 payment, handcuffs, stun gun and a pistol. But Cecil Sartin told the paper his son just wanted to get his money back. "He just wanted to get her over here so he could sue her," the elder Sartin said. "And in the back of his heart, I think he was still hoping they might have a life together." Click for more at Houston Chronicle. • Print • Email • Share • Comments • Recommend • Tweet Related Stories Police: Student shot at Maryland high school Man with machete arrested near GOP convention site, police say Blast kills 6 on public transit vehicle in Colombia Share This Article Newsletter Signup Sign up for free e-mail news alerts from FoxNews.com and FoxBusiness.com. Newsletter Signup This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read TEXAS page 76

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'American Taliban' Seeks Group Prayer in Prison (FOXNews.com)

The 31-year-old Lindh says the school of Islam to which he adheres requires Muslims to pray together five times a day, if • John Walker Lindh AP possible, and stipulates that not praying in a group is a sin. INDIANAPOLIS – American- Lindh says inmates are allowed born Taliban fighter John Walker to do other things in groups Lindh says the government is outside their cells, but not pray. forcing him to sin by denying him Lindh is serving a 20-year the right to pray with other sentence at a federal prison in Muslims in the highly restricted T e r r e H a u t e f o r a i d i n g Indiana prison unit where he is A f g h a n i s t a n ' s n o w - d e f u n c t held. Taliban government. Lindh testified in federal court in • Print Indianapolis Monday as a trial • Email began in his religious-rights • Share lawsuit against the government. • Comments Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:10:59 PM

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RadioShack No Contract Wireless rate plans leak, $60 will get you everything We're just about a week Brad Molen (Engadget) RADIOSHACK pageout 77from the rumored launch of

Best Buy founder ever closer to finalizing company buyout bid Jamie Rigg (Engadget) Submitted at 8/27/2012 1:01:00 PM

Best Buy founder Richard Schulze may have stepped down as chairman of the board, but he's certainly not out. His plan to buy the turbulent company has reached the next step -- an agreement which pre-empts the formal offer. Schulze now has access to all the private numbers he'll need to put together an investor group within the 60-day timeframe. And, if this round is unsuccessful, it'll be next January before another bid can go to the Board of Directors, followed by direct shareholder offers if the second attempt fails. Given that Schulze owns 20 percent of Best Buy, he gets two seats-worth of voting power as long as he sticks to the agreed process. So, with a new CEO taking the reigns in

September and the acquisition machinery in top gear, is there fresh hope for the big box retailer? Continue reading Best Buy founder ever closer to finalizing company buyout bid Filed under: Misc Best Buy founder ever closer to finalizing company buyout bid originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 13:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| | Email this| Comments

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RADIOSHACK

ENGADGET'S

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RadioShack's Cricket-based No Contract Wireless plans, and more details are beginning to trickle out about the prepaid service. Specifically, we've just received information concerning how much The Shack intends to charge on a monthly basis, and it's just about what you'd expect: you can choose between featurephone and smartphone options, with the former hooking you up with unlimited messaging and your choice of 300 minutes for $25 or 1,000 minutes for $35. As for the smartphone plans, you'll get unlimited voice, messaging and Muve Music downloads on both selections; the $50 option will get you one gigabyte of 3G data (before throttling ensues), while $60 bestows you with 2.5GB data and mobile hotspot use, Visual

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Voicemail access, unlimited international text and all-you-caneat directory assistance. As a comparison, Cricket's $35 featurephone plan will give you unlimited voice and SMS, compared to 1,000 minutes and unlimited SMS / MMS / 1X data on The Shack. The carrier's basic smartphone option is $55 and offers unlimited voice, messaging and 3G data (throttled at 2.5GB); this may seem like the better deal -- unless you're interested in using Muve Music. Since you have to pay an extra $10 to add the unlimited music service into the mix on Cricket, you'll see a monthly savings of $5 if you waltz into The Shack for the toptiered plan. We're still waiting for RadioShack to come clean and acknowledge the existence of the

NoContract service, but we'll continue to reveal more details as they come down the pipeline. Check out the featurephone rate plans after the break. [Thanks, Anonymous!] Continue reading RadioShack No Contract Wireless rate plans leak, $60 will get you everything Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Mobile RadioShack No Contract Wireless rate plans leak, $60 will get you everything originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 12:36:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| | Email this| Comments

goods that we here at Engadget even rely on to get our gear in and out of the various events we attend -- jump past the break to see our picks. Continue reading Engadget's back to school guide 2012: bags and cases Filed under: Handhelds, Wearables Engadget's back to school guide

2012: bags and cases originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 27 Aug 2012 12:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| | Email this| Comments

Engadget's back to school guide 2012: bags and cases Joe Pollicino (Engadget)

Submitted at 8/27/2012 12:00:00 PM

Welcome to Engadget's back to school guide! T he end of summer vacation isn't nearly as much fun as the weeks that come before, but a chance to update your tech tools likely helps to ease the pain. Today, we're helping you keep all your gear organized -- and you throughout the month. Be sure to can head to the back to school hub keep checking back -- at the end to see the rest of the product of the month we'll be giving away guides as they're added

a ton of the gear featured in our guides -- and hit up the hub page right here!

most ideal setup -- especially when it's time to grab what you need throughout the day. To solve that dilemma, we've selected more than a handful of sacks and cases that'll keep your gear at hand and organized so that you'll spend less time rummaging for your gizmos and more time exploring your campus. Best of all, you can rest assured knowing many of the Trying to pack a load of gadgets, selections past the break are peripherals and a laptop into your ENGADGET'S page 77 average book bag usually isn't the