Sunday, May 31, 2009
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Pennsylvania Mother Who Faked Abduction Tricked Co-Worker Into Borrowing ID
This woman has some severe issues that need to be addressed!!!
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A Pennsylvania mom found at Walt Disney World after claiming she and her 9-year-old daughter were abducted by two men and stuffed into a car trunk, allegedly conned a co-worker out of her identification to use in the hoax.
Bonnie Sweeten used a co-worker's driver's license and presented it as her own when she bought an airline ticket and flew to Orlando, Fla. on Tuesday, Bucks County District Attorney Michelle Henry said, adding
Sweeten also used the license to check into the Grand Floridian Hotel at Disney World.
Jillian Jenkinson said Thursday on CBS' "The Early Show" that Bonnie Sweeten's request to use her identification to fix a discrepancy on her 401(k) "seemed innocent."
She said she had worked with Sweeten for nine years, but didn't specify where they had worked. She described Sweeten as a good mother who was always on top of things.
"I think whatever's going on in her life is a way bigger issue than my ID," Jenkinson said. "I hope that she's OK."
Sweeten and her daughter, Julia Rakoczy, were taken into custody Wednesday night at their hotel in Orlando, Henry said.
Sweeten is expected to be extradited from Florida Thursday and charged with making false reports and identity theft, authorities said.
Anthony Rakoczy, the girl's father and Sweeten's ex-husband, was expected to pick up Julia in Florida.
"We are taking steps to have her extradited back here to Bucks County to face criminal charges," Henry said Thursday. "The important thing is we're in the process of reuniting the 9-year-old daughter with her biological father and bringing her back safely."
Henry told FOX News their understanding is that Julia was out of school for a doctor's appointment.
"I think if you look at the evidence, it appears she was very calculated in this plan," Henry told FOX News. "This didn't happen in a second. It was very well thought out."
Rakoczy was tight-lipped about his ex-wife's actions, only saying that he was exhausted from the events, MyFOXOrlando.com reported.
"I'm just done, and I got to get out of here," the station reported him saying.
A security camera reportedly showed Sweeten and Julia Rakoczy at Philadelphia International Airport, just hours after Sweeten made at least two 911 calls by cell phone saying she was locked in the trunk of a dark-colored 1990s Cadillac.
They had minimal luggage and the hotel was paid through Friday, Henry said. Sweeten had withdrawn about $12,000 from several bank accounts over recent days, but authorities were investigating whether that money had been stolen.
The day she left, Sweeten withdrew $7,000, prosecutors said Thursday.
ABC reported investigators uncovered that Sweeten allegedly was involved in stealing about $300,000 from her former employer, an attorney in suburban Philadelphia.
Sweeten is listed as the director of The Carlitz Foundation, a Pennsylvania-based charity run by lawyer Debbie Carlitz, MyFOXPhilly.com reported.
The charity raises money for autism research and people in Burma, according to the station.
Detectives and reporters had been puzzled by holes in Sweeten's story, and FBI spokesman J.J. Klaver confirmed earlier Wednesday the existence of "inconsistencies" in her account of the accident and abduction. But he declined at the time to elaborate and said those aren't the focus of the investigation.
Sweeten had told emergency dispatchers that she and her daughter were snatched in the middle of the day Tuesday by two men who rear-ended her SUV in suburban Philadelphia, according to police.
When investigators arrived at the scene, they found no evidence of the crash and the FBI and local police found no witnesses who saw the accident that the missing mother described.
And although Sweeten said the accident took place in Upper Southampton Township, a suburb of Philadelphia, Klaver said authorities discovered her 2005 GMC Denali SUV on Wednesday in Center City, 40 minutes away, along with a parking ticket that indicates it was there about 20 minutes after she dialed 911.
The 911 calls were traced to downtown Philadelphia, about 20 miles from the site of the reported fender-bender and abduction. One was picked up by a cell tower only two blocks from where Sweeten's car was found.
=======================================
A Pennsylvania mom found at Walt Disney World after claiming she and her 9-year-old daughter were abducted by two men and stuffed into a car trunk, allegedly conned a co-worker out of her identification to use in the hoax.
Bonnie Sweeten used a co-worker's driver's license and presented it as her own when she bought an airline ticket and flew to Orlando, Fla. on Tuesday, Bucks County District Attorney Michelle Henry said, adding
Sweeten also used the license to check into the Grand Floridian Hotel at Disney World.
Jillian Jenkinson said Thursday on CBS' "The Early Show" that Bonnie Sweeten's request to use her identification to fix a discrepancy on her 401(k) "seemed innocent."
She said she had worked with Sweeten for nine years, but didn't specify where they had worked. She described Sweeten as a good mother who was always on top of things.
"I think whatever's going on in her life is a way bigger issue than my ID," Jenkinson said. "I hope that she's OK."
Sweeten and her daughter, Julia Rakoczy, were taken into custody Wednesday night at their hotel in Orlando, Henry said.
Sweeten is expected to be extradited from Florida Thursday and charged with making false reports and identity theft, authorities said.
Anthony Rakoczy, the girl's father and Sweeten's ex-husband, was expected to pick up Julia in Florida.
"We are taking steps to have her extradited back here to Bucks County to face criminal charges," Henry said Thursday. "The important thing is we're in the process of reuniting the 9-year-old daughter with her biological father and bringing her back safely."
Henry told FOX News their understanding is that Julia was out of school for a doctor's appointment.
"I think if you look at the evidence, it appears she was very calculated in this plan," Henry told FOX News. "This didn't happen in a second. It was very well thought out."
Rakoczy was tight-lipped about his ex-wife's actions, only saying that he was exhausted from the events, MyFOXOrlando.com reported.
"I'm just done, and I got to get out of here," the station reported him saying.
A security camera reportedly showed Sweeten and Julia Rakoczy at Philadelphia International Airport, just hours after Sweeten made at least two 911 calls by cell phone saying she was locked in the trunk of a dark-colored 1990s Cadillac.
They had minimal luggage and the hotel was paid through Friday, Henry said. Sweeten had withdrawn about $12,000 from several bank accounts over recent days, but authorities were investigating whether that money had been stolen.
The day she left, Sweeten withdrew $7,000, prosecutors said Thursday.
ABC reported investigators uncovered that Sweeten allegedly was involved in stealing about $300,000 from her former employer, an attorney in suburban Philadelphia.
Sweeten is listed as the director of The Carlitz Foundation, a Pennsylvania-based charity run by lawyer Debbie Carlitz, MyFOXPhilly.com reported.
The charity raises money for autism research and people in Burma, according to the station.
Detectives and reporters had been puzzled by holes in Sweeten's story, and FBI spokesman J.J. Klaver confirmed earlier Wednesday the existence of "inconsistencies" in her account of the accident and abduction. But he declined at the time to elaborate and said those aren't the focus of the investigation.
Sweeten had told emergency dispatchers that she and her daughter were snatched in the middle of the day Tuesday by two men who rear-ended her SUV in suburban Philadelphia, according to police.
When investigators arrived at the scene, they found no evidence of the crash and the FBI and local police found no witnesses who saw the accident that the missing mother described.
And although Sweeten said the accident took place in Upper Southampton Township, a suburb of Philadelphia, Klaver said authorities discovered her 2005 GMC Denali SUV on Wednesday in Center City, 40 minutes away, along with a parking ticket that indicates it was there about 20 minutes after she dialed 911.
The 911 calls were traced to downtown Philadelphia, about 20 miles from the site of the reported fender-bender and abduction. One was picked up by a cell tower only two blocks from where Sweeten's car was found.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Reports: Missing Pa. mom, girl not abducted - Yahoo! News
PHILADELPHIA – Philadelphia news outlets are reporting a suburban mother who claimed she and her 9-year-old daughter had been abducted were spotted on video surveillance at Philadelphia International Airport boarding a plane to Florida.
The Philadelphia Inquirer and WPVI-TV, citing unidentified sources, report Wednesday that 38-year-old Bonnie Sweeten, and her daughter Julia Rakoczy, were shown boarding a plane to Tampa on Tuesday afternoon.
Investigators say they can now conclude that the two were not abducted by a pair of men following a traffic accident in suburban Philadelphia.
Sweeten called 911 before 2 p.m. Tuesday in downtown Philadelphia, about 20 miles from where the she said the abduction took place.
The FBI had no immediate comment on the reports.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A Philadelphia TV station is reporting that a suburban mother who claimed she and her 9-year-old daughter had been abducted were spotted on video surveillance at Philadelphia International Airport boarding a plane to Florida.
Citing unnamed law enforement sources, WPVI-TV is reporting Bonnie Sweeten, 38, and her nine-year-old daughter, Julia Rakoczy, were shown boarding a plane to Tampa on Tuesday afternoon.
Investigators told WPVI they can now conclude that the two were not abducted by a pair of men following a traffic crash.
Sweeten called 911 before 2 p.m. Tuesday in downtown Philadelphia, about 20 miles from the busy road where the she said the abduction took place. Her 2005 GMC Denali was found downtown early Wednesday, sporting a parking ticket from Tuesday afternoon.
The Philadelphia Inquirer and WPVI-TV, citing unidentified sources, report Wednesday that 38-year-old Bonnie Sweeten, and her daughter Julia Rakoczy, were shown boarding a plane to Tampa on Tuesday afternoon.
Investigators say they can now conclude that the two were not abducted by a pair of men following a traffic accident in suburban Philadelphia.
Sweeten called 911 before 2 p.m. Tuesday in downtown Philadelphia, about 20 miles from where the she said the abduction took place.
The FBI had no immediate comment on the reports.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A Philadelphia TV station is reporting that a suburban mother who claimed she and her 9-year-old daughter had been abducted were spotted on video surveillance at Philadelphia International Airport boarding a plane to Florida.
Citing unnamed law enforement sources, WPVI-TV is reporting Bonnie Sweeten, 38, and her nine-year-old daughter, Julia Rakoczy, were shown boarding a plane to Tampa on Tuesday afternoon.
Investigators told WPVI they can now conclude that the two were not abducted by a pair of men following a traffic crash.
Sweeten called 911 before 2 p.m. Tuesday in downtown Philadelphia, about 20 miles from the busy road where the she said the abduction took place. Her 2005 GMC Denali was found downtown early Wednesday, sporting a parking ticket from Tuesday afternoon.
Tyson family asks for privacy after girl's death
By JONATHAN J. COOPER – 1 hour ago
PHOENIX (AP) — The death of Mike Tyson's 4-year-old daughter in a terrible accident while playing at her home adds an awful chapter to the boxer's troubled life.
Exodus Tyson died at a hospital Tuesday after being on life support since she was injured Monday at her Phoenix home, police said. She either slipped or put her head in the loop of a cord hanging under a treadmill's console and was suffocated.
"There are no words to describe the tragic loss of our beloved Exodus," the family said in a statement. "We ask you now to please respect our need at this very difficult time for privacy to grieve and try to help each other heal."
Tyson, who has been living in Las Vegas, flew to Phoenix after his daughter was hurt and was seen entering the hospital.
The modest house where his daughter lived contrasts starkly with the lavish lifestyle Tyson had through his tumultuous years of boxing, when he spent tens of millions of dollars and says he had millions more stolen from him by unscrupulous associates.
During just two years at the height of his career, he earned $140 million — but he filed for Chapter 11 protection in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in 2003.
He has been promoting a new documentary about his life and told The New York Times earlier this month he had been sober for 15 months after years of drug and alcohol abuse.
"I don't know who I am," he told the newspaper. "That might sound stupid. I really have no idea. All my life I've been drinking and drugging and partying, and all of a sudden this comes to a stop."
Tyson began boxing in a facility for juvenile delinquents in upstate New York at the age of 12. Eight years later, he became the youngest heavyweight champion ever when he knocked out Trevor Berbick in 1986. But in 1990, he was defeated by James "Buster" Douglas in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history, and soon after was convicted of raping a beauty pageant contestant in Indianapolis.
Tyson, who still denies he raped the woman, served three years in prison.
A few years later, he served three months in jail for beating up two men after a minor car crash in suburban Washington.
As his career continued, so did his bizarre behavior. He bit off a piece of Evander Holyfield's ear during a boxing match and once threatened to eat the children of heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis.
Although Tyson's children had lived in their unassuming neighborhood for several years, he purchased a separate home in the tony Phoenix suburb of Paradise Valley in 2005 for $2.1 million, selling it two years later for $2.3 million.
In November 2007, Tyson spent 24 hours in Maricopa County's "Tent City" jail after pleading guilty to one count of cocaine possession and one misdemeanor count of driving under the influence. Police found the drug when they pulled over Tyson's car after he left a Scottsdale night club.
According to police, Tyson said after his arrest that he bought cocaine "whenever I can get my hands on it."
At Tyson's sentencing hearing, nearly a year after the arrest, his attorney David Chesnoff said his client had taken 29 drug tests without a relapse and was attending Alcoholic Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings.
Tyson had become an example of how a person overcomes problems with drugs, a violent past and poor upbringing, Chesnoff said.
"He's tried his hardest," his attorney said, "despite coming from almost impossible beginnings."
PHOENIX (AP) — The death of Mike Tyson's 4-year-old daughter in a terrible accident while playing at her home adds an awful chapter to the boxer's troubled life.
Exodus Tyson died at a hospital Tuesday after being on life support since she was injured Monday at her Phoenix home, police said. She either slipped or put her head in the loop of a cord hanging under a treadmill's console and was suffocated.
"There are no words to describe the tragic loss of our beloved Exodus," the family said in a statement. "We ask you now to please respect our need at this very difficult time for privacy to grieve and try to help each other heal."
Tyson, who has been living in Las Vegas, flew to Phoenix after his daughter was hurt and was seen entering the hospital.
The modest house where his daughter lived contrasts starkly with the lavish lifestyle Tyson had through his tumultuous years of boxing, when he spent tens of millions of dollars and says he had millions more stolen from him by unscrupulous associates.
During just two years at the height of his career, he earned $140 million — but he filed for Chapter 11 protection in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in 2003.
He has been promoting a new documentary about his life and told The New York Times earlier this month he had been sober for 15 months after years of drug and alcohol abuse.
"I don't know who I am," he told the newspaper. "That might sound stupid. I really have no idea. All my life I've been drinking and drugging and partying, and all of a sudden this comes to a stop."
Tyson began boxing in a facility for juvenile delinquents in upstate New York at the age of 12. Eight years later, he became the youngest heavyweight champion ever when he knocked out Trevor Berbick in 1986. But in 1990, he was defeated by James "Buster" Douglas in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history, and soon after was convicted of raping a beauty pageant contestant in Indianapolis.
Tyson, who still denies he raped the woman, served three years in prison.
A few years later, he served three months in jail for beating up two men after a minor car crash in suburban Washington.
As his career continued, so did his bizarre behavior. He bit off a piece of Evander Holyfield's ear during a boxing match and once threatened to eat the children of heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis.
Although Tyson's children had lived in their unassuming neighborhood for several years, he purchased a separate home in the tony Phoenix suburb of Paradise Valley in 2005 for $2.1 million, selling it two years later for $2.3 million.
In November 2007, Tyson spent 24 hours in Maricopa County's "Tent City" jail after pleading guilty to one count of cocaine possession and one misdemeanor count of driving under the influence. Police found the drug when they pulled over Tyson's car after he left a Scottsdale night club.
According to police, Tyson said after his arrest that he bought cocaine "whenever I can get my hands on it."
At Tyson's sentencing hearing, nearly a year after the arrest, his attorney David Chesnoff said his client had taken 29 drug tests without a relapse and was attending Alcoholic Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings.
Tyson had become an example of how a person overcomes problems with drugs, a violent past and poor upbringing, Chesnoff said.
"He's tried his hardest," his attorney said, "despite coming from almost impossible beginnings."
Study: Stockings for stroke patients don't work
LONDON (AP) — Special stockings commonly given to stroke patients to prevent blood clots don't work, a new study reported Wednesday.
Doctors often prescribe the tight, thigh-high stockings to patients who have suffered a stroke, seeking to prevent blood clots in patients' legs — which could prove fatal if they break off and reach the heart or lungs.
About two-thirds of stroke patients can't walk when admitted to hospital, and up to 20 percent of those patients develop a blood clot in their legs. The stockings squash the legs and force the blood to circulate better, and can be used in place of, or alongside, anti-clotting drugs like heparin.
But in a study of more than 2,500 stroke patients in Australia, Britain and Italy, doctors found the stockings did nothing to reduce the chances of a clot. Not only that, but they caused problems like skin ulcers and blisters.
The results were simultaneously published in the Lancet medical journal and presented at the European Stroke Conference in Stockholm on Wednesday.
Some experts were surprised by the findings.
"We have used these stockings because we assume they work," said Dr. Ralph Sacco, president-elect of the American Heart Association, who was not linked to the study. "But sometimes you're surprised when you find out the truth with a randomized trial."
The stockings have been proven to reduce clots in surgery patients, so experts had long thought the low-cost solution might also help stroke patients.
In the study, about half of the patients got standard care in addition to the stockings. The other half just got standard care. Experts took an ultrasound of patients' legs after about 7 to 10 days, and then again after 25 to 30 days. About 10 percent of patients in both groups developed blood clots.
In the group wearing stockings, 5 percent reported side effects like skin problems and blisters. That compares to 1 percent in the group not given the stockings.
The study was paid for by Britain's Medical Research Council, the Scottish government, the health charity Heart and Stroke Scotland, Tyco Healthcare in the United States and the U.K. Stroke Research Network.
In Britain, draft guidelines recommend patients wear the stockings and they are used to treat an estimated 80,000 patients per year. Martin Dennis, of the University of Edinburgh and one of the study authors, said he has contacted British officials to suggest they reconsider their advice.
"This should cause a big change in how patients are treated," Dennis said, noting that in 2002, 90 percent of stroke units in Britain used the stockings.
In the United States, stockings for stroke patients are far less popular than in the U.K.
Dr. Marc Mayberg, co-director of the Seattle Neuroscience Institute, said he hadn't recommended the stockings for patients in about 20 years. He said the stockings were cumbersome and difficult for many patients, whose legs were paralyzed, to put on and take off.
Recommendations from the American Heart Association published in 2005 advised doctors to consider using the stockings in addition to an anti-clotting drug, or for patients who can't take such drugs.
Sacco said American doctors were more likely to use drugs instead of stockings to prevent clots. He thought the guidelines promoting stockings might now have to be revised.
"With this lack of effect, doctors may be much less inclined to use them," he said.
Doctors often prescribe the tight, thigh-high stockings to patients who have suffered a stroke, seeking to prevent blood clots in patients' legs — which could prove fatal if they break off and reach the heart or lungs.
About two-thirds of stroke patients can't walk when admitted to hospital, and up to 20 percent of those patients develop a blood clot in their legs. The stockings squash the legs and force the blood to circulate better, and can be used in place of, or alongside, anti-clotting drugs like heparin.
But in a study of more than 2,500 stroke patients in Australia, Britain and Italy, doctors found the stockings did nothing to reduce the chances of a clot. Not only that, but they caused problems like skin ulcers and blisters.
The results were simultaneously published in the Lancet medical journal and presented at the European Stroke Conference in Stockholm on Wednesday.
Some experts were surprised by the findings.
"We have used these stockings because we assume they work," said Dr. Ralph Sacco, president-elect of the American Heart Association, who was not linked to the study. "But sometimes you're surprised when you find out the truth with a randomized trial."
The stockings have been proven to reduce clots in surgery patients, so experts had long thought the low-cost solution might also help stroke patients.
In the study, about half of the patients got standard care in addition to the stockings. The other half just got standard care. Experts took an ultrasound of patients' legs after about 7 to 10 days, and then again after 25 to 30 days. About 10 percent of patients in both groups developed blood clots.
In the group wearing stockings, 5 percent reported side effects like skin problems and blisters. That compares to 1 percent in the group not given the stockings.
The study was paid for by Britain's Medical Research Council, the Scottish government, the health charity Heart and Stroke Scotland, Tyco Healthcare in the United States and the U.K. Stroke Research Network.
In Britain, draft guidelines recommend patients wear the stockings and they are used to treat an estimated 80,000 patients per year. Martin Dennis, of the University of Edinburgh and one of the study authors, said he has contacted British officials to suggest they reconsider their advice.
"This should cause a big change in how patients are treated," Dennis said, noting that in 2002, 90 percent of stroke units in Britain used the stockings.
In the United States, stockings for stroke patients are far less popular than in the U.K.
Dr. Marc Mayberg, co-director of the Seattle Neuroscience Institute, said he hadn't recommended the stockings for patients in about 20 years. He said the stockings were cumbersome and difficult for many patients, whose legs were paralyzed, to put on and take off.
Recommendations from the American Heart Association published in 2005 advised doctors to consider using the stockings in addition to an anti-clotting drug, or for patients who can't take such drugs.
Sacco said American doctors were more likely to use drugs instead of stockings to prevent clots. He thought the guidelines promoting stockings might now have to be revised.
"With this lack of effect, doctors may be much less inclined to use them," he said.
The Queen is NOT amused!!
Left Out of D-Day Rites, Queen Elizabeth Fumes
Indeed, she is decidedly displeased, angry even, that she was not invited to join President Obama and France’s president, Nicolas Sarkozy, next week at commemorations of the 65th anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy, according to reports published in Britain’s mass-circulation tabloid newspapers on Wednesday. Pointedly, Buckingham Palace did not deny the reports.
The queen, who is 83, is the only living head of state who served in uniform during World War II. As Elizabeth Windsor, service number 230873, she volunteered as a subaltern in the Women’s Auxiliary Territorial Service, training as a driver and a mechanic. Eventually, she drove military trucks, though in support roles in England, not on the battlefield.
While serving, she met the supreme Allied commander for the D-Day landings, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, and developed a fondness for him, according to several biographies. This prompted Queen Elizabeth, who was crowned in June 1953, to say in later years that he was the American president with whom she felt most at ease .
But on June 6, when Mr. Obama and Mr. Sarkozy attend commemorations at the iconic locations associated with the American D-Day assault — Utah Beach, the town of Ste.-Mère-Église, where the first United States paratroopers landed, and the American war cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer — the highest-ranking British representative will be Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Although he will join the American and French leaders during the day, his main role will be at ceremonies at the town of Arromanches, near the beaches where British troops landed.
How the queen came to be excluded has become entangled in a thicket of diplomatic missteps, or misunderstandings, depending on whether the account is given in London or Paris. The French have said officially that they regard the commemorations in the American sector of the landings as “primarily a Franco-American ceremony,” and that it was up to the British, not the French, to decide who should represent Britain — in other words, that Mr. Brown was at fault for not seeking an invitation for the queen.
The French have also said the Brown government was slow to accept that the ceremonies merited more than a modest British involvement, since British policy, changed late in the planning for this year’s occasion, had been to give full-scale government backing only to commemorations at decade-long intervals.
The last of those was the 60th anniversary in 2004, when the queen joined President George W. Bush in the Normandy observances. British veterans’ groups demanded more backing for this year’s ceremonies on the grounds that only a handful of soldiers who fought in Normandy are likely to be alive at the 70th anniversary in 2014.
In Britain, commentators have suggested that Mr. Sarkozy, who has declared himself ardently pro-American, did not want to share the telegenic moment when he hosts Mr. Obama, who remains hugely popular in Europe. This was all the more so, the British commentators have said, because the queen’s presence might risk turning the occasion into a celebration of the Anglo-American alliance, whose troops carried out the landings, losing about 37,000 men in the battle for Normandy. French troops played no part in the June 6 landings.
When accounts of the dispute made the headlines of the British tabloids on Wednesday, the diplomatic gloves came off, at least somewhat. “Palace fury at D-Day snub to the queen,” roared The Daily Mail, the first time in days that its front-page splash has been on something other than the furor over British parliamentarians’ expenses. A Buckingham Palace spokesman declined to comment beyond a terse, one sentence statement that “no invitation has been issued as yet to any member of the royal family.”
The tabloids quoted anonymous palace officials as saying it was the Brown government that dropped the ball, possibly because of reported strains between Mr. Brown and the queen. Among other issues, the queen is said to have cooled on Mr. Brown because of his habit of appearing late for their weekly audiences. The Daily Mail quoted one “senior palace official” as saying that the palace had made clear to the government that the queen would have liked to have gone to Normandy.
“We have gone through all the normal channels and had conversation after conversation, but received no feedback,” the official said. “It is very frustrating.”
Indeed, she is decidedly displeased, angry even, that she was not invited to join President Obama and France’s president, Nicolas Sarkozy, next week at commemorations of the 65th anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy, according to reports published in Britain’s mass-circulation tabloid newspapers on Wednesday. Pointedly, Buckingham Palace did not deny the reports.
The queen, who is 83, is the only living head of state who served in uniform during World War II. As Elizabeth Windsor, service number 230873, she volunteered as a subaltern in the Women’s Auxiliary Territorial Service, training as a driver and a mechanic. Eventually, she drove military trucks, though in support roles in England, not on the battlefield.
While serving, she met the supreme Allied commander for the D-Day landings, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, and developed a fondness for him, according to several biographies. This prompted Queen Elizabeth, who was crowned in June 1953, to say in later years that he was the American president with whom she felt most at ease .
But on June 6, when Mr. Obama and Mr. Sarkozy attend commemorations at the iconic locations associated with the American D-Day assault — Utah Beach, the town of Ste.-Mère-Église, where the first United States paratroopers landed, and the American war cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer — the highest-ranking British representative will be Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Although he will join the American and French leaders during the day, his main role will be at ceremonies at the town of Arromanches, near the beaches where British troops landed.
How the queen came to be excluded has become entangled in a thicket of diplomatic missteps, or misunderstandings, depending on whether the account is given in London or Paris. The French have said officially that they regard the commemorations in the American sector of the landings as “primarily a Franco-American ceremony,” and that it was up to the British, not the French, to decide who should represent Britain — in other words, that Mr. Brown was at fault for not seeking an invitation for the queen.
The French have also said the Brown government was slow to accept that the ceremonies merited more than a modest British involvement, since British policy, changed late in the planning for this year’s occasion, had been to give full-scale government backing only to commemorations at decade-long intervals.
The last of those was the 60th anniversary in 2004, when the queen joined President George W. Bush in the Normandy observances. British veterans’ groups demanded more backing for this year’s ceremonies on the grounds that only a handful of soldiers who fought in Normandy are likely to be alive at the 70th anniversary in 2014.
In Britain, commentators have suggested that Mr. Sarkozy, who has declared himself ardently pro-American, did not want to share the telegenic moment when he hosts Mr. Obama, who remains hugely popular in Europe. This was all the more so, the British commentators have said, because the queen’s presence might risk turning the occasion into a celebration of the Anglo-American alliance, whose troops carried out the landings, losing about 37,000 men in the battle for Normandy. French troops played no part in the June 6 landings.
When accounts of the dispute made the headlines of the British tabloids on Wednesday, the diplomatic gloves came off, at least somewhat. “Palace fury at D-Day snub to the queen,” roared The Daily Mail, the first time in days that its front-page splash has been on something other than the furor over British parliamentarians’ expenses. A Buckingham Palace spokesman declined to comment beyond a terse, one sentence statement that “no invitation has been issued as yet to any member of the royal family.”
The tabloids quoted anonymous palace officials as saying it was the Brown government that dropped the ball, possibly because of reported strains between Mr. Brown and the queen. Among other issues, the queen is said to have cooled on Mr. Brown because of his habit of appearing late for their weekly audiences. The Daily Mail quoted one “senior palace official” as saying that the palace had made clear to the government that the queen would have liked to have gone to Normandy.
“We have gone through all the normal channels and had conversation after conversation, but received no feedback,” the official said. “It is very frustrating.”
Police find feral girl in Siberia - Yahoo! News
Police find feral girl in Siberia - Yahoo! News:
"MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian police have taken into care a 5-year-old girl who has been shut up in a flat in the company of cats and dogs for her entire life, police said on Wednesday.
The girl, who lived in the Eastern Siberian city of Chita, could not speak Russian and acted like an dog when police took her into care.
'For five years, the girl was 'brought up' by several dogs and cats and had never been outside,' a police statement said.
'The unwashed girl was dressed in filthy clothes, had the clear attributes of an animal and jumped at people,' it said.
The flat had no heat, water or sewage system.
A police spokeswoman said the girl, known as Natasha, is being monitored by psychologists in an orphanage. Her mother was being questioned but her father has not been found yet.
She appears to be about 2-years-old, though her real age is five, refuses to eat with a spoon and has taken on many of the gestures of the animals with which she lived, police said.
'When carers leave the room, the girl jumps at the door and barks,' the police said.
Feral children, the stuff of folklore all over the world, usually exhibit the behaviour of the animals with whom they have had closest contact, a condition known as the Mowgli Syndrome after the fictional child from Rudyard Kipling's 'The Jungle Book' who was raised by wolves in the jungle.
Such children have usually built strong ties with the animals with whom they lived and find the transition to normal human contact extremely traumatic."
"MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian police have taken into care a 5-year-old girl who has been shut up in a flat in the company of cats and dogs for her entire life, police said on Wednesday.
The girl, who lived in the Eastern Siberian city of Chita, could not speak Russian and acted like an dog when police took her into care.
'For five years, the girl was 'brought up' by several dogs and cats and had never been outside,' a police statement said.
'The unwashed girl was dressed in filthy clothes, had the clear attributes of an animal and jumped at people,' it said.
The flat had no heat, water or sewage system.
A police spokeswoman said the girl, known as Natasha, is being monitored by psychologists in an orphanage. Her mother was being questioned but her father has not been found yet.
She appears to be about 2-years-old, though her real age is five, refuses to eat with a spoon and has taken on many of the gestures of the animals with which she lived, police said.
'When carers leave the room, the girl jumps at the door and barks,' the police said.
Feral children, the stuff of folklore all over the world, usually exhibit the behaviour of the animals with whom they have had closest contact, a condition known as the Mowgli Syndrome after the fictional child from Rudyard Kipling's 'The Jungle Book' who was raised by wolves in the jungle.
Such children have usually built strong ties with the animals with whom they lived and find the transition to normal human contact extremely traumatic."
North Korea Says Truce No Longer Valid - WSJ.com
Lets get those M.A.S.H. units fired back up. There could be some shootin' going on!!!! Hawkeye, Trapper - Let's go!!
North Korea Says Truce No Longer Valid
SEOUL – North Korea on Wednesday delivered an angry response to South Korea's decision a day earlier to join an effort to halt atomic-weapons trafficking, saying it would no longer stick to the armistice agreement that halted fighting in the Korean War of the 1950s.
North Korea threatened a military strike against the South Wednesday, a day after Seoul joined a U.S.-led initiative to intercept shipments suspected to be weapons of mass destruction. Video courtesy of Reuters.
"Any minor hostile acts, including cracking down on or searching our peaceful vessels, will be an unacceptable infringement of our republic's sovereignty," said the statement, issued by North Korea's military and broadcast by state media. "We will respond with immediate and strong military strike."
North Korea routinely uses war-like words in official statements when it is upset with actions taking place in the United Nations or the three countries it considers to be enemies – South Korea, Japan and the U.S.
The latest statement reiterated an earlier one that said South Korea's full participation in the U.S.-led Proliferation Security Initiative would amount to a "declaration of war" against it.
North Korea has used that phrase dozens of times since the 1980s, including when U.S. President Ronald Reagan called it a "terrorist state" and when U.S. President George W. Bush called it part of an "axis of evil."
It has threatened to quit the armistice agreement less often, analysts said and a review of Pyongyang's official announcements and news accounts showed.
"Our military will no longer be bound by the armistice," the North's statement said on Wednesday. It went on to blame the U.S. for persuading South Korea, which it called a "puppet," to go along with the effort to monitor and halt the movement of atomic weapons and related components.
North Korea last said it wouldn't adhere to the 1953 armistice agreement that ended the Korean War in August 2006, when it expressed anger at the joint military exercises conducted annually by U.S. and South Korean forces.
In response to the latest statement, the Joint Chiefs of Staff of South Korea's military said, "Our military will restrain North Korea's additional provocation and manage the current situation stably."
The exchange added to a climate of tension that's been building since North Korea in February began preparing for weapons tests. On April 5, it tested a multi-stage missile for just the third time and on Monday it tested a nuclear explosive for the second time.
The tests showed North Korea's nuclear-weapons development program is advancing. The U.S. and other nations since the early 1990s have tried to persuade Pyongyang to stop such work, using a variety of tactics including incentives and penalties. Monday's test drew strong condemnation not just from the countries North Korea considers to be enemies but also its two closest allies, China and Russia.
In Washington Wednesday, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned that North Korea would face consequences because of its "provocative and belligerent'' actions, the Associated Press reported. Mrs. Clinton also underscored the U.S. commitment to defend South Korea and Japan.
She said that talks at the United Nations "are going on to add to the consequences that North Korea will face,'' but she did not provide specifics.
Analysts say the rapid succession of weapons tests and fiery statements may mark a change from a longtime pattern in which North Korea made a provocative action and then sought economic aid or security concessions not to do it again.
That view was reinforced by market activity in recent days. Though usually unfazed by Pyongyang's words and actions, investors showed some concern over the latest volleys. South Korea's Kospi stock market index fell .73% on Wednesday, a day when most other markets in Asia posted solid gains. The Kospi also performed worse than other Asian markets a day earlier, when it dropped 2%.
"I don't think they will turn their rhetorical harshness into action," said Park Young-ho, senior research fellow at the Korea Institute of National Unification in Seoul, a think tank affiliated with the government agency that deals with the North.
But he added that references in the statement to a maritime border dispute with the South – over possession of five islands in the Yellow Sea – suggest the North's next step may be to try to provoke the South Korean Navy.
More of the North's latest statement was directed at the U.S., which it often portrays as ready to invade the country or to oust its authoritarian government.
"There is no bigger misjudgment than thinking that the law-of-jungle kind of U.S. logic could work with us," the statement said. "If needed, we have great military power and our own striking means to conquer a neighboring target at a stroke or to hit vital U.S. points at a blow."
North Korea Says Truce No Longer Valid
SEOUL – North Korea on Wednesday delivered an angry response to South Korea's decision a day earlier to join an effort to halt atomic-weapons trafficking, saying it would no longer stick to the armistice agreement that halted fighting in the Korean War of the 1950s.
North Korea threatened a military strike against the South Wednesday, a day after Seoul joined a U.S.-led initiative to intercept shipments suspected to be weapons of mass destruction. Video courtesy of Reuters.
"Any minor hostile acts, including cracking down on or searching our peaceful vessels, will be an unacceptable infringement of our republic's sovereignty," said the statement, issued by North Korea's military and broadcast by state media. "We will respond with immediate and strong military strike."
North Korea routinely uses war-like words in official statements when it is upset with actions taking place in the United Nations or the three countries it considers to be enemies – South Korea, Japan and the U.S.
The latest statement reiterated an earlier one that said South Korea's full participation in the U.S.-led Proliferation Security Initiative would amount to a "declaration of war" against it.
North Korea has used that phrase dozens of times since the 1980s, including when U.S. President Ronald Reagan called it a "terrorist state" and when U.S. President George W. Bush called it part of an "axis of evil."
It has threatened to quit the armistice agreement less often, analysts said and a review of Pyongyang's official announcements and news accounts showed.
"Our military will no longer be bound by the armistice," the North's statement said on Wednesday. It went on to blame the U.S. for persuading South Korea, which it called a "puppet," to go along with the effort to monitor and halt the movement of atomic weapons and related components.
North Korea last said it wouldn't adhere to the 1953 armistice agreement that ended the Korean War in August 2006, when it expressed anger at the joint military exercises conducted annually by U.S. and South Korean forces.
In response to the latest statement, the Joint Chiefs of Staff of South Korea's military said, "Our military will restrain North Korea's additional provocation and manage the current situation stably."
The exchange added to a climate of tension that's been building since North Korea in February began preparing for weapons tests. On April 5, it tested a multi-stage missile for just the third time and on Monday it tested a nuclear explosive for the second time.
The tests showed North Korea's nuclear-weapons development program is advancing. The U.S. and other nations since the early 1990s have tried to persuade Pyongyang to stop such work, using a variety of tactics including incentives and penalties. Monday's test drew strong condemnation not just from the countries North Korea considers to be enemies but also its two closest allies, China and Russia.
In Washington Wednesday, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned that North Korea would face consequences because of its "provocative and belligerent'' actions, the Associated Press reported. Mrs. Clinton also underscored the U.S. commitment to defend South Korea and Japan.
She said that talks at the United Nations "are going on to add to the consequences that North Korea will face,'' but she did not provide specifics.
Analysts say the rapid succession of weapons tests and fiery statements may mark a change from a longtime pattern in which North Korea made a provocative action and then sought economic aid or security concessions not to do it again.
That view was reinforced by market activity in recent days. Though usually unfazed by Pyongyang's words and actions, investors showed some concern over the latest volleys. South Korea's Kospi stock market index fell .73% on Wednesday, a day when most other markets in Asia posted solid gains. The Kospi also performed worse than other Asian markets a day earlier, when it dropped 2%.
"I don't think they will turn their rhetorical harshness into action," said Park Young-ho, senior research fellow at the Korea Institute of National Unification in Seoul, a think tank affiliated with the government agency that deals with the North.
But he added that references in the statement to a maritime border dispute with the South – over possession of five islands in the Yellow Sea – suggest the North's next step may be to try to provoke the South Korean Navy.
More of the North's latest statement was directed at the U.S., which it often portrays as ready to invade the country or to oust its authoritarian government.
"There is no bigger misjudgment than thinking that the law-of-jungle kind of U.S. logic could work with us," the statement said. "If needed, we have great military power and our own striking means to conquer a neighboring target at a stroke or to hit vital U.S. points at a blow."
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
US wants to paint the world white to save energy
LONDON(AFP) (AFP) – US Energy Secretary Steven Chu said Tuesday the Obama administration wanted to paint roofs an energy-reflecting white, as he took part in a climate change symposium in London.
The Nobel laureate in physics called for a "new revolution" in energy generation to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
But he warned there was no silver bullet for tackling climate change, and said a range of measures should be introduced, including painting flat roofs white.
Making roads and roofs a paler colour could have the equivalent effect of taking every car in the world off the road for 11 years, Chu said.
It was a geo-engineering scheme that was "completely benign" and would keep buildings cooler and reduce energy use from air conditioning, as well as reflecting sunlight back away from the Earth.
For people who found white hard on the eye, scientists had also developed "cool colours" which looked to the human eye like normal ones, but reflect heat like pale colours even if they are darker shades.
And painting cars in cool or light colours could deliver considerable savings on energy use for air conditioning units, he said.
Speaking at the start of a symposium on climate change hosted by the Prince of Wales and attended by more than 20 Nobel laureates, Chu said fresh thinking was required to cut the amount of carbon created by power generation.
He said: "The industrial revolution was a revolution in the use of energy. It offloaded from human and animal power into using fossil fuels.
"We have to go to a different new revolution that can severely decrease the amount of carbon emissions in the generation of energy."
The Nobel laureate in physics called for a "new revolution" in energy generation to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
But he warned there was no silver bullet for tackling climate change, and said a range of measures should be introduced, including painting flat roofs white.
Making roads and roofs a paler colour could have the equivalent effect of taking every car in the world off the road for 11 years, Chu said.
It was a geo-engineering scheme that was "completely benign" and would keep buildings cooler and reduce energy use from air conditioning, as well as reflecting sunlight back away from the Earth.
For people who found white hard on the eye, scientists had also developed "cool colours" which looked to the human eye like normal ones, but reflect heat like pale colours even if they are darker shades.
And painting cars in cool or light colours could deliver considerable savings on energy use for air conditioning units, he said.
Speaking at the start of a symposium on climate change hosted by the Prince of Wales and attended by more than 20 Nobel laureates, Chu said fresh thinking was required to cut the amount of carbon created by power generation.
He said: "The industrial revolution was a revolution in the use of energy. It offloaded from human and animal power into using fossil fuels.
"We have to go to a different new revolution that can severely decrease the amount of carbon emissions in the generation of energy."
Friday, May 22, 2009
NY Senators oppose Coyotes' relocation bid
"BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP)—U.S. Sens. Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York are opposed to the Phoenix Coyotes relocating to southern Ontario because it would have a potential “crippling” effect on the Buffalo Sabres.
In a letter sent to NHL commissioner Gary Bettman on Thursday, the two Democrats sided with the league in its bid to prevent Canadian businessman Jim Balsillie from purchasing the bankrupt Coyotes and moving them to Hamilton, Ontario, located about 45 minutes west of Buffalo.
The Sabres, one of the NHL’s strongest U.S. small-market franchises, generate about 20 percent of their revenue from across the border.
The NHL has asked a bankruptcy judge to uphold the league’s right to determine who owns a franchise and where it plays."
In a letter sent to NHL commissioner Gary Bettman on Thursday, the two Democrats sided with the league in its bid to prevent Canadian businessman Jim Balsillie from purchasing the bankrupt Coyotes and moving them to Hamilton, Ontario, located about 45 minutes west of Buffalo.
The Sabres, one of the NHL’s strongest U.S. small-market franchises, generate about 20 percent of their revenue from across the border.
The NHL has asked a bankruptcy judge to uphold the league’s right to determine who owns a franchise and where it plays."
Thursday, May 21, 2009
Police: Mom killed boy, buried him in playground sand - CNN.com
Police: Mom killed boy, buried him in playground sand - CNN.com
(CNN) -- A 23-year-old woman suffocated her son and then buried his body beneath the sand of a playground, police in Albuquerque, New Mexico, said Thursday.
Police arrested Tiffany Toribio about 4 a.m., just hours after they said they wanted to speak to her about her missing 3-year-old son, Ty.
Family members had contacted authorities, saying her son matched the description of a boy found Friday at an Albuquerque playground.
Police Chief Ray Schultz said she confessed to killing the boy soon after being apprehended.
"She placed her hand over her son's mouth and nose and suffocated him. She had second thoughts about what she did. She performed CPR on her son, brought him back to life and then decided to go forward with that original act she had started to commit," Schultz said.
"What makes this story especially sad is, when asked the reason why she took Ty's life, Tiffany said that she did not want him to grow up with no one caring about him, the same way that she had grown up where nobody had cared about her."
An emotional Schultz added that Toribio has tried to kill herself since her arrest. She was being held in isolation at a detention facility and kept under observation, he said.
He added, "As you can see, this case has been very emotional for everybody in the department."
Toribio was charged with first-degree murder and an array of other charges, including abuse of a child under 12 that caused death.
The discovery of the body Alvarado Park on Friday shocked the community, which dubbed the boy "Baby Justice" and "Baby Angel" as they rallied around his case.
Police released a composite image of the boy Tuesday, hoping to garner more leads in the case. They weren't able to release a photo of the boy because his body was so disfigured by the sand's heat.
Schultz said that after killing her son, Toribio dug a hole under gym equipment at the playground, moved the body and buried him in the shallow grave.
The boy was wearing Arizona brand clothing, size 3T: nylon black running pants with red stripes, a red shirt with a monster truck on it and black, gray and lime green Skechers sneakers.
Toribio did not comment Thursday morning after her arrest as she was put in a police car.
(CNN) -- A 23-year-old woman suffocated her son and then buried his body beneath the sand of a playground, police in Albuquerque, New Mexico, said Thursday.
Police arrested Tiffany Toribio about 4 a.m., just hours after they said they wanted to speak to her about her missing 3-year-old son, Ty.
Family members had contacted authorities, saying her son matched the description of a boy found Friday at an Albuquerque playground.
Police Chief Ray Schultz said she confessed to killing the boy soon after being apprehended.
"She placed her hand over her son's mouth and nose and suffocated him. She had second thoughts about what she did. She performed CPR on her son, brought him back to life and then decided to go forward with that original act she had started to commit," Schultz said.
"What makes this story especially sad is, when asked the reason why she took Ty's life, Tiffany said that she did not want him to grow up with no one caring about him, the same way that she had grown up where nobody had cared about her."
An emotional Schultz added that Toribio has tried to kill herself since her arrest. She was being held in isolation at a detention facility and kept under observation, he said.
He added, "As you can see, this case has been very emotional for everybody in the department."
Toribio was charged with first-degree murder and an array of other charges, including abuse of a child under 12 that caused death.
The discovery of the body Alvarado Park on Friday shocked the community, which dubbed the boy "Baby Justice" and "Baby Angel" as they rallied around his case.
Police released a composite image of the boy Tuesday, hoping to garner more leads in the case. They weren't able to release a photo of the boy because his body was so disfigured by the sand's heat.
Schultz said that after killing her son, Toribio dug a hole under gym equipment at the playground, moved the body and buried him in the shallow grave.
The boy was wearing Arizona brand clothing, size 3T: nylon black running pants with red stripes, a red shirt with a monster truck on it and black, gray and lime green Skechers sneakers.
Toribio did not comment Thursday morning after her arrest as she was put in a police car.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Deficit will darken Schwarzenegger's final months - San Jose Mercury News
By JULIET WILLIAMS Associated Press Writer
LOS ANGELES—Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's election six years ago in California's unprecedented recall election was followed by unlimited promise that the state's famously dysfunctional finances would finally be fixed.
Today the Republican governor faces a financial crisis even worse than the one he inherited, after voters overwhelmingly rejected a slate of budget-balancing measures in Tuesday's special election.
Figuring out how to fill a $21.3 billion budget deficit—nearly a quarter of California's general fund—is likely to occupy most of his remaining time in office, foiling any chance he had left to build the type of legacy he desires.
"The budget mess will overshadow everything else the governor does until he leaves office. The problem is so big that he can forget about major policy innovations," said Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College in Southern California. "He was hoping to revolutionize state government. He'll be lucky to avoid a complete collapse."
It's the latest blow for a celebrity governor who came to Sacramento promising blockbuster-sized reforms. He vowed to end California's roller coaster finances by running the state like a business and cutting through the political gridlock.
His promises to tear up the state's credit cards and "end the crazy deficit spending" seem like distant memories—and now impossible to accomplish before he leaves office in January 2011.
Schwarzenegger has succeeded in borrowing billions of dollars for infrastructure projects and pushing through redistricting reform, but his major achievements may end there.
A combination of political backbiting and financial reality already forced him to delay or cast aside many of his sweeping policy initiatives. The state's shaky finances will make rebuilding California's water system a longshot priority. Health care and education reforms have been defeated or scrapped.
Meanwhile, the recession is gnawing at the state's image of resilience. Unemployment has climbed to a record 11 percent, home foreclosures continue apace, the commercial real estate market has cratered and much of the construction industry has ground to a halt.
With only a third of Californians approving of his job performance, Schwarzenegger has few bargaining tools remaining as he seeks to address the very same problems that compelled him to seek office six years ago.
The governor said Wednesday that he understands the message from the special election results: Californians want elected officials to solve the problems, not constantly turn to them.
"Don't to come to us for extra help. That was the message," Schwarzenegger said Wednesday after a meeting with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in Washington, D.C. "And you know something? I appreciate that when you hear that from the people. It gives us a chance to go and adjust, and say 'OK, we went in the wrong direction. Now let's go in the right direction and let's go do what the people want.'"
Schwarzenegger was scheduled to meet with legislative leaders Wednesday to begin discussing ways to bridge the budget gap.
Within weeks, the state's budget crisis will transform from an abstraction in the minds of most Californians to painful reality.
The governor has proposed shortening the school year by seven days, eliminating health care for tens of thousands of low-income children, laying off up to 5,000 state employees and taking $2 billion from local governments. The shift of local money is likely to translate into reduced police and firefighting services, shortened library hours and local parks becoming overgrown and strewn with trash.
"To take money out of local government suggests what the state does is more important than police, fire, after-school programs and library programs," said Chris McKenzie, executive director of the League of California Cities. "The voters have made it very clear they want the state to stand on its own two feet."
Tens of thousands of teachers also face the prospect of layoffs, and school officials were bracing for what they called unprecedented cuts.
That is not the California Schwarzenegger hoped to be shaping during his final year-and-a-half in office. He already spent most of the last two years tied up in contentious budget negotiations, and the budget package he signed in February already raised taxes by $12.8 billion and cut $15 billion from state programs.
He has said he won't raise taxes again, setting the stage for clashes with state employee unions and other groups determined to protect their interests.
In campaigning for the ballot propositions before Tuesday's election, Schwarzenegger tried to weave his own narrative in the face of likely defeat. He told audiences that Tuesday's special election was not about his time in office or the legacy he hopes to leave, but rather about California's future.
That future now appears darker, at least in the short term. The scope of the crisis will challenge lawmakers to meet their rarely met June 15 to pass a balanced budget, creating the potential for another prolonged budget fight.
Schwarzenegger did get some good news on Wednesday. The federal government informed him that California will remain eligible for $8 billion in Medicaid funds despite complaints from unions that previous pay cuts to home healthcare workers violated the terms of the federal stimulus bill.
Schwarzenegger had appealed to administration officials not to jeopardize California's share of the economic stimulus funding because of the cuts to state programs lawmakers are being forced to make.
Kenneth Burt, political director of the California Federation of Teachers, which opposed parts of the ballot package, said there is still a role for Schwarzenegger during this critical time for the state—if he can reclaim his role as bipartisan peacemaker.
"He's obviously a lame duck, but he still has a role to play in bringing together the legislative leaders," he said.
LOS ANGELES—Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's election six years ago in California's unprecedented recall election was followed by unlimited promise that the state's famously dysfunctional finances would finally be fixed.
Today the Republican governor faces a financial crisis even worse than the one he inherited, after voters overwhelmingly rejected a slate of budget-balancing measures in Tuesday's special election.
Figuring out how to fill a $21.3 billion budget deficit—nearly a quarter of California's general fund—is likely to occupy most of his remaining time in office, foiling any chance he had left to build the type of legacy he desires.
"The budget mess will overshadow everything else the governor does until he leaves office. The problem is so big that he can forget about major policy innovations," said Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College in Southern California. "He was hoping to revolutionize state government. He'll be lucky to avoid a complete collapse."
It's the latest blow for a celebrity governor who came to Sacramento promising blockbuster-sized reforms. He vowed to end California's roller coaster finances by running the state like a business and cutting through the political gridlock.
His promises to tear up the state's credit cards and "end the crazy deficit spending" seem like distant memories—and now impossible to accomplish before he leaves office in January 2011.
Schwarzenegger has succeeded in borrowing billions of dollars for infrastructure projects and pushing through redistricting reform, but his major achievements may end there.
A combination of political backbiting and financial reality already forced him to delay or cast aside many of his sweeping policy initiatives. The state's shaky finances will make rebuilding California's water system a longshot priority. Health care and education reforms have been defeated or scrapped.
Meanwhile, the recession is gnawing at the state's image of resilience. Unemployment has climbed to a record 11 percent, home foreclosures continue apace, the commercial real estate market has cratered and much of the construction industry has ground to a halt.
With only a third of Californians approving of his job performance, Schwarzenegger has few bargaining tools remaining as he seeks to address the very same problems that compelled him to seek office six years ago.
The governor said Wednesday that he understands the message from the special election results: Californians want elected officials to solve the problems, not constantly turn to them.
"Don't to come to us for extra help. That was the message," Schwarzenegger said Wednesday after a meeting with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in Washington, D.C. "And you know something? I appreciate that when you hear that from the people. It gives us a chance to go and adjust, and say 'OK, we went in the wrong direction. Now let's go in the right direction and let's go do what the people want.'"
Schwarzenegger was scheduled to meet with legislative leaders Wednesday to begin discussing ways to bridge the budget gap.
Within weeks, the state's budget crisis will transform from an abstraction in the minds of most Californians to painful reality.
The governor has proposed shortening the school year by seven days, eliminating health care for tens of thousands of low-income children, laying off up to 5,000 state employees and taking $2 billion from local governments. The shift of local money is likely to translate into reduced police and firefighting services, shortened library hours and local parks becoming overgrown and strewn with trash.
"To take money out of local government suggests what the state does is more important than police, fire, after-school programs and library programs," said Chris McKenzie, executive director of the League of California Cities. "The voters have made it very clear they want the state to stand on its own two feet."
Tens of thousands of teachers also face the prospect of layoffs, and school officials were bracing for what they called unprecedented cuts.
That is not the California Schwarzenegger hoped to be shaping during his final year-and-a-half in office. He already spent most of the last two years tied up in contentious budget negotiations, and the budget package he signed in February already raised taxes by $12.8 billion and cut $15 billion from state programs.
He has said he won't raise taxes again, setting the stage for clashes with state employee unions and other groups determined to protect their interests.
In campaigning for the ballot propositions before Tuesday's election, Schwarzenegger tried to weave his own narrative in the face of likely defeat. He told audiences that Tuesday's special election was not about his time in office or the legacy he hopes to leave, but rather about California's future.
That future now appears darker, at least in the short term. The scope of the crisis will challenge lawmakers to meet their rarely met June 15 to pass a balanced budget, creating the potential for another prolonged budget fight.
Schwarzenegger did get some good news on Wednesday. The federal government informed him that California will remain eligible for $8 billion in Medicaid funds despite complaints from unions that previous pay cuts to home healthcare workers violated the terms of the federal stimulus bill.
Schwarzenegger had appealed to administration officials not to jeopardize California's share of the economic stimulus funding because of the cuts to state programs lawmakers are being forced to make.
Kenneth Burt, political director of the California Federation of Teachers, which opposed parts of the ballot package, said there is still a role for Schwarzenegger during this critical time for the state—if he can reclaim his role as bipartisan peacemaker.
"He's obviously a lame duck, but he still has a role to play in bringing together the legislative leaders," he said.
I am glad he hears it - now do something about it!!!!
WASHINGTON (AP) — California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Wednesday he's heard "loud and clear" a voter message to take care of deficits through budget cuts alone, without passing additional costs along to them.
Voters on Tuesday resoundingly rejected Schwarzenegger's package of budget-balancing measures that he promised would temporarily fix the state's financial crisis.
Instead, he now faces a $21.3 billion budget deficit.
Schwarzenegger said the state's residents have had to sell off motorcycles, second cars and hold garage sales to make ends meet in recent months. Now, they're telling state officials that the government has to shrink, too.
"Don't to come to us for extra help. That was the message," Schwarzenegger said after a meeting with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. "And you know something. I appreciate that when you hear that from the people. It gives us a chance to go and adjust, and say 'OK, we went in the wrong direction. Now lets go in the right direction and lets go do what the people want.' "
Still, Schwarzenegger said the budget cuts to come may be more painful than California voters realize. While they may not want to pay more for services, they can't say specifically which services they would pare, he said.
He said cuts will certainly come in education, health care and in prisons by transferring undocumented immigrants to federal facilities and transferring more non-violent offenders to local jails. He plans to meet with state lawmakers in the afternoon to discuss the state's options.
Schwarzenegger did get some good news on Wednesday. The federal government informed him that California will remain eligible for an extra $8 billion in Medicaid funds despite complaints from unions that it violated the terms for getting extra stimulus dollars for health care.
The governor said he felt all along the state should trim certain government services, but he didn't want to make what he described as drastic cuts.
"Now we have to. There's no other choice. I think the message was clear from the people: Go all out and make those cuts and live within your means," Schwarzenegger said.
Voters on Tuesday resoundingly rejected Schwarzenegger's package of budget-balancing measures that he promised would temporarily fix the state's financial crisis.
Instead, he now faces a $21.3 billion budget deficit.
Schwarzenegger said the state's residents have had to sell off motorcycles, second cars and hold garage sales to make ends meet in recent months. Now, they're telling state officials that the government has to shrink, too.
"Don't to come to us for extra help. That was the message," Schwarzenegger said after a meeting with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. "And you know something. I appreciate that when you hear that from the people. It gives us a chance to go and adjust, and say 'OK, we went in the wrong direction. Now lets go in the right direction and lets go do what the people want.' "
Still, Schwarzenegger said the budget cuts to come may be more painful than California voters realize. While they may not want to pay more for services, they can't say specifically which services they would pare, he said.
He said cuts will certainly come in education, health care and in prisons by transferring undocumented immigrants to federal facilities and transferring more non-violent offenders to local jails. He plans to meet with state lawmakers in the afternoon to discuss the state's options.
Schwarzenegger did get some good news on Wednesday. The federal government informed him that California will remain eligible for an extra $8 billion in Medicaid funds despite complaints from unions that it violated the terms for getting extra stimulus dollars for health care.
The governor said he felt all along the state should trim certain government services, but he didn't want to make what he described as drastic cuts.
"Now we have to. There's no other choice. I think the message was clear from the people: Go all out and make those cuts and live within your means," Schwarzenegger said.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
What the new credit card law means to consumers - Politics AP - MiamiHerald.com
What the new credit card law means to consumers
By David Lightman
McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — The Senate passed legislation Tuesday to protect credit card holders from sudden interest-rate spikes, but consumer groups and card issuers warned that people are still likely to face obstacles in getting and maintaining credit.
The Senate vote was 90-5. The House of Representatives is expected to approve the bill overwhelmingly, probably Wednesday, and it then will go to President Barack Obama, who's pushed hard for the legislation.
The new law would protect consumers from sudden increases in interest rates, but companies are saying that they'll be more selective in issuing cards.
The Senate vote represents "the biggest reforms of the industry since the invention of credit cards," said Peter Garuccio, a spokesman for the American Bankers Association.
Consumer groups voiced similar thoughts. "The biggest change is that the contract between the consumer and the companies will become stronger," said Nick Bourke, the manager of the Pew Safe Credit Cards Project, which provides education and advocacy for consumers on credit matters.
That may not mean instant help for many people, however.
The bill, similar to regulations the Federal Reserve Board issued recently that will take effect in summer 2010, probably will require significant changes in how card issuers do business, notably by offering fewer cards to high-risk consumers.
"There will be a different business model going forward," Garuccio said.
Issuers long have practiced "risk-based pricing," in which they impose higher interest rates on people who are more prone to pay late. The bill will restrict issuers' ability to increase interest rates, and as a result "your ability to use risk-based pricing is very limited," Garuccio said.
Consumer groups have a more immediate concern: Most of the bill's provisions won't go into effect for nine months, giving card issuers time to hike interest rates, a practice that helped spur the congressional action.
Pew surveyed 12 large card issuers last year and found that 93 percent of the cards permitted the issuers to raise any interest rate at any time. Eighty-seven percent of the cards could have automatic penalty interest-rate increases imposed on balances, even if the accounts weren't 30 days or more past due.
As a result, the study said, "current credit-card practices place American cardholders at risk of sudden, potentially drastic price increases, which can seriously impair a household's stability and spending power."
The legislation takes strong steps to discourage such practices. The Senate measure would require that consumers get 45 days' notice before any new interest rates, fees or finance charges went into effect.
Interest rates couldn't be increased during the first year an account is open, and promotional rates must remain in effect for at least six months.
It would prohibit issuers from imposing retroactive rate increases until consumers are more than 60 days behind in payments. After six months, if the consumers have paid the minimum balances on time, the lower rates would return.
The bill also would require parents or guardians to guarantee any debts assumed by cards issued to most people younger than 21, unless the young people have sufficient independent income.
Consumers need to be unusually vigilant in the months ahead, said Adam Levin, the chairman and co-founder of Credit.com, an education and advocacy Web site.
Even after the law takes effect, issuers still would be able to cut off customers' cards suddenly. While the measure restricts changes in credit card interest rates, it sets no limit on what rates can be imposed initially. Issuers also can still cut customers' credit limits dramatically.
Consumers should "come up with a plan to reduce debt," and "have an arsenal of credit cards, so if one experiences a cutback, they can go to another," Levin said. They also should try to pay off balances first that are subject to the highest interest rates.
People should be aware of what fees and rates are being imposed. Go online constantly, Levin advised, look for such charges and question anything that seems unusual.
Garuccio, though, maintained that issuers aren't about to act arbitrarily or irresponsibly. They've known for months that changes are coming and have moved to change their practices.
"The industry is already taking steps to implement the new rules," he said.
For instance, it may impose higher interest rates in the future because it's unable to spread risk as it has in the past.
Garuccio cited this example: If a company gives cards to 20 people with the same credit profiles, history shows that one will have trouble paying on time (though recent experience suggests that two of the 20 could have problems). The issuer has no way of knowing who might have that trouble, so all 20 get a lower interest rate at first.
In the past, the company then would charge the delinquent consumer a higher interest rate than the others. Since new restrictions on rate increases are likely, however, the company would be inclined to charge all 20 a somewhat higher rate from the start.
Consumer groups remain wary, warning that simply because the president and Washington lawmakers are celebrating a great consumer victory, the fight isn't necessarily over.
"This bill is a significant first step," Levin said, "but it's not a silver bullet."
By David Lightman
McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — The Senate passed legislation Tuesday to protect credit card holders from sudden interest-rate spikes, but consumer groups and card issuers warned that people are still likely to face obstacles in getting and maintaining credit.
The Senate vote was 90-5. The House of Representatives is expected to approve the bill overwhelmingly, probably Wednesday, and it then will go to President Barack Obama, who's pushed hard for the legislation.
The new law would protect consumers from sudden increases in interest rates, but companies are saying that they'll be more selective in issuing cards.
The Senate vote represents "the biggest reforms of the industry since the invention of credit cards," said Peter Garuccio, a spokesman for the American Bankers Association.
Consumer groups voiced similar thoughts. "The biggest change is that the contract between the consumer and the companies will become stronger," said Nick Bourke, the manager of the Pew Safe Credit Cards Project, which provides education and advocacy for consumers on credit matters.
That may not mean instant help for many people, however.
The bill, similar to regulations the Federal Reserve Board issued recently that will take effect in summer 2010, probably will require significant changes in how card issuers do business, notably by offering fewer cards to high-risk consumers.
"There will be a different business model going forward," Garuccio said.
Issuers long have practiced "risk-based pricing," in which they impose higher interest rates on people who are more prone to pay late. The bill will restrict issuers' ability to increase interest rates, and as a result "your ability to use risk-based pricing is very limited," Garuccio said.
Consumer groups have a more immediate concern: Most of the bill's provisions won't go into effect for nine months, giving card issuers time to hike interest rates, a practice that helped spur the congressional action.
Pew surveyed 12 large card issuers last year and found that 93 percent of the cards permitted the issuers to raise any interest rate at any time. Eighty-seven percent of the cards could have automatic penalty interest-rate increases imposed on balances, even if the accounts weren't 30 days or more past due.
As a result, the study said, "current credit-card practices place American cardholders at risk of sudden, potentially drastic price increases, which can seriously impair a household's stability and spending power."
The legislation takes strong steps to discourage such practices. The Senate measure would require that consumers get 45 days' notice before any new interest rates, fees or finance charges went into effect.
Interest rates couldn't be increased during the first year an account is open, and promotional rates must remain in effect for at least six months.
It would prohibit issuers from imposing retroactive rate increases until consumers are more than 60 days behind in payments. After six months, if the consumers have paid the minimum balances on time, the lower rates would return.
The bill also would require parents or guardians to guarantee any debts assumed by cards issued to most people younger than 21, unless the young people have sufficient independent income.
Consumers need to be unusually vigilant in the months ahead, said Adam Levin, the chairman and co-founder of Credit.com, an education and advocacy Web site.
Even after the law takes effect, issuers still would be able to cut off customers' cards suddenly. While the measure restricts changes in credit card interest rates, it sets no limit on what rates can be imposed initially. Issuers also can still cut customers' credit limits dramatically.
Consumers should "come up with a plan to reduce debt," and "have an arsenal of credit cards, so if one experiences a cutback, they can go to another," Levin said. They also should try to pay off balances first that are subject to the highest interest rates.
People should be aware of what fees and rates are being imposed. Go online constantly, Levin advised, look for such charges and question anything that seems unusual.
Garuccio, though, maintained that issuers aren't about to act arbitrarily or irresponsibly. They've known for months that changes are coming and have moved to change their practices.
"The industry is already taking steps to implement the new rules," he said.
For instance, it may impose higher interest rates in the future because it's unable to spread risk as it has in the past.
Garuccio cited this example: If a company gives cards to 20 people with the same credit profiles, history shows that one will have trouble paying on time (though recent experience suggests that two of the 20 could have problems). The issuer has no way of knowing who might have that trouble, so all 20 get a lower interest rate at first.
In the past, the company then would charge the delinquent consumer a higher interest rate than the others. Since new restrictions on rate increases are likely, however, the company would be inclined to charge all 20 a somewhat higher rate from the start.
Consumer groups remain wary, warning that simply because the president and Washington lawmakers are celebrating a great consumer victory, the fight isn't necessarily over.
"This bill is a significant first step," Levin said, "but it's not a silver bullet."
Nancy Pelosi Owes America an Apology… and the Truth
The quarterback of the Central Intelligence agency says he doesn’t want his agency to be a pawn in a game of political football; it’s too late, Democrats have been tackling the CIA for months and President Obama is not willing to toss a penalty flag.
If Nancy Pelosi really believes the enhanced interrogation techniques were unlawful, we now know she was aware of it and did nothing to stop it. That makes her an accessory to a crime.
It’s difficult to say which is more troubling, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi playing a game of CYA at the expense of the CIA, or President Obama’s continued support as she calls members of the intelligence agency liars. Either way, Republicans say it’s time for Nancy Pelosi to put up or shut up, after she apologizes of course.
The primary mission of the CIA is “to collect, evaluate, and disseminate foreign intelligence to assist the president and senior US government policymakers in making decisions relating to the national security.”
CIA Director Leon Panetta said it’s against the laws and values of the agency to lie to Congress. On Monday, he urged lawmakers (including Pelosi) to keep the CIA out of their partisan political battles, or run the risk of jeopardizing our national security.
“If they start to use these issues as political clubs to beat each other up with, then that’s when we not only pay a price, but this country pays a price,” Panetta said.
Speaker Pelosi has long called for a “truth commission” to look into the investigation techniques of terror suspects after 9-11. In her recent train wreck of a news conference, Pelosi tried to clear up inconsistencies about what she knew and when she knew it. The problem is, she just made matters worse for herself, and the country.
As ranking member of the Intelligence Committee, Pelosi told reporters she was briefed by the CIA in September, 2002, saying, “the only mention of waterboarding at that briefing was that it was not being employed.” She goes on to say, “I was informed then that the Department of Justice opinions had concluded that the use of enhanced interrogation techniques were legal.”
In February of 2003, Pelosi said she was informed by a member of her staff that waterboarding was being conducted.
The Speaker wrapped up her statement by saying the CIA not only gave her inaccurate and incomplete information, they lied to her and Congress repeatedly.
Careful Madam Speaker, as Abraham Lincoln said, “truth is generally the best vindication for slander.”
The truth is just what the media wanted from Pelosi, and they pushed her to explain previous claims that the CIA never told her about the use of waterboarding.
As Pelosi lost her place on her notes, her credibility went right along with it. Her story went from “I wasn’t briefed” to “I was told” to “I was informed from someone who was briefed” to “I was just briefed that they were informed.” What?
It makes me think of Bill Clinton’s grand jury testimony on the Lewinsky affair when he said “it depends on what your definition of the word ‘is’ is.” In Pelosi’s case, it depends on what your definition of the word “briefed” is.
And when the media stripped Pelosi down to her briefs, she resorted to calling the CIA, and the Bush administration a bunch of liars.
From all indications, Pelosi and “The Gang of Four” were told about the interrogation techniques. If they weren’t told specifically, they were told enough to ask the tough questions, but they chose not to, so as to avoid the appearance of being soft on terror.
Instead of raising objections when she was first briefed seven years ago, the ranking member of the Intelligence Committee said she was busy “doing her job” of changing leadership in congress and the White House. Excuse me? The dust was still settling on 9/11, Americans were afraid of airplanes, anthrax, and Al Qaeda; and Nancy Pelosi believed electing a Democratic president took precedent over our national security?
When Rep. Jane Harman wrote a letter to the Bush Administration with concerns about the interrogation techniques, Pelosi supported the letter.
If Pelosi believes the CIA lied to Congress, that’s a crime, take it to the Justice Department.
If she really believes the enhanced interrogation techniques were unlawful, we now know she was aware of it and did nothing to stop it. That makes her an accessory to a crime.
Speaker Pelosi, you have the right to remain silent.
If Nancy Pelosi really believes the enhanced interrogation techniques were unlawful, we now know she was aware of it and did nothing to stop it. That makes her an accessory to a crime.
It’s difficult to say which is more troubling, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi playing a game of CYA at the expense of the CIA, or President Obama’s continued support as she calls members of the intelligence agency liars. Either way, Republicans say it’s time for Nancy Pelosi to put up or shut up, after she apologizes of course.
The primary mission of the CIA is “to collect, evaluate, and disseminate foreign intelligence to assist the president and senior US government policymakers in making decisions relating to the national security.”
CIA Director Leon Panetta said it’s against the laws and values of the agency to lie to Congress. On Monday, he urged lawmakers (including Pelosi) to keep the CIA out of their partisan political battles, or run the risk of jeopardizing our national security.
“If they start to use these issues as political clubs to beat each other up with, then that’s when we not only pay a price, but this country pays a price,” Panetta said.
Speaker Pelosi has long called for a “truth commission” to look into the investigation techniques of terror suspects after 9-11. In her recent train wreck of a news conference, Pelosi tried to clear up inconsistencies about what she knew and when she knew it. The problem is, she just made matters worse for herself, and the country.
As ranking member of the Intelligence Committee, Pelosi told reporters she was briefed by the CIA in September, 2002, saying, “the only mention of waterboarding at that briefing was that it was not being employed.” She goes on to say, “I was informed then that the Department of Justice opinions had concluded that the use of enhanced interrogation techniques were legal.”
In February of 2003, Pelosi said she was informed by a member of her staff that waterboarding was being conducted.
The Speaker wrapped up her statement by saying the CIA not only gave her inaccurate and incomplete information, they lied to her and Congress repeatedly.
Careful Madam Speaker, as Abraham Lincoln said, “truth is generally the best vindication for slander.”
The truth is just what the media wanted from Pelosi, and they pushed her to explain previous claims that the CIA never told her about the use of waterboarding.
As Pelosi lost her place on her notes, her credibility went right along with it. Her story went from “I wasn’t briefed” to “I was told” to “I was informed from someone who was briefed” to “I was just briefed that they were informed.” What?
It makes me think of Bill Clinton’s grand jury testimony on the Lewinsky affair when he said “it depends on what your definition of the word ‘is’ is.” In Pelosi’s case, it depends on what your definition of the word “briefed” is.
And when the media stripped Pelosi down to her briefs, she resorted to calling the CIA, and the Bush administration a bunch of liars.
From all indications, Pelosi and “The Gang of Four” were told about the interrogation techniques. If they weren’t told specifically, they were told enough to ask the tough questions, but they chose not to, so as to avoid the appearance of being soft on terror.
Instead of raising objections when she was first briefed seven years ago, the ranking member of the Intelligence Committee said she was busy “doing her job” of changing leadership in congress and the White House. Excuse me? The dust was still settling on 9/11, Americans were afraid of airplanes, anthrax, and Al Qaeda; and Nancy Pelosi believed electing a Democratic president took precedent over our national security?
When Rep. Jane Harman wrote a letter to the Bush Administration with concerns about the interrogation techniques, Pelosi supported the letter.
If Pelosi believes the CIA lied to Congress, that’s a crime, take it to the Justice Department.
If she really believes the enhanced interrogation techniques were unlawful, we now know she was aware of it and did nothing to stop it. That makes her an accessory to a crime.
Speaker Pelosi, you have the right to remain silent.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Arnold Schwarzenegger Package Appears Headed to Defeat in Tuesday Vote
Schwarzenegger Package Appears Headed to Defeat
California Voters Appear Poised to Reject 5 of 6 Budget-Related Ballot Measures Tuesday
By TEDDY DAVIS
May 18, 2009
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is facing a drubbing at the polls on Tuesday as California voters prepare to weigh in on six budget-related ballot measures backed by the former action movie star.
"Five of the six ballot measures are headed to defeat," Mark DiCamillo, the director of the non-partisan Field Poll, told ABC News. "There's a lack of trust. Voters have turned away from the governor. He will certainly be in lame duck status for the rest of his term."
A defeat on Tuesday would be a big setback not only for the Republican governor but also for the scores of Democrats and six Republicans in the state legislature who placed the propositions on the ballot as part of a budget deal struck in February. Voter approval is needed for these measures because they involve changes to the state's constitution.
According to public polling in the state, the only measure which is headed towards passage is Proposition 1F which would restrict pay hikes for elected officials in deficit years but not actually generate much in the way of savings for the taxpayers.
The other measures appear to be headed towards defeat (see below for a summary of all six).
California, home to one in eight Americans, is in dire fiscal shape.
Even if all of the ballot measures were to pass on Tuesday, the state is facing a deficit of $15.4 billion. If the measures do not pass, the state's budget shortfall gets even worse.
Schwarzenegger warned last week that if his package goes down to defeat, the state's deficit will swell to $21.3 billion.
The governor said a deficit of that size will force him to shorten the school year by seven days, cut off health care to more than 200,000 children, and shorten the state prison sentences of up to 19,000 illegal immigrants so they can be handed over to federal authorities for deportation.
If Proposition 1A, a measure that includes a tax hike and rainy day fund, goes down to defeat on Tuesday, anti-tax groups will have defeated a "yes" campaign which had significantly more resources.
It is not clear, however, how the state will react to the deep cuts which the governor says will be necessary if his ballot measures fail.
said DiCamillo. "In our recent poll, the only areas where a majority supported making cuts are . . . the prison system and state parks."
"Public schools, health-care, higher education -- those are areas that voters are least apt to make major cuts to and yet those programs constitute about 75 percent of the budget," he added.
Asking voters to approve higher taxes in a bad economy was never going to be easy, but DiCamillo thinks advocates of the ballot measures made things harder on themselves by choosing "obtuse" ballot language.
"They were too cute by half," said DiCamillo. "They wanted to avoid describing any of the negative impact. But as a result, they made the language so vague that even a knowledgeable voter was left to wonder what would happen if they voted 'yes.' When voters are confused about what the effect of a measure will be, they tend to vote "no" because it's seen as a safer vote."
SUMMARY OF CALIFORNIA BALLOT MEASURES:
Proposition 1A: Raises sales, car, and income taxes by $16 billion over a two-year period and requires a bigger rainy day fund going forward.
Proposition 1B: Requires the state to make $9.3 billion in additional payments to schools and community colleges. 1B only takes effect if 1A passes.
Proposition 1C: Authorizes the state to expand the lottery by offering bigger prizes and then borrows $5 billion against the new revenue that the expanded lottery is expected to generate.
Proposition 1D: Directs tobacco tax revenue away from director Rob Reiner's Early Childhood Development program and toward the state's general fund.
Proposition 1E: Directs "personal income tax surcharge" away from specified mental health programs and toward the state's general fund. (The "personal income tax surcharge" is a tax of 1 percent on the portion of taxable income in excess of $1 million).
Proposition 1F: Prevents legislators, the governor, and other state elected officials from receiving pay increases in years when the state is running a deficit.
California Voters Appear Poised to Reject 5 of 6 Budget-Related Ballot Measures Tuesday
By TEDDY DAVIS
May 18, 2009
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is facing a drubbing at the polls on Tuesday as California voters prepare to weigh in on six budget-related ballot measures backed by the former action movie star.
"Five of the six ballot measures are headed to defeat," Mark DiCamillo, the director of the non-partisan Field Poll, told ABC News. "There's a lack of trust. Voters have turned away from the governor. He will certainly be in lame duck status for the rest of his term."
A defeat on Tuesday would be a big setback not only for the Republican governor but also for the scores of Democrats and six Republicans in the state legislature who placed the propositions on the ballot as part of a budget deal struck in February. Voter approval is needed for these measures because they involve changes to the state's constitution.
According to public polling in the state, the only measure which is headed towards passage is Proposition 1F which would restrict pay hikes for elected officials in deficit years but not actually generate much in the way of savings for the taxpayers.
The other measures appear to be headed towards defeat (see below for a summary of all six).
California, home to one in eight Americans, is in dire fiscal shape.
Even if all of the ballot measures were to pass on Tuesday, the state is facing a deficit of $15.4 billion. If the measures do not pass, the state's budget shortfall gets even worse.
Schwarzenegger warned last week that if his package goes down to defeat, the state's deficit will swell to $21.3 billion.
The governor said a deficit of that size will force him to shorten the school year by seven days, cut off health care to more than 200,000 children, and shorten the state prison sentences of up to 19,000 illegal immigrants so they can be handed over to federal authorities for deportation.
If Proposition 1A, a measure that includes a tax hike and rainy day fund, goes down to defeat on Tuesday, anti-tax groups will have defeated a "yes" campaign which had significantly more resources.
It is not clear, however, how the state will react to the deep cuts which the governor says will be necessary if his ballot measures fail.
said DiCamillo. "In our recent poll, the only areas where a majority supported making cuts are . . . the prison system and state parks."
"Public schools, health-care, higher education -- those are areas that voters are least apt to make major cuts to and yet those programs constitute about 75 percent of the budget," he added.
Asking voters to approve higher taxes in a bad economy was never going to be easy, but DiCamillo thinks advocates of the ballot measures made things harder on themselves by choosing "obtuse" ballot language.
"They were too cute by half," said DiCamillo. "They wanted to avoid describing any of the negative impact. But as a result, they made the language so vague that even a knowledgeable voter was left to wonder what would happen if they voted 'yes.' When voters are confused about what the effect of a measure will be, they tend to vote "no" because it's seen as a safer vote."
SUMMARY OF CALIFORNIA BALLOT MEASURES:
Proposition 1A: Raises sales, car, and income taxes by $16 billion over a two-year period and requires a bigger rainy day fund going forward.
Proposition 1B: Requires the state to make $9.3 billion in additional payments to schools and community colleges. 1B only takes effect if 1A passes.
Proposition 1C: Authorizes the state to expand the lottery by offering bigger prizes and then borrows $5 billion against the new revenue that the expanded lottery is expected to generate.
Proposition 1D: Directs tobacco tax revenue away from director Rob Reiner's Early Childhood Development program and toward the state's general fund.
Proposition 1E: Directs "personal income tax surcharge" away from specified mental health programs and toward the state's general fund. (The "personal income tax surcharge" is a tax of 1 percent on the portion of taxable income in excess of $1 million).
Proposition 1F: Prevents legislators, the governor, and other state elected officials from receiving pay increases in years when the state is running a deficit.
Friday, May 15, 2009
Former NFL great Bruce Smith faces drunken driving charge
VIRGINIA BEACH (AP) — Former NFL star Bruce Smith was charged with drunken driving Friday morning after a police officer stopped him for speeding, Virginia Beach police said.
Police spokesman Jimmy Barnes said Smith was released on bond a few hours after being charged with speeding, driving under the influence and refusal to take an alcohol breath test. He could not determine whether a hearing date has been set, and it was not immediately clear whether the 45-year-old Smith had an attorney.
Smith, who played for the Buffalo Bills and the Washington Redskins, is the NFL's all-time sacks leader. He was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame earlier this year. He played in 11 Pro Bowls and was a first-team All-Pro selection nine times.
Smith played at Virginia Tech before being taken by the Bills as the No. 1 overall pick in the NFL draft in 1985. He is a native of Norfolk but now lives in Virginia Beach.
Barnes said an officer in a special DUI enforcement unit stopped Smith's vehicle on Interstate 264 at about 1:42 a.m. He said he didn't know how fast Smith was driving in the 55 mph zone, but it must have been less than 75 mph or he would have been charged with reckless driving instead.
Police spokesman Jimmy Barnes said Smith was released on bond a few hours after being charged with speeding, driving under the influence and refusal to take an alcohol breath test. He could not determine whether a hearing date has been set, and it was not immediately clear whether the 45-year-old Smith had an attorney.
Smith, who played for the Buffalo Bills and the Washington Redskins, is the NFL's all-time sacks leader. He was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame earlier this year. He played in 11 Pro Bowls and was a first-team All-Pro selection nine times.
Smith played at Virginia Tech before being taken by the Bills as the No. 1 overall pick in the NFL draft in 1985. He is a native of Norfolk but now lives in Virginia Beach.
Barnes said an officer in a special DUI enforcement unit stopped Smith's vehicle on Interstate 264 at about 1:42 a.m. He said he didn't know how fast Smith was driving in the 55 mph zone, but it must have been less than 75 mph or he would have been charged with reckless driving instead.
Putting the yellow in Yellowstone
You would have to imagine that there is something very seriously wrong with someone who feels compelled to do this!!
`~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Just about everything is on a webcam these days. So you have to wonder why seasonal employees in Yellowstone thought they could get away with an illegal trek to the edge of Old Faithful, where one of them apparently urinated into the geyser.
The Associated Press reports that one 23-year-old man was fined $750 after the May 4 incident. He also was banned from Yellowstone for two years. The case against a second employee is pending.
Park employees were tipped off by someone watching a webcam who saw six employees making tracks for the fissure's edge. The geyser was not erupting at the time.
`~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Just about everything is on a webcam these days. So you have to wonder why seasonal employees in Yellowstone thought they could get away with an illegal trek to the edge of Old Faithful, where one of them apparently urinated into the geyser.
The Associated Press reports that one 23-year-old man was fined $750 after the May 4 incident. He also was banned from Yellowstone for two years. The case against a second employee is pending.
Park employees were tipped off by someone watching a webcam who saw six employees making tracks for the fissure's edge. The geyser was not erupting at the time.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Remaining UAW Workers Need To Worry !!!!!
Gotta love this guy - He shoots right from the hip.
http://billbalsamico.com/blog/?p=173
Remaining UAW Workers Need To Worry !!!!!
Posted by iceman Posted in Bailout, Election Posted on 05-14-2009
After BILLIONS of taxpayers dollars to bail out auto companies “TOO BIG TO FAIL” we have now come full circle and the two automakers that took bailout money “HAVE FAILED”. With this many jobs will be lost due to consolidation of plants and dealerships along with the elimination of brands. And now Chrysler will close yet another plant (that makes motors) and move even more jobs to Mexico and I’m betting GM will do the same. How long do you think it will take Fiat and General Motors to import more of it’s cars along with making Chryslers over seas and shipping them into the United State thus closing more American plants and costing more American jobs.
And now for the complicated part nobody has yet addressed. The remaining UAW workers that have survived the deep job cuts for now are faced with their union that owns 55 % of Chrysler and will probably end up with a large percentage of GM. How can a UAW auto worker feel good about negotiating a contract through their union when the union owns part of the company. Do you think the UAW will give up monies for wages and benefits when it will have a direct outcome on the bottom line of the companies they now have ownership in?
And if you’re a Ford employee (and since Ford didn’t take bailout money) how do you get treated equally? You are asking your union to get you a better wage at contract time, yet the same union has a financial interest in two of the three companies they represent. I see a conflict of interest here and a lot of problems down the road.
http://billbalsamico.com/blog/?p=173
Remaining UAW Workers Need To Worry !!!!!
Posted by iceman Posted in Bailout, Election Posted on 05-14-2009
After BILLIONS of taxpayers dollars to bail out auto companies “TOO BIG TO FAIL” we have now come full circle and the two automakers that took bailout money “HAVE FAILED”. With this many jobs will be lost due to consolidation of plants and dealerships along with the elimination of brands. And now Chrysler will close yet another plant (that makes motors) and move even more jobs to Mexico and I’m betting GM will do the same. How long do you think it will take Fiat and General Motors to import more of it’s cars along with making Chryslers over seas and shipping them into the United State thus closing more American plants and costing more American jobs.
And now for the complicated part nobody has yet addressed. The remaining UAW workers that have survived the deep job cuts for now are faced with their union that owns 55 % of Chrysler and will probably end up with a large percentage of GM. How can a UAW auto worker feel good about negotiating a contract through their union when the union owns part of the company. Do you think the UAW will give up monies for wages and benefits when it will have a direct outcome on the bottom line of the companies they now have ownership in?
And if you’re a Ford employee (and since Ford didn’t take bailout money) how do you get treated equally? You are asking your union to get you a better wage at contract time, yet the same union has a financial interest in two of the three companies they represent. I see a conflict of interest here and a lot of problems down the road.
Crew of crashed plane being used as 'scapegoats,' relative says - CNN.com
The mother of the co-pilot who died in a plane crash near Buffalo, New York, in February, said Thursday that her daughter and the pilot were "being used as a scapegoat."
Lynn Morris says she was shocked at how her daughter, the plane's co-pilot, was portrayed in the NTSB hearings.
Lynn Morris' daughter, First Officer Rebecca Shaw, was among the 50 people killed in the crash of the plane, operated by Colgan Air. Morris made the comments on the final day of investigative hearings held by the National Transportation Safety Board.
"I think I walked out of the hearings in shock, because I truly felt that both she and the captain were being used as a scapegoat," Morris said.
Testimony from the hearings, which began Tuesday, revealed that fatigue may have contributed to the failure of Shaw and Colgan Air Capt. Marvin Renslow to save the plane as it approached Buffalo Niagara International Airport.
Testimony on Wednesday indicated that crews on a number of airlines could be suffering from lack of sleep. Many crews live far from their base of operations, causing them to come to work already tired from travel, NTSB investigators said.
Renslow had nearly a full day off before assuming command of Continental Connection Flight 3407. Yet the NTSB investigation found he slept in the Newark Airport crew lounge -- against Colgan Air regulations. The airline, though, appears not to have been enforcing that rule.
"Nobody argues that the human body needs to have its rest, and sometimes it doesn't gel with the schedules of an airline," testified Capt. Rory Kay, executive air safety chairman for the Air Line Pilots Association.
NTSB board member Kitty Higgins said the Colgan policy "is that they're not to sleep in the crew room, but it turns out they are sleeping in the crew room."
Daniel Morgan, Colgan's vice president for flight safety, said, "People can come in between their flights to take a nap." Asked if napping was considered sleeping, he replied, "That's a definition I'm probably not prepared to answer."
A nap of about 10 to 20 minutes can be restorative for most people, Dr. Michael Silber, a co-director of the Center for Sleep Medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, told the clinic's monthly "Women's HealthSource" publication last year. However, a longer nap can make people feel groggy, Silber said for the publication's October issue.
Shaw had three days off before the flight. She commuted through the night from Seattle, Washington, catching rides on connecting Fed Ex flights to get to Newark, New Jersey, where the Colgan flight originated.
"It is shocking. It's hard to believe that it is allowed to go on," said Kathy Johnson, whose husband, Kevin, died in the crash. She said Wednesday she was furious that the crew may have been functioning on little sleep.
The NTSB, which has not issued its report on the February 12 crash, said it scheduled the hearings to gather information. The plane plunged into a house in Clarence Center, New York, killing everyone on board and a man on the ground.
The NTSB's preliminary investigation determined there was some ice accumulation on the Bombardier Dash 8-Q400 aircraft, but the "icing had a minimal impact on the stall speed of the airplane."
On Thursday, safety board member Deborah Hersman questioned why Renslow and Shaw apparently didn't notice, as they approached the Buffalo airport, that the plane's speed had abruptly dropped from 207 mph to 150 mph (from 180 to 130 knots).
She asked R. Key Dismukes, chief scientist for the NASA division that focuses on human-centered design and operations, whether this was a period in every flight that is a time of high workload for the crew, meaning their attention may have been diverted.
Dismukes noted that there was a lot going on, including conversations between Renslow and Shaw and communication with a control tower.
"That certainly didn't help the workload situation," Dismukes said. "There were a number of concurrent tasks, and this is a vulnerable period. No questions about it."
Hersman said she had seen the same failure to note a drastic, quick change in speed in other crashes. She suggested that the crew receive an alert in those cases.
"I think an alert that your air speed is deteriorating is kind of like a fire alarm," Hersman said.
On Wednesday, it was revealed that Renslow, in his Colgan Air job application, failed to reveal two pilot exam failures.
The crew also violated a rule that requires cockpit conversation to be focused on the flight.
At Tuesday's hearing, Colgan Air acknowledged that Renslow had never trained on the "stick pusher" emergency system in a flight simulator. The system warns pilots when the plane's speed is too slow.
But in a written statement, the carrier said both Renslow and Shaw had received other specific training on how to handle situations like those that preceded the crash
Lynn Morris says she was shocked at how her daughter, the plane's co-pilot, was portrayed in the NTSB hearings.
Lynn Morris' daughter, First Officer Rebecca Shaw, was among the 50 people killed in the crash of the plane, operated by Colgan Air. Morris made the comments on the final day of investigative hearings held by the National Transportation Safety Board.
"I think I walked out of the hearings in shock, because I truly felt that both she and the captain were being used as a scapegoat," Morris said.
Testimony from the hearings, which began Tuesday, revealed that fatigue may have contributed to the failure of Shaw and Colgan Air Capt. Marvin Renslow to save the plane as it approached Buffalo Niagara International Airport.
Testimony on Wednesday indicated that crews on a number of airlines could be suffering from lack of sleep. Many crews live far from their base of operations, causing them to come to work already tired from travel, NTSB investigators said.
Renslow had nearly a full day off before assuming command of Continental Connection Flight 3407. Yet the NTSB investigation found he slept in the Newark Airport crew lounge -- against Colgan Air regulations. The airline, though, appears not to have been enforcing that rule.
"Nobody argues that the human body needs to have its rest, and sometimes it doesn't gel with the schedules of an airline," testified Capt. Rory Kay, executive air safety chairman for the Air Line Pilots Association.
NTSB board member Kitty Higgins said the Colgan policy "is that they're not to sleep in the crew room, but it turns out they are sleeping in the crew room."
Daniel Morgan, Colgan's vice president for flight safety, said, "People can come in between their flights to take a nap." Asked if napping was considered sleeping, he replied, "That's a definition I'm probably not prepared to answer."
A nap of about 10 to 20 minutes can be restorative for most people, Dr. Michael Silber, a co-director of the Center for Sleep Medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, told the clinic's monthly "Women's HealthSource" publication last year. However, a longer nap can make people feel groggy, Silber said for the publication's October issue.
Shaw had three days off before the flight. She commuted through the night from Seattle, Washington, catching rides on connecting Fed Ex flights to get to Newark, New Jersey, where the Colgan flight originated.
"It is shocking. It's hard to believe that it is allowed to go on," said Kathy Johnson, whose husband, Kevin, died in the crash. She said Wednesday she was furious that the crew may have been functioning on little sleep.
The NTSB, which has not issued its report on the February 12 crash, said it scheduled the hearings to gather information. The plane plunged into a house in Clarence Center, New York, killing everyone on board and a man on the ground.
The NTSB's preliminary investigation determined there was some ice accumulation on the Bombardier Dash 8-Q400 aircraft, but the "icing had a minimal impact on the stall speed of the airplane."
On Thursday, safety board member Deborah Hersman questioned why Renslow and Shaw apparently didn't notice, as they approached the Buffalo airport, that the plane's speed had abruptly dropped from 207 mph to 150 mph (from 180 to 130 knots).
She asked R. Key Dismukes, chief scientist for the NASA division that focuses on human-centered design and operations, whether this was a period in every flight that is a time of high workload for the crew, meaning their attention may have been diverted.
Dismukes noted that there was a lot going on, including conversations between Renslow and Shaw and communication with a control tower.
"That certainly didn't help the workload situation," Dismukes said. "There were a number of concurrent tasks, and this is a vulnerable period. No questions about it."
Hersman said she had seen the same failure to note a drastic, quick change in speed in other crashes. She suggested that the crew receive an alert in those cases.
"I think an alert that your air speed is deteriorating is kind of like a fire alarm," Hersman said.
On Wednesday, it was revealed that Renslow, in his Colgan Air job application, failed to reveal two pilot exam failures.
The crew also violated a rule that requires cockpit conversation to be focused on the flight.
At Tuesday's hearing, Colgan Air acknowledged that Renslow had never trained on the "stick pusher" emergency system in a flight simulator. The system warns pilots when the plane's speed is too slow.
But in a written statement, the carrier said both Renslow and Shaw had received other specific training on how to handle situations like those that preceded the crash
Study: Ginger helps relieve nausea of chemotherapy
Ginger capsules can relieve the nausea caused by chemotherapy, a new study shows.
Up to 70% of patients become nauseated after chemo, according to a study of 644 people released Thursday, in advance of the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, which begins in two weeks in Orlando.
Although drugs such as Kytril can prevent vomiting, they don't always relieve nausea, says author Julie Ryan, assistant professor of dermatology and radiation oncology at the University of Rochester Medical Center.
Ginger, however, reduced patients' nausea levels by half, according to the study, funded by the National Cancer Institute. On a scale of one to seven — in which seven represents the worst nausea — chemo patients given placebos rated their nausea as a 5 or 6, or very nauseous.
Those given ginger, however, rated their nausea level as only 2 or 3, Ryan says.
Patients took ginger three days before and three days after getting chemo, Ryan says. Patients took three capsules, twice a day. The most effective doses were 1 gram and 0.5 gram a day, which are equal to half a teaspoon or one-quarter of a teaspoon of ground ginger.
All patients also got standard drugs to prevent vomiting, Ryan says.
Significantly, ginger caused no side effects.
Doctors were careful to monitor patients' platelet levels, because some earlier research suggested that ginger might act like a blood thinner, Ryan says.
"That's why we're so excited. This is something that people have access to, that won't harm them," says Ryan, who notes that ginger capsules are commonly sold in health food stores.
Although ginger has been used as a folk remedy for nausea for centuries, this is the first time that it has been so rigorously tested for chemo patients, says Richard Schilsky, oncology society president, who wasn't involved in the study. He describes the trial's results as "conclusive."
Several studies have shown that ginger can relieve morning sickness during pregnancy, says Linda Lee, director of the Johns Hopkins Integrative Medicine & Digestive Center. Doctors don't yet understand exactly why it works.
Lee notes that the Food and Drug Administration doesn't regulate supplements such as ginger the same way as it regulates drugs.
"One of the challenges about recommending a ginger supplement is that not all brands are created equal," Lee says. "One study looked at several ginger supplements on the market, only to find a few of them did not contain gingerol, one of the active compounds in ginger."
And Schilsky notes that, because researchers didn't test powdered or fresh ginger, they don't know if these types of ginger are as effective as capsules.
"How do you translate ginger in a capsule to the ginger in your spice rack?" Schilsky asks. "Can you drink a six pack of ginger ale?"
Douglas Blayney, incoming president of the oncology society, says cancer patients should resist the temptation to indulge in too much ginger soda or cookies, however. Some studies show that cancer patients who gain weight are more likely to relapse.
Studies show up to two-thirds of cancer patients try herbal remedies or other alternative therapies.
Cancer researchers are increasingly interested in testing these approaches.
In 2007, researchers at the cancer society meeting showed that ginseng could help relieve cancer patients' fatigue.
After eight weeks of treatment in that study, roughly 27% of those who took the two highest ginseng doses rated their fatigue as "moderately" or "very much" better, she says. Only 10% of those who took placebos or the lowest ginseng dose improved that much.
And while alternative therapies can relieve some treatment-related symptoms, researchers haven't shown the these folk remedies actually treat cancer. At the 2007 meeting, researchers found that shark cartilage had no effect on lung cancer.
Up to 70% of patients become nauseated after chemo, according to a study of 644 people released Thursday, in advance of the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, which begins in two weeks in Orlando.
Although drugs such as Kytril can prevent vomiting, they don't always relieve nausea, says author Julie Ryan, assistant professor of dermatology and radiation oncology at the University of Rochester Medical Center.
Ginger, however, reduced patients' nausea levels by half, according to the study, funded by the National Cancer Institute. On a scale of one to seven — in which seven represents the worst nausea — chemo patients given placebos rated their nausea as a 5 or 6, or very nauseous.
Those given ginger, however, rated their nausea level as only 2 or 3, Ryan says.
Patients took ginger three days before and three days after getting chemo, Ryan says. Patients took three capsules, twice a day. The most effective doses were 1 gram and 0.5 gram a day, which are equal to half a teaspoon or one-quarter of a teaspoon of ground ginger.
All patients also got standard drugs to prevent vomiting, Ryan says.
Significantly, ginger caused no side effects.
Doctors were careful to monitor patients' platelet levels, because some earlier research suggested that ginger might act like a blood thinner, Ryan says.
"That's why we're so excited. This is something that people have access to, that won't harm them," says Ryan, who notes that ginger capsules are commonly sold in health food stores.
Although ginger has been used as a folk remedy for nausea for centuries, this is the first time that it has been so rigorously tested for chemo patients, says Richard Schilsky, oncology society president, who wasn't involved in the study. He describes the trial's results as "conclusive."
Several studies have shown that ginger can relieve morning sickness during pregnancy, says Linda Lee, director of the Johns Hopkins Integrative Medicine & Digestive Center. Doctors don't yet understand exactly why it works.
Lee notes that the Food and Drug Administration doesn't regulate supplements such as ginger the same way as it regulates drugs.
"One of the challenges about recommending a ginger supplement is that not all brands are created equal," Lee says. "One study looked at several ginger supplements on the market, only to find a few of them did not contain gingerol, one of the active compounds in ginger."
And Schilsky notes that, because researchers didn't test powdered or fresh ginger, they don't know if these types of ginger are as effective as capsules.
"How do you translate ginger in a capsule to the ginger in your spice rack?" Schilsky asks. "Can you drink a six pack of ginger ale?"
Douglas Blayney, incoming president of the oncology society, says cancer patients should resist the temptation to indulge in too much ginger soda or cookies, however. Some studies show that cancer patients who gain weight are more likely to relapse.
Studies show up to two-thirds of cancer patients try herbal remedies or other alternative therapies.
Cancer researchers are increasingly interested in testing these approaches.
In 2007, researchers at the cancer society meeting showed that ginseng could help relieve cancer patients' fatigue.
After eight weeks of treatment in that study, roughly 27% of those who took the two highest ginseng doses rated their fatigue as "moderately" or "very much" better, she says. Only 10% of those who took placebos or the lowest ginseng dose improved that much.
And while alternative therapies can relieve some treatment-related symptoms, researchers haven't shown the these folk remedies actually treat cancer. At the 2007 meeting, researchers found that shark cartilage had no effect on lung cancer.
Calif governor sees $15.4 billion budget gap, wants big cuts
SACRAMENTO, California (Reuters) - California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday proposed harsh measures to tackle a budget shortfall of $15.4 billion, including deep spending cuts for schools and health programs and eliminating 5,000 state jobs.
Schwarzenegger warned the state's budget gap could grow to $21.3 billion if voters reject budget-related ballot measures in a special election next week. And he said California also will need to sell a $6 billion revenue anticipation warrant to help balance its books.
Schwarzenegger said education spending needs to be cut by $3 billion, which may require shortening the state's school year by five days, and he will seek spending cuts across social and health-care services funded by the state.
If the ballot measures fail and California's deficit swells to $21.3 billion, Schwarzenegger said education could suffer an additional $2.3 billion in spending cuts and social and health programs would see their budget cuts even more.
Tax increases are not part of Schwarzenegger's budget plan, a revised version of his earlier plan, and he said during a press conference in the state capital of Sacramento that he would not sign a budget that includes higher taxes.
Schwarzenegger, however, said he hopes to raise revenue by selling seven state properties, including San Quentin State Prison and the Los Angeles Coliseum, two aging state facilities.
Schwarzenegger warned the state's budget gap could grow to $21.3 billion if voters reject budget-related ballot measures in a special election next week. And he said California also will need to sell a $6 billion revenue anticipation warrant to help balance its books.
Schwarzenegger said education spending needs to be cut by $3 billion, which may require shortening the state's school year by five days, and he will seek spending cuts across social and health-care services funded by the state.
If the ballot measures fail and California's deficit swells to $21.3 billion, Schwarzenegger said education could suffer an additional $2.3 billion in spending cuts and social and health programs would see their budget cuts even more.
Tax increases are not part of Schwarzenegger's budget plan, a revised version of his earlier plan, and he said during a press conference in the state capital of Sacramento that he would not sign a budget that includes higher taxes.
Schwarzenegger, however, said he hopes to raise revenue by selling seven state properties, including San Quentin State Prison and the Los Angeles Coliseum, two aging state facilities.
Schwarzenegger to propose selling San Quentin
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today will propose selling San Quentin Prison, the Los Angeles Coliseum and other state-owned properties in a bid to raise cash to counter the state's daunting budget shortfall.
He also wants to accelerate the sale of Agnews Developmental Center, the 81-acre facility on the north edge of San Jose that closed its doors in March after 120 years.
The proposal to sell off state assets is part of the governor's revised budget plan being released today. Besides the Coliseum and San Quentin, the properties he's eyeing for sale are the Cow Palace in Daly City, the Orange County Fairgrounds, Cal Expo in Sacramento, Del Mar Fairground, and the Ventura County Fair.
The sale of those properties would generate upward of $600 million and possibly more than $1 billion for the state, according to a copy of Schwarzenegger's proposal. But proceeds from those sales would not arrive for another two to five years.
Selling the Agnews property would be done within two years.
With its stunning views of the San Francisco Bay, San Quentin has long been eyed for a more lucrative use. Sen. Jeff Denham, R-Modesto, has proposed selling both San Quentin and the Coliseum to generate badly needed revenues for the state.
If voters reject a slate of ballot propositions in a special election Tuesday, as polls indicate they will, the state will face a deficit of $21.3 billion through mid-2010.
He also wants to accelerate the sale of Agnews Developmental Center, the 81-acre facility on the north edge of San Jose that closed its doors in March after 120 years.
The proposal to sell off state assets is part of the governor's revised budget plan being released today. Besides the Coliseum and San Quentin, the properties he's eyeing for sale are the Cow Palace in Daly City, the Orange County Fairgrounds, Cal Expo in Sacramento, Del Mar Fairground, and the Ventura County Fair.
The sale of those properties would generate upward of $600 million and possibly more than $1 billion for the state, according to a copy of Schwarzenegger's proposal. But proceeds from those sales would not arrive for another two to five years.
Selling the Agnews property would be done within two years.
With its stunning views of the San Francisco Bay, San Quentin has long been eyed for a more lucrative use. Sen. Jeff Denham, R-Modesto, has proposed selling both San Quentin and the Coliseum to generate badly needed revenues for the state.
If voters reject a slate of ballot propositions in a special election Tuesday, as polls indicate they will, the state will face a deficit of $21.3 billion through mid-2010.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
FDA questions General Mills' Cheerios marketing - Triangle Business Journal:
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration sent a warning letter to General Mills Inc. last week asking it to change how it promotes the health benefits of Cheerios.
The FDA told General Mills to stop promoting Cheerios, the country’s best-selling cereal, as a product that can lower cholesterol levels, reduce heart disease and reduce the risk of cancer. The agency said that claiming the cereal can lower cholesterol levels by 4 percent in six weeks amounts to marketing it as a drug and violates the federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. A local branch of the FDA gave the Minnesota-based food provider 15 days to explain how it will correct its statements on Cheerios.
In a prepared statement, General Mills (NYSE: GIS) said the complaint doesn’t question whether the cereal actually lowers cholesterol levels and said the dispute is over language, not science.
“The scientific body of evidence supporting the heart health claim was the basis for FDA’s approval of the heart health claim, and the clinical study supporting Cheerios’ cholesterol-lowering benefit is very strong,” the statement said. “We look forward to discussing this with FDA and to reaching a resolution.”
Cheerios boxes say that two, one-and-a-half-cup servings of the cereal every day have been clinically proven to lower cholesterol. The message has been on the box for more than two years.
The FDA told General Mills to stop promoting Cheerios, the country’s best-selling cereal, as a product that can lower cholesterol levels, reduce heart disease and reduce the risk of cancer. The agency said that claiming the cereal can lower cholesterol levels by 4 percent in six weeks amounts to marketing it as a drug and violates the federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. A local branch of the FDA gave the Minnesota-based food provider 15 days to explain how it will correct its statements on Cheerios.
In a prepared statement, General Mills (NYSE: GIS) said the complaint doesn’t question whether the cereal actually lowers cholesterol levels and said the dispute is over language, not science.
“The scientific body of evidence supporting the heart health claim was the basis for FDA’s approval of the heart health claim, and the clinical study supporting Cheerios’ cholesterol-lowering benefit is very strong,” the statement said. “We look forward to discussing this with FDA and to reaching a resolution.”
Cheerios boxes say that two, one-and-a-half-cup servings of the cereal every day have been clinically proven to lower cholesterol. The message has been on the box for more than two years.
Buffalo plane crash pilot 'had failed numerous tests' - Telegraph
Buffalo plane crash pilot 'had failed numerous tests'
The captain of an American commuter plane that crashed into a house near the city of Buffalo, New York, had failed numerous flight tests and had never had proper training on how to respond to an emergency, it has been claimed.
By Tom Leonard in New York
Last Updated: 5:37PM BST 11 May 2009
According to the Wall Street Journal, Marvin Renslow, the plane's captain, did not know how to respond to a warning system designed to prevent the aircraft from stalling.
All 49 people on board the plane and another person on the ground were killed in February when the flight from Newark, New Jersey, tried to land in fog and light snow.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Marvin Renslow, the plane's captain, did not know how to respond to a warning system designed to prevent the aircraft from stalling.
As the Bombardier Q400 turboprop's speed slowed to a dangerous level, setting off the stall-prevention system, the pilot did the opposite of the correct procedure, according to people involved in the official accident investigation.
Cockpit voice recordings also revealed that Rebecca Shaw, his co-pilot, was complaining of feeling "congested" and should not have been on the flight.
The Journal said that Capt Renslow, 47, who joined Colgan Air in September 2005, had a history of failing periodic tests of competency.
Investigators reportedly believe the pilots did not fully understand the operation of an ice-protection system, and therefore incorrectly programmed approach speeds into a flight computer.
As the plane made its approach towards Buffalo with the autopilot engaged, the crew exchanged idle banter, which is prohibited by federal rules on flights flying below 10,000 feet.
The captain of an American commuter plane that crashed into a house near the city of Buffalo, New York, had failed numerous flight tests and had never had proper training on how to respond to an emergency, it has been claimed.
By Tom Leonard in New York
Last Updated: 5:37PM BST 11 May 2009
According to the Wall Street Journal, Marvin Renslow, the plane's captain, did not know how to respond to a warning system designed to prevent the aircraft from stalling.
All 49 people on board the plane and another person on the ground were killed in February when the flight from Newark, New Jersey, tried to land in fog and light snow.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Marvin Renslow, the plane's captain, did not know how to respond to a warning system designed to prevent the aircraft from stalling.
As the Bombardier Q400 turboprop's speed slowed to a dangerous level, setting off the stall-prevention system, the pilot did the opposite of the correct procedure, according to people involved in the official accident investigation.
Cockpit voice recordings also revealed that Rebecca Shaw, his co-pilot, was complaining of feeling "congested" and should not have been on the flight.
The Journal said that Capt Renslow, 47, who joined Colgan Air in September 2005, had a history of failing periodic tests of competency.
Investigators reportedly believe the pilots did not fully understand the operation of an ice-protection system, and therefore incorrectly programmed approach speeds into a flight computer.
As the plane made its approach towards Buffalo with the autopilot engaged, the crew exchanged idle banter, which is prohibited by federal rules on flights flying below 10,000 feet.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Perez Hilton: God told me Carrie Prejean did not deserve to win! | The Dish Rag | Los Angeles Times
Someone should check and see if Mr. Hilton )term used lightly) should have his head examined!!!
Perez Hilton: God told me Carrie Prejean did not deserve to win!
from The Dish Rag by Elizabeth Snead
Perez Hilton says God told him to ask Carrie Prejean that gay marriage question at the Miss USA Pageant.
And the gossip blogger also says that God told him that Carrie's Miss California crown should be taken away
Responding to statements to momlogic.com by Carrie's mother, Francine Prejean about Perez being "an evil man," Perez Hilton fires back.
"...God does not think I'm evil. God loves me. And I love God. I spoke to God before the Miss USA pageant and he told me himself to ask that question. He also told me that Carrie Prejean did not deserve to win. Really! That's what God said to me. Ask her!"
He adds, "But, all kidding aside: the question I asked was fair and relevant. Carrie Prejean did not answer it as well as she could have. To this day, neither Carrie nor her mother acknowledge the fact that I was not upset with her answer to my question but HOW she answered it."
"Oh, and I spoke to God again today. She says that Carrie's title as Miss California should be taken away!"
Wait, God's a she?
Does God have caller ID? Should God start screening his/her incoming calls?
Perez Hilton: God told me Carrie Prejean did not deserve to win!
from The Dish Rag by Elizabeth Snead
Perez Hilton says God told him to ask Carrie Prejean that gay marriage question at the Miss USA Pageant.
And the gossip blogger also says that God told him that Carrie's Miss California crown should be taken away
Responding to statements to momlogic.com by Carrie's mother, Francine Prejean about Perez being "an evil man," Perez Hilton fires back.
"...God does not think I'm evil. God loves me. And I love God. I spoke to God before the Miss USA pageant and he told me himself to ask that question. He also told me that Carrie Prejean did not deserve to win. Really! That's what God said to me. Ask her!"
He adds, "But, all kidding aside: the question I asked was fair and relevant. Carrie Prejean did not answer it as well as she could have. To this day, neither Carrie nor her mother acknowledge the fact that I was not upset with her answer to my question but HOW she answered it."
"Oh, and I spoke to God again today. She says that Carrie's title as Miss California should be taken away!"
Wait, God's a she?
Does God have caller ID? Should God start screening his/her incoming calls?
Friday, May 8, 2009
Mom Outraged by Son's Arrest Reportedly Knew of His Web Stardom for Phone Threats
Mom Outraged by Son's Arrest Reportedly Knew of His Web Stardom for Phone Threats
Friday, May 08, 2009
Print ShareThisWhen a North Carolina woman accused the federal government last week of abusing the Patriot Act to imprison her teenage son for allegedly making bomb threats, the mother's allegation caused quite an uproar, including calls to free 16-year-old Ashton Lundeby.
But a new report by Wired News suggests that, not only was the teenager an online superstar in rogue tech communities for his prank phone calls, but his mother may have known all along that the boy was conspiring with others to make bomb threats.
Lundeby, known online as "Tyrone," allegedly had progressed into selling his services as a threatmaker, charging schoolchildren from across the country $5 apiece to place threatening, Internet-based phone calls that would cause administrators to shut down their schools, Wired News reports.
"I heard the prank phone calls he made," his mother, Annette Lundeby, said in the Wired report. "They were really funny prank calls."
On top of that, the U.S. Attorney's office handling the case says her story about abuse of the Patriot Act was false.
On March 5, FBI agents took Ashton Lundeby into custody at his Oxford, N.C., home and placed him in a federal juvenile facility in Indiana, where he remains on charges he made bomb threats against Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., and other schools.
Last week the boy's mother, Annette Lundeby, went on local TV and called her son's arrest a violation of the Constitution. She said Ashton, who'd been home-schooled and lived in a house full of American flags, was innocent, and that others had "hacked her son's IP address."
Bloggers on both the left and right of the political spectrum had come to the boy's defense, calling him a victim of government oppression, prompting the U.S. Attorney's office to issue a statement Thursday refuting the mother's claim.
Ashton Lundeby was charged under a long-standing law against making threats, and "this charge is unrelated to the Patriot Act," the statement says.
Wired News reports that Ashton was famous in online chat rooms as "Tyrone," a prank caller who'd patch hundreds of like-minded jokers into Internet-based conference calls where they could listen to him harass employees at Wal-Mart and other stores.
"Tyrone" allegedly moved on to bigger things, according to Wired News, which says he began calling in bomb threats and pretty soon was being paid for them via a PayPal account.
Annette Lundeby admitted to Wired News that she knew Ashton had been making "really funny" prank calls, and that he'd made bomb threats, and that he'd received money for some of the calls — but she said it was all just a joke.
An Australian college student who told Wired News that he tipped off the FBI about Ashton said Annette Lundeby knew exactly what her son was doing.
"His mother knew that he was making calls, because she'd come on the microphone when he was talking and tell him not to do any bomb threats because the house was going to get raided," the student told Wired News.
Friday, May 08, 2009
Print ShareThisWhen a North Carolina woman accused the federal government last week of abusing the Patriot Act to imprison her teenage son for allegedly making bomb threats, the mother's allegation caused quite an uproar, including calls to free 16-year-old Ashton Lundeby.
But a new report by Wired News suggests that, not only was the teenager an online superstar in rogue tech communities for his prank phone calls, but his mother may have known all along that the boy was conspiring with others to make bomb threats.
Lundeby, known online as "Tyrone," allegedly had progressed into selling his services as a threatmaker, charging schoolchildren from across the country $5 apiece to place threatening, Internet-based phone calls that would cause administrators to shut down their schools, Wired News reports.
"I heard the prank phone calls he made," his mother, Annette Lundeby, said in the Wired report. "They were really funny prank calls."
On top of that, the U.S. Attorney's office handling the case says her story about abuse of the Patriot Act was false.
On March 5, FBI agents took Ashton Lundeby into custody at his Oxford, N.C., home and placed him in a federal juvenile facility in Indiana, where he remains on charges he made bomb threats against Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., and other schools.
Last week the boy's mother, Annette Lundeby, went on local TV and called her son's arrest a violation of the Constitution. She said Ashton, who'd been home-schooled and lived in a house full of American flags, was innocent, and that others had "hacked her son's IP address."
Bloggers on both the left and right of the political spectrum had come to the boy's defense, calling him a victim of government oppression, prompting the U.S. Attorney's office to issue a statement Thursday refuting the mother's claim.
Ashton Lundeby was charged under a long-standing law against making threats, and "this charge is unrelated to the Patriot Act," the statement says.
Wired News reports that Ashton was famous in online chat rooms as "Tyrone," a prank caller who'd patch hundreds of like-minded jokers into Internet-based conference calls where they could listen to him harass employees at Wal-Mart and other stores.
"Tyrone" allegedly moved on to bigger things, according to Wired News, which says he began calling in bomb threats and pretty soon was being paid for them via a PayPal account.
Annette Lundeby admitted to Wired News that she knew Ashton had been making "really funny" prank calls, and that he'd made bomb threats, and that he'd received money for some of the calls — but she said it was all just a joke.
An Australian college student who told Wired News that he tipped off the FBI about Ashton said Annette Lundeby knew exactly what her son was doing.
"His mother knew that he was making calls, because she'd come on the microphone when he was talking and tell him not to do any bomb threats because the house was going to get raided," the student told Wired News.
Firefighters Work to Contain Calif. Blaze
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — A wildfire on the hills near this oceanside city was only 10 percent contained on Thursday, and firefighters struggled to pen in the flames, which had destroyed 75 houses since they began on Tuesday.
Faltering winds slowed the fire’s spread through the day, but officials worried that the blaze could worsen as the humidity dropped, temperatures rose and the evening winds returned.
“Firefighters have been building lines in pieces around the perimeter,” said Mike Carr, a spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. “Now they are working to connect the dots.”
The fire has burned about 2,793 acres, and 15,000 people have been evacuated from the area, which is known for its sprawling mansions and ocean views. A mandatory evacuation order was in effect for about seven square miles from the Santa Ynez foothills to just outside downtown Santa Barbara, the police said.
Hotels in the area were near capacity, with families unable to return to their homes.
Mr. Carr said strong winds expected Thursday evening could threaten 3,500 homes and 100 businesses in the area.
At a news conference here Thursday, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said that the state’s budget woes would not affect efforts to fight the fire but that the blaze presented a “great challenge.”
“Seventy-five percent of the response cost” would be covered by the federal government, Mr. Schwarzenegger said, after his declaration of a state of emergency on Wednesday.
“This is very, very helpful for us,” he said, “because, as you know, we have a financial crisis in California. But I want to reassure you all that even though we have this crisis, we will not be short of money when it comes to fighting this fire.”
More than 9,000 elementary and high school students were evacuated from schools in the county on Thursday, said Barbara Keyani, a spokeswoman for Santa Barbara’s two largest school districts. Ms. Keyani said 12 schools remained closed.
Ten firefighters have been injured, officials said, although most of the injuries were minor. No injuries were reported among evacuees.
At 2 a.m. Thursday, as the winds that had fanned flames rapidly Wednesday afternoon slowed to fitful gusts, a few hundred firefighters slept between shifts in trucks and tents at the city fairgrounds. Sixty or so lay in sleeping bags scattered like blue cocoons over the trim lawn near their command post.
The air smelled of acidic, sweet wood smoke, and ash flakes fluttered to the ground. Crews from across Southern California had come to assist, said Capt. David Sadecki of the Santa Barbara County Fire Department.
Geege Ostroff, 65, walking out of a Red Cross shelter in a high school down the road, said he and his wife, Carole, decided to evacuate ahead of orders on Tuesday, when they saw smoke plumes and orange flames near their home at the Santa Barbara Botanic Gardens, where he is a caretaker.
“We knew that with the winds what they were, this would grow,” Mr. Ostroff said.
He said he was sure his house had burned.
“Sometimes I think it’s there,” he said, as he held his hat in a gust of wind, “then I realize it’s gone. I miss the stupidest things now, like my coffee grinder. I want to be home.”
Faltering winds slowed the fire’s spread through the day, but officials worried that the blaze could worsen as the humidity dropped, temperatures rose and the evening winds returned.
“Firefighters have been building lines in pieces around the perimeter,” said Mike Carr, a spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. “Now they are working to connect the dots.”
The fire has burned about 2,793 acres, and 15,000 people have been evacuated from the area, which is known for its sprawling mansions and ocean views. A mandatory evacuation order was in effect for about seven square miles from the Santa Ynez foothills to just outside downtown Santa Barbara, the police said.
Hotels in the area were near capacity, with families unable to return to their homes.
Mr. Carr said strong winds expected Thursday evening could threaten 3,500 homes and 100 businesses in the area.
At a news conference here Thursday, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said that the state’s budget woes would not affect efforts to fight the fire but that the blaze presented a “great challenge.”
“Seventy-five percent of the response cost” would be covered by the federal government, Mr. Schwarzenegger said, after his declaration of a state of emergency on Wednesday.
“This is very, very helpful for us,” he said, “because, as you know, we have a financial crisis in California. But I want to reassure you all that even though we have this crisis, we will not be short of money when it comes to fighting this fire.”
More than 9,000 elementary and high school students were evacuated from schools in the county on Thursday, said Barbara Keyani, a spokeswoman for Santa Barbara’s two largest school districts. Ms. Keyani said 12 schools remained closed.
Ten firefighters have been injured, officials said, although most of the injuries were minor. No injuries were reported among evacuees.
At 2 a.m. Thursday, as the winds that had fanned flames rapidly Wednesday afternoon slowed to fitful gusts, a few hundred firefighters slept between shifts in trucks and tents at the city fairgrounds. Sixty or so lay in sleeping bags scattered like blue cocoons over the trim lawn near their command post.
The air smelled of acidic, sweet wood smoke, and ash flakes fluttered to the ground. Crews from across Southern California had come to assist, said Capt. David Sadecki of the Santa Barbara County Fire Department.
Geege Ostroff, 65, walking out of a Red Cross shelter in a high school down the road, said he and his wife, Carole, decided to evacuate ahead of orders on Tuesday, when they saw smoke plumes and orange flames near their home at the Santa Barbara Botanic Gardens, where he is a caretaker.
“We knew that with the winds what they were, this would grow,” Mr. Ostroff said.
He said he was sure his house had burned.
“Sometimes I think it’s there,” he said, as he held his hat in a gust of wind, “then I realize it’s gone. I miss the stupidest things now, like my coffee grinder. I want to be home.”
Ready for 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Drag Queen'? | The Dish Rag
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/thedishrag/2009/05/harry-potter-and-the-halfblood-drag-queen.html
Ready for 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Drag Queen'?
Daniel Radcliffe, a.k.a. Harry Potter, 19, has a controversial brand new friend.
Her name is Our Lady J, and she's a blond transsexual performer from New York City. Her real name is Jonnah Speidel.
They met during Daniel’s "Equus" run on Broadway, in which the Potter star appears stark naked.
The Sun reports their budding relationship with the classic headline, "When Harry met Tranny."
But, calling her a "drag queen," the Sun's source says: “Daniel is fascinated by the drag culture and is always asking questions. He’s a lovely guy and he and Our Lady J got on like a house on fire. They have eaten out together and been to parties. They have become quite close.”
Daniel, who reappears in July in “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” raved about an Our Lady J gig on a U.S. TV show, calling it “awesome”.
Lady J boasted about their latest May 3 assignation in London on her Twitter: “My iphone UK data plan is FINALLY working! Just had delish meal w/Dan Radcliffe."
Dan?
On her Twitter, she also blasted the stupid Sun for calling her a drag queen. She's a transsexual. Get it straight, English wankers!
Are you really surprised by Radcliffe's friendship with Our Lady J?
Or are you just taking your time looking for your surprised face?
Ready for 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Drag Queen'?
Daniel Radcliffe, a.k.a. Harry Potter, 19, has a controversial brand new friend.
Her name is Our Lady J, and she's a blond transsexual performer from New York City. Her real name is Jonnah Speidel.
They met during Daniel’s "Equus" run on Broadway, in which the Potter star appears stark naked.
The Sun reports their budding relationship with the classic headline, "When Harry met Tranny."
But, calling her a "drag queen," the Sun's source says: “Daniel is fascinated by the drag culture and is always asking questions. He’s a lovely guy and he and Our Lady J got on like a house on fire. They have eaten out together and been to parties. They have become quite close.”
Daniel, who reappears in July in “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” raved about an Our Lady J gig on a U.S. TV show, calling it “awesome”.
Lady J boasted about their latest May 3 assignation in London on her Twitter: “My iphone UK data plan is FINALLY working! Just had delish meal w/Dan Radcliffe."
Dan?
On her Twitter, she also blasted the stupid Sun for calling her a drag queen. She's a transsexual. Get it straight, English wankers!
Are you really surprised by Radcliffe's friendship with Our Lady J?
Or are you just taking your time looking for your surprised face?
KFC Cancels Oprah Deal After Chaos -- baltimoresun.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdFJjeLYVjk&feature=player_embedded
From the KFC website:
We are so sorry, but due to the overwhelming response to our FREE Kentucky Grilled Chicken meal coupon, we can no longer redeem the free coupon at this time. But we will honor our commitment to giving you a free Kentucky Grilled Chicken meal.
Please visit a participating KFC restaurant for a rain check form. Complete the form, attach your original coupon , and give it to the KFC restaurant manager or postmark per the form's instructions, by May 19, 2009, and we'll send you a rain check for your free Kentucky Grilled Chicken meal at a later date, plus a free Pepsi with our compliments. Your participating KFC restaurant will provide you with the form you need.
Please note that the redemption periods of the rain checks will vary. All other terms and conditions of the original free Kentucky Grilled Chicken coupon will apply.
Thank you for your understanding,
Roger Eaton
KFC® President
From the KFC website:
We are so sorry, but due to the overwhelming response to our FREE Kentucky Grilled Chicken meal coupon, we can no longer redeem the free coupon at this time. But we will honor our commitment to giving you a free Kentucky Grilled Chicken meal.
Please visit a participating KFC restaurant for a rain check form. Complete the form, attach your original coupon , and give it to the KFC restaurant manager or postmark per the form's instructions, by May 19, 2009, and we'll send you a rain check for your free Kentucky Grilled Chicken meal at a later date, plus a free Pepsi with our compliments. Your participating KFC restaurant will provide you with the form you need.
Please note that the redemption periods of the rain checks will vary. All other terms and conditions of the original free Kentucky Grilled Chicken coupon will apply.
Thank you for your understanding,
Roger Eaton
KFC® President
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Briton wins ‘best job in the world’ on island - Down Under and beyond- msnbc.com
Briton wins ‘best job in the world’ on island
34-year-old picked after campaign that highlighted power of social media
May 6: Ben Southall from the UK won the contest to become the caretaker of islands of the Great Barrier Reef for six months. ITN's Paul Davies' reports.
updated 10:25 a.m. PT, Wed., May 6, 2009
CANBERRA - A British charity fundraiser won the "best job in the world" Wednesday — caretaker of an Australian tropical island — after an innovative marketing campaign that highlighted the power of social media.
Ben Southall, 34, was picked from 16 finalists in a highly publicized contest by Tourism Queensland which attracted nearly 34,700 video entries from almost 200 countries and surpassed all expectations in promoting tourism in the Australian state.
The job description? Explore the islands of the Great Barrier Reef for six months and report back to Tourism Queensland and the world via blogs, a photo diary, video updates and interviews.
Also, if you feel like it, feed the fish, collect the mail and clean the pool — and earn $110,000 for your efforts.
"To go away now as the island caretaker for Tourism Queensland and the Great Barrier Reef is an extreme honor," Southall said on live television from Hamilton Island after being named the winner.
"I hope I can fill the boots as much as everybody is expecting, my swimming hopefully is up to standard and I look forward to all of the new roles and the responsibilities that the task involves," he said, adding he would soon be joined by his Canadian girlfriend on the island.
While the job itself attracted global attention, so did the campaign by state-run Tourism Queensland as it highlighted the marketing potential of Web sites such as YouTube and Facebook.
"This is probably the first time that a campaign has achieved this sort of reach with so little advertising spend other than a few strategically placed job ads around the world," said Australian marketing analyst Tim Burrowes, editor of media and marketing Web site Mumbrella.
"This has all been about the power of people passing things on, largely through YouTube. The main lesson to be learned here is that if you have an original, exciting idea that gets people talking you don't need to spend huge on advertising."
The "Best Job in the World" campaign began in January with Tourism Queensland launching an advertising campaign centered around the lure of a job that is more like a paid holiday.
Within days, the campaign was one of the most popular items on the web, as applicants from all over the world sent in 60-second video applications and news of the contest spread on social networking sites.
Race for promotion
The number of applicants was cut to a top 50 who competed to develop online followers, holding stunts to promote themselves that included scuba diving in a tank in an Amsterdam square and riding the London Tube in scuba gear. It’s A Snap!
The final 16 contestants, from 15 countries, included students, journalists, TV presenters, photographers, a receptionist, radio DJ, teacher and an actress.
They also came from countries where Australia is pushing itself as a tourist destination including China, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, India, France, Britain, the United States, Singapore and Germany.
The candidates were flown to Hamilton Island last weekend and tested on a range of personal, communication and other skills with a panel of four appointed to decide the winner.
Tourism Queensland has hailed the advertising campaign as an enormous success, calculating the $1.7 million spent had reaped an estimated $110 million in global publicity.
"The worldwide response to Tourism Queensland's "Best Job in the World" campaign has been nothing short of phenomenal," said Tourism Queensland's CEO Anthony Hayes.
"The key now however is to convert the global interest raised by "The Best Job in the World" into visitors to Queensland — to bring more tourist dollars into Queensland's economy, protect existing tourism jobs and hopefully create new ones."
Burrowes said the announcement of the winner, who starts work on July 1, would not end the publicity.
"They will have months of coverage where this person who already has a connection with the outside world will start to write blogs and be an ambassador of the islands," he said.
"The chances are this could become an annual event."
34-year-old picked after campaign that highlighted power of social media
May 6: Ben Southall from the UK won the contest to become the caretaker of islands of the Great Barrier Reef for six months. ITN's Paul Davies' reports.
updated 10:25 a.m. PT, Wed., May 6, 2009
CANBERRA - A British charity fundraiser won the "best job in the world" Wednesday — caretaker of an Australian tropical island — after an innovative marketing campaign that highlighted the power of social media.
Ben Southall, 34, was picked from 16 finalists in a highly publicized contest by Tourism Queensland which attracted nearly 34,700 video entries from almost 200 countries and surpassed all expectations in promoting tourism in the Australian state.
The job description? Explore the islands of the Great Barrier Reef for six months and report back to Tourism Queensland and the world via blogs, a photo diary, video updates and interviews.
Also, if you feel like it, feed the fish, collect the mail and clean the pool — and earn $110,000 for your efforts.
"To go away now as the island caretaker for Tourism Queensland and the Great Barrier Reef is an extreme honor," Southall said on live television from Hamilton Island after being named the winner.
"I hope I can fill the boots as much as everybody is expecting, my swimming hopefully is up to standard and I look forward to all of the new roles and the responsibilities that the task involves," he said, adding he would soon be joined by his Canadian girlfriend on the island.
While the job itself attracted global attention, so did the campaign by state-run Tourism Queensland as it highlighted the marketing potential of Web sites such as YouTube and Facebook.
"This is probably the first time that a campaign has achieved this sort of reach with so little advertising spend other than a few strategically placed job ads around the world," said Australian marketing analyst Tim Burrowes, editor of media and marketing Web site Mumbrella.
"This has all been about the power of people passing things on, largely through YouTube. The main lesson to be learned here is that if you have an original, exciting idea that gets people talking you don't need to spend huge on advertising."
The "Best Job in the World" campaign began in January with Tourism Queensland launching an advertising campaign centered around the lure of a job that is more like a paid holiday.
Within days, the campaign was one of the most popular items on the web, as applicants from all over the world sent in 60-second video applications and news of the contest spread on social networking sites.
Race for promotion
The number of applicants was cut to a top 50 who competed to develop online followers, holding stunts to promote themselves that included scuba diving in a tank in an Amsterdam square and riding the London Tube in scuba gear. It’s A Snap!
The final 16 contestants, from 15 countries, included students, journalists, TV presenters, photographers, a receptionist, radio DJ, teacher and an actress.
They also came from countries where Australia is pushing itself as a tourist destination including China, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, India, France, Britain, the United States, Singapore and Germany.
The candidates were flown to Hamilton Island last weekend and tested on a range of personal, communication and other skills with a panel of four appointed to decide the winner.
Tourism Queensland has hailed the advertising campaign as an enormous success, calculating the $1.7 million spent had reaped an estimated $110 million in global publicity.
"The worldwide response to Tourism Queensland's "Best Job in the World" campaign has been nothing short of phenomenal," said Tourism Queensland's CEO Anthony Hayes.
"The key now however is to convert the global interest raised by "The Best Job in the World" into visitors to Queensland — to bring more tourist dollars into Queensland's economy, protect existing tourism jobs and hopefully create new ones."
Burrowes said the announcement of the winner, who starts work on July 1, would not end the publicity.
"They will have months of coverage where this person who already has a connection with the outside world will start to write blogs and be an ambassador of the islands," he said.
"The chances are this could become an annual event."
Report: Sutherland headbutts man in dispute
Actor allegedly intoxicated, talking to Brooke Shields before altercation
PEOPLE.com
updated 8:16 a.m. PT, Wed., May 6, 2009
Kiefer Sutherland rose to Brooke Shields's defense early Tuesday morning in downtown Manhattan — though she didn't particularly request it, and the interloper allegedly suffered a broken nose from the "24" star, according to reports.
"There was an incident that occurred at 2 a.m. at 99 Prince (Street)," a NYPD spokesperson tells PEOPLE. "It's all under investigation by the police department ... People will come in sometime this afternoon (to be questioned).
New York's Daily News reports that Proenza Schouler women's wear designer Jack McCollough — a friend of Shields's — interrupted her and Sutherland while they were speaking outside the SoHo nightspot SubMercer, resulting in an agitated Sutherland allegedly headbutting McCollough after the two men exchanged words.
Witnesses also say Shields was shoved but not hurt. All were out for an after party following the Met's Costume Institute Gala, and a rep for Shields denied she had anything to do with the alleged headbutting. "Nothing happened to her ... Jack did nothing inappropriate. It's not clear what caused Kiefer to do what he did," the rep told TMZ.com. An attorney for Sutherland had no comment.
McCollough reportedly received a minor cut on his nose. The designer is quoted as telling authorities that Sutherland "was drunk and obnoxious and wouldn't back down or be logical," and that the actor "pulled this stupid wrestling move like a teenager" before the headbutt. An attorney for Sutherland had no comment.
Police and friends of Sutherland's told the News that Sutherland was intoxicated. The paper says that both Sutherland, 42, and Shields, 43, are expected to speak to the police on Wednesday.
Sutherland recently served a seven-week sentence for his second DUI.
The incident was first reported on N.Y.C. nightlife blog Guest of a Guest.
© 2009 MSNBC Interactive
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30600145/
PEOPLE.com
updated 8:16 a.m. PT, Wed., May 6, 2009
Kiefer Sutherland rose to Brooke Shields's defense early Tuesday morning in downtown Manhattan — though she didn't particularly request it, and the interloper allegedly suffered a broken nose from the "24" star, according to reports.
"There was an incident that occurred at 2 a.m. at 99 Prince (Street)," a NYPD spokesperson tells PEOPLE. "It's all under investigation by the police department ... People will come in sometime this afternoon (to be questioned).
New York's Daily News reports that Proenza Schouler women's wear designer Jack McCollough — a friend of Shields's — interrupted her and Sutherland while they were speaking outside the SoHo nightspot SubMercer, resulting in an agitated Sutherland allegedly headbutting McCollough after the two men exchanged words.
Witnesses also say Shields was shoved but not hurt. All were out for an after party following the Met's Costume Institute Gala, and a rep for Shields denied she had anything to do with the alleged headbutting. "Nothing happened to her ... Jack did nothing inappropriate. It's not clear what caused Kiefer to do what he did," the rep told TMZ.com. An attorney for Sutherland had no comment.
McCollough reportedly received a minor cut on his nose. The designer is quoted as telling authorities that Sutherland "was drunk and obnoxious and wouldn't back down or be logical," and that the actor "pulled this stupid wrestling move like a teenager" before the headbutt. An attorney for Sutherland had no comment.
Police and friends of Sutherland's told the News that Sutherland was intoxicated. The paper says that both Sutherland, 42, and Shields, 43, are expected to speak to the police on Wednesday.
Sutherland recently served a seven-week sentence for his second DUI.
The incident was first reported on N.Y.C. nightlife blog Guest of a Guest.
© 2009 MSNBC Interactive
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30600145/
`Star Trek': Are the hardcore fans onto something?
There is plenty of history and footage of past episodes that could have been reviewed to make the new Star Trek film. Many hard core fans that would have lended themselves as consultants to J.J. when he did this work. On the Colbert Report on 5/4/09 he even said he was unfamiliar with the series. Maybe he should have had some help. I am going to view the movie, not on the opening weekend tho, with an open mind for the story they spin.
By TED ANTHONY, AP National Writer Ted Anthony, Ap National Writer – Wed May 6, 6:37 am ET
It took just a few seconds of footage — a single trailer, dropped from the heavens with great fanfare — for the hue and cry to rise on Trekmovie.com, the top fan site for J.J. Abrams' new "Star Trek" movie. By the hundreds they weighed in, a contentious cacophony that would have jammed even Lt. Uhura's comms system.
Spock's voice is weak. The Enterprise bridge looks like it was manufactured by Apple in Cupertino. The ship wasn't built in Iowa; it was built in San Francisco. The transporter effect is too different. Anton Yelchin looks nothing like the original Chekov. John Cho is way too old to be Sulu. Jim Kirk was never this rebellious. Sounds like Star Wars. Where's Shatner? It's a reboot. No, it isn't. Yes it is. How dare you. How dare YOU?
Those fans who loved the trailer unequivocally were dismissed as undiscerning Kool-Aid drinkers. Those who dismantled it point by point were whiners. The discussion kept coming back to one word — a word that contains much of the passion behind Gene Roddenberry's imagined world of the 23rd (and, later, 24th) century.
Canon.
In the runup to the film's opening Friday, fan passions are still running extremely high when it comes to debating "canon" — the notion that the details of the most enduring fictional universe in TV history are coherent, cohesive and should not be jumbled up for the sake of marketing.
"We're all hardcore. No one is more hardcore than anyone else, really. And we all love it. But I guess it's almost political," says Anthony Pascale, who oversees Trekmovie.com. "Some people have a very strict view of what `Star Trek' is: `It's this, this and this.' They've got a checklist."
Sure, it's easy to dismiss this with the old nerd-in-mom's-basement trope. William Shatner did, notoriously, years ago on "Saturday Night Live" when he jokingly told hardcore fans to "get a life." But that outlook misses the point. In reality, "Trek" fans run the gamut in America — including, apparently, the president himself.
It's more than that, though: In a nation where mass entertainment helps define the culture, and where the national narrative is based on exploring the frontier, "Star Trek" fans' sense of ownership about their fictional final frontier offers a glimpse into modern American mythmaking — and why our stories matter to us so much.
For 43 years, since before mainstream fandom even existed, "Star Trek" has been embraced by — and guided by — its fans. The original series, which aired from 1966 to 1969, might not have even had a third season had it not been for an uprising of the faithful that caused NBC to reconsider its cancellation.
The myth accumulated copious details over the decades as it moved from the original to an animated series, from theatrical movies to "The Next Generation" and three more series that ran until 2005. For those keeping score at home, that's 716 episodes from six series plus 10 films. That's a lot of nits for the picking.
"Once those details start to mount up, it becomes really fun to follow it. And we start to talk about events in these fictional people's lives as if they were really past occurrences," says James Cawley, an actor and producer who is behind a sophisticated fan-made "Star Trek" series that picks up where the original five-year mission left off. In it, he plays Kirk.
"It's been cultivated so well for so long that the fans just love it and are very protective of it," Cawley says.
Abrams' movie, though, creates a new frontier for the final one, re-imagining Kirk, Spock and all the beloved original characters in ways that are both familiar and different. He has said repeatedly that the new "Trek" targets fresh fans — people who may have never seen a single episode.
"We're not completely restarting everything," he told GQ magazine, but "the work we had to do is in many ways the same. You have to make sure you're giving people a way in."
There's where it gets dicey. Yes, "Star Trek" as a philosophy has always been about inclusiveness — racial, extraterrestrial, ideological — but in reality the fan base can come across as insular. The message often seems as if it's this: Come join us, yes, but on our terms.
How does the new movie get around this? It shrewdly (minor spoiler alert here) brings time travel into the equation. In other words, if the past is tinkered with, then any changes to "canon" fit in conveniently with the original story. This is sci-fi, after all, and it's how writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman have framed the new approach.
Other American sci-fi/fantasy tales have been reconfigured in recent years without big-time hand-wringing. "Batman Begins" emerged in 2004 to widespread acceptance at the re-invigoration of the "Dark Knight" story. And the TV series "Smallville," which reimagines the Superman myth, posits Clark Kent as a struggling young man — and recently took the unlikely step of making Jimmy Olsen, of all people, a drug addict.
Yet both Superman and Batman have always shifted with the times, keeping the core fragments intact while reconfiguring key details. Batman went from being dark and angry to smiling and collaborative to cartoonish, then back to dark and angry again. "Star Trek" always tried to follow its own details to the letter.
Still, most "Trek" fans, no matter how "canonista" they are, typically agree that the mythos must involve a sense of hope about the future, a feeling of deep friendship among the characters and a zest for exploration. As global as "Star Trek" is, those are fundamental characteristics of the American experience.
Now they're back for a fresh audience. Coincidence?
This is an odd, unsettling time in America. Disarray is everywhere, and long-accepted narratives are being questioned. It's a time not unlike the late 1960s, the tumultuous age when the original "Star Trek" first set its sights on the future.
"Stories survive partly because they remind us of what we know and partly because they call us back to what we consider significant," Robert Fulford writes in "The Triumph of Narrative: Storytelling in the Age of Mass Culture."
Viewed through that prism, the return of "Star Trek" to the American canon in the jumbled, dark days of 2009 — post-"Blade Runner," post-"Terminator," post-"Cloverfield," even — makes eminent sense. It's a coherent universe that functions as a roadmap back to sane times.
One of its better-known fans might even call it, say, the audacity of hope.
By TED ANTHONY, AP National Writer Ted Anthony, Ap National Writer – Wed May 6, 6:37 am ET
It took just a few seconds of footage — a single trailer, dropped from the heavens with great fanfare — for the hue and cry to rise on Trekmovie.com, the top fan site for J.J. Abrams' new "Star Trek" movie. By the hundreds they weighed in, a contentious cacophony that would have jammed even Lt. Uhura's comms system.
Spock's voice is weak. The Enterprise bridge looks like it was manufactured by Apple in Cupertino. The ship wasn't built in Iowa; it was built in San Francisco. The transporter effect is too different. Anton Yelchin looks nothing like the original Chekov. John Cho is way too old to be Sulu. Jim Kirk was never this rebellious. Sounds like Star Wars. Where's Shatner? It's a reboot. No, it isn't. Yes it is. How dare you. How dare YOU?
Those fans who loved the trailer unequivocally were dismissed as undiscerning Kool-Aid drinkers. Those who dismantled it point by point were whiners. The discussion kept coming back to one word — a word that contains much of the passion behind Gene Roddenberry's imagined world of the 23rd (and, later, 24th) century.
Canon.
In the runup to the film's opening Friday, fan passions are still running extremely high when it comes to debating "canon" — the notion that the details of the most enduring fictional universe in TV history are coherent, cohesive and should not be jumbled up for the sake of marketing.
"We're all hardcore. No one is more hardcore than anyone else, really. And we all love it. But I guess it's almost political," says Anthony Pascale, who oversees Trekmovie.com. "Some people have a very strict view of what `Star Trek' is: `It's this, this and this.' They've got a checklist."
Sure, it's easy to dismiss this with the old nerd-in-mom's-basement trope. William Shatner did, notoriously, years ago on "Saturday Night Live" when he jokingly told hardcore fans to "get a life." But that outlook misses the point. In reality, "Trek" fans run the gamut in America — including, apparently, the president himself.
It's more than that, though: In a nation where mass entertainment helps define the culture, and where the national narrative is based on exploring the frontier, "Star Trek" fans' sense of ownership about their fictional final frontier offers a glimpse into modern American mythmaking — and why our stories matter to us so much.
For 43 years, since before mainstream fandom even existed, "Star Trek" has been embraced by — and guided by — its fans. The original series, which aired from 1966 to 1969, might not have even had a third season had it not been for an uprising of the faithful that caused NBC to reconsider its cancellation.
The myth accumulated copious details over the decades as it moved from the original to an animated series, from theatrical movies to "The Next Generation" and three more series that ran until 2005. For those keeping score at home, that's 716 episodes from six series plus 10 films. That's a lot of nits for the picking.
"Once those details start to mount up, it becomes really fun to follow it. And we start to talk about events in these fictional people's lives as if they were really past occurrences," says James Cawley, an actor and producer who is behind a sophisticated fan-made "Star Trek" series that picks up where the original five-year mission left off. In it, he plays Kirk.
"It's been cultivated so well for so long that the fans just love it and are very protective of it," Cawley says.
Abrams' movie, though, creates a new frontier for the final one, re-imagining Kirk, Spock and all the beloved original characters in ways that are both familiar and different. He has said repeatedly that the new "Trek" targets fresh fans — people who may have never seen a single episode.
"We're not completely restarting everything," he told GQ magazine, but "the work we had to do is in many ways the same. You have to make sure you're giving people a way in."
There's where it gets dicey. Yes, "Star Trek" as a philosophy has always been about inclusiveness — racial, extraterrestrial, ideological — but in reality the fan base can come across as insular. The message often seems as if it's this: Come join us, yes, but on our terms.
How does the new movie get around this? It shrewdly (minor spoiler alert here) brings time travel into the equation. In other words, if the past is tinkered with, then any changes to "canon" fit in conveniently with the original story. This is sci-fi, after all, and it's how writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman have framed the new approach.
Other American sci-fi/fantasy tales have been reconfigured in recent years without big-time hand-wringing. "Batman Begins" emerged in 2004 to widespread acceptance at the re-invigoration of the "Dark Knight" story. And the TV series "Smallville," which reimagines the Superman myth, posits Clark Kent as a struggling young man — and recently took the unlikely step of making Jimmy Olsen, of all people, a drug addict.
Yet both Superman and Batman have always shifted with the times, keeping the core fragments intact while reconfiguring key details. Batman went from being dark and angry to smiling and collaborative to cartoonish, then back to dark and angry again. "Star Trek" always tried to follow its own details to the letter.
Still, most "Trek" fans, no matter how "canonista" they are, typically agree that the mythos must involve a sense of hope about the future, a feeling of deep friendship among the characters and a zest for exploration. As global as "Star Trek" is, those are fundamental characteristics of the American experience.
Now they're back for a fresh audience. Coincidence?
This is an odd, unsettling time in America. Disarray is everywhere, and long-accepted narratives are being questioned. It's a time not unlike the late 1960s, the tumultuous age when the original "Star Trek" first set its sights on the future.
"Stories survive partly because they remind us of what we know and partly because they call us back to what we consider significant," Robert Fulford writes in "The Triumph of Narrative: Storytelling in the Age of Mass Culture."
Viewed through that prism, the return of "Star Trek" to the American canon in the jumbled, dark days of 2009 — post-"Blade Runner," post-"Terminator," post-"Cloverfield," even — makes eminent sense. It's a coherent universe that functions as a roadmap back to sane times.
One of its better-known fans might even call it, say, the audacity of hope.
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