Liberty Newspost Mar-13-2012

Curated News Edition
- 13/03/12
http://www.LibertyNewspost.com
Fed sees economy improving, but leaves interest rates alone

(USATODAY.com Feed)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:09:59 PM
By Paul Davidson, USA TODAY Updated The Federal Reserve upgraded its outlook Tuesday, saying it expects the economy to grow moderately this year, but the central bank held to its forecast that interest rates will likely stay near zero until at least 2014. AFP/Getty Images file No major came out of Tuesday's meeting of the Federal Reserve in Washington. In its statement after a one-day meeting, the Fed's policy-making committee said although oil and gasoline prices have risen lately, it expects the increase to have only a short-term effect on inflation. "The committee expects moderate economic growth over coming quarters and consequently anticipates that the unemployment rate will decline gradually" toward normal levels, the Fed said.
In January, policymakers appeared less optimistic, forecasting "modest" growth this year of 2.2% to 2.7%. A report on retail sales Tuesday added further evidence that the economy may be shifting into a higher gear. The Commerce Department said retail sales rose 1.1% in February in line with economists' estimates as consumers largely shrugged off higher gasoline prices and increased spending on cars, clothing, sporting goods and building materials. Sales, excluding autos, beat estimates by rising 0.9% and sales for the prior two months were revised slightly higher. The report supplemented other recent data showing increased activity in the manufacturing and service sectors and improved consumer confidence. Fed policymakers, meanwhile, provided a more buoyant view of the labor market, saying "the unemployment rate has declined
notably in recent months," but it "remains elevated." The jobless rate has fallen to 8.3% from 9.1% since August as employers added an average 200,000 jobs a month. In a nod to the eurozone's recent agreement to restructure Greece's massive debt and provide the troubled country with additional bailout money, the Fed said "strains in global financial markets have eased, though they continue to pose significant downside risks to the economic outlook." The Fed said both household spending and business investment have picked up, but the "housing sector remains depressed." Along with keeping interest rates near zero, the Fed said it will continue a policy it announced in September to shift its portfolio of government bonds to longer-term maturities to lower long-term interest rates and spur home and other purchases. Richmond Fed President Jeffrey Lacker was the lone dissenter,
saying the Fed should not say interest rates will likely stay near zero until 2014. Despite the recent uptick in economic indicators, many experts believe the Fed will launch another round of bond purchases later this year to further stimulate growth due to headwinds the economy still faces. Those include a sluggish housing market, rising gasoline prices, anticipated federal budget cuts, and European financial turmoil. In February, Fed chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress "the job market remains far from normal," with still-high unemployment and more than 40% of those unemployed out of work at least six months. The Fed statement on Tuesday "neither takes a step toward nor backs away from" more bond purchases, RDQ Economics said in a research note. For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To
report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com. USA TODAY is now using Facebook Comments on our stories and blog posts to provide an enhanced user experience. To post a comment, log into Facebook and then "Add" your comment. To report spam or abuse, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box. To find out more, read the FAQ and Conversation Guidelines. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Headline/ Top News/ Technology/ Policy/
Iran rejects claims of cleaning up nuclear works

(USATODAY.com Feed)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:01:20 PM
earth-moving vehicles at the location. That set off assertions by diplomats, all nuclear experts TEHRAN, Iran (AP) Iran on accredited to the U.N. nuclear Tuesday rejected allegations it agency in Vienna, about a cleanup attempted to clean up radioactive operation. traces possibly left by secret The diplomats said the crews at nuclear work at a key military site Parchin may be trying to erase before granting U.N. inspectors evidence of a test of a small permission to visit the facility. nuclear-weapon trigger. They Handout via AP This Aug. 13, spoke on condition of anonymity 2004, file satellite image provided because they were not authorized by DigitalGlobe and the Institute to discuss the information on the for Science and International record. Security shows the military The assertions added to tensions complex at Parchin, Iran. surrounding Iran's controversial nuclear program, which the West Handout via AP fears is geared toward nuclear This Aug. 13, 2004, file satellite weapons-making but Tehran image provided by DigitalGlobe insists is for peaceful purposes. and the Institute for Science and Mehmanparast dismissed the International Security shows the diplomats' assertions. military complex at Parchin, Iran. "Those who are familiar with Foreign Ministry spokesman nuclear physics know that these R a m i n M e h m a n p a r a s t t o l d comments are not remarkable in reporters in Tehran that the any way," he said. "This is mainly allegations were misleading and public speculation and not based false, and insisted that such traces on logic." could not be cleaned up. "Basically, nuclear military Satellite images of Iran's Parchin activities are not cleanable, at all," military facility that circulated last Mehmanparast said. He did not week appeared to show trucks and directly address the satellite [unable to retrieve full-text content] [unable to retrieve full-text content]
photos but stressed that Parchin has been continuing its "conventional military" activities and operations. Inspecting Parchin, southeast of the capital Tehran, was a key request made by senior IAEA teams that visited Tehran in January and February. Iran rebuffed those demands at the time, as well as attempts by the nuclear agency's team to question Iranian officials and secure other information linked to the allegations of secret weapons work. Iran said last week that a visit was possible once an unspecified set of conditions was reached. But an IAEA official said the agency had received no new offer from Iran on allowing such an
inspection as of Tuesday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment publicly on confidential IAEA matters. The Parchin complex has been often mentioned in the West as a suspected base for secret nuclear experiments a claim Iran consistently denies. IAEA inspectors visited the site in 2005, but only one of four areas on the grounds and reported no unusual activities. An IAEA report last year said there were indications Tehran has conducted high-explosives testing to set off a nuclear charge at Parchin. Iran denied the atomic activity and insisted that any decision to open the site rests with the armed forces since it was a military, not nuclear, facility. Associated Press writer George Jahn in Vienna contributed to this report. Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. For more
information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com. USA TODAY is now using Facebook Comments on our stories and blog posts to provide an enhanced user experience. To post a comment, log into Facebook and then "Add" your comment. To report spam or abuse, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box. To find out more, read the FAQ and Conversation Guidelines. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
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Headline/ Top News/ Economy/
Missing New Jersey toddler found dead in septic tank

(USATODAY.com Feed)
Why Chinese Web Video Is Like the Steel Business - BusinessWeek

(china - Google News)
at 7:30 p.m. the body of a child was discovered in the tank. Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:55:44 PM The discovery of her body ended LAKEWOOD, N.J. (AP) the hours-long search by township Authorities on Tuesday were police, an Ocean County Sheriff's investigating how a toddler Department canine unit and a reported missing ended up dead in state police helicopter. a septic tank in the backyard of "The body is believed to be the her home near the Jersey shore. child reported missing, although By Beth DeFalco, AP at this time that identification has Police tape ropes off an area near not been made," Ocean County a home Tuesday in Lakewood, Prosecutor Marlene Lynch Ford N . J . A u t h o r i t i e s w e r e said in a statement. "The family investigating how a toddler h a s b e e n i n f o r m e d a n d i s reported missing ended up dead in understandably distraught over a septic tank. this turn of events." The 2-year-old girl was reported Michel A. Paulhus, a spokesman missing by her mother, Marina for the prosecutor's office, said Matias, shortly before 5 p.m. on that there was no reason to believe Monday, according to the Ocean that there was a major delay in the County Prosecutor's Office, which mother calling police once she is investigating the death. realized her daughter was Matias told police she could not m i s s i n g . find her child, identified only by It's unknown how long the the initials J.C., who had been toddler was inside the septic tank playing in the yard with her four after her family had reported her siblings. missing. Search teams quickly found a 3- Copyright 2012 The Associated foot wide hole in the yard, which Press. All rights reserved. This lead to a septic tank. The Public material may not be published, Works Department was called in b r o a d c a s t , r e w r i t t e n o r to pump out water in the tank, and r e d i s t r i b u t e d . F o r m o r e [unable to retrieve full-text content]
information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com. USA TODAY is now using Facebook Comments on our stories and blog posts to provide an enhanced user experience. To post a comment, log into Facebook and then "Add" your comment. To report spam or abuse, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box. To find out more, read the FAQ and Conversation Guidelines. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
government's censors. Best Stock Streak Since January Buoyed by Tudou Advance: Los Angeles Times China Overnight Bloomberg Why Chinese Web Video Is Like China's top 2 online video the Steel Business companies merging San Francisco BusinessWeek Chronicle By Bruce Einhorn on March 13, Youku to buy Tudou, creating 2012 As they cheer the proposed China online video giant Reuters marriage of China's two largest Los Angeles Times- Washington online video companies, investors Post in Youku (YOKU) and Tudou all 414 news articles Holdings (TUDO) should make sure to thank the Chinese
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:50:57 PM
US, EU, and Japan challenge China's rare earth export restrictions - Christian Science Monitor
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:01:19 PM
Christian Science Monitor US, EU, and Japan challenge China's rare earth export restrictions Christian Science Monitor In a tripartite challenge against China's export restrictions on rare earth materials, the US, European Union, and Japan filed a complaint with the World Trade
Organization. By Michail Vafeiadis, Contributor / March 13, 2012 A laborer works at the site... EU, US, Japan launch rare earth WTO case against China Reuters US vs. China: The trade battles CNN Trade Fight Flares on China Minerals Wall Street Journal Fox News- BusinessWeek all 1,528 news articles
Top News/
Candidates play expectation game in Deep South primaries - CNN

(Top Stories - Google News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:20:07 PM
Looking ahead at Alabama and Mississippi STORY HIGHLIGHTS Polls show the races are up for grabs in Alabama and Mississippi The pressure is on Newt Gingrich to continue wins in South Rick Santorum's campaign says Romney's delegate math message not inspiring voters Gingrich suggests he and Santorum 'tag-team' to stop Romney Wolf Blitzer talks to Mitt Romney about his campaign and how he thinks today's primaries will affect the GOP contest. Watch"The Situation Room" today at 5 p.m. ET on CNN. (CNN)-- The Republican presidential candidates' campaigns were downplaying expectations as Alabama and Mississippi voted Tuesday -- an indication of how tight the two primaries are and the importance of momentum on the long road to the GOP convention. Polls released Monday showed a virtual dead heat between frontrunner Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich with Rick Santorum running eight to 10 points behind. Gingrich, the former House speaker, is under the most
pressure to take both states. He has won contests in South Carolina and Georgia, which he represented in Congress for two decades, but has finished third or worse in most contests outside the region. Santorum is coming off a big win in Kansas on Saturday but would
give himself a bigger boost in the battle to be the conservative alternative to Romney if he could beat Gingrich on his home turf. And a win down south for Romney would finally give him a victory in a region dominated by social conservatives, who have been hesitant to support his
candidacy. Forty-seven delegates are up for grabs in Alabama, with 37 at stake in Mississippi, all being divided proportionally. Both states hold open primaries, which mean Republicans, independent voters and even Democrats can cast ballots in the GOP contests.
Hawaii and American Samoa also hold caucuses Tuesday, with 17 delegates to be allocated in Hawaii and six in American Samoa. Gingrich has campaigned intensively in Alabama and CANDIDATES page 7
Top News/
Looking beyond Jefferson's job? Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell

(The Front Page)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 4:33:00 AM
Could you be looking at the lineup for 2016? Thats what someone replied to me on Twitter on Friday morning, February 24, after I had sent out word I was covering a panel at the Newseum in Washington featuring Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, chairman of the Republican Governors Association, and Maryland Gov. Martin OMalley, chairman of the Democratic Governors Association. The forum was sponsored by Politico and the two governors who are considered among their parties brightest stars for tomorrow did not disappoint. Whether the issue was taxes (OMalley said they need to be on the table, while McDonnell spoke proudly of cutting taxes in his state), education (OMalley wants to invest more tax dollars in education, McDonnell made the case for greater local oversight of public schools), or spending (OMalley spoke of reprioritzing spending, McDonnell spoke forcefully of cutting spending), the two governors did not disappoint their audience as forceful advocates for their to mix it up. OMalley warned of different stands. In wasnt long before they started w h a t w o u l d h a p p e n i f Republicans controlled the
presidency and both houses of Congress. Pointing to states in which the GOP holds the
governorship as well as both houses of the legislature, the Democrat spoke of the
Republican agendas moving LOOKING page 6
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states to the right. [Its about] outlawing womens reproductive rights, he said, and, referring to embattled Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, outlawing unions, said, what the hell does it have to do with creating jobs? As an example of what he considered the GOPs preoccupation with a social agenda, OMalley cited recent controversy in neighboring Virginia over legislation requiring ultrasounds to be performed before any abortion takes place and said he got the impression from area newspapers that that was all they were interested in Virginia. McDonnell sat calmly, listened to his opposite number, andafter voicing his not-so-high opinion of news coverage in the Washington, D.C. arearemarked: I thought all they were interested in in Maryland was raising taxes and same sex marriage. The Virginian, to use a phrase, brought the house down. McDonnell went on to point out that he has proposed more than 150 bills in the current session of the Virginia General Assembly and none of them were related to social issues. But, he quickly added, I am a pro-life governor and what you believe is important. Regarding the same sex marriage proposal that OMalley publicly championed and then signed into law, McDonnell simply said that voters in the Old Dominion State spoke on this in a statewide referendum two years ago saying clearly that
marriage was a union between a man and a woman. It was quite obvious from the very revealing morning session why so many pundits and pols quickly bring up these two IrishCatholic governors with roots in County Mayo as key players in the futures of the two major parties. And it was also quite clear to me why the 56-year-old McDonnell is spoken increasingly of as a Republican vice presidential candidate with his presidential favorite Mitt Romney. Both Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are Virginia residents and would thus forfeit the states 13 electoral votes if they tapped McDonnell. Ready for national office Even a cursory glance at Bob McDonnells resume can reassure skeptics that he is ready for national office. A onetime high school football star in Northern Virginia who went on to graduate from Notre Dame, McDonnell served as a medical supply officer in the U.S. Army and rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel in the Army reserves. He also earned a masters degree in business administration from Boston University by going nights and law and public policy degrees from Virginias Regent University. After 14 years in the Virginia House of Delegates, McDonnell eked out election as state attorney general by 323 votes in 05. In the race for governor four years later, he again faced the same Democrat that he had defeated for attorney
general and took the statehouse by a landslide. The two other statewide constitutional offices up for election that year were handily won by Republicans and, by 2011, both the state senate and House of Delegates were in Republican hands. McDonnell and wife Maureen have five children, including daughter Jeanine who is serving in the Army (including a stint in Iraq) and twin sons who are star athletes at the University of Virginia. When I asked McDonnell whether he felt Virginia would go Republican in 2012 four years after it gave its electoral votes to Barack Obama and whether he would consider becoming the Republican vice presidential candidate, he replied without hesitation that his state would go back to being Republican. He noted the gains the GOP has made since 08, including his own leading a statewide sweep, the pickup of three U.S. House seats, and capture of the state legislature. And Obama now has a record to defend, McDonnell noted. In the Virginians eyes, Hes a phenomenal campaigner and a bad president. But would he accept the second slot on the ticket with Romney or another candidate? I was going to skip that one, he chuckled, Im busy being governor, and it really means a lot to me that I hold the same job held by Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry. And, look, its not
my call. But, McDonnell also left the door slightly ajar, as he told me: If the leader of your party calls and asks you to do something, of course you think about it. We discussed Roman Catholic voters and how Obama carried the votes of Americas largest single religious faith in 08. Could putting a Roman Catholic such as McDonnell on the ticket enhance Republican appeal to Roman Catholic voters. Its a misnomer to speak of the Roman Catholic vote, he told me, Theres no monolithic Roman Catholic vote because there are different kinds of Catholics. Look at Gov. OMalley and me, for example. So there has been a split among Catholic voters in the past and there will be one in the future. Our conversation then segued into a discussion of the administrations controversial policy requiring faith-based hospitals and other health providers to cover contraceptives for employees, even when the policy poses a contradiction with religious beliefs. In McDonnells words, This presidents intrusive policies into religious freedom are contrary to the dictates of conscience and they are contrary to the tradition of religious freedom in this country articulated more than 200 years ago by Thomas Jefferson. Looking ahead to 2016 Throughout the weekend, Bob McDonnell was a clear presence at the NGA meeting at
Washington, D.C.s J.W. Marriott Hotel McDonnell is readily available for reporters and takes questions on just about every subject. He makes it clear that the states chief executives will have to make tough decisions regarding their budgets, that current economic unease means we cannot afford to do everything we have done before. He also makes it clear, in contrast to OMalley, that raising taxes is not the answer he is looking for or will consider. My predecessor [former Democratic Gov. and present Democratic Senate hopeful Tim Kaine] oversaw a $2.8 billion tax increase, says McDonnell, proudly adding that we ended his tax increase and made spending cuts of more than $6.8 billion. And as a result, we have an atmosphere favoring the creation of private sector jobs and we have invested $4.8 billion in transportation and $230 million in higher education. When we discussed Medicaid obligations that he considers the Number One debt driver, I asked McDonnell if he felt the administration would consider granting waivers and the muchsought greater flexibility to the states to grapple with the Medicaid rolls. I doubt it, shot back the RGA chairman. But, like Indianas Gov. Mitch Daniels and Mississippis Phil Bryant, McDonnell made it clear he was LOOKING page 9
CANDIDATES
Mississippi over the last week. "You would think he was running for governor here because of his campaigning, going to restaurants, going to church on Sunday. He is showing up everywhere," Alabama Republican Party Chairman Bill Armistead said on CNN's "Starting Point" Tuesday morning. Armistead echoed others' positions that Gingrich has a lot riding on the outcome. "He's got to do extremely well in Alabama and Mississippi just to stay in the race," he said. A top Gingrich adviser wouldn't predict victory Monday night, saying only that her candidate was "competitive" in the races. "There's no must-win state, there's a must-win election this year. And the place that Newt can really win and we see it in our polling also is on the debate stage with Barack Obama," Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway said. Romney's campaign has been holding up its large lead in delegates as a reason for Gingrich and Santorum to get out of the race. Romney is far short of the 1,144 delegates needed to clinch the nomination -- he holds a 459-203 lead over Santorum, with Gingrich at 118 and Ron Paul at 66, according to a CNN delegate estimate. Another GOP strategist said he sees the delegate race as evidence that Santorum's hopes are dimming. "Given how far behind Santorum is from Romney with delegates, it
looks like that path continues to dim every day, which is very challenging for his campaign to overcome, because they now need to get 65% of the delegates that are still available, and so that path probably doesn't exist, and if it does exist, then it needs to start with real wins and big wins in a hurry," said Doug Heye, a GOP strategist and a former communications director for the Republican National Committee. But Santorum spokeswoman Alice Stewart said Romney's mathematics argument is "not very inspiring." "What he is doing is, they have put out memos and talked about the fact it would be mathematically impossible for Rick Santorum to come out ahead in this fight, when the truth is that's nothing more than a smokescreen to demonstrate the fact that he is not inspiring the base. He is not in touch with conservatives," Miller told CNN's "AC360." "What we are letting folks know today is the math is still a long way out. Rick is the true conservative in this race. He is inspiring the base. And that's why he has got Mitt Romney up against the ropes." A leading Republican strategist said that Romney could be the real winner on Tuesday night. "I continue to think this is fundamentally about a delegate fight, so I'm reluctant to talk about momentum as an important story. But I do think there is a momentum story that could
emerge after Alabama and Mississippi if Romney overperforms," said Gentry Colllins, a former political director for the Republican National Committee and the Republican Governors Association. "Much has been written about Romney's weakness in Southern state contests, and Santorum and especially Gingrich have used a Southern strategy as a basis for arguing they had a pathway to the nomination. On Super Tuesday, Romney took as many delegates out of the Southern states as anyone else. But that story was offset because Gingrich and Santorum weren't on the Virginia ballot, and because the Romney campaign let Tennessee expectations get out of whack. "But if he adds a win in either Alabama or Mississippi, and wins as many or more delegates than any of the others, he will have shut his opponents' Southern strategy down," added Collins, who ran Romney's 2008 operation but is neutral this time around. Even if he doesn't win either Alabama or Mississippi, Romney will pick up delegates in both. Add to that a bunch of likely delegates in more moderate Hawaii, and Romney will probably expand his lead. Romney picked up the endorsement of Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant last week. And while Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley said he had voted for Santorum, his office later issued a statement after his vote was interpreted as
an endorsement saying, "Governor Bentley views Rick Santorum as the most conservative candidate in the Republican presidential primary. Governor Bentley has chosen not to publicly endorse a candidate. He believes a vote is a personal decision that should be based on a voter's values and principles, not on someone else's opinion." Romney's been trying out his Southern charm, saying last week on the campaign trail in Mississippi that he was "an unofficial Southerner" and joking that "I am learning to say 'y'all' and 'I like grits,' and things. Strange things are happening to me." Romney's campaign and a proRomney super PAC have combined to spend nearly $2 million to run TV commercials in the two states. Southern comedian Jeff Foxworthy also joined him on the campaign trail Monday. "I was able to avoid politics for 53 years and somebody said, 'Why in the world would you get into it now?' and the answer is it's too important. Because I love this country," said Foxworthy, campaigning with Romney in Alabama. But Gingrich threw a new wrinkle into the slow-Romney movement, suggesting that he and Santorum team up to stop the former Massachusetts governor. "There's a certain advantage I think right now in having both of us tag-team Romney, because neither one of us by ourselves can raise the money to match
Romney," Gingrich said on the "Rick and Bubba" radio show in Birmingham. But Santorum has suggested that he wants Gingrich out of the race so that the anti-Romney movement is no longer split between him and the former House speaker. "If you go out and deliver a conservative victory for us on Tuesday, this race will become a two-person race," Santorum said last week in Alabama. "And when it becomes a two-person race for the Republican nomination, the conservative will win the nomination." But if Santorum loses to Gingrich on Tuesday, it undercuts his argument that he's the conservative alternative to Romney. "Rick Santorum has a little bit of a danger zone," said Republican strategist Chip Saltsman, who managed Mike Huckabee's 2008 Republican presidential campaign. "He had a big win obviously Saturday in Kansas. He got a lot of delegates. Not a lot of coverage because everybody was focused on Mississippi and Alabama. "If he comes in third in both places, then they're going to say, 'Well, is Newt now the conservative alternative?' And we'll start that story again." Paul hasn't campaigned over the past week in either Alabama or Mississippi and doesn't appear to be much of a factor in either state. CANDIDATES page 12
Top News/
Afghan outrage builds from shooting massacre - CBS News

(Top Stories - Google News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:37:34 PM
where the killings took place. He was shot in the head almost instantly and died. Play CBS News Video Two other Afghan army Afghanistan, Ten Years Later personnel were wounded in the 20 Panetta: Awaiting plans to draw -minute firefight that ensued in down Afghan surge one of the two villages in Romney: U.S. troops reaching Kandahar province where the "breaking point" killings had occurred two days Obama vows to hold killer of before. 16 Afghans accountable Hayden: Early Afghan withdrawal undercuts goals Afghan shooting suspect could Obama vows to hold Afghan face death penalty killer to account Taliban: We'll "behead" U.S. Defense chief Leon Panetta says troops over massacre "war is hell" The gunbattle came as images of Complete Coverage the aftermath of Sunday's killings spread across the country, and the Updated at 3:31 p.m. ET public reaction which at first ( C B S / A P ) B A L A N D I , seemed surprisingly muted Afghanistan - Taliban insurgents began to build. opened fire on two brothers of In the east, students staged the Afghan President Hamid Karzai first significant protest in response as they left a memorial service to the killings, raising concerns Tuesday for 16 villagers allegedly about a repeat of the wave of killed by a U.S. soldier. violent demonstrations that Qayum and Shah Wali Karzai rocked the nation after last and other top Afghan officials in month's burning of Korans by their delegation escaped in their troops at a U.S. base. cars unharmed from the ambush Burning an effigy of President in the country's south. Obama and chanting "Death to CBS News correspondent Mandy America," the protesters in the Clark reports that one Afghan city of Jalalabad demanded the soldier was killed in the attack. U.S. soldier face a public trial in The soldier was protecting the their own country, Clark reports. two men as part of a high-level The incident has also added to government delegation that was pressure in the U.S. to get out of visiting one of the two villages A f g h a n i s t a n m o r e q u i c k l y .
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, speaking to reporters on the plane traveling to Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, said the military withdrawal was still on schedule to finish by 2014. Panetta said he was awaiting plans from Gen. John Allen, the top commander in Afghanistan, to bring home the remaining 23,000 U.S. troops sent to Afghanistan during the 2009 surge. Those forces are due to leave by the end of September, dropping the U.S. presence in the country down to 68,000 troops. G.I.'s plea: Give troops with PTSD more help U.S. analysts weigh threats after
Afghan shooting On Tuesday, Mr. Obama issued his strongest condemnation of the shooting. "The United States takes this as seriously as if it was our own citizens and our own children who were murdered," Mr. Obama told reporters in Washington. Obama vows to hold Afghan killer to account "I can assure the American people and the Afghan people that we will follow the facts wherever they lead us, and we will make sure that anybody who was involved is held fully accountable with the full force of the law," he
said. Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi claimed responsibility for the attack on the delegation in Balandi village in Panjwai district, an area considered the birthplace of the militant group. Previously, the movement had vowed to behead those responsible for the shootings. The militants rode to the village on motorcycles, police said. They ambushed the delegation from the cover of a distant row of trees. Afghan security forces fired back, killing three militants, said Gen. Abdul Razaq, the Kandahar police chief. The two Afghan army personnel who were wounded included a soldier and a military prosecutor, he said. Qayum Karzai sought to play down the ambush. He said the delegation, which also included Kandahar Gov. Tooryalai Wesa and Minister of Border and Tribal Affairs Asadullah Khalid, had been giving their condolences to the victims' families. They then heard "two very, very light shots." "Then we assumed it was the national army that started to fire in the air," said Karzai. Nine of the 16 civilians killed on Sunday in Balandi and Alkozai villages were children and three were women, according to the AFGHAN page 13
Top News/
Darpa director leaving the Pentagon for Google

RT (News RSS : Today)
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war machine, there is only so much left to explore. Confirming the move to asenior Reuters / Krishnendu Halder executive position with Google, One of the most top-secret D a r p a s p o k e s m a n E r i c Pentagon departments the Mazzacone tells Wired that same that spawned Americas Dugan couldnt refuse an offer drones, military robots, with such aninnovative electromagnetic guns and other company as the search engine sci-fi weaponry is about to lose giant. Until the latest news broke, its top officer to Google. however, Darpa had been touted Regina Dugan oversaw the as a creative yet controversial development of some of the US research lab for space-age militarys most marvelous high technology only once imaginable. tech accomplishments as director Darpa has developed technologies of Darpa, but the head of the used across the globe that can take DoDs research lab is parting away lives and, as seen with ways with the Pentagon to take on c u t t i n g - e d g e r o b o t i c l i m b s , a role with Google. Not even p r a c t i c a l l y c r e a t e t h e m . three years after she took on the With the Defense Department role as the first female director of scaling back on many operations the Americas Defense Advanced and Google seemingly only Research Projects Agency, or growing, Dugans departure only Darpa, Regina Dugan is now makes sense given the timing. walking away to join the ranks of Both US President Barack Obama Americas other innovative and Defense Secretary Leon powerhouse. Dugan will be Panetta have thrown their weight relinquishing her top roll at the behind a shift in the Pentagons Defense Departments Darpa budget in an effort to save billions program and trading in the over the next few years. Google, Potomac River for Silicon Valley, on the other hand, has only and says it is a natural decision to increased its outreach, operating move somewhere where the countless new endeavors and p o s s i b i l i t i e s s e e m e n d l e s s . taking on new mediums. Apparently within the cogs of the Thats not to say, of course, that
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:46:11 PM
going to press the issuehard. A Romney-McDonnell ticket in 2012? Its probably not in the cards. But what is clearly in the cards for 2016 and beyond is Bob McDonnell as a major player for Dugan avoided trouble while with Dugan, however, had blasted his party on the national stage. Darpa. She has been the subject of Darpa for not doing enough only a During his session with an investigation after awarding year earlier. There is a time and Marylands OMalley, McDonnell pricey contracts to a defense a place for daydreaming. But it is said tongue-in-cheek he was research company she partially n o t a t D a r p a , s h e t o l d a staying in shape. He does so, he owns, a deal which prompted the congressional panel in March explained, by jogging, working Pentagons Office of the Inspector 2011. Darpa is not the place of out, and watching Fox News. General to open a probe. Lt. Col. dreamlike musings or fantasies, This is the third in a series of one Melinda Morgan, a spokesperson not a place for self-indulging in -on-one interviews with vice for the Office of the Secretary of wishes and hopes. Darpa is a presidential contenders. Next Defense, says that the change in place of doing. week, John Gizzi profiles Indiana c o m m a n d a n d o n g o i n g The transition also raises further Gov. Mitch Daniels. investigation into Dugans RedX questions about what relationship This entry passed through the Defense company are unrelated, the federal government has with Full-Text RSS service if this is but aside that there is little known G o o g l e . A s R T r e p o r t e d your content and you're reading it about her career change. On their yesterday, an advocacy group will on someone else's site, please read part, a Google rep tells PC Mag, " b e t a k i n g t h e U S N a t i o n a l the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentRegina is a technical pioneer who Security Agency to court later this only/faq.php#publishers. Five brought the future of technology month in hopes of finding details Filters recommends: Donate to to the military during her time at on what ties, if any, the NSA has Wikileaks. DARPA," adding,"She will be a with Google. The NSA has real asset to Google, and we are refused to disclose any details in thrilled she is joining the team." t h e p a s t t h a t d i s c u s s a In a statement from the Pentagon, relationship, despite a series of Frank Kendall for Defense for Freedom of Information Act Acquisition, Technology and requests. Logistics, adds,Regina Dugans This entry passed through the leadership at Darpa has been Full-Text RSS service if this is extraordinary and she will be your content and you're reading it m i s s e d t h r o u g h o u t t h e on someone else's site, please read Department. the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentWe are all very grateful for the only/faq.php#publishers. Five many contributions she has made Filters recommends: Donate to in advancing the technologies that Wikileaks. our war fighters depend on.
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Top News/
Netflix Deal Reveals Apple's Secret Sauce: iTunes Pay Channel

Kit Eaton (Fast Company)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:59:40 PM
As announced this week, the new Apple TV brings a new UI, better internal specs, and full HD capability to the table. But there's the business equivalent of an Easter egg hidden in it for Netflix subscribers: From now on, if you want to join Netflix you can do it through your Apple TV, and Apple handles the payments via its iTunes back channel. Essentially it works like this: The Apple TV functionality hinges on your iTunes user account, the same kind that's powered 25 billion app downloads to date. You give Apple your credit card details then click "okay, charge it" when you buy an app, rent a movie, or download a song from iTunes. Now Apple's made joining Netflix just as frictionless through Apple TV, eliminating the need to retype your credit card info into the Netflix app. You just allow Apple to charge your iTunes account. It works from a consumer point of view because it's easy, and because we're all getting used to trusting Apple as a pay channel for our apps and content--handing over $1.99 for an app, trusting Apple's device-to-device security and so on is now normal. It works for Netflix because it makes it
easier for users to sign up to their paid service, which is likely to bump up the numbers. It also works from Apple's point of view, because they no doubt get a little financial action from Netflix on the deal (though probably not the traditional App Store 30% cut-we've queried them on this) and certainly they can use the information to improve their customer analytics.
But the iTunes customer database is now composed of hundreds upon hundreds of millions of users, with a secure verification system and credit card number attached to each account. Apple's even pushing its Mac userbase toward signing up to an Apple account, even if you're not an iTunes subcriber, with the Mac app store, meaning there are millions more customers handing
over their data to Apple. And it's at this point you need to remember Apple's EasyPay system, on trial in U.S. stores. It's a clever "future shopping" play, whereby you can actually order and pay for physical goods in Apple stores through the Store app on, say, your iPhone. And for certain goods you can actually pick them off the shelves, scan the code, pay for it through the app
and leave the store without speaking to a sales assistant. It's simple, convenient, enabled by Apple's iTunes/Mac account database, has built-in security courtesy of your phone's own security layers and its known location at the time of the transaction, it all happens over Wi -Fi, and there's no NFC or NETFLIX page 15
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OneID: A Tech To Ditch Dodgy Passwords For Secure Digital Identities

Kit Eaton (Fast Company)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:39:34 PM
OneID's team knows that logging in to site after site is a pain for users--and as a sequence of hightech hacks have shown, passwords are generally insecure. Which is why OneID's proposing a new tech "next-generation digital identity service" to neatly scoot around both of these issues. The service launches today as a public release for developers, and the press release notes it's all about enabling customers to "sign in to websites and pay online with a single digital identity," with the ultimate goal of improving the experience for users and site owners because it "reduces the friction, fraud, and costs associated with authentication and financial transactions." It's apparently as simple as inserting a "few lines of code" at the developer end of things. But this simplicity would seem to belie the "advanced asymmetric cryptography" and "unique distributed architecture" that makes the whole shebang work. Without revealing their secrets, of course, OneID explains the tech works using public key cryptography (a similar amazingly clever tech to the one that enables secure transactions on web pages such as Amazon's) and it works
on browsers, mobile devices, websites, and the cloud. The press release notes it's all about replacing a "shared secret" (passwords) with a public key (the cryptographic angle) because the password system is broken. CEO Steve Kirsch spoke to Fast Company to explain more: "The idea behind OneID is to move us out of the Stone Age and into a more modern age where we're using the latest crypto technology
so that we can securely log in to websites, so we can share information, authorize transactions, and so forth. It's kind of a 'Burger King' for identity--it's a 'have it your way.' There's always a convenience/security trade-off, and usually anytime you introduce security convenience goes way, way down. So we make it possible to introduce security without sacrificing convenience." Of course there are other
solutions in this space, like Facebook Connect and Oauth solutions (those "login via Twitter" buttons work using this), and Kirsch noted that introducing OneID to partners is a movable feast: "Some people will say, 'Oh, call us back when you have a million sites' or 'call us back when you have 10 million users.'" But he's confident that many people are already comfortable with the benefits his tech offers, and that
within a few years "thousands" of sites will be using OneID. Most interestingly, the company is extremely flexible in its thinking about monetizing its service. "People seem to be willing to pay for this," Kirsch noted, "so we can make money by charging consumers, we can make money by doing transactions for sites, approving transactions and ONEID: page 16
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Top News/
US wins extradition of British student over UK-based website

Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:01:42 PM
Richard O'Dwyer (AFP Photo / Carl Court) A 23-year-old student from the UK will be extradited to the United States to face trial for operating a website overseas that linked visitors to external pages that hosted copyrighted material. Richard O'Dwyer of Sheffield Hallam University in northern England will soon find himself on American soil following the United States recent victory in an attempt to extradite the student stateside over a website he ran. American authorities attest that ODwyers TVShack website, while not in violation of any UK laws where he lived and operated it, infringed on American copyright legislation. The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement department first seized ODwyers website, TVShack.com, in June 2010. At the time they were able to shutdown the site as the US has jurisdiction over any .net and
.com domain names, a revelation which prompted ODwyer to relaunch his site with a .cc domain extension shortly after. Even still, authorities were back in a matter of months and questioned ODwyer over his revamped operation. That meeting happened in November, and the boys mother explained to Ars Technica at the time, " One of them said 'Don't worry, you won't have to go to America.'" Barely a year later, the US opened a new investigation, filed extradition papers and, as of now, ODwyer is expected to soon see an American judge. On Tuesday, the UK Home Secretary agreed to extradite the young man after the Westminster Magistrates' Court ruled in January that shipping him to America to face charges would be an option on the table. "I've done nothing wrong under UK law, and, it's pretty ridiculous isn't it? Dwyer tells BBC Newsbeat in the UK."A 65-yearold man was extradited a few weeks ago, so if they can extradite someone that old they can extradite anyone really, couldn't
they? "Copyright laws differ between countries and that's yet to be fought, that argument." Despite that argument, however, the US believes that ODwyer was in the wrong, as far as they are concerned. TVShack sold advertising space and, according to American officials, netted more than $230,000 before American agents first shut it down. The site itself provided users with links to other sites which, when clicked, would take his visitor to external and unaffiliated pages that often streamed copyrighted material, including American television programs protected by US laws. ODwyers case is similar to that of Megaupload.com founder Kim Dotcom, who is facing a possible extradition from New Zealand to the US over his own site, one which provided file-sharing services for users and made money off of selling ads and subscriptions. Unlike Dotcom, however, ODwyer did not host any illegal material or allow users to commit crimes by uploading such. Instead, rather, ODwyer
managed a website that just contained links to other site, something his attorney says is on par with the services Google offers. "If Richard appears to have committed a crime in this country then try him in this country, he mother, Julia, tells BBC today. She adds that she believes that her son wassold down the river by the government and cautions others to be weary of UK officials siding with pressure from the US. "It's disgusting. Next time it may be your son. I urge everyone who cares about unfair extradition to write to their MP and insist this disreputable law is changed, adds Ms. ODwyer. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Chinese Monetary Discipline Sows Seeds Of New Growth - Forbes

Submitted at 3/13/2012 10:50:26 AM
Forbes Chinese Monetary Discipline Sows Seeds Of New Growth Forbes For investors, an appreciation of China requires a similar comprehensive analysis. One significant subtlety that seems to be overlooked by investors today is China's macro policy strategy. Professor Stephen Roach in the Financial Times thinks the... China Struggles to Bridge Gap Between Rich, Poor Voice of America Why China Wants to Slow Down Its Own Economy The Atlantic China needs a new growth model, not a stimulus Financial Times MarketWatch- China Daily all 60 news articles
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13
Ice Age Park? Russian, S.Korean scientists to clone woolly mammoth

AFGHAN
Sakha University have access to more frozen mammoth parts than Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:22:00 PM any other. A woolly mammoth skeleton Hwang is one of the worlds (Ethan Miller / Getty Images / leading geneticists, and a celebrity AFP) in his native country. He was the A Siberian research institute has first to clone a dog (Snuppy the joined forces with the worlds Afghan hound, born in 2005) but most controversial geneticist to was later given a suspended clone the woolly mammoth a prison sentence for embezzlement species that has been extinct for and ethical violations when it was thousands of years. found out that he had faked some -Vasily Vasilyev, vice rector of of his research. North-Eastern Federal University of the Sakha Republic and Hwang -But despite the perfect match, the Woo-Suk of South Korea's Sooam c l o n i n g i s a n y t h i n g b u t Biotech Research Foundation straightforward Russian and have signed an agreement, and Japanese scientists have been say they hope to produce a living working on cloning the mammoth mammoth within six years. for the best part of a decade, and The union is no accident. the two countries already have a Although mammoths once world-class team at Sakha roamed Earth, they survived the U n i v e r s i t y . longest in Northern Siberia, with One of the problems is that the the last dying out less than 2,000 DNA needs to be perfectly years ago some 8,000 years preserved. Hwang said that after they disappeared elsewhere. finding undamaged tissue would The cold climate also meant that be theprimary difficulty, and they were best preserved in that labeled the joba tough task. part of the world, meaning If scientists did isolate perfect Russian research institutes like DNA from the mammoth, it
would need to be implanted into the eggs of an elephant. The embryos would then be carried by an African elephant the closest surviving relative of the mammoth during a 22-month pregnancy. But despite the difficulty, seeing the creatures famed for their colorful fur and 5 meter-long curved tusks alive on Earth again would constitute perhaps the greatest scientific achievement of the century. If the project is successful, it would be the second time an extinct animal has been resurrected. The Pyrenean ibex a type of wild goat that became extinct in 2000 was cloned three years ago, but the billy died within minutes. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Afghan president. Some of their bodies were burnt after they were killed. The U.S. has an Army staff sergeant in custody who is suspected of carrying out Sunday's pre-dawn killings but has not released his name. Villagers have described the gunman stalking from house to house in the middle of the night, opening fire on sleeping families and then burning some of the dead bodies. Witnesses interviewed by The Associated Press after the attack described only one shooter, and U.S. officials have been adamant that there was only one soldier involved. On Tuesday, villagers who testified to the delegation insisted there were two soldiers, citing relatives who survived the attacks. Mohammad Wazir, who was away from his home in Balandi village that night, said his sister saw two U.S. soldiers enter the house and start shooting. Everyone started running different directions, and she ran to the
kitchen to hide. When the gunfire ended and she re-emerged, 11 of her relatives were dead. In Alkozai to the south, a man named Sayed Jan said his cousins told him that they saw two soldiers come into his house and start firing. Jan's relatives barricaded their door and snuck out another exit. Jan was away in Kandahar city that night. The villages are about 40 miles southwest of Kandahar city. 1 2 Next Page This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Chic Backstage-Inspired Editorials The Muse 'Lady Doll' Shoot Stars Toni Garn and Kendra Spears (TrendHunter.com)
(TREND HUNTER - The Latest Trends)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:00:03 PM
( TrendHunter.com) The Muse 'Lady Doll' editorial gives people
a glamorous glimpse into what it is like to be backstage at a runway show. Of course, this photo shoot has been completely stylized. Part of the magazine's spring...
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Top News/ Technology/
Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann Shows Off New Profile, New Social Tools, Addresses Controversy
E.B. Boyd (Fast Company)
time on refining the product than on considering monetization Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:11:46 PM strategies. Cofounder and CEO Ben Responding to a question about Silbermann also talks APIs and affiliate tracking links that affiliate links at SXSW. Pinterest had once implemented Pinterest, the addictive image (which also became a subject of collection and sharing site, will contention in the media last soon release a new profile page, month), Silbermann said the possibly as soon as this week, and Pinterest team had installed those expand the types of items people in order to assess whether people can collect to include video. CEO were using the site in the ways and cofounder Ben Silbermann "we were hoping they were using said that the company is also it"--namely as a way of helping working on ways to make them discover things out at other attribution of shared media "easier sites on the web. and easier." "We put in an affiliate tracking The upgraded profile pages will might have on Facebook or mission of Pinterest is not to keep API is to expand their own site to system to try to understand that help Pin-sters find other sharers Twitter," he said during a panel people on the site forever. It's to other platforms, like the iPad. behavior," Silbermann said. The they might want to follow. It will today at SXSW in Austin,TX. get people out and to find those Only once that's in place will company took down those links also show who people re-pin "We wanted to make a snapshot objects." Pinterest focus on opening itself down shortly before the news from, so that users can trace of what you're about." about them broke. Pinterest is also working on an to third parties. backward to find the individuals Sometime soon, Pinterest will API that one day will allow other "We don't want to do it too early," E.B. Boyd is FastCompany.com's who are influencing the people expand the number of things users companies to build apps that said Silbermann, who has said Silicon Valley reporter. Twitter| you're following. can pin, including videos from interact with the data on the site. that the hardest thing for a startup Google+| Email The profile will also be "more H u l u , V i m e o , a n d N e t f l i x . But the company doesn't have an is "focus." beautiful," said Silbermann. "We "Driving traffic out is really exact date for that, Silbermann Similarly, Silbermann said that wanted to make your profile very fundamental for us," he said. "The said. Pinterest's first goal with the the company was spending more different from the profile you
US wins extradition of Richard O'Dwyer

Nate Anderson
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:32:45 PM
A 23-year old student from Sheffield Hallam University in the north of England is bound for
America. That wouldn't be unusual -- except that Richard O'Dwyer won't go voluntarily
By: Nate Anderson, Edited by: Duncan Geere Continue reading...
Top News/ Business/
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Everybody's Running From MurdochExcept Readers - BusinessWeek

Felix Gillette (Top Stories Google News)
NETFLIX
Murdochs daily London tabloid, the Sun, remains the U.K.s most popular paper. According to the Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:11:05 PM Audit Bureau of Circulations, the British lawmakers may be fed up Suns circulation averaged 2.6 with Rupert Murdochs style of million copies between September tabloid journalism. But one group 2011 and February 2012. While has been more hesitant to break its those numbers are down 8 percent longstanding relationship with the over the same period a year embattled Australian media lords earlier, the Suns circulation London red-topsreaders. remains well above its closest On Tuesday, British police r i v a l s , t h e D a i l y M a i l ( 1 . 9 arrested six individuals as part of million), the Daily Mirror(1.1 the ongoing phone-hacking m i l l i o n ) a n d t h e D a i l y investigation, according to the S t a r ( 6 4 0 , 0 0 0 ) . Associated Press, including In February, Murdoch launched a Rebekah Brooks, the former top Sunday edition of the Sun, A executive overseeing Murdochs recent poll found that 32 percent papers in London, and her of the British population thought h u s b a n d C h a r l i e B r o o k s , a it was a bad idea, while only 22 racehorse breeder and friend of percent supported the move. Even British Prime Minister David so, the debut issue of the Sun on Cameron. Sunday sold 3.2 million copies, The high-profile arrests follow according to the ABCmaking it, the news in late February that overnight, the countrys topJames Murdoch, Ruperts son, selling weekend paper. w a s s t e p p i n g d o w n a s t h e Although the numbers have since executive chairman of News dipped, sales remain strong. The International. second issue of the Sun on Despite all the negative press, Sunday sold 2.6 million copies,
Bluetooth gizmos involved. And it sounds a whole lot like the mobile payments-based future shopping revolution we've written about. Now Apple's expanding this influence to let you pay for Netflix too. What Apple is quietly doing is changing how you pay while the third issue, on March for things online, and the more 11, sold 2.7 million, according to speculative reader may wonder if a report in the Guardian. Thats this is a bigger step toward a longabout what the News of the World rumored mobile payment system was selling (2.67 million copies), from Apple. As we've noted, and the Guardian notes, in the month several recent moves by different before Murdoch shuttered the players in this game from credit Sunday tabloid last summer amid card companies and PayPal have public outrage over phone- confirmed, the mobile pay space is evolving so quickly that there's hacking revelations. The prolonged drumbeat of bad something of a land-grab going news also seems to have done on, each firm trying to ensure its l i t t l e t o d a t e t o d a m p e n position in the upcoming mobile Murdochs enthusiasm for his payment space. London tabloids. Sun on Sunday Apple's iTunes trick for EasyPay improving every week, Murdoch and now Netflix neatly side-steps recently wrote on Twitter. See all of this mess. As far as Apple's tomorrows article by Yvette concerned it has your credit card Cooper. Should stir the pot! Another big paper for 50p. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five (housing - Google News) Filters recommends: Donate to Submitted at 3/13/2012 10:02:01 AM Wikileaks. Bloomberg Foreclosed Homeowners Inspire Architects to Float Housing Ideas BusinessWeek By James S. Russell on March 13, 2012 Amid a housing market profoundly altered by stagnant
details, it can verify who you are for security reasons, it has its own software running on its own hardware and it has its own solutions to user problems. As it's demonstrated with iMessage, responsible for worrying the phone networks so much, Apple's quite happy to go its own way with things--meaning it could easily come up with its own mobile pay solution, an expansion of EasyPay that lets you pay for groceries in the supermarket, or tickets in a movie theater just as easily as a pair of headphones in the Apple Store. It's speculation, but it's not that big a step. [Image: Flickr user Avijeet Sachdev] Chat about this news with Kit Eaton on Twitter and Fast Company too.
Foreclosed Homeowners Inspire Architects to Float Housing Ideas - BusinessWeek

incomes, declining wealth and Wall Street folly, the Museum of Modern Art displays a waterfall cascading down an atrium in a high-rise apartment. Foreclosed Homeowners Inspire Museum's Architects Show: James S. Russell Bloomberg all 2 news articles
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Business/ Technology/ Featured/
ONEID:
charging them a fee--but our costs are lower than the fee that we charge. Kind of like a PayPal model, where some sites say 'we don't want our users to pay a fee, we want to make sure it's free for them so we'll pay you a fee.'" And here's the kicker that really makes the tech different--it doesn't involve a OneID username or password, in a traditional sense at the customer level. To share your identity, to authorize a site to log you in for example, OneID has a "personalization" service that Kirsch describes like a Twitter handle--you can pick a tag that's not your name, and so on, for convenience. All the secure technology handshaking between the login site and your ID then happens in the background. The proof in this pudding is in the eating, of course. We're pretty convinced many Net users would
love a simple one-click sign-in/ sign-out system that was simpler and yet more secure than a password/username combination, and that many folk are now convinced that passwords are insecure. But what OneID needs is for some high-profile sites to quickly embrace its offering, and to get its tech out there and accessed by millions of users-then it'll be proven a success. The firm's off to one good start, anyway--it was just now a finalist at the SXSW Interactive Accelerator for 2012. [Image: Flickr user M.Markus] Chat about this news with Kit Eaton on Twitter and Fast Company too.
Here Comes The Fed Stress Test Results...

Joe Weisenthal (Business Insider)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:14:43 PM
Kerrey Ad Reminds Voters He's From Nebraska

Michael Warren (The Weekly Standard)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:12:00 PM
A new TV ad from Democrat
At 4:30, the Fed will release its stress test results for the country's big banks. Remember, the banks are being tested against this nightmare scenario: The supervisory stress scenario for CCAR 2012, which was designed in November 2011, depicts a severe recession in the United States, including a peak unemployment rate of 13 percent, a 50 percent drop in equity prices, and a 21 percent decline in housing prices. The supervisory stress scenario is not the Federal Reserve's forecast for the economy, but was designed to represent an outcome that, while unlikely, may occur if the U.S economy were to experience a Bob Kerrey, who is running for deep recession at the same time his old Nebraska Senate seat, that economic activity in other welcomes the former senator major economies contracted significantly. home: The stress test results were supposed to come out at 4:30 PM
on Thursday, but JPMorgan seems to have jumped the gun and released their results early, causing the Fed to move up their numbers. We'll have the full release here when the numbers come out. Please follow Clusterstock on Twitter and Facebook. Join the conversation about this story See Also: REVEALED: More Details On
The Fed's Breathtaking $7.7 Trillion In Loans To Large Banks Here's The Real Scandal From The Fed's $7.77 Trillion Secret Lending To The Banks Dylan Ratigan And Eliot Spitzer Go Off On Secret Fed Loans, MF Global, And The Citigroup Settlement
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13 Management Secrets You Should Steal From Google (GOOG)

Matt Lynley (Business Insider)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:17:00 PM
Google is run by engineers, but it still needs a lot of people to manage the teams and make sure things are running smoothly. Enter the product managers a batch of executives that sits between the top brass and the teams for each product like Chrome or advertising. A few former Google product managers and engineers have chimed in on Quora about what makes a good product manager at the traditionally engineer-centric company. Since it's a company as well run as Google, you should probably take note a lot of them are just best practice for any tech company. Be ready to live near the corporate headquarters or visit it frequently The Google hive is based in Mountain View and that's where most of the executives and power sits. If you want to work remotely, you'll have to be ready to visit the corporate headquarters often. You're better off just moving there.
Take ownership of the product and all issues related to it Whatever product you are assigned to, it is entirely your responsibility. That means you should be going out of your way to make it perfect grilling engineers, checking for bugs and finding out what users think. "T his goes a long way, if you own the product, you are the first one looking for bugs, first communicating with users and
to be a software engineer just think like one. Be technical. "I don't mean that you actually need to be coding the product. I mean you should be curious about how the product is built as if you were an engineer. You should be interested in understanding how much something costs in engineering time, and why it costs so much." "What algorithms are in use for that feature? Why is this page slow? Any engineer on the team will pay a lot of attention to big architecture decisions that affect the product and so should you." See the rest of the story at Business Insider Please follow SAI on Twitter and first worrying about whether or Facebook. not you got it right. You're always See Also: first to volunteer to do the many Why Google Calls Its Awesome varied tasks that go along with Video Chat Feature 'Hangouts' running a product/team like taking THE GOOGLE INVESTOR: notes, sending emails to Big Developer Scrapping Android customers, filling things out, Due To Fragmentation triaging bugs, or doing a quick Google Fixed Chrome's mockup." $60,000 Security Problem In 24 Understand the nitty gritty details Hours of your product Google likes to employ engineers in just about every role. That doesn't necessarily mean you have
Housing Market Still Crashing, Says Leading Financial Newsletter Profit ... - Houston Chronicle
(housing - Google News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 9:19:01 AM
Housing Market Still Crashing, Says Leading Financial Newsletter Profit... Houston Chronicle While some analysts and economists are saying that the US housing market is getting better, Michael Lombardi, lead contributor to Profit Confidential, says it hasn't hit bottom yet. While some analysts and economists are saying that the US housing... and more
Syracuse's Fab Melo out with eligibility issue

(Sports News Headlines Yahoo! News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:14:07 PM
Syracuse sophomore center Fab Melo has been ruled ineligible for the NCAA tournament, another shot in a season full of them for the Orange.
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Business/ News Wire/ World News/
Affordable Housing Opportunities Richard O'Dwyer's to be Provided for 8 Iowans by mother says Iowa Finance ... - LoanSafe
(housing - Google News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:02:04 PM
Affordable Housing Opportunities to be Provided for 8 Iowans by Iowa Finance... LoanSafe The funding is made available
through the State Housing Trust Fund's Project-Based program, which provides financing for the development of affordable singlefamily and multifamily housing units. The State Housing Trust Fund's Project-Based Program... (Nation - Google News) and more
government has 'sold him down the river' as his ... - Daily Mail
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:52:41 PM
A Samsung Employee Claims Apple Is Working On A Mini iPad (AAPL)

Steve Kovach (Business Insider)
Epoch Times | National, World, China, Sports, Entertainment News

(Epoch Times | National, World, China, Sports, Entertainment News)
just be a prototype. Don't Miss: Details on the new iPad Apple didn't tell you Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:15:00 PM Please follow SAI: Tools on Quoting an anonymous Samsung Twitter and Facebook. employee, the Korea Times Join the conversation about this reports that Samsung will provide story Apple with 7-inch displays for a See Also: new mini iPad. You're Too Late! iPad Pre9to5 Mac found the Korea Times Orders Are SOLD OUT report. Here Are Some Details On The We've heard this rumor over and New iPad Apple Didn't Tell You over again. It's important to note All The Ridiculous Things that even if Samsung is making 7- People Are Saying About The inch displays for an Apple device, New iPad it doesn't mean Apple will release one to the public. It could easily
has warned corporate America not to use company funds to affect the outcome of the fall election. The federal government on Top Stories Monday blocked a new Texas law The Federal Reserve will release that requires voters to present results of its latest bank stress test government-issued identification later this week. It is expected that before voting in elections. In the most banks will show healthier law, Texas voters would have to balance sheets leading to profit show identification that they had [...] never had to show in the [...] Brutal assault on Syrias civilian This entry passed through the population but the world appears Full-Text RSS service if this is unable to do more than wring its your content and you're reading it hands. on someone else's site, please read A 1,000-foot-long unopened the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentsection of a high-speed railway in only/faq.php#publishers. Five Chinas Hubei province collapsed, Filters recommends: Donate to prompting concerns over safety. Wikileaks. A coalition of some of Americas most prominent advocacy groups
Daily Mail Richard O'Dwyer's mother says government has 'sold him down the river' as his... Daily Mail By Anthony Bond The mother of a student who is accused of infringing copyright laws claimed he is being 'sold down the river' by the Government after his extradition to the US was approved today. Sheffield Hallam University undergraduate Richard... British student Richard O'Dwyer 'sold down the river' as Home Secretary... The Independent Richard O'Dwyer case: TVShack creator's US extradition approved BBC News Home Secretary approves extradition of student Richard O'Dwyer over pirate TV... Telegraph.co.uk Metro- Reuters UK- WalesOnline all 144 news articles
News Wire/
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Will South Be Last Stand For 4-Way GOP Race?

(FOXNews.com)
nice folks, but they have not organized a campaign with a staff, the organization, the fund-raising Mar. 12, 2012: Republican capacity to actually beat Barack presidential candidate, former Obama. I have." Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney The contenders fanned out on greets supporters who braved the Monday across Mississippi and rain during a campaign stop at the Alabama, which have 37 and 47 Whistle Stop Cafe. delegates up for grabs, BILOXI, Miss The Republican r e s p e c t i v e l y . H a w a i i a n d presidential primary candidates American Samoa are also holding are preparing to add to their GOP caucuses on Tuesday. delegate totals Tuesday with two Gingrich, who acknowledges that big-ticket states in the South, he needs to win one of the where Rick Santorum and Newt Southern states, was spending the Gingrich need to excel to stay day in Alabama Tuesday, though competitive. Romney and Santorum were Mitt Romney, on the other hand, moving on to states holding future acknowledged he doesn't need to contests. win Alabama or Mississippi to Santorum has downplayed his stay in the nomination hunt even chances of winning, though he as he expressed confidence -- claimed once more that Romney backed by late polling -- that can't secure the support of e v a n g e l i c a l a n d s o c i a l l y conservatives, particularly conservative voters in the South evangelicals who are part of the think he's the one to win the party's key base. White House back from President "If the opportunity provides itself Obama. in an open convention, they're not "John McCain didn't win either of going to nominate a moderate t h e s e s t a t e s , A l a b a m a o r Massachusetts governor who has Mississippi," he told Fox News. been outspending his opponent 10 "We are delighted that we are -1 and can't win the election doing so well there. The polls are outright," Santorum said in a suggesting it is kind of a three- t e l e v i s i o n i n t e r v i e w a s h e way tie. It is an away game for campaigned across Alabama and me." Mississippi. Romney added that many in the Romney has more delegates than two Southern states are joining his his rivals combined, and is effort because "the other guys are amassing them at a rate that puts
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:22:31 PM
him on track to clinch control of the nomination before the convention opens in the summer, a prospect that his rivals prefer not to dwell on. AP's tally shows him with 454 of the 1,144 delegates needed to win the nomination, Santorum with 217, Gingrich with 107 and Ron Paul with 47. The Republican contenders pointed toward the next primaries as a pair of national polls indicated Obama's support has fallen after recent gains. A Washington Post-ABC News poll found that 46 percent of those surveyed approve the way the president is handling his job, and 50 percent disapprove. A New York Times/CBS poll found 41 percent approval, and 47 percent disapproval. Evangelical voters play an outsized role in both state primaries. Four years ago, 77 percent of GOP primary voters in Alabama and 69 percent in Mississippi said they were born again or evangelicals, a group that Romney has struggled to bring to his side in the primaries. His best showing in a contested primary was 38 percent in Florida. Hoping to establish a connection with Southerners, the former Massachusetts governor campaigned in Mobile, Ala., with comedian Jeff Foxworthy, whose
trademark jokes begin "You might be a redneck if. ..." Romney isn't -- he was born in Michigan, educated at Harvard and elected governor of Massachusetts. And he drew laughter from his audience when he poked fun at himself by saying he hoped to go hunting with an Alabama friend who "can actually show me which end of the rifle to point." "We have a moral responsibility not to spend more than we take in," he says in an ad his campaign ran in both primary states, although not all the commercials were as self-deprecating as his rhetoric or as positive as his on-air message. Primary Coverage: Track the Results in Real-Time: Mississippi| Alabama Restore Our Future, a super PAC that supports Romney, aired ads critical of Santorum for having voted in Congress to provide federal funding for Planned Parenthood, and attacking Gingrich for supporting action to combat climate change through cleaner sources of energy. A radio ad the group aired across both states makes use of Santorum's own voice, including him saying in a debate last month that he was proud of the earmarks he has supported and that he had voted for federal education
mandates even though they are against his principles. "But you know, when you're part of the team, sometimes you take one for the team," he says. The same organization hit Santorum in mail sent to thousands of homes in Alabama. "Rick Santorum voted with Hillary Clinton to allow felons to vote. Typical behavior from Washington insider," says one mailing, which makes no mention of Romney. Red, White and Blue Fund, which backs Santorum, was hardly kinder. It aired commercials saying that Romney and Obama "aren't much different" on key issues such as federal spending and supporting a requirement for individuals to purchase health care coverage. That's a reference to a Massachusetts law that Romney signed in his home state that bears similarities to the legislation Obama won from Congress. Gingrich, who said over the weekend that Romney is the weakest Republican front-runner in nearly a century, is backed by a super PAC airing ads, as well. His campaign is advertising at lower levels, including a commercial that hits Obama for high gas prices and another that WILL page 24
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News Wire/
Afghan government team attacked, Taliban fume over massacre

(Reuters: Top News)
for the exit of most foreign combat troops. "The Islamic Emirate once again By Rob Taylor and Mirwais warns the American animals that Harooni the mujahideen will avenge them, KABUL| Tue Mar 13, 2012 and with the help of Allah will 2:48pm EDT kill and behead your sadistic (Reuters) - Suspected insurgents murderous soldiers," Taliban opened fire on Tuesday on senior spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid Afghan investigators of the said in a statement, using the term massacre of 16 civilians by a lone by which the Islamist group U.S. soldier, Afghan officials describes itself. said, just hours after the Taliban The grim warning, which was threatened to behead American unlikely to have any impact on troops to avenge the killings. heavily-protected NATO soldiers The gunmen shot from long on the ground, followed the range at two of President Hamid February beheading of four Karzai's brothers, Shah Wali Afghan men by insurgents in a Karzai and Abdul Qayum Karzai, country where such killings are and security officials at the site of relatively rare. the massacre in Kandahar's Tuesday's attack, which was Panjwai district. carried out despite tight security Karzai's brothers were unharmed a r o u n d K a r z a i ' s s i b l i n g s , in the brief battle, which began Kandahar governor Tooryalai during meetings with local people Wesa and Tribal Affairs Minister at a mosque near Najiban and Asadullah Khalid, underscored Alekozai villages, but a soldier the insurgents' ability to strike at w a s k i l l e d a n d a c i v i l i a n fledgling Afghan government wounded. The area is a Taliban forces. stronghold and a supply route. The first protests over Sunday's T h e T a l i b a n h a d e a r l i e r massacre also broke out in eastern threatened reprisals for the city Jalalabad, where around weekend shooting spree, which 2,000 demonstrators chanted came weeks after deadly riots " D e a t h t o A m e r i c a " a n d across the country over the demanded President Karzai reject burning of copies of the Koran by a planned strategic pact with U.S. troops at NATO's main base Washington that would allow U.S. in the country. That violence led advisers and possibly special to calls to accelerate a 2014 goal forces to remain in Afghanistan
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:48:12 PM
beyond 2014. An unnamed U.S. soldier -reported to have only recently arrived in the country -- is accused of walking off his base in Kandahar province in the middle of the night and gunning down at least 16 villagers, mostly women and children. A U.S. official said the accused soldier had suffered a traumatic brain injury while on a previous deployment in Iraq. U.S. President Barack Obama, speaking after a phone call with Karzai -- who is said to be furious over the latest deaths -- said the shootings had only increased his determination to get American troops out of Afghanistan as planned. However, Obama cautioned there should not be a "rush to the exits" for U.S. forces who have been fighting in Afghanistan since late 2001 and that the drawdown set for the end of 2014 should be done in a responsible way. The soldier, from a conventional unit, was based at a joint U.S.Afghan base used by elite U.S. troops under a so-called village support program hailed by NATO as a possible model for U.S. involvement in the country after the 2014 drawdown. Such bases provide support to local Afghan security units and provide a source of security
advice and training, as well as anti -insurgent backup and intelligence. "CAN NO LONGER BE CALLED ROGUE" A spokesman for the Kandahar governor Wesa said tribal elders in the area of the massacre would urge against protests and work to dampen public anger if the investigation process was transparent. "They are supporting the government and will accept any conclusion by the investigators. Today we have meetings with people in the area and all will become clear," spokesman Ahmad Jawid Faisal said. NATO officials said it was too early to tell if the U.S. soldier would be tried in the United States or Afghanistan if investigators were to find enough evidence to charge him, but he would be under U.S. laws and procedures under an agreement between U.S. and Afghan officials. Typically, once the initial investigation is completed, prosecutors decide if they have enough evidence to file charges and then could move to an Article 32 or court martial hearing. NATO's top commander in Afghanistan, Marine General John Allen, has promised a rapid investigation of the massacre,
while security was being reviewed at NATO bases across the country. U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Monday that the death penalty could be sought in the U.S. military justice system against the soldier, but portrayed the shooting as an isolated event that would not alter withdrawal plans. While Afghan MPs in parliament called for a trial under Afghan law, Karzai's office was understood to accept that a trial in a U.S. court would be acceptable provided the process was transparent and open to media. Afghan MPs protested against the shooting for a second day in the capital Kabul by walking out of a session. Analysts said the incident would complicate U.S. efforts to reach agreement with the Afghan government on a post-2014 security pact before a May summit in the U.S. city of Chicago on the future size and funding of Afghan security forces. Thomas Ruttig of the Afghanistan Analysts Network said that despite NATO and White House references to the killings as the work of a "rogue" soldier, similar events had happened before, including a "kill AFGHAN page 23
News Wire/
21
Violence across Syria; soldiers killed in ambushes

(Reuters: Top News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:05:01 PM
By Oliver Holmes and Erika Solomon BEIRUT| Tue Mar 13, 2012 3:05pm EDT (Reuters) - Syrian government forces killed dozens of people in the northern city of Idlib, dumping their bodies in a mosque, while some 22 soldiers died in two separate rebel ambushes, opposition activists said on Tuesday. The army intensified its assault on the Idlib province near the Turkish border, intermittently shelling built-up areas and spraying houses with machinegun fire in a bid to dislodge antigovernment fighters. Clashes were also reported in the eastern city of Deir al-Zor and security forces shelled Syria's third largest city, Homs, as the year-long uprising against President Bashar al-Assad's authoritarian rule increasingly resembles a civil war. The United Nations says more than 8,000 people have died in the uprising and its refugee agency said on Tuesday that some 230,000 Syrians had fled their homes during the past 12 months, of whom around 30,000 have sought safety abroad. In an apparent bid to deter the
exodus, Syrian forces have laid landmines near its borders with Lebanon and Turkey, along routes used by refugees to escape the mayhem, advocacy group Human Rights Watch said. Speaking after meeting opponents of Assad in Turkey, U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan said he was expecting to hear later on Tuesday the response from Syria to "concrete proposals" he had made to end the escalating violence. By evening, there was no word on an answer, although the Syrian parliament said Assad had ordered a legislative election for May 7. It will be held under a new constitution, approved by a referendum last month which the opposition and their Western and Arab backers dismissed as a sham. Both Russia and China have welcomed Assad's reform pledges, including the promised election, and have blocked moves in the United Nations to censure the Syrian leader. But the U.S. State Department was dismissive of the plan: "Parliamentary elections for a rubber-stamp parliament in the middle of the kind of violence that we're seeing across the country? It's ridiculous," spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said. STREWN BODIES
Following a brutal crackdown in the central city of Homs, the army has intensified its operations in the north and has been shelling the town of Idlib for the past three days. An activist in the town, speaking by telephone, said security forces had killed more than 20 people trying to leave the area in the past two days and dumped their bodies in al-Bilal mosque. When locals went to inspect the corpses, they too came under fire, pushing the death toll above 50, he said. Another activist gave a slightly lower death toll. "When people came from the neighborhood early this morning, the security forces also started firing at them. In total, about 45 people were massacred," said the man, who like many in Syria gave only his first name, Mohammed, for fear of reprisals. Reports from Syria cannot be independently verified as the authorities deny access to rights groups and journalists. Video footage showed the bodies of several unidentified men strewn on the floor of the mosque. An unseen voice said it was impossible to move them due to heavy shelling. Army defectors killed at least 10 soldiers in an ambush in Idlib region, while rebels also killed 12 members of the security forces in
the southern town of Deraa, according to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Following meetings with Assad at the weekend in Damascus, former U.N. chief Annan held talks in Ankara with the Syrian National Council (SNC) - a fractious assortment of Assad opponents whose leadership lives abroad. "I am expecting to hear from the Syrian authorities today, since I left some concrete proposals for them to consider," Annan told a subsequent news conference. "Once I receive their answer we will know how to react." Annan has not disclosed what his proposals entailed, but a diplomatic source said the U.N. envoy had told Assad he wanted an immediate cessation of hostilities, humanitarian access to the conflict zones and political dialogue. SNC leader Burhan Ghalioun said the aim remained to secure a political and diplomatic solution, otherwise foreign governments would deliver on promises to supply weapons to rebel forces. Sunni Muslim Saudi Arabia and Qatar have called for arms to be sent to help in the fight Assad, who is a member of the minority Alawite sect and is allied to Shi'ite Iran.
However, the SNC is deeply divided, as resignations from the council showed. Haitham alMaleh, a former judge and veteran dissident, quit the SNC and another opposition leader, Kamal al-Labwani, said he too was preparing to resign. "There is a lot of chaos in the group and not a lot of clarity over what they can accomplish right now," Maleh told Reuters in explaining his resignation from the SNC. "We have not gotten very far in working to arm the rebels." Syria lies in a pivotal position, bordering Turkey, Jordan, Israel, Iraq and Lebanon. Its 23-million population comprises a mix of faiths, sects and ethnic groups, and analysts say the gathering conflict could destabilize the entire region. While the rebels have only light weapons, the army has repeatedly used tanks, mortars and artillery. "I have heard shelling in the Old City since 8 this morning," one activist in Homs told Reuters. "There is gunfire everywhere," he added, asking to be referred to only as Sami. Human Rights Watch said antipersonnel and anti-vehicle mines of Russian origin had been found near Syria's borders, with VIOLENCE page 24
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News Wire/
TV Show Criticized Over Image of IranianAmericans

(FOXNews.com)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:22:31 PM
Theyre rich. Theyre spoiled. Theyre Persian. Which means Bravos latest reality endeavor, The Shahs of Sunset, has Iranian-Americans up in arms over the stereotypes they claim it perpetuates. So much so, in fact, that petitions are circulating in Iranian communities to have the show yanked off the air. The program, which premiered on Sunday night, follows a group of six Persian-American socialites in Los Angeles as they navigate love and life with what seems like bottomless checking accounts. They are the children of the Iranians who escaped their country after the 1979 Iranian Revolution ended the reign of the Shah Reza Pahlavi. The show is produced by Ryan Seacrest, who is also the executive producer of Keeping up with the Kardashians, and the various spin-offs of that venerable series. Several petitions to halt the show have been circulated around the Persian-American community. One of them, Protest Shahs of Sunset, encourages signers to help the Persian community by signing this petition to end 'Shahs of Sunset' and other such racist,
exploiting television programming. Another, which has collected 500 signatures on Change.org, argues that the show promotes racial stereotypes. One signer of that petition, Shepard Jacobson, commented: The show wants to present caricatures of IranianAmericans. This is not
entertaining. Rather, it is racist and only encourages others who do not know Persians in our American society to feed into the worst kind of stereotype, rather than showing a new generation of ambitious yet hardworking Iranian-Americans. The shows focus does seem to be on the characters' frivolous
sides. Golnesa 'GG' Gharachedaghi, who is being heralded as the next Kim Kardashian, is a 30-year-old trust fund baby who uses her fathers credit card to buy designer clothing and vehemently argues on the first episode that she does not like ugly people. "Charge it to my Daddy" is one of
her favorite sayings, and could end up being the series' tagline. During the first episode she also adds, 'I am 30 years old, and my only paycheck is from my Daddy. GG nearly comes to blows with fellow cast member Asa Soltan SHOW page 24
News Wire/ Sports/
23
Fed holds steady course, offers few clues on future
AFGHAN
team" apprehended in Kandahar in 2010. "In the stress of an environment of escalated violence - by both sides, but particularly after Obama's troop surge in early (Reuters: Top News) remains elevated," the central 2008 and has bought $2.3 trillion Analysts are looking to the Fed's 2009, it looks as if most soldiers bank said in a statement after a i n b o n d s t o b o o s t g r o w t h . two-day meetings in April and Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:58:29 PM simply see Afghanistan as a one-day meeting. Financial markets are trying to June for decisions about any new Federal Reserve Chairman Ben U.S. stocks held gains, the dollar gauge whether policymakers may directions for policy. At both whole as 'enemy territory' and Bernanke testifies before the hit a fresh 11-month high against take fresh steps to stimulate the meetings, Bernanke will hold a every Afghan as a potential terrorist. This can no longer be Senate Banking Housing and the yen and prices for U.S. economy in coming months. news conference and officials will called 'rogue'," Ruttig said. Urban Affairs committee in government bonds slipped after EASING AHEAD? make public updated economic (Additional reporting by Jack Washington March 1, 2012. the statement was released. A quickening in the pace of jobs and interest rate projections. Kimball; Editing by Daniel Credit: Reuters/Gary Cameron "They recognize employment is growth and a sharp drop in the Most economists think the By Mark Felsenthal and Pedro da getting better but still has room to unemployment rate to 8.3 percent economy will expand at about a 2 Magnowski) This entry passed through the Costa improve and inflation may be a from 9.1 percent in August has percent annual rate in the first Full-Text RSS service if this is WASHINGTON| Tue Mar 13, little higher ... but longer term led some analysts to rein in their quarter. Fed Chairman Ben your content and you're reading it 2012 2:58pm EDT inflation is to remain stable," said expectations for a further easing Bernanke said in January it would on someone else's site, please read (Reuters) - The Federal Reserve Greg Michalowski, chief currency of monetary policy. normally take a growth pace of the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contenton Tuesday provided few clues on analyst at FXDD in New York. A report on Tuesday showed between 2 percent and 2.5 percent the prospects for further monetary As widely expected, the Fed retail sales posted their largest just to hold the jobless rate steady. only/faq.php#publishers. Five easing, offering just a slight reiterated its expectation that gain in five months in February, While the economic recovery is Filters recommends: Donate to upgrade to its economic outlook overnight interest rates would the latest data to suggest the nearly three years old, officials Wikileaks. while restating concerns about the remain near zero until at least economic recovery is on a more lament that the United States is high level of unemployment. through late 2014 and that it solid footing. still far from full employment. The central bank said it expects would continue its program to Even so, Fed officials are Although the jobless rate has "moderate" growth over coming reweight its portfolio toward uncertain whether the progress fallen significantly over the last quarters with the unemployment longer-term securities. That reducing unemployment can be six months, it remains stubbornly rate declining gradually; in program, known as "Operation maintained given still-sluggish high. January, it said it expected Twist," expires at the end of June. economic growth, and many (Editing by Andrea Ricci and Tim "modest" growth. Richmond Federal Reserve Bank economists believe the central Ahmann) It also said a recent spike in President Jeffrey Lacker dissented bank will launch another round of This entry passed through the energy costs would likely push up against the decision because he bond buying later in the year. Full-Text RSS service if this is (Sports News Headlines inflation, but only temporarily. d i d n o t e x p e c t e c o n o m i c In a poll on Friday of firms that your content and you're reading it Yahoo! News) Over a longer stretch, the Fed said conditions to warrant ultra-low trade directly with the Fed, 14 of on someone else's site, please read inflation would likely run at or rates until late 2014. In January, 18 economists anticipated further the FAQ at fivefilters.org/content- Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:13:16 PM below the its 2 percent target. he had dissented against the quantitative easing. That survey only/faq.php#publishers. Five Glen Rice Jr. was kicked off the "Labor market conditions have decision to offer a time frame for was taken after the government Filters recommends: Donate to Georgia Tech basketball team i m p r o v e d f u r t h e r ; t h e the first expected rate hike. said the economy created more Wikileaks. Tuesday, less than a week after a unemployment rate has declined The Fed cut overnight interest than 200,000 jobs for the third shooting incident outside an notably in recent months but rates to near zero in December month running in February. Atlanta nightclub led to criminal charges.
Ga. Tech's Rice kicked off team after shooting
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SHOW
WILL
Rahmati when Asa accuses GG of wearing clothes bought at H&M. The horror. It was comments and scenes like those that caused some viewers to take to Bravos official message board to complain about the show after it aired on Sunday night. Due to the current political climate between the United States and factions in the Middle East, I cannot see the benefit of this show, wrote one viewer. I think it is rather tasteless of you to show how the rich from the Middle East can settle here to continue their lives of opulence where there are still many who still struggle to continue with their daily lives, here and there. Another viewer commented that the show was insulting to the Persian-American community. It's a shame that the premise of this show is specifically geared as a representation of Persian culture. There's not an ounce of humility and even general human decency shown here. And quite frankly, it's embarrassing to watch. I could understand how this could stereotype people from this background in a real negative
way. I found myself really disliking these people by the end of the show. Not everyone agrees. "Shahs" cast member Mike Shouhed, a 33year-old former high roller in the Las Vegas real estate market who claims to be looking for a woman he can bring home to his mother, told Fox411 that all of the petition makers and the haters on the message boards are simply jealous. The only reason people are petitioning is that they are 100 percent jealous that they arent on the show. All we are doing is hanging out and being ourselves, Shouhed said. People are intrigued to learn more about our culture instead of automatically associating us with negative portrayals like terrorism. It humanizes us in a way." Despite the pilot proving to be more Jersey Shore meets The Real Housewives than a PBS documentary on how Persians live their lives in the States, some Persian-American advocates agree with Shouhed that good can come out of the show. A lot of the Iranian-American
community is upset because the show does hype up negative stereotypes. You see materialism and superficiality at its worst, says Nomar Elmi, the director of community outreach for the National Iranian American Council in Washington, D.C. But the silver lining for me is that it will get people talking. Usually we are depicted as terrorists from the axis of evil. At least this is another side to the community. It isnt the most positive or accurate, but it will get the American public talking. A rep for Bravo didn't respond immediately to a request for comment. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
VIOLENCE
indications they had been planted by the army this year. Syria, like Russia, the United States and over 30 other states, has not signed up to a global ban on landmines. "Any use of anti-personnel landmines is unconscionable,"
said Steve Goose, Arms Division director at HRW. (Writing by Crispian Balmer; Editing by Alastair Macdonald) This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read
says the president modeled his health care reform plan after the one Romney had enacted in Massachusetts. The former House speaker also is using a recorded phone message from Chuck Norris in Alabama. "As president, Newt will repeal Obamacare, get rid of Obama's czars, and use commonsense measures, like building the Keystone Pipeline to lower the cost of gas to two and half dollars a gallon," says Norris, whose website notes he is a movie star and World Professional Middle Weight Karate Champion. Santorum and Gingrich employed different approaches as they campaigned -- the former Pennsylvania senator more critical of Romney, while the former House speaker focused his attacks on Obama. Romney made the economy his text for criticizing Obama. He said the president wrongly thinks the country is doing better because of recent increases in employment. More than 200,000 jobs have been created in each of the past three months, but Romney said the president, "should go out and talk to the 24 million Americans who are out of work or stopped looking for work or are unemployed." Are you voting in the Alabama and Mississippi primaries? Send us photos of the crowds around the polls -- and we may feature them on-air!
The Associated Press contributed to this report. Related Stories uReport: Are you voting in the Alabama and Mississippi primaries? Send us photos and videos of you at the polls! Gingrich Takes His Stand in Dixieland Hawaii Republicans to vote in first ever GOP caucuses Mississippi Primary Coverage: Track the Results in Real-Time Alabama Primary Coverage: Track the Results in Real-Time Related Video GOP candidates' southern strategies Who will win big in Alabama, Mississippi? Related Video Southern states Gingrich's last chance? 2012 candidate weighs in on primaries Related Video Dixie Primary Day! Chris Stirewalt breaks down the Mississippi and Alabama primaries at the big board. Related Video Who will win big in the South? All-Star panel previews next GOP primaries This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
News Wire/ Technology/ World News/
25
Nike Sees Red From Irish Over 'Black and Tan' Shoes
(FOXNews.com)
Supreme Court stays seizure of Kripa's assets Times of India

(Nation - Google News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:04:44 PM
using a phrase that can be viewed as inappropriate and insensitive." Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:22:31 PM "We apologize," the statement In a statement to FoxNews.com, continued. "No offense was representatives at Nike said the intended." sneakers, which are dubbed by the The Irish Times has noted that company as the Nike SB Dunk the sneakers are being advertised Low, have been "unofficially with the controversial moniker by named by some using a phrase several online sellers. In 2006, ice that can be viewed as cream purveyors Ben & Jerry's inappropriate and insensitive." made a similar gaffe when it Sneaker giant Nike is released a "Black and Tan" flavor backtracking after a St. Patrick's and later apologized to Irish Day-themed shoe dubbed the consumers, according to the "Black and Tan" by retailers drew newspaper. criticism for paying unwitting 1920s for its attacks on Irish Reform, told IrishCentral.com FoxNews.com's Joshua Rhett homage to the British paramilitary civilians during the War of t h a t t h e c h o i c e l e f t h i m Miller contributed to this report. Independence. speechless, saying the American This entry passed through the forces of Northern Ireland. One advertisement for the shoe, equivalent would be calling a Full-Text RSS service if this is The black leather sneaker with brown trim earned an unofficial which sells for $90, says: "Tis the sneaker "the Al Qaeda." your content and you're reading it name apparently meant as a nod season for Irish beer and why not Staunton asks: Is there no one at on someone else's site, please read to the drink made by mixing stout celebrate with Nike. The Black Nike able to Google Black and the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contenta n d l a g e r i n a p i n t g l a s s , and Tan sneaker takes inspiration Tan?" only/faq.php#publishers. Five a c c o r d i n g t o t h e B e l f a s t for the fine balancing act of a In a statement to FoxNews.com, Filters recommends: Donate to Telegraph. But the drink itself Stout (Guinness) on top a Pale Nike officials said the sneakers, Wikileaks. officially called the Nike SB takes its name from the Royal Ale (Harp) in a pint glass." Ciaran Staunton, president of the D u n k L o w , h a v e b e e n Irish Constabulary Reserve Force, which became notorious in the Irish Lobby for Immigration "unofficially named by some
NDTV Supreme Court stays seizure of Kripa's assets Times of India NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday took charge of the probe into the alleged disproportionate assets of former Mumbai Congress chief Kripashankar Singh and his family members by asking Mumbai Police to file a status report before it. Kripashankar assets won't be attached, but probe on Hindustan Times SC refuses to stay probe against Kripashankar Indian Express Apex court nod for Kripa probe, assets get breather Daily Pioneer The Hindu- NDTVIBNLive.com all 24 news articles
Google updates Google+ mobile UI

Kelly Hodgkins (TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:00:00 PM
The Google+ mobile website is easier on the eyes thanks to a redesign Google rolled out on
Monday. The new UI is available on any mobile device, including the iPad which still does not have a native client. Comments on the redesign suggest the web UI improves performance on the tablet device, but it still lacks key
features like hangout support and
image uploading. If you're an iPad owner and browse Google+ on your tablet, check out the new mobile UI and let us know what you think. Google updates Google+ mobile UI originally appeared on TUAW
- The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Tue, 13 Mar 2012 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Source| Permalink| Email this| Comments
26
World News/ Technology/ Sports/
Strategic Posture Review: Global Insights: India, Iran and the Japan
(World Politics Review: Articles)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 9:11:00 AM
brought energy security to the fore as the country scrambles to find alternative sources amid As an advanced industrialized public anxiety about the safety of democracy and the worlds third- nuclear power. Japans strategic largest economy, Japan is well- posture in the region and beyond positioned to help shape the d e p e n d s f u n d a m e n t a l l y o n e c o n o m i c , s e c u r i t y a n d whether political leaders can institutional architecture of the devise a plan for sustainable A s i a - P a c i f i c a s t h e r e g i o n growth. increasingly becomes the center As Japan focuses on the urgent of gravity in the international need for a growth strategy, it also system. Yet this island nation is remains attuned to an external beset by several challenges, security environment that presents including anemic economic a range of challenges that could growth, public debt, an aging affect its national security. These population, a declining birthrate include instability on the Korean and political paralysis that could Peninsula, nuclear proliferation, complicate efforts to sustain its the opaque nature of Chinas strategic and diplomatic weight. military buildup, territorial The earthquake and tsunami of disputes, piracy and terrorism. March 11, 2011, illuminated some Japanese defense policy continues of these challenges, and the to evolve in response to changes subsequent nuclear disaster in the international security
environment, but a sluggish economy and ongoing political debates about the role of the SelfDefense Forces (SDF) could continue to put downward pressure on defense spending and render security strategies insufficiently resourced. Furthering joint capabilities under the rubric of its security alliance with the United States and fostering relationships with new partners are priorities for Japan in this period of fiscal stringency. ... This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Limits of Sanctions
Submitted at 3/13/2012 7:31:00 AM
Tablet Magazine Launches - The 'Toronto Tempest' Set to Release BiMonthly Issues on the iPad (TrendHunter.com)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:39:03 PM
possesses nuclear warheads and long-range ballistic missiles represents a plausible military A major Indian trade mission is threat to the latter group. But for in Iran seeking to exploit Tehrans India, China, Russia and many i n c r e a s i n g d i p l o m a t i c a n d other non-Western countries, an commercial isolation to rectify Iranian attack on their own Indias trade imbalance with Iran. countries remains a remote But while Indian companies are contingency. From New Delhis understandably eager to take perspective, for instance, a a d v a n t a g e o f t h e r e s u l t i n g nuclear-armed Iran would pale as commercial opportunities, the a threat compared to Chinas Indian government must soothe growing military power and U . S . , I s r a e l i a n d E u r o p e a n Pakistans nuclear arsenal. Like concerns that Indian firms will America and its allies, India fears simply undercut international nuclear terrorism, but New Delhi s a n c t i o n s a g a i n s t I r a n b y sees this danger as emanating backfilling Western companies from Pakistans militants, rather currently departing the country. than from Irans Revolutionary Indias behavior highlights a Guards. ... major problem with the Iran This entry passed through the sanctions regime: Many countries Full-Text RSS service if this is face a different set of calculations your content and you're reading it with regard to Iran than the on someone else's site, please read United States, Israel and the the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentEuropean and Persian Gulf only/faq.php#publishers. Five governments that support the Filters recommends: Donate to sanctions on Tehran. An Iran that Wikileaks.
( TrendHunter.com) Editor and Publisher Simon Wallace has launched Toronto's first iPad
magazine. Exclusively available to tablet users, the 'Toronto Tempest' is revolutionizing the delivery of online publication, and will...
Suspended Broncos players fighting back

(Sports News Headlines Yahoo! News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:07:08 PM
Two Denver Broncos players are
suing the NFL to overturn their drug suspensions, saying the league violated protocol in collecting urine samples from linebacker D.J. Williams and
defensive lineman Ryan McBean, and then refused to clear the players even after the collector was fired.
World News/
27
Iran's Parliamentary Rebel bid to kill Elections: Don't Believe Health Bill fails - The the Ayatollahs' Spin Press Association
Submitted at 3/13/2012 7:33:00 AM
Schoolgirl, 12, Dies After Being Hit By Ball - Sky News

Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:46:44 PM
When results began to emerge from Irans March 2 parliamentary elections, the ayatollahs, their cohorts and the news outlets they control were quick to herald a resounding victory for the principles of velayat-e faqih, or governance by the Islamic jurist, the doctrine that puts Irans religious leadership at the top of the political hierarchy. Western media followed suit, declaring a solid victory for factions supporting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei by lumping together all Islamic parties that had gained parliamentary seats.
Yet, jumping to such conclusions simply reinforces what Irans fundamentalists want their own public and the West to believe, at the expense of a more nuanced understanding of the elections outcome. In fact, the results are more complicated and less favorable for the ayatollahs than they claim, as are its likely impacts on Irans internal and international affairs. ... This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Andrew George, called for the... NHS reforms: Lib Dem divisions Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:00:00 PM resurface as bill returns to Telegraph.co.uk parliament The Guardian Rebel bid to kill Health Bill fails Doctors give up fight with The Press Association Government over NHS reforms The Government has seen off a The Independent rebel Liberal Democrat bid to kill NHS bill: Lords and MPs off controversial health reforms. debating healthcare shake-up The move, which had the support BBC News of the Labour front bench, was Morning Star Online- Daily Mail defeated by 314 votes to 260, all 158 news articles majority 54. The rebel leader,
India non-committal on UN resolution - Deccan Herald

Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:13:38 PM
Sky News Schoolgirl, 12, Dies After Being Hit By Ball Sky News A 12-year-old girl has died after being struck by a rugby ball at a school in Basildon, Essex, the East of England Ambulance Service has said. Leonie Nice was catching the ball during a lesson at Woodlands Comprehensive School in Takely End when she... Schoolgirl dies after being hit by rugby ball The Guardian Girl, 12, dies after being struck in the chest by a rugby ball at school Daily Mail Girl, 12, dies after being hit by ball at Essex school BBC News Belfast Telegraph- The Sun all 91 news articles
Independent Online India non-committal on UN resolution Deccan Herald
Notwithstanding an uproar in Parliament over allegations of brutality by the Sri Lankan Army during its 2009 offensive against Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, New Delhi on Tuesday remained non-committal on supporting a
proposed resolution in United... PM writes to Jaya, Karuna, says trying to find way forward Hindustan Times Uproar over Sri Lanka resolution Daily Pioneer Government undecided on UN
resolution on Sri Lanka Livemint GreaterKashmir.com- Indian Express- Washington Post all 742 news articles
28
World News/ Technology/
Gangrape case Cubbyhouse blood Fly Or Die: The LG cracked, 5 held - may be murdered Spectrum Hindustan Times child's - Ninemsn
Jordan Crook (TechCrunch)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:19:12 PM
worker in Gurgaon were arrested on Tuesday. Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:52:40 PM Five held, two still on the run Hindustan Times Daily Pioneer Gangrape case cracked, 5 held Another working woman Hindustan Times gangraped in Gurgaon Times of Sahara Mall at MG road in India Gurgaon. A 23-year-old girl Another rape in Gurgaon in less working in a pub at the mall was than 48 hours! Firstpost allegedly gang-raped by six men. SamayLive- NDTV HT/Manoj Kumar Five of the all 76 news articles seven men who allegedly abducted and gangraped a pub
the ground inside the playground cubbyhouse in late January. Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:01:25 PM Pool of blood in school cubby a NEWS.com.au possible homicide ABC Online Cubbyhouse blood may be Police renew appeal for help over murdered child's human blood in playground The Ninemsn Daily Telegraph Blood found inside a school Cubby house blood may be c u b b y h o u s e i n S y d n e y ' s murdered child BigPond News southwest may have come from a Courier Mail murdered child, police believe. all 113 news articles Teachers at Riverwood Public School found the blood pooled on
Man found dead as Baby found dead in house goes up in washing machine flames - The Age ABC Online
(Nation - Google News) (Nation - Google News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:58:24 PM
Man found dead as house goes up in flames The Age The man, who is yet to be formally identified, was found dead in the Melton South home by emergency services who were
called to the house fire before 2am. A 48-year-old man who was also inside the home managed to escape the blaze without injury. Man dies in Melbourne house fire NEWS.com.au Man found dead after house fire at Melton South Herald Sun all 18 news articles
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:51:53 PM
Baby found dead in washing machine ABC Online Police are investigating the death of a baby found in a washing machine at a house on Brisbane's
northside in January this year. The baby's body was found in a Bald Hills home on Australia Day, but until now police had not released any details. Dead infant found in washing machine Lithgow Mercury all 129 news articles
The Spectrum has been a busy little diva the last few days, strutting in and out of our NYC studio like she belongs there. So much in fact, that Ive given her a gender and started to refer to her in gender-specific pronouns. A scary thought, to say the least. Matt seems less perturbed by her presence, though I was (and still am) more than willing to duke it out with home over the value of this here phone. Heres the deal: The LG Spectrum has solid specs 4G LTE, 4.5-inch 720p TrueHD display, 1.5GHz dual-core processor, and a solid little 8megapixel camera all at a reasonable $200 price (on contract, of course). It also happens to look and feel cheap. This is my main beef with the phone, and to me it was a dealbreaker. Matt, on the other hand, sees potential in the Spectrum, viewing the price-point and the specs as a winning combo (despite the fact that its likely to be the ugliest phone in the store). But is that enough to stake his word on it and give it a Fly?
Technology/
29
Onesheet On-The-Go: Music Service Now Lets Artists Connect With Fans Across Mobile Devices
Rip Empson (TechCrunch)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:03:16 PM
If youre in a band and you dont know Onesheet, you should check it out. For those unfamiliar, Onesheet is, as its name would suggest, a one-page dossier for bands. We originally referred to(and have continued referring to) Onesheet as the About.me for bands/musicians, but that analogy is annoying in the way all tech media analogies are shortsighted and also because it just doesnt really fit anymore. Case-in-point: Onesheet is today taking its show on the road, or more specifically, is translating its web experience into those small, mobile screens to give bands an opportunity to connect with their fans on-the-go. Originally, Onesheet started off where bands can create aggregated, customizable profiles, verifying their identities through Facebook or Twitter to connect with third party services like Soundcloud, Bandcamp and ReverbNation along with requisite social media services like Posterous, Tumblr and YouTube. Then, in January, Onesheet Founder Brenden Mulligan opened the site up to the
whole entertainment industry so that filmmakers, actors, TV shows, movies, comedians, etc. could get in on the action. He also added some more internal management, recruiting employees who cut their teeth at Digg, Columbia Records, RootMusic, MySpace, Warner/ Chappell, and Groupon, and integrated a full suite of iTunes/ AppStore/iBookstore widgets to that any user could sell music, video, apps, and books directly from Onesheet. Seeing as nearly every user on Onesheet has sold/is selling digital goods through one of those stores, that was a big step. Whats more, if being a finalist for a Crunchie Award isnt enough validation, in less than eight months, Onesheet has attracted 25K entertainment professionals, with the latest big artist to sign up being Michelle Branch. Since relaunching in January, the user engagement per page (time on site and clicks) has doubled, Mulligan says. And Onesheet users now collectively have over 200 million fans on Facebook and Twitter. Meaningless vanity metrics aside, its true that the one big area where Onesheet has been
underperforming (besides the ability to get bands signed, of course) has been mobile. So, today, the startup is rolled out its pilot program for Onesheet Mobile, which basically means that the team has optimized the sites experience for mobile devices. Sign up for Onesheet Mobile, and the service automatically generates a branded mobile app; but, importantly for musicians, thats where the work ends. Theres no app to download; everyone who visits your page on a mobile device will see it. Whats more, if a visitor saves your page to their homescreen, it creates a mobile icon with your image, and when they launch the app, their screen is filled with your background image as the app loads. The one problem with Onesheets mobile experience is that some of the widgets the desktop site employs wont render on a mobile device, either because of their size or because they use flash, which means that those widgets will be grey-ed out. This is partly due to the lack of cross-platform flexibility on the part of the third-party companies themselves, partly due to the fact that Onesheet hasnt had time to optimize all of them yet, though
Mulligan said that theyre currently working with their partners to provide that content in a more mobile friendly way, which will be fixed on a rolling basis over the next few months. Onesheet Mobile is a premium feature offered as part of the sites premium, Pro Package, which will run you just under $5 per month. During the pilot, Onesheet has enabled all of its users to access their mobile-friendly pages for the remainder of the March. After that, youll have to cough up that five-spot. So, there it is. Onesheet is beginning to connect the dots on mobile. For now, Onesheet is focusing its mobile offering on bands, but it will no doubt next be bringing mobile to the rest of the entertainment industry in the near future. As to whats next, after it nails mobile, Onesheet is going to focus on working with creatives to optimize their pages, helping them to answer questions like, what can I do to attract more fans, or increase engagement? Onesheet will also be honing in on metrics and providing bands with a better picture of how visitors are interacting with the different features of their pages.
Obviously, offering bands the opportunity to give their fans and followers a more seamless experience across platforms is huge, with mobile engagement becoming an increasingly important part of every business (let alone bands) strategy. That alone could take them past Myspace. But, in the end, Onesheet Mobile still isnt even close to the quality of native apps its a mobile optimized web feature. On the other hand, mobile web apps generally require tons of uploading and customization, and so Onesheets new mobile dress has the potential to be a huge time saver for bands that want a mobile presence but either cant afford it or dont know how to code it. What the end game is for Onesheet is still a little unclear, and clearly About.me got lost in trying to define what it would be after its initial awesome one-page bio model took off. I dont think Onesheet will have the same problem, however, and it will be interesting to see if the startup becomes an acquisition target for one of the larger music sites it already partners with, like ONESHEET page 30
30
Technology/
[Poll] What Company Provides the Best HTML5 Framework and Toolset?
Dan Rowinski (ReadWriteWeb)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:00:00 PM
the best offering? That is the topic of this week's ReadWriteMobile poll. HTML5 and the mobile Web is Sponsor starting to catch up with native Netbiscuits launched a"Tactile" a p p s , a t l e a s t i n t e r m s o f HTML5 framework yesterday to d e v e l o p e r a t t e n t i o n . M a n y enter the HTML5 utility arms developers are rushing to create race. It combines server and client HTML5-ready mobile websites or - s i d e o p t i m i z a t i o n , d e v i c e hybrid apps and need the proper d e t e c t i o n , p r o g r e s s i v e tools to create dynamic apps that enhancement and responsive will function across platforms. As design to give developers a tool such, there is an arms race in the that can create apps that will HTML5 ecosystem to create tools render on any device. Like the that developers will need to other tools, Netbiscuits uses Web produce quality apps and content standards such as HTML5 and for the mobile Web, Android and CSS3 to create and deploy apps iOS. quickly and efficiently. Within the last several weeks AppMobi continues to trudge t h e r e h a v e b e e n s e v e r a l along with its controversial companies that have released jqMobi product, an HTML5 products for HTML5 developers. framework for creating hybrid and S e n c h a r e l e a s e d T o u c h 2 , HTML5 Web apps. AppMobi appMobi upgraded jqMobi to its utilizes nearly 60 APIs and is first public version, Brightcove t a c k l i n g l a r g e e c o s y s t e m made updates to its App Cloud challenges like how to deploy and Adobe continues to invest in mobile Web apps, rendering on HTML5 tools. Frameworks like Android, HTML5 sound issues Zepto.JS and jQuery Mobile have and game development. It has a environments and libraries for PhoneGap XDK to wrap HTML5 developers. What company has apps for deployment in Google
similar offerings that allow users that are not experts in coding to create custom templates and themes for HTML5 development and wrapping. Brightcove is an enterprise solution that is free to use until the point where you get the actual binary to ship to Google Play or the App Store (it is $15,000 for the premium edition). Brightcove considers itself a content hosting platform and that is more than just videos as it Play and the App Store. branches into app development as Sencha's Touch 2 is a robust well. Conduit created a similar update to its framework that came dashboard where developers can out of beta earlier this month. pull content from a variety of Like appMobi, Sencha also sources, package it and wrap it for promises to work on Android publication on the mobile Web, enhancement. One of the unique A n d r o i d , W i n d o w s P h o n e , features with Sencha Touch 2 is B l a c k B e r r y , B a d a o r i O S . that it allows developers to create Adobe is letting Flash die a slow i O S a p p s f r o m a W i n d o w s and painful death but is focusing m a c h i n e , s t r e a m l i n i n g t h e on creating tools for HTML5 development process for many developers. It acquired Nitobi, the developers. Sencha wants to be makers of PhoneGap, in the fall of the end-to-end solution for 2011 and has been aggressively developers with Sencha Animator, rolling out HTML5 tools for Designer and Sencha.io, its cloud developers since. It is almost solution. ready to ship Adobe Edge for Brightcove and Conduit have motion and interaction design.
Adobe still has a variety of options for developers looking to create rich content. Zepto.JS and jQuery Mobile are standard JavaScript frameworks with good libraries that developers have to trust and rely on. Zepto is a JavaScript framework for mobile WebKit browsers while jQuery Mobile is a HTML5-based framework optimized for smartphones and tablet. jQuery is considered one of the standards for many developers looking to get into mobile development. Appcelerator also provides tools for mobile development but its HTML5 efforts are still in nascent form so we will exclude them from this specific poll. So, who wins? What framework and tool set attracts developers and makes life easiest? Take the poll below and let us know what you have tried and what you think of the ecosystem in the comments. What Is The Best HTML5 Framework or Toolset? Discuss
ONESHEET
Soundcloud. Although with its increasingly broad focus on the entertainment industry, that might not be a good fit. Either way, its becoming an
increasingly valuable platform for musicians (and creatives) alike. For more, check em out at home here.
Technology/
31
Yahoo vs Facebook: Not The Next Mobile Patent War?

Ingrid Lunden (TechCrunch)
GroupLogic Has New Way To Securely Synch Your Files With ActivEcho
David Strom (ReadWriteWeb)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:32:00 PM
patents describing different functions, and what they are Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:08:01 PM supposed to protect. Outside the The lawsuit filed on Monday by U.S., its much harder to make Yahoo against Facebook over claims like that stick, he said. alleged infringements of certain Its generally a lot easier to get method patents was a high one granted than it is to uphold it profile step for Yahoo to take in in court, so I think Yahoo should the lead-up to Facebooks IPO. think quite hard before exposing But although Facebook has seen itself in a number of other patent suits against it double in jurisdictions. the last year, dont necessarily He also notes that if it is the case take this as a sign that Yahoo will t h a t Y a h o o i s b a n k i n g o n necessarily extend its fight to Facebook being inclined to make more jurisdictions, nor that social a deal pre-IPO, a big piece of media will be come the next litigaion is all you have to put in battleground, after mobile, in play. patent wars, says one senior Nor does he think that patents patent lawyer in London. around social media will ever Myles Jelf, a partner at the UK have the same currency as those law firm Bristows which works around mobile technology a with a number of multinationals field that has spawned a number in the telecoms, media and of suits between Apple and technology sector on patent and Android device makers (like i n t e l l e c t u a l p r o p e r t y c a s e s , Samsung), as well as other including Samsung in its patent companies including Microsoft, dispute with Apple says that he Nokia and many others. would be surprised if Yahoo In the Apple/Samsung cases, for began to broaden out its case example, its a global battle for beyond the U.S. consumers, and its a matter of The cost goes up by an order of life and death, he said. Its like magnitude once you spread across the two competing against each the globe, he said, but he added other on the supermarket shelf, that other jurisdictions might not and thats why you have to go be so sympathetic on method into every court.
In contrast, he explained, Yahoo is not saying Facebook is a competing service, and it should be pulled. Its saying: you are using my technology and so we want a revenue stream. Beyond that, in the mobile world, he noted that the players who have huge patent portfolios have them because theyve invested often billions in research money to make something work. All of this 3G and 4G technology costs billions of dollars to create and so theres a greater driver to produce income from that. In social media its not R&D billions but neat packaging. However, he does note that with the market for internet services significantly more saturated now than it has been in years past in the case of Yahoo that has meant difficulty in getting an edge over Google in search, or competing against them as effectively in advertising companies that work in these fields will need to find new income streams, and so if there are any possibilities in that patent portfolio to do that, this could change the outlook significantly.
If your company is nervous using Dropbox or other cloud-based file repositories, then you might want to take a closer look at a new service launched by GroupLogic today called ActivEcho. The idea is that you put a client piece of software on various desktops and you can automatically synchronize your files across a wide variety of devices. Today they have clients for Web, Windows, Mac and iOS but they will eventually add others such as Android and Linux later this year. Sponsor The company has other products, including MobilEcho, that provides mobile access to file servers that we wrote about last summer here. The ActivEcho enterprise file sharing solution has been tested in organizations with thousands of users over the past several months, and is a good idea for firms that are regulated or require better security than what the public cloud providers have. (Not to pick on Dropbox, but there have been a number of exploits such as this one reported last year.)The other feature that is attractive is that the software integrates with Active Directory
to make easier setup for users and policies. Here is a video showing how it all works: If you don't have AD you can still manually set things up for your user population. You will need a server component that creates a secure file repository and management features and audit trail that runs on Windows 2003 or 2008 servers to enable the synchronization. ActivEcho will work to synchronize files on machines both inside and outside the corporate firewall. ActivEcho's pricing is on a per user basis. For 500 users, it will run $55 per user per year, which is about on par with the enterprise plans of the public cloud providers. Competitors include VMware's Project Octopus, which has been announced last year. Discuss
32
Technology/
Arm Flycatcher chips aim for years of battery time

Chris Burns (SlashGear)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:16:38 PM
The Arm Holdings group have revealed this week their newest bit of architecture for microcontrollers based on their Flycatcher design, noting that this new technology will, amongst other things, offer years of life from a single battery-pack. This new architecture will have one third less energy draw than its predecessors, they only offered with 8 and 16-bit capabilities while Arms newest chip is capable of 32-bit processing. These bits of futuristic technology built with Cortex M0+ architecture will have chipmakers building microprocessors with fabulously advanced capabilities at the same time as requiring what they say is ultra low power. Arm is describing this technology as ready soon for medical equipment, refrigerators, and energy meters as well as office lighting, toasters, and mobile devices. The technology described here has been licensed already by two firms already: NXP Semiconductors and Freescale, Geoff Lees of Freescale noting the following about the
technology in its soon to be life state: It opens up all devices to the potential of being connected all the time. Its allowing us to provide connectivity everywhere. So anything from consumer appliances, MP3-music audio docks, kitchen equipment with displays right through to remote sensors in rain monitoring equipment or personal medical devices an area where ultra-long battery life allied to high performance and safety is becoming more and more
important. Lees Arm notes that theyve created processor cores measuring an incredibly small 1mm by 1mm in size, this widening the possibilities for this technology further than ever. Best of all is this technologys ability to utilize power effectively, it being a low leakage part, consuming almost no power when in sleep mode. Arm noted that in addition to being able to offer wireless connectivity when pared with bluetooth or radio equipment, this technology is able to offer years
of life from a single battery-pack where before similar tech only offered months. As Arms director of embedded marketing Gary Atkinson said, Every developed nation country has a graph showing electricity demand is going to outstrip supply at some point in the next 20 years unless we do something different. If the wider electricity network is being very heavily used and if the element in your dishwasher could go off for two or three minutes to alleviate that well then that would make a
big difference. Atkinson If Arms claims align with reality the way they say they do, well be seeing a whole lot less cash on our energy bills in the near future. Cant wait for that! [ via BBC] Arm Flycatcher chips aim for years of battery time is written by Chris Burns& originally posted on SlashGear. 2005 - 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Technology/ Culture/
33
A Guide to Various Google raises Pinterest Scams, And How registration fee to Avoid Them for I/O 2012
David Strom (ReadWriteWeb)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 4:00:06 PM
Earlier this month we wrote about a few of the Pinterestrelated scams. Since then, there have been others reported. Over lunch today with my stepdaughter, who is in the process of learning how to use Pinterest, she asked me if the site was "safe for running my business." I told her she was being a bit paranoid. Yes, people can be fooled into revealing all sorts of information, as we reported with particular image-based phishing scams. But there are others that have been observed out there too, including enticing users to take surveys, sign up for subscription services, reveal personal information and even install unwanted executables on their PCs. Sigh. The Internet can be such a nasty place. Sponsor Symantec has a series of
explanations on how the scams operate here, including a fancier version of the gift-card scam that we cited from the Trend Micro blog post. There is also this post from The Daily Dot that shows how scammers have taken over contests on Pinterest. This is because you can't remove pins that are put there by another contributor if you allow anyone access. "Some brands have already discovered a spam-free option for holding a contest.
Instead of inviting users to pin to the brand's board, it asks users to design and submit their own boards to the contest." An alternative is to email the pins or tag them on Twitter with a special hashtag. Arrgh. The Daily Dot had an earlier post here that showed just by adding someone or some famous brand to your site as a collaborator could be used for evil purposes. So be careful out there fellow pinners. Think twice before a link that asks you to download something to your computer is really necessary. Avoid dialogue boxes that ask you to enter any personal information. Don't take any surveys from unknown third parties, or better yet, avoid surveys altogether. Don't use your email address to sign up for anything that you didn't initiate. And don't click on something that sounds too good to be true, because it probably is. Discuss
Scott Webster (CNET News)

Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:59:31 PM
In addition to raising the registration price for the annual event, developers are also required to use Google Wallet. Google I/O 2012 to run one day longer than in the past. Google has released the registration details for its annual Google I/O developer conference in San Franciscon June 27 to 29. Not only is the company charging attendees a higher registration fee for three-day event ($900), but also developers will be required to make payments online using Google Wallet. For many this is a small price to pay for the wealth of knowledge and hands-on experience that comes with Google I/O, but for others looking for an easy way to snatch up a free tablet and/or Chromebook it may be too high a price tag. Registration for the conference kicks off at 7:00 AM Pacific time on March 27 and I expect that tickets will sell out in short order.
Last year's event, which was attended by approximately 5,500 developers, sold out in just under one hour so considering that Android has done nothing but skyrocket in the since then, I'm hoping that Google's site be will able to handle the demand. As to what exactly will go down over the course of three days remains to be seen however that will likely shake out in the coming weeks. Previous years have focused on Chrome, Google TV, and of course, Android. I'd look for this year to center on NFC, Android 4.0, Google+, Chrome, and the Play initiative. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Rock of Ages: The evolution of SXSW [infographic]

(Holy Kaw!)
Via Silicon Angle and RocksauceStudios.com.
Like infographics? So do we. Permalink| Leave a comment
34
Technology/ Featured/
McGraw Hill VP bullish on $399 iPad 2 for students

Steven Sande (TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:35:00 PM
At Apple's education keynote in January, McGraw Hill Education was announced as one of the partners in the initiative to move textbooks to a digital format. The company's vice president of new ventures, Vineet Madan, is impressed with the power and display of the new iPad, but says he thinks that the newly discounted iPad 2 gives more schools a chance to deploy iPads to their students. In an interview with Talking Points Memo, Madan said that "I've long thought that the tippingpoint price for a tablet is between $200 and $300. Now that the entry-level iPad 2 has dropped by $100, and it's now $399 for a 16 gigabyte version, we'll see much
more uptake." McGraw Hill currently has five K -12 textbooks available, as well as over 50 iPad textbooks aimed at the higher education and professional market through partner Inkling. Although the existing e-textbooks use interactive features, Madan feels that the new iPad's Retina display, 4G network support and 10-hour battery life can make life easier for textbook readers and creators. Speaking about LTE, Madan said "You could be anywhere and can immediately pull up all sorts of high-res, data-rich content. You can stream it instantaneously and
you don't have pulling down gigs and gigs of content and storing it on the app locally." Madan also sees the high resolution Retina display as a way to "really unlock the potential of 'pinch to zoom' functionality" in textbooks. McGraw Hill VP bullish on $399 iPad 2 for students originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Tue, 13 Mar 2012 15:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Source| Permalink| Email this| Comments
As Nasdaq pierces 3,000 level, Yahoo stock remains in blah mode

Charles Cooper (CNET News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:03:50 PM
The Irony of the GOP Race

Jeffrey H. Anderson (The Weekly Standard)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:14:00 PM
Summarizing President Obama's a c c o m p l i s h m e n t s t o d a t e , Republic, "Health care reform Jonathan Cohn writes in the New a l o n e c o n s t i t u t e s a m a j o r
legislative legacy. The Recovery Act launched infrastructure and energy projects that could shape the economy and, by the way, education for a generation.
its expectations. If investors thought it was a big deal and Yahoo had a good case, With tech-heavy index on fire yet they would have bid up the again, investors yawn one day company's shares strongly as the after Yahoo throws the kitchen tech-heavy Nasdaq pierced the sink at Facebook. 3,000 level for the first time since Nadaq regains the 3,000 level the dot-com bubble. Instead, there Well, that didn't work out so was a collective yawn on Wall well. Street as shares of Yahoo bounced O n M o n d a y , Y a h o o s u e d around the even line most of the Facebook, claiming that the social day before finishing trading up a network had infringed on a host of whopping 6 cents to close at its patents. Who knows whether $14.59. the case ever makes it to trial. This entry passed through the Facebook says Yahoo's smoking Full-Text RSS service if this is dope but let's not rule out the your content and you're reading it possibility Mark Zuckerberg on someone else's site, please read decides to write a check to get rid the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentof what he deems a nuisance only/faq.php#publishers. Five lawsuit. Or he could fight it. Filters recommends: Donate to But judging from the interim Wikileaks. judgement rendered by the smart money set, Yahoo should temper
Technology/ Featured/
35
Draw Something hits 20 million downloads in just five weeks

Steven Sande (TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog)
2012, over 3,000 drawings a second were being generated by users. Submitted at 3/13/2012 4:00:00 PM Not all of the downloaders are Being a blogger in the Apple active users of the game; ecosystem, I'm used to seeing OMGPOP reports that "only" 12 numbers that are completely million users are actively playing staggering -- the number of iPads Draw Something. Part of the app's sold during an introductory attraction and one of the reasons it weekend, for example. But when is being downloaded so much is an iPhone app is able to pull in a that it requires at least two people huge number of downloads in a to play. very short timeframe, I really pay Do you play Draw Something? If attention. That's the case with so, tell other TUAW readers what Draw Something($0.99), a social you like -- or dislike -- about this game that has not only jumped to incredibly popular game. the top of the paid apps chart in Draw Something hits 20 million 79 countries, but has also been downloads in just five weeks downloaded a whopping 20 originally appeared on TUAW million times in the five weeks Draw Something has been in the The Unofficial Apple Weblog on App Store than they made all of Tue, 13 Mar 2012 16:00:00 EST. that it has been available. CEO of developer OMGPOP, last year. Over one billion pictures Please see our terms for use of Dan Porter, says that the app is have been drawn using the app, feeds. generating six figures a day. The which is similar to the classic Source| Permalink| Email this| company has also made more Pictionary game. The superlatives Comments money in the five weeks that keep on coming -- on March 11,
Google wins patent for ringback adverts

Rue Liu (SlashGear)
Turner to Run for Senate in New York

Michael Warren (The Weekly Standard)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:01:00 PM
nomination to challenge Kirsten Gillibrand, a Democrat and New York's junior senator. The Associated Press reports: Democrat Anthony Weiner, will be running for the GOP
Bob Turner, the newly-elected Republican congressman from New York City who replaced
now have another channel to deliver ads, although its not clear whether it would be a feature Google has just been granted a implemented through Android or patent from the USPTO that through partnerships with carriers. replaces ringback tones with The advertising ringback could adverts. The idea is to replace the also be implemented as part of ringback sound you hear when Google Voice, which is a free youre calling someone and VoIP calling and voice message waiting for them to pick up. The management system. The use of r i n g b a c k s o u n d t h a t y o u d audio adverts in the ringback n o r m a l l y h a v e t o l i s t e n t o could be justified for sustaining anyways while youre waiting is the free service. r e p l a c e d b y a n a u d i o [ via Unwired View] advertisement. Google wins patent for ringback Its a concept that end-users may adverts is written by Rue Liu& not appreciate, but carriers and originally posted on SlashGear. advertisers will be more receptive 2005 - 2012, SlashGear. All t o f o r a d d e d r e v e n u e a n d right reserved. exposure. Google being the advertising company that it is will
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:35:33 PM
36
Technology/
FTC seeks Apple testimony in Google antitrust probe

Josh Lowensohn (CNET News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:47:56 PM
Federal regulators have reportedly taken an interest in the deal between Apple and Google that makes the search engine Safari's default. The search options on Apple's Safari browser on iOS. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has reportedly taken an interest in the mobile side of a business relationship between Apple and Google, and wants it on the record.
Citing two people familiar with the matter, Bloomberg reports that the U.S. regulatory group has subpoenaed Apple in hopes of getting details about its mobilesearch deal with Google. That includes information on the agreement that has made Google the default search engine on Apple's iPhone, iPad, and iPhone since 2007, the report said. The subpoena, which Apple did not confirm or comment on to Bloomberg, is part of a larger investigation by the FTC to figure out whether Google has used
on the report. While Google has long been the default search engine on Apple's iOS, there are other options. In the United States, that includes Yahoo and Microsoft's Bing, the latter of which became an option in mid-2010. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it unfair or deceptive business that Google unfairly promotes its on someone else's site, please read practices. The FTC and the U.S. own services in its search results. the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentSenate already have investigations Google did not immediately only/faq.php#publishers. Five under way focused on concerns respond to a request for comment Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
T-Mobile expands 4G HSPA+ network, LTE in 2013

Rue Liu (SlashGear)
Mobiles 4G HSPA+ coverage include: Abilene, Amarillo, Odesa, and Victoria, Texas; T-Mobiles CTO Neville Ray Bakersfield, California; Eau announced today that the carrier Claire, Wisconsin; Joplin and St. has expanded its 4G HSPA+ Joseph, Missouri. Additionally, network to eight additional cities, Ray said that customers in bringing its total coverage to 225 Abilene, Amarillo, Bakersfield, markets. The question-and-answer Odessa, Port St. Lucie, and format of the announcement also Victoria will get access to Ttouched on the carriers HSPA+ M o b i l e s H S P A + 4 2 M b p s 42Mbps network and possibility network, which will be supported for an 84Mbps network as well as by the Samsung Galaxy S Blaze its plans to implement LTE. 4G and the HTC One S. The eight new cities to get T- The carrier is still evaluating
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:12:56 PM
T-Mobile to refarm some of its 1900MHz specturm for HSPA+ while freeing up more AWS spectrum for LTE. T-Mobile expands 4G HSPA+ network, LTE in 2013 is written by Rue Liu& originally posted on SlashGear. 2005 - 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved. whether it will implement an HSPA+ 84Mbps network or continue toward LTE. Ray says that he would like to see both technologies advanced, but that the main priority right now is to launch LTE in 2013. The new AWS spectrum gain from AT&Ts failed acquisition will help with the transition, allowing
Technology/ Finance/
37
Christian World Adoption

Two new dinosaur species fill in evolutionary gaps
Christian World Adoption is one of the largest international adoption agencies in the United States. Since 1991, Christian World Adoption has placed thousands of children from Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and Duncan Geere challenges of a rise in energy use Latin America. These children Mark Brown lived approximately 75 million is to modify humanity to simply now enjoy the love and security of years ago, was one to two metres Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:57:00 PM Submitted at 3/13/2012 10:44:55 AM use less energy. He suggests a a forever family. Christian World in length, and weighed less than Forget geoengineering, the latest range of ways to achieve this, A d o p t i o n c u r r e n t l y o f f e r s A team of paleontologists have 91 kilograms. It had a short frill adoption programs in Bulgaria, named two new species of behind its head, a parrot-like proposal in the fight against from creating an aversion to meat China, Ethiopia, Guatemala, dinosaurs, based on fossils beak, rounder teeth than any climate change is bioengineering b y g i v i n g d i n e r s a m i l d Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia intolerance to it, to using gene c o l l e c t e d f r o m C a n a d a . other leptoceratopsid and its jaw humans to require less energy. and Ukraine. Explore our website Unescoceratops koppelhusae and had a bone that jutted out like a New York University bioethics t h e r a p y t o c r e a t e s m a l l e r to learn more about international professor S Matthew Liao has c h i l d r e n . Gryphoceratops morrisonii hail small chin. adoption. Then, when youre from the leptoceratopsidae family. By: Mark Brown, Edited by: published a paper in Ethics, By: Duncan Geere, Edited by: ready, call our friendly adoption Let's start with Unescoceratops. Duncan Geere Continue reading... Policy and the Environment Nate Lanxon Continue reading... c o u n s e l o r , t o l l f r e e , a t arguing that one way to tackle the This small-bodied, horned reptile 1.888.97ADOPT.
Bioethicist's solution to climate change: hacking humanity
Debt crisis: live

Amy Wilson (Finance News Business news from the UK and world)
Greece must make even deeper spending cuts in the next two years to meet targets agreed as
part of its bail-out, according to a European Commission report, and the IMF is to give the country a
further 8.2bn.
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Technology/ Economy/ Culture/
Secluded EMS Homes - The Ambulance Garage House by Doepel Strijkers is an Orange Haven (TrendHunter.com)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:49:03 PM
Fed To Accelerate Stress Test Result Release Following JP Morgan Disclosure

Tyler Durden
Video: How Austin Works: Austin City Guide

(HowStuffWorks Daily Feed)
( TrendHunter.com) The Ambulance Garage House by Doepel Strijkers lives up to its name: it was once an ambulance garage before this contemporary designed home located on the borders of a secluded park. It's an exclusive...
The WSJ has more on this glaring example of just who runs Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:57:24 PM stuff in this banana republic: As noted earlier when we said The Federal Reserve will release that Jamie Dimon ( who just the results of its latest stress tests happens to be one of two Class A today at 4:30 p.m. Eastern time, directors at the NY Fed) just two days before it had planned to showed the Fed who is boss, the unveil the sensitive review of big Fed has now been "forced" to banks. release the Stress Test results The schedule change came after today at 4:30 pm instead of as J.P. Morgan Chase & Co . sent previously scheduled on March out a news release announcing it 15. Jamie Dimon is now officially had passed the stress test. J.P. defining the Fed's timetable. This Morgan said it will raise its is all in jest of course: Dimon dividend and authorized a $15 would never do anything without billion stock repurchase program. preauthorization from Bill Bankers were scrambling Dudley, which means that even as Tuesday after the unexpected the FOMC statement was a big t i m i n g o f J . P . M o r g a n ' s yawn, the JPM release less than announcement. Several bankers an hour later was planned purely said they are pleased with their to ramp stocks into the close on banks' results but weren't willing the lack of a definitive promise by to give out specifics before the the Fed to keep printing. Well Fed's own statement. played gents. The Fed had planned to release
the results of this year's Comprehensive Capital Analysis and Review, or stress tests, on Thursday afternoon. It decided to move up the timing after some banks had disclosed their results, the Fed said. The tests look at how the 19 biggest U.S. banks would fare in a severe downturn, including an unemployment rate of 13%, a 21% decline in housing prices and a 50% drop in equity prices. Average: Your rating: None Average: 4( 1 vote) This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Visitors come to Austin each year for great music, food, and more. Learn more about visiting Austin in this video from HowStuffWorks. most watched: city guide videos recently added: city guide videos This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
The Ultimate Weird Al Yankovic Quiz

(HowStuffWorks Daily Feed)
The first memory many of us have of Weird Al Yankovic is the video for "Eat It," his shot-forshot remake of Michael Jackson's
"Beat It" video. Years later, he's still trucking, churning out his signature food-themed song parodies. Test your knowledge of this curly-haired, Hawaiian-shirtwearing wild man.
Earn a point for every right
answer! Save your score at the end of the quiz. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read
Policy/
39
Mission Incomplete - By Bruce Riedel and Michael O'Hanlon

BRUCE RIEDEL, MICHAEL O'HANLON (Foreign Policy)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:51:47 PM
The United States needs to stay in Afghanistan until the job is done. BY BRUCE RIEDEL, MICHAEL O'HANLON| MARCH 13, 2012 Afghanistan policy is in crisis, at least in the United States. With Osama bin Laden now dead, some are wondering whether it's time to declare this mission accomplished -- or with Afghanistan so troubled, perhaps it's mission impossible? In fact, it is mission incomplete: The Afghanistan mission is going worse than we had all hoped, but better than many understand. With patience and perseverance, we can still struggle to a tolerable outcome. There is no denying that the past weeks have represented a setback for NATO efforts. Afghans, angered by the desecration of Qurans at a U.S. base, recently demonstrated violently against the NATO forces in their country, and the March 11 massacre of 16 Afghans by an apparently deranged U.S. soldier will only increase popular anger. These resentments have been further fueled by Iran and Pakistan and have rightly raised doubts that international forces have sufficient support in Afghanistan
to complete the mission they have embarked upon. But beneath the headlines, international forces are actually making substantial progress. This
has been particularly evident in Afghanistan's south, reflecting Gen. Stanley McChrystal's 2009 concept that the provinces of Kandahar and Helmand
represented the heartland of the Taliban movement and that securing the main population and transportation corridors in those provinces would deprive
insurgents of their chief support bases. This part of the plan, at least in military terms, has worked MISSION page 41
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Policy/
The Parchin Trap - By Mark Fitzpatrick

MARK FITZPATRICK (Foreign Policy)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:56:52 PM
Don't count on the IAEA uncovering a smoking gun at Iran's military complex. BY MARK FITZPATRICK| MARCH 13, 2012 As dysfunctional as the U.S. political system can be, Washington is a model of unity in comparison with the politics in Tehran. Disarray in the Iranian capital was on full display in February when a high-level team from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was needlessly sent home for the second time without anything to show for its trouble. And that's just a preview of the sort of confusion that's in store for international powers as they prepare to once again sit down at the table with Iranian officials to discuss Iran's nuclear program. The dispute between the IAEA and Tehran partly centers on the Parchin military complex, located about 20 miles southeast of Tehran. IAEA inspectors want to confirm evidence that, some years ago, Iran conducted highexplosives tests there that the IAEA termed"strong indicators of possible weapon development." In anticipation of coming out ahead in the PR game, the Iranian diplomats who negotiated with the IAEA indicated in January that they would allow a visit to the Parchin military base. They also
indicated that they would agree to a plan for addressing other questions about nuclear activities with "possible military dimensions," as the IAEA puts it.
On the first day of the follow-up visit in mid-February, the Iranian Foreign Ministry team was tough but workmanlike in negotiating an IAEA plan to provide access to
sites of interest and full information about past and current nuclear activities. When Iranian diplomats sought to clear the tentative plan with others in the
ruling elite, however, they were rudely overruled by Iranian hardliners -- the inspectors were PARCHIN page 42
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reasonably well. Most of the populated south has been cleared of important insurgent sanctuaries, weapons caches, and improvised-explosive-device fields. Violence was down about one-third in 2011, relative to 2010. There has been at least some progress in the quality of governance, too -- for example under Gov. Mohammad Gulab Mangal in Helmand, where far more provincial and district offices are now staffed and where citizens now line up at government buildings to request officials' help with their problems and needs. Meanwhile, the deterioration that had occurred in Afghanistan's north and west in recent years has been arrested and partially reversed. Kabul has worsened slightly in statistical terms over the last year, but only modestly: The capital still accounts for less than 1 percent of insurgent attacks nationally, despite containing about 15 percent of the country's population. Overall, enemyinitiated attacks in Afghanistan are down almost 25 percent over the last few months, relative to the comparable period last year. Despite the recent rash of tragedies involving Afghan attacks on NATO troops, there are important indicators that Afghan security forces are improving too -- not enough to quell the insurgency, but enough to prevent Taliban reconquest of the country's major cities and transportation routes even after 2014, when U.S. President Barack
Obama has announced that the current NATO mission in Afghanistan will end. Afghan security forces are securing Kabul largely on their own. They provided at least half of combined forces on major operations in the south in 2010 and 2011 and are increasingly in the driver's seat in parts of that region now. And Afghans from the south are also starting to join police forces in substantial numbers. All is not well, of course. Afghanistan's east was 20 percent more violent statistically in 2011 than in 2010, as insurgents belonging to the infamous Haqqani network and others wreaked havoc, and international forces remain underresourced there. Obama's decision to accelerate the drawdown of U.S. forces in Afghanistan from 100,000 to 68,000 by this September will impede the previously planned reinforcement of foreign troops there. If, as recently announced, France withdraws its troops more quickly than previously expected, that also will hurt stability in the east. And U.N. statistics suggest that, if insurgent attacks are somewhat lower, crime is somewhat higher. So there are reasons for observers to have doubts about the future of the Afghanistan mission. But this is far from a quagmire: Even without further accelerations of the U.S. troop drawdown, there is a clear campaign plan for reducing the U.S. role and presence over the next 30 months. This will happen, for better or
worse -- nobody should fear an unending military commitment in Afghanistan. The plan for 2012 and 2013 focuses on several key priorities. First, international forces will work to secure areas south of Kabul, so the country's ring road connecting it to Kandahar can be safely traveled and so the capital can be better protected from insurgents by a layered defense. Most of the ring road is already reasonably secure, or at least usable; international forces now need to work with Afghans to complete the job. Second, the International Security Assistance Force will deepen its hold over the south, while gradually handing off more responsibility there and elsewhere to Afghan forces. Major developments are in the works already on this front, and in the course of 2012 we will see major U.S. and other NATO troop reductions in Helmand and Kandahar. Third, international forces will continue their efforts to strengthen Afghan security forces to their requisite size and capability -- a process that will remain intensive for about two more years, before reaching the goal of at least 350,000 trained and equipped Afghan army and police members who have not only gone through basic training, but spent at least a year in the field in a form of apprenticeship with NATO forces. It is important that the U.S. administration stay committed to this goal, which will be reached
by late 2013 or early 2014 based on current trends. A number of these tasks cannot be accomplished without the presence of a substantial number of foreign troops. That is why the United States cannot rush out of Afghanistan -- a fact the White House needs to bear in mind as it contemplates future policy options. While handing over primary responsibility for security nationwide to Afghan forces may be accelerated to 2013, it cannot be moved up to 2012 -- the Afghans are not yet strong enough, and the east remains too troubled for them to handle the job on their own. Even after 2014, the Afghan government will still need international support. Perhaps 10,000 to 15,000 foreign troops will be needed in Afghanistan to help with training, mentoring, air support, special operations, and logistics. If the United States cannot work out a deal on this matter now with Kabul, it should simply keep trying next year, after the U.S. presidential race. As for peace talks with the Taliban, they are only in their earliest days, and international expectations for success should be limited. But it is an avenue worth exploring, especially given the increasing evidence of tension between the Taliban and their Pakistani patrons. The U.S. relationship with Afghan President Hamid Karzai -dysfunctional as it often looks -is actually more harmonious than the partnership between the
Taliban and Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistan's premier spy agency, on the other side of the hill. Premature withdrawal will sabotage any reconciliation process by suggesting time is on the Taliban's side. There is also the issue of Karzai's successor. The Afghan Constitution requires him to step down in 2014, and the United States must insist that this happens. It is crucial to the development of an institutionbased Afghan democracy: Only when citizens experience peaceful transfers of power can they truly begin to place more faith in institutions and offices rather than individuals. Despite some recent reports to the contrary, Karzai may be happy to secure a muchdeserved retirement, but many of his supporters will likely seek to persuade him to stay on, given their uncertainty about what would come next. Rather than being blindsided by such dynamics, the international community should expect them as the natural outgrowth of Afghanistan's current lack of robust political movements, which heighten the importance of strong personalities. One helpful idea may be to look inside the U.N. system for a post-presidential position for Karzai that plays to his strengths (which are real), such as serving as special representative for relations between the Islamic world and the West. Long ago, the international MISSION page 43
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PARCHIN
denied access to Parchin and returned to Vienna empty-handed. Think Colin Powell being boxed in by Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld, or Russia's Trotskyites outmaneuvered by Stalinists. To make matters even more opaque, it's not even clear who the "Stalinists" were in this scenario. Although the main political intrigue in Tehran concerns a noholds-barred power struggle between President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, the dispute in this case appears to have been between forces in the executive branch nominally under the president. Vienna insiders suspect that the veto was voiced by Saeed Jalili, whom Ahmadinejad appointed four years ago as secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and chief nuclear negotiator. That would be a confusing development because Jalili was the official who tentatively accepted -- on Ahmadinejad's behalf -- the nuclear fuel-swap plan offered by U.S. President Barack Obama in the autumn of 2009. Under the terms of that deal, Iran would have sent the bulk of its enricheduranium stockpile to Russia in exchange for replacement fuel plates for the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR). But back then, Ahmadinejad's rivals, from all sides of the political spectrum,
shot down the plan in order to deny the president a diplomatic victory. This is far from idle Kremlinology. In upcoming nuclear talks, Jalili will be Iran's lead negotiator with the P5+1 -the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council (Britain, China, France, Russia, and the United States), plus Germany. The negotiations promise to be contentious. The P5+1 is demanding a suspension of uranium enrichment and of work on a research reactor near the city of Arak that would be able to produce weapons-grade plutonium. As a confidencebuilding measure, the P5+1 wants Iran to stop producing 20 percent enriched uranium, remove its stocks, and stop work in the deeply buried enrichment facility at Fordow, which has fueled Israeli fears that Iran is entering a "zone of immunity," robbing Israel of its ability to destroy Iran's nuclear program through conventional military means. With the passage of time, the prospects of Washington and Tehran reaching a deal have only grown dimmer. Last fall, Ahmadinejad offered to halt the 20 percent enrichment if Iran was provided TRR fuel, which is enriched to that level. Iran's foreign minister repeated the offer, but some analysts doubted
whether others in the regime would go along, especially given the way Ahmadinejad has been emasculated by Khamenei during the past year. Indeed, it is questionable whether Khamenei would accept any deal that is also acceptable to Washington. Parchin, incidentally, is a side show. The IAEA wants to examine a large containment chamber where hydrodynamic tests reportedly had taken place before 2004. But an IAEA visit now may not uncover much -- and not just because Iran has had plenty of time to hide any incriminating evidence in the eight-plus years since the alleged activity took place. The testing experiments that were reportedly conducted there used surrogate material to simulate nuclear components. Unless nuclear material was present for some other reason, IAEA environmental sampling would not detect any telltale signs, giving Iran an excuse to trumpet its vindication. Nevertheless, the wrangling over Parchin is a microcosm of a larger debate about whether Iran is dealing with the international community in good faith. At the IAEA board of governors' March 8 meeting in Vienna, Iranian Ambassador Ali Asghar Soltanieh sought to put a positive spin on what he called Iran's "proactive and cooperative approach." The
response by IAEA officials, however, reflected a very different characterization. Director General Yukiya Amano said Soltanieh's words were not "factually correct." In Vienna, those are fighting words. Amano said Iran had sought to impose restrictions that would make it impossible for the agency to properly carry out its verification work. Herman Nackaerts, head of the IAEA Safeguards Department, explained that Iran sought to confine the IAEA's questions and refuse it the right to pose follow-up queries to Iran's answers. Iran also continues to refuse to provide design information regarding new nuclear facilities under construction and updated design information about the Arak research reactor. Such reporting is required in IAEA safeguards rules that Iran had agreed to in 2003 and then unilaterally abrogated four years later. The issue of design information for new nuclear facilities is particularly relevant because Iran wants to restrict talks with the IAEA to the set of outstanding questions about alleged past activities -- and not focus on the ongoing and potential future nuclear activity that is of most concern to the international community. Iran does allow inspection of its enrichment work
at Natanz and Fordow. If Fordow had not been discovered by Western intelligence agencies, however, Iran surely would not have revealed it voluntarily. Concerned countries want Iran to agree to come clean about all new nuclear facilities. Iran has hinted that, in talks with the international powers, it will seek to have all negotiations over its nuclear activity channeled through the IAEA. If that will create space for a face-saving compromise on grounds that the issues are of a technical and not political nature, it might not be a bad idea. However, the manner in which Iran dealt with the IAEA over the smaller question of Parchin will not give the United States and its partners any reason to think that the bigger questions about Iran's far-reaching nuclear program are any more likely to be resolved by going through Vienna. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Economy/
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MISSION
community squandered the chance for a clean victory in Afghanistan. Catastrophic defeat can likely be avoided, however, as long as we are patient and persistent in attaining the U.S. administration's goals over the next two-and-a-half years. For the United States, this part of the world offers a choice of generally mediocre options. But some options are far less bad than others and offer a reasonable chance of success. American policymakers should keep their eye on the ball: It's the big-picture trends, not a spate of admittedly
Inquiring minds might be interested in knowing which banks have borrowed the most in absolute and percentage terms from the ECB via LTROs. Courtesy of Google Translate, please consider a Ranking of Borrowings from the ECB. After two rounds of cheap financing of the ECB European banks via LTRO (3-year loans at 1% interest) the ECB Balance sheet looks like a Botero noreply@blogger.com (Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered sculpture, swollen to represent Mish Shedlock) (Mish's Global investment advisor representative over 30% of euro area GDP. Economic Trend Analysis) f o r S i t k a P a c i f i c C a p i t a l Detail is now available that Management. Sitka Pacific is an shows the level of funding Submitted at 3/13/2012 11:33:00 AM Here is a very interesting video asset management firm whose r e q u e s t e d b y e a c h b a n k that came my way called a " Day goal is strong performance and i n d i v i d u a l l y . A c c o r d i n g t o Made of Glass". It is effectively low volatility, regardless of estimates by UBS, in a ranking an ad for Corning, but the market direction. Visit http:// where it relates the amount of technology shown is well worth a w w w . s i t k a p a c i f i c . c o m / funds borrowed to balance the play. account_management.html to size of each entity, the list of Mike "Mish" Shedlock l e a r n m o r e a b o u t w e a l t h financial institutions that have h t t p : / / m a n a g e m e n t a n d c a p i t a l most filled their balance sheets globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. preservation strategies of Sitka with cheap loans from the ECB. com Pacific. Euro System Borrowing by Click Here To Scroll Thru My Institution Recent Post List Mike The Portuguese Commercial Bank is in first place, followed by
dismal headlines, that hold the key to sound policymaking for Afghanistan. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Cheap Loans From the ECB: What Banks Have Borrowed the Most as Percentage of Funded Assets?
noreply@blogger.com (Mike Mish Shedlock) (Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:40:00 PM
Video: "Day Made of Glass" Provides Fascinating Look at Future Possibilities for Photovoltaic Glass
Bankinter, Bank of Ireland, the Portuguese also Holy Spirit, the Banco de Sabadell, Mediobanca, and BFA (Bankia). In these first 8 entities, the ECB's cheap financing represents over 10% of bank assets, a huge figure. Graphic via Finacial Times Alhpaville Euro System Names n Numbers A link back to Alphaville Euro System Names n Numbers sports an additional chart by absolute numbers. The reference to Botero piqued my curiosity. Here is a link to 17 pages of Botero Sculpture Images. I believe I found the perfect one that represents Mario Draghi's LTRO programs. Mike "Mish" Shedlock
h t t p : / / globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. com Click Here To Scroll Thru My Recent Post List Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http:// www.sitkapacific.com/ account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific.
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Economy/
STOCKS GO WILD, US BANKS LEAD THE WAY: Here's What You Need To Know (DIA, SPY, QQQ, JPM, BAC, C, GS, MCP)
Sam Ro (Money Game)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:59:00 PM
Wow. First the scoreboard: Dow: 13,177.7, +218.6,+1.6% S&P 500: 1,395.0, +24.2, +1.8% NASDAQ: 3,039.6, +56.6,+1.8% And now the top stories: There wasn't a huge amount of market moving news overseas. In Germany, the ZEW investor confidence index, surged to 22.3 from 5.4 in February. Economist were looking for the metric to climbed to 10. Asian and European markets passed the baton to U.S. markets on a high note. LEAKED MEMO REVEALS: What A Greek Default Will Cost Europe And The World > February retail sales climbed 1.1 percent, which was right in line with estimates. Excluding autos, retail sales climbed 0.9 percent which beat expectations for a 0.7 percent gain. The best news out of all of this was that January's headline retail sales growth number was revised up to 0.6 percent from a previous reading of 0.4 percent. The Fed completed its Federal Open Market Committee meeting
today. As everyone expected, not much happened. There was no change in rates, and the language signaled no major shift in monetary policy. Here's what they said about energy prices: "The recent increase in oil and gasoline prices will push up inflation temporarily, but the Committee anticipates that subsequently inflation will run at or below the rate that it judges most consistent with its dual mandate." There was no talk of new QE. This Is What It Means When People Talk About 'Sterilized' QE > The FOMC also had some comments on jobs: "Labor market conditions have improved further; the unemployment rate has declined notably in recent months but remains elevated." But there are labor market skeptics out there. UBS's Art Cashin cited experts Doug Kass and Bill King who each saw major problems with the current structure of the labor market. In other jobs news, the U.S. had 3.5 million job openings. This is according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Job Openings and Labor Turnover (JOLT) report. Economists estimated there would
While we're on the subject of dividends, it's worth noting that cries for Apple to initiate a dividend are getting louder. Why Apple Investors All Need To Stop Whining About Not Getting A Dividend > In other news, the EU, US, and Japan have asked the World Trade Organization to do something about China's rare earth export restrictions, which are causing prices to explode higher. Rare earth giant Molycorp traded slightly higher than the major stock indices. Don't Miss: The 10 Countries With The Biggest Gold Reserves In The World > be 3.3 million openings. The stock markets really exploded higher after JP Morgan unexpectedly announced a new $15 billion stock buyback program. It also boosted its quarterly dividend to $0.30 per share from $0.25 per share. This sent the markets a signal that the JP Morgan probably passed its stress test (bank stress test results get announced on Thursday) with flying colors. Otherwise, the Federal Reserve wouldn't have allowed this to happen. Shortly after JP Morgan's announcement, the Wall Street Journal reported that Bank of America passed its stress test. Other big winners in today's monster bank rally included Citigroup and Goldman Sachs. Following the the JP Morgan and Bank of America headlines, the Federal Reserve announced that it would be releasing the results of its bank stress tests at 4:30 PM EST. The results were initially scheduled to come out on Thursday. Please follow Money Game on Twitter and Facebook. Join the conversation about this story See Also: STOCKS GO NOWHERE: Here's What You Need To Know STOCKS RALLY AGAIN: Here's What You Need To Know Markets Do Nothing On The Jobs Report
Economy/
45
Here Comes The Fed Stress Test Results...

Joe Weisenthal (Money Game)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:14:00 PM
At 4:30, the Fed will release its stress test results for the country's big banks. Remember, the banks are being tested against this nightmare scenario: The supervisory stress scenario for CCAR 2012, which was designed in November 2011, depicts a severe recession in the United States, including a peak unemployment rate of 13 percent, a 50 percent drop in equity prices, and a 21 percent decline in housing prices. The supervisory stress scenario is not the Federal Reserve's forecast for the economy, but was designed to represent an outcome that, while unlikely, may occur if the U.S economy were to experience a deep recession at the same time that economic activity in other major economies contracted significantly. The stress test results were supposed to come out at 4:30 PM on Thursday, but JPMorgan seems to have jumped the gun and released their results early, causing the Fed to move up their numbers. We'll have the full release here
Get A Headstart On Tomorrow's News With "10 Things You Need To Know Before The Opening Bell"
Business Insider (Money Game)
when the numbers come out, though lots of news is already coming out. JPMorgan, of course, was first out of the gate with their buyback + dividend announcement. Bank of America has apparently passed, though it's evidently not announcing a new buyback. Morgan Stanley says it has received no objection form the Fed with regards to dividend plans. USB has announced an increased dividend. Please follow Clusterstock on
Twitter and Facebook. Join the conversation about this story See Also: REVEALED: More Details On The Fed's Breathtaking $7.7 Trillion In Loans To Large Banks Here's The Real Scandal From The Fed's $7.77 Trillion Secret Lending To The Banks Dylan Ratigan And Eliot Spitzer Go Off On Secret Fed Loans, MF Global, And The Citigroup Settlement
information then click the "Sign Up" button. Please follow Business Insider on Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:10:00 PM Twitter and Facebook. Looking to get a headstart on the Join the conversation about this day's most important financial and story economic stories? If so, you've See Also: probably seen the daily " 10 Get A Headstart On The Latest Things You Need To Know Economic News With Money Before The Opening Bell" posts Game's "10 Things You Need To on Business Insider. Know Before The Opening Bell" Now, this easy-to-read, early Subscribe To The "10 Things morning digest of the 10 most You Need To Know Before The important stories that you need to Opening Bell" Newsletter know before the market opens is Get A Jump start On The Latest available as a daily newsletter Economic News With Money delivered straight to your inbox, Game's "10 Things You Need To M-F. Know Before The Opening Bell" Signing up is quick and easy. Use the form below to enter your
46
Economy/ Culture/
CBO Hikes 2012 Budget Deficit Forecast By $97 Billion In One Month, Sees $1.17 Trillion In Funding Shortfall
Tyler Durden
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:50:33 PM
What a difference a month makes: back on February 7, the CBO released its first forecast for the 2012 budget deficit. The number then? $1.08 trillion. Just over a month later, the CBO has released its amended budget deficit. The bottom line this time around: an increase of just under $100 billion, or $1.171 trillion. Since this number is still about $150 billion less than the President's own scoring, or $1.33 trillion, expect even more revisions. And why not: this is
simply debt that nobody will ever repay, and in exchange the money, which is finally flowing through the bottom line at least to the banks (JPM shareholders thank the US Treasury) will
$186 billion reduction in total deficits compared to January. Let's not forget that b then Greece will have negative debt/GDP ratio. Here is the revised number. Source Average: Your rating: None This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read proceed to pad if not the middle the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentclass, then certainly banker only/faq.php#publishers. Five bonuses.But not all is bad news: Filters recommends: Donate to by 2022, the CBO, which has a Wikileaks. pristine track record of predicting one decade into the future, sees a
Screensaver+ Adds an iOS-like Lock Screen to Your Mac [Mac Downloads]

Adam Dachis (Lifehacker)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:30:00 PM
The simplicity of the iOS lock screen is fantastic, so why not have it on your Mac? Screensaver+ lets you do just that, and you can even set an Androidstyle unlock pattern for added security. More
Zynga Does Secondary Offering Less Than Three Months After Going Public
Tyler Durden
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:31:26 PM
Is social media the new Chinese reverse merger? Only three months after its IPO, ZNGA (trading over 21% above its postIPO open price) will be doing a
secondary offering. Yes, you lucky punters who can't get enough of FBOOK's IPO can step in and fill another money void (with your money on the sidelines) with this follow-on ( supposedly to avoid a lock-up sell -off!!). The stock is trading down
dividend hike? Chart: Bloomberg Average: Your rating: None This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it only 2% on this 'great' news. on someone else's site, please read When will ZNGA announce their the FAQ at fivefilters.org/content-
only/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Culture/
47
Lee Strobel: Why Does God Allow Pain, Suffering?

(Christianpost.com > Most Popular)
survey that Mark [Mittelberg] did more recently where he asked Christians 'What are you afraid of being asked?' this was one of the (Photo: InCast Events via top questions as well," Strobel Christian Post) Speakers at said during the conference. a p o l o g e t i c s c o n f e r e n c e , He tackled the tough question of "Questions Christians Hope No pain and suffering during one of One Will Ask," include (L to R) several sessions that featured L e e S t r o b e l , C r a i g H a z e n , Mttelberg, who is his co-founder Douglas Groothuis, and Mark along with Strobel of The Institute Mittelberg, March 10, 2012. at Cherry Hills, an apologetics (Photo: Lee Strobel) and evangelism ministry, and scholars Craig Hazen and Douglas March 11, 2012| 9:25 am Groothuis. A few years ago, Christian Strobel said the question is raised apologist and author Lee Strobel by two different types of people. said that in doing research for his The first kind of person is one that book, The Case for Faith, he is presently going through pain asked the Barna Group research and suffering. organization to conduct a national Order Online: The Case for Faith survey among people across a "When someone is raising this spectrum of beliefs that asked that issue with me and I know they are hypothetical question. coming from that perspective I Strobel spoke about the results of know that they really don't want that survey at an apologetics the long, intellectual answer about conference Saturday from Cherry w h y G o d a l l o w s p a i n a n d Hills Community Church in suffering," he said. "When you are Highlands Ranch, Colo., and in the midst of suffering you are s i m u l c a s t t o m o r e t h a n 7 5 looking for someone to be Jesus churches throughout the U.S., to you. You are looking for Canada, and Australia. He was someone to love you and help one of four speakers at the event take care of you, and reach out to called, "The Questions Christians you. Hope No One Will Ask." "It's important for us to "By far, the number one question understand that when people raise that people wanted to ask God is this issue it's not always because ' W h y H e a l l o w s p a i n a n d of an intellectual curiosity," suffering in this world?' In the Strobel explained. "It's about their
own hurts and we need to be sensitive to that." There are other people that bring up the question because it is a legitimate intellectual question to ask, he said. "We don't have a complete answer. 1 Corinthians 13:12 says on this side of heaven we sort of see things dimly (paraphrase). We don't understand everything. We are not God," Strobel continued. "But, I believe that God has revealed enough to us that we do have enough of a satisfactory answer to minister to our hearts and souls to this particular question." Jesus was honest about this issue, he said. "There are Eastern religions that deny the reality of pain and suffering. They just try to wipe it away by saying it's all an illusion. Well, Jesus didn't call it an illusion. In John 16:33 Jesus said, 'In the world you are going to have tribulation.' You are going to have trouble. You are going to have pain. You are going to have suffering," Strobel insisted. "Why? Because we live in a sin scarred cosmos." Even though the issue of pain and suffering is a legitimate topic it does not negate all of the positive, affirmative evidence we have for the existence of God, he said. Strobel then asked, "So, what
does God reveal about this issue to us to help us process?" "The first thing is this. God is not the creator of evil, pain, and suffering. This answers the question, 'Why didn't God create a world where people don't suffer?' "The answer is He did. Genesis 1:31 says God saw all that He had made and it was very good," he continued. "But if God is not the author of pain and suffering where did it come from? God has existed from eternity past as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in perfect harmony in relationship, the relationship of love that has gone on for eternity. "When God reached a decision He wanted to create humankind He wanted humankind to experience this greatest value in the universe, which is the value of love. Well, the only way we can experience and express love is if we have the free will to love or not to love," he said. Love always involves a choice, Strobel explained. "We human beings have abused our free will by rejecting God and by walking away from Him." The result has been evil entering the world and bringing pain and suffering by the wrong moral choices people make. The other type of evil is natural evil such as disasters, he said. "This is a sin-corrupted world, not
as God created it," he said. Another point made by Strobel on the topic is that although suffering is not good, "God can use it to accomplish good." Other questions discussed at the conference included: "What makes you think God exists at all?" "Why trust the Bible; isn't it full of mistakes?" "Jesus was a good man but the Son of God?" "Why choose Christianity over all the other religions?" "Is hell real and does God really send people there?" Mittelberg told The Christian Post before the conference that he and the other speakers wanted to instill in Christians the confidence that not only is the Christian faith true, but it is also defensible. "To know that we really do have, by God's grace, truth that stands up to scrutiny," Mittelberg said. "More than that, we hope this will encourage believers to move from just putting up a good defense (1 Peter 3:15) to actively getting on the offense (2 Corinthians 10:5) initiating conversations and lovingly showing their friends the evidence and logic that backs up our faith, and ultimately encouraging those friends to put their trust in Christ." LEE page 52
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Culture/
A Patent Lie: How Yahoo Weaponized My Work

Andy Baio (Wired Top Stories)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:44:00 PM
While most of the tech world was partying at South by Southwest in Austin yesterday, Yahoo! announced it was filing a lawsuit against Facebook for allegedly infringing on 10 patents from their 1,000+ patent warehouse. Im no fan of Facebook, but this is a deplorable move. Its nothing less than extortion, expertly timed during the SEC-mandated quiet period before Facebooks IPO. Its an attack on invention and the hacker ethic. In the interest of full disclosure, I have a small supporting role in this story. None of the patents I co -invented are cited in the Yahoo complaint, but a handful of applications I worked on with Yahoo were granted patents, weaponized now to use against people like me. Heres how the process worked, in my case: In 2005, Yahoo acquired Upcoming.org, the collaborative events calendar Id launched two years before. Back then, the Web 1.0 behemoth seemed on the verge of turning things around. A series of smart moves high-profile hires, the Oddpost and Flickr acquisitions, the launch of the Yahoo! Developer Network, and their
Research Lab was breathing new life into things. Two months after we were acquired, Del.icio.us and Webjay joined us in the Yahoo fold. After we moved in, we were asked to file patents for anything
and everything wed invented while working on Upcoming.org. Every Yahoo employee was encouraged to participate in their Patent Incentive Program, with sizable bonuses issued to everyone who took the time to
apply. Now, Ive always hated the idea of software patents. But Yahoo assured us that their patent portfolio was a precautionary measure, to defend against patent trolls and others who might try to
attack Yahoo with their own holdings. It was a cold war, stockpiling patents instead of nuclear arms, and every company in the valley had a bunker full of PATENT page 52
Culture/
49
Killing Drug Cartel Bosses Isn't Working, Says Top U.S. General
Robert Beckhusen (Wired Top Stories)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:00:00 PM
Gen Charles Jacoby, who heads U.S. Northern Command. Photo: NORAD Mexicos decapitation strategy of capturing or killing high-value drug cartel leaders with the help of U.S. advisers has a certain merit to it. After all, cartel bosses are seriously bad dudes who corrupt, bribe, kidnap and kill their way to power across swathes of territory across our border. The problem, according to the chief of U.S. military forces in North America, is that the strategy isnt working. The decapitation strategy theyve been successful at that. Twenty-two out of the top 37 trafficking figures that the Mexican government has gone after have been taken off the board, Gen. Charles Jacoby, commander of U.S. Northern Command, said during testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday. Then, a caveat: But it has not had an appreciable effect an appreciable, positive effect. In other words, the Mexican government has demonstrably (and frequently) succeeded in capturing and killing cartel leaders. But the impact of those
strikes may be fleeting. Three weeks ago, Mexican federal police reportedly came close to even capturing Joaquin El Chapo Guzman boss of the Sinaloa Cartel and reportedly the worlds most powerful drug lord near the resort city of Cabo San Lucas less than a day before
G20 foreign ministers gathered nearby. El Chapo, who has a security detail reported to include helicopters and up to 300 men, was likely lying low with minimal escort. Meanwhile, Mexican authorities last week captured the boss of the Jalisco New Generation cartel,
which has been battling the Zetas for control of the eastern port city of Veracruz. The army also killed a top Zeta capo in the border city of Nuevo Laredo earlier this month, though its probably too early to draw broad lessons from each. The capo, named El Guerra or The War, was only
eight months on the job and his predecessor was also killed by the army. Mexicos gangsters have also shown to be resilient at absorbing losses, and adept at corrupting both government officials and members of the KILLING page 54
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Culture/
Batmobile-like Nissan DeltaWing is the Future of Racing

Damon Lavrinc (Wired Top Stories)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:43:00 PM
| Next >> | Next >> View all Heres a glimpse at the future of racing. Its called the Nissan DeltaWing and its part road racer, part salt-flat runner and looks like a modern interpretation of the Keaton-era Batmobile. Not only is it lighter and more aerodynamic than the rest of the endurance racing field, it uses half the fuel, which not only makes it more environmentally friendly, but more competitive. And against all odds, its coming to the
only race that matters: the 24 Hours of LeMans. The DeltaWing is a joint project between former Lola design chief Ben Bowlby and Chip Ganassi Racing, and pitched as the future of IndyCar. IndyCar passed on the design, calling the DeltaWing too
radical, and instead falling back on the latest interpretation of the Dallara chassis the series has been using for years. Bowlby and crew, along with American racing legend Dan Gurney and forward-thinker Don Panoz, shrugged off the rejection,
scored a few important partnerships (namely Michelin) and set their sights even higher. Now Nissan has joined the team, appending its name to the project and more importantly supplying the engine. If youve ever seen Nissans
funky Juke crossover, youre already vaguely familiar with whats powering the DeltaWing. The range-topping Juke DIG-T (Direct Injection Gasoline Turbocharged) in Japan comes BATMOBILE-LIKE page 55
Culture/
51
Schuller Coleman Breaks Away From Crystal Cathedral

Crystal Cathedral pastor told congregants that regular Sunday services will continue in the famed glass building and Sheila Schuller Coleman, the members were free to decide firstborn child of Robert H. and where they would like to be next A r v e l l a S c h u l l e r a n d t h e Sunday morning, according to Executive Director of Ministry The Orange County Register. "We and Mission at the Crystal are very sad, very sorry about Cathedral video address released this," Pastor Emeritus Juan Carlos on Nov. 17, 2011. Ortiz, who began the Hispanic ( P h o t o : R E U T E R S / A l e x ministry for the Crystal Cathedral, G a l l a r d o ) A v i e w o f t h e was quoted as saying. "I hope Millennial Memorial Wall on the they both have success those grounds at the Crystal Cathedral who stay and those who leave." in Garden Grove, California The split comes a day after the August 10, 2011. founder and his wife, Arvella Schuller, announced their March 12, 2012| 8:48 am resignation from the board of the Hope Center of Christ will be the megachurch, saying they had lost name of the church. Coleman, a hope of settling disputes with daughter of Crystal Cathedral d i r e c t o r s o v e r c o p y r i g h t founder Dr. Robert H. Schuller, infringement and payment for expects to find a location for her services in a positive atmosphere. breakaway church this week. Coleman said Jim Penner, former She said in a video message executive producer from the posted on the church's new "Hour of Power" television website that they would announce program, and Scott and Debbie where the new church will meet Smith, who headed the church's for worship in the next few days. music program, were coming with It would not be more than five or her to the new church. 10 minutes from the old building, Like us on Facebook she added. Penner appeared alongside Soon after her announcement, a Coleman in the video posted on
hopecenteroc.org. He said they would soon spread their mission around the world by television and the Internet. The landmark campus of the Crystal Cathedral now belongs to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange County after an agreement in February for a $57.5 million sale on a court's order. The megachurch had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October 2010. Crystal Cathedral can continue to worship on the campus for three years for $100,000 a month during the first year and $150,000 for the following two years. In 2015, the congregation is expected to move out of the campus, which will then serve as the spiritual home of the 1.2 million Catholics in Orange County. After the founder handed over the leadership of the Crystal Cathedral to his family in 2008, the megachurch faced numerous challenges, including a growing debt and a leadership struggle. Schuller founded the church with a $500 loan over 55 years ago. In her final message at the Crystal Cathedral, Coleman reminded the dwindling
congregation that despite the sale, they have not lost their "house." "Where is God's house? Let us never mistake property for God's house God's house that He wants all of us to remain focused on is eternal," she said, stressing that their home is in heaven with Jesus. "Nothing can take that away from us. That is never ever ever for sale because it's already been bought with the blood of Jesus Christ!" she exclaimed. "I have good news for you today your escrow on your eternal home has closed!" "If God allowed me and my family and all of us to go through the pain in the last couple of years to just learn that lesson and hear that message today, that escrow's closed, you don't have to worry about it, you've been bought by the blood of Jesus Christ." This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Are you a sunbeam or a storm cloud?

(Holy Kaw!)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:30:00 PM
Bosses control the weather in their workplace, writes Scott Eblin. A leader's off-the-cuff remarks or sideways glances can be enough to put a spring in their worker's step or to drag down the mood of the whole office, Eblin writes. "If the leader is sunny and bright, everyone else is likely to be sunny and bright. If the leader is stormy and cloudy, get your umbrella out," he adds. Full story at SmartBlog on Leadership by SmartBrief. More SmartBrief stories. Photo credit: Fotolia Permalink| Leave a comment
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Culture/ Finance/
PATENT
them. Against my better judgement, I sat in a conference room with my co-founders and a couple of patent attorneys and told them what wed created. They took notes and created nonsensical documents that I still cant make sense of. In all, I helped Yahoo file eight patent applications. Years after I left I discovered to my dismay that four of them were granted by the U.S. Patent and Trade Office. I thought I was giving them a shield, but turns out I gave them a missile with my name permanently engraved on it. I was naive. Even if the original intention was truly defensive, a patent portfolio can easily change hands, and a company can even more easily change its mind. Since I left in 2007, Yahoo has had three CEOs and a board overhaul. The scary part is that even the most innocuous patent can be used to crush anothers creativity. One of the patents I co-invented is so abstract, it could not only cover
Facebooks News Feed, but virtually any activity feed. It puts into very sharp focus the trouble with software patents: Purposefully vague wording invites broad interpretation. In their complaint, Yahoo alleges that Facebooks News Feed violates Dynamic page generator, a patent filed in 1997 by their former CTO related to the launch of My Yahoo, one of the first personalized websites. Every web application, from Twitter to Pinterest, could be said to violate this patent. This is chaos. Software patents should be abolished, plain and simple. Software is already covered by copyright, making patent protection unnecessary. Ask any programmer developing software is as creative and unique as writing poetry. Yahoos lawsuit against Facebook is an insult to the talented engineers who filed patents with the understanding they wouldnt be used for evil. Betraying that trust wont be forgotten, but I doubt it matters
anymore. Nobody I know wants to work for a company like that. Im embarrassed by the patents I filed, but Ive learned from my mistake. Ill never file a software patent again, and I urge you to do the same. For years, Yahoo was mostly harmless. Management foibles and executive shuffles only hurt shareholders and employee morale. But in the last few years, the companys incompetence has begun to hurt the rest of us. First, with the wholesale destruction of internet history, and now by attacking younger, smarter companies. Yahoo tried and failed, over and over again, to build a social network that people would love and use. Unable to innovate, Yahoo is falling back to the last resort of a desperate, dying company: litigation as a business model. That its Yahoo makes it even sadder. The complaint isnt really wrong when it asserts that: For much of the technology upon which Facebook is based, Yahoo!
got there first. But being first with something generic that would have been invented by someone (like the wheel) as opposed to something few could have imagined (like the Segway) is a big difference. Ask any start-up CEO execution is everything. As Facebook founder Jesse Eisenberg cum Mark Zuckerberg says in The Social Network, If you guys were the inventors of Facebook, youd have invented Facebook. Illustration: From one of the patents I helped Yahoo obtain. Homepage photo: Schill/Flickr This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Instead of Saying "I Don't Have Time," Say "It's Not a Priority" [Time Management]
Adam Dachis (Lifehacker)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:00:00 PM
LEE
We lead busy lives and use our limited time as an excuse to procrastinate and avoid getting things done, but often claiming we don't have time is a lie. It's a lie we tell others and ourselves. It helps us believe we'll never get anything done, and this is a problem. Fortunately, the solution might be as simple as changing your language. Wall Street Journal writer Laura Vanderkam explains: More
Strobel and Mittelberg plan to lead another conference called " Unpacking Atheism" in October that will also be available to churches interested in hosting a simulcast. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it
on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Fed slightly more upbeat on economy

Richard Blackden (Finance News - Business news from the UK and world)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:19:03 PM
of the US economy but dropped no clues as to whether it is considering a third round of quantitative easing.
The Federal Reserve has offered a slightly more upbeat assessment
Culture/
53
Schuller, Wife Resign From Crystal Cathedral Board

independent board members regarding the latest of many offers made by the couple over the past months to settle their claims in the (Photo: Reuters/Alex Gallardo) bankruptcy court, were told on A view of Crystal Cathedral, the Tuesday night that "the Board had glass-walled megachurch in no interest in continuing their Garden Grove, Calif., is seen this d i a l o g u e a i m e d a t p o s i t i v e Aug. 10, 2011 photo. resolution," the news release explained. March 11, 2012| 9:04 am The landmark campus of Crystal "We cannot continue to serve on Cathedral in Garden Grove, the Board in what has become an Calif., now belongs to the Roman a d v e r s a r i a l a n d n e g a t i v e Catholic Diocese of Orange atmosphere, especially since it County after an agreement in now seems that it will not be February for a $57.5 million sale ending anytime soon," Arvella o n a c o u r t ' s o r d e r . T h e Schuller said in a statement megachurch had filed for Chapter Saturday. 11 bankruptcy in October 2010. The couple was involved in a "Particularly in these difficult legal battle with the board of times for the ministry, the d i r e c t o r s o v e r i n t e l l e c t u a l ministry's decision to spend its p r o p e r t y a n d c o p y r i g h t money on attorneys and court infringement claims as well as proceedings is bewildering to us," b a c k p a y m e n t f o r s e r v i c e s Arvella Schuller said. rendered, according to their Like us on Facebook daughter Carol Schuller Milner. Crystal Cathedral can continue to The Schullers, who had been worship on the campus for three awaiting a decision by the years for $100,000 a month
during the first year and $150,000 for the following two years. In 2015, the congregation is expected to move out of the campus, which will then serve as the spiritual home of the 1.2 million Catholics in Orange County. Schuller's attorney Carl Grumer was also quoted in the news release. "Our proposals have always been structured in a way that would allow full payment to creditors to go forward without delay while leaving the ministry with more operating capital than originally contemplated in the court approved bankruptcy plan," Grumer said. "We were optimistic that a solution was close at hand which would be mutually beneficial to the Schullers and the ministry. What motivated the board's decision to make a sudden shift after it had seemed that we were so close to a positive conclusion, we do not know." The news release by the Schullers concluded by saying, "No matter
what, God is still God. No matter what, God is still a good God. God loves you and so do I." Milner said her parents were removing themselves only from the governance of the ministry. "They're not cutting all ties. They're still planning on worshipping in the congregation." After the founder handed over the leadership of the Crystal Cathedral to his family in 2008, the megachurch faced numerous challenges, including a growing debt and a leadership struggle. Schuller founded the church with a $500 loan over 55 years ago. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Save Money on Groceries By Cooking Like a Peasant [Saving Money]

Melanie Pinola (Lifehacker)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:00:00 PM
Making great meals using just a few resources is an art many of our grandmothers and greatgrandmothers know how to do. Get Rich Slowly reminds us that we can use the same principles of using cheap, filling ingredients to make comfort foods todayand reduce our grocery bill. More
Tweets and photos make up the bulk of SXSW buzz

(Holy Kaw!)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:38:00 PM
Almost two-thirds of the social
chatter surrounding the South by Southwest conference is made up of tweets and shared photos, according to an Alerti analysis. The remaining third is split fairly
evenly among Facebook updates, news reports and blog posts. Full story at SmartBlog on Social Media by SmartBrief.
More SmartBrief stories. Permalink| Leave a comment
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Culture/ Finance/
KILLING
police and military. Theyve also demonstrated the ability to bypass military checkpoints to move drugs and personnel. To make matters worse, killing or capturing cartel leaders hasnt reduced the overall level of violence, or reversed the growing reach of the cartels throughout Mexico, Central America and the United States. Another problem: theres no shortage of replacements for cartel leaders once the top bosses are taken out. Even worse, decapitation can cause violence to increase, at least in the short-term. According to Alejandro Hope, an analyst and former official at Mexicos CISEN (the countrys equivalent of the CIA), decapitation of criminal bands can escalate violence due to succession conflicts, the unraveling of some groups, or through power vacuums that are exploited by rivals groups. Hope supports decapitation strikes, but accompanied by measures which will prevent destabilizing effects, and maximize effects which dissuade violence. Namely, targeting the most violent cartels first and capturing their leaders if at all possible.
Now, the U.S. isnt giving up on Mexicos war quite yet. I agree that there are other things that need to be done, said Jacoby, who oversees the militarys homeland defense efforts as head of U.S. Northern Command. He also referenced Mexicos latest offensive against the Zetas, aimed at reducing violence across the northeast [region of Mexico], and I think thats the right strategy to follow. The U.S. is also helping out by sending former Navy SEAL commander and counter-terrorism specialist Rear Adm. Colin Kilrain to Mexico City to serve as Americas liaison in Mexicos war on drugs. Deploying Kilrain a veteran of the U.S. wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq could be a signal that from the U.S. perspective, what Mexico needs is someone who has the special skills and experiences complementary to battling the cartels, Mexico military specialist Roderic Camp told the Houston Chronicle. Theres bad news in the Caribbean, though. The U.S.s mainstay in drug interdiction efforts in the Caribbean, the Oliver Hazard Perry-class missile
frigate, is being retired and replaced with the Littoral Combat Ship: the newly prized and expensive shoreline-warfare vessel. The problem, however, is that the Littoral Combat Ship might not be able to replace all the frigates operating in the region. That is one of the issues were seeing with the availability of naval ships is the retirement of those frigates, said Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, who heads up U.S. Southern Command. And this has been a gap that we have seen for a few years now coming and so the Littoral Combat Ship will have a great capacity to also support our mission as well in the future. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Angelina Jolie Begins Filming Maleficent in June

Katie Henry (PopSugar)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:07:34 PM
Angelina Jolie's Maleficent begins shooting in June- The Hollywood Reporter Sofia Vergara is thinking about freezing her eggs- People Gwyneth Paltrow lands a new modeling gig- Lainey Gossip Watch Jay-Z's entire SXSW performance- HuffPost Entertainment Courtney Love is mad at the Muppets- D-Listed Justin Bieber got a new calf tattoo- Pink Is the New Blog Dave Franco is growing up and looking very GQ- JustJared See the most creative signs from The Hunger Games premiere - BuzzFeed Megan Fox trades sexy stilettos for cozy pink Uggs- Hollywood Tuna Vanessa Hudgens is embracing the neon trend- The Superficial
Was Ben the worst Bachelor of all time?- The Daily Beast Britney Spears's team resumes X Factor negotiations- Zap2it Nicole Richie pulled an evil prank on Lionel- TooFab Pregnant Alessandra Ambrosio hangs out in NYC- I'm Not Obsessed Eva Mendes and Ryan Gosling are still together- YourTango Rihanna is embracing her rootsCity Rag
Punters stake less as markets more poised

Rachel Cooper (Finance News Business news from the UK and world)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:35:54 PM
Calmer markets might be good for traders' blood pressure, but it meant that one spreadbetting business saw punters put less
money on the table.
Culture/
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BATMOBILE-LIKE
packing a turbod 1.6-liter fourcylinder engine putting out a little over 180 horsepower. But when modified for racing duty, output swells to some 300 hp. To reduce drag and optimize weight bias, the engine is mounted behind the driver and power is sent to the rear wheels. More intriguingly, with both the engine and driver mounted far back in the carbon fiber chassis, the ultra-thin front tires dont have to move much to elicit a change in direction. If youre thinking those miserly front meats cant be stable at speed, check the video below of the DeltaWing testing at Buttonwillow Raceway in Southern California. Compared to the LeMans leaders in the LMP1 class, including the recently revealed 510-hp Audi R18 Ultra, the DeltaWing is down on both power and traction, but thats not the name of the game when it comes to endurance racing. The DeltaWing weighs in at a svelte 1,300 pounds with a full tank of fuel and driver on board
about half what a comparable LMP1 car weighs. Couple that low tonnage with its slippery shape, good for a claimed 50 percent reduction in aerodynamic drag, and suddenly the DeltaWing is competitive. Just as important as its aero advantage and reduced weight is the boost in fuel economy, which Nissan estimates will be about half that of an LMP1 car. Over the course of a 24-hour race, that means fewer pitstops to refuel and with its lightened load a reduced need for tire changes and brake swaps. That equates to more laps over less time, and thats what wins LeMans. Except, it cant win. The DeltaWing is running in a class of one, taking the Garage 56 spot at LeMans and wearing a 0 on its sides, both of which indicate that its a noncompetitive, exhibition racer; a rolling proof of concept that gets to play with the big boys and put on a show for the ACO, the organizing body of the race. But that doesnt mean the
DeltaWings participation isnt relevant. As motor racing rulebooks have become tighter over time, racing cars look more and more similar and the technology used has had less and less relevance to road car development, says Executive VP at Nissan Andy Palmer. Nissan DeltaWing aims to change that. And change that they will, beginning with its first public exhibition at Sebring International Raceway this Thursday and followed by taking the exclusive 56th slot at the 24 Hours of LeMans this June. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Jennifer Lopez and Casper Smart Share Steamy Nighttime PDA on the Set
Katie Henry (PopSugar)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:07:14 PM
Jennifer Lopez hung out with boyfriend Casper Smart on the set of her new music video "Follow the Leader" in Acapulco last night. Jen and Casper shared a kiss between takes, when she wasn't showing off her hot dance moves. J Lo arrived in Mexico over the weekend with Casper, and has since gotten down to work with musicians Wisin & Yandel. Their short getaway will need to wrap up by tomorrow, when Jen is expected back in LA and on the judging panel at American Idol. Last week, contestants belted out songs by Stevie Wonder, and the top 12
will next take the stage to perform songs from the year in which they were born. Do you plan to tune in for the next installment of American Idol? View Slideshow
Video: Jessica Simpson Shares Wedding Plans While Nicole Richie Declares Love For Her Costar
Karli Bulnes (PopSugar)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:55:26 PM
Jessica Simpson and Nicole Richie are both making multiple
TV appearances ahead of the
premiere of Fashion Star. The designers get candid about their personal lives and each other in today's PopSugar Rush.
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Culture/ Politics-Left/ News Photos
5 Most Coveted Offshore Idlib residents Petroleum Reserves targeted by snipers

Robert Lamb (HowStuffWorks Daily Feed)
subterranean reservoirs of petroleum in the form of liquid oil, natural gas and oil shale. If you could gaze back thro-ugh - T o d a y , E a r t h ' s p e t r o l e u m 500 million years of history, you'd reservoirs are buried under find the oceans of pr-ehistory massive layers of rock. And on a swarming with microscopic life. planet that's 71 percent water, Tiny floating plant and animal life much of that petroleum is also drifted through the seas, spurred underwater. Humans have spent on by cooling ocean temperatures the last centur-y developing better and an atmosphere that was ways to extract these precious r-apidly reaching the levels of d e p o s i t s , b u t w e ' r e s t i l l breathable oxygen we can't live d i s c o v e r i n g n e w o f f s h o r e without. Ironically, the humans p e t r o l e u m r e s e r v e s . - P l u s , that eventually evolved out of environmental laws, treaties and these primordial waters now the limits of human technology depend on another byproduct of continue to keep some of these this early era: petroleum. reservoirs just out of the reach of -For milli-ons- of years, these vast the global oil industry. But, in a clouds of plankton burned through world that consumes more than 80 their brief live-s, littering the million barrels a day, you can rest ocean floors with their dead. In assured no one has forgotten what time, mud and sediment covered riches these off-limits regions these plains of decaying organic may contain [source: CIA]. matter. Sealed off from oxygen, heat and pressure very slowly Under the United Nations' Law of cooked this dead matter into the Sea treaty, a coastal country
can lay claim to coastal waters extending up to 200 nautical miles off its shoreline. A country can request up to 350 nautical miles if officials can prove the area is part of the country's continental shelf by May 2009. The continental shelf is the sloping undersea plain that runs from dry land to the deep, open ocean. -Oil companies are frothing at the mouth to sink their drills into the ocean's untapped fossil fuel riches. In this article, we'll look at the five offshore petroleum reserves they'd most like to drain dry. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
(AL JAZEERA ENGLISH (AJE))

Submitted at 3/13/2012 6:05:01 AM
For months before the Syrian army assault on Idlib, snipers have stalked the city, firing seemingly at random on ordinary residents. While an Al Jazeera team was working in the northwestern city this past week, three civilians, all of them elderly men, were shot dead.
Al Jazeeras Anita McNaught has this exclusive report from inside Idlib. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
PHOTOS: 2012 St. Patrick's Day Parade Patch.com

(news photos - Google News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:23:12 PM
Telegraph.co.uk
PHOTOS: 2012 St. Patrick's Day Parade Patch.com Add your photos to our gallery!
By Jim Gamelin Although a year has passed since I covered the annual St. Patrick's Day parade in West Warwick, as I walked the
parade route it seemed as though time stood still. The sunshine and seasonal temperatures... Send us your St. Patrick's Day
photos Wicked Local all 92 news articles
Politics-Left/
57
Syria's Assad sets parliamentary poll date

Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:14:04 PM
estimates, is fast approaching 10,000 (activists argue the number is much higher). Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian Annan, who met Assad, has not p r e s i d e n t , h a s i s s u e d a disclosed what those proposals decree stating that parliamentary entailed. elections will be held on May 7, "Let me say that the killings and even as Kofi Annan, the UN-Arab the violence must cease," Annan League envoy to Syria, awaited a told reporters. "The Syrian people response from Damascus on have gone through a lot and they "concrete proposals" he put deserve better," he said. forward to end the conflict raging The envoy said he had had a in the country. "useful meeting" with Syrian Assad's move on Tuesday was o p p o s i t i o n m e m b e r s w h o part of a raft of reforms that he "promised their full co-operation had unveiled to calm a year-long which will be necessary if we are uprising against his rule. His going to succeed". reforms have, however, failed to Idlib assault quell the anti-government protests Burhan Ghalioun, the head of the and not eased in any way the SNC, said the aim of talks was to mounting pressure on him to quit. find a political and diplomatic I t w a s u n c l e a r w h e t h e r solution in Syria, otherwise parliamentary elections were also foreign governments would part of the six-point peace plan deliver on promises to supply presented by Annan during his weapons to rebel forces in the recent visit to the country. country. The former UN chief was in the The latest diplomatic T u r k i s h c a p i t a l A n k a r a o n development came as Syrian T u e s d a y , w h e r e h e m e t a troops pressed an assault on rebel delegation from the opposition strongholds in the Turkish border Syrian National Council (SNC) . region on Tuesday. IN VIDEO "I am expecting to hear from Al Jazeera reports how snipers Syrian authorities today since I have been targeting residents at left some concrete proposals for random in Idlib them to consider," Annan told The UK-based Syrian reporters after the meeting. "Once Observatory for Human Rights I receive their answer we will said Syrian forces used heavy know how to react." machine guns to rake the town of Annan arrived in Turkey on El-Baraa in Jabal al-Zawiya Monday after negotiations in region, an opposition bastion in Damascus over the weekend northwestern Idlib province. aimed at ending the escalating The Observatory said armed violence that, according to UN fighters hit back before dawn with
an attack on a military checkpoint in the town of Maaret al-Numan in which at least 10 Syrian soldiers were killed. In Khan Sheikhun, another opposition bastion in Idlib, fighters attacked troops in heavy military vehicles, damaging two of them and seizing others, the Observatory said. It also reported clashes in Deir Ezzor in eastern Syria, in Aleppo in the north, and in Daraa in the south. The army has since March 9 mounted an offensive in the mountainous region near the Turkish border in a bid to seize control of the city of Idlib, which bears the same name as the province, and other towns where the opposition fighters are based. Dozens of people have been killed since last week by army shelling of Idlib city, which is now partly controlled by the government, and in violence across the province. Amid the reports of violence, the UN on Tuesday said that it would soon deploy human rights monitors in countries bordering Syria to collect witness testimony on "atrocities" committed in the
country. "We will be sending monitors for documentation of atrocities in bordering countries later this week," Kyung-wha Kang, Deputy UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, told the UN Human Rights Council during a debate on the crisis in Syria. Russia's military co-operation Russia, meanwhile, said it would press Syria to accept international monitors who could observe the implementation of a "simultaneous" ceasefire between government troops and the armed opposition fighters. "The objective is for both sides to understand that there is an independent observer watching how they meet demands - and we are definitely going to be making such demands - for an immediate ceasefire," Sergei Lavrov, the foreign minister, told reporters on Tuesday. "This must be simultaneous. We must not have a situation in which the government is required the leave the cities and villages while the armed groups are not made to do the same. "This is unrealistic not because we want the bloodshed to
continue, but because the unilateral withdrawal of government forces is completely unrealistic. "The Syrian authorities will not go for that, whether we like it or not," Lavrov said. Ahead of Lavrov's comments, a senior Russian government official said Moscow saw no reason for curtailing its military co-operation with Damascus despite calls from Western powers to stop arming Assads government. Anatoly Antonov, Russia's deputy defence minister, said his country would abide by existing contracts to deliver weapons to Syria. He told reporters that Russia enjoyed "good, strong military technical co-operation with Syria, and we see no reason to reconsider it". Russia and China have twice used their power as permanent members of the UN Security Council to veto resolutions on Syria. On Monday, at a UN Security Council ministerial meeting, Western governments stepped up pressure on Moscow and Beijing to end their blockage of action over the Syrian government's assault on protest cities. Russia, however, showed little sign that it would change its stance, with Sergei Lavrov, the R u s s i a n f o r e i g n SYRIA'S page 59
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Politics-Left/
Afghan officials attacked over US killings

Submitted at 3/13/2012 11:55:49 AM
Afghan students in Jalalabad protested and burned an effigy of Barack Obama on Tuesday [Reuters] Gunmen have attacked a senior Afghan government delegation investigating the massacre of 16 civilians by a US soldier in southern Kandahar province. At least one Afghan soldier was killed as the delegation, which included two brothers of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, came under fire on Tuesday, Abdul Raziq, the police chief for Kandahar province, told the AFP news agency. "There was an armed attack on them from a distance and the firing continued for about 10 minutes," said a local reporter at the scene in Panjwayi district. "Bullets were coming like rain on us," another witness told AFP. The attack came as hundreds of students took to the streets of the eastern city of Jalalabad, as anger over Sunday's killings by the unnamed US soldier prompted more anti-US protests. About 400 university students shouted "Death to America -
Death to Obama", burning an effigy of the US president and blocking the main highway to Kabul before dispersing after about two hours. Obama pledge Amid the public anger, Barack Obama, the US president, once again pledged a full investigation. From the perspective of one neighbourhood in Herat The United States takes this as seriously as if it was our own citizens or children. We are
heartbroken at loss of innocent lives," he said on Tuesday. "I can assure the American people and the Afghan people that we will follow that facts wherever they lead us." Leon Panetta, the US defence secretary, told reporters a day earlier that the shooting suspect would be brought to justice under the US military legal code, and could face the death penalty if convicted. Asked if the suspect could be
sentenced to death, Panetta said: "My understanding is in these instances that could be a consideration." Taliban threat The Afghan Taliban threatened on Tuesday to behead US troops in revenge for the killings by the US soldier. "The Islamic Emirate once again warns the American animals that the mujahideen will avenge them, and with the help of God will kill and behead your sadistic
murderous soldiers," Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid said in an emailed statement. Though the killings have outraged Afghans, they have not yet triggered a similar scale of protests that the burning of copies of the Quran at a US base sparked last month. Abdul Rahim Ayoubi, a member of the Afghan parliament from Kandahar, told Al Jazeera that many locals were still deciding how to respond to the attacks. "And once they decide, there will be no army, no force that can stop them," Ayoubi said. The US embassy in Kabul has warned its citizens to be on their guard, mindful of the prevailing mood in the country. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Products/ News Photos
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SYRIA'S
minister, condemning "risky recipes" which he said could increase conflict in the Middle East. Since the outbreak of violence in Syria last year, 230,000 people have fled their homes, the UN refugee agency said on Tuesday. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees' co-ordinator for Syria said 30,000 people had already fled to Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan and "on a daily basis hundreds of people are still crossing into neighboring countries". Panos Moumtzis told reporters in
Geneva that according to the Syrian Arab Red Crescent at least 200,000 people were also displaced within the country. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Consumer Reports News Filters recommends: Donate to (Consumer Reports) Wikileaks.
Most ID theft victims don't know their rights, the FTC says
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:29:59 PM
Donald Trump's sons under fire for hunting photos New York Daily News
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:24:06 PM
New York Daily News Donald Trump's sons under fire for hunting photos New York Daily News Donald Trump's sons are under fire after a series of photos from their African safari last year surfaced online. Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., who both appear on their father's NBC reality show Celebrity Apprentice, are facing harsh
Most ID theft victims don't know their rights, the FTC says The Federal Trade Commission released the results of a survey this week outlining the experiences of identity theft victims who called consumer reporting agencies to report the incident. The FTC report found that prior to calling a consumer-reporting agency, less than half of survey criticism from... responders were aware of the Trump's Sons RIPPED By majority of their rights under the Animal Org. -- You're 'PITIFUL' Fair Credit Reporting Act as for Mutilating Elephant TMZ.com amended by the Fair and Accurate Photos: Donald Trump's Sons Credit Transactions Act. Awesome At Killing Elephants The FCRA and FACT protect And Other Wildlife Gothamist your rights if you are a victim if Donald Trump's Sons Address ID theft by enabling you to put Controversy Caused by Their fraud alerts on your credit report W i l d l i f e H u n t i n g P h o t o s with the consumer reporting AceShowbiz Access Hollywood- The Hollywood Gossip all 36 news articles
agencies, get a free credit report from the three national consumer reporting agencies when placing a fraud alert, block fraudulent information from appearing in your credit report, and receive a notice of these and other rights from the consumer reporting agencies. The FTC report also found that some complained about feeling pressured to buy additional ID theft monitoring products. We've said before that you don't necessarily have to pay good money in order to protect yourself
against ID theft. For tips and advice about how best to guard against identity theft see Identity Theft: What you can do, plus several ways to secure your identity for less. For more see our Consumer Reports guide to online security, which includes software Ratings(available to subscribers). Previously: Identity theft again tops annual list of consumer complaints New ID fraud study: Good news FTC Issues Report on the Experiences of Victims Recovering from Identity Theft[FTC] Subscribe now! S u b s c r i b e t o ConsumerReports.org for expert Ratings, buying advice and reliability on hundreds of products. Update your feed preferences
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TV/
Eric Larnick: 'WWE Raw' Recap: Musical Showdown With The Rock
Eric Larnick (TV on HuffingtonPost.com)
Santino and Mr. Jennifer Hudson are announced as the captains for their respective teams at Submitted at 3/14/2012 11:01:11 AM WrestleMania ... but not before a The big showdown from the Mar. ridiculous flexing display from 12 Raw, live in Cleveland, Ohio is Otunga that required at least three a musical battle between John whole bottles of baby oil. Just as Cena and the Rock. the action gets underway, We're two weeks away from " Laurinaitis decides to change the WrestleMania 28" on Sun., April match from a mixed tag to a 1. Live from the Sun Life Stadium handicap match.... in Miami, Florida, headliners Match 2, Take Two: Handicap Cena -- the face of World Match - Santino vs. Otunga and Wrestling Entertainment -- will be the World's Strongest Man, Mark squaring off against wrestlerHenry turned-movie star Dwayne "The During the match, Smackdown Rock" Johnson at the Super Bowl General Manager Teddy Long popular guy in WWE because he Vickie Guerrero) vs. Sheamus "everything is fine," while her of wrestling. seemed like a cool guy that used The Celtic Warrior and the Show eyes clearly scream for help. comes out to try to support But before we get ahead of cuss words (which is all it takes to -Off have what ends up being the Daniel Bryan is great at playing a Santino, but since Big Johnny ourselves, onto this week's appeal to teenage boys). Now, night's lengthiest contest. And it's smarmy jerk and undeserving runs this show, he's powerless. showdown: there's just something silly about not a bad fight. The problem is champion, but because Daniel and Long retaliates by hilariously Opening Segment: John Cena's it. that it's inevitable that Sheamus AJ look like two hipsters, it shoving Laurinaitis down and Battle Rap And as clever as Cena's rhymes will win. There's no way he's doesn't have the cartoonish then walking away, but it doesn't WATCH ON WWE FAN may be, they've always been going to have his momentum cut madness of "Macho Man" Randy affect the action in the ring. NATION painfully slow. Still the rap itself out from underneath him after Savage and Miss Elizabeth. Santino puts up a noble underdog Cena comes out in full "Doctor of was classic trash talk and the winning the Royal Rumble. Instead, it reminds me of Fred effort, but he's expectantly put Thuganomics" gear, complete emotion behind it was tough. Ziggler shouldn't feel like such an Savage and Candace Cameron in down by Henry in quick fashion. with Cavaliers jersey. Despite the Otunga and Henry proceed to beat Verdict: It was good, but it just after-thought, especially after the "No One Would Tell." local sports team pandering and up the champ after the bell. First, reminds us that we don't get this incredible matches he's had over Winner: Sheamus wrestling fans' love of nostalgia, version of Cena every week. the past year. And double Verdict: Perfectly fine television Kofi Kingston and then R-Truth Cena is met with a divisive race out to help Santino, but they What appears to be a hype video especially, when we're this close wrestling. crowd. He lays down some pretty for another Undertaker-HBK- to WrestleMania. Raw General Manager John "Mr. are both squashed by Henry. Mr. vulgar rhymes, including wanting T r i p l e H c o n f r o n t a t i o n i s During the course of the match, Excitement" Laurinaitis walks out Excitement announces Henry as to give Rock a Cleveland steamer. interrupted by Vickie Guerrero, Josh Matthews tries to conduct a to provide commentary for our t h e s e c o n d m e m b e r o f h i s Cleveland, uh, appreciates(?) the WrestleMania team (duh). who comes out to complain about skybox interview with World next match... shout-out. D a y l i g h t S a v i n g s T i m e Heavyweight Champion Daniel Match 2: Mixed Tag Team - Winner: David Otunga and Mark When John Cena used to do this (seriously), which then segues Bryan. It's cut short when Josh United States Champion Santino Henry Mark Wahlberg-esque thug into... asks AJ about Bryan's treatment Marella and Aksana vs. David ERIC page 61 routine in 2003, he was the most Match 1: Dolph Ziggler (with of her; she responds with an Otunga and ?
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ERIC
Verdict: This bid for power between Long and Laurinaitis is so much more enjoyable than anyone expected, and it's giving a lot of the guys in the locker room something to do. The 12-man tag team match for control of all WWE programming could be a surprise crowd favorite at WrestleMania. Behind-the-Scenes Feature: The Miz's upcoming guest appearance on this Wendesday's episode of " Psych." Whatever. Recap: John Cena's battle rap We just saw this 38 minutes ago. Sure, wrestling fans cheered Sgt. Slaughter after he became an Iraqi sympathizer in 1991, but we're not so dense as to forget something we saw less than an hour ago. During the recap, Michael Cole utters a word that he repeatedly uses during the course of the night in regards to Cena's rap: "attitudinal." This company has spent years trying to re-brand itself away from the Jerry Spinger -esque "Attitude Era" of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin and DGeneration-X, and start selling itself as an " American Idol"-like family friendly circus that appeals to Nickelodeon and Mattel Toys. And the face of this new image has been John Cena. But then the Rock came back and verbally annihilated him with a creative freedom that no other modern wrestler had been given, and suddenly, Cena didn't seem as cool to all those kids that buy his t -shirt. It feels like WWE is in major damage control to protect their
merchandise cash cow, so he isn't totally neutered by a legit Hollywood star. Every skit involving Cena has framed him as being bullet-proof in a way that he just isn't, especially when Rock can show up and get a Cena insult to trend worldwide on Twitter within 60 seconds. Recap: Maria Menounous interviews the WWE Divas on "Extra" Oof. Alicia Fox talks about how her outfit is more important than a match at WrestleMania, then she giggles. Are they even trying to sell these women as athletes anymore? Backstage at the Arena That jezebel Eve comes across Zack Ryder, who does his best to resist her feminine wiles, but he finally caves when Eve suggests they become "friends with benefits." Sounds like Vince McMahon finally added "No Strings Attached" to his Netflix queue. Then, Divas Champion Beth Phoenix wanders onto the scene to complain about Maria Menounous hogging her spotlight. She makes a vague threat about showing up on "Extra" to show Menounos who is boss.* After Ryder leaves, Beth compliments Eve on the way she totally manipulates Zack and asks if she could borrow him. Eve gets crazy eyes and tells her to back off.** *Because if there's one thing beerdrinking wrestling fans from the Midwest want, it's forcing them to watch glossy celebrity coverage from the likes of Nancy O'Dell. **Because if there's one thing all
women have in common, it's being a manipulative, paranoid, backstabbing shrew (apparently). Backstage (Again) Mr. Laurinaitis is busy making deals happen when he's interrupted by the Miz. To prove he deserves a top spot on the WrestleMania card, Miz brings out "Psych" star James Roday. For the first time in history, a WWE executive is not impressed by a minor basic-cable celebrity, and Johnny forces Miz into a match with WWE World Champion, CM Punk. If Miz wins, he gets a spot on Laurinaitis' WrestleMania team. Roday ad libs a few jokes about Howard Finkel with the Raw General Manager and now I want Laurinaitis to grace other USA Network shows with his weird deliberate anti-charisma. Match 3: "The Funkasaurus" Brodus Clay vs. Jinder Mahal Brodus Clay is a 400-pound dancing superfly with back-up dancers and fireworks. Jinder Mahal has a scowl and a turban. Clay's victory celebration actually goes longer than the match. Winner: The Funkasaurus Verdict: Clay didn't even get to do his mid-match bits like "My bad" or "Should I get him?" Those are the best parts of his schtick. Verbal Confrontation: "The Heartbreak Kid" Shawn Michaels and The Undertaker During Michaels's walk to the ring, we get the sign of the night when someone plants "Explain GTV" in full view of the camera. (
Was it Goldust? Tom Green? Headbanger Thrasher?) HBK reiterates the same points we've been hearing for the past month regarding the upcoming WrestleMania match: This 'TakerTriple H blow-off will be the "end of an era," blah blah blah. Undertaker's music hits, we fastforward 17 minutes and he's standing face-to-face with Michaels. And then, we get more of the same points reiterated in super dramatic fashion: How dare anyone accuse Michaels of failing to get the job done? He will gladly count the pin on 'Taker, 'Taker has no problem ending Michaels if he doesn't call the match down the middle. Triple H comes out at the end to crotch chop the Deadman; enjoy the callback to DX for these last few weeks because at WrestleMania, it will be the end of an era. Verdict: Crowds are getting restless. These long. drawn-out monologues are getting heckled with more and more "what" chants from the crowds, and this storyline is too corny and oldschool for them to react to that. Look, we know the actual cage match is going to be amazing, but they don't really need to fill 15 minutes of live TV every week harping on the same three points with all the gravitas of an episode of Lorenzo Lamas' "Renegade." In conclusion, when are they going to get to the fireworks factory?! Match 4: WWE World Champion CM Punk vs. The Miz James Roday comes out to do
guest ring introductions and looks like he actually wants to be there, unlike Burt Reynolds at WrestleMania 10 in 1994. Crowds are decidedly mixed for this encounter because, despite being the most obnoxious bad guy in wrestling, Miz is getting plenty of hometown love from the Cleveland crowd. In fact, Miz's reception might be warmer than Cena's. After a few minutes of solid action, Punk locks Miz with the Anaconda Vice submission and Miz has no choice but to tap out. His losing streak continues so close to WrestleMania. Winner: CM Punk Punk's victory celebration is interrupted by Chris Jericho on the big screen. The feud gets awesomely personal when Jericho brings up Punk's real childhood and tells the crowd that Punk's alcoholic father is the reason he's straight-edge. His slimy dissection of Punk's sarcasm, tattoos and character are punctuated by the point that Punk will always be a failure in his father's eyes and he'll end up a pathetic drunk too ... when Jericho humiliates him at WrestleMania. For the first time in his WWE career, Punk is near tears and speechless. WATCH ON WWE FAN NATION Verdict: The match was fine, but the aftermath was classic pro wrestling. Punk and Jericho's title bout just got personal like Ric Flair and Ricky Steamboat, in the glory days of 1989. We already knew Punk-Jericho would be an ERIC page 63
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'Community' Stars Talk Weddings, Booze & Sexy Voices

Maggie Furlong (TV on HuffingtonPost.com)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:36:23 PM
Shave your Twitter beards and get ready to go back to school because " Community" is finally returning this week (Thurs., Mar. 15, 8 p.m. ET on NBC)! I was on set while they shot this week's big, romantic episode, "Urban Matrimony and the Sandwich Arts," which features a Boyz II Men-soundtracked proposal, a possible wedding, a potential new business partnership and the return of Malcolm-Jamal Warner, a.k.a. Shirley's ( Yvette Nicole Brown) baby daddy and former ex Andre. Brown, Warner, Joel McHale, Alison Brie, Danny Pudi, Donald Glover and Gillian Jacobs teased drunken breakdowns, wedding planning, surprising new sides of certain characters and what Troy and Abed's idea of "normal" actually looks like. So Andre proposes again? We haven't seen him in quite a while. Yvette Nicole Brown: "Mmhmmm. Yeah, it's been a while -- Shirley's referenced baby Ben a few times, and life is going on, but this is the first time in this season that we get to see Malcolm. He's been busy -- he's got his own show now, so we just now got to steal him from ' Reed
Between the Lines' for a bit." Alison Brie: "He's very sexy. And he goes all out in this episode." Joel McHale: "He can dance, too. That man can do anything." Malcolm-Jamal Warner: "I had to come back and represent for the bad ex-husbands around the world!" Andre proposing to Shirley with "Motown Philly" Boyz II Men backup singers: Will we actually see a wedding? Yvette Nicole Brown: "Wow. That's something I'm not gonna answer. [Laughs.] There is a rehearsal and ... Shirley has a couple of options in her life right now, and she's exploring both of those options. And not everybody's happy about that. It's life -- you make a decision for yourself and change and grow as a human being, and sometimes your family and friends can follow you there and support you, and sometimes they're threatened. So she's in the middle of that fight with a couple of people in her life, not just Andre." Malcolm-Jamal Warner: "There's definitely a little bit of a fight ... a kerfuffle, if you will, between Shirley and Andre. And you see it and you can only imagine what happens behind closed doors with them. [Laughs.] I think he's got some ulterior motives, but yeah ...
being Mr. Mom is kind of taking its toll -- it's a little more than he can handle --and he's realizing having Shirley back home to help with the family would be nice." And the wedding takes place at school? Danny Pudi: "Why leave Greendale's campus when we've got everything you need right here? And everyone here has their Internet minister license, so anybody here can do your wedding." It actually looks pretty in here -- I hear Britta had a lot to do with the planning and decorations. Gillian Jacobs: "Maybe people are surprising themselves in this episode. Maybe different sides of people that they're not comfortable with are being revealed. Maybe." So Troy and Abed are trying to be "normal" for Shirley's wedding? Joel McHale: "But, of course, their normal is very odd. It's bizarre." Donald Glover: "Yeah, we're normal in this episode. It's weird ... it's like a slightly exaggerated version of yourself. Really affable and pleasant. Everything's pleasant. It's like watching 'Family Ties.'" Danny Pudi: "In real life, I love dancing at weddings. If we can't celebrate these two people getting
together and loving each other by doing the worm in their honor ... [Laughs.] I don't think the worm is happening here though, but there is some dancing. I usually get drunk at weddings, and there's an open bar here, but there's enough people drunk here that Abed doesn't really need to be. You've gotta pace yourself. While we can all agree that this is one couple that should be together, this is another opportunity for everyone to be like, 'How do we feel about marriage?' Shirley's definitely fearful about how Troy and Abed are going to behave. We have sort of a history of finding our own adventures during other people's big moments." The gang debates marriage: But not everyone is behaving -looks like Jeff and Britta get a little bit wasted. Alison Brie: "They get drunk." Danny Pudi: "Surprise, surprise - did you see them on Troy's 21st birthday? They're the ones, every time it's someone else's day, they get sloshed." Gillian Jacobs: "Duh. Britta and Jeff, ego, alcohol, insecurity, daddy issues all combined ... at a wedding." Joel McHale: "Crazy, huh? Jeff's got some issues. A lot of alcohol, a lot of pent up memories. Amid his in a drunken stupor, he goes
back to his childhood memories. I think it's a crack in the shell ... he knows it, but he doesn't want to face it. But not much comes out after this. That's what's so great about Dan is he only lets it out a little bit at a time. It's not like, 'And now I'm changed!'" I see a lot of family members here today for Shirley and Andre ... Malcolm is still so well known for being part of a very famous TV family ... it got me doing some wishful thinking. Yvette Nicole Brown: "Wouldn't it be great if we just had Bill Cosby or Phylicia Rashad somewhere in the audience? Just sitting ... can you imagine? The joy if I would've walked in and Phylicia Rashad or Dr. Bill Cosby, PhD, was just in the audience? That would be so awesome. But no, unfortunately I have not seen either of the Huxtable parents here today." Even with her own wedding going on, Shirley has time to team with someone very unlikely. Pierce? Really? Yvette Nicole Brown: "As you know, Ken's character, Senor Chang, burned down the Hot & Brown in his detective episode. So since Shirley wants to open a restaurant or a brownie shop or whatever, there's an idea of her 'COMMUNITY' page 64
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athletic display, but now. it's going to have some real heat behind each blow. Hopefully, the crowd in Miami responds in kind. Commercial: The Law Offices of David Otunga Need legal counseling? Contact@DavidOtunga who will help you win your case, when he's not busy winning matches. Hilarious wrestling bad guy-ism in the spirit of Irwin R. Schyster (the evil taxman) or The Genius (the evil academic) that reminds us of one of the sport's oldest truisms: Wrestling fans do not like white collar jobs. Match 5: "The Viper" Randy Orton vs. Jack Swagger (with Vickie Guerrero) Technically sound, just like Ziggler-Sheamus from earlier, but it suffers from the same problem in that the bad guy needs more credibility than he has. Orton predictably puts Swagger away with an RKO, but Orton is startled after the three count by an eruption of Kane's hellfire and brimstone. Winner: Randy Orton Verdict: Fans were expecting some kind of physical confrontation between Orton and Kane; a WrestleMania match between Orton and the revamped monster could make for a great match, but it feels so last-minute.
Smackdown Preview Christian returns from injury to host a special edition of his inring interview segment "The Peep Show" with none other than dueling Managers John Laurinaitis and Teddy Long. That one should be legitimately enjoyable. Too bad it's going to have to wait untill Saturday morning as I don't want to be the kind of wrestling fan that stays in on Friday nights. Next Week on Raw John Cena takes on the World's Strongest Man, Mark Henry. Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker and Triple H will all be in the ring together for something called, no joke, "The End of An Era Prediction." Here's hoping they think of something new to say, or else that drunk Philadelphia crowd is going to heckle them mercilessly for 15 minutes of live awkward TV ... actually, I hope that's exactly what happens. Closing Segment: Dwayne Johnson's "Rock" Concert WATCH ON WWE FAN NATION Say what you will about the Rock's movies, but the man can control a crowd like nobody's business. He can get tens of thousands of people to chant whatever he suggests at the drop of a dime, so you can't really
blame him for goofing around. He quickly gets into the business at hand and tears into Cena, calling him the bastard child of Vanilla Ice and the purple Teletubby ( Wiki tells me this is Tinky Winky). Rock picks up his six-string and entertains the crowd with a bluesy reworking of "Jailhouse Rock." It picks up momentum in the second verse when he pulls together some lingering story threads regarding Cena making out with Eve. He then turns his attentions to Cena's adult male fans and zings them for being virgins. At least he didn't make fun of them for "being gay" -- you take any progressive victory you can get in pro wrestling, no matter how tiny it is. Finally, he closes it out with a verse about nailing Cena's mom. But wait there's more! He leads Cleveland in a karaoke version of "We Will Rock You" that slides "Cena Sucks" perfectly into the beat. Rock thanks the crowd and we're out. Winner: Like any Battle of the Bands, the winner is determined by the fans; tonight, the Rock was the clear favorite. Verdict: This is the most heavilyhyped main event in WrestleMania history and it's just not clicking. When Hulk Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior finally
collided at WrestleMania 6, it really split fans across party lines. Both men had die-hard followings and the collective audience's mind was blown when they finally came to blows. That's not happening now. The Rock is bigger than wrestling and beloved by pop culture on a whole other level. To make him anything other than the clear crowd favorite is counterproductive, but that's what WWE is intent on doing. Any current WWE Superstar would have trouble trying to steal cheers away from the Rock -- maybe CM Punk could do it -- but to task John Cena with the job is such a bad idea. It's not that fans don't respect Cena's athleticism, but he represents everything that is corporate and neutered in modern WWE. He's the spokesman for a very PC image that goes against the aggressive, super-masculine freakshow that is pro wrestling. To exert hour after hour of broadcasting time telling us that Cena's fanbase is just as strong as the Rock's -- when we can hear that to be false -- just angers those people who are frustrated with WWE. And then, they take it out on Cena. The Rock doesn't need to come back to wrestling. His movies
make a lot of money and 2012 could be one of his biggest years at the box office. To try to paint him as the guy who went "Hollywood" and lost his edge isn't working with fans because if he really went Hollywood, he wouldn't come back at all. Fans aren't going to buy Cena's trash talk. Cena may be here for the fans every week, but the fans don't want him. So the fans are just going to tune everything out and enjoy the Rock when they can. And that means completely forgetting about any kind of heavily-hyped pay-per-view fight, because Rock is telling funny jokes right now. The Real Main Event of the Show: Jericho's brutal character assassination of CM Punk. It's the only match at WrestleMania that's got real hatred between opponents. The Curtain Jerker: The foreshadowing of more Divas cattiness with NBC's "Extra." Maria Menounos versus Beth Phoenix is a far cry from Cyndi Lauper versus The Fabulous Moolah (no offense to Beth).
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'COMMUNITY'
and Pierce joining forces and maybe starting their own little sandwich shop here on campus." Alison Brie: "Pierce has always kind of had a thing for Shirley -he used to send her dirty emails in the first season. But I don't know if this sandwich shop is necessarily gonna happen ... there are a lot of obstacles in their way!" There's a Shirley reveal that this wonderful high voice -- what you all call the Miss Piggy voice -- is actually a turn-on? Yvette Nicole Brown: "I laughed so hard when I realized this. The dual Shirley voices -- the high and the low -- was something that I came up with to kind of show that she turns on a dime. I'd always talked to Dan Harmon like, 'I don't even know what Shirley's voice really is. I don't think the high one or the low one is her real voice.' Then I come to find out in this episode that when Shirley is sounding like Miss Piggy, she's being sexy. Andre likes it. That's her 'Hey, baby' come hither voice. [Laughs.] Which now makes me want to go back and watch every
episode and see ... Shirley has been flirting with a lot of people! She flirts with everyone! 'Hello!' How does that turn anyone on except for Kermit the Frog? And it doesn't even work for Kermit!" Malcolm-Jamal Warner: "Yep! [Laughs.] When I read that, I was like, 'Oh, that is hilarious.' The cool thing about this episode is it really gives good insight into Shirley's life. Normally you just see her with the other castmembers, but this is a great episode for her to kind of show another side." Can we please finally get an episode where Shirley and Donald [Glover] get to play together? Do you guys fight behind the scenes or something? Yvette Nicole Brown: "I've never had one episode with him! Me and Donald are secretly lovers, and I think they're afraid ... I'll speak for myself, I don't want to speak for my love, but I personally feel that if me and Donald are in the same frame, the heat of us just being that close to each other will probably burn the HD out of television. So, for
safety's sake ... Shirley and Troy do not talk outside of the study room." Anything else you all are dying to have happen on the show? Danny Pudi: "I just want to deliver another baby." Joel McHale: "Dan said he was going to put my character through hell, and that I'd possibly meet my dad, so that's really interesting and exciting to me, because Jeff has major issues, and it's really funny to rub against those." Any other weddings on the horizon? Britta and Jeff maybe? Gillian Jacobs: "We've already done it, right? In this room. You could just do the deed really quickly ... it's almost like eloping, but in the study room." "Community" returns Thursday, March 15, 8 p.m. ET on NBC. See the fates of your favorite shows here:
Hire Someone Else On Your Flight To Deal With Your Screaming Kid
Mary Beth Quirk (The Consumerist)
with their needs and mood swings. Nannies submit references so parents can do a Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:00:00 PM little digging before handing over The worst part about flying with their children. your kids when they go into As the founder puts it in a recent meltdown mode is probably the i n t e r v i e w , " T h e m o m g e t s repeated annoyed looks from childcare, and the nanny makes fellow passengers and mutterings some extra money on a flight of "Why can't they handle their [during which] she otherwise own children?" while you're would have been doing nothing." frantically offering toys/treats/ And the parent gets to shrug and bribes. Touting a cure is Nanny in exchange looks with everyone the Clouds, an in-flight nanny else when the kid starts acting up! service to take those tantrums out Perhaps the parents of the of your hands. screaming toddler who got the FoxNews.com spotlights the family kicked off a JetBlue flight Nanny in the Clouds model, last week or the mom whose which works thusly: Parents and daughter's tantrum had a man nannies register for free, and triggering the emergency slide to when the parent finds a potential allay her outburst could've used caregiver that happens to be something like this. flying on their flight, they pay $10 Flying with Kids? Hire an into the site to connect. Then they're flight nanny[FoxNews.com] on their own to decide whether or This entry passed through the not they trust that person to care Full-Text RSS service if this is for their child, and negotiate a your content and you're reading it rate. on someone else's site, please read The involved parties then decide the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contenton a place to meet, and for how only/faq.php#publishers. Five long the nanny will take care of Filters recommends: Donate to the kids whether they take Wikileaks. them on at check-in or just sit with them on the flight to deal
TV/ Products/
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John Polly: WATCH: 'Drag Ya Later With Jon & John' Takes On 'RuPaul's Drag Race' Season 4, Ep. 7 Sony Cyber-shot
John Polly (TV on HuffingtonPost.com)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:26:00 PM
Jon and I discuss Willam's barely there scheme for interior decoration. Less is more! If it's Tuesday, that must mean it's time for another weekly Drag Ya Later with Jon & John recap of all the lovely lunacy that went down on this week's episode of RuPaul's Drag Race. For week 7, the top seven queens had to channel their inner Devil Wears Prada editorial skillz, as they had to get crafty and create magazine covers for a bunch of themed "dragazines." Yep, it's not enough for a queen
to look good in a wig and pumps and be able to turn out a convincing Rihanna number atop a pool table anymore; today's drag superstars must also be media moguls. Watch out, Martha Stewart and Tina Brown (and
while we're at it, our own Arianna Huffington)! These editrixes are coming for you. And of course, there was the annual "reading" challenge (see Paris Is Burning), talk of smoked hams, kitty cats, and the saucy
side of guest judge Regina King, and get ready for the launch the Latrice Royale Home collection for Raymour & Flanigan. (Sort of.) SPOILER ALERT: Yes, we'll tell you who won and who got the shaft, so if you've not yet enjoyed this week's episode responsibly, please go to LogoTV.com and do so! WATCH: And here's one last image for you. Don't stare at it too hard. You'll go blind! Miss Sharon Needles enjoys a self-reflective moment in the Interior Illusions Lounge. Ouch.
DSC-TX66 review: A pointand-shoot that packs in the features

Consumer Reports News (Consumer Reports)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 11:59:59 AM
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX66 review: A point-and-shoot that packs in the features The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX66 SONY page 66
Check Your Tree For Signs Of Impending Death

Phil Villarreal (The Consumerist)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:30:00 PM
By the time it becomes obvious that a tree in your yard is dying, it may be too late to save it. In order to avoid a costly, time-consuming
removal project, it's helpful to monitor your trees for signs that they're embarking on a death spiral. Gardening Know How warns you to examine your trees for these signs that all isn't right. One telltale giveaway that your tree is
hurting is an unseasonal lack of foliage. Brittle bark and a spongy trunk are also signs of weakness. If you notice your tree is in trouble, take an inventory of its symptoms and talk to someone at a garden or tree shop. Your problem could be insects, lack of
access to water or nutrient-rich soil, a fungus or some sort of disease, and all can be treatable with proper care. What Does A Dying Tree Look Like: Signs That A Tree Is Dying[Gardening Know How] This entry passed through the
Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
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subcompact($350) is a small even for a subcompact: Its half an inch thick and roughly the same width and length of a credit card. But this tiny camera is packed with smart technology and innovative features. Smart technology. As with most point-and-shoot digital cameras, the TX66 includes a traditional Program Auto (Mode P), which automatically adjusts aperture and shutter speed. But the TX66 has two additional auto modes. Intelligent Auto automatically determines the appropriate scene mode for specific shots. For example, when I opened my wallet and focused on a credit card, it selected the Macro or Close Focus setting. But when I focused on a face, it selected the Portrait scene mode, and in low light, Night Portrait. (Scene modes are auto modes used for specific shooting situations.) The other auto mode, Superior Auto, fires off a burst of images and then creates a composite image by selecting the best portions of each photo. This can be effective with backlighted subjects; a person standing in front of a window on a bright sunny day, for example. In such situations, normal Auto modes either capture details of the subject indoors or the background outdoors, but not both. Because Superior Auto mode selects different sections and composites them together, you get the best of
both worlds: details in both shadows and highlights, inside and outside. Superior Auto mode (left image) does a better job at capturing and maintaining details in bright areas, such as the scene outside the window, than Program Auto mode (right image). I found the Superior Auto mode didnt always work, though. Sometimes it seemed to snap only one photo, and the resulting photo looked identical to the same shot taken in Program Auto mode. But on the whole, all three auto modes worked well. The camera comes equipped with a variety of other useful smart or automated features, including Smile Shutter, Panorama Sweep, and two self-portrait self-timing modes that begin to count down as soon as one or two subjects are recognized. Again, in my tests, I found most of the automated features worked pretty well, although the selfportrait self-timing modes had a hard time recognizing two subjects in profile (for example, when the subjects were kissing) or if one face was in shadow and the other in bright light. In those cases, the self-timer never started. A few quibbles over basic features. I was struck by the camera's compact size and elegantly minimalist design out of the box. You turn it on by sliding down a large plate to reveal the camera's lens and flash. The TX66
includes not only a 5x optical zoom lens, more than the usual 3x optical found on many subcompacts, but the zoom is wide angle, too, making it wellsuited for group portraits and landscapes. And the lens is nontelescoping, so it doesnt protrude from the body. A 3.3-inch touchscreen display takes up the whole back of the camera, so no physical controls are located there. But while theres no dedicated video button, there is a virtual Movie control that you can touch on the display. In addition to three Auto modes, the TX66 includes a Panorama mode and a 3D Shooting mode, among others. Overall, I was impressed with the TX66s stills and video in bright and low light. Its burst mode seemed decent, too: I was able to capture 10 shots, at its maximum resolution of 18 megapixels, before the camera had to stop shooting to catch its breath. And the sensitivity goes all the way up to ISO 12,800, which lets you take shots in very low light, but the images I shot at that setting displayed lots of grainy speckled dots. As with most models in its class, the TX66's flash isnt very versatile. But it does include a slow-sync flash mode in some settings, which can be helpful when you're shooting flash shots using the low-light or night-time settings.
As youd expect on such a small camera, there isnt a lot of room for controls, which can be annoying for those with large fingers. For example, the shutter button on top is long, thin, and responsive, but it was too close to the On/Off button for me. And the zoom control is one of the smallest Ive seen. It worked, but wasnt always the most accurate or comfortable to use. Some controls are too small: For example, the zoom button is tiny and hard to control. One design feature I found unusual is that the TX66 stores photos on either microSD memory cards or Sonys Memory Stick Micros, which are both very tiny compared to SD or Memory Stick Duo cards. You may need to purchase a memory-card adapter to transfer your photos and video to a computer. You also need to make sure to insert the tiny memory cards correctly into the camera, or it wont recognize them, which happened to me several times. However, these are quibbles. Its a fairly quick process to set up the camera and start shooting in one of the cameras three different auto modes, which is just one of the cameras many smart technologies. Shooting in 3D is hit or miss. Like many Sony Cyber-shots, the TX66 can capture 3D still photos as well as 3D panoramas. In my experience, though, capturing
shots in 3D was hit or miss at best. Some photos and panoramas had no 3D effect at all. Others seemed mixed: Some areas of the photo appeared with the 3D effect, but other sections looked flat. In addition, the camera has a special Sweep Multi Angle mode, which attempts to simulate a 3D effect on the cameras 2D display, but I didnt find that effective. Bottom line: The Sony Cybershot DSC-TX66 worked quite well and was easy to use. I think its one of the few cameras that makes an attempt at luring back the masses that have migrated to using their smart phones for photos and video. It may not be a wirelessly connected device, like a smart phone, but the TX66 offers an impressive assortment of features, a 5x zoom, and full HD resolution video (with the ability to zoom during video capture). Its also extremely light and portable. Subscribe now! S u b s c r i b e t o ConsumerReports.org for expert Ratings, buying advice and reliability on hundreds of products. Update your feed preferences
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67
Completely Unfair Comparisons: on Helvetica, Butterflies, and Confetti

(Woot! - One Day, One Deal)
lentils, and all foul smells erased by the distinctive odor of cooked Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:15:00 PM legumes, an odor common in There are plenty of places on many Ethiopian restaurants. What Woot where you can find helpful I'm getting at is you'll smell information. This is not one of worldly. those places. Every week we will Advantage: Lentils be comparing 3 pairs of things 2. Canadian Bacon vs. A that shouldnt be compared using N e w s b o y C a p i n t e r m s o f this formula: Unrelated Thing X C a t c h i n g B u t t e r f l i e s vs. Unrelated Thing Y in terms of Leave Canadian bacon out on F u n c t i o n Z . F a c t s w i l l b e your porch and youre bound to misunderstood, overlooked, or get attract some bugs, but not changed for the sake of the necessarily butterflies, since they argument. Enjoy. have more of a sweet tooth. With 1. Lentils vs. Helvetica in terms a newsboy cap it's a totally of Laundry Detergent different story. Think about it: the Helvetica is the cleaner of the it's such a silly hat that it makes two. Its a smooth, crisp font; you, its wearer, look like a theres nothing cluttered about it. cartoon character, and if you've But would it make a good laundry ever watched cartoons, you know detergent? No. Think about it: just that cartoon characters are always like your favorite pair of jeans, getting accosted by butterflies Helvetica has been overused and who want land on their shoulders as a result, is a bit stale and worn or their fingers or whatever. out. So, pouring some Helvetica Advantage: A Newsboy Cap into your wash will do little to 3. Confetti vs. A Pedal Boat in clean the stains and cover the terms of Filling out the Perfect smells, whereas with lentils its a March Madness Bracket different story. All previous stains The pedal boat is the purest are covered by the stain of the pleasure craft. It cant go very
warmth debate: You can take all the drawers out of the catalog (and you may have to break out some of the supports for those drawers), and you'll have a nice little place to shelter from wind, rain, and other things that make you cold. What about all the holes in your shelter from where the drawers were, you ask. fast. It cant go very far. It cant Well, you've got plenty of cards to really be used in any competitive plug those holes, and I defy you way. Thus, it has absolutely to find something that works nothing in common with March better as insulation than card Madness. Confetti, by itself, isn't catalog cards. all that competitive either, but it is You too can be like cbrett with often dropped on the winning your name up in pixels here on team at the end of a competition, the Woot blog. Just respond to and so it is well acquainted with one of the above arguments in the the various qualities that winners comments below! possess. So, at the outset of "Vegetarian Cuban lentils over March Madness, all you must do r i c e " b y f l i c k r u s e r , is sprinkle confetti on your SaucyGlo;"suits" by flickr user, bracket and watch where it settles. istolethetv;"Confetti Eggs" by There, my friends, are your picks! flickr user, haunted by Leonard Cohen. All used under a Creative Advantage: Confetti Last week's Rebuttal of the Week Commons License. goes to long-time rebuttler, firsttime winner cbrett42, for his take on the cactus v. card catalog for
Diablo 3 beta bug opens three secret gates of Hell

Jessica Conditt (Joystiq)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:20:00 PM
The Diablo 3 beta is well underway with hundreds of thousands of players delving into the dungeons of Sanctuary, and with so many deviants roaming the deadlands, there was bound to be some mischief. A bug in the beta granted access to three areas not yet intended for public play: the Festering Woods, Drowned Temple and Fields of Misery. The three bugged levels are mostly playable, featuring larger, more diverse beasts than in the released beta levels, including goatmen, violent trees, ghouls, spirits and more, incgamers reports. Blizzard pulled the servers to lock the areas out again, according to ubergizmo, but not before a few players recorded their adventures -- watch one romp through the Fields of Misery above. Diablo 3 beta bug opens three secret gates of Hell originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 13 Mar 2012 15:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Email this| Comments
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Products/
Walmart's in-store disc-todigital program converts DVDs and Blu-rays

Consumer Reports News (Consumer Reports)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:59:59 PM
Would You Pay $12,500 To Visit The Wreckage Of The Titanic With A Groupon?
Mary Beth Quirk (The Consumerist)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:00:00 PM
Walmart's in-store disc-to-digital program converts DVDs and Blurays At a press conference today, Walmart announced a new disc-to -digital service that will let customers bring in their physical DVD and Blu-ray libraries and convert them to digital movies that can be accessed via Vudu, the online video service now owned by Walmart. You can bring in any disc you own, not just those purchased from Walmart. Once they're digitized, you'll be able to watch the movies on a variety of Internet -connected devices, including televisions, tablets, smart phones, and game consoles. To use the service, you simply
bring your DVDs or Blu-ray titles into a Walmart retail store, where an associate will help you create a free Vudu account (if you don't have one). A standard digital DVD or Blu-ray conversion will cost $2 per disc, or you can pay $5 to get a high-def version of a DVD. Walmart will then authorize the digital copies (there are no uploads, and you get to keep your discs) and place them in your Vudu account. You can view the movies any time by logging into your account at Vudu.com.
The program, which rolls out in 3,500 Walmart stores on April 16, was launched in partnership with the five major Hollywood Studios: Fox, Paramount, Sony, Warner Bros., and Universal. Walmart says the new program will be compatible with UltraViolet, Hollywood's new copy-protected, cloud-based digital locker system, currently in beta. It's unclear at this time whether the disc-to-digital program covers only movies, or whether it will also apply to TV shows created by or owned by the studios and their affiliates. Subscribe now! S u b s c r i b e t o ConsumerReports.org for expert Ratings, buying advice and reliability on hundreds of products. Update your feed preferences
We thought Celine Dion put the nail in the coffin so far as the cheapening of a historical event with "My Heart Will Go On," but this new offering from Groupon goes to show that we're not done profiting from the tragedy of the Titanic. For just $12,500, you can visit the final underwater resting place of the Titanic's wreckage. The Chicago Tribune says the vacation package, which includes the tour in a deep-ocean vessel, is valued at $59,680 and is offered through a partnership with Expedia's Getaways. The $12,500 price tag includes round-trip airfare, transport to the site via ship, the day exploration of the wreckage and admission to events commemorating the 100th anniversary of the crash that killed 1,517 people. There's only one unit available, however, and
that lucky buyer will also get a DVD of Titanic signed by no, not the real guy a Leonardo DiCaprio impersonator. It's not that going on the tour isn't kind of a neat experience, as the story of the Titanic has always held fascination for history buffs and normal folk alike, it's just the auctioning off of the visit for morbid sightseeing's sake that feels a bit... icky? But anyway, collect your pennies and buy, and you could be whispering, "Jack, Jack, I'll never let go,"* on the ocean floor. *Spoiler alert! She totally let go. Groupon offers $12,500 trip to Titanic[Chicago Tribune] This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Sports/
69
Sidney Crosby to play vs. Rangers - ESPN

(- Bing News)
"I'm just trying to make sure I progressed and remain symptomfree," he said. "Everything's gone Updated: March 13, 2012, 3:26 really well." PM ET Associated Press His arrival further bolsters C A N O N S B U R G , P a . - - hockey's hottest team. The Pittsburgh Penguins star Sidney Penguins have won nine straight Crosby, out since early December and closed to within striking because of concussion-like d i s t a n c e o f t h e E a s t e r n symptoms, will make his return Conference-leading Rangers. Thursday against the Rangers in Pittsburgh has been the NHL's New York. best team since mid-January and The 24-year-old went through an while coach Dan Bylsma is eager a r d u o u s w o r k o u t w i t h h i s to have Crosby's No. 87 back on teammates Tuesday and got the ice, he's planning to ease his bumped around enough that he captain back into the rotation. feels prepared for the grind that Crosby will play on the third line awaits during the final month of with Matt Cooke and Tyler the regular season and beyond. Kennedy while being limited to "You're not going to get hit to the about 15 minutes against the extent that you would in a game," Rangers, though Bylsma will Crosby said. "But you've got to experiment putting Crosby with test that as best you can." MVP candidate Evgeni Malkin The dizziness and headaches that and fellow center Jordan Staal have plagued Crosby since the when given an opportunity. symptoms resurfaced in early "It's a great step for him and our December have abated. Crosby hockey team," Penguins general believes he's in better shape now manager Ray Shero said. "He's than he was during a brief been trying to get back for a while comeback from a 10-month layoff now and I've always said, 'He's a last fall, when he collected 12 hockey player who wants to play points in eight games before the game of hockey.' I know our heading back to injured reserve. team's been looking forward to
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:06:23 PM
having him back in our lineup." While Bylsma allows it's difficult to keep a player like Crosby on the bench, putting him on a line with the workmanlike Cooke and Kennedy should keep Crosby from piling up too much ice time too quickly. The coach pointed out Crosby played about 20 minutes in each of his first three games back during his previous return. That's not really an option with the Penguins playing three times in four days. The Penguins are assured of a playoff spot and while Pittsburgh is eager to catch New York and assure themselves home ice through the playoffs, Bylsma also wants to use the next half-dozen games to experiment. That includes putting Crosby on the point during the power play and shifting him around to various spots. "He'll need some games and I think that was a goal for him to come back this season and not in the second and third game of the playoffs," Shero said. "He wanted to come back as soon as he could to get into the swing of playing hockey games again and get ready
for the playoffs." If Pittsburgh gets injured defenseman Kris Letang back Thursday from his concussion, it means the Penguins will be at full strength for just the second time this season. The team's dressing room is burgeoning with optimism. "We really like the feel we have here," forward James Neal said. "Especially if we're at full strength with Sid and (Letang)." It will be hard for Crosby to top his previous return, when he scored twice and collected four points in a win over the New York Islanders on Nov. 21. Yet he's more relaxed this time around. He's become an expert on his condition and knowing what to expect has put him at ease. "That first game was pretty overwhelming," Crosby said. "I'm going to try to pace myself a bit especially with the schedule. It's going to be (work) enough getting back into it." The road has been tough enough already. Crosby's latest stint on injured reserve had him crisscrossing the continent trying to figure out why his symptoms
returned. Tests revealed a previously undiagnosed soft tissue injury in the neck that mimics a concussion. He received an injection in late January to help alleviate some of the problems and believes it produced the desired results. "I saw some noticeable changes after that (treatment)," he said. "That part definitely feels better." So did getting knocked around in practice. The Penguins worked for more than an hour Tuesday, with Crosby right in the middle of it. He mixed it up during drills and bounced right back up following a not-so gentle nudge from defenseman Ben Lovejoy. Copyright 2012 by The Associated Press This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
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Sports/ News Photos
San Jose at Edmonton - CBS Sports

(- Bing News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:13:32 PM
CBSSports.com wire reports March 13, 2012 EDMONTON, Alberta -- Oilers coach Tom Renney unloaded on his players after what he felt was a lackadaisical effort against San Jose. Logan Couture scored a tiebreaking goal early in the third period and the Sharks snapped a five-game slide with a 3-2 victory at Edmonton on Monday night. The usually calm and collected Renney was fuming after the Oilers' sixth loss in seven games. "It doesn't take many [players] with the wrong attitude to make its way through your dressing room. It doesn't take many guys at all," Renney said. "We have a few people who need to look in the mirror here. Because this is unacceptable. You're the Edmonton Oilers. You're a millionaire. You have an opportunity to play the game. Suck it up and play hockey." Renney accused his team of giving up and in the process helping San Jose stay in the playoff hunt. "Problem No. 1 one was playing not to lose," he said. "Problem No. 2 is two power-play goals for
your opponent. Problem three was deciding it was just too hard." Joe Thornton had a goal and an assist while Torrey Mitchell also scored for the Sharks (34-25-9), who are trying to get back in playoff position after losing 11 of their previous 13 games. San Jose is one point back of eighth-place Colorado in the tight Western Conference race. The Avs won 3-2 in overtime against Anaheim on Monday. "We needed this really bad," Thornton said. "We're struggling right now and to come in here and get a big win, every game is so important for us. The playoffs have already started for us. It was just a huge two points for us. "Hopefully this gives some guys some confidence." Ryan Whitney and Taylor Hall scored for the Oilers (26-36-7), who have the second-fewest points in the NHL with 59. "Everyone in this room knows we have to be better," Hall said. "This isn't the way we wanted to start off this homestand." San Jose got off to a fast start, taking advantage when Oilers goalie Devan Dubnyk lost sight of a bouncing puck. Mitchell converted a rebound of a Tommy Wingels shot just 1:07 into the game.
The Oilers tied it with 49 seconds left in the first. Whitney wound up from the top of the faceoff circle and fired a shot past Antti Niemi while both teams were down to four players a side. Dubnyk made up for his earlier gaffe midway through the second, coming across to make a huge stick save on a rebound attempt by T.J. Galiardi. The Sharks went up 2-1 on the power play a minute later. Patrick Marleau fed a pass through to Thornton, who snapped home his 15th of the season. Edmonton drew even again with five minutes to play in the second on a tremendous effort by Hall. After blocking a shot at his own blue line, Hall turned on the jets to outrace a pair of San Jose defenders to the puck and beat Niemi for his 26th of the season. The Sharks got their go-ahead goal 38 seconds into the third period when Dan Boyle unleashed a hard shot from the point that Couture tipped past Dubnyk while on the power play. The Sharks were without a power -play goal in their previous six games but went 2-for-2 with the man advantage on Monday. "Our power play was the difference tonight, getting those two goals," Couture said. "We
created some opportunities from the top of the point and were able to get rebounds and tips off of them. "We've been sliding and points are very important for us at the moment given our circumstances. We'll see how we build off this win. It's been a tough stretch for us. Any confidence we can get from winning games is huge for us right now." Notes It was the fourth and final scheduled meeting between the teams this season. Edmonton won two of the first three in shootouts. Oilers F Ben Eager returned to the lineup after missing two games with the flu. Sharks winger Marty Havlat could return as early as next week. He has been out since Dec. 21 with a hamstring injury. The last time the Sharks missed postseason play was in 2003. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
PHOTOS: 'The Hunger Games' premiere's in LA - 9NEWS.com

Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:41:10 PM
9NEWS.com PHOTOS: 'The Hunger Games' premiere's in LA 9NEWS.com ( Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/ Getty Images) LOS ANGELES, CA - MARCH 12: Actress Amy Paffrath arrives at 'The Hunger Games' Los Angeles premiere held at Nokia Theatre LA Live on March 12, 2012 in Los Angeles, United States. Photos: The Hunger Games Movie Premieres In Hollywood Denver Post 'Hunger Games' premiere: Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson walk the red... Washington Post (blog) Access Hollywood - Celebrity News, Photos& Videos Access Hollywood Wall Street Journal (blog)Christian Post all 1,205 news articles
Sports/
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Sources: Titans eye Steve Hutchinson - ESPN

(- Bing News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:44:54 PM
Updated: March 13, 2012, 3:48 PM ET By Chris Mortensen and Adam Schefter| ESPN As Tennessee plots its push for free-agent quarterback Peyton Manning, the Titans are hosting a visit from former Minnesota Vikings Pro Bowl guard Steve Hutchinson on Tuesday. One goal of signing Hutchinson would be to make Tennessee even more appealing to Manning, who is close to the guard from the time they've spent together at multiple Pro Bowls in Hawaii. But Hutchinson was on the Titans' radar even before the Manning pursuit began, as they want to beef up the interior line with a veteran leader. Hutchinson is close to Titans quarterback Matt Hasselbeck, as well, from their days together in Seattle. Titans coach Mike Munchak left the Titans' headquarters just before noon Tuesday and headed to the Nashville airport to pick up
Hutchinson. Munchak returned with the veteran guard within the hour and drove past reporters without speaking. Hutchinson, who played with Minnesota last year, is a five-time first-team All-Pro and a player who could boost the offense line for the Titans. Tennessee ranked 31st in rushing last year averaging 89.9 yards per game. Chris Johnson had a career-low 1,047 yards. The Titans also were preparing to make a major run at Houston Texans defensive end Mario Williams, but the organization has shifted its focus to Manning, a league source said. Meanwhile, despite speculation that the Texans could make a run at Manning, the team has no plans to pursue him, team owner Bob McNair confirmed Tuesday. McNair said the Texans are committed to Matt Schaub, who played in 10 games last season before breaking his right foot, and wants to re-sign outside linebacker Mario Williams.
Manning met with Miami Dolphins coach Joe Philbin, offensive coordinator Mike Sherman and other staff members for roughly five or six hours Monday night in Indianapolis, according to sources. He was expected to meet with Munchak and a number of Titans offensive assistants Tuesday or Wednesday, sources said. Munchak, a Hall of Fame guard, was a teammate of Manning's father, Archie, during the 1982 and 1983 seasons with the Houston Oilers. "I want Manning," Titans owner Bud Adams told The Tennessean Sunday. "I'd love to see him in Titan blue after watching him so many years with the Colts. ... I want him. I am ready to do what it takes to get him aboard, and I think he'd be the guy to get us into the playoffs." The Titans already have Hasselbeck, signed to a three-year contract last July, and Jake Locker, picked with the No. 8 overall selection in the 2011 draft.
But Hasselbeck is due $5.5 million in salary this year after getting a chunk of his deal last season. Manning, who already has met with the Denver Broncos and Arizona Cardinals, has continued to rehab his shoulder and neck. He is expected to resume his throwing regimen -- most likely at Duke University, where he threw last week -- while he analyzes his free-agent choices, with no apparent deadline in place to make a decision, a source added. Chris Mortensen is ESPN's senior NFL analyst. Adam Schefter is ESPN's NFL Insider. Information from The Associated Press was used in this report. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
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Gaming/ Science/
Silent Hill: Downpour review: When you're strange
Mass Effect anime coming this fall, all about James Vega
JC Fletcher (Joystiq)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:35:00 PM
Funimation picked up some anime stars to work on the visuals, including studio Richard Mitchell (Joystiq) mythos did little to move copies All of the storytelling, none of Production I.G and a character off of retail shelves. Enter Silent the player choice. The Mass d e s i g n e r f r o m E u r e k a Submitted at 3/13/2012 4:00:00 PM Hill: Downpour, which tries to Effect anime is still on the way S e v e n ( p r e s u m a b l y K e n i c h i If you had told me in 1999 that have it both ways, hewing a bit from Funimation, and, as social Yoshida). We'll see how this Silent Hill would ever be anything closer to the series' roots while media manager Justin Rojas Texas studio's collaboration with less than terrifying, my response attempting to offer a new twist on revealed at SXSW ScreenBurn, Japanese artists on a Canadian sci would have been an incredulous, the twisted traditions of Silent it's focusing on Mass Effect 3's -fi license works out this year -nervous laugh, muffled by the Hill. James Vega. "We're estimating fall or so," blanket I used to shield myself Gallery: Silent Hill: Downpour Mass Effect: Paragon Lost is Rojas said. f r o m n e w f o u n d i m a g i n a r y (PS3/Xbox 360) being written and created by Mass Effect anime coming this horrors. And yet, the human mind Continue reading Silent Hill: Funimation (who usually works fall, all about James Vega q u i c k l y a d a p t s , s w i f t l y Downpour review: When you're primarily on existing content from originally appeared on Joystiq on categorizing and sterilizing even strange Japan) working with EA and Tue, 13 Mar 2012 14:35:00 EST. the bizarre world Konami created Silent Hill: Downpour review: B i o W a r e , a n d t e l l s V e g a ' s Please see our terms for use of all those years ago. With seven When you're strange originally backstory before his appearance feeds. games to its name, Silent Hill has appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 13 in Mass Effect 3, which includes Permalink| Email this| Comments arguably been gathering rust for Mar 2012 16:00:00 EST. Please some "epic" things, Rojas assured. quite some time. see our terms for use of feeds. Silent Hill: Shattered Memories Permalink| Email this| Comments did wonders to revitalize the series, though the fresh take on its
DARPA Wants Swarms of Cheap, Disposable Satellites That Take Pictures on Demand
Rebecca Boyle (Popular Science - New Technology, Science News, The Future Now)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:28:46 PM
SeeMe Satellites The SeeMe program would give warfighters the ability to receive timely imagery of their specific overseas location directly from a small satellite, all at the press of a button. DARPA Warfighters have plenty of eyes in the sky, with a massive drone fleet and a satellite network that can spot their locations on the ground. But satellites are only helpful when they're overhead, and battlefield situations can't wait for orbital physics. To solve this problem, DARPA wants a DARPA page 73
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DARPA
swarm of cheap satellites nestled between the big ones up above and the aerial drones down below. The satellite swarm would be positioned in tactical orbits and able to send a space-based image back to any individual who wants a picture. The SeeMe program (Space Enabled Effects for Military Engagements, hooray for meaningful acronyms) would use a smartphone or tablet to send a command, according to DARPA. A soldier or marine would press "see me" on a handheld device, and a satellite above would find the person and send back an image within an hour and a half. DARPA is seeking proposals for these satellites from the mobile
phone, optics and racecar industries, which could have some ideas about low-cost manufacturing, imaging and propulsion. The SeeMe fleet would consist of a couple dozen satellites, costing no more than $500,000 apiece, according to Dave Barnhart, DARPA program manager. They would have to sweep around the Earth in a specific pattern to provide planetary coverage, and would be situated at low orbital altitudes. They would last just two or three months before re-entering the atmosphere and burning up. Conveniently, there's another DARPA rapid-launch satellite system, the Airborne Launch Assist Space Access (ALASA)
program, which aims to launch lightweight satellites from aircraft into any required orbit. The SeeMe swarm could take advantage of this new system. "SeeMe is a logical adjunct to UAV technology, which will continue to provide local or regional very high-resolution coverage, but which can't cover extended areas without frequent refueling," Barnhart said. [ DARPA via New Scientist]
Video: Cambridge Researchers Use Legos to Build Artificial Bone in the Lab
Clay Dillow (Popular Science -
VIDEO: page 74
FYI: Why Do Kids Hate Brussels Sprouts?

Ryan Bradley (Popular Science - New Technology, Science News, The Future Now)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:23:11 PM
Taste Buds Todd Detwiler Because Brussels sprouts are bitter, and kids generally don't like bitter tastes. It's not their fault. Researchers say that an aversion to bitter and sour (generally a heightened gag reflex) is a survival instinct, since most toxins taste that way too. On the other hand, sweetness typically indicates that something
is safe to eat, so children are born with a preference for sweets. What we like to eat changes over time. As we age, we realize that even though something tastes bitter or sour, it won't kill us, and we learn to enjoy it. When we're older, we lose some of our olfactory sensitivity-we can't smell as well. Humans need smell to experience flavor, which is different than taste (minty, for example, is a flavor but not a taste). We also lose taste buds with age. With our senses diminished, we'll probably begin
adding sugar and salt to our food, to heighten the flavor. In fact, there's a theory that the reason many especially "big"-tasting wines in recent years have won
awards is that wine critics are getting older and finding subtle flavors harder to sense. If someone is unable to detect flavors at all, he may have a taste
disorder, which can be caused by a tongue injury or brain damage. Or it could be a problem with smell. The channel that separates the mouth from the nose allows us to smell retronasally (literally, behind our nose) and is crucial for enjoying most complex flavors. That's why food seems flavorless when we have a stuffy noseexcept chicken noodle soup. It's so salty.
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Politics-Right/ Daily World/ Health/
VIDEO:
Lego Mindstorms in the Lab Researchers at Cambridge University are building artificial bone in the lab, and they're doing so with what might be considered an unorthodox partner: Lego. The tedious process of building up a sample of artificial bone requires a lot of repetitive dipping of samples into various substances, rinsing, and repeating. So to automate sample creation, the researchers built a couple of inexpensive laboratory robots using Lego Mindstorms. The robots, as you will see in the video below, handle the sample creation duties, freeing up the human researchers to focus on
other laboratory tasks. Which is pretty clever. Lego, for its part, sees an expanding role for itself in the laboratory and in education in general. The company has teamed up with Google for the 2012 Google Science Fair, which is a (The Feed) p r e t t y c o o l i n i t i a t i v e t h a t Submitted at 3/13/2012 6:43:24 AM encourages kids 13 to 18 to solve answer any question that's been Via ABC News: bothering them any which way An Afghan government they can. delegation visiting one of the sites [via Slashdot] where a U.S. soldier is suspected of shooting and killing 16 civilians came under fire today. A member of the groups security team died during the attack, according to the Associated Press, but its unclear whether anyone was injured. The group was inside a mosque offering their condolences and prayers when they heard small and heavy arms fire. The delegation includes two brothers of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, senior officials
Militants Fire on Afghan Delegation Visiting Scene of Attack

from Kabul and at least a dozen journalists. Security forces traveling with the group responded, exchanging fire with the militants for about 10 minutes. .. When you tell everyone the day youre leaving the timetable youve already declared the end of the war, so why wait? Time to (Shots - Health Blog) go. . . Greg Pollowitz This entry passed through the Submitted at 3/13/2012 9:36:00 AM Full-Text RSS service if this is iStockphoto.com your content and you're reading it Hip replacements are a boon for on someone else's site, please read aging boomers, but they're not the FAQ at fivefilters.org/content- perfect. only/faq.php#publishers. Five Hip replacements can do a lot of Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks. METAL page 76
Metal Hips Prone To Early Failure
I saw my mother hurt and bloodied after rapists attack

Paul Cheston (Evening Standard - News)
door in the passageway. There were marks all over her face. There was blood. There was some Submitted at 3/13/2012 9:40:15 AM on her clothes. She was crying The woman, named as Charlene, and she was speaking to my was 10 when she saw her mother stepdads mum. S h i e l a J a n k o w i t z e n t e r t h e Her stepfather, Erwin, came familys south London flat on home and her mother ran to the Christmas Day 1987. bathroom. She said her stepShe told the Old Bailey: I saw grandmother coaxed the woman my mum standing by the front out and she heard her mother say
she had been raped. It is alleged Mrs Jankowitz, 29, was one of the first victims of serial sex attacker Imiela, who was convicted in March 2004 of raping seven women in a savage and perverted campaign in 2001 and 2002. The jury were told Mrs Jankowitz died six years ago. Detectives launched a cold case
review of unsolved rapes and found DNA taken from her matched his, - with a probability that it came from someone else rather than him was one in a billion. Imiela, now 57, denies rape, another serious sexual offence and indecent assault. He claims any sex was consensual. The trial continues.
This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Health/
75
Timing Of Birth Control Coverage May Differ For Students, Profs

(Shots - Health Blog)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 1:36:00 PM
Alex Wong/ Getty Images Sandra Fluke, a third-year law student at Georgetown University and former president of the Students for Reproductive Justice group there, testifies during a hearing before the House Democratic Steering and Policy
Committee last month in Washington. Could Georgetown University students like Sandra Fluke have to wait an extra year for free birth control? There's a reason to ask the question. Fluke, in case you missed it somehow, is the law student who testified before the House
Democratic Steering and Policy Committee last month about the importance of providing free contraceptive services to students and others at religiously affiliated institutions. Her comments drew a caustic and mocking response from conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh, who called her a "slut" and a "prostitute." He later
apologized, but many advertisers on his show have reportedly pulled their ads. Under the health care overhaul, new health plans (or those that change their benefits enough to lose grandfathered status) have to begin providing free contraceptive services to women in August. Religious insitutions, such as churches, are exempt from the
requirement, but colleges and hospitals and other employers that are affiliated with religious institutions aren't. After some of them protested the requirement impinged on their religious freedom, the Obama administration announced an"accommodation" that will TIMING page 76
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TIMING
good, but they don't last forever. To lower the failure rates of artificial hips, particularly in younger people, doctors have tried using metal-on-metal hip joints with larger heads. But those metal-on-metal hips, which were supposed to be more durable, have their own problems. Last year, the Food and Drug Administration told makers of the devices that they should monitor patients after surgery, after complaints about pain, infection and allergic reactions showed that some of the metal hips were failing much sooner than expected. Two weeks ago, the British agency that oversees medical devices said that patients with metal-on-metal hips should get regular checkups. And a new analysis published in the journal The Lancet confirms that metal-on-metal joints fail at higher rates than other types. Stemmed metal-on-metal devices with larger heads fail at a higher rate than joints with smaller heads in both men and women, the study found. Women had more problem with the metal joints overall. They had a failure rate of 5 percent
after five years compared to 3.7 percent of men. Those data apply to people aged 60. There were other chunks of data for other ages. The numbers came from Britain's National Joint Registry, the world's largest source of data about people who have received hip replacements. Of the 402,051 who've had the surgery, 31,171 got stemmed metal-on-metal joints. There's no similar registry in the U.S., which makes it hard for patients and doctors here to get solid information on the dozens of devices on the market. "We need a registry in the United States to show what's happening in our patient populations," says Joshua Jacobs, professor and chair of orthopedics at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. A national registry is being developed, he says, but needs a way to get all hospitals to participate so the information's complete. About one-third of hip replacements in the U.S. were metal-on-metal in 2009, the Lancet study says. People with those hips shouldn't
panic, Jacobs says. There are many different forms of metal-onmetal hips; not all have problems. And the vast majority of the people with the hips considered problematic are doing fine. People with metal-on-metal hips should make sure to get regular routine checkups with their orthopedic surgeons, Jacobs says. And any hip replacement recipient who experiences pain should get to the doctor promptly. The pain might be from something as harmless as bursitis, Jacobs says, but it still needs to be checked out. "Just because their implant has a higher failure rate overall, doesn't mean that theirs will," he says. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
allow employees at these institutions to get the free birth control services through the insurer rather than their employer. There's a wrinkle in the timing, however. Religiously affiliated institutions have a one-year transition period before they have to be in compliance. Could that mean that students at Georgetown University, a Catholic and Jesuit institution, as well as other religiously affiliated colleges might have to wait until August 2013 for the provision to take effect? Not a problem, says Marcia Greenberger, co-president of the National Women's Law Center. The one-year delay applies to religiously-affiliated institutions in their role as employers, and thus would only affect the employees that are covered under the organization's health plan. Students aren't employees, and student health plans are generally
individual policies that the students buy on their own, even if they're offered through the college. "Since the students deal directly with the insurance company, it's not the same relationship as it is with the employer," says Greenberger. "We don't believe the one-year accommodation should apply." Of course, what advocates hope will apply is still to be determined. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Politics-Right/
77
Afghanistan: Negotiating While Withdrawing Is Poor Strategy

Lisa Curtis (The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation)
calm the situation and reassure Afghans the incident is an extreme aberration that will not reoccur. Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:45:45 PM In the wake of a U.S. Army staff The U.S. must not base its sergeants murdering 16 Afghan Afghan strategy around this one civilians (mostly women and terrible incident. As tempting as it children), U.S. officials are may be to view the current contemplating the pace and scope troubles in Afghanistan as an of the U.S. troop drawdown from excuse to cut and run, U.S. the country. At the same time, leaders must recognize that such a they are seeking a negotiated decision would be irresponsible settlement with the Taliban and lead to greater dangers for the leadership. U.S. and NATO U.S. and the Afghans. Instead, the Commander in Afghanistan U.S. and Afghan authorities must General John Allen said yesterday double down on their efforts to t h a t h e d i d n o t f o r e s e e a n improve the partnership and show accelerated drawdown of U.S. unity of purpose. troops because of the shooting It is no secret that there are incident, but it is almost inevitable differences between the U.S. that this terrible tragedy will lead political and military leadership A m e r i c a n s t o q u e s t i o n t h e over the pace and scope of viability of the U.S. mission there withdrawals. It is likely that The first goal of the U.S. President Obamas political Administration should be to advisers will use the recent demonstrate that it values Afghan shooting rampage and the Koran lives and will pursue swift justice burnings to bolster their calls for against the perpetrator of the speeding up the drawdown of heinous murders. This will help U.S. troops. But U.S. military
commanders on the ground reportedly would like to keep most of the 68,000 troops that will be in place as of September 2012 until military gains are consolidated. Racing for the exits before the mission is accomplished will only create more chaos in the country that will redound to the insurgents benefit. While U.S. policymakers are reeling from events in Afghanistan over the last month, the Taliban probably cannot believe their stroke of luck. Making concessions to the Taliban at this juncture would only embolden them and give average Afghans the impression that the Talibans return to power is all but inevitable. There are alternatives to negotiating with the Taliban that the U.S. can pursue, which would better ensure that Afghanistan does not return to serving as an international terrorist safe haven. At this stage of the conflict, the
Administrations time and energy would be better spent on supporting anti-Taliban elements and concluding a Strategic Partnership Agreement with the Karzai administration that ensures the U.S. will be able maintain a robust military presence post2014 to conduct training and counterterrorism missions. This is a far more promising strategy than engaging in long-shot negotiations with the Taliban, which will likely succeed only in giving increased political legitimacy to them and their extremist ideology. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
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Red Tape Ties Up Industrial Base

Brian Slattery (The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:15:15 PM
Defense officials need to rethink the way they award contracts, says Daniel Goure, vice president of the Lexington Institute. Goure argues that, in its effort to promote competition, the Pentagon has actually convoluted its system and potentially weakened the defense industrial base. Frequent changes to regulations make it difficult for companies to take advantage of economies of scale, as they must continually adapt to new requirements. Instead of adding layers of bureaucracy to its buying practices, the Pentagon should promote a robust defense strategy in the larger context. The duty of the military is to preserve national security, and the U.S. Constitution mandates that Congress provide for the common defense. In recent years, neither has been able to effectively carry out these responsibilities due to across-theboard defense cuts. No amount of acquisition modification will reverse an atrophying industrial base if defense spending continues to rapidly decline. Underlying Americas withering defense budget is the Obama Administrations disregard for national security. Rather than writing budget requests that reflect threats to Americas
The Rare Earths Distraction

Derek Scissors, Ph.D. (The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:15:00 PM
The U.S., EU, and Japan are suing China in the World Trade Organization (WTO), calling Chinese export quotas on rare sovereignty and security, Obama t h e i r a t t e m p t t o p r o m o t e t h a t f r e q u e n t , c o n f u s i n g earth elements an illegal trade has slashed the defense budget to c o m p e t i t i o n a m o n g s t t h e procedural changes make it practice. appear fiscally responsible. His industrial base. This is the difficult for companies to navigate The U.S. will most likely win. strategy is fundamentally flawed, cornerstone of capitalism, after the federal business world. But the suit is peripheral to real however, as he has failed to all. However, there are better Excessive regulation harms issues and was brought because address the real debt drivers: ways to go about acquisition Americas industrial base and, as the U.S. is unable or unwilling to entitlement spending. Defense reform then increasing the amount a r e s u l t , w e a k e n s n a t i o n a l address the true problems in SinoAmerican economic spending is less than one-fifth of of red tape companies must go s e c u r i t y . the federal budget, yet it has through to contract with the This entry passed through the r e l a t i o n s . Of the many questionable already accounted for half of military. James Carafano offers a Full-Text RSS service if this is deficit reduction efforts. The number of suggestions to this end, your content and you're reading it practices in Chinese trade policy, Administration could reduce the such as killing the Jones Act and on someone else's site, please read the rare earths quota is a strange defense budget to zero today, but other Buy America provisions. the FAQ at fivefilters.org/content- one to pick on. Last year, the programs such as Social Security Amidst dramatically shrinking only/faq.php#publishers. Five quota was barely half-filled; and Medicaid would continue to d e f e n s e b u d g e t s , P e n t a g o n Filters recommends: Donate to higher prices and expanding supply elsewhere caused demand consume the lions share of officials should continue to strive Wikileaks. for Chinese rare earths to federal spending. for best business practices. Pentagon officials are justified in However, they also need to realize RARE page 79
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RARE
plummet. Last week, the largest American rare earths company, Molycorp, swung a deal that will lead to Molcorp exporting to China. The fear that China would deny rare earths to the world never made much sense and makes even less now. Still, there is in fact something to see here, folks. What the U.S. really wants to complain about is anti-competitive Chinese behavior in rare earths both in the global market and in China itself. Globally, China became the dominant producer by driving everyone out of business with low prices. After doing so, Beijing decided that competition was disorderly and suddenly discovered environmental harm in rare earth mining. It is now attempting to
force consolidation of its rare earth industry. The export quota is a minor symptom of a major illnessChina likes rare earth competition only for other countries firms. This may sound familiar. America complaints about the value of Chinas currency, the RMB, have led to a 25 percent appreciation. But almost none of the problems in economic relations have been solved. Thats because the danger isnt an exchange rate peg or a quota; those are just (minor) tools. The heart of the matter is that China subsidizes its firms so they can outcompete everyone elses internationally but uses regulations to prohibit competition at home. Its a winwin: China wins at home and China wins overseas.
The U.S. government has struggled with this for years, for good reasons. The WTO treats subsidies inadequately, and American competition regulations stumble over state-owned companies. But those are the real issues to tackle, not a quota that may not even get filled. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Pinterest to Release New Profile Pages This Week

Lauren Indvik (Mashable!)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:19:46 PM
Pinterest is planning to release redesigned profiles this week, according to CEO and cofounder Ben Silbermann. Im so excited about it, said Silbermann (pictured, left), who spoke at the South By Southwest conference in Austin, Texas, on Tuesday. We wanted to make it more beautiful To make your profile different in kind than the profile you have on Facebook, he said.
Silbermann emphasized new discoverability features in the redesign, saying he and his team wanted to make it easier for users to stumble upon other like-minded users, and highlight the people PINTEREST page 80
Apple's Sir Jonathan Ive: our competitors have 'completely the wrong goals'
Daniel Cooper (Engadget)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:52:00 PM
"genuinely better" products, Cupertino's unnamed rivals instead are "interested in doing London's favorite only remaining something different, or want to evening free-sheet has snagged an appear new," which he says is the interview with Apple design wrong goal. The difference is that maven Sir Jonathan Ive. In the he and his team aren't tied to a piece he talks about being thrilled price, a schedule or a marketing and humbled by his recent scheme -- which he believes Knighthood, the importance of his "have scant regard for people who London upbringing and why use the product." There's also a Apple's competitors can't win. barbed reference to consumers Pointing to a desire not to make being able to sense "great care in
Apple's Sir Jonathan Ive: our competitors have 'completely the wrong goals' originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Mar 2012 15:52:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| Evening Standard| Email this| Comments the design and when there is cynicism and greed" in products on the market. Head on down to the source link to read more, including his frustration with designers who "wag their tails in his face" -- who knew designers had tails, eh?
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their connections are repinning images from. He also said the team is working on expanding the number of things users can pin, including video. Soon, people will be able to pin from Vimeo, Hulu and Netflix, among others. And, as was revealed earlier this week, an iPad app as well as a public API are also in the works. At the beginning of the interview, Silbermann spoke of his inspiration for Pinterest, saying it was a project he always wanted to build. I collected insects, I collected stamps, he recalled. I was obsessed with this idea that what you collect says something about who you are. He also talked about the sites original design. We labored over that grid, he said. There were literally dozens of that which were fully coded. We felt like, if your collectios didnt look awesome, if they werent beautiful, why would anyone spend the time to build them? SEE ALSO: What People Are
Pinning on Pinterest Although Pinterests popularity has skyrocked over the past six months, gaining traction was painfully slow during the first year-and-a-half, Silbermann recounted. Nine months after launch, the site still had fewer than 10,000 users. Someone was asking, Why did you keep going? I think the answer was telling everyone that we blew it was so embarrassing, Silbermann admitted. Google [wasn't] going to hire me [again], they barely hired me the first time. Silbermann wasnt able to identify a precise turning point for the company, but rather pointed to a number of things that built momentum for the service. There was never a celebrity that took it from zero to 60, he explained. Instead, growth was more organic: People would join, become proud of their collections and show it to their friends. Participation at a design conference andpin it forward, an online blogger event, also
helped raise awareness. Silbermann also pointed out that the site didnt take off in the Bay Area, or in New York. Rather, the earliest Pinterest users were from the Midwest and Southeast, areas that are still disproportionately represented. Interviewer and Hunch founder Chris Dixon asked Silbermann how he was handling the recent flood of Pinterest clones. Clones have always happened, he pointed out. What makes Pinterest special is the people. If you were to pull out all the people and pins, it would be empty. He said that the company isnt focused on racing against such imitators, but on ensuring what they create is really beautiful. Meanwhile, monetization is not a priority at the moment, according to Silbermann. For a time, Pinterest was generating revenue via affiliate marketing service Skimlinks, which Silbermann said was implemented to understand behavior. The long-term monetization will have to speak
to the heart of the product itself, which is helping people discover things, he said. Affiliate revenue is not the business model, he insisted. Mashable reporter Sarah Kessler contributed to this story. A Pinterest Timeline March 2010: Pinterest Launched Pinterest is launched to a closed beta. Later it will move to the email invite system it currently employs. Click here to view this gallery. More About: pinterest For more Dev & Design coverage: Follow Mashable Dev & Design on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Dev & Design channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad
Social Media/
81
Hashtag Prompts Twitter Discussion of Unreported Sex Crimes

Kate Freeman (Mashable!)
hashtag. Far more serious attacks go unreported. Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:51:14 PM The hashtag prompted broad Be prepared to see some sobering discussion about a variety of tweets about rape and sexual sexual crimes from child abuse to assault this week on Twitter. The violence against transgendered hashtag #ididnotreport began people. The tweets can be pretty popping up in peoples feeds on raw. Some are less descriptive, Monday and Tuesday. A flood of but nonetheless heartbreaking. tweets from people discussing Heres a sample of a few: One unreported sexual crimes brought tweeter says, #ididnotreport some somber reality to the because I was ashamed I hadnt Twitterverse. been able to fight harder or An unknown blogger for London scream louder. I thought I Feminist says she started the deserved to be punished for hashtag on Tuesday after reading failing. Another person tweeted, a survey about sexual assault did report after assault at victims who reported the all-too- gunpoint. Never heard from common response that they did p o l i c e a g a i n . 3 y r s l t r , not report the crimes to authorities #ididnotreport when a guy shoved for fear of not being believed. hand up my skirt. Futility. And. I had no idea how powerful that #ididnotreport cos I was 4 & would be, she wrote on her blog. didnt know the words-children I had imagined that it was learn silence with the abuse. predominantly low-level street #webelieveyou. h a r a s s m e n t w h i c h w a s n o t Mashable reached out to the reported, but it wasnt just this London Feminist blogger to find sort of abuse, that came up on that out her identity. One commenter
hashtag would encourage women to report sexual assaults that she deems, low level the ones that women typically ignore, like, bring groped on public transportation or being prodded in any other way while in public. And although those things are all on the about page of the blog offenses, she writes. We dont wrote, Hi Julian. Another clue: report them because theyre too there are several references to minor and because we didnt get Julian and the London Feminist a good look at the guy who did it, blog on various websites. The a n d b e c a u s e t h e h a s s l e o f blog is connected with the reporting it would be so great. London Feminist Network, a Whats your reaction to this women-only feminist activism hashtag? Tell us in the comments. group. Photo courtesy of iStockphoto, The hashtag did not burst through Don89 the top trending topics in the More About: hashtag, legal, United States or the U.K. by Twitter, Violence, women T u e s d a y m i d - d a y i n S a n For more Media coverage: Francisco. However, at the rate Follow Mashable Media on t w e e t s w i t h t h e h a s h t a g Twitter #ididnotreport came pouring in, Become a Fan on Facebook we might continue to see this Subscribe to the Media channel topic rising in popularity on Download our free apps for Twitter in the coming days. Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad The blogger wrote she hoped the
Apples iTunes Match Update Restores Genius to iPhone or Does It?

Chris Taylor (Mashable!)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:06:44 PM
If you signed up for the $25-ayear Apple service iTunes Match, which lets you access your entire iTunes library on the fly from your iPhone or iPad, you may have noticed one major flaw: iTunes Match killed Genius. Well rejoice, for Genius has been restored kind of. Genius is Apples answer to Pandora, effectively. Choose a song, hit the Genius button on that track the one that looks like an atom and you get an instant playlist of similar-sounding tracks. Its a great way to DJ from your iPhone if youre feeling lazy. But iTunes Match users were dismayed to discover that signing up for the service, which launched last November, meant losing Genius. Apple has offered no explanation; the Genius icon simply disappeared from your tracks. APPLES page 82
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APPLES
Mac experts offered all kinds of workarounds, such as creating a bunch of Genius playlists in iTunes on your computer. But none of them quite got the lazy DJ nature of Genius. The whole point was that we like to use it spontaneously, an intelligent shuffle to match our mood. It was especially useful in offline situations, such as in-flight or on a long road trip. As of the iOS 5.1 update, however, Genius has been quietly restored. Apple made as much mention of its return as of its departure (ie. none, though we have reached out to the Cupertino company for comment). Theres one big difference with this new version of Genius, however you have to be online to use it. Even then, it appears not to work for some users.
SEE ALSO: Apple is Censoring Music on iTunes Match I was so excited to see 5.1 added Genius, wrote one user in an Apple forum that has been discussing the problem since November. But every time I try to use it I get a message to try again. Come in Apple, I really want to use this service! In Mashables tests, we were able to replicate the try again message on obscure tracks with few Genius matches. It does not appear to be a bandwidth issue. Are you using iTunes Match or Genius? Have you seen this issue? Let us know in the comments. More About: genius, iphone, itunes, itunes-match
News of the World sent thank you gifts to Scotland Yard

(Evening Standard - News)
He later added: My wife said she often did not see me for many Submitted at 3/13/2012 9:47:43 AM of them [Saturdays]. The The Mets head of media, Dick influential press chief told how he Fedorcio, said Coulson, former was often bothered at weekends editor of the News of the World, by the News of the World. arranged the gift to pay tribute to On one occasion, it was over the his staffs dealings with the alleged plot to kidnap Victoria d e f u n c t S u n d a y t a b l o i d i n Beckham which he said needed a December 2003. police response, as well as a Coulson ran the News of the press response. Nine people were World between 2003 and 2007 arrested over the suspected plan before leaving to become David after the News of the World Camerons press spokesman. He passed information to police in was forced to resign over the November 2002. The charges hacking scandal in January last were later dropped. Mr Fedorcio y e a r a n d w a s a r r e s t e d o n also said he arranged for former suspicion of conspiring to hack NoW editor Colin Myler to speak phones in July. to ex-Commissioner Sir Paul Mr Fedorcio told Lord Justice Stephenson when the newspaper Leveson: I believe this was a was about to publish its scoop on t h a n k y o u f o r t h e D P A s the corrupt Pakistani cricketers. [Directorate of Public Affairs] Mr Fedorcio, who is on efforts in dealing with the papers gardening leave, admitted letting demands, often at short notice on a News of the World journalist a Saturday afternoon. use his computer to file a story
about a senior policeman. The papers former crime editor Lucy Panton wrote and emailed an article about former Metropolitan Police commander Ali Dizaei from his office. Mr Fedorcio said in a written statement: To help her, and as she was under pressure, I offered to let her type the story, which she did from notes that she arrived with, in an email on the standalone computer in my office. Mr Fedorcio also admitted that he had arranged for the loan of the horse to Rebekah Brooks. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Daily World/ Technology/
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Sian Williams leaves the BBC on a Samsung Galaxy Tab high after being named newscaster 2 (7.0) makes a pass of the year at the Tric Awards through the FCC
(Evening Standard - News)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 11:55:39 AM
admitted it could get emotional. She said: "Bill told me today he's not going to look at me for the last Williams, who is leaving the half-hour of the programme. early morning show before its "You know what it's like when move from London to Salford, you can look at each other and was named newscaster/reporter of laugh and we have the same the year at the Tric Awards today. ability to make each other cry. Speaking backstage at the central "He said to me today, 'what's our London event, she said she anti-crying strategy', because probably would not watch BBC w e ' v e g o t a n a n t i - g i g g l i n g Breakfast after she left but added s t r a t e g y . that it would be down to her "So we are working on an antichildren, crying strategy and we have to She said: "At the moment there is work it out from now to Thursday a battle on in the house anyway morning. We've got that time to between whether they watch their work on how not to cry." mum on the programme or Other winners at the awards were whether they watch CBeebies, The Only Way Is Essex which and to be honest CBeebies always won satellite/digital programme wins." of the year, Chris Evans who won Williams said she was "hoping to digital radio personality of the hold it back" on Thursday but year, and EastEnders which won
soap of the year. There was a posthumous award for Coronation Street stalwart Betty Driver who won TV soap personality. Driver, who died last year, played Rovers Return barmaid Betty Williams for more than four decades. The Tric (Television and Radio Industries Club) special award went to veteran star June Whitfield. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Brad Molen (Engadget)

Submitted at 3/13/2012 4:19:00 PM
It's March. Don't bother looking at your calendar, we fact-checked it for you. It would make sense, then, that the seven-inch sequel to the Samsung Galaxy Tab, slated for a March UK release, should work its way through the proper FCC certifications before its inevitable launch. The docs don't say much about the GT-P3100's specs, aside from the fact that it sports AT&T 3G radios. We still haven't heard any official word on whether or not we can expect this to get any carrier interest, but given the popularity of the first model, we wouldn't be surprised to find this gracing at least a few shelves before not too long. If you're up for some digging of your own, head to the source.
Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 (7.0) makes a pass through the FCC originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Mar 2012 16:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink| FCC| Email this| Comments
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Politics/
On Judicial Nominees, a Moment of Truth for the Senate

Andrew Cohen (Politics : The Atlantic)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:06:40 PM
Tomorrow, we are going to find out whether Congress is capable even of ministerial functions like hiring enough judges for America's courtrooms. trekandshoot/ Shutterstock I know of no man, even among those who devote all of their time to watching public affairs, who can even pretend to keep track, at the same time, of his city government, his state government, Congress, the departments, the industrial situation and the rest of the world. What men who make a study of politics as a vocation cannot do, the man who has an hour a day for newspapers and talk cannot possibly hope to do. He must seize catchwords and headlines or nothing.--Walter Lippmann, Liberty and the News, 1920 There are many things that Congress does, many important choices it makes, which are complicated. Take legislation, for example. As we are reminded daily by the roiling debate over the Affordable Care Act, both before and after its passage nearly two years ago, there are typically a great many moving parts that go into a federal statute. To a mathematical certainly, I would
bet, the complexity of the policy choice -- who benefits, who bears the burden, who decides -- begets the variety (and the validity) of the spin. That's why Republicans had so little smack to offer President Obama when U.S. troops killed Osama bin Laden last May. Complex policy issues generate complex spin. Simple issues of governance generate plain old
nonsense On the other hand, the more complicated the matter, the more prone it is to demagoguery, the more easily it can be manipulated. The loaded word"Obamacare," for example, is a perfect illustration of what Lippmann meant about "catchwords." Never mind what the law's details involve -- or what it actually does -- to the millions of people opposed to the
Affordable Care Act the word " Obamacare" connotes some degree of malevolent control on the part of the president, his White House, and his other federal offices, over individual health care choices. You can spin a law. You can spin a policy. You can spin the influence of lobbyists and political money. You can spin judicial decisions and
Congressional hearings and you can even spin what's broadcast on C-Span every day if you really wanted to. What cannot be spun, however, what is so simple and basic a matter of governance that it beggars spin, is the choice United States Senators must make when they are voting on judicial nominees who already have been JUDICIAL page 86
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Sandra Fluke: I will not be silenced

Tina Korbe (Hot Air Top Picks)
to prevent unwanted pregnancy. They are Catholic women, who see no conflict between their Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:05:41 PM social justice -based faith and posted at 3:05 pm on March 13, family planning. They are new 2012 by Tina Korbe moms, whose doctors fear that Sandra Fluke is clearly not another pregnancy too soon could concerned about the risk of jeopardize the mothers health and overexposure but she might the potential childs health too. not need to be. Liberal outlets T h e y a r e m o t h e r s a n d continue to praise her as the grandmothers who remember all mainstream voice that will end too well what it was like to be sexual shaming and usher in a called names decades ago, when new era of respect for the they were fighting for a job, for reproductive rights of women. health care benefits, for equality. For those of us who disagree with They are husbands, partners, her, though, this debate is getting boyfriends and male friends who old primarily because its going know that without access to nowhere. contraception, the women they Most recently, Fluke authored an c a r e a b o u t c a n f a c e u n f a i r op-ed for CNN to restate the case obstacles to participating in public that she thinks has been so life. And yes, they are young distorted by talkers and writers on women of all income levels, the right. Heres an excerpt: races, classes and ethnicities who These attempts to silence women need access to contraception to and the men who support them control their reproduction, pursue have clearly failed. I know this their education and career goals because I have received so many a n d p r e v e n t u n i n t e n d e d messages of support from across pregnancy. And they will not be the country women and men silenced. speaking out because they agree Its a well-written op-ed, but, for that contraception needs to be those who saw her testimony or treated as a basic health care who have followed the subsequent service. controversy, its not worth Who are these supporters? reading in its entirety. Why? It They are women with polycystic says nothing new. ovarian syndrome, who need Fluke doesnt seem to grasp that contraception to prevent cysts anyone could have heard her from growing on their ovaries, arguments and actually disagreed which if unaddressed can lead to with them. Her premise is still infertility and deadly ovarian that women have a right to cancer. They are sexual assault i n s u r a n c e t h a t c o v e r s victims, who need contraception contraception because they have a
right to have sex without the fear of pregnancy. Fluke shows very little respect for reality. The reality is that (a) the exercise of a right generally doesnt cost somebody else something and, if it does, that might be a clue the so-called right is not actually a right and (b) the only completely foolproof way to prevent pregnancy is to abstain from sex. The possibility of pregnancy even with contraception is part of the reality of sex. Fluke thinks objectors dont understand that shes not asking taxpayers to directly subsidize her birth control. Shes asking insurance companies to include contraception coverage in the plans they develop for clients (a.k.a. religious employers) that dont want contraception coverage included in the plans. That shows little respect for the prerogative of the insurance company to include in its plans whatever it wants to assume risk for and no more. It shows little respect for the prerogative of an employer to negotiate for a group rate for a plan that doesnt violate his conscience. If Fluke and her Georgetown classmates want to purchase insurance that covers contraception, they are free to do so such plans exist to meet the demand but they are not then free to avail themselves of the group insurance rate negotiated for by an employer that opposes contraception for religious
reasons. Simple enough. Women who have sex when theyre not in a position to become pregnant are engaging in a risky behavior that triggers the need for contraception. Women like that on an insurance plan that does cover contraception are driving premiums up for everyone on that plan. As a woman who is not engaging in that risky behavior, Id like to have the option to purchase an insurance plan that doesnt cover contraception. *** Like Fluke, I am not alone. Who are the people who share my opinion? They are women with polycystic ovarian syndrome, who use one of the many other forms of medication available to treat their condition. They are sexual assault victims, who, in the midst of the horror and trauma theyve experienced, find healing in the embrace of life and the love of a child. They are Catholic women who affirm the Churchs teaching on contraception, recognizing that openness to life in all its fullness is the fundamental posture from which to engage reality. They are new moms who use natural methods or breast feeding to space the births of their children and exult in how in tune with their bodies they become as a result. They are mothers and grandmothers who remember all too well what it was like to be
denigrated by their fellow women for their decision to be at-home wives and the primary caretakers of their children. They are husbands, partners, boyfriends and male friends who respect a womans fertility, who recognize that pregnancy is a possibility even with contraception and are ready and willing to embrace the responsibility of fatherhood and/ or committed to forgoing sex if theyre not. And yes, they are young women of all income levels, races, classes and ethnicities who choose to wait to have sex until they are prepared for whatever the consequences of the decision to have sex might be. And we will not be silenced. *** This is not a plea for Sandra Fluke to become like me. It is a plea for her and for others like her to recognize that (a) some men and women legitimately object to contraception on religious grounds and (b) to recognize that some women even women who dont object to contraception in general legitimately do not think all insurance plans should be made by the federal government to cover contraception. It is a plea for her to respect that. Before Rush Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke a sl-t and a prostitute, I watched the video of her testimony. Based on the SANDRA page 88
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broadly endorsed by the Senate Judiciary Committee. Which brings us to tomorrow and a potential showdown in the Senate which ought to be required following for every high school and college political science class. There is a lot at stake. First, we are going to find out whether the Senate in this election year is capable even of ministerial functions like making sure there are enough judges to respond to the crush of federal litigation all over the country. Second, we are going to be reminded now of how vital the race for control of the Senate is going to be leading up to November's vote. Like all pressure points, this one is borne of frustration. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (DNev.) announced Monday that he was fed up with Republican intransigence over the president's pending judicial nominees and that he would move, at the same time, to invoke cloture on 17 such nominees. The move could tie the chamber up for weeks of debate -and there is no other way to perceive it but as an exercise of raw power by the majority to force the minority into making substantive choices about the nominees. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Let's take a closer look at the Gang of 17. They are all federal trial court nominees. They come from 15 different states and the District of Columbia. Eight were unanimously voted out of the Judiciary Committee by a voice vote -- there was no
Republican opposition to their nomination. Six others were opposed by only one Republican lawmaker (Sen. Mike Lee (RUtah) has adopted a policy of opposing any Obama nominees because of the president's controversial recess appointments a few months ago). Many of these uncontroversial nominees -- I count seven of the 17 but the number may be higher -- would work in districts that have been formally declared "judicial emergencies' because the existing judges there cannot handle the workload. In other words, like fresh troops to a battle, the nominees are desperately needed within the federal judicial system to plug holes that exist on court dockets. Who suffers from the lack of federal judges? You and me. And any other litigant who has to wait years to have her rights and remedies adjudged. It's simple. It's not complex. Say you are having a bourbon tonight with your neighbor and you tell him: The Senate has 17 smart, willing people ready to come to work for the federal government. They have been vetted by their profession. They have been vetted by the White House. And they have been vetted by the Congress in the form of the Judiciary Committee. There is a great need for these people to be approved so that they can get to work. And there's already been evidence that there is little to no substantive opposition to their nominations.
Yet they cannot get about their vital jobs because one party in Congress wants to slow down the pace of the president's judicial nominations. How would your neighbor respond? Would he say that the nation is better off letting those 17 would-be judges cool their heels for another few months while litigants all over America are forced to wait longer for their day in court? Would he say that "judicial emergencies" are just a"manufactured" controversy and that all those litigants deserve to wait for justice because the president made a few recess appointments a while ago? Or would he just shake his head and say: "No wonder congressional popularity is at an all-time low." Complex policy issues generate complex spin. Simple issues of governance -- like allowing strong judicial nominees to become public servants -- generate plain old nonsense. For example, Sen. Lee, who has made a career out of political stunts designed to hinder the White House's ability to get judicial nominees through Congress, now says that Sen. Reid's cloture move is a " political stunt." Sen. Lee wants to teach the president a lesson -- and of course it's you and me and your neighbor the plaintiff who will have to pay the price. When it comes to judicial nominees, all this talk of Senate tradition and prerogative is bunk (whether it comes from Republicans or Democrats). The reason the American people have
turned on federal legislators is because those legislators have consistently chosen form over substance, procedure over practicality. Is there a simpler example of this damaging trend than the story of these judicial nominees? There is nothing in the Constitution that requires or allows the Senate to unilaterally downsize the judicial branch in this fashion. The other silly argument Republicans now are employing to justify their failure to make life easier for litigants blames Obama for not nominating enough judges. This is a version of the same argument your child makes to you when he has a full plate of food in front of him while he's asking for seconds. How about the GOP get these 17 easy nominees out of the way first, get them on the road toward their districts so they can work for citizens who have federal grievances, before they complain about the lack of new appointees in the pipeline? If GOP senators had a beef with these nominees on the merits they should have raised those concerns during committee hearings. And if GOP lawmakers have a beef now with the nominees they should express those concerns on the floor of the Senate. The fact that the former did not happen and that the latter isn't even being discussed tells you what you need to know about the depth of Republican concern over the quality of the candidates. It's not about the nominees -- or the litigants who need them. How do
you like your Senate now? Little of this bodes well for the immediate future. If President Obama wins reelection and the Senate narrowly remains in Democratic hands we are likely to see this destructive game played out for four more years. And, if the president wins reelection and the Republicans take over the Senate, we'll see fewer and fewer of his judicial nominees making it out of the Judiciary Committee in the first place since that Committee will then be led by a group of Republicans who are among the fiercest opponents of the president's judicial nominees. The Middle East is complicated. The economy is complicated. Gas prices are complicated. Whether the Affordable Care Act is constitutional is complicated. What is not at all complicated is the question of whether honest, decent men and women who want to serve America in the best way they know -- as underpaid, overworked, eternally harassed federal trial judges -- should be given the earliest opportunity to do so. There is no way for Senate Republicans to spin this: it's just bad governance in its most needlessly self-destructive form. This article available online at: http://www.theatlantic.com/ politics/archive/2012/03/onjudicial-nominees-a-moment-oftruth-for-the-senate/254426/ This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it JUDICIAL page 88
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The Ongoing Effort to Sanitize Obama's Image

Conor Friedersdorf (Politics : The Atlantic)
Hinderaker's now famous praise of our last leader: "It must be very strange to be President Bush. A Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:04:09 PM man of extraordinary vision and The president's supporters brilliance approaching to genius, continue to ignore his civil- he can't get anyone to notice. He liberties abuses and executive- is like a great painter... who is power excesses as they tell the ahead of his time, and who story of his first term. unveils one masterpiece after See web-only content: another to a reception that, when http://www.theatlantic.com/ not bored, is hostile." politics/archive/2012/03/the- Of course, Guggenheim was paid ongoing-effort-to-sanitize-obamas t o p r o d u c e a n u n c r i t i c a l -image/254389/ appreciation of Obama. The same In the interview above, producer, cannot be said for the left-leaning d i r e c t o r , a n d d o c u m e n t a r y journalists who continue to filmmaker Davis Guggenheim p u b l i s h h i g h l y i n c o m p l e t e becomes the latest in a long line retrospectives on the man they of liberals to help sanitize w a n t r e e l e c t e d . H i s P r e s i d e n t O b a m a ' s i m a g e , accomplishments are prominently advancing a narrative that totally touted, whereas the reader would ignores his transgressions against never know that the president has civil liberties and expansion of v i o l a t e d h i s o w n r h e t o r i c , executive power. Paid by the campaign promises, and liberal Obama campaign to produce what v a l u e s o n i s s u e s i n c l u d i n g he calls a 17-minute documentary, executive power, indefinite but that is better termed a political d e t e n t i o n , t h e s t a t e - s e c r e t s c o m m e r c i a l o r p i e c e o f privilege, the transparency of his propaganda, Guggenheim goes so administration, and the treatment far as to aver that the biggest of whistleblowers. negative about Obama's first term A journalist needn't be taken with is that he accomplished so many any of the Republican candidates wonderful things it was difficult to acknowledge that, whether or to fit them all into the allotted not Obama is better than the time. competition, he is a flawed T h i s c l i p o u g h t t o b e president. But as I've documented immortalized alongside John on multiple occasions, Obama
boosters continue to write and speak about the president's first term as if his civil-liberties abuses and executive-power excesses never happened. They aren't explained or dismissed. They're just totally ignored; unmentioned; disappeared from the narrative. Yet another prominent example comes from the normally excellent Washington Monthly. Editor Paul Glastris, who deserves credit for much of what is great about that magazine, goes on for thousands of words about Obama's tenure so far, and how he'll be remembered as a great or near-great president. "That's not to say that his instincts and decisions have always been right," he notes near the end of the piece, and I thought, finally, he's going to at least mention his reversals on issues at the core of his 2008 campaign. Here what he actually wrote: "I cannot, for instance, find a good reason why he should not have at least threatened to use Fourteenth Amendment powers to unilaterally raise the debt ceiling to break the hostage standoff with the GOP last year." That's his biggest complaint? Civil liberties and executive power were not marginal issues in 2008. President Obama's criticism of the Bush Administration was
righteous and withering, and on numerous occasions he explicitly promised that if he was elevated to the presidency he'd wage the War on Terror in strict accordance with American values and the rule of law. As the ACLU subsequently pointed out in the comprehensive report it issued on the 10th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks: Ten years ago, we could not have imagined our country would engage in systematic policies of torture and targeted killing, extraordinary rendition and warrantless wiretaps, military commissions and indefinite detention, political surveillance and religious discrimination. Not only were these policies completely at odds with our values, but by engaging in them, we strained relations with our allies, handed a propaganda tool to our enemies, undermined the trust of communities whose cooperation is essential in the fight against terrorism, and diverted scarce law enforcement resources. Some of these policies have been stopped. Torture and extraordinary rendition are no longer officially condoned. But most other policies -- indefinite detention, targeted killing, trial by military commissions, warrantless
surveillance, and racial profiling - remain core elements of our national security strategy today. These policies are now part of the bipartisan consensus. Every narrative rendering of Obama's presidency where they go unmentioned helps to normalize them further. The implicit message is that indefinite detention, extrajudicial assassinations, wars without Congressional approval, and all the rest aren't actually important enough to warrant scrutiny so long as the liberal agenda on health care, economic stimulus, education, and other domestic matters are being carried out. This article available online at: http://www.theatlantic.com/ politics/archive/2012/03/theongoing-effort-to-sanitize-obamas -image/254389/ This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
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Hi, how are you? Would you like a free ultrasound?

Tina Korbe (Hot Air Top Picks)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:15:18 PM
JUDICIAL
on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
posted at 4:15 pm on March 13, 2012 by Tina Korbe Today, March 13, 2012, is an important day in the pro-life movement. Today is the day a handful of visionaries officially launch Save the Storks, a new kind of pro-life initiative. Kristen Walker of New Wave Feminists explains what makes it different: Heres what happens: a woman is walking up to an abortion clinic. She is approached by Dave or Daryl or another member of Save the Storks. Hi, how are you? Would you like a free ultrasound? This is the approach. There is no dangling rosary, no graphic pamphlet, no doom-and-gloom. Just an offer of free help from a non-threatening, friendly, smiling young person. And then there is the Stork bus.
It is a bright, lovely blue on the outside, and the inside is clean and free of clutter, with a welcoming but no-nonsense clinical feel. There is a little couch for the mother to sit on and speak to a counselor, and a padded bench where she can lie comfortably. The ultrasound machine pulls out from underneath the bench. It is operated only by a licensed sonographer whose work is frequently reviewed by an OB/ Gyn. In the back there is a small private toilet for pregnancy testing. It isnt the slightest bit cramped or unpleasant; these mothers get only the best. The completed bus with the ultrasound machine was paid for by private donations to the tune of about $140,000. The Stork bus is by no means the first mobile ultrasound vehicle it was Chris Slatterys mobile sonogram bus that inspired Dave and Joe in the first place but it may be the smallest, lightest, and
most practical. It doesnt require a permit or special permission to park. It will fit in a parking space or even at a meter. The average clinic sidewalk approach is, of necessity, Please dont kill your baby. Heres why. And heres help. Because they have their awesome bus, Save the Storks are able to say, Heres help. Now please dont kill your baby. Heres why. Its a subtle difference but an important one. Invitation is always more effective than admonishment. (That its an invitation also prevents the liberal cry that ultrasound is rape; these women are consenting!) While all sidewalk counselors invite pregnant mothers to consider all their options, Save the Storks presents another option in real time. The campaign is distinctive in other ways, too. For one thing, the minds behind it are clearly creative. From the name an obvious riff on campaigns to save
every animal from turtles to whales to polar bears to the website, these guys get it. Brand matters. Theyre committed to connect with pregnant mothers from the first minute they meet them on the little things as well as the big. The Save the Storks bus hits the streets of Dallas today. The Save the Storks staff thought Dallas essentially the birthplace of the institution of abortion was the appropriate place to start. I agree. But this is just the beginning. They plan to deliver six new buses to pregnancy centers in the next three years and, eventually, to build a national movement. A Stork bus in every major city in America: Im on board with that. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Santorum: Lets face it, Fox News is shilling for Romney

Allahpundit (Hot Air Top Picks)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 2:40:12 PM
SANDRA
evidence of that testimony, I didnt think she was either of the words Rush Limbaugh used, but I thought she was unbelievably spoiled and disdainful of the opinions of others. Nothing that I have seen or read since then has changed my opinion of her. How
Id love for something to change it now! Tags: birth control, contraception, contraception mandate, feminism, Georgetown coed, Georgetown law student, Obamacare, reproductive rights, rush limbaugh, Sandra Fluke, sexual liberation, sexual morality
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posted at 3:40 pm on March 13, 2012 by Allahpundit Via the Daily Caller, a spicy hors doeuvre before the main course tonight in Alabama and Mississippi. You know what would have been useful here? Specifics. Santorum: Brian, look, I love you guys Kilmeade: No, you can feel the way you want, Im just telling you, theres no way I agree with that, and youve been on as much as anyone Santorum: I can tell you, we watch the coverage there, and look, you guys are allowed to cover what you want to cover I can tell you we want to make sure a conservative is nominated, and were going to go out there and SANTORUM: page 90
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Romney's NFL-Owner Friends: Why Doesn't He Learn From His Mistakes?

Jill Lawrence (Politics : The Atlantic)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 12:47:48 PM
Time after time, the former Massachusetts governor finds ways to show just how more wealthy he is than the average voter. Reuters Newsflash: Some of Mitt Romney's good friends own football teams. That's in addition to his great friends who own NASCAR teams. The rich are different from you and me. Apparently they have lots of friends who own sports teams - something most people probably never thought about until Romney's presidential campaign. The interview with Paul Finebaum, a syndicated sports radio host based in Birmingham, Ala., was going so well for Romney until the last couple of minutes. He had described as "pretty tasty" if "a bit fattening" his dinner the night before of catfish, fried dill pickles, and hush puppies. He had convincingly discussed his longstanding loyalty to the basketball team at Brigham Young University, which he attended as an undergrad, as
opposed to Harvard, where he earned his business and law degrees. MORE FROM NATIONAL JOURNAL Obama on Afghan Killings: Those Accountable Will Face Full Force of Law Voters Watch Jobless Number Mitt Rommey, Chessmaster And then came the Peyton Manning question. "I know you want him somewhere away from New England. Where do you think he ought to go?" Finebaum
asked about the star quarterback. "I don't want him in our neck of the woods, let's put it that way. I don't want him to go to Miami or the Jets," Romney said, laughing, referring to two teams that play the New England Patriots in the American Football Conference's Eastern Division. "I got a lot of good friends -- the owners of the Miami Dolphins and New York Jets -- both owners are friends of mine, but let's keep away from New England so that Tom Brady has a better shot of picking up a championship for us."
Romney didn't mention that Jets owner Woody Johnson is one of his national finance co-chairmen. A very good friend indeed. The $10,000 bet, the two Cadillacs, the $374,000 in speaking fees that Romney described as "not very much," the NASCAR team owners and now the football team owners -- it is getting hard to keep track of all the times Romney doesn't notice he is casually saying things that are completely outside the experience of regular people. I predicted this problem wouldn't
stop. But it's still amazing that it continues. This article available online at: http://www.theatlantic.com/ politics/archive/2012/03/romneysnfl-owner-friends-why-doesnt-helearn-from-his-mistakes/254433/ This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
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SANTORUM:
nominate on mathematics, were not going to focus on the process Kilmeade: You dont want us to add up delegates? Three possibilities. One: Fox is spending an undue amount of time on the delegate count, emphasizing that mathematically its almost impossible for Santorum to win. I havent watched much cable news lately but is that the sense our resident Fox-watchers get? If so, how much time is an undue amount of time? Were more than two months past Iowa and a week removed from Super Tuesday. Time to start counting delegates, folks. Two: Maybe Santorums just a whiner. Hes complained before about Drudge being in the tank for Romney too, but in that case theres at least circumstantial evidence to support it. In the case of Fox, whats the smoking gun? Santorum was on Hannity just last night to dump on Bill Maher. Palin, the networks most high profile contributor, is a Gingrich fan. Aside from the occasional
Ann Coulter guest appearance, whos supposedly shilling for Romney on FNC? Three: Maybe hes saying this for strategic reasons, using Foxscourse correction back towards the center last year to cast Romney as the choice of the Republican establishments favorite news network. But in that case, how to explain the trouble Romneys had sporadically with the network? Foxs decision to allow Times scribe Jim Rutenberg into the building to confront the candidates in person [after a "Huckabee" candidate forum] threw campaign aides off guard, especially in the Romney camp, which went into defensive mode immediately, insisting that the reporter stay far away, as Rutenberg later wrote. But the decision was just the latest example of what Fox head Roger Ailes recently called a course correction in an interview with Howard Kurtz of Newsweek. The Romney teams debate-night tussle was the second
embarrassing episode suffered by the candidate at the hands of Fox News in a week, after Bret Baier conducted a hard-hitting interview with Romney on November 29 that made news for several days. (After the contentious interview, Baier told Bill OReilly that Romney privately called his questions overly aggressive and uncalled for.) Whats Santorum talking about? If Fox is guilty of being proRomney simply for calling him the presumptive frontrunner, then Im pro-Romney too. And Im not pro-Romney. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/contentonly/faq.php#publishers. Five Filters recommends: Donate to Wikileaks.
Intel: Optical Thunderbolt cables arriving this year

Daniel Cooper (Engadget)
meters." Dave Mr. Salvator wouldn't commit to a release date, Submitted at 3/13/2012 3:29:00 PM or how much more we'll be Intel's Dave Salvator has been expected to pay for the cables, but talking about Thunderbolt's given that we're also expecting to future, promising that optical see PCI-Express 3.0 bolted on to v e r s i o n s o f t h e h i g h - s p e e d the standard soon, we'll start interconnect will arrive this year. saving today. The copper version currently Intel: Optical Thunderbolt cables available is cheaper and can carry arriving this year originally 10 watts of power, but it can only appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 be run a maximum distance of six Mar 2012 15:29:00 EDT. Please meters. While the fiber version see our terms for use of feeds. loses the ability to power devices, Permalink| Macworld| Email this| it's reportedly far faster and Comments capable of running to the "tens of
Social Network/
91
Sexy API from Klout

Felipe Oliveira (The Official Klout Blog)
Submitted at 3/13/2012 11:30:13 AM
Tweet Klout had an incredible 2011, and as the end of the year approached I felt so proud to be part of such an amazing team! We accomplished a lot, so the holidays came at a great time; it was a much-needed opportunity for the team to catch a break and have some fun with our families. At the same time, I was excited about all the incredible things we were gonna have a blast building. So when January 2nd came along, I was back at Klout HQ ready to go; as is customary at Klout, there was a fun challenge ahead. Weve been hard at work for the past few months and were excited to share with you what weve built. The challenge was to re-engineer Klouts API to sustain its rapid growth and massive trafficten billion API calls a month and growingand also to empower our clients with all the features currently available on Klout.com. So I started by concentrating on the problem at hand; I find it much more productive than jumping into the solution or any implementation detail, going against our instinct as engineers. Theres a small select group of companies serving that type of massive API traffic but a peculiar number screams out of the infographic above. Klout is the only one with less than seven
hundred employees; we actually only have about 76 troopers! And what does that number represent? That number tells me that as fast as our API should be, we need to be moving even faster as a teamwe need killer productivity! Besides, everyone likes to go fast! Lets Play! As seems to be a recurring fact in my lifesee more on Why Did I Fall in Love with Play! Framework?the technology stack chosen was the always
awesome, lean-and-mean, superduper productive Play! Framework. As I mentioned on my previous blog post, Find Your Klout, Play was designed to provide a powerful, easy to extend infrastructure, it uses fast nonblocking IO, and it uses a stateless model that makes horizontal scaling a cakewalk. There is such a joy that comes every time my terminal singsplay new klout-* with scala. And with this type of traffic, our API might just be
the most heavily used Play! Framework application to date! Our API has Swagger We were obviously going to create a RESTful API, but there are some components of SOAP(Simple Object Access Protocol) that have a lot of value. Even though I wanted no part of that business, in any shape or form, new or old, and its verbose XML format (remember the productivity factor) the WSDL (Web Service Definition
Language) does provides features that arent commonly seen in REST. The WSDL allows client proxies to be automatically generated (wsdl2java comes to mind); it also allows developers to create client interfaces easily. How could we accomplish that without deep-diving into thousands of lines of XML? Swagger son! Heres how Wordnik defines their marvel: SEXY page 92
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Swagger is a specification and complete framework implementation for describing, producing, consuming, and visualizing RESTful web services. Swagger allows our API to have a well-defined contract in JSON, the same format we are using on every single endpoint. Talk is cheap. Show me the code. Linus Torvalds First of all, add the dependency on Swagger Play to your conf/ dependencies.yml and run play deps. Then go ahead and define your data transfer class. Now its time to define the controller. All the @Api* annotations are provided by Swagger. The code you are about to see doesnt do much other instantiating the Score class and setting its value to 100 (I wish
that was my Klout score). We created an API trait to define all the business logic used on every endpoint. This trait provides an api method which we wrap each controller action with; this method does the validation, JSON transformation, and it tracks number of calls and response times with StatsD using David Ross super useful StatsD module. Stay tuned in our blog for another post on StatsD and our monitoring infrastructure soon. Now its time to define our REST-friendly route for our endpoint, a walk-in-the-park with my beloved Play! Framework. To do that add the following line to conf/routes. Caching is being done using Memcached, re-using Plays support for it. Jay Taylor, Klout Perks lead engineer, wrote a nice
wrapper for it. Were excited that the Play framework is now commercially supported by Typesafe, along with Akka and the Scala, all of which are firing on all cylinders at Klout. Building on a modern foundation like the Typesafe Stack makes it much easier for our development team to punch above its weight! If you are down to Play! come join us and follow us on Twitter at@_felipera,@dyross,@ladlestei n. Unlock Your Klout!

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