Slow news day? #1

Woman: 'GOD' Spelled Out In Salami

Is it a divine message or a meaty coincidence trapped in casing?

A South Florida woman said she was cooking fried salami when she noticed the word "GOD" on the meat, Miami television station WFOR reported.

Nancy Simoes said she had three pieces in a skillet and flipped one of them and saw the letter G.

"Then got the O and I thought to myself how cool will it be if the third letter was a D."

Simoes realizes people may think she's crazy.

"I can't make this up. ... it's there in the burn marks."

http://www.wsbtv.com/irresistible/19383509/detail.html

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Specter Wants Coleman To Win In Minnesota

By Eric Kleefeld

Memo to Sen. Arlen Specter (RD-PA): You're supposed to be a Democrat now.

In an interview with the New York Times, Specter stated in no uncertain terms that he wants Norm Coleman to win the disputed Minnesota Senate race: "There's still time for the Minnesota courts to do justice and declare Norm Coleman the winner."

So what exactly are the Dems getting out of this whole deal?

Late Update: NRSC press secretary Amber Wilkerson gives us this comment: "First he voted against President Obama's budget, then he said he wouldn't be a loyal Democrat, now he wants Norm Coleman to win. We've never agreed so much with Arlen Specter. You just have to wonder whether Joe Sestak agrees with the positions of his fellow Pennsylvania Democrat?"

Late Late Update: It's possible that Specter might have been telling a joke -- a really bad joke that someone in his position shouldn't even be attempting. I've put in a request for comment/clarification to his office, and have yet to hear back.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/05/specter-wants-coleman-to-win-in-minnesota.php

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The least I can do

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Ultimate Generational Bummer

By David Ignatius

WASHINGTON -- People have accused the baby boomers of being whiners almost since we were born. But just wait until we get to retirement age and discover that we don't have nearly enough money to take care of our "golden years." That's going to be the ultimate generational bummer.

I've been gathering some data about what I'll call, with the usual boomer understatement, the "retirement crisis." My mentors have been Eugene Ludwig, the head of the consulting firm Promontory Financial Group, and his colleague Michael Foot. The numbers show a genuinely frightening gap between what people have saved for retirement and what they will need. And many of these studies don't take into account last year's stock market crash, which will make the problem worse.

Let's start with the basic fact that only about half of Americans have any employer-sponsored retirement plan at all. The other folks will have to depend on Social Security. For a typical boomer worker, that would mean a monthly benefit of about $2,400 if you reach retirement age of 66 in 2020. On that, you won't be able to afford many lattes at Starbucks.

But let's assume that our average worker is one of the lucky ones with an employer-sponsored pension. Not so long ago, that usually would have meant a "defined benefit" pension at retirement. About 80 percent of employees in medium and large companies had such plans in 1985, according to the Labor Department. By 2000, the defined-benefit recipients totaled just 36 percent.

What's happened is that employees have taken on the investment and actuarial risks, as their employers shifted to "defined contribution" formulas. Employers now contribute to 401(k) plans that are managed by the employees. Unfortunately, workers often don't do a good job as investors. They underestimate what they will need in retirement, and they underfund their 401(k) plans. And as for shifting out of stocks before the market tanks, well, let's just forget about that. ...

How bad are baby boomers at financial planning? Extremely bad, according to Annamaria Lusardi and Olivia Mitchell of the National Bureau of Economic Research. They found that more than one-quarter of boomer households thought "hardly at all" about retirement, and that financial literacy among boomers was "alarmingly low." Half could not do a simple math calculation (divide $2 million by 5) and fewer than 20 percent could calculate compound interest. The NBER researchers also found that, as of 2004, the typical boomer household was holding nearly half its wealth in the form of housing equity. Uh-oh.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/05/07/ultimate_generational_bummer_96377.html

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The Right's pandemic paranoia

by Brian Frederick

While the Department of Homeland Security and the Centers for Disease Control spent the week informing the public with details on the H1N1 virus, the right-wing noise machine spent the week misinforming the public with paranoid theories about the virus. Because the flu virus may have originated in Mexico, the story provided some on the right with an excuse to engage in some good-old fashioned immigrant-bashing and renew their calls for greater border security. The story also provided right-wing media figures with more fuel for their fear-mongering about the Obama administration.

As the story of the H1N1 virus emerged, it was initially referred to as the "swine flu," but the Obama administration called for moving away from that language because it was contributing to baseless fears that the virus had to do with pork consumption. This did not sit well with CNN's Lou Dobbs, who referred to people using the H1N1 terminology as "idiots" and claiming "they are out of their cotton pickin' minds." Such people include several of Dobbs' colleagues at CNN, including the network's chief medical correspondent.

In response to the administration's request for a name change, radio host Neil Boortz suggested calling the virus the "fajita flu." But that was one of Boortz's more tepid comments about the virus. Boortz stirred up fears that the virus was some sort of "bioterrorist" plot, asking, "What better way to sneak a virus into this country than to give it to Mexicans?" Similarly, radio host Michael Savage claimed, "There is certainly the possibility that our dear friends in the Middle East cooked this up in a laboratory somewhere in a cave and brought it to Mexico knowing that our incompetent government would not protect us from this epidemic because of our open-border policies." After all, Savage claimed, the terrorists might have known that Mexicans "are the perfect mules for bringing this virus into America."

It's hard to determine which came first -- the intolerance or the paranoia.

http://mediamatters.org/columns/200905010048

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Springsteen to Seeger: 'You Outlasted the Bastards'

by Katrina vanden Heuvel

"You outlasted the bastards, man," Bruce Springsteen told the roaring crowd.

I think that was my favorite line at the rollicking birthday concert celebrating Pete Seeger's 90th!

There were other uplifting, astonishing moments Sunday night at Madison Square Garden, at a five-hour concert which Seeger only OK'd because it raised much-needed funds for his Clearwater project--a non profit organization which the oft-maligned bard started in 1969 to clean up his beloved, polluted Hudson River.

Fifteen thousand people, of all ages, (okay, median age was probably 55) danced, clapped and sang along as Seeger did a soaring version of "Amazing Grace" and the saintly looking Joan Baez sang " Where Have All the Flowers Gone."

Arlo Guthrie reminded us that Pete, like his father Woody, "believed in the power of the people singing songs to change the world." Richie Havens reminded us why "Freedom" is a great anthem for all times. Tim Robbins and his son, strumming the guitar, to "Michael, Row The Boat Ashore." Ruby Dee entranced with her enchanting reading of a poem (for peace) written by Pete's uncle before he joined the Foreign Legion. In between, a startlingly youthful Emmylou Harris recounted correspondence she had with Pete as a young folk singer; Tom Morello and Taj Mahal teamed up on "Waist Deep in the Big Muddy"), and John Mellencamp offered up "If I Had a Hammer." Congressman John Hall, once the lead singer for one of my favorite groups, "Orleans," joined in several rounds.

Toward the end of the five-hour Seeger-apoza, Springsteen announced to the crowd, "Pete's gonna come out," and "He's gonna look like your granddad--if your granddad could kick your ass." If character and integrity keeps you youthful, and I believe it does. Seeger looked all of 25--of strong backbone and spirit and moxie and with keen eyes which are the stronger for having seen the best, and the worst, of our country's history.

In so many ways, Pete is a repository of American history in himself. As Springsteen said, he has a "stubborn, nasty, defiant optimism," and he serves as "the stealth dagger through the heart of our country's illusions about itself."

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut/432714?rel=hp_picks

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Nixon has a burrito

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
Nixon Has a Burrito
thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis Political Humor

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Slow News Day? #2

Rooster wanders into Keokuk County jail

SIGOURNEY — Cock-a-doodle-whoa.

By Jeff RaaschA rooster surprised deputies in Keokuk County this morning when it wandered into the jail from a house down the street. Dispatcher Terry Burger was on the phone with a reporter from The Gazette when the phone went silent.

"Whoa, we've got a rooster in here," Burger said. "Can you hear him?"

Burger said the rooster visits the jail occasionally. A residence nearby is home to about a dozen of them, he said.

"The people that live down the street have a fenced in area, and they sell eggs," Burger said. "Every once in a while, the kids leave the gate open and one wanders down here."

Burger said deputies shooed the rooster outside and went on with their day.

 

http://www.gazetteonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090506/NEWS/705069947/1001/NEWS

 

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Ready, Aim—Dream! Has photography blinded us to the reality of the American West?

Once you allow figures into a landscape, it's hard to lock all narrative out. As Arthur Miller said on the set of the movie The Misfits in the Nevada desert: "The people were so little and the landscape was so enormous." It's hard not to see a story there.

Consider Darius Kinsey's 1906 photograph Felling a Fir Tree, 51 Feet in Circumference. Here Kinsey shows part of a large tree, mortally wounded and flanked by small men with axes and saws. In the mouth of the tree's fatal crack lies a man, alive, relaxed, almost smiling. He is a picture of true machismo, casual and radiant in the face of death. Kinsey, who was clearly aiming for a David and Goliath tale, must have set up the shot: "You, there, you crawl into that crack, and I'll pay you a buck!" Still, the man in the maw really must have been brave enough to lie there. So I'd say this is not so much a pure fantasy as a tale of true grit.

Darius Kinsey, Felling a Fir Tree, 51 Feet in Circumference, 1906. Museum of Modern Art, New York.

 

http://www.slate.com/id/2217604/

 

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Meet India's first porn star

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Here she comes: Saudi's Miss Beautiful Morals

Khadra al-Mubarak, left, shows potential contestant brochures of the "Miss Beautiful Morals" contest at her office in Safwa in the eastern province, Saudi Arabia, Tuesday, May 5, 2009. Al-Mubarak is one of the organizers of the "Miss Beautiful Morals" pageant, one that focuses on the female contestant's commitment to Islamic morals. The winning queen will be the one who exhibits the most devotion and respect for her parents irrespective of her looks. (AP Photo/Nissreen Aldar)

By DONNA ABU-NASR

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) -- Sukaina al-Zayer is an unlikely beauty queen hopeful. She covers her face and body in black robes and an Islamic veil, so no one can tell what she looks like. She also admits she's a little on the plump side.

But at Saudi Arabia's only beauty pageant, the judges don't care about a perfect figure or face. What they're looking for in the quest for "Miss Beautiful Morals" is the contestant who shows the most devotion and respect for her parents.

"The idea of the pageant is to measure the contestants' commitment to Islamic morals... It's an alternative to the calls for decadence in the other beauty contests that only take into account a woman's body and looks," said pageant founder Khadra al-Mubarak.

"The winner won't necessarily be pretty," she added. "We care about the beauty of the soul and the morals."

So after the pageant opens Saturday, the nearly 200 contestants will spend the next 10 weeks attending classes and being quizzed on themes including "Discovering your inner strength," "The making of leaders" and "Mom, paradise is at your feet" - a saying attributed to Islam's Prophet Muhammad to underline that respect for parents is among the faith's most important tenets.

Pageant hopefuls will also spend a day at a country house with their mothers, where they will be observed by female judges and graded on how they interact with their mothers, al-Mubarak said. Since the pageant is not televised and no men are involved, contestants can take off the veils and black figure-hiding abayas they always wear in public.

The Miss Beautiful Morals pageant is the latest example of conservative Muslims co-opting Western-style formats to spread their message in the face of the onslaught of foreign influences flooding the region through the Internet and satellite television.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_SAUDI_MISS_BEAUTIFUL_MORALS?SITE=ININS&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

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Meanwhile, in Wasilla...

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We distort. You decide.

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An invention that could change the internet for ever

Revolutionary new web software could put giants such as Google in the shade when it comes out later this month. Andrew Johnson reports

The biggest internet revolution for a generation will be unveiled this month with the launch of software that will understand questions and give specific, tailored answers in a way that the web has never managed before.

The new system, Wolfram Alpha, showcased at Harvard University in the US last week, takes the first step towards what many consider to be the internet's Holy Grail – a global store of information that understands and responds to ordinary language in the same way a person does.

Although the system is still new, it has already produced massive interest and excitement among technology pundits and internet watchers.

Computer experts believe the new search engine will be an evolutionary leap in the development of the internet. Nova Spivack, an internet and computer expert, said that Wolfram Alpha could prove just as important as Google. "It is really impressive and significant," he wrote. "In fact it may be as important for the web (and the world) as Google, but for a different purpose.

Tom Simpson, of the blog Convergenceofeverything.com, said: "What are the wider implications exactly? A new paradigm for using computers and the web? Probably. Emerging artificial intelligence and a step towards a self-organising internet? Possibly... I think this could be big."

Wolfram Alpha will not only give a straight answer to questions such as "how high is Mount Everest?", but it will also produce a neat page of related information – all properly sourced – such as geographical location and nearby towns, and other mountains, complete with graphs and charts.

The real innovation, however, is in its ability to work things out "on the fly", according to its British inventor, Dr Stephen Wolfram. If you ask it to compare the height of Mount Everest to the length of the Golden Gate Bridge, it will tell you. Or ask what the weather was like in London on the day John F Kennedy was assassinated, it will cross-check and provide the answer. Ask it about D sharp major, it will play the scale. Type in "10 flips for four heads" and it will guess that you need to know the probability of coin-tossing. If you want to know when the next solar eclipse over Chicago is, or the exact current location of the International Space Station, it can work it out.

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/an-invention-that-could-change-the-internet-for-ever-1678109.html

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Celebrating Mixed Messages.

The Mudflats

Tiptoeing Through the Muck of Alaskan Politics

So….. Abstinence didn't work for Bristol Palin.

And…..she doesn't think it works for anyone else.

But….she's now a teen spokesperson for an abstinence organization.

And…Candie's, the organization who runs this abstinence foundation, has ads like this.

http://www.themudflats.net/2009/05/05/celebrating-mixed-messages/?cp=1

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CDC confirms outbreak of "Elephant Flu" in 26 States.

By Dewey Cheetham


In an unusual Sunday press conference Acting CDC Director Dr. Richard Bresser confirmed that the dreaded "Elephant Flu" virus has been identified in 26 states, "This is the same strain that first identified in Wheeling, West Virginia on Feb 9, 1950, when Senator McCarthy babbled the following, 'The State Department is infested with communists. I have here in my hand a list of 205—a list of names that were made known to the Secretary of State as being members of the Communist Party and who nevertheless are still working and shaping policy in the State Department' most rational people new that a serious mental disease had entered in the public square, it continues to this day".

CDC epidemological experts believe that the number of people that are at risk for the flu has declined considerably because they have been getting such large doses of it over the last 8 years.

The CDC has issued the following bulletin listing the 5 stages of development of the Elephant Flu

Elephant Flu - 5 Stage Matrix

The stages of Elephant Flu are classified as hyperaccumulative, in that as the disease progresses the additional stages are added to the previous stages and do not supersede them. It is common for patients to exhibit all 5 stages of the disease. The symptoms generally follow a standard progression and are obvious in their stasis but in some cases the later stages are so pronounced that it is thought that they skipped earlier stages. The symptoms exhibit both chronic and remitting behavior and almost never relapsing although it generally gets more pronounced in 2 year cycles. It almost always is accompanied by serious failure of the histauthentic lobe of the cortex resulting in constant confusion of historical facts.

Stage One - Extreme Political Ego/Narcissistic Transmodulation

Identifying Characteristics The affected person begins to transpose individual experience with metaphysical truth. For example if a person has a bad experience at a post office they might express it with the following comment "The Government is the Problem we should dismantle Department of Education." There is also a transposing of personal interests with both the individual's own larger group interest and historical fact. One of the most common manifestations with this is "The Founding Fathers were both good evangelical Christians and Capitalists". (note 1)

Notable Occurrencess The first recordedoccurrencee was McCarthy'sinsistencee, without any independent evidence, that the US Army had tortured and denied the German soldiers who had murdered 90 American serviceman at Malmedy a fair trial.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malmedy_massacre ) Later this mumbo jumbo would be completely inverted and used by commentator Bill O'Reilly to assert that the Americans had executed German POWs (none of the Germans convicted of these crimes and sentenced to death actuallyreceivedd the death penalty.

Stage Two - Logic Impairment

Identifying Characteristics When they are speaking normal people get severe headaches. They frequently take statements that have an element of truth expand the parameters until what seems like a statement that has a logical foundation becomes absurdity. For example, stating that tax reduction has a stimulative effect is logical when the variable tax rate can reach 60% but becomes increasingly illogical when the rate goes down. If it were true at all rates then a tax reduction of 9% on a 10% rate would be stimulative, which of course it is not.

Notable Occurrences

When Republicans move their lips.

Stage Three Apocalyptic Collapse Syndrome

Identifying Characteristics: The affected person becomes hysterical and links everyday events to end of the world with a perpetualeschatologyl interpretation that ascribes final "end of the world" epochal signs to normal everyday occurrences.

Notable Occurences: They can be seen daily on The Glenn Beck Show, even other affected people like O'Reilly consider him beyond treatment http://pushingrope.blogspot.com/2009/02/glenn-becks-cra... . The affected person becomes delusional (here comparing Hitler and Jesus http://crooksandliars.com/2007/09/24/glenn-beck-jesus-a... ) and also show signs of megalomania (here arguing for a NAZI style Final Solution on all 'Islamic Extremists' http://crooksandliars.com/2007/11/06/glenn-becks-final-... )

Stage Four Group Purification Syndrome

Identifying Characteristics: The infected sub group goes through a kind of obsessive nit picking and name calling among its own infected group in a relentless effort to achieve sanctity through purification not dissimilar to an OCD patient repeatedly washing their hands.

Notable Occurrences:

See Goldwater vs. Rockefeller, Reagan vs. Ford, and the current Steele vs. everyone vs. Gingrich vs. Palin.

Stage Five - Batshit Crazy

Identifying Characteristics: You will know it when you see it:

Notable Occurrences:

Too extensive to detail but since the original symptoms shown by Joe McCarthy there have been thousands of examples. Here are some recent examples showing geographic spread of the syndrome;



"I'm a foreign correspondent on enemy lines and I try to let everyone back here in Minnesota know exactly the nefarious activities that are taking place in Washington." Michelle Bachman



George Lambus, candidate (R) for Mayor of Jackson, MS
"Crime can only be alleviated by a noose and a stout tree limb. I will provide the noose."



Fox's Megyn Kelly asks ACORN spokesman: "You're going to send child rapists out to conduct the census?

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://4.bp.blog...

Arguably the worst case to date:



Preventative measures; No prophylactic regime is known to have an effective barrier for the disease. The best preventative step is to stay away from small groups of close minded uneducated fearful people. Try and stay engaged with open minded well educated people with an altruistic mindset interested in history who are capable of transcending their own personal experiences and deal with complex abstract thoughts.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x8389090

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A 6th Anniversary Look Back at Media Coverage of 'Mission Accomplished'

By Greg Mitchell

NEW YORK On May 1, 2003, Richard Perle advised, in a USA Today Op-Ed, "Relax, Celebrate Victory." The same day, exactly six years ago, President Bush, dressed in a flight suit, landed on the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln and declared an end to major military operations in Iraq -- with the now-infamous "Mission Accomplished" banner arrayed behind him in the war's greatest photo op.

Chris Matthews on MSNBC called Bush a "hero" and boomed, "He won the war. He was an effective commander. Everybody recognizes that, I believe, except a few critics." He added: "Women like a guy who's president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president. It's simple."

PBS' Gwen Ifill said Bush was "part Tom Cruise, part Ronald Reagan." On NBC, Brian Williams gushed, "The pictures were beautiful. It was quite something to see the first-ever American president on a -- on a carrier landing."

Bob Schieffer on CBS said: "As far as I'm concerned, that was one of the great pictures of all time." His guest, Joe Klein, responded: "Well, that was probably the coolest presidential image since Bill Pullman played the jet fighter pilot in the movie Independence Day. That was the first thing that came to mind for me."

Everyone agreed the Democrats and antiwar critics were now on the run.

When Bush's jet landed on an aircraft carrier, American casualties stood at 139 killed and 542 wounded.

The following (a revised version of a chapter in my 2008 book on Iraq and the media, "So Wrong for So Long") looks at how one newspaper -- it happens to be The New York Times -- covered the Bush declaration and its immediate aftermath. One snippet: "The Bush administration is planning to withdraw most United States combat forces from Iraq over the next several months and wants to shrink the American military presence to less than two divisions by the fall, senior allied officials said today."

***

By Elisabeth Bumiller

WASHINGTON, May 1--President Bush's made-for-television address tonight on the carrier Abraham Lincoln was a powerful, Reaganesque finale to a six-week war. But beneath the golden images of a president steaming home with his troops toward the California coast lay the cold political and military realities that drove Mr. Bush's advisors to create the moment.

The president declared an end to major combat operations, White House, Pentagon and State Department officials said, for three crucial reasons: to signify the shift of American soldiers from the role of conquerors to police, to open the way for aid from countries that refused to help militarily, and--above all--to signal to voters that Mr. Bush is shifting his focus from Baghdad to concerns at home.

''This is the formalization that tells everybody we're not engaged in combat anymore, we're prepared for getting out,'' a senior administration official said.

***
By Michael R. Gordon and Eric Schmitt

BAGHDAD, May 2--The Bush administration is planning to withdraw most United States combat forces from Iraq over the next several months and wants to shrink the American military presence to less than two divisions by the fall, senior allied officials said today.

The United States currently has more than five divisions in Iraq, troops that fought their way into the country and units that were added in an attempt to stabilize it. But the Bush administration is trying to establish a new military structure in which American troops would continue to secure Baghdad while the majority of the forces in Iraq would be from other nations.

Under current planning, there would be three sectors in postwar Iraq. The Americans would keep a division in and around Baghdad; Britain would command a multinational division in the south near Basra; and Poland would command a third division of troops from a variety of nations.

***
By Dexter Filkins and Ian Fisher

BAGHDAD, May 2--The war in Iraq has officially ended, but the momentous task of recreating a new Iraqi nation seems hardly to have begun. Three weeks after Saddam Hussein fell from power, American troops are straining to manage the forces this war has unleashed: the anger, frustration, and competing ambitions of a nation suppressed for three decades.

In a virtual power vacuum, with the relationship between American military and civilian authority seeming ill defined, new political parties, Kurds, and Shiite religious groups are asserting virtual governmental authority in cities and villages across the country, sometimes right under the noses of American soldiers. There is a growing sense among educated Iraqis eager for the American-led transformation of Iraq to work that the Americans may be losing the initiative, that the single-mindedness that won the war is slackening under the delicate task of transforming a military victory into political success.

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003968329

 

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Art student's car vanishing act

Sara Watson took three weeks to transform the car

A design student made a battered old Skoda "disappear" by painting it to merge with the surrounding car park.

Sara Watson, who is studying drawing at the University of Central Lancashire (Uclan), took three weeks to transform the car's appearance.

She created the illusion in the car park outside her studio at Uclan's Hanover Building in Preston.

The car is now being used for advertising by the local recycling firm that donated the vehicle.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/lancashire/8030766.stm

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Voters should have say in how president elected

Senate Bill 5599 has been passed and signed, enlisting the Washington state in a scheme to bypass the Electoral College. It went through without much discussion, which is unfortunate. The Seattle Times thinks the people should vote on it.

ON Tuesday Gov. Chris Gregoire signed into law a bill that aims to change the way Americans elect the president and vice-president of the United States. This was a big thing done with little public notice, and is disturbing in its implications.

Senate Bill 5599 — sponsored by Sens. Joe McDermott, Jeanne Kohl-Welles and Adam Kline of Seattle and seven other Senate Democrats — is part of a plan to do an appendectomy on the Electoral College, the institution under which the states choose the president and vice president.

The states all decided ages ago to cast their electoral votes based on the outcome of the popular vote in their state, with all but two states casting all their votes based on the statewide totals.

The objection to this is that occasionally, when the national popular vote is close, the Electoral College can go the other way. When that happened in 2000, Americans talked of amending the Constitution. It is possible to do that — it has been amended 12 times in the past century — but amendments require wide support, and ending the Electoral College didn't have it.

The bill signed by Gregoire would achieve the same result by having the states game the system. Once activated, all the states in the agreement will cast their electoral votes for the candidate with the highest popular vote (not necessarily a majority) nationwide. If that agreement had been in effect in 2004, Washington would have had to cast its 11 electoral votes for George W. Bush, even though John Kerry won 53 percent of the popular vote here.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/editorialsopinion/2009167552_editb04electoral.html

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Stop worrying about your children!

Kids today are just as safe as they were in the '70s, says "Free-Range Kids" author Lenore Skenazy, and what's really distressing is an alarmist culture that refuses to let them grow up.

By Katharine Mieszkowski

Over the past year, syndicated columnist Lenore Skenazy, 49, has become something of a heretic. She's an American mother of two boys, now 11 and 13, who dares to suggest that today's kids aren't growing up in constant state of near peril.

Amid the cacophony of terrifying Amber Alerts and safety tips for every holiday, Skenazy is a chipper alternative, arguing that raising children in the United States now isn't more dangerous than it was when today's generation of parents were young. And back then, it was reasonably safe, too. So why does shooing the kids outside and telling them to have fun and be home by dark seem irresponsible to so many middle-class parents today?

Skenazy first instigated a kerfuffle about contemporary parenting mores when she and her husband allowed their then 9-year-old son Izzy to ride the subway alone in April 2008. After she wrote a column about Izzy's independent excursion, she and the little subway veteran made the rounds on TV morning shows and cable news, where Skenazy fielded heated questions about her common sense, if not her outright sanity. The tsk-tsking wasn't limited to the TV talking heads, either. This year, a train conductor on the Long Island Rail Road called the police after then 10-year-old Izzy took a train ride by himself. (For the record, it's entirely legal.)

In her new book, "Free-Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts With Worry," Skenazy suggests that many American parents are in the grips of a national hysteria about child safety, which is fed by sensationalistic media coverage of child abductions, safety tips from alarmist parenting mags, and companies marketing products that promise to protect tykes from every possible danger. She by no means recommends that mom and dad chuck the car seats, but says that trying to fend off every possible risk, however remote, holds its own unfortunate, unintended consequences.

http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2009/05/04/free_range_kids/

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Aid convoy in the Mediterranean to Gaza

Italy, May 5, 2009-The climax to the Seventh Palestinians in Europe conference was the launch of the long anticipated 'Hope for Gaza convoy' The convoy moved to Gaza and recently is in the Mediterranean carried by a shipping boat.

The convoy is destined for the Gaza Strip and carries provisions for the education and medical sectors, specifically for Palestinians with special needs – those who were handicapped by the major Israeli attacks of December and January.

Through a chorus of cheers and tears the convoy of a dozen well-equipped ambulances and some 30 trucks loaded with medical and humanitarian supplies set sail on a cargo ship from Genoa along with human rights volunteers, European parliamentarians, and journalists.

Non-governmental organizations, institutions and human solidarity movements across the continent are part of the global movement campaigning for the besieged people in Gaza. They are forming a strong coalition of activists, professionals from various backgrounds, politicians, human rights organizations who are dedicated in bringing to light Israeli crimes and violations of international law as well as the routine imprisonment of the Palestinian people in their homes.

Beginning in Milan on Sunday evening the convoy travelled to the Italian port city of Genoa where it set sail for Alexandria, Egypt. From there it will travel by land Sinai with the intention of passing into the Gaza Strip through the Rafah border crossing.

Representatives of Palestinian rights groups chanted slogans of solidarity saying that "Gaza is a symbol of pride." With thousands of people killed or injured, in addition to the destruction of home and business, the convoy is urgently needed to deliver some respite and gestures of kindness to a people who are in danger in losing hope in basic human kindness. Past convoys have found it difficult to deliver the desperately needed aid, at present we can only be cautiously optimistic that this convoy will be allowed to pass.

Palestinian flags waved high above the cheers and tears as the convoy set out. Dr. Arafat Madi, President of the European Campaign to Lift the Siege on Gaza, said, "What we are doing is the least we can do. It is a drop in the ocean compared to the sacrifices made by our people in Palestine..""Dr. Madi added, "We promised our people in the West Bank and Gaza Strip We will invest all our efforts to send these aids and medical kits for those who deserve it in Gaza. Many people have been left maimed and disabled. All of us agree that they need urgent aid, especially medical aids to help in their grueling rehabilitation from the latest."

The convoy is headed by 12 high-profile politicians from across Europe including, Britain, Italy, Scotland, Switzerland and Greece. Also joining the convoy will be many people from the Arab and Muslim communities from various European countries.

More: www.savegaza.eu

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Mashaal: Hamas wants 10 year cease-fire

Hamas has stopped launching rockets at Israel and is looking to establish a Palestinian state along the 1967 borders, the Islamist group's political leader Khaled Mashaal told The New York Times in an interview published Monday. He went on to say that Hamas supported "a state on the 1967 borders, based on a long-term truce. This includes east Jerusalem, the dismantling of settlements and the right of return of the Palestinian refugees," specifying that by a "long-term" agreement he meant 10 years.

Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal speaks during a rally in Damascus

Mashaal, who was re-elected as the leader of the movement's political bureau for the fourth time earlier this week, called the firing of rockets from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel "a method, not a goal," and said that the cessation of such aggression was "part of an evaluation from the movement which serves the Palestinians' interest."

The Times also quoted the Damascus-based leader as saying that Hamas sought to agree to a truce with Israel, as well as an agreement to swap captured IDF soldier Gilad Schalit with multiple Palestinian prisoners.

He did not, however, stray far from the group's previous statements, reiterating, "There is only one enemy in the region, and that is Israel," and opining that pushing Hamas to recognize Israel was merely "a pretext by the United States and Israel to escape dealing with the real issue and to throw the ball into the Arab and Palestinian court."

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1239710865692&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

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Egypt: Israeli nukes 'greatest threat' to security

By BRENDA GAZZAR

Western policies based on pressuring Iran to give up its nuclear program will fail because they disregard Israeli nuclear capabilities, which is "the first and greatest threat to security in the region," an Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Monday.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor categorically rejected that classification.

"If he can quote at least one occasion in which Israel has threatened any of its neighbors with the alleged nuclear weapon, then his statements would gain him credibility," Palmor said. "Unless he produces evidence to support his claims, these kinds of remarks are completely out of line."

Spokesman Hossam Zaki, in a declaration to editors accredited with the ministry, said Egypt's position on disarmament and nonproliferation aimed to safeguard Egyptian security and to address the threats that undermine security and stability in the Middle East, according to Egypt's official Middle East News Agency.

Cairo sought to realize the aims of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to guarantee the security of all states, whereas possession of nuclear weapons by some countries disrupted the balance of power and encouraged other nations to address this imbalance by seeking to acquire nuclear weapons, he said.

Zaki called on the international community to justly and indiscriminately apply the Non-Proliferation Treaty that requires states to comply with its provisions, and asked it to refrain from the adoption of double standards in pressuring states to abandon their programs, he said.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1239710864019&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

 

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The Playboy Running Pakistan

by Nicholas Schmidle

Nicholas Schmidle, who lived in Pakistan from 2006 to 2008, is a fellow at the New America Foundation and author of To Live or To Perish Forever: Two Tumultuous Years in Pakistan, which will be published May 12.

As Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari heads for Washington—amid a fresh surge of violence in his country—Nicholas Schmidle explains how a Karachi playboy and accused murderer became our ally, and why his days are numbered.

Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari relishes politics behind closed doors. But as his army continues to battle Taliban militants in northwest Pakistan with fighter jets, air-dropped commandos, and helicopter gunships, Zardari has been keeping an exceptionally low profile.

Perhaps for good reason. Even though the military has reclaimed some of the territory overrun by the Talibs last week in Buner district, the Taliban are still holding some 50 kidnapped Pakistani soldiers hostage, tens of thousands of civilians have been displaced, and there's a nasty ethnic conflict festering in Karachi that's already left dozens dead. If part of a president's job is to guarantee the safety of his people, Zardari is having an awful time of it these days.

Zardari is, in many ways, a fluke president. A Karachi socialite and playboy who reportedly turned his basement into a disco, Zardari stabled his polo horses at the prime minister's official residence during Bhutto's first term in office.

The Taliban's conquest of Buner, an advance that brought them within 70 miles of Islamabad, triggered international alarm. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton went so far as to warn the Senate that "Pakistan poses a mortal threat to the security and safety of our country and the world." But Zardari's office issued just one vacuous, disingenuous statement, declaring that military action was only "one aspect of the solution" and that his government "will not succumb to any pressure from the militants." On the first part, he's right: Military efforts to crush the Taliban are only likely to breathe life into the insurgency. On the second point, however, he's just bluffing: The fact is that Zardari's government—and Pervez Musharraf's before that—have already succumbed in northwest Pakistan, both having negotiating peace deals that allowed the Taliban safe havens.

When Zardari shows up in Washington next week, he'll likely try to justify these concessions as part of a bigger strategy. But will the White House believe him? Could Zardari possibly have something else up his sleeve?

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-04-30/the-playboy-running-pakistan/

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Condi Ignored Warnings: ‘4th Grader Determined to Strike’

By Don Davis

"HOW WAS I TO KNOW THAT A 4TH GRADER WOULD HAVE A SUPERIOR MORAL CODE AND MORE RESPECT FOR THE LAW THAN A CERTAIN STANFORD PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL SCIENCE."

http://satiricalpolitical.com/?p=7086

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Taliban prepare for U.S. surge

Militants in Afghanistan say plans for Obama's new troops include more IED, suicide bombers and assassinations

by JESSICA LEEDER

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN — Taliban fighters say they are planning a bloody summer campaign of buried bombs and staged ambushes in rural areas and a rash of multiple co-ordinated suicide bombings and assassinations in urban Kandahar.

Designed to spread terror across the most densely populated areas of this province, the militants' ramped-up battle plan is a response to the impending surge of U.S. troops and retrenching of other forces here.

After two weeks of interviews with Taliban, close observers and Afghan government officials from some of the province's most troubled districts, a picture emerges of what to expect from what may be the most intense fighting season in years – and places nervous civilians squarely in the crosshairs.

"We have new plans, new tactics," a Taliban logistics director based in the volatile Panjwai district says. He recently returned from high-level meetings with militant commanders in Quetta, Pakistan, and spoke about plans on condition his name remains unpublished.

"The new strategy of fighting is very important for us," he said. "It will be very dangerous for the government and for foreign troops."

Central to the summer strategy is a two-pronged terror campaign currently being mapped out by Taliban planners in a mountain refuge in northern Maywand district. The area links Afghanistan's Helmand and Kandahar provinces and is poised to become a focal point of the war when U.S. troops deploy there.

Their plan will be carried out by young fighters who, in recent weeks, have been trickling into the notorious rural areas west of Kandahar city, armed with new machine guns and sustained by villagers' donations of dry bread and watery yogurt.

When their commanders give the green light, these young militants, mainly between 18 and 30 years old, will instigate clashes on two fronts: the first will be across rural areas west of the city – the traditional summer battlefields for militants clashing with coalition troops. The second will be in urban Kandahar city, home to key provincial government offices and a hub for Canadian troops.

Out-powered in rural areas by military weaponry, fighters there will carry machine guns and attempt to sharpen the results of their ambushes, but they will rely more on land mines and improvised explosive devices, sources say.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090504.wtaliban05/BNStory/International/home

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Which is the gay one?

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Obamaman

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'Witness for Jesus' in Afghanistan

 

Bagram has a thriving evangelical Christian community

US soldiers have been encouraged to spread the message of their Christian faith among Afghanistan's predominantly Muslim population, video footage obtained by Al Jazeera appears to show.

Military chaplains stationed in the US air base at Bagram were also filmed with bibles printed in the country's main Pashto and Dari languages.

In one recorded sermon, Lieutenant-Colonel Gary Hensley, the chief of the US military chaplains in Afghanistan, is seen telling soldiers that as followers of Jesus Christ, they all have a responsibility "to be witnesses for him".

"The special forces guys - they hunt men basically. We do the same things as Christians, we hunt people for Jesus. We do, we hunt them down," he says.

"Get the hound of heaven after them, so we get them into the kingdom. That's what we do, that's our business."

Local language Bibles

The footage, shot about a year ago by Brian Hughes, a documentary maker and former member of the US military who spent several days in Bagram, was obtained by Al Jazeera's James Bays, who has covered Afghanistan extensively.

IN VIDEO

US troops urged to 'witness for Jesus' in Afghanistan

More videos ...

Bays also obtained from Hughes a Pashto-language copy of one of the books he picked up during a Bible study lesson he recorded at Bagram.

A Pashto speaker confirmed to Bays that it was a Bible.

In other footage captured at Bagram, Sergeant Jon Watt, a soldier who is set to become a military chaplain, is seen giving thanks for the work that his church in the US did in getting Bibles printed and sent to Afghanistan.

"I also want to praise God because my church collected some money to get Bibles for Afghanistan. They came and sent the money out," he is heard saying during a Bible study class.

It is not clear that the Bibles were distributed to Afghans, but Hughes said that none of the people he recorded in a series of sermons and Bible study classes appeared to able to speak Pashto or Dari.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2009/05/200953201315854832.html

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Rip! A remix manifesto

an open source document

http://www.ripremix.com/

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