Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/03/sofia-vergara-blonde-hair-love-it-or-loathe-it/
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Friday, March 29, 2013
Ahmadinejad roadshow: Pitching his political heir
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) ? During a celebration last week to mark the Persian new year, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did something quietly remarkable: He stood modestly to the side and let his favored aide have the spotlight.
The gesture was far more than just a rare demure moment from the normally grandstanding leader. It was more carefully scripted stagecraft in Ahmadinejad's longshot efforts to promote the political fortunes of his chief of staff ? and in-law ? and seek a place for him on the June presidential ballot that will pick Iran's next president.
In the waning months of Ahmadinejad's presidency ? weakened by years of internal battles with the ruling clerics ? there appears no bigger priority than attempting one last surprise. It's built around rehabilitating the image of Esfandiari Rahim Mashaei and somehow getting him a place among the candidates for the June 14 vote.
To pull it off, Ahmadinejad must do what has eluded him so far: Come out on top in a showdown with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the other guardians of the Islamic Republic. Ahmadinejad has been slapped down hard after bold ? but ultimately doomed ? attempts in recent years to push the influence of his office on policies and decisions reserved for the ruling clerics.
That has left him limping into the end of his eight-year presidency with many allies either jailed or pushed to the political margins. Mashaei is part of the collateral damage.
He's been discredited as part of a "deviant current" that critics say seeks to undermine Islamic rule in Iran and elevate the values of pre-Islamic Persia. The smear campaign has even included rumors that Mashaei conjured black magic spells to cloud Ahmadinejad's judgment.
The prevailing wisdom is that the backlash has effectively killed Mashaei's chances for the presidential ballot. The ruling clerics vet all candidates and, the theory follows, they seek a predictable slate of loyalists after dealing with Ahmadinejad's ambitions and disruptive power plays. In short: Friends of Ahmadinejad need not apply.
Khamenei and others, including the powerful Revolutionary Guard, also are hoping to quell domestic political spats that they fear project a sense of instability during critical negotiations with the West over Tehran's nuclear program.
Yet none of this seems to have discouraged Ahmadinejad, whose son is married to Mashaei's daughter. Ahmadinejad has been trying to groom Mashaei for years as his potential heir and now appears reluctant to toss his backing behind a less controversial figure.
To that end, the president has hit the road as a cheerleader for Mashaei under the slogan "Long Live Spring."
At one stop, Ahmadinejad described Mashaei as "a pious man." At another event he called him "excellent, wise," and at a third said his adviser has "a heart like a mirror."
At last week's event, both men burst into tears as they discussed the need to help children with cancer. Ahmadinejad then "thanked God for having the opportunity to get to know Mashaei."
Ahmadinejad appears to be banking on his populist appeal to force the Guardian Council ? the gatekeepers for the candidates ? to consider Mashaei too prominent to reject.
"Ahmadinejad doesn't want to go out with a whimper. That's not his style," said Mustafa Alani, an analyst at the Gulf Research Center based in Geneva. "He wants his legacy, his man, as his successor."
Tehran-based political analyst Sadeq Zibakalam also sees Mashaei as Ahmadinejad's last-ditch insurance policy. Without an ally as successor, Ahmadinejad fears he will be cast to the political sidelines.
"Ahmadinejad has no option but to get one of his loyalists into power," he said.
It will be more than a month before the candidate list is finalized. The presidential hopefuls will register from May 7-11, the semiofficial Fars news agency reported Monday.
Already, however, the general contours are taking shape.
There is Ahmadinejad's quest for Mashaei as the only active campaign roadshow.
Many conservatives, meanwhile, seem to be coalescing around a three-way alliance ? all apparently in the good graces of the ruling system ? of former Foreign Minister and current Khamenei adviser Ali Akbar Velayati; Tehran Mayor Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf and prominent lawmaker Gholam Ali Haddad Adel, whose daughter is married to Khamenei's son.
"Should we win, our coalition will form the backbone of the future government," Velayati told a press conference earlier this month, suggesting that the potential winner would seek key posts for the other two.
A separate roster of establishment-friendly candidates is getting bigger by the day. It includes former Intelligence Minister Ali Fallahian; parliament's vice speaker, Mohammad Reza Bahonar, and a former Revolutionary Guard commander, Mohsen Rezaei, who ran against Ahmadinejad in his disputed re-election in 2009.
Reformists remain undecided whether to fall behind a potential candidate or boycott the vote in protest of the 2009 outcome ? which they claim stole the election from Green Movement leader Mir Hossein Mousavi ? and the crushing pressures on dissent that followed. Mousavi and fellow reformist candidate Mahdi Karroubi have been under house arrest for more than two years.
But the most unpredictable element is still Ahmadinejad's push for Mashaei, whom he bills as his ideological heir and supporter of populist initiatives such as government stipends to poor families.
"Ahmadinejad will travel city to city and tell the public that they should vote for me if they want Ahmadinejad's plans to be pursued," Mashaei was quoted as saying by Iranian media.
The president ? the same man who calls for the destruction of Iran's enemies ? is often musing and sentimental as Mashaei's pitchman.
"I testify that this man loves all human beings," Ahmadinejad said of his in-law.
Mashaei, however, has been a political lightning rod for years. In 2009, Ahmadinejad appointed him as his first vice president, but was forced to backtrack on orders from Khamenei.
Mashaei is believed to have been Ahmadinejad's adviser in a stunning feud with Khamenei over the choice of intelligence chief in 2011. The president boycotted Cabinet meetings for 11 days ? an unprecedented show of disrespect to Iran's supreme leader ? but finally backed down.
In December, Ahmadinejad named Mashaei to a top post in the Nonaligned Movement, a Cold War holdover that Iran seeks to revive as a counterweight to Western influence. The appointment was seen as an attempt to raise Mashaei's political profile and give him some international experience.
While it's not possible to rule out any candidate until the vetting process is complete, one conservative cleric gives Mashaei no chance.
"The exalted supreme leader ordered that Mashaei is not qualified to serve as first vice president." said Qasem Ravanbakhsh. "So will the Guardian Council approve for president a man was not qualified to be the first vice president? Never."
___
Murphy reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ahmadinejad-roadshow-pitching-political-heir-063835043.html
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Multiple moves found harmful to poor young children
Mar. 28, 2013 ? Poor children who move three or more times before they turn 5 have more behavior problems than their peers, according to a new study by researchers at Cornell University and the National Employment Law Project. The study is published in the journal Child Development.
Moving is a fairly common experience for American families; in 2002, 6.5 percent of all children had been living in their current home for less than six months. Among low-income children, that number rose to 10 percent. In addition, in 2002, 13 percent of families above poverty moved once, but 24 percent of families below poverty moved. Research has shown that frequent moves are related to a range of behavioral, emotional, and school problems for adolescents.
Using national data on 2,810 children from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, a longitudinal, representative study of children born in 20 large U.S. cities between 1998 and 2000, researchers sought to determine how frequent moves relate to children's readiness for school. Parents were interviewed shortly after the birth of their children, then again by phone when the children were 1, 3, and 5; in-home assessments were done when the children were 3 and 5. The study also looked at the children's language and literacy outcomes, as well as behavior problems reported by mothers.
The study found that 23 percent of the children had never moved, 48 percent had moved once or twice, and 29 percent had moved three or more times. Among children who moved three or more times before age 5, nearly half (44 percent) were poor; poverty was defined based on the official federal threshold. Moving three or more times was not related to the children's language and literacy outcomes.
But children who moved three or more times had more attention problems, anxiousness or depression, and aggressiveness or hyperactivity at age 5 than those who had never moved or those who had moved once or twice. These increases in behavior problems occurred only among poor children, the study found, suggesting that frequent moves early in life are most disruptive for the most disadvantaged children.
"The United States is still recovering from the great recession, which has taken a major toll on the housing market," notes Kathleen Ziol-Guest, postdoctoral associate at Cornell University, who led the study. "As housing markets have collapsed across communities, highly mobile low-income families have moved in search of work and less expensive housing.
"The findings in this study suggest that the housing crisis and its accompanying increase in mobility likely will have negative effects on young children, especially poor children."
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Society for Research in Child Development, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
- Kathleen M. Ziol-Guest, Claire C. McKenna. Early Childhood Housing Instability and School Readiness. Child Development, 2013; DOI: 10.1111/cdev.12105
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/Y4-8E5yDj7Y/130328080229.htm
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Monday, March 25, 2013
Joe Weider, fitness mentor to Schwarzenegger, dies at 93
LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Joe Weider, a legendary figure in bodybuilding who helped popularize the sport worldwide and played a key role in introducing a charismatic young weightlifter named Arnold Schwarzenegger to the world, died Saturday. He was 93.
Weider's publicist, Charlotte Parker, told The Associated Press that the bodybuilder, publisher and promoter died of heart failure at his home in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley.
"I knew about Joe Weider long before I met him," Schwarzenegger, who tweeted the news of his old friend's death, said in a lengthy statement posted on his website. "He was the godfather of fitness who told all of us to be somebody with a body. He taught us that through hard work and training we could all be champions."
A bodybuilder with an impressive physique himself, Weider became better known in later years as a behind-the-scenes guru to the sport.
He popularized bodybuilding and spread the message of health and fitness worldwide with such publications as Muscle & Fitness, Flex and Shape. Schwarzenegger himself is the executive editor of Muscle & Fitness and Flex.
He created one of bodybuilding's pre-eminent events, the Mr. Olympia competition, in 1965, adding to it the Ms. Olympia contest in 1980, the Fitness Olympia in 1995 and the Figure Olympia in 2003.
He also relentlessly promoted Schwarzenegger, who won the Mr. Olympia title a then-record seven times, including in 1980 and every year from 1970 through 1975.
"Every sport needs a hero, and I knew that Arnold was the right man," he said.
Weider brought Schwarzenegger to the United States early in his career, where he helped train the future governor of California as well as aided him in getting into business. Schwarzenegger also said Weider helped land him his first movie role, in the forgettable film "Hercules in New York," by passing off the Austrian-born weightlifter to the producers as a German Shakespearean actor.
"Joe didn't just inspire my earliest dreams; he made them come true the day he invited me to move to America to pursue my bodybuilding career," the actor said in his statement. "I will never forget his generosity. One of Joe's greatest qualities is that he wasn't just generous with his money; he freely gave of his time and expertise and became a father figure for me."
Weider also mentored numerous other bodybuilders.
Born in Canada in 1919, Weider recalled growing up in a tough section of Montreal.
Just like the apocryphal tale of the skinny kid who starts working out after a bully kicks sand in his face, Weider said he was indeed a small, skinny teenager picked on by bullies when he came across the magazine Strength.
He had tried to join a local wrestling team, he said, but was turned down by the coach who feared he was so small he'd be hurt.
Inspired by the magazine, he built his own weights from scrap parts found in a railroad yard and pumped them relentlessly.
Word of his efforts got around and he was invited to join a weightlifting club.
"When I saw the gym, saw the guys working out, supporting one another, I was mesmerized," he recalled.
He won his first bodybuilding ranking at age 17, and soon after began to publish his first magazine, Your Physique.
Later he started a mail-order barbell business, and in 1946 he and his younger brother staged the first Mr. Canada contest in at Montreal's Monument National Theater. At the same time, they formed the International Federation of Bodybuilders.
In recent years, Weider donated much of his bodybuilding memorabilia to the University of Texas at Austin, which opened the Joe and Betty Weider Museum of Physical Culture in 2011.
He is survived by his wife.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/joe-weider-fitness-mentor-schwarzenegger-dies-221700701--spt.html
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Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Cricket-hair sensor used in bio-inspired technology
Mar. 11, 2013 ? Crickets use sensitive hairs on their cerci (projections on the abdomen) to detect predators. For these insects, air currents carry information about the location of nearby predators and the direction in which they are moving. These University of Twente researchers wondered whether they could use the same principle to create a new kind of "camera," capable of imaging entire flow patterns rather than measuring flows at a single point. They mimic the cricket hairs using microtechnology.
The hairs themselves are made of a type of epoxy, which is attached to a flexible suspended plate. That acts as a capacitor, whose capacitance varies with movement. Measuring that variation gives you information about the movement. Using an entire field or array of such fine hairs, it is possible to identify patterns in the flow, in much the same way as complete images are formed from the individual pixels detected by chips in cameras.
Flow camera
The trick is then to be able to read each hair individually. To this end, a range of options have been explored. Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM) offers the greatest advantages. With FDM, the measured signal is not delayed while in transit, it is not difficult to synchronize the individual sensors, and the sensor array can easily be expanded without sacrificing performance. Also, the hardware involved is less complex than that required by other technologies. Looking ahead, the researchers believe that it will ultimately be a relatively simple matter to integrate the sensors and the hardware. This will result in a "camera" that is capable of imaging flow patterns. These could be used as a motion detection system in robots, for example.
The study by Ahmad Dagamseh and his colleagues was carried out in the Transducer Science and Technology group, headed by Professor Gijs Krijnen. The group is part of the University of Twente's MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology. Their research was funded by the EU's Customized Intelligent Life-Inspired Arrays programme (CILIA), and by the "Bio-EARS" VICI grant awarded to Gijs Krijnen by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) and the STW Technology Foundation.
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Twente.
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Journal Reference:
- A M K Dagamseh, R J Wiegerink, T S J Lammerink, G J M Krijnen. Towards a high-resolution flow camera using artificial hair sensor arrays for flow pattern observations. Bioinspiration & Biomimetics, 2012; 7 (4): 046009 DOI: 10.1088/1748-3182/7/4/046009
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
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For longtime yoga instructor, 90, only her age isn't a stretch
Fran Miller was in her 50s when she became a yoga teacher.
That was four decades ago.
Miller, who turns 91 this week, is still at it ? teaching three classes a week in the San Fernando Valley for the city's Department of Recreation and Parks.
She is so lithe and energetic that her students say they hardly notice her age. "I didn't even know she was that old," said Maureen Hanrahan. For much of the 10 years she's been taking Miller's classes, Hanrahan thought the instructor was in her 70s, she said.
Miller moved from her native New York to the Los Angeles area in 1941 and eventually settled in Valley Village. Her husband passed away when she was 40, and the onetime secretary was left to raise her daughters: Robin Cosio, 64, and Wendy Nordstrom, 60.
She first tried yoga after spotting a newspaper ad for a class taught by a rabbi at the Van Nuys YMCA.
Yoga had always fascinated Miller. But it seemed "so far out," she said.
A rabbi teacher was a different story, however. "How could I pass this up?" Miller recalled thinking. She is Jewish, and the class was close by, she said. She enrolled "and took to it like a duck to water."
The rabbi asked Miller to be one of his demonstrators in exchange for free classes. She agreed, and soon he asked her to fill in teaching his classes when he was away.
The first time the anxious Miller arrived to teach, she was armed with a list of notes. She didn't need them. She kept teaching, and when the rabbi announced he was retiring, he gave his position to Miller. Offers to lead private sessions followed, including a full-time summer job at the Highland Springs Resort in Cherry Valley, Calif.
"It just grew and grew," Miller said.
Years passed, and she just kept going. Her age is not something she dwells on. "To me, it's just a number," she said.
Though experts say Miller's staying power is rare, the prospect of "more and more 80- and 90-year-old participants" in yoga is likely as people live longer and the popularity of yoga grows, said George Salem, associate professor at USC's Division of Biokinesiology and Physical Therapy, who has researched yoga and older practitioners.
The 5-foot-31/2 Miller, who weighs around 120 pounds, credits her overall well-being to yoga, along with weekly walks and a diet that includes nuts and yogurt and a mandatory cup of hot water with lemon each morning.
"It's not only stretching," Miller said. "It's your mind, your body, your breathing. It gives you more awareness."
Her classes at Balboa Sports Center and Studio City Recreation Center have built a faithful following. Students' ages range from 12 to the 70s.
It took Charo Martinez months to persuade her husband, Rick Benzel, to accompany her to Miller's yoga sessions.
"I'm not going to take yoga," the 61-year-old writer and publishing consultant told her. "And what, the teacher is 90 years old? How can a 90-year-old be teaching yoga?"
Martinez coaxed her husband "just go watch her, just once."
That's all it took, Benzel recalled. "I fell in love with it and with Fran on Day One." That was a year ago. Today, Benzel is a regular at Miller's sessions, which he says have helped improve his balance and flexibility.
Hanrahan, 61, the veteran student, said she feels "more comfortable" with Miller as an instructor than, say, a 20-year-old.
At a recent session, Miller, dressed in black leggings and a blue-and-black-striped top, ambled between the 20 or so participants as they lay on mats preparing to commence with 90 minutes of Hatha yoga, which focuses on balancing mind and body.
"As you quiet your body, you quiet your mind," Miller told the group as they lay in a restorative pose. Later she guided them through a salutation to the sun.
"Stand at the front of your mat ? feet apart ? inhale reaching upward," Miller commanded.
Bending forward, she pushed her chest to her thighs and her hands to the floor. With hands at either side of her right foot, she lunged her left leg behind her while lifting her shoulders and lengthening her spine. She stepped her right leg back so her feet were side by side. Head down, arms extended, body straight, she held the pose for several seconds.
ann.simmons@latimes.com
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Monday, March 11, 2013
Rebel Wilson Straddles Channing Tatum For Dangerous Movie Awards Drive
'Pitch Perfect' actress will star as host of this year's ceremony, airing live Sunday, April 14.
By Amy Wilkinson
Rebel Wilson and Channing Tatum
Photo: MTV
Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1703409/channing-tatum-rebel-wilson-mtv-movie-awards-2013.jhtml
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Sunday, March 10, 2013
Hubble finds birth certificate of oldest known star
Friday, March 8, 2013
A team of astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has taken an important step closer to finding the birth certificate of a star that's been around for a very long time.
"We have found that this is the oldest known star with a well-determined age," said Howard Bond of Pennsylvania State University in University Park, Pa., and the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Md.
The star could be as old as 14.5 billion years (plus or minus 0.8 billion years), which at first glance would make it older than the universe's calculated age of about 13.8 billion years, an obvious dilemma.
But earlier estimates from observations dating back to 2000 placed the star as old as 16 billion years. And this age range presented a potential dilemma for cosmologists. "Maybe the cosmology is wrong, stellar physics is wrong, or the star's distance is wrong," Bond said. "So we set out to refine the distance."
The new Hubble age estimates reduce the range of measurement uncertainty, so that the star's age overlaps with the universe's age ? as independently determined by the rate of expansion of space, an analysis of the microwave background from the big bang, and measurements of radioactive decay.
This "Methuselah star," cataloged as HD 140283, has been known about for more than a century because of its fast motion across the sky. The high rate of motion is evidence that the star is simply a visitor to our stellar neighborhood. Its orbit carries it down through the plane of our galaxy from the ancient halo of stars that encircle the Milky Way, and will eventually slingshot back to the galactic halo.
This conclusion was bolstered by the 1950s astronomers who were able to measure a deficiency of heavier elements in the star as compared to other stars in our galactic neighborhood. The halo stars are among the first inhabitants of our galaxy and collectively represent an older population from the stars, like our sun, that formed later in the disk. This means that the star formed at a very early time before the universe was largely "polluted" with heavier elements forged inside stars through nucleosynthesis. (The Methuselah star has an anemic 1/250th as much of the heavy element content of our sun and other stars in our solar neighborhood.)
The star, which is at the very first stages of expanding into a red giant, can be seen with binoculars as a 7th-magnitude object in the constellation Libra.
Hubble's observational prowess was used to refine the distance to the star, which comes out to be 190.1 light-years. Bond and his team performed this measurement by using trigonometric parallax, where an apparent shift in the position of a star is caused by a change in the observer's position. The results are published in the February 13 issue of the Astrophysical Journal Letters.
The parallax of nearby stars can be measured by observing them from opposite points in Earth's orbit around the sun. The star's true distance from Earth can then be precisely calculated through straightforward triangulation.
Once the true distance is known, an exact value for the star's intrinsic brightness can be calculated. Knowing a star's intrinsic brightness is a fundamental prerequisite to estimating its age.
Before the Hubble observation, the European Space Agency's Hipparcos satellite made a precise measurement of the star's parallax, but with an age measurement uncertainty of 2 billion years. One of Hubble's three Fine Guidance Sensors measured the position of the Methuselah star. It turns out that the star's parallax came out to be virtually identical to the Hipparcos measurements. But Hubble's precision is five times better that than of Hipparcos. Bond's team managed to shrink the uncertainty so that the age estimate was five times more precise.
With a better handle on the star's brightness Bond's team refined the star's age by applying contemporary theories about the star's burn rate, chemical abundances, and internal structure. New ideas are that leftover helium diffuses deeper into the core and so the star has less hydrogen to burn via nuclear fusion. This means it uses fuel faster and that correspondingly lowers the age.
Also, the star has a higher than predicted oxygen-to-iron ratio, and this too lowers the age. Bond thinks that further oxygen measurement could reduce the star's age even more, because the star would have formed at a slightly later time when the universe was richer in oxygen abundance. Lowering the upper age limit would make the star unequivocally younger than the universe.
"Put all of those ingredients together and you get an age of 14.5 billion years, with a residual uncertainty that makes the star's age compatible with the age of the universe," said Bond. "This is the best star in the sky to do precision age calculations by virtue of its closeness and brightness."
This Methuselah star has seen many changes over its long life. It was likely born in a primeval dwarf galaxy. The dwarf galaxy eventually was gravitationally shredded and sucked in by the emerging Milky Way over 12 billion years ago.
The star retains its elongated orbit from that cannibalism event. Therefore, it's just passing through the solar neighborhood at a rocket-like speed of 800,000 miles per hour. It takes just 1,500 years to traverse a piece of sky with the angular width of the full Moon. The star's proper motion angular rate is so fast (0.13 milliarcseconds an hour) that Hubble could actually photograph its movement in literally a few hours.
###
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center: http://www.nasa.gov/goddard
Thanks to NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center for this article.
This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.
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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127216/Hubble_finds_birth_certificate_of_oldest_known_star
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Saturday, March 9, 2013
After filibuster, Senate confirms Brennan for CIA
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. is questioned by reporters in an elevator as he leaves a GOP policy meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, March 7, 2013. Call it Rand's Stand: a nearly 13-hour filibuster on the Senate floor that is thrusting a tea party hero back into the national spotlight. Paul's Wednesday night filibuster of President Barack Obama's pick for CIA director drew comparisons to the movie "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington." Paul, the son of former Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul, repeatedly demanded assurances that the administration would not use drones in the United States to kill terrorism suspects who are U.S. citizens. He got that assurance on Thursday. Paul is a freshman senator who challenged the Republican party's establishment to win his seat in 2010 and now commands attention as a defender of limited government. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. is questioned by reporters in an elevator as he leaves a GOP policy meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, March 7, 2013. Call it Rand's Stand: a nearly 13-hour filibuster on the Senate floor that is thrusting a tea party hero back into the national spotlight. Paul's Wednesday night filibuster of President Barack Obama's pick for CIA director drew comparisons to the movie "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington." Paul, the son of former Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul, repeatedly demanded assurances that the administration would not use drones in the United States to kill terrorism suspects who are U.S. citizens. He got that assurance on Thursday. Paul is a freshman senator who challenged the Republican party's establishment to win his seat in 2010 and now commands attention as a defender of limited government. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
FILE - In this Feb. 7, 2013 file photo, CIA Director nominee John Brennan, testifies before a Senate Select Intelligence Committee confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. Senate Democrats push for quick confirmation vote on John Brennan's nomination to head CIA, but Republican senator mounts lengthy debate. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., leaves the floor of the Senate after his filibuster of the nomination of John Brennan to be CIA director on Capitol Hill in Washington, early Thursday, March 7, 2013. Senate Democrats pushed Wednesday for speedy confirmation of John Brennan's nomination to be CIA director but ran into a snag after Paul began a lengthy speech over the legality of potential drone strikes on U.S. soil. But Paul stalled the chamber to start what he called a filibuster of Brennan's nomination. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)
This video frame grab provided by Senate Television shows Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. speaking on the floor of the Senate on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday night, March 6, 2013, shortly before 10 p.m. EST. Paul was still going strong with his self-described filibuster blocking confirmation of President Barack Obama?s nominee John Brennan to lead the Central Intelligence Agency. (AP Photo/Senate Television)
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., walks to a waiting vehicle as he leaves the Capitol after his filibuster of the nomination of John Brennan to be CIA director on Capitol Hill in Washington, early Thursday, March 7, 2013. Senate Democrats pushed Wednesday for speedy confirmation of John Brennan's nomination to be CIA director but ran into a snag after Paul began a lengthy speech over the legality of potential drone strikes on U.S. soil. But Paul stalled the chamber to start what he called a filibuster of Brennan's nomination. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Senate confirmed John Brennan to be CIA director Thursday after the Obama administration bowed to demands from Republicans blocking the nomination and stated explicitly there are limits on the president's power to use drones against U.S. terror suspects on American soil.
The vote was 63-34 and came just hours after Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, a possible 2016 presidential candidate, held the floor past midnight in an old-style filibuster of the nomination to extract an answer from the administration.
Still, Brennan won some GOP support. Thirteen Republicans voted with 49 Democrats and one independent to give Brennan, who has been President Barack Obama's top counterterrorism adviser, the top job at the nation's spy agency. He will replace Michael Morell, the CIA's deputy director who has been acting director since David Petraeus resigned in November after acknowledging an affair with his biographer.
The confirmation vote came moments after Democrats prevailed in a vote ending the filibuster, 81-16.
In a series of fast-moving events, by Senate standards, Attorney General Eric Holder sent a one-paragraph letter to Paul, who had commanded the floor for nearly 13 hours on Wednesday and into Thursday.
"It has come to my attention that you have now asked an additional question: 'Does the president have the authority to use a weaponized drone to kill an American not engaged in combat on American soil?" Holder wrote Paul.
"The answer to that question is no."
That cleared the way.
"We worked very hard on a constitutional question to get an answer from the president," Paul said after voting against Brennan. "It may have been a little harder than we wish it had been, but in the end I think it was a good healthy debate for the country to finally get an answer that the Fifth Amendment applies to all Americans."
However, Paul's stand on the Brennan nomination and insistence that the Obama administration explain its controversial drone program exposed a deep split among Senate Republicans, pitting leader Mitch McConnell, libertarians and tea partyers against military hawks such as John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.
The government's drone program and its use in the ongoing fight against terrorists were at the heart of the dispute.
Though Paul held the Senate floor for the late-night filibuster, about a dozen of his colleagues who share his views came, too, to take turns speaking for him and trading questions. McConnell, a fellow Kentuckian who faces re-election next year, congratulated him for his "tenacity and for his conviction."
McConnell said in Senate remarks on Thursday, "The United States military no more has the right to kill a U.S. citizen on U.S. soil who is not a combatant with an armed, unmanned aerial vehicle than it does with an M-16."
Paul's filibuster echoed recent congressional debates about the government's authority in the anti-terror war and whether the United States can hold American terror suspects indefinitely and without charge. The disputes have created unusual coalitions as libertarians and liberals have sided against defense hawks.
The latest GOP split also underscored the current rift within the rank and file over budget cuts, with some tea partyers willing to reduce defense dollars to preserve tax cuts but longtime guardians of military spending fighting back.
During his talkathon, Paul had suggested the possibility that the government would have used hellfire missiles against anti-war activist Jane Fonda or an American sitting at a cafe. During the height of the Vietnam War, Fonda traveled to North Vietnam and was widely criticized by some in the U.S. for her appearances there.
McCain derided that notion of an attack against the actress and argued that Paul was unnecessarily making Americans fear that their government poses a danger.
"To somehow allege or infer that the president of the United States is going to kill somebody like Jane Fonda or somebody who disagrees with the policies is a stretch of imagination which is, frankly, ridiculous," McCain said.
McCain found himself in the odd position of defending Fonda's constitutional rights over her July 1972 trip to Hanoi that earned her the derogatory nickname "Hanoi Jane."
"I must say that the use of Jane Fonda's name does evoke certain memories with me, and I must say that she is not my favorite American, but I also believe that, as odious as it was, Ms. Fonda acted within her constitutional rights," said McCain, a prisoner of war in Vietnam for 5? years. "And to somehow say that someone who disagrees with American policy and even may demonstrate against it is somehow a member of an organization which makes that individual an enemy combatant is simply false. It is simply false."
Graham expressed incredulity that Republicans would criticize Obama on a policy that Republican President George W. Bush enforced in the terror war.
"People are astonished that President Obama is doing many of the things that President Bush did," Graham said. "I'm not astonished. I congratulate him for having the good judgment to understand we're at war. And to my party, I'm a bit disappointed that you no longer apparently think we're at war."
Graham, initially a "no" vote against Brennan, told reporters that the confirmation fight had become a referendum on the drone program and he planned to back the president's nominee.
As Graham spoke on the Senate floor, he stood before a sign that said al-Qaida had killed 2,958 Americans in the United States while drones had killed none.
The tea party-backed Paul, son of former Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, first stepped on the national stage in 2010 when he vanquished McConnell's chosen Senate candidate in a GOP primary in Kentucky. Since then, he's inherited his father's libertarian-leaning political network, built over two failed Ron Paul presidential runs. All that has stoked belief inside GOP circles that he may be positioning himself for a future national campaign, possibly as early as 2016.
Paul received a loud, standing ovation in the Senate chamber early Thursday morning when he ended his filibuster, with several House and Senate Republicans applauding his stand. More important for the GOP, the National Republican Senatorial Committee used Paul's effort for a fundraising appeal and took in donations in the "high five figures."
He became a Twitter sensation.
Graham, who is up for re-election next year, faced criticism from the tea party for attending a dinner with Obama Wednesday night rather than joining Paul in the filibuster. Amy Kremer, chairman of the Tea Party Express, said Graham was "clearly on the wrong side of this issue and I think there will be consequences."
On Tuesday, the Senate Intelligence Committee had voted 12-3 to approve Brennan's nomination after the White House broke a lengthy impasse by agreeing to give lawmakers access to top-secret legal opinions justifying the use of lethal drone strikes against al-Qaida suspects overseas.
The Holder letter marked the administration's third concession in recent days in its attempt to bring the Brennan nomination to a vote.
Earlier this week, the White House gave Republicans documents relating to last year's deadly attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya.
___
Associated Press writers Andrew Taylor and David Espo contributed to this report.
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For Biden chief of staff Bruce Reed, less is more
WASHINGTON (AP) ? Understated. Self-effacing. Nonthreatening. Refreshingly old-fashioned.
Don't let these cool descriptors from friends and colleagues fool you: As the vice president's chief of staff, Bruce Reed plays Mr. Fix-It, guiding Joe Biden's role as a driving force behind the Obama administration's agenda.
With the White House wrestling Congress over gun control and tax-and-spending priorities, Reed's deep ties to the Oval Office and reputation for getting along with both parties make him a central character in some of Washington's biggest political battles.
Those who know Reed say his low-key style and consensus-oriented approach to deal-making are the keys to how he's managed time and again to bridge an ever-widening gap between Democrats and Republicans ? even when it rankles partisan Democrats who see concessions to the GOP as selling out.
"It gets characterized from an ideological perspective, meaning centrist vs. leftist. Bruce would probably see it more as, 'Are you a reformer and willing to make changes to accomplish the same goals?'" said Chicago mayor and former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, who co-wrote a policy book with Reed after they served together in the Clinton administration.
It's a trait that meshes well with the pragmatic, do-what-you-can approach to governing of President Barack Obama's administration. Reed's former and current colleagues say his method is also in sync with Biden's freewheeling but driven personality.
Once considered a potential liability to Obama, Biden has evolved into a serious heavy hitter whose broad portfolio of issues is never far removed from the president's top priorities. It was Biden, not Obama, who finally cut the New Year's deal with the Senate that averted the so-called fiscal cliff. White House officials credit Reed, who turns 53 this month, with steering Biden away from political pitfalls, helping him gauge which battles to fight and just how far to push.
But Reed's influence extends far beyond the vice president's quarters and deep into the West Wing. He's considered a full-fledged member of the economic team, joining the treasury secretary and others when the National Economic Council meets. Last year, he was tapped by Obama's then-chief of staff, Bill Daley, to help coordinate the State of the Union address. When Biden negotiates with Republicans in Congress, Reed is often the only other person on the phone.
And when Obama's most senior advisers meet every morning at 7:40 to set the day's agenda, Reed is there. These mornings, it's Reed who keeps Obama's team up to date on one of the administration's top priorities: gun control.
When the president tasked Biden with crafting a series of proposals to respond to a scourge of mass shootings, the role of chief architect fell to Reed, who cut his teeth on gun issues as Clinton's domestic policy adviser. The ensuing proposal includes broadly supported measures like universal background checks, but also a controversial ban on assault weapons.
It quickly became clear the ban would face near-insurmountable obstacles in Congress. That led many to question whether the White House proposed the ban to placate those demanding tough action, but was ready to drop it if necessary to strike a deal. A Senate panel plans to vote on the ban Tuesday, though it has virtually no chance of passing the full Senate. While Biden and Obama say the ban deserves a vote, both have avoided describing it as a must-have.
"Nobody needed to tell me. I saw Bruce's fingerprints all over it," said former Clinton adviser William Galston, who met Reed in the late 1980s working on Al Gore's first presidential campaign. "Bruce is not afraid of the politics of aspiration, but he has a healthy awareness of the distinction between the best and the attainable. He will not counsel people to fall on their sword."
So far, there have been few outcries from the left over the prospect that the White House will abandon the assault-weapons ban ? perhaps because even many Democrats are on the fence and fear being cast as infringing on lawful gun ownership.
On other issues where Reed has sought consensus with Republicans, the backlash has sometimes been quite public.
Credited with coining the phrase "end welfare as we know it," Reed bore the wrath of liberals when he helped Clinton in 1996 secure a welfare overhaul ? negotiated with Republicans ? that ended some guarantees for poor Americans. A handful of Clinton officials resigned in protest.
Still, even those on the losing end of policy disagreements say Reed somehow manages to keep it from getting personal. Peter Edelman, one of the officials who resigned, said even when consensus proved elusive, Reed treated his adversaries with respect.
"In all the years I worked with him, I only saw him lose his temper once at me," said Paul Weinstein, an economist who has worked for Reed in various roles since the 1980s. The rare outburst came in 1992, near the end of Clinton's campaign, when Weinstein told Reed he needed to step away from the campaign to finish his Ph.D. "Bruce just lost it on me," Weinstein said. "When I tell people I saw him lose his temper, they practically fall over backwards because they don't believe it."
Democratic strategist Kiki McLean, who has known Reed for more than two decades, said his sense of humor is striking considering his unobtrusive manner. "Bruce is not the guy who will stand on the table and sing, but he is the guy who will lean over and whisper something so you have to hold your sides to keep from bursting out laughing," she said.
Raised in Coeur d'Alene, a small Idaho town near the Washington state border, Reed followed his mother, Mary Lou Reed, a Democrat and former Idaho state senator, into politics. He moved east for school, studying English at Princeton University before becoming a Rhodes Scholar and earning a master's degree at Oxford University. An avid baseball fan, Reed proposed to his wife, attorney Bonnie LePard, at a Pittsburgh Pirates game; they have two children.
He wrote speeches for then-Sen. Al Gore, D-Tenn., starting in 1985, then joined the Democratic Leadership Council, a now-defunct group that sought to push the Democratic Party toward the political center. He served for all eight years in the Clinton White House, where he was often the public face of the administration's policies on education, guns and welfare reform. Later, he ran the Simpson-Bowles commission, tasked with forging a bipartisan deficit-reduction deal.
That deal never made it to a vote in Congress, but Reed impressed lawmakers from both parties. Republican Sen. Mike Crapo of Idaho, a vocal critic of Obama, recalled how Reed would flesh out a lawmaker's idea, providing the analysis and figures needed to fully evaluate it.
"It happened again and again," Crapo said. "Even if it wasn't necessarily something he would support from his personal political perspective, he was very focused on helping the individual member."
It's been just over two years since Biden tapped Reed to be his chief of staff, and his cautious and meticulous manner often serves as a counterweight to the more verbose and unrehearsed Biden. In that short time, Biden has played a leading role in winding down the war in Iraq, negotiating a fiscal-cliff deal with Senate Republicans, nudging Obama toward an embrace of gay marriage and spearheading Obama's push on gun control.
Reed declined to be interviewed for this story. But Galston, the former Clinton adviser, said Reed values clarity of expression above almost all else.
"He edits documents the way a sculptor works with a block of marble: by subtraction," said Galston. "You get rid of what you don't want, and what's left is what you have in mind."
___
Reach Josh Lederman on Twitter at http://twitter.com/joshledermanAP
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/biden-chief-staff-bruce-reed-less-more-171951510--politics.html
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Friday, March 8, 2013
UA entrepreneur teams place at business competitions - The City Wire
The University of Arkansas continued its success this year in graduate student business plans, reaching the finals in each of the last two competitions in which it competed.
EverClean Coating Solutions, which has created a self-cleaning coating technology for solar panels that improves efficiency, advanced to the final round and placed third at Cardinal Challenge 2013, the University of Louisville Business Plan Competition.
The team took home a $3,000 cash prize on Feb. 16.
On Feb. 23, ParadigMed, which manufactures a cost-effective device for adult male circumcision in an outpatient setting, pushed into the finals and finished fourth at the Spirit of Enterprise Graduate Business Competition, hosted by the University of Cincinnati?s Center for Entrepreneurship. PardigMed won $1,000.
The university has managed to advance to the finals in each competition it?s competed in this year. On Jan. 26, Picasolar, which has developed a patent-pending process to improve the efficiency of solar cells, won the grand prize at the 2013 IBK Capital-Ivey Business Plan Competition, held at the Richard Ivey School of Business at the University of Western Ontario.
?The results this year have been outstanding,? said Carol Reeves, associate vice provost for entrepreneurship. ?The University of Arkansas continues to succeed on both a national and international stage.?
The University of Arkansas has fielded competitive graduate student teams at state, regional, national, and international business plan competitions since 2002. During the past decade, students have almost $1.4 million in cash at these competitions.
The EverClean Coating Solutions team members are Bill Ryan and Manish Phogat, master in business administration students and Corey Thompson, a doctoral student in engineering.
Stephen Kayode and Tara Mink, both in the executive MBA program at the Walton College founded ParadigMed.
The teams formed their business plans in the New Venture Development graduate course taught by Reeves.
A fourth team, HomeDx, is working to develop the first over-the-counter influenza test that will be distributed through large retail channels. HomeDx will compete at the Global New Venture Competition on March 13 at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Source: http://www.thecitywire.com/node/26780
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Thursday, March 7, 2013
Bees get a buzz from flower nectar containing caffeine
Mar. 7, 2013 ? You may need a cup of coffee to kick start the day but it seems honeybees also get their buzz from drinking flower nectar containing caffeine. Publishing in Science, researchers have shown that caffeine improves a honeybee's memory and could help the plant recruit more bees to spread its pollen.
In tests honeybees feeding on a sugar solution containing caffeine, which occurs naturally in the nectar of coffee and citrus flowers, were three times more likely to remember a flower's scent than those feeding on just sugar.
Study leader Dr Geraldine Wright, Reader in Neuroethology at Newcastle University, explained that the effect of caffeine benefits both the honeybee and the plant: "Remembering floral traits is difficult for bees to perform at a fast pace as they fly from flower to flower and we have found that caffeine helps the bee remember where the flowers are.
"In turn, bees that have fed on caffeine-laced nectar are laden with coffee pollen and these bees search for other coffee plants to find more nectar, leading to better pollination.
"So, caffeine in nectar is likely to improve the bee's foraging prowess while providing the plant with a more faithful pollinator."
In the study, researchers found that the nectar of Citrus and Coffea species often contained low doses of caffeine. They included 'robusta' coffee species mainly used to produce freeze-dried coffee and 'arabica' used for espresso and filter coffee. Grapefruit, lemons, pomelo and oranges were also sampled and all contained caffeine.
Co-author Professor Phil Stevenson from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the University of Greenwich's Natural Resources Institute said: "Caffeine is a defence chemical in plants and tastes bitter to many insects including bees so we were surprised to find it in the nectar. However, it occurs at a dose that's too low for the bees to taste but high enough to affect bee behaviour."
The effect of caffeine on the bees' long-term memory was profound with three times as many bees remembering the floral scent 24 hours later and twice as many bees remembering the scent after three days.
Typically, the nectar in the flower of a coffee plant contains almost as much caffeine as a cup of instant coffee. Just as black coffee has a strong bitter taste to us, high concentrations of caffeine are repellent to honeybees.
Dr Wright added: "This work helps us understand the basic mechanisms of how caffeine affects our brains. What we see in bees could explain why people prefer to drink coffee when studying."
Dr Julie Mustard, a contributor to the study from Arizona State University, explains further: "Although human and honeybee brains obviously have lots of differences, when you look at the level of cells, proteins and genes, human and bee brains function very similarly. Thus, we can use the honeybee to investigate how caffeine affects our own brains and behaviours."
This project was funded in part by the Insect Pollinators Initiative which supports projects aimed at researching the causes and consequences of threats to insect pollinators and to inform the development of appropriate mitigation strategies.
Population declines among bees have serious consequences for natural ecosystems and agriculture since bees are essential pollinators for many crops and wild flowering species. If declines are allowed to continue there is a risk to our natural biodiversity and on some crop production.
Professor Stevenson said: "Understanding how bees choose to forage and return to some flowers over others will help inform how landscapes could be better managed. Understanding a honeybee's habits and preferences could help find ways to reinvigorate the species to protect our farming industry and countryside."
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Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Newcastle University.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
- G. A. Wright, D. D. Baker, M. J. Palmer, D. Stabler, J. A. Mustard, E. F. Power, A. M. Borland, P. C. Stevenson. Caffeine in Floral Nectar Enhances a Pollinator's Memory of Reward. Science, 2013; 339 (6124): 1202 DOI: 10.1126/science.1228806
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/strange_science/~3/gRa4zzRbZ3U/130307145257.htm
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The Income Blogging Guide Membership ? Build A Recurring ...
"If You Have A Few Hours Per Week, Then We Can Show You How To Earn Significant Income With Your Own Blog! Step by Step (by Step)"
Yes, there are many ?step by step? online income guides?but most of the time you already need a laundry list of web skills to go along with product creation, writing skill, marketing, etc?
We all need as much help as we can get. Have you ever looked into a product, course, or ebook that suggested it was ?easy?, ?ready-made?, or ?step by step?, only to find that each step needs a ?step by step? to it as well? That?s where our 3rd ?by step? comes in. Step by step by step?
But most sites don?t give you that extra step?in fact, most sites lack quite a bit of information?
Andrew Rondeau has spent most of his working for someone else?but he wanted a way out of the corporate world and he turned to the internet.
At first he was excited. There were sales letters everywhere promising to make him a Millionaire. He believed them, and before he knew it, he had bookcases full of e-books, audios and video courses.
But it was totally overwhelming. It took Andrew three years of long, hard work before he could give up the 9-5. He made loads of mistakes, but he eventually created the step-by-step process that he now uses to run his own on-line business.
Joel Williams used to work 9 ? 5 at a couple of large companies, and in the evenings worked on building his online business. There is so much information and misinformation out there and some expensive mistakes and lessons to learn that cost him much more than he likes to remember.
After 10 years of? Read more?
Source: http://smallinvestmentbusinessideas.volkingmedia.com/the-income-blogging-guide-membership/
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Wednesday, March 6, 2013
PFT: Eagles shoot down Asomugha release report
APWith Patriots receiver Wes Welker planning to test the market, the question becomes the outcome of the looming experiment.
Per a source with knowledge of the situation, the Pats remain the favorite to retain Welker.? That said, one or two teams could intervene.
?It?s close,? the source explained.
As of Saturday, teams officially can begin talking with the agents of free agents.? Unofficially, conversations surely have happened.
Staying in New England presents a stew of conflicting concerns for Welker.? He surely wants to continue playing with quarterback Tom Brady, even if every time the sure-handed Welker fails to catch a poorly-thrown ball the media and fans deem it a ?drop.?
Then there?s the fact that, before tight end Aaron Hernandez sprained an ankle early in the 2012 regular season, Hernandez appeared to be the team?s new slot receiver, with Welker being phased out.? Welker reportedly fears that could happen again.
And the ?take less to win more? vibe undoubtedly has made its way into the negotiations, with Brady?s recent contract becoming the $27 million elephant in the room.? The Pats know how to get business done on their terms, and if Brady was subtly cajoled into taking less how could anyone else complain?
In the end, Welker has to ask himself whether he wants more money or another chance to finish what the team started in 2007, when he was in his first year of the relatively modest long-term deal that expired after the 2011 season.
Of course, chasing the money also could result in playing with a quarterback whose periodic poor throws won?t be blamed on the guy who wasn?t able to make the difficult catch.
Source: http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/03/06/report-eagles-to-cut-asomugha-today/related/
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Monday, March 4, 2013
The sequestration nation
The austerity economics on which we?ve embarked is a cruel hoax ? Reich writes ? cruel because it hurts those who are already hurt the most; a hoax because it doesn?t work.
A visitor takes a photo of the US Capitol in Washington. The trickle-down-economics, on which Republicans base their refusal even discuss closing tax loopholes for the wealthy, is a proven failure, Reich writes.
Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
EnlargeWith the sequester now beginning, I find myself thinking about Robert F. Kennedy ? and 46 years ago when I was an intern in his Senate office.
Skip to next paragraph Robert ReichRobert is chancellor?s professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Clinton. Time Magazine?named him one of the 10 most effective cabinet secretaries of the last century. He has written 13 books, including ?The Work of Nations,? his latest best-seller ?Aftershock: The Next Economy and America?s Future," and a new?e-book, ?Beyond Outrage.??He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine and chairman of Common Cause.
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1967 was a difficult time for the nation. America was deeply split over civil rights and the Vietnam War. Many of our cities were burning. The war was escalating.?
But RFK was upbeat. He was also busy and intense ? drafting legislation, lining up votes, speaking to the poor, inspiring the young. I was awed by his energy and optimism, and his overriding passion for social justice and the public good. (Within a few months he?d declare his intention to run for president. Within a year he?d be dead.)?
The nation is once again polarized, but I don?t hear our politicians talking about social justice or the public good. They?re talking instead about the budget deficit and sequestration.
At bottom, though, the issue is still social justice.?
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Another cannonball for Bucs?
Getty ImagesSo why did March 4 become the real deadline for the Ravens to get a deal done with quarterback Joe Flacco?
Because the Ravens didn?t want to have to choose between the non-exclusive and exclusive level of the franchise tag.
The latter, in light of the recent restructurings by Tom Brady and Ben Roethlisberger, would have put Flacco on track to make more than $74 million over three years, if Flacco opted to take it year to year under the franchise tag.? (That?s more than $24 million per year.)? The former would have opened the door for a front-loaded monster offer from another team that the Ravens couldn?t have matched without dumping plenty of players.
That was enough to persuade the Ravens to get it done before encountering a fork in the road with a pair of paths that led nowhere good.
Unless the Falcons and quarterback Matt Ryan work out a new deal within the next 12 months, Atlanta G.M. Thomas Dimitroff will face a similar dilemma.
Per a source with knowledge of Ryan?s contract, his cap number in 2013, the final year of his rookie contract, will be $12 million.? Which means that his non-exclusive tender would be no higher than the base quarterback amount for 2014, since a 20-percent raise over $12 million will be only $14.4 million.
The exclusive number will be several million higher, setting the stage for a much higher three-year haul under a formula that would give Ryan a 20-percent raise for the second year of the tag and a 44-percent raise in the third.
The difference in this case is that Ryan is represented by CAA, which handles an ever-growing stream of franchise and highly-paid quarterbacks (Eli and Peyton Manning, Drew Brees, Matthew Stafford, Tony Romo, Sam Bradford, Philip Rivers, Robert Griffin III) and which consistently emerges from these talks with top-of-market deals, team cap situation be damned.? Now that the contract CAA negotiated in 2012 for Drew Brees has been eclipsed by the non-CAA Flacco deal, the goal will be to get back on top.
It?ll likely happen with Ryan, whether now or later or on the brink of the franchise-tag dilemma.? Or at some point after that.
Source: http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/03/03/will-bucs-make-a-splash-in-free-agency/related/
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Lewis holds on to win HSBC Champions for 6th title
Stacy Lewis of the United States poses with the challenge trophy after winning the HSBC Women's Champions golf tournament on Sunday, March 3, 2013 in Singapore. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E)
Stacy Lewis of the United States poses with the challenge trophy after winning the HSBC Women's Champions golf tournament on Sunday, March 3, 2013 in Singapore. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E)
Stacy Lewis of the United States celebrates with the challenge trophy after winning the HSBC Women's Champions golf tournament on Sunday, March 3, 2013 in Singapore. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E)
Stacy Lewis of the United States poes with the challenge trophy after winning the HSBC Women's Champions golf tournament on Sunday, March 3, 2013 in Singapore. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E)
Stacy Lewis of the United States celebrates after sinking a shot on the 18th green on Sunday March 3, 2013 in Singapore to win the HSBC Women's Champions golf tournament. Lewis won the tournament on Sunday for her sixth career LPGA title, overcoming two bogeys and some shaky putting on the back nine to hold off South Korean Na Yeon Choi. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E)
Paula Creamer, of the United States, tees off on the 8th hole during the final round of the HSBC Women's Champions golf tournament on Sunday, March 3, 2013, in Singapore. (AP Photo/Wong Maye-E)
SINGAPORE (AP) ? American Stacy Lewis won the HSBC Women's Champions on Sunday for her sixth career LPGA title, overcoming two bogeys and some shaky putting on the back nine to hold off South Korea's Na Yeon Choi.
Lewis, the 2012 LPGA Player of the Year, shot a 1-under 71 in the final round at Sentosa Golf Club to finish at 15-under 273, one stroke ahead of Choi.
"The last four or five holes, I was pretty nervous, I'm not going to lie," Lewis said. "I just played hard and put my head down and tried to make as many putts as I could and fortunately I came away with the win."
Choi, who had a 72, was runner-up at the tournament for the second consecutive year. She lost to Angela Stanford in a four-player playoff last year.
Paula Creamer, hampered by a shoulder injury from a car accident last week in Thailand, briefly held a share of the lead early in the day but struggled with her putting on the back nine and faded to a 71 to finish third at 13-under.
Top-ranked Yani Tseng shot a 74 to finish a disappointing week in a share of 28th place.
Lewis started the day tied with Choi atop the leaderboard, but she was able to gain some distance with a superb shot on the par-5 7th hole.
After a long drive off the tee, Lewis hit a perfectly placed, 200-yard shot toward the pin that stopped about five inches short of going in for an albatross. She tapped it in for eagle, which put her one clear of Choi and two up on Creamer.
"It was probably one of the best shots I've ever hit," Lewis said. "It had to be pretty close. I couldn't really tell from where I was but it was perfect."
On the back nine, however, the 28-year-old American had to battle nerves and a determined challenge by Choi.
Leading by two shots on the 15th, Lewis hit her tee shot into the water for the second time this week and slammed her club into the turf in frustration. She took a bogey on the hole, allowing Choi to pull within one.
"I hit the fairway (on 15) in the practice rounds, but I did not hit it on any tournament day," she said. "I had two in the water and two in the bunker."
"Today I was just glad to get out of there with a bogey."
Then, on the 17th, Lewis hit into the bunker off the tee and missed a long par putt to card her second bogey of the back nine.
That gave Choi one last chance to even the score on the 18th, but she pulled her birdie putt wide by an inch. Lewis exhaled deeply after making her own par putt for the win.
"I tried to do my best until the last hole," Choi said. "Last year, I finished runner-up, too. I went into the playoff and lost. I really wanted to win this week."
Lewis and Choi had their putting woes, but it was almost worse for the 26-year-old Creamer, who was aiming for her 10th LPGA title.
She missed a 20-footer for eagle on No. 12 by inches, covering her mouth in disbelief. Then she barely missed a 25-foot birdie putt on No. 14 and started laughing. Two more near-misses followed on No. 15 and 16, which wiped the smile from her face.
"I had some good, long efforts and they just didn't fall in. Sometimes it's your day and sometimes it's not," she said.
Creamer never dreamed she'd be this close to the title after the car accident on the way to the airport in Bangkok after the LPGA Honda Thailand tournament last week.
She slammed her right shoulder into the dashboard of the car and woke up Thursday morning still numb from the injury. Her caddie, Colin Cann, and fellow golfer Ai Miyazato were also injured. Miyazato withdrew before the tournament began with soreness in her back, neck and head.
Creamer set low expectations for her chances, which may have taken the pressure off.
"This is much more than what I even bargained for. Didn't even know if I was going to tee it up and taking a third after what Colin and I have been through, it's pretty good," she said.
It was a tough week for Tseng, who was never a factor after the first day. The five-time major winner hasn't won a tournament in nearly a year and could soon lose her top ranking to Choi or Lewis, who moves up to third after this week.
"I didn't hit the ball very well this week but it's OK. You know you always have next year to come back here," she said.
"World No. 1, I know it's good and people like it, but I want to care about myself more and I just want to enjoy (my golf)," she said. "If I lose (it), I'll get back one day, too."
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Satellite TV ? The True Home Entertainment Experience | TechSling ...
Big-screen TVs were the centre of attention at the International CES in Las Vegas earlier this year. Manufacturers were eager to show off 3D TVs, 4K-resolution TVs and a host of other innovations and developments. But one question remains ? what is there to watch on these high-end TVs?
It does not take long after purchasing a HD-capable TV and a Blu-Ray player to become accustomed to watching movies and TV broadcasts in 1080p. Once you have got used to that, the quality of SDTV and DVD-quality viewing material is hardly satisfactory. Unfortunately, most people have huge DVD collections and it will take a lot of time (and money) to re-build an equivalent Blu-Ray collection.
Endless Entertainment
If you want to watch HD-quality TV series, movies and documentaries, then the best thing to do, right now, is use a broadcast service. Streaming services do broadcast in HD in many cases, but it is often limited to 720p and even where 1080p is available, there is no guarantee that your internet connection will be able to provide a high-quality, consistent stream whenever you want it. Satellite TV may be an older technology, but it offers a consistent, reliable viewing experience. The selection of channels is massive and you can pick and choose your own package from lists such as the one available here.
Documentaries, Dramas, Movies and Sports
With programming including dramas such as The Walking Dead and Game of Thrones, documentaries such as Planet Earth and Storm Chasers and a huge selection of sports, including pro-wrestling, all of your favourite basketball and football leagues and mixed martial arts, you should never be short of viewing material. The lag-time between a movie being released at the cinema and it hitting DVD/Blu-Ray and satellite TV is getting shorter, so the selection of movies broadcast on both free and premium movie channels is increasing.
DirecTV offers more than 185 HD channels and the DISH network has a huge selection of full HD channels as well as some that broadcast a mixture of programming. Proponents of streaming and on-demand services love to point to the flexibility that they offer, but they?re forgetting about the issue of quality and reliability.
When you?re planning a movie night at home, you want a service that just works and one that is as close to the cinema as possible. You don?t want to content with buffering, low-quality audio or artefacts on the screen ? not when you have a huge LCD TV and a surround-sound system. Instead, you want to dim the lights, lie back on the sofa and enjoy a cinema-like experience in the company of your friends and with fresh popcorn.
Satellite TV is still the premier home-entertainment experience and the best choice for people who want high-quality, rich and varied entertainment.
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Source: http://www.techsling.com/2013/03/satellite-tv-the-true-home-entertainment-experience/
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