|  |  |  | | | | | Huffington Post | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Nathaniel Fujita, a former high school football player in Wayland, Mass. was charged with first-degree murder Tuesday in the death of his 18-year-old ex-girlfriend Lauren Astley. Fujita plead not guilty and is being held without bond at Middlesex Jail in Cambridge, Mass.
Astley, also recently graduated from Wayland High School, reportedly dated Fujita for three years until they broke up several weeks ago. Although Astley broke off the relationship, the two were on amiable terms, The Boston Globe reports. Officials are still investigating what may have triggered the alleged murder.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  WASHINGTON -- The House or Senate might reject a final proposal for raising the debt ceiling if the plan does not make sufficient cuts, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said on Wednesday, arguing that the negotiation process should be more transparent to prevent a bad deal from landing on lawmakers at the last minute.
"I'm very worried that a last-minute proposal that's insufficient could be turned down in the House or the Senate, and we could have a crisis that we don't need to have," Sessions told reporters.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  THE CANADIAN PRESS -- CALGARY - Agriculture products company Agrium Inc. (TSX: AGU) says it has agreed to buy Vancouver-based turf products maker Evergro Canada for US$50 million.
Evergro, a manufacturer and distributor of horticultural products in Western Canada, has seven distribution centres throughout B.C. and Alberta and annual revenues of roughly US$60 million.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Facebook unveiled a video chat product Wednesday as part of its new partnership with Skype.
But this isn't the first time a social network has teamed up with Skype. A quick trip through news archives shows that in October 2007, Myspace joined with Skype to provide free Internet phone calls to MySpace members.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | One of the best parts of my job is meeting amazingly smart and cool people. This week I talked with Bobbi Silten, the President of Gap Foundation and Senior Vice President of Global Responsibility for Gap Inc., about her killer career, her passion for service and how her background in business is key to running a successful foundation. Besides being sworn in as a member of the White House Council for Community Solutions earlier this year, Bobbi is the central force behind the Reimagining Service collaborative, increasing the impact of volunteerism.
Aaron Hurst: Each generation seems to have such a different outlook on life and social change. What generation do you identify with and why?
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | As a follow up to the Harrison Ford interview, I sat down with Steven Spielberg, Brian Grazer and Ron Howard, three of the producers of Cowboys & Aliens, at the offices of Imagine Entertainment. I can't tell you how cool and enlightening it was to have access to this wealth of talent and experience. Every meeting or editing room visit predictably evolved into a first hand history lesson in Hollywood. I tried to capture a sense of what these conversations were like. In these interviews we touch upon subjects like Jaws, the Oklahoma Land Rush, sneaking onto the studio lot and John Ford's advice to a young Spielberg.
It is interesting to note that this is the first time that Steven Spielberg and Ron Howard have collaborated on a project in this capacity. They have been friends for many years but I got the sense that they really enjoyed the opportunity to actually collaborate on a film and I was grateful to be part of that experience.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Hugo Chavez took off his medical leave clothes -- wind breaker and sweat pants that often match Fidel Castro's -- and wore the military uniform once again. Hours later, he made a surprise appearance in his native Venezuela.
His health saga has had ups and downs, but specially has born the trademark of the Cold War era. After 24 days of absence he arrived in Caracas under total secrecy. The images provided by state TV were edited (never showed him walking up or down the stairs off the plane) and disclosed at 7 in the morning. Doctors and 'scientists' are reportedly checking the president and monitoring his health, he can not be in public appearances or give speeches for more than 30 minutes.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  James Spader will be the new boss on "The Office." For about a day. Then, it's up to corporate.
A press release from Universal reveals that Spader has sealed a deal to join the show on a full-time basis, reprising the character he played during last season's finale's hunt for a new Scranton head honcho. But instead of settling for the desk in Pennsylvania, he ends up climbing much, much higher -- to the top of Sabre.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Game of Thrones has gone classic. The theme from the book-turned-HBO series got a makeover this week when Jason Yang arranged the score, playing each part himself on both electric and acoustic violin and then assembling the video with harmony intact.
"I'm a huge fan of the show so this one is dedicated to the entire cast and crew, as well as to all the other fans out there!" notes Yang, always the uber fan, on the video's YouTube page.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | I was never too interested in watching Chris Hansen's program, To Catch a Predator. If you aren't familiar with it, premiering in 2004 and running until 2007, Hansen and his team would lure child-molesters prowling the internet to a house where Hansen would be waiting with a camera crew.
My disinterest certainly wasn't because he was getting these men off the internet and into the hands of the law, and, hopefully, to counselors to help them deal with their obsession. Everyone should be happy to have such individuals away from our children.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Today I watched some television coverage on the Casey Anthony murder trial in Florida that resulted in a conclusion of the criminal justice process with a verdict of not guilty. Prosecutors don't like to hear that. Neither, it appears, do the media pundits who had convicted the young woman of murdering her daughter. According to the people speaking on television, justice doesn't exist without a guilty verdict.
I did not follow the trial, so I don't have any idea what the jurors heard. Nevertheless, the entire criminal justice process was carried out. The defendant stood trial. Prosecutors had their say. In the end, jurors said not guilty. Now pundits express shock, accusing the jury of getting it wrong, expressing outrage at the defense attorneys for celebrating their victory.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Late last year, advocates for low-wage workers in Florida's Palm Beach County made what they thought was a modest request of their county commissioners: pass a wage-theft ordinance that would make it easier for working people to reclaim unpaid wages from employers who stiff them.
But that seemingly simple request is now in limbo, as Florida's business interests have begun campaigning strongly against such ordinances. Some local clergy in Palm Beach are wondering what's so controversial about making sure working people are paid what's owed them.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Congressman Steve King (R-Iowa) and Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) may be staff-sharing, Obamacare-repealing BFF's in the House of Representatives, but does that ensure that Bachmann will receive King's endorsement in the run-up to next year's Iowa caucuses? Conventional wisdom suggests that it's a done deal. Just last month, the Sioux City Journal's Christopher Rants called the pair "foxhole buddies" and opined, "I can't imagine him not putting his organization to work for her."
But what does King have to say when he's put on the spot? Radio Iowa's O. Kay Henderson reports:
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | 
(Reuters - Leon Cika) - A tiny Albanian village that President George W. Bush visited in 2007 has unveiled a shirt-sleeved statue of him, in a square named for him.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Given the high caliber of so many scripted drama series on basic cable these days it may be asking too much for the press to show big love for VH1's Single Ladies -- a simple show that seeks only to entertain -- but how about a little "like"? This sexy primetime soap about the personal and professional lives and loves of three upscale women in Atlanta (where the series is filmed) may at times be lighter than air, but the same can be said of many of the books, reality television programs and movies that pass for summer escapist fare, and they all have their strident supporters in the media and elsewhere.
Single has been compared to the modern scripted classic Sex and the City and the current unscripted hit The Real Housewives of Atlanta, but similarities to either are slight at best. Even at its most outlandishly materialistic, there was a realistic feel to Sex that is largely absent in Single, perhaps because Atlanta is not used in Single to the same advantage that Manhattan was in Sex. (I've got to note, however, that the daytime and nighttime establishing shots of Atlanta that punctuate so much of Single are breathtakingly beautiful and on their own may encourage tourists to visit The ATL.) Also, the primary characters in Single tend to live very well; not as well as characters in those fondly remembered primetime serials of the Eighties, but a step or two up from the women of Sex and the City, at least when we first met them early in that show's run. As for the inevitable (and lazy) comparisons to the Atlanta Housewives, even with their fantasy lives the women in Single seem far more identifiable in their personal searches for love and fulfillment than the women in Housewives in their desperate bids for stardom.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  So says Carina Chocano, anyway, in Sunday's New York Times: enough with the "strong female characters," she writes, give 'em to us weak.
Strangely, I think she has a point.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Minnesota Timberwolves GM David Kahn said last year that he believes Michael Beasley is maturing and getting rid of his bad habits after "smoking too much marijuana" as a member of the Miami Heat.
Turns out that Kahn was wrong.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The Strauss-Kahn case is not about winning or losing, but opening a dialogue on rape, violence and gender.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  WASHINGTON -- Recent changes in rhetoric from Republicans on Capitol Hill have provided a sliver of hope about the prospects of getting an infrastructure bill through Congress.
Several freshmen House Republicans have either publicly stated or privately pushed for enhanced federal spending in their home districts. The most recent revelation came when Rep. Bobby Schilling (R-Ill.) told a town hall last week that the president's stimulus package -- which he had criticized on the road to election -- would have been better had it "taken a lot bigger chunk of that money and put it into infrastructure."
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | There are few issues more vital to our state of Michigan, as well as our nation, than advanced manufacturing and trade. The "Make it in America" agenda is a plan to rebuild the American manufacturing sector through various pieces of legislation introduced by members in the Democratic caucus. Several of these have already become law, while some are currently pending.
Continuing from last week, as part of this agenda, we are trying to force the House Republican leadership to bring to a floor vote the 'Currency Reform for Fair Trade Act', which would help American businesses compete on a more level playing field in the global economic market.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Village Voice Media, fresh off its triumph putting Ashton Kutcher in his place for trying to bring awareness to the problem of human trafficking, has directed its crosshairs to an even bigger celebrity and a more vexing issue: George Clooney's advocacy against the genocide in Darfur.
"Clooney and his fellow nay-sayers claim that the genocide in Darfur has claimed the lives of 400,000 and rendered more than 2.5 million people homeless," the Voice declared in a vitriolic investigative piece, due to hit newsstands July 7. "And yet, if you do the math, those figures don't hold up. If you look at how many Janjaweed have actually been arrested for, let alone convicted of, murder and rape, or the number of members of Minnawi's SLA brought in for questioning for their alleged slaughter of the Fur tribes, there's been precious few, if any. So, really, how can six or seven people just accused of some shenanigans be guilty of the massacre of 400,000?
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | In order for a market to truly be "free," it can't be manipulated or augmented via subsidies and tax breaks. The term "free" means "not physically restrained, obstructed or fixed; unimpeded" and is unambiguous by nature. Without a qualifier like "partially," the term "free" infers total and unequivocal lack of restraint or manipulation. So how can Republicans in Congress espouse the "free market" while fighting to keep massive subsidies, loopholes and corporate tax breaks in place? Doesn't this dichotomy strike anyone as hypocritical? Or has the term "free market" lost all meaning and relativity amidst the New Corporatism usurping our government?
I could list all the various tax breaks and subsidies given to various industries and corporations, but suffice to say it would take far too many pages to do so. The info is easy to Google, and the overall picture is just as instructive in making the point. Just take a look at a few industries that do not operate in a "free" market: agriculture, banking, pharmaceuticals and oil. These industries operate in a highly manipulated environment. U.S. taxpayers dole out roughly 12 billion dollars a year in subsidies to oil companies, and yet the U.S. federal corporate income tax rate of oil giant Exxon Mobil in 2009 was effectively zero. How much would Exxon's record profits be without any subsidies and tax breaks? And would the price of oil or gas be any higher than it is today? While gas prices have gone up, so have oil company profits:
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  President Obama took questions from the Internet today during a Twitter Town Hall meeting broadcasted from The White House. During the interactive discussion, the President fielded questions about the economy (even Republican House Speaker John Boehner tweeted, "Where are the jobs?") as well as other important topics.
It's a good thing the tweets were highly screened, however, because from what we saw on Twitter most of the topics people wanted to hear Obama gab about have little to do with the economy or his style of governing. In fact, we found some pretty hilarious "questions" tweeted with the hashtag #AskObama over the last few hours that we just have to share. Vote for your favorite tweet below!
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  WASHINGTON -- While some have asserted that the debt limit might be unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment, and therefore President Obama does not need congressional approval to raise it, Republicans have been quick to express skepticism over the idea. On Tuesday, a Republican congressman went a step further, saying that if Obama were to use that argument to bypass Congress on the issue, it would be an impeachable offense.
"This president is looking to usurp congressional oversight to find a way to get it done without us. My position is that is an impeachable act from my perspective," said Rep. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) at a meeting sponsored by the Tea Party group LowCountry 9.12 Project on Tuesday, first reported by Lindsay Street on West Ashley Patch.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | United States Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes was fond of saying, "leverage is everything." Today, philanthropy is coming to recognize the value of this insight as essential to fulfilling sector-wide shared missions. The leaders of major foundations - Judith Rodin of Rockefeller, Luis Ubinas of Ford, Bill and Melinda Gates of Gates, and President Bill Clinton of the Clinton Global Initiative - all embrace the philosophy of leveraging, often in the language of public-private-partnerships, as driving their approach. Tough economic times demand that not only foundations but also individuals and governments embrace this leveraging approach, to systematically hone our ability to innovate on how we partner. I call this new approach to giving Crisis Philanthropy.
Why is Crisis Philanthropy so important today, and what is it all about. The philosophy behind this approach has five axioms. First, constrained budgets and ballooning social needs means that money must go further -- foundations are asked increasingly to fulfill obligations once shouldered by governments. Second, we face a crisis of opportunity in this country that can only be addressed by partnerships that leverage the capacity and ingenuity of unemployed and under-employed Americans. Third, we must view foundations as coinvestors alongside federal, state and local governments, private firms, non-profits, and individuals - all of whom must be imbibed by the public interest and also ensure that they find ways of fulfilling their respective fiduciary duties in doing so. Fourth, foundations must identify the unique leverage that they bring to the table in addressing specific challenges. Fifth, partnerships demand foundations not only to rethink metrics of success but also to find ways of constantly learning from experience and spearheading innovations,
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Muammar al-Gaddafi is a blend of Bedouin, coup leader, autocrat, and fake thinker. For decades under the logic of the Cold War he was able to use terrorism to his benefit.
Gaddafi is generally considered responsible for the Lockerbie bombing, the bombing of Berlin night clubs on April 5, 1986, and to have commanded assassinations of his opponents in various European capitals. Although Gaddafi has tried to present himself as a revolutionary leader with a certain intellectual capacity to* boot, in reality he is a crafty Bedouin with a violent terrorist streak. Where slyness and terrorism clash, terrorism appears to carry the day: Gaddafi failed to respect even the ancient and universal tribal rules regarding hospitality when, having invited the Lebanese leader Musa Sadr to Tripoli, he "disappeared" his own guest. Sadr, a moderate who could have made a substantial contribution to the search for stability in the troubled Middle East, was never heard from again
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  PRESS ASSOCIATION -- Newspaper watchdog the Press Complaints Commission has announced that it will launch a review of "all aspects of press regulation" in the wake of the latest News of the World phone hacking allegations.
The commission, composed of "editorial" figures such as newspaper editors and "public" members drawn from different areas of public life, said it accepts it has a responsibility to ensure "events of this sort" never happen again.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Hot dogs, hamburgers and reform. That's what I'm looking forward to this summer holiday season. The conviction of our former governor should cause us to fire up our demand for better government.
After Rod Blagojevich was arrested in December 2008, we got a first crack at reform. Now that the former governor has been convicted on 17 criminal counts of corruption, we should get real change.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Like the 104th Congress when Republicans controlled the House of Representatives, the House today is swinging a sledgehammer at a cornerstone of contemporary American democracy and undermining the most extraordinary body of environmental law in the world.
Chief among the attacks is HR 2018, known as the "Clean Water Cooperative Federalism Act of 2011." The bill, currently working its way through the House, hogties the federal government's role in administering the federal Clean Water Act and gives states a veto power over a host of critical water quality decisions that the Clean Water Act currently authorizes the Environmental Protection Agency to make. This approach will foster a 1950s-style race to bottom as shortsighted and self-interested state politicians dismantle their clean water laws in order to recruit filthy polluters.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Is evangelical feminism an oxymoron?
A slew of writings has recently emerged about the "evangelical feminism" represented by women like Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann. Since I studied women like these for my first book, "God's Daughters: Evangelical Women and the Power of Submission," I've been on a few reporters' call lists for commentary. A lot of confusion remains, however, and I hope I can contribute something more substantial to this discussion.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Every spring, I embark on a cleaning binge, clearing my house of the detritus of daily life accumulated over the winter months. This year I decided to tackle the attic too. While the third-floor storage space holds a few boxes of my own household discards (flannel sheets are not needed post-menopause), most of the "stuff" in the 40 or so plastic containers belongs to my three adult children. I realized that my home had become -- as a British company dubbed it -- "the warehouse of mum and dad."
After a survey of 2,000 Britons about their storage habits, British insurer LV estimates that parents are holding onto more than £2.4 billion worth of "stuff" too treasured to be tossed, but not valued enough for the "kids" to cart to their own homes. More than 22 percent of parents store items for friends and family, and more than half of that number are running a storage facility of sorts for their adult children. Many parents noted that the "kids" were well into their late 20s and early 30s before they removed the last of possessions from the family home. Topping the list of stored items are clothing, school books, souvenirs, jewelry, sports equipment, musical instruments and old photos.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Joan Brunwasser: My guest today is India Mussell-McKay. Welcome to OpEdNews. I understand you have something different planned for your upcoming vacation. Can you tell us something about it?
India Mussell-McKay: Hey, Joan! Yes, actually this year's family vacation is going to be quite different than years past. We are heading to Joplin, Mo. to help with debris cleanup and to work with families affected by the tornado that hit on May 22. This tragedy was the deadliest single tornado in 60 years, killing 155 people, leaving 5,000 people homeless, and destroying over 30 percent of the city. A friend of mine, Jamey Johnston, went down in June, and after reading his journals and seeing the pictures of how devastated the area was, I knew I wanted to get involved. I shared my interest in going down with my family, and next thing I knew, it turned into a family project. I'm excited to be going down with my mom, dad, 17-year-old brother, my cousi, and my friend Jamey, who is returning to Joplin for a second time.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  According to an article in U.S. News Education, the average tuition and fees package offered to in-state students at the top 10 most expensive public business schools was $34,698 for the 2010-11 school year.
Though all ten business schools are good (all ten made it into the top 40 best business schools rankings and seven made it into the top 25), the prices are still astronomically high (and figures don't even include room and board, books, and other miscellaneous costs). The survey noted that four of the ten schools charged state resident more than $40,000 for the school year.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  PRESS ASSOCIATION -- David Cameron has hinted at Cabinet wrangling over the scrapping of red tape to encourage economic growth.
Addressing an audience of business leaders at a Downing Street reception, the Prime Minister assured them the Government is "determined to tear down the barriers getting in your way".
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Bristol Bay is synonymous with wild salmon. Each year tens of millions of salmon return to the pristine rivers and streams of southwest Alaska, fueling one of the most productive commercial, recreational, and subsistence fisheries in the world -- sustaining the people, communities, and wildlife of Bristol Bay for thousands of years.
Since large mines inevitably contaminate their surroundings, and since copper in amounts of only a few parts per billion over background levels is toxic to salmon, the Pebble Mine is a disaster in the making -- a toxic time-bomb if ever there was one.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  A rocky Australian coast on the Great Southern Ocean is the setting for this latest time lapse find from NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day blog.
In the video, created by "hobbyist astronomer" Alex Cherney, we're treated to a spectacle in the sky, courtesy of a colorful sunset, dark floating clouds and a vertical band of zodiacal light. The constellation Orion also makes an appearance toward the end of the time lapse.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Phone hacking is the only show in town this week, and a combination of disgust and intrigue has everyone hooked.
It's sad that it has taken the appalling news that Milly Dowler's phone was hacked (and messages were deleted) for this story to achieve national prominence. Perhaps it says a great deal about the esteem in which our politicians and celebrities are held that there was little public condemnation when we knew that they had been targeted. But it's also strange to see the news that parents of the Soham victims were hacked leading the rolling news coverage.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Since I'm an only child, and since my parents and I migrated from India away from our immediate family in 1980, I haven't directly experienced the loss of someone close to me. I was very close to my grandmother, but by the time she passed away from the world, I had already been in America for over 12 years, and time had diminished any attachment I had for her.
My dad cried like I had never seen him cry before. His father had passed away when he was only seven years old, so he was quite close to her. His major regret was that he couldn't be with her when she passed.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Explain to me why women who think they are so smart demonstrate such limited insight when they are hurtful to their daughter-in-laws or future daughter-in-laws? It boggles the mind to think a mom can be so short-sighted and selfish.
A nasty email has gone viral showing the future mother-in-law chastising the fiancé about her bad manners and rude behavior. Has the mother-in-law looked in the mirror lately? Does she not think it rude that she would judge, criticize, and arrogantly put her son's fiancé in her place?
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  PRESS ASSOCIATION -- A woman has been caught trying to sneak her common-law husband out of a Mexican prison in a suitcase following a conjugal visit.
A spokesman for police in the Caribbean state of Quintana Roo said staff at the prison in Chetumal noticed that the woman seemed nervous and was pulling a black, wheeled suitcase that looked bulky.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Aloha may mean hi, hello, love, but nothing translates the warm grand groundswell of emotion felt when you say "aloha" or express it in some form or another. It's like a mini-orgasm of the heart. Maybe it's felt in Israel when one says shalom, but I can't vouch for that because I have never grown up there, nor have I felt the magic of having someone make something for me and give it to me from their hands and heart while simply saying "shalom." I have had it happen with "aloha." And it's a feeling you don't forget and one that you want to give to others. It's contagious in a good way --
Maybe that's why I love the "aloha shirt." The aloha shirt is something that lifts my heart and says, "Hi, hello, love," and does so with a relaxing way that invites people to look at the images of ukuleles, hula girls, palm trees and other icons that represent Hawaii and other images of our 50th United State that are beautiful and speak of paradise and grace these fun wardrobe pieces.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | A Canadian man has been found not guilty by reason of insanity in the murder of a Scottish man who he thought was a zombie.
Tianhui Zhan, 19, stabbed Michael Davis, a 21-year-old cleaner in Glasgow because Zhan thought that Davis was a zombie, the BBC reported.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  PRESS ASSOCIATION -- Defying European judges over giving the vote to prisoners may look "macho" but would weaken the United Kingdom's ability to put pressure on other countries, a justice minister said.
Lord McNally, who is also the leader of Liberal Democrat peers, warned against refusing to implement the ruling from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) and signalled his support for giving prisoners the vote.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Now that Michele Bachmann is out on the stump and breaking upwards in most polls, it seems to be time to start putting her personal life through the media churn. So far, the result is mostly a litany of things you already knew, or could surmise, from her rather plainspoken Christian conservative beliefs. There's a healthy emphasis on the divisive -- and that's the rub, really. Most of what we're (re-)learning about Michele Bachmann is precisely the sort of thing both candidate and campaign don't mind being discussed. Moreover, there's plenty of muddle in the reporting, as the pieces, to varying degrees, reach for a judgment-free tone.
Let's begin with today's Washington Post, which has an article up today titled "Michele Bachmann's husband shares her strong conservative values." Those values? Well, they primarily involve extreme antipathy for members of the LGBT community. The article leads with the quote from Marcus Bachmann that's getting such wide play of late, in which he refers to homosexuals as "'barbarians' who 'need to be educated, need to be disciplined.'" The couple, it is reported, share a "common abhorrence of homosexuality."
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  PRESS ASSOCIATION -- Two touts have been warned they face jail over a £5 million Olympic ticket fraud which took in more than 10,000 customers.
The scam saw sports fans pay up to 48 times the price of Beijing Olympics tickets - but not a single one arrived.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Every Wednesday is Tip Day.
This Wednesday: Ten things I can do every day -- even when I can't do anything else.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  Press Association -- There has been a jump in the number of patients waiting more than six weeks for key tests over the past year.
At the end of May, 15,900 people were waiting more than six weeks for one of 15 key tests, including MRI, CT and heart scans, ultrasound and colonoscopies.
More... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  There are a few things in life I know in that 'beyond a shadow of a doubt' way. One is that children shouldn't be sold for sex.
When a Village Voice reporter called, challenging a statistic commonly used in child sex trafficking discussions, I told the truth, which is that when you work on social issues, perfect data is often, at best, hard to come by. I've worked on many issues and have yet to come across the kind of current, comprehensive, reliable data I depended on daily when I worked in the private sector.
More... | | | | | | | | | |  | |  | |  |
Chef Grant Achatz's 
Having recently been named the 
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