ken atchity door to door

Very Very British [via David Adashek]

2012-02-20T00:00:00.000-08:00

A simple philosophy refined to its essence [via Steven Kates]

2012-02-17T00:00:00.000-08:00

Washington Post winning Submissions - Alternate meanings for common words [via Steven Kates]

2012-02-15T00:00:00.000-08:00

The Washington Post has published the winning submissions to its yearly contest, in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for common words.

And the winners are:

1. Coffee, n. The person upon whom one coughs.

2. Flabbergasted, adj. Appalled by discovering how much weight one has gained.

3. Abdicate, v. To give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.

4. Esplanade, v. To attempt an explanation while drunk.

5. Willy-nilly, adj. Impotent.

6. Negligent, adj. Absent mindedly answering the door when wearing only a nightgown.

7. Lymph, v. To walk with a lisp.

8. Gargoyle, n. Olive-flavored mouthwash.

9. Flatulence, n. Emergency vehicle that picks up someone who has been run over by a steamroller.

10. Balderdash, n. A rapidly receding hairline.

11. Testicle, n. A humorous question on an exam.

12. Rectitude, n. The formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists.

13. Pokemon, n. A Rastafarian proctologist.

14. Oyster, n. A person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddishisms.

15. Frisbeetarianism, n. The belief that, after death, the soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there.

16. Circumvent, n. An opening in the front of boxer shorts worn by Jewish men.

My Valentine's Day Challenge

2012-02-14T00:00:00.000-08:00

by Sarah White

The Naked Therapist

The "Day of Love" is upon us, and with Rick Santorum (aka Senator Lovekill) surging in the polls, I heartily put forth to HuffPost readers the same Valentine's Day Challenge I gave to my clients: Send a love note to the last person in the world you would ever admit to loving.

No, I'm not trying to start some "spread the peace" movement, though that would be a wonderful byproduct. Rather, I pose this challenge to help you see that all the hate you feel for someone who's "done you wrong," all the disgust you hurl at your neighbor's "lifestyle," all the scorn you pile upon those who seem "different," all this loathing might be a gateway drug to higher forms of love, and if you embrace the object of your disfavor you may discover one of life's most transformative realizations: we can't know what someone does for us until we stop obsessing over what they've done to us.

Take the case of George, one of my clients. As soon as his kids fly the nest, his wife starts openly cheating on him. She calls him on the phone and lets him hear her having sex with her new boy toy. She refuses to make love with him because she claims he can't compare to what she's getting from the newbie. And she constantly tells him that were he a real man, he'd leave her. So what do I tell George? Leave the bitch? No. I tell him to write a love note to his wife's new stud muffin, letting him know how grateful he is that he's bringing pleasure back into his wife's life.

Does he do it? Yep. Does it help him? Big time. Because, deep down, George loves his wife's new playboy. He's been feeling inadequate for years. His marriage had become sexless long ago. He had stopped seeing his wife as alluring. But her infidelity (a misnomer for what is in fact often an act of deep and desperate faith in the potential of a relationship) roused his dormant emotions and made him feel excited again!

So what does he do with all that excitement? Something truly brave. He embraces the cuckold lifestyle. Yes, in one of the more productive reaction adjustments of the modern age, being a cuckold, which for centuries was cause enough for a man to murder his wife (e.g. Othello), is now a growing fetish in which a man gains sexual gratification from his partner having intercourse with other people. That's right. George and his wife are not only having sex again, but he's also enjoying the experience of watching her make it with his rival. His world has been blown wide open, he's exploring new erotic horizons, and he's feeling better than ever. Happy Valentines Day, Mr. Other Man. I love you!

Now if only I can get Rick Santorum to send some candy hearts to Dan Savage :-)

Sarah White Bio:

Sarah White is the founder of Naked Therapy, an innovative form of psychotherapy in which the therapist removes her clothes during the therapy session in order to bring about several unique elements that can at times be lacking in a traditional therapeutic context: an openness on certain topics between therapist and client, a more transparent transference, and the types of powerful self-discoveries that often emerge in a state of arousal. She practices Naked Therapy at SarahWhiteTherapy.com, and she writes about psychology, sexuality and culture on her blog, NakedTherapy.org.

Giggles [via Mary Calhoun]

2012-02-13T00:00:00.001-08:00

She's Alive... Beautiful... Finite... Hurting... Worth Dying for. [via Virginia Gunn]

2012-02-10T00:00:00.000-08:00

Somethings Just Make You Smile [via Kayoko Mitsumatsu]

2012-02-08T00:00:00.000-08:00

A Man. A Van. A Surprising Business Plan [via Nina Reznick]

2012-02-06T00:00:00.000-08:00

We've all been there. Trapped in line at the DMV. Or stuck on hold while trying to call a city agency. It's easy to complain about government bureaucracy. But it's the rare person who sees such inefficiency as a business opportunity.

Meet Adam Humphreys. He lives in New York City, and he wanted to travel to China for a vacation. His bureaucratic hassles with the Chinese consulate launched a whole new business.

LISTEN TO THIS GREAT INTERVIEW ON NPR

It's Not Easy Being The Best Man [via David Angsten]

2012-02-03T00:00:00.000-08:00

Raw Video: Timelapse of Solar Storm Light Show [via Nina Reznick]

2012-02-01T00:00:00.000-08:00

Published on Jan 24, 2012 by AssociatedPress

The Northern Lights lit up the skies above Scotland and northern England after the biggest solar storm in more than six years bombarded Earth with radiation. Video shot last weekend shows the effect of the Aurora Borealis above Norway. (Jan. 24)

Going To The Dogs [via Laurie Dressman]

2012-01-30T00:00:00.000-08:00

Buddy Greene at Carnegie Hall [via Jock Miller]

2012-01-27T00:00:00.000-08:00

Necessity Is The Mother Of Invention

2012-01-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

HAPPY NEW YEAR - YEAR OF THE WATER DRAGON

2012-01-23T10:52:00.000-08:00

THE DEVIL IN THE DETAILS [via Steven Kates]

2012-01-20T00:00:00.000-08:00

Try and guess what this commercial is for … BEFORE it ends …

Dirt Devil-The Exorcist from MrPrice2U on Vimeo.

2012-01-18T00:00:00.000-08:00

Killer Whale Luna Mimics Boat Sounds [via Nina Reznick]

2012-01-16T00:00:00.000-08:00

Meet Luna, a remarkable whale.Separated from his family when he was just two years old, this orca whale lived alone off the coast of Vancouver Island, Canada. There, in 2001, Luna became known for interacting with local boaters.The amazing video above captures Luna swimming right next to a boat and mimicking boat noises. Luna's sounds are almost indistinguishable from those of the boat's engine.

Video ABOVE courtesy of TheWhaleMovie.com

Useful Graphs

2012-01-13T00:00:00.000-08:00

Unusual and Wonderous Places [via Nina Reznick]

2012-01-11T00:00:00.000-08:00

Jeff Rivera Interviews Producer Morris Ruskin for Author Learning Center

2012-01-09T00:00:00.000-08:00

Producer of over forty five films Morris Ruskin has made Shoreline Entertainment the go-to company for film sales. From Glengarry Glen Ross to The Maid, Ruskin has built a reputation for not only being a producer who can get films made under budget but also one of the most accessible executives in the industry.

Jeff Rivera sits down with Ruskin in the Rogers & Cowan offices to discuss his latest animated 3D film called The Living Corpse.

In their video interview, Ruskin tells with Rivera what it took to pull this film together over the course of four years.

2012-01-06T00:00:00.001-08:00

E-Newsletter - January 2012

For the cost of one yoga class, you can change a life.

Holiday Special E Letter

Happy New Year!

SUCCESS STORY: Thanks to your continued support, YGB has increased our fund recipients to 81 people for 2012, 35 mothers and 46 children.

With an extremely successful year in 2011, YGB now funds additional four children and one mother at Deenbandhu Trust Home, Karnataka. At NISHTHA in West Bengal, we were able to add 11 mothers and their 11 daughters to the 22 morhters and 22 daughters we already support. YGB's goal is to commit our funding to individuals, for 5 years so that they can make fundamental changes to their lives and build sustainable livelihoods through education and economic empowerment.

Some of the new YGB fund recipients:
Deenabandhu Trust Home, Karnataka, South India

Ten years old Poornima came to Deenabandhu Trust Home last May, when her aunt could no longer financially care for her. Poornima's father deserted her mother and children, after her mother became mentally ill. Despite of this, Poornima is a sweet girl with a beautiful smile. She enjoys helping others especially with writing and reading. She is the first to pick up a broom if a room is dirty.

Latha is a sensitive, sweet four year old girl who came to Deenabandhu last May. When Latha was a new born, her alcoholic father died. While living in poverty, Latha and her mother were rescued by Shaktidhama Women's Shelter. Eventually, her mother requested care from Deenabandhu which they now receive.
NISHTHA: Tripuranagar Village, West Bengal

Ninety per cent of the first 22 mothers who received micro loans from YGB in 2011 have repaid their loans and will receive a second cycle of loans in 2012. Before receiving funds fromYGB, only 50% of them had paid work. Now 95% are earning an income with a 77% increase of income. This success enabled us to fund an additional 11 mothers and 11 daughters in this same village, Without funding to secure education, here in this remote village of West Bengal, daughters are forced to marry at an age as young as 13. NISHTHA continues to provide necessary guidance and vocational training for mothers to start their income earning work with micro loans. Their daughters are provided with personal educational counseling as well as workshops on health and gender issues.

YGB is delighted to work with these two NGOs in India who continue to send us regular reports with current status and photos of our fund recipients.
YGB Global Calendar 2012 is still available for online purchase!!
Yoga Gives Back's first global calendar appreciates and celebrates YGB's global yoga community. Included in the calendar are photos from our first successful global fundraiser, "Thank You Mother India." Over 750 people in 10 countries took part, and other events that were held throughout the world. Additionally, each month features portraits of women and girls from our partner organizations in India who are direct recipients of YGB funds.
You can make a change, one calendar at a time.

Press!

ABC Chicago News feature YGB: 5:00pm, Thursday, Dec 29, 2011 A great piece produced by Sylvia L. Jones, at WLS-TV ABC 7 CHICAGO, with an interview of YGB rep Chelsea Mack. The special donation class by Colleen Rose at Yoga 360 was also covered. Thank you everyone!!!

Exciting News!

YGB is excited to have two new global representatives: One from the Netherlands and one from Brazil. Read more about our dedicated global team here.
Janneke Verburg-Wiersma, the Netherlands
"I've been in India many times and I love the country, but the poverty over there has made a big impact on me. It's really hard for us Westerners to imagine that you just don't have any resources or ways to make something of your life. I really believe in micro financing as a way to provide the necessary resources to people who need it, to enable them to change their lives. So I'm really excited that we can make a difference by getting the yoga community together (worldwide!) and we can start giving back! "
Cacau Peres: Sao Paulo, Brazil
“I think Seva is one of the best ways we have to show our love and compassion towards others. Yoga Gives Back is a wonderful opportunity to do Seva and show our gratitude for Yoga.”

Write to us (info@yogagivesback.org) if you would like to join the YGB team in your area!!!

Upcoming Events!

Movie Night Series @ Rising Spirit Yoga, Wells River, Vermont

January 27, 2012, 7:30 PM; Rising Spirit Yoga is hosting three special "Movie Night at the Studio" series to benefit YGB!

Cost: $5-$10 Suggested Donation

YOGAWOMAN : Yoga was brought to the West from India by a lineage of male teachers. Now there's a generation of women who are leading the way.
February 24th: "YERT" 50 States. 1 Year. Zero Garbage?
March 23rd: "ENLIGHTEN UP! "A Skeptic's Journey into the World of Yoga

Special Donation Class@Laguna Yoga Shala, Laguna Beach, California

January 29, 2012, Sunday, 9-10:30am; Itay Dollinger is teaching this special donation Ashtanga Led Class, organized by Neemu Murthy. YGB presentation and refreshments to follow.

Thank you for this event!

New Year's Special Class@ Infuse Yoga, Chicago

January 1, 2012, 11:00 AM; By popular request, ring in 2012 with this dynamic class for all levels led by Meredith Wroblewski! In order to hold the appropriate space both physically and energetically, reservations are required. You are welcome to stay for brunch immediately following the class. A portion of the proceeds will benefit Yoga Gives Back!

Class is $18 drop in ($20 with mat). Brunch is $5-$15 suggested cash donation.

*Check www.yogagivesback.org for more upcoming events and details.

Thank you for your support, which is making a difference one event at a time!!

IN THIS ISSUE

SUCCESS STORY

PRESS

EXCITING NEWS

UPCOMING EVENTS

FOLLOW

Follow Yoga Gives Back on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube!

JOIN

DONATION

Your donation helps Yoga Gives Back's campaign to alleviate poverty in India. To make a donation, click the link below.

Yoga Gives Back is a 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Organization.

Questions, comments, want to get involved?
Email info@yogagivesback.org.

www.yogagivesback.org

2012-01-05T00:00:00.000-08:00

2012-01-04T00:00:00.001-08:00

Being Responsible [via Alex Cord]

2012-01-03T00:00:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!

As many of you know, I do like a good Scotch on the rocks.

Well, as the holiday spirit(s) will be flowing over the festivities I
thought I would share this with you all in the interest of acting responsibly.

Specifically, I would like to share an experience about drinking and driving.

Last night, I was out for a few drinks with some friends and had a few
too many Scotches. Knowing full well I may have
been slightly over the limit, I did something I've never done before -
I took a bus home. .!!

I arrived home safely and without incident, which was a real surprise,
as I have never driven a bus before and am not even sure where I got it..!!

FINGERS ON THE KEYS LISTENERS AT THE KEYHOLE [via Nina Reznick]

2012-01-02T00:00:00.000-08:00

An Android app developer has published what he says is conclusive proof that millions of smartphones are secretly monitoring the key presses, geographic locations, and received messages of its users.

The video was posted four days after Carrier IQ withdrew legal threats against Eckhart for calling its software a “rootkit.” The Connecticut-based programmer said the characterization is accurate because the software is designed to obscure its presence by bypassing typical operating-system functions.

2012

2012-01-01T00:00:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!

2011-12-31T00:00:00.000-08:00

Join Michael Chearney At HIs Opening at the George Billis Gallery LA Saturday January 7th, 5-8 PM

2011-12-30T00:00:00.000-08:00

So You Think You Can Dance [via David Angsten]

2011-12-28T09:40:00.000-08:00

Incredible India

2011-12-26T00:00:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

Cajun Night Before Christmas

2011-12-24T00:00:00.000-08:00

Why Iceland Should Be in the News, But Is Not [via Nina Reznick]

2011-12-21T00:00:00.000-08:00

by: Deena Stryker, The South Africa Civil Society Information Service | News Analysis

(Photo: Páll Hilmarsson / Flickr)

An Italian radio program's story about Iceland’s on-going revolution is a stunning example of how little our media tells us about the rest of the world. Americans may remember that at the start of the 2008 financial crisis, Iceland literally went bankrupt. The reasons were mentioned only in passing, and since then, this little-known member of the European Union fell back into oblivion.

As one European country after another fails or risks failing, imperiling the Euro, with repercussions for the entire world, the last thing the powers that be want is for Iceland to become an example. Here's why:

Five years of a pure neo-liberal regime had made Iceland, (population 320 thousand, no army), one of the richest countries in the world. In 2003 all the country’s banks were privatized, and in an effort to attract foreign investors, they offered on-line banking whose minimal costs allowed them to offer relatively high rates of return. The accounts, called IceSave, attracted many English and Dutch small investors. But as investments grew, so did the banks’ foreign debt. In 2003 Iceland’s debt was equal to 200 times its GNP, but in 2007, it was 900 percent. The 2008 world financial crisis was the coup de grace. The three main Icelandic banks, Landbanki, Kapthing and Glitnir, went belly up and were nationalized, while the Kroner lost 85% of its value with respect to the Euro. At the end of the year Iceland declared bankruptcy.

Contrary to what could be expected, the crisis resulted in Icelanders recovering their sovereign rights, through a process of direct participatory democracy that eventually led to a new Constitution. But only after much pain.

Geir Haarde, the Prime Minister of a Social Democratic coalition government, negotiated a two million one hundred thousand dollar loan, to which the Nordic countries added another two and a half million. But the foreign financial community pressured Iceland to impose drastic measures. The FMI and the European Union wanted to take over its debt, claiming this was the only way for the country to pay back Holland and Great Britain, who had promised to reimburse their citizens.

Protests and riots continued, eventually forcing the government to resign. Elections were brought forward to April 2009, resulting in a left-wing coalition which condemned the neoliberal economic system, but immediately gave in to its demands that Iceland pay off a total of three and a half million Euros. This required each Icelandic citizen to pay 100 Euros a month (or about $130) for fifteen years, at 5.5% interest, to pay off a debt incurred by private parties vis a vis other private parties. It was the straw that broke the reindeer’s back.

What happened next was extraordinary. The belief that citizens had to pay for the mistakes of a financial monopoly, that an entire nation must be taxed to pay off private debts was shattered, transforming the relationship between citizens and their political institutions and eventually driving Iceland’s leaders to the side of their constituents. The Head of State, Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, refused to ratify the law that would have made Iceland’s citizens responsible for its bankers’ debts, and accepted calls for a referendum.

Of course the international community only increased the pressure on Iceland. Great Britain and Holland threatened dire reprisals that would isolate the country. As Icelanders went to vote, foreign bankers threatened to block any aid from the IMF. The British government threatened to freeze Icelander savings and checking accounts. As Grimsson said: “We were told that if we refused the international community’s conditions, we would become the Cuba of the North. But if we had accepted, we would have become the Haiti of the North.” (How many times have I written that when Cubans see the dire state of their neighbor, Haiti, they count themselves lucky.)

In the March 2010 referendum, 93% voted against repayment of the debt. The IMF immediately froze its loan. But the revolution (though not televised in the United States), would not be intimidated. With the support of a furious citizenry, the government launched civil and penal investigations into those responsible for the financial crisis. Interpol put out an international arrest warrant for the ex-president of Kaupthing, Sigurdur Einarsson, as the other bankers implicated in the crash fled the country.

But Icelanders didn't stop there: they decided to draft a new constitution that would free the country from the exaggerated power of international finance and virtual money. (The one in use had been written when Iceland gained its independence from Denmark, in 1918, the only difference with the Danish constitution being that the word ‘president’ replaced the word ‘king’.)

To write the new constitution, the people of Iceland elected twenty-five citizens from among 522 adults not belonging to any political party but recommended by at least thirty citizens. This document was not the work of a handful of politicians, but was written on the internet. The constituent’s meetings are streamed on-line, and citizens can send their comments and suggestions, witnessing the document as it takes shape. The constitution that eventually emerges from this participatory democratic process will be submitted to parliament for approval after the next elections.

Some readers will remember that Iceland’s ninth century agrarian collapse was featured in Jared Diamond’s book by the same name. Today, that country is recovering from its financial collapse in ways just the opposite of those generally considered unavoidable, as confirmed yesterday by the new head of the IMF, Christine Lagarde to Fareed Zakaria. The people of Greece have been told that the privatization of their public sector is the only solution. And those of Italy, Spain and Portugal are facing the same threat.

They should look to Iceland. Refusing to bow to foreign interests, that small country stated loud and clear that the people are sovereign.

That’s why it is not in the news anymore.

[via Nina Reznick]

2011-12-19T00:00:00.000-08:00

New drug could cure nearly any viral infection
Researchers at MIT’s Lincoln Lab have developed technology that may someday cure the common cold, influenza and other ailments.

Anne Trafton, MIT News Office

Most bacterial infections can be treated with antibiotics such as penicillin, discovered decades ago. However, such drugs are useless against viral infections, including influenza, the common cold, and deadly hemorrhagic fevers such as Ebola.

Now, in a development that could transform how viral infections are treated, a team of researchers at MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory has designed a drug that can identify cells that have been infected by any type of virus, then kill those cells to terminate the infection.

The microscope images above show that DRACO successfully treats viral infections. In the left set of four photos, rhinovirus (the common cold virus) kills untreated human cells (lower left), whereas DRACO has no toxicity in uninfected cells (upper right) and cures an infected cell population (lower right). Similarly, in the right set of four photos, dengue hemorrhagic fever virus kills untreated monkey cells (lower left), whereas DRACO has no toxicity in uninfected cells (upper right) and cures an infected cell population (lower right). |

In a paper published July 27 in the journal PLoS One, the researchers tested their drug against 15 viruses, and found it was effective against all of them — including rhinoviruses that cause the common cold, H1N1 influenza, a stomach virus, a polio virus, dengue fever and several other types of hemorrhagic fever.

The drug works by targeting a type of RNA produced only in cells that have been infected by viruses. “In theory, it should work against all viruses,” says Todd Rider, a senior staff scientist in Lincoln Laboratory’s Chemical, Biological, and Nanoscale Technologies Group who invented the new technology.

Because the technology is so broad-spectrum, it could potentially also be used to combat outbreaks of new viruses, such as the 2003 SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) outbreak, Rider says. Other members of the research team are Lincoln Lab staff members Scott Wick, Christina Zook, Tara Boettcher, Jennifer Pancoast and Benjamin Zusman.

Read More

Thinking of our Louisiana roots and some great card-playing memories. [via Laurie Atchity]

2011-12-17T00:00:00.000-08:00

Bourré (Booray)

Introduction

This gambling game is popular in Louisiana, USA. Although it is a trick-taking game unrelated to Poker, it has become known to Poker players in North America as an alternative choice in home Poker games. The game is of French origin. It is a descendant of Bourre, a three-card game which was popular in southwest France in the early 20th century, which was probably descended in turn from the Spanish game Burro ("donkey"). In the French game a player who plays and takes no tricks is said to be "bourré", and it is this term that gives its name to the Louisiana gameBourré, which is sometimes spelled with just one 'r': (bouré). Sometimes this is altered to "bourre" or "boure" by American writers unfamiliar with French accents, and often it is written "booray" or "boo-ray" which in American spelling approximates the French pronunciation of bourré.

The information on this page relies heavily on the book Bouré by Roy J Nickens (Baton Rouge, 1972) as well as correspondence from John May, Brad Duhon, Victoria Diemer and others.

Players and Cards

The game is best for seven players. In theory any number from two to eight can play, but with fewer than about five players the game becomes less interesting.

A standard international 52-card pack without jokers is used. The cards of each suit rank from high to low: A-K-Q-J-10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2.

Ante and Deal

Before the first deal each player must contribute an ante of one chip to the pot. Before subsequent deals, certain players may not have to pay an ante, depending on the result of the previous hand - see below.

Any player who wishes to may shuffle and the dealer has the right to shuffle last. The cards must then be cut by the player to dealer's right.

The dealer deals out the cards one at a time, starting with the player to dealer's left and continuing clockwise until each player has five cards. Cards are dealt face down, except for the dealer's fifth and last card, which is dealt face up. The suit of this card indicates the trump suit.

The turn to deal passes to the left after each hand.

Draw or Pass

Players pick up their cards and look at them, but may not show their cards to anyone else.

Beginning with the player to dealer's left, each player in clockwise order must declare whether he or she will pass or play, and if playing, how many cards he or she wishes to discard.

If you pass, you stack your cards face down in front of you.and take no further part in the play of the hand. You can no longer win the pot on that deal, nor can you lose any additional chips.

If you play, you may discard some of your cards face down, announcing how many you are discarding. The dealer then deals you an equal number of replacement cards from the undealt part of the deck. You may discard your whole hand of five cards if you wish to, or if you are happy with your original cards you may stand pat and play with the hand you were dealt, discarding nothing.

It may happen, especially in an eight-player game, that the dealer runs out of cards to deal before all the players who wish to play have been served with replacements for their discards. In that case the dealer gathers up all the discarded cards and passed hands from the players who have already acted (but not the discards of the player who is currently being served). These cards are shuffled and cut and used to continue dealing cards to replace any remaining discards.

If the turned up trump card is an ace, the dealer must play. There is no risk in doing so since the ace of trumps always wins a trick.

If only one player elects to play, all the others passing, the lone player is deemed to have won all five tricks by default, and this player therefore collects the whole pot without playing out any cards. If all players other than the dealer pass, the dealer should of course play and collect the pot.

You should be careful not to make any premature announcement or gesture indicating whether you intend to play or pass or how many cards you might discard, before it is your turn to act. The penalty is to forfeit your next turn to deal.

The Play

The player to dealer's left, or if this player has passed, the next player in clockwise rotation who is playing, leads to the first trick. Thereafter the winner of each trick leads to the next.

A card is led by placing it face up in the centre of the table. Each of the other active players (those who have not passed) in clockwise order must also play a card face up in the centre. When all have played a card, the trick is complete. It is won by whoever played the highest card of the trump suit, or if no trump was played, by whoever played the highest card of the suit that was led.

The play of the cards is governed by strict rules.

Players must always "follow suit" if able to - that is, all but the first to play to a trick must play a card of the same suit as the card that was led.
Any player who is unable to follow suit, having no card of the suit that was led, must play a trump if able to.
Subject to the requirement to follow suit, each player must play a card that beats the highest card so far played to the trick if possible.

A player who is unable to beat the highest card played to the trick, is still forced to follow suit if possible, and otherwise to trump. If the trick has already been trumped, and you are unable to follow suit, you must overtrump if possible, but if your trumps are not high enough to overtrump, you must still play a trump.

However, if you are unable to beat the highest card in the trick, you are under no obligation to play a high card, provided that you obey the rules of following suit or trumping. Example: spades are trumps and the queen of diamonds is led. The second player trumps with the four of spades. Playing third, you hold the ace and six of diamonds and some spades. You have diamonds so you are not allowed to trump, and therefore cannot win the trick. You can and should play your six of diamonds, not the ace. If the second player had played a diamond, you would have been obliged to play the ace of diamonds, to beat the queen.

A player who has no card of the suit led and has no trumps either can play any card, but of course cannot win the trick.

If the dealer is playing, the dealer's card that was dealt face up to determine the trump suit counts as belonging to the dealer's hand (except in the very unusual case that the dealer chose to discard it) and is played in accordance with the rules of play above.

A player who has three sure tricks irrespective of how the cards are played, and is therefore certain to win the pot, is said to have a cinch. In this case there are additional restrictions.

If you have a cinch and it is your turn to lead, you must lead your highest trump.
If you have a cinch and are playing on a trick to which another player led, and you are able to play a trump to the trick, you must play your highest trump.
If you have a cinch and are playing last to a trick, there are no special restrictions - you must simply win the trick if you can, subject to the usual restrictions of following suit and trumping.

Note that your hand can be a cinch at the start of the play if you have a trump holding such as A-K-Q or K-Q-10-9-8. It can become a cinch later, for example if after winning a trick you have two sure trump tricks. Also, if you win the first three tricks, the cinch rules apply since you are sure to take the pot, and you must lead a trump to the fourth trick if you have one.

When you are required to play your "highest" trump because your hand is a cinch, the play of an adjacent trump - such as the King from Ace-King or the Jack from King-Jack when the Queen has already been played - is acceptable.

Payments

The player who wins most tricks takes the whole pot. To win the pot it is necessary to win more tricks than any other single player. Three tricks are always sufficient. The pot can be won with two tricks if three other players take one trick each.

If there is a tie for most tricks (when the tricks divide 2-2-1, and in the rare case of five players taking one trick each) no one takes the pot. This is known as a "split pot" but the pot is not shared out - it remains for the next deal and the new antes and any penalties are added to it.

Anyone who plays and takes no trick is said to have gone "bourré". These players must pay an amount equal to the whole contents of the pot. This payment forms part of the pot for the next deal.

A player who goes bourré does not have to place the normal one chip ante for the next deal. Also, if the pot is split, the players who tied for most tricks do not post an ante for the next deal. All remaining players pay one chip ante as usual.

In the following example the seven players are A, B, C, D, E, F and G.

Deal 1: All seven players ante so there are 7 chips in the pot. B, C, E and G play; the others pass. E wins 3 tricks, B and G win one each and C is bourré. E takes the 7 chips from the pot. C must pay 7 chips to the next pot. All players must ante for the next deal except for C. Therefore the pot now contains 13 chips.

Deal 2: With 13 chips in the pot, A, B, E and F play. The others pass. A and F take 2 tricks each, B takes one and E none. This is a spilt pot between A and F, so no one wins it. E has to add 13 chips to the pot, and B, C, D and G each ante one chip for the next deal, so the pot now contains 30 chips.

Deal 3: Only C, D and E play, and D wins all five tricks. D takes the 30 chips from the pot and C and E must each pay 30 chips to the next pot. In addition everyone C and E must pay an ante for the next deal, and the pot now contains 65 chips.

It should be clear from this example that the pot can sometimes build rather quickly, especially if more than one player is bourré or there is a split pot. For thisa reason the game is sometimes played with a limit. For example if the limit is 20 chips, then when the pot contains more than 20 chips, a player who wins takes only 20 chips from the pot, and a player who is bourré pays only 20 chips.

Any play that is not in accordance with the rules of play - such as failure to follow suit, failure to trump or failure to beat the highest card in the trick when able, is known as a renege. If the renege is not corrected before the next player plays a card, the penalty is to pay an amount equal to the size of the pot, exactly as though the player had gone bourré.

However, if having reneged you realise your error before the next player plays, you are allowed to recall your card and substitute a correct card. In this case you forfeit the right to win the pot, even if you take most tricks, and you forfeit your next turn to deal, but you do not have to match the pot (unless you win no tricks).

Variations

Double Ante

In this variation, all players pay an ante of one chip before the deal, and in addition, any player who decides to play must pay an additional chip to the pot. Those who pass do not pay this second ante - they just lose their first ante and forgo their chance to win the pot in this deal.

In the double ante game, it is normal to require an initial ante from all players, including those who paid for a bourré or were involved in a split pot on the previous deal.

Some play that the decisions whether or not to play and how many cards to draw are separated into two separate rounds. First each player in turn declares either "play" (paying a second ante of one chip) or "pass". After everyone has declared, there is a second round in which those who decided to play discard cards if they wish and are dealt replacements.

Separate Trump Card

Some play that five cards are dealt face down to each player, and then an extra card is dealt face up to determine the trump suit. There are two forms of this variation.

The turned up trump belongs to no one. It indocates the trump suit but cannot be taken or played by any player.
The turned up trump can be taken by the dealer if he or she decides to play. The dealer effectively has six cards; if for example the dealer discards four cards and elects to use the tuirned up trump, three replacement cards will be dealt to make up the dealer's five-card hand.

Simultaneous Declaration

Some play that instead of declaring in rotation, all players decide independently whether they will play or pass. Those who want to play hold a chip in their closed fist; those who pass hold an empty fist. All reveal their decisions simultaneously and then those who decided to play discard in rotation as ussual.

I suspect that this variation is not traditional in Louisiana, but was adopted by poker players, who use a similar method for declaring high or low in some hi-lo games.

Four card Bourré

Victoria Diemer reports that in Indiana, Bourré is played with just four cards dealt to each player, with a separate card that belongs to no one indicating the trump suit. Players must have at least one trump or at least one club (a "dirty club") to play, which costs one chip. After players have decided whether to stay, up to 3 cards can be discarded, but not all four. After the draw, players have another chance to pass; those who want to play must pay an additional chip. As usual the player who takes most chips wins the pot, and if there is a tie the pot is carried over to the next deal. Anyone who takes no tricks must match the pot for the next deal. The penalty for a renege is twice the pot.

Other Bourré Web Sites

Another description of Bourré is available on Wikipedia.

Rules of a simplified version of Boo-Ray can be found in Peter Sarrett's Game Report site, although in fact it is a trick taking game, unrelated to Poker.

TIME Magazine's Person of the Year: The Protester [via Nina Reznick]

2011-12-16T00:00:00.001-08:00

The Protester

By Kurt Andersen

"Mohamed suffered a lot. He worked hard. But when he set fire to himself, it wasn't about his scales being confiscated. It was about his dignity."
—Mannoubia Bouazizi, Tunisia

Photograph by Peter Hapak for TIME

Once upon a time, when major news events were chronicled strictly by professionals and printed on paper or transmitted through the air by the few for the masses, protesters were prime makers of history. Back then, when citizen multitudes took to the streets without weapons to declare themselves opposed, it was the very definition of news — vivid, important, often consequential. In the 1960s in America they marched for civil rights and against the Vietnam War; in the '70s, they rose up in Iran and Portugal; in the '80s, they spoke out against nuclear weapons in the U.S. and Europe, against Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, against communist tyranny in Tiananmen Square and Eastern Europe. Protest was the natural continuation of politics by other means.

And then came the End of History, summed up by Francis Fukuyama's influential 1989 essay declaring that mankind had arrived at the "end point of ... ideological evolution" in globally triumphant "Western liberalism." The two decades beginning in 1991 witnessed the greatest rise in living standards that the world has ever known. Credit was easy, complacency and apathy were rife, and street protests looked like pointless emotional sideshows — obsolete, quaint, the equivalent of cavalry to mid-20th-century war. The rare large demonstrations in the rich world seemed ineffectual and irrelevant. (See the Battle of Seattle, 1999.)

There were a few exceptions, like the protests that, along with sanctions, helped end apartheid in South Africa in 1994. But for young people, radical critiques and protests against the system were mostly confined to pop-culture fantasy: "Fight the Power" was a song on a platinum-selling album, Rage Against the Machine was a platinum-selling band, and the beloved brave rebels fighting the all-encompassing global oppressors were just a bunch of characters in The Matrix. (See pictures of protesters around the world.)

"Massive and effective street protest" was a global oxymoron until — suddenly, shockingly — starting exactly a year ago, it became the defining trope of our times. And the protester once again became a maker of history.

SKIN CONTROL [via Nina Reznick]

2011-12-14T00:00:00.000-08:00

Breakthrough: Electronic circuits that are integrated with your skin

By Robert T. Gonzalez

A team of engineers today announced a discovery that could change the world of electronics forever. Called an "epidermal electronic system" (EES), it's basically an electronic circuit mounted on your skin, designed to stretch, flex, and twist — and to take input from the movements of your body.

EES is a leap forward for wearable technologies, and has potential applications ranging from medical diagnostics to video game control and accelerated wound-healing. Engineers John Rogers and Todd Coleman, who worked on the discovery, tell io9 it's a huge step towards erasing the divide that separates machine and human.

Coleman and Rogers say they developed EES to forego the hard and rigid electronic "wafer" format of traditional electronics in favor of a softer, more dynamic platform.

To accomplish this, their team brought together scientists from several labs to develop "filamentary serpentine" (threadlike and squiggly) circuitry. When this circuitry is mounted on a thin, rubber substrate with elastic properties similar to skin, the result is a flexible patch that can bend and twist, or expand and contract, all without affecting electronic performance.

This video demonstrates the resilience of the EES patch, and how easily it can be applied. The patch (comprised of the circuitry and rubber substrate) is first mounted on a thin sheet of water-soluble plastic, then applied to the skin with water like a temporary tattoo.

All images courtesy of John Rogers

TOO CORNY TO MISS PORCUPINE WON'T SHARE CORN ON THE COB [via Nina Reznick]

2011-12-12T00:00:00.000-08:00

The Three Little Pigs

2011-12-09T00:00:00.000-08:00

A teacher was reading the story of the Three Little Pigs to her class.

She came to the part of the story where first pig was trying to gather the building materials for his home.

She read. 'And so the pig went up to the man with the wheelbarrow full of straw and said: 'Pardon me sir, but may I have some of that straw to build my house?'

The teacher paused then asked the class: 'And what do you think the man said?'

One little boy raised his hand and said very matter-of-factly...

'I think the man would have said - 'Well, F#ck me!! A talking pig!'

The teacher had to leave the room.

Yoga Gives Back's First Global Calendar designed by Jonathan Mills!

2011-12-08T00:00:00.000-08:00

Yoga Gives Back's first global calendar is now for sale here http://www.yogagivesback.org/calendar.php.

Yoga Gives Back's first global calendar is created to appreciate and celebrate YGB's global yoga community, with photos from our first successful global fundraiser "Thank You Mother India" that involved over 750 people in 10 countries, as well as other events throughout the world. Each month also features portraits of women and girls from our partner organizations in India, where YGB sends funds directly.

You can support Yoga Gives Back's mission by purchasing this global calendar. We can make a difference if we work together.

Lots of great photos from "Thank You Mother India" events in 10 countries and more!!

Tom's work for homeless Dec 15-18

2011-12-07T00:00:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the online home of The Giving Spirit, a tax exempt, Los Angeles-based non-profit organization helping and administering aid to the homeless community through direct volunteer interaction.

Have a heart. Lend a hand. Please sign up for our 13th Annual Holiday Reach-Out Event Thursday to Sunday, December 15th, 16th, 17th and 18th!

To register online CLICK HERE.

We’re banding together to assemble survival kits. We’re distributing them to our homeless neighbors throughout the community. And we simply can’t do it without your help!

To learn more, read our FAQs.

Don’t miss this chance to put your heart into action. Register today and make a life-changing difference!

Please visit our blog and join our community on Facebook to read more about our work and stay updated on our latest activities. To see a time lapse video of the TGS volunteers in action, click here.

The Giving Spirit - What We Do

2011-12-06T00:00:00.001-08:00

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Seven Ways to Die [NOOK Book]

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Overview

From the Nez Perce Indian reservation in Idaho to New York’s Central Park is a straight line right through Bill Diehl’s last and most intriguing lead character, Micah Cody.

There are seven basic ways to die. In 1969 Dr. John C. Cavanaugh catalogued them all in his Primer of Forensic Pathology-Cast Studies for the Novice M.E.

Micah Cody is a 30-something NYPD captain of homicide, who’s founded a special unit known as TAZ with city-wide license to take over any investigation at all, with special focus on serial killers. Now its ultimate challenge is on the loose in Manhattan, with three victims already whose causes of death seem like intentional defiance of TAZ’s existence—and four to go in four deadly days leading up to Halloween. Chronicling it all with great amusement is the Capote-like award-winning crime writer Ward Hamilton who, egged on by his sexually voracious socialite bedmate, is determined to bring TAZ to its knees journalistically.

Captain Micah Cody's Nez Perce name is “Youngest Wolf” from his ability to communicate with the animals and read nature's signs. As all hell is breaking loose in Manhattan, the wolves in Central Park howl, the peregrine falcons shriek their warnings—and Micah is listening.

Seven Ways to Die is a non-stop, sexy read with Diehl doing to the end what he did best throughout his bestselling career.

Product Details

BN ID: 2940013453814
Publisher: AEI Books
Publication date: 11/18/2011
Format: eBook
File size: 375 KB
Items ship to U.S, APO/FPO and U.S. Protectorate addresses.

The “SPLINTERNET”: GOLDEN AGE OF THE INTERNET SOON TO BE HISTORY? [via Nina Reznick]

2011-12-05T00:00:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the age of the splinternet
by Anil Ananthaswamy

Openness is the internet's great strength – and weakness. With powerful forces carving it up, is its golden age coming to an end?

How quickly the world changes. In August 1991 Tim Berners-Lee, a researcher at CERN near Geneva, Switzerland, posted a message to a discussion forum detailing a new method for sharing information between networked computers. To make his idea a reality, he also set up a server running on one of CERN's computers. A mere two decades later, some 2 billion of us are hooked up to Berners-Lee's invention, and the UN General Assembly last month declared access to it a fundamental human right. It is, of course, the World Wide Web.

Today, most of us in the developed world and elsewhere take the internet for granted. But should we? The way it works and the way we engage with it are still defined by characteristics it has inherited from its easy-going early days, and this has left it under threat - from criminals, controlling authorities and commercial interests. "The days of the internet as we used to think of it are ending," says Craig Labovitz of Arbor Networks, a security software company in Chelmsford, Massachusetts. Could we now be living in the golden age of the internet?

Though it was the World Wide Web that opened the internet to the world, the underlying structure dates back much further. That architecture took shape in the early 1960s, when the US air force asked Paul Baran at the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California, to come up with a military communications network that could withstand a nuclear attack. Baran proposed a network with no central hub; instead, information would pass from any point in the network to any other through many decentralised switching stations, or routers.

For Baran's plan to work, every message would be broken up into small packets of digital information, each of which would be relayed from router to router, handed over like hot potatoes. Dividing the message into packets instead of sending it whole meant that communication links would only be busy during the instant they were called upon to carry those packets. The links could be shared from moment to moment. "That's a big win in terms of efficiency," says Jon Crowcroft, a computer scientist at the University of Cambridge. It also made the network fast and robust: there was no central gatekeeper or single point of failure. Destroy any one link, and the remaining routers could work out a new path between origin and destination.

Baran's work paved the way for the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (see "Internet evolution"), which then led to the internet and the "anything goes" culture that remains its signature. From then on, the internet was open to anyone who wanted to join the party, from individual users to entire local networks. "There was a level of trust that worked in the early days," says Crowcroft. No one particularly cared who anyone was, and if you wanted to remain anonymous, you could. "We just connected and assumed everyone else was a nice guy." Even the hackers who almost immediately began to play with the new network's potential for mischief were largely harmless, showing up security weaknesses for the sheer technical joy of it.

These basic ingredients - openness, trust and decentralisation - were baked into the internet at its inception. It was these qualities, which allowed diverse groups of people from far-flung corners of the world to connect, experiment and invent, that were arguably the key elements of the explosive technological growth of the past two decades. That culture gave us the likes of Skype, Google, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.

The internet's decentralised structure also makes it difficult for even the most controlling regime to seal off its citizens from the rest of the world. China and North Korea are perhaps the most successful in this respect; by providing only a few tightly controlled points of entry, these governments can censor the data its people can access. But less restrictive countries, such as South Korea, also splinter their citizens' experience of the web by restricting "socially harmful" sites. Savvy netizens routinely circumvent such attempts, using social media and the web's cloak of anonymity to embarrass and even topple their governments. The overthrow of the Egyptian regime in February is being called by some the first social media revolution. Though debatable, this assertion is supported in the book Tweets From Tahrir, an account told entirely through Twitter messages from the centre of the nation's capital.

It is tempting to think that things can only get better - that the internet can only evolve more openness, more democracy, more innovation, more freedom. Unfortunately, things might not be that simple.

There's a problem on the horizon, and it comes from an unexpected quarter - in fact from some of the very names we have come to associate most strongly with the internet's success. The likes of Apple, Google and Amazon are starting to fragment the web to support their own technologies, products and corporate strategy. Is there anything that can be done to stop them?

Some authorities are certainly trying. Google, for instance, has attracted the scrutiny of the US Federal Trade Commission, which last month launched an antitrust investigation to determine whether the company's search results skew towards businesses with which it is aligned and away from its competitors. And as millions of people buy into Apple's world of iPads and iPhones, they are also buying into Apple's restricted vision of the internet. The company tightly controls the technologies users are allowed to put on those devices.

Take, for instance, Adobe's Flash software, which most PCs support and most websites use to run graphics and other multimedia, and even entire apps. Flash is prohibited in all Apple apps, for security reasons - which means that the iPhone browser cannot display a large portion of the internet. That creates a private, Apple-only ecosystem within the larger internet. A similar kind of balkanisation is evident in Google's Android mobile-phone operating system, Amazon's Kindle e-reader, and Facebook's networks, which are completely walled off from the rest of the internet.

Should we care? On the one hand, these companies have grown so big precisely because they make products and provide services that we want to use.

The problem is that this concentration of power in the hands of a few creates problems for resilience and availability. "From an engineering standpoint, the downsides to this are the same things you get with monoculture in agriculture," says Labovitz. Ecosystems without genetic variation are the most vulnerable to being wiped out by a single virus. Similarly, as more of us depend on ever fewer sources for content, and get locked into proprietary technologies, we will become more susceptible to potentially catastrophic single points of failure.

That problem will only intensify with the ascendancy of the cloud, one of the biggest internet innovations of the past few years. The cloud is the nebulous collection of servers in distant locations that increasingly store our data and provide crucial services. It started with web mail services like Hotmail, which let you store your email on central servers rather than on the computer in front of you. The concept quickly spread. Last month, Apple announced the iCloud, a free service that will store all your music, photos, email, books and other data - and even apps - for seamless access via any Apple device, be that an iPhone, iPad or MacBook laptop.

Some companies have moved their entire IT departments into the cloud. Indeed, there are companies that barely exist outside the cloud: in addition to backing up data, Amazon lets internet-based companies rent space on its servers.

The cloud could generate exactly the single points of failure that the internet's robust architecture was supposed to prevent. And when those points fail, they may fail spectacularly. During an outage of Amazon's cloud service in April, when the company's servers went dark, entire companies briefly blinked out of existence. Cloud services also raise security concerns. "One big issue with being connected to the cloud is that a lot of information is in different places and shared," says Labovitz. "You no longer have one castle to protect. It's a much more distributed architecture, and a connected one. You just need one weak link."

Labovitz's worries are substantiated by a recent rise in real-world attacks. In March, an unknown group hacked RSA, a company that makes electronic tokens that can be used to create a supposedly impregnable password. Two months later, hackers used what they had gleaned from that attack to infiltrate computers belonging to the defence contractor Lockheed Martin, which relied on those tokens for their security. In May, Sony Online Entertainment's servers were hacked, compromising the personal information of about 25 million users.

The vulnerability is worrying enough if it's our email or personal data being hacked, but soon it could be more intimate and dangerous than that. Imagine being a heart patient and having your pacemaker hacked, or someone with diabetes whose insulin supply is suddenly cut off. That is a real prospect, as the next big internet innovation, the "internet of things", gets under way. In the utopian vision, sensors embedded in all kinds of everyday objects will continuously communicate with the cloud.

Objects that participate in this internet of things might be as mundane as a sensor in your refrigerator that tells the nearest supermarket when you're out of milk. Or it could be a medical sensor that taps into a cloud-based controller, for example, a monitor that transmits a diabetic person's glucose levels to a data centre every 5 minutes. This information could instantly be used to calculate an optimal insulin dosage, which is transmitted back to an insulin pump.

As we begin to interact with the internet in this way, without ever touching a keyboard or a screen, we will become increasingly vulnerable to threats, such as hacking and network instability, that were once only relevant for a small and relatively insignificant part of our lives. And that might necessitate a fundamental rethink of how the internet works.

Take anonymity. "It is the internet's greatest strength and its greatest weakness," says Marc Goodman, a computer security consultant who blogs at futurecrimes.com. For every popular uprising it facilitates, anonymity allows a slew of criminals far more dangerous than those early hackers to cover their online tracks. And these anonymous criminals can reach right into your computer if it's not well protected. There is no security built into the internet.

There have been several proposals to address this weakness. In 2009, Eugene Kaspersky, who runs the internet security firm Kaspersky Labs, based in Moscow, Russia, suggested that the internet would be better off if people were required to have a kind of licence to get online. To access Kaspersky's vision of the internet, for example, the processor in your computer might need to be verified. An authentication requirement would fragment the internet in many ways. Despite the idea's significant technical obstacles and the objections it raises among privacy advocates, however, similar proposals pop up from time to time.

There might be another way. The US National Science Foundation is investing $32 million in a project it calls the Future Internet Architectures programme. Under its auspices, four different groups have been set up, each spread across numerous institutions, to investigate options for a more evolved internet. The groups will cover mobile internet access, identity verification schemes, data safety - and cloud computing, part of the project called Nebula, after the Latin for "cloud". Given the promise of the internet of things, securing the cloud might be a good place to start. That means revamping the internet to ensure that it is highly resilient and constantly available: for example, by finding new ways of transmitting packets of information.

"Internet routing algorithms were designed in an era where people were really excited about finding the best path through a network," says Jonathan Smith of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, who heads the Nebula team. "It's a beautiful algorithm. If you can find the best path, you should take it."

But what if that "best" path breaks down, in an attack, say? Choosing a new path can introduce delays that might be trivial for checking your email but crippling for applications that rely on real-time instructions from the cloud, such as the control for an insulin pump. So Smith and his colleagues are developing algorithms that will establish many, predetermined paths from endpoint to endpoint, something that is not possible in today's internet. Such an advance could increase the network's resilience to hacking.

Nebula's creators also envisage giving senders more control over the path their packets take, just as offline businesses can opt to hire safe couriers for a particularly important package, rather than entrusting it to the general mail. Similarly, receivers could dictate who can send them packets and routers could verify that a packet is indeed taking the intended path. This could solve the problem of trusting your network without resorting to a national or global internet identity programme.

There are some hard choices ahead. Had the internet been built with bulletproof security in mind, we might never have reaped the rewards of breakneck innovation. Yet as our dependence on the internet grows, we are more vulnerable to those who seek to disrupt - whether they are hackers exposing the internet's weaknesses, governments intent on keeping their citizens under control, or corporations driven by profits.

So how many of the internet's fundamental properties do we want to change? The nature of our future online lives will depend on answering this question, on how we walk the tightrope between total security and innovation-friendly openness. It is a question that will require widespread and vocal debate, says William Lehr of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "We cannot just assume that everything will work out fine," he says. But with some careful thought about how we want the next phase of the internet to look, we might prolong its golden age.

Anil Ananthaswamy is a consultant for New Scientist

Magazine issue 2821. Editorial: "The rise of the splinternet"

http://www.newscientist.com

Friends of Irony [via David Angsten]

2011-12-02T00:00:00.000-08:00

THE OTHER MADONNA: STORY MERCHANT CLIENT DIANE MYERSON’S BEST FRIEND

2011-11-30T00:00:00.000-08:00

MADONNA: STORY MERCHANT CLIENT DIANE MYERSON’S BEST FRIEND

2011-11-28T00:00:00.000-08:00

THE CAVE OF CAVES [via Nina Reznick]

2011-11-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

Into the depths of the earth: Cave network in the heart of Vietnamese jungle is so large its end is yet to be found

These are the breathtaking images which capture the hidden depths of the world's biggest cave passage, which still has left cavers still searching for its end.

Hidden in the depths of the Vietnamese jungle lies The Hang Son Doong, part of a network of over 150 caves.

Discovered by British cavers in 2009, the cave passage in Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park was originally thought to be a modest 150 metres long and 200 feet high.

Intrepid journey: A caver stands in front of a huge rock formation as the light shines beneath a skylight in Hang Son Doong

But these remarkable images - taken during two further expeditions of the caves - show the previously undiscovered depths of the magnificent cave passage, now the largest in the world.

At a mammoth 2.5 miles long, 330ft wide and almost 800ft high, Hang Son Doong also known as Mountain River Cave, is as high as 25 double decker buses.

And as shown in these amazing images taken by photographer Carsten Peter, there is even a jungle concealed deep inside the cave.

Carsten from Munich, Germany, took the images in 2010 when he joined British and German cavers during further expeditions of the site.


Wonderful waterfalls: A waterfall explodes into Hang Son Doong in the hidden depths of the Vietnamese jungle, which is part of a network of over 150 caves

The purpose of the expedition was to make a complete exploration of Hang Son Doong and create a photographic record of the cave.

Cartsen, 52 said he spent up to two weeks at a time deep inside the caves, where he slept with just a sleeping bag and spent his time exploring and photographing the secret underground world.

He said: ‘We discovered new parts of the cave, it's a huge area so to find them and access them is very difficult.

‘Photographing caves of this size is a challenge, it needs a lot of preparation.

Going underground: Expedition members enter the cave, tunnelled out by the Rao Thuong River in Vietnam - the cave was discovered in 2009

‘But it's a great feeling to photograph a newly discovered cave, for me I see the cave for the first time when I see the photographs.

‘I love to explore, I have been in some great caves in my lifetime and this is one of the most magnificent.

‘I've been a photographer and explorer for the last 35 years and I've visited so many caves, I've lost count.

‘But this is by far one of the most unique and unusual caves I have ever seen.

‘To see a cave so large it has a forest inside is superb - it was overwhelming.’

Gigantic proportions: At a mammoth 2.5 miles long, 330ft wide and almost 800ft high, Hang Son Doong also known as Mountain River Cave, is as high as 25 double decker buses

Spraying [via Nina Reznick]

2011-11-23T00:00:00.001-08:00

About Pepper Spray

By Deborah Blum |

One hundred years ago, an American pharmacist named Wilbur Scoville developed a scale to measure the intensity of a pepper’s burn. The scale – as you can see on the widely used chart to the left – puts sweet bell peppers at the zero mark and the blistering habanero at up to 350,000 Scoville Units.

I checked the Scoville Scale for something else yesterday. I was looking for a way to measure the intensity of pepper spray, the kind that police have been using on Occupy protestors including this week’s shocking incident involving peacefully protesting students at the University of California-Davis.

As the chart makes clear, commercial grade pepper spray leaves even the most painful of natural peppers (the Himalayan ghost pepper) far behind. It’s listed at between 2 million and 5.3 million Scoville units. The lower number refers to the kind of pepper spray that you and I might be able to purchase for self-protective uses. And the higher number? It’s the kind of spray that police use, the super-high dose given in the orange-colored spray used at UC-Davis.

The reason pepper-spray ends up on the Scoville chart is that – you probably guessed this - it’s literally derived from pepper chemistry, the compounds that make habaneros so much more formidable than the comparatively wimpy bells. Those compounds are called capsaicins and – in fact – pepper spray is more formally called Oleoresin Capsicum or OC Spray.

Photo courtesy: California Aggie

But we’ve taken to calling it pepper spray, I think, because that makes it sound so much more benign than it really is, like something just a grade or so above what we might mix up in a home kitchen. The description hints maybe at that eye-stinging effect that the cook occasionally experiences when making something like a jalapeno-based salsa, a little burn, nothing too serious.

Until you look it up on the Scoville scale and remember, as toxicologists love to point out, that the dose makes the poison. That we’re not talking about cookery but a potent blast of chemistry. So that if OC spray is the U.S. police response of choice – and certainly, it’s been used with dismaying enthusiasm during the Occupy protests nationwide, as documented in this excellent Atlantic roundup - it may be time to demand a more serious look at the risks involved.

My own purpose here is to focus on the dangers of a high level of capsaicin exposure. But as pointed out in the 2004 paper, Health Hazards of Pepper Spray, written by health researchers at the University of North Carolina and Duke University, the sprays contain other risky materials:

Depending on brand, an OC spray may contain water, alcohols, or organic solvents as liquid carriers; and nitrogen, carbon dioxide, or halogenated hydrocarbons (such as Freon, tetrachloroethylene, and methylene chloride) as propellants to discharge the canister contents.(3) Inhalation of high doses of some of these chemicals can produce adverse cardiac, respiratory, and neurologic effects, including arrhythmias and sudden death.

Their paper focuses mostly, though, on the dangerous associated with pepper-based compounds. In 1997, for instance, researchers at the University of California-San Francisco discovered that the “hot” sensation of habaneros and their ilk was caused by capsaicin binding directly to proteins in the membranes of pain and heat sensing neurons. Capsaicins can activate these neurons at below body temperature, leading to a startling sensation of heat. Repeated exposure can wear the system down, depleting neurotransmitters, reducing the sensation of the pain. This knowledge has led to a number of medical treatments using capsaicins to manage pain.

Its very mechanism, though, should remind us to be wary. As the North Carolina researchers point out, any compound that can influence nerve function is, by definition, risky. Research tells us that pepper spray acts as a potent inflammatory agent. It amplifies allergic sensitivities, it irritates and damages eyes, membranes, bronchial airways, the stomach lining – basically what it touches. It works by causing pain – and, as we know, pain is the body warning us of an injury.

In general, these are short term effects. Pepper spray, for instance, induces a burning sensation in the eyes in part by damaging cells in the outer layer of the cornea. Usually, the body repairs this kind of injury fairly neatly. But with repeated exposures, studies find, there can be permanent damage to the cornea.

The more worrisome effects have to do with inhalation – and by some reports, California university police officers deliberately put OC spray down protestors throats. Capsaicins inflame the airways, causing swelling and restriction. And this means that pepper sprays pose a genuine risk to people with asthma and other respiratory conditions.
And by genuine risk, I mean a known risk, a no-surprise any police department should know this risk, easy enough to find in the scientific literature. To cite just three examples here:

1) Pepper Spray Induced Respiratory Failure Treated with Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation
2) Assessing the incapacitative effects of pepper spray during resistive encounters with the police.
3) The Human Health Effects of Pepper Spray.

That second paper is from a law enforcement journal. And the summary for that last paper notes: Studies of the effects of capsaicin on human physiology, anecdotal experience with field use of pepper spray, and controlled exposure of correctional officers in training have shown adverse effects on the lungs, larynx, middle airway, protective reflexes, and skin. Behavioral and mental health effects also may occur if pepper spray is used abusively.
Pepper spray use has been suspected of contributing to a number of deaths that occurred in police custody. In mid-1990s, the U.S. Department of Justice cited nearly 70 fatalities linked to pepper-spray use, following on a 1995 report compiled by the American Civil Liberties Union of California. The ACLU report cited 26 suspicious deaths; it’s important to note that most involved pre-existing conditions such as asthma. But it’s also important to note a troubling pattern.

In fact, in 1999, the ACLU asked the California appeals court to declare the use of pepper spray to be dangerous and cruel. That request followed an action by northern California police officers against environmental protestors – the police were accused of dipping Q-tips into OC spray and applying them directly to the eyes of men and women engaged in an anti-logging protest.

“The ACLU believes that the use of pepper spray as a kind of chemical cattle prod on nonviolent demonstrators resisting arrest constitutes excessive force and violates the Constitution,” wrote association attorneys some 13 years ago.
Yesterday, the University of California-Davis announced that it was suspending two of the police officers who pepper-sprayed protesting students. Eleven of those students were treated by paramedics on scene and two were sent to a hospital in Sacramento for more intensive treatment.

Undoubtedly, these injuries will factor into another scientific study of pepper spray, another acknowledgement that top of the Scoville scale is dangerous territory. But my own preference is that we start learning from these mistakes without waiting another 13 years or more, without engaging in yet another cycle of abuse and injury.
Now would be good.

Cross-posted from Speakeasy Science.

About the Author: Deborah Blum is a Pulitzer-Prize winning science writer and the best-selling author of The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York. A professor of science journalism at the University of Wisconsin, she blogs about chemistry culture at Speakeasy Science. Follow on Twitter @deborahblum.

The beach walker (unreal!) via David Angsten

2011-11-21T00:00:00.000-08:00

Led Intermediate Class : Mysore [via Kayoko Mitsumatsu]

2011-11-18T00:00:00.000-08:00

http://www.mahamondo.typepad.com/http://www.mahamondo.typepad.com/

UpPark [via Nina Reznick]

2011-11-16T00:00:00.000-08:00

In Singapore, opened a new wonder of the world. "Sky Park" Marina Bay Sands is located on the 200-meter height on the three skyscrapers, as if on three pillars. Here is the most expensive in the world of casinos, bars, restaurants, the largest outdoor swimming pool, 150 meters long and even the Museum of Modern Art.

Michael Chearney: Living Color by David Kelting

2011-11-14T00:00:00.000-08:00

Michael Chearney: Living Color from David Kelting on Vimeo.

LA-based painter Michael Chearney creates work using flowers as brushes. Afterward, he embeds the flowers, his own clothes and paint brushes into the work.

See examples: chearneygallery.com/gallery/rooms/RDS/RDS_01.htm

Michael Chearney Gallery - www.chearney.com

HD Video by David Lee Kelting - kelting.net
Michael Chearney: Living Color from David Kelting on Vimeo.

IS AMERICA WAKING UP? [via Nina Reznick]

2011-11-11T00:00:00.000-08:00

I AM NOT MOVING - Short Film - Occupy Wall Street

THRILLIONAIRE NIK HALIK MAKING HIS POINT

2011-11-09T00:00:00.000-08:00

DASHA DOES REALITY

2011-11-07T00:00:00.000-08:00

Heard On The Tennis Courts

2011-11-04T00:00:00.000-07:00

NASA astronaut Douglas Wheelock shared pictures of the Earth ...

2011-11-02T00:00:00.000-07:00

with the world while he was aboard the International Space Station

Smile [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-10-31T00:00:00.000-07:00

Heard On The Tennis Courts

2011-10-28T00:00:00.001-07:00

Best Steve Job Quotes [via Nina Reznick]

2011-10-26T00:00:00.000-07:00

"We've never worried about numbers. In the market place, Apple is trying to focus the spotlight on products, because products really make a difference. [...] Ad campaigns are necessary for competition; IBM's ads are everywhere. But good PR educates people; that's all it is. You can't con people in this business. The products speak for themselves."

-- Playboy interview, 1985

"That's been one of my mantras -- focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it's worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains."

-- BusinessWeek interview, May 1998

"The most compelling reason for most people to buy a computer for the home will be to link it into a nationwide communications network. We're just in the beginning stages of what will be a truly remarkable breakthrough for most people--as remarkable as the telephone."

-- Playboy interview, 1985

"We've kept our marriage secret for over a decade."

-- Jobs' answer to Kara Swisher asking about the "greatest misunderstanding" in Jobs' relationship with Bill Gates. (May 2007)

"It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them."

-- BusinessWeek interview, May 1998

"Picasso had a saying: 'Good artists copy, great artists steal.' We have always been shameless about stealing great ideas...I think part of what made the Macintosh great was that the people working on it were musicians, poets, artists, zoologists and historians who also happened to be the best computer scientists in the world."

-- 1994

"[Y]ou can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something -- your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."

-- Stanford University commencement address, June 2005.

"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything -- all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart. ... Stay hungry. Stay foolish."

-- Stanford University commencement address, June 2005.

"I read a study that measured the efficiency of locomotion for various species on the planet. The condor used the least energy to move a kilometer. Humans came in with a rather unimpressive showing about a third of the way down the list....That didn't look so good, but then someone at Scientific American had the insight to test the efficiency of locomotion for a man on a bicycle and a man on a bicycle blew the condor away.

That's what a computer is to me: the computer is the most remarkable tool that we've ever come up with. It's the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds."

-- Interview for the documentary "Memory and Imagination," 1990

"My model for business is The Beatles. They were four guys who kept each other's kind of negative tendencies in check. They balanced each other and the total was greater than the sum of the parts. That's how I see business: great things in business are never done by one person, they're done by a team of people."

-- Interview with 60 Minutes, 2003

Holy Sh@#t! [via David Angsten]

2011-10-24T00:00:00.000-07:00

Food For Thought [via David Adashek]

2011-10-21T00:00:00.000-07:00

Apparently Winston Churchill was once asked about his position on whisky.

Here’s how he answered:

"If you mean whisky, the devil’s brew, the poison scourge, the bloody monster that defiles innocence, dethrones reason, destroys the home, creates misery and poverty, yea, literally takes the bread from the mouths of little children; if you mean that evil drink that topples men and women from the pinnacles of righteous and gracious living into the bottomless pit of degradation, shame, despair, helplessness, and hopelessness, then, my friend, I am opposed to it with every fiber of my being.

"However, if by whisky you mean the oil of conversation, the philosophic wine, the elixir of life, the ale that is consumed when good fellows get together, that puts a song in their hearts and the warm glow of contentment in their eyes; if you mean good cheer, the stimulating sip that puts a little spring in the step of an elderly gentleman on a frosty morning; if you mean that drink that enables man to magnify his joy, and to forget life’s great tragedies and heartbreaks and sorrow; if you mean that drink the sale of which pours into our treasuries untold millions of dollars each year, that provides tender care for our little crippled children, our blind, our deaf, our dumb, our pitifully aged and infirm, to build the finest highways, hospitals, universities, and community colleges in this nation, then my friend, I am absolutely, unequivocally in favor of it.

"This is my position, and as always, I refuse to compromise on matters of principle."

Bird-Brain! [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-10-19T00:00:00.000-07:00

Bill owns a company that manufactures and installs car wash systems. Bill 's company installed a car wash system in Frederick , Md. Now, understand that these are complete systems, including the money changer and money-taking machines. The problem started when the new owner complained to Bill that he was losing significant amounts of money from his coin machines each week. He went as far as to accuse Bill 's employees of having a key to the boxes and ripping him off. Bill just couldn't believe that his people would do that, so they setup a camera to catch the thief in action. Well, they did catch him on film!

That's a bird sitting on the change slot of the machine.

The bird had to go down into the machine, and back up inside to get to the money!

That's three quarters he has in his beak!

Another amazing thing is that it was not just one bird -- there were several working together. Once they identified the thieves, they found over $4000 in quarters on the roof of the car wash and more under a nearby tree.

[via Nina Reznick]

2011-10-17T11:20:00.000-07:00

Yoga Gives Back - October Newsletter

2011-10-14T00:00:00.000-07:00

October 2011

For the cost of one yoga class, you can change a life.

"Thank You Mother India" Special E Letter

SUCCESS STORY: First Global Event Raised $ 27,505.16!!!

We did it!!! This unprecedented global fundraiser brought together over 50 yoga studios in 11 countries with 750 participants for one great cause. Thanks to the overwhelming support, this international event raised $ 27,505.16 to date, surpassing our goal of $20,000. Your contributions will significantly aid in our campaign to secure the second year of "Sister Aid" direct funding to 56 women and children in India, as well as increasing the number of our fund recipients. We will update you as soon as our local NGO partners; NISHTHA in West Bengal and Deenabandhu in Karnataka, identify our new fund recipients. This global collaboration has been so encouraging and inspiring for us not only because of the amount of money raised, but more importantly because it has proven that a global yoga community can come together for one mission; to make a difference and give back to India together. Below are some heartfelt "testimonials" from our global supporters.

Check TYMI website for the list of all participants and updates for 2012 event!! If you could not support TYMI event, but would like to contribute, please use our Pay Pal Donation.

Please send your suggestions for TYMI in 2012 to info@yogagivesback.org.

Our thanks to the following sponsors and studios!

Platinum ($2500 +): David Hong, Wei Wong & Friends in Hong Kong, Omkar108 Yoga LA

Gold ($1000+): Khalid Faiz Muhamed, The Yoga Shala Singapore, Pure Yoga Hong Kong, Yoga Mala Hong Kong, Chet Jewan & Soul Body Yoga Moorpark-LA, Yoga Flex Charlotte, The Yoga Place LA

Silver ($ 500+): Tri Yoga Chelsea-London, Mark Robberds Tokyo, Chaz Russ@Lululemon Calabasas-LA, Yoga Happy Norwich-UK, Black Dog Yoga Sherman Oaks-LA, MahaMondo.com, Mission Street Yoga Pasadena-LA, Steven Woodruff Family LA, Yogayama Stockholm-Sweden

Sponsors: Yoga Magazine, National Yoga Month, Zobha, Manduka, yogitoes, C pur, bijubee, ekaDasa, Sokenbicha, , Jala Clothing, Capital Brands, Le Pain Quotidien, The Conservatory Coffee, Core Power Yoga, Yoga Earth

Global Calendar 2012 "Thank You Mother India"

YGB is creating our first global calendar to celebrate this successful global campaign. This calendar will be distributed to all the participating yoga studios and sponsors worldwide. To become an advertising sponsor for this special calendar, please contact us immediately at info@yogagivesback.org. Space is very limited.

Testimonials from our global supporters!!

Laruga Glaser, Yogayama, Stockholm, Sweden
"We had a great group of people for the class. This type of thing is still quite new to Sweden, however with that being said, there is interest and we have hopes that it will grow with future events!"

Luna Delgado Dold, Dharma Yoga, Chicago
"We had a wonderful time and a great turnout for our little space! We raised 320 dollars!!! I was so proud of the students who came and brought their friends. I truly believe that this was such a great way to promote yoga and offer thanks to India through these women. I cannot wait to see how this project impacts their lives! I really look forward to following up with you and also planning for next year's events!!! "

Mark Robberds, Tokyo, Japan
"For me it was special to note that despite the recent tragedies in Japan early this year, and all the help that is needed in Japan itself, the yoga students here showed their generosity of spirit and big hearts to come and give to those in need elsewhere."

Caroline Wilson, Karmic Living, Hertfordshire, UK
"A big thank you to all my yoga friends and their friends that helped raise £141.50 at today's charity yoga class for Yoga Gives Back. Today we've helped up to 9 women in India to start their own businesses with microfinancing and it felt fabulous. Thank you YGB for coming up with this lovely idea - perfect for a Sunday morning!"

Shari Bourque Goldstein YogaFlex, Charlotte, NC
"We thank you for bringing your beautiful organization to our studio! We had one of the most amazing classes taught by Mara Healy this morning in your honor - with live drumming and yoga energy over-filling the room."

Wendy Wyvill, Pure Yoga, Hong Kong
"Our YGB Karma class was a great success! We raised over 11000$ HK $. Our class was taught by five amazing Pure Yoga teachers. We blended all our teaching together. I think this brought a unique feel to the class. I am very stoked to do another class next year and again co-teach with my other dear Pure teachers."

Maria Merrill, Yoga Ananda, Houston, TX
"We had a small class but the energy and intention for this great cause was HUGE!"

Welcome New Ambassadors!!

YGB is thrilled to have Claudia Fucigna, Denise Woods, Joan Hyman, and Sarah Ezrin from Los Angeles, and Julee Yew-Crijns from UK to join us. Check this growing powerful team and their messages at: http://www.yogagivesback.org/ambassadors.php

Upcoming Events

"Donation Class Relay" happening in new cities!!!

Sukha Yoga, Eco Lake, Singapore
"Yoga in Nature" Botanical Garden

Sunday Oct. 9th, 5-8pm

Living Yoga Studio, New Hampshire

Sunday Oct, 30th, 9-10:30am; Beth-Aime Labonte's special charity class

The Class, Kensington, London
at Whole Food Market

Mondays from Oct. 3rd, 6:30-8pm; Yoga Magazine hosts this special charity class every Monday taught by Heather Lee from Y&W

Press!

"An Important Place in India: Yoga off the Mat" (Wholeliving daily) Great blog by YGB Ambassador Sophie Herbert, who is making her annual visit to Deenbandhu Trust Home in Karnataka, India. YGB now funds 2 mothers and 6 children at this home.

Thank you for your support, which is making a difference one event at a time!!

IN THIS ISSUE

SUCCESS STORY
Global Fundraiser
"Thank You Mother India"

SPECIAL THANKS

GLOBAL CALENDAR

TESTIMONIALS

NEW AMBASSADORS

UPCOMING EVENTS

PRESS

FOLLOW

Follow Yoga Gives Back on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube!

JOIN

DONATION

Your donation helps Yoga Gives Back's campaign to alleviate poverty in India. To make a donation, click the link below.

Yoga Gives Back is a 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Organization.

Questions, comments, want to get involved?
Email info@yogagivesback.org.

www.yogagivesback.org

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Heard on the Tennis Court

2011-10-13T00:00:00.000-07:00

Yoga Gives Back Around the World

2011-10-12T00:00:00.000-07:00

Leslie Hendry

Founder, Azawhistle.com

After foot surgery, I had to find an exercise regime that didn't require shoes. My gym offered a yoga class and from there I started "doing" yoga.

I'd heard of yoga places with their Om or shanti-something names, but it didn't mean I would enter the unknown. My gym was the familiar, and even though I peddled on the bikes, climbed the elliptical machine, and pounded weights, I knew no one and spoke to no one.

This is how I rolled for years. I still know no one from the gyms I frequented, and I've never reminisced about padding the mechanical stairs. I certainly didn't help launch a non-profit to give back to a culture that brought weigh training into my life. But that's what I did after I hit the yoga path.

Eleven years of yoga practice later, I pause when reading what yoga brings to practitioners. I do this because I still don't comprehend how yoga does all that people proclaim, but it does, and more.

Here's what I do know: The physical practice of yoga changes the body. As the body changes, our physical, mental and emotional well-being improves. So much so that I've made lifelong friends, studied scripture and philosophy, traveled near and far to practice yoga with compadres and respected teachers, and I contribute through Yoga Gives Back, a non-profit that helps women build sustainable livelihoods with microloans and helps their children reach their dreams through education.

That's my story. For Jorgen Christiansson, long-time yoga teacher and ambassador for Yoga Gives Back, Indian music filtered through his dad's recording studio in Sweden. At a young age he gravitated to the sounds of world music. In the local library, he explored different cultures and, in his late teens, set off to India to learn about Indian philosophy and yoga. Twenty years later he is still practicing and teaching yoga.

"I've always felt strongly about trying to unite people from different faiths, cultures and traditions," Christiansson said. We sat down in his yoga studio, Omkar108, and chatted on the floor while old Hindi bhajans and incense wafted through the air. Christiansson has bright blue eyes and passes for a Midwesterner or a native Swede, but he definitely seems otherworldly.

Yoga, as Westerns have witnessed, has transitioned through the terrible branding phase of the 70s. Like the awkward teen, it's morphed into the beautiful being so many embrace. Yoga's explosion speaks not only to the integrity of yoga but also to the creativity and innovation of the West.

Retail stores like Lululemon and yoga schools like Bikram have blossomed. But without this ancient Indian practice we would have none of this.

Kayoko Mitsumatsu, a Japanese documentary filmmaker and resident of Los Angeles, started to explore yoga's roots while enjoying her regular yoga practice. Mitsumatsu also understood the power of microloans after producing a documentary on the subject, learning about Dr. Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank and the innovator of microloans as we know them today. Mitsumatsu felt strongly about the practice's effect on her and founded Yoga Gives Back to give back to the country that gave us yoga.

76% of India's population lives below the poverty line while six billion dollars is spent each year on yoga in the U.S. alone.

"With $25 a month, a struggling woman can start her own business, or a child can go to school. For the cost of one yoga class, you can change a life," Mitsumatsu said.

Yoga Gives Back is just a few years old but has grown rapidly with an expanding network of teachers and volunteers around the globe. Proceeds from donation yoga classes go to either the Grameen Foundation or to a direct funding program launched in 2010 called Sister Aid. Among 22 mothers who received microloans this year, 15 women are already making profits.

On September 17, Yoga Gives Back launches their first global fundraiser, "Thank You Mother India," with over 50 studios from 10 countries participating. Teachers will devote a special donation class so that everyone can share in the moment.

"I appreciate Jorgen's support to make this event for all, uniting the global yoga community beyond schools and geographical borders to give back to India."

"It's nice to acknowledge India," Christiansson said. "With the yoga community to support this cause it helps us remember the importance of the roots of yoga and practice it from a sincere place."

Today in India, yoga's roots are going through another transformation as techies and middle-class Indians seek out Western style yoga studios. Christiansson was recently asked to teach yoga in India to Indians. Given that he sought out this unique and old culture as a child, I asked him if he thought it was strange it would seek him out as an adult.

"People come to practice from all walks of life, with their own limitations and reasons, but we realize through yoga, the main work we do inside is all the same."

A quest that began in a Swedish library and a recording studio, grew into a lifelong dedication to India. "You reach people's hearts through three things: music, food and language," Christiansson said.

I guess we can now add a fourth, yoga.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leslie-hendry/yoga-gives-back_b_935591.html

Yoga Gives Back is a 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Organization.

Questions, comments, want to get involved?
Email info@yogagivesback.org.

www.yogagivesback.org

Can I Borrow a Ladder? [via Nina Reznick]

2011-10-10T00:00:00.000-07:00

Dolphin Tool [via Nina Reznick]

2011-10-07T00:00:00.000-07:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/26/science/26obdolphin.html?ref=science

Dolphin Tool Helps to Find Fare on Seafloor

Eric M. Patterson

A bottlenose dolphin wearing a marine basket sponge in Shark Bay.

By SINDYA N. BHANOO

In the 1980s it was discovered that some bottlenose dolphins in Shark Bay, Australia, rip up marine basket sponges from the seafloor and place them on their beaks for protection as they forage for food along rocky substrate. It is the only known instance of tool use by dolphins in the wild.

2011-10-05T00:00:00.000-07:00

New York now leads the world’s great cities in the number of people around whom you shouldn’t make a sudden move.—David Letterman

ADIEU, ELAINE! [via Stefanie Smith]

2011-10-03T00:00:00.000-07:00

Op-Ed Contributor http://www.nytimes.com

The Elaine’s That I Knew

By BRIAN McDONALD

ONE night, after I’d pulled the rolling metal gates down over the storefront of Elaine’s, the legendary restaurant on the Upper East Side, and just as I was about to put the padlocks on, I realized that I wasn’t sure if my boss, Elaine Kaufman, had left or not.

She had. But in that moment, at 4 a.m. on the sidewalk, it occurred to me that Elaine might have been perfectly happy spending the night locked in her restaurant. Her relationship with her joint, as she called it, was co-dependent. She didn’t want to be anywhere else, and the place couldn’t exist without her.
It really couldn’t. Elaine’s restaurant opens tonight for the last time, and then will close for good, less than six months after Elaine’s death.

What made the place famous was, of course, fame. Tell a story about Elaine’s, and you’re likely telling about a celebrity. I worked behind the bar at Elaine’s for 11 years, from 1986 to 1997, and my highlight reel includes Jackie Gleason behind the oak doing his “Joe the Bartender” routine; pouring Champagne into the Stanley Cup when some of the New York Rangers came in with it after winning the 1994 National Hockey League championship; and watching Hunter S. Thompson set himself on fire drinking flaming shots of Bacardi 151 rum.

One evening, when it seemed that all of Elaine’s literary lions were in for dinner — William Kennedy, Kurt Vonnegut and George Plimpton, to name a few — Elaine sat with the thriller writer Mary Higgins Clark. Later, Elaine came up to the bar. “She sells more books than all of them combined,” she said with a satisfied expression, one woman sticking up for another.

But what I find more remarkable than the celebrities and writers who flocked to Elaine’s is that the restaurant has been open since 1963, and for much of that time has been packed with customers, and this even though Elaine ran it like a candy store. In this age of computerized point-of-sale systems and restaurant-reservation apps, she wrote all the dinner checks by hand, took reservations over a pay phone and had an old NCR cash register behind the bar that seemed to ring all night. Back when flatbed trucks hauled huge rolls of newsprint paper down Second Avenue past the restaurant toward the New York Times presses, Tommy, my bartending partner, would look out the window and say, “Here’s Elaine’s shipment of cash register tape.”

At the end of business, I’d hand Elaine the receipts and a fat roll of cash, which she’d slide into her brassiere. Then she’d push her glasses up on her forehead, look at the totals of the tape through a squinted eye and say, “Nice,” in a throaty whisper.

I was often asked if I knew the secret to the restaurant’s success. I have no idea, I’d say. Though the food wasn’t as bad as some made it out to be — even considering the afternoon I saw the chef breading slabs of roast beef because he’d run out of veal cutlets — it certainly wasn’t the fare that drew the crowds. Perhaps the chance to rub elbows with the rich and famous attracted some of the customers. Then again, we New Yorkers pride ourselves on our immunity to celebrity fever.

I’m sure some would say that Elaine was the reason for the restaurant’s popularity. But those of us who knew her well would never accuse her of being a crowd pleaser. On busy nights, she’d sit on the cashier’s seat at the end of the bar, stab her pencil in the electric sharpener and bury her head in the dinner checks.
She was much more at ease in the afternoons, when the restaurant was closed. She was always there, reading the tabloids or paying the liquor bill or the fish man. We’d gossip about the customers, and she’d tell stories of the old days of the restaurant. But she was never nostalgic. Nor did she seem all that concerned about the future. One afternoon she was on the pay phone when I came in. I listened as she answered questions about the Queens neighborhood where she grew up and the grammar school she went to. After she hung up, I inquired about the call. “An obit writer,” she said offhandedly. “They keep them on file.”
Maybe that’s the reason her restaurant was successful: for Elaine, there was no profit in worrying about tomorrow or yesterday. What mattered to her were the names in the reservation book for that night.

Brian McDonald is the author of “Last Call at Elaine’s: A Journey From One Side of the Bar to the Other.”

Smile! [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-09-30T00:00:00.000-07:00

Green Jobs Are Real [via Nina Reznick]

2011-09-28T00:00:00.000-07:00

By Stephen Lacey, Climate Progress

Washington, D.C., United States – With roughly 93,500 direct and indirect jobs, the American solar industry now employs about 9,200 more workers than the U.S. steel production sector, according to 2010 Bureau of Labor Statistics. The American steel industry has historically been a symbol of the country's industrial might and economic prosperity. But today, the solar industry has the potential to overtake that image as we build a new, clean-energy economy.

Last week, Germany’s economic development agency announced similarly big news: There are now more than 100,000 workers employed in the German solar PV industry alone. Why is that so significant? The U.S. figures take into account solar jobs in PV, solar hot water and concentrating solar power; Germany is only factoring in solar PV.

And as a reader over at Clean Technica observed: “The US has about 312 million people while Germany has 82 million, about 25% as many people…. That makes the German solar industry more than four times as large an employer than US steel based on country size.”

A couple words of caution: These figures are comparing solar manufacturing, sales and installation to steel production alone. If one were to factor in products made from steel, the industry would be up around 160,000 workers.

With that said, the solar industry is just getting started here in America. Solar is a high-growth industry with the potential to create millions more jobs in a diverse range of sectors; while still an extraordinarily important industry, steel is not.

Rhone Resch, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association, explains the significance:

Whether it is construction contractors, plumbers, electricians, assembly-line workers or even lawyers and accountants, solar is creating new opportunities at a time when so many Americans are looking for some good news on the job front. In just three short years, the solar industry has grown from a small start-up to an industry that now employs more Americans than U.S. steel production.

Yet, even with such a big milestone for the U.S. economy, political leaders like Louisiana Representative John Fleming are questioning the “so-called green jobs that we’re yet to see produced.”

The bigger question for Mr. Fleming and other doubters is: Which curve do you want to place your bets on? Read More

I Want One of These [via Laurie Dressman]

2011-09-26T00:00:00.000-07:00

By Chris Woodyard, USA TODAY

There's nothing like a giant drivable banana to light up everyone you meet.

It's the creation of Steve Braithewaite of Cooperstown, Pa., who recently peeled through Flint, Mich., the Flint Journal reports.

"I had no idea how much I was going to enjoy people laughing and smiling at me," Braithwaite was quoted as saying after parked.

The banana cruiser started life as a Ford F-150 pickup truck and was transformed with the help of steel, foam and fiberglass. He says he was inspired by the fruit basket he spied one day.

"I just had a crazy desire to do something ridiculous," he tells reporter Khalil AlHajal.

Lawrence Goldberg, "Marcus Pincus" [via David Adashek]

2011-09-23T00:00:00.000-07:00

Listen Up [via David Angsten]

2011-09-21T00:00:00.000-07:00

Gillette Commercial

...don't block the keeen-whaaa... [via Steven Kates]

2011-09-19T00:00:00.000-07:00

http://www.fogandsmog.com

DRUG YOURSELF AT COSTCO [via Nina Reznick]

2011-09-16T00:00:00.000-07:00

Since the cost of prescription drugs is so outrageous, I thought everyone should know about this. It pays to shop around! This helps to solve the mystery as to why they can afford to put a Walgreen's on every corner. On Monday night, Steve Wilson, an investigative reporter for Channel 7 News in Detroit , did a story ongeneric drug prices gouging by pharmacies. He found in his investigation that some of these generic drugs were marked up as much as 3,000% or more. So often we blame the drug companies for the high cost of drugs, and usually rightfully so. But in this case, the fault clearly lies with the pharmacies themselves. For example if you had to buy aprescription drug, and bought the name brand, you might pay $100 for 100 pills.

The pharmacist might tell you that if you get the generic equivalent, they would only cost $80, making you think you are saving $20. What the pharmacist is not telling you is that those 100 generic pills may have only cost him $10!

At the end of the report, one of the anchors asked Mr. Wilson whether or not there were any pharmacies that did not adhere to this practice, and he said that Costco consistently charged little over their cost for the generic drugs.

I went to the Costco site, where you can look up any drug, and get its online price. It says that the in-store prices are consistent with the online prices. I was appalled. Just to give you one example from my own experience I had to use the drug Compazine which helps prevent nausea in chemo patients.

I used the generic equivalent, which cost $54.99 for 60 pills at CVS. I checked the price at Costco, and I could have bought 100 pills for $19.89. For 145 of my pain pills, I paid $72.57. I could have got 150 at Costco for $28.08.

I would like to mention, that although Costco is a 'membership' type store, you do NOT have to be a member to buy prescriptions there as it is a federally regulated substance. You just tell them at the door that you wish to use the pharmacy, and they will let you in. I am asking each of you to please help me by copying this letter, and passing it into your own e-mail, and send it to everyone you know with an e-mail address.

Sharon L. Davis
Budget Analyst
U.S. Department of Commerce
Room 6839
Office Ph: 202-482-4458
Office Fax: 202-482-5480
E-mail Address:sdavis@doc.gov

Did you ever wonder how much it costs a drug company for the active ingredient in prescription medications? Some people think it must cost a lot, since many drugs sell for more than $2.00 per tablet. We did a search of offshore chemical synthesizers that supply the active ingredients found in drugs approved by the FDA. As we have revealed in past issues of Life Extension a significant percentage of drugs sold in the United States contain active ingredients made in other countries. In our independent investigation of how much profit drug companies really make, we obtained the actual price of active ingredients used in some of the most popular drugs sold in America .

Celebrex:100 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $130.27
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.60
Percent markup: 21,712%

Claritin:10 mg
Consumer Price (100 tablets): $215.17
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.71
Percent markup: 30,306%

Keflex:250 mg
Consumer Price (100 tablets): $157.39
Cost of general active ingredients: $1.88
Percent markup: 8,372%

Lipitor:20 mg
Consumer Price (100 tablets): $272.37
Cost of general active ingredients: $5.80
Percent markup: 4,696%

Norvasc:10 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $188.29
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.14
Percent markup: 134,493%
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Paxil:20 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $220.27
Cost of general active ingredients: $7.60
Percent markup: 2,898%

Prevacid:30 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $44.77
Cost of general active ingredients: $1.01
Percent markup: 34,136%

Prilosec: 20 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $360.97
Cost of general active ingredients $0.52
Percent markup: 69,417%

Prozac:20 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets) : $247.47
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.11
Percent markup: 224,973%

Tenormin:50 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $104.47
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.13
Percent markup: 80,362%
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Vasotec:10 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $102.37
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.20
Percent markup: 51,185%

Xanax:1 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets) : $136.79
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.024
Percent markup: 569,958%

Zestril:20 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets) $89.89
Cost of general active ingredients $3.20
Percent markup: 2,809%

Zithromax:600 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $1,482.19
Cost of general active ingredients: $18.78
Percent markup: 7,892%

Zocor:40 mg
Consumer price (100 tablets): $350.27
Cost of general active ingredients: $8.63
Percent markup: 4,059%

Zoloft:50 mg
Consumer price: $206.87
Cost of general active ingredients: $1..75
Percent markup: 11,821%

Irony At Its Best [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-09-14T00:00:00.000-07:00

A Memorable Event [via Steven Kates]

2011-09-12T00:00:00.000-07:00

Dr. Epstein was a renowned physician who earned his undergraduate, graduate, and medical degrees in his home town and then left for Manhattan , where he quickly rose to the top of his field.

Soon he was invited to deliver a significant paper, at a conference, coincidentally held in his home town. He walked on stage and placed his papers on the lectern, but they slid of f onto the floor. As he bent over to retrieve them, at precisely the wrong instant, he inadvertently farted. The microphone amplified his mistake resoundingly through the room and reverberated it down the hall! He was quite embarrassed but somehow regained his composure just enough to deliver his paper. He ignored the resounding applause and raced out the stage door, never to be seen in his home town again.

Decades later, when his elderly mother was ill, he returned to visit her. He reserved a hotel room under the name of Levy and arrived under cover of darkness.The desk clerk asked him, "Is this your first visit to our city, Mr. Levy?"

Dr. Epstein replied, "Well, young man, no, it isn't. I grew up here and received my education here, but then I moved away."

Why haven't you visited?" asked the desk clerk.

Actually, I did visit once, many years ago, but an embarrassing thing happened and since then I've been too ashamed to return."

The clerk consoled him. "Sir, while I don't have your life experience, one thing I have learned is that often what seems embarrassing to me isn't even remembered by others. I bet that's true of your incident too."

Dr. Epstein replied, "Son, I doubt that's the case with my incident."

"Was it a long time ago?"

"Yes, many years."

The clerk asked, "Was it before or after the Epstein Fart?"

Watch the official teaser trailer for the post-apocalyptic western DRY!

2011-09-11T13:08:00.000-07:00

Directed By:Jonathan Ehlers & Patrick Ward-Perkins
Written By:Jonathan Ehlers & Patrick Ward-Perkins
Produced By: Jenine Mayring

Join Facebook fan page (http://facebook.com/DRYmovie) or follow us on Twitter (http://twitter.com/DRYmovie).

THE GOLF WAR [via David Angsten]

2011-09-09T00:00:00.000-07:00

Smile [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-09-07T00:00:00.000-07:00

Yoga Gives Back - August Newsletter

2011-09-05T00:00:00.001-07:00

SUCCESS STORY: Nishtha, West Bengal, India

Thanks to your support, YGB's direct funding project "Sister Aid" is providing funds for 56 impoverished mothers, children and orphans, supporting their education and economic independence.

YGB's new PR card selected a photo of women in Tripuranagar Village, our direct fund recipients

YGB's direct funding program "Sister Aid" continues to sponsor 22 mothers in Tripuranagar, West Bengal, through their micro credit programs. YGB also funds their 22 daughters so they can receive a full education and private tutoring for the whole year.
Here is the update report from NISHTHA's director Mina Das:

Out of 22 women supported, all are continuing their livelihood initiatives and 17 women have started earning profits.
All women except one have been able to not only earn a living, but have also begun to pay back their loan.
All 22 supported daughters of this women's group are continuing their education in formal school education. Personal tutoring is also offered to everyone.

Story of Anjali Naskar
Anjali Naskar lives in Tripuranagar village of Shikharbali - I GP. She lives with her husband and two daughters. Her husband works in a fishery but the work is only available during the rainy season and the rest of the time he farms a small piece of land they have, but the income was not enough to ensure proper education of the daughters. Being illiterate, Anjali and her husband were unable to school them at home.
When we initially shared with Anjali the idea of the women's micro credit collaboration group, she was hesitant. After we briefed her about the benefits of being a part of group, she agreed and now is a Treasurer!

Anjali had experience with the envelope-making business but didn't have enough money to continue. After receiving a loan, and with the support of the group, Anjali grew confident. She is steadily growing her business and her daughters are now going to school regularly, as well as receiving much needed personal tutoring to help with their studies.

YGB is also supporting NISHTHA artisan group's handmade crafts sales at our events, raising over $1500 so far!!

Watch the YGB video series, "Sister Aid " to meet our fund recipients on YGB’s YouTube Channel!!!

Yoga Gives Back is a 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Organization.

Questions, comments, want to get involved?
Email info@yogagivesback.org.

www.yogagivesback.org

Shortest College Essay [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-09-02T00:00:00.000-07:00

A college class was told they had to write a short story in as few words as possible.

The instructions were:The short story had to contain the following three things

1. Religion
2. Sexuality
3. Mystery

Below is the only A+ in the entire class.

Good God, I'm pregnant; I wonder who did it.

Yoga Magazine September issue features YGB and "Thank You Mother India"

2011-08-31T12:12:00.000-07:00

Yoga Magazine USA September 2011

Zoom In (+) To Read Article

YGB- Other Participating Studios

Book to Film: Do It Yourself - video - Author Learning Center

2011-08-30T00:00:00.000-07:00

Book to Film: Do It Yourself - video - Author Learning Center

Outside The Box [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-08-29T00:00:00.001-07:00

CONGRATULATIONS, CLINT!

2011-08-27T00:00:00.000-07:00

Japanese Quake Relief [via David Angsten]

2011-08-26T00:00:00.001-07:00

JAPAN: three months after the quake

These stunning before and after pictures show the amazing progress--and lack of progress--in Japanese cleanup and recovery efforts. (Click HERE for more pix.)For readers interested in contributing to the cause, you can go right now to this page on Amazon.com, and for $3.99 buy a collection of wonderful Japan-themed stories specifically written by 20 different thriller/mystery authors to raise money for Japanese quake relief. Every nickel raised from sales of the book will go to organizations working to rebuild shattered communities and shattered lives in the wake of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. (You can find more details on this remarkable collaboration at the website of author Tim Hallinan).

Please buy the book and pass on the word--you'll enjoy some excellent stories while helping do some good.

THIS IS A CEILING MURAL IN A SMOKER'S LOUNGE.

2011-08-24T00:00:00.000-07:00

Public Toilet in Houston

2011-08-22T00:00:00.000-07:00

It's made entirely of one-way glass!

No one can see you from the outside, but

When you are inside it's like sitting in a clear
Glass box!

Rice Fields of Japan [via David Angsten]

2011-08-19T00:00:00.000-07:00

Looks ordinary enough... but watch as the rice grows!

Stunning crop art has sprung up across rice fields in Japan , but this is no alien creation. The designs have been cleverly PLANTED! Farmers creating the huge displays use no ink or dye.

Instead, different colour rice plants have been precisely and strategically arranged and grown in the paddy fields.

As summer progresses and the plants shoot up, the detailed artwork begins to emerge.

Closer to the image, the careful placement of the thousands of rice plants in the paddy fields can be seen.
Rice-paddy art was started there in 1993 as a local revitalization project, an idea that grew from meetings of the village committees.

The different varieties of rice plants grow alongside each other to create the masterpieces. In the first nine years, the village office workers and local farmers grew a simple design of Mount Iwaki every year. But their ideas grew more complicated and attracted more attention.

In 2005, agreements between landowners allowed the creation of enormou s rice paddy art. A year later, organizers used computers to precisely plot the planting of four differently colored rice varieties that bring the images to life!

TRULY A WORK OF ART!!

HE WILL COVER YOU WITH FEATHERS [via Diane Myerson]

2011-08-17T00:00:00.001-07:00

Psalm 91:4, He will cover you with his feathers. He will shelter you with his wings.

His faithful promises are your armor and protection.

Longest Password [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-08-15T00:00:00.000-07:00

During a recent password audit by Microsoft & Google, It was found that a blonde was using the following password:

" MickeyMinniePlutoHueyLouieDeweyDonaldGoofySacramento"

When asked why she had such a long password,

She said she was told that it had to be at least 8 characters long

And include at least one capital

Against The Wind [via Mary Calhoun]

2011-08-12T00:00:00.000-07:00

NEW BOOK ON "HOW TO UNDERSTAND WOMEN" [via David Angsten]

2011-08-10T00:00:00.000-07:00

“Feel-Sighted” - August 18th - September 3rd

2011-08-08T12:56:00.000-07:00

Artists include: Sylvia Cooper, Airom, Michael Chearney, Nancy Larrew, Alisa Gabrielle and Jaime Becker Curator: Hannah Kim

Opening Reception: Thursday August 18th, 6-10pm

Show Duration: August 18th through September 3rd

The Center for the Partially Sighted Donor Appreciation Night: Thursday, September 1, 6-9pm

Closing Reception: Saturday, September 3rd, 6-10pm

Location: BG Gallery (Bleicher/Golightly) 1431 Ocean Avenue, Santa Monica, CA 90401
Hours: Sunday-Wednesday 12-6pm Thursday-Saturday 12-11pm, +1 310-878-2784 www.bgartdealings.com

Press Contact: Hannah Kim, Hannah@bgartdealings.com

Bleicher Golightly Gallery presents “Feel-Sighted,” a group exhibit featuring touchable artwork. Presenting an unconventional way to “see” art, this show displays works that were meant to be touched as the foremost but not exclusive way to appreciate the art. Some works have been created by artists with partial vision. Inspired by how influential the role of touch can play in the creation of these works, artists invite their guests to don blindfolds and enjoy the works with their fingers instead of their eyes.Employing a diverse vocabulary of textures, forms, and even temperatures, these works invite new considerations and critiques of the traditional visual-only reception of art. Certain showcased artists, who rely heavily on their sense of touch to create their works, invite guests to experience art as the artist does during its formation. The idea was to create work that felt as great as it looked and synthetically inspire the viewer to enjoy it wholly, not just through sight alone.

A portion of the proceeds will be donated to The Center for the Partially Sighted, an L.A.-based non-profit. The Center for the Partially Sighted brings technological training and assistance to those who have lost their sight to help them live independently, and also creates opportunities for them to lead fulfilling and productive lives. We are pleased to coordinate an event that presents works of art to those who have lost much of their sight, as well as to those who typically experience art through their eyes alone. www.low-vision.org

Answering Machine [via Vicki Hake]

2011-08-05T00:00:00.000-07:00

Goldman ‘Too Big’ to Face Prosecution Over Mortgage Securities, Hintz Says [via Nina Reznick]

2011-08-03T00:00:00.000-07:00

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) won’t face criminal prosecution related to sales of mortgage-linked securities because such a move could threaten the U.S. financial system, according to Brad Hintz, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co.

The U.S. Department of Justice, which is reviewing a Senate subcommittee report that alleged Goldman Sachs misled clients before the financial crisis, will avoid jeopardizing the fifth- largest U.S. bank by assets because it’s viewed as “too big to fail,” Hintz wrote in note to clients today.

“If an alleged violation is identified during a Goldman investigation, we expect a reasoned response from the Justice Department,” Hintz wrote. “In a worst case environment, we would expect a ‘too big to fail’ bank such as Goldman to be offered a deferred-prosecution agreement, pay a significant fine and submit to a federal monitor in lieu of a criminal charge.”

Stephen Cohen, a spokesman for New York-based Goldman Sachs, declined to comment on Hintz’s note. Laura Sweeney, a spokeswoman for the Justice Department in Washington, didn’t immediately reply to requests for comment.

Under a deferred-prosecution agreement, the U.S. files charges against a company and agrees to dismiss them after a certain period, typically if the company pays a fine or penalty and improves its governance or other practices. In October, the Justice Department dismissed a conspiracy case against UBS AG (UBSN), Switzerland’s biggest bank, after the expiration of an 18-month deferred prosecution agreement with the Zurich-based bank.

Litigation Risk ‘Manageable’

Hintz, ranked the No. 1 analyst covering brokerage firms in a survey by Institutional Investor last year, said that the Justice Department’s approach to criminal charges against companies has changed since accounting firm Arthur Andersen LLP’s business collapsed following a felony charge.

A 2003 Justice Department policy document “stated that prosecutors can reward cooperation by offering a negotiated settlement to a targeted company that can range from immunity from criminal indictment to a deferred prosecution agreement,” Hintz wrote. “Ultimately, the targeted company is treated not as a hardened criminal but as the equivalent of a juvenile offender that can be reformed.”

Goldman Sachs’s potential civil litigation risk related to sales of mortgage-backed securities and collateralized debt obligations “is manageable,” Hintz wrote, because the statute of limitations for many of the claims has already passed.

Franchise Will ‘Suffer’

Goldman Sachs’s most senior employees, known as partners, have every incentive to put the firm’s legal and political problems behind them, Hintz said.

He kept his “outperform” rating on Goldman Sachs. The stock fell $2.32, or 1.6 percent, to $138.41 at 9:55 a.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. Goldman Sachs has declined 16 percent this year through yesterday.

“As politicians continue to criticize the firm and the public scrutiny persists, we believe that Goldman’s clients will begin to rethink their relationship with the firm and the franchise will ultimately suffer,” he wrote. “With approximately 17 percent of the ownership in the hands of current and former partners, this control group has ample motivation to make amends with politicians and the public in order to reduce the threat to its franchise.”

In July, Goldman Sachs agreed to pay $550 million to settle a civil fraud suit by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that alleged the firm misled clients about a mortgage-linked investment. The settlement, in which the company also admitted to making a “mistake,” was agreed to three months after the firm’s statement that the allegations “are completely unfounded in law and fact and we will vigorously contest them and defend the firm and its reputation.”

Fabrice P. Tourre, the only Goldman Sachs employee who was also sued by the SEC in that case, hasn’t settled that suit.

To contact the reporter on this story: Christine Harper in New York at charper@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: David Scheer at dscheer@bloomberg.net.