Tim Cook...A new look ?

Apple CEO Tim Cook publicly confirmed he is gay.
In an essay by Bloomberg Businessweek advocating for human rights and equality, Cook says he was inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King to set aside his desire for privacy to do something "more important."

"While I have never denied my sexuality, I haven't publicly acknowledged it either, until now,". "So let me be clear: I'm proud to be gay, and I consider being gay among the greatest gifts God has given me."

Cook becomes the first openly gay CEO of a Fortune 500 company.
"Tim Cook's announcement today will save countless lives," says HRC President Chad Griffin. "He has always been a role model, but today millions across the globe will draw inspiration from a different aspect of his life."

"Alabama was too slow to guarantee the rights of minorities during the civil rights era, and now it's too slow to ensure the rights of people based on sexual orientation and gender identity, Apple CEO Tim Cook said Monday in challenging his home state to do better.

Just a thought.

Buffer- !!

Egypt has started work on a buffer zone by destroying homes along its border with the Gaza Strip, following some of the worst attacks by terrorists on the army.
Bulldozers began destroying several abandoned houses along the frontier, just days after armed men attacked an army post killing 31 soldiers in the area.

Egypt has declared a state of emergency in the Sinai Peninsula and indefinitely closed the Rafah crossing, the only non-Israeli passage for Gazans.  It also accelerated plans to create the 500-metre deep buffer zone, and told the area's 10,000 residents they had 48 hours to pack up and leave before they would destroy around 800 homes.

The buffer zone will extend along the 10km border with Gaza, with water-filled trenches to thwart tunnel diggers. Authorities say the border area is used by criminal gangs to smuggle arms from Gaza to Sinai.

The Egyptian army has waged a broad offensive in northern Sinai against armed groups who have emboldened their presence in several areas in the neglected eastern region over the past three years, destroying much of the web-like network of smuggling tunnels that connect the area with Gaza.

Hamas really pulled Israel and Egypt together against their criminal activities in the area. Just a thought.

Goog and Cancer.

Google-Chrome Contact Lenses.

Google is working on a wearable device that would detect changes by monitoring nanoparticles in a person's body. That way, they could detect minor swings in tumor cells and other diseases before it becomes a problem. This would not be Google's first foray into healthcare.

Google has partnered with Alcon and Novartis to make a smart contact lens that measures the glucose levels in diabetics' tears.

The company's research lab is already in the midst of a study involving 10,000 people for its nanoparticle platform, but is looking for partners to help scale it.

Google's announcement was certainly opposite of Apple's.

Apple CEO Tim Cook told the same audience: "I don't see Apple getting into cancer research ...That's well beyond our expertise."

Between 2009 and 2012, Apple shielded at least $74 billion in profits from U.S. tax laws by setting up subsidiaries in Ireland under a special arrangement, the report said. While the practice of using foreign operations to avoid U.S. taxes is legal and common among multinationals, Apple’s scheme was unprecedented in its use of multiple affiliates that had no semblance of a physical presence, Senate staffers said.

You be the Judge, it's your money.           Just a thought.

The Code breaker.

Alan Turing, was a British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher, pioneering computer scientist, mathematical biologist, and marathon runner. He was highly influential in the development of computer science, providing a formalisation of the concepts of "algorithm" and "computation" with the Turing machine.

He is widely considered to be the father of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence.  He devised a number of techniques for breaking German ciphers, including Polish bombe method, an electromechanical machine that could find settings for the Enigma machine.

Winston Churchill said that Turing made the single biggest contribution to Allied victory in the war against Nazi Germany. Turing's pivotal role in cracking intercepted coded messages enabled the Allies to defeat the Nazis in several crucial battles. It has been estimated that Turing's work shortened the war in Europe by as many as two to four years.

Turing has received a royal pardon, almost 60 years subsequent to his suicide. Turing’s homosexuality culminated in the renowned mathematician and computer scientist being subject to criminal prosecution in the early 1950s  a time when homosexual activities were criminalized in the U.K.

Just a thought.

Nurse Kaci

Nurse Kaci Hickox [worked overseas with Doctors Without Borders] said of her three-hour wait at Newark Airport: “No one seemed to be in charge. No one would tell me what was going on or what would happen to me.” An hour later, with little to eat or drink in the meantime, a forehead-scanning thermometer found her temperature to be 101 degrees but staffers refused to use an oral thermometer.
       

"I am scared about how health care workers will be treated at airports when they declare that they have been fighting Ebola in West Africa. I am scared that, like me, they will arrive and see a frenzy of disorganization, fear and, most frightening, quarantine," she said.
       

She was taken by police escort to an isolation tent outside Newark’s University Hospital, where an oral thermometer found a normal temperature of 98.6 degrees, but a forehead scanner again read 101 degrees — a bad reading she blamed on being flushed from her ordeal. A blood test later tested negative for the virus.
                

Hickox will remain in a mandatory 21-day quarantine as part of new procedures put in place by the governors of NY and NJ after a doctor tested positive for the virus.

So there is more to be done. This courageous woman did the best anyone can do. Then the bad news, two million people using the subway like sardines] on a daily basis . Imagine??

Just a thought.

Subway and the Ebola?

 

 

You may Loose it all.

Texas tycoon Samuel Wyly [Worth a Billion Dollars] has filed for bankruptcy, saying he does not have the assets to pay the nearly $300 million that U.S. regulators are demanding for his role in a fraudulent offshore scheme.

Last month, U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin in New York ordered Wyly and the estate of his late brother Charles to pay damages plus interest to the SEC, after a jury found them liable for fraud in May.

In documents filed with a U.S. bankruptcy court in Dallas, Wyly said he had between $100 million and $500 million of both assets and liabilities. 

But lawyers for the SEC have said in court documents that the Wylys' offshore trusts still hold hundreds of millions of dollars in assets. The SEC accused the brothers of constructing a complex system of trusts in the Isle of Man that netted them $553 million in untaxed profits through more than a decade of hidden trades in four companies they controlled.  Nothing is new.

Just a thought.

Canadian Bacon...

A soldier gunned down while guarding a hallowed war memorial in Ottawa.  A shootout in the halls of Parliament shocked Canada's capital and left parts of the city on lockdown. Authorities haven't ruled out the possibility that an additional shooter could be on the loose.

Michael Bibeau has been identified by Canadian officials as the suspected gunman. The gunman was killed after two shooting incidents, one at the Canada War Memorial, and another just minutes later nearby inside Parliament.

Bibeau, born in 1982, was a convert to Islam and had a history of drug use.

His passport had been confiscated by authorities when he planned to go fight overseas.

Comment:

1- Canada is giving "people of the world" a place to live when they couldn't live in their own Countries.

2- Whoever wants to go and join a certain group to fight, he/she should be released and informed that his citizenship expired due to his new allegiances. He/ she should not be back or benefit of the social services provided to the Canadian Citizens.
So kiss the Canadian Bacon good bye.     Just a thought.

Bentley.

Nina Pham and Bentley.

Follow the money.. Monica .

Monica Lewinsky nearly broke down in tears as she recounted her experience as the first person to have their reputation completely destroyed worldwide via the Internet.”

Lewinsky vowed to “give purpose to my past” by speaking publicly.“Sixteen years ago, fresh out of college, a twenty-two year old intern in the White House  and more than averagely romantic, I fell in love with my boss. It happens, By my boss was the president of the United States.

“There was no Facebook, Twitter or Instagram back then. But there were gossip, news and entertainment websites complete with comment sections and emails could be forwarded,” she said. “Of course it was all done on the excruciatingly slow dial-up.”

Monica is back and so is the coming election.
Watch for the funds against the nominees Hilary Clinton.  Watch as the machine start throwing all that they can against the Clinton. It is not going to work.

Just a thought.

Tang & Fang.

Image is not related.

Two female thieves, named Tang Shuiyan and Fang Yunyun, were caught trying to break into the home of an official in Hefei, Anhui Province.   The duo established their name by stealing from officials only.

Tang had been arrested on a burglary. She fled and later joined Fang [2009] in her stealing rampage. Three days before they were arrested, Fang broke into the home of the deputy director of the banking watchdog in Anhui and made off with pre-paid shopping cards, valued at 1.5 million yuan.

Tang had once worked for a telecoms company, where she stole the information of her desired victims, including home address and phone number. Before her “unannounced visits,” she would call to make sure no one was home or in the office.

For instance, Tang once blew the whistle on her two victims, ex-head of Rural Credit Cooperatives in Guizhou Province, and ex-director of the Transportation Department in Guizhou. Her expose led to the duo’s being investigated for disciplinary violations and later indicted for taking bribes.

The duo would take photos of the stolen items and send them to an accomplice, to be used as a warning to victims against calling the police. Since most of the stolen properties were predictably ill-gotten gains  their value way exceeded the owners’ official salaries most victims had chosen to remain silent.               Just a thought.

All direction.

Hired at St. John’s after graduating from its master’s program. Three years later, she was named a dean. 

 Dr. Chang associated with a whirlwind of characters: Catholic priests, Chinese gangsters, American lawmakers, a Taiwanese general and a fantastically corrupt city politician, to name a few.

She had been married three times. One husband was involved in organized crime; another told the police before succumbing to gunshot wounds that she was behind it.  Police suspected her as having a role in the murder of her first husband.

She offered honorary degrees to people of wealth or influence, then soliciting donations. Two such honorees were Taiwanese industrialists who were later charged with multimillion-dollar frauds.

      

Many of the grants, under her control, went to the children of her friends or associates, including one given in 2004 to the granddaughter of Frank H. Murkowski, a former senator and governor of Alaska.

In 2003, in a letter, she congratulated Mr. Murkowski, who was then governor, on his daughter’s election to the Senate and offered them both honorary degrees.
      

Four years later, she asked him to enlist his daughter, Senator Lisa Murkowski, to write a letter supporting the immigration application of “a St. John’s honorary alumni chairman." Wang You-Theng, a Taiwanese businessman under investigation for embezzling millions of dollars, was a fugitive, and remains so today.
      

Federal prosecutors accused her of forcing foreign students to perform household labor in exchange for tuition grants, stealing over $1 million from the university and taking $250,000 from a Saudi prince to organize academic conferences that never occurred.   

As her legal troubles mounted, she found friendship among bartenders and casino bus drivers. She would curry favor by lending money to people from Chinese communities in Flushing and to fellow gamblers at the Foxwoods casino in Connecticut, where she was spending more time. She ended her life.

Let us learn of her ways. Just a thought.             

You'r out...

The Navy Reserve discharged Vice President Joe Biden's son Hunter this year after he tested positive for cocaine, U.S. officials confirmed.

 

The discharge of Biden, a 44-year-old lawyer and managing partner at an investment firm, was first reported by the Wall Street Journal. He confirmed the report.

 

"It was the honor of my life to serve in the U.S. Navy, and I deeply regret and am embarrassed that my actions led to my administrative discharge. I respect the Navy's decision. With the love and support of my family, I'm moving forward," he said.

Biden was commissioned as an ensign in May 2013 and assigned as a public affairs officer in a Norfolk, Virginia-based reserve unit. A month later, he tested positive for cocaine, and he was discharged in February, according to the report.

 

The U.S. official said the Navy never had contact with the vice president's office over the issue, and that standard procedure for failed drug tests is administrative discharge.

The vice president's office didn't comment on the report.

 

Hunter Biden is the younger of Biden's two sons. His older brother, Beau Biden, is Delaware's attorney general and a major in the Delaware Army National Guard. He was deployed for a year in Iraq.  [CNN reported].

 

I am impressed. Just a thought.

A little about E...

The current Ebola outbreak is the most widespread ever recorded.  It is by far the biggest in terms of numbers of people affected and geographical spread.  EVD is a haemorrhagic disease and the mortality rate is 53%.

It is believed the virus resides in animal reservoirs. Outbreaks are thought to be caused by animal-to-human transmission after people consume or come into contact with species of animal harbouring the virus, including monkeys and bats. The disease is transmitted by direct contact with the body fluids of an infected patient or contact with a corpse of a person who has succumbed to disease.

Viral entry is usually via mucus membranes, cuts or abrasions, and the virus can be transmitted from the dried body fluids of an infected individual on an object (e.g. bedsheets). Ebola can be sexually transmitted

The virus can be killed by a variety of disinfectants, including the hypochlorites used in household bleach and swimming pool chlorine. Disinfection of surfaces, therefore, is an important control measure. And as soap will kill the virus, hand washing with soap and water is another important measure. There are no specific treatments for EVD.

There is no risk of transmission during the incubation period, which usually lasts between 4–16 days following infection, with a range of 4–21 days. There is no transmission by air droplets (i.e. sneezing or coughing) and only a low risk of transmission during the early stages of the disease.
In the prodromal phase, it may present with non-specific flu-like symptoms including:

• fever, diarrhea, vomiting, muscle ache, sore throat, headache.

Full symptoms of EVD can develop rapidly. Clinical signs may include:

• vomiting, diarrhea, confusion, haemorrhage, including conjunctival injection (red eye), rash, chest pain and shortness of breath. The condition progresses to serious haemorrhagic complications and organ failure.

Family members or health workers caring for infected patients are at the greatest risk of infection.

To minimize the risk of infection when visiting an Ebola-endemic area travellers should be advised to:

• Avoid contact with symptomatic patients and their body fluids, deceased patients and their body fluids and wild animals (alive and dead);
• Avoid bush meat in endemic areas (i.e., the meat of wild animals that could be a reservoir for the disease);
• Wash hands regularly using soap or an alcohol-based hand sanitiser;
• Consider avoiding unessential travel to affected countries;
• Identify appropriate in-country healthcare resources in advance of travelling;
• Check that medical insurance will cover repatriation in the event of infection. 

Just a thought.

US Economy.

US Treasury reported that tax receipts in 2014 grew by $247 billion, or 9%, because of an improving economy as well as the expiration of some tax provisions and higher tax rates on high-income individuals.
The economy not only bolstered tax receipts from wages and payroll taxes, it also boosted corporate profits and therefore business tax revenue.

On the spending side, outlays grew by just $50 billion or 1%.
A big reason for the modest growth in spending was controlled dollars going to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. In addition, spending in many other areas of the budget fell. These included defense, homeland security, justice, unemployment benefits, and housing programs.

The drop in the 2014 deficit is the fifth consecutive annual decline. That trend has come as economic stimulus programs to counter the damage of the financial crisis dried up and Congress implemented broad spending cuts known as the sequester. It was also spurred by changes in tax rates for high-income households.

Great improvement and perhaps a surplus by the end of the coming 2 years.

Just a thought.

Republican Senate candidate.

 

Republican Senate candidates have been holding the firewall in the most high-profile races around the country: Joni Ernst in Iowa, Mitch McConnell in Kentucky, Cory Gardner in Colorado. But one Republican Senate candidate in Michigan is doing exactly the opposite getting disowned by her own party.

 

The critics of Terri Lynn Land’s campaign have turned harsher recently, accusing Land of ignoring the normally requisite advance notice given before public appearances, and of ducking the press any time she feels threatened by its line of questioning, among other problems.  

 

U.S. News called her campaign “invisible”.  Conservative radio host F. Beckmann published an “autopsy” of Land’s campaign in the Detroit News. The National Republican Senatorial Committee pulled almost a million dollars from Land’s campaign.

 

Bill Ballenger, a former Republican senator, told ABC News that no one in Michigan had guessed Land was going to be “as inept and inarticulate as she’s proven to be.”

 

What an encouragement    !!!!?

 

Just a thought.

Doubtful...*!

Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman told ABC News that President Obama has made more lasting changes to the country while in office than President Bill Clinton.

“Bill Clinton is an incredibly gifted politician, but Clinton was not a consequential president. Obama, although clearly not the natural politician, is a consequential president.”

Krugman has previously been a harsh critic of Obama. In 2009, he was featured in a Newsweek cover story titled “Obama is Wrong: The Loyal Opposition of Paul Krugman,” which identified him as the leading liberal voice against the president.
“People who had this idea that Obama was going to bring a transformation of America, I thought were being naïve,” Krugman said.

But, by God, we got health reform, and a significant financial reform. We are getting the environmental action … it’s not everything you would have wanted, but it’s more than anyone else has done for decades.

Krugman also said that Obama’s achievements were more consequential than those of Republican President Ronald Reagan.

“In the end, Reagan did not leave the structure of America’s society particularly different,” Krugman said. “He did not in fact change the basic legacy of Lyndon Johnson and FDR.”

Krugman’s ranking of consequential presidents, he said, would be Franklin Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, followed by Obama and then Reagan. Well said, then.

Just a thought.

Who Done it?

An ex-con enjoyed 15 minutes of freedom before he was shot by a former inmate he once had beef with in prison.

Devon Simmons served 15 years on an assault conviction and was released from the Otisville State Penitentiary. He planned to take a train from a nearby Metro-North station in Orange County to Manhattan.

A car rolled up. Police said Simmons got in the car - even though he didn’t know the driver. He was apparently duped into thinking it was sent by relatives to pick him up.

The car stopped, the trunk latch is released and a guy jumped out of the trunk and starts shooting,” State Police Capt. Pierce Gallagher said. “The minute he sees the guy, Simmons start running.”

He managed to get to a nearby train station, where someone called 911. State police say the man underwent surgery at Westchester Medical Center.

 

Two men spotted fleeing the scene in a car with Illinois plates. Cops busted the two in Manhattan. Welcome Back to Jail boys.
 

 Just a thought.

Solicitation...

They were planning their future together. She said the relationship had its bad times and that Schellpfeffer was jealous and abusive.  

She filed a restraining order against him, then later dropped it.

“I grabbed a  knife, and I said to him… ‘If you do not give me my car keys and let me leave, I’m going to slice this couch.’ And I did a slice and then he screamed. He threw my keys at me.”

Even with all the drama, the relationship endured and Strom and her children moved in with him. “We always made up right afterwards,”  “We have such a strong bond of love…that we would continue to stay together.” 

She hired a man to kill her fiancé and boyfriend of six years.  He was an informant for the local police department. Their meeting was taped.

“She was young, vibrant, beautiful... We just clicked,” Schellpfeffer recalled.

He believes his life was never in danger and Strom did not intend for the hitman to go through with the plan. He says he attributes her plot to mental illness. At one restraining order hearing, Schellpfeffer proposed to Strom in front of the judge and she accepted. He still cares about his former fiancée

She was sentenced.... after a plea for solicitation to commit first degree intentional homicide.

This guy's behavior is questionable. He knows it all.     Just a thought.

A Famous Dog..!!...

Image is not related.

A nurse, Teresa Romero, is the first person known to have contracted the deadly virus, Ebola, outside West Africa.

She had treated two missionaries who later died from Ebola. The virus has killed 3,879 people, mostly in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

She might have become infected when removing her protective suit after cleaning one of the missionaries' room. The cause is still unknown.

A court order to euthanize Ms. Romero's dog was issued despite uncertainty over whether the animal was also infected or risked spreading the disease.

The fate of the dog sparked huge interest on social networks, after Ms. Romero's husband, who is kept in isolation, alerted animal protection groups via social networks.

Two protesters were hurt when they tried to stop the van in which the animal was being transported.

Ebola is a serious disease. One patient in Taxes required contact at least 150 individuals and quarantine some. It is all about our habits, some needs to be changed.

Just a thought.

The Fight, Palin...

The drunken brawl involving Sarah Palin and her family last month was a wild one.
Klingenmeyer told police he was angry that the Palins had showed up and were causing problems. He had asked Bristol to leave and she responded, “Who the f*** are you?” Klingemeyer told her he owned the home and Bristol said she didn’t believe him and “she will kick his a**".

An officer described Bristol Palin as “heavily intoxicated and upset” and told police that Klingenmeyer had “drug her across the lawn by her legs” calling her names.   She also said both her sandals and sunglasses had been taken.

Matthew McKenna tried to break up the fight and saw people “piling” on Todd Palin. He also said after he saw Bristol punch Klingenmeyer six times a “bunch of wives tackled her a**.”

Track Palin, shirtless “ appeared to have an injury under his left eye, on his upper cheek.” The officer said that Track Palin was “angry and intoxicated.”

The Palin’s 20-year old daughter Willow told police Klingenmeyer had “assaulted” Bristol and she had been pushed by an “older lady” and others involved in the fight were “saying things like f*** the Palins.” Police described Willow as “extremely agitated.”

Knew.....!!! ?.

The biggest problem the United States faced in dealing with Syria and the rise of the Islamic State was America’s allies in the region, Joe Biden said.

Turkey let foreign fighters cross into Syria, and with, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia funneled weapons and other aid to Syrian rebels [the Nusra Front, Al Qaeda and ISIL].

President Obama made a similar point
 about Syria’s Arab neighbors fueling extremist organizations in their zeal to oust Al-Assad, though he did not name the culprits.

Turkey is watching as Kobani being run over by ISIL. The town is surrounded for weeks. Turkey considers Syrian Kurds terrorists.

When Obama warns from the red line, It wasn't clear who used biologic weapon since US allies are desperate to get red of Al Assad.

Leon Panetta's memoir criticizing Obama for not following up, McCain, and others to interfer in Syria, provide weapons to the rebel and leave US forces in Iraq. Short sighted advise.

US is not sure which direction should go.  The oil rich countries are clearly supporting certain terrorists. So here it is, today some are fighting on one side, and tomorrow fighting the other. 

Just keep the American people busy with a problem in the Middle East.

Just a thought.  

A little to drink?

Image is not related.

A law enforcement source said the victim was “a little drunk” when leaving Birthday soirée with a friend and the lawyer. The trio went back to the lawyer’s apartment.   Eventually, the friend was asked to leave by the alleged victim. The Post reports that "witness accounts of her extreme drunkenness in the hours before the party".

That version of events, in which the pair had consensual sex, conflicted with one presented by a police source, the victim awoke from a booze-filled haze to find she was having sex with the lawyer.

“She’s a credible woman. But anytime alcohol is involved, things get complicated,” a police source said, a possible third-degree rape [incapable of consent].

Everyone in (1 Police Plaza) could not be happier about this,” a police source said.
All in all, no winners.                     Just a thought.

Boots on the. Air?

The United States sent helicopters into combat against Islamic State targets west of Baghdad on Sunday, the first time low-flying Army aircraft have been committed to fighting in an engagement.

The helicopters carry two-man crews and, with their missiles and powerful cannons, increase the amount and accuracy of the firepower that the U.S. military can bring to bear against the Islamic State in support of Iraqi ground troops.

But because helicopters fly relatively "low and slow," the Obama administration is taking on greater risk in terms of exposing U.S. forces to casualties.

Jeffrey White, analyst who closely follows developments in Iraq, said the use of helicopter gunships means that U.S. troops effectively are now directly involved in ground battles.

"It's definitely boots in the air. This is combat, assuming U.S. Army guys were flying the helicopters".

Just a thought.

Housing boom?

 
Bernanke said "I recently tried to refinance my mortgage and I was unsuccessful in doing so." the audience laughed, Bernanke responded: "I'm not making that up."

Banks and regulators tightened lending standards and they might have swung too far, especially for first-time home buyers, and that is "probably excessive."

Records show that Bernanke bought a house in Washington, D.C. for $839,000 in 2004, valued at $965,468.

He was paid $200,000 as chairman of the Federal Reserve, is now commanding as much as $250,000 per speech. He is also a distinguished fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.   He had assets worth between $1.1 million and $2.3 million when he left the Fed chairman post, making him one of the least wealthy members of the Fed's Board.

So expect loosening of the rules and another bounce in housing.

Just a thought.

A costly lie ....??

 

The Liberian man infected with Ebola who brought the disease to the United States will be prosecuted when he returns home for lying on his airport screening questionnaire, Liberian authorities said.

 

With an Ebola crisis raging in West Africa, passengers leaving Liberia are being screened for fever and are asked if they have had contact with anyone infected. Neighbors say he had days earlier helped carry to a taxi a pregnant woman who later died of Ebola.

 

Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins says his office is considering whether to press charges against Eric Duncan, the first person with Ebola in the U.S.

 

Duncan, who traveled to Dallas to visit relatives, wasn't diagnosed with Ebola until several days after he arrived. The Dallas family he stayed with is under quarantine and their apartment was decontaminated. The range of people under observation is close to 150 but fear is all around us.

We expect people to do the honorable thing," said Kesselly of Liberia Airport Authority. He said that people like Duncan and Patrick Sawyer, a Liberian-American with Ebola who traveled to Nigeria and infected people there, have brought a "stigma" upon Liberians living abroad.

Just a thought.

Big Yawn...!

                      

  

It’s a conventionally accepted notion that any attention is good attention, and that brazen tactics are justified if they’re in the name of a good cause. But new research says that may not be true. 

Aside from all the other negative effects of unrealistic, oversexualized advertising, it is just ineffective when you’re “selling ethics.”

Two new University of Queensland studies on “Using Sexualized Images of Women” have found that when subjects view sexy PETA ads, “Intentions to support the ethical organization were reduced for those exposed to the sexualized advertising” and “that behaviors helpful to the ethical cause diminished after viewing the sexualized advertisements.” In one of the studies, researchers found that men who viewed the ads were likely to report (shocker), but that they were no likelier to support the cause itself.

The lead researcher on both studies, says, ”There’s a negative link between dehumanization and the treatment of others, it reduces concern … If you are using images that are dehumanizing, it’s likely to backfire.” So, bikini girls making out with vegetables doesn’t end slaughterhouse abuse?

It certainly back fired. see the image.

Oil Prices-Good for some !!

 

 

Global oil prices have fallen to their lowest level in more than two years after Saudi Arabia cut its official selling price in a move to protect its market share, analysts said.

Higher output in the US, together with forecasts of lower global demand by IEA, are driving prices down. Brent crude fell to $93 a barrel, its lowest since June 2012. US light crude fell to $85 for the first time in 17 months.

"This is a structural change in the oil market, with Saudi Arabia explicitly stating that they are to compete on price," said Bjarne Schieldrop, an analyst at SEB.

The extraction of shale oil in the US has increased the country's production of oil significantly - the IEA has forecast that the US will soon overtake Saudi Arabia and Russia to become the world's biggest oil producer.

Analysts suggested that the price lowering is intended to bankrupt ISIL in Syria.  ISIL  can't sell oil to Turkey so revenue decreased and Air strikes prevent their parade of armored vehicles in the open as a result.  The Air Campaign caused ISIL big imbalance and have no way to recover.

Just a thought.

Doesn't Pay...

Prosecutors argued that Curry, 57, poisoned his wife in order to collect more than $500,000 in insurance money and other benefits. “This man took Linda Curry for a paycheck,” This occurred 21 years ago.

He sedated his wife with the sleep drug Ambien before injecting her with nicotine, Deputy district attorney, said during the trial.

They were married for 21 months when Linda died mysteriously in their Orange County home. She was a nonsmoker, but tests revealed fatal levels of nicotine in her system.

Jurors in Calif. Superior Court reached the verdict after a day of deliberations – guilty of first-degree murder, with special circumstances for poisoning and murder for financial gain. He was also convicted of insurance fraud.

So you live your life with fear of being discovered, looking over your shoulder every time a policeman passes by and then your done. Crime doesn't pay. 

Just a [repeated] thought. 

Eye seeing Dog.

Jogging Buddy.

Guide dogs are assistance dogs trained to lead blind and visually impaired people around obstacles.
Although the dogs can be trained to navigate various obstacles, they are partially (red–green) color blind and are not capable of interpreting street signs. The human half of the guide dog team does the directing, based upon skills acquired through previous mobility training. The handler might be likened to an aircraft's navigator, who must know how to get from one place to another, and the dog is the pilot, who gets them there safely.
In several countries, guide dogs, along with most service and hearing dogs, are exempt from regulations against the presence of animals in places such as restaurants and public transportation.

What happened when the reverse occur? The dog gets old and is blind? a dilemma.

Just a thought.