Wednesday, June 10, 2009

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Ariane de Bonvoisin: Choices Top
It was my birthday a few days ago, always a time when I take a moment to think about the year. We're nearly halfway through this one already. For those of you who've been reading my blog for a while, you know that I am a big fan of picking a word for the year, more so than making resolutions. My word last year was to say "Yes. Yes to anything," things that I thought I wouldn't enjoy--last-minute invitations, things that scared me, you get the picture--and I was stretched way out of my comfort zone. But, to me, that's a great thing. So this year, my word was "Allow. Allow things to happen more than make them happen." Push, strive, control, act. I've done a lot of that and it's served me well. But I also see the power of allowing myself to receive, to sit back and open up to what life is trying to give me. Then my birthday rolled around a few days ago and I really wanted to have another word as my focus for the second half of this year. "Choice." I am so incredibly present to the fact that we really do get to choose so much of what we live through. We choose to stay in a relationship, or a job that no longer serves us. We choose to continue to be overweight. We really believe there is no choice, no alternative to what we're doing at the moment. It's just not possible to do anything else! We are in jail, trapped! We choose to live in places we dislike. We choose to continue eating badly. We choose to lie. We choose to be busy, busy, busy. We choose not to go to the gym. We choose to watch TV. I keep reminding myself that we can choose joy. We can choose to let go of our excuses. We can choose to stop telling everyone the story of why something has or hasn't happened. (It's family, genetics, the economy.) We can choose not to check email for a few hours. We can choose very different ways of living. We can choose to take a day off. Yes, society will impose its structures, its beliefs, tell you that you are not really free. Even the Buddha picked up from a perfect life of luxury, being a prince, married with a child and left to go contemplate life. Alone. Poor. This concept of really being free to choose is very hard to grasp when so much of our lives seem planned, organized, structured. Yes you can leave a job. Yes you can go back to school. Yes you can write a book. Yes you can leave a loveless marriage even when you have kids. Our lives are determined by the choices we make. We all know people who are born with life working against them yet they make choices to have an extraordinary life. Most of us have bought into why we cannot be, do or have something. It's time for us really to look at those reasons. Many of us will say, "ah but what about the money?" True, it's easy for folks to make serious choices when they have money. Most regrets and failures in life have nothing to do with money. Ask anyone who regrets something. They regret not getting divorced. They regret not going back to school. They regret not traveling. They regret not pursuing their dream. They regret not living somewhere else. They regret not telling someone they loved him/her. You can choose to have your reasons or you can choose to have the life that deep down you are longing for. Big choices, for instance, often start with smaller ones. Start being conscious of all the opportunities you have to make a choice. Here are a few basic choices most of us face each day: * what should I have for breakfast? * what should I say to myself when I look in the mirror? * what should I wear? * am I being kind or rude? * am I going to go to the gym? * am I smiling or not? * should I take this phone call? * should I take the elevator or the stairs? People are happier because day by day they make better choices with what life gives them. For the next 24 hours, simply notice all the choices you get to make!
 
Ariane de Bonvoisin: Tips for Recent Graduates on Finding a Job Now! Top
As a Change Expert, I'd like to offer some advice to graduates on the First 30 Days After Graduating in a No-Job Environment. 1) You don't need to figure out your entire career Begin by starting with something you want to do. Most 40/50 year olds still haven't figured out what they want to do with their lives. Chunk it down. Is there a part-time job you want to do for the next month or two? What would you be happy doing for the next year? That's all. Then see what happens. Get out from the pressure of figuring out your life's work. You cannot possibly know yet. 2) Go for what you love You are the "Do Something You Love Generation." This generation is much more motivated that the previous one to follow their passions. But then parents get in the way. Or fears. Or the news. Or friends who have gone on to do something that's safe. Do the inner work to get honest with yourself, listen to your gut, and ask -- what do you really want to spend your time doing? When there are fewer jobs, you learn to get incredibly focused. Become immune to what others want you to do or what anyone else thinks is right for you. Apply for jobs that speak to your heart and your passion instead of applying for everything and anything that is out there. 3) The original will inherit the jobs Do things no one else is doing. Don't just apply for the same jobs, go to the same job fairs or search the same sites online. Think about the companies, products, services you love. Even if they are no obvious jobs being offered, get resourceful. Find out the right person to mail. Tell them you love the company, what they stand for, their goals. Tell them why. Do your homework. Work hard. Make it personal. Get your personality on paper. Make it funny. Make it something they've never read before. Make it easy for them to meet you. 4) Take a "news fast" Trends, general opinions, and the news are not on your side. Read other types of news, sites and magazines. Refrain from agreeing with everyone on how bad it is out there. You get to choose what you listen to and what you let into your brain. Optimists choose to look at what's possible, the progress they're making, how something good will happen. Act as if no one had told you how bad it was out there. And don't use the news/statistics as your excuse to fall back on. 5) Flex your "change muscle" The most important life skill you can learn right now that can help you land your dream job is to be cool with change and uncertainty. The quality of your life is directly proportionate to the amount of uncertainty you can be comfortable with. Don't cling to answers, being in control, knowing what's next or how its going to turn out. Get flexible. Let things unfold. Be okay if you thought you were going to get a job and then didn't. Something good will come from any change. You are much stronger, more resilient, more intuitive than you've ever been told. The best of who you are comes out during times of transition. 6) Get Healthy Clean yourself up, literally! Get a makeover, get rid of any old clothes, cut your hair, cover up those tattoos, change those earrings and treat yourself to a new wardrobe. Working takes energy and endurance. A job search does, too. The more you take care of yourself, sleep, eat well, stay hydrated, exercise, the more energy you will have to dedicate to this post-graduation phase. Employers prefer to hire and also keep people who are healthy. When everything on the outside seems out of control, this area is under your control. Feeling discouraged, go to the gym, go for a run. You will always feel better about yourself. Get those emotions of fear, doubt, impatience moving out of your body. 7) Don't Eat the Marshmallow In a study at Stanford University conducted over 25 yrs ago, a class full of 5 year olds were given a marshmallow and told not to eat it for five minutes and only then, would they be given a second marshmallow. The teacher then left and observed the class. 90% of the kids ate the marshmallow. The kids were then followed for the next 25years. Those who were able to delay the instant gratification and wait, were off the charts and more successful in every area of their life. What's the lesson? Good things come to those who wait. Many students graduate and feel such pressure to be the next Steve Jobs, the next Anderson Cooper or a superstar designer. It's fine if it takes you a little while to find the job you want. We all overestimate how quickly things are going to happen in a month or so and often give up or settle. And we all underestimate how different our lives can be in six-to-nine months. Give yourself a longer runway. If you only do one only one thing to help yourself during this period of uncertainty, let it be to shift your beliefs! The job market is only as bad as you choose to believe it is. There will always be jobs. There will always be opportunities to help, to try to build your own company. Be part of the solution, not the problem. Think abundance, not scarcity! And until you do find that perfect job of your dreams, find an hour or two to contribute or volunteer. Your character is what's most important. "Giving back" has you meeting people, feeling useful, realizing someone needs you and your skills. Offer to help people. "Is there anything small I can help you with?" The world has a funny way of helping those who help others. Ask how you can be serve and you just might find the world looking to serve you too! Ariane is the founder/CEO of www.first30days.com, a company that helps people through all types of life changes. She is also the author of the book, The First 30 Days; Your Guide to Making any Change Easier (HarperCollins) just released in paperback. More tips for graduates are available on her blog at www.first30days.com/ariane
 
MTV's 'Real World' Going To D.C. Top
LOS ANGELES — MTV is electing Washington as the next location for "The Real World." The cable network announced Wednesday that the 23rd season of the reality series would begin production in the nation's capital later this summer and premiere in 2010. Previous editions have focused on young strangers living together in front of cameras in such cities as New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Boston, London, Las Vegas, Paris and Austin, Texas. Tony DiSanto, MTV's president of programming, said the network is "thrilled to be filming our classic franchise in the heart of where history is being made." The Cancun-set 22nd season of "The Real World" premieres June 24.
 
Chocolate Bunny Feud Heads To Europe's High Court Top
This morning in Luxembourg, five crimson-robed and white-scarved judges of the European Union's highest court will issue a ruling on this most gnawing question: Can you trademark a chocolate bunny?
 
Norm Coleman Ordered To Pay Al Franken $95K By Minnesota Court Top
ST. PAUL, Minn. — Republican Norm Coleman must pay Democrat Al Franken $94,783 to cover court costs for his appeal of Minnesota Senate election results. A Ramsey County court administrator entered the judgment Wednesday. It results from the two-month trial that ended with Coleman 312 votes short of Franken. Minnesota law required Coleman to cover some of Franken's court costs because the race's outcome didn't change. The judgment excludes Franken's attorney fees. The men have spent $50 million so far on their campaigns and legal fight over the November election. That's more than double the cost of the 2002 race when Coleman captured what had been a Democratic seat. The Minnesota Supreme Court hasn't said when it will rule on Coleman's appeal. More on Al Franken
 
CTA Tattler Turns Five Top
Today marks the fifth anniversary of CTA Tattler.
 
Egypt Praises Obama As Welcome Change From Bush Top
CAIRO — Egypt's president praised President Barack Obama on Wednesday, saying his outreach to the Muslim world is a welcome change from the policies of his predecessor. President Hosni Mubarak's comments were his first since Obama delivered a speech last week in Cairo aimed at improving relations between the U.S. and the Muslim world that were strained under former President George W. Bush. "In the previous administration, there was a feeling that Islam is a group of terrorists, Islam is hated and a Muslim should be watched over," said Mubarak in an interview with Egyptian television in the southern city of Aswan. Obama "sympathizes and says Islam is a heavenly religion like other religions," he said. The relationship between Egypt and the U.S. during Bush's time in office was often strained because of the administration's push for democracy in the region. Obama stressed the benefits of democracy in his speech but said it could not be imposed by any one nation. Obama also pushed for Israelis and Palestinians to work toward a peace deal based on a two-state solution, an effort Mubarak urged everyone in the region to support. "Obama understands the issue and will do his best," said Mubarak. "We must help him and the Israelis must help too." Obama has pushed Israel to commit to the creation of a Palestinian state and stop settlement construction in the West Bank, taking what many have described as a harder line than his predecessors. But Israel's new prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has refused to agree to either demand. "President Obama is someone who differs from the other presidents of the United States," said Mubarak.
 
Trial Begins In Sex-Games Slaying Of French Banker Top
GENEVA — A woman charged with the murder of one of France's richest men during sex games begged his family's forgiveness Wednesday at the start of her trial in Switzerland. Banker Edouard Stern was killed in 2005, his body found in his penthouse apartment in Geneva, clad in a latex suit and shot four times, authorities said. His mistress Cecile Brossard, 40, was arrested two weeks later and confessed, according to Prosecutor Daniel Zappelli. Brossard told Geneva's Court of Assizes that she was sorry. "I would like to ask forgiveness from Mrs. Stern and her children," Brossard told a courtroom packed with 100 spectators, including dozens of reporters. "I know that it is offensive because you cannot pardon something this horrible. My heart is full of remorse." The woman had not yet testified on the circumstances of the killing, but her lawyer Alec Reymond said it was a crime of passion, which is punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment. The prosecution said it was murder, punishable by 20 years in prison. Two of the children and Stern's ex-wife, who live in New York, are attending the trial. The court went into closed session to listen to their testimony. Stern and his wife divorced in 1999. Brossard said Stern, 50, promised her $1 million to help her become financially independent, Zappelli said. Stern then deposited the sum in a special account for her, but the two quarreled over control of the money. Brossard told the court, however, "It was not a question of money. It was a question of love." Zappelli said that when the couple met for the last time they had "games of a sexual nature, consisting of her dominating him." "Edouard Stern was sitting tied up on a chair in a submissive position," according to the prosecutor. A police inspector told the court that Brossard had confessed to becoming enraged when Stern told her during their sexual games, "One million for a whore, that's expensive." The prosecution says she then got one of Stern's guns and shot him once in the face, then in the chest and side. He fell to the floor, and she fired a fourth shot in the temple, killing him. Brossard has been in prison since 2005. Xavier Gillet, who was Brossard's companion and supported her financially, said Stern sometimes harassed her the whole day with phone calls and messages. Gillet, 21 years older than Brossard, said he didn't realize Brossard had an intimate relation with the banker. Brossard had told him she was Stern's "sexual secretary," Gillet told the court, indicating she put Stern in touch with call girls. Stern had a long background in investment banking, working for his family firm Banque Stern from the age of 22 and forcing his father out of the company two years later _ with the help of two uncles. He sold the family business in 1985, but stayed on as chairman until 1998. He also was once in line to succeed his father-in-law, Michel David-Weill, as head of the investment bank Lazard LLC, but left the company in 1997 after they argued. He then set up his own investment fund, Investments Real Returns SA. _____ Associated Press writer Nathalie Ogi contributed.
 
Iraq War General Under Bush Names His Horses "Shock" And "Awe" Top
I [am not] making up the fact that two of the prize stallions on the Franks stud farm are named "Shock" and "Awe."
 
iPhone Service Coming To CTA Subways Top
The CTA board today approved adding subway cell phone access for AT&T customers later this year. More on iPhone
 
Fed Officials Bashed Ken Lewis In Emails Top
Federal Reserve officials sharply criticized Bank of America Corp. and its Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis in emails to each other after the bank tried to pull out of its deal to buy troubled investment bank Merrill Lynch, according to documents unearthed by congressional investigators. More on Bank Of America
 
House GOP's Energy Bill Calls For 100 Nuclear Plants Top
WASHINGTON — House Republicans are calling for a hundred new nuclear power plants to be built in the next two decades as part of an energy plan they say is a better alternative than one championed by Democrats. The legislation unveiled by the GOP Wednesday would also increase production of oil and gas offshore, open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling and spur refinery construction. The money from the new drilling would go into a trust fund that would pay for the development of renewable energy. "You have a conflict of visions between the Democratic approach and the Republican alternative. It is a difference between the carrot and the stick," said Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., who chaired the Republican task force charged with developing the legislation, which will be introduced this week. The Democratic bill has the support of the White House and is on course to reach the House floor as early as the end of the month. It sets mandatory targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and for producing electricity from renewable sources. Democrats believe that limits on global warming pollution _ which will require companies to spend money to reduce emissions _ are needed to encourage conservation and the development of cleaner forms of energy, including nuclear. Republicans on Wednesday said that approach amounted to a national energy tax that would result in job losses and increase energy costs. "The winter of our discontent comes not from the environmental climate, it comes from the economic climate," said Rep. Thaddeus McCotter, R-Mich. "Why at this point in time...would you come forward with a bill the premise of which is this: The government will control the weather by raising your taxes, taking you job and telling you how to live." Republican leaders said their bill provides incentives to switch to cleaner energy sources, by extending tax credits for renewable energy and streamlining the permit process for nuclear power plants and refineries. But it was unclear whether that would be enough to drive a transition on the scale needed to reduce emissions to avert the worst consequences of global warming. House Democrats, in a memo handed out by aides after the Republican news conference, called the Republican plan "a rehash of failed energy policies." ___ On the Net: Republicans in Congress: http://www.gop.gov House Energy and Commerce Committee: http://energycommerce.house.gov
 
Burris Adviser: He's Made Durbin A Better Senator Top
On Ray Hanania's WJJG radio show this morning, Delmarie Cobb, adviser to Sen. Roland Burris, said that she "jokes with Roland that he has made Dick Durbin a better senator than he ever was." She also asserted that Durbin "is so busy trying to show Roland up that he is suddenly running all over town at ribbon-cuttings and groundbreakings."
 
The Six Top Republicans Obama Listens To Top
Regardless of whether the President's bipartisan outreach is producing legislative results, there is a handful of conservatives and Republicans that the president and his White House team respect. By respect, I mean, quite simply, the degree to which the White House responds to their worries and needs and believes that the time spent responding is useful and necessary. It is unclear whether the quality of this outreach differs from the respect accorded to Sen. Ben Nelson by the Bush White House.
 
Sheriff Hires Ex-Prostitutes, Closes Mother-Daughter Brothel Top
The Cook County sheriff's office has added two former prostitutes to the payroll as part of its efforts to combat the world's oldest profession, STNG Wire reports . Sheriff Tom Dart hopes to use the women to glean inside information that will help his department target pimps and human traffickers. "We were trying to use our brains" to fight prostitution, Dart said . Dart's office also announced Wednesday the arrests of a west suburban mother and daughter on prostitution charges following a three month investigation. Kimberly "Big Kim" Miniea, 49, and her 19-year-old daughter, Kimberly Petersen, 19, were charged with felony pandering and keeping a house of prostitution after authorities executed a search warrant on their Berkeley home, STNG Wire reports . A March lawsuit Dart filed against Craigslist accusing the site of creating "the largest source of prostitution in America" contributed to the site's removal of its "erotic services" section in May.
 
Isha: The Struggle for Peace Top
Ten years ago, my life changed dramatically. The loss of several of my loved ones along with an abrupt end to my financial security had left the image of who I thought I was lying in pieces. Exactly how these losses brought me to transform myself from the inside out is another story, but now, a decade later, I look back on who I used to be and feel like a totally different person. In this blog, I will explore the insights and practical steps that brought me from my own personal hell to absolute freedom, and eventually led me to create the Isha System, which today is used by thousands of people around the world to create more peace, joy and love in their lives. The transformations I went through a decade ago brought me to South America, a fascinating part of the world that I previously knew almost nothing about. I have been living and traveling throughout the continent ever since. The following incident, which took place when I first established a retreat center in Colombia, will help explain the nature of my message . ... As I was driven through the jungle, I asked the driver the name of the head of the paramilitary. I was on my way to visit him, having recently arrived in what turned out to be his territory. The oceanfront hilltop my foundation had set up base on was in the middle of a "red" zone, 'protected' by the paramilitaries who looked over us like the Sierra Nevada, the largest coastal mountain in the world. It turned out that his name was Jesus. I thought to myself ironically, let's hope Jesus is my friend. Jesus was. He was charming, delighted that I was teaching a form of expansion of consciousness so close to his beloved city. He assured me that if I had any trouble, he would swiftly deal with anyone who was impeding my stay. I avoided asking exactly how he was planning on dealing with them, opting instead to just smile sweetly. Here I was, a spiritual teacher in the middle of the jungle, proposing union in a province where paramilitaries and guerrilla soldiers shared only their dislike of the government. One day, as the sounds of movement broke the morning in our hilltop offices, where usually the rhythmic rumble of the ocean coaxed us out of bed, a troop of exaggeratedly heavily armed soldiers trooped purposefully up the steps. Dressed in black, laden with grenades and guns that would require a heavy workout just by being carried, they assembled sternly on our veranda, the spectacular tropical panorama framing them, like intruders on someone's vacation. They were anti-narcotic police, under President Uribe's command, but we didn't know that until they presented themselves. After a few gruff questions about our intentions in the area, they put down their Uzis and their hand grenades, and Rambo bullet belts, and sat for a brief introduction to the work of the foundation. As they listened about consciousness, unconditional love and the union that exists beyond our apparent differences, their faces denoted sincere interest and curiosity. But the most impacting was their responses to the question, what do you want? It doesn't matter where I go in the world. Whether I am speaking at a high security prison, an international forum, to senators, catholic nuns or ex-guerrilla soldiers... everyone has the same answers. "Peace" said one of the soldiers. "Love" murmured another. Peace. A word that unites humanity in its common desire for union. Even those who fight, are fighting for peace. Have you noticed that when people are asking for peace, they're usually screaming? I want to be in peace! Leave me in peace! Turn off that noise! I want some peace!!! As humans, we are always saying, I want to be in peace, and then next minute we're fighting for 'justice'; fighting to be right. So what's really the most important? Our peace, or being right? When we become attached to our point of view, it can become more important to us than anything else. This need to be right, which often requires proving the other wrong, generates conflict. Where are you fighting in your life? Where has your opinion become more important than peace, than harmony? Beyond our apparent differences, lies the common core of consciousness, which unites us beyond all diversity. Here's an idea: why don't we focus on that, instead of the things that seem to separate us? Maybe if we did more of that, we would discover the peace we so yearn for. I am not suggesting that we abandon our ideals, but let's not lose sight of what is truly important, and stoically create the world we want from the inside out.
 
Congressional Dems Will Let Gitmo Detainees In US For Trial Top
In a partial reprieve for President Barack Obama, congressional Democrats plan to allow detainees held in the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to be brought onto U.S. soil for trial, two congressional aides said on Wednesday. More on Guantánamo Bay
 
Jeffrey Feldman: When Politics Turns From Talk To Killing Top
Today, James Von Brunn became the latest domestic terrorist to express his political views with an act of murder, in this case an attempted mass murder. US Holocaust Museum security guard Stephen Tyrone Johns, by contrast, joined an inspiring list of American heroes who have stopped a terrorists bullet with their own bodies. While we mourn for the loss of Stephen Johns and our hearts reach out to his family and loved ones, it is worth considering a simple question: What can each of us do to stop this startling trend--this horrible switch some Americans are making from talk to violence to express their politics? To be realistic, the people who have been directly victimized by these crimes never had the luxury of feeling safe. Nonetheless, now is the time for each of us to ask what we can do to stem this trend of violence. For starters, we can pause and insist on a better political debate and we can talk openly about the kind of political talk we demand from our media, our politicians, and ourselves. This moment when politics seems to be turning from talk to killing has emerged at a time when our politics is dominated by an alarming amount of over-the-top confrontational rhetoric firing on all cylinders from every form of broadcast media. It is not just unpleasant, but capable of heating already simmering citizens to the boiling point. As summer heats up, we should all do what it takes to ratchet the political rhetoric down. My suggestions are simple enough for everyone to do immediately. First, the next time we hear a radio or TV host bombard an issue with overstated, violent rhetoric--we need to speak out against it. We should turn it off, sure. But we also need to tell our neighbors, friends, and coworkers that we do not want that kind of talk in our media. Second, the next time we hear a politician incite hateful rage on the campaign trail with unsubstantiated claims and conspiracy theories about their opponents--we need to speak out against it. We should vote for someone else, sure. But we also need to tell our neighbors, friends, and coworkers that we do not want that kind of talk in our elections. What each of us can do is stop consuming the rhetoric that pushes people to even consider violence as legitimate politics. And then, we need to say in our own words what kind of civic culture we want to reclaim. Insisting on a better public debate will not magically do away with the various hateful ideologies that drive political assassins to kill, but it can go a long way to cooling things down. The fact is, Americans are out of practice standing up and saying in our own words what kind of public discussion we expect in our politics. What we want is a conversation in the media and in the public square that helps us get the information we need to understand the complex problems we can only solve together. We want a productive, pragmatic debate. To get back to it, we need to say so out loud. As we head into summer, each of us can honor the memory of Stephen Tyrone Johns not only with our silent prayers, but by sharing with others the kind of talk we want in our politics.
 
Valerie Tarico: Christian Belief Through the Lens of Cognitive Science: Part 3 of 6 Top
I Know Because I Know On a warm afternoon in June, two men have appointments with a psychiatrist. The first has been dragged to the office by his wife, much to his irritation. He is a biologist who suffers from schizophrenia, and the wife insists that his meds are not working. "No," says the biologist, "I'm actually fine. It's just that because of what I'm working on right now the CIA has been bugging my calls and reading my email." Despite his wife's skepticism and his understanding of his own illness, he insists calmly that he is sure, and he lines up evidence to support his claim. The other man has come on his own because he is feeling exhausted and desperate. He shows the psychiatrist his hands, which are raw to the point of bleeding. No matter how many times he washes them (up to a hundred in a day) or what he uses (soap, alcohol, bleach or scouring pads) he never feels confident that they are clean. In both of these cases, after brain biochemistry is rebalanced, the patient's sense of certainty falls back in line with the evidence. The first man becomes less sure about the CIA thing and gradually loses interest in the idea. The second man begins feeling confident that his hands are clean after a normal round of soap and water, and the cracks begin healing. How do we know what is real? How do we know what we know? We don't, entirely. Research on psychiatric disorders and brain injuries shows that humans have a feeling or sense of knowing that can get activated by reason and evidence but can get activated in other ways as well. Conversely, when certain brain malfunctions occur, it may be impossible to experience a sense of knowing no matter how much evidence piles up. V. S. Ramachandran describes a brain injured patient who sees his mother and says, "This looks like my mother in every way, but she is an imposter." The connection between his visual cortex and his limbic system has been severed, and even though he sees his mother perfectly well, he has no sense of rightness or knowing so he offers the only explanation he can find ( Capgras Delusion ). From malfunctions like these, we gain an understanding of normal brain function and how it shapes our day to day experience, including the experience of religion. Neurologist Robert Burton explains it this way: "Despite how certainty feels, it is neither a conscious choice nor even a thought process. Certainty and similar states of knowing what we know arise out of involuntary brain mechanisms that, like love or anger, function independently of reason." ( On Being Certain , xi) This "knowing what we know" mechanism is good enough for getting around in the world, but not perfect. For the most part, it lets us explain, predict, and influence people or objects or events, and we use that knowledge to advantage. But as the above scenarios show, our ability to tell what is real also can get thrown off. Burton says that the "feeling of knowing" (rightness, correctness, certainty, conviction) should be thought of as one of our primary emotions, like anger, pleasure, or fear. Like these other feelings, it can be triggered by a seizure or a drug or direct electrical stimulation of the brain. Research after the Korean War (e.g. R Lifton ) suggested that the feeling of knowing or not knowing also can be produced by what are called brainwashing techniques: repetition, sleep deprivation, and social/emotional manipulation. Once triggered for any reason, the feeling that something is right or real can be incredibly powerful -- so powerful that when it goes head to head with logic or evidence the feeling wins. Our brains make up reasons to justify our feeling of knowing rather than following logic to its logical conclusion. For many reasons, religious beliefs are usually undergirded by a strong "feeling of knowing." Set aside for the moment the question of whether those beliefs tap underlying realities. Conversion experiences can be intense, hypnotic, and transformative. Worship practices, music and religious architecture have been optimized over time to evoke right brain sensations of transcendence and euphoria. Social insularity protects a community consensus. Repetition of ideas reinforces a sense of conviction or certainty. Forms of Christianity that emphasize right belief have built in safeguards against contrary evidence, doubt, and the assertions of other religions. Many a freethinker has sparred a smart, educated fundamentalist into a corner only to have the believer utter some form of "I just know." Does this mean that rational argumentation about religion is useless? The answer may be disappointing. Religious belief is not bound to regular standards of evidence and logic. It is not about logic but about something more intuitive and primal. Arguments with believers start from a false premise -- that the believer is bound by the rules of debate rather than being bound by the belief itself. The freethinker assumes that the believer is free to concede; but this is rarely true. At best the bits of logic or evidence put forth in an argument go into the hopper with a whole host of other factors. And yet each of us who is a former believer (we number in the millions) reached some point in our lives when we simply couldn't sustain our old certainties. Our sense of knowing either eroded over time or abruptly disappeared. So sometimes those hoppers do fill up. Given what I've said about knowing, how can anybody claim to know anything? We can't, with certainty. Those of us who are not religious could do with a little more humility on this point. We all see "through a glass darkly" and there is a realm in which all any of us can do is to make our own best guesses about what is real and important. This doesn't imply that all ideas are created equal or that our traditional understanding of "knowledge" is useless. As I said before, our sense of knowing allows us to navigate this world pretty well -- to detect regularities, anticipate events and make things happen. In the concrete domain of everyday life, acting on what we think we know works pretty well for us. Nonetheless, it is a healthy mistrust for our sense of knowing that has allowed scientists to detect, predict, and produce desired outcomes with ever greater precision. The scientific method has been called "institutionalized doubt" because it forces us to question our assumptions. Scientists stake their hopes not on a specific set of answers but on a specific way of asking questions. Core to this process is "falsification" -- narrowing down what might be true by ruling out what can't be true. And to date, that approach has had enormous pay-offs. It is what has made the difference between the nature of human life in the Middle Ages and the 21st Century. But knowledge in science is provisional; at any given point in time, the sum of scientific knowledge is really just a progress report. When we overstate our ability to know, we play into the fundamentalist fallacy that certainty is possible. Burton calls this "the all-knowing rational mind myth." As scientists learn more about how our brains work, certitude is coming to be seen as a vice rather than a virtue. Certainty is a confession of ignorance about our ability to be passionately mistaken. Humans will always argue passionately about things that we do not know and cannot know, but with a little more self-knowledge and humility we may get to the point that those arguments are less often lethal. Robert A. Burton, On Being Certain V. S. Ramachandran (TED talk), A Journey to the Center of Your Mind If you don't want to miss any of this series, subscribe to Valerie Tarico at this blog or send email to valerietarico at hotmail.com and request to be added to her mailing list for weekly articles.
 
Ivonne A-Baki: Where Poverty and Culture Intersect: Embracing Local Traditions to Better Fight Poverty Top
Culture does not live just in storied museums. It is not confined exclusively to the art and architecture, the literature and music, of leading capital cities. Rather, culture is the definition of a people. And, if those people are among the three billion global citizens who are today struggling to live on less than $2.50 a day, we must do a better job of understanding -- and respectfully implementing -- the role of culture in sustainable economic growth. If the world's poor are to pull themselves out of extreme poverty and onto the path of development, culture is both a means and ends for doing so. In a recent book, the World Bank explains how culture can be both respected and properly leveraged in solving some of the world's most pressing problems such as systemic poverty. It points to how unique cultural sensitivities and practices are often the basis for how a society will design and implement specific programs to fight poverty. Many in the development community call this common-sense innovation "country ownership," placing the focus and responsibility on nations themselves to build homegrown anti-poverty projects based on their own cultures, not those imposed by outside donors. Respecting a country's cultural identity makes for smarter and more sustainable development solutions. Respecting culture means that the international community will not waste valuable resources on programs that will not be relevant or have the desired impact. Respecting culture when fighting poverty ensures a better way of communicating, so that lives can change for the better. Fostering cultural expression can have a major positive impact on driving local as well as global well-being. Indigenous design, craft, and historical sites hold a wealth of potential in creating new jobs and improving incomes while preserving ages-old traditions. UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), for example, is improving the living standards of the poor in Latin America through projects aimed at generating employment by preserving and promoting the cultural heritage and traditional handicrafts of local communities. Bi-lateral donors have also taken note, and are embracing culture as a way to more effectively deliver assistance in reducing poverty. The Millennium Challenge Corporation program, for example, has dedicated $112 million in Morocco, to support the country's centuries-old artisan sector in the Fez Medina area, including investing in clean-burning, environmentally-friendly kilns to assist poor potters produce the world famous Moroccan pottery in an attempt to boost their earnings while reducing their environmental impact. While these approaches are not new, they are more relevant than ever and deserve the attention of the world community. The best minds of the world's cultural, scientific and education communities must come together to identify solutions to poverty that embrace growth opportunity while correctly speaking the language that is local culture. Exploring the intersection between culture and poverty reduction is a tangible way of more effectively meeting the Millennium Development Goals. Embracing this approach will help developing countries implement their national development strategies better and move closer to halving the proportion of their citizens living in extreme poverty. Embracing culture allows for a process for citizen participation, for giving the poor a voice in their own development. Building on that approach, cultural expressions are a sustainable portfolio of products and services that can generate income while respecting the environment and local languages and traditions as populations climb out of poverty. Now is the time to embrace and leverage culture not only for the world's aesthetic enrichment, but even more importantly, to help transform the lives of the world's poor in sustainable, meaningful ways. More on Poverty
 
Perry Garfinkel: Releasing My Inner Emeril: Lagasse Grilled Top
My father, for all his lack of domestic skills, was a brilliant grill-meister. On a New Jersey summer night, like the ones we begin to savor now, he would start the grill early on the back patio, Pabst Blue Ribbon in hand. There wasn't much to prepare. This was long before the fully loaded gas contraptions designed to heat up male testosterone as much as heat up burgers and hot dogs. Those things require a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering to operate and the local fire department on call. We had a grill that looked like a black metal beach ball that had been cut in half, and a grill top that was as sturdy as my father's own hands when he tried to screw in a light bulb. But the meals he produced were so memorable I am salivating now all over my laptop and onto this web page (sorry, Arianna). Memorable in their simplicity: steak marinated in red wine, pepper and soy sauce, Jersey corn husked down to one layer, and Jersey tomatoes on the side swimming in garlic, oregano and olive oil -- Jersey being the operative essential ingredient. Despite the Joisey jokes, it is, after all, the Garden State ( http://www.aarpmagazine.org/travel/my_jersey_journey.html ). Now comes Emeril Lagasse -- one of those celebrity chefs the size of whose multimedia empire long ago exceeded the size of his girth, but not his ego -- with a book entitled "Emeril at the Grill" ( http://www.emerils.com ). Endlessly promoting it (including a shameless appearance on Jon & Kate Plus 8 ), he next stops in at the Kahala Food & Wine Classic on June 12 and 13, at the Kahala Resort & Hotel (5000 Kahala Ave., Honolulu; 800-367-2525; http://www.kahalaresort.com/fwc_emeril_lagasse.cfm ). Though it's only a couple of days away, the organizers tell me there are some late-booking deals to be had on packages that include wine and cigar tastings, dinners, demos, of course the room, and more food -- all themed to the new cuisine of Emeril's hometown, New Orleans. "Bam!" He got me there -- love that gumbo and beignets. But I never got the man-grill thing myself. What is it about standing in front of a grill that makes a man feel more of a man by spreading his legs, drink in one hand, huge tongs in the other, slathering BBQ sauce on a hunk of meat? Of course, there is something primal about it that takes him back to the days when he was slathering BBQ sauce on a sabre-toothed tiger, drink in hollowed-out skull bone in one hand, huge machete in the other. Emeril thinks he can turn me into one of those alpha males, cockily standing in front of the grill, deftly pushing aside pretenders to my grill throne, simply by throwing guy phrases into his book like "Oh yeah, baby," and "I'm telling you, you will be the smash, the bomb, the top dawg of the neighborhood." Really? What about when that translucent piece of salmon slips through the grill and I am left desperately trying to spear it back from death by mesquite charcoal? How manly will I look then, huh, Emeril? And anyway, why would a man's man be grilling any kind of fish when meat will clog arteries so much better and more efficiently? But, it turns out, Emeril may not be such a guy's guy after all, because there is a whole chapter on grilling fish. Fish!? And then he goes ahead and offers such sensitive advice that one wonders if Emeril himself is in touch with his feminine side. To wit: "Scatter soaked hardwood chunks over your coals for a quick and easy way to add a smoky nuance to your grilled foods." "Wrap fish fillets, sliced veggies, and other quick-cooking items inside foil packets with bundles of fresh herbs and throw them directly on the grill; the steam will release the herb's perfume and flavor anything contained inside the pouch." "I love fresh citrus and always keep lemons, limes, and oranges on hand; they come in handy for spritzing up quickly grilled meats, seafoods, and vegetables, especially when followed up by a quick drizzle of extra virgin olive oil." Here's one of the fish dishes he'll make at the Kahala this weekend, right out of his book. Sambal Shrimp 2 cups sambal oelek (ground fresh chili paste) 1⁄2 cup sugar 1⁄2 cup freshly squeezed lime juice 1⁄2 cup olive oil 1⁄4 cup minced garlic 1⁄4 cup minced fresh ginger 1⁄4 cup mirin 2 tablespoons Vietnamese fish sauce (nuoc nam) 2 tablespoons dark Asian sesame oil 3 pounds large shrimp (about 30 shrimp), peeled and deveined, head and tail segments intact 2 tablespoons roughly chopped fresh cilantro 2 tablespoons roughly chopped fresh mint 1. In a medium bowl, combine all the ingredients except the shrimp, cilantro, and mint. Whisk well to combine. Allow the marinade to sit at room temperature for at least 1 hour and up to 4 hours. 2. Place the shrimp in a 1-gallon resealable plastic bag, and add all but 1 ⁄2 cup of the marinade to the bag. Allow the shrimp to marinate at room temperature for 1 hour. 3. Preheat a grill to medium-high and oil the grill. 4. Place the shrimp on the grill and cook until they are just cooked through, 2 to 21 ⁄2 minutes per side. Transfer the cooked shrimp to a large bowl. Add the reserved 1 ⁄2 cup marinade, the cilantro, and the mint, and toss well to combine. Transfer the shrimp to a large serving bowl or platter, and serve immediately. Yield: 6 to 8 servings. Oh yeah, Emeril! See you in Honolulu! Aloha and Mahalo!
 
Stephanie Gertler: Middle Lane Top
The cab driver who took me from the train station in Springfield, Massachusetts to Northampton, Massachusetts on Monday morning had two very authentic-looking green eyes tattooed on the back of his bald head. He also drove with both hands off the wheel (was he using his knees?) while he talked and gesticulated about morality, the nonsensical illegality of marijuana as juxtaposed to the nonsensical legality of tobacco products, and how he believes in welfare, but doesn't like the prostitutes at the bus depot (who "take" welfare, he said) and sell their "wares" as well as pills with kids in tow. In addition, he told me about his difficult childhood as the youngest of seven children whose father was a violent alcoholic, his sainted mother, his hard-working wife, his three small daughters, and how he feels that no one is ever entitled to boredom: All this during a 20- minute car ride at roughly 70 miles per hour in the left lane. I am a middle lane kind of woman who stays within the speed limit and keeps her eyes on the road. Did I really just make that last statement? Am I really, with all my bravado, just a middle-lane kind of woman who proceeds with caution? So, there I was visiting my daughter Ellie in Northampton since Monday -- a promise I kept as she and Larry settle into their new house while Larry was away on business. It's the first time Ellie's lived in a house except for the one where she grew up with parents and brothers in place. She was a little skittish about being "alone," and their 55-pound dog Tucker is trained not to bark -- not a great asset when you hear bumps in the night and want a guard dog. Right now, Ellie and Larry's house smells like lemons since I spent a lot of time cleaning. Alas, I know the scent will be only temporary since I can't get either of them jazzed enough about the citrus scent -- not to mention that long work hours for both don't leave a lot of time for home maintenance. And romance is better. The cleaning wasn't entirely for them -- although I would be a liar to say I wasn't motivated. Cleaning is therapy for me -- a combination of exercising my muscles while organizing my thoughts as I wash away grime and fold items of clothing like origami. There's a synergy: Dull surfaces -- mental, emotional, wooden, porcelain -- come to a glimmer. Though the mini epiphanies during cleaning have to be written down or they'll go right out of my head again... The night before last, Ellie and I tooled around town before stopping for sushi: I bought her a refrigerator magnet that pictures a 1950's "housewife" with a bobbed , gray shirtwaist dress and apron scrubbing a gleaming white bath tub. It says, " A clean house is a sign of a wasted life." Ellie insisted that I buy a coffee mug for myself -- with a similar female image it reads, ""If by 'happy' you mean trapped with no means of escape, then yes, I'm happy." Yesterday morning, my mug was filled with coffee, and Ellie and I both laughed. This morning I used one of Ellie's large floral mugs -- ones once in our old house. The new mug haunts me now: It was a joke that evoked too much conversation last night and opened too many doors that should have stayed closed -- with me behind them no matter how she pulled on the door knob. What happens when we become our daughter's "friend" if we discuss ourselves as wives is that we end up burdening them -- making what we say subject to misinterpretation. After all, we're either still married or once were married to their fathers. We try to answer questions truthfully, unable to fool women in their twenties, yet when we lay ourselves bare as women/wives, we become all too vulnerable as mothers. The thing is, these young women are still our children. They don't want to see us rage on, shed tears, suffer confusion, endure uncertainty. We talk to them, trying not to cross boundaries -- yet without the intimate explanations... the nuances... it's like body surfing as the waves come up and over us as we fight the pull of the undertow in tandem. So last night was a new course for me in motherhood titled perhaps How Much of Our Lives Do We Reveal to Our Daughters? I believe, regardless of the daughter's efforts to allow us a "no holds barred" forum, mothers and daughters cannot talk about the mother's life. We mothers must bite our lips no matter the temptation... bite to the point of drawing blood. This is a strange crossroads: Ellie is the woman I always wanted her to be. She is brilliant, sensitive, and perceptive. She is an innate feminist, and beautiful inside and out. But she is my child. And although she was cavalier about the purchase of the coffee mug, she doesn't want to know when I take the editorial comment to heart even though she asked a million questions. Truth is, sure there are times I've wanted to escape, but at heart, I am the woman who drives in the middle lane -- and from the middle lane you have more options: It's easier to get to the fast lane and the slow lane depending upon the drive. Unlike the road, life is not linear (God, how many times do I say that?), but certain detours taken and navigated are personal maps. She'll have her own journey. As I left, Ellie said, "You're my best friend, you know." I kissed her and held her close. Sometimes, for me, she's still about six. "Aren't you going to say that I'm yours?" she asked. Based upon last night, I said, "No. I'm your mother, and I love you. I can be your best friend -- but you can't be mine." Sometimes a coffee mug is just a coffee mug. More on Relationships
 
Senator Calls Out Frank Luntz From Senate Floor Top
It's not every day that a sitting senator takes to the floor to call out a GOP strategist. But on Wednesday, Oregon Democrat Jeff Merkley did just that, whacking messaging guru Frank Luntz for writing a blueprint for demonizing health care reform and Republican officials for dutifully following his lead. "Now, you may think that I'm raising this document before you, this -- this plan for how to kill health care, and that maybe it doesn't have any bearing on the real debate," said Merkley, a freshmen Democrat, from the floor, waving a thin set of white papers in his right hand. "But it absolutely does. These talking points are being echoed in this very chamber in order to kill health care." What followed was a point-by-point comparison of Luntz's 28-page memo, distributed to congressional Republicans, to some of recent talking points coming straight from the mouths of GOP leadership. Said the Senator: Here we go. Frank Luntz's memo, that's his memo on how to kill health care, came out in April. It says - talking point number five - "Health denial care horror stories in Canada and other countires do resonate, but you have to humanize them. You notice we recommend the phrase 'government takeover' rather than 'government run' or 'government control.'" Why? Because government takeover sounds even scarier. So what did we hear in the chamber from our minority leader just recently? I quote - "Americans are concerned about a government takeover of health care and for good reason." And it goes on. So recognize that that is a point that's coming from a document about how to kill health care, not a responsible debate about the plan we have in front of us. Merkley's remarks represent a new line of political debate about the reform process. The extent to which Democrats can establish that opposition to greater government involvement in health care is driven by poll-tested talking points, as opposed to legitimate ideological disagreements, could go some ways towards affecting the legislative process. To be certain, progressive health care advocates also have well-tuned talking points and polling data at their disposal. But the conventional wisdom going into the upcoming reform battle has held that the Clinton-era effort at an overhaul was, in part, derailed by massive and correlated effort between private industry actors and sympathetic Republicans. There is little public appetite for that happening again. Hence the benefits in putting Luntz at the center of the debate. Get HuffPost Politics On Facebook and Twitter!
 
Karen Luniw: 5 Easy Tips for Felling Better When You're Freaking Out About Money Top
Yes, we know there is an economic crisis that is about to get better...someday. Yes, we feel lucky to have made it this far. Yes, we should feel grateful for all that we have in our lives. Yes, it's good to think all these things and we feel good for having these thoughts. I am a good person. But, I am totally freaking out! Whaaat? No, I didn't say that! (At least not while anyone was around) Everyday I get emails or talk to clients that know they can attract what they want into their life and the flip side is they also know that they can attract what they don't want into to their life, too. The statement about freaking out about money is common - all too common. Does that sound familiar to you? Trust me, you are definitely not alone. The word is out. We have some semblance of control over our life and it starts with our inner world. But what happens when our inner world is having heart palpitations while making lunch, waking up at 3 o'clock in the morning in a sweat wondering where the next month's income is coming from? Doesn't this seriously mess up my Law of Attraction mojo? Sad to say, but yes, yes it does seriously screw up your attraction mojo. Darn it, hey? So what does one do about it? How do we get our happenin', attractin' mojo back? First, let's define Law of Attraction mojo. Law of Attraction, if you haven't heard, is the process of attracting into our life that which we focus on most of the time. Like energy attracts like energy and everything, including money and the intense feeling of freaking out about it, is also made up of energy. Mojo, in this format, we'll define as a type of personal magnetism. (I have great parking spot mojo!) We could actually use Law of Attraction (LOA) and mojo independently to describe the same sort of action - attraction. So how does that gut-wrenching, all -encompassing excruciating feeling about not having enough money affect our circumstances and our ability to attract more money? Well, if you've had that feeling, you know it and you know it well enough that you never, ever want to have it again. It doesn't feel good. The feeling is intense and there's the kicker. When we have intense feelings, there is a lot of energy associated with those intense feelings and they are powerful. This is powerful enough energy to immobilize most people. What happens when we're immobilized? Let me give you a hint, most people make terrible decisions, if they make a decision at all, or worse, they don't do anything at all. They stay stuck. They don't perform well and the ability to see opportunities or make good decisions about money or anything else, disappears. Do we like to work with or do business with these people? No. Do we like to hire these people? No. It's sad to say, but a fact, that desperation does not inspire confidence. So what can we do when we're wigging out about our finances? Here's my Top 5 Tips: 1. Stop and breathe and come back to the present moment. You're still alive; the world has not literally fallen down around you. Nothing has profoundly changed from the moment prior, okay, maybe you got some lousy news but you are still breathing and as long as you are, you have options baby! 2. Quit the gloom and doom crap. Let's do a Byron Katie for a moment. Is the dire misfortune you're forecasting really true? Is there really no other way out? Are all options lost? Or, are you just playing out a really bad scene in your head because, well, that's just what you do? Don't worry, your ability to creatively forecast the worst is just a bad habit and bad habits can be changed with a little information, a little technique and a little time. Also know that you are in extraordinarily good company - almost the entire population of the world does the same thing. (Alright, I don't have stats on that but I would bet a lot that it's true) 3. Start imagining the best outcome you could possibly imagine. This starts to put you into a totally different frame of mind which can allow you to see possibility. When you can imagine it, you can start to create it. If you can't do that, do #4. 4. Go do something fun. Distraction is a key component to living a great life. Of course, we have to be responsible and take action, but only when you're in the right frame. Who hasn't witnessed a bad action creating worse circumstances? We've all seen it...someone says something out of anger and it escalates into a situation far worse. Who needs that? Play is the answer! 5. Full circle - be grateful for something, anything! The feeling of gratitude is extremely powerful (why else would Oprah recommend that we have a Gratitude Journal?) and puts us into a feeling state that allows us to think, feel and believe that there is goodness in our life and that there can be more on it's way. Powerful. All our actions have no choice but to fall in line with what we think, feel and believe. What we think, feel and believe have their own energy. When we're having positive, happy thoughts, feelings and beliefs we act in a way that attracts more. Who wouldn't want that? More on Layoffs
 
Karen Luniw: He's Just Not That Into You... Top
Recently the movie based on the book 'He's just not that into you' came out to theaters. What gets me wondering is whether people will finally get the message. As a girl growing up, I was always desperate to be loved. I always had boyfriends and had no problems around that except for one thing....many of my boyfriends were absolutely no good for me or my self-esteem. Of course, I attracted that because I had low self-esteem. Then, one day in my late 20's or early 30's, everything changed. I stopped looking for love and started enjoying being with me and finding out what I wanted from my life. When Geoff, my sweetheart, came into my life shortly thereafter, I was ready for him...or at least pretty ready. You see, he called when he said he was going to call. He looked thrilled to see me and he was nice to me and excited to introduce me to his friends. What did I do? I kept looking for flaws - he was too good to be true, so much so that I almost started picking fights because I couldn't understand why he was so good to me and then I stopped. He was exactly what I had been hoping for but I had to grow into the person that could accept that level of love, sharing and intimacy. And I did, I just accepted that I was good enough to be treated well. Did you get that - I finally allowed myself to be treated well!! Every week I get emails from people who want a particular person in their life - usually someone that has already been in their life and has moved on. The writer usually wants to know how to get that person back. (And yes, I am so guilty of this in my past!) It breaks my heart because everyone deserves to have the 'Mr. Right' or 'Miss Right'. What ends up happening is that the focus of these writers is on what is no longer a match for them. That's a focus on lack, not love. Dr. Phil said it the best - your boyfriend or girlfriend should be treating you as the special person you really are (or something along those lines!). In any case, all of us deserve to be treated wonderfully and if someone in your life isn't treating you that way - they don't deserve to be in your life. Get this - focus on the great times you had with the other person, focus on the qualities (not the person) that you loved and then focus on being good to yourself. If that person who is now gone is meant to be with you - they will be attracted back to you by the focus on the good stuff rather than the focus on getting them back. Truly, that rarely works out in the long run. Also, get this....we all will move heaven and earth to be with the person we really want to be with and if someone is not doing that for you, don't make up excuses for them. They are not the right person for you and vice versa....period. If you can do these few things and accept this new understanding into your consciousness you will turn a new page in your life and it will ROCK!
 
Gitmo Detainees: Records Document "Shocking" Weight Loss Top
When most people talk about the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, the focus is usually on what a beauty queen-endorsed demi-paradise it is . Or the awesome health care the inmates receive , through Hillarycare. Or the " two types of fruit " they get to eat, as if they were rich libertines. Or the one free colonoscopy they receive , because why not, that sounds like a real perk. But you know what too often goes unsaid about Gitmo? The way they've been totally starving the detainees, half to death. But you can read more about it, in a report authored by Andy Worthington, titled " Guantanamo's Hidden History: Shocking Statistics Of Starvation ." But here's the salient findings : In March 2007, the Pentagon released a series of documents, "Measurements of Heights and Weights of Individuals Detained by the Department of Defense at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba," which recorded, in numbing detail, the prisoners' weights, from the date of their arrival and, in general, at monthly intervals thereafter until December 2006, when these particular records come to an end. In the cases of prisoners on hunger strike, the weights were recorded at weekly intervals, and, in some cases, on a daily basis. Unnoticed at the time of their release, these documents have not, until now, been analyzed in depth, but after conducting a comprehensive review of the documents I can reveal that the results demonstrate the extent to which the Pentagon's prohibition on releasing any photos of the prisoners has enabled it to disguise a truly shocking fact: throughout Guantánamo's history, one in ten of the total population -- 80 prisoners in total -- weighed, at some point, less than 112 pounds (eight stone, or 50 kg), and 20 of these prisoners weighed less than 98 pounds (seven stone, or 44 kg). Well, no wonder those colonoscopies are so inexpensive! MORE: Guantánamo's Hidden History: Shocking Statistics of Starvation [Andy Worthington] Hunger Strike [Attackerman] [Would you like to follow me on Twitter ? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here .]
 
South Carolina Gov. Sanford: 'Probably Isn't' Good for Cheney To Be Voice Of The GOP Top
On this week's ABC News Shuffle podcast, GOP Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina talks about the Republican voices being heard and why Rush Limbaugh and former Vice President Cheney need to defer and allow some new ones to be heard. [...] Asked if it's a good thing for former Vice President Cheney to be seen as the voice of the Republican Party, as recent polling indicates, Sanford said it probably isn't." He expressed a similar sentiment about conservative talk radio giant Rush Limbaugh. More on Dick Cheney
 
James Moore: The Inelegant Internet Top
The internet may one day prove to be the most profoundly transformative creation of humankind. There is also the possibility it can turn into a garbage dump of the human mind where the glittering is buried beneath the refuse. The overwhelming flow, redirection, and accumulation of information have the potential to render almost everything meaningless. New developments, which are designed to simplify, have often tended to complicate. Twitter, as an example, can be confounding. The types of information generally offered on the 140 character communication tool have the approximate cultural and informational value of data grunts. As a curiosity, Twitter is fascinating. However, it appears to function almost as a switching center for tens of millions of thoughts that are often of marginal value. At its worse, Twitter is comprised of users offering you compressed links to pages they discovered and think you ought to see. Who are these people who sit on Twitter all day and link off to page after page of "interesting stuff?" What did they do before Twitter? Twitter is, nonetheless, kind of fun and there are some cases where it even becomes a useful tool. A couple of recent news stories have profiled a pizza joint in New Orleans and a taco truck in Los Angeles that have made effective use of the service. (Hardly qualifies as a "profound" cultural development but it's something.) There are also methods for using Twitter as a kind of "walk up window" where a customer can view a business' service or production in process, and there may be other valuable usages to grow out of Twitter. Regardless, the prevailing climate of the service at this nascent stage seems to be people trying to accumulate followers and share links or "Twit pics." (E-mail also accomplishes these minor feats, though your photo or avatar is not part of that process, unless by design.) Unless you are famous, acquiring followers is not simple. Peter Shankman, who runs HARO (Help a Reporter Out) and has more than 40,000 followers the last time I looked, once publicly ridiculed me for having only 47 people following me shortly after I had signed up for Twitter. (I felt like a high school sophomore with bad acne and no friends.) Sadly, I am still under 200 and I am following less than 100. Unfortunately, even with the low number of people I am following I cannot manage to track even the slightest amount of what is transpiring on my Twitter feed. A few individuals on my feed "tweet" dozens of times daily and I have frequently signed on to discover one person has zapped out 15 consecutive tweets. There are some "twitterers" who follow tens of thousands and their feeds must be essentially a haze of photos and text that might be edited together and turned into a time lapse movie. Again, I'm searching, patiently, for value. I find it enjoyable to connect with people I might otherwise not have met but I wonder if I need to know the songs they are listening to at a particular moment in the day or how they felt on the run they just concluded. (Is there more than one answer to that question?) There are also endless tweets that are tips about how to use Twitter. I think it's fair to call much of this absurd. Twitter's two founders attended the Wall Street Journal's All Things Digital (D7) conference recently and were very coy about how they plan to make money off of their digital child. They probably just don't know and see no real need to commit to monetization as long as speculators are suggesting the service may be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. If Twitter started taking ads and generating a modest cash flow it would be pretty easy to place a dollar value on it and that amount would almost assuredly not be hundreds of millions, which makes "coy" a good business strategy. All of this net noise is now being amplified by television news teams scrapping over audience share. Suddenly, reporters and anchors are asking people to follow them on Twitter and Facebook and their news programs have pages where viewers can post comments on the latest stories. We entered into a science fiction parody not too long ago when the first network TV camera was pointed at a computer monitor so a TV audience could read and have read to us a viewer opinion posted on the news anchor's web site. If I wanted to know what Madge in Boise thought about President Obama's trip to Saudi Arabia, I would call Madge and chat her up. I watch network news to hear from experts on policy and politics and culture and history and not for the opinions of Joe Don Barnes from Lubbock. Unfortunately, someone somewhere wrote that journalism and web sites and business are most successful in the internet era when they are "interactive" and, suddenly, there are more inbound signals in the broadcasting business than there are outbound and nobody even stopped and bothered to ask if this were a good thing. So I'm asking. My sense is that for technology to succeed it must be simple and work in the background to perform a task. I want my computer to be an appliance like a toaster. Instead, the net, new applications, smart phones, (dumb users), downloads, uploads, updates, and browsers that are evolving faster than machines in a Terminator flick are complicating what were once mundane, daily tasks. (Yes, they might actually be simplifying and I am unable to keep pace.) There must be some time when the learning curve slows because consumers of technology are certain to grow weary of constantly having to understand the latest software or hardware and as soon as it is mastered they then confront the latest iteration. I may also simply be jealous of the fact that I did not create one of the 50,000 iPhone apps and lacked the genius to realize I could grow wealthy by creating the electronic version of the whoopee cushion in the form of a digital fart. Technologically, though, who is not impressed when Google delivers a few million search matches in .0014 seconds? Yahoo is equally proficient but both provide endless lists of blue links with a few incomplete sentences of explanation and reference. As wondrous as internet search engines are they also add levels of complexity not easily parsed by average users. Refining search parameters does not necessarily deliver sought after knowledge or information. As a writer who has relied extensively on the power of search engines, I am grateful for all of the hours I was not required to spend in library stacks and digging through reference articles. (Search engines have, in fact, accelerated the production of books by authors and may have even contributed to their devaluation.) Is it not possible, though, even Google and Yahoo are just dumping inordinate amounts of information into a user's lap and not doing an effective job of refining? Two new search engines, Bing and Siri, were demonstrated at D7 in San Diego and both offer significant advancements in results presentation. Bing gives aggregated resorts in categories on the left of the links list and a mouse-over on the links to the right, which reveals even greater detail like associated relevant photos and videos. Siri, however, when it launches, is likely to change the way web users view search engines and it is also certain to redefine their expectations. Siri's developers used an iPhone to demo how easily their product answers questions without relying on detailed parameters from users. A conversation takes place between the searcher and the search engine. A hungry person wanting Italian in Salt Lake City can ask the question about restaurants either using text or voice and through a series of brief responses the searcher very quickly discovers a table can be booked at a highly-rated eatery very close to where they are standing. Siri turns a phone and a search engine into a personal assistant and sends technology out scampering across the web to find what you want. Google has a similar app on iPhone but Siri's appears to have advanced the technology to be more intuitive. These kinds of developments are certain to make technology more useful and prevent it from turning into a steaming pile of information and barely discernible data that can never be meaningfully comprehended. However, we will all continue to get updates on Facebook and Twitter from friends who want us to know they took a quiz to determine which president they would be and they turned out to be Millard Fillmore. A group of researchers at Half Past Human reached the conclusion that the internet was the first manifestation of the human consciousness and by studying language used on the net they can predict future events. The theory is that the net can have moments of pre-cognition just like humans and predictive linguistics will reveal tragedies and glories in advance of their arrival. They've sent out bots across the web to gather language and deliver interpretations and the news awaiting us is apparently not all that great. If the social media noise continues to increase, though, I'm confident the web bots will be rendered useless and soon they will only be able to predict that Madge in Boise is not going to like it whenever President Obama talks to Muslims. Simple is elegant. Maybe convergence of technologies will begin to take us toward simplicity in design and function on the net. It's just as likely is that Google will buy up every new idea and product and assert world technological dominion. In the end, all things become Google and a river runs through it? Oh, and if you are interested, I intend to post this piece on my Facebook page, link to it on Twitter, feature it on my personal web site, http://www.moorethink.com and cross post it to Huffington Post. Also at http://www.moorethink.com
 
Norah O'Donnell's Shoes: The MSNBC Anchor Reveals What She's Wearing Under The Desk (SLIDESHOW) Top
MSNBC's Chief Washington, D.C. Correspondent Norah O'Donnell is always kept on her toes, whether she's covering Capitol Hill news for the cable network, contributing to the "Today Show," or reporting on the weekends. Luckily, she has fantastic footwear to stand on. Norah photographed a week's worth shoes and told us about each. Which pair would you say shows Norah putting her best foot forward? Curious about what goes on under other news desks? Check out Mika Brzezinksi's fancy footwear . *Follow Huffington Post Style on Twitter and become a fan of Huffington Post Style on Facebook * More on MSNBC
 

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