corporate entertainment: May 2012

Thursday, May 31, 2012

Gender bias found in fertility counseling for cancer survivors

Recent medical advances have increased the number of cancer survivors. Following successful treatment and return to a normal life, a number of cancer survivors in their reproductive years desire to start - or complete - their family. Unfortunately, however, the cancer treatment can impact their therapy.

A new study by Swedish researchers has found that more men than women are counseled regarding fertility preservation before embarking on a treatment regimen. Researchers at the Karolinska University Hospital (Stockholm, Sweden) and the Uppsala University (Uppsala, Sweden) published their findings online in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

The goal of the study was to investigate the perception of fertility-related information and use of fertility preservation in male and female cancer survivors who were of reproductive age. The authors reviewed data from population-based registers in Sweden and identified cancer survivors diagnosed from 2003 to 2007. Included in the study were cancer survivors who were age 18 to 45 years at diagnosis and had lymphoma, acute leukemia, testicular cancer, ovarian cancer, or female breast cancer that was treated with chemotherapy. A questionnaire was mailed to 810 eligible participants; 484 cancer survivors (60%) returned the questionnaire.

The researchers found that the majority of male participants reported having received information about the impact of cancer treatment on fertility (80%) and fertility preservation (68%); more than half of the men banked frozen sperm (54%). The women were less informed. Less than half (48%) reported that they received information about treatment impact on fertility and 14% reported that they received information about fertility preservation. Only seven women (2%) underwent fertility preservation. Predictors for receiving information about treatment impact on fertility were a pretreatment desire to have children, male gender, and being age 35 years or less at diagnosis. Predictors for receiving information about fertility preservation included male gender, age 35 years or less at diagnosis, and having no children at diagnosis.

The authors concluded that a marked gender difference was found in regard to the receipt of fertility-related information and use of fertility preservation. They stressed that an urgent need existed for the dissemination of fertility-related information to female cancer victims. This would allow them to participate in informed decisions regarding their treatment and future reproductive ability.

Take home message:
This study should serve as a wakeup call to healthcare professionals caring for cancer patients. All cancer patients of reproductive age should be offered counseling in regard to the impact of the therapy on their fertility and options for fertility preservation. The study is important information for any cancer victim facing treatment. If a healthcare professional does not offer counseling, it should be requested by interested women. Cancer treatment with radiation and/or chemotherapy can impact fertility. If a woman is desirous of future fertility, in some cases, the treatment regimen can be modified to improve a woman?s chances of future childbearing. Women can have ova (eggs) or portions of their ovaries frozen for future use. Excellent results have been reported with this approach. Also, embryos can be frozen to be implanted at a future date. The foregoing methods may be of interest to a surviving spouse of a woman who does not survive her cancer. Embryos can be implanted in a surrogate in this situation.

Reference: Journal of Clinical Oncology

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Cocktails and Small Bites at Happy's Bar and Kitchen - BeantownEats

What happens when a successful Boston Chef creates a diner concept with upscale ingredients? A whole lotta fun. Chef Michael Schlow has one rule at his recently opened Happys Bar and Kitchen: there are no rules. Break out of the suit and tie, don a Sox hat and head to Happy?s for dinner before the game, or like we did, for some drinks and small plates among friends.

Upon entering, you will notice that the design of the restaurant was well thought out. A vast bar is located to the left and the space takes up the entire front of the restaurant. High top tables with no chairs give the Fenway Park crowd a spot hang out before the game, place their beer and order some finger-friendly appetizers. Tables are available in the bar area, but not too many, leaving the space open and able to accommodate a crowd.

A host stand is located in front of a large but unassuming curtain that divides the casual dining room from front bar area. We sat in the dining room and immediately started perusing the cocktail menu. A simple list of classics includes the likes of a Tom Collins, Negroni and Pisco Sour, all priced from $12-14. For the more adventurous, the New Twists consists of Happy?s originals like the A&P (also $12-14).

The evening that commenced was full of food from the appetizer and munchies menus, which were all perfect for sharing at the table. The menu is fairly large but not overwhelming and this post only describes the left side of the menu. On the right are entrees including a Grilled Pork Chop with cherry peppers, sausage and potatoes ($17.99), Chicken Milanese ($16.99) and Fall River-style Portuguese Fisherman?s Stew ($21.49). Daily specials boast the fun and creativity of Schlow and his team. The Never Been Frozen TV Dinner special changes daily, and featured chicken fried steak the night of our visit, served in true tv dinner fashion, in a sectioned tray with two sides and a dessert. Blue-plate specials include a monstrous 1-lb Meatball (Tuesday) and All-You-Can-Eat Fried Chicken (Monday), all while supplies last.

Here is just a small sampling of some of the great items you can find at Happy?s Bar and Kitchen.

Start Mexican with a spicy margarita and cool duck tacos. The spice in the margarita is noticeable but not overwhelming. The little bit of heat dissipates and leaves your taste buds able to taste your food. Two small duck tacos come in one serving; the creamy cucumber cilantro sauce will cool your palate, unless you also eat the Jalepeno sliver. Tender duck meat will melt in your mouth.

A&P?(Lunazul tequila, spicy passion fruit, lime, agave; $14)

Duck Tacos?with cucumber, cilantro, mint and chiles ($9.00)

Feeling more like a taste of Italy? Try the M.B.?s Aperol Spritz (not pictured), made with Aperol, Prosecco and soda water. Pair that with a cured meat plate (the best ever, to be exact, according to Happy?s playful menu), and one of my favorites of the night, homemade ricotta; creamy yet fluffy, served with toasted crudit?s.

Cured Meat Plate?with garnishes ($10.49)

Homemade Ricotta with olive oil, sage and hot pepper flakes?($8.20)

For something more refreshing as the hot summer days approach, try a simple mojito with a wedge salad. As seemed to be a trend running through Happy?s cocktails, the mojito was not too sweet and well-proportioned. ?The wedge salad was a nice size for an appetizer salad, or so share with the table with other small plates.

Mojito ($12)

The Greatest Wedge? Ever?(seriously, that?s how it?s printed on the menu; $8.49)

Comfort dictates this last ?pairing? of bourbon and mac and cheese. Happy?s rendition of a Manhattan wasn?t exactly a home run, but certainly acceptable. ?The mac and cheese was creamy, savory and had a nice play of salty bacon with smokey jalapenos.

Mr. Pete?(Craig bourbon, burnt orange, bitters, sweet vermouth; $12)

Petra?s Super Mac and Cheese with?bacon, peas, jalapenos and crunchy bread crumbs

Last but not least, we couldn?t pass up on dessert. One of Happy?s featured desserts is a Chef Schlow staple, appearing on the menus of two of his other restaurants, Via Matta and Alta Strada. ?This fun dessert is a plate of cookies with a side of marscapone cream for dipping, almost like a richer version of a do-it-yourself Oreo. ?We were also treated to a serving of Strawberry Shortcake, which boasted a very light ending to our meal. ?The shortbread was a great consistency: not too dense yet held up to the moist strawberries and whipped cream.

Mascarporeos of chocolate shortbread and marscapone cream

Strawberry Shortcake

There is a lot more on the menu to taste and enjoy at Happy?s. I already have my eye on the TV Dinner Special and I?m sure at some point one of us will just have to try the 1-pound meatball. ?But until then, Happy?s brings a fun?atmosphere?to the Fenway neighborhood, with good food at reasonable prices.

Have you been to Happy?s? If so, what was your favorite dish?

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Charles Taylor sentenced to 50 years for war crimes

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Hollande: Syria Ambassador To France Being Expelled

In this image made from amateur video released by the Shaam News Network and accessed Monday, May 28, 2012, purports to show black smoke rising from buildings in Homs, Syria. (AP Photo/Shaam News Network via AP video)

Russia's foreign minister said on Sunday both sides in the Syrian conflict bear responsibility for the massacre in Houla.

AP reports:

Both sides have obviously had a hand in the deaths of innocent people, including several dozen women and children. This area is controlled by the rebels, but it is also surrounded by government troops," Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said after talks in Moscow with visiting British Foreign Secretary William Hague.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Make Money Online ? Why Your Free Online Home Business Is Not

According to Google the keyword phrase ?free online business? is searched 74,000 times per month without the quotation marks.

Even the phrase ?free online home business? is searched hundreds of times.

What is interesting is how competitive this phrase is on Google Adwords.

People who are searching for these keyword phrases are looking to make money online with their own business without spending any money. I understand the logic behind this. Some of them do not have any money, and others are not willing to gamble until they know a little bit more about a business opportunity.

The point I try to get across to new Internet marketers is a free online home business is never really free. The competition online will never allow you to build a home business without investing something.

What is great about the Internet is you can spend your time as opposed to investing your money. What makes this not free is your time is actually worth something even if you are not making any money.

My Internet business began to grow when I started valuing my time as money. You might start out by saying you?re going to pay yourself $8 an hour to work on the Internet.

If you spend 20 hours in one week working on building your business that?s the equivalent of paying yourself $160. You may not actually have $160 in your bank account, but you have invested that much time back in your business.

Where the Internet is a great equalizer is in how you can trade time for dollars. Let me give you an example.

Let?s say you write an article and want to submit it to article directories to get some traffic to your site. You can manually submit your article to one directory at a time. This will take you longer to do than using a submission site such as Submit Your Article where you can reach multiple directories with one click.

Here is another example. One way to get traffic to a landing page is to join a traffic exchange such as Soaring 4 Traffic.

You build credits by clicking on other people?s ads and viewing them. You can join the traffic exchange for free. Most of them have a different credit ratio for free accounts.

You might only earn one credit for every two ads viewed, as opposed to if you were a paid member where you have a 1 to 1 ratio of ads viewed for credits earned.

You can even purchase credits and have your ad shown without spending your time clicking on ads. However, if you want to build your online business for free one way to promote it is to spend your time clicking on ads to earn credits to get your ad shown.

There are numerous ways you can trade your time for money on the Internet. When you value your time based on an hourly rate you begin to understand why your free online business is not really free, but it?s still possible for anyone to eventually make money.

Join JV With Jeff Schuman for more free money making tips!

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Tags::free online home business Home Business

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New deadly quake shakes northern Italy

CAVEZZO, Italy (Reuters) - An earthquake killed at least 15 people in northern Italy on Tuesday, damaging buildings and spreading fear among thousands of residents living in tents after a similarly strong tremor in the same region flattened their homes nine days ago.

Officials said 200 people had been injured and seven were missing, trapped under the rubble of houses and warehouses in the Emilia-Romagna region, where several building sites had just reopened after the previous quake on May 20.

The Italian government said 15 people were confirmed dead, more than twice the number killed in the May 20 quake that, like Tuesday's, had its epicenter near the city of Modena. The number of those forced to leave their homes doubled to 14,000.

Many residents ran out of buildings when they felt the 5.8-magnitude tremor, which hit shortly after 0700 GMT just as operations to rebuild the quake-struck region were under way.

"As we were coming down the stairs, we heard the sound of crumbling houses around us. There was a big cloud of dust," said 72-year-old Giulio in Cavezzo, a badly damaged village about 30 km (20 miles) from Modena where three died.

The quake was the most deadly to strike Italy since 2009 when a tremor partially destroyed the central city of L'Aquila, killing about 300 people and leaving thousands homeless.

With its streets deserted, Cavezzo looked like a ghost town. A shop in the centre still had fruit displayed on stalls outside in the street.

In a nearby empty coffee shop a half-eaten croissant was left on a plate on the bar and an apron lay on the floor.

"It's a disaster, I've never seen anything like it. An endless series of very strong tremors after those of May 20, which had already pulled everything to its knees," said a very shaken Stefano Draghetti, mayor of Cavezzo.

"We need a lot of help to restart, from those who can - the state, the European community."

Italian media showed buildings and shopping malls shaking and collapsing under the force of the quake and ambulances racing across towns while rescuers worked through the rubble.

In Medolla, also near the epicenter, an electromedical equipment plant collapsed, killing a worker. Rescuers were frantically searching for three other workers still believed to be under the rubble, a Reuters witness said.

"The situation is one of great fear and uncertainty," said Salvatore Iannizzotto, provincial head for the Modena police.

"The population was becoming more relaxed and slowly moving back into their homes. They have now left their homes again."

The civil protection service was setting up new emergency campsites in to provide residents with shelter for the night.

Initial rescue operations were hampered by disruption to the mobile phone network and to the railway network around Bologna.

QUAKE WOUNDS ITALY

The quake hit one of the most productive regions in a country struggling with a deep economic recession.

Farmers estimated the damage of the previous quake to agriculture in one of Italy's most fertile areas at more than 200 million euros ($250 million).

Sports car maker Ferrari and motorcycle firm Ducati closed their plants in the region for safety reasons. The world's top pasta-maker Barilla, based in Parma, evacuated a plant for 15 minutes but said production had not stopped.

The quake was felt across northern and central Italy, including in the most populous northern city Milan. The area was hit by several large aftershocks, one of 5.6 magnitude

Schools and buildings were evacuated as far south as Florence. A soccer match between Italy and Luxembourg in Parma scheduled later on Tuesday was called off.

Emilia-Romagna, famed for its cured ham and mature Parmesan cheese, is in the middle of the Po plain, traditionally considered safer than other areas of seismic Italy.

Several historic buildings, some hit by the previous quake, suffered further damage.

In the town of San Felice sul Panaro whose imposing 14th-century Estense Castle was badly damaged in the quake just over a week ago, three workers were killed by a crumbling warehouse.

"The situation is very serious, some people are stuck under the rubble," Alberto Silvestri, the town's mayor, told Italian television.

Italian media also reported serious damage to the Baroque cathedral of Carpi and the Te Palace in Mantua, an architectural masterpiece from the Renaissance.

Prime Minister Mario Monti, whose cabinet is due to approve fresh emergency measures on Wednesday, tried to reassure the population in an impromptu news conference.

"I want to assure everyone that the state will do all that it must do, all that is possible to do, as fast as it can to guarantee the return to normality in a region so special, so important, so productive for Italy," he said.

French President Francois Hollande's office said France stood ready to provide Italy with any experts or logistical aid it might need. Greece was among the first nations to offer help.

A 3.8 magnitude quake was also felt in western Bulgaria on Tuesday, causing no casualties or serious damage, the National Geophysical Institute said. It had its epicenter near Pernik.

(Writing by Lisa Jucca; Additional reporting by Antonella Cinelli and Steve Scherer in Rome, Svetlana Kovalyova, Antonella Ciancio and Lisa Jucca in Milan; Editing by Louise Ireland and Janet Lawrence)

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Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Financial Health Check ? Money Management Help | Personal ...

Are you financially healthy? Find out how you can improve your financial condition.

How is your financial condition at this time? Have you spent time to evaluate it? Unless you evaluate it, how can you make significant improvement?

1. Evaluate Your Goals

Do you remember your last year goals in terms of your relationships, health, career, personal development, spiritually and financial? How well are you doing so far? Have you analyzed your finances ? expenses, income, saving and investment? If you have not done your financial goals yet, now is the right time to do so. Stop procrastinating and get started.

2. What Is Your Diagnosis?

You need to be honest to yourself. Please do your financial balance sheet and evaluate which part of your finances is in a good condition and which part needs improvement. Numbers can?t lie to you. Having your financial balance sheet allows you to face the reality and thus making significant improvement.

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Next, compare your investments against a benchmark (e.g. a person of a certain age will have a benchmark heart rate or blood pressure). Did your portfolio grow overall? What is your diagnosis in your investment?

3. Money Management Advice

There are money management advisers around. You can consult a wealth creation coach, especially if you have specific concerns. A money management coach may be able to give you a more objective view of your investment needs and recommend a more disciplined decision. A coach can also offer an insight into longer-term market trends and review your portfolio to see whether it is likely to achieve the returns you are targeting. Finding the right wealth creation coach, will surely turn your financial condition.

4. Wealth Management Knowledge and Skills

There are many self-help books, audio and video that will help you manage your money well. I know one of a great resource that helped my financial condition from being broke to a journey of financial freedom. Please get the resource you need.

Unless you do something about it, your financial condition will remain the same if it is not getting worse. Remember that you are responsible with your financial destiny.

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First lady's book: On growing seeds, healthy kids

WASHINGTON (AP) ? From the beginning, Michelle Obama's kitchen garden has been an overachiever, churning out more peppers, parsley and eggplant than expected, and generating interest that ? yes, really ? crosses oceans.

Now, the first lady has added a 271-page book to her gardening resume, and Americans can read all about the planting misses that came with the hits, get tips on gardening at home, and, Mrs. Obama hopes, draw some inspiration that just might change their lives. Oh, and if it happens to help her husband's re-election campaign, that would be nice, too.

Lofty goals for a book about a garden.

In "American Grown: The Story of the White House Kitchen Garden and Gardens Across America," Mrs. Obama holds out the raised vegetable beds on the South Lawn as "an expression of my hopes" for the nation's children. "Just as each seed we plant has the potential to become something extraordinary, so does every child," she writes.

The $30 book, released Tuesday by Crown Publishers, traces how a city kid from the South Side of Chicago who became a working mother and then a political spouse found herself fretting on that first planting day, March 20, 2009, about whether an L-shaped stretch of soil would prove fertile ground for a national conversation "about the food we eat, the lives we lead, and how all of that affects our children."

The book, which answers that question with a resounding yes, arrives just in time for her husband's re-election campaign.

And while the book is decidedly non-political, that fits perfectly with the Obama campaign's view that the first lady can do her husband a world of good simply by pushing the non-threatening causes such as healthy living that have made her a far more popular figure than the president himself. Mrs. Obama's favorability rating in the latest AP-GfK poll was 70 percent, compared with 58 percent for her husband.

The book's release comes with a flurry of media appearances. She's already been a TV frequent flyer to promote her "Let's Move" campaign to combat childhood obesity ? doing pushups with Ellen DeGeneres, playing tug-of-war with Jimmy Fallon in the White House and serving veggie pizza to Jay Leno. She says she gets asked about the garden wherever she goes, around the world.

"It turned out exactly as I envisioned. It's a beautiful book, wonderful pictures," she said in an appearance Tuesday on ABC's "Good Morning America."

"It is definitely a passion. Getting the kids in our country to eat healthy," Obama added. "This book is a way to talk about our journey" to better health, she said.

The first lady said that her "Let's Move" campaign to improve fitness, particularly for young people, isn't an attempt to tell people how to live. "That's not really what 'Let's Move' has been about," she said. "This isn't about government telling people what to do."

The book is chock full of colorful, glossy photos of luscious-looking vegetables, complete with a cover picture in which the first lady's blouse seems to be color-coordinated with the eggplants in her bulging basket of produce. Bo, the popular family dog, gets plenty of cameo appearances. There are maps tracing the growth of the garden over the past three years, and stories about community gardens around the country. Even a how-to on creating a compost bin.

The book is divided into four sections marking the seasons, and includes a complement of recipes for each.

There are inside stories about planting travails that will ring true with any weekend gardener: pumpkins that wouldn't grow, cantaloupes that tasted blah, blackberry bushes that wouldn't play nice with the raspberry bushes and an invasion of cucumber beetles, among them. The first lady makes clear she's not the one doing most of the hoeing and weeding, crediting school kids, White House chefs and grounds crew and enthusiastic volunteers from all over the White House chain of command with providing lots of manpower.

And there are bits of historical trivia woven throughout: John Adams ordered up the first White House garden, but it was never harvested after he lost re-election. Thomas Jefferson was obsessed with trying to grow a four-foot-long cucumber. Heiress Rachel "Bunny" Mellon, at 101 now a figure in the John Edwards' corruption trial, helped redesign the Rose Garden for President John Kennedy.

There are also bits of personal history: Mrs. Obama's father worked as a boy on one of the vegetable trucks that would deliver produce to neighborhoods, and had a reputation for sneaking pieces of fruit. Her mother's family had a plot in a neighborhood victory garden on the corner of an alley, and the kids had to eat their vegetables or go to bed without supper.

It is a tradition for first ladies to use books to advance their causes. Hillary Clinton wrote the best-seller "It Takes a Village," about the importance of community in raising children; and Laura Bush collaborated with daughter Jenna on a picture book about a reluctant reader, with "Read All About It!"

This is Michelle Obama's first book. She got no advance payment, and plans to donate all her proceeds to the National Park Foundation for programs that promote gardening and healthy eating, and to help care for the White House garden.

___

Online:

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AmericanGrown?ref=ts

___

Follow Nancy Benac on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/nbenac

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Torres looks to impress in Spain friendly

Associated Press Sports

updated 9:37 a.m. ET May 29, 2012

PAUL LOGOTHETIS

AP Sports Writer

MADRID (AP) -Fernando Torres is trying to put a season of struggles behind him to focus on Spain's campaign to defend its European Championship title.

The Chelsea striker will look to impress on Wednesday when Spain plays a friendly against South Korea in Switzerland.

Four years ago, Torres scored the winning goal at the Euro 2008 final. This year, he was not assured a spot in Spain's squad until a late season turnaround coupled with all-time leading scorer David Villa's absence to injury.

Torres, who has 88 caps for the World Cup champions, played sparingly for the Blues on their way to win the Champions League and FA Cup this season. Following talks with the Chelsea brass, Torres is optimistic about his future at the club and certain his form will pick up at the start of the European tournament in Poland and Ukraine next month.

"Physically I feel very good and fresh because I haven't had the drain of so many games as my teammates. I'm hopeful of showing my best to the team," Torres said from Spain's training camp in Austria. "It's true I would have liked to have played more with Chelsea to be in better playing shape."

Torres will compete with Fernando Llorente and Alvaro Negredo for the starting striker's spot in the warm up matches against South Korea on Wednesday and China on Sunday. A good performance in the two friendlies will secure him a place in Spain's opening match against Italy June 10.

"You can't stop the debates," Torres ahead of the match Wednesday - his first since November. "I think we are all here on our own merits. I played with the FA Cup and Champions League winners, so I don't think the end of the seasons was so bad."

Torres missed Spain's 2-0 win over Serbia on Sunday. Juan Mata was out too, but both Chelsea players are in Wednesday's lineup.

Missing from the match will be nine internationals from Barcelona and Athletic Bilbao. They will only join the team when they return to Spain after the South Korea match.

Spain eased past Serbia with its usual brand of possession and passing, which will serve them well to beat opponents in the two remaining warm-up matches for the Euro 2012.

Defender Sergio Ramos did not train on Monday during the team's final public practice in Austria which was marked by the pitch invasion by fans.

Spain travels will travel to its tournament base in the Polish city of Gdansk on June 5.

After Italy, they will face Ireland and Croatia in Group C.

More newsFilippo Monteforte / AFP - Getty Images

Monti wants Italian football halted for 2-3 years

ROME (AP) -Premier Mario Monti suggested Tuesday that Italian football should be suspended for two to three years after the latest match-fixing scandal rocked the national team and tarnished the image of the domestic game yet again just a week before the start of the European Championship.

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Monday, May 28, 2012

Ba Hons CG Arts & Animation @ UCA Rochester Course Blog: All ...

Welcome to the Ba Hons CG Arts & Animation group blog!

This is where you share information, advice, cultural nuggets and technical know-how. If you've got a problem with Maya, with an essay question, or with a project brief there's someone on here who can help you. This is also the place where your tutors will notify you regarding up and coming events and any last minute changes to the timetable.

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Fowl weather report

This is not Big Important News -- no economic meltdowns or international showdowns. It's just a note about a new generation of backyard chickens trying to fit in.

By John Yemma / May 27, 2012

An indigenous woman holds a rooster for sale during the weekly market IN Chichica stenango, Guatemala.

Melanie Stetson Freeman/Staff/File

Enlarge

A new generation of spring chickens, fuzzy and endearingly incompetent, arrived at our New England home six weeks ago. They are replacements. During the hungry winter months, a red-tailed hawk visited. Hawks are admirable in their own way. So despite the drama, there are no hard feelings. And because this is the time of year the biota of the Northern Hemisphere bust loose, predators now have other options.?

Skip to next paragraph John Yemma

Editor, The Christian Science Monitor

John Yemma is the editor of The Christian Science Monitor, which publishes on CSMonitor.com, in a print weekly, and in an e-mail delivered daily news briefing. Yemma, who became the Monitor?s editor in 2008 after 20 years at the Boston Globe, has been a foreign correspondent, Washington reporter, and covered economics, science, and culture during his 35-year career. A 1974 graduate of the University of Texas, he was a Reuter Fellow at Oxford University in 1994 and a Sulzberger Fellow at Columbia University in 2008.

Why I Quit the Catholic Church

They say you can?t be neutral on a moving train, and if recent developments on the American political scene have demonstrated anything, it?s that the Catholic Church is a train headed in a pretty distressing direction: away from equality and social justice, and set on a collision course with the wall of separation between church and state.

As if the child abuse scandals from the last several decades and the complicity and cover-ups that seemed to reach to the highest levels of the Church weren?t enough, now there?s the crackdown on American nuns who, in their commitment to social justice and helping the poor, have been accused by U.S. priests and bishops of straying too far from sanctioned Church doctrine and not spending enough time denouncing feminists and gays. It?s also clear that pressure from Catholic religious leaders plays a large role in the Republicans? ?war on women? and some of the recent bills proposed to restrict access to birth control and health care for women, all in the name of religious freedom. For those of us who have been keeping an uneasy eye on the socially conservative, theologically strict and consistently anti-feminist Pope Benedict XVI since his appointment seven years ago, this most recent response of the Catholic Church really comes as no surprise.

And so it?s no real surprise that there?s push-back from atheists, secularists and humanists who?ve about had it with an antiquated, patriarchal hierarchy trying to actively interfere with the democratic processes of government. The anger and disgust is clear in a recent, full-page ad run in the Washington Post by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, asking ?liberal? and ?nominal? Catholics to quit the Church once and for all:

It?s time to quit the Roman Catholic Church. Will it be reproductive freedom, or back to the Dark Ages? Do you choose women and their rights, or Bishops and their wrongs? Whose side are you on? [...] The Church that hasn?t persuaded you to shun contraception now wants to use the force of secular law to deny birth control to non-Catholics. You?re better than your church, so why stay? Why put up with an institution that discriminates against half of humanity?

The language of the FFRF ad is harsh, and in many ways it over-reaches when it turns from criticisms of the Church as an institution to mockery of religious belief in general. In an editorial response, E.J. Dionne writes that he is not planning on quitting the Catholic Church any time soon, and he dismisses many of the ad?s arguments as just the ?usual criticism? that liberal Catholics face, saying:

Catholic liberals get used to these kinds of things. Secularists, who never liked Catholicism in the first place, want us to leave the church, but so do Catholic conservatives who want the church all to themselves.

I?m sorry to inform the FFRF that I am declining its invitation to quit. They may not see the Gospel as a liberating document, but I do, and I can?t ignore the good done in the name of Christ by the sisters, priests, brothers and lay people who have devoted their lives to the poor and the marginalized.

Like the FFRF ad, Dionne makes no distinction between the Church as an institution and Catholicism as a religion, and his commitment to the latter means that he?s a part of the former, come hell, high water, or anti-feminist disciplinary crackdown on the very sisters and lay people whom he credits for inspiring his Catholic faith.

But Dionne?s response weakens when he tries to tackle the most interesting challenge presented in the ad, the belief that liberals, by remaining part of the Catholic Church, can help change the Church from within:

If you think you can change the church from within ? get it to lighten up on birth control, gay rights, marriage equality, embryonic stem-cell research ? you?re deluding yourself. By remaining a ?good Catholic,? you are doing ?bad? to women?s rights. You are an enabler. And it?s got to stop.

With more than a little snark, Dionne calls out the ad for its overuse of unnecessary quotation marks and off-handedly dismisses the accusation of being an enabler almost as if he doesn?t know what enabling looks like (like, say, dismissing criticisms of destructive behavior on superficial grounds such as grammar or tone). Yet for all his disagreement, Dionne doesn?t offer a single practical way in which liberal Catholics can successfully challenge, from within, the extreme conservative direction that today?s Church is heading.

Dionne?s best attempt is to recall the somewhat-feminist leanings of Pope John XXIII, who wrote in a 1963 papal encyclical that ?far from being content with a purely passive role or allowing themselves to be regarded as a kind of instrument, [women] are demanding both in domestic and in public life the rights and duties which belong to them as human persons.? Yet in that same encyclical, Pope John XXIII wrote that while a man ?has the inherent right not only to be given the opportunity to work, but also to be allowed the exercise of personal initiative in the work he does? ? ?women must be accorded such conditions of work as are consistent with their needs and responsibilities as wives and mothers.? Hardly the ringing endorsement of gender equality and self-determination for women that Dionne might lead us to believe.

But even if it were, his attempt to challenge the conservative Church from within consists of little more than ?wishing? that Catholic bishops were more familiar with Pope John XXIII and ?wondering? if the bishops realize how their anti-feminist stance strengthens the Church?s adversaries. Neither of these seem to be very effective or practical ? let alone very compassionate towards women who have more at stake than whether or not Catholicism beats secularism in a popularity contest. Dionne himself acknowledges that these are by no means new criticisms of the Church, but fails to wonder why such criticisms are on-going if the liberal challenge from within were really all that effective. All the more discouraging is that American women religious, who might be the best example of liberal Catholics challenging the Church from within its own ranks, are getting a very real taste of how Church leadership responds when that internal challenge becomes too effective and wide-spread.

In the end, Dionne never actually addresses what is perhaps the most important point of the FFRF ad. Much of the Church?s political power derives from the sheer number of Catholics who count themselves members of the Church even when Church leaders do not really represent their views at all. In fact, representing the views of lay Catholics isn?t even in the job description. The Catholic Church is not, and never has been, a representative democracy.

Politicians looking to score votes and gain support see one massive block of well-financed power consolidated in the hands of a few conservative male leaders who dictate religious doctrine and ethics for millions. They form political alliances and propose religiously conservative legislation with that view of the Church in mind?. and they do so because, for the most part, it works.

One example of why it works is the Manhattan Declaration. Sponsored by conservative Christian leaders back in 2009, it was intended to ?rejuvenate the political alliance of conservative Catholics and evangelicals that dominated the religious debate during the administration of President George W. Bush? and to call President Obama?s attention to the ?formidable force? that this conservative religious alliance has in pushing for anti-women and anti-gay legislation. As of today, the Manhattan Declaration has more 525,000 signatures.

A similar petition proposed by liberal Christians to counter the Manhattan Declaration and to affirm support for equal rights for all, regardless of gender or sexual orientation?. sputtered to a pathetic halt with less than 3,000 signatures.

This is too often what Catholic liberal resistance looks like. Trying to stay neutral on a moving train.

~~~

Though my own journey away from the Catholic Church culminated in a definitive break more than eight years ago, when it became known that a close family friend had suffered from on-going sexual abuse as a child at the hands of a trusted Catholic priest, my journey began much earlier than that. My devotion to the ideals of Christ ? peace, social justice, care for the poor and the marginalized, the law of love ? led me in search of a deeper spiritual authenticity that, according to the standards of today?s Catholic Church, had led me far astray from sanctioned Church doctrine long before I ceased to call myself Catholic.

In many ways, the Catholic Church abandoned me years before I finally woke up to the fact and left of my own accord. For years, I struggled with the feeling of being a solitary Catholic liberal crying out in the wilderness. Like Dionne, I felt beleaguered by atheists and secularists on the one side of me, criticizing Catholicism for being a monolithic monstrosity of backwards-looking conservative patriarchy, while on the other side of me were many of my fellow Catholics striving to make the Church exactly that. I braced myself against the notion of being an example of everything that a Catholic could be ? open-minded, intelligent, and feminist while still being devoted to the basic teachings of the Church.

But eventually, the cognitive dissonance and the sense of betrayal were too much to bear. Unlike Dionne, I am a woman ? and for that reason alone, no matter how devoted I remained to the church, I would never be welcomed into the halls of power. The efficacy of my ?challenge from within? was inherently and irrevocably restricted. And though I valued loyalty and honored the traditions of my family deeply, I also came to realize that one of the Catholic Church?s most basic teachings ? the teaching on which the whole damn structure hangs ? is that hierarchy and inequality are divinely sanctioned.

I didn?t leave the Church because I no longer believed in Christ, or the sacred mystery of love, or the importance of religious community, or the valuable insights from Catholic theologians, saints and mystics in the past. I left because I no longer believed in the Church as a just or ethical socio-political institution. As my brilliant stepdaughter recently pointed out, ?You don?t give any one leader a lot of power just because he seems like a good guy, because you never know whether or not the next one who comes along is also going to be good.? We didn?t reject monarchy in favor of democracy because all kings were bad; we rejected it because the political institution of kingship was itself an opportunity for abuse and injustice.

The same theology of hierarchy and patriarchy that buttresses the current institution is also the reason why Dionne is not, despite what he apparently imagines, participating in a democratic and representative religious community in which liberals and conservatives vie for influence. Dionne might appeal to the slightly more liberal views of previous Popes, but the fact is, as a lay Catholic he has no part in the process of choosing who the next infallible leader of his religion will be. The Catholic Church is not an institution steered by consensus. Conservative Catholic leaders are in power: they?re laying the tracks and they?re at the wheel. Liberal Catholics are little more than passengers on this train and they will, as American nuns are now discovering, one day face the angry countenance of the conductor demanding to see their tickets.

~~~

This was a difficult piece to write. Many of my closest friends, not to mention family members, are Catholics, and I hold great sympathy for those who have remained members of the Church despite the scandals and abuses over the years. They possess a degree of devotion and loyalty that is admirable.

My hope is that their devotion is not misplaced. That they do not make an idol of the institution. That they have the wisdom to see the difference between Catholicism as a faith, and the Church as a socio-political construct, and that they do not compromise the one for the sake of up-holding the other. My hope is that they follow the example of their sisters and women religious, rather than the examples of their priests and bishops. And to be honest, I hope that, in doing so, they will dismantle and remake the Church as we know it.

Because if they don?t, the Catholic Church will die, because it deserves to die. And a great tradition will be lost.

The Meadowsweet Commons | Social Justice | Comments ( 6 )

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The New iPad Contest

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Sunday, May 27, 2012

BWW TV: Broadway Salutes the Troops at Fleet Week- Part 2; PORGY & BESS, ANYTHING GOES, and More!

The Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum, along with the City of New York and the United States Navy, this week celebrated the 25th annual Fleet Week, to be held through May 28, 2012. Fleet Week is America?s premier tribute and ?thank you? to the men and women who serve in the armed forces, and BroadwayWorld was there this afternoon for a special tribute to the troops from Broadway.

Check out performances from the casts of ANYTHING GOES, PRISCILLA QUEEN OF THE DESERT, and PORGY AND BESS below!

Soon to be the home of the Space Shuttle Enterprise, the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum complex includes the 900-foot-long aircraft carrier ?Intrepid? with seven full decks and four theme halls; the guided missile submarine Growler; and an extensive collection of 27 aircraft including the A-12 Blackbird, the fastest plane in the world, and the British Airways Concorde, the fastest commercial aircraft in the world. Guests can experience areas of the ship including the Flight Deck, Hangar Deck, fo?c?sle (commonly known as the anchor chain room), new multimedia presentations and exhibit collections, interactive educational stations and a state-of-the-art public pier.

Guests to the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum also can experience the 12,240 square-foot interactive Exploreum ? which contains a variety of hands-on exhibits ? that teaches guests about the different properties of the sea, air, space and living at sea as each relates to the ship Intrepid. In the Exploreum, guests can experience a flight simulator, transmit messages using Morse code, sit on the bunk of a crewmember, learn how the Intrepid turned salt water into fresh water and perform various tasks while wearing space gloves.

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Ford says Sync is now in 4 million vehicles, takes a moment to talk up Focus Electric

Since its debut in 2007, Ford and Microsoft's Sync infotainment system has made its way into several of the auto maker's models, including the 2012 Focus Electric. At this week's Future in Review tech conference, Ford announced that more than 4 million vehicles in the US have its entertainment platform on board. In addition to dropping that stat, the company talked up its new EV, which it says can charge in half the time it takes for the Nissan Leaf. Maybe Ford caught wind of Nissan's just-announced e-NV200 all-electric van and wanted to remind those in the market for an EV that a blue box isn't the only option.

Continue reading Ford says Sync is now in 4 million vehicles, takes a moment to talk up Focus Electric

Ford says Sync is now in 4 million vehicles, takes a moment to talk up Focus Electric originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 26 May 2012 01:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Club Colors Hires Collegiate Sales Manager | PRLog

PRLog (Press Release) - May 25, 2012 -
SCHAUMBURG, Ill. ? Club Colors, a full-service brand management solutions provider specializing in the distribution of promotional products and branded apparel, recently announced the hiring of Vu Chan as collegiate sales manager. In this role, Chan will be responsible for managing and training a team of collegiate account managers as the company continues its growth efforts.

?Vu has a proven track record of managing and training top sales teams in a wide variety of industries throughout his career,? said Cris Tase, director of sales at Club Colors (http://www.clubcolors.com). ?Vu?s extensive experience will be invaluable as we continue to grow our sales team and customer base.?

Chan comes to Club Colors after serving most recently as regional sales supervisor for Comcast Corporation. During his tenure at Comcast, Vu was responsible for new hire sales training as well as managing the top-ranked team of regional sales reps, breaking department records for residential outbound sales. Prior to Comcast, Chan managed the sales and operations of three branch offices for mortgage broker CitiWide Financial, LLC.

Chan, a Plainfield, Ill. resident, is a graduate of the DeVry University and holds a Bachelor of Science in Computer Information Systems.

About Club Colors: Club Colors is a full-service brand management solutions provider, offering a comprehensive portfolio of products and services to the corporate and collegiate marketplace. Club Color?s global sourcing and distribution provides customers with high-quality promotional products and branded apparel at cost-effective prices with the highest level of customer service in the industry. Club Colors continues to develop strategic industry relationships and innovative e-commerce solutions to deliver the best value to its customers. Club Colors is headquartered in Schaumburg, Illinois, with offices across the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Brazil, Hong Kong, and China. To learn more about Club Colors, please visit http://www.clubcolors.com or call 800-249-2582.

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Saturday, May 26, 2012

Five Reasons to Watch Henry Rollins' Animal Underworld

Posted 56 Mins Ago

pastemagazine.com

Next week, Nat Geo WILD is set to unveil a three-part documentary series titled Animal Underworld. The series-which is also hosted by former Black Flag frontman, spoken word artist, actor, observer of culture and all-around interesting guy Henry Rollins- explores the connection between people and animals that many U.S. citizens would find dangerous, scary or...

'Dear Photograph' Turns 1, Spawns Book, Prepares for App Launch

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UN agency finds higher enrichment at Iranian site

VIENNA (AP) ? Inspectors have located radioactive traces at an Iranian underground bunker, the U.N. atomic agency said Friday in a finding that could mean Iran has moved closer to reaching the uranium threshold needed to arm nuclear missiles.

In a report obtained by The Associated Press, the International Atomic Energy Agency said it was asking Tehran for a full explanation. But the report was careful to avoid any suggestion that Iran was intentionally increasing the level of its uranium enrichment, noting that Tehran said a technical glitch was responsible.

Analysts as well as diplomats who had told the AP of the existence of the traces before publication of the confidential report also said the higher-enriched material could have been a mishap involving centrifuges over-performing as technicians adjusted their output rather than a dangerous step toward building a bomb.

Still, the finding was bound to resonate among the 35 IAEA board members for which the report was prepared, among them the six world powers that had just concluded talks with Iran on its enrichment activities.

The talks left the two sides still far apart over how to oversee Tehran's atomic program but resolved to keep dialogue going as an alternative to possible military action.

The six nations ? the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany ? are already concerned that Iran is enriching to 20 percent because material at that level can be turned into weapons-grade uranium much more quickly than its main, low-enriched stockpile suitable for nuclear fuel. The higher the enrichment, the easier it becomes to re-enrich uranium to warhead quality at 90 percent. As a result, any finding of traces at 27 percent was likely to spark international interest.

Iran denies any plans to possess nuclear weapons but has for years declined offers of reactor fuel from abroad, including more recent inducements of 20-percent material if it stops producing at that level. The Islamic Republic says it wants to continue producing 20 percent uranium to fuel its research reactor and for medical purposes.

But its refusal to accept foreign offers have increased fears it may want to turn its enrichment activities toward producing such arms. The concerns have been fed by IAEA suspicions that Iran has experimented on components of an atomic arms program ? suspicions Tehran also denies.

The report cited a May 9 letter from Iranian officials suggesting any enrichment at 27 percent at the Fordo enrichment plant in central Iran was inadvertent. The letter said the particles were produced "above the target value" and could have been for "technical reasons beyond the operator's control."

David Albright, whose Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security looks for signs of proliferation, said a new configuration at Fordo means it tends to "overshoot 20 percent" at the start.

"Nonetheless, embarrassing for Iran," he wrote in an email to the AP.

Others were more skeptical.

"It's not surprising because they have the technology. Iran doesn't intend to stop its nuclear weapon program, and the fact that they are at 27 percent shows the Iranian intentions," said a senior Israeli defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not allowed to speak with the media.

International concerns have increased since Iran started higher enrichment at Fordo, which is carved into a mountain to make it impervious to attack. Israel and the United States have not ruled out using force as a last option if diplomacy fails to curb the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.

Iran already has about 700 centrifuges churning out 20-percent enriched uranium at Fordo. The report noted that although Iran has set up about 350 more centrifuges since late last year at the site, these machines are not enriching.

While the reason for that could be purely technical, it could also be a signal from Tehran that it is waiting for progress in the negotiations.

The IAEA report also detailed some progress in separate talks between the U.N. nuclear agency and Iran that the agency hopes will re-launch a long-stalled probe into the suspicions that Tehran has worked on nuclear-weapons related experiments.

The latest attempt to persuade Iran to compromise ended inconclusively Thursday at a meeting in Baghdad. At the talks, the six world powers failed to persuade Tehran to freeze its 20 percent enrichment. Envoys said the group will meet again next month in Moscow.

Iran went into the Baghdad talks urging the West to scale back on recently toughened sanctions, which have targeted Iran's critical oil exports and have effectively blackballed the country from international banking networks. The 27-nation European Union is set to ban all Iranian fuel imports on July 1, shutting the door on about 18 percent of Iran's market.

Saeed Jalili, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, offered a lukewarm assessment of the latest negotiations, in light of European and American refusal to lift tough sanctions against Iran as Tehran had hoped.

"The result of the talks was that we were able to get more familiar with the views of each other," Jalili told reporters.

European diplomats focused on the positives.

"It is clear that we both want to make progress and that there is some common ground," European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who led the Baghdad talks, told reporters. "However, significant differences remain. Nonetheless, we do agree on the need for further discussion to expand that common ground."

But in Washington, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said significant differences remain between the two sides and that it's now up to Iran "to close the gaps."

"Iran now has the choice to make: Will it meet its international obligations and give the world confidence about its intentions or not?" Clinton said.

___

AP writer Ian Deitch in Jerusalem contributed this report.

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