Winckel

:-) - Winckel

one of yours? - Halil

I had hoped to avoid the gangnam meme.... - Winckel

"British men typically have bigger penises than the French - but are less well endowed than German guys, new research claims. The average British man's penis is apparently 5.5in when erect - coming ahead of the French at 5.3in, Australians (5.2in), Americans (5.1in) and Irish (5in). And it towers over the average manhood in North and South Korea - the smallest in the study at a mere 3.8 in. But British men do not have a great deal to shout about in the trouser stakes - coming only 78th out of 113 nationalities covered in the study. The men of Africa's Republic of Congo are best equipped of all at 7.1 in. They are closely followed by Ecuadoreans at 7in, Ghanaians at 6.8in and Colombians at 6.7in. In Europe, Icelanders are the best endowed at 6.5in and the Irish are the second smallest at 5.03in - behind only Romanians at 5.01in. Africans have the biggest penises at an average of 6.3in and north-east Asians the smallest at 4.2in. Brits come in just under the Germans, who are bang on the European average of 5.7in. The sensitive subject has been tackled by Richard Lynn, emeritus professor of psychology at Ulster University. He is known for voicing the controversial view that evolutionary pressures have led to racial and national differences in intelligence. Mr Lynn says that the findings confirm previous theories of "race differences in penis length." He concludes: "For most populations penis length are predictable and confirmed." But critics have claimed that Mr Lynn's research is flawed because he has admitted gathering his data on penis length from websites. Jelte Wicherts, professor of methodology at Tilburg University, Holland, said: "This is a brave paper in a controversial area but the data has no methodology." The research is published in scientific journal Personality and Individual Differences. Average penis size by country: Republic of Congo, 7.1 Ecuador, 7 Ghana, 6.8 Colombia 6.7 Iceland 6.5 Italy 6.2 South Africa 6 Sweden 5.9 Greece 5.8 Germany 5.7 New Zealand 5.5 UK 5.5 Canada 5.5 Spain 5.5 France 5.3 Australia 5.2 Russia 5.2 USA 5.1 Ireland 5 Romania 5 China 4.3 India 4 Thailand 4 South Korea 3.8 North Korea 3.8" - Winckel

Obviously this is a source of concern for all of us. So as long as we don't meet an average Congolese gent, we're fine :-) - Winckel

Fascinating stuff! - Son of Groucho

Feeling above average *looks for yardstick* - Greg GuitarBuster

Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill on Sunday which prohibited people under the age of 18 from undergoing sexual orientation change therapy. The move marks a major victory for gay rights advocates who say the therapy, also called reparative therapy, has no medical basis because homosexuality is not a disorder. The bill had support from the American Psychiatric Association, California Psychological Association and the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, among others. Human Rights Campaign President Chad Griffin said: "LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) youth will now be protected from a practice that has not only been debunked as junk science, but has been proven to have drastically negative effects on their well-being." He urged other states to follow California's lead. State Senator Ted Lieu, the bill's sponsor, said in a statement that Mr Brown had signed the bill. Mr Lieu said the psychiatrist who pioneered the therapy, Dr Robert Spitzer, has since renounced it and has apologised to the gay and lesbian community. Opponents said the bill encroached on the rights of parents to make choices for their children. They also said politicians should not regulate what they considered to be a matter for medical boards to decide. The bill will come into effect on January 1. - Winckel

certainly is :-). I love the big brush strokes and really confident lines, like Van Gogh wore his heart on his sleeve - Winckel

"A courageous 16-year-old boy risked his own life to save a toddler trapped inside a burning home. Nelson Fonangwan was sleeping but leapt into action after hearing the desperate screams of a neighbour and found black smoke billowing from the property in Southampton, Hampshire. Mother-of-two Aneta Jedlikoswka, 32, was frantically trying to punch a hole in her kitchen window to reach her trapped two-year-old son, Adam, who was knocking on the glass from inside. All smiles: Nelson Fonangwan (centre), who rescued Aneta Jedlikowska's (centre left) son Adam (near right). Also pictured is Mrs' Jedlikowska daughter Kamila Brodowska (left) and husband Piotr Jedilkowski (right) Nelson, a pupil at Richard Taunton Sixth Form College in the city, smashed his way into the house through the window while his mother called 999, and crawled in before carrying the child to safety.   More... Insurance row as police deny riots to blame for fire He told the Southern Daily Echo: ‘I couldn't believe what I was seeing. The lady had punched the glass and created a perfect hole. She had cut herself and she was bleeding. Saved: Nelson Fonangwan (right) with Adam (left) heared the desperate screams of his neighbour and found black smoke billowing from the property ‘She was obviously hurting but all she was thinking about was her baby. She didn't speak good English and she pointed to me inside the house and said “baby”, I knew I had to do something.’ He said the smoke was so thick he was ‘choking’ and admitted he was ‘a bit nervous’ before going into the house. When he brought out Adam, he said Mrs Jedlikoswka hugged the baby tight. The drama unfolded after Mrs Jedlikoswka had taken rubbish outside and became locked out when the door blew shut. While she was stuck outside, a pan left on the stove started to burn. Firefighters, police and paramedics were all sent to the scene. She was taken to Southampton General Hospital where she had an operation for two damaged tendons in her hand. Mrs Jedlikoswka told the Southern Daily Echo: ‘It was a relief. I was so happy to be reunited and happy he was not inside anymore. There was lots of smoke and it could have been so dangerous. I can't thank him enough.’ Nelson, who is originally from Cameroon in west Africa, is studying health and social care, maths, English and PE. His principal Alice Wrighton said: ‘We're all so proud of Nelson for his brave actions.’" - Winckel

I don't normally quote from the Torah, made up deities offend me, but I'm reminded of the quote, "He who saves one life, it's as if he saved the entire world." (Talmud, Sanhedrin 37a) - Winckel

"There is a heart-rending interview going around the net with Vaughan Roberts, the rector of St Ebbe's, a hardline evangelical church in Oxford. He is gay, though he wouldn't use the term, and celibate. He talks about two things: the difficulty of remaining celibate, and the difficulty for conservative evangelicals of ever admitting to anyone, even to themselves, that they are in fact gay. A further layer of irony and pain is added to the situation because his interviewer, Julian Hardyman, leads a Cambridge Baptist church where his predecessor was chased out of the job for coming out and announcing he had a partner. What the article makes clear is that, even among conservative evangelicals, it is no longer possible to deal with gay people, and the problems their existence poses, by simple repression. Coming out was obviously a hugely painful business for him. "Close family and friends have known for a considerable time that I experience same-sex attraction … In fact, I included some personal references when I first wrote the chapter on homosexuality six years ago, but I removed them before it was published, because we were all conscious of the potential dangers of unhelpful labelling." I sympathise with anyone who wants to keep their sex life, or lack of it, private. But Roberts appears to realise the truth of the anti-Mafia slogan "Silence is complicity" – in his case, complicity with homophobia. The message of evangelical churches is often that gay people are repulsive and the things they do disgusting. "We in the church are too often heard to be presenting only a negative message, which can leave them feeling deep shame and discourage them from emerging from the isolation of a lonely and private battle, which creates a fertile soil where temptation increases and compromise becomes more likely." So, at last, we have an important evangelical figure admitting that conservative evangelicals are repelled by gay people, that homosexuality is not a choice, and that God won't cure it, even if omnipotence means He could: "A small proportion of people, including Christians, find that they remain exclusively attracted to the same sex as they grow into mature adulthood. God has the power to change their orientation, but he hasn't promised to and that has not been my experience." The vision he sets out of a celibate gay Christian life lacks joie de vivre. In fact, he compares it to depression, alcoholism and blindness. "Those who have not married have embraced the Bible's very positive teaching about singleness as a gift (see 1 Corinthians 7.32-35), whether chosen or not, which, I imagine, alongside loneliness and sexual frustration, has afforded them wonderful opportunities for the loving service of God and others." It's not really surprising that few Christians find this prospect attractive; silence and suppression were very much safer. But a constant theme in his interview is that it is the sexually relaxed culture around them that is forcing the church towards greater honesty. Meanwhile, the moderate evangelical grouping Fulcrum, which was formed, really, in order to uphold the prohibition on gay sex but to welcome women priests, carries an article on its website that shows opinion shifting there as well: Matthew Grayshon, the rector of St Mary's Hanwell, in west London, wrote in favour of blessing civil partnerships. One factor in changing his mind had been the fact that one of his churchwardens is in a civil partnership. Grayshon is still opposed to gay marriage, and ambivalent about gay adoption. Unlike Vaughan Roberts, he is himself straight. But he writes like a man who has had intimate conversation with gay friends (which must, in a way, be much more difficult for celibates still mostly in the closet). He writes: "It is cruelly unhelpful to suppose that anyone has chosen their sexual orientation. I have had fierce conversations in east Africa, which have used up nearly all my credibility in defending the givenness of sexual orientation." This last, is I think, the crucial point. Conservative evangelicals in England have dreamed or hoped for 20 years that England could be brought back to a Nigerian or Ugandan view of homosexuality. It's not going to happen, and it's not going to happen within the Church of England, either. That's true whoever becomes archbishop. The sexuality wars are coming to an end, and the liberals have won." - Winckel

Not sure I agree entirely with Brown's analysis - I've read what god said, you can too here - http://www.biblegateway.com/ - and the dude's a homophobe, no doubt about it. So if you're a christian, and doing what you're told, you're a homophobe too. - Winckel

I bet it smells beautiful - Winckel

Winckel, it does, I have been in such field last year around Kent area, however it is too strong to stay long unless you are used to it. - Nemo

Oh,yes, and there are huge clouds of insects as bees and other insects, so to the smell you hear nature music,too :-) - Slavomira

we don't see much of that is Surrey, Nemo, looks wonderful - Winckel

I used to build lots of plastic models of planes like this. It was an education :-) - Winckel

Devonshire was one of my early ship models. - Winckel

1959, Sport calendar DOSO Marine disciplines – international, national and local competitions, national teams or Marine Club’s teams. 2,000,000 participants at republic Spartakiada ( typical mass sport soc event) :-) Yes, it is me, at left above, at that time. https://secure.flickr.com/photos... BSFS has its own sport calendar, too. And,of course, the both structures were in unofficial fights for souls :-)for their activities, as the humans were the same on state territory, around 15-20% of population. - Slavomira

"Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) is to be the lead ship of her class of United States Navy supercarriers. As announced by the U.S. Navy on 16 January 2007, the ship will be named after the 38th President of the United States, the late Gerald R. Ford, whose World War II naval service included combat duty aboard the light aircraft carrier Monterey in the Pacific Theater.[4] The keel of the Gerald R. Ford was laid down on 13 November 2009.[2] Construction began on 11 August 2005, when Northrop Grumman held a ceremonial steel cut for a 15-ton plate that will form part of a side shell unit of the carrier. The schedule calls for the ship to join the U.S. Navy’s fleet in 2015. Gerald R. Ford is slated to replace the current USS Enterprise, ending her then 50-plus years of active service with the United States Navy.[5] Contents  [hide]  1 Ship naming 2 Design and development 2.1 Flight deck 2.2 Power generation 2.3 Launch systems 2.4 Communications 2.5 Possible upgrades 3 Construction 4 Wikimedia Commons Gallery 5 See also 6 External links 7 References [edit]Ship naming Ford in Navy uniform, 1945 In 2006, while Gerald Ford was still alive, Senator John Warner of Virginia proposed to amend a 2007 defense-spending bill to declare that CVN-78 "shall be named the U.S.S. Gerald Ford."[6] The final version signed by President George W. Bush on 17 October 2006[7] declared only that it "is the sense of Congress that ... CVN-78 should be named the U.S.S. Gerald R. Ford."[8] Since such "sense of" language is typically non-binding and does not carry the force of law,[9] the Navy was not required to name the ship after Ford. On 3 January 2007, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced that the aircraft carrier would be named after Ford during a eulogy for the president at Grace Episcopal Church in East Grand Rapids, Michigan.[10] Rumsfeld indicated that he had personally told Ford of the honor during a visit to Ford's home in Rancho Mirage a few weeks before Ford's death. This makes the aircraft carrier one of the few U.S. ships named after someone still alive. Later in the day, the Navy confirmed that the aircraft carrier would indeed be named for the former President.[11] On 16 January 2007, Navy Secretary Donald Winter officially named CVN-78 the USS Gerald R. Ford. Ford's daughter, Susan Ford Bales, was named the ship's sponsor. The announcements were made at a Pentagon ceremony attended by Vice President Dick Cheney, Senators Warner and Levin, Major General Guy C. Swan III, Bales, Ford's other three children, and others.[12] The USS America Carrier Veterans Association (CVA) had pushed to name the ship USS America. The CVA is an association of sailors who served aboard USS America (CV-66), which was decommissioned in 1996 and scuttled in the Atlantic as part of a classified weapons damage/battle damage test of large deck aircraft carriers in 2005.[13] (America will instead be the name of the lead ship of a new class of amphibious assault ships). [edit]Design and development The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier has been an integral part of United States power projection strategy since Nimitz was first commissioned. Displacing approximately 100,000 tons when fully loaded, a Nimitz-class carrier is capable of steaming faster than thirty knots, self-sustaining for up to ninety days, and launching aircraft to strike targets hundreds of miles away.[14] The endurance of this class is exemplified by USS Theodore Roosevelt, which spent 159 days underway in support of Operation Enduring Freedom without the need to visit a port or be refueled.[15] Over the lifespan of the class many new technologies have been successfully integrated into the design of this vessel. However, with the technical advances made in the past decade the ability of the US Navy to make improvements to this class of ship has become more limited. “The biggest problems facing the Nimitz class are the limited electrical power generation capability and the upgrade-driven increase in ship weight and erosion of the center-of-gravity margin needed to maintain ship stability.”[16] With these constraints in mind the Navy developed what was initially known as the "CVN-21" program, which ultimately evolved into CVN-78, Gerald R. Ford. Improvements were made through developing technologies and more efficient design. Major design changes include a larger flight deck, improvements in weapons and material handling, a new propulsion plant design that requires fewer personnel to operate and maintain, and a new smaller island that has been pushed aft. Technological advances in the field of electromagnetics have led to the development of an Electromagnetic Aircraft Launching System, (EMALS), and an Advanced Arresting Gear, (AAG). An integrated warfare system has been developed to support flexibility in adapting the infrastructure of the ship to future mission roles. The new Dual Band Radar (DBR) combines S-band and X-band radar in a single system.[17] With new design and technology the Ford will have a 25% increase in sortie generation, threefold increase in electrical generating capacity, increased operational availability, and a number of quality-of-life improvements.[18] Requirements for a higher sortie rate of around 160 exits a day with surges to a maximum of 220 sorties a day in times of crisis and intense air warfare activity, have led to design changes in the flight deck, which enable greater aircraft launch capabilities. [edit]Flight deck Changes to the flight deck are the most visible of the differences between the Nimitz and Gerald R. Ford classes. Several sections have been altered from the layout of the Nimitz class flight deck to improve aircraft handling, storage, and flow. Catapult number four on the Nimitz class cannot launch fully loaded aircraft because of a deficiency of wing clearance along the edge of the flight deck.[19] CVN-78 will have no catapult-specific restrictions on launching aircraft, but still retains 4 catapults, 2 bow and 2 waist,[20] and the number of aircraft lifts from hangar deck to flight deck level was reduced from the earlier ships from 4 to 3. The design changes to the flight deck are instrumental in the maximization of sortie generation. The route of weapons to the aircraft stops on the flight deck has been replanned to accommodate higher re-arming rates, and in turn higher potential sortie rates. Another major change: a smaller, redesigned island will be pushed further back relative to the older classes of carriers. Moving the island creates deck space for a centralized re-arming and re-fueling location. This reduces the number of times that an aircraft will have to be moved after landing before it can be launched again. Fewer aircraft movements require, in turn, fewer deck hands to accomplish them, reducing the size of the ship's crew. A similar benefit is realized by altering the path and procedures for weapons movement by redshirts from storage to flight deck, again potentially allowing the new ship to support a higher sortie rate than the Nimitz-class ship while using fewer crew members than the Nimitz requires. On Nimitz-class carriers the time that it takes to launch a plane after it has landed is defined by the time necessary to re-arm and re-fuel. To minimize this time, ordnance will be moved by robotic devices from storage areas to the centralized re-arming location via re-located weapons elevators. The new path that ordnance follows does not cross any areas of aircraft movement, thereby reducing traffic problems in the hangars and on the flight deck. According to Rear Admiral Dennis M. Dwyer these changes will make it theoretically possible to re-arm the airplanes in "minutes instead of hours."[21] [edit]Power generation The propulsion and power plant of the Nimitz-class carriers was designed in the 1960s. Technological capabilities of that time did not require the same quantity of electrical power that modern technologies do. "New technologies added to the Nimitz-class ships have generated increased demands for electricity; the current base load leaves little margin to meet expanding demands for power."[22] Increasing the capability of the U.S. Navy to improve the technological level of the carrier fleet required a larger capacity power system. The new A1B reactor plant is a smaller, more efficient design that provides approximately three times the electrical power of the Nimitz-class A4W reactor plant. The modernization of the plant led to a higher core energy density, lower demands for pumping power, a simpler construction, and the use of modern electronic controls and displays. These changes resulted in a two-thirds reduction of watch standing requirements and a significant decrease of required maintenance.[23] A larger power output is a major component to the integrated warfare system. Engineers took extra steps to ensure that integrating unforeseen technological advances onto a Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier would be possible. The Gerald R. Ford class will be an integral component of the fleet for a total of nearly ninety years. One lesson learned from that is that for a ship design to be successful over the course of a century, a great deal of foresight and flexibility is required. Integrating new technologies with the Nimitz class is becoming more difficult to do without any negative consequences. To bring the Gerald R. Ford class into dominance during the next century of naval warfare requires that the class be capable of seamlessly upgrading to more advanced systems. [edit]Launch systems The Nimitz-class aircraft carriers use steam-powered catapults to launch aircraft. Steam catapults were developed in the 1950s and have been exceptionally reliable. For over fifty years at least one of the four catapults has been able to launch an aircraft 99.5% of the time.[24] However, there are a number of drawbacks. “The foremost deficiency is that the catapult operates without feedback control. With no feedback, there often occurs large transients in tow force that can damage or reduce the life of the airframe.”[25] The steam system is massive, inefficient (4–6%),[26] and hard to control. Control problems with the system results in minimum and maximum weight limits. The minimum weight limit is above the weight of all UAVs. An inability to launch the latest additions to the Naval Air Forces is a restriction on operations that cannot continue into the next generation of aircraft carriers. The Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) provides solutions to all these problems. An electromagnetic system is more efficient, smaller, lighter, more powerful, and easier to control. Increased control means that EMALS will be able to launch both heavier and lighter aircraft than the steam catapult. Also, the use of a controlled force will reduce the stress on airframes, resulting in less maintenance and a longer lifetime for the airframe. Unfortunately the power limitations for the Nimitz class make the installation of the recently developed EMALS impossible. Electromagnetics will also be used in the new Advanced Arresting Gear (AAG) system. The current system relies on hydraulics to slow and stop a landing aircraft. While effective, as demonstrated by more than fifty years of implementation, the AAG system offers a number of improvements. The current system is unable to capture UAVs without damaging them due to extreme stresses on the airframe. UAVs do not have the necessary mass to drive the large hydraulic piston used to trap heavier manned planes. By using electromagnetics the energy absorption is controlled by a turbo-electric engine. This makes the trap smoother and reduces shock on airframes. Even though the system will look the same from the flight deck as its predecessor, it will be more flexible, safer, more reliable, and require less maintenance and manning.[27] [edit]Communications Another addition to Gerald R. Ford class is an integrated search and tracking radar system. The dual-band radar is being developed for both the DDG 1000 Zumwalt class of guided missile destroyers and the Gerald R. Ford class of aircraft carriers. The island can be kept smaller by replacing six to ten radar antennas with a single six-faced radar. The DBR works by combining the X-Band AN/SPY-3 multi-function radar with the S-band volume search radar.[28] The three faces dedicated to the X-band radar are responsible for low altitude tracking and target illumination, while the other three faces dedicated to the S-band are responsible for target search and tracking regardless of weather. "Operating simultaneously over two electromagnetic frequency ranges, the DBR marks the first time this functionality has been achieved using two frequencies coordinated by a single resource manager."[17] This new system has no moving parts, therefore minimizing maintenance and manning requirements for operation. [edit]Possible upgrades Each new technology and design feature integrated into the Ford-class aircraft carrier improves sortie generation, manning requirements, and operational capabilities. New defense systems, such as free electron laser directed-energy weapons, dynamic armor, and tracking systems will require more power. “Only half of the electrical power-generation capability on CVN 78 is needed to run currently planned systems, including EMALS. CVN 78 will thus have the power reserves that the Nimitz class lacks to run lasers and dynamic armor.”[29] The addition of new technologies, power systems, design layout, and better control systems results in an increased sortie rate of 25% over the Nimitz class and a 25% reduction in manpower required to operate.[30] Breakthrough waste management technology will be deployed on the new Gerald R. Ford. Co-developed with the US Navy, PyroGenesis Canada Inc, in 2008, was awarded the contract to outfit the ship with a Plasma Arc Waste Destruction System (PAWDS). This compact system will treat all combustible solid waste generated on board the ship. After having completed factory acceptance testing in Montreal, the system is scheduled to be shipped to the Huntington Ingalls shipyard in late 2011 where it will be installed on the carrier.[31] [edit]Construction The initials of Susan Ford Bales being welded into the keel of the aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) during a keel laying and authentication ceremony at Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding in Newport News. On 10 September 2008 the US Navy signed a $5.1 billion contract with Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding in Newport News, Virginia, to design and construct the carrier. Northrop had begun advance construction of the carrier under a $2.7 billion contract in 2005. The carrier is being constructed at the Northrop Grumman Newport News Shipbuilding facilities in Hampton Roads, Virginia, which employs 19,000 workers.[32] The keel of the new warship was ceremonially laid on November 14, 2009 in Dry Dock 12[33] by Ford's daughter, Susan Ford Bales. Said Bales in a speech to the assembled shipworkers and DoD officials, "Dad met the staggering challenges of restoring trust in the presidency and healing the nation's wounds after Watergate in the only way he knew how — with complete honesty and integrity. And that is the legacy we remember this morning."[34] As of August 2011, the carrier was reported to be approximately "half completed".[35] In April 2012, it was said to be 75 percent complete.[36] On May 24, 2012, the important mile-stone of completing the vessel up to the waterline was reached when the critical lower bow was lifted into place.[37] This was the 390th of the nearly 500 lifts of the integral modular components (from which the vessel is assembled) that the ship's construction will ultimately require. The island is scheduled to "land" in 2012.[38] It is scheduled for launch (i.e.: Christening) in 2013 and delivery in 2015.[35]" - Winckel

;-) Hi,Winckel You got my attention with this link. I connected it with their celebration of 100 years military air forces. As I do not like widespread usages of photos, obviously from somewhere, but not pointed exactly, I did research on only track- the name of the photographer. So :-) sharing bellow results. - Slavomira

Yes, and you see many other things around. Adore photos :-) - Slavomira

chilly :-) - Winckel

:-) - Winckel

"A week ago today, France shuttered its embassies, consulates, cultural centers, and schools in twenty countries. The reason given was that a satirical newsweekly called Charlie Hebdo had published cartoons satirizing two very different films: “The Intouchables,” just selected as France’s Academy Awards entry in the foreign-language film category; and “Innocence of Muslims,” a film less foreign to those who follow the news than it has any right to be. The cover of the Charlie Hebdo issue in question is a crude depiction of an Orthodox Jewish man pushing a Muslim man in a wheelchair: “The Intouchables 2,” it reads. (The actual “Intouchables” is a cloying tale of a rich white man who, paralyzed in a paragliding accident, hires a poor black man to care for him. Guess who gets his joie de vivre back?) When you turn the pages, you see ungainly caricatures, presented more or less as advertisements for a film—only tenuously connected with the front cover’s spoof—sure to “set the Muslim world ablaze.” Muhammad, labelled as such, is shown naked and bending over, begging to be admired. Then the Prophet is crouched on all fours, with genitals bared. “A Star is Born!” the caption reads—a reference to the attention given “Innocence of Muslims,” a trifle of murky and unpleasant provenance, that has been invoked in attacks leading to the death of almost fifty people to date, including J. Christopher Stevens, America’s Ambassador to Libya. (Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, the fifty-five-year-old Californian man believed to be the video’s creator, is in jail after an arrest yesterday for violating eight terms of his probation in a 2010 bank-fraud case. The charges include using aliases; if he is in fact the filmmaker, he would have violated terms from another case that restricted his use of the Internet.) When word got out a week ago Monday that the paper was printing a representation of Muhammad—an act that many Muslims consider blasphemous—Paris police called the editor (and cover cartoonist), Stéphane Charbonnier, just as the issue was closing. Charb, as he is known, sent the prefecture the front and back covers, and the police urged him to think again. He declined—satire is, after all, his bread and butter—and the issue hit newsstands a week ago Wednesday. Immediately, the French government increased security and announced its decision to close the twenty foreign outposts last Friday, which was a Muslim day of prayer. French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault issued a statement criticizing the cartoons and any such “excess.” Politicians and editorial pages in much of France attacked the drawings as irresponsible, inopportune, and imbecilic. Why now, they asked, and why at all? The right-leaning newspaper Le Figaro rebuked the weekly for publishing “silly provocations” that fall into the trap of the Islamists, while the Roman Catholic La Croix asserted that “editorial responsibility requires an assessment of the consequences of what one publishes” and that “fuelling the flames to show one’s noble resistance to extremism leads to offending simple believers.” Laurent Fabius, France’s Foreign Minister, said on public radio, “In the present context, given this absurd video that has been aired, strong emotions have been awakened in many Muslim countries.” He asked, rhetorically, “Is it really sensible or intelligent to pour oil on the fire?” Charbonnier, Charlie Hebdo’s editor, sounds exactly sensible and intelligent when he says that the cartoons will only “shock those who will want to be shocked.” He also told Le Monde, “I don’t feel as though I’m killing someone with a pen. I’m not putting lives at risk. When activists need a pretext to justify their violence, they always find it.” This is not the first time Charlie Hebdo has met—or sparked—controversy. Last fall, the paper printed an issue “guest-edited by Muhammad”—“Charia Hebdo”—the cover of which promised “100 lashes if you don’t die of laughter!” Charb found his offices firebombed and his Web site hacked in response. (The site read: “You keep abusing Islam’s almighty Prophet with disgusting and disgraceful cartoons using excuses of freedom of speech. Be God’s curse upon you!”) The weekly pushed back by declaring “love stronger than hate,” with a slobbery cover cartoon of a Muslim man kissing a pasty-white male cartoonist. The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt has condemned Charb’s latest cartoons as blasphemous. But blasphemy may well be the point: Charlie Hebdo clearly thinks so. With its offices under police protection, Charb said that mocking Islam must continue “until Islam is just as banal as Catholicism.” The taboo—the blasphemy, the untouchable—is the very reason. Le Monde reminded its readers that religions “can be freely analyzed, criticized, even ridiculed.” This, after all, has been the case “since Voltaire.” The left-leaning French daily Libération went so far as to call blasphemy a sacred right. In a democracy, it said, “every publication is free to establish its editorial line; every reader is free to read or not read; free is every offended person to seek reparation before the courts, the only legal arm. And let’s hope that, in other regimes, arms of a different nature are not used.” Banning anything that anyone calls blasphemous—especially when it is a matter of vocal chords or ink—is a kind of violence itself. “The aim is to laugh,” Laurent Léger, a journalist at Charlie Hebdo, told CNN. “We want to laugh at the extremists—every extremist. They can be Muslim, Jewish, Catholic. Everyone can be religious, but extremist thoughts and acts we cannot accept.” Perhaps France’s precautions abroad were tactically wise: the Friday that it closed its embassies, at least nineteen people died in violence in Pakistan, related to government-sanctioned protests against the American anti-Islam video. The next day, a Pakistani cabinet minister offered a hundred thousand dollars for the death of the video’s creator. But there was also a chilling effect in the streets of France, where the Prime Minister banned the protests against the American-made “Innocence of Muslims” that had been scheduled for Saturday, demanding that “les flics” crack down if need be. Interior Minister Manuel Valls confirmed this directive to Reuters, and added, in an even harder line, “Neither will I allow street prayers, which have no place in this republic. And naturally the law will apply to anyone who wears the full face veil.” But fiery cartoons may be better answered with fiery cartoons, like those in Al-Watan, a secular Egyptian newspaper, which Monday printed cartoons that ring in their own way of the #Muslimrage meme. One depicts a pair of glasses, each lens showing one of the Twin Towers engulfed in smoke. The caption reads, “Western glasses for the Islamic world.” On Wednesday, the Spanish satirical magazine El Jueves published on its cover a controversial cartoon of its own: a police lineup of Muslim men, under a caption “But … does anyone know what Muhammad looks like?” The New Yorker’s cartoon editor, Robert Mankoff, wrote this week that the only “culturally, ethnically, religiously, and politically correct cartoon” is an empty one (his illustration of such an uncompromised cartoon was an empty white box). Mankoff might agree with the Charlie Hebdo currently on newsstands, with its big red (self-imposed) banner across the cover reading “Irresponsible newspaper.” The cover depicts “The Invention of Humor”: an oafish caveman adding oil to fire. As Salman Rushdie recently told the New York Times’s Charles McGrath, on the release of his memoir, “Joseph Anton”—which describes the ten years he lived in hiding in response to an Iranian fatwa over his novel “The Satanic Verses”—the debate over blasphemy is not purely static. McGrath asked Rushdie whether he thinks what happened to him changed anything. Rushdie replied, “Some of the British Muslims now say, ‘We think we were wrong.’ Some of them for tactical reasons, but others are actually using the free-speech argument: ‘If we want to say what we want, he has to be allowed to say what he wants.’ So I think some little bit of learning has happened.”" - Winckel

"Strongly criticizing provisions of the Democratic Party platform, Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield (Illinois) warned that “a vote for a candidate who promotes actions or behaviors that are intrinsically evil and gravely sinful makes you morally complicit and places the eternal salvation of your own soul in serious jeopardy.” Bishop Paprocki first discussed the controversy over the inclusion of the word “God” in the party’s platform: After outcries of protest from outside as well as within the Democratic Party, the sentence with the same reference to God used in 2008 was restored to read, "We need a government that stands up for the hopes, values and interests of working people, and gives everyone willing to work hard the chance to make the most of their God-given potential." Before anyone relaxes and concludes that all is well now that the Democratic Party Platform contains a single passing reference to God, the way that this was done should give us pause. Convention chairman Antonio Villaraigosa had to call for the voice vote three times because each time the sound level for the "ayes" and the "nays" sounded about even, far short of the two-thirds necessary according to convention rules to amend the platform. That did not stop the convention chairman from declaring, "The ayes have it!" What is troubling about that is the blatant disregard for the rules and for the apparent wishes of about half the delegates. The reference to God is back in the platform apparently because President Obama wanted it back in. That may be fine for now, but if a future president wants references to God taken out, apparently that can be done regardless of the wishes of the delegates if that is what The Leader wants. That does not bode well for democracy in the Democratic Party. Bishop Paprocki then offered strong criticism of the party’s positions on abortion and same-sex marriage: In 1992 Presidential candidate Bill Clinton famously said that abortion should be "safe, legal and rare" … Apparently "rare" is so last century that it had to be dropped, because now the Democratic Party Platform says that abortion should be "safe and legal." Moreover the Democratic Party Platform supports the right to abortion "regardless of the ability to pay." Well, there are only three ways for that to happen: either taxpayers will be required to fund abortion, or insurance companies will be required to pay for them (as they are now required to pay for contraception), or hospitals will be forced to perform them for free. Moreover, the Democratic Party Platform also supports same-sex marriage, recognizes that "gay rights are human rights," and calls for the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, the federal law signed by President Clinton in 1996 that defined marriage as the legal union of one man and one woman. Now, why am I mentioning these matters in the Democratic Party Platform? There are many positive and beneficial planks in the Democratic Party Platform, but I am pointing out those that explicitly endorse intrinsic evils. My job is not to tell you for whom you should vote. But I do have a duty to speak out on moral issues. I would be abdicating this duty if I remained silent out of fear of sounding "political" and didn't say anything about the morality of these issues. Turning to the Republican Party platform, he added: So what about the Republicans? I have read the Republican Party Platform and there is nothing in it that supports or promotes an intrinsic evil or a serious sin … One might argue for different methods in the platform to address the needs of the poor, to feed the hungry and to solve the challenges of immigration, but these are prudential judgments about the most effective means of achieving morally desirable ends, not intrinsic evils. Certainly there are "pro-choice" Republicans who support abortion rights and "Log Cabin Republicans" who promote same-sex marriage, and they are equally as wrong as their Democratic counterparts. But these positions do not have the official support of their party. “I am not telling you which party or which candidates to vote for or against, but I am saying that you need to think and pray very carefully about your vote, because a vote for a candidate who promotes actions or behaviors that are intrinsically evil and gravely sinful makes you morally complicit and places the eternal salvation of your own soul in serious jeopardy,” he concluded." - Winckel

You can't keep the nutjobs down :) - Winckel

"Responding to a recent request by Prime Minister John Key, a New Zealand inspector general has concluded that the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) broke the law when it spied on Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom in connection with January's raid on his mansion. Following the Thursday release of the report, Key issued a personal apology to Dotcom for the mistake. The GCSB is an intelligence agency similar to the National Security Agency in the United States. Like the NSA, it is supposed to focus its surveillance activities on foreign targets. Because Dotcom had obtained permanent resident status, he does not qualify as a foreigner under the latest version of the GCSB law, and therefore should not have been subjected to GCSB surveillance. But the agency evidently misunderstood the law or failed to verify Dotcom's immigration status. "If they had been more thorough in what they had done, they would have worked out that Mr. Dotcom had a residence class visa, and therefore was protected by the law," Key told reporters on Thursday. "Frankly, I'm pretty appalled by what I've seen because these are basic errors." "This is really a matter of mistake and human error, not one of a great conspiracy," Key said. But he emphasized that "the agency has let itself down very badly. " Key told reporters he did not expect the illegal GCSB surveillance to affect the fight over extraditing Dotcom to the United States, because none of the evidence the United States planned to use against Dotcom in those proceedings were derived from GCSB surveillance. "I accept your apology," Dotcom tweeted in response to Key's statements. "Show your sincerity by supporting a full, transparent & independent inquiry into the entire Mega case." Key is under pressure from opposition members of parliament to investigate the incident more thoroughly. Green party co-leader Russel Norman grilled Key about the oversight on Wednesday. He reiterated calls for an independent investigation on Thursday. Key's response to the scandal is a striking contrast to the situation in the United States. When evidence of illegal surveillance activities by the American government is uncovered, the government tends to duck accountability by invoking legal theories like the state secrets privilege and the doctrine of sovereign immunity. The government has even refused Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)'s request for a ballpark estimate of the number of Americans whose communications have been intercepted. It's hard to imagine President Obama ordering an independent investigation of illegal NSA surveillance of Americans, to say nothing of issuing a public apology to the targets of illegal spying." - Winckel

"Intel Corp. (INTC) Chief Executive Officer Paul Otellini told employees in Taiwan that Microsoft Corp. (MSFT)’s Windows 8 operating system is being released before it’s fully ready, a person who attended the company event said. Enlarge image Microsoft is eager to get Windows 8, the first version of its flagship software compatible with tablets, into computers next month to help it vie with Apple Inc.’s iPad during the crucial holiday shopping season. Photographer: Jonathan Alcorn/Bloomberg Intel Corp. Chief Executive Officer Paul Otellini told employees improvements still need to be made to Microsoft Corp.’s Windows 8 operating system. Photographer: Noah Berger/Bloomberg Improvements still need to be made to the software, Otellini told employees at a company meeting in Taipei yesterday, said the person, who asked not to be identified because the meeting was private. Microsoft is eager to get Windows 8, the first version of its flagship software designed for touch tablets, into computers next month to help it vie with Apple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPad during the holiday shopping season. Releasing the operating system before it’s fully baked is the right move, and Microsoft can make improvements after it ships, Otellini told staffers. Intel, the biggest semiconductor maker, is Microsoft’s closest partner, and Otellini’s remarks echo criticism from analysts such as Michael Cherry at Directions on Microsoft. While Windows is fundamentally sound, the operating system lacks a wide range of robust applications and PC makers haven’t had enough time to work out kinks with so-called drivers, which connect software to such hardware as printers, Cherry said. “We are concerned at the level of bugs and fine tuning that appears necessary to get the beta systems we demoed ready for prime time,” Alex Gauna, an analyst at JMP Securities LLC in San Francisco, wrote in a Sept. 13 note in response to versions of Windows 8 shown at Intel’s recent developer forum. Intel shares rose 0.5 percent to $22.65 at the close in New York, while Microsoft declined less than 1 percent to $30.17. Vista Flops Technology vendors often release software before it’s completely ready and make adjustments on the fly. Still, the practice can backfire. Vista, a version of Windows that debuted in 2007, was introduced two years late. It was met with poor adoption as the software initially didn’t work with many applications and drivers. “With over 16 million active preview participants, Windows 8 is the most tested, reviewed and ready operating system in Microsoft’s history,” said Mark Martin, a spokesman for Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft. Laura Anderson, a spokeswoman for Santa Clara, California- based Intel, declined to comment on the internal meeting. She also said that the company “believes Windows represents a tremendous opportunity for our business and we’re looking forward to working with Microsoft on enabling a host of new experiences on a variety of devices.” In a statement posted today on its website, Intel said news reports about Otellini’s comments were “unsubstantiated.” Intel’s Sales During the meeting, Otellini declined to elaborate on the company’s outlook following the announcement this month that it’s cutting the third-quarter revenue forecast. Lackluster demand for PCs won’t be bad enough to cause the company to lay off workers, and the market will grow in 2013, he said. Intel said on Sept. 7 that third-quarter sales will be $12.9 billion to $13.5 billion, from a prior projection of $13.8 billion to $14.8 billion. Analysts on average had estimated sales of $14.2 billion, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Intel said orders in emerging markets and demand for chips used in business machines are lower than expected, compounding concern that the PC market may not grow this year as consumers flock to smartphones and tablets. Microsoft plans to release Windows 8 on Oct. 26." - Winckel

I hope Windows 8 is good, Microsoft still don't impress me but they owe it to all of us not to be a bad as they have been historically. - Winckel

:-) - Winckel

"This man, Norman Bettison headed up the liaison unit responsible for orchestrating the lies and black propaganda that was the police response to the deaths of 96 people at Hillsborough. Attempting to cover up the police's role in causing the tragedy, the liaison unit perpetuated false stories of drunken football fans and hooligans kicking police officers as they tried to help the wounded and dying. He was still blaming fans behaviour on Thursday when he said it "made the job of the police in the crush outside Leppings Lane turnstiles harder than it needed to be.” Today he was forced to apologise in a desperate attempt to keep his job. This man truly is scum. 'Sir' Norman Bettison, is now "one of the country's most experienced officers and responsible for overseeing the policing of domestic extremism" according to the Guardian. He is the police national lead on the PREVENT strategy, and the vice chair of ACPO's Terrorism and Allied Matters Committee. This puts him at the heart of state snooping against Muslim, Kurdish and Tamil communities, as well as 'counter-terror' strategies against LWX (left wing extremists) and anarchists. In his PREVENT role he has shown evidence of some rather unpleasant views. When the Met was found guilty and fined in a corporate prosecution for the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes, he described it as "a triumph for health and safety, a lucrative new territory for lawyers, a disaster for common sense." He has also claimed that that schoolchildren as young as 13 are being groomed for terrorism, said that it will “probably take 20 years” to prevent the “infection” of extremism spreading within Britain’s borders", and blamed Muslim communities for not doing enough to prevent terrorism. He's not averse to a bit of the high life. In July he was criticised for spending £300,000 of his force's money on seven high performance executive cars for the 'personal and professional use' of senior officers, including himself, despite moaning on about police spending cuts. His crusade against 'all forms of extremism' has also taken him on all-expenses paid trips to Pakistan, Bangladesh and Abu Dhabi. He should be behind bars serving a lengthy 'deterrent sentence' for perverting the course of justice. Sadly the worst thing likely to happen to him is that he'll have to draw his not insubstantial cop pension a bit early and take a lucrative directorship in the rapidly expanding counter-terrorism industry." - Winckel

:-( - Winckel

"A New Jersey police officer and his employer, the township of Hanover, are facing a million-dollar civil rights lawsuit after the officer allegedly tackled a 15-year-old boy in retaliation for his use of a video camera to document the encounter. In March 2012, Austin DeCaro and two friends cut through Black Brook Park on the way to the home of one of the boys in the group. Because the park is closed at night, they were stopped by Joseph Quinn, a plainclothes officer in an unmarked car. The boys sat on the curb on Quinn's orders. DeCaro, who says he carries a camcorder with him everywhere he goes, decided to document the encounter. "Turn that video camera off right now, or it's going to be mine forever," said a voice on the videotape that DeCaro says belongs to Quinn. When DeCaro asked "why," there was a scuffle as Quinn allegedly tackled the 100-pound teenager. "Now you're under arrest," the police officer said in the video. "You get off of me," DeCaro replied. The video appears to show the camera being thrown. DeCaro says it was damaged as a result. "They were going to charge him with obstruction, vandalism, and being in the park after dark," DeCaro's father told a local television reporter. But when the video of the encounter was shown to the police chief, the department "dropped all charges except for being in the park." In May, the family filed a lawsuit against Quinn and the city, charging the officer with using excessive force and violating their son's constitutional rights. Now Quinn is getting some unwanted publicity thanks to a story on the local television news. The police department declined to comment for that story, citing the pending lawsuit." - Winckel

I think cops the world over routinely act thuggishly and corruptly - in the US as in the UK they seem to feel they can act with impunity, often racistly, and abuse people simply because they think they can. This kid was brave and sensible. - Winckel

"U.S. retailer Urban Outfitters told analysts that was equipping all of its stores with iPad and iPod touch-based payment systems, and never buying another cash register again. According to a report by Business Insider, the retail chain's chief information officer Calvin Hollinger said that equipping stores would iPad sales systems would save both space and money, and allow for more customer interaction. Hollinger said an iPad cost a fifth as much as a conventional cash register, and can be installed to swivel around to face the customer, who can view the order, add their personal information, and perform tasks such as creating a gift registry. When not in use, an iPad can be quickly detached, freeing counter space for inventory use or merchandise packing. In addition to setting up iPads at checkout, Urban Outfitters will also be equipping sales people with smaller iPod touch systems, similar to those used by Apple's retail stores and an increasing number of other retailers. The Philadelphia-based Urban Outfitters operates more than 400 stores under the brands Urban Outfitters, Anthropologie, Free People, Terrain and BHLDN." - Winckel