Friday, June 29, 2012

Get a taste of Nabisco’s Gay Pride Oreo.


Rainbow Oreo a symbol of corporations’ embrace of gay-rights issues
The rainbow-colored Oreo graphic unveiled for LGBT Pride Month proves at least one thing: Gays are just as susceptible to clever marketing as straights. At long last! Equality under commercialization.
The graphic was posted Monday evening on Oreo’s Facebook page and drew more than 52,000 shares and 177,000 likes in 24 hours — a robust social-media response that amounts to free advertising for Oreo, which is made by Nabisco, which is a subsidiary of Kraft Foods, which, with annual revenue of $54.4 billion, is the planet’s second-largest food company and doesn’t really need your pro-bono assistance with brand expansion.
“We are excited to illustrate what is making history today in a fun and playful way,” says Basil T. Maglaris, associate director of corporate affairs for Kraft, in an e-mail that toes the company’s sunny line. “Kraft Foods has a proud history of celebrating diversity and inclusiveness. We feel the OREO ad is a fun reflection of our values. There has been a lot of buzz about the image, and it shows how relevant OREO is to people even after 100 years.”
A cultural moment — galvanized politically by President Obama’s May endorsement of same-sex marriage — is being validated and exploited economically by big business over and over again. Earlier this month J.C. Penney, after enduring fringe criticism forenlisting Ellen DeGeneres as a spokeswoman in February, doubled down with a Father’s Day advertisement featuring two fathers and their children dressed in sensible shorts and bright-colored polo shirts. Last month, Gap put two young gentlemen inside one snug gray T-shirt next to the words “Be One.” In March, Ben and Jerry’s released an ice cream pint called “Apple-y Ever After” whose container depicted a tuxedoed pair atop a rainbow-ribboned cake.  >>>MORE<<<
thank you battleskin88


Short URL: http://www.newsnet14.com/?p=104717

Moroccan Government Demands Arabic Become Standard Part of European School Curriculum


The Moroccan minister for Moroccans Living Abroad, Abdellatif Mâazouz, is pressing governments in Europe to make the teaching of Arabic a standard part of the European school curriculum.
For several months he and his governement have been undertaking a veritable cultural offensive to impose the Arabic language in the educational curricula of European countries, alongside English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and/or Mandarin. 
“A special effort is made on the cultural level and on the level of language teaching…” explains the minister. His activism is starting to bear fruit, as he insists the “voice [of the Moroccan government] is starting to be heard, especially in France, which will soon announce something in this vein,” even going on to enlarge his listening audience to “the EU too”.
…The objective is that young people of the 2nd, 3rd and 4th generations remain attached to Morocco not only in their thoughts and hearts, but through culture,” explains the minister.
…For the idea of teaching Arabic as a foreign language to hit the target, the strategy of the minister is simple:
“We sell the idea that there are almost 4 million Moroccans living in Europe, 600 million Arabic-speakers across the world, and that Europeans and others must know this language, even if only to get to know some of their citizens better,” he argues. 
The Moroccan diplomat’s communication tactic is effective since, based on the figures, and highlighting the mutual interests of the Arab and European countries, it reinforces the legitimacy of the demand that Arabic be included in the European educational curricula.  MORE

Domesticating Foreign Ads or Translating the Maghreb

Foreignization, domestication, transmutation… Karima Bouziane has mastered the vocabulary of her topic. At today’s presentation at TALIM, the audience caught on immediately to this specialized world of semiotics, which has to do with the study of signs and communication.



Holder Found in Contempt Yet The DOJ Won't Prosecute


Holder Found in Contempt

WASHINGTON — The Republican-led House of Representatives on Thursday voted to hold Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in contempt for failing to disclose internal Justice Department documents in response to a subpoena. It was the first time in American history that Congress has imposed the sanction on a sitting member of a president’s cabinet.
The politically and constitutionally charged dispute centered on whether the Justice Department must turn over e-mails and memorandums showing its internal deliberations last year about the botched Arizona-based gunrunning investigation known as Operation Fast and Furious. President Obama has invoked executive privilege to block the subpoena.
The vote — 255 to 67, with one Democrat voting present— followed an acrimonious debate that played out hours after the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Mr. Obama’s health care law, dashing the hopes of conservatives.
Scores of Democrats, accusing Republicans of abusing their power to engineer an election-year “partisan witch hunt,” walked out of the chamber in protest and cast no votes, punctuating a day filled with bitter, sharp-edged rhetoric.

What In Thee….Justice Department won’t prosecute Attorney General Holder for contempt of Congress

The Justice Department moved Friday to shield Attorney General Eric Holder from prosecution after the House voted to hold him in contempt of Congress.
The contempt vote technically opened the door for the House to call on the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia to bring the case before a grand jury. But because U.S. Attorney Ronald Machen works for Holder and because President Obama has already asserted executive privilege over the documents in question, some expected Holder’s Justice Department to balk.
Deputy Attorney General James Cole confirmed in a letter to House Speaker John Boehner that the department in fact would not pursue prosecution. The attorney general’s withholding of documents pertaining to Operation Fast and Furious, he wrote, “does not constitute a crime.”
“Therefore the department will not bring the congressional contempt citation before a grand jury or take any other action to prosecute the attorney general,” Cole wrote
A department official told Fox News the letter was “pro forma” — or a formality — considering that ex-Attorney General Michael Mukasey in 2008 also refused to refer two Bush White House aides to a grand jury after they were held in contempt.
Republicans nevertheless blasted the Justice Department for the move. Frederick Hill, spokesman for House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, said “it is regrettable that the political leadership of the Justice Department is trying to intervene in an effort to prevent the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia from making an independent decision about whether to prosecute this case.”  MORE

Maps: Coverage Gains and Budget Challenges and Where Obamacare would expand Medicaid most.



While the Supreme Court narrowly upheld the core of President Obama’s health care law Thursday, the justices came down hard against a provision that would have expanded Medicaid to millions more low-income Americans. As passed by Congress, the legislation expanded Medicaid to nearly everyone making up to 133 percent of the federal poverty line, which would have added an estimated 16 million people to state Medicaid rolls over the next seven years. States that refused to comply would run the risk of losing all Medicaid funding.
Seven justices ruled that the move went too far, and that the government can only withhold the funds to expand Medicaid, not existing money that helps states run their pre-expansion programs.
So will more conservative states take advantage of this new leeway and reject the expansion? That’s what Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman, a Republican, suggested Thursday, when he said that he opposed expanding Medicaid in his state. A spokeswoman for Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who has made a show of rejecting federal funds in the past, wouldn’t say whether he would block the expansion. Medicaid is often one of the biggest lines in states’ budgets, and that share is growing as health care costs continue to rise.Source

States in Action Archive Coverage Gains and Budget Challenges  October/November 2008

The U.S. Census Bureau reported recently that both the percentage and number of people without health insurance decreased in 2007, from 47.0 million (15.8 percent) in 2006 to 45.7 million (15.3 percent) in 2007. The percentage of people covered by private health insurance actually decreased, but the drop in private coverage was more than offset by an increase in coverage through government health insurance programs.
Meanwhile, the economy took a turn for the worse, threatening to undo gains in health insurance coverage and straining state budgets. Even before the Wall Street financial crisis, the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities reported that 29 states were facing budget shortfalls in 2009, raising serious doubts about their ability to sustain gains in health coverage or consider additional reforms.
This issue of States in Action takes a close look at the Census Bureau’s health insurance coverage data, considering how coverage changed by state, and describes ways in which states are trying to stay the course to cover the uninsured in a worsening economy.


CBO:Mar 12, 2012 –
In preparing the March 2012 baseline budget projections, the Congressional 
Budget Office (CBO) and the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) 
have updated estimates of the budgetary effects of the health insurance coverage 
provisions of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
1.That legislation comprises the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Public Law 111-148) and the health care provisions of the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 (P.L. 111-152).
The insurance coverage provisions of the ACA establish a mandate for most legal 
residents of the United States to obtain health insurance; create insurance 
“exchanges” through which certain individuals and families may receive federal 
subsidies to substantially reduce the cost of purchasing health insurance; 
significantly expand eligibility for Medicaid; impose an excise tax on certain 
health insurance plans with relatively high premiums; establish penalties on 
certain employers who do not provide minimum health benefits to their 
employees; and make other changes to prior law.
2.  CBO and JCT now estimate that the insurance coverage provisions of the ACA 
will have a net cost of just under $1.1 trillion over the 2012–2021 period—about 
$50 billion less than the agencies’ March 2011 estimate for that 10-year period 
(see Table 1, following the text).
3.The net costs reflect:
? Gross additional costs of $1.5 trillion for Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), tax credits and other subsidies for the purchase of health insurance through the newly established exchanges and related costs, and tax credits for small employers, 
? Offset in part by about $0.4 trillion in receipts from penalty payments, the 
new excise tax on high-premium insurance plans, and other budgetary effects 
(mostly increases in tax revenues).

L.A. City Council approves construction of Sherman Oaks synagogue despite years of neighbors protest.


A day after the L.A. City Council approved a synagogue expansion for the second time, neighbors critical of the Sherman Oaks facility said they will closely monitor its operations.

Neighbors warring over Chabad

of North Hollywood expansion

project

“Why are you doing this?” Abend demanded, turning to confront his neighbor. “You’re either doing this out of love or hate,” he added, his eyes bright with anger. “And I don’t think it’s love.”
The cause of the dispute loomed directly behind the men: Steel beams, concrete walls, and a faded drawing of what Chabad of North Hollywood’s new compound will look like – if it’s completed as planned.
In August, a judge sided with Chabad opponents who argue the city broke its own planning rules in approving the 12,000-square- foot building in a residential neighborhood.
Now, the City Council will have to reconsider the project it approved in 2009. It could sign off on it again – allowing the growing congregation to complete construction – or bow to the chorus of discontent from nearby homeowners and recommend downsizing the compound.
Opponents have argued the Chabad of North Hollywood expansion, which includes a new Hebrew school, synagogue, lecture area, and playground, is too large with too little parking for their leafy stretch of Chandler Boulevard, where homes start at $1 million.
Supporters say a larger building is needed, but an abundance of parking spaces is unnecessary because observant Jews walk to the synagogue on the Sabbath. What’s really fueling the opposition, said some supporters of Chabad, is a fear that Orthodox families will dominate the neighborhood.
Neighbors of Chabad of North Hollywood are unhappy with the construction of the building along Chandler Boulevard.
Jeff Gantman, one of several opponents living near Chabad of North Hollywood, said he was disappointed with the council’s unanimous decision Wednesday allowing a 12,000-square-foot building that is partially built to resume construction.
The facility, at the corner of Chandler Boulevard and Ethel Avenue, will replace a much smaller space that no longer accommodates the growing Orthodox Jewish congregation. Gantman and other opponents of the project were angered by Councilman Paul Koretz’s motion permitting the 28-foot-high project to move forward.
“We will be working with the new councilman’s office to ensure that the conditions put in place to mitigate this project’s impact on the neighborhood are followed correctly,” Gantman said.
Critics said the synagogue is too big for their residential neighborhood. After years of legal wrangling, they won a court decision saying the city erred in its first approval process. That necessitated a second approval vote this week.
Chabad supporters turned out in force at Wednesday’s hearing and broke out in applause after the vote.  >>>MORE<<<

WHY IS SEC. CLINTON GIVING HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS TO MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD?


Mohammed Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, just won a presidential election in Egypt described by the White House as a “milestone in Egypt’s transition to democracy.”

And while no one has brought forth direct ties between Obama and the Muslim Brotherhood, Walid Shoebat and Ben Barrack have pointed to tangible, familial ties between the Islamist organization and the office of Obama’s Secretary of State that cannot be ignored. In particular, they’ve shown that the mother of Huma Abedin, “Hillary Clinton’s Deputy Chief of Staff and closest advisor,” is not only a member of the Muslim Sisterhood, but also a member of its “Guidance Bureau.”
The Muslim Sisterhood is, as its name suggests, a sister organization to the Muslim Brotherhood. Service on the Guidance Bureau of that organization is quite a prestigious position. It is so prestigious that one of the women Abedin’s mother serves with is Najla Ali Mahmoud, the wife of Mohammed Morsi. The plot only thickens when we consider the fact that Abedin’s brother, Hassan Abedin, has allegedly collaborated with “al-Qaeda godfather Omar Naseef and Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, two of the most influential terror supporters in the world.”
There should be an investigation of whether these ties have helped in what the U.S. government has recognized as the Muslim Brotherhood’s self-proclaimed goal of “civilization jihad” against America and the West.

Furthermore, the investigation should determine if those ties contributed to Sec. Clinton’s “waiver of Congressional restrictions on aid to Egypt, allowing $1.5 billion to be transferred in a highly unusual lump-sum payment.”   MORE FROM SOURCE

Houston Strip Clubs Hit By New ‘Pole Tax’


The city of Houston is turning to an unusual source to help fund rape investigations: strip clubs.
The City Council of the nation’s fourth-largest city passed an ordinance Wednesday that requires strip clubs to pay a $5-per-visitor fee to help pay for the analysis of biological evidence collected from rape victims in hopes of identifying their attackers.
Police in Houston, and in many other parts of the U.S., lack the money to promptly analyze evidence such as hair particles and blood specimens, gathered by investigators in packets known as rape kits. Houston estimates it has 6,000 rape kits that have yet to be scrutinized by crime laboratories.
Supporters of the ordinance, which was supported by Mayor Annise Parker and approved on a 14-1 vote, contend that strip clubs should shoulder some of the costs of rape investigations because the establishments can cultivate unhealthy attitudes toward women that can lead to sexual assaults.
“There are negative secondary effects associated with adult-entertainment establishments,” said Ellen Cohen, the council member who championed the ordinance, which could generate up to $3 million in annual revenue.MORE

New York court rules private lap dances not tax exempt

(Reuters) – A private lap dance is not tax exempt, a New York court has ruled after a gentleman’s club near the state capital of Albany claimed the service was a tax free “dramatic or musical art performance.”
In New York state a sales tax must be paid on admission to or for the use of any place of amusement except for dramatic or musical arts performances.
Nite Moves of Latham, New York, owned by 677 Loudon Corporation, has been fighting a 2005 audit by the New York Division of Taxation, which found that the club owed nearly $125,000 in sales tax on door admission charges and private lap dance sales.
But the New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division ruled on Thursday that the club had not provided enough evidence to support its argument that lap dances were a dramatic or musical art performance.

Supreme Court upholds Obama’s healthcare law, what they aren’t telling you is you’ll be chipped too? Since 2004


WASHINGTON — Led by a chief justice who some conservatives immediately branded a turncoat, the Supreme Court upheld most of President Obama‘s healthcare law Thursday, resolving a high-stakes constitutional clash not seen in decades and handing Obama a victory that surprised many in Washington.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and the four liberal justices joined to uphold the Democrats‘ most ambitious social legislation in a generation.
The unpopular requirement that everyone buy health insurance or pay a penalty — likened by detractors to a rule that everyone purchase broccoli — was unconstitutional as a mandate, Roberts said, but valid as long as it was simply considered a tax.
Obama, who had staked the success of his presidency on passage of the law, initially thought he had lost when Fox News and CNN incorrectly reported the mandate had been struck down. But after he retreated to his offices to ponder his defeat, White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler walked in to give him the thumbs-up.
“First, there were dark clouds,” one aide said, “and then there was joy.”
Obama’s first call was to Solicitor Gen. Donald B. Verrilli Jr., who had insisted on presenting the tax argument to the justices.
Later the president went before television cameras to pronounce the ruling “a victory for people all over this country whose lives will be more secure because of this law and the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold it.”     thank you Brian

Coverage under Obamacare

will require an implantable

microchip?

There’s a pretty starling thing in the bill that 95% of Americans won’t like. 
The Obama Health care bill under Class II (Paragraph 1, Section B) specifically includes ‘‘(ii) a class II device that is implantable.” Then on page 1004 it describes what the term “data” means in paragraph 1, section B: 
14 ‘‘(B) In this paragraph, the term ‘data’ refers to in15 
formation respecting a device described in paragraph (1), 
16 including claims data, patient survey data, standardized 
17 analytic files that allow for the pooling and analysis of 
18 data from disparate data environments, electronic health 
19 records, and any other data deemed appropriate by the 
20 Secretary” 
What exactly is a class II device that is implantable? Lets see… 
Approved by the FDA, a class II implantable device is a “implantable radio frequency  transponder system for patient identification and health information.” The purpose of a class II device is to collect data in medical patients such as “claims data, patient survey data, standardized analytic files that allow for the pooling and analysis of data from disparate data environments, electronic health records, and any other data deemed appropriate by the Secretary.”      thank you Steven

I just tried to search on the Obamacare health bill for anything saying anything about  microchips being implanted in citizens and Snopes reported it as FALSE, but I don’t know what exactly to think of that?  shera~

FDA approves computer chip; more like rods or a fuse for humans in 2004.

10/13/2004

FDA approves computer chip for humans

Devices could help doctors with stored medical information

WASHINGTON — Medical milestone or privacy invasion? A tiny computer chip approved Wednesday for implantation in a patient’s arm can speed vital information about a patient’s medical history to doctors and hospitals. But critics warn that it could open new ways to imperil the confidentiality of medical records.
The Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday that Applied Digital Solutions of Delray Beach, Fla., could market the VeriChip, an implantable computer chip about the size of a grain of rice, for medical purposes.
With the pinch of a syringe, the microchip is inserted under the skin in a procedure that takes less than 20 minutes and leaves no stitches. Silently and invisibly, the dormant chip stores a code that releases patient-specific information when a scanner passes over it.

Medical Device Technology Forecast: Discussion

Although a large number of topics emerged from this survey, six major trend categories circumscribe all of the product-type examples. These same categories encompass all of the generic technologies except “infection control” (which elicited responses too heterogeneous for analysis), and “virtual reality” (which participants viewed as an educational tool, not a clinical one). These trend categories are:
  1. Computer-related technology
  2. Molecular medicine
  3. Home- and self-care
  4. Minimally invasive procedures
  5. Combination device/drug products
  6. Organ replacements and assists
The first two of these trend categories comprise developments grounded in scientific advances; the second two in growing delivery modalities; and the last two in specific product-types.

MAUDE Adverse Event Report:

UNKMICROCHIP/CAPSULE


UNK MICROCHIP/CAPSULE  
Event Date 08/01/2002
Event Type  No Answer Provided
Event Description
Caller reported their church reverend and church deacon entered the house while caller was asleep, sedated them, removed them from the home and implanted a “microchip” into their right ear for experimental purposes. Caller did not know the purpose of the experiment. Caller experienced disorientation, pain to right head. Caller reports that the deacon and reverend have “rigged up the microchip” so that caller receives audio messages regarding their past medical and personal history. Caller went to hospital and had x-rays and ct scans done which showed the microchip was implanted.
Search Alerts/Recalls                                Page Last Updated: 05/31/2012