Friday, September 14, 2012

988th day of the Tens

A US hostage held by Al-Qaeda urges his wife in a video to contact American Jewish communities to call on US President Barack Obama to help secure his release, SITE Intelligence Group say.



Warren Weinstein, a relief worker with USAID captured in Lahore, Pakistan in August 2011, appeared in the video shared on Islamist websites yesterday, the US-based monitoring group said, in the second video appealing for his freedom in recent days.
Weinstein, who says his captors treat him well, "asked his wife to make contact with Jewish communities in the US to pressure Obama and the American government to work with and accept Al-Qaeda's demands," SITE say.

He also calls on his wife to "work with the American Jewish communities in order to work with the Israeli government and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu" to help secure his freedom.

In the video appeal released on Wednesday, 12 Sept., Weinstein calls for help from Netanyahu, in a "one Jew to another" appeal, to help in his case, saying that Obama seems to take "no interest" in his captivity.

In a video in May Weinstein had asked Obama to accept the demands of his kidnappers for an end to air strikes and the release of Islamists held in the United States.

SOURCE: { http://www.ejpress.org/article/61707 }
IMG SRC: { http://www.whatsonningbo.com/news_images/2ef1dfe30fa79691_Warren_Weinstein.jpg }


Wednesday, August 29, 2012

972nd day of the Tens

Climate change could increase levels of avian influenza in wild birds

Rising sea levels, melting glaciers, more intense rainstorms and more frequent heat waves may come to mind, among other planetary woes, when we mention climate change.  Now, two University of Michigan researchers say an increased risk of avian influenza transmission in wild birds ranks among those risks.
Population ecologists Pejman Rohani and Victoria Brown used a mathematical model to explore the consequences of altered interactions between an important species of migratory shorebird and horseshoe crabs at Delaware Bay as a result of climate change.
They found that climate change could upset the carefully choreographed interactions between ruddy turnstone shorebirds and the horseshoe crabs that provide the bulk of their food during the birds' annual stopover at Delaware Bay, a major estuary of the Delaware River bordered by New Jersey to the north and Delaware to the south.
Climate change-caused disruptions to the well-timed interplay between the birds and crabs could lead to an increase in the avian influenza infection rate among ruddy turnstones and resident ducks of Delaware Bay, the researchers found.
Delaware Bay lies at a crossroads for many bird species traveling between continents, an increase in the avian infection rate there could conceivably help spread novel subtypes of the influenza virus among North American wild bird populations, according to Rohani and Brown.
"We're not suggesting that our findings necessarily indicate an increased risk to human health," said Rohani, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, a professor of complex systems and a professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health.
"But every single pandemic influenza virus that has been studied has included gene segments from avian influenza viruses. So from that perspective, understanding avian influenza transmission in its natural reservoir is, in itself, very important."
Avian influenza refers to infection with bird flu Type A viruses. Those viruses occur naturally among wild aquatic birds worldwide and can infect domestic poultry and other bird and animal species.
Avian flu viruses do not normally infect humans. However, sporadic human infections with avian flu viruses have occurred. Since 2003, for example, more than 600 cases—including more than 300 deaths—of human infection with highly pathogenic avian influenza A H5N1 have been reported worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.
Delaware Bay, known as a hot spot for avian influenza virus, hosts many resident bird species as well as the hundreds of thousands of migratory birds that gather to feed on horseshoe crab eggs.  Infection levels in ruddy turnstones, which stop at Delaware Bay each May during their northbound migration to breeding grounds in the Arctic after wintering in South America, have been found to be exceptionally high.
The birds time their arrival at Delaware Bay to coincide with the availability of the horseshoe crab eggs. Brown and Rohani wondered what would happen to influenza levels in Delaware Bay birds if climate change altered the timing of the ruddy turnstone's migratory flight to Delaware Bay or affected the timing of horseshoe crab spawning.
Their mathematical model looked at virus infection rates in ruddy turnstones and two species of duck—mallards, which winter at the bay, and American black ducks, which live there year-round.
The researchers found that if ruddy turnstones reached Delaware Bay either several weeks earlier or later than their current May arrival date, influenza infection rates in the species increased significantly, driving up the infection rates—also called prevalence levels—in the resident ducks as well.
"If the ruddy turnstones arrive either earlier or later than they do now, then their arrival coincides with higher viral prevalence in the resident ducks," said Brown, a postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and the Center for the Study of Complex Systems. "And because these birds are interacting with a greater number of infected resident ducks, prevalence levels in ruddy turnstones are boosted.
"There's a feedback mechanism at work as well. Higher prevalence levels in the ruddy turnstones may, in turn, impact the prevalence levels in the resident ducks, driving them even higher."
If the timing of the horseshoe crab spawning season at Delaware Bay changed significantly due to climate change, ruddy turnstone populations would drop significantly due to a loss of food, and the influenza infection rate would decrease sharply as well, the researchers found.
The Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network declared Delaware Bay a site of hemispheric importance in 1986.
Sites of hemispheric importance act as staging, nesting or breeding grounds for at least 500,000 shorebirds annually, or at least 30 percent of the biogeographic population of any species.

SOURCE: [ Findings were published online Aug. 29 in the journal Biology Letters. ]

Monday, August 27, 2012

970th day of the Tens

Ban Ki-Moon Gives Iran An 'Undeserved Gift' With Decision To Travel To Tehran Summit 
  
The Anti-Defamation League says that decisions made by United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to address the Non-Alignment Movement summit in Tehran represents an “undeserved gift” that could give an Iranian regime belligerence on the nuclear issue and escalating anti-Israel, anti-American, and anti-Semitic rhetoric and incitement.
Talk about bad timing,” says Abraham H. Foxman, National Director of The ADL. “The Secretary General's decision to travel to Iran,” he continues, “sends the wrong signal at the wrong time. It will be viewed by many in the international community as undermining the effort to prevent the terrorist regime from developing nuclear weapons. Mr. Ban's decision is an undeserved gift to Iran that could have the unintended consequence of rewarding the regime for their belligerence on the nuclear issue and repeated threats to harm Israel and Jews around the world.”
Mr. Foxman adds that, “Mr. Ban's planned trip further undermines the intensive efforts by the United States and the P5+1 to make it clear to Iran that there are severe consequences for its ongoing nuclear weapons program, including economic and diplomatic isolation.”

The ADL had previously urged the Secretary General to decline the invitation, saying, 'Your presence in the Iranian capital at this time will be counterproductive to the efforts of the international community to bring Iran into compliance with its obligations under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions.'

COMMENT: The agenda calls for better diplomacy on behalf of Zionism's centre-right patriarchal moral. No such things as a Non-Aligment Movement exists in politic-rhetoric! Belligerent comes across as the sine-qua-non of the economic overstatement; states going over-the-top! Mutual inequality? Diversity: the International community. Does Mssr. Foxman's over-indulgent statement do the work of the Iranian belligerent, on their behalf? The P5+1 does not include Iran as part of a Rothschild controlled economic state. The other main countries not controlled by the IMF & World Bank-- the Rothschilds-- include Cuba and North Korea. How do we bankrupt another?




Tuesday, August 21, 2012

964th day of the Tens


Britons, a nation of 'sniff testers' says national fridge audit

The first ‘National Fridge Audit’ by Beko home appliances shows that a staggering 30 million of UK residents admit to having out of date food in their fridge.  Alarmingly, although half of us say we would never serve a guest food that goes out of date, it still means that around 1.2 million potential hosts in Britain would secretly scrape off the mouldy parts and then serve up the rest.

According to the new study out today, three quarters of us would still eat food that goes beyond its use-by-date, happy to trust our nose and judgement with a quick ‘sniff test’.  If one goes round to their neighbours for a dinner party at the weekend then beware; two thirds of Brits think that the use by date serves as a guide only.

Old cheese tops the list for the average Brit as the worst offender.  The top ten out of date chilled items in the UK at present comprise the following list: cheese; jar of curry sauce; yogurt; eggs; milk; open can of beans; fruit; bread; meat; fish.

Behind closed doors, over a quarter of Brits cite fridge habits as the cause of arguments with their housemates or partner.  Topics that really tick us off include how we store things, like a half eaten tin of beans left uncovered.

In fact, 1-in-10 Brits say they argue with their partner as to whether they should refrigerate things such as eggs. 

Over half of the people surveyed wrongly believe they should store eggs in the fridge.  Over 40% think they should keep items such as jam, marmalade, honey and ketchup chilled despite the fact that these items can keep when stored at room temperature.

Top 10 things that Brits refrigerate unnecessarily: eggs; jam/marmalade; honey; onions; garlic; bread; potatoes; bananas; dried fruit; tinned vegetables.

Confirming that the contents of our fridges can speak volumes, when it comes to our friends one fifth of Britons admitted they judge others’ lifestyle choices by the contents of their fridge.  Indeed, one in eight admitted they would not go to a friend’s house for dinner if their fridge looked messy or dirty and more men than women agreed that they would think of their friend as ‘tight’ if they spotted budget brands in the fridge.

Teresa Arbuckle of Beko Plc, who carried out the poll, says: "Our survey reveals that we are nation who judge each other on the contents of our chiller – the fridge is the new status symbol.

"So it is surprising to learn that so many of us are running on empty where our food is concerned, almost a third of people saying their fridge usually contains the bare minimum to get them through the week."

2012 Masterchef winner Shelina Permalloo, who agrees: "The rising popularity of entertaining at home, particularly with the summer of sporting events and Autumn of new talent shows on TV, friends and neighbours will have plenty of opportunity to peep in your fridge.

2012 Masterchef winner, Shelina Permalloo

"It is important to keep your fridge stocked up and well maintained not only to avoid embarrassing questions from house guests, but also to make sure ourselves and our families aren't being exposed to any health risks. And as any host will tell you, cooking from scratch and home entertaining is an easy way to impress your guests – and lots of fun too!"

IMG SRC: [ http://shelinapermalloo.com/images/photos/shelina_kitchen.jpg] 

Monday, August 20, 2012

963rd day of the Tens


Dulwich Picture Gallery celebrates a 25 year storytelling reign



Robert Lagnado’s magical storytelling skills have captivated and delighted hundreds of participants, of all ages, at Dulwich Picture Gallery for a quarter of a century.  An integral part of the life and fabric of the Gallery, the charismatic storyteller, Lagnado, moves to France with his wife.  In celebration of his amazing work, the Gallery shares tributes below from those who worked the closest with him.

Gillian Wolfe CBE, Director of Learning and Public Affairs at Dulwich Picture Gallery, met Robert Lagnado when they both taught in a London Comprehensive School.  Soon after Gillian Wolfe started at the Gallery in 1984 she invited Robert Lagnado to join, knowing that his unique talents would prove brilliant for the Education department she decided to set up.
She says: “He has infinite patience, is as at home with 90 year olds as with 9 year olds, smiling all the time with never an unkind word about anyone in all those years.  He has certainly been instrumental in us achieving so many awards for excellence, 26 in 28 years.  Despite his charisma Robert Lagnado shows modesty, disinterested in personal glory but everlastingly fascinated by people and their story.  He is irreplaceable; we will miss him every day.”

Alice Ross, former Urban Youth Programme Co-ordinator, says: “He was a delight to watch even when he wasn’t telling stories.  Simply arriving by motorbike always brought me a feeling of joy and rebellion … and proof that he was as free in his own life as he was in his amazing storytelling.”

Lettie McKie, Education Public Programme Manager, says: “There are lots of good storytellers and lots of good teachers but Robert stands out because of his incredible personality.  He couldn’t help but charm everybody he met with his irrepressible optimism and zest for life, his imagination bubbles out of him in everything that he says and he simply lights a room up when he walks into it … one of a kind!”

Janie Airey, Freelance photographer, says: “When I picture Robert I see: his sparkly waistcoat; flowing white hair and very cool motorbike; his ability to silence and captivate a large group within seconds of starting a story about a painting; his ability to bring a painting to life and find the smallest detail that would delight any child or adult; his ability to get both children and adults waving their arms around or enacting a scene without inhibition in the middle of the Gallery.”
In his final session, Robert led participants from the Good Times: Art for Older People at Dulwich Picture Gallery programme on a tour of Philip Haas’ sculpture installation The Four Seasons.  Full of adventure and tall truths, Robert unravelled the fantastic stories behind the monumental characters, drawing on myth and fairy tale, stimulating imagination in the beautiful Gallery gardens.

SOURCE: [ http://press.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk/2012/08/16/dulwich-picture-gallery-celebrates-a-25-year-storytelling-reign/ ]
IMG SRC: [ http://press.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk/2012/08/16/dulwich-picture-gallery-celebrates-a-25-year-storytelling-reign/ ] accessed: 20th August, 2012.

 

Friday, August 3, 2012

946th day of the Tens


Bowiefest

UKs first film festival dedicated to the work on screen of legend David Bowie

Legendary rock star David Bowies involvement in films spans a period that lasts as long as his music making career.  From Friday 31 August to Sunday 2 September, the Institute of Contemporary Arts will celebrate the best of his celluloid appearances with Bowiefest, 3 days of screenings,
talks, and Q&As.

Renowned for consistently remaking his image and assuming alter egos Bowie portrays a fantastically wide range of characters in film.  This phenomenon takes place over the last 40 years.

Bowiefests Opening Night will include a rare screening of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, D.A. Pennebakers epochal behind the scenes documentary and concert film of the last ever Ziggy Stardust concert at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1973.  

One of the original Spiders from Mars, drummer Woody Woodmansey, will take part in conversations with the ICAs Tom Wilcox as part of the Culture Now series of talks.

Another cult documentary, Cracked Actor, follows an alienated Bowie during the Diamond Dogs tour of America in 1974.  The director, Alan Yentob former Chair of the ICA - will take part in conversations with leading UK artist Jeremy Deller about this influential film to close the festival.  After watching Cracked Actor, director Nic Roeg realised that he had found the leading man for his then forthcoming feature, The Man Who Fell to Earth, a film about a humanoid alien who comes to earth on a mission to take water back to his drought stricken planet.  A Q&A with Roeg will take place after the screening of his spectacular film.

Another chance to see Bowie performing in concert comes in the film Christiane F, about a young junkie prostitute in Berlin here, the soundtrack for the film was provided by Bowie too, from his Berlin era albums, Low, Heroes, and Lodger.

The decade of the 1980s kept David Bowie at his busiest film-wise, living up to his chameleon nick-name, playing everything from a goblin king to a vampire lover to a London wide boy and WW2 army major.

Bowiefest gets the opportunity to show some of these films, including The Hunger, Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence (which Bowie himself called his most credible performance), Absolute Beginners and Labyrinth.

Bowiefest also features entertainment and DJs in a bar on the Friday and Saturday nights where fans can come dressed as their favourite era Bowie.  Bowiefest takes place from Friday 31 August - Sunday 2 September 2012.


Wednesday, August 1, 2012

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944th day of the Tens

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Friday, July 27, 2012

939th day of the Tens

New study reveals uncomfortable shoes cost UK women £2.5 billion per year

Women across the UK fritter away £2.5 billion each year on uncomfortable shoes they rarely wear a recent study reveals.

The average woman in the UK spends £136.52 on five new pairs of shoes every year, at a cost of £27.40 each. Instead of investing wisely in shoes they can wear more than once, three out of the five pairs of women
s shoes end up at the bottom of the wardrobe having only been worn once or twice after hurting the wearer's feet.

The research, commissioned by shoe specialist Hotter Comfort Concept, also revealed that 40% of the 1000 women questioned admitted to choosing their shoes purely for how they looked and not how they felt on their feet.

Lisa McCarten from Hotter, says:
Shoes really can change your life: they have an impact on the health of your feet, can influence how you feel and play a significant part in how much you enjoy your day. Not only do uncomfortable shoes make for a bad day today, squeezing your toes into ill-fitting footwear can also damage your feet causing pain and discomfort in later life.

Worryingly almost a third of women (28%) who have tried on shoes and know that they will feel uncomfortable, they still purchase them as they cannot resist how they look.

Lisa continues: 
We all want to look our best, keep up with our busy lives and have fun; stylish comfy shoes are an essential part of the modern woman's wardrobe to help her tackle all three.

62% of the women surveyed revealed that they spend at least one day a week wearing uncomfortable shoes with 48% hoping to wear them in until their feet get used to them.

More than half of the women surveyed (53%) will keep uncomfortable shoes for up to a year before giving up on them and throwing them away despite only wearing them once.

They also revealed that they own at least four pairs of shoes just to wear when sitting down or 'Dinner Shoes' that look amazing but feel very painful to walk in.

Regionally, women in Chelmsford buy the most shoes, purchasing on average seven new pairs a year whereas women in Leicester buy the least purchasing just four pairs every year.

Women in Worcester buy the most uncomfortable shoes admitting that 70% of their shoe collection only gets worn once, whereas the most comfort savvy women come from Cambridge revealing that just 20% of their collection gets worn only once.

To assist with the problem of uncomfortable shoes, Hotter's website offers a handy shoe fitting guide allowing customers to ensure their shoes fit just right: http://www.hottershoes.com/en/info/Hotter-Shoes-Fitting-Guide

STATS
The average women in UK buys three pairs of shoes at £27.40 each per year (£82.20) multiplied by the UK female population of 31.4million.
SOURCE
Hotter research completed a poll of 1000 women in UK, June 2012.


Friday, June 29, 2012

911th day of the Tens

ADL Calls On Ban-Ki Moon To Condemn Incendiary Anti-Semitic Remarks By Iranian Vice President At U.N. Drug Abuse Conference
The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) have called on U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to immediately condemn an incendiary anti-Semitic and conspiracy-laden speech by Iran's vice president blaming Jews for spreading drug addiction and controlling the international illegal drug trade.

In his address to a U.N-sponsored conference marking International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking in Tehran, Iranian First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi bizarrely claimed that no Jews have any addiction to drugs, declaring: “The Islamic Republic of Iran will pay for anybody who can research and find one single Zionist who is an addict. They do not exist. This is the proof of their involvement in drugs trade.” Rahimi went on to blame “Zionists and Jews” for involvement in other alleged conspiracies, including the Russian Revolution and ordering the killing of black babies.

Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director, issued the following statement:

To all those who thought that anti-Semitism is a thing of the past, certainly this makes it very clear that it is alive and well again. What makes it more sinister and dangerous is the fact that it comes from a leader of a country that has vowed to destroy the Jewish state, and is making efforts to obtain the means to do it;
Before now, good people in the world either ignored Iran's anti-Semitism or did not take it seriously. One would hope that this resurgence of dangerous anti-Semitic themes at a U.N. conference in Tehran would shake up the moral, political, religious leadership to condemn it with a strong voice. We begin by calling on Ban Ki-moon to speak out and to make clear that these views are not only objectionable, but repugnant to the entire international community.”



Wednesday, June 27, 2012

909th day of the Tens


British exam board condemned by Jewish community for asking pupils to ‘justify’ anti-Semitism

One of Britain’s leading exam boards became engulfed in accusations of anti-Semitism, over a national exam paper which asked pupils to ‘justify’ prejudices against Jews.

The AQA board had set the question, as part of a religious studies GCSE examination for 16-year-old British pupils, which asked pupils to “explain, briefly, why some people are prejudiced against Jews.”

Board of Deputies chief executive Jon Benjamin lead the public outcry of the board’s reasoning for including the question in an exam distributed to leading Jewish schools such as Jewish Free School (JFS). The cross-communal Jewish representative body described it as “unacceptable” and “nothing to do with Jews or Judaism.”

We will be taking it up with the examination board and it seems to me that it is also something to raise with the Department of Education, with which we are meeting to discuss anti-Semitism in schools,” added Mssr. Benjamin.

In a separate statement, Education Secretary Michael Gove joined critics of the exam board in saying: “To suggest that anti-Semitism can ever be explained, rather than condemned is insensitive and, frankly, bizarre.”

Mssr. Gove continued to say that it was “the duty of politicians to fight prejudice, and with anti-Semitism on the rise we need to be especially vigilant.”

A spokesperson for the AQA board expressed “concern” that the question had offended the Jewish community and insisted that whilst it acknowledges that “some people hold prejudices; it does not imply in any way that prejudice is justified.”

The spokesperson added that the question, which formed part of a paper focusing on Judaism, required students to use “the Holocaust to illustrate prejudice based on irrational fear, ignorance and scapegoating.”

Exam regulator Ofqual confirmed it had contacted AQA for comment on the controversial test, adding: “We will take appropriate follow-up action if necessary.”


Friday, June 22, 2012

904th day of the Tens

Israeli Air Force Targets Terrorist Rocket Squad in the Gaza Strip

Today, Israeli Air Forces aircraft targeted a terrorist squad during preparations to fire a rocket at Israel from the central Gaza Strip. Authorities identified a hit.

During the past week over 130 rockets hit Israel.

The Israeli Defence Force {IDF} shall not tolerate any attempt by terrorist groups to target Israeli civilians and IDF soldiers, The IDF Blog says, and shall continue to operate against those who use terror against the State of Israel.  The Hamas terror organization assumes sole responsible for any terrorist activity emanating from the Gaza Strip.

Comment: What does Alistair Burt plan to do about this issue, other than offer lip service to a public apathetic towards Alistair Burt?  The British Mandate along with The French Mandate assume full responsibility for the creation of the borders that threaten both Israeli and Palestinian independence; so, shouldnt Hamas bomb British and French territories?