Just What You Needed: Higher Taxes

by Bill Bischoff

While you hear a lot about the federal income tax, you don’t hear much about the Social Security tax. That’s odd because for many folks especially the self-employed Social Security tax can be the bigger hit. Here are some little-known truths about how the Social Security tax works and how much it can amount to.

Joplin tornado chaos leaves hundreds still missing

JOPLIN, Mo (Reuters) – On the wall of the Red Cross shelter in Joplin was taped a poster with a picture of Emma Marie Hamp-Haines, on which someone had scrawled “FOUND.”

Hamp-Haines was reunited with her daughter at the center on Wednesday, three days after a huge tornado carved a path of destruction through the city of 50,000 people known as a waystation on historic “Route 66.”

“That made it worth it, to see a family brought together,” said Amie Houston, a Missouri State University student, who watched the reunion.

The meeting of mother and daughter was a welcome happy ending in a town where too many other stories have ended in shock and tears.

By Thursday, nearly 100 hours after the deadliest tornado in the United States in 64 years, officials were still trying to find 232 people unaccounted for. State officials criticized for problems with information made available to the public swept in new resources Thursday.

“We will keep a relentless focus on the search, rescue and identification of those 232 people, and we will not rest until everyone has been accounted for, and that number is zero,” Governor Jay Nixon said.

Getting accurate information out of the six-mile-long scar left by Sunday’s tornado has been a struggle. Cell phone service was spotty, landlines dropped and electric power remained cut for thousands across the city.

Local radio filled with callers hunting for friends and family. A Safe and Well list maintained by the Red Cross had more than 1,800 names registered and more than 79,000 searches by Thursday morning, spokesman Jim Rettew said.

Searchers hung five posters, including that of Hamp-Haines, on a glass case behind the Red Cross workers.

“One of the first questions we’re asking is ‘Have you notified your family? Do they know you’re safe?’” Rettew said.

MISSING NUMBER PROBLEMS

Governor Nixon said Thursday the number of missing had fallen as stories like Hamp-Haines’s came to light. He acknowledged the frustration and confusion over initial estimates of a staggering 1,500 missing reported for two days following the tornado.

As briefings continued for the media, the number of missing did not decline. Then on Wednesday, officials abruptly stopped giving out a figure at all.

State officials directed 60 investigators starting on Wednesday to work around the clock to deliver Thursday’s more accurate number, Nixon said.

“We have absolutely no reason to hide anything from anybody,” Nixon said.

Debbie Cummins, great-grandmother of 16-month-old Skyular Logdson, who was finally identified in a morgue on Wednesday, said she and others have tried for two days to verify with coronors’ representatives that he has been located, as relatives of the boy’s father have said.

“I want to know when there’s going to be that next press conference because I want to ask ‘where are our loved ones?’” Cummins said on Thursday. “I want to know this and not just for myself and our family. We can’t get any answers.”

Some of the remains recovered were in very poor condition, Nixon told reporters. Morgue workers, including a federal team, were working to ensure there were no incorrect identifications, he said.

“I don’t know what you say to someone who was sitting at home eating dinner and heard the sirens and haven’t seen their loved ones since,” Nixon said.

The official death toll from the tornado had risen by one to 126 on Thursday, with the addition of Skyular. More than 900 were injured, according to government officials in Joplin. It was the eighth deadliest tornado in U.S. history.

Houston, the Red Cross shelter worker, was one of the lucky ones. She spent hours after the storm making phone calls and slowly locating her friends from school. Some of them managed a reunion at the shelter.

There wasn’t a lot of talking,” Houston said. “We didn’t even need to say anything. It was the fact that we were all together.”

(Editing by Greg McCune and Jerry Norton)

EBay and PayPal sue Google over trade secrets

By Yinka Adegoke

(Reuters) – EBay and its online payment unit, PayPal Inc, on Thursday sued Google Inc and two executives for stealing trade secrets related to mobile payment systems.

The two executives, Osama Bedier and Stephanie Tilenius, were formerly with PayPal and led the launch on Thursday of Google’s own mobile payment system in partnership with MasterCard, Citigroup and phone company Sprint.

The suit highlights the growing battle by a wide range of companies from traditional finance to Silicon Valley trying to take a major stake in what has been described as a $1 trillion opportunity in mobile payments. The mobile phone is seen as the digital personal wallet of the future.

The eBay suit said Bedier worked for nine years at PayPal, most recently serving as vice president of platform, mobile and new ventures. He joined Google on January 24 this year.

Tilenius was at eBay from 2001 to October 2009 and served as a consultant to the company until March 2010. The suit says Tilenius joined Google in February 2010 as vice president of e-commerce.

Bedier is accused in the suit of having “misappropriated PayPal trade secrets by disclosing them within Google and to major retailers.”

The suit accused Tilenius of recruiting Bedier, thereby breaking a contractual agreement with eBay. It also claims Bedier attempted to recruit former colleagues still at PayPal.

Ebay said PayPal and Google worked closely together for three years until this year on developing a commercial deal where PayPal would serve as a payment option for mobile application purchases on Google’s Android phones.

It said Bedier was the senior PayPal executive leading and finalizing negotiations with Google on Android during this period.

It also claimed Bedier transferred up-to-date versions of documents outlining PayPal’s mobile payment strategies to his non-PayPal computer just days before leaving PayPal for Google.

“By hiring Bedier, with his trade secret knowledge of PayPal’s plans and understanding of Google’s weaknesses as viewed by the industry leader (PayPal), Google bought the most comprehensive and sophisticated critique of its own problems available,” the suit said.

Google spokesman Aaron Zamost said the company had not yet received a copy of the complaint would not be able to comment until it has had a chance to review it.

Google and PayPal have done battle in the recent past in online payments via computers with the launch of Google Checkout in 2006, but Checkout has had a minimal impact on PayPal’s market dominance.

The suit was filed at Superior Court of the State of California, county of Santa Clara, Case No: CV20l863.

(Reporting by Yinka Adegoke, additional reporting by Jennifer Saba; Editing by Gary Hill, Bernard Orr and Matt Driskill)

For water researchers, an atmosphere full of questions

A research project called CalWater is trying to determine why some clouds give up their moisture and others don’t as they roll across the mountain ranges that provide the state with much of its water.

By Bettina Boxall, Los Angeles Times

A Gulfstream turboprop sits on the McClellan Airport runway under gray, gloomy skies. Kim Prather has waited two weeks for this day.

“I can’t believe there are finally clouds,” she says gratefully as she and her research team check and calibrate several million dollars’ worth of equipment stacked in the plane’s cabin.

Scientists: Iceland’s Grimsvotn volcano erupting

By GUDJON HELGASON
Associated Press

REYKJAVIK, Iceland (AP) — Iceland’s most active volcano has started erupting, scientists said Saturday – just over a year after another eruption on the North Atlantic island shut down European air traffic for days.

Iceland’s Meteorological Office confirmed that an eruption had begun at the Grimsvotn volcano, accompanied by a series of small earthquakes. Smoke could be seen rising from the volcano, which lies under the uninhabited Vatnajokull glacier in southeast Iceland.

A no fly zone has been designated for 120 nautical miles (220 kilometers) in all directions from the eruption. Isavia, the company that operates and develops all airport facilities and air navigation services in Iceland, described this as standard procedure around eruptions.

“The plume of smoke has reached jet flying altitude and plans have been made for planes flying through Icelandic air control space to fly southwardly tonight,” said Hjordis Gudmundsdottir, the spokeswoman for Isavia.

Grimsvotn last erupted in 2004. Scientists have been expecting a new eruption and have said previously that this volcano’s eruption will likely be small and should not lead to the air travel chaos caused in April 2010 by ash from the Eyjafjallajokull volcano.

History shows that previous eruptions in Grimsvotn have not had much influence on flight traffic – unlike the massive disruption caused last year.

Pall Einarsson, geophysicist at the University of Iceland, said last year’s eruption was a rare event.

“The ash in Eyjafjallajokull was persistent or unremitting and fine-grained,” Einarsson said. “The ash in Grimsvotn is more coarse and not as likely to cause danger as it falls to the ground faster and doesn’t stay as long in the air as in the Eyjafjallajokull eruption.”

A plane from the Icelandic Coast Guard carrying experts from the University of Iceland will fly over the volcano and evaluate the situation.

One eyewitness, Bolli Valgardsson, said the plume rose quickly several thousand feet (meters) into the air.

Sparsely populated Iceland is one of the world’s most volcanically active countries and eruptions are frequent.

Eruptions often cause local flooding from melting glacier ice, but rarely cause deaths.

Last year’s Eyjafjallajokul eruption left some 10 million air travelers stranded worldwide after winds pushed the ash cloud toward some of the world’s busiest airspace and led most northern European countries to ground all planes for five days.

Whether widespread disruption occurs again will depend on how long the eruption lasts, how high the ash plume rises and which way the wind blows.

In November, melted glacial ice began pouring from Grimsvotn, signaling a possible eruption. That was a false alarm but scientists have been monitoring the volcano closely ever since.

The volcano also erupted in 1998, 1996 and 1993. The eruptions have lasted between a day and several weeks.

—

Jill Lawless and Danica Kirka in London contributed to this report.

Skepticism grows over products touted as eco-friendly

Environmentalists and some consumers are questioning the claims of an increasing number of companies and items promoted as green.

By Tiffany Hsu, Los Angeles Times

To Marina Meadows, green may be the new white.

When she goes shopping these days, Meadows is often overwhelmed by a bevy of products touted as green, from Earth-friendly dish soaps and bamboo-derived towels to eco-detergents and plant-based soda bottles.

But the Santa Monica resident, 26, said that while she is willing to pay extra to help the environment, she’s often not sure how much of the labeling she should believe.

“Sometimes, I wonder if any of it’s really green or if it’s all a marketing scheme,” Meadows said.

With booming interest in the environment, more companies are trying to cash in by promoting themselves and their products as green.

But environmentalists and some consumers are crying foul, saying that many companies are making the products out to be greener than they really are, a practice they call greenwashing.

The term caught on when hotels began asking guests to reuse towels, saying they were trying to conserve water, though skeptics said it was really to skimp on laundry costs.

These days, greenwashing is reaching “epidemic proportions,” according to advertising firm Ogilvy & Mather, which has been pushing for accurate environmental marketing.

“If we allow companies to get away with exaggeration, consumer skepticism will become cynicism and they’ll stop choosing green products at all,” said Scott McDougall, chief executive of eco-marketing company TerraChoice.

Last year, TerraChoice counted 5,000 items in retail stores that claimed to be green, a 73% increase from the year before. But on every toy and 95% of home and family products, at least one eco-friendly claim turned out to be misleading or false, the company found.

Some efforts just seem a bit odd: Plastic Barbie dolls can now sport handbags and accessories made from recycled materials.

“Most companies are engaged in incremental tinkering — symbolic actions without any real substance,” said Kumi Naidoo, executive director of Greenpeace International.

But no one can agree on what exactly makes a product green and therefore what exactly constitutes greenwashing.

As a result, federal regulators have had difficulty setting standards to regulate green labeling. The Federal Trade Commission has a voluntary guideline for eco-advertising, but it is 20 years old. It is being updated.

According to a recent survey, 65% of consumers want a single seal identifying a green product, similar to the way beef is labeled by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

But for now, there’s a swarm of companies that issue green certification, endorsements and labels for a fee.

One such program, the EcoAd from EcoMedia, a division of CBS Corp., has earned the ire of some environmental groups. They complained to the FTC that CBS was being potentially deceptive when it sells green leaf badges for advertisers to use in commercials.

“An Eco-label that promises advertisers a green image while telling them they don’t need to do anything to earn that image is the very definition of greenwashing,” said Michael Green, executive director of the Center for Environmental Health, in a statement.

A portion of all EcoAd proceeds go to environmental projects, said EcoMedia President Paul Polizzotto. And although there aren’t disclaimers on the ads themselves, viewers are directed to a website noting that the leaf symbol is not meant as an endorsement of the companies that use it.

“If an advertiser wants 30 seconds of your time, they might as well improve the quality of your life, and that’s the furthest thing from greenwashing,” Polizzotto said. “What I usually see in media is a lot of talk about greening and not a lot of action.”

Labels play a major role in helping consumers decide between products claiming to be green. Nearly 40% said they rely on labels, according to a report from the eco-marketing company Shelton Group.

“Many don’t trust manufacturer motives, but they end up making a decision at the shelf based on the packaging, usually just buying the brands they’ve always bought,” said Suzanne Shelton, chief executive of the group.

It can be a tricky call for consumers, who are regularly met by a vast array of vaguely defined green catchphrases such as “natural,” “clean” and “organic.”

Even manufacturers often don’t know the difference between designations such as “compostable” and “biodegradable,” researchers said. Biodegradable goods break down into carbon dioxide, water and biomass over time, while compostable items do the same while also releasing nutrients into the soil, which can be good for growing plants.

“Companies don’t really understand the science behind it and they don’t question it,” said Steven Mojo, executive director of Biodegradable Products Institute, a testing group. “They think that their packaging or product is somehow going to magically disappear in a landfill.”

Claire Scarisbrick, 26, recently spent half an hour sifting through eco-friendly body wash options at Whole Foods. The dental hygienist and chef, who lives near West Pico Boulevard and South La Brea Avenue, said she researches unfamiliar brands on her iPhone and avoids green products from large companies out of fear of being “duped.”

She likes locally produced products that aren’t heavily processed. She didn’t buy a cosmetic company’s “natural” line of face washes after she compared it to the company’s standard product and found little difference in the ingredients.

“I don’t want to be putting something with 30 chemicals in it onto my skin,” she said. “If I’ve got the money, I’d much rather spend more of it on something that I believe in, not something that’s just easily accessible.”

tiffany.hsu@latimes.com

Military plane crashes in Southern California

cnn.com

(CNN) — A tanker plane crashed during takeoff at Point Mugu naval air base in Southern California Wednesday evening, but the three people aboard escaped with minor injuries, a U.S. Navy spokesman said.

The plane crashed at 5:25 p.m. PT, base spokesman Vance Vasques said in a statement. The resulting fire was extinguished about three and a half hours later.

The Boeing 707, operated by Omega Air Refueling, went down near the beach, spewing large plumes of black smoke, CNN affiliate KABC reported.

The Ventura County Fire Department sent a full response team, including a helicopter and three fire engines, spokesman Ron Oatman said.

The National Air Transportation Board is conducting an investigation into the cause of the crash.

Omega Air Refueling is contracted by the Navy to provide fleet operations support at Point Mugu.

“و بازهم ما هستیم که همچنان نمی دانیم چه می خواهیم”

دکتر حسین لاجوردی

سال 1357 در ایران مردم شاه را نمی خواستند. مشکلات سیاسی فراوان و بی فکری های آشکاری بود که ایران را به امروزش رسانده است، ما ایرانیان بهای سنگینی برایش پرداخت کرده ایم و غرب هم بی نصیب نمانده است چرا که ضمن نعمات آقتصادی بسیار پی آمدهای منفی اش را نیز همچنان بدوش میکشد.
انقلاب 1357 که با خواست دگرگونی و آزادی از طرف مردم ایران از سوئی و دخالت مستقیم غرب برای منافع اقتصادی از سوئی دیگر بود، بی هیچگونه تردیدی حاصلی جز ویرانی برای ایران و سرگردانی و خسارت های بی پایان برای چندین نسل از مردم ما بدنبال نداشت. پی آمدهای این فاجعه همچنان دامنگیرمان است و همه ما هم لحظه به لحظه بدنبال این هستیم که راه فراری را جستجو کنیم و آزادی کشورمان را بدست آوریم، خواست با ارزشی که می رود بسرعت به بار بنشیند.
تجربه انقلاب ایران درس بزرگی برای غرب بود که می توان رئیس حکومتی را تغییر داد ولی سیستم حکومتی را برای تحولات بعدی همچنان بر جای نگاهداشت، کاری که امروز در تونس و مصر بانجام رسید و بی تردید گامی به جلو و مانعی برای ویرانی کشورشان بود و شاید بتوان امید داشت که سیستمی آزاد جایگزین شود.
تحولات منطقه و جنبش های مردم تونس و مصر که موفق شدند روسای جمهورشان را سرنگون کنند و بقیه کشورهائی در منطقه که در صدد چنین حرکتی هستند اگر چه جنبش هایی هستند مردمی ولی هیچگاه نمی تواند و نباید سمبل خواست های آزادیخواهانه مردم ایران در گذر یک قرن گذشته باشند.
در این میان سناریوی غرب برای حفظ منافع خود در فرستادن نمایندگان نظامی اش یکسان بود ولی دستورات و نتایجش متفاوت، درسال 1357 “هویزر” به ایران آمد و ارتش ایران را مضمحل کرد اما با تجربه از تحولات ایران، فرستاده های ارتش امریکا به تونس و مصر تنها به کنار گذاشتن روسای مملکتشان انجامید. تجربه ی امروز برای مصر و تونس و…، تغییر شخص اول مملکت و بنوعی امکانات و احتمالن آزادی های بیشتری برای مردم آن کشورهاست ولی متاسفانه برای ما نتیجه اش از دست شدن حدود یک میلیون نفر از جوانان مان، میلیاردها ثروت کشورمان و بی اعتباری و تروریست شناخته شدن مان در سطوح بین المللی بوده است.
امروز ما شاهد جنبش هائی اجتماعی – اقتصادی و نه الزامن سیاسی در منطقه هستیم که بسیار هم قابل ارزش است – مهمتر آنکه بدین ترتیب سطح آگاهی اجتماعی رو به افزایش گذاشته است، ولی این سوال همچنان باقی است که آیا مردم تونس و مصر به آزادی و دموکراسی رسیده اند و یا تنها موفق به برکنار کردن بن علی و مبارک شده اند و ارتش با کمک دولت، رژیم حاکم را حفظ کرده است؟
امروز اگر بیشترین خواست های مردم در کشورهای خاورمیانه در عین تنفر از رژیم های استبدادی، خواست های اقتصادی – اجتماعی است ولی مردم ما به رغم داشتن همانگونه مشکلات گسترده، به مانند سی و دو سال گذشته به دنبال دموکراسی و آزادی و رهائی از استبداد و دیکتاتوری میباشند.
امروز ما ایرانیان در مرحله جدیدی از تاریخ کشورمان قرار گرفته ایم و نباید فراموش کنیم که حکومت جمهوری اسلامی که برای ما فاجعه، سیاهی، بی هویتی و حقارت است برای منافع غرب در منطقه همچنان مفید و با ارزش است و امروز دیگر تنها خامنه ای و احمدی نژادش خوب نیستند و صد البته خاتمی و موسوی و کروبی اش بسیار هم کارسازترند، پس برای آنان به هر شکلی این حکومت باید حفظ شود:
-    چرا که جمهوری اسلامی برای منطقه خوبست چون با حکومت اسلامی می توان در آینده ای نه چندان دور باز هم در مقابل نفوذ روسیه ایستاد.
-    چرا که جمهوری اسلامی برای کشورهای مسلمانِ ثروتمندِ سُنی مذهب خوبست که همچنان بر طبل شیعه گری بکوبد و آنها را برای محافظت از خود نیازمند امریکا و اروپا و دیگر ابر قدرت ها نماید.
-    چرا که جمهوری اسلامی برای جلوگیری از حرکت و جنبش مردم ایران خوبست چون غرب به خوبی می داند که اگر ناسیونالیسم ایرانی زمینه و بستر رُشد پیدا کند جلوگیری از آن به راحتی انجام پذیر نخواهد بود.
برای حکومت جمهوری اسلامی نیز به چند دلیل حفاظت تام و تمام از آقایان خاتمی، موسوی و کروبی حیاتی است:
-    به این دلیل که وحشت دارد اگر موسوی و کروبی و خاتمی آزادانه رفت و آمد کنند گروهی از تند روهای حکومت به آنها آسیبی رسانده و یا آنها را به قتل برسانند – این تندروها با این فکر ساده لوحانه تصور بر این دارند که اگر اینها نباشند دیگر مشکلی برای حکومت اسلامی وجود نخواهد داشت؛
-    به این دلیل که نگران هستند مردمی که بدنبال آزادی در ایران هستند و آقایان موسوی، کروبی و خاتمی را مانع این آزادی می دانند آنها را به قتل برسانند و باز هم با این فکر که تنها آنها هستند که مانع آزادی در ایران می باشند؛
-    جمهوری اسلامی به خوبی می داند که در تمامی این موارد و با کشته شدن هر یک از این سه نفر بهانه ای برای مردم آزادیخواه بوجود خواهد آمد که حکومت حتا با کشتار و سرکوب بیشتر هم راه به جائی نخواهد برد و چه بسا پی آمدش به از میان رفتن کل حکومت نیز بیانجامد و به همین دلیل است که نهایت حراست و حفاظت را از آنها خواهد داشت.
ما باید هشیار باشیم که با جایگزین شدن آقایان موسوی کروبی و یا خاتمی نوع رقیق تری از جمهوری اسلامی بر ما حکومت خواهد کرد و ما همچنان در افسوس خواسته های از دست رفته امان خواهیم ماند.
هشدار من اینست که به یکسال و نیم گذشته و به سی و دو سال پیش برگردیم، هیچیک از این سه نفر هیچگاه به دنبال منافع ایران و ایرانیان نبوده اند و همانگونه که خودشان بارها گفته اند حفظ نظام و حکومت جمهوری اسلامی برایشان مهم بوده و ارجحیت داشته است.
هشدار دیگرم اینست که دقیق تر به مسائل نگاه کنیم، تردید نداشته باشیم که عمر جمهوری اسلامی با گروه حاکمش به سر آمده است وتحولات منطقه نیز آنرا سرعت بسیار بخشیده است. نگران حصر آقایان موسوی، کروبی و خاتمی نباشیم، آنها جایشان بسیار امن است و در محافظت کامل قرار دارند، این ما هستیم که باید بدانیم چگونه از این مهلکه می توانیم بیرون بیائیم.
اگر ادامه اعتراض های منطقه بتواند در ایران هم موثر واقع شود و به حقیقت بپیوندد و در نهایت به فرار آقایان خامنه ای و احمدی نژاد منجر شود. گام نخست آن از هم پاشیده شدن سپاه پاسداران است و بسیار هم ساده خواهد بود. در آینده ای نه چندان دور سپاه بدلیل مشکلات درونی اش از هم خواهد پاشید و پس از یک دوره نابسامانی، ارتش آنرا جمع خواهد کرد. بطور طبیعی تعدادی کشته و مجروح و فراری و بقیه هم در اختیار ارتش قرار خواهند گرفت و ارتش همان نقشی را بازی خواهد  که در تونس و مصر شاهدش بوده ایم و رژیم بدون خامنه ای و احمدی نژاد و با خاتمی و موسوی و…، و همان حکومت جمهوری اسلامی ادامه پیدا خواهد کرد.
فراموش نکنیم و باید بدانیم که اگر مردم ایران با همراهی غرب بتوانند به مانند تونس و مصر تنها خامنه ای و احمدی نژاد را از میان بردارند هیچ چیز عوض نخواهد شد و این بار با آشتی کردن و لبخند و حرف های قشنگ و امکانات بیشتر ومشخص تر از سوی امریکا جمهوری اسلامی رقیق تری که خواسته امریکا و تمام غرب است بر جای خواهد ماند و بازهم تنها ما بهایش را پرداخته و خواهیم پرداخت.
باید اضافه کنم که ناآگاه بدین مسئله نیستم که ممکن است تعدادی از شما که خواستار بی چون و چرای نبودن جمهوری اسلامی هستید در این روزهای بحران زا و سرنوشت ساز با هیجان بسیار این تصور را داشته باشید که اگر خامنه ای و احمدی نژاد نباشند همه چیز درست شده است، ولی این همان هیجانی است که در سال 57 برای ما وجود داشت که اگر شاه نباشد همه چیز درست خواهد شد. همینطور ناآگاه نیستم که آن تعدادی که بدنبال دموکراسی و آزادی طرفدار “رهبران” جنبش سبز هستند از این تحلیل آزرده خاطر شوند. اما امروز با آنروزها تفاوت بسیار کرده است ولی در یک مورد مشترک است و آن اینکه “رهبران” جنبش سبز بصراحت می گویند که چه می خواهند و آن حفظ نظام و بازگشت به دوران طلایی امام است و باز هم این ما هستیم که نمی دانیم چه می خواهیم و یا در هیجان خود نمی خواهیم بشنویم که آنها چه می گویند.
هدف من از نوشتن این مطلب تنها هشداری است که بازهم فردا شیون و فریاد برنیاوریم که فریب خوردیم و انقلاب ما را دزدیدند و…، روی سخنم بیشتر با آنهائیست که نسل امروز را با تمامی آگاهی ها و هشیاری هایشان تشکیل می دهند و بیشترینشان از پدر و مادر هایشان گله دارند که چرا در سال 1357 ایران را به چنین روزی انداختند. بدانید که اگر شما هم همچنان با هیجان به امروزتان نگاه کنید مورد سوال و جواب فرزندانتان قرار خواهید گرفت و باید پاسخگوی فردای بچه هایتان باشید. در شروع انقلاب شخص من که کم و بیش در سنین امروز شما بودم هیچ تجربه ای را از نسل های پیشین خودم در اختیار نداشتم ولی امروز با تمام وجودم تمامی تجربه سیاسی خودم را با شما در میان می گذارم، شاید که گوشه بسیار کوچکی از آن موثر واقع شود.
با هیجان می توان به ادامه جمهوری اسلامی کمک کرد و با اندیشه و تامل بیشتر می توان امروز و فردای روشن تری را برای فردائی بهتر به ارمغان آورد.
به مانند همیشه با امید به امروز و فردائی بهتر که بسیار نزدیک است.

دکتر حسین لاجوردی
پاریس – سه شنبه سوم اسفند 1389
22 فوریه 2011

Most content online is now paid for, thanks to Netflix

cnn.com

(WIRED) – Netflix streaming movies now fill more of the U.S.’s internet tubes than any other service, including peer-to-peer file sharing, which long held the top spot — to the consternation of Hollywood.

That means for the first time perhaps in the internet’s history, the largest percentage of the net’s traffic is content that is paid for.

The change is reported in the Spring traffic report 2011 from Sandvine, a company that sells network management and measurement software to large ISPs.

Netflix accounts for 22.2% of all U.S. broadband traffic compared to BitTorrent’s 21.6% share. And at peak times, Netflix hits 30% of all traffic, a bounce of 44% over results from the fall.

(Note that these numbers are about percentage of usage, and say nothing about what percentage of “capacity” the net has, so hold your horses on predicting an internet brown-out due to people streaming “Blazing Saddles”).

WIRED: Netflix accounts for 20% of peak U.S. bandwith use

Streaming real-time entertainment is also on the rise, including such things as the “March Madness” NCAA basketball tournament, the British royal wedding and PGA golf tournaments.

The increase in streaming media decreased the percentage of traffic headed to websites and social networking sites, but there’s no evidence that the number of visits to those sites down at all.

Two things that might be the take-aways here.

One, internet traffic is cheap. A Netflix streaming-only, all-you-can-watch monthly subscription costs just $9.

WIRED: Netflix everywhere — sorry cable, you’re history

Serving up a movie likely costs Netflix somewhere between two cents and a dime — it’s the licensing of content that’s expensive.

Secondly, peer-to-peer file sharing, a large proportion of which is people trading copyrighted files, isn’t going to disappear overnight.

And it won’t decline significantly until Hollywood makes more of its back catalog and new releases available for rental and online streaming.

And finally, it’s clear that Americans have accepted that in the future all information flow will be IP-based, even as we’re stuck leaving the infrastructure for that future in the hands of private companies that would rather we would stop all the downloading.

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s two sons born days apart

CBS NEWS

cnn.com

Los Angeles (CNN) — A son fathered by Arnold Schwarzenegger with his housekeeper was born less than a week after Maria Shriver gave birth to another Schwarzenegger son, according to birth records obtained Wednesday by CNN.

The New York Times, citing two friends of the family, reported the mother was Mildred Patricia Baena, who worked for two decades as housekeeper for the Schwarzenegger family.

The former California governor acknowledged Tuesday he was the father of a child “over a decade ago,” but he did not identify the mother.

CNN is not identifying the child.

The birth certificate listed the father as the man Baena was married to at the time.

However, divorce papers obtained by CNN say the couple separated less than three weeks after the October 2, 1997, birth. She is a 50-year-old native of Guatemala, according to the document.

The Los Angeles Times, which first reported the story early Tuesday, quoted the woman as saying she recently retired “on good terms” with the couple after working for them for 20 years.

Schwarzenegger has provided support for the child since birth, one source told CNN.

Property records indicate Baena purchased a home in Bakersfield, California, in June. Television crews and paparazzi swarmed the residential cul de sac in northwest Bakersfield on Wednesday, but there was no sign of Baena.

A neighbor told journalists, including a reporter with CNN affiliate KTLA, that Baena told them she previously worked for Schwarzenegger.

The revelation that Schwarzenegger fathered a child outside his marriage came a week after Schwarzenegger and Shriver jointly announced they were “amicably separating.” No reason for their split was given at the time.

The developments have been “very hard” for Schwarzenegger, and the actor “is doing everything he can to take full responsibility to take all of the spotlight off his children and wife,” a source close to Schwarzenegger told CNN.

“He realizes the terrible mistake he made and has a lot of work to do to repair his relationship with his family,” the source said, adding that Schwarzenegger has asked people around him to not talk about his relationship with his wife and children.

“He’s in touch with his family and talked to them last night and apologized to them,” the source said Tuesday, noting that Schwarzenegger also spoke with Maria Shriver, his wife of 25 years.

The source told CNN the action-movie star has three movie deals and is slated to shoot a drama called “Cry Macho” this summer. However, the source said, Schwarzenegger has put the other two movie projects on hold to concentrate on his family.

“He has a lot of work to do to repair the relationships and rebuild their trust,” the source said. “He will do whatever they want him to do — give them space or be there — to allow them to heal and get through this.”

Shriver, meanwhile, joined talk show legend Oprah Winfrey on Tuesday for a taping of the Oprah Surprise Spectacular — part of the final episodes of “The Oprah Winfrey Show” scheduled to air next week.

As she walked on stage with longtime Oprah confidant Gayle King, thousands in Chicago’s United Center jumped to their feet and erupted in applause.

“For 30 years you have bestowed the most amazing friendship on me,” Shriver told Winfrey.

Shriver went on to talk about Winfrey’s role in encouraging young people to pursue their education and introduced a video tribute from youths around the world.

Shriver did not talk to media backstage but appeared happy and smiled in a long, navy sequin gown throughout her on-camera appearance.

Earlier Tuesday, she released a written statement describing “a painful and heartbreaking time.”

“As a mother, my concern is for the children,” Shriver said. “I ask for compassion, respect and privacy as my children and I try to rebuild our lives and heal. I will have no further comment.”

A source close to Shriver said Tuesday that the former NBC anchor and her children were “circling the wagons and are working through” the family crisis.

The source, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, said Schwarzenegger was “way on the outside of the circle” and “rambling around” their huge house with none of his family around.

Schwarzenegger, in a statement obtained by CNN Tuesday, said he told his wife about the child after he left the governor’s office in January.

“I understand and deserve the feelings of anger and disappointment among my friends and family,” he said. “There are no excuses and I take full responsibility for the hurt I have caused. I have apologized to Maria, my children and my family. I am truly sorry.”

Schwarzenegger’s four children were told about their sibling only recently, with Shriver “methodically” talking to them, the source said. They were “well prepared” before it became public, the source said.

The couple have four children together between the ages of 13 and 21.

Patrick, Schwarzenegger’s 17-year-old son, expressed his feelings Tuesday morning in a Twitter posting:

“Some days you feel like s–t, some days you want to quit and just be normal for a bit, yet i love my family till death do us apart. #family”

The oldest child, 21-year-old Katherine, followed with her own tweet later Tuesday:

“This is definitely not easy but I appreciate your love and support as i begin to heal and move forward in life. I will always love my family!”

Privately with her children, “Maria is very much ‘Don’t abandon your father,’” one source said “It is very admirable to not show your children the anger and also ask your children to be supportive of their father.”

After Schwarzenegger and Shriver married in 1986, they became one of America’s most famous couples.

He was one of Hollywood’s highest-paid actors, and she was a network news anchor and a member of the Kennedy family, America’s storied Democratic political dynasty.

Shortly before the 2003 gubernatorial election that catapulted the former actor to political office, however, the Los Angeles Times ran a series of articles in which 16 women accused him of sexually harassing and humiliating them over a 30-year period in incidents on movie sets, at gymnasiums and elsewhere.

One of the women said that when she worked with Schwarzenegger on a movie, he pulled up her shirt to expose her breasts and took a picture and groped her on two other occasions.

The woman, Rhonda Miller, filed a lawsuit, saying Schwarzenegger and his campaign staff tried to discredit her by spreading false information about her.

Schwarzenegger said he knew nothing about Miller’s allegations and said the timing of the complaints of the 16 women was “rather odd,” given that no one had filed a complaint against him in the 35 years that he had lived in the United States.

Schwarzenegger issued a general apology for “behaving badly sometimes” but said many of the allegations were not true “because that’s not my behavior.”

Shriver took to the campaign trail to defend her husband a day after the allegations surfaced and just four days before the 2003 recall election.

“You can listen to all the negativity, and you can listen to people who have never met Arnold, or who met him for five seconds 30 years ago. Or you can listen to me,” she said in a speech to a Republican women’s group in Orange County.

“I wouldn’t be standing here if this man weren’t an A-plus human being. I wouldn’t be taking my time, I wouldn’t have left my job that I love, I wouldn’t be doing any of this if I didn’t believe in this man.”

Speaking to reporters after the speech, Shriver described her husband as “an extraordinary man” and took issue with the characterization that he behaves boorishly toward women.

“He’s honest, he’s sensitive, he’s sincere. And he is gracious with every bone in his body,” she said. “I have met thousands and thousands of women who have come up to me and said they have worked with him, they have worked for him, alongside (him) and he has been an extraordinary gentleman.”

Shriver said then that she was not personally hurt by the allegations.

“Nothing hurts, because I know the man that I’m married to,” she said. “Has he said and done everything absolutely (right) 100% of the time? No. But I don’t know anybody on the planet, male or female, who’s led a perfect life.

Schwarzenegger, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Austria who gained fame as the youngest winner of the Mr. Universe bodybuilding contest, was governor until January. He has been busy in recent months reviving his acting career and signing movie deals — including plans for another installment of his “Terminator” series.

CNN’s Alan Duke, Joe Sterling, Thelma Gutierrez, Traci Tamura, Angie Massie, and Megan Clifford contributed to this report.