text:
The agreement between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and General Pervez Musharraf on setting up a joint working group on terrorism has come in for widespread criticism.
More than that, the prime minister's reference to Pakistan being a victim of terrorism has angered many. There are also allegations that the prime minister's change of attitude and certification of Pakistan as a victim of terrorism was due to US pressure.
On the other side, there are several arguments in favour of the working group.
For one, General Musharraf has now accepted that terrorism is generated out of Pakistan. While he maintains that it is not State-sponsored he accepts that there are 'freelance' terrorists.
Second, terrorism is being accepted as a core subject to be discussed in a dedicated mechanism between the two countries.
Third, acceptance of freelance terrorists and groups within Pakistan would call for discussion of various groups in Pakistan, their activities and action taken against them.
Fourth, Indian public opinion will not allow any flexibility on the J&K issue unless it is satisfied that there is progress in dealing with terrorism in Pakistan.
Fifth, by terming Pakistan a victim of terrorism and separating the linkage between the Pakistani State and terrorist groups Pakistan is made more accountable in regard to controlling terrorist activity in its territory.
Ultimately, the proof of the pudding is in eating and the effectiveness of this mechanism will depend upon Pakistani bonafides.
Pakistan has a record of a quarter of a century of outsmarting the US and the CIA on both nuclear proliferation and terrorism. In fact, they continue to support the terrorist Al Qaeda and Taliban even as they manage to get certificates of cooperation in the war on terror from the US president.
The resurgent Taliban today is putting up stiff fight against US and NATO forces in southern and eastern Afghanistan. They could not have got their money from the drug trade, could not have got their arms and could not have trained their men without Pakistani help.
Yet Pakistan maintains its innocence and is to receive F-16 aircraft as a reward for its cooperation in the war on terror.
US President George W Bush vowed that any country which gave asylum to Osama Bin Laden and his associates would be treated as an enemy. Even as the US air force was pounding Torah Borah mountains in Afghanistan, Osama Bin Laden and his senior associates slipped into Pakistani territory and are safely esconced there ever since.
To add insult to injury, General Musharraf asserts that Bin Laden is in southern Afghanistan, an area under the jurisdiction of US and NATO forces. He implies that the US has not been competent enough to capture bin Laden in territory in which it operates.
Having allowed the Taliban to regroup and surge in southern and eastern Afghanistan, he has concluded a ceasefire agreement in Waziristan which will make it a safe haven for the Taliban. He claims to have the word of honour of tribal elders that the area would be free of Taliban activity. The history of Afghanistan and switching and reswitching of loyalties of tribal chieftains in that country would bear witness to the fact that such promises are of very little value.
Similarly, Pakistan has got away with shielding Dr A Q Khan and his nonproliferation activities. A recently published book by BBC journalist Gordon Correra, Shopping for the Bomb reveals that the CIA and Western intelligence agencies were aware of Dr Khan's activities from 1987 onwards, and allowed him to carry on with his proliferation in the expectation that he would lead to the proliferating nations.
Despite this, General Musharraf gets away with his claim that A Q Khan operated on his own and the Pakistani government and the army were totally unaware of his proliferation activities. And US President George Bush accepts such a claim.
Today the US and NATO forces are put under risk because of Pakistani support to Taliban. Osama Bin Laden and Al Zawahiri are able to issue audio and video messages against US from their safe havens in Pakistan. Dr A Q Khan is safe from the interrogation of US and IAEA officials.
At the same time Pakistan is acclaimed to be in the forefront of the fight against terrorism. President Clinton now reveals that the plan to train Pakistani commandos to capture bin Laden was vetoed by General Musharraf as the army chief.
The 9/11 Commission has brought out that the attack on twin towers and the Pentagon was planned by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in Pakistan. Money transfer to the lead attacker Mohammed Atta was made by Omar Sheikh, the Pakistani terrorist exchanged in Kandahar hijack.
The shoe bomber Richard Reid started his journey from Pakistan. Many of the terrorists who plotted the London transport system bombing were trained in Pakistan. The main players in the latest plot to blow up airliners over the Atlantic had all visited Pakistan and were trained in terrorist training camps there.
In spite of all this the US is full of appreciation of Pakistan's role.
If Pakistan has rendered services to the US in the war on terrorism that would not be kept a secret. But the US media, US think tanks, US servicemen and European diplomats make no secret of Pakistan's support to the Taliban in the war in Afghanistan. Yet Pakistan has been able to get away with its massive terrorist activity against the US.
The only logical conclusion possible in these circumstances is that the US is under Pakistani nuclear blackmail. Pakistan has been able to convince the US that any pressure on it would lead to weakening of General Musharraf and his possible replacement by a jhadi general, and consequent risks of nuclear weapons and material falling into the hands of jihadis. Presumably, this blackmail has been effective and the US is prepared to put up with all Pakistani transgressions.
At the same time Pakistan feels that if terrorism is brought to an end, the US will lose all interest in Pakistan. Therefore terrorism has to be used an instrumentality to milk the US.
Given this record of Pakistan vis-a-vis the US, its successful dodging of responsibility for terrorism and its earning endorsement from the US leadership, Pakistan is not likely to be very cooperative in the joint working group in respect of terrorism generated from Pakistan vis-a-vis India.
India does not have even a fraction of the clout which the US has with Pakistan. In any case India has not made effective use of the material it has on Pakistani complicity in terrorism. Pakistanis killed and captured in Jammu & Kashmir or elsewhere are treated as statistics, and no attempt is made to project their links to Pakistani organisations and publish their photographs.
Though Masood Azhar and Omar Sheikh were in Indian custody for years, their interrogation reports have not been made use of in the information campaign against terrorism.
There is no harm in having a joint working group and attempting to make terrorism a core issue in the India-Pakistan composite peace process. But there should be no illusion that it is going to be productive with the Pakistanis, the past masters in the art of practising terrorism and disowning responsibility.
Above all, there should be an Indian strategy about handling this issue. But do we have one?


text:
NEW YORK — Bud Selig says he means it this time, that he will retire as baseball commissioner in January 2015.
After a decade of maintaining his departure was imminent, the 79-year-old baseball commissioner put his exit plans in writing Thursday and said in a statement he will step down after 22 years — the second-longest term behind Kenesaw Mountain Landis.
Selig's revolutionary reign produced an $8 billion industry, interleague play, an expanded postseason and two decades of labor peace. But he also presided over a canceled World Series and long-running drug scandal.
"I think he's left quite a legacy with the changes he's made in baseball," San Francisco Giants manager Bruce Bochy said. "He'll be missed, but at the same time appreciated from everybody in baseball for his contribution to our game."
Selig's length of service and impact on his sport matches those of Pete Rozelle, the NFL commissioner from 1960-89, and David Stern, who is stepping down in February after 30 years as NBA commissioner.
Selig said he will soon announce a transition plan that will include a reorganization of central baseball management. Rob Manfred, baseball's chief labor negotiator, has gained increased influence in recent years, but it's not clear whether Selig's successor will come from within the commissioner's office.
"I look forward to continuing its extraordinary growth and addressing several significant issues during the remainder of my term," Selig said.
Many had speculated Selig wanted to surpass the term of Landis, who served from November 1920 to November 1944.
Perhaps the biggest mark on Selig's tenure was the prevalence of performance-enhancing drugs. Management didn't have a drug agreement with its players from October 1985 until August 2002, and drug testing with penalties didn't start until 2004. Selig has repeatedly defended his record, saying baseball acted as fast as it could in a matter that was subject to bargaining with players.
"The game has grown under him tremendously. He's made every effort to try to clean the game up," New York Yankees manager Joe Girardi said. "He's left his mark on the game. There's no doubt about it."
Selig's tenure also included splitting each league into three divisions instead of two in 1995, when wild cards and an additional round of playoffs were added. Wild cards doubled to four last year, when the postseason stretched to four rounds.
Expansion teams in Arizona and Tampa Bay started play in 1998, raising the major league total to 30. Interleague play began in 1997 along with revenue sharing, which allowed the smaller-market clubs a better chance to compete. Jackie Robinson's No. 42 was retired by Selig for all of MLB that same year, and other initiatives followed. Major League Baseball Advanced Media launched in 2000, the World Baseball Classic in 2006, limited video review of umpires' calls in 2008 and the Major League Baseball Network in 2009.
Owners have repeatedly praised Selig's financial stewardship, which has led to record franchise values as shown by the $2 billion sale of the Los Angeles Dodgers last year. The average player salary has tripled under his tenure to more than $3 million.
Selig's critics said he moved cautiously — a characterization even he sometimes agreed with. Running baseball from his longtime home in Milwaukee, he worked to build consensus rather than dictate to owners in the manner of Peter Ueberroth. Selig used a grandfatherly charm to get what he wanted.
"Everything's been a success overall," Toronto general manager Alex Anthopoulos said. "You're going to have your detractors, that goes without saying."
Selig became a baseball fan when his mother took him to games as a child. Working in the family auto-leasing business, he became a minority investor in the Milwaukee Braves and tried to stop the team's move to Atlanta for the 1966 season.
As a stopgap measure, he arranged for the Chicago White Sox to play nine regular-season games at Milwaukee in 1968 and 11 the following year. Just before the 1970 season, he bought the Seattle Pilots in bankruptcy court, moved the franchise to Milwaukee and renamed it the Brewers.
Selig became a leading owner by the early 1980s in his role as chairman of the Player Relations Committee, which determined labor policy. He was part of the group that wanted major changes in the sport's lab contract with players and forced the resignation of Fay Vincent, who had been in office for three years. Selig took over as acting commissioner on Sept. 9, 1992, in his role as chairman of the executive council.
He presided over a 7½-month strike in 1994-95 that led to the cancellation of the World Series for the first time in 90 years. Following eight straight work stoppages, owners and players reached agreements without interruption in 2002, 2006 and 2011.
Although Selig repeatedly said he would not take the job full time, he was formally elected commissioner July 9, 1998. He turned running the Brewers over to daughter Wendy Selig-Prieb, but the Selig family did not sell the franchise until 2005.
Selig agreed to a new contract as commissioner in 2001. He first announced his planned retirement in 2003, telling a group from Associated Press Sports Editors he would leave in 2006.
"For a guy who took it in Sept. 9, 1992, and I told my wife it was two-to-four months — 14 years later ... I think that will be enough. There's no question, because there are other things I really would like to do."
He then agreed to new contracts in 2004, 2008 and 2012.
Selig has said he wants to write a book. He has taught at the University of Wisconsin and Marquette's law school.
"We look forward to working with the commissioner over the next 15 months," union head Michael Weiner said in a statement. "Then, we hope the commissioner enjoys his retirement and wish him well."
AP Sports Writers Dave Campbell, David Ginsburg and Janie McCauley contributed to this report.

subset: commoncrawl


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The hooks seem to grab everyone's attention (pun intended). Other squid families have hooks on the arms, or the tentacles, or both, but the colossal squid is the only hooked squid in its family (the Cranchiidae, about 20 species). It possesses hooks on each of the eight arms, and also on the two long tentacles, but the arm-hooks and tentacle-hooks are very different.
The tentacular hooks (above and below) are the swivelling hooks. Each sits on a short stalk, flush with the oral surface of the tentacle club, in a flattened depression that allows the flattened 'back' surface of the hook to rotate. The hooks can swivel 360 to 720 degrees, but it is not known whether the squid actively controls each hook individually, or whether the hooks swivel passively once latched onto the prey, in order to keep the best grip. There are 22 to 25 hooks in two rows on the middle part (manus) of the tentacle club, and each row is flanked by a row of tiny marginal suckers. The swivelling hooks are smaller than those on the arms and have only a singe main 'claw.'
The arm hooks (below) do not swivel. They are set in a double row in the middle of each arm, preceded and followed by the more standard toothed suckers. The arm hooks are set in fleshy, very muscular sheaths and are strongly attached to the arms. They are likely to assist in holding and immobilising struggling prey as it is being killed and eaten. Most of the arm hooks have the main strong 'claw' (visible below), and also two smaller auxiliary cusps closer to the hook's base, making them three-pointed and maximising their ability to hold and dig in. The base of each hook also has a complex structure that is set deep into the surrounding musculature.
- Kat Bolstad


text:
I'm running Raspbian (Wheesy 2013-05-29) under QEmu just to make dev a bit quicker. The problem goes that the Raspbian image is 2GB which leaves only 200Mb free for apps/data.
To resize the image, start by resizing the image and giving it an extra 2GB (this is run on the host):
> qemu-img resize 2013-05-29-wheezy-armel.img +2G
Now boot into Raspbian and issue the following to resize the partition (from within linux):
1. > sudo fdisk /dev/sda 2. Print the partition table ("p"). Take note of the starting block of the main partition 3. Delete the main partition ("d"). Should be partition 2. 4. Create (n)ew partition. (P)rimary. Position (2) 5. Start block should be the same as start block from the original partition 6. Size should be the full size of the image file (just press "enter") 7. Now write the partition table (w) 8. Reboot (shutdown -r now). After reboot, 9. > sudo resize2fs /dev/sda2
When that's all done, run "df -h" and you should have plenty of space.


text:
There are horrific photos of subdued rhinos with their horns amputated by poachers that have become a viral phenomenon. Google is now giving $5 million to a conservation group for lightweight drones that will patrol the African bush, exposing ivory hunters along the way.
Google's cash will help the World Wildlife Fund purchase a fleet of tablet-operated "conservation drones," which will soar through the wilderness and take snapshots of poachers in action. Citing a need for "solutions that are as sophisticated as the threats we face," the WWF said the drones will help bolster conservation efforts thwarted by the demand for endangered-animal goods.
The investment couldn't come at a better time: The past year has seen a significant rise in poaching across Africa. In South Africa alone, 588 rhinos have recently been attacked, up from just 13 five years ago.
Via Slate


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Is Donald Trump's Hair a $60,000 Weave? A Gawker Investigation [Updated]
Presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump has generated an unceasing torrent of press attention that some estimate to be worth roughly $2 billion. Yet the central mystery at the very core of his persona—his inscrutable hairdo—has somehow, impossibly, remained unsolved. Until, perhaps, now.
A tipster who claimed knowledge of Trump's hair recently came to Gawker with a potential solution to the enigma: Trump's hair is not his own, costs tens of thousands of dollars for installation and upkeep, and comes from a man as mysterious as Trump is bombastic.
This solution that Trump, our tipster says, sought for his hair woes is a little-known, patented hair restoration treatment called a "microcylinder intervention." It's only performed by one clinic that we know of—Ivari International—where our source once sought treatment, and where he says he learned of Trump's apparent patronage. What's more, Ivari's New York location was inside Trump Tower—on a floor that's now private and reserved for Donald Trump's children's offices.*
[There was a video here]
Gawker was unable to independently confirm Trump's connection to Ivari; both Trump and Ivari did not respond to multiple and persistent requests for comment. [Update: 31 days after this post was published, Ivari's attorney represented to Gawker that "Mr. Trump has never been a client of Ivari. Ivari has not treated his hair in any way, at any time," adding that "Ivari was in practice for over 30 years in the United States, and remains in practice today in Paris, and has one of the finest reputations in the industry. [Although] a very small number of its thousands of clients have voiced a complaint...the vast majority of Ivari's clients have been loyal for decades and are extremely satisfied by its services."] But after extensive research into Ivari's history, Ivari's treatments, and the photographic record of Donald Trump's hair, this is a potential answer—perhaps the first plausible one—to the riddle of Donald Trump's hair.
Allow me to explain.
What we know about the hair
In a 2011 profile in Rolling Stone, Trump actually revealed the supposed secret behind the hair that's mystified America for years:
OK, what I do is, wash it with Head and Shoulders. I don't dry it, though. I let it dry by itself. It takes about an hour. Then I read papers and things.
...I then comb my hair. Yes, I do use a comb. ...Do I comb it forward? No, I don't comb it forward. I actually don't have a bad hairline. When you think about it, it's not bad. I mean, I get a lot of credit for comb-overs. But it's not really a comb-over. It's sort of a little bit forward and back. I've combed it the same way for years. Same thing, every time.
Ignoring the fact that an hour seems like an excessive amount of time for Trump's thin, relatively short strands to dry post-shower, this all sounds believable enough.
Still, it doesn't fully explain the cotton candy hairspray labyrinth that has fascinated so many Americans. In the picture below, for instance, you'll notice a sporadically arranged hairline that seems to be hanging on for dear life. And then there's that flap.
How is that section of hair so thick compared to the hair around it? And where, exactly, does the hairline start?
And then there's this.
How can one possibly comb natural, human hair so that it lies comfortably in such a shape? Hair that grows naturally from a head will not—cannot—form the web we see laid bare in the thinning section of scalp curtain above.
Adding to the question of the provenance of Trump's hair is its motion, or lack thereof. Natural hair, even when heavily doused in product, does not move as if it exists apart from the scalp itself. And yet, that is precisely what we see with Trump's candy-colored head rug. Notice how it flaps as one in the breeze.
Now take a look at what happened last August when Time interviewed Donald Trump as part of its Person of the Year lineup. Naturally, Time decided to present Trump with a bald eagle named Uncle Sam. But in an act of performance art that was, truthfully, a bit too on-the-nose for my tastes, the living symbol of American pride attacked the angry orange candidate. And as Uncle Sam's wings flapped frantically, Trump's hair piece migrated. It was ever so slight and ever so brief, but migrate it did. And in one impossibly solid piece.
[There was a video here]
Let's see that one more time.
You'll notice that as it's being sideswiped by the powerful wing of Uncle Sam, Trump's meticulously arranged pile of hair moves as though it were a single entity. Or, perhaps, as though it were woven together.
Which brings us to the patented microcylinder technique of Mr. Edward Ivari.
What we know about the method
An archived copy of Ivari International's website shows that in 2000, when our tipster was told that Donald Trump used Ivari International's non-surgical brand of hair treatment, Ivari only advertised two hair restoration options. Only one of those options was surgery free. So if Trump did indeed seek treatment here, and he picked the less-invasive, nonsurgical method, he was likely laying down tens of thousands of dollars for Ivari's patented "microcylinder intervention."
This meticulous procedure is undertaken according to the needs of each client. Hair can be thickened, short hair may be lengthened, and balding areas can be recovered. Through the use of Microcylinders, additional hair is added to your own hair recreating the natural look of your hair to its original and full-body shape.
...This extraordinary procedure has proven successful regardless of the lack of volume or degree of hairloss.
In other words, even with Trump's presumably thinning hair, Ivari's microcylinder attachments should offer both additional thickness and length, and make Trump more than capable of swirling and situating his artificially extended locks in whatever unholy position he sees fit.
According to a brochure sent by Ivari to its new patients:
The Microcylinder Technique is just one of the patented inventions available at Ivari centers. Through these tiny cylinders, additional strands of natural hair are added until the desired effect is reached (without surgery). The final result leaves you free to swim, shower, and brush as often as you wish without concern. The Ivari Techniques are suitable for both men and women regardless of hair loss or the amount of hair desired. Your privacy and confidentiality requirements are protected with all Ivari services and correspondence.
All that secrecy isn't guaranteed for nothing—the treatment is wildly expensive. In 2007, the cost of the initial process for at least one patient came out to be $60,000, with maintenance estimates ranging from $300 to $3,000 per month. In exchange, though, Ivari promises that patients will get hair that is "perfectly identical to the person's initial hair in terms of shade and texture; they mingle with your own hair and you quickly 'forget them.' ... No other indication: You can wash them as frequently as desired, brush them vigorously, and massage your scalp freely."
In all its promotional materials, Ivari emphasizes the fact that its microcylinder attachments can take just as much as much tugging as any head of human-grown hair, something Donald Trump takes pains to point out is also true of his mop.
[There was a video here]
While Ivari International seems to have very nearly disappeared from U.S. soil (more on that later), its patents still exist on both Google and the European Patent Register.
As the patents were originally filed in France, they are full of questionable translations and are otherwise difficult to parse. But thanks to a lawsuit filed against Ivari by Alicia Roach in 2001, we have a decent breakdown of what a microcylinder treatment actually entails:
The intervention involves the use of skeins of natural donor hair. Each skein consists of a line of hairs attached to a thread about one inch in length. The threads are then attached end-to-end in concentric circles over the client's head. The circles of thread are then anchored to each other by separate threads, which radiate from the center so that the underside of the resulting hairpiece resembles a spider's web. The client's natural hair is attached to the hairpiece by forty to sixty separate threads. Each of those threads is attached at one end to the web and at the other end to a tiny metal clamp around a few strands of natural hair at the scalp. Every few weeks, as the natural hair grows out from the scalp, the hairpiece loosens on the head. This places increased tension on the natural hair to which the microcylinders are attached and can cause hair breakage. A maintenance procedure (maintenance) is necessary wherein the clamps must be removed and replaced closer to the scalp. A maintenance tightens the hairpiece on the client's head.
Maintenance apparently has to be done every six to eight weeks. And while Ivari claims that its methods produce hair indistinguishable from that which you've grown naturally, the ruling court was notably less kind.
The judge's decision states, "Ivari, Inc. is in the business of installing exorbitantly-priced hairpieces on the heads of people with thinning hair. These hairpieces are the functional equivalent of wigs and might be expected to look and feel like wigs after attachment."
While images of the actual process of Ivari's microcylinder treatment remain elusive, the Ivari website is more than happy to share a few before and after photos.
Each man's head is unquestionably full. Though just like a certain confoundingly coiffed candidate for president, where exactly all that hair is coming from (not to mention the direction in which it grows) is far more difficult to pin down.
While we couldn't track down any visuals on the microcylinder process itself, this nonsurgical "micro link" method from a hair restoration clinic in Canada appears to be fairly similar:
Most notably, what's going on at the near-root level bears a striking resemblance to what seems to be happening beneath Donald Trump's hair, as demonstrated by its reaction to an unexpected gust of wind.
As you can see, in this microcylinder stand-in, the distressingly long growth folds back to hide the wispy scalp hairs from which it spurts:
Just as Trump's own distended follicles apparently belie a nearly barren scalp below:
At the very least, microcylinders would certainly explain how a 69-year-old man could grow hair with the capacity to effectively wrap itself around the circumference of his head several times over. Without having direct access to Donald Trump's head, of course, it's difficult to say for sure exactly how these attachments would function. Are they simply a web of additional hair as described in the Roach lawsuit? Do the microcylinders include what the Ivari brochure dubs "microextensions," ensuring extraordinary length?
Or is it a combination of both? Perhaps some questions are better left unanswered.
What we know about Edward Ivari
If Edward Ivari really is the man behind Donald Trump's mane, we couldn't have invented a better match.
According to at least one lawsuit filed against Ivari, he often depicts himself as a doctor and a pioneer in the field of hair restoration, though he has no actual medical degree. What's more, none of the hair restoration specialists Gawker spoke with were familiar with either him or his work.
But just because Ivari isn't well-known among the professionals in the field doesn't mean he's totally off-the-grid, at least where New York's wealthy socialites are concerned. In 1999, the New York Post ran an article about plastic surgery-loving Jocelyn Wildenstein's then-boyfriend, Ken Godt, who had been "flying to Los Angeles, California, via first class every six weeks to have his hair woven at Ivari International." According to the Post, the initial procedure had cost him $40,000 while "the adjustments cost $3,000 every six weeks."
Ivari International is just one of the many names under which Edward Ivari (otherwise known as Mohammad Ali Ivari) has conducted business, according to the lawsuit filed against Ivari by Dennis Graff. There's Ivari International Centers, Inc. (formerly located in Los Angeles) as well as Ivari International, Inc. (formerly located in New York City). The company has also allegedly existed as Ivari, Ivari International Capillaire, Ivari Centre International Capillaire, and the Ivari Treatment Center.
Ivari International Centers was incorporated in California in 1989, but according to the California Secretary of State, its business license was suspended in October of 2015 for failure to meet tax requirements. This was the fourth time that Ivari has had its license suspended in California for tax-related reasons.
Still, the address for the Los Angeles location remains on the Ivari website (which doesn't seem to have been updated since 2005). The provided phone number is dead. Should you decide to stop by for a visit, instead of this...
...you'll find this.
The New York center, though, is where things get interesting as far as Donald Trump is concerned. Currently, the Ivari website lists only an unresponsive email address under the contact info for its New York location, along with the message that it's "in the process of changing the address."
Before this most recent message appeared, though, an archived copy of the website from April of 1997 shows that Ivari had previously listed itself as located on the 25th floor of none other than Trump Tower.
Now, how exactly would an "available private entrance for our prominent clients" work with an office on the 25th floor of a high rise? You'd likely need to have access to whatever it was that took up space on either side of your business's walls. As luck would have it, Donald Trump's office was located directly above, on the 26th floor.*
According to our tipster's theory, Donald Trump first started seeking treatment at Ivari at some point prior to the year 2000. However, Ivari International had advertised its services in New York Magazine periodically between 1995 and 1997, as seen below. So Donald Trump could have easily caught wind of the treatment then.
It wasn't until November in 2005 that Ivari stopped listing the New York location as being on the 25th floor of Trump Tower. It has claimed to be "in the process of changing the address" ever since.
Did Ivari simply shutter the doors to its New York office not long after removing the address from its website? According to records from the New York Department of State, Ivari didn't become inactive as a business (in all its forms) until 2010. (This information is voluntarily reported and isn't definitive evidence that a business was "active" up until the point it was listed as dissolved; nor does it necessarily mean that Ivari has ceased doing business in New York since 2010.)
We were unable to try to track down Ivari's former New York location because, as someone with knowledge of Trump Tower's inner workings explained, since at least 2011 it's been impossible to get to the 25th floor without a security escort. Nothing, we are told, remains there but the Trump family business.
If Dennis Graff's 2009 lawsuit is to be believed, though, Edward Ivari might have good reason for wanting to stay out of sight. The lawsuit claims that "upon information and belief, Mohammad Ivari is one of several aliases used by Edward Ivari in the furtherance of various highly suspicious and illegal operations in the United States, the Middle East, and elsewhere."
Whether there's any credence to these claims remains unknown, as Graff ultimately chose to settle out of court and did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Judging by Ivari's own website, the company's activities do seem to fall outside of the norm. How many high-end hair restoration clinics also have a department for financing "personal or professional projects" on the side?
Ivari doesn't just dole out loans, he apparently solicits them, too—or at least, Edward Ivari allegedly did so while treating Dennis Graff. According to Graff's initial complaint (the majority of which Ivari denied), in the middle of the 10-to-12 hour process of installing the hair replacement system, Ivari asked Graff "if he would loan him $250,000 at 6% interest for his various 'interests.'" Graff declined to loan the man he barely knew a quarter of a million dollars, so Ivari then "advised Graff he 'would be unable to complete his work' and would complete only the top part." This left Graff with a "grossly uneven product covering the top of his head only."
Furthermore, Graff claims that Ivari was suddenly and mysteriously booked solid, meaning that he was stuck with the mess on his head for the two months Ivari claimed it would take to squeeze him in. When the appointment to finish Graff's treatment finally did roll around, Ivari allegedly hit him up for money again—this time for $500,000 at an 18 percent interest rate.
When Graff declined to loan Ivari the money yet again, Ivari supposedly said he was suddenly unable to finish the treatment that day. He would, however, be happy to see Graff at his next available appointment date—one whole month from then. That's when things really started to get fun. From Graff's initial complaint:
In July of 2007, Graff appeared for his appointment at Ivari, Inc. to have the hair replacement done. Edward Ivari advised Graff he lost millions of dollars in a Saudi Arabia deal, had actually been held in prison there for a year, and desperately needed to borrow $1,000,000 at 18% to be repaid in 6 months. When Graff declined to loan the money to him, Edward Ivari advised him he could not complete the work until September 2007.
A few weeks later, an employee at Ivari called Graff, according to court documents, and told him he needed to pay $12,000 immediately or else Ivari would be unable to ever complete the treatment at all (Graff had already paid the previously agreed upon $60,000 in full). Then, in August, Graff had several hair replacement specialists check out Ivari's partially finished work. The experts described Ivari's product as "substandard, a dead giveaway it was a hairpiece, not finished, and lacking in good quality." By October, "the hair replacement system completely fell apart and needed to be removed as it hung loosely on Graff's head."
According to the complaint, from the date of his initial appointment to October when he finally had it removed, Graff's friends described the hairpiece as a "ground hog," a "cheap piece of carpet," and "an unmade bed."
Finally, on October 8, 2007, Graff allegedly went back to Ivari and met with Edward Ivari's wife, Amy, who "was shocked at [the hair replacement system's] quality." She redid the treatment herself in the hope of avoiding any subsequent lawsuit.
It didn't work. According to court documents, the system fell further into disarray, and Ivari continued to refuse to fix the hairpiece properly until finally, in May of 2009, Ivari allegedly told Graff that Graff would have to sue them to get what he wanted. In July, Graff did just that. In April of 2010, Graff and Ivari settled the case out of court.
According to filings from the French Trade Registry, Ivari's Paris office—its sole remaining public location—was, until March of this year, in the building pictured below at 26 Place Vendome. It has since moved to a new spot that appears to be Ivari's home address.
The Paris treatment center's web site, however, continues to list as its place of business 26 Place Vendome, which is where a Gawker stringer recently went to make an appointment for a consultation. She found herself unable to enter the building, so our correspondent called the Paris phone number, only to be told that the next available consultation wasn't for another ten days. She was never told about the apparent change in location.
Let's say, hypothetically
Here's a fun little thought exercise. Let us pretend for a minute that perhaps Ivari was never really "in the process of changing the address" in New York. That would mean that, for at least the five additional years the business continued to function in New York state (if not longer), Ivari International sat squarely in the direct vicinity of Donald Trump's office.
Considering the lack of advertising and refusal to share its actual location, new clients would have surely been rare, if not nonexistent. This would mean, then, that Ivari would need some steady source of income from some sort of mega-client. Some mega-client that, perhaps, has built an identity around his objectively terrible hair choices but refuses to concede that his hair is anything but his own. In which case, this bombastic, mega-client would of course demand the utmost privacy.
Wouldn't it be convenient, then, if Ivari's New York office was right below its number one client's own office?* And wouldn't having other clients become unnecessary if this one hyper-wealthy regular required constant attention?
Might this secret mega-client singlehandedly sustaining Ivari International's New York office with constant treatments be none other than presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump himself?
It seems possible. But this is merely a thought exercise; like Donald Trump wondering aloud what Ted Cruz's father was doing with John F. Kennedy's assassin, I'm just asking questions.
*Editor's note: This post has been corrected to reflect the fact that during the time when Ivari International was located on the 25th floor of Trump Tower, Donald Trump's personal office was one floor above, on the 26th.
Summary video by Mandy Mandelstein, supercut video by Nicholas Stango.


text:
There is nothing more awkward than watching a guy beg for a woman's number, even for the sake of comedy. No, especially for the sake of comedy.
The now-viral video "Laying the SmackDown on Her Candy Ass – Get Her Number!"–whose popularity was helped by it being tweeted by Ashton Kutcher and The Rock–shows a bunch of rather nerdy college guys trying to pick up women on the street. The twist here is that the guys are using ridiculous wrestling lines–such as "lay the smackdown on your candy ass"–which makes the video mildly amusing at times, but mostly it's just plain misogynist.
Here's the video in question:
Some of the interactions are harmless enough, but others make you want to protect the woman in question. The thing is, being hit on isn't flattering; it's a form of harassment. Women typically do not walk along a street hoping to garner such attention–whether the pickup lines come from the WWE or not. Women also don't expect to be secretly filmed and then have their interactions posted on the Internet.
Guys, there's a surefire way to know that you're making a woman uncomfortable: She'll laugh nervously. Society has give women the message to be polite and ladylike, and this takes the form of nervous laughter when we're in a stressful situation. Inside, we might be saying, "Get the hell away from me," but outside we giggle. Many of the women in the video let out this laugh when one of the guys says, "Come on, let me have your number." Rather than clearly saying no, they say, "I don't think so." I know that a lot of guys who watch this video will say, "If they don't want to, they should just say no." But guys, the truth is that we're trying. You have to understand that since you're a strange man coming up to us, we are likely to see you as an aggressor, and we're trying not to make you mad.
Street harassment sucks. It's uncomfortable and occasionally shameful. When my friends and I lived in New York City, we had to deal with it all the time, so we would put in our IPod earbuds and try to block out the catcalls. But we couldn't block out the stares. And in case you're wondering, it didn't matter what we were wearing: I could walk outside in sweat pants without makeup and I would get catcalled or asked out by the guy serving me frozen yogurt. And it's not like a movie in which Jake Gyllenhaal plays the frozen yogurt guy and is all charming and gorgeous and lovable. No, it's creepy, it's weird, and when I politely decline the guy keeps up his rap–just like in the video. Guys, that's when you go from a regular person to a creepy effing stranger. Do you really want to be a creepy effing stranger?
I couldn't watch this video without creating my own video response, so here it is:
Photo by Flickr user daysofthundr46 under license from Creative Commons 2.0


text:
Toronto, ON – Colby Rasmus smashed a two-run homer and supplied an RBI double, helping the Toronto Blue Jays finish off a three-game sweep of the reeling Philadelphia Phillies with a 6-2 win at Rogers Centre.
"Just an outstanding day (for Rasmus)," said Toronto manager John Farrell.
Kelly Johnson and Rajai Davis added run-scoring singles for the Blue Jays, who recorded a sweep of the Phillies for the second time in franchise history. They also swept a three-game set in Philadelphia in 2009.
Brett Cecil (1-0) made a successful return to the majors, tossing five solid innings in his 2012 debut with Toronto. He gave up solo home runs to Jim Thome and John Mayberry Jr. among five hits, walked one and struck out five to pick up his first win in the big leagues since July 29, 2011.
Cecil had gone 0-7 with a 5.16 ERA in his final 10 starts for the Blue Jays last year.
The southpaw toed the rubber Sunday in place of an injured Brandon Morrow (strained left oblique), one of three Blue Jays starters to land on the disabled list in the past week.
Cecil began the season in the minors after a subpar showing in spring training. He went 3-2 with a 3.38 ERA in nine starts for Double-A New Hampshire before earning a win on June 12 in his lone outing for Triple-A Las Vegas.
Kyle Kendrick (2-7) allowed six runs -- five earned -- on eight hits in 6 1/3 innings for Philadelphia, which finished its road trip with a 3-6 mark. The Phillies fell to 4-12 this month.
"I felt like I pitched a lot better than my numbers show," Kendrick said.
Toronto jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first. Brett Lawrie and Rasmus hit consecutive doubles off Kendrick to open the frame, producing a run. Johnson then plated Rasmus with a two-out chopper to center field.
The Phillies erased the deficit with leadoff home runs by Thome and Mayberry in the second and third innings, respectively. Thome's blast to right-center field was his 100th as a Phillie.
But the Blue Jays moved back in front in the fourth. After Johnson grounded into a double play, Kendrick gave up a single to Yunel Escobar and hit Yan Gomes with a pitch before yielding an RBI single to Davis, who drove home the winning run in the 10th inning on Saturday.
Toronto extended its lead to 5-2 in the fifth when Lawrie worked a leadoff walk and Rasmus followed with a home run to right field.
The Blue Jays scored a sixth run on a fielding error by Hunter Pence in the seventh.
Game Notes
The Phillies were swept on the road in an interleague matchup for the first time since June 23-26, 2006 at Boston...Thome became the fourth player in MLB history to hit 100 home runs with three different teams, joining Alex Rodriguez, Reggie Jackson and Darrell Evans. Thome hit 337 homers for the Cleveland Indians and 134 for the Chicago White Sox...Luis Perez limited Philadelphia to one hit in three innings of relief...Catcher Carlos Ruiz returned to the Phillies' lineup after injuring an oblique muscle on Friday...Rasmus and Mayberry both had three hits...The Phillies committed 10 errors on the road trip.


text:
Not all the people who have been protesting in New York's Zuccotti Park are trying to Occupy Wall Street. Some are trying to , and are ready to march. That includes boycotting that Thanksgiving icon, the Butterball turkey.
So far that group is tiny, with just two women: , who's a writer and nutrition educator, and Erika Lade, a graduate student in New York University 's Food Studies Program. But OBF has a blog and a and a goal: "To take our food back and out of the hands of just a few large corporations."
That goal echoes the aim of the Occupy Wall Street protesters, who want to wrest control of the financial sector from large corporations.
The business interests of the meat, dairy, and countless other agricultural industries have shaped our food system, and many activists argue that our health, environment and local economies have suffered from that influence. As a headline in Mother Jones put it last month, "Big Food makes Big Finance look like amateurs." That same article listed four reasons why foodies should head to Zuccotti Park.
Wartman tells The Salt that she and Lade were among those who heeded that call. They hung around Zuccotti Park until the protesters were evicted this week, and were inspired by the experienced organizers there. "We've been learning from them how to get people together," Wartman says. "We feel like there are a lot of people left out of the discussion in the food movement."
OBF plans to expand that discussion with a rally this Saturday. It will start at Zuccotti Park and features such speakers as Marion Nestle, a professor of food studies and nutrition at NYU and the blogger behind , and Bill Granfield, president of UNITEHERE Local 100, which represents 6,000 food service workers in the New York area.
Like the other Occupy movement, this one finds people bringing their pet issues to the table. For Granfield, it's a concern about the health of food service workers who have to eat a lot of "Big Food" on the job, and have developed diet-related diseases from it.
For Nestle, it's a budding interest in the farm bill. She's been teaching a class this fall on the topic, and told The Salt in an email that she thinks the legislation should really be promoting sustainable agriculture, conservation, and the revitalization of rural America. Instead, she writes, "the subsidies and most other benefits go to large agribusinesses that work hand-in-glove with Congress."
It is a bit late in the game for OBF to try to tackle the farm bill; Politico reported this morning that the legislation may already be in the hands of the supercommittee. But Nestle notes that another problem with the farm bill is that it's "profoundly undemocratic because it is so difficult to comprehend."
So we predict this is what she'll be pushing tomorrow at the OBF rally: learn the farm bill. Then start talking about it. The OBF organizers, meanwhile, want to talk about Butterball, the biggest producer of turkeys in the U.S. They don't have much to say about Butterball's specific misdeeds, but they are urging people to find a reason to Occupy Big Food on Thanksgiving all the same.
Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.


text: Airmaster can trace its roots back to the late 1960s. The look of this legendary series has been continuously renewed whilst retaining its focus on a classic style over the years. All of the watches in the Airmaster collection are fitted with premium parts so that the series has rightly become TITONI's icon down through generations.


text:
Data Encryption Standard (Wikipedia)
I know that with brute force there are 2^56 possible keys to check (56 bits, each either a 1 or 0). But let's say I know the message itself is only made up of letters (a-z, A-Z).
Would knowing things (like the limitation to just letters) about the plaintext make breaking the encryption easier?


text:
Having an XP computer can be good if you're used to the system, but it can be so slow that you're unable to play any of the latest games that are out now. Fortunately, there's actually an easy way to speed up your XP system so it can run the latest games. Here's how…
The problem that prevents XP from playing a lot of the latest games is that it has a lot of corrupt and damaged settings which prevent a lot of games from even loading. The settings that Windows needs are all kept inside a part of the system called the 'registry'; and it's well documented that XP has one of the highest rates of 'registry corruption' out of all the Windows system.
In a nutshell, the problem that is stopping you from playing the latest games is the way in which XP is that this system has too many damaged registry files that make it unable to run smoothly. Each time you load up your PC (and any software program on it), it's actually having to read 100's of different settings to help it remember a lot of the details that you want on your PC. All the latest games have 1,000's of registry settings which need to be loaded at once, and although this is okay with Vista and Windows 7… XP has not got the technology to keep up with this demand on its settings.
If you play any of the latest games on XP, it simply gets swamped with commands, requests and settings… making it confused and leading it to save many of these important files in the wrong way. This is a major problem that stops almost every XP machine from running some of the most advanced and enjoyable games. Fortunately, you can fix this problem by keeping the 'registry' clean of any damaged files that are inside it.
The way to keep the registry clean is to use a software program known as a 'registry cleaner'. These are programs which clean through the Windows registry and remove any of the damaged or corrupted files that it often has inside it. They work automatically and to use one on XP, you first need to download one of these programs. Then you need to install it on your computer and let it scan through all the settings on your PC. After it's scanned the settings, it will show you how many damaged ones you have and will prompt you to fix them all. After doing that, you'll be able to make your PC run fast, and play all your favorite games smoothly.


text: Below are this week's Rite Aid's deals. If you see any other deals or coupon matchups, please leave a comment on this post so that everyone can take advantage of the deals. You can email them to me but I may not have a chance to post each and every deal – so posting them here would be better.


text:
April 18, 2012
Graduate student's cattle research rounds up top honor
Submitted by Communications and Marketing
Research on a bacteria that helps fights metabolic disorders in cattle on high-energy diets has earned a Kansas State University graduate student first-place honors from the Plains Nutrition Council.
Kevin Miller, doctoral student in animal sciences and industry from Manhattan, earned the honor at the council's recent graduate student competition in San Antonio. Miller competed against 31 other master's and doctoral students from 11 academic institutions. He garnered 80 percent of the first-place votes for his scientific presentation, "Orally Dosing Cattle with Lactipro to Accelerate Adaptation to High-Concentrate Diets." The recognition comes with a $2,000 cash award.
"Kevin's award is special because the subject of his research, Lactipro, is the culmination of nearly 10 years of collaboration between the Kansas State University and industry," said Jim Drouillard, professor of animal sciences and industry and Miller's lead professor.
"I am very fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with this exciting new product," Miller said. "Producers typically adapt cattle to high-energy diets using several different diets to prevent metabolic disorders. Our research shows that cattle given Lactipro can be placed directly onto high-energy diets without experiencing metabolic disorders. This simplifies operations by decreasing the number of different diets that need to be fed."
Lactipro, a registered trademark, is a product by MS-Biotec in Wamego. It is a unique strain of the microorganism Megasphaera elsdenii, which effectively combats serious metabolic disorders in cattle fed high-energy diets.
MS-Biotec established operations in Kansas in 2010 with support of the Kansas Bioscience Authority, and soon after received U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval to use Megasphaera elsdenii in cattle.
Miller is employed full-time as manager of the university's Beef Cattle Research Center, a part of the department of animal sciences and industry. He completed his master's degree earlier this semester, and is now seeking his doctorate in animal sciences and industry with a focus on feedlot cattle nutrition and management. He also earned his bachelor's from the university. He is the son of Jeff and Debbie Miller, Leavenworth.
The Plains Nutrition Council is an annual two-day scientific exchange among professional industry consultants, feedlot managers, academicians and allied industry representatives involved in the beef feedlot industry. More than 500 participants were present at this year's event.