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Is the Near-Trillion-Dollar Student Loan Bubble About to Pop?
"If you want to take a relation of violent extortion, sheer power, and turn it into something moral, and most of all, make it seem like the victims are to blame, you turn it into a relation of debt." -- Economic anthropologist David Graeber, author of Debt: The First 5,000 Years
Tarah Toney worked two full-time jobs to put herself through college, at McMurry University in Abilene, Texas, and still has $75,000 in debt. She graduated in six years with a Bachelor's in English and wanted to go on to teach high school.
"Right about the time I graduated, Texas severely cut funding to our education system—thanks, Perry--and school districts across the state stopped hiring and started firing. It became abundantly clear that there was no job for me in the Texas public school system," she told me. "After two months of job searching I got a temporary position in a real estate office."
She continued, "In August my post-graduation grace period was up and all of the payments on my student loans amount to $500/month. Adding that expense to my monthly bills puts me at $2,100 per month. If I don't make my payments they will revoke my real estate license, which I need in order to do my job."
Max Parker (not his real name) enrolled at Texas A&M in College Station, Texas to get a BA in economics and a BS in physics. His freshman year was great—his parents had saved some money to help pay the bills, and after that he was able to get "more generous" student loans. He took a job to help cover the fees and bills that his student loans wouldn't cover, and worked about 35 hours a week during his sophomore year while taking 15 hours of classes—but found that his grades dropped with his workload.
"Part of the reason I thought to take on such a heavy load was the university's newly (at the time) implemented policy of flat-rate tuition," he explained. "This policy stated basically, no matter how many hours you enroll in (full time) for the semester, you will pay for 15. This means, you enroll in 12 hours or 20 hours, and you'll pay for 15 hours either way. Being economically minded, I wanted to make the best decisions I could with the money I had been loaned, so I enrolled in 15 hours."
He adjusted his course load, but in the spring of his junior year, a family emergency led him to withdraw midway through the semester, taking incompletes in his courses.
"I am 25 years old now, and shacking up in my parents' guest bedroom," he told me. "I have successfully made four payments on my student loans in the past three and a half years. I have over $48,000 dollars of student loan debt, and absolutely nothing to show for it. No degrees. No certificates. No qualifications. I have continued my education to the best of my ability since leaving A&M, but always at community colleges and always paying for everything out of pocket. As you can imagine, since I'm not 'qualified' for a decent paying job, my savings for school piles up very slowly, and then disappears when August and January roll around. I haven't been back to school in about a year now, and I currently work at Subway, making sandwiches. I don't make my loan payments."
He's about to join the military because he sees it as his only option. "I am depressed at the idea of signing my life away for four years so I can fight someone else's wars. I am angry beyond belief that it's come to this," he said.
Kate Sternwood (not her real name) was recently laid off from a job at a nonprofit organization where she was making $55,000 a year. She has $40,000 in debt from the University of Massachusetts. "When I called my repayment program to tell them I was losing my job, they told me my payment would go from $400 a month to $384 a month because making $55K a year I already qualified for the "hardship" rate."
The agency in question is Van Ru, a collection agency that takes loans from the Dept. of Education if they go into default. Sternwood said they can't even tell her what the rate will be when she's paid enough to get out of default because they don't know which bank will end up with her loans.
Colleen Williams, a writer in New York, has $975 a month in payments on various student loans from her undergraduate degree at the University of New Mexico and her graduate degree from Parsons School of Design; $325 of that is automatically debited from her account each month after she went into "Student Loan Rehab" after a default.
"When you default on government loans, the collection agency the loans eventually go to are ridiculous," she said. "Obviously someone defaulting on student loan debt does not have the payoff amount, and they will argue with you, repeatedly, to get you to pay $30,000 off, in full. 'Don't you have a friend you can borrow the money from?' etc."
Williams noted that she's not pursuing the career she originally intended after Parsons, which was fashion design. "If I could do it all over again, I would have gone into science," she said.
Matt Hindman graduated two years ago from Temple University in Philadelphia and is pursuing a career in film. "We are all trying to get our feet wet in our collective industries. The job hunting process costs money too," he pointed out. "I don't think it makes sense that I got penalized for being late on payments during my first year out of school. Plus I went into forbearance once, so now my interest is super high from that."
The story is the same around the country. The economy is stagnant, the job market terrible, and graduates who used to believe their degrees would lead to good jobs are struggling. Meanwhile, the unforgiving student loan system continues to penalize them for their inability to pay.
As Mychal Denzel Smith at the Grio pointed out, "The fundamentals of our economy aren't strong, but they are the same as ever: we are a country built on low wages and debt." With those low wages, and particularly with the likelihood of finding a job remaining so low, students who took on debt to pay for an education cannot pay it back. We're in the middle of another bubble—a student loan bubble. And it doesn't look like we've learned much from the impact the popping of the housing bubble had on our economy—the same lending practices are continuing.
The Bubble
Since the beginning of the recession, most types of credit have gone down. The only exception to that rule has been student loans.
A recent piece in the Atlantic noted that student debt has grown by 511 percent since 1999. At that time, only $90 billion in student loans were outstanding—by the second quarter of 2011, that balance was up to $550 billion, according to the New York Fed. And the Department of Education estimates that outstanding loans total closer to $805 billion—and that number will pass $1 trillion soon.
As student loans rise, so has delinquency. Phil Izzo at the Wall Street Journal reported that 11.2 percent of student loans were more than 90 days past due and that rate was steadily going up. "Only credit cards had a higher rate of delinquency — 12.2 percent — but those numbers have been on a steady decline for the past four quarters," he noted.
It shouldn't be surprising to anyone that student loan defaults are going up as young workers especially are struggling in the current economy. Izzo reported, "Workers between 20 and 24 years old have a 14.6 percent unemployment rate, compared to the national average of 9.1 percent recorded in July. That comes even as the share of 20- to 24-year-olds who are working or looking for a job is at the lowest level since the 1970s, before women entered the labor force en masse."
In his Huffington Post blog, Michigan Democratic Representative Hansen Clarke noted, "This year, the average borrower graduating from a four-year college left school with roughly $24,000 of student debt, despite the grim statistic that -- according to a Rutgers University study -- only 56 percent of 2010 graduates were able to find work following completion of their studies."
Back in July, credit rating firm Moody's Analytics warned that student debt could lead to the next economic crisis. How did student loans go from "good debt" that could be expected to pay off--Pew found that an adult with a bachelor's degree earns about $650,000 more during their career than a typical high school graduate—to a bubble that threatens the economy?
According to the National Center for Education Statistics, college enrollment skyrocketed 38 percent, from 14.8 million to 20.4 million, between 1999 and 2009. (The previous decade it had only gone up 9 percent.) This should be a good thing—except it was not accompanied by measures to make tuition affordable for working families who wanted to send their kids to school. Combined with the decline in the type of union manufacturing jobs that used to allow workers to be comfortably middle-class without a college degree, we've wound up with working-class families taking on debt to send their kids to college, which they are told will help those kids make more money.
Labor economist Mark Price told me:
"Manufacturing was a path into the middle class that didn't require a college degree but manufacturing has shrunk as a share of all employment and access to similarly high paying good jobs in the service sector typically requires a college education. One other complicating factor is that that the manufacturing that remains in this country often does require more than just a high school diploma for entry."
As student loans are relatively easy to come by, both from the government and from private lenders increasingly getting into the game, universities have been able to keep hiking tuition without seeing a drop in enrollment. Students are still advised that student debt is "good debt," as noted above, and that they will be able to pay it off—but the costs are rising far more rapidly than average incomes.
The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that Temple University has raised tuition every year since 1995—it's gone up 9.9 percent for in-state students. At the University of Pennsylvania (an Ivy League private university—Temple is the state school) tuition went up 3.9 percent to $42,098 a year. "Throw in a dormitory bed, meals and books, and the price reaches $57,360," wrote Inquirer reporter Jeff Gammage.
Josh Harkinson at Mother Jones pointed out that like anything else, the bang for your buck isn't the same at different universities. Private universities have increased per-student spending by about $7,500, he wrote. But public community college spending per student has stayed flat at around $10,000—while those private college students get $36,000 spent on them. He wrote, "It should come as no surprise then that graduates of prestige schools continue to outpace other collegians."
All of these factors have combined to send student loan debt into the stratosphere. Daniel Indiviglio at the Atlantic pointed out, too, that student debt has far outpaced the growth of all other household debt over the past 10 years—including increasing twice as fast as housing debt. He argued:
"This wasn't just any average period in history for household debt. This period included the inflation of a housing bubble so gigantic that it caused the financial sector to collapse and led to the worst recession since the Great Depression. But that other debt growth? It's dwarfed by student loan growth."
RJ Eskow at the Smirking Chimp noted that the same banks that broke the economy by creating that housing bubble are responsible for the student debt crisis—as well as the federal government, which issues student loans. "[T]hese debts were incurred with broken promises. Much of that money is owed to the government itself, and billions are owed to the banks we bailed out at taxpayer expense," he wrote.
Student loans are not really comparable to housing loans, though: if you default on your student loans, there's nothing to repossess. Instead, you'll face a drop in your credit rating, and constant pressure from the types of collection agencies that Williams and Sternwood discussed above. They can garnish your wages, as Williams explained, and even if you declare bankruptcy, your student loans don't go away. And as Hindman noted, miss a payment, and your interest rate goes up, creating a punitive spiral of debt there's no way to escape from.
Even if mass default isn't likely to happen the same way mortgage defaults did, Indiviglio wrote that the cost of college and debt is already slowing the economy. "As Americans grapple with high student loan payments for the first few decades of their adult lives, they'll have less money to spend and invest," he wrote, pointing out that all the money going into colleges and the pockets of lenders in the form of interest is being funneled away from other places it could be spent. "Of course, this would be a rather unfortunate irony: higher education is supposed to enhance a nation's growth, but with such an enormous debt burden, graduates might not be able to spend and invest enough to allow that growth to occur."
Iris Van Kerckhove, who blogs about business at On My Grind, wrote:
"Now the labor pool is flooded with people who have postgraduate degrees and are desperate for work. Employers are overwhelmed with the number of applicants and, in response, demand higher qualifications as a way to filter the applications. Yet higher education institutions continue selling something that doesn't exist-- a guarantee of a better future. Something's gotta give."
The Solutions
So what can give?
Mychal Smith reminded us that just last year in his State of the Union, President Obama proclaimed, "No one should go broke because they chose to go to college." He called for student loans to be forgiven after 20 years—10 for those who go into public service—and a $10,000 tax credit for families paying for a four-year college.
But that's not a solution for people like Parker, who was unable to finish school because of the cost, or Toney, who wanted to go into public service but saw that door shut in her face with state budget cuts. They're in debt now, not in 20 years, and $10,000 doesn't begin to cover their debt, let alone the $80,000 Williams owes for a graduate degree. As tuition goes up thousands of dollars a year, a $10,000 tax credit looks pretty measly—and the chances of getting even that through the current Congress are slim to none.
The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that New Jersey's state legislature has a bill under consideration that would ban state colleges from raising tuition more than 2 percent a year. Keeping tuition down is certainly part of the solution—tuition growing faster than wages is a recipe for defaults as students struggle to pay back their loans. In addition, just as housing prices going way up wound up pricing many people out of home-buying, increases in tuition will price students out of an education—particularly if the benefits of that education become less clear, as jobs remain hard to come by.
One university actually lowered its prices recently. The Inquirer reported that Sewanee, the University of the South, a private school in Tennessee, cut its annual cost 10 percent, from about $46,110 to $41,000--without closing programs or laying off staff:
"Enrollment was better than expected, alumni giving went up, and some parents donated the $5,000 price difference back to the university. The deficit turned out to be half of what was projected, at $1.5 million, and Sewanee got the bump in publicity it sought: Campus visits increased 60 percent."
But what do we do for the people who've already finished college but are stuck without jobs and with mounting debts? RJ Eskow proposed a "Youth WPA," imitating the Works Progress Administration from the New Deal to put young people to work rebuilding our infrastructure, developing new business ideas, make creative works that we can all enjoy, and more (his six-part proposal is worth reading in detail).
An idea that's been getting a lot of traction lately—including an online petition pushed by MoveOn member Robert Applebaum that has 320,000 signatures as of this writing—is student loan forgiveness as economic stimulus.
Rep. Hansen Clarke introduced a resolution in Congress, co-sponsored by 12 other members, that includes student loan forgiveness in its suggestions for bringing down the U.S.'s "true debt burden."
In his Huffington Post blog, Clarke wrote:
"Congress is now completely focused on reducing debt. This would be a positive development, if not for one detail: it's focused on the wrong kind of debt.
With over a quarter of all American homeowners "underwater" -- owing more on their homes than their homes are worth -- and total student loans slated to exceed $1 trillion this year, it is household debt, not government debt, that is constraining spending, undermining confidence, and precluding sustainable long-term growth."
Clarke is right. For years, credit was a substitute for real wage growth in the U.S. And now as that debt burden has grown unsustainable, working families are barely able to keep up with payments, let alone spend enough to get the economy back on its feet. And student debt, as we've shown, is on the least sustainable trajectory of all.
Mychal Smith wrote:
"[C]onsider the potential impact on the economy if all of a sudden 35 million people were able to add to their monthly budget anywhere between $400 and $1000 that they no longer needed to satisfy exorbitant student loan repayments. And no longer faced with the threat of default(at a rate of 7 percent as of September 2010), credit scores would rise and more people with inclination toward starting small businesses (those things that every politician proclaims drive economic growth)[could do so]. Debt free degree holders would allow for more risk taking and innovation."
Student debt forgiveness would put $400 a month back into Sternwood's pockets, $975 a month in Williams'. Even just forgiving the government loans would probably allow Parker to finish his degree instead of going to war.
Of course the resolution is unlikely to pass Speaker John Boehner's Congress, and even if it does, it's just a resolution. But the instant popularity of Applebaum's petition shows something: Americans realize that student debt at the current levels is completely untenable, and something must be done soon.
Republicans love to talk about the debt we're leaving our children with. But saddling them with record levels of student debt and no jobs with which to earn money to pay it back hurts young people much, much more than government budget deficits.
- An ethicist untangles the morality of canceling student debt - Alternet.org ›
- Greg Abbott blasted as 'Governor Mengele' for back-to-school policies - Alternet.org ›
- Biden urged to cancel student debt during Super Bowl at SoFi Stadium - Alternet.org ›
- 'Debt relief for me but not for thee': Why some critics of Biden's student debt program are 'hypocrites' - Alternet.org ›
- The consequences of the Supreme Court killing student loan forgiveness: report - Alternet.org ›
- 'Take the reins': House Democrat urges young people to vote out the 'current generation establishment' - Alternet.org ›
- This financial columnist paid off her mortgage — and her credit score tumbled - Alternet.org ›


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UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN River Falls
"Small Potatoes" is a collection of memories about growing up in River Falls, Wisconsin, during the Depression era. George D. Foss reminisces about life and activities in River Falls; poverty, job loss, and the WPA (Works Progress Administration); and recalls childhood stories about attending matinees at the old Falls Theater, going to Glen Park, and Christmastime during the Depression. A hard copy of Small Potatoes is held at the UW-River Falls University Archives and Area Research Center as well as the Pierce County Historical Association in Ellsworth, Wisconsin.
A transcription of the memoir is available online at USGenWeb on the Pierce County, Wisconsin, page under "Memoirs."
Excerpt from "Small Potatoes":"I learned what it meant to steal."
"I recall an incident that occurred while we lived in the Denzer house. I don't know the exact year this happened, but at the time of the incident I didn't know the real value of a dollar. I would guess the year was about 1934 or I was home alone one afternoon and I spotted a silver dollar on the top of my folks dresser. I didn't know how much it was, but I knew it was valuable because it was so much bigger than a familiar nickel. Since there was no one around I decided to take it and buy some candy. I went downtown to Mueller's Corner Grocery Store. Then I proceeded to pick out some candy and handed old man Mueller the silver dollar. He said "wait a minute, you have some change coming." Well, my eyes nearly bugged out of my head when he kept putting change into my hand. There were quarters, nickels, dimes, and pennies. I only thought about how rich I was. Then it started to sink in that I had really gotten into more than I had bargained for. What to do with the big bag of candy, and what to do with all that change? I went down by the railroad tracks and hid it all under a big rock. After I got home no one had missed the dollar yet. Soon, however, a crisis swept over the family. My folks never accused anyone, but they never let up in their relentless search and discussion about it. This went on for several days. I was aware things were bad, but I didn't realize the scope of this. I never let on that I took it because by this time I was scared to death, and I didn't know how to confess...Instead of thinking that I had gotten away with the perfect crime, I realized from that time on what it meant to be honest."
Foss Family in 1937

subset: commoncrawl


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All too often, subscription boxes can leave us feeling – well, boxed in. I don't know about you, but I like more than just beauty, or just fashion, or just fitness products. But I don't have unlimited funds to get subscription boxes each month for all the kinds of products I like.
Enter FabFitFun, a seasonal subscription gift box with full-size fashion, beauty, fitness and lifestyle goodies. Since it's a mix, I wasn't sure if all the products in FabFitFun's box would appeal to me, but as soon as I opened the Summer 2015 box, I was delighted. They just GET me. It felt like Christmas in July, and I didn't even shop on Prime Day. Continue reading FabFitFun Summer 2015 Box Review


text: 1 And after five days the high priest Ananias came down with some elders and a spokesman, one Tertullus. They laid before the governor their case against Paul. 2 And when he had been summoned, Tertullus began to accuse him, saying: "Since through you we enjoy much peace, and since by your foresight, most excellent Felix, reforms are being made for this nation, 3 in every way and everywhere we accept this with all gratitude. 4 But, to detain you no further, I beg you in your kindness to hear us briefly. 5 For we have found this man a plague, one who stirs up riots among all the Jews throughout the world and is a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes. 6 He even tried to profane the temple, but we seized him. 8 By examining him yourself you will be able to find out from him about everything of which we accuse him." 9 The Jews also joined in the charge, affirming that all these things were so. 10 And when the governor had nodded to him to speak, Paul replied: "Knowing that for many years you have been a judge over this nation, I cheerfully make my defense. 11 You can verify that it is not more than twelve days since I went up to worship in Jerusalem, 12 and they did not find me disputing with anyone or stirring up a crowd, either in the temple or in the synagogues or in the city. 13 Neither can they prove to you what they now bring up against me. 14 But this I confess to you, that according to the Way, which they call a sect, I worship the God of our fathers, believing everything laid down by the Law and written in the Prophets, 15 having a hope in God, which these men themselves accept, that there will be a resurrection of both the just and the unjust. 16 So I always take pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and man. 17 Now after several years I came to bring alms to my nation and to present offerings. 18 While I was doing this, they found me purified in the temple, without any crowd or tumult. But some Jews from Asia— 19 they ought to be here before you and to make an accusation, should they have anything against me. 20 Or else let these men themselves say what wrongdoing they found when I stood before the council, 21 other than this one thing that I cried out while standing among them: 'It is with respect to the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial before you this day.'" 22 But Felix, having a rather accurate knowledge of the Way, put them off, saying, "When Lysias the tribune comes down, I will decide your case." 23 Then he gave orders to the centurion that he should be kept in custody but have some liberty, and that none of his friends should be prevented from attending to his needs. 24 After some days Felix came with his wife Drusilla, who was Jewish, and he sent for Paul and heard him speak about faith in Christ Jesus. 25 And as he reasoned about righteousness and self-control and the coming judgment, Felix was alarmed and said, "Go away for the present. When I get an opportunity I will summon you." 26 At the same time he hoped that money would be given him by Paul. So he sent for him often and conversed with him. 27 When two years had elapsed, Felix was succeeded by Porcius Festus. And desiring to do the Jews a favor, Felix left Paul in prison.


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Company of Heroes was a game for true armchair generals. There was no resource collecting, no tank rushes, none of the hallmarks of other games that look like they're about a clash of armies but are really little but mouse-driven sprint races.
Built around the concepts of cover and directional fire, suppression and morale, you had to use actual battlefield strategies if you wanted to succeed, and seven years on (the game was released in 2006), the formula is so perfect that it remains unchallenged, even by developer Relic's semi-related Dawn of War series.
Seven years is a long time between wars, though, and now that we have a sequel, people are expecting a lot from this game, the first time Company of Heroes has ditched Western Europe for the Eastern Front. So what's new?
The weather, for one. The Eastern Front was a brutal theatre of war, and the weather in this game wants to make sure it has more than a cosmetic effect. Snowstorms will slow your infantry and even kill them if they're out in the open too long, while frozen rivers can be blown open to block passage or sink enemy forces.
The fact the Soviets are now playable is the main addition here, though, and also the most disappointing.
CoH2's campaign does not live up the standards set by the original game and its expansions. It begins too slowly and, even worse, is drenched from beginning to end in an awkward veneer of moralising, as Relic attempt to justify the fact you're playing as an army "not as bad as the Germans because they're on our side" by putting you in the shoes of a dissident aghast at the Soviet's shocking brutality.
It doesn't work.
The cutscenes, rendered using crude 3D models (see above), are hammy like a bad 70s war movie, their grim tone is at odds with the ragdoll action in the missions and it's all dreadfully dull, making the campaign's story as insufferable as (sorry) a cold Russian winter.
Another problem with the campaign is that it attempts to shoe-horn several new features into the game in the name of factional authenticity, like an endless supply of conscripts and NKVD officers who shoot retreating soldiers. These feel crudely implemented, as they do little but upset the balance of the game (the former, as you can brute force your way to victory) and simply add one more arbitrary meter to the screen you need to look out for (the latter).
The campaign doesn't even make the most of the new weather conditions, with only a handful of missions making any significant use of frozen rivers and only a single one challenging you with troop-killing snow.
It's only towards the end of the 14-mission campaign, when you get a fantastic small-scale partisan mission and a few good "proper" battles (where you're free to build a whole army and take over the map) that it finds its feet.
Lucky, then, the campaign is a glorified tutorial that you'll soon forget once you get into the real meat of the game.
That used to be CoH's excellent multiplayer (where you can also play as the Germans), which was as enjoyable with/against friends as it was skirmishing against the AI. That remains the case with the sequel, only now it's even better, the bad weather conditions so overlooked in the main game a blast in multiplayer, as the struggle to just keep your men alive, let alone fighting, turns many old strategies on their head.
The real draw here, though, is a new, third game mode that combines singleplayer and multiplayer into something fresh for the series, something that - wait for it - you'll be familiar with if you've played Call of Duty recently.
It's called Theater of War, and like CoD's Spec Ops mode, it presents the player with a number of scenarios they can tackle either alone or co-op with a friend, ranging from battles with specific conditions to focused objectives like holding a small base against waves of enemy attacks.
Having ditched the narrative of the campaign and without the "blank canvas" of a multiplayer match it might sound like a middling stepchild, but in truth it's a mode that brings out the very best in the game. Free of the campaigns blunt story and yet providing a little more focus to multiplayer (or skirmish, as Relic refreshingly make AI battles a prominent option), it's easily the most fun I've had with a real-time strategy game in years.
Outside the campaign is also where the Soviets are most enjoyable, as you're able to use some of their monstrously massive equipment when and how you want, instead of at the whims of the campaign.
Before I wind this up, I want to point something out that you don't normally get to do in a strategy game review: this game is explosive. The sound in this game is incredible, more like something you'd get in a Hollywood war movie than a top-down strategy game, and it really adds to a feeling of immediacy with the battlefield that's already strong thanks to all the mud, dirt, bodies and debris that go flying around.
Company of Heroes 2 isn't the revolution its predecessor was. Too much remains the same (down to the battle UI), and too much of the Soviet faction, particularly its employment in singleplayer, is a disappointment.
But you know what, that's OK. There are many, myself included, who would argue the basic design underpinning the original was almost perfect, and it's still there. Adding more stuff on top of that, some of it not so great, most of it (like Theater of War) excellent, is about what you'd expect from a video game sequel.
In the end, then, think of Company of Heroes 2 as the embodiment of the thing it's trying to recreate, namely the Soviet's advance into Germany. Blunt, and wasteful in parts, but in the end an overwhelming success.


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Keurig Vue Brewer Named Edison Awards Finalist
Keurig Vue Brewer Named Edison Awards Finalist
Keurig® Vue® Will Be Recognized at Edison Awards Gala on April 25 in Chicago
READING, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. (GMCR) (NAS: GMCR) , a leader in specialty coffee and coffee makers, today announced the Keurig® Vue® Brewing System has been named a 2013 Award Finalist by the internationally renowned Edison Awards™. The Keurig® Vue® is a Finalist in the consumer packaged goods beverage preparation category, one of twelve categories honored by the Edison Awards. The distinguished awards symbolize the persistence and excellence personified by Thomas Alva Edison, inspiring creative minds to remain in the forefront of innovation, creativity and ingenuity in the global economy.
"More than any year, this year's slate of Finalists demonstrate the enormous value of teamwork, experimentation, consumer focus, market awareness and game-changing success," said Frank Bonafilia, Edison Awards' executive director. "It's exciting to see companies like GMCR and its Keurig® Vue® Brewing System continuing Thomas Edison's legacy of challenging conventional thinking."
"We are deeply honored to be named a finalist in such a prestigious award program saluting the best of innovation," said Michelle Stacy, president of GMCR's Keurig business unit. "The Keurig® Vue® brewing system represents the most advanced system in Keurig's single-serve beverage delivery and is a great example of GMCR's commitment to delivering sustained innovation. By adding features that allow consumers to brew what they love the way they love it - stronger, bigger and hotter - we've further enhanced consumer choice and we believe broadened the appeal of the Keurig® Single Cup Brewing System. "
The ballot of nominees for the Edison Awards is judged by more than 3,000 senior business executives and academics from across the nation whose votes acknowledge the Finalists' success in meeting the award criteria of Concept, Value, Delivery and Impact. The Panel includes members of the Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG), the American Association Advertising Agencies (4As) the Chief Marketing Officer Council (CMO), the Design Management Institute (DMI), the American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC) the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the Association of Technology Management & Applied Engineering (ATMAE). Also on the Panel are hundreds of past Edison Award winners, marketing professionals, scientists, designers, engineers and academics.
Award winners will be announced April 25, 2013 at the Edison Awards Annual Gala, held in the Grand Ballroom at historic Navy Pier in Chicago, IL.
The Edison Awards is a program conducted by Edison Universe, a 501(c)(3) charitable organization dedicated to fostering future innovators. The 2013 Edison Awards are sponsored by Nielsen, Discovery Communications, Science Channel, and USA Today. For more information about the Edison Awards, Edison Universe and a list of past winners, visit www.edisonawards.com.
Celebrating 15 years of innovation in 2013, the Keurig® Single Cup Brewing System has revolutionized the way people consume their beverages both at home and at the office. The single cup technology behind the Keurig® brand has disrupted consumer behavior and made quality coffee and other specialty beverages a staple option. The Vue® commercial brewer, V1200, received the Gold Award for Innovation in the OCS & Water Equipment Category at the 2012 National Automatic Merchandiser Association's One Show for its innovative offerings. In addition, Keurig® was named coffee maker "Brand of the Year" in the 2012 Harris Poll EquiTrend® Equity Study. According to NPD Group, a leading syndicated data provider, in the fourth quarter of the 2012 calendar year (October-December) the Vue® brewing system ranked #8 in the coffee/espresso maker category in dollar sales and was the #1 brewer based on dollar and unit sales for brewers priced above $175.
About Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc.
As a leader in specialty coffee and coffee makers, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. (GMCR) (NAS: GMCR) , is recognized for its award-winning coffees, innovative Keurig® Single Cup brewing technology, and socially responsible business practices. GMCR supports local and global communities by offsetting 100% of its direct greenhouse gas emissions, investing in sustainably-grown coffee, and donating a portion of its pre-tax profits to social and environmental projects.
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Forward-Looking Statements
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Diamond Bar G Ranch Star Camp - Oct 21 - 23, 2011
Wednesday, September 21 2011 @ 02:40 pm EDT
Contributed by: dgrosvold
Views: 4,739
|Satellite view of Diamond Bar G Ranch
Click image to view in Google Maps
The Diamond Bar G Ranch Star Party is a casual event with no registration fees and no planned schedule, other than a pot luck dinner on Friday evening, Oct 21st. We will not be having speakers or any other type of program. The purpose of the event is to do observing in a fairly dark-sky location without a lot of time devoted to other pursuits.
The observing field is wide so there is a clear view to the south and east, with low tree lines to the north and west. The Diamond Bar G Ranch is located in the Bortle Class 2 (blue) Zone, so light pollution is minimal. There are light domes from both Fayetteville in the NE and Van Buren / Fort Smith in the south but they are not obtrusive, and are usually only visible when there is cloud cover. The Milky Way is easily visible with the naked eye on clear nights.


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Baltimore, MD – Chris Davis clubbed his major league-leading 46th home run and Wei-Yin Chen pitched seven strong innings as the Baltimore Orioles held off the Tampa Bay Rays, 4-2, to avoid a three-game sweep.
Adam Jones also homered while knocking in two runs for the Orioles, who won for just the third time in their last nine games.
Chen (7-6), who had lost his previous three starts, gave up six hits and a pair of runs to help Baltimore beat the Rays for only the second time in the last nine meetings between the clubs.
The Orioles used three pitchers in the final inning, with Tommy Hunter recording his fourth save thanks in part to Matt Wieters throwing out Kelly Johnson on a stolen base try to end the game.
"It was a big win," Wieters said. "You'd like to get a series, but the only thing would could tonight was to win one game. Wei-Yin threw the ball great and we were able to get enough runs and give him some support."
The loss by the Rays dropped them out of first place in the AL East and a game behind the Boston Red Sox, who won at San Francisco, 12-1, Wednesday afternoon.
Jeremy Hellickson (10-7) permitted seven hits and four runs over 4 1/3 innings to lose his fourth straight decision over a five-start span.
Jason Bourgeois belted his first homer of the year and third of his career for Tampa Bay. Sean Rodriguez also went deep, but the Rays lost for only the second time in eight games.
Rodriguez homered to center leading off the fourth inning to cut the Rays' deficit to 3-2, but the Orioles got that run back with a titanic shot off the bat of Davis in the fifth. The leadoff hit was crushed over the wall in right field and landed on Eutaw Street.
The Rays were held without a hit for four straight innings until Wil Myers singled off Darren O'Day to begin the ninth. Brian Matusz then walked pinch- hitter James Loney during an 11-pitch at-bat.
Hunter entered from the bullpen and retired pinch-hitter Matt Joyce on a fly ball to center. Johnson, also in a pinch-hit role, grounded back to the mound for a force out at second. Wieters then made a perfect throw on Johnson's steal attempt, and shortstop J.J. Hardy applied the tag on the left leg to end the game.
"It's a division series and you're going to win two out of three games. That's a good spot to be in," Johnson said.
Baltimore filled the bases before Hellickson could record an out. Nate McLouth and Manny Machado opened the bottom of the first with singles and Davis was walked. Jones then grounded into a run-scoring fielder's choice before stealing second. Desmond Jennings made an over-the-shoulder grab in center, but the fly ball from Wieters scored Davis.
Bourgeois homered to left in the second, and the Rays were able to stay within striking distance when Hellickson escaped a bases-loaded jam in the bottom half.
Jones led off the home third with his 26th homer, a shot to center, that put Baltimore up by a 3-1 score.
Game Notes
Davis has 25 home runs at Oriole Park this year, two shy of the Orioles' home record set by Frank Robinson in 1966 at Memorial Stadium. The 25 HR's are tied with Rafael Palmeiro (1998) for the most in a single season at Camden Yards ... Davis' 46 homers are tied with Jim Gentile (1961) for the third-most in single-season franchise history. Brady Anderson hit 50 in 1996 and Robinson 49 in 1966 ... The teams combined to go 0-for-12 with men in scoring position.


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Yay, yay, yay, and yay some more! Our Lego Room is finalllllly clean!
You know how you have those places in your house that you walk by and immediately upon looking at it, your shoulders droop, you suddenly feel tired, and you just have to walk away? (If you don't know what I'm talking about, I am so happy for you. I hope to be like you some day.)
Our Lego Room is such a place as this. It is constantly a mess. We clean it, and within days it is a mess once again. Legos all over the floor. Legos beginning to string out into the hallway. Legos, Legos everywhere.
First, how is it, you might ask, that we happen to have such a room in our house that is dedicated only to Legos? It is a blessing and a kid's dream come true, that's for sure. Well, the simple answer is that we have a Lego Room because all four of our boys sleep in one big bedroom. We used to have them divided into two bedrooms, but they'd always end up sleeping in the same room anyway (and fighting each night over which room and which bed and whose turn and bleh). So, enough was enough, and all the beds got put into one room which became "the boys room". Then the other room became a Lego Room.
Side note, because apparently I've decided to jump around in this post: It is awesome to have all of our boys in the same room. Sure, sometimes (like once a year at the most) one of them mentions something about having their own room, and truly, we'd figure it out if they really wanted it that badly. But having them all together means that they are making awesome memories together. At night, we hear them reading together, making up stories together, singing together (serious or goofy), and laughing together. It's incredible and wonderful, and Matt and I love listening to it.
Anyway, back to the dreaded Lego Room. It was constantly a disaster, and nothing I'd tried in the past to make it better had ever worked. Finally, last week, the boys and I talked about how we could work together to solve the problem (so that Mom could learn to like Legos again). After way too many suggestions (seriously), we finally decided that the best idea would be to purchase some drawers so that they could separate and store the Legos by color.
We spent hours and hours the next few days, sorting colors, sorting Lego people, sorting, sorting, forgetting that we were sorting and starting to play, being reminded that we were sorting, and sorting some more. Then we re-arranged, swept, dusted, set up some ground rules, and we were finished!
Isn't it lovely!? Now, instead of feeling discouraged when I walk by, I get excited. It looks like a great place to create and play! I've made the kids promise NEVER to dump out a container of Legos again for the rest of their lives!! And if they are working on a project and have Legos on the floor, when it's time to do something else, they are to put their project into a plastic container until later.
Will this new system work? Oh I hope so. I think so. It better. ;)
I'm thankful to have this project behind me, and thankful that together, we figured out a system for Lego Room survival. :)
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LONDON, Jan. 2 (UPI) -- A fourth British military communications satellite built by Europe's aerospace company Astrium has been launched into orbit.
The satellite, the fourth launched since 2007 as part of the Skynet 5 program, was sent into orbit from a facility in French Guiana under a $6.5 billion Private Finance Initiative program.
"The Skynet program provides vital support to the armed forces," said Col. Mike Griffiths, head of Networks for the Defense Equipment and Support organization of Britain's Defense Ministry. "The launch of this latest satellite will deliver additional global communications capacity to support our operations."
The satellite, designated Skynet 5D, will travel 765 million miles while in orbit at a speed of about 6,200 miles per hour.
The Skynet constellation of satellites is operated by Astrium Services through a concession arrangement in force until 2022. The contract includes Astrium Service's provision of service personnel with the ground terminals to provide all beyond-line-of-sight communications to Britain's military.


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NFL teams may replace playbooks with iPads
The head of tech for the Dallas Cowboys tells CNET his team and at least a "couple" others are thinking of abandoning paper playbooks and game-day printouts of plays.
ARLINGTON, Texas--NFL teams including the Dallas Cowboys could soon be abandoning their traditional paper playbooks and game-day printouts of plays in favor of iPads or other tablets.
Pete Walsh, head of technology for the Cowboys, said his team and at least a "couple" of others are currently considering abandoning their playbooks in favor of iPads, a move they feel could save them as much as 5,000 pages of paper printouts per game.
Walsh explained this potential philosophical and technological shift to CNET during a discussion about Cowboys Stadium technology at Super Bowl Media Day here Tuesday. The stadium will play host on Sunday to Super Bowl XLV between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers.
For tech-friendly sports fans, it's an appealing image--coaches and players sitting on the sidelines of the giant Cowboys Stadium, iPads in hand, studying likely plays for the next few series, or sifting through overhead photos of the last plays in order to assess their performance, or that of their opponents.
In a lot of ways, this is exactly what tablets are meant for: easy access to data via wireless networks, high-quality photos, and portability. And from a coach's or player's perspective, imagine being able to quickly sort through a large set of plays, look at them in a stylish graphical presentation, see animations of them in action, and more--or to download a photo of the last play seconds later.
Still, it's also a bit difficult to imagine old-school NFL coaches agreeing to carry around a shiny gadget like an iPad instead of their trusty playbooks--or reviewing glossy color photos on the 9.7-inch screen rather than shuffling through paper printouts of the last passing play. One can imagine such coaches agreeing to hand over their playbooks only through tightly gritted teeth.
But Walsh suggested that this migration could well be coming, though he didn't say how long it would be before we see football pros stalking the sidelines with tablets.
On the up side, there's the potential savings of paper. For another, Walsh indicated, there's the feeling that if a tablet could be remotely wiped, it means that a lost iPad wouldn't necessarily result in all the plays for the next Sunday's game potentially falling into enemy hands.
However, Walsh said that one delay in the implementation of the shift is that the iPad isn't seen in the NFL's technology circles as being secure enough yet. That's why tablets, such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab, or others running the Android operating system could end up being selected if teams, or the NFL, decide they're more secure.
Walsh did not say which other teams were considering the move to tablets, but did say that "right now, all my counterparts [in the] league are discussing" the issue of how to secure the devices. Presumably, there's concern about whether hostile parties could break into them wirelessly and about whether a lost tablet could be remotely locked down or erased.
For Walsh, who reports to famous Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, the mandate is clearly to protect the Cowboys' intellectual property, and so he seemed prepared to wait to make the switch until he and his peers feel that devices like the iPad or its competitors can be used without causing anyone to lose sleep over how they might expose a team's plans.
"I've got that responsibility to the Jones family," Walsh said, "to make sure those [football] assets don't get out there."


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Herbal and dietary supplements are popular. People claim they make their joints feel better, their bones stronger, and their hearts healthier. But a recent study by researchers at the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute in Salt Lake City shows that many of these people may not realize their favorite supplement, mixed with prescription medications, may be putting their lives in danger, especially if they are taking warfarin -- a blood-thinning medication commonly prescribed to patients living with atrial fibrillation to lower their risk of stroke.
Researchers and pharmacists from the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute, along with registered dieticians from Utah State University, conducted interviews with 100 atrial fibrillation patients to determine their understanding of potential interactions between supplements and medications, such as warfarin.
Warfarin is a commonly prescribed drug used to prevent blood clots from forming. It is prescribed for people with certain types of irregular heartbeat, people with prosthetic heart valves, and people who have suffered a heart attack. Warfarin is also commonly used to treat or prevent venous thrombosis and pulmonary embolism.
Researchers found that of 35 patients combining warfarin with supplements, more than half (54 percent) were unaware of potential interactions. Researchers also found that of the 100 most-used supplements, 69 percent interfere with the effectiveness of warfarin.
The most commonly used herbal and dietary supplements among a-fib patients were: supplemental vitamins, glucosamine/chondroitin, fish oil and coenzyme Q10.
Researchers will present their findings at the American Health Association's annual scientific session in Chicago on Nov. 15.
"This is an alarming finding," said T. Jared Bunch, MD, a study author and heart rhythm specialist at the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute.
Warfarin and herbal and dietary supplements "compete" in the liver. This competition changes the way the blood thinner works -- either intensifying its active ingredients, thereby increasing the risk of bleeding, or by reducing its effectiveness, increasing the risk of stroke, he said.
"This data is important because it demonstrates how important it is for physicians to understand our patients' knowledge about and use of these products," said Dr. Bunch. "We need to do a better job of teaching our patients about the dangers of mixing warfarin with these products."
Those taking herbal and dietary supplements often experienced worse outcomes, possibly attributable to drug interaction, said Dr. Bunch. For example, those who take supplements reported higher rates of unexplained bleeding (23 percent vs. 17 percent) and a greater need for blood transfusions (14 percent vs. 10 percent).
Two other notable findings suggest lack of understanding about warfarin use: Patients who reported taking supplements were more likely to skip their warfarin (34 percent to 17 percent) or take extra doses when it was missed.
"We have also learned that -- for whatever reason -- patients don't want to tell their doctors that they are taking herbal and dietary supplements," Dr. Bunch said. "Physicians must be active in asking about supplement use and not place responsibility on patients. We need to tell our patients that it's acceptable to use herbal and drug supplements, but important for them to tell us so that we can educate them about the benefits, dangers, and potential interactions with their other medications."
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Multiple-Monitors are love
Update on dual monitors. Don "luddite" Box comments about how much he likes the larger 1024 x 768 pixels on his Thinkpad x30. Hey - how many pixels do you need to run emacs and type all those angle brackets anyways? :) [IUnknown.com: John Lam's Weblog on Software Development]
Withholding any barbs against Don's choice of editor...I run 1600x1400 (120dpi) on my laptop and 1280x1024 (96dpi) on my laptop. When people say they don't dig the ultra-high-res you get on a 120/130dpi laptop (like Tablet PCs, that require 120) I say, two words: Large Fonts. I run large fonts and large icons. I run my fonts in VS.NET in 14 point bold Lucida Console. The ratio of the size of the fonts in relation to the physical dimensions of the screen higher, but what to I get with all my "extra" pixels? Resolution, Baby. ClearType, clarity, the feeling of staring at Paper not an LCD or CRT. And personal preference aside, anyone who doesn't believe in ClearType (ClearType Online Tuning Wizard here) needs to think twice.
Someone still running 800x600 or 1024x768 happily because they didn't want to take the time to scale their screen elements on a higher-res screen is probably renting those "special" Full Frame DVDs because they think they are missing information covered by the black bars. ;)
Product Tip: There's another great Screen Scaling for the technologically challenged who like "big pixels" and want that 1024x768 feel on a 1280x1024 screen - LiquidView from Portrait. (It's arguably 100% necessary as XP includes a plethora of support for sizing things, but it scales EVERYTHING)
I also use their Pivot software RELIGIOUSLY. (They'd sell more software if their website didn't suck egregiously) When you're editing a giant doc, it's nice to view it like paper on a portait oriented display. Even better, Pivot is smart about multi-monitors and having a pivotable LCD next to a non-pivotable one.
About Scott
Scott Hanselman is a former professor, former Chief Architect in finance, now speaker, consultant, father, diabetic, and Microsoft employee. He is a failed stand-up comic, a cornrower, and a book author.
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Story highlights
Usain Bolt wins the 100 meters at the world championships in a time of 9.77 seconds
Bolt reclaims the world title after being disqualified from the 2011 final due to a false start
American Justin Gatlin took the silver and Jamaica's Nesta Carter claimed bronze
Once Usain Bolt got out of the starting blocks, no one was going to beat him at the world championships.
Two years ago at the worlds, the Jamaican false started in the 100-meter final and was disqualified. His countryman and training partner, Yohan Blake, took advantage to claim gold in Daegu, South Korea.
There was no false start for Bolt on Sunday in rainy Moscow and he captured his second world title in the 100 meters.
His time of 9.77 seconds was well off his world record of 9.58 seconds but still good enough to comfortably beat American Justin Gatlin and Jamaican Nesta Carter.
Bolt now owns six world championship gold medals to go along with six gold medals at the Olympics.
"I am happy but I wanted to do better," Bolt was quoted as saying by the BBC. "My legs were sore after the semifinals."
Perhaps mindful of what happened in South Korea, Bolt's start was cautious and Gatlin led him early. But after getting fully into his stride, Bolt – despite not feeling at his best – eased past Gatlin and coasted home.
Gatlin finished in 9.85 seconds and Carter in 9.95.
"I thought I had it for a second but then I saw these long legs coming on my right side," Gatlin told reporters.
Bolt last year called himself a "living legend" and the result in Moscow on Sunday won't diminish his confidence.
It likely also lifted Jamaican sport.
Jamaica was left reeling when two-time 200-meter Olympic champion Veronica Campbell-Brown, former 100-meter world-record holder Asafa Powell and Olympic relay gold medalist Sherone Simpson tested positive for banned substances before the world championships.
Then last week, soccer's FIFA announced that a Jamaican international tested positive for a banned substance, without naming the player.
Besides Powell, Campbell-Brown and Simpson, American Tyson Gay failed a drug test and ruled himself out of the world championships in July.
Read: Day of shame for sprinters
With sprinters thus under scrutiny, Bolt spoke up in July and said: "I know I am clean."
Without Gay – who owned the two fastest times in the 100 meters this year prior to Moscow – and the injured Blake, Bolt's task was made easier in Russia, although Gatlin defeated Bolt in Rome in June.
Gatlin has served a four-year ban for doping.
Bolt took center stage but he wasn't the only standout to win another world title Sunday.
Ethiopia's Tirunesh Dibaba collected her third in the 10,000 meters, an event she's won twice at the Olympics.


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An effort to rename a NASA flight research center after the late moonwalker Neil Armstrong was relaunched this week in Congress.
U.S. Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon, R-Calif., and House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., announced legislation on Thursday to redesignate NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center as the Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research Center. The bill would also rename the Western Aeronautical Test Range as the Hugh L. Dryden Aeronautical Test Range.
Similar legislation to retitle the southern California facility was introduced in July 2007 by Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., who is co-sponsoring the new bill. McKeon and McCarthy supported the prior attempt to rename the center, which is located at Edwards Air Force Base in California's Mojave Desert.
Armstrong, who in July 1969 became the first man to walk on the moon, died earlier this year following complications resulting from heart surgery.
"I will never forget watching Neil Armstrong take those first steps on the moon," McKeon said in a release issued by his office. "In that remarkable and powerful moment, Neil Armstrong confirmed to the entire world watching that anything is possible and that nothing, not even traveling to outer space and walking on the moon, was too tall of an order for the United States." [Photos: Neil Armstrong Remembered]
"I am proud to be an original co-sponsor of this bill renaming the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center in honor of Neil A. Armstrong," McKeon added. "Dedicating this stellar institution to Neil Armstrong is a small token of our public gratitude and will hopefully work to ensure that his legacy is honored for generations to come."
Dryden Flight Research Center is NASA's primary center for atmospheric flight research and operations. In addition to its research work to advance the design of civilian and military aircraft, Dryden was the primary alternate landing site for the space shuttle and is now managing the launch abort systems testing and integration for NASA's Orion crew module, its next-generation multipurpose spacecraft.
Engineer vs. astronaut
Dryden was originally known as the Muroc Flight Test Unit under the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, the predecessor to NASA. The facility was also referred to as the High-Speed Flight Research Station and High-Speed Flight Station before becoming a part of the nation's space program with NASA's founding in 1958.
On March 26, 1976, the flight research center was named in honor of Hugh L. Dryden, the former director of NACA, who served as NASA's first deputy administrator up until his death in 1965. One of the country's most prominent aeronautical engineers, Dryden helped shape policy that led to the development of the nation's high-speed research program and its record-setting X-15 rocketplane. He also headed the negotiations for the early agreements with the Soviet Union on the peaceful use of space.
The proposed legislation, if approved by both houses of Congress and signed into law by the president, would still honor Dryden.
"This bill also continues to recognize Hugh Dryden by renaming the center's test range in his honor," McCarthy said.
According to McCarthy, the decision to honor Armstrong was based in part on the astronaut's history working at the flight research center.
"This bill recognizes the achievements of Neil Armstrong in aerospace travel and space exploration, and highlights his important connection to Kern County," McCarthy said. "He was a great American who served as a test pilot and began training for his famous astronaut career here in Eastern Kern. Later, he oversaw aeronautical research programs at the center and spearheaded technological innovation that continues to this day."
From 1955 to 1962, Armstrong served as a test pilot at the center (then the High-Speed Flight Station), amassing 2,400 hours of flying time, including flights on the X-15. While still at the center in the early 1960s, Armstrong was part of a team that conceptualized the Lunar Landing Research Vehicle, which helped create the training vehicle that he and other Apollo astronauts used to practice landing on the moon. [Space History Photo: Pilot Neil Armstrong and X-15 #1]
Advocates for Armstrong
The bid to rename the flight research center and its test range has the support of members of the area's aerospace industry and local community organizations, including the Antelope Valley Board of Trade, the Mojave Chamber of Commerce, the Palmdale Chamber of Commerce, and the Edwards Air Force Base Civilian-Military Support Group.
"It is most appropriate that astronaut Neil A. Armstrong be honored and memorialized in this way with his noted lifelong accomplishments as the first human to walk on the moon and as a former test pilot who worked at the Dryden Flight Research Center," said Stuart Witt, CEO of the Mojave Air and Space Port.
Should the bill become law, it wouldn't be the first time a NASA center has been renamed for an astronaut.
On March 1, 1999, Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio — which was named after Dryden's predecessor at NACA, George Lewis — became the NASA John H. Glenn Research Center at Lewis Field, recognizing the first U.S. astronaut to orbit the Earth.
Follow CollectSpace on Facebook and Twitter @collectSPACE and editor Robert Pearlman @robertpearlman. Copyright 2012 CollectSpace.com. All rights reserved.


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From fabric-store fur to Lee press-on nails, werewolf transformations on film have a checkered past.
Movie versions of the werewolf metamorphosis usually rely on the actors to stare wide-eyed at their furry hands and creepy nails and emit panicky, mortified screams, although not nearly as convincing as the ones that must have escaped them at the movie's premiere.
Most werewolf transformations–let's face it–are epic fails. The "Twilight" movies opt for an instantaneous flash transformation over the stare-and-scream method, but then again [spoiler alert] the guys in question are not actual werewolves, but shape-shifters. Thus, they don't really count.
But lest you think werewolf fails are a phenomenon of the pre-CGI past, I call your attention to the otherwise excellent BBC series "Being Human." (Warning: there's a nekkid tush in this video.)
#1: "Being Human"
He screams a lot, then screams some more, then turns briefly into Cindy-Lou Who before going full werewolf. I give "Being Human" sci-fi points for the physiological explanation, but the visuals of the transformation are an utter fail.
#2: "Teen Wolf"
The Michael J. Fox classic "Teen Wolf" enjoyed a feature-film FX budget, but didn't fare much better.
Step 1: Grow long, lustrous nails
Step 2: Look in mirror; observe bubbles moving under facial skin; put hands over face
Step 3: Open mirror, perhaps in search of astringent for bubble-face issues
#3: "The Howling"
The werewolf in "The Howling" also suffers from bubble-face/hand-staring syndrome (BFHS):
In addition, he also experiences theatrical snout-stretching with little accompanying facial reaction, which meshes nicely with the "when will this be over I would really like a latte" expression on the face of the gal witnessing the transformation. I've seen more fear on the faces of people waiting for the plumber's estimate.
#4 "American Werewolf in London"
If we were to break down the transformation checklist for "American Werewolf in London" (tush warning #2), it would look a little different from the classic BFHS sequence:
Step 1: Grab head
Step 2: Shed clothes
Step 3: Looking-at-hand sequence (see previous)
Step 4: Morph into Harry from "Harry and the Hendersons," while keeping downstage leg positioned to avoid NC-17 rating
#5 "Bad Moon"
Don't let the cheesy production values scare you away: This movie has an original take on low-budget werewolf FX. Keys to the transformation are a Vaseline-smeared lens and, possibly, a taxidermied polar bear. Steps are as follows:
Step 1: Develop sudden orthodontia issues
Step 2: Scare the crap out of Mariel Hemingway
Step 3: Go really blurry and kinda lumpy
Step 4: Bust out of Reeboks
I'm sure I've stomped on some of your favorite werewolves, so please, tell me if I'm wrong. And if you know of a good werewolf transformation caught on film, do tell.


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SHANGHAI, China – Tiger Woods is expected to get a $2 million appearance fee and Rory McIlroy $1 million for their one-day exhibition match Monday in Zhengzhou, China.
The top-ranked McIlroy and Woods, a 14-time major winner, will play their first head-to-head match in an event without other competitors at Lake Jinsha International Golf Club.
The 18-hole medal-match has been dubbed the "Duel at Lake Jinsha."
"We're going to try and put on a good show, shoot a low round and have a little bit of fun," said Woods.
McIlroy finished second Sunday in the BMW Masters in Shanghai, while Woods tied for fourth in the $6.1 million CIMB Classic in Malaysia.
McIlroy visited the Lake Jinsha course in north-central China last year as part of the seven-day, seven-stop, 18-hole "China Challenge" that also featured Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter and China's Liang Wen-chong.
The four played just three holes at Lake Jinsha, with McIlroy posting par, birdie and bogey before moving on to the next Challenge stop. Westwood was the eventual winner.
"The only thing I remember is that just so many people turned up to the golf course to watch the four of us," McIlroy said.
Woods bundled McIlroy out of the Turkish Airlines World Golf Final earlier in October in an event featuring six others.
"I do treat these exhibition matches as a bit of fun and it will be good to get a little bit of bragging rights," McIlroy said. "Of course I will be a lot more hungry this time against Tiger than I was in Turkey ... My game is a lot better and hopefully it will be a closer match.."


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The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CSPC) late Thursday issued an official recall of 1 million Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphones.
Samsung had issued its own recall Sept. 2, but there was no formal recall in cooperation with the CPSC until now.
The recall is necessary because the Note 7 "presents such a fire hazard," Elliot Kaye, the CPSC chairman, said in a news conference.
Kaye said customers subject to the recall have two options: either to seek a replacement or a refund, "which is the choice of the customer and the customer alone."
The CPSC indicated on its website that when a customer receives a new Galaxy Note 7, it will come with a different battery than those suspected of causing fires. Some replacement batteries in Note 7 phones have reportedly worked safely in other countries.
Samsung's own recall discussed only the possibility of an exchange for another Note 7 or a Galaxy S 7 or Galaxy S 7 Edge.
The CPSC last week urged Note 7 customers to power down their devices over the fires. "This week's message is to refund or replace," Kaye said.
Based on videos and photos of the damage that the fires can cause, he urged consumers to "take advantage of the recall right away, as we've seen these phones can present a fire hazard."
He said consumers wouldn't be able to swap out the battery in the Note 7 to prevent the fire hazard. "It's in the phone and that requires a new phone or a refund."
He said Samsung's decision to issue its own recall before reaching out to the CPSC was "not a recipe for success," but didn't elaborate about whether the agency planned any action against Samsung.
Kaye also didn't elaborate on whether Samsung has provided safe replacement units of Note 7 devices. Some customers have complained about not being able to get replacements. Kaye mentioned that 1 million phones are subject to the recall, while reports have indicated that 2.5 million Note 7 devices have been sold.
Customers should seek a refund or replacement from their carrier or Samsung directly, Kaye said. Samsung previously listed phone numbers and emails for five major carriers in its Sept. 10 statement, which urged customers to power down and not charge the phones.
Samsung listed how to find the IMEI or serial number on the affected Note 7 phones and how to check it online. The serial number is located at Apps>Settings>About Phone or General Management> Status>IMEI Information or Serial Number. Kaye said customers should also check the back of the phone for the serial number.
Samsung can be reached at 1-844-365-6197 if customers bought the phone from Samsung or if they have other questions.
A Canadian government agency issued an official recall earlier this week.
Jack Narcotta, an analyst at Technology Business Research, said the refund option provided by the CPSC recall order "would be among the worst-case scenarios for Samsung."


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MOSCOW – The Russians and the Chinese have built a space bunker – a new space station – in case the alien attack destroys Earth.
Vladmir Putin s began production on a new Russian space station two years ago, with financial and technological help from the Chinese, in preparation for the alien attack predicted to occur on November 27, 2011.
The space station was secretly launched in July. It is capable of keeping twenty-four people on board alive for up to two years. Food, oxygen and supplies on board may allow them to live even longer.
Sources close to Putin say that he has been closely following the ongoing alien invasion – as written about extensively on WWN – and has met with Dr. John Malley of the U.N. Panel of Extraterrestrials.
Dr. Malley has identified the three large spaceships that are heading to Earth as being from Planet Gootan. They are closing in on Mars as of today. There is already an alien invasion that began in October, 2010 and is predicted to continue to 2015. But these aliens – from Planet Zeeba and Planet Xicuc – are known to be peaceful, docile. The Gootan, however, are a different story.
"The Gootans are unpredictable. They may be coming in peace to help save Earth from itself – environmentally, politically and maybe even financially – but they also may be coming here to attack and destroy us," said Malley.
Putin says he is not one hundred percent sure he believe everything that the U.N. Panel and Dr. Malley is saying, but he wants to be safe, just in case.
So, Putin had the space station built and has six Russia rockets ready to blast him, 14 other Russians and 9 Chinese to the space station. Reports are that Putin has selected three close friends and nine Russian supermodels to join him in space if Earth is destroyed.
"I will have to restart the human race, so I will need the very best human specimens on earth. That include me and the beautiful Russian women."
Some say Putin may launch himself and the supermodels to the new space station – whether or not the Gootan attack destroys earth.


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NASHVILLE (BP) — Belief in God may lead to better outcomes for patients getting short-term treatment for psychiatric illness, a new study suggests.
McLean Hospital, a psychiatric affiliate of Harvard Medical School, announced in an April 25 press release that the study, published in the current issue of Journal of Affective Disorders, examined individuals at McLean's Behavioral Health Partial Hospital.
"Our work suggests that people with a moderate to high level of belief in a higher power do significantly better in short-term psychiatric treatment than those without, regardless of their religious affiliation," David H. Rosmarin, a McLean Hospital clinician and instructor at Harvard Medical School's Department of Psychiatry who conducted the examinations, said in the press release. "Belief was associated with not only improved psychological wellbeing, but decreases in depression and intention to self-harm."
According to the press release, the study examined 159 patients, asking participants to gauge their belief in God and their expectations for treatment outcome and emotion regulation. Levels of wellbeing, self-harm and depression were assessed at the start and finish of the treatment program.
The study found that even the more than 30 percent of patients who expressed no religious affiliation still saw the same treatment benefits if they had a moderately or very high belief in a higher power. Conversely, patients with "no" or "slight" belief in God were twice as likely not to respond to treatment as patients with higher levels of belief.
"Given the prevalence of religious belief in the United States — over 90 percent of the population — these findings are important in that they highlight the clinical implications of spiritual life," Rosmarin said in the press release. "I hope that this work will lead to larger studies and increased funding in order to help as many people as possible."
GOVT. SEEKS 45-YEAR SENTENCE IN FAMILY RESEARCH COUNCIL ATTACK — The government is seeking a 45-year sentence for a man accused of plotting a massacre at the Family Research Council.
The Associated Press reported that prosecutors recommended the sentence for Floyd Corkins II, who attacked the Washington headquarters of the FRC, a conservative Christian lobbying organization well-known for its stance against gay marriage.
Corkins was carrying nearly 100 rounds of ammunition and 15 Chick-fil-A sandwiches, the AP reported, adding that he planned to kill as many people as possible and smear the sandwiches in their faces as a political statement. But Corkins only managed to wound a security guard, who subdued Corkins in the lobby.
Corkins carried a list of four socially conservative organizations, the AP reported, and he told authorities he planned to commit shootings at the other organizations if he were not stopped at the FRC.
According to the AP, the government wrote that if the security guard had not subdued him, Corkins "would have almost certainly succeeded in committing a massacre of epic portions."
Corkins pleaded guilty to interstate transportation of a firearm, assault with intent to kill while armed and committing an act of terrorism while armed, the AP reported.
MORE STATES ENACT PRO-LIFE LAWS — Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback signed into law April 19 expansive legislation that includes a ban on sex-selection abortions and stating that life begins "at fertilization," The Wichita Eagle reported. The measure also includes provisions expanding restrictions on state funding of abortion and writes into law and strengthens the informed consent guidelines used by the state's Department of Health and Environment.
"All human life is sacred. It's beautiful," Brownback said before signing the Pro-life Protections Act, according to The Eagle. "With this, we continue to build this culture of life in our state."
North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple signed into law April 16 a bill barring abortion after 20 weeks gestation, based on evidence an unborn child experiences pain at that point, according to the Associated Press. North Dakota becomes the ninth state to approve a pain-capable abortion ban. The other states to do so are Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Nebraska and Oklahoma, according to the National Right to Life Committee.
Previously this year, Dalrymple had signed three pro-life measures into law: A ban on abortions as early as six weeks into gestation based on an unborn baby's heartbeat; a prohibition of abortions on the basis of an unborn child's genetic abnormality; and a requirement that abortion doctors must have admitting privileges at a local hospital.
Among other states enacting legislation in 2013 that restricts abortions or establishes stricter standards for abortion clinics are Alabama, Arkansas and South Dakota.
ADF AGAIN CHARGES PLANNED PARENTHOOD WITH MISUSE OF FUNDS — The Alliance Defending Freedom, in its latest report to Congress, is charging that Planned Parenthood Federation of America continues to waste and abuse government funds and possibly commit fraud.
ADF made its report public April 10, updating results of an investigation it presented to Congress in 2011. The latest report says Planned Parenthood "is far less concerned with providing competent healthcare to women than it is with padding its bottom line" with government money.
"American tax dollars should be used responsibly and for the common good, and taxpayers deserve to know if their hard-earned tax money is being funneled to groups that are abusing it," said Catherine Glenn Foster, litigation counsel for ADF, in a written statement.
Its report on audits and reviews of Planned Parenthood affiliates, as well as state family planning programs and a family planning organization, showed more than $108 million in "waste, abuse and potential fraud," ADF reported. It called for Congress to investigate.
Affiliates of Planned Parenthood, the country's No. 1 abortion provider, performed 333,964 of the lethal procedures during 2010-11, the most recent year for which statistics are available. That total surpassed the previous yearly record for Planned Parenthood clinics of 332,278 in 2009.
Planned Parenthood also established a record for funds received from federal, state and local governments. It received $542.4 million in government grants and reimbursements during the latest fiscal year. Those public funds were nearly half of Planned Parenthood's $1.2 billion in total revenue for the year.
JOHNS HOPKINS PRO-LIFE CLUB GAINS OFFICIAL RECOGNITION — A Johns Hopkins University student committee has approved a pro-life organization as an official club on campus
The Baltimore school's Student Government Association Judiciary Committee voted unanimously April 9 to overturn SGA's rejection of Voice for Life as a student club. In March, the SGA voted down VFL's request, and the SGA Senate later endorsed that action.
In explaining its decision, the SGA said one of the reasons for the rejection of the application was VFL's plan to do sidewalk counseling outside an abortion clinic. The Thomas More Law Center wrote to school officials and the Judiciary Committee to explain why recognition of the pro-life organization is a legal requirement.
"Today is a victory not only for pro-life students here at Johns Hopkins, but for pro-life students around the country," VFL President Andrew Guernsey said in a written release. "We hope that our story of rising above discriminatory opposition can inspire pro-life students around the country to courageously take a stand for life and speak truth to power at their own college campuses."
FIRST WOMB TRANSPLANT RECIPIENT REPORTEDLY BECOMES PREGNANT — A Turkish woman who benefited from the first successful womb transplant also apparently has become the first transplant recipient to become pregnant.
Early test results for Derya Sert, 22, were "consistent with the expected signs of pregnancy," doctors reported in Antalya, Turkey, according to an April 12 report in the Daily Mail.
Sert, who was born without a womb, received a womb from a dead donor in 2011. Physicians waited 18 months before transferring an embryo into her womb, the British newspaper reported. Doctors took eggs from her ovaries, which are healthy, and fertilized them with the sperm of her husband, Mustafa. Specialists transferred at least one embryo to her womb in early April.
The risk for a miscarriage and other problems early in pregnancy is high, according to the Daily Mail. If Sert's baby continues to develop, doctors would deliver him by Caesarean section eight months into pregnancy and then remove her womb.
Other women have received womb transplants since Sert did so successfully, but she is the first to become pregnant.
DEARBORN CLINIC IS 6TH IN MICHIGAN TO CLOSE IN 7 MONTHS — A Dearborn, Mich., abortion clinic has become the sixth to close in the state in the last seven months.
The American Family Planning clinic stopped doing business April 12, according to a report from Citizens for a Pro-life Society (CPLS). The clinic, which had been in operation more than 20 years, closed upon the reported retirement of abortion doctor Noon-Nahm Ann, 73, according to CPLS.
Not only was the Dearborn center the sixth to close since September, it also was the ninth in the state to shut down or be prevented from opening in the last 18 months. In addition, Ann became the third Michigan abortion doctor to retire this year, CPLS reported.
Compiled by John Evans, a writer in Houston, and Tom Strode, Washington bureau chief for Baptist Press. Get Baptist Press headlines and breaking news on Twitter (@BaptistPress), Facebook (Facebook.com/BaptistPress ) and in your email ( baptistpress.com/SubscribeBP.asp).


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Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- The U.S. military suffered another day of heavy losses in Afghanistan on Tuesday as roadside bombs killed eight soldiers, two military officials told CNN.
An Afghan civilian working with NATO troops also was killed in the attacks in southern Afghanistan, the military said. The officials said that, according to initial reports, one blast took place just outside Kandahar and the other was in neighboring Zabul province.
Seven of the soldiers who died were traveling together in one vehicle, said Sgt. Jerome Baysmore with the International Security Assistance Force Joint Command.
The military gave no further details about the bombings, which it said also wounded several other service members. The official said one service member was killed in one attack, while the other seven were killed in the other attack.
The U.S. military described the bombings as "multiple complex IED attacks," which means they were followed by small arms fire, the official said. That has been the typical Taliban operational method for attacking U.S. forces in recent months, the official said.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs issued a statement of condolence: "As always our prayers go out to those who have lost a loved one and for those who sacrificed so much to serve our country."
The attacks happened a day after 14 Americans were killed in a pair of helicopter crashes in Afghanistan. The 14 deaths were the largest number of Americans killed in Afghanistan in a single day in more than four years.
With the deaths of two troops on Sunday, a total of 24 Americans, most of them military, have been killed in 48 hours. That makes October 2009, with 58 fatalities, the deadliest month for the U.S. military since the Afghanistan war began in October 2001.
Enemy action was not thought to be the cause of either of Monday's helicopter crashes. Three Drug Enforcement Administration special agents and seven U.S. troops were killed in one crash in western Afghanistan as they returned from a raid on a compound believed to be harboring insurgents tied to drug trafficking.
The DEA identified its agents as Forrest N. Leamon, 37, of Woodbridge, Virginia; Chad L. Michael, 30, of Quantico, Virginia; and Michael E. Weston, 37, of Washington.
Leamon and Michael were members of the DEA's Foreign-deployed Advisory and Support Teams, and West was assigned to the agency's Kabul Country Office.
Monday's other crash, in which two helicopters collided over southern Afghanistan, killed four Marines.
It is roadside bombs, commonly referred to as IEDs, short for improvised explosive devices, that have caused the majority of U.S. fatalities in Afghanistan in recent months. Last month, Defense Secretary Robert Gates approved a deployment of up to 3,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan to deal with the growing threat from roadside bombs.
Such attacks have been on a steady rise since February and account for 70 percent of U.S. casualties in Afghanistan this year, according to U.S. military statistics.
Compared with just two years ago, the number of American troops killed by roadside bombs is up 400 percent.
"That's the No. 1 threat," Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in July about IEDs in Afghanistan. Eighty-two deadly attacks occurred in June, almost double the number from May, and 105 in July, according to the latest U.S. military statistics.
Maj. Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, commander of U.S. troops in eastern Afghanistan, said he has noticed an "increasing sophistication" in the types of IEDs used.
"We're seeing some of the tactics, techniques and procedures that were used in Iraq, and [were] common there, migrate, obviously, here," Scaparrotti said in a recent briefing on operations in his area of command.
CNN Pentagon producer Mike Mount in Washington contributed to this report.


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Tonto Natural Bridge
Monday, 19th June 2006 by Alex Turnbull
This is the Tonto Natural Bridge near Payson, AZ – which is less like a natural bridge and more like a natural tunnel.
The creekbed disappears into the 50 metre-high tunnel for around 120 metres – the two entrances you can see in our thumbnails, and the inside of which you can see in numerous online galleries. (I've chosen this gallery to link to, because I like the way they've gone over the top with arty-farty photoshop filters 😀 )
Thanks to Jason Creach.


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GADSDEN, Ala. – Relatives and friends of the grandmother and stepmother charged with running a 9-year-old girl to death as a punishment have been defending and attacking the women on Facebook and in at least one case nearly divulging what could be considered evidence.
A judge has warned prosecutors and defense lawyers not to discuss the murder case, and so far they have obeyed. But experts say the hundreds of messages posted online since Savannah Hardin died in February show the legal system has yet to catch up with the social media explosion. They say it highlights the difficulty of making sure witnesses and jurors aren't swayed by outside influences.
Most posts are fairly innocuous, either supporting the women or honoring Savannah's memory. Others get to the heart of the case, including a few discussing how the child died. Many high-profile cases are discussed by thousands or even millions of people online, though in most cases those people aren't directly connected to the case. For instance, the Casey Anthony and Trayvon Martin cases generated immense worldwide attention on Facebook and Twitter.
Because of that, judges routinely admonish jurors not to read about a particular case online. And in Idaho, the Prosecuting Attorneys Association has advises prosecutors to avoid social media relationships that could create ethical problems — including being Facebook friends with judges — and never to talk about their cases online.
The grandmother of Savannah Hardin, Joyce Hardin Garrard, is charged with capital murder for allegedly making the child run and carry yard debris for hours as punishment for a lie about candy. The girl's stepmother, Jessica Mae Hardin, is charged with failing to intervene in the punishment until it was too late.
Garrard could be sentenced to death if convicted; Hardin could get life imprisonment.
Both women remain in Etowah County's jail without access to computers. But as in other high-profile court dramas, Facebook pages dedicated to the case appeared soon after Savannah's death.
The "Justice for Savannah Hardin" page includes calls for harsh sentences for the women. A "Justice for Joyce Hardin Garrard" page includes supportive posts by relatives and friends and photos of Savannah, Joyce Garrard and her husband, Johnny Garrard. Backers of the women can even order T-shirts for about $15.
Many of the posts simply express sympathy for one side or the other, but some go further. In a post last month, a person posting as Johnny Garrard disagreed with a commenter's claim about what killed the child, concluding: "I have the Death Certificate and that is not what it says."
A few other writers suggest they have knowledge about the case that hasn't been made public in court. In one post, a person who claims to have known Jessica Hardin for two decades explains the circumstances of the girl's death and concludes that, in effect, Savannah ran herself to exhaustion by trying to finish chores too quickly.
Court files don't indicate whether Judge William Ogletree is aware of the way the case is playing out in social media. He publicly admonished lawyers during a hearing in March to keep a lid on their own comments, though.
"This case has been attempted to be tried somewhat in the court of public opinion," Ogletree said at the time.
Ogletree's warning didn't slow down the social media chatter, and law professors said it's unlikely a judge could do that anyway because Facebook posts are a bit like people talking on the courthouse steps. They said the case highlights the problem the legal system faces with social sites like Facebook, where jurors, witnesses, lawyers and even judges could be "friends" or see the latest, unfiltered gossip on cases.
"It's a phenomenon in society that's just starting to enter the legal field," said Don Cochran, a former prosecutor and professor at Samford University's Cumberland law school in suburban Birmingham. "I think it's a huge issue in practice, and it ought to be something we're talking about in law schools."
Steven Hobbs, a law professor at the University of Alabama, said attorneys don't generally have a duty to police comments by relatives and friends of people involved in criminal cases.
"However, a lawyer might find it useful to so advise a potential witness as the witness is being prepared for the trial," he wrote in an email. "Expressions on social media could hurt the case just like anything we say or post on Facebook, etc., could be used against us in the court of law or the court of public opinion."
Prosecutors and Joyce Garrard's attorney declined comment on the Facebook posts. A lawyer for Jessica Hardin did not return a message seeking comment.