“The Daily Beast” - And, We're Up and Running! Welcome to the 2011 Women in the World Live Blog

Dispatches from our second annual Women in the World Summit.

The Daily Beast

March 10, 2011

http://www.thedailybeast.com/women-in-the-world/connect/2011/3/8/women-in-the-world-live-blog-dispatches-from-day-o?cid=hp:mainpromo2

Today begins our second annual Women in the World Summit, a three-day gathering of inspirational female leaders from all over the world. Over the course of the week, we'll meet female trailblazers from Africa and the Middle East, Asia and the United States, CEOs and politicians, grassroots activists, women reporting from the frontlines of war zones, former and current secretaries of state, and innumerable others who are doing everything in their power to create change for women around the world.

Today kicks off with a welcome from NEWSWEEK and Daily Beast Editor in Chief Tina Brown, as well as introductions from Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, of the World Bank, Rockefeller Foundation President Judith Rodin, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and longtime friend of the Beast, Diane von Furstenberg. In one of our two male appearances tonight—we love men, too!—New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg will give a talk, followed by a reading from Iranian-American actress (and Oscar nominee, for House of Sand and Fog) Shohreh Aghdashloo.

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“Peter Capella” - UN alarmed at huge decline in bee numbers

Peter Capella - AFP

Thursday, March 10, 2011

http://www.prisonplanet.com/un-alarmed-at-huge-decline-in-bee-numbers.html

GENEVA (AFP) – The UN on Thursday expressed alarm at a huge decline in bee colonies under a multiple onslaught of pests and pollution, urging an international effort to save the pollinators that are vital for food crops.

Much of the decline, ranging up to 85 percent in some areas, is taking place in the industrialised northern hemisphere due to more than a dozen factors, according to a report by the UN’s environmental agency.

They include pesticides, air pollution, a lethal pinhead-sized parasite that only affects bee species in the northern hemisphere, mismanagement of the countryside, the loss of flowering plants and a decline in beekeepers in Europe.

“The way humanity manages or mismanages its nature-based assets, including pollinators, will in part define our collective future in the 21st century,” said UNEP executive director Achim Steiner.



“Youtube” - Two Fresh TSA Gropedown Videos: Pregnant Woman pulled aside, TSA Thugs Block Man From Filming Wife Being Groped

Youtube

TSA Pat-down of pregnant wife

March 10, 2011

http://www.prisonplanet.com/two-fresh-tsa-gropedown-videos-pregnant-woman-pulled-aside-tsa-thugs-block-man-from-filming-wife-being-groped.html

There you have it! We were on our way to the SHOT Show and had to face this.

Coming back the Las Vegas airport didn’t even touch my wife. She went through the same metal detecting machines too not the full-body scanner thing.

Go figure.

Atlanta TSA threats of arrest and detainment over videotaping body scanner opt out pat down

This is half of the video I shot of the TSA experience we had in the Atlanta airport on March 2nd 2011. Before the video started I was threatened with arrest over using a video camera after my wife refused a TSA naked body scanner. They surrounded me like gang members and told us they would hold us there all day and make sure we missed our flight. I will be trying to obtain by any means the whole video from surveilance of that day.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/two-fresh-tsa-gropedown-videos-pregnant-woman-pulled-aside-tsa-thugs-block-man-from-filming-wife-being-groped.html



Goon-Squad Politics: How the Wisc. GOP Trampled Democracy to Appease Their Wealthy Backers

Posted on March 9, 2011, Printed on March 10, 2011When Wisconsin Republicans did an end run around Democrats on Wednesday night in order to pass a bill that would strip public employees of most of their collective bargaining rights, they showed themselves to be liars. This was supposed to be about balancing Wisconsin's budget, remember? The collective bargaining rights revocation was all of a piece with an ironically named "Budget Repair Bill," and Gov. Scott Walker, darling of billionaire union-hater David Koch and his astroturf group, Americans For Prosperity, swore up and down that it was only the budget he cared about in this fight.

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"David Korten" - How the buccaneers and privateers of days past came to be the Wall Street profiteers of the present.

On the Origin of Corporations

by David Korten

This is the tenth of a series of blogs based on excerpts adapted from the 2nd edition of Agenda for a New Economy: From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth. I wrote Agenda to spur a national conversation on economic policy issues and options that are otherwise largely ignored. This blog series is intended to contribute to that conversation. —DK

Like many Americans, I grew up believing that conservative values were about local control and personal responsibility for family, community, and nature. It seemed curious to me that the political alliance that drove a rollback of the Roosevelt-era policies that created the American middle class called itself conservative and dismissed its liberal opponents as un-American.

Eventually, however, I discovered that the term conservative harkens back to a day when conservatives were monarchists who considered democracy a threat to social order and the seas were ruled by buccaneers and privateers. That was a clarifying moment.

Buccaneer is a colorful name for the pirates of old who pursued personal fortune with rules of their own making. They were, in their time, an iconic expression of “free market” capitalism.

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“Lee Fang” - WI Senate GOP Leader Admits On-Air That His Goal Is To Defund Labor Unions, Hurt Obama’s Reelection Chances

By Lee Fang

March 9, 2011

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/03/09/scott-fitzgerald-obama/

A prank call from a man purporting to be petrochemical billionaire David Koch to Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) a few weeks ago revealed that Walker had crafted his “budget repair” bill in a bid to crush the labor unions. The revelation was at odds with the GOP’s public argument, that removing collective bargaining rights has something to do with the state’s budget deficit.

In an interview with Fox News’ Megyn Kelly moments ago, State Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-WI), one of Walker’s closest allies in the legislature, confirmed the true political motive of Walker’s anti-union push. Fitzgerald explained that “this battle” is about eliminating unions so that “the money is not there” for the labor movement. Specifically, he said that the destruction of unions will make it “much more difficult” for President Obama to win reelection in Wisconsin:

FITZGERALD: Well if they flip the state senate, which is obviously their goal with eight recalls going on right now, they can take control of the labor unions. If we win this battle, and the money is not there under the auspices of the unions, certainly what you’re going to find is President Obama is going to have a much difficult, much more difficult time getting elected and winning the state of Wisconsin.

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‘Dr. Mercola” - Omega-3 Builds Muscle Mass in Cancer Patients

Posted By Dr. Mercola

March 09 2011

http://blogs.mercola.com/sites/vitalvotes/archive/2011/03/09/omega3-builds-muscle-mass-in-cancer-patients.aspx

For cancer patients, supplementation with omega-3 fats could help them maintain and even regain lost muscle mass, according to a new study.

Most patients who took a daily supplement for 10 weeks either maintained or gained muscle mass.  Patients who didn't take anything either maintained or lost muscle mass.

MSNBC reports:

“[Omega-3’s] interfere with inflammation, thereby reducing its effect on muscle ... Loss of muscle mass and fat is bad for cancer patients because it hampers their ability to respond to cancer treatments”.



Dr. Mercola” - Frequent Hunger and Sweet Cravings? You May Be Making This Common Mistake

Posted By Dr. Mercola

March 09 2011

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/03/09/weight-watchers-finally-recognizes-calorie-counting-doesnt-work.aspx

David Kirchoff, president of Weight Watchers, the world's largest diet company, recently said on their website: "Calorie counting has become unhelpful.

When we have a 100-calorie apple in one hand and a 100-calorie pack of cookies in the other, and we view them as being 'the same' because the calories are the same, it says everything that needs to be said about the limitations of just using calories in guiding food choices."

Kirchoff and Weight Watchers have eliminated the company's popular "Points" system, which encouraged dieters to lose weight by eating any foods as long as they kept the portions small. The new system tries to encourage dieters to consume more natural, less processed food.

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“JP Massar” - Sebelius and HHS Bow Down Before the MEGA Health Insurance Company.

Wed Mar 09, 2011

by jpmassar

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/03/09/954231/-Sebelius-and-HHS-Bow-Down-Before-the-MEGA-Health-Insurance-Company

I'm not making this up. There really is a MEGA Life and Health Insurance Company. And yesterday, the Department of Health and Human Services granted a waiver to Maine's individual insurance market -- dominated by (who else?) MEGA.

There are exactly three companies that compose 99% of that market:

• MEGA Life and Health Insurance Company
• Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield of Maine
• HPHC Insurance Company

with MEGA claiming 49% for itself. What does granting this waiver mean?

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“Stonehenge” - GOP Says No To Distressed Homeowners and Consumers

by Stonehenge

Wed Mar 09, 2011

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/03/09/954281/-GOP-Says-No-To-Distressed-Homeowners-and-Consumers-

Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives are trying to terminate funds for foreclosure-prevention programs that help families fend off foreclosure and trying to strip the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau of its funding before it even opens its doors.

he Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) has helped about half a million homeowners remain in their homes, while another eight million families are at risk of losing their homes.  HAMP's aim is to reduce borrowers' monthly payments to affordable levels. When it was launched in March 2009, the administration projected that it would prevent 3 million to 4 million foreclosures before it expired in December 2012.  

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