Al Gore Jr.'s real family: SOS [Save Our Selves] founder Kevin Wall is joined by Cameron Diaz and Al Gore [Jr.] to announce the launching of Save Our Selves, the Campaign for a Climate Crisis which includes Live Earth, a 24-hour concert on 07 July 2007, in seven continents. Image Credit: MATA/AFP/Getty
Leadership: What Does Al Gore Jr. Choose To Do?
July 7th looms very large as a date on which the Gore family will define itself. July 7th is the date for a concert that is being put on to promote awareness to the “Global Climate Crisis” but July 7th is also a day on which Al Gore Jr. can show the world what he is really made of.
This morning on MSNBC, screenwriter John Ridley put forth a plea to the importance of the argument of family leadership. He made the point that one of the strongest, most effective acts that any man can do is to raise competent and balanced family. Ridley went on to say that the greatest ill effecting the black family is the lack of fatherly leadership in the family dynamic.
Earth Live 7 Point Pledge - Maybe Al Gore Jr. should create a pledge in support of the value of raising and supporting the family worldwide! Image Credit: ecj-MAXINE (still lifted from Earth Live video from press conference)
John Ridley argued that Al Gore Jr. should tape a video to be shown at the concert and hop on his private jet and stand beside his youngest son at a time of Al Gore the third’s greatest need of fatherly leadership.
John went on … Where will the Earth be twenty years from now, well it is going to be here, but more importantly, where will Al Gore III be twenty years from now if Al Gore Jr. does not step up and BE the father to the younger Al at a time of his greatest need!
I agree with John Ridley. Al Gore Jr. has not been elected to the office he NOW appoints himself to be – Supreme Leader of the Green World.
The Real Al Gore Jr.!
Al Gore Jr. would actually come out on the backside of this situation in a grand way by attempting to save the direction of his only son’s life while maintaining the mantle of the instigator of Live Earth – The Concert for “Global Climate Crisis” awareness … or as Al himself stated in an interview at this very moment – “the largest live entertainment performance EVER.” “A chance to deliver a wake-up call and sign a pledge to solve this crisis of global climate change!” “An ‘SOS’ [Save Our Selves] call to action.”
Well there you have it – The Ridley imperative to family values verses an SOS call to action. I think the real SOS (Save Our Society - Save Our Son) call to action is a car full of drugs flying down the road at 100 miles an hour putting anyone in the way at risk … and the fact that Al Gore the third is truly a person at risk.
Earth Live 7 Point Pledge - Maybe Al Gore Jr. should create a pledge in support of the value of raising and supporting the family worldwide ... And SIGN it! Image Credit: ecj-MAXINE (still lifted from Earth Live video from press conference)
We, at MAXINE, think the case has been made by screenwriter, John Ridley ... but Al Gore Jr. is NOT up to the task or the responsibility of family leadership.
Sadly, How Al Gore Jr. Sees Himself ... NOT Answering The Important SOS "Call" ... dot, dot, dot - dash, dash, dash - dot, dot, dot!
This is a booking mug shot photo released by the Orange County Sheriffs Department of Al Gore III, 24, who was arrested early Wednesday, July 4, 2007 on suspicion of possessing marijuana and prescription drugs after deputies pulled him over for speeding, authorities said. Image Credit: AP Photo/Orange County Sheriff's Dept.
Born To Be Wild
We all know the song, and we all know the first line – “Get your motor runnin’, head out on the highway …!”
Well I guess this is the song ol’ “Carbon Neutral” loving Al Gore the third (son of former Vice-President, Al Gore Jr.) was listening to when he was pulled over for doing 100 miles per hour in a Toyota Prius … that’s right, a hybrid economy car!
OOPS! He was carrying a bunch of drugs and some marijuana. The Orange County Sheriff that pulled him over stated that he smelled the pot so he performed a search.
It makes one wonder what would make the Gore family more upset – the actual smoking of marijuana which creates additional carbon borne pollution OR driving a Toyota Prius at over 100 miles per hour.
We at MAXINE guess the latter – NOBODY should ever, ever, ever drive a Prius over, say 70 miles per hour.
Excerpted from AP via Yahoo! News –
Al Gore's son arrested on drug suspicion AP - LAGUNA NIGUEL, Calif. - 2 hours, 27 minutes ago
Al Gore's son was arrested early Wednesday on suspicion of possessing marijuana and prescription drugs after deputies pulled him over for speeding, authorities said.
Al Gore III, 24, was driving a blue Toyota Prius about 100 mph on the San Diego Freeway when he was pulled over at about 2:15 a.m., Sheriff's Department spokesman Jim Amormino said.
The deputies said they smelled marijuana and searched the car, Amormino said. They found less than an ounce of marijuana along with Xanax, Valium, Vicodin and Adderall, which is used for attention deficit disorder, he said.
"He does not have a prescription for any of those drugs," Amormino said.
Gore was being held in the men's central jail in Santa Ana on $20,000 bail.
Kalee Kreider, a spokeswoman for his parents, did not immediately return phone messages to The Associated Press on Wednesday. Reference Here>>
Always wondered where Springfield really is? Does anyone really know? Well the folks at 7-Eleven do – in fact they’ve been working very closely with Apu Nahasapeemapetilon. The Kwik-E-Mart was made famous in The Simpsons and has landed in the streets of Burbank, Ca.. Image Credit: 7-Eleven Corporate website - YouTube Video (below) Credit: LAMISCH
Kwik-E-Mart Debut In Twelve "Springfield's"
Just before the release of the feature length movie, "The Simpson's Movie", scheduled for release on July 27th, twelve 7-Eleven convenience stores in North America have been converted to the famed "Kwik-E-Mart" stores.
We, at MAXINE were just minding our own business when all of a sudden we came upon a very crowded store where once a 7-Eleven stood on Olive Avenue in Burbank.
To our amazement, there stood a complete Kwik-E-Mart store and about 400 people were snaked from the front door to around the corner of the building wanting to share in the experience of a real life movie promotion.
It is pretty cool in that the Kwik-E-Mart not only looks like a Kwik-E-Mart, but it will sell products only found at the fictional store in Springfield. That's right, Buzz Cola, KrustyO's cereal and Squishees, the slushy drink knockoff of Slurpees.
Every promotion though has something that can kill a BUZZ ... no, really!
You are correct in guessing that there will be NO BUZZ BEER sold at the Kwik-E-Mart.
That is a Buzz Killer for sure!
Excerpts from AP via Yahoo! News -
7-Elevens become Simpsons 'Kwik-E-Marts' By DAVID KOENIG, AP Business Writer - Sun Jul 1, 7:44 PM ET
DALLAS - Over the weekend, 7-Eleven Inc. turned a dozen stores into Kwik-E-Marts, the fictional convenience stores of "The Simpsons" fame, in the latest example of marketers making life imitate art.
Those stores and most of the 6,000-plus other 7-Elevens in North America will sell items that until now existed only on television: Buzz Cola, KrustyO's cereal and Squishees, the slushy drink knockoff of Slurpees.
It's all part of a campaign to hype the July 27 opening of "The Simpsons Movie," the big-screen debut for the long-running television cartoon, which loves to lampoon 7-Eleven as a store that sells all kinds of unhealthy snacks and is run by a man with a thick Indian accent.
For 20th Century Fox Film Corp. and Homer's creators at Gracie Films, the stunt is a cheap way to call attention to their movie, since 7-Eleven is bearing all the costs, which executives of the retail chain put at somewhere in the single millions. ---- "We thought if you really want to do something different, the idea of actually changing stores into Kwik-E-Marts was over the top but a natural," said Bobbi Merkel, an executive for of 7-Eleven's advertising agency, FreshWorks, a unit of Omnicom Group Inc. "It shows they get the joke."
The monthlong promotion has been rumored a long time — it's hard to keep a secret known by so many suppliers and franchisees — but 7-Eleven managed to keep the locations of the stores quiet until early Sunday morning. That's when the exteriors of 11 U.S. stores and one in Canada were flocked in industrial foam and given new signs to replicate the animated look of Kwik-E-Marts.
The U.S. locations where a 7-Eleven store was transformed into a Kwik-E-Mart are New York City; Chicago; Dallas; Denver; Burbank, Calif.; Los Angeles; Henderson, Nev.; Orlando, Fla.; Mountain View, Calif.; Seattle; and Bladensburg, Md. ---- The Fox/7-Eleven deal is an example of a practice called reverse product placement. Instead of just putting products prominently in a movie or TV show, fake goods move from the screen to reality.
In some cases, 7-Eleven has contracted with manufacturers of similar products to make their Kwik-E-Mart counterparts. Malt-O-Meal, the Northfield, Minn., cereal maker, will conjure up a recipe for KrustyO's, for example. In others, existing products will simply be renamed. One flavor of 7-Eleven's own Slurpee will be sold as "WooHoo! Blue Vanilla" Squishee for the month. ---- After Fox pitched a 7-Eleven tie-in last year, representatives from the studio, the stores, and Gracie Films — including Simpsons creator Matt Groening and executive producer James L. Brooks, met in Los Angeles to kick around ideas. Brooks added one — holding a contest to let one fan be drawn into a future episode of the TV show.
7-Eleven executives loved the idea. They had surveys showing a strong overlap between their customers and fans of the show — both tend to be young and male. It sounded like cash registers ringing.
"They've been looking at Squishees and KrustyO's and Buzz Cola for years and have never been able to put their hands on it," said Merkel, the advertising executive.
But they won't find Duff beer, the brand chugged by Homer Simpson. The movie will be rated PG-13, and selling a Simpson-themed beer "didn't seem to fit," said Rita Bargerhuff, a 7-Eleven marketing executive. "That was a tough call, but we want to make sure it's considered good, responsible fun."
Bargerhuff predicted extra sales to Simpsons fans will more than offset the cost of the promotion and create new customers for the chain. She also said the chain is prepared for crowds and will have extra security and clerks at the Kwik-E-Marts. Reference Here>>
Always wondered where Springfield really is? Does anyone really know? Well the folks at 7-Eleven do – in fact they’ve been working very closely with Apu Nahasapeemapetilon.
Dr. Brij V. Lal is a Fijian historian of Indian descent. He was born in Labasa, on the northern island of Vanua Levu. He was educated at the University of South Pacific, the University of British Columbia and the Australian National University. Image Credit: The Australian National University
The Real Survivor Fiji – Coup-less vs Clueless
An article in the Fijian news outlet Fiji Live ponders whither the overthrow Government formed through the latest coup headed by Commodore Frank Bainimarama will stand up to a legal challenge in the Fiji court system … or will the military change the constitution.
We at MAXINE could not believe what we were reading!
Look, we all like an intellectual exercise but the discussion initiated by the leading academic in Fiji just seems a little, well, Clueless!
Any Government that is established through a coup can not be legitimate … so why is the issue even a process open to an exploration in a court system that only exists at the behest of Commodore Frank's marauding party.
Of course, Commodore Frank will “SHAPE” the previous constitution to meet the needs of HIS idea of what Fiji should be and THAT would be the point of the military takeover in the first place.
We really are beginning to wonder about Fiji … does the island nation want to remain Coup-less or Clueless?
Excerpts from Fiji Live -
Regime may abrogate constitution: Lal Fijilive.com - Saturday June 30, 2007
Fiji's interim regime may decide to abrogate Fiji's Constitution to get itself out problematic situations, says leading Fiji academic Dr Brij Lal.
A series of lawsuits are already being processed by Fiji Courts on the legality of the December 5 coup. Leading this is the litigation by deposed Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase and members of his ousted government.
Lal said the regime's "real challenge will come when the legality of the military overthrow is tested before the courts in the months ahead".
"Those challenges will take place within the provisions of the 1997 constitution, the very constitution the military claims to be withholding," he said.
"What happens if the courts decide against the military is anyone's guess. But by proclaiming that the 1997 constitution is still alive and well and functioning complicates the military's position.
"Of course the military may decide that the best way forward for it is to abrogate the constitution."
Lal said then some of the leading members of the regime "who had a hand in fashioning the 1997 constitution will have to explain why they are now advocating its abrogation".
"Fiji has been in a constitutional conundrum for the last six months," he said.
"A coup took place, but the constitution remained intact. It was claimed to be a 'constitutional coup but there is no such thing as a 'constitutional coup.
"No democratic constitution provides for its own overthrow by a military coup." ---- Lal said some of the changes the military wants to introduce are good, "such as removing racial voting, but they have to be introduced in the proper way".
"What people have to realise is that constitution making in the modern world is a comparative exercise," he said.
"It cannot be done in isolation. ---- The regime justified its "clean-up campaign" resulting in the termination of members of the civil service, government heads and government statutory bodies through a mandate given by the President Ratu Josefa Iloilo post December 2006.
"But in the Westminster system, the President acts on the advice of the elected government," Lal said. ---- "The mandate that the interim administration is claiming is so wide ranging, so sweeping, that it will take years to accomplish."
Lal said it gives "an entirely new meaning to the word 'interim.'" ---- When asked to comment on whether the abrogation of the constitution could be employed by the interim administration, Interim Attorney General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum said, "the interim administration does not respond to speculation".
"We are guided by a mandate given to us by the president," he said.
"One of the clauses in that mandate is to uphold the constitution."
The last time Fiji's Constitution was abrogated was on May 30 2000 by military commander Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama who appointed Qarase as interim Prime Minister five days later.
A High Court verdict in November 2000 and a subsequent Fiji Court of Appeal decision in March 2001 declared that the 1997 Constitution was not abrogated by Bainimarama and remained intact. Reference Here>>
Hey Fiji, Frank is an impatient man and the Fijian constitution be damned.
“Sanctu-Harry” Reid (Sanctuary/Harry), in a final attempt to stitch together a few more votes to gain passage of the cloture vote, took to the Senate floor and waxed about a phone call he had receive from “Tommy”. Image Credit: Uncorrolated.com - January 11, 2007
National Sovereignty … It’s A Good Thing
The Senate finally listens to the very strong opinion of the American people and shot down the revived effort to legalize the status of 12 to 20 million Human Beings. These Human Beings choose to continue to break our laws to be accepted and live here in the United States in a properly identified manner.
“Sanctu-Harry” Reid (Sanctuary/Harry), in a final attempt to stitch together a few more votes to gain passage of the cloture vote, took to the Senate floor and waxed about a phone call he had receive from “Tommy”.
While standing and addressing the whole of the Senate, Harry Reid stated that he was withholding the last name of Tommy for fear of the government would look him up and possibly deport him. Tommy had called the leader of the Senate to urge him on to pass the immigration reform bill so that he or his friend would not have to live in fear any more.
This is the leader of the Senate … sworn to uphold the laws of our land and he admittedly pursued a process of sanctuary for Tommy by withholding his last name. With leadership like this, no wonder we can not get funding for the border fence that had been approved last year.
Recognition of the 53 members of the Senate that believe National Sovereignty is a good thing should take place. A particular mention should be made for Senator Brownback of Kansas, who changed his vote from Yea! To Nay! during the course of the roll call vote process.
Voting "no" were 15 Democrats, 37 Republicans and 1 independent.
In the same regard, one should shun the following Senators for NOT protecting the sovereignty of the country they represent. Most surprising of these names voting to extend amnesty through the “Z-Visa” is the pro war-on-terror Senator Joseph Lieberman, Connecticut.
Voting "yes" were 33 Democrats, 12 Republicans and 1 independent.
The 46-53 roll call vote by which the Senate voted to block final action on a bill that would have legalize millions of unlawful immigrants took place June 28, 2007.
Let the celebration of the sovereignty and power of the American people begin.
Also, let the vigorous enforcement of or borders and immigration laws begin as well. (ht: Associated Press, Laura Ingraham)
Recognizing the threat of China's growing online community, Chinese President Hu Jintao called in January for the Internet to be "purified", and the government has since launched a number of online crackdowns. Image Credit: AFP
Fairness Doctrine vs Citizen Journalism
Here in the good ol’ USA, we have members of our congress walking the halls complaining about the success of “Talk Radio” and how it needs to be regulated. A recent account observed that senators Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Hillary Clinton (D-CA) were conversing about how the “Fairness Doctrine” needs to re-implemented in order to curb the free market influences that rule the popularity of this broadcast and communications medium.
This doctrine grew out of concern back in 1949 because of the large number of applications for radio station being submitted and the limited number of frequencies available. Broadcasters had to make sure they did not use their stations simply as advocates with a singular perspective. Rather, they had to allow all points of view. That requirement was to be enforced by FCC mandate. With the deregulation sweep of the Reagan Administration during the 1980s, the Federal Communications Commission dissolved the fairness doctrine.
It is funny how our currently elected leadership waxes philosophical regarding the limitation of free speech in the face of the communications landscape that exists today. The focus on the success of Talk Radio and the Fairness Doctrine leaves behind the rest of the singularly liberal forces that exist with mainstream broadcast television, newspaper print media, and the educator class that run our universities.
Oh!, And let us not forget the freedom of speech and communication that has become the “Wild West” landscape of the internet. How will our elected leaders like Boxer and Clinton address the internet in light of this concept of the “Fairness Doctrine”? … Maybe they can draw on the experience the political leaders in China.
Excerpts from Agence France-Presse via Breitbart -
'Citizen journalism' battles the Chinese censors AFP - Jun 24 11:44 PM US/Eastern
In the strictly controlled media world of communist China, "citizen journalism" is beating a way through censorship, breaking taboos and offering a pressure valve for social tensions.
In one striking example this month, the Internet was largely responsible for breaking open a slave scandal in two Chinese provinces that some local authorities had been complicit in.
A letter posted on the Internet by 400 parents of children working as slaves in brickyards was the trigger for the national press to finally report on the scandal that some rights groups say had been going on for years.
The parents' Internet posting was part of a growing phenomenon for marginalised people in China who can not otherwise have their complaints addressed by the traditional, government-controlled press.
"The phenomenon of 'citizen journalism' suddenly arrived several years ago," said Beijing-based dissident Liu Xiaobo, who was one of the student leaders of the 1989 Tiananmen democracy protests.
"Since the appearance of blogs in particular, every blog is a new platform for the spread of information."
He cited the example of a couple in the southwestern city of Chongqing who became known as the "Stubborn Nails" in April because they refused to leave their home until they received adequate compensation from the property developer who wanted them out. ---- "That case was first revealed through blogs," Liu said.
Also in Chongqing, parts of the city were this month set on fire following the beating of flower sellers by the "chengguan", city police charged with "cleaning up" the city's roads.
Witnesses to the beatings had appealed to local television journalists, but nothing was broadcast.
The incident only became known outside the city thanks to photos and stories published on the Internet, sparking anger among China's netizens.
"It's fascism," said one, while another mocked: "The inhabitants of Chongqing are truly naive, the Chinese media is all controlled by the Communist Party, they decide what people know." ---- Recognising the threat of China's growing online community, Chinese President Hu Jintao called in January for the Internet to be "purified", and the government has since launched a number of online crackdowns.
"The department of propaganda has sent out regulations to try and control the opinions being spread on the Internet, but every citizen has the right to criticise or to take part in public affairs on the Internet," said Zhu Dake, a professor at Shanghai Tongji University.
"The government has to accept the criticisms of the people, it can no longer react crudely like in the past."
Julien Pain, who monitors Internet freedom issues for Reporters Without Borders, is less optimistic.
"One cannot truly say that the Internet in China is becoming more and more free, because at the same time as the development of citizen journalists, the government finds ways of blocking or censoring content," Pain said.
Reporters Without Borders, which labels the Chinese government an "enemy of the Internet," says about 50 cyber dissidents are currently behind bars in China. Reference Here>>
At least here in America, we have the First Amendment in our Constitution.
Even Senators John Kerry, Dick Durbin, and Diane Feinstein and their wishes to stop the "hyperbole" coming from a free and open media with a fairness doctrine ... will not be able to "purify" the American communications landscape. (ht: The Museum of Broadcast Communications and Fox News)
Science Cover: A female Aedes aegypti mosquito attempts to take flight after a blood meal. Image Credit: James Gathany/CDC
NBC Plays The PC Card On IQ Test Report (does not mention that the study also recognizes gender along with social rank in family dynamics)
The NBC Weekend Today Show for Saturday decided to report on an article published in the journal Science and when doing so decided to color the conclusions to meet their own politically correct, or should we say gender correct, template.
In the study titled - Explaining the Relation Between Birth Order and Intelligence Petter Kristensen and Tor Bjerkedal, Science 22 June 2007 - NBC claimed that intelligence is more about environment than biology without EVER mentioning either the word Male or Female ... but if one reads the article, the phrase that really sticks out is the order on which the study finds the IQ ranking – “It's a matter of what they call social rank in the family - the highest scores were racked up by the senior boy - the first born - or, if the firstborn had died in infancy, the next oldest.”
By reading this, gender plays a greater role (ie. first born Male - as in senior boy) than does actual rank as first born.
CNN took a clearer and more direct description to the findings in the article in their title of the reporting of the findings.
This from AP via CNN –
Boys treated as eldest do better on IQ tests POSTED: 5:51 p.m. EDT, June 21, 2007
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Boys at the top of the pecking order -- either by birth or because their older siblings died -- score higher on IQ tests than their younger brothers.
The question of whether firstborn and only children are really smarter than those who come along later has been hotly debated for more than a century.
Norwegian researchers now report that it isn't a matter of being born first, but growing up the senior child, that seems to result in the higher IQ scores.
Petter Kristensen and Tor Bjerkedal report their findings in Friday's issue of the journal Science.
It's a matter of what they call social rank in the family -- the highest scores were racked up by the senior boy -- the first born or, if the firstborn had died in infancy, the next oldest. ---- Frank J. Sulloway of the Institute for Personality and Social Research at the University of California, Berkeley, welcomed what he called the Norwegians' "elegantly designed" analysis.
"These two researchers demonstrate that how study participants were raised, not how they were born, is what actually influences their IQs," said Sulloway, who was not part of the research team. Reference Here>>
And this from AP via Forbes -
Families' Eldest Boys Do Best on Tests By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID - Associated Press - 06.21.07, 4:15 PM ET
Boys at the top of the pecking order - either by birth or because their older siblings died - score higher on IQ tests than their younger brothers. The question of whether firstborn and only children are really smarter than those who come along later has been hotly debated for more than a century. ---- It's a matter of what they call social rank in the family - the highest scores were racked up by the senior boy - the first born or, if the firstborn had died in infancy, the next oldest. ---- The average IQ of first-born men was 103.2, they found.
Second-born men averaged 101.2, but second-born men whose older sibling died in infancy scored 102.9.
And for third-borns, the average was 100.0. But if both older siblings died young, the third-born score rose to 102.6.
The findings provide "evidence that the relation between birth order and IQ score is dependent on the social rank in the family and not birth order as such," they concluded.
It's an issue that has perplexed people since at least 1874, when Sir Francis Galton reported that men in prominent positions tend to be firstborns more often than would have been statistically expected.
Since then, several studies have reported higher intelligence scores for firstborns, while other analyses have questioned those findings and the methodology of the reports.
While the Norwegian analysis focused on men, other studies have included women, some indicating a birth-order effect and some not. Reference Here>>
The La Salle Bank Grand Prix of Cleveland held on the runways and taxiways of the Burke Lakefront Airport, downtown Cleveland. Image Credit: Getty Images via CBS Sportsline
Champ Cars Take Flight In Cleveland (Television Broadcast - CBS June 24, 1:00 pm ET)
The long, flat airport taxiways and runways make for one of the most exciting driver skill contested venues for an open-wheel event in Champ Car to be staged this year.
In Cleveland, the race is held on a working (but shut-down for the week-end) private aircraft airport right on the lakefront that the City of Cleveland resides on.
From Burke Lakefront Airport, the Cityscape of Cleveland acts a jewel of a backdrop with the Rock-N-Roll Hall Of Fame as a centerpiece.
The biggest attraction of the race venue has to be the track itself ... and in particular, Turn One on ANY start and restart.
The strightaway leading to the approach to Turn One is as wide as any concrete eight to ten lane freeway. The turn itself circles back to the other direction about 315 degrees onto a crossover to another runway heading back to the oposite direction.
As the Champ Cars and drivers head into Turn One, many are tempted to cut the corner short and take the shortest route to the apex, while others take a much higher line which allows one the hit the apex of the turn at a higher rate of speed.
The cars and drivers fan out and hope for the best. If a driver gets it right, they pass a few cars for position and get away clean ... if a driver gets it wrong? ...
... Well, here is the start of the race from last year where A.J. Allmendinger (currently racing in NASCAR) is able to just get past Sebastian Bourdais to maintain the pole starting position - Position One, while others will need assistance for a restart.
2006 Cleveland Grand Prix Race Start
This year may actually be the last race from Burke if some people in Cleveland have their way - and this would be very sad indeed. The Cleveland Grand Prix is one of just a few races that helped to define what it ment to BE a Champ Car venue. Really, it is right there with Long Beach, Elkhart Lake, and Toronto.
The Burke Lakefront Airport circuit in Cleveland, Ohio offers a challenging 2.106-mile, wide-open 10-turn race track. This will be the 26th time that the Champ Cars "Roar by the Shore". This event is the longest tenure of any temporary race venue on the Champ Car circuit.
Is it possible that the race in Cleveland will go the way of other great venues that were Champ Car staples like Ohio and Vancouver?
Excerpts from the Cleveland Plain Dealer -
What to do with Burke? Its past as landfill complicates future UPDATED: 10 :30 a.m. EDT, June 20, 2007 - Joan Mazzolini - Plain Dealer Reporter (originally published - Monday, April 23, 2007)
The vast expanse of land that makes up Burke Lakefront Airport has tantalized residents for decades as the last, best hope to give Cleveland a real lakefront, akin to Chicago, Milwaukee or Toronto.
And with two underperforming local airports -- Burke and Cuyahoga County -- the refrain from various quarters has long been to close Burke and merge operations.
But the hurdles to use Burke's 450 acres for a commercial center or housing or even a massive park are greater and more expensive than many realize.
While often called prime lakefront land, the reality is very different.
Most of Burke sits on garbage and dredge material. In fact, a Cleveland city dump since the time of horse-drawn wagons was located there and the garbage was burned until the 1950s.
Workers doing any digging on or near Burke are required to wear environmental hazmat suits because of the contamination, which includes PCBs, methane, oil, car tires and other debris.
Image Credit: Google Maps
Mike Hoyle, chief executive of Business Aircraft Group Inc., an aircraft management and sales company at Burke, doesn't believe the airport can be closed, both for the economic benefit it brings to Cleveland and for the simple reason that turning the land into a park would be too expensive.
City officials and others estimate that Burke contributes at least $100 million a year to the economy.
"You dig 4 feet and you're in sludge," Hoyle said. "My building sits on 6-foot-wide footers and it has settled 9 inches. You can't build a high-rise here." ---- But long before any new use of the land can even be considered, another question must be answered.
Can it be done? Can Burke, in fact, be closed?
That may be finally answered, with a master plan of the airport that Burke Commissioner Khalid Bahhur expects to be complete later this year.
It would finally answer the question of "does Burke stay or does it go?"
"If it stays, we'll be able to say here's why, and if it goes, here's why," Bahhur said. ---- If Burke goes, and the process could take years, a big question is where do the hospital helicopters, the Federal Reserve flights, the flight schools, corporate jets and others that use Burke go?
Some say other close-by reliever airports, such as Cuyahoga County, Lost Nation and Lorain County, could take portions. Of those, only Cuyahoga County has a control tower. ---- To close Burke, Cleveland would probably have to repay the Federal Aviation Administration $4.1 million in grants it received for airport upkeep.
But it might not be that simple.
The FAA could require Cleveland not just to move all operations to other airports, but could also require the city to reproduce Burke and its acreage at a different location.
"It's more than simply repaying the money," said FAA spokesman Tony Molinaro. "We would do an airspace study . . . to see what the consequences are and does this create more congestion.
"We can say 'No, you can't close this.' "
Longtime Burke Commissioner Mike Barth, who left to run Lorain County airport, said he believes you can give people more access and keep the airport.
Barth, who left in 1999 after 28 years at Burke, including 10 as the airport's commissioner, said dredged material should continue to be dumped at Burke, which would ultimately allow a runway to be added to the north. ---- "We all know the lakefront would be really prime land. We could have parks, entertainment, housing and retail," Dimora said.
"What land in the county isn't contaminated? You'll have to build with pilings," he said. "It's more difficult, more costly. But it's more desirable." Read All>>
Hey! ... and then there is the Cleveland Grand Prix and all the commerce and attention this event brings into the Cleveland economy every year for the last 26 years ... where is the mention of this little tidbit of information?
Long live the Cleveland Grand Prix at the Burke Lakefront Airport circuit.
Sicko, Michael Moore's new film, is ostensibly about health care in America; it's not, any more than Moby Dick is about a fishing trip. Like Moore's other documentaries (Fahrenheit 9-11, Bowling for Columbine), Sicko's central theme is American democracy -- how it works, where it doesn't -- and the culture of capital. Caption and Image Credit: Cinematical
Fear Of Seizure … Or Fear Of Failure
After the surprising breakout success of Michael Moore’s “mockumentary” Fahrenheit 9/11 … you remember, the “Palme d'Or” awarded 2004 film at Cannes designed to derail a presidential election and paint all people who believe our freedom loving way of life was somehow being hijacked by (not Islamo-Fascist terrorists) George H. W. Bush and his administration … the film maker had a very steep hill to climb with the release of his follow-on effort entitled “SICKO”.
He entered the film in the Cannes Film Festival for 2007 in the hopes of repeating his political and cultural coup. The film was a bust – no award, not even an honorable mention.
As one reviewer wrote, “Moore then tells how he anonymously sent a check for the cost of the wife's treatment -- $12,000. It's a funny bit -- and, to anyone who can parse a sentence, not actually 'anonymous' at all, anymore.
It's that tone -- of selfless self-celebration, of public altruism, of snide sensitivity -- that undercuts a lot of Moore's work, and it undermines Sicko.” - James Rocci
So now SICKO is reported as being leaked to a video posting site ostensibly to protect the film from being confiscated by the Federal Government.
This excerpted from Zero Paid -
Michael Moore's new documentary "Sicko" leaked on BitTorrent posted by soulxtc in bittorrent - 6-15-2007
Won't have to worry about copies getting seized by the Feds after all as his new controversial film makes its way around BitTorrent tracker sites everywhere.
A couple of days ago it was reported that Michael Moore had decided to stash a copy of his latest and greatest documentary "Sicko," an apparently scathing expose on the US healthcare system, in Canada just in case the Feds decided to confiscate it.
He feared such a seizure because of the fact that part of the documentary was filmed in Cuba without proper authorization from the US Treasury Department. Its illegal for US citizens to travel to Cuba because of a trade embargo in place since 1962.
Moore insists he hasn't broken any laws because he traveled to Cuba for a "journalistic endeavor."
"We brought back 15 minutes of the movie and we're concerned about any possible confiscation efforts," Moore told a news conference in New York.
"We took measures a few weeks ago to place a master copy of this film in Canada so if they did take our negative we would have a duplicate negative of this film in Canada."
Well, it would seem his concerns are no longer warranted because a DVDSCR of the film, the most magical download of them all (Oscar season anyone?), has appeared on BitTorrent tracker sites for all the world to see.
So now, even if the Treasury Dept does decide to seize his film, it looks like there will be plenty of copies to go around.
Moore's stance on file-sharing is that it's okay so as long people aren't profiting from it. He feels that the message behind his films are what's most important, and that he does well enough financially that he's more concerned with spreading ideas than he is with ensuring that everybody properly pays to hear them. Reference Here>>
We at MAXINE believe this, SICKO was pre-released to the internet so that Michael Moore would have a scapegoat for the films commercial failure.
With all of Michael Moore’s liberal, socialistic views … he has proven himself a capitalistic egomaniac and will go to ANY length to promote his products and give himself wiggle-room. Especially when the appearent success of his current product does not match up to previous efforts.
SICKO may be the title of Moore’s latest effort but it is also describes a bent in the personality of Michael Moore himself --- A Counter-Culture-Capitalist!
This opinion and recommendation to Michael Moore from possible GOP Presidential nominee, Senator Fred Thompson -
Slightly above Average but below Good ... not Excellent.
Backdrop:
WILL PIRACY INFECT BOX OFFICE FOR SICKO? Thursday, June 21 2007
Michael Moore’s Sicko had been downloaded about 4,000 times from peer-to-peer websites PirateBay and Mininova as of Wednesday, according to figures posted on the sites.
Clips from the film were also viewed over 1,000 times on YouTube and Google Video before they were yanked following protests by the Weinstein Company, which produced the health-care documentary. (Trailers and interviews with Moore remain.) Moore has said that the piracy appeared to be an “inside job,” given the fact that a perfect digital print was posted on the file-sharing sites.
CNET News writer Greg Sandoval commented Wednesday that he doubted that the online piracy will hurt the film at the box office. “First,” he wrote, “the controversy ... generated plenty of headlines for Sicko.
Nobody associated with the movie is going to be distressed about that. On the sites where the bootlegs appeared scores of comments were posted and that’s the kind of word-of-mouth promotion marketers love.”
“Castro said, under Political Prisoner Health Plan, I could easily lose 90 pounds in 90 days ... and that’s without surgery!” - Caption and Image Credit: Rocketman, Powerline Forum
UPDATE July 01, 2007:
SiCKO Is Ill At The Boxoffice
The results this weekend leave Michael Moore hoping to match “Bowling for Columbine” numbers as opposed to being able to heat up to “Fahrenheit 9/11”!
Excerpts from a FOX News report -
1. "Ratatouille," $47.2 million.
2. "Live Free or Die Hard," $33.15 million.
3. "Evan Almighty," $15.1 million.
4. "1408," $10.6 million.
5. "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer," $9 million.
6. "Knocked Up," $7.4 million.
7. "Ocean's Thirteen," $6.05 million.
8. "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End," $5 million.
9. "Sicko," $4.5 million.
10. "Evening," $3.5 million.
"Sicko," Moore's dissection of the ills of U.S. health care, played in 441 theaters, about half the number for his last movie, 2004's $100 million hit "Fahrenheit 9/11." With a $23.9 million opening, "Fahrenheit 9/11" did five times as much business, though.
Still, "Sicko" had the second-best documentary debut ever behind "Fahrenheit 9/11." By comparison, "Ratatouille" opened in nearly 4,000 theaters, about nine times as many as "Sicko."
Harvey Weinstein, co-chairman of the Weinstein Co., said he wanted to roll "Sicko" out slowly to give it a longer shelf life and keep Moore's stand for universal health care on the front burner.
"The idea is to hold during the summer and just continue to build this thing," Weinstein said. "I just think the debate in this country is going to catch up with the movie, so we've got to keep it slow."
Weinstein and Moore said they hoped "Sicko" would do in the range of the $21.6 million total for the filmmaker's 2002 Academy Award winner "Bowling for Columbine." (ht: FOX News) ---- Regardless of the spin Harvey Weinstein is putting on the numbers, “SiCKO” NOT the success that Michael Moore was aiming for.
Scientists have discovered the most effective method yet to convert glucose, found in plants worldwide and nature’s most abundant sugar, to HFM, a chemical that can be broken into components for products now made from petroleum. Image Credit: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Hydroxymethylfurfural - A Substance For The Ages
Oil has become the root substance of our modern society. The compounds not only fuel our automobiles, they are the building blocks that form plastics and chemical compounds that make modern life easier.
Corn and other plant material, when distilled to make Ethanol, have been heralded as the replacement for gasoline for our cars but what if we were able to use plant material for more … much more.
Well, scientists at the The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland Washington is a US Department of Energy (DOE) government research laboratory, have released an article to the journal, Science, that describes just this breakthrough.
Scientists have discovered the most effective method yet to convert glucose, found in plants worldwide and nature's most abundant sugar, to Hydroxymethylfurfural - HMF, a chemical that can be broken into components for products now made from petroleum.
Excerpts from press release issued from The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) -
Scientists get plastic from trees Submitted by Vidura Panditaratne - PNNL - Fri, 2007-06-15
The researchers at PNNL-based Institute for Interfacial Catalysis, or IIC, took a giant step closer to the biorefinery when they directly converted sugars ubiquitous in nature to an alternative source for those products that make oil so valuable, with very little of the residual impurities that have made the quest so daunting.
“What we have done that no one else has been able to do is convert glucose directly in high yields to a primary building block for fuel and polyesters,” said Z. Conrad Zhang [Chief Scientist - Institute for Interfacial Catalysis, Pacific Northwest National Lab], senior author who led the research.
That building block is called HMF, which stands for hydroxymethylfurfural. It is a chemical derived from carbohydrates such as glucose and fructose and is viewed as a promising surrogate for petroleum-based chemicals.
Glucose, in plant starch and cellulose, is nature’s most abundant sugar. “But getting a commercially viable yield of HMF from glucose has been very challenging,” Zhang said. “In addition to low yield until now, we always generate many different byproducts,” including levulinic acid, making product purification expensive and uncompetitive with petroleum-based chemicals.
Zhang, lead author and former post doc Haibo Zhao, and colleagues John Holladay and Heather Brown, all from PNNL, were able to coax HMF yields upward of 70 percent from glucose and nearly 90 percent from fructose while leaving only traces of acid impurities. To achieve this, they experimented with a novel non-acidic catalytic system containing metal chloride catalysts in a solvent capable of dissolving cellulose.
The solvent, called an ionic liquid, enabled the metal chlorides to convert the sugars to HMF. Ionic liquids provide an additional benefit: It is reusable, thus produces none of the wastewater in other methods that convert fructose to HMF. ---- “This, in my view, is breakthrough science in the renewable energy arena,” said J.M. White, IIC director and Robert A. Welch chair in materials chemistry at the University of Texas. “This work opens the way for fundamental catalysis science in a novel solvent.”
The chemistry at work remains largely a mystery, Zhang said, but he suspects that metal chloride catalysts work during an atom-swapping phase that sugar molecules go through called mutarotation, in which an H (hydrogen) and OH (hydroxyl group) trade places. ---- “The key is to take advantage of the open form to perform a hydride transfer through which glucose is converted to fructose.”
Zhang’s next step is to tinker with ionic solvents and metal halides combinations to see if he can increase HMF yield from glucose while reducing separation and purification cost.
“The opportunities are endless,” Zhang said, “and the chemistry is starting to get interesting.” Read All>>
“My hand was forced,” says Commodore Bainimarama. “In November, when I was in New Zealand, three high commissioners and ambassadors went up to the [army] camp to convince my troops and senior officers to stop following my orders - they were inciting mutiny. If they were successful, we would be fighting one another in the camp. But my troops knew what action they must take. They warned me immediately.” - Interim Prime Minister of Fiji, Commander Frank Bainimarama. Image Credit: Dev Nadkarni
The Real Survivor Fiji – A Neighborly View
The United States, much like Fiji, has a lot of problems. Our nation states are suffering from a force of insurgency.
In the United States, the insurgency takes the form of twelve to twenty million people who are not here under a process of legal assimilation. This has the effect of hijacking the sense of fairplay and the dilution of the rule of law our country is known for. This problem also may result in our country becoming less safe from the threat of terrorism.
In Fiji, the insurgency takes a more sinister form in that the country has already lost its Government. The military hijacked any sense of fairplay and the rule of law through its “bloodless” coup when it ousted the freely elected democratic Government of the people. As for the threat of terrorism? ... the terrorists are already in charge!
In both cases, a minority illegally holds the culture and processes of the rule of law hostage to their selfish demands. The main difference here, however, the United States still has its Government (barely) whereas Fiji has lost any of its Governmental legitimacy through the demands of one headstrong military leader.
This view from the neighboring nation of New Zealand -
The Mapp Report: The Fijian Banana Republic Friday, 15 June 2007, 5:04 pm - Press Release: New Zealand National Party
The coup in Fiji continues to cause problems, which is not surprising. Let's be clear; the current regime in Fiji is not a legitimate interim government, it is a military dictatorship.
And of course, they are acting just like military dictatorships always do. They rule by decree; they use fear and intimidation. The so called 'chats' with pesky journalists at the Queen Elizabeth barracks do not involve cups of tea and cucumber sandwiches; beatings and abuse are more the order of the day.
Military dictatorships hate hearing an opposing view to their own; that not everyone is actually keen on the end of democracy, freedom of speech and the ability to hold the government to account.
The New Zealand Parliament – on a fully bipartisan basis – is united on this issue. We want to see the end of Bainimarama's dictatorship, and the return to democracy. Because, as Winston Churchill said, "No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise.
Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time." The Fijian dictatorship is certainly demonstrating the truth of that proposition.
They claim to have taken power to end corruption, rebuild the economy and protect the constitution. It really is a bizarre claim – the rule of the gun to protect constitutional government!
There does appear to be an element to all of this that we may be missing in New Zealand. The ostensible reasons for the coup simply do not stack up on any objective assessment. Normally when such coups take place, there is some desire on the part of the coup makers to ensure some level of normality is restored. But that is not happening in this case. People continue to be arrested and taken to Queen Elizabeth barracks.
The coup leaders seem quite enthusiastic to deliberately irritate the major countries in the region. They have been resistant to the efforts of fellow Pacific Island countries to defuse tension, and restore normality. There would seem to be other factors not readily apparent that are keeping tension at a high level.
But at some point Fiji will have to return to constitutional government, and this is clearly in our interests as well as Fiji's. New Zealand will always want a good relationship with Fiji, but it is not unconditional. The Fijian regime needs to understand New Zealand will not just look aside, irrespective of the actions of the coup leaders.
When they want something from New Zealand; be it aid, transit visas, support in the UN; then the rules of good governance are among the tests we should apply.
Right now Fiji is failing those tests. The Fijian interim government needs to start thinking about how to yet again re-establish itself within the Pacific family of nations. Reference Here>>
Al Gore Jr.'s real family: SOS [Save Our Selves] founder Kevin Wall is joined by Cameron Diaz and Al Gore [Jr.] to announce the launching of Save Our Selves, the Campaign for a Climate Crisis which includes Live Earth, a 24-hour concert on 07 July 2007, in seven continents. Image Credit: MATA/AFP/Getty
Earth Live 7 Point Pledge - Maybe Al Gore Jr. should create a pledge in support of the value of raising and supporting the family worldwide! Image Credit: ecj-MAXINE (still lifted from Earth Live video from press conference)
Earth Live 7 Point Pledge - Maybe Al Gore Jr. should create a pledge in support of the value of raising and supporting the family worldwide ... And SIGN it! Image Credit: ecj-MAXINE (still lifted from Earth Live video from press conference)
.jpg)
