Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Mildred Baene and Joseph
When it was revealed that Arnold Schwarzenegger had a 13-year-old child with a trusted member of the family’s domestic staff, the world let out a collective gasp.
The mother, housekeeper Mildred Baena, has since been in hiding.
Facebook Hires Former White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart
Joe Lockhart is used to answering difficult questions. As White House Press Secretary during President Clinton's second term--including the impeachment hearings--Lockhart weathered that media firestorm well before and may well be steering himself into a fiercer one.
News arrived Tuesday late afternoon that Lockhart would be joining Facebook's executive team as Vice President of Global Communications. Currently working as managing director and founding partner of the strategic communications consulting firm Glover Park Group, Lockhart will handle Facebook's corporate, policy, and international communications. He'll report to vice president of global communications, marketing ,and public policy, Elliot Schrage. "Joe's arrival brings new skills and greater depth to our incredibly busy team," said Schrage in a statement. "His experience building and running a press office at the White House gives him particular appreciation for the demands of a global 24-hour news cycle and the challenges of responding effectively to intense scrutiny."
Seeking out former top government officials and friends seems to be Facebook's modus operandi lately. Last year, the company hired former top aide to Larry Summers, Marne Levine, to run its Washington office. Earlier this year, there were rumors that Secretary Robert Gibbs would join Facebook in a senior-level communications role. But according to Liz Gannes at All Things Digital, "That didn't happen." It seems possible that Facebook chose the more controversy-seasoned Lockhart instead. With increasing scrutiny from Congress about privacy practices, waning American usership and an estimated $100 billion IPO this fall, they're going to need it.
Sources
Facebook Hires Former White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart, Liz Ganness, All Things Digital
The secrecy, the risk taking, the denial
The New York congressman says he is seeking professional treatment "to focus on becoming a better husband and healthier person" following a sexting scandal that threatens to drive him from office.
Weiner hasn't specified what type of care he is getting, or where. If he has opted for an inpatient treatment facility, experts say there are just a handful of places where he could be, including a Mississippi clinic where Tiger Woods reportedly sought help for his litany of marital indiscretions. Or perhaps he is getting outpatient advice on sexual addiction.
Experts witnessing the demise of the rising politician's reputation, if not his career, are among those opining from afar. Some say Weiner's actions — making electronic sexual contact with strangers — mimic the characteristics of drug addicts, alcoholics or problem gamblers.
"He's exhibiting behavior of an addict. The secrecy, the risk taking, the denial," said Robert Weiss, founder of the Sexual Recovery Institute in Los Angeles.
"I am sure he understood on some level what he was doing," Weiss said. "When someone like that is not in a state of arousal, they can have a more intellectual, nuanced view of things. But that gets lost in the euphoria. And he begins not thinking clearly."
Weiss, a nationally recognized expert who has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey and Larry King programs, said Weiner probably can't explain his actions because they are on some level inexplicable even to him.
"I have a lot of empathy for him. He really doesn't understand why," Weiss said. "He can't figure out why he made these choices."
Kimberly Young, clinical director of the Center for Online Addiction in Bradford, Pa., said that in many ways, Weiner's online behavior was "very commonplace." Plenty of men and women secretly live out their fantasies on the Internet, sometimes in compulsive fashion.
The treatment for online compulsion, she said is usually twofold. Patients have to first modify their online behavior; that might mean not using the computer during certain hours, or at certain locations, or only communicating with certain types of people online. Next, they must examine what mental health issues might be causing the behavior.
"Is he depressed, is he anxious and stressed out?" she said. "First you need to deal with the behavior, then deal with the reasons why that happened ... It will probably take more than a 28-day rehab program. ... The treatment has to fit the person."
Timothy Lee, a licensed clinical social worker who runs New York Pathways, which treats sexual addiction on an outpatient basis, said Weiner's proclivity for sending photos of himself to strangers likely has escalated over time.
"He didn't wake up and just start sending pictures," Lee said. "I assume this is some type of voyeuristic exhibitionism type behavior. But it does show how delusional one must be to engage in this behavior. To think that the person on the other end is going to get off on it?"
Behavior like Weiner has confessed to, Lee said, usually starts with an innocent joke or flirtation, perhaps with an acquaintance or co-worker, but can quickly escalate.
"The greater the risk, the more excited they get. It's sort of like the high gamblers get," Lee said. "The greater the risk in getting caught, the bigger the high. I would look at his abusing his sexuality like someone else might abuse a drug," Lee said.
Weiner's weekend announcement that he is seeking treatment was short on specifics; he did not explicitly say that he has entered a rehab facility. A statement said only that he requested "a short leave of absence from the House of Representatives so that he can get evaluated and map out a course of treatment to make himself well."
Lee said if the congressman has gone for inpatient treatment, he would likely have to be in a program for 30 days or more, although some facilities offer help in less time. He said Pine Grove Behavioral Health and Addiction Services in Hattiesburg, Miss., where Woods reportedly went, has a 45-day program. The Meadows in Wickenburg, Ariz., has about a 30-day program, The Keystone in Chester, Pa., offers a 14-day program, other experts said.
Calls or e-mails to clinic officials seeking comment were not returned; most boast of offering confidentiality to patients.
As far as Weiner's prospects after treatment?
"People love a comeback story," said Lee. "From a PR perspective, going into rehab is the best thing he can do. Obviously he is also dealing with the humiliation he has brought upon his wife. It's just a sad case."
Dr. Jeffrey T. Parsons, a sex addiction expert and psychology professor at Hunter College in New York City, noted sexual addiction is officially recognized as a mental illness in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The next edition is due out in 2013 and there has been talk about including a passage on the topic, describing it clinically as a hypersexual disorder, he said.
Taking an alternate view from some his colleagues, Parsons questions whether Weiner indeed is a sex addict in need of treatment.
"I'm not so sure. He certainly has a media relations nightmare and saying he needs treatment sounds a lot better than the alternatives," Parsons said. "It's a lot harder to bash someone who says he is seeking treatment and help."
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Why Facebook lost 6 million U.S. users: 4 theories
New York – The social networking giant reportedly lost quite a few friends in May. Market saturation, or the beginning of the end?
Facebook may be nearing 700 million users with a $100-billion IPO on the horizon, but all may not be well in Zuckerberg land. According to Inside Facebook, the social networking giant lost nearly 6 million users in the United States in May, along with 1.52 million in Canada and hundreds of thousands in the United Kingdom, Norway, and Russia. The company still managed to add 11.8 million new users worldwide last month, but its growth has been slowing significantly. What's happening? Here, four theories:
1. Facebook has made as many friends as it can
Mark Zuckerberg and Co. may be "hitting a saturation point in key markets," especially in the U.S., where roughly 50 percent of the population is already on Facebook, says Kent Bernhard Jr. at Portfolio. If that's the case, the social network might not be able to reach Zuckerberg's goal of 1 billion users without conquering China (and its strict online censorship).
2. People are sick of Facebook
"I think users are deleting their accounts because they... are burnt out," says Lindsay Mannering at The Stir. Even Bill Gates, a Zuckerberg friend and Facebook investor, recently quit the social networking site, saying his friend requests had gotten "out of hand." I don't blame him. "Between the feeds and the friends, it's too much... more of an obligation than a fun way to pass a few minutes." No wonder people are logging off for good.
3. This is just a temporary dip
"Seasonal changes like college graduations, and other short-term factors, can influence numbers month to month and obscure what's really happening," says Eric Eldon at Inside Facebook. These May figures are certainly intriguing, but let's not overreact. The long-term trends are the ones that really matter.
4. Other social networks are on the rise
It's "worth noting" that Twitter and LinkedIn are gaining in many of the areas that Facebook saw big losses — namely the U.S. Canada, and the United Kingdom, says Robin Wauters at TechCrunch. But let's not forget that "on a global level... Facebook is drawing more visitors than ever."
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Inside Facebook
Facebook made its biggest gains in Latin America, specifically Mexico and Brazil, as well as Asian nations, like India, Indonesia and the Philippines. And worldwide numbers show that Facebook’s traffic is still rising rapidly.
As its user ranks approach 700 million worldwide, Facebook traffic in the United States has dropped significantly, a sign that the social network behemoth may be on the way down, reports Inside Facebook.
According to statistics from Inside Facebook Gold analytics service — which gets its information from Facebook’s advertising tool — new Facebook users totaled 11.8 million people in May — an impressive number by any stretch of the imagination. But that compares to the 13.9 million who joined in April, and an average of about 20 million in the 12 months prior.
This drop is primarily due to a plunge in registered users in the US. The number of US Facebook users fell from 155.2 million to 149.4 million during the month of May alone. That̢۪s nearly 6 million people who decided they no longer need to stay connected through the service, and is the first time Facebook has lost users in the last year.
It’s not looking good in the rest of North America, either. About 1.5 million Canadians also ditched their Facebook profiles, bringing that country’s total users down to 16.6 million. This may or may not mean anything, however, as Canada’s userbase has fluctuated in this area over the past year. Other countries where Facebook had losses of 100,000 or more include: the UK, Norway and Russia.
Facebook made its biggest gains in Latin America, specifically Mexico and Brazil, as well as Asian nations, like India, Indonesia and the Philippines. And worldwide numbers show that Facebook’s traffic is still rising rapidly.
But for Facebook to continue the meteoric climb its enjoyed in recent years, Inside Facebook says the company must break into the populous Chinese market, which would give access to hundreds of millions of users who have yet to join the site. And you know what? It just might do exactly that. Though it’s far from clear how it would compete in this highly competitive — and censored — market.
Julia Gillard snubs Dalai Lama
CANBERRA, Australia – Prime Minister Julia Gillard refused to meet the Dalai Lama during his visit to Parliament House on Tuesday but insisted that the snub had nothing to do with Chinese pressure on world leaders to shun the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader.
"I make my own decisions and the government makes its own decisions about meetings that we hold," Gillard told reporters.
The Dalai Lama said he wasn't disappointed. He seemed to know little about Gillard — including her gender.
"If your prime minister has some kind of spiritual interest, then of course, my meeting would be useful, otherwise I have nothing to ask him," the Dalai Lama said during a news conference. He twice referred to Gillard as a man before he was corrected.
Meetings with the Dalai Lama are a delicate issue for heads of state because China regards him as a dangerous separatist who wants Tibet to split from the country — a charge he denies. In Australia, which has extensive trade ties with China, a low-key 2008 meeting between the Dalai Lama and the acting prime minister brought a rebuke from Beijing.
Some lawmakers accused Gillard of being out of step with Australia's most important defense ally, the United States, where the Dalai Lama has met President Barack Obama.
Some observers suspect Gillard is demonstrating her independence of the Greens party, a vocal critic of China's control of Tibet and a crucial supporter of the ruling Labor Party. Greens leader Sen. Bob Brown met the Dalai Lama Tuesday and had been lobbying Gillard to do the same.
Brown criticized Gillard for failing to meet the Dalai Lama while her office door was open to mining executives.
"There is more to this place than simply people with big money," Brown told reporters, referring to Parliament House.
Gillard did not provide reasons for her snub, despite acknowledging last month that Australians expected their leaders to receive the revered Nobel Peace Prize winner.
"The Dalai Lama is a frequent visitor to Australia, I think he's been here four times in the last five years," she told reporters. "On some occasions he's met with the prime minister, on others he hasn't."
"I've determined on this occasion that I won't be meeting with the Dalai Lama," she said.
The 75-year-old Buddhist monk held a private meeting with education minister and former rock star Peter Garrett as the government's representative on Tuesday, as well as meeting conservative opposition party leaders.
Michael Danby, convener of the Friends of Tibet group of lawmakers, said he had expected at least Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd would have met the Dalai Lama to gain insights into the democracy movement in China.
Conservative Prime Minister John Howard was the last Australian leader to meet Tibetan Buddhism's highest spiritual authority, in 2007 during a 20-minute chat in Howard's Sydney office. The Dalai Lama's 2008 meeting was with Sen. Chris Evans, then the government's third-highest-ranking lawmaker; he was acting prime minister because then-Prime Minister Rudd and Gillard, then his deputy, were both overseas.
The Dalai Lama recently turned over his political authority over Tibetans, but remains their spiritual leader.
In a press conference at Parliament House, he warned Australia of the ecological dangers of its current mining boom and its burgeoning trade in raw materials exported to China.
He rejected a reporter's suggestion that Australian mining executives should look for other customers because of China's human rights record. The Dalai Lama said China should not be isolated or contained.
Seriously McDonald picture is a hoax
Racial hoax causes PR headache for McDonald’s - Yahoo! News
An online hoax that falsely suggests McDonald's discriminates against African-American customers is causing a PR headache for the Golden Arches.
Over the weekend, the photograph above circulated widely on the internet. The image shows what looks like an official McDonald's notice in the window of a restaurant, telling customers that blacks will be charged $1.50 extra "as an insurance measure due in part to a recent string of robberies."
Many internet users retweeted the photo, using the words "Seriously McDonald's," to express their disapproval of the burger chain.
In response, McDonald's sent a tweet of its own on Saturday: "That pic is a senseless & ignorant hoax McD's values ALL our customers. Diversity runs deep in our culture on both sides of the counter."
But that clearly wasn't enough to clear things up, because Twitter users continued to send out the picture, with that same message of condemnation: "Seriously McDonald's." Indeed, so many people sent "Seriously McDonald's" Tweets that the phrase became a leading entry on Twitter's trend list.
That led to a second, blunter McTweet, on Sunday: "That Seriously McDonalds picture is a hoax."
The latest pushback effort seems to have helped keep the photo from spreading too much further--but there's no telling how many people out there still think the photo is for real.
This is hardly the only recent barrage of negative publicity for the burger behemoth--some of it more justified. McDonalds CEO Jim Skinner recently was forced to defend the company's renewed use of the Ronald McDonald mascot to appeal to children, after critics said the restaurant's fat-laden burgers and fries endanger kids' health.
It's not clear who created the hoax image. It appears to have first showed up on the popular 4chan message board, and it was posted last year on an anti-McDonald's blog.
But there's no doubt it's fake. As some Twitter users have pointed out, the toll-free number given at the bottom of the sign is actually the number for ... Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Facebook and Privacy
Facebook: 100k Brits bored with site deactivate accounts amid privacy fears | Mail Online
Tired of social networking? Logging off Facebook? You’re probably not the only one.
Fearing for their privacy or perhaps just bored with using the site, 100,000 Britons are said to have deactivated their accounts last month.
And Facebook fatigue seems to be catching. Six million logged off for good in the U.S. too, figures show.
Logging off for good: Computer users concerned for their privacy are choosing to shut down the Facebook accounts. (Pictured posed by model)
Worldwide, the rate of growth has slowed for a second month in a row – and as it aims to reach its goal of one billion active users, Facebook is having to rely on developing countries to boost its numbers.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2003131/Facebook-100k-Brits-bored-site-deactivate-accounts-amid-privacy-fears.html#ixzz1PEcwpmOI
14 juicest Sarah Palin's emails
The state of Alaska has released 24,199 printed pages of emails from Sarah Palin's tenure as governor, ranging from her 2006 inauguration to the 2008 presidential campaign. And for the most part, the media and the public have found themselves shocked--to learn how pedestrian the trove turns out to be. "No big revelations," read a Reuters headline. "The bombshell that wasn't," sighed Yahoo! News.
Indeed, a large portion of the emails seems to confirm already-well-known Palin lore: her feuds with the Alaska state senate president, her association with a controversial pastor. The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the emails was submitted by news organizations way back in 2008, leaving some political journalists to question whether they have any news relevance now. "Sincere question. Sarah Palin is not a candidate, not an elected official, not a party official. Why do we care about her emails again?" tweeted the Washington Post's Greg Sargent. The answer, of course, is because she's Sarah Palin, and buried deep in the otherwise bland correspondence, some fascinating nuggets can be found, like her stances on climate change and gay rights (not as firm as some Tea Partiers might prefer.) From her praise for President Obama to her jokes with George W. Bush, read about the juiciest emails.
Plus, see our full coverage here.
1. Kind Words for Obama
In an email dated August 4, 2008, from her Yahoo account—just three weeks before joining Sen. John McCain's ticket—Palin wrote that Obama had given a "great speech" in Michigan, and praised his mention of Alaska. "We need to take advantage of this a[nd] write a statement saying he's right on," she wrote. In a follow-up email, Palin added that Obama "did say 'yay' to our pipeline. Pretty cool. Wrong candidate."
2. Climate Change a 'Top' Issue
Although she would later dismiss climate change as "junk science," Palin didn't always feel that way. In an email dated Sept. 15, 2008, she wrote that "climate change is the top issue for our state." Later in her political career, Palin distanced herself from such a stance, at one point calling climate science "junk."
3. Her Own Controversial Pastor
Obama has Reverend Jeremiah Wright and Palin has Pastor John Hagee. McCain rejected an endorsement from Hagee, an avowedly anti-Semitic zealot, in 2008, citing his hate speech as the reason. But in a May 3, 2007 email, Palin asked her scheduler to see if she could attend one of Hagee's events at the Juneau Christian Center in June. When Palin learned she couldn't make it, she wrote back, "I should try to get back to juno for this one."
4. Hesitant on Social Issues
Palin is well known for her social conservative bona fides, so it's fairly shocking to see that in an email dated March 16, 2007, she wrote that she was "torn" about endorsing a ballot question outlawing benefits for same-sex couples, supported by the Alaska Family Coalition. "My belief is administration should NOT attempt to sway the outcome of ballot props … my belief that we weren't supposed to try to sway the vote once it's in the hands of the people," she wrote.
5. Denying Bristol's Pregnancy...While Bristol Is Pregnant
When rumors began circulating that her 18-year-old daughter Bristol was pregnant in April 2008, the hands-on Mama Grizzly scoffed at the news, writing that the rumors are "pretty pathetic." (PDF) What's more, she blamed Alaska state senate president Lyda Green and her staff for brewing lies: "Flippin' Unbelievable. Wouldn't you think they'd be afraid of being proved wrong when they rumor around the building like that?…hopefully it'll be another reason why reporters and the public can't trust that odd group of strange people." The media has found no email records of Palin rescinding her accusations after learning that Bristol would indeed give birth to her son in December 2008—eight months after the "rumors" began circulating.
6. VP Buzz and Dubya
Palin's time as governor reveals she had a habit of forwarding messages to her staff from people supportive of her vice-presidential bid. One such message came from George W. Bush. "The [president] and I spoke about military, [including] Track's deployment and how Iraq is a different place than it was a year ago," Palin wrote to her chief of staff Mike Mizich, referring to an encounter she had with the then-president in early August. "He also spoke about (and we joked about) VP buzz."
7. Asking God for Budget Help
Palin asked for divine guidance when she was faced with a group of Republicans demanding she make budget reductions. "I have been praying for wisdom on this ... God will have to show me what to do on the people's budget because I don't yet know the right path ... He will show me though," she wrote in an email to Tom Irwin, a close adviser and senior official at the Alaskan Department of Natural Resources. Palin has referred to the oil pipeline she supported as "God's will."
8. Deflecting the Early Trig Rumors
In the 2008 presidential election, rumors circulated that Trig Palin was actually the son of Sarah's daughter Bristol, despite any evidence to support the claim. Emails show the rumor started long before that, with Palin sending an email over a week before Trig's birth blaming a political opponent for the rumor. "Sounds like The Bristol rumor was started and continues via Lyda's office," she wrote to staff and her husband. Lyda Green, a Republican, was senate president at the time and a frequent opponent of Sarah's. "Bristol does want it squashed — we just don't know how to do so without making it a bigger issue. . . . I figured it was them or [former Palin staffer John] Bitney," she wrote. Several weeks late Palin emailed staffers again about the rumor, saying that Trig's doctor mentioned it and that Bristol received two calls from friends who'd heard it.
9. Ghostwriting a Pageant Letter
After a letter to the editor in the Anchorage Daily News questioned her absence at the 2008 Miss Alaska pageant, Palin wrote to three staffers in July 2008 "looking for someone to correct the letter writer's goofy comments, but don't want the letter to ADN in response to come from me." The easiest solution, of course, was to write a letter pretending to be someone else, and refer to herself in the third person: "When I first asked the Gov. Palin if she was ever Miss Alaska, (as Ms. Spry stated), our Governor replied, 'Nope, a mere Miss Congeniality' ... about 100 years ago it seems now.'" She continues writing in her own defense that "in this situation it was especially important to have Governor Palin...travel to Fairbanks that evening between the weekend's statewide Governor's Annual Committee Picnics and meet with seven US Congressman who were touring ANWR." She also made sure to point out that her husband, "First Gentleman Todd Palin," had spent "two days judging the event."
10. Courting BP's Tony Hayward—After Catastrophic Alaska Oil Spill
Apparently the the March 2006 Prudhoe Bay oil spill, the worst in Alaska's state history, was no big fuss to Governor Palin. She was pleading with BP's Tony Hayward to support her Alaska Gasline Inducement Act, which proposed to build a multibillion-dollar pipeline to deliver natural gas from Alaska's North Slope fields to the mainland U.S. But even BP refused to back the plan, believing it was a bad deal.
11. Criticizing Republican 'Party Politics' Weeks Before Joining McCain's Camp
20 days before Palin swept into the national spotlight as John McCain's 2008 running mate, she dissed her own party and even expressed reservations about attending the Republican National Convention. The speech Palin eventually gave at the convention, accepting the vice-presidential nomination, ended up stealing the show and turned her into a star. But in early August 2008, she was making plans to "keep the trip short." "I don't need staff besides Kris—we need to remember the GOP, for the most part... especially the AK machine... has not had any support or assistance provided our administration so our time and efforts will continue to be spent on serving Alaskans, not party politics," Palin wrote to her scheduler, Janice Mason, and close aide Kris Perry.
12. 'Toxic' Relationship With Alaska State Senate President
Despite the national attention, things were not so smooth on the Alaska political front. Palin's emails back up revelations from former aide Frank Bailey's memoir Blind Allegiance to Sarah Palin that her relationship with State Senate President Lyda Green—a fellow Republican—had turned sour. In an email dated May 8, 2008, Palin wrote that Green wanted the governor's office to "bail her butt out of a pickle she got herself into." "I feel very 'set up' by Lyda on this one… we're being used," she wrote in the email to her staff about a special session Green called to pass legislation. "I want the bills passed, obviously, and I don't want her to get to put any blame on me for the failure of these bills to get adopted." But even worse, by April 2008, Palin was convinced Green was the one starting the rumors that Bristol was pregnant.
13. Mixing Professional Matters With Private Email Account
Palin maintained another private email account for most of her time in office, on which she mixed personal and professional matters. Emails that passed between private accounts are not included in the release because only emails (at her official state account and a frequently used Yahoo account) that passed through the state server in some fashion were included. But Palin used a sp@hslak.com to conduct business with her aide Frank Bailey, raising concerns that some of her official business communications were not captured in this release. Bailey, of course, would later sour on Palin and write his scathing memoir.
13. Defensive About Showing Travel Expenses
In August 2008—before she joined Sen. John McCain's campaign—emails from Palin show her in defense mode over accusations that she was spending state money on personal and family expenses. In an email to several aides who had forwarded her a request for her travel records, Palin wrote: "Make sure he knows we don't accept the kids meals/per diems... And that the state doesn't rent me an apartment or nor hotels in Anchorage or the Valley on a regular basis." She also took a shot at Alaska's former governor Frank Murkowski, to highlight his personal shortcomings and scandals against her record: "Show him Murkowski's 'top advisor-my wife' memo also please."
14. "No Scientific Evidence" Polar Bears Are Endangered
In January 2007, Palin sent an email to her aides with an embedded letter from Mary Walker, the head of an Anchorage environmental group, which rebukes the governor for requesting that the federal government not include the polar bear on its list of endangered species. The environmentalist wrote in her letter that Palin's written request to the government "had several clear factual errors such as the statement: there is no scientific evidence.... that these polar bear populations are declining." Walker then provided the scientific evidence to counter Palin's claim, and disparaged her assertion that there was "no discrete human activities that can be regulated" when it came to the effects of global warming on polar bears' habitat
Monday, June 13, 2011
Nasra Yussef Mohammed al-Enezi
Kuwait's supreme court on Sunday upheld a woman's death sentence for setting ablaze her husband's wedding tent, killing 57 women and children.
Nasra Yussef Mohammed al-Enezi, 24, was condemned to death by a lower and appeals courts for the apparent act of revenge against her husband for taking a second wife.
Under Islamic laws, men in Kuwait can take up to four wives at a time.
The ruling against Enezi is final unless the emir commutes the sentence to a life term. Death sentences in the oil-rich Gulf state are carried out by hanging.
Enezi, who has two mentally-ill children from her husband, denied the charges throughout the trial and her defence lawyers argued there was no material evidence to convict her.
The August 15, 2009 inferno engulfed the women-and-children-only tent in minutes and triggered a stampede. The final death toll was 57, including Saudis and stateless Arabs.
If Enezi is hanged, she would be the first Kuwaiti woman to be executed in the Gulf state's history. Three foreign women have been hanged.
Kuwait has executed a total of 72 people since it introduced the death penalty some four decades ago. Most of those condemned have been convicted murderers or drug traffickers.
The last execution in the emirate dates back to mid-2007 although dozens of convicts are on death row.
Tom MacMaster alias "Gay Girl in Damascus"
Update: The Washington Post provides further background information on Tom MacMaster, the man who has admitted to writing the blog. He is a 40 year-old American from Georgia, and he is currently working on his master’s degree at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. He is on vacation in Turkey at the moment with his wife.
After a week of speculation, a man named "Tom MacMaster" has revealed himself to be the real person behind the popular Syrian-American blogger "Gay Girl in Damascus," in a post on the blog. He wrote that he "never expected this level of attention," and that "while the narrative voıce may have been fictional, the facts on thıs blog are true and not mısleading as to the situation on the ground." He added, "I do not believe that I have harmed anyone."
The blog 'Gay Girl in Damascus' advertised itself as being written by a Syrian-American woman named Amina Abdallah Araf, and attracted numerous readers and international attention for highlighting issues about being gay during the protest movement in Syria. But the attention intensified one week ago, after a blog post appeared by someone introducing herself as Araf's cousin, informing that the blogger was seized by three men while on her way to meet with protest organizers. A Facebook page sprouted up for Araf, including information about how to contact U.S. representatives from Virginia to facilitate her release.
But under the heightened scrutiny, the story began to unravel. First, no one who had actually met Araf in person stepped forward. Further, some strongly doubted whether her anecdotes, whether they involved run-ins with Syrian security forces, kissing in public, and learning Hebrew were fact or fiction, as they struck those familiar with the culture as unrealistic. But the biggest red flag was that a Croatian woman named Jelena Lecic appeared on the BBC to explain that hundreds of pictures purportedly showing Araf on her Facebook page were actually of Lecic.
Still, even those investigating her story, such as NPR's Andy Carvin, were hesitant to call her story fake. Carvin said he believed Araf is a "real person," perhaps using a pen name. If Araf's story is real, he said, he doesn't want to distract people from the possibility that she is being "brutalized in detention." He did retweet a quote that if Araf's story is fake, "this is truly one of the cruelest jokes I've ever witnessed."
It turns out it is fake. "Tom MacMaster" posted the following on the blog on Sunday, where he said the "facts on this blog are true." Here is the full text of his post.
I never expected this level of attention. While the narrative voıce may have been fictional, the facts on thıs blog are true and not mısleading as to the situation on the ground. I do not believe that I have harmed anyone -- I feel that I have created an important voice for issues that I feel strongly about.
I only hope that people pay as much attention to the people of the Middle East and their struggles in thıs year of revolutions. The events there are beıng shaped by the people living them on a daily basis. I have only tried to illuminate them for a western audience. This experience has sadly only confirmed my feelings regarding the often superficial coverage of the Middle East and the pervasiveness of new forms of liberal Orientalism. However, I have been deeply touched by the reactions of readers. Best,
Tom MacMaster,
Istanbul, Turkey
July 12, 2011A picture of MacMaster from his Facebook page is below.
Beijing-Shanghai high speed railyway to open
Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway set to open - Yahoo! News
Chinese railway authorities say all is ready for the opening of a showcase high-speed railway between Beijing and Shanghai later this month.
Railways Ministry Vice Minister Hu Yadong told reporters in Beijing on Monday that tickets for the rail link between the China's top two cities would range from 410 yuan to 1,750 yuan ($63 to $270), depending on speed and class of train seat.
The fastest travel time on the 1,318-kilometer (813 mile) line will be five hours, or about half the current time, and the longest to just under eight hours, he said in a transcript posted on the ministry's website.
Trial operations for the new rail line began May 11. Its formal inauguration coincides with the July 1st 90th anniversary of the founding of the ruling Communist Party.
"We can proudly say that the Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway is China's own, independent landmark project," Hu said.
Hu said the railway was designed to ensure absolute security and safety. Earlier, the top operational speed for its trains was cut to 300 kilometers per hour (186 mph) from the originally planned 350 kph (217 mph), after questions were raised about safety.
China will continue to run 136 ordinary trains between the two cities, Hu said.
Siegel : Don't Resign, Congressman Weiner
Jules Siegel: Don't Resign, Congressman Weiner
By JULES SIEGEL
In case you missed it, a liberal congressman named Anthony Weiner sent a picture of his bulging briefs to a female college student who had invited him to add her to his private Twitter harem. Unfortunately he inserted the wrong code and sent to all his zillion followers, none of whom saw it because he immediately deleted it, except for a rather unsavory guy who was stalking him. Enter right wing fake scandal monger Andrew Breitbart. Congressman Weiner freaks and issues awkwardly false denial. Pictures of other beautiful Weiner Twitter harem girls then appear. One of them proudly confesses to consensual virtual sex with him and publishes the transcript.
Abashed congressman withdraws denial and tearfully cops to being a stupid putz. The next thing you know, Sarah Palin's totally unpolitical Paul Revere vacation tour (in a bus plastered with ads for her PAC) to warn the British that we aren't giving up our guns is off the front pages and Weiner's weiner is getting Nancy Pelosi all hot and bothered, even though the offending picture is not exactly Marky Mark.
Now, as weiner jokes tsunami the Internet, Weiner is in the bunker making apologetic phone calls to Democratic bigshots. Meanwhile, his wife is off being Hillary Clinton's chief of staff while three months pregnant, arousing teabagger speculation that Hillary is really the baby's father and that's why Weiner was resorting to fooling around online instead of saving his precious sperm for post-morning sickness sex. He performed his duty, right? What more do people expect of him? He's just Hillary's beard, they chortle.
I think Anthony Weiner and his wife should go on the View and play this out in public like adult human beings. It will be better than Nixon's Checkers speech. This totally lame scandal is about on the level of getting caught jerking off while looking in the mirror. Like who cares? No body fluids were exchanged. It's thought crime. I'm sure his wife was annoyed, but she's his wife. You can be sure she gets annoyed a lot. Don't they all? I don't see how voters were involved in this.
The GOP doesn't see it that way, of course (except for Boehner, who has not ventured an opinion, possibly because the Enquirer is reporting that he's boning a blonde lady to whom he is definitely not married, as it would be bigamy). Once again, however, Democratic girly men (and women) are showing their utter lack of backbone, just as they stampeded to betray Bill Clinton. This could revive Joe Lieberman's career as a Quisling sell-out. As usual they let the GOP set the rules and the agenda. This is why we lost the House in 2010. The youth vote does not consider sexting a moral flaw, you know.
BlackBerry Trackball
The Power of Internet
Shadow mobile phone system
In February 2009, Richard Holbrooke and Lieutenant General John Allen were taking a helicopter tour over southern Afghanistan and getting a panoramic view of the mobile phone towers dotting the remote countryside, according to two officials on the flight.
By then, millions of Afghans were using mobile phones, compared with a few thousand after the 2001 invasion. Towers built by private companies had sprung up across the country.
The United States had promoted the network as a way to cultivate goodwill and encourage local businesses in a country that in other ways looked as if it had not changed much in centuries.
There was just one problem, Allen told Holbrooke, who only weeks before had been appointed special envoy to the region. With a combination of threats to phone company officials and attacks on the towers, the Taliban was able to shut down the main network in the countryside virtually at will. Local residents report that the networks are often out from 6pm until 6am, presumably to enable the Taliban to carry out operations without being reported to security forces.
The Pentagon and State Department were soon collaborating on the project to build a "shadow" mobile phone system in a country where repressive forces exert control over the official network.
Details of the network, which the military named the Palisades project, are scarce, but current and former military and civilian officials said it relied in part on mobile towers placed on protected US bases. A large tower on the Kandahar air base serves as a base station or data collection point for the network, officials said.
A senior US official said the towers were close to being up and running in the south and described the effort as a kind of 9/11 system that would be available to anyone with a mobile phone.
By shutting down mobile phone service, the Taliban had found a potent strategic tool in its asymmetric battle with US and Afghan security forces.
The United States is widely understood to use mobile phone networks in Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries for intelligence gathering. And the ability to silence the network was also a powerful reminder to the local populace that the Taliban retained control over some of the most vital organs of the nation.
When asked about the system, Lieutenant Colonel John Dorrian, a spokesman for the US-led International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF, would only confirm the existence of a project to create what he called an "expeditionary cellular communication service" in Afghanistan.
He said the project was being carried out in collaboration with the Afghan government in order to "restore 24/7 cellular access."
"As of yet the program is not fully operational, so it would be premature to go into details," Dorrian said.
Dorrian declined to release cost figures. Estimates by US military and civilian officials ranged widely, from $US50 million to $US250 million. A senior official said that Afghan officials, who anticipate taking over US bases when troops pull out, have insisted on an elaborate system.
"The Afghans wanted the Cadillac plan, which is pretty expensive," the official said.
Broad subversive effort
In May 2009, a North Korean defector named Kim met officials at the US Consulate in Shenyang, a Chinese city about 190 kilometres from North Korea, according to a diplomatic cable. Officials wanted to know how Kim, who was active in smuggling others out of the country, communicated across the border.
"Kim would not go into much detail," the cable says, but did mention the burying of Chinese mobile phones "on hillsides for people to dig up at night".
Kim said Dandong, China, and the surrounding Jilin Province "were natural gathering points for cross-border cell phone communication and for meeting sources".
The mobile phones are able to pick up signals from towers in China, said Libby Liu, head of Radio Free Asia, the US-financed broadcaster, who confirmed their existence and said her organisation uses the calls to collect information for broadcasts as well.
The effort, in what is perhaps the world's most closed nation, suggests just how many independent actors are involved in the subversive efforts. From the activist geeks on L Street in Washington to the military engineers in Afghanistan, the global appeal of the technology hints at the craving for open communication.
In a chat with a Times reporter via Facebook, Malik Ibrahim Sahad, the son of Libyan dissidents who largely grew up in suburban Virginia, said he was tapping into the internet using a commercial satellite connection in Benghazi.
"Internet is in dire need here. The people are cut off in that respect," wrote Sahad, who had never been to Libya before the uprising and is now working in support of rebel authorities. Even so, he said, "I don't think this revolution could have taken place without the existence of the World Wide Web."
The Understanding of Migraine Biology
Scientists have uncovered a trio of genes tied to migraine headaches, including one in which the link is exclusive to women, according to a new study.
Migraines are acutely debilitating headaches -- sometimes with an "aura", in which patients have the impression of seeing through frosted glass -- that strike up to 20 percent of the population.
Scientists describe the condition, which is three to four times more common in women, as a brain disorder in which neurons, or brain cells, respond abnormally to stimuli.
The precise cause it unknown, but inheritance is thought to play a significant role.
To assess the genetic component, Markus Schuerks of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston coordinated an international sweep of genomes in 23,230 women, 5,122 of whom suffered from migraines.
So-called genome-wide association studies compare differences between individuals across the approximately three billion pairs of basic molecular building blocks found in the human genetic code.
The study, published Sunday in the British journal Nature Genetics, is the largest to date of its kind. It found variations in three genes that showed up more frequently in migraine patients.
Two of them, known as PRDM16 and TRPM8, were specific to migraines, as opposed to other kinds of headaches.
TRPM8, in addition, was linked to migraines only in women. Earlier studies have shown that the same gene contains the genetic "blueprint" for a pain sensor, in both men and women.
The third suspect gene, LRP1, is involved in sensing the external world and in chemical pathways inside the brain.
"The brain of a person with migraine responds differently to certain stimuli, their nerve cells 'talk' differently to each other," explained Shuerks in an email.
"Many neurotransmitters are involved in this cross-talk and some seem to have a special role in migraines. LRP1 interacts with some of these neurotransmitter pathways and may thus modulate nerve responses that promote or suppress migraine attacks."
None of the genetic variants appeared to be connected specifically to migraines with or without auras.
The findings, published in Nature Genetics, were replicated in two smaller population-based studies, one in the Netherlands and the other in Germany, and in a clinical group followed by the International Headache Genetics Consortium.
"Inheritance of any of the genetic variants alters migraine risk by about 10 to 15 percent," said Schuerks.
The influence of these genes is probably not large enough to be immediately used as a diagnostic tool. But the result "is an advancement of the understanding of migraine biology," he said.
Where is Lauren Spierer ? Why is Jesse Wolff being a police person's interest?
Police name boyfriend of missing Lauren Spierer 'person of interest' as search continues for 20-year-old student | Mail Online
The boyfriend of missing Indiana University student Lauren Spierer has been named a 'person of interest' in the case, according to police.
Twenty-one-year-old Jesse Wolff from Long island is one of ten people being questioned about her disappearance after a night out with friends on June 3.
Bloomington Police Lt Bill Parker said Wolff is being 'cooperative'.
Missing: Lauren Spierer, 20, disappeared on June 3 after a night out with friends
Sarah Palin, God, and Trig
SARAH PALIN'S COMPLETE LETTER TO HER FAMILY ABOUT TRIG
To the Sisters, Brother, Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, and Friends of Trig Paxson Van Palin (or whatever you end up naming him!):
I am blessing you with this surprise baby because I only want the best for you. I've heard your prayers that this baby will be the happy and healthy, and I've answered them because I only want the best for you!
I heard your heart when you hinted that another boy would fit best into the Palin family, to round it out and complete that starting five line-up. Though another girl would be so nice, you didn't think you could ask for what you really wanted, but I knew so I gave you a boy.
Then, I put the idea in your hearts that his name should be "Trig," because it's so fitting, with two Norse meanings: "True and "Brave Victory" ...
Then, finally, I let Trig's mom and dad find out before he was born that this little boy will truly be a GIFT. They were told in early tests that Trig may provide more challenges, and more joy, than what they ever may have imagined or ever asked for. At first the news seemed unreal and sad and confusing. But I gave Trig's mom and dad lots of time to think about it because they needed to understand that everything will be OK. ...
This new person in your life can help everyone put things in perspective and bind {you} together and get everyone focused on what really matters. The baby will expand your world and let you see and feel things you haven't experienced yet. He'll show you what "true, brave victory" really means as those who love him will think less about self and focus less on what the world telss you is "normal" or "perfect."...
Trig will be his dad's little buddy and he'll wear Carhartts while he learns to tinker in the garage. He'll love to be read to, he'll want to play goalie, and he;ll steal mom's heart just like Track, Bristol, Willow, and Piper did. And Trig will be the cuddly, innocent dependent little brother that his siblings have been waiting for... in fact Trig will - in some diagnostic ways - always be a mischievous, dependent little brother, because I created him a bit different than a lot of babies born into this world today.
Every child is created special, with awesome purpose and amazing potential. Children are the most precious and promising ingredient in this mixed-up world you live in down there on earth. Trig is no different, except he has an extra chromosome. Doctors call it "Down syndrome," and Downs kids have challenges, but can bring you much delight and more love than you can ever imagine! ...
Trig's mom and dad don't want people to focus on the baby's extra chomosome. They're human, so they haven't known how to explain this to people who are caring and are interested in this new little Alaskan. ... Some will think Trig should not be allowed to be born because they fear a Downs child won't be considered "perfect" in your world. ...
Many people will express sympathy, but you don't want or need that, because Trig will be a joy. You will have to trust me on this.
I know it will take time to grasp this and come to accept that I only want the best for you, and I only give my best. Remember though: "my ways are not your ways, my thoughts are not your thoughts... for as heavens are higher than earth, my ways are higher than yours!"
I wrote that all down for you in the Good Book! Look it up! You claim that you believe me - now it's time to live out that belief!
Trig can't wait to meet you. I'm giving you ONLY THE BEST!
Love, Trig's Creator, Your Heavenly Father
Bill Gates is funny man
Rocking gently in his chair, he begins to sing: 'I wanna be a billionaire so freakin' bad. Buy all the things I never had. I wanna be on the cover of Forbes magazine. Smiling next to Oprah and the Queen...'
'It will be a minuscule portion of my wealth. It will mean they (his children) have to find their own way. They will be given an unbelievable education... But they will have to pick a job they like and go to work,' said Bill Gates
Travie McCoy and Bruno Mars’s hit Billionaire reached No 3 on both sides of the Atlantic last year. The irony of the lyrics isn’t lost on either of us. They are, Gates chuckles, regularly used by his three children to poke fun at him.
At 55, he has graced the cover of Forbes magazine many times. As the co-founder, with Paul Allen, of Microsoft, he grew a 1975 back-room start-up into a software behemoth worth, at its peak, $400 billion. Oprah Winfrey is a close friend; the pair meet regularly and she has discussed signing his ‘Giving Pledge’ to donate the bulk of her $2.7 billion estate to charity.
And the Queen? Well, she gave him an honorary knighthood back in 2005.
‘The Billionaire song is what my kids tease me with,’ he says. ‘They sing it to me. It’s funny.’
They have apparently also introduced him to the ‘joys’ of Lady Gaga, ‘but the 12-year-old is always worried about the nine-year-old listening to songs with bad words. So he’s like, “No! Skip that one!” So I only know some Lady Gaga songs.’
It’s probably just as well his children have a well-developed sense of humour. Gates is officially the second richest man in the world, only losing the No 1 spot to Mexican businessman Carlos Slim last year, after holding it for nearly two decades, on a technicality; he has given away $28 billion to charity, so is now personally worth ‘only’ $56 billion.
But Jennifer, 15, Rory, 12, and Phoebe, nine, aren’t going to inherit anything like that much.
‘I don’t think that amount of money would be good for them.’
To say that Gates is socially awkward is putting it mildly. This is a man who built a multi-billion-dollar company yet seems totally unaware of the social niceties of life (pictured above: Caroline Graham with Bill)
He won’t specify what they will get, but the reports that they’ll receive ‘only’ $10 million each can’t be far off, because he concedes, ‘It will be a minuscule portion of my wealth. It will mean they have to find their own way.
'They will be given an unbelievable education and that will all be paid for. And certainly anything related to health issues we will take care of. But in terms of their income, they will have to pick a job they like and go to work. They are normal kids now. They do chores, they get pocket money.’
He is determined that his family life should be as unaffected as possible by his fortune, and that he should be a hands-on father.
‘I never took a day off in my twenties. Not one. And I’m still fanatical, but now I’m a little less fanatical. I play tennis, I play bridge, I spend time with my family. I drive myself around town in a normal Mercedes. I’ve had a Lexus. The family has a Porsche, which is a nice car that we sometimes take out. We have a minivan and that’s what we use when it’s the five of us. My eldest daughter rides horses, so we go to a lot of three-day shows. The kids are a big part of my schedule.’
'I never took a day off in my twenties. Not one. And I'm still fanatical, but now I'm a little less fanatical'
Has he succumbed to the inevitable pleas from the children for an iPad, iPhone and iPod? His face hardens: ‘They have the Windows equivalent. They have a Zune music player, which is a great Windows portable player. They are not deprived children.’
He mentions a U2 concert he attended the previous night in Seattle, which has been the talk of the town. He has been friends with Bono for years; along with his wife, he shared the cover of Time magazine with him in 2005, when the trio, dubbed ‘The Good Samaritans’ for their philanthropy, were named ‘Persons of the Year’.
‘We went to the concert with my daughter and three of her friends, so there were six of us and we took the minivan. I drove.’
Did Bono invite them backstage? A long pause, then: ‘Umm, no – actually, he stayed at our house.’ Of course.
There’s something surreal about hearing Gates talk on such a personal level. Meeting him is comparable to meeting a head of state. We’re in a conference room in the sparkling new home of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in Seattle, a $500 million glass-walled, eco-friendly office space which Gates jokes is ‘mostly the brainchild of my wife – I just signed all the cheques’.
To say that Gates is socially awkward is putting it mildly. This is a man who built a multi-billion-dollar company yet seems totally unaware of the social niceties of life. His voice is loud and oddly high-pitched. He’s in constant motion as he speaks, rocking in his chair with his arms folded protectively in front of him, tapping his toes, fiddling with a pen. He fails to look me in the eye and doesn’t engage in small talk.
I ask him whether this is it now – is Microsoft history to him, replaced in his heart by his philanthropy? He retired from the day-to-day running of Microsoft in 2008, with many believing it has since lost its edge to companies like Apple and Google.
He says, ‘My full-time work for the rest of my life is this foundation.’
A police mugshot of Gates after his arrest for driving without a licence in 1975
Will he ever return to helm Microsoft?
‘No. I’m part-time involved. But this is my job now.’
His foundation has assets worth $37.1 billion, thanks in part to contributions of shares from his mentor, American ‘uber-investor’ Warren Buffett. But forget the figures. The only thing Gates wants you to know is that he intends to give it all away.
Famously publicity-shy, he has granted this rare one-on-one interview to Live not – unsurprisingly – to talk about what non-Apple gadgets his children have, but to promote a ‘pledging conference’ for donors and partners of the GAVI Alliance (the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation, which Gates co-founded in 2000) that kicks off in London on Monday.
Hosted by David Cameron, the event marks the culmination of a drive, spearheaded by Gates, to raise $3.7 billion to vaccinate 243 million children in the world’s poorest countries against illnesses such as pneumonia and measles. Gates and Cameron are expected to announce the money has been successfully raised and, it’s hoped, will save four million lives over the next four years.
His foundation began humbly in 1994 after a double whammy that made the billionaire think about his own mortality. It was the year Gates married Melinda, 46, a former Microsoft manager, and when his much-loved mother Mary, a former teacher and businesswoman, died of breast cancer.
After Mary’s death, Gates’s father Bill Sr, feeling listless, started ploughing through the stacks of begging letters which had piled up at his son’s office, simply ‘for something to do’. He would send the requests he thought worthy to his son, who would then write the cheques, which Bill Sr would send out with brief notes. Bill Sr is now co-chair of the foundation, and still shows up for work every day, despite being 85.
In a letter to her daughter-in-law on the eve of the wedding, Mary Gates wrote, ‘From those to whom much is given, much is expected.’
Gates still has the letter.
Gates at work in 1984. As the co-founder, with Paul Allen, of Microsoft, he grew a 1975 back-room start-up into a software behemoth worth, at its peak, $400 billion
‘It was six months before my mum died, so of course we kept that. It’s at home.’
Gates decided vaccinating the world’s disadvantaged is a cost-effective, simple way to help the very poor.
‘You get more bang for your buck.’
Why not be the guy who cures cancer instead?
‘The motto of the foundation is that every life has equal value. There are more people dying of malaria than any specific cancer. When you die of malaria aged three it’s different from being in your seventies, when you might die of a heart attack or you might die of cancer. And the world is putting massive amounts into cancer, so my wealth would have had a meaningless impact on that.’
He is swift to praise the Prime Minister for increasing Britain’s foreign aid.
‘What David Cameron is doing is something to be proud of. The UK has led the way, particularly in getting value for money. Your government went and ranked the various aid groups. Some came out poorly and some came out very strongly. GAVI was ranked one of the best of all, because if you give those vaccines to the poorest of the poor, the impact on saving lives and avoiding sickness is incredible.’
Bill and Melinda Gates in India earlier this year. Their foundation has assets worth $37.1 billion. He intends to give it all away
I mildly disappoint him when I ask whether foreign aid really does go to the most deserving. What about Robert Mugabe’s henchmen skimming off millions in Zimbabwe?
‘Well, no one gives aid to Zimbabwe through the Mugabe government,’ he says sharply.
‘Charities like the World Food Programme go in on a direct basis. When we buy vaccines we are super-smart about what we pay. We get price reductions. We can track how many kids get the vaccines. People don’t stockpile vaccines. It’s not like you’re going to go to Mugabe’s mansion and you’d find polio vaccines in the basement and he’s going’ – at this point, marvellously, he breaks into a Dr Evil impression – ‘“Ha, ha, ha! I took it ALL!”’
'When you go into a ward with kids who have cholera, it's horrific'
How about countries like India, which receives billions in aid yet has 70 billionaires and a space programme?
‘Countries which receive aid do graduate,’ he insists. ‘Within a generation Korea went from being a big recipient to being a big aid donor. China used to get quite a bit of aid; now it’s aid-neutral. India in the north still needs all the help we can give in terms of helping with childhood death rates, maternal deaths and polio.
‘It is important to me to get out into the field. I went to Uttar Pradesh (in northern India) recently. It was a long way from this…’
He waves his hand around the conference room.
‘It is important to see places. When you go into a ward with kids who have cholera, it’s horrific. They are losing their vital fluids and their brains are shutting down. As a father, as a human, it’s just horrific.
‘I met this girl, Hoshman, a polio victim. She’s three years old and can’t walk and never will. She’s just beginning to realise how different her life will be from the other kids’. I spoke to her mum and her older sister. Because of the work we’ve done she will be one of the last 50 kids in India to be paralysed from polio.’
He smiles when I tell him one of his foundation workers told me how he helped pull himself across a river in Uttar Pradesh, and that while everyone in the Western world has heard of Bill Gates, in the Third World he’s a nobody.
‘Oh, absolutely. They don’t know who I am, because it doesn’t relate to their world. I went to one place with the chief minister and someone said, “Who is this guy?”, and the chief minister said, “This is a white-skinned guy I brought with me.” If you’re a person struggling to eat and stay healthy you might have heard about Michael Jordan or Muhammad Ali, but you’ll never have heard of Bill Gates.’
His passion for aid is such that he devotes his spare time to reading about it: ‘At the moment I’m reading Getting Better by Charles Kenny, and I’m going to China soon, so I’m reading The Dragon’s Gift, about the history of Chinese aid to Africa.’
Gates is a voracious reader. His famously palatial home – a £100 million, 66,000 sq ft hi-tech wonderland overlooking nearby Lake Washington – has a library packed with books. Ironically, he prefers his books in old-fashioned physical form: ‘I read a lot of obscure books and it is nice to open a book. But the electronic devices are good as well. Digital reading will completely take over. It’s lightweight and it’s fantastic for sharing. Over time it will take over.’
His pride and joy is the Codex Leicester, one of Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks, which he bought in 1994 for $30.8 million.
‘I’m lucky that I own that notebook. I’ve always been amazed by Da Vinci, because he worked out science on his own. He would work by drawing things and writing down his ideas. Of course, he designed all sorts of flying machines way before you could actually build something like that.’
He says it would be one of the first things he’d rescue from his home in a fire, but adds, ‘I have documents by Isaac Newton and Abraham Lincoln. I have some pretty nice art too. It would be a shame to lose any of that.’
He’s still inquisitive about technology. Pointing to a large whiteboard behind my head in the conference room, he gives me a tip.
‘The next big thing is definitely speech and voice recognition. You’ll be able to touch that board or speak to it and get your message to colleagues around the world. Screens are cheap.’
He has his own Twitter account and Facebook page, although ‘I had a problem with Facebook, because the friend requests got out of hand’.
He is friends with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, 27, who has already pledged to give most of his fortune away. Gates lets slip that Zuckerberg may be engaged to Priscilla Chan, his long-term girlfriend: ‘I didn’t say to Mark, “Give me all your money!” He was predisposed to do it and he came to me seeking advice.
'His fiancée Priscilla thought about education and he gave money to Newark, New Jersey, and we did a co-grant so that some of our people who had some expertise in that field could help him out. He deserves credit. I started meaningful philanthropy in my forties. He’s starting way earlier.’
I ask about his ‘legacy’, and for the first time I understand how Microsoft employees felt when Gates interrupted meetings to declare, ‘That’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard!’
‘Legacy is a stupid thing! I don’t want a legacy. If people look and see that childhood deaths dropped from nine million a year to four million because of our investment, then wow! I liken what I’m doing now to my old job. I worked with a lot of smart people; some things went well, some didn’t go so well. But when you see how what we did ended up empowering people, it’s a very cool thing.
'I want a malaria vaccine. If we get one then we’ll have to find the money to give it to everyone, but the impact would be so huge we would find a way. Understanding science and pushing the boundaries of science is what makes me immensely satisfied. What I’m doing now involves understanding maths, risk-taking. The first half of my life was good preparation for the second half.’
Gates was always described as a geek, but that seems terribly unfair in the wider context of the passions that now drive him. As I stand to leave, he laughs the label off.
‘Hey, if being a geek means you’re willing to take a 400-page book on vaccines and where they work and where they don’t, and you go off and study that and you use that to challenge people to learn more, then absolutely. I’m a geek. I plead guilty. Gladly.'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-2001697/Microsofts-Bill-Gates-A-rare-remarkable-interview-worlds-second-richest-man.html#ixzz1P5DWtiV0
