Have you ever wondered, if the world could vote, what would the election look like and what would they say about this administration/  well, this website says it all and you can draw  your own conclusions

http://www.iftheworldcouldvote.com/results

John McCain's campaign is looking for a scapegoat. It is looking for someone to blame if McCain loses on Tuesday.

And it has decided on Sarah Palin.

In recent days, a McCain "adviser" told Dana Bash of CNN: "She is a diva. She takes no advice from anyone." Imagine not taking advice from the geniuses at the McCain campaign. What could Palin be thinking? Also, a "top McCain adviser" told Mike Allen of Politico that Palin is "a whack job." Maybe she is. But who chose to put this "whack job" on the ticket? Wasn't it John McCain? And wasn't it his first presidential-level decision? And if you are a 72-year-old presidential candidate, wouldn't you expect that your running mate's fitness for high office would come under a little extra scrutiny? And, therefore, wouldn't you make your selection with care? (To say nothing about caring about the future of the nation?) McCain didn't seem to care that much. McCain admitted recently on national TV that he "didn't know her well at all" before he chose Palin.

But why not? Why didn't he get to know her better before he made his choice? It's not like he was rushed. McCain wrapped up the Republican nomination in early March. He didn't announce his choice for a running mate until late August.

Wasn't that enough time for McCain to get to know Palin? Wasn't that enough time for his crackerjack "vetters" to investigate Palin's strengths and weaknesses, check through records and published accounts, talk to a few people, and learn that she was not only a diva but a whack job diva? But McCain picked her anyway. He wanted to close the "enthusiasm gap" between himself and Barack Obama. He wanted to inject a little adrenaline into the Republican National Convention. He wanted to goose up the Republican base.

And so he chose Palin. Is she really a diva and a whack job? Could be. There are quite a few in politics. (And a few in journalism, too, though in journalism they are called "columnists.") As proof that she is, McCain aides now say Palin is "going rogue" and straying from their script. Wow. What a condemnation. McCain sticks to the script. How well is he doing? In truth, Palin's real problem is not her personality or whether she takes orders well. Her real problem is that neither she nor McCain can make a credible case that Palin is ready to assume the presidency should she need to.

And that undercuts McCain's entire campaign.

This was the deal McCain made with the devil. In exchange for energizing his base by picking Palin, he surrendered his chief selling point: that he was better prepared to run the nation in time of crisis, whether it be economic, an attack by terrorists or, as he has been talking about in recent days, fending off a nuclear war.

"The next president won't have time to get used to the office," McCain told a crowd in Miami on Wednesday. "I've been tested, my friends, I've been tested." But has Sarah Palin? I don't believe running mates win or lose elections, though some believe they can be a drag on the ticket. Lee Atwater, who was George H.W. Bush's campaign manager in 1988, told me that Dan Quayle cost the ticket 2 to 3 percentage points. But Bush won the election by 7.8 percentage points.

So, in Atwater's opinion, Bush survived his bad choice by winning the election on his own.

McCain could do the same thing. But his campaign's bad decisions have not stopped with Sarah Palin. It has made a series of questionable calls, including making Joe the Plumber the embodiment of the campaign.

Are voters really expected to warmly embrace an (unlicensed) plumber who owes back taxes and complains about the possibility of making a quarter million dollars a year? And did McCain's aides really believe so little in John McCain's own likability that they thought Joe the Plumber would be more likable? Apparently so. Which is sad.

We in the press make too much of running mates and staff and talking points and all the rest of the hubbub that accompanies a campaign.

In the end, it comes down to two candidates slugging it out.

Either McCain pulls off a victory in the last round or he doesn't.

And if he doesn't, he has nobody to blame but himself.

http://www.denverpost.com/politicswestnews/ci_10854976

Become A Good Mate Ever wonder what you could do as a boater to help keep the waterways you enjoy clean and healthy? Order our FREE DVD today and learn what you can do! The Jones Beach Power Squadron in Long Island, NY organizes volunteers for monthly waterway clean-ups and provides educational outreach to fellow boaters and the community. Check out what they’re doing at: http://wakeupjbps.net/

As a boater, you’re in a unique position to be a true steward of our oceans, lakes, and waterways.

Recreational boating means enjoying the beauty of the water -- but stop and think for a minute, and you’ll realize that the very nature of boating makes it a potential source for the most damaging types of water pollution: oil and fuel, sewage, chemicals, solid waste, and debris. Boaters can all-too-easily introduce these harmful pollutants into the environment through their everyday activities.

The good news is that even small changes in the way we maintain and operate our boats can make a big difference for aquatic environments and the amazing variety of animals and plants making their homes in the water. To help keep waterways and the ocean clean, Ocean Conservancy’s Good Mate program raises awareness, and promotes environmentally responsible boating as well as responsible marina operations.

Did you know?

• When spilled, a single quart of oil can create a two-acre oil slick that’s the size of three football fields.
  
• Releasing untreated sewage from a 20-gallon holding tank has the same impact as discharging several thousand gallons of treated sewage from a treatment plant.
  
• Many cleaning products are safe to use in our homes because household wastewater is usually treated at treatment plants. When used on a boat, they may spill or wash off directly into the water and untreated.
  
• Using dish soap on a fuel or oil spill just sinks the pollution to the bottom and into the sediment. Use oil absorbent pads instead.
  
• It can take up to 200 years for an aluminum can to degrade in the ocean.

Get Involved!

Ocean Conservancy is starting a sea change in how we all care for the ocean’s health. If everyone takes simple steps, the ocean can remain healthy and resilient for future generations. So join fellow boaters and participate in the Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup!

Order Ocean Conservancy's free Good Mate CD and learn more about what you can do to keep waterways clean and healthy for boating. We are happy to provide educational materials to boaters, boating clubs, and marinas that include tips and best practices on the following topics:

• Oil & Fuel
• Sewage
• Vessel Maintenance & Repair
• Vessel Operations
• Marine Debris

For more information or to order materials, please contact Sonya Besteiro at sbesteiro@oceanconservancy.org For additional resources, please click here for links to other sites with environmentally friendly boating tips

Conservative activists escalate 'doom and gloom' rhetoric as Nov. 4 nears

Terrorist strikes on four American cities. Russia rolling into Eastern Europe. Israel hit by a nuclear bomb. Gay marriage in every state. The end of the Boy Scouts.

All are plausible scenarios if Democrat Barack Obama is elected president, according to a new addition to the campaign conversation called "Letter from 2012 in Obama's America," produced by the conservative Christian group Focus on the Family Action.

The imagined look into the future is part of an escalation in rhetoric from Christian right activists who are trying to paint Obama in the worst possible terms as the campaign heads into the final stretch and polls show the Democrat ahead.

Although hard-edge attacks are common late in campaigns, the tenor of the strikes against Obama illustrate just how worried conservative Christian activists are about what should happen to their causes and influence if Democrats seize control of both Congress and the White House.

'Smells like desperation'
"It looks like, walks like, talks like and smells like desperation to me," said the Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell of Houston, an Obama supporter who backed President Bush in the past two elections. The Methodist pastor called the 2012 letter "false and ridiculous." He said it showed that some Christian conservative leaders fear that Obama's faith-based appeals to voters are working.

Like other political advocacy groups, Christian right groups often raise worries about an election's consequences to mobilize voters. In the early 1980s, for example, direct mail from the Moral Majority warned that Congress would turn a blind eye to "smut peddlers" dangling pornography to children.

"Everyone uses fear in the last part of a campaign, but evangelicals are especially theologically prone to those sorts of arguments," said Clyde Wilcox, a Georgetown University political scientist. "There's a long tradition of predicting doom and gloom."

But the tone this election year is sharper than usual and the volume has turned up as Nov. 4 nears.

Steve Strang, publisher of Charisma magazine, a Pentecostal publication, titled one of his recent weekly e-mails to readers, "Life As We Know It Will End If Obama is Elected."

Strang said gay rights and abortion rights would be strengthened in an Obama administration, taxes would rise and "people who hate Christianity will be emboldened to attack our freedoms."

Separately, a group called the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission has posted a series of videos on its site and on YouTube called "7 Reasons Barack Obama is not a Christian."

The commission accuses Obama of "subtle diabolical deceit" in saying he is Christian, while he believes that people can be saved through other faiths.

But among the strongest pieces this year is Focus on the Family Action's letter which has been posted on the group's Web site and making the e-mail rounds. Signed by "A Christian from 2012," it claims a series of events could logically happen based on the group's interpretation of Obama's record, Democratic Party positions, recent court rulings and other trends.

Among the claims:

·  A 6-3 liberal majority Supreme Court that results in rulings like one making gay marriage the law of the land and another forcing the Boy Scouts to "hire homosexual scoutmasters and allow them to sleep in tents with young boys." (In the imagined scenario, The Boy Scouts choose to disband rather than obey).

·  A series of domestic and international disasters based on Obama's "reluctance to send troops overseas." That includes terrorist attacks on U.S. soil that kill hundreds, Russia occupying the Baltic states and Eastern European countries including Poland and the Czech Republic, and al-Qaida overwhelming Iraq.

·  Nationalized health care with long lines for surgery and no access to hospitals for people over 80.

The goal was to "articulate the big picture," said Carrie Gordon Earll, senior director of public policy for Focus on the Family Action. "If it is a doomsday picture, then it's a realistic picture," she said.

Obama favors abortion rights and supports civil unions for same-sex couples, but says states should make their own decisions about marriage. He said he would intensify diplomatic pressure on Iran over its nuclear ambitions and add troops in Afghanistan.

On taxes, Obama has proposed an increase on the 5 percent of taxpayers who make more than $250,000 a year and advocates cuts for those who make less. His health care plan calls for the government to subsidize coverage for millions of Americans who otherwise couldn't afford it.

One of the clear targets of this latest conservative Christian push against the Democrat is younger evangelicals who might be considering him. The letter posits that young evangelicals provide the margin that let Obama defeat John McCain. But Margaret Feinberg, a Denver-area evangelical author, predicted failure.

"Young evangelicals are tired — like most people at this point in the election — and rhetoric which is fear-based, strong-arms the listener, and states opinion as fact will only polarize rather than further the informed, balanced discussion that younger voters are hungry for," she said.

Last-minute push?
In an interview, Strang said there are fewer state ballot measures to motivate conservative voters this election year and that the financial meltdown is distracting some voters from the abortion issue. But he said a last-minute push by conservative Christians in 2004 was key to Bush's re-election and predicted they could play the same role in 2008.

Kim Conger, a political scientist at Iowa State University, said a late push for evangelical voters did help Bush in 2004, "but it is a very different thing than getting people excited about John McCain," even with Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice presidential pick.

Phil Burress, head of the Ohio-based Citizens for Community Values, said the dynamics were quite different in 2004, when conservative Christians spent some energy calling Democrat John Kerry a flip-flopper but were mostly motivated by enthusiasm for George W. Bush.

Now, there is less excitement about McCain than fear of an Obama presidency, Burress said.

"This reminds me of when I was a school kid, when I had to go out in the hall and bury my head in my hands because of the atom bomb," he said.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27369927/

"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."  Mahatma Gandhi 

Hillerman, author of the acclaimed Navajo Tribal Police mystery novels and creator of two of the unlikeliest of literary heroes — Navajo police officers Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee — died Sunday of pulmonary failure. He was 83.

Hillerman's daughter, Anne Hillerman, said her father's health had been declining in the last couple years and that he was at Presbyterian Hospital in Albuquerque when he died at about 3 p.m.

Hillerman lived through two heart attacks and surgeries for prostate and bladder cancer. He kept tapping at his keyboard even as his eyes began to dim, as his hearing faded, as rheumatoid arthritis turned his hands into claws.

"I'm getting old," he declared in 2002, "but I still like to write."

Anne Hillerman said Sunday that her father was a born storyteller.

"He had such a wonderful, wonderful curiosity about the world," she said. "He could take little details and bring them to life, not just in his books, but in conversation, too."

Lt. Joe Leaphorn, introduced in The Blessing Way in 1970, was an experienced police officer who understood, but did not share, his people's traditional belief in a rich spirit world. Officer Jim Chee, introduced in People of Darkness in 1978, was a younger officer studying to become a "hathaali" — Navajo for "shaman."

Together, they struggled daily to bridge the cultural divide between the dominant Anglo society and the impoverished people who call themselves the Dineh.

Hillerman's commercial breakthrough was Skinwalkers, published in 1987 — the first time he put both characters and their divergent world views in the same book. It sold 430,000 hardcover copies, paving the way for A Thief of Time, which made several best seller lists. In all, he wrote 18 books in the Navajo series, the most recent titled The Shape Shifter.

Each is characterized by an unadorned writing style, intricate plotting, memorable characterization and vivid descriptions of Indian rituals and of the vast plateau of the Navajo reservation in the Four Corners region of the Southwest.

The most acclaimed of them, including Talking God and The Coyote Waits, are subtle explorations of human nature and the conflict between cultural assimilation and the pull of the old ways.

"I want Americans to stop thinking of Navajos as primitive persons, to understand that they are sophisticated and complicated," Hillerman once said.

Occasionally, he was accused of exploiting his knowledge of Navajo culture for personal gain, but in 1987, the Navajo Tribal Council honored him with its Special Friend of the Dineh award. He took greater pride in that, he often said, than in the many awards bestowed by his peers, including the Golden Spur Award from Western Writers of America and the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America, which elected him its president.

Hollywood was less kind to Hillerman. Its adaptation of his 1981 novel, Dark Wind, with Lou Diamond Phillips and Fred Ward regrettably cast as Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn, was a bomb.

Although Hillerman was best-known for the Navajo series, he wrote more than 30 books, including a novel for young people; the memoir, Seldom Disappointed; and books on the history and natural beauty of his beloved Southwest.

"Those places that stir me are empty and lonely," he wrote in The Spell of New Mexico, a collection of his essays. "They invoke a sense of both space and strangeness, and all have about them a sort of fierce inhospitality."

He also edited or contributed to more than a dozen other books including crime and history anthologies and books on the craft of writing.

Born May 27, 1925, in Sacred Heart, Okla., population 50, Tony Hillerman was the son of August and Lucy Grove Hillerman. They were farmers who also ran a small store. It was there that young Tony listened spellbound to locals who gathered to tell their stories.

The teacher at Sacred Heart's one-room school house was rumored to be a member of the Ku Klux Klan, so Tony's parents sent him and his brother, Barney, to St. Mary's Academy, a school for Potawatomie Indian girls near Asher, Okla. It was at St. Mary's that he developed a lifelong respect for Indian culture — and an appreciation of what it means to be an outsider in your own land.

In 1943, he interrupted his education at the University of Oklahoma to join the Army. He lugged his mortar ashore at D-Day with the 103rd Infantry Division and was severely wounded in battle at Alsace, France. He returned from Europe a genuine war hero with a Silver Star with Oak Leaf Cluster, temporary blindness and two shattered legs that never stopped causing him pain.

He returned to the university for his degree and, in 1948, married Marie Unzer. Together, they raised six children, five of them adopted.

As a young man, he farmed, drove a truck, toiled as an oil field roughneck and worked as a reporter and editor for the Borger News-Herald in Borger, Texas; the Morning Press-Constitution in Lawton, Okla.; United Press International in Oklahoma City; and the Santa Fe New Mexican, where he rose to executive editor. He quit in 1962 to earn a master's degree from the University of New Mexico, where he later taught journalism and eventually became chairman of the journalism department. In 1993, he was inducted into the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame.

Hillerman was still teaching when he wrote his first novel, Blessing Way. A story that always made him chuckle: His first agent advised him that if he wanted to get published, he would have to "get rid of that Indian stuff." Hillerman is survived by his wife, Marie, and their six children. Services are pending.

http://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2008-10-27-hillerman-obit_N.htm

 

Recently, President Bush asked his Cabinet to consider protecting several ecologically important ocean areas in the Central and Western Pacific. These include seven remote US territories in the Central Pacific, three islands in the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas, the world’s smallest atoll in American Samoa, and the vibrant, productive, and unique coral reefs and ocean ecosystems around them. These islands are among the most intact natural coral reef ecosystems remaining in the Pacific. Countless seabirds, dolphins, sea turtles, fishes, corals, and creatures yet to be discovered have a chance at undisturbed survival, free of the threats that are decimating ocean life elsewhere but only if the President gives full protection to these areas. The Administration is poised to protect a vast region of the Pacific Ocean - an area three times the size of Texas and larger than all our national parks combined. It’s up to each of us to make sure this plan for the Pacific becomes a reality and that full protections are put in place for these valuable, pristine, and unique ocean gems. Please urge the President to create the world’s largest marine conservation area, and tell him that these ocean gems must have full protection. Right now, President Bush is under intense pressure from industry to allow destructive uses of these ocean treasures, which is why he needs to hear from you by Sunday, October 26th! Please join us in urging the President to preserve these Yosemites of the sea for future generations. These remaining havens for coral reefs, fish, and migratory birds in the Pacific desperately need protection. They are among the most intact natural coral reef ecosystems remaining in the Pacific. Write to President Bush before Sunday, October 26th, and urge him to grant full protection to these ocean treasures! Countless seabirds, dolphins, sea turtles, fishes, corals, and creatures yet to be discovered have a chance at undisturbed survival, free of the threats that are decimating ocean life elsewhere, but only if the President gives full protection to these areas. Thank you for your help in protecting our ocean treasures. For more information on these plans for the Pacific please visit our website. Sincerely, Dennis Heinemann, PhD Vice President, Ocean Climate Change Program Ocean Conservancy

Experts are warning of an uptick in malware-laced spam that pretends to be airline ticket invoices and boarding passes.

In a reprise of a summer tactic, hackers are trying to trick people into infecting their PCs with malware by sending them e-mail that poses as bogus airline ticket invoices and boarding passes, a security company said Monday.

The spam, which claims to be from Continental Airlines Inc. , thanks the recipient for using a new "Buy flight ticket Online" service, provides a log-in username and password, and says the recipient's credit card has been charged more than US$900, according to Trend Micro Inc.'s research.

An attached .zip file, the message says, includes an invoice and "flight ticket." In fact, noted Trend Micro, the archive file contains an executable file "e-ticket.doc.exe," that is actually a Windows worm that downloads and installs other attack code to the PC.

"It's the old double-extension trick to hopefully fool the user to double-click the attachment," said Joey Costoya, a Trend Micro researcher, in an entry to the company's security blog . "The phrase'Your credit card has been charged ...' will just add more worry for the user, convincing him more to examine [and] double-click the'flight details'," Costoya added.

An almost-identical attack hit consumers last July when hackers sent spam that masqueraded as mail from Delta Air Lines Inc. and Northwest Airlines Corp. Among the few differences: The current campaign has dramatically bumped up the amount supposedly charged to recipients' credit cards. In July, the figures were often in the $400 range.

Airline ticket prices jumped this summer as fuel costs climbed, a fact Continental recognized when it posted its third-quarter earnings last Friday. The airline, which reported a net loss of $236 million for the quarter, blamed both high fuel prices and Hurricane Ike for its poor performance.

According to Continental, its jet fuel averaged $3.49 per gallon during the quarter, up from $2.16, a 62% increase. Fuel prices peaked at $4.21 per gallon during the period, Continental said.

The malware used in July also differed from the attack code spotted by Trend Micro. Three months ago, hackers tried to plant an identity-stealing Trojan horse on users' Windows PCs. The Trojan had made a name for itself in 2007 as the malware used to rip off more than 1.6 million customer records from Monster Worldwide Inc. , the company that runs the popular Monster.com job site.

  http://www.pcworld.com/article/152491/article.html?tk=nl_spxnws

There is no telling what you will see sailing off San Diego or in San Diego Bay.  It’s not unusual to cross path with a warship, an aircraft carrier, a classic boat or Tall Ship or even a nuclear submarine.

 

For many years, San Diego was, the base for the US America’s cup team and we still have a few America’s Cup 12M sailing around on a daily basis or the replica of the original America schooner.

 

This past weekend was no exception.  As we sailed passed Point Loma, we could see what looked like a large trimaran south of us.  I rushed down into the cabin, grabbed a pair of binoculars and to our amazement, we could see a huge trimaran, on the sail, in large letters the name Oracle and the BMW logo.  There she was BMW Oracle the new 90ft trimaran launched barely a few weeks ago to Challenge Alinghi for the America’s Cup.

 

They were doing sea trials and slowly increasing the sail load, that allowed us to sail around her and get amazing shots, we were all in awe.  She is huge, the largest multihull I have ever seen, not the largest, but how often do you get to see one of these extreme racing machines on the water, sailing and at close range.

 

BMW Oracle Racings new 90 foot carbon fiber multihull was launched in Fidalgo Bay after more than 9 months of building. To design this new high-tech trimaran the team partnered with Van Peteghem & Lauriot Prévost of France, and one of the most respected skippers in multihull racing, YachtPal Franck Cammas.

 

Russell Coutts, who will skipper the new America's Cup boat said: “We have learned a lot and developed a lot of new technology in building this boat and I’m really looking forward to testing it on the water. It is going to be an interesting challenge and we will need to build up slowly and carefully to testing its full potential.” The U.S. team expects sea trials to begin in early September, once the fitting out is complete, and structural load tests are conducted at dockside.

 

 

Tell officials at the Department of Interior just how bad this rule is, not just for right whales, but for all endangered species. I want to thank a number of you for taking action to protect right whales and other endangered species that are under attack. In September, we asked you and many other members of our Ocean Action Network to take a stand against a damaging proposal that would change the way the Endangered Species Act is carried out, and you heeded our call. Close to 5,000 people wrote to their elected officials in Congress demanding that the public be given more time to consider these proposed changes and provide feedback. With the help of people like you, that message got through loud and clear. The Department of Interior extended their deadline to October 15th, giving the public more time to offer invaluable comments. Now we need you to tell officials at the Department of Interior just how bad this rule is, not just for right whales, but for all endangered species. Take action by 5 p.m. EDT, October 15th, before the deadline for comments closes! Among several of the proposed changes is one that would allow government agencies to decide for themselves whether endangered species like the right whale could be harmed by their actions. This is an unacceptable risk for right whales and other endangered species. Tell the Department of Interior to send this ill-conceived rule back to the drawing board. Thank you for your support, Vicki Cornish Director, Marine Wildlife Conservation Ocean Conservancy PS - For more information on the proposed rule visit our website.

CEO --Chief Embezzlement Officer.

CFO-- Corporate Fraud Officer.

BULL MARKET -- A random market movement causing an investor to mistake Himself for a financial genius.

BEAR MARKET -- A 6 to 18 month period when the kids get no allowance, The wife gets no jewelry, and the husband gets no sex.

VALUE INVESTING -- The art of buying low and selling lower.

P/E RATIO -- The percentage of investors wetting their pants as the Market keeps crashing.

BROKER -- What my broker has made me.

STANDARD & POOR -- Your life in a nutshell.

STOCK ANALYST -- Idiot who just downgraded your stock.

STOCK SPLIT -- When your ex-wife and her lawyer split your assets Equally between themselves.

FINANCIAL PLANNER -- A guy whose phone has been disconnected.

MARKET CORRECTION -- The day after you buy stocks.

CASH FLOW -- The movement your money makes as it disappears down the toilet.

YAHOO -- What you yell after selling it to some poor sucker for $240 per Share.

WINDOWS -- What you jump out of when you're the sucker who bought Yahoo @ $240 per share.

INSTITUTIONAL INVESTOR -- Past year investor who's now locked up in a Nuthouse.

PROFIT -- An archaic word no longer in use.

Iowa-based CIS Internet Services, a small ISP, will likely never see the $236 million awarded to them by a federal judge, but there is at least the satisfaction of watching a pair of spammers get clobbered.

By 2003, CIS was handling 500 million spam emails daily from several spammers, using up customer bandwidth and forcing the ISP to add servers to handle the load. Why was a small-town Iowa ISP such a heavy target? Best guess is their cis.net domain is similar to CompuServe’s cis.com domain.

An Arizona couple appear to have made a similar mistake and were ordered by a federal judge to pay CIS $10 per bulk email sent, which adds up to $236 million. While some think that seems excessive, courts are feeling they have to get tougher with spammers because, once a judgment is handed down, they tend to disappear and never pay their penalties. They often reemerge later, though.

Henry Perez and Suzanne Bartok ran their spam operation the way you might expect Joy and Darnell to on “My Name Is Earl”: They used a software program called Bulk Mailing 4 Dummies. 

Google CEO Eric Schmidt called the Internet a "Cesspool" Wednesday in reference to the quality of content and the amount of false information residing on it. This according to AdAge is a subject he spoke about with an audience of magazine executives at Google's campus, where an annual industry conference was taking place.  Schmidt stressed that "Brands are the solution, not the problem...Brands are how you sort out the Cesspool."
http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2008/10/08/this-cesspool-we-call-the-internet

OCTOBER 2008 The Mysterious Monk Only about 1,200 Hawaiian monk seals remain -- and their numbers are dwindling at the rate of four percent a year. What makes this statistic even more poignant is that this seal is the only endangered marine mammal whose entire range -- past and present -- lies within our borders.  Learn more about what makes this seal one of the truly special species on Earth.  Vessel Ahead:  Can You Save the Right Whale? Get your mouse ready to save the whale!  Try your hand at our free online game for kids that teaches them about the challenges that right whales face along the migratory path.  Learn more about right whales at the Smithsonian's new Sant Ocean Hall in Washington, D.C. -- made possible in part by a contribution from Ocean Conservancy.  Fish Vote '08:  Who's on Your Plate this Year? Cast your vote and tell us which fish you would like to work on with us so that we can ensure there are fish in our future. View the candidates, consider their platforms and cast your vote today! Tell your friends and family to vote: Send them the Fish Vote '08 eCard. Thank you to the Coastal Cleanup Volunteers! On Saturday, September 20th, hundreds of thousands of volunteers descended on coasts and waterways across the globe to clean up our ocean for the International Coastal Cleanup.  Were you one of them?  Share your cleanup stories, photos and weirdest finds with us. Spice Things Up:  Check Out Ocean Conservancy Magazine What's on your dinner menu tonight? Spice things up with delicious recipes like pan-grilled Florida snapper with avocado-strawberry salsa or grilled fennel-rubbed black cod. The recipes are a small taste of what's offered in Ocean Conservancy magazine. Join Ocean Conservancy today to receive our quarterly magazine. Learn more >>    Six Degrees to the Ocean Major League Baseball's Playoff month, October, has finally arrived. Learn how baseball is connected to the ocean in -- you guessed it -- fewer than six steps. Have a Six Degrees to the Ocean idea to share with us?  Send us a challenging headline for the next issue and we'll put it to the test!   What We're Up to Ocean Conservancy Welcomes First-Ever Ship Speed Restrictions around East Coast Ports to Save Endangered North Atlantic Right Whales   Government Closer to Protecting Habitat for Hawaiian Monk Seals in the Main Hawaiian Islands International Fishery Managers Punt on Shark & Skate Conservation You Can Help Click Wines' Flying Fish Merlot celebrates the spirit of the region's famed sockeye salmon, made from grapes grown in Washington's Columbia Valley. Available in restaurants around the country, this wine will soon be available in stores. Ocean Conservancy receives $1 per case from the sale of Flying Fish Merlot.   What We're Watching Ocean Conservancy has teamed up with Emeril Lagasse in his new show Emeril Green, on Discovery's Planet Green Channel. Emeril investigates sustainable seafood with the help of Ocean Conservancy in an upcoming episode. Keep an eye on our homepage for air dates. Tell us: What are you watching?  Start a Conversation We welcome your thoughts and suggestions for improving this newsletter. Have friends who might find this ocean news interesting? Keep them informed by forwarding this email.

Hoax prompts users to install new software before viewing their video

Savvy Internet users know that downloading unsolicited computer programs is one of the most dangerous things you can do online. It puts you at great risk for a virus or another time bomb from a hacker.

But even some sophisticated surfers could get taken in by a sneaky new attack in which criminals create fake YouTube pages — dead-on replicas of the real site — to push their malicious software and make it look like it's safe stuff coming from a trusted source.

A program circulating online helps hackers build those fake pages. Users who follow an e-mail pointing them to one of the pages would see an error message that claims the video they want won't play without installing new software first. That error message includes a link the hacker has provided to a malicious program, which delivers a virus.

Even worse: once the computer is infected, it's simple for the hacker to silently redirect the victims to a real YouTube page to see videos they were hoping to see — and hide the crime.

"It's spot-on accurate, and that is scary," said Jamz Yaneza, threat research manager for security software company Trend Micro Inc. "If I were watching YouTube videos all day I would probably click on this one."

The tactic itself isn't new: There's a constant push by criminals to build more convincing spoofs of legitimate sites to trick people into downloading harmful software. And the latest attacks don't target any vulnerability in the YouTube site.

But it highlights the fact that criminals are getting better at creating bogus sites and developing so-called "social engineering" methods to fool people.

Fortunately, truly alert Internet users can still see the telltale warning signs with the fake YouTube pages. For one, the Web browser won't show the real YouTube's Internet address. And to even see the malicious page, you have to first follow a link that's sent to you, which is often a tip-off that you should independently verify whether the site is legitimate.

PS:  I was almost caught myself by a bogus My Space page.  as soon as the page opened, a window popped up looking like a Microsoft Windows update page.  The IP address of the pagedid not look right and I could not closed the pop up window, which really and rightly so made me suspicious.

After years of battling crippling premiums and agonizing deductibles, local resident Michael Haige finally succumbed this week to the health insurance policy that had ravaged his adult life.

A healthy Michael Haige and his wife, six months before his courageous struggle with health insurance began.

Haige, who had suffered from limited medical coverage for nearly a decade, passed away early Monday morning. According to sources, the 46-year-old was laid to rest at Fairplains cemetery, surrounded by friends, family members, and more than $300,000 of mounting debt.

"I miss Michael every single day, but at least he can finally rest now," said Sheila Haige, who watched as insurance rates ate away at her husband over time. "What Michael went through, the humiliating forms, the invasive background checks, the complete loss of dignity and hope—I wouldn't wish that kind of torture on anyone."

Once a healthy and happy father of two, Haige saw his life forever change seven years ago when health insurance professionals diagnosed him with a preexisting condition. As months passed and his line of credit continued to deteriorate, the former high school football coach would experience excruciating headaches and bouts of nausea every time another hospital bill arrived.

"My dad always seemed invincible, like there was nothing in the world that could hurt him," son Ryan Haige said. "But then, one night, I found him bent over a stack of UB-92 and HCFA forms, and he was crying. I'd never seen my father look so scared in all my life."

Added Ryan, "Making those payments each month—it was killing him."

While family members refused to look at Haige's insurance plan as a death sentence, it soon became clear that their loved one was facing the biggest fight of his life. Countless visits to doctors, claims adjusters, and loan officers proved futile, with Haige being told at every turn that his case was hopeless.

"They said there was nothing they could do for him, that modern medicine was powerless against this monster," Sheila Haige said. "Still, Michael never gave up. He kept saying that he was going to beat the odds, that he was going to find some way to get coverage."

According to an independent study released last month by the Mayo Clinic, health insurance is the nation's No. 2 cause of death, claiming the lives of some 400,000 Americans each year. A silent killer, health insurance often strikes without warning, its harmful and profit-based policies avoiding detection until it is far too late. Although the cruel bureaucratic disorder does not discriminate, statistics have shown that senior citizens, young dependents, and those woefully underemployed are most at risk.

"I can't tell you the number of patients I've had to deliver the bad news to over the years," said Haige's longtime family physician, Dr. Howard Silverman. "It's never easy to look someone in the eye and tell them it's going to have to be out-of-pocket. For most of these poor people, prayer is the only hope."

Toward the end of Haige's seven-year ordeal, family members said, the once loving husband and father had become an empty husk of his former self.

"I remember the last thing he ever said to me," said eldest son Mark Haige, holding a small picture of his father during happier times, before the endless battery of co-pays began. "He took my hand in his, and he said, 'Son, promise me you'll never sign up for a high-deductible, network-model HMO.'"

While still angry and in shock over Michael's premature passing, Sheila and her two children say the whole experience has taught them the importance of family.

"If Dad were still with us, I know he would want us to be here, at home, supporting Mom," Mark Haige said. "She really hasn't been doing so well ever since Bankers Life and Casualty denied her life insurance claim." http://www.theonion.com/content/news/man_succumbs_to_7_year_battle_with