Things In The News #01

http://www.nytimes.c...29honduras.html
Honduran President Is Ousted in Military Coup
By ELISABETH MALKIN
Published: June 28, 2009

MEXICO CITY - President Manuel Zelaya of Honduras was ousted by the army on Sunday, capping months of tensions over his efforts to lift presidential term limits.

In the first military coup in Central America since the end of the cold war, soldiers stormed the presidential palace in the capital, Tegucigalpa, early in the morning, disarming the presidential guard, waking Mr. Zelaya and putting him on a plane to Costa Rica.

Mr. Zelaya, a leftist aligned with President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, angrily denounced the coup as illegal. "I am the president of Honduras," he insisted at the airport in San José, Costa Rica, still wearing his pajamas.

Later Sunday the Honduran Congress voted him out of office, replacing him with the president of Congress, Roberto Micheletti.

The military offered no public explanation for its actions, but the Supreme Court issued a statement saying that the military had acted to defend the law against "those who had publicly spoken out and acted against the Constitution's provisions."

Leaders across the hemisphere, however, denounced the coup, which American officials on Sunday said they had been working for several days to avert.

President Obama said he was deeply concerned and in a statement called on Honduran officials "to respect democratic norms, the rule of law and the tenets of the Inter-American Democratic charter.

"Any existing tensions and disputes must be resolved peacefully through dialogue free from any outside interference," he said. His quick condemnation offered a sharp contrast with the actions of the Bush administration, which in 2002 offered a rapid, tacit endorsement of a short-lived coup against Mr. Chávez.

The Organization of American States issued a statement calling for Mr. Zelaya's return and said it would not recognize any other government. The organization's secretary general, José Miguel Insulza, called an emergency meeting of the group to weigh further actions.

The arrest of Mr. Zelaya was the culmination of a battle that had been simmering for weeks over a referendum, which was to have taken place Sunday, that he hoped would lead to a revision of the Constitution. Critics said it was part of an illegal attempt by Mr. Zelaya to defy the Constitution's limit of a single four-year term for the president.

Early this month, the Supreme Court agreed, declaring the referendum unconstitutional, and Congress followed suit last week. In the last few weeks, supporters and opponents of the president have held competing demonstrations. On Thursday, Mr. Zelaya led a group of protesters to an Air Force base and seized the ballots, which the prosecutor's office and the electoral tribunal had ordered confiscated.

When the army refused to help organize the vote, he fired the armed forces commander, Gen. Romeo Vásquez. The Supreme Court ruled the firing illegal and reinstated General Vásquez.

As the crisis escalated, American officials began in the last few days to talk with Honduran government and military officials in an effort to head off a possible coup. A senior administration official, who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity, said the military broke off those discussions on Sunday.

The two nations have long had a close military relationship, with an American military task force stationed at a Honduran air base about 50 miles northwest of Tegucigalpa. The unit focuses on training Honduran military forces, counternarcotics operations, search and rescue, and disaster relief missions throughout Central America.

In Costa Rica, Mr. Zelaya told the Venezuelan channel Telesur that he had been awoken by gunshots. Masked soldiers took his cellphone, shoved him into a van and took him to an air force base, where he was put on a plane. He said he did not know that he was being taken to Costa Rica until he landed at the airport in San José.

"They are creating a monster they will not be able to contain," he told a local television station in San José. "A usurper government, that emerges by force, cannot be accepted, will not be accepted by any country."

Electricity was cut off for much of the day in Tegucigalpa on Sunday, in what local reports suggested was on military orders. Tanks patrolled the streets and military planes flew overhead. Soldiers guarded the main government buildings, residents said.

A nationwide curfew was imposed overnight starting at 9 p.m.

At the Salvadoran border, an immigration official allowed passage into Honduras Sunday night with a warning: "Be careful. We don't know what's going on in there."

The military also appeared to be moving against Mr. Zelaya's allies. Local media reported that Foreign Minister Patricia Rodas and the mayor of San Pedro Sula, the country's second largest city, had been detained at military bases.

Church services were canceled and most people stayed home. Several thousand protesters supporting the president faced off against soldiers outside the presidential palace, burning tires.

The government television station and a television station that supports the president were taken off the air. Television and radio stations broadcast no news. Only wealthy Hondurans with access to the Internet and cable television were able to follow the day's events.

The Congress met in an emergency session on Sunday afternoon and voted to accept what was said to be a letter of resignation from the president. Mr. Zelaya, whose term officially ends in January, later assured reporters that he had written no such letter.

Obama administration officials said they were working with other members of the Organization of American States to ratchet up pressure on the Honduran military to end the coup and dismissed the prospect of outside military intervention in the matter.

"We think this can be resolved through dialogue," said the senior administration official. However, he admitted that the Honduran military was not responding to calls from the American government.

The officials also dismissed allegations by Mr. Chávez that the coup had been orchestrated by the United States. They said that the Obama administration considered Mr. Zelaya the constitutional leader of Honduras and that Washington had been consistent in its demands for a peaceful resolution to the brewing crisis.

Honduras has had a civilian government since 1982. But as in much of Central America, the military is still a powerful force behind the scenes. The last coup in the region occurred in Guatemala in 1983, when the military overthrew the government headed by Gen. Efraín Ríos Montt.

Mr. Zelaya, 56, a rancher who often appears in cowboy boots and a western hat, has the support of labor unions and the poor. But the middle class and the wealthy business community fear he wants to introduce Mr. Chávez's brand of socialist populism into the country, one of Latin America's poorest.
 
Bernie Madoff gets mximum penalty of 150 years in prison.

http://www.guardian....adoff-editorial
Bernie Madoff: Just rewards
Editorial
The Guardian, Tuesday 30 June 2009

Everything about Bernie Madoff was too good to be true, from the returns he offered, to the size of his Ponzi scheme (at $65bn, the biggest in history), to the Dickensian aptness of his surname (Made-off, indeed). Unsurprisingly, he became the public face of the Age of Irresponsibility and the butt of countless one-liners. All this was no more than a swindler's just desserts. No wonder the courtroom cheered yesterday as the 71-year-old conman was sentenced to 150 years in jail, or that judge Denny Chin described his crimes as "extraordinarily evil".

Until his arrest and ostracism last December, Mr Madoff was not a fraudster - but a pillar of the Wall Street community. He even served as a chairman of the Nasdaq stock exchange. Besides, to have created such a large scam and kept it going for such a long time required accomplices - and blind belief on the part of investors. The Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel called Mr Madoff "God" and, on the strength of just two meetings, handed over not only his life savings, but those of his wife and a $15m chunk from his charitable foundation, too. Mr Wiesel - who now refers to his former fund manager as "thief, scoundrel, criminal" - was not alone. Mr Madoff's victims believed he could deliver returns that were too good to be true, and did not ask how or why. Yes, there was slack regulation - but, harsh as it sounds, one reason why the fraudster suckered so many people was because so many people were willing to be suckers.

Nor was Mr Madoff a lone rogue. As the Financial Times reported three months ago, "virtually every week has brought at least one new Ponzi scheme charge" from US authorities. The problem is that the culture of investment is not so different from that of Ponzi fraud. Swindlers and legitimate fund managers both project an image of respectability and stability - and they both make promises about how much money they can make for clients. But while other, legal fund managers did not necessarily do anything criminal, they too have lost billions placed with them by investors savings for holidays or retirements.

The Madoff case throws an interesting light on the fragility of trust in financial markets. Mervyn King, the head of the Bank of England, talked a few days ago about how faith could be restored in a world where "my word is my bond" had been replaced by "my word is my CDO squared". But investors always take a leap of faith in those who handle their money. In good years, their trust is rewarded; in bad years, not. It may be hard to believe this in 2009, but that faith can be replenished. All it takes is for time to pass and memories to fade. And then the bubbles begin again.

People are wondering if Madoff's family will be prosecuted for their involvement.
http://www.dailymail...on-swindle.html
How much DID Bernie Madoff's wife and sons know about his eye-popping $50billion swindle?
By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 10:22 AM on 16th December 2008

His wife is a co-trustee of his family foundation and regularly entertained her husband's clients.

And his sons Mark and Andrew occupied senior positions at his firm, along with his brother Peter.

So just how much did the Madoff family know about what is rapidly becoming the world's biggest financial fraud?

That's what investigators want to know.

As the nuclear fallout from Bernard Madoff's shocking $50billion Ponzi scheme ripples through the worlds of finance, Hollywood, and charitable foundations, Madoff himself has insisted the deception was 'all his fault', according to a criminal complaint filed last week.

But the sheer scale of the paperwork involved to carry out such a scam left investigators sceptical.

Now his wife Ruth is coming under scrutiny from investigators as to how much she knew about his business and whether she helped him to raise money from their social network of wealthy individuals.

Mrs Madoff was regularly seen with her husband, entertaining at their three multi-million-dollar homes and the six golf clubs of which they were members.

She accompanied him to charity dinners, often among the elite Jewish fraternity in New York, and is a co-trustee of the $19 million Madoff Family Foundation.

She has not been charged and her lawyer Ike Sorkin said: 'We are in no position to tell the investigators what to look at.'

New York investigators are also keen to find out exactly how much Mr Madoff's two sons, Mark and Andrew, knew about his Ponzi scheme.

It is reported that they blew the whistle on him to the FBI after their father told them he had lost $50 billion.

They have not been allowed to see or speak to their father since they brought in the authorities on Thursday night.

Last night a lawyer for the brothers stated they had no knowledge of any alleged fraud before their father's shocking revelation at a family meeting last week.

The lawyer also insisted neither brother was involved in the Madoff firm's asset management business.

Mark, 44, and Andrew, 42, both have worked at the firm since they were in their 20s.

They supervised the firm's stock-trading desks - which, so far, have not been implicated in the fraud.

The New York Times has quoted sources claiming the pair have been told they are not being targeted in the investigation, but are being questioned as witnesses only.

The brothers were 'shocked' to learn of their father's deception, their lawyer said - adding they had contacted authorities immediately on hearing the news.

Employees of the firm have also spoken of the family's apparent shock at hearing the news.

The lawyer also claimed the brothers were among the victims of the scheme. The New York Times has reported that one of the brothers had a 'substantial' amount of money invested in the accounts his father managed.

The sons have promised they will continue to cooperate fully with the investigation.

Madoff's brother Peter, also occupying a senior position at the firm, has not been told by investigators that he is being targeted, his lawyer was quoted as saying yesterday.

He also expected to continue cooperation, the lawyer said.

Madoff's wife is claiming that she was deceived too.
http://www.nydailyne..._years_in_.html
Full statement: Bernie Madoff's wife Ruth breaks silence after husband sentenced to 150 yrs. in jail
Updated Monday, June 29th 2009, 2:53 PM

I am breaking my silence now, because my reluctance to speak has been interpreted as indifference or lack of sympathy for the victims of my husband Bernie's crime, which is exactly the opposite of the truth.

From the moment I learned from my husband that he had committed an enormous fraud, I have had two thoughts - first, that so many people who trusted him would be ruined financially and emotionally, and second, that my life with the man I have known for over 50 years was over. Many of my husband's investors were my close friends and family. And in the days since December, I have read, with immense pain, the wrenching stories of people whose life savings have evaporated because of his crime.

My husband was the one we (and I include myself) respected and trusted with our lives and our livelihoods, often for many, many years, and who was respected in the securities industry as well. Then there is the other man who stunned us all with his confession and is responsible for this terrible situation in which so many now find themselves. Lives have been upended and futures have been taken away. All those touched by this fraud feel betrayed; disbelieving the nightmare they woke to. I am embarrassed and ashamed. Like everyone else, I feel betrayed and confused. The man who committed this horrible fraud is not the man whom I have known for all these years.

In the end, to say that I feel devastated for the many whom my husband has destroyed is truly inadequate. Nothing I can say seems sufficient regarding the daily suffering that all those innocent people are enduring because of my husband. But if it matters to them at all, please know that not a day goes by when I don't ache over the stories that I have heard and read.
 
14 Year Old Girl, Sole Survivor of Yemeni Air crash into Indian Ocean, near Madagascar. She survives by clinging onto wreckage for 13 hours.

I saw this report on TV. The French said that this type of airliner is banned from flying in Europe dues to safety issues. The Yemeni's must not have been concerned about the potential for disaster.

BBC News - Girl survives Yemen plane crash
Girl survives Yemen plane crash
last updated at 03:23 GMT, Wednesday, 1 July 2009 04:23 UK

A French rescuer said he had spotted the 14-year-old-girl in choppy waters amid bodies and wreckage. He said she was shaking as he pulled her up.

The girl was taken to a hospital in capital of the Comoros, Moroni. Five bodies have also been recovered.

The plane came down in bad weather with about 153 people on board on Tuesday.

The Airbus 310 was attempting a second landing when it crashed.

The rescuer told France's Europe 1 radio of finding the girl.

"We tried to throw a life buoy. She could not grab it. I had to jump in the water to get her," he said.

"She was shaking, shaking. We put four sheets on her. We gave her hot, sugary water. We simply asked her name, village."

Dr Ada Mansour, who treated the child in hospital, told AFP she was conscious and talking, but added: "We are trying to warm her up because she was freezing."

It is believed the girl lives in Marseille and was travelling with her mother to the Comoros.

There were 66 French nationals on board, and the French military were involved in the search.

Most of the plane's passengers had flown on a different Yemenia aircraft from Paris or Marseille before boarding flight IY626 in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen.

The French transport ministry had earlier said the Airbus 310 plane had been banned from France because of "irregularities".

The crash was the second involving an Airbus aircraft in recent weeks. On 1 June an Air France Airbus 330 travelling from Rio de Janeiro to Paris plunged into the Atlantic, killing all 228 people on board.

An airline spokesman said poor weather was more likely to have been a factor in the crash than the condition of the plane.

Yemeni Transport Minister Khaled Ibrahim al-Wazeer also told Reuters news agency that the plane had recently undergone a thorough inspection overseen by Airbus and conformed to international standards.

Gen Bruno de Bourdoncle de Saint-Salvy, French naval commander in the Indian Ocean, said the plane had come down about 15km (eight nautical miles) north of the Comoran coast.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090701/ap_on_re_af/yemen_plane_crash
Teen clung to Comoros plane wreckage for 13 hours
By TOM MALITI and ANGELA CHARLTON, Associated Press Writers Tom Maliti And Angela Charlton, Associated Press Writers – Wed Jul 1, 5:40 pm ET
MORONI, Comoros – The lone survivor of a Yemeni jetliner crash, who clung to wreckage for 13 hours before being rescued, lay in a hospital bed with a broken collarbone Wednesday, asking for little — except for a chance to see her mother.

But relatives said 14-year-old Bahia Bakari was too traumatized to be told her mother was feared dead, along with 151 others on board the Yemenia airways flight.

"I have told her that her mother is in the next room," the girl's uncle, Joseph Yousouf, told The Associated Press outside a hospital in this former French colony, where the jetliner was attempting to land in fierce winds before dawn Tuesday when it slammed into the Indian Ocean.

He said the girl was coherent and asking for food.

"They were coming to Comoros for vacation," Yousouf said of Bahia, who lived with her parents and three younger siblings outside Paris. "She was going to be staying with her grandmother."

The girl's father, Kassim Bakari, described his daughter as "fragile" and said she could "barely swim," but still managed to hang on for hours.

Her account of the crash aftermath seemed to indicate others survived the initial impact.

"I spoke to her this afternoon ... and I asked her what happened," Bakari said from his home in a suburb south of Paris. "She said 'Papa, we saw the plane going down in the water. I was in the water, I could hear people talking, but I couldn't see anyone. I was in the dark, I couldn't see a thing.'"

Bakari fingered his wife Aziza's old passport as he recalled the final moments before she and his daughter boarded the plane in Paris.

"When we arrived at the airport, I kissed both, then my wife turned around, she looked at me and she waved," he said. "That was the last time I saw my wife alive. My daughter... I will see her again I hope, but for my wife it was the last time."

The passengers on the downed plane, an aging Airbus 310, were flying the last leg of a journey from Paris and Marseille to Comoros, with a stop in Yemen to change planes. Most on board were from Comoros and 66 were French citizens. Severe turbulence was believed to be a factor in the crash, Yemen's embassy in Washington said.

For many, Bahia's survival was nothing short of miraculous.

On Wednesday, more than a dozen people — most of them government officials — crowded into a small room in Moroni's El Maaruf Hospital where Bahia lay curled in a fetal position, covered by a blue blanket.

She was conscious with bruises on her face and gauze bandages on her right elbow and right foot; at one point, she gamely shook the hand of Alain Joyandet, France's minister for international cooperation.

"It is a true miracle. She is a courageous young girl," Joyandet said of Bahia, who held onto floating debris from 1:30 a.m to 3 p.m. before she was seen by a passing boat, which rescued her.

"She really showed an absolutely incredible physical and moral strength," he said. "She is physically out of danger, but she is evidently very traumatized."

Bahia was flown home to Paris late Wednesday aboard a chartered executive jet and was to be taken to a hospital for further treatment, Joyandet said.

French and American recovery crews, meanwhile, continued to search for the plane's black boxes in deep waters off the Comoros after detecting a distress beacon. Officials hope the flight data and cockpit voice recorders will provide clues to the cause of the crash. Once retrieved, they will be taken to France for analysis, Yemenia said.

It was not immediately clear which section of the passenger cabin the girl had been sitting in. But if the plane flew into the water at speed, the impact damage to the fuselage would have been so violent and extensive that no part of the cabin would have been safer than any other, experts said.

Hassan al-Hawthi, the head of maintenance at Yemenia, told reporters Wednesday that air traffic controllers had instructed the pilot to change course because of the strong wind. He said there was no distress call before the crash.

The London-based International Federation of Air Line Pilots Association said the plane may have been trying to go around for another approach when it hit the sea.

The 9,558-feet long runway at Prince Said Ibrahim International Airport on Moroni island is adequate for modern airliners, but is considered a difficult one due to weather conditions and the surrounding hills. Some airlines provide special training to pilots who need to fly in there.

Pilots coming in from the north, as the Yemenia flight was doing, must land their planes visually and don't have any all-weather instrument landing system to help them.

"The field in question is thought of as being challenging, and certain operators consider it a daytime-only airport," said Gideon Ewers of the pilots' association.

Tuesday's crash came two years after aviation officials reported equipment faults with the plane.

The French air accident investigation agency BEA was sending a team of safety investigators, accompanied by advisers from Airbus, to Comoros, an archipelago of three main islands 1,800 miles south of Yemen, between Africa's southeastern coast and the island of Madagascar.

A judicial inquiry headed by three judges was also opened to determine the cause of the crash and those who eventually could be held responsible.

Rescue boats plied the waters north of the main island Wednesday and scores of people gathered on nearby beaches to watch.

"The sea is pretty rough at the present time, the wind is blowing hard and the drift is strong ... The bodies of the victims and the debris are drifting rapidly towards the north," said Christophe Prazuck, spokesman for the French military joint staff.

The tragedy prompted an outcry in Comoros, where residents have long complained of a lack of seat belts on Yemenia flights and planes so overcrowded that passengers had to stand in the aisles.

French aviation inspectors found a "number of faults" in the plane's equipment during a 2007 inspection, French Transport Minister Dominique Bussereau said.

European Union Transport Commissioner Antonio Tajani said the airline had previously met EU safety checks but would now face a full investigation amid questions over why passengers were put on another jet in Yemen for the final leg to Comoros.

"We can't accept that a plane is banned from Europe but still allowed to fly in Africa. It's the proof that our world isn't fair and that human beings don't weigh the same depending on which side of the Mediterranean they are," said Gilles Poux, mayor of the Paris suburb of La Courneuve, where Comorans gathered for prayers.

Mohammed Abdul Qader, the Yemenia spokesman and deputy head of civil aviation, said the same plane that crashed had flown to London about a week ago.

Abdul-Khaleq Al-Qadi, chairman of Yemenia's board, said the company has decided to pay families $28,300 for each death.

He added that maintenance was carried out regularly according to high standards.

"The crash has nothing to do with maintenance," he told reporters in San'a, adding that the aircraft received maintenance just two months before the crash under the supervision of an Airbus technical team.
 
This is a surprise to hear.

MSN | Outlook, Office, Skype, Bing, Breaking News, and Latest Videos
Palin to resign as Alaska governor
Former vice presidential hopeful says she won't finish out first term

Breaking news
NBC News and news services
updated 23 minutes ago

WASILLA, Alaska - Sarah Palin announced Friday she plans to resign as governor of Alaska in a few weeks, saying she will try to "affect positive change" from outside government.

Palin, the Republican vice presidential candidate in 2008, made the announcement at a press conference Friday.

She said the decision has been "in the works" for a while and comes after "prayer and consideration."

She is handing the reins over to Lt. Gov. Sean Parnell, who will be sworn in on July 25. Parnell and most of Palin's cabinet were present at the announcement.

"We know we can affect positive change outside government at this moment in time on another scale and actually make a difference," she said, adding that politics had become a "superficial, wasteful bloodsport."

Some have speculated in the past that Palin may be interested in running for president in 2012, but she did not mention running for another office.

Palin was elected Alaska's youngest and first woman governor in 2006 at age 42. She was the surprise pick of Arizona Sen. John McCain as running mate in the 2008 presidential election.

She was only the second woman to appear on a major party presidential ticket — Democrat Geraldine Ferraro was the first when she ran unsuccessfully for vice president with Walter Mondale in 1984.

Very strange of her to do.
 
http://www.msnbc.msn...-womens_health/
World's oldest new mom dies, leaves 2 toddlers
- Spanish woman gave birth to IVF twins at age 66, sparking outrage

updated 6:01 p.m. ET, Wed., July 15, 2009

MADRID - She devoted years to caring for her mother, who died at age 101. Then Maria del Carmen Bousada embarked on a quest to become a mom herself. She lied to a California fertility clinic to skirt its age limit, and later pointed to her mother’s longevity as a reason to expect she’d be around to care for her kids. At age 66 she had twins, becoming the world’s oldest new mom — and raising questions about maternity so late in life. Now she is dead at age 69, leaving behind boys not yet 3.

Bousada’s brother told the Diario de Cadiz newspaper his sister died Saturday, though he did not disclose the cause. The newspaper said Bousada had been diagnosed with a tumor shortly after giving birth.

Shortly after her sons, Pau and Christian, were born in December 2006, Bousada reflected on her decision to deceive doctors in order to have a family. “I think everyone should become a mother at the right time for them,” she told the British tabloid News of the World, which showed her beaming as she cradled her 1-month-old infants, both dressed in pale blue pajamas.

“Often circumstances put you between a rock and a hard place, and maybe things shouldn’t have been done in the way they were done, but that was the only way to achieve the thing I had always dreamed of, and I did it,” she said.

Beginning in 2005, Bousada underwent hormone treatments to reverse nearly 20 years of menopause and sold her house to pay for in vitro fertilization at the Pacific Fertility Clinic in Los Angeles.

Deceiving doctors
Slender with dark brown hair, she told the clinic she was 55 — the facility’s maximum age for single women undergoing the procedure. When her sons were born in December 2006, Guinness World Records said she was the oldest woman on record to give birth.

Dr. Vicken Sahakian, director and owner of the clinic, said Bousada falsified her birth date on documents from Spain.

When he learned of the deception, “I figured something might happen and wind up being a disaster for these kids, and unfortunately I was right,” he told The Associated Press.

It’s easy for women to lie to their doctors, Sahakian said.

“We don’t ask for passports, obviously. When is the last time you went to a doctor and he asked you for a birth certificate? We’re not detectives here,” he said.

Sahakian said he implanted the Spanish woman with a younger woman’s eggs and donated sperm, using hormone therapy to “rejuvenate” her uterus after she had been in menopause for 18 years.

The hormone treatment lasted three weeks. Sahakian said he did not believe that increased the woman’s cancer risk.

“Nothing she did (to get pregnant) caused her illness,” he said.

The brother, Ricardo Bousada, told the Barcelona-based newspaper El Periodico de Catalunya that he had sold details of his sister’s death to an unidentified television program and the proceeds would go to looking after his sister’s twins.

Repeated calls to Ricardo Bousada’s residence in the southern province of Cadiz went unanswered Wednesday.

Another brother, Jose Luis Bousada, told the AP he was estranged from his siblings and read about his sister’s death in the newspaper.

Asked who might raise the children, he said he imagined arrangements had been made and “I suppose there will be no problem.”

Bousada had once said she would look for a younger man to help her raise them.

Women undergoing in vitro fertilization have their hormone systems manipulated by doctors, typically injecting themselves with hormones several times a day. The procedure increases the chance of a multiple birth, which heightens the risk of complications during pregnancy.

Bousada lived with her mother most of her life in Cadiz and worked in a department store before retiring. She decided to have children after her mother died in 2005 and initially kept her plan secret from her family.
She sold her house to raise $59,000 to pay for in vitro fertilization in Los Angeles, she told the News of the World.

Spanish law on assisted reproduction sets no age limit, but state-funded and private clinics have an informal agreement establishing 50 as the cutoff, based on recommendations from the scientific community, according to the Health Ministry.

There is no U.S. law regulating the age of in vitro candidates, but Sahakian said his clinic won’t take older women because “I would like the mother ... to basically survive until the kids reach 18.”

When Bousada told her relatives she was two months pregnant, they thought she was joking, she said.

“Yes, I am old of course, but if I live as long as my mom did, imagine, I could even have grandchildren,” she said after the birth.

Allan Pacey, secretary of the British Fertility Society, said the organization recommends that assisted conception generally not be provided to women beyond the natural age of menopause at about 50.

Just because Ms. Bousada's mother lived to be 101 years of age, that was no guarantee the daughter would live a long time.

It's a shame, but something like this was bound to happen with elderly women chose to have children. It was selfish of her. Bousada was a single woman too, so there is no husband to take over care of the children.

Ms. Bousada has one brother Ricardo who seems to be helping with the arrangements, but the other brother Jose says that he's had no contact with his siblings for year. These kids may end up orphans anyways as these uncles are old.

Comments?
 
Unrepentant kitten killer mocks courtroom filled with animal lovers after receiving a plea bargain.

Remember these girls names. They're bound to do much worse crimes in the future.

http://www.nydailyne...g_kitten_i.html
Teen Cheyenne Cherry taunts animal activists after guilty plea for killing kitten in oven
BY Dorian Block
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Updated Thursday, July 16th 2009, 9:08 AM

A heartless kitty killer hissed angrily at animal rights activists Wednesday, grinning widely as she took credit for stuffing the helpless pet into a 500-degree oven.

"It's dead, bitch!" snapped an unrepentant Cheyenne Cherry, sticking her tongue out after a plea bargain that will put her behind bars for a year in the May 6 killing of tiny Tiger Lily.

Cherry, 17, was confronted after her guilty plea in Bronx Supreme Court to charges of animal cruelty and attempted burglary in the May 6 killing at her former roommate's apartment.

Tiger Lily was left to die inside the blistering oven after Cherry and a 14-year-old friend trashed the apartment of Valerie Hernandez destroying furniture before stealing DVDs and food.

After her arrest, Cherry told police the cat killing was "just a joke."

In court Wednesday, Cherry admitted to Judge Margaret Clancy that the younger girl put the cat in the oven - and "I didn't let the cat out."

The pair fled the apartment because they didn't want to hear the dying cat's cries or desperate scratching at the oven door, authorities said.

The second girl is facing trial in Family Court because of her age. Prosecutor Jennifer Troiano said Cherry was granted a plea deal because her cohort was "more culpable" for the crimes.

Under the agreement, Cherry pleaded guilty to two charges in a six-count indictment. She waived her right to appeal and agreed not to keep a pet for the next three years. Cherry, jailed on a probation violation, faces formal sentencing July 31.

As she exited the courtroom, she passed a row of animal rights activists outraged by her crime.

"Justice for Tiger Lily," read one sign held by the demonstrators.

Sharon Tuerlings, 43, of Levittown, L.I., extended both her middle fingers and kissed them. Cherry grinned widely, stuck out her tongue and responded with her profane retort.

Cherry is not new to animal crimes.

She was busted last year for using a BB gun to dog-nap a teacup Yorkie with her boyfriend. She was also arrested for robbing a man of his iPod at gunpoint.

The dozen animal lovers who attended the hearing said they represented more than 20,000 people who signed an online petition supporting harsh punishment for Cherry.

They were thrilled by the deal that guaranteed Cherry would do time for the cruel killing. "She is dangerous," said Brooklyn cat owner Josie Marrero. "A very dangerous young lady."

Tuerlings said she wanted to get a glimpse of the monster behind the cat execution. "It felt so good to look at her ugly face," she said. "Those evil eyes that she has."

I'm not an animal lover, but it seems obvious that these girls need to be put away for life in the name of public safety.

Comments?
 
A local woman from LaSalle, (the town southwest of Windsor) got bit by a Massasauga Rattlesnake while she was gardening! :blink:
She went to work, not realising that the snake was a rattlesnake.

The local hospitals didn't have any antivenin since this is so rare. Arrangements had to be made with The Detroit Zoo to get some antivenin since they have rattlesnakes on exhibit.

http://www.windsorst...4092/story.html
Rattlesnake bites LaSalle woman, antivenin fetched from zoo
By Frances Willick, The Windsor Star
July 22, 2009

LASALLE, Ont. -- A LaSalle woman got a nasty surprise when she went into her backyard garden to pick some chives.

Eunja Joo, 46, stooped down to collect the herb on Thursday morning when she felt a sting on her left hand.

"It felt like a bee, but I saw something moving in the garden," she said.

"I saw a tail rattling."

That rattling tail belonged to an eastern massasauga rattlesnake, the only species of venomous snake in the province.

"It was kind of small, about 30 centimetres, not long and earth-coloured," she said.

Joo, who lives on Grillo Drive east of Malden Road, immediately called her husband, who was inside the house. "He was very scared. He came and he killed it with a rake."

Joo's hand became swollen and sore to the touch, but she didn't immediately head for the hospital.

"It was OK. I didn't feel the pain or anything. It was a little bit swollen, but nothing happened."

Joo first went to work at a nearby convenience store and didn't go to the hospital until later in the evening. "Around six o'clock, my husband looked on the Internet and saw a picture of it, and it said go to the hospital right away."

The couple went to Windsor Regional Hospital only to find that it doesn't stock the necessary treatment.

The hospital's pharmacy director Christine Donaldson said the nearest Canadian supplier of antivenin — the treatment for rattlesnake bites — was in Parry Sound.

That's when the Detroit Zoo stepped in as an unlikely medical supplier.

"Knowing that Parry Sound was five or six hours up the highway, we went and got the antivenin from the Detroit Zoo. They have a reptile world, so they have some on hand for their own staff."

Donaldson said the Poison Control Centre, which gives advice regarding treatments of poison, advised the hospital staff to administer a half-dose of the serum.

Joo was required to spend the night in hospital, but was discharged the next morning.

She said she feels fortunate that she survived the experience.

"I'm lucky because I have a five-year-old kid. For a kid, it could be very dangerous and life-threatening."

Joo said she's more cautious now when she's in her garden, and only allows her child to be on the pavement or bricks in the backyard.

After the offending reptile was quickly dispatched by Joo's husband, the couple snapped photos of the rattlesnake.

"Then we left it for a couple days and put it in the garbage. It was kind of dry after two days," said Joo.

Essex County naturalist Tom Hurst said rattlesnake bites are uncommon.

"It's actually difficult to get them to bite you. Usually if you're walking by, you won't even notice them. They'll just freeze. It's not like they leap at you. You pretty much have to step on them."

Donaldson said the last time anyone was treated for a rattlesnake bite in the Windsor area was about eight years ago.

Hurst said the eastern massasauga rattlesnake is on the endangered species list. "They are concerned about the numbers declining, with all the residential development in that part of LaSalle. Quite a bit of the habitat is being built upon."

In Ontario, the snakes are most often found on the Bruce Peninsula and along the eastern shoreline of Georgian Bay.
 
http://news.aol.com/...rom-home/580819
Dog Drags Newborn From Family Home
By JEFFREY McMURRAY, AP
posted: 2 DAYS 5 HOURS AGO

LEXINGTON, Ky. (July 21) - A father was frantically calling 911 to report his newborn missing when he spotted the baby, bleeding from the mouth and clutched in the mouth of a family dog who had carried him from his crib to the heavily wooded backyard.

Four-day-old Alexander James Smith was rushed to the emergency room at University of Kentucky Hospital in Lexington, where he was listed in critical condition Tuesday with two collapsed lungs, a skull fracture, broken ribs and various cuts and bruises.

His father, Michael Smith, said doctors were optimistic the boy would survive, but a day earlier they braced the family for the worst and had to use resuscitation paddles to get a heartbeat.

"They took us straight to a consulting room with a pastor and gave us pretty much what was the last visitation," Smith said in an interview with The Associated Press from a hospital waiting room.

Smith said he and his wife, Chrissie, had just put Alexander James (or A.J.) in his crib Monday afternoon in their Nicholasville, Ky., home and were preparing for a baby shower. When Chrissie returned to the bedroom minutes later, one of the doors was ajar and both the baby and their Native American Indian dog — a breed that looks similar to a husky — were gone.

Michael Smith initially headed to the backyard, knowing that Dakota, a mixed breed with wolves in its ancestry, had a reputation for stealing household items like cups and wallets and depositing them there. He spent 10 minutes looking among the trees and bushes in the two-acre fenced backyard before finding the dog and child about 200 yards behind the house.

"When you're running through the backyard and you can't find him, every worst fear comes through your head," Smith said. "We had to try to stay positive, try and find him. My guess is five more minutes and he wouldn't be here."
Jessamine County chief deputy sheriff Allen Peel said no charges had been filed, but the case remains under investigation.

"It's unreal," Peel said.

Smith, who is the owner of a security company where his wife also works, said the dog was treating the baby as a puppy and wasn't being vicious.

But he expects that Dakota, who was taken into custody by animal control, will be destroyed. The 4-year-old was one of three dogs the family had owned since they were puppies and had no history of aggression, even when playing with Smith's two other children from a previous marriage, he said.

"It wasn't a vicious dog attack," Smith said. "She had A.J. for 10 minutes on her own, and if you look at A.J.'s belly, there's about 100 little marks. All the dog had to do was one bite and A.J. wouldn't be here."

Geez, the web poll has people sympathizing for the dog, assuming that it was trying to care and protect the baby.

Doesn't seem obvious that the dog is a danger to the baby? If the dog didn't injure the baby, then the father must have done it. But since he wasn't arrested for that, then the authorities think the dog did it.

Do you think the dog should be destroyed?
No 57%
Yes 43%

I think the parents were negligent.

What do you think?
 
http://www.telegraph...Bruno-film.html
Sacha Baron Cohen threatened by Palestinian terrorists over Bruno film
- Sacha Baron Cohen has been threatened by the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a Palestinian terrorist organisation, after it took offence at its portrayal in his film 'Bruno'
By Dina Kraft in Tel Aviv for TELEGRAPH.CO.UK
Published: 5:32PM BST 27 Jul 2009

The Martyrs Brigades, a group of West Bank Palestinian insurgents, said it was "very upset" that it appeared in the film starring Baron Cohen's flamboyant Austrian homosexual character and would "respond in a suitable way", according to a statement published on the Right-wing website called World Net Daily.

In the film, Bruno, a television journalist interviews Ayman Abu Aita, who is claimed in the movie to be the leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.

Mr Baron Cohen's character implores Mr Abu Aita to capture him, saying, "I want to be famous. I want the best guys in the business to kidnap me. Al-Qaeda is so 2001."

Mr Abu Aita and his associates were angry by his portrayal according to the statement published by the Jerusalem bureau of the World Net Daily.

"We reserve the right to respond in the way we find suitable against this man. The movie was part of a conspiracy against the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades," the statement read.

"According to what we checked there was was no meeting about the real context of the film," the statement added "This was a dirty use of our brother, Ayman, and we don't accept that the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades is part of the film."

A lawyer for Mr Abu Aita said that he was tricked into appearing in the film and was no longer involved with the Martyrs Brigades, it was reported. He added that Mr Abu Aitas planned to file a law suit against the 37-year-old British comedian.

Mr Baron Cohen has reportedly tightened his security following the publication of the statement.

I can't say that I'm surprised at this reaction from the terrorist group. They're crazy enough to carry out the assasination of Cohen.

I remember the violence caused by an editorial cartoon in Denmark depicting Prophet Mohammed having a bomb in his turban resulting in attacks on Danish diplomatic buildings in Tehran, Beirut and Syria by ordinary Muslims. Getting Islamic terrorists angry is bound to have an even more extreme response.

Do you think Sacha Baron Cohen is in danger?
 
Baby Girl Cut Out of Slain Mother Found By Police

A woman in Massachusetts was slain and her baby was apparently cut out by the killer.

Baby Cut From Womb Found Alive
By BOB SALSBERG, AP
posted: July 30, 2009 - 7:05 Eastern Time

WORCESTER, Mass. (July 30) - A baby girl cut from her mother's womb was found and a woman arrested after acquaintances became suspicious of her claims that she had just given birth, police said.The body of the girl's mother was found Monday in a closet at her Worcester apartment. It was not until an autopsy that authorities discovered the fetus was missing.

The girl appeared to be in "fairly good health" at a New Hampshire hospital Wednesday, Worcester Police Sgt. Kerry Hazelhurst said.

Julie Corey, 35, of Worcester, Mass., and a male companion were arrested in Plymouth, N.H., where police found them with the child. Corey was charged as a fugitive from justice and is to be arraigned in district court in Concord, N.H., on Thursday. She was in custody and could not be reached for comment late Wednesday, and Worcester police did not know whether she had a lawyer. Police in New Hampshire said the man was released.

Corey told acquaintances that she delivered the baby sometime late Thursday or early Friday at an undisclosed hospital, and by later Friday was showing the newborn off to acquaintances, police said."Some friends became a little concerned about how she got home so early after just giving birth," Hazelhurst said.

Police said Corey had reportedly gone to New Hampshire to relocate. A newspaper report said she arrived at a Plymouth homeless shelter Tuesday night. She told workers there that the girl was 6 days old and identified herself as the mother but had no information on the child, according to the Union Leader in New Hampshire.

Corey was arrested Wednesday as she tried to leave the shelter with the infant after workers alerted police and a nurse began photographing the baby with her cell phone, the report said.

The baby's mother, Darlene Haynes, was eight months pregnant. Her body was found by her landlord, William Thompson, who said a "horrifying smell" led him to her apartment, where he found her body wrapped in bedding in a closet. Her death was ruled a homicide.

"It's horrific," Thompson said Wednesday. "There's no words to describe what's going on in this building today."

The exact cause of Haynes' death has yet to be determined pending toxicology tests, but Worcester said the autopsy indicated Haynes suffered head injuries.

Police said the 23-year-old had apparently been dead for several days, and that she hadn't contacted family or friends since Thursday.

Haysha Toledo, a 17-year-old neighbor, said neighbors used to hear fighting from the apartment Haynes shared until recently with her boyfriend, Roberto Rodriguez.

"We used to hear her crying and screaming but no one ever really did anything," Toledo said, adding that neighbors did not want to get involved.

Haynes had a restraining order against Rodriguez, who allegedly pushed her into a glass table in June and cut her arm, then grabbed her by the throat and slapped her, according to court records. Court records also showed Rodriguez was charged with hitting Haynes in 2008 in a case that was continued without a finding.

In June, Haynes described the 24-year-old Rodriguez as her boyfriend of several years. Her landlord said Rodriguez moved out of the apartment last month.

Rodriguez was interviewed by authorities. He told WCVB-TV that Haynes was "a nice girl.""She had her problems, you know, but nobody deserves to go (through) what she went through," he said.

Family members said she had three other children.

Her youngest, an 18-month-old girl, is in state custody, according to Department of Children and Families spokeswoman Alison Goodwin. Family members had been looking after her.

Karl Whitney, Haynes' uncle who is acting as a spokesman for the family, said Haynes' grandmother, Joanne Haynes, is raising the two other children, Jasmine, 5, and Lillian, 3.

He told the Telegram & Gazette that Haynes had picked the name Sheila Marie for her fourth child.

This article doesn't say if the victim's boyfriend is ths suspected killer or if the woman claiming to be the newborn's mother is the suspected killer.

There have been other cases where women are murdered in order to get their baby.

Didn't the season finale of "Private Practice" have a disturbed woman about to kill Amy Brenneman's character so she could have her baby.
 
http://today.msnbc.m...y-today_people/

Agreement reached on custody of Jackson kids
- Katherine Jackson gets custody; Debbie Rowe gets visitation, but no money

By Mike Celizic
TODAYShow.com contributor
updated 1 hour, 26 minutes ago

Michael Jackson’s mother will get custody of his three children, and the biological mother of the two oldest children will get visitation rights but no additional money, NBC News learned Thursday.

As reported by NBC News’ Jeff Rossen, the children — Prince Michael, Paris, and Prince Michael II, nicknamed Blanket — will live with Jackson’s 79-year-old mother, Katherine. Debbie Rowe will have visitation rights as the biological mother of the two oldest children. The identity of Blanket’s surrogate mother has never been revealed.

“Sources say, it was Debbie Rowe who decided the kids are better off staying with Katherine and the Jackson family,” Rossen reported. “Both sides will submit this deal to a judge on Monday morning for approval.”

Rossen also reported that Prince and Paris have been told that Rowe is their biological mother. Her initial visits with them will be attended by a child psychologist, Rossen reported.

Under the agreement, according to sources, Rowe will not get any additional money beyond what she got in her initial agreement with Michael Jackson when she agreed to give up parental rights. Rowe does get to keep her parental rights under the new agreement, Rossen reported.

The agreement had been predicted by Katherine Jackson’s attorney during a TODAY appearance on Monday.

“Whatever the agreement will be [it] will not be based on money,” attorney L. Londell McMillan had told TODAY’s Matt Lauer Monday. Asked if an agreement can be reached before a scheduled Monday, Aug. 3 court hearing, Katherine Jackson’s legal representative replied with one word: “Absolutely.”

Rossen reported that the agreement is expected to be approved at Monday’s court date.

McMillan had praised all parties involved in the custody discussions, refuting media speculation that there was friction in the custody agreement negotiations.

NBC News also obtained new video of Paris’ fourth birthday party in 2002 at Jackson’s Neverland ranch.

With a white bow in her light brown hair, Paris says, “I love my Daddy so much. You’re the best daddy in the whole world.”
 

By Simon Shuster and Anastasia Teterevleva

Skype singled out as threat to Russia's security

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's most powerful business lobby moved to clamp down on Skype and its peers this week, telling lawmakers that the Internet phone services are a threat to Russian businesses and to national security.

In partnership with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's political party, the lobby created a working group to draft legal safeguards against what they said were the risks of Skype and other Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephone services.

VoIP software has used the Internet to let hundreds of millions of people talk long-distance for free, or at far cheaper rates than traditional service providers can offer.

At a meeting of the lobby this week, telecom executives portrayed the most popular VoIP programmes like Skype and Icq as encroaching foreign entities that the government must control.

"Without government restrictions, IP telephony causes certain concerns about security," the lobby's press release said. "Most of the service operators working in Russia, such as Skype and Icq, are foreign. It is therefore necessary to protect the native companies in this sector and so forth."

Skype was not immediately available for comment.

In a presentation posted on the lobby's Web site, Vice President of TTK, a telecoms unit of state-owned Russian Railways, Vitaly Kotov, called on regulators to stop VoIP services from causing "a likely and uncontrolled fall in profits for the core telecom operators."

Valery Ermakov, deputy head of Russia's No.3 mobile phone firm MegaFon, drove the point home with a picture of two hands in handcuffs, the caption running, "protect investments and fight VoIP services."

Delegates at the meeting also warned that it has been impossible for police to spy on VoIP conversations, Vedomosti business daily reported on Friday.

The lobby, called the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, forecast that 40 percent of calls could be made through VoIP services by 2012.

As an alternative to Skype and its peers, the telecom executives proposed creating VoIP services inside their own firms, which would then make them safely available to the Russian public.

"MegaFon is interested in this market. We're interested in providing analogous services. We don't support limiting competition, but we want the market to be civilised," Ermakov said.

TTK's press service said on Friday that it will take until September for the relevant legal amendments to be drafted by the special committee, whose members include top telecoms executives and lawmakers from Putin's United Russia party.

Now, is that what they call a democracy? :angry:
 
The TV has just reported that Senator Edward (Ted) Moore Kennedy has died from Brain Cancer at his home at Hyannis Port, Massachusetts home just before midnight.

He was the youngest Kennedy brother who was left to head the family's political dynasty after his brothers President John F. Kennedy and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated.

This is the end of a great American political era.

R.I.P. Senator Ted Kennedy.

http://abcnews.go.co...tory?id=6692022
Ted Kennedy Dies of Brain Cancer at Age 77
'Liberal Lion' of the Senate Led Storied Political Family After Deaths of President John F. Kennedy, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy
Aug. 26, 2009

Sen. Ted Kennedy died shortly before midnight Tuesday at his home in Hyannis Port, Mass., at age 77.

The man known as the "liberal lion of the Senate" had fought a more than year-long battle with brain cancer, and according to his son had lived longer with the disease than his doctors expected him to.

"We've lost the irreplaceable center of our family and joyous light in our lives, but the inspiration of his faith, optimism, and perseverance will live on in our hearts forever," the Kennedy family said in a statement. "He loved this country and devoted his life to serving it."

Sen. Edward Moore Kennedy, the youngest Kennedy brother who was left to head the family's political dynasty after his brothers President John F. Kennedy and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated.

Kennedy championed health care reform, working wages and equal rights in his storied career. In August, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom -- the nation's highest civilian honor -- by President Obama. His daughter, Kara Kennedy, accepted the award on his behalf.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, known as Ted or Teddy, was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor in May 2008 and underwent a successful brain surgery soon after that. But his health continued to deteriorate, and Kennedy suffered a seizure while attending the luncheon following President Barack Obama's inauguration.

For Kennedy, the ascension of Obama was an important step toward realizing his goal of health care reform.

At the Democratic National Convention in August 2008, the Massachusetts Democrat promised, "I pledge to you that I will be there next January on the floor of the United States Senate when we begin the great test."

Sen. Kennedy made good on that pledge, but ultimately lost his battle with cancer.

Kennedy was first elected to the Senate in 1962, at the age of 30, and his tenure there would span four decades.

A hardworking, well-liked politician who became the standard-bearer of his brothers' liberal causes, his career was clouded by allegations of personal immorality and accusations that his family's clout helped him avoid the consequences of an accident that left a young woman dead.

But for the younger members of the Kennedy clan, from his own three children to those of his brothers JFK and RFK, Ted Kennedy -- once seen as the youngest and least talented in a family of glamorous overachievers -- was both a surrogate father and the center of the family.

And certainly it was Ted Kennedy who bore many of the tragedies of the family -- the violent deaths of four of his siblings, his son's battle with cancer, and the death of his nephew John F. Kennedy Jr. in a plane crash.

Kennedy, Youngest Kennedy Brother, Led Political Dynasty in Wake of Tragedy
Edward Moore Kennedy was born in Brookline, Mass., on Feb. 22, 1932, the ninth and youngest child of Joseph P. Kennedy and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy.

His father, a third-generation Irish-American who became a multimillionaire businessman and served for a time as a U.S. ambassador to Britain, had risen high and was determined that his sons would rise higher still.

Overshadowed by his elder siblings, Teddy, as he was known to family and friends, grew up mostly in the New York City suburb of Bronxville, N.Y., and attended private boarding schools. He was expelled from Harvard during his freshman year after he asked a friend to take an exam for him.

After a two-year stint in the Army, Kennedy returned to earn degrees at Harvard and then the University of Virginia law school. He married Virginia Joan Bennett, known by her middle name, in 1958. The couple would have three children, Kara, Teddy Jr. and Patrick.

By the time he reached adulthood, tragedy had already claimed some of his siblings: eldest brother Joe Jr. was killed in World War II, sister Kathleen died in a plane crash, and another sister, Rosemary, who was mildly retarded, had to be institutionalized following a botched lobotomy.

But then the family hit its pinnacle in 1960, when John F. Kennedy became president.

His brother's ascension created a political opportunity, and Joe Kennedy decided he should take over JFK's Senate seat. Ted Kennedy was only 28 at the time -- two years short of the required age -- so a family friend was found to hold the temporary appointment.

In 1962, Ted Kennedy -- backed by his family money and the enthusiasm his name generated among Massachusetts' Catholics, was elected to the Senate.

The Only One Left
In 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. His brother Robert became the focus of the family's -- and much of the country's -- dreams.

Following the tragedy in Dallas, Robert and Ted Kennedy became closer than they had ever been as children.

"When I was working for Robert Kennedy, there was hardly a day in which the two of them didn't physically get together, I would say at least three or four times," said Frank Mankiewicz, who served as an aide to Robert Kennedy. "I mean, if, if Sen. Robert Kennedy wasn't in his office, and nobody knew where he was, chances are he was seeing Ted about something."

Five years later, while pursuing the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968 against Lyndon Johnson, Sen. Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed. That left Ted as the only surviving Kennedy son.

"He seriously contemplated getting out of politics after Robert's death," said Kennedy biographer Adam Clymer. "He thought, you know, it might just be too much. He might be too obviously the next target and all of that. But he decided to stick it out and as he said on more than one occasion, pick up a fallen standard."

Kennedy was seen by many as his brothers' heir, and perhaps he could have won the White House had he stepped into the presidential race then. But he didn't. And the very next year there occurred a tragedy that would forever block Ted Kennedy's presidential ambitions.

In July 1969, following a party on Martha's Vineyard, Kennedy drove off a bridge on the tiny Massachusetts island of Chappaquiddick. The car plunged into the water. Kennedy escaped, but his passenger did not.

Kennedy later said he dived into the water repeatedly in a vain attempt to save Mary Jo Kopechne, one of the "boiler room girls" who had worked on Bobby Kennedy's campaign. But Kopechne, 28, drowned, still trapped in the car.

Questions arose about how Kennedy had known Kopechne -- he denied any "private relationship," and Kopechne's parents also insisted there was no relationship -- and why he failed to report the accident for about nine hours.

Kennedy pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of leaving the scene of an accident. He received a two-month suspended sentence and lost his driver's license for a year, but the political price was higher.

Kennedy was re-elected to the Senate in 1970, but the accident at Chappaquiddick effectively squashed his presidential hopes.

He ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination in 1979 against incumbent President Jimmy Carter.

Once when his daughter Kara, then 19, was passing out campaign leaflets, a man took one and said to her, "You know your father killed a young woman about your age, don't you?"

Kennedy Curse: Political Power, Personal Tragedy
Sen. Ted Kennedy was not done confronting personal tragedy.

In 1973, 12-year-old Teddy Jr. was diagnosed with bone cancer, and he had to have a leg amputated. Kennedy's marriage to Joan deteriorated. Some blamed her drinking, others cited his alleged womanizing. The couple divorced in 1981.

In contrast, Kennedy's career in the Senate continued to flourish.

He supported teachers' unions, women's and abortion rights, and health care reform. He sponsored the Family and Medical Leave Act. And he was seen as a stalwart of the Democratic Party, delivering several rousing speeches at conventions.

Former Boston Glober reporter Tom Oliphant, who covered Kennedy's career in Washington, observed, "It's not all back slapping and, and personal relationships. I think one of the things that sets Kennedy's politics apart is his, what I call his dirty little secret. He works like a dog."

Political analyst Mark Shields said Kennedy's "concerns were national concerns, but his forum for achieving his ends and changing policy, became the Senate. And he mastered it like nobody else I've ever seen."

But another family incident exposed Kennedy's vulnerabilities and held him up to public censure.

A nephew, William Kennedy Smith, was accused of raping a woman at the family's estate in Palm Beach, Fla. The case generated lurid headlines around the world. Kennedy was at the estate at the time of the alleged attack and had been at the bar where Smith met his accuser.

Eyebrows were raised even further when a young woman who had been with Kennedy's son Patrick that night revealed that she had seen the senator roaming around the house at night, wearing an oxford shirt but no trousers.

Smith was acquitted following a highly sensational trial, but the incident definitely left a dent in Kennedy's armor. His alleged heavy drinking and womanizing were widely lampooned, and in October 1991 he thought it prudent to be low-key in his opposition to Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, who had been accused of sexually harassing a former subordinate.

Kennedy's life, both professional and personal, took a turn for the better in 1992.

He married Victoria Reggie, a divorced attorney with two children from a previous marriage, Curran and Caroline. That year Kennedy also supported Bill Clinton, an open admirer of the Kennedy clan.

"Well, sometime during our courtship, I realized that I didn't want to live the rest of my life without Vicky," Kennedy said about his wife of nearly 30 years. "And since we have been together, it's made my life a lot more fulfilling. I think more serene, kind of emotional stability."

Elected in 1992, President Bill Clinton appointed Kennedy's sister, Jean Kennedy Smith, ambassador to Ireland. And in 1994, Kennedy had the satisfaction of seeing his son Patrick elected to the House of Representatives from Rhode Island.

But tragedy returned that year.

In May 1994, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis died of cancer. Kennedy had remained close to his sister-in-law, who once quit her job at a publisher's after it came out with an unflattering biography of Ted.

Kennedy's Battle With Cancer Lost
Kennedy had served as a surrogate father for many of his nephews and nieces, but he may have been closest to Jackie's children, Caroline and John F. Kennedy Jr.

He was horrified when in July 1999, five years after Jackie's death, John Jr. and his bride of two years, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, along with her sister Lauren Bessette, were killed when the small plane John was piloting crashed off the Massachusetts island of Martha's Vineyard.

Sen. Kennedy led the family during the harrowing wait for information as Coast Guard crews searched for the missing plane.

When the bodies were retrieved from the ocean, Kennedy and his two sons went to identify the remains. The senator's eulogy for his nephew who "had every gift but length of years" and "the wife who became his perfect soul mate" touched grief-stricken Americans.

It was an all-too-familiar sight for those who remember Ted Kennedy mourning the deaths of his brothers John and Robert, and helping the family bear up after the deaths of Robert's sons David and Michael.

For decades, it was Ted Kennedy who carried the burden and led the way as the patriarch of a family seen as America's answer to royalty.
 
There's a report that 18 years after being kidnapped at the age of 11, police have discovered that the woman accompanying a known child molestor was actually his victim. He fathered her 2 children.

The case broke after Phillip Garrido was spotted Tuesday with two children as he tried to enter the University of California, Berkeley, campus to hand out religious literature. The officers said he was acting suspiciously toward the children. They questioned him and did a background check, determining he was a parolee, and informed his parole officer.

Phillip Garrido was ordered to appear for a parole meeting and arrived Wednesday with Dugard, his wife and two children. During questioning, corrections officials said he admitted kidnapping Dugard. It was not known if he had a lawyer. I hope this has no bearing on the admissibility of the case.

Hard to understand or believe that this was possible.

http://www.msnbc.msn...rime_and_courts
Kidnapped girl resurfaces 18 years later
- Police say victim was kept as sex slave, had 2 children by her abductor

NBC, msnbc.com and news services
updated 1 hour, 40 minutes ago

PLACERVILLE, Calif. - Joyous, miraculous news that a little girl kidnapped nearly two decades ago was found alive gave way Friday to the horrifying details of how police say she has lived all those years: kept by a convicted rapist in his backyard as a sex slave and forced to bear two of his children.

Jaycee Lee Dugard, who was 11 in 1991 when she was snatched from her school bus stop, was locked away from the outside world behind a series of fences, sheds and tents in the back of a suburban home, police said.

Her abductor, investigators said, raped her for years and fathered two children with her, the first when Jaycee was about 14. Those children, both girls now 11 and 15, also were kept hidden away in the backyard compound.

Dugard's stepfather, who witnessed her abduction and was a longtime suspect in the case, said he was overwhelmed by the news.

"He destroyed our lives," Carl Probyn told TODAY on Friday, referring to convicted sex offender Phillip Garrido, 58, who was charged with various kidnapping and sex charges.

Probyn, 60, said the incident killed his marriage. "We were happy," he told TODAY in an interview. He also said that Jaycee and his ex-wife got on so well, they were like sisters.

As for Garrido, Probyn said he had little to say other than he hopes he will spend the rest of his life behind bars. "He's pretty sick." he said.

Living in the backyard
Dugard, now 29, was reunited Thursday with her mother, but the meeting was tempered with sadness as the family learned their smiling, blue-eyed, blond little girl had spent most of her life as a virtual slave.

"She was in good health, but living in a backyard for the past 18 years does take its toll," Kollar said.

The compound had electricity from extension cords and a rudimentary outhouse and shower, "as if you were camping," Kollar said.

Garrido's wife was also arrested, and authorities said she was with him during the kidnapping in South Lake Tahoe.

Garrido told NBC station KCRA of Sacramento in a telephone interview Thursday from jail that he has turned his life around.

"Wait until you hear the story of what took place at this house," he said. "You are going to be completely impressed. It's a disgusting thing that took place with me at the beginning. But I turned my life completely around and to be able to understand that, you have to start there."

He added: "If you take this a step at a time you're going to fall over backwards and in the end, you're going to find the most powerful heart-warming story."

Nothing seemed amiss
Garrido was on lifetime parole, and his arrest raises questions about how closely parolees are monitored. But Kollar said a visitor to Garrido's house would not notice anything was amiss — the compound was well concealed by shrubs, garbage cans and a tarp.

Authorities said they do not know if Garrido also abused his daughters, but that they are investigating.

The case broke after Garrido was spotted Tuesday with two children as he tried to enter the University of California, Berkeley, campus to hand out religious literature. The officers said he was acting suspiciously toward the children. They questioned him and did a background check, determining he was a parolee, and informed his parole officer.

Garrido was ordered to appear for a parole meeting and arrived Wednesday with Dugard, his wife and two children. During questioning, corrections officials said he admitted kidnapping Dugard. It was not known if he had a lawyer.

Neighbors weigh in
Garrido's compound was located in Antioch, a San Francisco-area city of 100,000 about 170 miles from her family's home in South Lake Tahoe. The house was cordoned off with police tape as it was searched by FBI agents and the El Dorado County Sheriff's Department.

People who knew Garrido said he became increasingly fanatic about his religious beliefs in recent years, sometimes breaking out into song and claiming that God spoke to him through a box.

"In the last couple years he started getting into this strange religious stuff. We kind of felt sorry for him," said Tim Allen, president of East County Glass and Window Inc. in Pittsburgh, Calif., who bought business cards and letterhead from Garrido's printing business for the last decade. Three times in recent years, Garrido arrived at Allen's showroom with two "cute little blond girls" in tow, he said.

In April 2008, Garrido registered a corporation called Gods Desire at his home address, according the California Secretary of State. During recent visits to the showroom, Garrido would talk about quitting the printing business to preach full time and gave the impression he was setting up a church, Allen said.

"He rambled. It made no sense," he said.

Garrido would talk about holding events at UC Berkeley and mentioned the names of important people as if he knew them. Allen said he had no inkling of Garrido's criminal record.

"We never thought anything bad about the guy," Allen said. "He was just kind of nutty."

In addition to kidnapping charges, Garrido is being held for investigation of rape by force, lewd and lascivious acts with a minor and sexual penetration, said Jimmie Lee, a spokesman for the Contra Costa Sheriff's Department. His wife, Nancy Garrido, 54, was arrested on kidnapping charges.

A neighbor, Cheyvonne Molino, told the Contra Costa Times she started seeing the girls this summer when their father brought them by the Molinos' auto wrecking yard when doing printing business for them.

"I don't think they realized anything was wrong or different except they didn't go to schools with other kids," said Molino, who was told that the girls were home-schooled, described them as "very shy" and said the older one was "very clingy to her father."

Long criminal record

Garrido has a long rap sheet dating back to the 1970s.

He has a conviction for rape by force or fear and was paroled from a Nevada state prison in 1988, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

In 1991, police believe he was trolling for victims in South Lake Tahoe in a Ford Granada and snatched Dugard from a bus stop outside her home. The case attracted national attention and was featured on TV's "America's Most Wanted," which broadcast a composite drawing of a suspect seen in the car.

Her stepfather said he saw someone reach out and grab her before the car sped away.

"As soon as I saw the door fly open, the driver's door, I jumped on my mountain bike and I tried to get to the top of the hill but I had no energy," Probyn recalled. "I rode back down and yelled at my neighbor, 911!"

Stepdad struggles to understand

Probyn said his wife, from whom he is separated, was devastated by the kidnapping. He told the Associated Press that for 10 years after the crime, she would take a week off work at Christmas and on the anniversary of the abduction and spend the time crying at home.

Probyn eventually lost hope that he would ever see his stepdaughter alive. He said he was struggling to understand why Dugard didn't come forward earlier.

"I don't know if she was brainwashed, I don't know if she was walking around on the street, I don't know if she was locked up under key for 18 years, I have no idea."

The mother and daughter met Thursday morning at an area hotel. Dugard retains custody of her children, authorities said.

Probyn said that he got a call from his wife shortly after she got the news of Dugard's reappearance.

"She said, 'They found Jaycee. She's alive,'" he told the Contra Costa Times. "We cried for about two minutes."

At the Lake Tahoe Unified School District, employees huddled around television sets and computers to watch the news conference. Their tears of joy that Jaycee was alive became tears of horror and anger when details of her abduction and long captivity were recounted by police.

"Oh my God," murmured Superintendent James Tarwater.

Resident Angie Keil said the Lake Tahoe community rallied around the family, holding candlelight vigils, and in the early days organizing searches.

"Jaycee has always been in our minds, all these years," she said, her eyes moist with tears.
 
In a stunning move, Disney buys Marvel Entertainment Inc. for 4 Billion Dollars.

Who would have thought that company behind Spiderman and The Incredible Hulk could grow to such heights. Marvel Comics faced hard times for a period during the 1970s, and again in the mid 1990s.


Disney catches comics giant Marvel in a $4B web

By RYAN NAKASHIMA,
AP Business Writer Ryan Nakashima,

– Mon Aug 31, 7:06 pm ET

LOS ANGELES – The Walt Disney Co. is punching its way into the universe of superheroes and their male fans with a deal announced Monday to acquire Marvel Entertainment Inc. for $4 billion, bringing characters such as Iron Man and Spider-Man into the family of Mickey Mouse and "Toy Story."

The surprise cash-and-stock deal sent Spidey senses tingling in the comic book world. It could lead to new rides, movies, action figures and other outlets for Marvel's 5,000 characters, although Marvel already was aggressively licensing its properties for such uses.

The deal won't have benefits right away, and Disney stock sank on the news. Disney expects a short-term profit hit, and Marvel characters from X-Men to Daredevil are locked up in deals with other movie studios and theme parks. But Disney's CEO, Robert Iger, promised an action-packed future.

"`Sparks will fly' is the expression that comes to mind," Iger told analysts.

Stan Lee, the 86-year-old co-creator of "Spider-Man" and many more of Marvel's most famous characters, said he was thrilled to be informed of the marriage Monday morning.

"I love both companies," he said. "From every point of view, this is a great match."

The deal is expected to close by the end of the year and marks Disney's biggest acquisition since it purchased Pixar Animation Studios Inc., the maker of "Up" and "Cars," for $7.4 billion in stock in 2006.

Marvel would follow another storied comic book publisher into the arms of a media conglomerate. DC Comics, the home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, was bought by Warner Bros. — now part of Time Warner Inc. — in 1969.

Buying Marvel is meant to improve Disney's following among men and boys. Disney acknowledges it lost some of its footing with guys as it poured resources into female favorites such as "Hannah Montana" and the Jonas Brothers.

"Disney will have something guys grew up with and can experience with their kids, especially their sons," said Gareb Shamus, whose company Wizard Entertainment Group runs several of the Comic-Con conventions around the nation.

Marvel TV shows already account for 20 hours per week of programming on Disney's recently rebranded, boy-focused cable network, Disney XD, and that looks likely to increase, Iger said. The shows are "right in the wheelhouse for boys," he said.

There will be some lag before Marvel's trove of characters are fully developed at Disney, because of licensing deals Marvel has with other studios.

For example, Sony Corp.'s Columbia Pictures is developing the next three "Spider-Man" sequels, starting with "Spider-Man 4" set for a May 2011 release. News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox has the long-term movie rights to the "X-Men," "Fantastic Four," "Silver Surfer" and "Daredevil" franchises.

Both studios maintain those rights in perpetuity unless they fail to make more movies.

Separately, Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures has a five-picture distribution deal for Marvel-made movies, the first of which will be "Iron Man 2," set for release next May. Paramount said it expects to continue working with Marvel and Disney.

General Electric Co.'s Universal Studios has an attraction called Marvel Super Hero Island in Orlando, Fla., that will stay in existence as long as Universal wants to keep it there and follows the contract terms, Universal said.

Disney said it will honor and re-examine Marvel's licensing deals upon expiration and may extend the profitable ones. Iger noted that when it bought Pixar, that company also had third-party licensing agreements that eventually expired, allowing the companies to move forward together.

Despite beginning to make its own movies, starting with "Iron Man" last year, licensing remained a key driver of Marvel's $206 million in profit and $676 million in revenue last year. Iger said Disney could give Marvel broader global distribution and better relationships with retailers to sell Marvel products.

However, analyst David Joyce of Miller Tabak & Co. noted that the $4 billion offer was at "full price."

Marvel shareholders will receive $30 per share in cash, plus 0.745 Disney shares for every Marvel share they own. That values each Marvel share at $50, a 29 percent premium over Friday's closing stock price. The final ratio of cash and stock will be adjusted to ensure Disney stock makes up at least 40 percent of the final offer.

Marvel shares shot up $9.72, or 25 percent, to close at $48.37 on Monday. Disney shares fell 80 cents, or 3 percent, to $26.04.

Disney investors were probably unhappy that the deal will reduce earnings per share in the short term and might not turn positive until the company's 2012 fiscal year. Disney's earnings per share will drop partly because the company will issue 59 million new shares, and partly because Marvel plans to release two costly blockbusters, "Thor" and "The First Avenger: Captain America" in 2011. DVD sales of those films likely won't roll in until fiscal 2012.

Disney said the boards of both companies have approved the transaction, but it will require an antitrust review and the approval of Marvel shareholders.

If it works out, Marvel's chief executive, Isaac "Ike" Perlmutter, 66, will pocket a hefty payday. He snatched Marvel assets out of bankruptcy in 1998, in a deal that valued the company at around $450 million including debt, outmaneuvering investors Carl Icahn and Ronald Perelman. His 37 percent stake in Marvel is now worth about $1.5 billion.

-- AP Entertainment Writer Jake Coyle in New York contributed to this report.
 
In a stunning move, Disney buys Marvel Entertainment Inc. for 4 Billion Dollars.

Who would have thought that company behind Spiderman and The Incredible Hulk could grow to such heights. Marvel Comics faced hard times for a period during the 1970s, and again in the mid 1990s.

http://news.yahoo.co...l_entertainment

Disney catches comics giant Marvel in a $4B web

By RYAN NAKASHIMA,
AP Business Writer Ryan Nakashima,

– Mon Aug 31, 7:06 pm ET

LOS ANGELES – The Walt Disney Co. is punching its way into the universe of superheroes and their male fans with a deal announced Monday to acquire Marvel Entertainment Inc. for $4 billion, bringing characters such as Iron Man and Spider-Man into the family of Mickey Mouse and "Toy Story."

The surprise cash-and-stock deal sent Spidey senses tingling in the comic book world. It could lead to new rides, movies, action figures and other outlets for Marvel's 5,000 characters, although Marvel already was aggressively licensing its properties for such uses.

The deal won't have benefits right away, and Disney stock sank on the news. Disney expects a short-term profit hit, and Marvel characters from X-Men to Daredevil are locked up in deals with other movie studios and theme parks. But Disney's CEO, Robert Iger, promised an action-packed future.

"`Sparks will fly' is the expression that comes to mind," Iger told analysts.

Stan Lee, the 86-year-old co-creator of "Spider-Man" and many more of Marvel's most famous characters, said he was thrilled to be informed of the marriage Monday morning.

"I love both companies," he said. "From every point of view, this is a great match."

The deal is expected to close by the end of the year and marks Disney's biggest acquisition since it purchased Pixar Animation Studios Inc., the maker of "Up" and "Cars," for $7.4 billion in stock in 2006.

Marvel would follow another storied comic book publisher into the arms of a media conglomerate. DC Comics, the home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, was bought by Warner Bros. — now part of Time Warner Inc. — in 1969.

Buying Marvel is meant to improve Disney's following among men and boys. Disney acknowledges it lost some of its footing with guys as it poured resources into female favorites such as "Hannah Montana" and the Jonas Brothers.

"Disney will have something guys grew up with and can experience with their kids, especially their sons," said Gareb Shamus, whose company Wizard Entertainment Group runs several of the Comic-Con conventions around the nation.


Marvel TV shows already account for 20 hours per week of programming on Disney's recently rebranded, boy-focused cable network, Disney XD, and that looks likely to increase, Iger said. The shows are "right in the wheelhouse for boys," he said.

There will be some lag before Marvel's trove of characters are fully developed at Disney, because of licensing deals Marvel has with other studios.

For example, Sony Corp.'s Columbia Pictures is developing the next three "Spider-Man" sequels, starting with "Spider-Man 4" set for a May 2011 release. News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox has the long-term movie rights to the "X-Men," "Fantastic Four," "Silver Surfer" and "Daredevil" franchises.

Both studios maintain those rights in perpetuity unless they fail to make more movies.

Separately, Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures has a five-picture distribution deal for Marvel-made movies, the first of which will be "Iron Man 2," set for release next May. Paramount said it expects to continue working with Marvel and Disney.

General Electric Co.'s Universal Studios has an attraction called Marvel Super Hero Island in Orlando, Fla., that will stay in existence as long as Universal wants to keep it there and follows the contract terms, Universal said.

Disney said it will honor and re-examine Marvel's licensing deals upon expiration and may extend the profitable ones. Iger noted that when it bought Pixar, that company also had third-party licensing agreements that eventually expired, allowing the companies to move forward together.

Despite beginning to make its own movies, starting with "Iron Man" last year, licensing remained a key driver of Marvel's $206 million in profit and $676 million in revenue last year. Iger said Disney could give Marvel broader global distribution and better relationships with retailers to sell Marvel products.

However, analyst David Joyce of Miller Tabak & Co. noted that the $4 billion offer was at "full price."

Marvel shareholders will receive $30 per share in cash, plus 0.745 Disney shares for every Marvel share they own. That values each Marvel share at $50, a 29 percent premium over Friday's closing stock price. The final ratio of cash and stock will be adjusted to ensure Disney stock makes up at least 40 percent of the final offer.

Marvel shares shot up $9.72, or 25 percent, to close at $48.37 on Monday. Disney shares fell 80 cents, or 3 percent, to $26.04.

Disney investors were probably unhappy that the deal will reduce earnings per share in the short term and might not turn positive until the company's 2012 fiscal year. Disney's earnings per share will drop partly because the company will issue 59 million new shares, and partly because Marvel plans to release two costly blockbusters, "Thor" and "The First Avenger: Captain America" in 2011. DVD sales of those films likely won't roll in until fiscal 2012.

Disney said the boards of both companies have approved the transaction, but it will require an antitrust review and the approval of Marvel shareholders.

If it works out, Marvel's chief executive, Isaac "Ike" Perlmutter, 66, will pocket a hefty payday. He snatched Marvel assets out of bankruptcy in 1998, in a deal that valued the company at around $450 million including debt, outmaneuvering investors Carl Icahn and Ronald Perelman. His 37 percent stake in Marvel is now worth about $1.5 billion.

-- AP Entertainment Writer Jake Coyle in New York contributed to this report.
 
Kanye West sticks his foot in his mouth, Again!

http://entertainment...spx?news=431007
Beyonce, nominated for best female video for "Single Ladies," was bested by Swift, the best-selling artist of the year outside of Jackson. The 19-year-old was giddy when she won for her clip "You Belong With Me," the first award given out Sunday, and said: "I always wondered what it would be like to maybe win one of these someday, but never actually thought it would happen."

But West ruined her moment when he jumped on stage at Radio City Music Hall.

"Taylor, I'm really happy for you, and I'm gonna let you finish, but Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time," said West, as a shocked Beyonce looked on and the crowd began to boo.

A crestfallen Swift didn't finish her speech, but the crowd applauded her anyway. She later performed "You Belong With Me" in a subway station.

Swift later got a speech do-over, courtesy of Beyonce, who won video of the year for "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)." Beyonce recalled that she won her first VMA at age 17, as a member of Destiny's Child.

"I remember how excited I was," she said. "I'd like Taylor to come out and have her moment."

A smiling but nervous Swift then said, "Can we try this again?" before going on to thank everyone she would have thanked had West not interrupted her.

Later, backstage, Swift said she had never met West and had been a fan. She declined to get into a verbal tussle with West: "I don't know him and I don't want to start anything."

Instead, she praised Beyonce for giving her the stage: "I thought that I couldn't love Beyonce more and then tonight happened and it was just wonderful."

The celebrity crowd was unforgiving of West. When Diddy read his name later in the show while introducing the nominees for best male video, the crowd booed, and Diddy said in mock surprise, "What happened?" The crowd responded by chanting Swift's name (T.I. ended up winning the award). They also booed his name later.

West also addressed that, too, on his blog: "BEYONCE'S VIDEO WAS THE BEST OF THIS DECADE!!!! ... EVERYBODY WANNA BOOOOO ME BUT I'M A FAN OF REAL POP CULTURE!!! NO DISRESPECT BUT WE WATCHIN' THE SHOW AT THE CRIB RIGHT NOW CAUSE ... WELL YOU KNOW!!!! I'M STILL HAPPY FOR TAYLOR!!!! "

Kanye is an egocentric jerk.
huh.gif

Imagine what kind of self-importance and entitlement a person would need to go onstage during a TV show to proclaim the winner didn't deserve the win.

Poor Taylor Swift. She's still a kid. Winning this award was probably one of the highlights of her young life. To have Kanye come up and say to the effect "No offense, Taylor, but you stole Beyonce's award. But I'm still happy for your success." My heart goes out to her.
 
http://www.nbcphilad...o-59278957.html
Kanye West Gets Teary-Eyed on Leno Premiere
By CAITLIN MILLAT
Updated 12:07 AM EDT, Tue, Sep 15, 2009

Kanye West emotionally apologized again for interrupting Taylor Swift's speech at the MTV Video Music Awards Sunday evening, telling Jay Leno in the talk show host show's premiere that his mother, who died last year, would be ashamed of his behavior -- and that it's been "extremely difficult" dealing with his guilt.

West showed up in all black, looking somber as he sat down with the host for an unexpected interview that took even Leno by surprise.

"It's been extremely difficult, just dealing with the fact that I hurt someone or took it in a way, you know, from a talented artist or from anywhere," West said.

"I only wanted to help people. My entire life, I've only wanted to give and do something that I felt was right, and I immediately knew in this situation that it was wrong," he said.

"It was rude. Period," he said.

West wiped his eyes when Leno asked what his mother, who died last year, would think about his behavior.

"Obviously I deal with hurt," West said as he paused to think. "I'm just ashamed that my hurt caused someone else's hurt. My dream of what awards shows are supposed to be caused...I don't try to justify it because it was just wrong."

West said he needed to "take some time off" to analyze his next move and how he'd "improve" throughout his life. He ended the impromptu interview with a hug from Leno, then went to perform with Rihanna and Jay-Z.

The rapper stormed the stage at the MTV VMAs when Taylor Swift, 19, won the award for Best Female Video of the Year, telling the audience to a chorus of boos that his friend Beyonce should've won the award.

West wasn't Leno's only all-star guest at the premiere -- and Leno brought some of his old tricks to his new gig.

Leno opened his new show with a monologue reminiscent of his old routine on "The Tonight Show," jabbing at everyone from politicians to entertainers and athletes.

His first joke was a dig at the West/Swift scandal, comparing the feud to the rift between African-American Harvard professor Henry Gates, Jr. and the officer who Gates alleged arrested him earlier this summer because of his race.

"It's been a busy week for President Obama -- he invited Kanye West and Taylor Swift to the White House for a root beer summit," Leno joked. "She's only 19."

Leno, who wore a navy blue tie and dark blue suit to the premiere, also poked fun at Vice President Joe Biden, health care and the "Cash for Clunkers" program as well as Serena Williams' outburst at the U.S. Open and perennial football losers the Detroit Lions.

He also spoke with good friend and legendary comedian Jerry Seinfeld, who opened the show as Leno's first sit-down guest. Seinfeld wore a full tuxedo for the occasion, sitting on the plush blue velvet chairs on Leno's new streamlined stage as he spoke with the host.

"In the '90s, when we quit a show, we actually left," Seinfeld joked to Leno, who dumped NBC's "Tonight Show" last year.

"Jay and I have been very close friends for many years, but the truth is when I heard I was going to be asked to be the first guest, I was slightly disappointed you couldn't get a bigger name," Seinfeld said to Leno. "I haven't been on television in 11 years."

Oprah also appeared on the show via a video screen in between Seinfeld and Leno. She talked about the upcoming season of her show and conducted a mock interview with Seinfeld, who she said was her good friend.

A staged interview that juxtaposed a past interview with President Obama with new questions from Leno was also shown on the premiere, pairing old Obama clips with new Leno footage.

"Tort reform" was Obama's advice to Leno's question about whether he should eat a raspberry or blueberry pastry.

Kanye's already revising history when he claimed:
"I only wanted to help people. My entire life, I've only wanted to give and do something that I felt was right, and I immediately knew in this situation that it was wrong," he said.
West had earlier written on his website that he was "soooooo sorry", adding "Welcome to the real world!!!! Everybody wanna booooo me but I'm a fan of real pop culture!!!".

West wrote Sunday night (in All Caps = shouting):

"I'm sooooo sorry to Taylor Swift and her fans and her mom [Andrea].
I spoke to her mother right after and she said the same thing my mother would've said. She is very talented! I like the lyrics about being a cheerleader and she's in the bleachers! ........ I'm in the wrong for going on stage and taking away from her moment!....... Beyonce's video was the best of this decade!!! I'm sorry to my fans if I let you guys down!!!!! I'm sorry to my friends at MTV. I will apologize to Taylor 2mrw. Welcome to the real world!!!! Everybody wanna booooo me but I'm a fan of real pop culture!!! No disrespect but we watchin' the show at the cribe right now cause.. Well you know!!!! I'm still happy for Taylor!!!! Boooyaawww!!!! You are very talented!!!!! I gave my awards to Outkast when they deserved it over me. That's what it is!!!! I'm not crazy yall, I'm just real. Sorry for that!!! I really feel bad for Taylor and I'm sincerely sorry!!! Much Respect!!!!!"

I guess that Kanye or his management realised how arrogant that he sounded, so his website deleted that first version and replaced it with an apologetic post.
The rapper wrote on Monday:

"I feel like Ben Stiller in 'Meet the Parents' when he messed up everything and Robert De Niro asked him to leave... That was Taylor's moment and I had no right in any way to take it from her. I am truly sorry.

Weasel... Worm...
 
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