Helle Ib: Pinslerne fortsætter i Masochistisk Folkeparti

Det siges, at Jehovas Vidner har en samling ældste – en gruppe tilsynsførende, der registrerer og støtter medlemmerne i at holde sig på dydens smalle sti. Dvs. afstå fra utroskab, hasard, blodtransfusioner og andre gerninger i strid med troen. Måske det er herfra, visse SF-medlemmer har hentet inspiration til forslaget om, at den unge skatteminister Thor Möger Pedersen (SF) skal have en bisidder, når regeringen indleder forhandlinger om næste års finanslov.

This Android Robot Is Controlled by Your Phone

Love robots? Have an Android phone? Have we got the thing for you. Meet BERO, and Google Android-inspired robot that is controlled by an app on your Android phone or tablet.

Originally inspired by the Google Bug Droid at Maker Faire, the open-source robot can be programmed to do virtually anything you want, with a fully programmable and customizable interface. Robots can be voice activated, and can be programmed to react to smartphone notifications.

Out of the box BERO comes with software so it can play your favorite tunes, and dance to the music with “realistic” dance moves such as head turns, arm waves, and side-to-side poses. Headphones on the top of the robot will also light up to match the beatof whatever tunes you’re playing.

SEE ALSO: This Robot Will Out-Dance You [VIDEO]

For getting around, BERO utilizes two infrared transmitters for navigation that allow the robot to detect obstacles up to 3-5 inches to the left, right and front. Users can interact with BERO and have the robot interact back with the user.

The project launched Tuesday currently on Kickstarter with a number of different BERO options available ranging from a non-functional desk model to a special fully-functional gold-plated limited edition only for Kickstarter backers.

BERO is expected to start shipping in late November 2013. Initially only capable of working with Android phones and tablets, plans are in the works to add iOS compatibility in the future as well as Twitter and MP3 functionality.

Reuters People News Summary

Following is a summary of current people news briefs.

Pioneering comedian Phyllis Diller dies at age 95

Comedian Phyllis Diller, the former
housewife whose raucous cackle and jokes about her own looks
made her one of America's first female stand-up comedy stars,
died in her sleep on Monday at age 95, her longtime manager
said. Diller was found in her bed at her home in the affluent
Brentwood section of Los Angeles by her son, Perry, who had
come to visit her, manager Milt Suchin said.

Rihanna admits she still loves Chris Brown

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - More than three years after being
beaten up by then-boyfriend Chris Brown, R&B singer Rihanna has
admitted that she still loves him, calling Brown possibly ``the
love of my life.'' The ``Umbrella'' singer told Oprah Winfrey in a
television interview broadcast on Sunday that she and Brown,
23, had rebuilt their trust and now had a ``very close
friendship.''

Rosie O'Donnell says ``lucky to be here'' after heart attack

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Comedian and talk show host Rosie

Jordan vs LeBron James: The Greatest of All Time?

There has been recent debate lately ever since team USA won gold and that is has LeBron James taken the torch from Michael Jordan as the best player of all

time? There’s no question that LeBron is the best basketball player on the planet right now, but that sure does not make him the best of all time. LeBron

may be able to reach that title, but the matter of the fact is that comparing anybody to the great Michael Jordan it has to be compared by the number of

rings they have at the end of their career.

I know it must be exciting to win gold for our country and the person on that team was LeBron James, so automatically people have ranked him the best player

of all time. I guess people have forgotten about Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell and the one that’s still playing Kobe Bryant.

There is nothing wrong in comparing LeBron to Jordan because if you think about it they are very similar in many ways.

Michael won his first NBA Title at the age of 28 and LeBron won his first title at the age of 27 a year younger than Michael was. However, it took MJ seven

seasons to win that first one and took James nine years, so if you look at it LeBron James should be on his way to win at least five more since Jordan won

his first title around the same age as LeBron is now.

The one thing that may hurt LeBron to take the best player of all time title away from MJ and that’s him going to another team. A team that has a Dwyane

Wade and a Chris Bosh which may not go well for people to name LeBron the greatest of all time. Yes, James did leave in a way that wasn’t acceptable by

pretty much everybody and that made him a villain until he won the NBA Title this past season. LeBron was a free agent and he had every right as any free

agent has to join a team that he seemed that he had a better chance to win a ring.

Trust me if Michael, Magic, Kareem, Larry and Kobe were on a team like LeBron was with in Cleveland all of them would have taken the advantage of free agency

to join another team that puts them in a better chance in winning a NBA Title. The fact is that all of those players were already on a great team. Magic came

to a Lakers team that already had Kareem and Kareem wasn’t going to leave once he learned that Magic was the guy to help him win multiple titles. Kobe had

Shaq and Phil Jackson as a coach, so Kobe isn’t going to leave. Larry had Kevin McHale and Dennis Johnson and with Larry’s talent he wasn’t going to leave

that team. As for Michael he was not on a great team when he came to the Bulls. The Bulls did not have the great players to put around Michael until Scottie

Pippen was drafted in 1987 and got Phil Jackson as their head coach in 1989 and we all know what happened in the 1990′s with Michael taking the Bulls to six

NBA Championships

The Cleveland Cavaliers never put the right keys around LeBron that’s why he left. He did not have a Kareem, a Magic, a McHale, a Pippen next to him in

Cleveland until he went to Miami and now has Wade by his side.

There’s no doubt that LeBron will end his career with multiple titles the question is how many? Kobe has five right now and is on his way to try to win his

sixth ring and tie Michael Jordan for the number of NBA Championships.

I wonder if anybody still thinks about Kobe possibly still being in the debate if he’s better than Michael. Why all of a sudden did LeBron surpass Kobe and

Michael at the same time? I don’t think so! LeBron needs to get in the discussion in which we talk about if LeBron is better than Kobe first before we start

talking about him being better than Jordan. Kobe has five championship titles and may be on his way to his sixth.

If LeBron can get to five or six NBA Championships then there will be a debate in who’s the greatest of all time is, but we have to wait for that. He just

one his first title and I’m positive that LeBron will end up with multiple championships just like Kobe and Michael, but until that happens we need to are

just going to have to wait and see what more LeBron James can do with the Miami Heat and only then we will be able to discuss who the greatest of all time

is.

Lebanon Militia Kidnaps Syrians

Syria's conflict sent shocks throughout the Middle East on Wednesday, with militiamen in neighboring Lebanon saying they had taken more than three dozen Syrian nationals and a Turkish man hostage, while several regional governments urged their citizens to immediately leave Lebanon.

Inside Syria, government jets razed homes and reportedly killed nearly two dozen people in a rebel-held town in the country's north. In Geneva, a United Nations commission held Syria's government and affiliated militia responsible for crimes against humanity, including for an attack that left scores of villagers dead in May.

Shiite Muslim militiamen in Beirut, Lebanon's capital, said Wednesday they had taken some 40 people—Syrians and a Turkish national—into captivity since the previous day. Dressed in military fatigues and brandishing assault rifles, masked gunmen from Lebanon's powerful Meqdad family demanded the release of a kinsman they said had been snatched inside Syria on Monday by fighters from the rebel Free Syrian Army. The militia members vowed to target Qatari, Saudi and Turkish nationals as well.
"We have a very wide range of targets and we do not advise anyone to test us," one of the masked gunmen, who identified himself as a member of the Meqdad family's military wing, said in remarks broadcast on several Lebanese stations from the family compound in Beirut's southern suburb.

Syria's conflict, as the kidnappings attest, is increasingly splitting the region along sectarian lines.

Syria's embattled President Bashar al-Assad has surrounded himself primarily with members of his Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam. Most Shiites in Lebanon support Mr. Assad. The Syrian president is opposed largely by Sunnis, the majority population in Syria. As the conflict has deepened, Sunni-majority neighbors, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey, have supported Syria's rebels.

People familiar with the Meqdads characterized them as essentially a large family with guns, which has had a contentious history with the far more influential Shiite militia Hezbollah, as well as the Lebanese state. Regional governments appeared to take the group seriously. The Saudi Embassy in Beirut told its nationals to leave Lebanon immediately after the "public threats" against them. The United Arab Emirates and Qatar issued similar warnings, their state media reported.

Many Lebanese, meanwhile, watched with apprehension as the government and security forces made no apparent attempt to intervene as boasts of mass kidnappings were playing out on national television.

The country was further destabilized by news that Wednesday's Syrian government offensive against Azzaz, a northern Syrian town near Aleppo, struck a building where rebels have been holding 11 Lebanese Shiites who were kidnapped in Syria in May. After the attack, angry Lebanese in Beirut blocked the road to the airport, as they have done before to demand the release of their kidnapped relatives in Syria.

The strike on Azzaz leveled buildings and brought chaos to a town where rebel fighters had begun to experiment with self-governance after having proclaimed the territory liberated from government troops three weeks ago.

Syrian fighter jets conducted two bombing runs that sent civilians fleeing, said Associated Press reporters who witnessed the attack, adding that they saw at least eight dead, including a baby, and dozens wounded, most of them women and children. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a U.K.-based group, gave a preliminary death toll of 23 people, and more than 200 injured.

A building housing the 11 Lebanese hostages was struck in the bombing, injuring two of them and leaving the fate of four unknown, said Louay Mokdad, a spokesman for the Free Syrian Army's higher military council. The four men who are unaccounted for are believed to be trapped under concrete rubble in the building's basement, where many of the men were seeking shelter, Mr. Mokdad said. The two injured were being treated at a nearby field hospital.

In recent weeks, the Lebanese men had made video and press statements—one broadcast live by a Lebanese station reporting from Azzaz last week—saying their Syrian captors were treating them well and they were all in good health.

The Azzaz attack came as a U.N. human-rights commission said government forces and pro-government militia had committed crimes against humanity—including murder, torture, sexual violence and war crimes—in Syria, and were responsible for the May 25 killings at Houla of over 100 Syrian civilians.

The report on the findings of the U.N. Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria between March and July is the first time a U.N. body concludes that the Syrian government has committed crimes against humanity, a charge that sets the stage for the potential trial of individuals at the International Criminal Court.

Antigovernment rebels have also committed "murder, extrajudicial killings and torture," the report by the commission said, adding: "These violations and abuses were not of the same gravity, frequency and scale as those committed by government forces and the Shabbiha," or pro-government militants.

The Lebanon kidnappings underscored the fragile balance in the country, where sectarian tensions are deep. The government is a delicate and often dysfunctional offset between rival camps—with parties allied with the Shiite Hezbollah militia and political party dominating government posts, and opposition Sunni and Christian factions controlling some institutions. Feudal-like political leaders rule local areas. The country's army, under the 1989 accord that ended Lebanon's 15-year civil war, is supposed to maintain neutrality.

Lebanon's divisions are so deep that any intervention by the country's security forces risks making matters worse, according to Khaldoun al-Charif, an adviser to Prime Minister Najib Mikati. He said calls were being made to all political faction leaders to contain the crisis.

"The role of the government is to try to preserve the balance as much as possible to keep the country from imploding," said Mr. Charif.

But several observers and officials, including those allied with anti-Syrian factions in government, saw Wednesday's events as a deliberate attempt by the Assad regime and its allies in Lebanon to widen the sphere of the conflict to deflect the increasing international pressure on Damascus.

"This is an attempt to plant Syria's problems in Lebanon," said Khaled Daher, a Lebanese lawmaker with the anti-Syrian March 14 bloc.

Questions surround the clan that took responsibility for the recent kidnappings. The Meqdads, like several other Shiite clans that hail from Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley, maintain virtual private armies and have long had a troubled relationship with the Lebanese state, as well as with the country's two most powerful and organized Shiite militia and political parties, Hezbollah and the Amal movement.

On Wednesday, the Beirut-based al-Mayadeen television station broadcast what it said were armed members of the Meqdad family. One could be heard interrogating two captive Syrians identifying themselves as members of the Free Syrian Army, or FSA, the grouping of local militias and defected soldiers fighting President Assad's regime.

On Monday, an FSA unit said it had abducted Hassan Salim Meqdad, a Lebanese national in Syria, and accused him of being a member of Hezbollah. It claimed that Mr. Meqdad had entered Syria with almost 1,500 Hezbollah members to fight alongside the Assad regime.

Although Hezbollah has long backed the Assad regime, it issued a statement Tuesday denying this, adding that Mr. Meqdad wasn't a member of its organization.

People close to Hezbollah said the group was "exercising maximum restraint" to avoid being dragged into sectarian war in Lebanon and worse, a Shiite-on-Shiite fight. Hezbollah appeared to be controlling its constituents against showing force in the streets.

"This is an incident when you want Hezbollah to have an active role, but it's impossible for it to do so. The stakes are extremely high," said Amal Saad-Ghoreyb, a political analyst close to the group.

The Meqdad clan said it kidnapped a Turkish citizen in Beirut on Wednesday. Later in the day, Lebanon's New TV broadcast a short interview of a man it identified as a Turkish appliance-company worker being held by the clansmen, who said he had been kidnapped after he left the airport in Beirut earlier in the day.

Turkey's foreign ministry confirmed late Wednesday that a Turkish male citizen, Aydin Tufan Tekin, had been taken hostage in Lebanon and said Turkish diplomats were working to obtain his release.

Lebanese officials couldn't be immediately reached to comment.

In Syria's capital, Damascus, a fuel tanker truck exploded Wednesday near a hotel used as the headquarters and residence of the U.N. observer mission to Syria, wounding three people, Syrian officials and state media said.

The attack happened one day before consultations in New York on the fate of the mission, whose mandate expires by the end of the week.

Syrian state media said a "terrorist armed group"—the term the government has used for the rebels now waging an insurgency against it—had attached an explosive device to the fuel truck. Footage from the early-morning attack in Damascus broadcast by Syrian and Arab television stations showed a thick black plume of smoke billowing from the scene shortly after the blast.

No U.N. staff members were injured in the blast, said Juliette Touma, spokeswoman for the U.N. mission in Syria. Syria's Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal al-Mokdad met representatives of the U.N. mission staying at the hotel and said later that they were unscathed in the blast, and expressed his government's pride that not a single member of the U.N. mission has been harmed since the start of their mandate in late April.
—Farnaz Fassihi, Nada Raad and Leila Hatoum contributed to this article.

Mitt Romney, Obama camp spar on Medicare plans

 Mitt Romney wants to make the Medicare debate easy to understand. So on Thursday, he pulled out a black marker and stepped toward a trusty white board

propped up on a school-room easel here to make a presentation.

 The presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s message was simple: For current seniors under President Obama, he said, Medicare would be cut by $716

billion, and some 4 million people would be kicked off their Medicare Advantage plans. Under Romney, he said, current seniors would see “no adjustments, no

changes, no savings.”
 For younger Americans who make up the next generation of seniors, Romney said, Obama would “bankrupt” Medicare, while Romney’s plan would leave the

federal retiree health-care program “solvent.”

“The differences in our Medicare perspective could not be more stark and dramatic, and I think as the people, as the seniors in America understand what the

president’s plan is doing to Medicare, they’re going to find it unacceptable,” Romney said at a news conference at the Greenville-Spartanburg

International Airport here.

The $716 billion in Medicare funding cuts are part of Obama’s 2010 health-care overhaul. An estimated 4 million seniors would shift off the Medicare

Advantage program, which offers seniors a chance to buy into a series of advanced coverage plans, but the Obama cuts do not result in the elimination of

Medicare coverage for anyone.

“Approximately 4 million people will lose their coverage under Medicare Advantage,” Romney said. “This is the plan they’ve chosen. … The president’s

plan has a dramatic impact on today’s seniors, people 55 years of age and older.”

Romney, gesturing at his white board, added, “As you can see, there’s no change in Medicare for seniors – none under my plan.”

Obama’s campaign was quick to respond.

“Unfortunately for Mitt Romney, a whiteboard presentation can’t change that he’s got his facts wrong on Medicare – so Obama for America’s Truth Team is

releasing a whiteboard of its own to set the record straight,” the Obama campaign said in a statement. “The president has extended the life of the program

by nearly a decade. If Romney had his way, it would run out of money by 2016. The president’s health care law eliminates insurance company subsidies and

cracks down on waste and fraud in Medicare – saving $716 billion – and doesn’t cut a single guaranteed Medicare benefit. Congressman Ryan included the

same savings in his budget, which Romney called ‘marvelous’ and said he’d sign into law.

“But it makes sense that Romney wouldn’t want to tell the truth,” the statement continued. “The Romney-Ryan budget eliminates the guarantee of Medicare

and instead provides people with a voucher to buy health care. In fact, a voucher plan authored by Paul Ryan and endorsed by Romney would cost future

retirees an additional $6,400.”

 Asked by one reporter whether his plan for future generations of seniors could be characterized as a voucher system, Romney said no.

 “Which of these two do you think is better?” Romney asked, pointing to the words “bankrupt” under Obama and “solvent” under Romney. “Going bankrupt

or being solvent? Well, obviously, being solvent.”

 Romney said his plan to keep Medicare solvent revolves around greater competition, such as having various private plans compete to provide Medicare benefits

through the government, as well as a means test so that higher-income people would not receive as many benefits as lower-income people.

 “By virtue of doing those things, why we’re able to keep Medicare solvent as opposed to what the president’s proposed, which at this time is to cut

Medicare, not to save it – that’s the amazing thing,” Romney said.

Hinode scientists' stellar effort keeps sun mission 'burning bright'

Whilst the most powerful earthquake since records began hit Japan in 2011, triggering a massive tsunami which devastated much of the country, space

scientists involved in one of the 'brightest' international Sun missions continued working tirelessly at the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science in

Sagamihara, Japan, to capture new data from our turbulent star. Ads by Google What Happens When You Die - New theory says death isn't the end -

RobertLanzaBiocentrism.com These latest Hinode results, to be discussed in a meeting at the University of St Andrews this week, include new data on the

structure of the Sun's coronal magnetic field, obtained whilst studying a violent solar eruption, and the observation of an unusual asymmetry in our star's

magnetic field – a finding that could have a significant impact on the behaviour and prediction of the next solar cycle. The new results will be presented

by David Long (UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory) and Masumi Shimojo (National Astronomical Observatory of Japan) respectively. The Hinode mission is led

by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) in collaboration with the UK, USA and European Space Agency. The UK Space Agency funds the operation of

the Extreme ultraviolet Imaging Spectrometer (EIS) - a UK-led instrument, building on the UK's long history of pioneering work in solar ultraviolet

spectroscopy. The Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) is the lead institute for EIS, and STFC's RAL Space provided the calibration and observing

software. Louise Harra, UK Principal Investigator for the Hinode EIS instrument and Professor of Solar Physics at UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory, said,

"The latest Hinode results will allow us to probe the Sun's activity both on short time scales of minutes, and on the longer scales of years, both of which

are critical to understanding our nearest star." Solar flares and associated coronal mass ejections have a wide range of effects on technology infrastructure

and our day to day lives, potentially disturbing the Earth's magnetic field, knocking-out orbiting satellites and disrupting satellite signals. The impacts

are wide-ranging, affecting radio communication, navigation and power systems. With its three advanced and highly sensitive telescopes (visible, X-ray and

ultraviolet), the Hinode spacecraft is studying the solar magnetic field at scales smaller than ever before and revealing new information about these

colossal explosions in the Sun's atmosphere. In recent years there have been disruptions to power grids, spacecraft have been lost completely and more than

half the Earth orbiting spacecraft were affected in their operation by high energetic particles that bombard the Earth's atmosphere during a storm. We are

dependent on spacecraft for everything from navigation to using credit cards, so predicting the impact of such storms is important for a technology- driven

world. The Hinode mission acts as a microscope on the Sun. The instruments onboard probe in detail the generation, transport, and dissipation of magnetic

energy from the photosphere to the corona and are recording how energy stored in the Sun's magnetic field is released as the field rises into the Sun's outer

atmosphere. This magnetic field can unleash huge amounts of energy in only tens of minutes. An example of this was observed on the 12th July, where a huge

flare exploded on the Sun, leading to disruption to radio communications and a reduction in the power output of a nuclear power station on the east coast of

the US. The data from Hinode are being analyzed in order to determine quantitative measurements of the pre-flare Sun to assist in predicting activity.