Michael Jackson Wallpapers

Just two weeks after the death of Michael Jackson, Randy Phillips, CEO of AEG Live, producers of what were to be Jackson’s 50 sellouts at the O2 Arena in London, still has not caught his breath. Among the most recent developments for Phillips, AEG Live and parent AEG, was the successful planning and execution of Jackson’s memorial at the AEG-operated Staples Center in L.A. on Tuesday.

“To me, the success of [the memorial] is measured by the fact that I think we were able to really humanize my friend and erase those caricatures that the press had created of him. If there is one thing I could point to it as to why it was successful, it would be that.”

Phillips noted that the event was “one of the largest broadcasts ever in the history of the world, right up there with Princess Diana’s funeral, maybe even bigger because of the Web now.” According to Nielsen Media Research, the memorial service for Jackson on Tuesday totaled a combined 20.5 household rating with 30.92 million viewers in the U.S. on the 19 networks carrying it from approximately 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

In offering a free media feed from the event to the world and refusing to sell merchandise at the event, AEG declined to monetize the memorial, despite the huge losses they have incurred following Jackson’s death. “This was a memorial service,” Phillips said. “In fact, it was really a funeral, because the casket and the body were there. We took the high road. I’m not saying this because I drank the AEG Kool-Aid, but that’s the only way this company knows how to work.”

That’s not to say Phillips and AEG have not taken their shots in the wake of Jackson’s death, from giving fans the option to keep their tickets to This Is It (with no refund) to selling merchandise on the This Is It website. “One thing I’ve learned in taking this job is you can’t please everybody,” Phillips says. “There will always be critics and skeptics and all that, but we did the right thing for my buddy. We buried him with dignity.”

The memorial featured moving and sometimes magnificent performances by such artists as Usher, Mariah Carey, Jennifer Hudson and Lionel Richie. While AEG owns this intellectual property, Phillips says there are no immediate plans to offer content, digital or otherwise, from the memorial.

“First of all, we didn’t know what it was going to be, how well it was going to come out,” Phillips says. “There may be [some sort of release], but we really haven’t thought about that. We’d have to go back to the speakers and the artists and get their permission.”

Even if there were video or audio released from the memorial, “we wouldn’t do anything without the estate,” says Phillips. “Michael was our partner in life, he’s our partner in death through his estate.”
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As a result, school officials “banished” Cohen to off-campus office space – what the city calls temporary reassignment centers – where she now spends her days painting watercolor portraits of fellow teachers while still receiving her annual salary.

Cohen is just one of more than 700 New York teachers receiving full pay while awaiting the results of disciplinary hearings for infractions that range from lying to sexual misconduct to ‘allowing a child to wear a hat in a classroom.’

According to city officials, teachers are sent to reassignment centers – called ‘rubber rooms’ by the educators and their union - because their union contracts require they be allowed to continue in their jobs while their cases are being heard.

“It is extremely difficult to fire a tenured teacher because of the protections afforded to them in their contract,” New York school spokeswoman Ann Forte told the Associated Press.

Once ‘banished’ from the classroom, teachers spend their days playing scrabble, doing yoga or planning their vacations. Teachers are not only paid their full salary – most earn $70,000 per year or more - they also continue to follow the school calendar for weekends, holidays and the summer break.

City officials told the AP the contract does not permit teachers to be given other work.

Teacher David Suker, accused of throwing away a student’s test sign-in sheet during an argument, has spent the past three months in a Brooklyn reassignment center.

“It’s sort of peaceful knowing that you’re going to work to do nothing,” Suker told the AP.

Suker’s three months in the rubber room pales in comparison to time served by other teachers. Since the cases are heard by just 23 arbitrators who work only five days a month, some teachers spend two or three years in the reassignment centers. Others have been there for five years or more.

“No one wants teachers who don’t belong in the classroom,” Ron Davis, spokesperson for the United Federation of Teachers, told the Associated Press. “However, we cannot neglect the teachers’ rights to due process.”

New York is not alone in paying teachers not to teach. The Los Angles district has nearly 200 teachers assigned to ‘rubber rooms’ and the city of Philadelphia sends teachers awaiting disciplinary action to what officials call “cluster offices.”

“They just sit you in a room in a hard chair,” Mary Shapiro, a retired Philly teacher told the AP. “And you just sit.”

Karen Horwitz, founder of the National Association for Teacher Abuse, said educators awaiting disciplinary hearings are typically sent home – with or without pay. She also said some school districts find non-classroom work for teachers’ accused of misconduct.

Once their hearings are over, the teachers are either sent back to the classroom or fired.

Judith Cohen’s hearing took place two months ago.

“I’m awaiting a decision from my hearing,” Cohen told the AP. “It was over on April 29… and here I sit, waiting, and waiting and waiting…”

According to the Associated Press, the New York City Department of Education estimates the practice of the ‘rubber rooms’ costs taxpayers $65 million a year.
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Jacqueline Wallace filed a complaint March 10 in McDowell Circuit Court against Community Radiology, Gary W. Wright, Dr. Stephen Raskin and Dr. Valery P. Sobczynski.

According to a letter Dr. Abbott Huang sent to Wallace’s attorneys, Wallace felt a small pea-sized lump in her right breast on Dec. 7, 2006. The following February her husband was concerned the lump was getting larger — “about the size of the end of a middle finger,” the letter says.

In turn, Wallace says she had an imaging test performed at Community Radiology in Bluefield, Va., on March 16, 2007.

On March 20, 2007, Community Radiology issued a report to Wallace, stating that the imaging appeared normal and that there was no evidence of cancer, according to the complaint.

About eight months later, Wallace went for her annual Pap smear test and mentioned the lump in her right breast was growing larger, according to the letter from Huang. Her doctor requested an ultrasound that was performed on Dec. 17, 2007.

A mass was found, and doctors performed a biopsy of the tissue imaged in the March test. In the tissue, doctors found a mass that was indeed cancerous, the complaint says.

Sobczynski was the radiologist responsible for reading the March test and initially determining Wallace was free of cancer, the suit states.

“From a radiologic point of view, the mass seen in the right breast was perceptible on the study of March 16, 2007,” Huang’s letter says. “Given the history of the mass, an ultrasound should have been performed on the initial study date. This reflects a deviation from the standard of care within a reasonable degree of medical certainty.”

Because doctors at Community Radiology failed to find the cancer, Wallace says she has endured emotional pain and suffering, plus physical pain, lost wages, emotional distress, economic loss and permanent disfigurement.

However, Community Radiology contends the complaint against it should be dismissed.

Although it does admit to releasing a report to Wallace saying there was no evidence of cancer, Community Radiology says it included a warning in the report.

“Defendant denies that that is the entirety of the information contained in the report and affirmatively states that the report further states that some patients with breast cancer have normal mammograms, in addition to other information,” its answer to Wallace’s complaint states.

In addition, Wallace was wrong in naming Raskin as a defendant in the complaint because of his ownership interest in Community Radiology, the center states.

In fact, Raskin, who performed the radiology services at Community Radiology, had no ownership interest in the company. Instead, he had a contract through Community Radiology and was responsible for contracting with other radiologists who may have been needed to fill in for him, it says.

Community Radiology is asking the court to dismiss Wallace’s complaint against it with prejudice and to award it attorneys’ fees and other relief the court deems just.

In addition to Community Radiology and the two doctors, Wallace names Wright as a defendant in the complaint, saying he is the president and chairman of Community Radiology. But Wright contends he, also, should be dismissed as a defendant in the case because he does not own Community Radiology.

“Rather, Community Radiology of Virginia is owned by CROV Holding, a Virginia company,” the suit states. “In turn, CROV Holding is owned by PG Diagnostic Acquisitions, Inc. Mr. Wright, a Florida resident, owns PG Diagnostic Acquisitions, Inc.”

In addition, Wright argues has no contacts with West Virginia and so the state’s long-arm statute does not apply to him.

“Mr. Wright, a Florida businessman connected to the Virginia parent company of Virginia company Community Radiology does not solicit any business whatsoever from West Virginia patients,” his response to the complaint says. “He has no contact whatsoever with the State of West Virginia.”

In her complaint, Wallace is seeking unspecified damages, plus other relief the court deems just.

Wright and Community Radiology have removed the case to federal court because of complete diversity of citizenship between them and Wallace and because Wallace is seeking more than $75,000.

They say Raskin’s and Sobczynski’s citizenships do not matter because the two doctors have not been served.

Eric M. Franci and Steven Mancini of Lewisburg will be representing Wallace.

Elizabeth S. Lawton and Jason Wandling of Shuman, McCuskey and Slicer in Charleston will be representing Wright and Community Radiology.
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Historically the former Assyrians cultivated fenugreek centuries before the time of Christ, and dried fenugreek seeds were used medicinally in time-honoured Indian, Greek, and Arabian medicine. Ancient Egyptians used fenugreek to induce childbirth. The seeds are commonly old in Indian curries, Egyptian bread, and to prepare a coffee substitute in northern Africa.

Fenugreek, which has anti-diabetic potency be like to cinnamon, is one of the most valuable spices for the control of glucose metabolism and thus the prevention and treatment of Type II diabetes. Remarkably, it has been shown to tone down blood glucose levels of Type II diabetics by as much as 46 percent.

Recent studies have investigated the blood cholesterol-lowering and blood glucose-lowering properties of fenugreek seeds, both in run-of-the-mill subjects and in those with diabetes. Significant reductions in total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol and triglyceride levels, but not HDL cholesterol levels, have been observed in non-insulin-dependent diabetics consuming 25 grams of fenugreek per day. The effective effects were sustained over five to six months. With only five grams of fenugreek a day, fasting and post-meal blood glucose levels were significantly reduced in those persons with diabetes. Today fenugreek is recognized as a of use botanical aid in the treatment of persons with diabetes.

Fenugreek seeds are rich in a type of dietary fiber that alters blood glucose levels by delaying the absorption of sugar in the intestines. It has also been shown to cut down on the absorption of fat and cholesterol from the intestines thereby providing added protection against heart disease and obesity.

Fenugreek has also been proven to be supportive when dealing with diabetes-related cataracts. In diabetics the enzymes that control glucose uptake into the lens of the eye do not use normally. Fenugreek has been shown to partially reverse both the metabolic changes in the lens and to reduce the density of the cataract.
While other spices like chilies and cinnamon agree to the culinary and medicinal headlines, the research into fenugreek is showing us that this spice has health benefits on a par with, or even superior to, those of the punter known spices.

http://www.melabic.com/Fenugreek/Fenugreek.html

But The Daily Racing Form, the horse-racing tabloid with the familiar red, white and black logo, appears to have found a survival strategy: it feeds its readers a product with news, analysis and data, and sells them more and deeper analytic information from its Web site, drf.com.

“Initially, the Internet was a small part of the company, but now I’d say that it’s 10 to 20 percent,” said Steven Crist, The Form’s chairman and publisher. “We’re not going to be selling more hard-copy newspapers in five years. I think we’ll still be selling them, because there are still thousands of people who are tactile and sensual about their newsprint and Flair pens and marking up their Form. I don’t think we’re going digital any time soon.”

In a few years, he expects the digital side to account for at least one-third of revenue.

The Form’s business model is bucking two economic trends: it is a daily in the midst of a recession that has decimated advertising and some general-interest papers. And it is a niche paper that serves a sport with considerable problems, but one that comes alive to a general audience for Triple Crown events like Saturday’s Belmont Stakes.

Still, it is the industry’s only daily, with its competition largely from The BloodHorse and The Thoroughbred Times’s Web sites, and the industry’s central data source, Equibase. A formidable challenge seemed to come in 1991, when Robert Maxwell started The Racing Times, which Crist edited. But it lasted less than a year, and The Form acquired some of its assets to kill it.

“Oh, The Racing Form is the bible,” said William Nack, the former Sports Illustrated horse-racing writer and a biographer of Ruffian and Secretariat who grew up admiring The Form’s top columnist, Charlie Hatton. “You can’t be without it at the track.”

Crist said that The Form’s unusual economics helped it endure the recession. He said that fewer than 10 people had been laid off this year, on a staff of about 200.

“Newspapers for the most part get 95 percent of our revenue from advertising, and circulation is break even, at best,” Crist said Friday at Belmont Park. “We’re 90-percent-plus from circulation. So the advertising fall hasn’t hurt much. I’m not saying we don’t like or need advertising, but we’re the most expensive newspaper in the world, at $5 or $6, and that’s where our money comes from.”

Circulation averages nearly 33,000 daily, said Jim Kostas, The Form’s president and general manager. Less than 20 years ago, it was closer to 100,000.

“Although it suffers from some of the same issues newspapers do, the combination of its editorial content and data puts it on firmer ground,” said Charles Hayward, the president of the New York Racing Association and a former president of The Form. “It’s like combining The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times.”

Although its circulation is modest, the $5 to $6 price tag, depending on the market, means revenue of at least $60 million from selling 39 regional editions of the paper at tracks (where The Form also publishes programs) and newsstands. Some days, just a few thousand copies are sold; on Triple Crown days, 350,000.

“Absolutely, we’re profitable,” Crist said. “It’s not even close. We turn over a lot of cash.” The Form is privately owned by a venture-capital firm, Arlington Capital Partners of Chevy Chase, Md., so there is no independent verification of Crist’s profitability claims.

But at least through its most recent sales, it has proved to be an increasingly valuable news-media property: in 1998, a group that included Crist acquired it for $44 million; six years later, the Wicks Group bought it for about $75 million. In 2007, before the recession struck, Arlington paid nearly $200 million as part of a strategy to sell premium sports data online.

“We know that that can’t go on forever,” Crist said of the rise in acquisition prices.

The Internet strategy has been building for a decade and focuses on selling charts, past-performance data, handicapping reports and products like Andrew Beyer’s speed figures for a few dollars to a few hundred dollars. “We’re constantly playing with pricing plans,” Crist said.

Marc Attenberg, The Form’s vice president for Internet, said, “We benefit because people are willing to pay for our information.” Perhaps The Form’s model is one that newspapers should have heeded instead of offering free content. But The Form may be different because what it offers is highly specialized and geared to gamblers, not general-interest readers.

Attenberg hopes that the next evolution in The Form’s digital growth is the creation of mobile devices that can accommodate the intricacy and depth of performance charts.

“Eighty-five percent of people come to our site, print out what they want and take it to the track or to their living room,” he said. “Right now, our stuff just doesn’t work on a BlackBerry.”
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Commissioner Mark Harmon reviewed the budgets line by line and identifed 28 take-home vehicles that could be cut from the sheriff’s office budget and 28 vehicles under other branches of county government that could also be cut.

The committee opted against Harmon’s proposal naming specific vehicles driven by specific employees, citing a desire to avoid micro-managing department heads.

Instead, the committee will send to the full commission a proposal to cut the funding by the number of vehicles outlined, then let the department heads make the call on where to cut.

School budget discussed

The committee also heard from Superintendent Jim McIntyre on the schools’ $375-million budget.

A previous plan to cut 69 teaching positions was trimmed back to 35 teaching positions. Additionally, 35 janitorial positions will be cut. Janitorial services have been reorganized to maintain area coverage.

A previous proposal, to change the high school start time to a later time to allow fewer bus routes to be run, has been taken off the table for now.

As for the stimulus, McIntyre noted the funds were primarily allocated for Title I and special education and would not go into the general operating fund.

Commissioner Brad Anders inquired whether the school might save money from employees’ insurance, but there was no movement on that front.

Anti-intimidation resolution discussed

The finance committee also approved a resolution brought by Commissioner Richard Briggs to make it clear that citizens bringing concerns before the commission would be free from any behavior that might intimidate them.

Briggs proposed the measure after a confrontation between Commissioner Greg Lambert and a property owner concerned about development in his neighborhood.

Briggs had initially considered a censure of Lambert over the incident but then revised the resolution to simply be one against any sort of intimidation of concerned citizens, and Lambert has since expressed support for the measure.
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Like many, Gregg Frederick, 57, took his hands for granted until osteoarthritis made it impossible to pinch his fingers together.

“You just don’t realize. A simple thing like buttoning a shirt. It’s very hard to do some of those things, especially your sleeves, with one hand,” Frederick said. Osteoarthritis of the thumb is one of the most common forms of arthritis. Over a lifetime, the small joint on the bottom of the hand becomes stressed from pinching and grasping.

“The forces that this joint sees can be 20 to 40 pounds per square inch,” Dr. A. Lee Osterman said.
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Femara and fertility treatments are constantly being revamped and reworked to gain a woman’s chances of becoming pregnant. There are two different instances in which fertility drugs can be useful: one, women who are not able to ovulate on their own can be medically stimulated to dream up and release an egg, and two, women that are already ovulating can be stimulated to have an increased chance of pregnancy by the release of multiple eggs during an ovulation return.

However, this change in hormonal levels because of fertility treatments does not always have the desired effects. For one, some women can have multiple births as the end result of taking medications like Gonal F and Follistim. And the increase in hormones can also be problematic for those women with a predisposition or a information of breast cancer. However, Femara and fertility treatments are not linked with increasing the hormonal levels, which makes the Femara a safer alternative for a larger group of women.

Women with breast cancer find that Femara and fertility concerns are congruent. Because Femara, also known as letrozole, is an aromatase inhibitor, it decreases the hull’s ability to produce the hormone estrogen, vital in the conception and pregnancy process. What Femara can do is work with conventional infertility treatments to regulate the amounts of estrogen that are in the body, allowing the woman to have an increased chance of pregnancy without the forebodings of too much estrogen in the body. Or it can be used by itself and naturally increase one’s chances of becoming pregnant.

Other advantages to Femara and fertility is the irritable metabolism of the chemical in the body, which allows it to work on the short term, rather than remaining in the body and affecting the resulting pregnancy as some super ovulation infertility treatment methods can do. In its methodology, Femara can help fertility by allowing the corpse to produce more of its own estrogen in a natural manner by the stimulation of the pituitary gland, rather than introducing additional estrogen in the treatment itself. When the enzyme in Femara suppresses the output of estrogen, rather than the estrogen receptors, this allows the pituitary gland to be activated.

There are some potential side effects to this reduction of estrogen, however, when using Femara and fertility treatments. Hot flashes, mamma tenderness, and minor headaches have all been reported with the use of Femara. Some studies have also shown that there is a risk of birth defects in those that are compelling Femara when they are already pregnant.

Femara and fertility treatments utilizing aromatase are shown to be significantly more impressive in women who have already failed with the use of traditional treatments: Clomid and Serophene, for example. In scientific studies, patients using Femara were capable to ovulate nine out of twelve months and of these twelve patients, three conceived while on the Femara.

Additional studies have shown that Femara and fertility are unmistakably linked. When patients have used Femara, there was an increase in the thickening of the uterine wall, which allowed for firmer egg implantation once the egg was fertilized. This event seems to allow for fewer miscarriages than the traditional fertility treatments. Treatment with Femara seems to be more effective in younger patients than in older women, however, the rates of good are high for those that have already failed with traditional treatments.

Other contenders include the Georgia Dome and The University of Georgia’s Sanford Stadium.

The committee mailed letters last week to public officials and stadium operators in metropolitan markets across the United States in a first step toward preparing a formal bid to play host to the FIFA World Cup in 2018 or 2022. The World Cup is easily the world’s most popular sporting event, drawing billions of television viewers.

“The United States is uniquely qualified to stage the FIFA World Cup in 2018 or 2022 as demonstrated by the dozens of metropolitan markets with venues capable of staging World Cup matches in every respect, from the quality of their stadiums to their overall ability to accommodate thousands of fans, news media and visitors from around the world,” said U.S. Soccer President Sunil Gulati, in a news release. “We will soon begin discussions with officials from throughout the U.S. in the name of presenting a world class proposal to FIFA and the global soccer community.”

In 1994, nine U.S. stadiums were used when the United States played host to FIFA World Cup, which then featured a 24-team and 52-match format compared with today’s field of 32 nations competing in 64 matches.

The United States is one of nine nations that have formally declared their desire to host the FIFA World Cup in 2018 or 2022. The others are Australia, England, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico and Russia, with joint bids from Netherlands-Belgium and Portugal-Spain. Qatar and South Korea have applied as candidates to play host to the tournament in 2022.
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Selig-blogThe Journal Sentinel’s Bob Wolfley quotes Fox Sports president Ed Goren as saying the two sides “have the same agenda … to get to first pitch more efficiently than we have in the past.”

MLB Commissioner Bud Selig has often said he would like to get World Series games started earlier than the current 8:20-8:35 p.m. ET range. After rain delayed the start of Game 3 last year in Philadelphia for over an hour and rain forced the suspension of Game 5 for two days, Selig also said he’d like to see some World Series games played in the afternoon, perhaps on weekend days. (Photo by H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY)

But Goren told the paper that Fox was not considering an early afternoon start for any Series games, citing the financial implications of selling advertising during the day vs. prime time.

Hat tip: Sports Business Daily

YOUR THOUGHTS: Will having the first pitch before 8 p.m. ET improve baseball’s popularity, especially with younger viewers?
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