Monday, July 22, 2013

Environment Canada probing tornado reports in eastern N.B.

CTVNews.ca Staff
Published Sunday, July 21, 2013 11:23AM EDT
Last Updated Sunday, July 21, 2013 8:36PM EDT

Parts of southern New Brunswick are cleaning up after a quick but destructive storm downed trees and levelled buildings Saturday night.

Several communities in and near the Grand Lake area were hit with strong winds, and possibly a tornado, according to video and eyewitness accounts.

One hard-hit area was Cambridge Narrows, located approximately 40 kilometres southeast of Fredericton.

Property owner Harold Jones lost three buildings in the storm. Several of his tractors were damaged.

?It only lasted about three minutes to five minutes and it was over,? said Jones told CTV Atlantic. ?I looked out on the veranda and everything was in the air, just like a big funnel -- pieces of garage, everything just flying.?

Nearby resident Mary-Beth Mitchell said she couldn?t believe what she was witnessing.

?We saw the lightning and we heard a lot of wind and a lot of rain, but when we came out this morning we drove down the road, there were all the trees uprooted.

?You don?t see stuff like that in New Brunswick.?

In nearby Whites Cove, strong winds destroyed a barn and a 100-year-old tree.

Alex Hache was finishing a day of waterskiing on a the lake with friends when he saw a something stirring in the distance.

?We just kept watching it and it just started getting bigger and bigger,? said Hache, who captured video footage of what appears to be a funnel cloud.

Says his friend Matthew Rideout: ?We saw it lift up a barn and disintegrate it. That?s huge, that?s strong.?

NB Power spent Sunday reconnecting power lines that were knocked out in the storm.

There were no reports of injuries.

Environment Canada is sending a team Monday to investigate the damage and assess whether the storm system was indeed a tornado.

With reports from CTV Atlantic?s Ashley Dunbar and David Bell

Source: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/environment-canada-probing-tornado-reports-in-eastern-n-b-1.1376683

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Wednesday, April 10, 2013

'North Pond Hermit' nabbed by Maine police

ROME, Maine (AP) ? Authorities say a man who lived like a hermit for decades in the woods of central Maine and may be responsible for more than 1,000 burglaries has been captured.

Police say 47-year-old Christopher Knight was arrested last week while stealing food from a camp in Rome.

Authorities on Tuesday found the campsite where they believed Knight ? known as the North Pond Hermit ? has lived for 27 years.

State police said they had no information on whether Knight has an attorney. A message could not be left after hours for officials at the Kennebec County Jail in Augusta, where Knight was being held on $5,000 bail on charges of burglary and theft.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/maine-hermit-living-wild-27-years-arrested-163447480.html

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B&O Play H3 and H6 bring Bang & Olufsen's newer badge to headphones

Bang & Olufsen H3 and H6 bring the B&O Play badge to inear and overear headphones

Bang & Olufsen already offers headphones, and it has the B&O Play line to serve a mobile-oriented world. Wouldn't it be nice if the two categories mixed? As of today, they do. The B&O Play H3 in-ears and H6 over-ears apply that Danish love of aluminum and leather to the kind of headphones you'd want to pack with your MP3 player or smartphone. The H3 carries 10.8mm drivers, a mini bass port and a 20Hz to 16kHz range in a unibody shape that should hold up to exercise; the slightly more stationary H6 over-ears sport 40mm drivers and a wider 20Hz to 22kHz range. Both have primarily iOS-oriented in-line mics and remotes, although the H6 alone has Monster-sourced daisy chaining support to share tunes with others. Don't expect a significant break in B&O's premium pricing just because they're B&O Play-branded headsets, however. The H3 and H6 will respectively cost €249 and €399 when they hit some retail stores in May, and US pricing isn't likely to be much cheaper.

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Source: B&O Play

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Bernanke notes 'stress tests' show stronger banks

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Federal Reserve's annual "stress tests" of major U.S. banks have become better able to detect risks, Chairman Ben Bernanke said Monday night. He said the tests show that the banking industry has grown much healthier since the financial crisis.

Speaking in Atlanta, Bernanke noted that this year's tests showed that 18 of the biggest banks had collectively doubled the cushions they hold against losses since the first tests were run in 2009. He says the tests are providing vital information to regulators.

The latest test results were released last month. They showed that all but one of the 18 banks were better prepared to withstand a severe U.S. recession and an upheaval in financial markets. The tests are used to determine whether the banks can increase dividends or repurchase shares.

Bernanke's comments came in a speech to a financial markets conference sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. He said he viewed the first stress test conducted in 2009, months after the financial crisis struck, as "one of the critical turning points in the crisis."

"It provided anxious investors with something they craved: credible information about prospective losses at banks," he said.

Bernanke said that in the ensuing years, the Fed has worked to improve the stress tests so they could serve as a resource for banking regulators to monitor and detect threats to the financial system.

During a question period after the speech, Bernanke was asked what kept him up at night.

"Let me assure you, there are no major problems you haven't heard about," he said in response. He said his list of concerns include whether the recovery will gain momentum and when the country will get back to full employment.

He said the economic situation in Europe also remains complex, as that region struggles to deal with its debt crisis. He said in the United States, a major issue remains how to deal with high budget deficits without compromising the economic recovery.

Bernanke made no comments during his appearance that suggested he was ready to modify the low-interest rate policies the Fed is pursuing in an effort to boost economic growth and lower unemployment.

The stress tests have been criticized by some banks because the central bank has kept secret the full details of the computer models it is using to evaluate each bank. The Fed has defended this practice. It has argued that it is similar to teachers not giving students specific questions that will appear on a test to guard against students memorizing the answers.

"We hear criticism from bankers that our models are a 'black box' which frustrates their efforts to anticipate our supervisory findings," Bernanke said. He said that over time, the banks should better understand the standards the tests are measuring.

In this year's test, the Fed approved dividend payment plans and stock repurchase plans for 14 of the 18 banks outright.

Two of the banks, JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs, were told by the Fed that they could proceed with their plans but would need to submit new capital plans. Two other banks, Ally Financial and BB&T, were forbidden by the Fed to go through with their dividend increases and share buybacks.

Ally Financial, the former financing arm of General Motors, fared the worst on the stress test. The Fed's data showed that Ally's projected capital level was below the minimum the Fed thinks a bank would need to survive a severe recession. Ally officials said they believed the Fed's testing models were unreasonable.

BB&T, based in Winston-Salem, N.C., said it would resubmit its capital plan and that it believes that it will be able to address the factors which had led to the Fed's objections.

___

Associated Press reporter Ray Henry in Atlanta contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2013-04-08-Bernanke-Banks/id-4dd694fa9cd9422a996fb4a7694d6e26

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Associate Real Estate Development and Finance Building Land ...

?

Associate ? Real Estate Development and Finance?

Building and Land Technology seeks an Associate to assist with financial analysis and transaction management across BLT?s portfolio.? Building and Land Technology (BLT) is a privately held, vertically integrated, mixed use real estate development, property management and private equity firm (www.bltoffice.com).? BLT was founded in 1982 and has developed, owned and managed over five million square feet of commercial space and over 4,500 residential units.? BLT office holdings include the corporate headquarters for Gen Re, GE Commercial Finance, Diageo, GE Real Estate, Xerox, GE Energy, Design Within Reach, Kayak Software, AON/Hewitt, Starwood Hotels and Resorts, and Structured Portfolio Management. BLT?s numerous office parks, apartment complexes, single family subdivisions, common interest communities and adaptive reuse projects total in excess of 8,000,000 square feet of development throughout Fairfield County. BLT is also the developer of Harbor Point (www.harborpt.com), a transformative mixed-use development in Stamford, CT. One of the largest redevelopments on the eastern seaboard, Harbor Point encompasses an entire neighborhood, with more than 4,000 residential units and several million square feet of commercial development. BLT?s holdings include more than 100 active real estate companies, a majority interest in William Pitt Sotheby?s residential brokerage firm with 28 offices and 1,100 agents, a mortgage and insurance company as well as numerous private equity investments.

?

Responsibilities?

  • Serve as a critical member of BLT?s transaction team
  • Provide financial modeling, deal underwriting and analysis, market research, transaction due diligence, and approval memoranda for acquisitions, restructurings, financings, and dispositions
  • Independently develop financial models, including property-level budgets, financial proformas, cash flow waterfalls, and sensitivity analyses for debt and equity investment opportunities
  • Prepare approval memos for submission to senior management with a comprehensive analysis of the deal terms
  • Proactively source new lending relationships
  • olicit and negotiate transaction term sheets
  • Partner with deal team in development of pricing and bid strategies?
  • Review and negotiate transaction documents
  • Close loan, equity and tax credit transactions
  • Act as a liaison with Asset Management to ensure all post-closing items are completed and all BLT departments or third parties are prepared to execute on the business plan?
  • Produce materials for monthly asset management reviews and investor reporting packages

?

Qualifications

  • Bachelor?s Degree required, MBA in Finance or Real Estate preferred
  • 5-7 years of real estate transactions experience?
  • Prior experience in overseeing legal teams and third party consultants
  • Experience in negotiating legal documents
  • Experience in budgeting, financial analysis and portfolio review
  • Experience in working in a cross-functional group, project management and/or process improvement?
  • Strong sense of urgency and ability to meet deadlines is a must
  • Expert experience with Microsoft Excel?

?

Source: http://www.selectleaders.com/candidate/viewjobdetails.do?jid=28479

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Banner Ad's Creators Dismayed By Its Current State | Digiday

Display advertising is now 18 years old. By all accounts, it?s undergoing something of an adolescent crisis.

The banner ad has grown into an industry workhorse. In some ways, its success is obvious. After all, the top five sellers of display advertising are projected by eMarketer to generate $18.6 billion in the U.S. alone this year, a 20 percent increase from 2011. The ad tech industry, tapping into new pools of data and efficient distribution systems, is making display advertising more efficient and more targeted.

And yet there is plenty of discontent around the banner. Publishers in particular rue how commoditized it has become in a sea of 5.3 trillion annual impressions. Advertisers and agencies lament the lack of creativity typically given banners, which some see as on their way to becoming a purely direct-response tool.

Digiday asked those involved in the creation of the first banner ad ? an AT&T ad that ran on HotWired in October 1994 ? for their thoughts on the state of the banner ad nearly two decades later. A future story this week will take a look at how the banner ad came to be during that time.

G.M. O?Connell, founder of Modem Media, the agency that created the first banners
The patient isn?t that healthy. It?s tough for me to see the banner paradigm being the main unit. The fact that it?s migrated from Prodigy to the Internet to the cell phone is a joke. The creativity is disappointing at best. It?s easy for me to say it sucks, but I don?t know what the better thing is. My philosophy has been if you?re not serving the customer with what you put online you?re going to end up in a bad place. Most [banners] aren?t serving value. They?re in the business of interrupting what you?re doing. There?s a limited creativity that?s been applied with what you can do with that space and the space itself is very limiting. On cellphones, it?s worse. Today these retargeting ads are creepy to me. I get it, but to do the equivalent of tracking a guy out of a shopping mall to his car and jumping on top of his car is what we?re doing on the Web now. Online is not a medium built on intrusion. It has to work in the context of what people are trying to accomplish.

Bill Clausen, the client at AT&T, the first banner ad advertiser
I think banner ads can be a part of your overall campaign but should not be the primary or only thing you do. It?s like your logo on your Web page. Your banner ad needs to be clever. Most people are ignoring them. They?re nothing but eye candy on the page. I don?t think they?ve evolved enough. They?ve unfortunately suffered a very slow growth as far as what a smart person could do. I don?t think they?re used very well at all.

Joe McCambley, creative director at Modem Media, who worked on the AT&T placement
Ours is an industry that kills the goose that lays the golden egg. Emails in 1994 had 100 percent open rates. Banners performed almost as well. I don?t even answer my land line anymore, because the only ones who call it are telemarketers. If advertisers can make the phone suck, imagine what they?ll do to content marketing. Between print, radio, tv, phones, The World Wide Web, tablets and now mobile phones, our industry has been given so many opportunities to be great. We keep fucking it up. Sure, not all ads can be fabulous, but our batting average is pathetic.

Andrew Anker, CEO at HotWired, the first publisher to run banners
Media lost sight of the fact it was media. Media is about a quid pro quo. You have to give something to get something. Typically, you?re giving interesting content, and you bring in a certain type of person. They?re willing to view a sponsor?s message. That?s a tight media equation that?s broken down. We get what we pay for, which is a race to the bottom, the commoditization of the media impression. On the margin, we get the creepiness factor. I?m not against everything that?s happened. But I?m assuming there?s a different model. The basic principles we started on have gotten lost. We?ve over-optimized for direct response.

Image via Shutterstock

Source: http://www.digiday.com/publishers/banner-ads-creators-dismayed-by-its-current-state/

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Tuesday, March 12, 2013

9 top productivity busters ? Business Management Daily: Free ...

hourglass and clockMost of us have room to improve our productivity and avoid time vampires lurking around every corner, says Dawn Rasmussen, Path??finder Writing and Career Ser??vices.

She lists the nine worst time-?suckers threatening your productivity.

  1. IMs, emails and texts. When you reply to every message as soon as it hits your screen, you take yourself off course and take time away from more important tasks.
  2. Repetitive emails. Create templates for messages you send over and over again. You?re wasting time rewriting the messages each time.
  3. Lost information. You need a structured organizational system for all of your computer and paper files.
  4. Communication breakdowns. Email doesn?t convey tone and contributes to miscommunication, which eats up time with frustration, resulting in back and forth. When in doubt, go talk to someone in person or call.
  5. The Internet. You may get on the Internet for a productive work reason, but soon you realize you don?t know how long you?ve been on or what you?ve been doing. Place a sticky note on your desktop to re??mind you to focus on your task.
  6. Unstructured meetings. Meetings that lack an agenda or have a leader who can?t keep everyone on task accomplish less. Make a plan in advance to keep participants focused.
  7. Chatty colleagues. If you spend too much time talking with colleagues, find a way to break away and take control of your work time.
  8. Other people?s problems. If you find yourself involved with other people?s problems, teach them to help themselves instead. Coach subordinates, be honest with colleagues and offer solution suggestions to bosses.
  9. Too many commitments. Learn to say no when you really don?t have time for additional duties.

? Adapted from ?9 Worst Productivity Suckers,? Dawn Rasmussen, Careerealism.

Online resource: Learn four more ways to beef up your productivity here.

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We believe great content should be read and passed around. After all, knowledge IS power. And good business can become great with the right information at their fingertips. If you'd like to share any of the insightful articles on BusinessManagementDaily.com, you may republish or syndicate it without charge.

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Monday, March 11, 2013

Lauer offered to resign with 'Today' troubles

(AP) ? A report says Matt Lauer was ready to take the fall last year for troubles on NBC's "Today" show.

The Daily Beast reported Monday that Lauer told Steve Burke, the chief executive of NBC Universal, that he would leave if Burke thought the show was better off without him. Burke dismissed the idea. The account of the behind-the-scenes drama at the troubled morning show was confirmed by show spokeswoman Megan Kopf on Monday.

"Today" has slipped behind ABC's "Good Morning America" in the ratings, and the slide was more pronounced after Ann Curry's messy departure as Lauer's co-host last summer.

Many viewers blamed Lauer for Curry's ouster, but the report said Lauer had been urging NBC to move more slowly with its plans to replace her.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-03-11-US-TV-Today-Lauer/id-78c2d0507c2e4046a76f9e31d988d7bc

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US probes Sanofi over blockbuster drug Plavix

PARIS (AP) ? The U.S. Justice Department is investigating drug maker Sanofi's disclosures to the Food and Drug Administration about different responses to its blockbuster blood thinner Plavix.

The French company said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last week that it learned in June about the investigation.

It only said the investigation centered on "the variability of response to Plavix." The company did not immediately respond to requests to give more details on the investigation.

In 2010, the FDA added a black box ? its strongest form of warning ? to the label for Plavix. At the time, the watchdog said certain patients with a genetic variation cannot metabolize the drug, putting them at increased risk for heart attack and stroke.

Before it got U.S. generic competition last May, Plavix was the No. 2 drug in the world by revenue, with annual sales of around $9 billion in 2011.

Sanofi says it is cooperating with the investigation into Plavix, which is jointly marketed with U.S.-based Bristol-Myers Squibb. Bristol-Myers Squibb spokeswoman Jennifer Fron Mauer said the company had no comment on the investigation.

Plavix is prescribed to heart disease patients to prevent dangerous blood clots, which can cause heart attack, stroke and death.

In order to work effectively, Plavix must be broken down by a particular liver enzyme. But the FDA says 2 to 14 percent of people in the U.S. have low levels of the enzyme, preventing them from successfully processing Plavix. The likelihood of being a non-responder varies by race, according to the FDA.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/us-probes-sanofi-over-blockbuster-drug-plavix-170559900--finance.html

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Friday, January 4, 2013

3 Ways In Which Video Marketing Can Help Grow Your Business ...

Are you looking for ways in which you can grow your business through online marketing, but are not entirely sure what some of the better methods that currently exist are? There are many different methods that you can utilize to grow your business through online marketing, so long as you are able toeffectively employ the strategies. One of the best strategies that you can utilize to grow your business is the creation of videos to promote it, and uploading them on the various video sharing websites. There are number of benefits to video marketing including the fact that it will drive traffic to your website, allow you to build back links which are going to grow your presence within the search engines, and also allow you to explain your business to what could be potential customers.

Drive Traffic To Your Website

One of the biggest benefits of employing video marketing strategies is the fact that you were going to be able to drive a lot of traffic to your website in a very short amount of time. If you are able to create interesting videos that users share with one another, that promote your business, as the videos gain attention on the video sharing websites, individuals will become interested in your business and this will allow you to drive a healthy amount of traffic to your website. Driving traffic to your website should be the main consideration when implying video marketing techniques, but is just one of a few different benefits.

Build Backlinks

As you probably know, building backlinks is a very important part of growing your presence within the search engines, and allowing your website to rank highly for a variety of search terms that are relevant your business. Most video sharing websites allow you to place a link in the description of your video, and when you are able to share that video on dozens of different websites, you are creating dozens of different backlinks that are relevant to your website, and your niche. With Google and other search engines taking social factors into account when ranking websites, it is become increasingly important to build backlinks on pages that are relevant to your niche, and contain content that is related to the content that is on your own website.

Explain Your business to Potential Customers

Another huge benefit to video marketing is the fact that you can utilize the video to explain your business to potential customers. One of the biggest disconnect that many businesses have, is being able to explain a complicated service or product to customers, and video marketing allows you to do so in a straightforward and visual manner, which will allow you to connect with a totally new base of customers, that you otherwise would not be able to connect to through copywriting alone.

If you would like to drive traffic to your website, increase your presence in the search engines, or explain your business to potential customers, video marketing can be an excellent strategy to employ.

Article Tags :

Source: http://www.workoninternet.com/business/reviews/miscellaneous/222272-article.html

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Thursday, January 3, 2013

Samsung, Android Remain On Top In U.S. Mobile, Apple Supplants LG As No.2 With 53% Smartphone Penetration: comScore

android-eats-appleBy one account Apple is having a very strong quarter in the U.S. in smartphone sales on the strength of the iPhone 5, but overall, Android and specifically Samsung are continuing to dominate the market. According to figures out today from comScore, there are 123.3 million people in the U.S. using smartphones as of November 2012, and Android represents 53.7 of them. Among all mobile users — smartphone and otherwise — 26.9% of them are using Samsung devices. The figures, the result of a survey of some 30,000 consumers as part of comScores ongoing MobiLens research, found that Apple’s iPhones account for 35% of all smartphone subscribers, and that its overall mobile share is now at 26.9%. That was enough to put Apple ahead of LG as the country’s number-two mobile brand, with LG now at 17.5%, and Motorola and HTC continuing to round out the top-five, but with smaller market shares than three months before. The survey, of course, does not include holiday shopping figures, so it will be interesting to see whether Apple inches closer to Samsung, or even surpasses it, as a result of that period. According to figures from Kantar Worldpanel, Apple’s iPhone, in the 12 weeks that ended November 25, reached its highest-ever sales share in the U.S. market at 53.3%. Top Mobile OEMs 3 Month Avg. Ending Nov. 2012 vs. 3 Month Ending Aug. 2012 Total U.S. Mobile Subscribers (Smartphone & Non-Smartphone) Ages 13+ Source: comScore MobiLens Share (%) of Mobile Subscribers Aug-12 Nov-12 Point Change Total Mobile Subscribers 100.0% 100.0% N/A Samsung 25.7% 26.9% 1.2 Apple 17.1% 18.5% 1.4 LG 18.2% 17.5% -0.7 Motorola 11.2% 10.4% -0.8 HTC 6.3% 5.9% -0.4 comScore also found that the percentage of mobile consumers using smartphones continues to climb. They now stand at 53%, and just as before the rankings continue to demonstrate that it’s an Android/iOS game: RIM, Microsoft and Symbian all lost market share. Top Smartphone Platforms 3 Month Avg. Ending Nov. 2012 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Aug. 2012 Total U.S. Smartphone Subscribers Ages 13+ Source: comScore MobiLens Share (%) of Smartphone Subscribers Aug-12 Nov-12 Point Change Total Smartphone Subscribers 100.0% 100.0% N/A Google 52.6% 53.7% 1.1 Apple 34.3% 35.0% 0.7 RIM 8.3% 7.3% -1.0 Microsoft 3.6% 3.0% -0.6 Symbian 0.7% 0.5% -0.2 But despite the ongoing move to smartphones, people are still using their devices for low-tech activities. ?Texting remains the most popular

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/sVXY14dzhmM/

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Pakistan embraces 'political goddess' Bhutto

Rizwan Tabassum / AFP - Getty Images

Crowds gather outside the Bhutto family mausoleum in Garhi Khuda Bakhsh on Thursday.

By Waj S. Khan, NBC News

GARHI KHUDA BAKHSH,?Pakistan -- ?In a country where ethnicity is more important than nationalism, little is celebrated collectively other than the odd cricket victory, and most fallen heroes are forgotten or berated, the commemoration of assassinated Prime Minister?Benazir Bhutto has gone the other direction and is verging on deification.

Since Bhutto?s death on Dec. 27, 2007, the region?s deep obsession with mysticism and the occult has evolved to incorporate her legacy.

?I?m here because the ?martyred queen? was there for us,? said?Mustafa, a police officer?from Bhutto?s nearby hometown of Larkana who volunteered to oversee security during a rally last week at a massive?Bhutto?mausoleum, a modern rendition of the Taj Mahal.

As Mustafa talked, electricity seemed to fill what is now Pakistan's most politicized tomb, with nearly a quarter of a million followers thronging to Bhutto?s ancestral graveyard. It was Pakistan?s State of the Union, Woodstock and Thanksgiving Day Parade, all rolled into one.

Wajahat S. Khan / NBC News

The Bhutto family mausoleum in Garhi Dera Bakhsh in the southern province of Sindh, Pakistan.

?I have this honor to serve in uniform because she bequeathed it,? the 29-year-old Mustafa told NBC News, as house music remixed with Sufi poetry and Bhutto?s own speeches rang through state-of-the-art speakers in a walled-off compound the size of a dozen football fields.?

The posthumous granting of titular royalty upon Bhutto is hardly surprising.?Bhutto?s brand of populism raged in the days leading to the main event --?a speech on Thursday by her son, 24-year old Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, which propelled him into the rough and tumble mainstream of Pakistani politics.

An A to Z guide to the Islamic Republic of 'Banistan'

Considered Pakistan?s most important political dynasty, the Bhuttos have crafted a critical brand over nearly five decades: Ivy Leaguers with feudal holdings; anti-military progressives with Islamic leanings; minority Sindhis who have challenged the Punjabi majority; loud and proud Shiites in an increasingly tense and sectarian Sunni country -- a modern cross between the Kennedys, the Tudors and the landed rajas of the subcontinent.

Bhutto's assassination just reinforced the existing cult of?martyrdom widely followed by many in her?constituency?in the?Sindh province and throughout Pakistan,?according to Raza Rumi, who directs policy for The Jinnah Institute, one of Pakistan's leading and more liberal think tanks.

Rizwan Tabassum / AFP - Getty Images

President Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of assassinated former premier Benazir Bhutto, embraces his son Bilawal Bhutto Zardari outside the Bhutto family mausoleum in Garhi Khuda Bakhsh, Pakistan, on Thursday.

"The legends and myths of famous Muslim sacrifices through the centuries have set the parameter for this religious/magical/political framework that now dominates her narrative," he said.?

Hashish, whiskey
At last week's rally, the smell of hashish and whiskey whiffed from dark corners, mixing exotically with the aroma of the langar, a makeshift community cafeteria designed to feed thousands.?But it was the combination of mysticism and politics that make the growing movement surrounding the Bhutto legacy unique. ?

Full NBC News?coverage of Pakistan

Dilawar, 28, and Samina, 20, who had trekked from neighboring Dadu with their 2-year-old child, swore about the magical powers of ?Bibi Shaheed,? which translates from Urdu as ?Martyred Lady.?

?It was this annual ziarat and dua (pilgrimage and prayers) to her grave that made our baby come into the world. Our conditions got better. That?s why we come every year,? Dilawar told NBC News.

A suicide bombing at a political rally kills Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. NBC's Matt Lauer reports.

7 aid workers shot and killed in Pakistan

Speaker after speaker took to the 40-feet high stage protected by bulletproof glass.??One Zardari outweighs them all!? the crowd chanted.

The reference was for the man who had just landed via helicopter, the current president and Bhutto?s widower, Asif Ali Zardari, who has managed to keep her party -- Pakistan?s most popular -- intact and in command, but barely, of the nation?s divided and war-torn polity.

'Modern political goddess'
"[During the] last five years, the death anniversary of Bhutto has turned out to be a bigger event than many actual mainstream religious events across Pakistan," said Rumi, the policy analyst. "That's phenomenal politics. The invocation of Sufi legends with a modern political goddess have altered the spiritual consciousness of the rural population."?

Muhammed Muheisen / AP

Images of daily life, political pursuits, religious rites and deadly violence.

The credit for sustaining the Bhutto brand through the?institutionalization?of this?commemorative?rally goes to Zardari. In a country accustomed to military coups, he has almost completing the full term of an elected civilian government for the first time since the Pakistan's independence 65 years ago.

Can social media propel 'rock star' politician Imran Khan to power in Pakistan?

While Zardari is considered one of Pakistan's sharpest political operatives, he is less popular than Bhutto was, and spent the years between 1996 to 2004 in jail on corruption charges that he says were politically motivated. But as he grooms his son to take over the country's largest political party, he continues to be locked in a power struggle with the judiciary as well as the so-called deep state, local parlance for the military establishment.

At the rally, which?his government branded ?The Day of Martyrdom," the?hundreds of thousands greeted Zardari with a roar of approval?as he pledged free elections in a country?unaccustomed?to them.

Dec. 27: Benazir Bhutto was born to lead the fight for Democracy in a hard-line Muslim nation. NBC's Chris Clackum looks back at her life.

More world stories from NBC News:

Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

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Source: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/02/16283955-commemoration-or-deification-pakistanis-honor-martyred-queen-benazir-bhutto?lite

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Goal Setting Part 1: The Only New Year's Resolution That *Really ...

iStock_000015646374XSmallDid you enjoy your holiday kicking back on the lawn chair? Good, because now that it?s the beginning of a new year, it?s time to get off your *ahem* and start goal setting!

(Actually, progress is best made with a balance of goal setting and getting, and lawn chair resting throughout the year?more on that in a minute.)

Since the new year is a time of new beginnings, now is a great time to set your goals for 2013 and beyond. Many people set new year?s resolutions, vowing to making this year different. I imagine you have a few things you?d like to be different this time around as well.

Unfortunately, the odds are not favorable. The majority of new year?s resolutions don?t make it past January; and many of us ?fall off the wagon? within a week! How many times have you set new year?s resolutions that you actually kept in the long term? Forget keeping resolutions through February?I often used to forget what my resolutions even were by February! Been there? ;)

Of course, that doesn?t mean you should ?resolve to have no resolutions,? as many people joke and some seriously recommend. It means knowing how to make new year?s resolutions?from here on out referred to as goals?that you can actually stick to.

Goat setting and goal-getting is an art, and a science. Whether you want to improve your health, advance your career, and finally get a good relationship (or make your current one better) ? and if you?re like me you want all of the above! ? then you?ll need to know how to go about doing it in the most effective, least stressful way.

Thus begins part 1 of a 3 part series on effective goal setting.

Part 1: The Only New Year?s Resolution That *Really* Matters:
A.k.a.: Why all of your other goals, dreams, and aspirations will either fail, or fail to make you any happier, until you?ve mastered this one thing.

Why? Because most people think that if I HAVE these things, I will get to DO these things, and then I will BE happy. Actually, it is the other way around. People who ARE (be) happy DO certain things that bring them STUFF (have).

So it comes down to knowing which direction the whole be-do-have thing works.

Happiness, feeling good about yourself, feeling at peace with yourself, getting in touch with your inherent, authentic perfection as a being?these are states of being. Incidentally, so are anger, sadness, frustration, bitterness, guilt, shame, boredom, and feeling like a failure. These states are instantly accessible: anytime, day or night, regardless of outside circumstance.

Goals, on the other hand, are specific things you?d like to do or have in the future. Such as: losing a certain amount of body fat, getting a raise, taking helicopter lessons, or going out on more dates. These are not instantly accessible. They are things that require planning to obtain (more on successfully planning them in Part 2).

To put it in more precise terms; a state = being, doing (internal process) while a goal = doing (external activity), having.

Goals do not necessarily equal states. It is simply incomprehensible to think that if ?I lost 20 pounds, I would be happy,? or, ?if I got a relationship, I would not be lonely anymore.? This is setting yourself up for failure, because either you won?t get the goal at all, or worse, you?ll get it and realize that it didn?t really bring you all the happiness you thought it would. A miserable person who loses 20 lbs is a miserable person who is 20 lbs lighter. A miserable 300 lb person who learns to embrace a happier state is a heavy, happy person.

Don?t even get me started on the Hollywood perpetuated myth that finding your soulmate will magically solve all your problems? ;)

It?s tempting to start off the new year with long lists of resolutions, but before we can do any resolution-making and goal setting that will matter, there is one very important thing that needs to be in place: ?You must know, down to your very core, that you are already good enough, awesome, great, wonderful, beautiful, whole, and perfect. Just as you are. Right now.

If you already know this?not just in your head, but in your heart of hearts, you may skip to Part 2. :)

For the rest of us, here are some thoughts on why it?s so important to have this belief before proceeding with much else.

Goals are a fun, useful tool make your life better. They will not ?fix a broken you. There is no stack of cash high enough, no body sculpted enough, no lover hot enough that will fix a broken you. All the self-help books and seminars in the world won?t fix a broken you. It?s impossible for anything outside of you to fix a broken you, because you aren?t broken in the first place.

As Mark Manson says in his article on the topic, self-help will only help if you already have a fundamental belief that you are OK as a person.

??Bad-to-OK people are in it because they believe that they?re fundamentally flawed and want to fix themselves. OK-to-Great people are in it because they think they are OK, but they want to become great.
?Generally speaking, the OK-to-Great people do just that ? they go from having an average and ?OK? life and turn it into something really unique and great over the course of years?The Bad-to-OK people improve little, if at all, even after years of ?effort?. In some cases, they may even get worse.?

We are always trying to run faster, jump higher, get skinnier, earn more, have more time, more sex, more stuff, in the hopes that one day, we will achieve that elusive something.

So, if you woke up on Jan 1 thinking some version of, ?Ok, here are all the things I need to fix about my life so I can finally be happy?? Stop. Crumple up that list. Delete it. Trash it. It will be useless to you until you stop trying to fix things.

The only new year?s resolution that really matters is this: that this is the year you will finally embrace your inherent goodness, wholeness, and perfection as a being (that is, if you haven?t already). You will become an ?Ok-to-Great? person; you will believe that you are okay the way you are, and it?s all icing on the cake from here on out!

Seriously, losing a few pounds and earning a few more dollars is a piece of cake compared to this. ;)

Before we move on, let?s define a few things:
?Goodness, in this context, conveys the idea that you are NOT bad, or that there is anything wrong with you. You may have done bad things (we all have), but you are not bad as a person.
?Wholeness, in this context, refers to the idea that you are not broken or incomplete.
?Perfection has a dictionary definition of ?corresponding to an ideal standard or abstract concept.? In this context, your inherent perfection is recognizing that the only ideal standard for you is you, ergo, you are perfect.

So, where do we lose our sense of inherent goodness, wholeness, and perfection? Where do we lose our belief that we are OK, and instead feel empty and broken?

If you?ll let me get all ?conspiracy-theorist? on you for a minute, you are surrounded by people who are trying to sell you stuff, and one of the most effective ways to sell you stuff is to make you feel bad about yourself.

This idea that you have to have a certain job, or a certain kind of relationship, or a certain kind of body?let?s just call it status?the idea that you need to have status to be good, whole, and/or perfect is a L-I-E.

Yes, it?s a lie that a lot of people have bought into, but just because lots of people believe it, that doesn?t make it true. Most people think that status comes from having *stuff,* which is great news for the marketing team, because that means they?ve done their job well.

By the way, I?m not really anti-marketing or anti-advertising. It is how we learn about certain things that are useful and make our lives better; but there is a big difference between ?Wow, my iPhone5 really makes certain things easier and more entertaining,? and ?I need an iPhone5 because having one makes me cool!?

Even if you?re not buying into the idea that you need certain products, most of us buy into the ideas that come from friends, family, and other people we look up to. I spent a good portion of my adult life thus far doing things that I hoped would turn a few people?s judgemental comments into praise (?But if they could just see..., then maybe??).

It all comes down to seeking approval from outside sources. Sometimes it is useful to have outside validation of your ability in certain skills, for example, a physician can examine your body and run certain tests to see what kind of health you?re in; a teacher can give a exam to see if a student has learned the material.

However, seeking outside validation to determine how close you are to perfect is a losing battle, because:

a) No outside source will agree on one standard, and many opinions will conflict.

b) All external measurements are man-made, arbitrary standards and can?t measure anything except for what they measure. A driving test can only measure driving ability; someone could get a ?perfect score? on a driving test, because there is an ideal standard for driving, but this does not measure their character or inherent perfection as a human being.

You are the ideal standard for you, just like the original Mona Lisa?is the standard for the Mona Lisa. Anyone who tries to copy this painting has to refer to the original. Well, in this case, you ARE the original, so you are also the ideal standard you need to adhere to. Your perfection lies in your authenticity.

It might seem like there are outside standards for how the ideal person should be, but again, there are way too many conflicting ideas about this for there to actually be a standard. In other words, you can either be perfectly you, or chip away at that by trying to be some outside ideal of perfection that actually doesn?t exist.

Even if you were to look at the average (the average person scores a ?16? on their XYZ Test by the age of 30), average is hardly the same thing as perfect. Seriously, why strive to be average when you can strive to be your best self? Trying to be like ?the average so-and-so? might be the most damaging form of approval seeking there is.

Many of us start off seeking the approval of parents, and teachers, mentors, then of peers and lovers (or those we wish were lovers). Some people turn to religion. Some people end up seeking the approval of a therapist, coach, or ?guru? as a way to feel like they?re *finally worthy,* but this is just replacing one outside source with another.

This is why we struggle with the idea that rest and recuperation (the lawn chair) are as important as action, movement, and achievement. This is why some people become addicted to stress. Sitting on a lawn chair probably won?t get you as much approval as moving, shaking, and doing, doing, doing; however, approval seeking will run you down, burn you out, and, worst of all, likely lead you away from achieving YOUR life?s purpose.

So what?s a hopeless approval-seeker to do? Well, luckily, now there?s a solution! For only 5 easy payments of $147.95, you can download my all new ?Ultimate Happiness and Peace of Mind Program?! Product launch 2013, yeah!

Ok, all kidding aside, ultimately, the knowledge that you are good, worthy, and perfect must come from within. Mommy, Daddy, friends, society, universities, your job, your boss, your car, your Apple products can?t give you this knowledge. Mentors, teachers, and spiritual guides might be able to point you in the right direction, but they can?t give it to you. Your partner, or future partner, cannot give it to you.

This can be a bit of a catch 22, since most people who feel unworthy, feel unworthy to grant themselves worthiness. However, by adopting a new mindset, this cycle can be broken.

Here are some of the ways to start to get in touch with your inherent perfection:
1. Notice if you feel angered by these ideas, and remember that I?m giving you nothing but compliments and encouragement, so what?s really got you upset? ;)

2. Become aware of when you do something to gain another person?s approval. Ask yourself, ?What would happen if this person did not approve of me?? For 99% of people, the answer is ?Nothing bad would happen.? If it?s someone like your boss, then, ok, maybe you?d lose your job, so maybe you should go ahead and do that thing that will let him or her see you a little more favorably. However, this awareness will help shift the focus to ?I?m doing this to keep my job/get a promotion,? rather than, ?I?m doing this because my boss?s approval helps me feel more complete as a person.?

3. ?Meditate?on the idea that you are perfect, just the way you are. That you are the only ?ideal standard? for you, and your perfection lies in your authenticity.

*Note (and I am of course in no way speaking from personal experience here ;) ): This might piss you off at first. You may want to cry, scream, or hit things. There might be a lot of layers of BS to wade through. There might be some indignant thoughts of, ?But it?s not fair that all those things happened to me!? You may be tempted to say ?Fuck it,? and go eat some ice cream instead. You may fall asleep. But stick it out and you?ll eventually find a moment of peace, where you feel totally perfect.

4. Don?t get pissed off when you realize that that one moment didn?t last forever, and you are not ?done.? This is a lifelong journey. ;)

5. Become grateful for what you have, quit whining about what you don?t have. Enjoy the things that make you smile and laugh. Below is one of my favorites:


Source: http://www.artofflirting.com/goal-setting-part-1-the-only-new-years-resolution-that-really-matters

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