A Shocker

Shocking...

More...

On Top

On Top, originally uploaded by killmylandlord.

Our wedding cake topper.

Whiter Our Fourth Estate?

Writer: Scrushy Bought Sympathetic Stories

By JAY REEVES, Associated Press Writer

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Throughout the six-month trial that led to Richard Scrushy's acquittal in the $2.7 billion fraud at HealthSouth Corp., a small, influential newspaper consistently printed articles sympathetic to the defense of the fired CEO.

Audry Lewis, the author of those stories in The Birmingham Times, the city's oldest black-owned paper, now says she was secretly working on behalf of Scrushy, who she says paid her $11,000 through a public relations firm and typically read her articles before publication.

Documents obtained by The Associated Press show The Lewis Group wrote a $5,000 check to Audry Lewis on April 29, 2005 — the day Scrushy hired the company. The head of the company, Times founder Jesse J. Lewis Sr., is not related to Audry Lewis.

The firm wrote another $5,000 check that day to the Rev. Herman Henderson, who employs Audry Lewis at his Believers Temple Church and was among the black preachers supporting Scrushy who were present in the courtroom throughout.

Audry Lewis and Henderson now say Scrushy owes them $150,000 for the newspaper stories and other public relations work, including getting black pastors to attend the trial in a bid to sway the mostly black jury.

The payments raise questions about the legitimacy of the ostensibly grass roots support for Scrushy seen throughout his trial.

The prosecutor in Scrushy's case, however, said there would not be anything illegal about someone offering money for favorable news articles, and jurors have said they were not influenced by media coverage but by a lack of evidence that Scrushy was involved in the scheme to overstate earnings at HealthSouth.

In an e-mail response to questions from the AP, Scrushy denied authorizing payments to Henderson or Audry Lewis for any work on his behalf.

Scrushy said he "hit the ceiling" when he learned that the PR firm had paid Henderson but added that he had considered Audry Lewis to be "a nice Christian woman that thought we had been treated badly and she wanted to help."

Now he said he knows they are both "about the bucks."

Jesse Lewis, whose son James E. Lewis Sr. is listed as the paper's editor, denied being part of any scheme to plant favorable coverage of Scrushy in the paper. "We are in the advertising and public relations business, period," he said.

Audry Lewis' columns were uniformly flattering toward the defense, both before and after money changed hands. After Scrushy hired The Lewis Group, her stories moved from inside the newspaper to the front page.

The day jurors got the case, the Times featured a front-page piece by Audry Lewis saying "pastors and community leaders have rallied around Scrushy showing him the support of the Christian and African American community."

Audry Lewis said she initially wrote the columns and submitted them to the paper for free because she believed Scrushy was innocent.

Scrushy liked the pieces and began paying her to write the articles midway through the case, she said.

"He didn't think he was getting a fair shake in the media, which is why he hired me," she said in an interview. She said she sent unedited copies of her stories to Scrushy and Jesse Lewis, who had them put in the paper.

Scrushy said he looked at some of her stories before publication "to make sure the facts from the trial were correct."

After the initial check for $5,000, Audry Lewis said she later got another $6,000 from Scrushy that was routed through the public relations firm, including $1,000 to replace a stolen computer.

Separately, a Colorado public relations man who worked for Scrushy, Charlie Russell, said he gave Audry Lewis $2,500 during the trial and signed a contract stating the money was an advance payment for possible work after the verdict.

Russell said she didn't do any work for the defense after the trial, but he denied the payment was for her stories. Russell said he gave Audry Lewis money mainly out of sympathy when one of her relatives died in Detroit and she lacked funds to get to the funeral.

Scrushy gave Henderson's church and an associated thrift store five checks totaling $25,000 during and after the trial, according to copies of checks provided by Henderson.

Henderson said he was paid for his efforts to raise support for the defendant, but Scrushy said he had given money to the church because Henderson and Audry Lewis had asked for his help with a church building project.

Donald V. Watkins, an attorney who represented Scrushy in the trial, said the allegations by Audry Lewis and Henderson, along with their requests for more money, "could be perceived as a shakedown. It definitely is a hustle."

During the trial, prosecutors had worried that Scrushy was attempting to sway community opinion — and possibly the jury — with a Bible-study program he hosts on local TV, as well as a daily show about the trial that aired on a local-access channel purchased by Scrushy's son-in-law.

U.S. Attorney Alice Martin, who prosecuted the case, said Audry Lewis' claims, if true, don't seem to indicate a crime occurred.

"If you want to pay someone to write favorable stories and can get a paper to print them, I don't know of any law it violates," Martin said.

Copyright 2006, The Associated Press.

Science v. God, Round No. Infinity

The same holds true for pretty much every fundamental property of the forces and particles that make up the universe. Change any one of them and life would not be possible. To the creationist, this cosmic comity is evidence of the glory of God. To the scientist, it is an embarrassing reminder of our ignorance about the origin of physical law.

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Uh-Oh...

Tests show birdflu virus is evolving as expected

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Correspondent

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Genetic tests of samples taken from Turkish victims of the bird flu virus show it has made a small change, but probably not enough to make it more dangerous yet, researchers said on Thursday.

The mutation is one of those that would be expected in a highly changeable virus, the experts said -- and is one of those that would be predicted to eventually allow it to cause a pandemic.

H5N1 avian influenza has caused a burst of human infections in Turkey and has been found in flocks of poultry across the country. It has killed at least two children in Turkey, probably three, and infected a total of 18 people, according to Turkish authorities.

Globally it has infected just 147 people and killed 78 of them, according to the tally from the World Health Organization, which only includes four of the Turkish cases.

Samples from two of the first Turkish victims were sent to a WHO-affiliated laboratory in Britain for analysis. Scientists are carefully watching the virus to see if it makes the changes needed to allow it to easily pass from human to human -- which could spark a pandemic that could kill millions.

There were two different strains of virus in the bodies of the teenage victims, said Dr. Ruben Donis, team leader of the molecular genetics team of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Influenza branch.

"One was a regular virus like we have seen in poultry in Turkey before -- no surprises there," Donis said in a telephone interview.

But half the viruses had a mutation in the a protein called hemagglutinin, which influenza viruses use to attach to the cells they infect. This protein is the "H" in a flu virus's designation.

EXPANDING ITS RANGE

This mutation has been found in the past to allow the virus to infect a greater range of cells via a structure known as sialic acid, Donis said.

"If you have this mutation, you have virus that can bind to more different sialic acid variations," he said.

This is only theoretical, Donis stressed. But when researchers have tested flu viruses in the lab, they found this particular mutation gave the virus a better ability to attach to human-like cells.

A spokeswoman at the World Health Organization said there was no evidence the mutation had much significance in making the virus either more transmissible to people, or more or less dangerous to them.

"It doesn't look as if it has significance regarding transmissibility or pathogenicity because it is not borne out by epidemiological evidence we have so far," WHO spokeswoman Maria Cheng said in Geneva.

Donis said similar mutations have been seen in H5N1, in Hong Kong in 2003, when it first re-emerged in people, and later in Vietnam.

"If this was a wildfire mutation that would have caused the virus to spread like wildfire in a population, we would have seen it more often," he said.

The H5N1 virus remains largely a virus that affects birds. But all influenza viruses mutate and evolve very easily, and regularly change into what are known as pandemic strains, which spread rapidly around the world, infecting and killing unusually large numbers of people.

There has not been a flu pandemic since 1968 and health experts feel the world is overdue.

The H5N1 virus, they say, resembles the H1N1 virus that apparently jumped from birds to humans in 1918, causing an especially deadly pandemic before the virus evolved into a less dangerous form and the human population built up an immunity to it.

Copyright © 2006 Reuters Limited.

Great News (I believe) for Us Mac Fanatics

If I had the money, I'd have already ordered a new iMac...

Apple Unveils New Macs Using Intel Chips

By MAY WONG, AP Technology Writer

Apple Computer Inc.'s historic shift to Intel microprocessors came months earlier than expected as CEO Steve Jobs debuted personal computers based on new two-brained chips from the world's largest semiconductor company.

The first Macs to deploy Intel Corp.'s Core Duo processors will be the latest iMac desktop, whose circuitry is all built into the slim display, and the all-new MacBook Pro laptop.

When it announced the massive switch in June, Apple said it expected to begin making the transition by mid-2006. On Tuesday, Jobs was joined at the Macworld Expo by Intel CEO Paul Otellini to unveil the new jointly designed computers.

The shift comes as Apple is on a streak with its hugely popular iPod music players. Earlier, Jobs said the company brought in a record $5.7 billion in sales during the holiday quarter as it sold 14 million iPods — nearly three times as many units as it did in the same period a year ago.

But Tuesday's focus was on Apple's Macintosh computers.

Jobs said its entire Mac line will be converted to Intel by the end of this calendar year — a move analysts say could boost Apple's computer sales, which cracked 4 percent of the U.S. market last year after hovering around 3 percent.

"Companies don't typically under promise and over deliver, and that's exactly what Apple has done," Sam Bhavnani, analyst with Current Analysis, said of the early launch.

Otellini came onstage wearing a clean-room suit that the chip company has famously used in its ad campaigns — and that Apple once lampooned in an ad of its own.

For years, Apple shunned Intel, which has provided chips that power a majority of the world's PCs, along with Windows software from Microsoft Corp. In the late 1990s, Apple even ran TV ads with a Pentium II glued to a snail.

But Apple, looking for faster, more energy-efficient chips, became increasingly frustrated in recent years as its chip suppliers, IBM Corp. and Motorola Corp.'s spinoff, Freescale Semiconductor Inc., failed to meet its needs.

Of particular concern was IBM's apparent inability to develop a G5 chip that would work well in notebook computers.

Intel, on the other hand, has been focusing on developing chips specifically tailored for notebooks. In 2003, it launched its Centrino notebook technology with a processor that boosted battery life by minimizing its power demand without hurting performance much.

During last week's International Consumer Electronics Show, Intel unveiled the latest generation, the Core Duo, which features two computing engines on a single piece of silicon.

It was that chip that the Apple decided to fit into the new iMacs and MacBooks.

Apple premiered a new television ad Tuesday touting its new partner: "For years, it's been trapped inside PCs, dutifully performing dull tasks when it could have been doing so much more. Starting today, the Intel chip will be set free and get to live inside a Mac. Imagine the possibilities."

Though the change to Intel has occurred faster than expected, it still poses some risks.

Besides potentially alienating a fan base that's accustomed to doing things differently, Apple's move opens up the issue of backward compatibility and the possibility that PC users might run pirated versions of Mac OS X, Apple's critically acclaimed operating system, on their generally cheaper non-Apple computers.

Jobs demonstrated new software, called Rosetta, that will let owners of the new Intel-based Macs run older applications. But he did not comment on how the company will lock its operating system to its hardware.

The change does not appear to have alienated one important player, Microsoft, which offers a Mac version of its popular Office productivity suite.

"We're formalizing our commitment to this platform," said Roz Ho, general manager of the Microsoft's Macintosh Business Unit. "We'll continue shipping Office (for the) Mac for a minimum of five years."

The new iMacs will have the same all-in-one design as previous models and will be available with 17-inch and 20-inch screens for $1,299 and $1,699. Jobs claimed the new models are two to three times faster than the iMac G5, based on an IBM chip.

"With Mac OS X plus Intel's latest dual-core processor under the hood, the new iMac delivers performance that will knock our customers' socks off," said Jobs.

The MacBook Pros — with 15.4-inch displays — start at $1,999. Jobs touted it as the thinnest and fastest operating laptop in Apple's portfolio.

All the new computers will include Apple's Front Row software and a remote control, which lets users watch videos, listen to music or browse photos from across a room.

The machines also will be bundled with Apple's newly announced iLife '06 suite of digital lifestyle programs. In one of the updates, the latest version of iPhoto will let Mac shutterbugs share pictures much like bloggers, and podcasters share content.

"This is podcasting for photos," Jobs said.

With a few clicks, users can post an online feed to which others — including Windows users — can subscribe. As changes are made to the album, subscribers automatically receive the updates.

The iLife suite also will enable the one-click export of video to iPods as well as a simple, drag-and-drop method of creating DVDs. The program also will support third-party DVD burners.

Shares of Apple jumped $3.07, or 4 percent, to a 52-week high of $79.12 on the Nasdaq Stock Market. Shares of Intel fell 47 cents, to $26.

Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press.

King of All Media Frenzy

By USA Today (See Below)...      By Chicago Tribune...      By Reuters...      By CBC...
By E! Online...      By MSNBC...      By Newsday...      By Seattle Times...      

----------

Playing it by ear: Howard Stern's Sirius debut

By Alison Maxwell, USATODAY.com

A synthetic heartbeat pounded. "Join the revolution" scrolled across the screen followed by 1-888-9-A**HOLE. Farting sounds to the theme from 2001: Space Odyssey played for more than a minute.

Howard Stern's Sirius radio show had hit the airwaves.

After dealing with about 20 minutes of technical glitches that forced him to play music for the first time in years, Stern hit his stride touching on topics from his purported marriage to the war in Iraq.

Though technically uncensored, Stern used little profanity. However, he didn't shy away from X-rated material peppered with bad language, and his staffers frequently cursed. From 6-10 a.m., we counted approximately 172 swear words.

Here's a look at the top news from Monday's opening show:

• After much build-up in the press and on the show, Stern announced that he had in fact married longtime girlfriend Beth Ostrosky. Staff expressed shock and outrage. Just five minutes later, he recanted: "No I am not married ... I wanted to see the reaction around the room." He continued: "Beth and I are on a roll. I am in love. She appears to be in love. It's a nice feeling that we get along great. We don't feel that if we got married it would enhance the experience anymore. We don't want to f—- it up."

• Stern introduced a new segment called "Revelations," where the staff anonymously reveals deep secrets and listeners and staff try to pair revelations with their confessor. Among Monday's 11 revelations: "I cheated on my wife and she caught me," "I have spent well over $10,000 on Internet porn," and "I once had my stomach pumped for alcohol poisoning. And when I woke up in the hospital an acquaintance of the same sex was fondling my genitals."

• Star Trek star George Takei, a frequent guest on Stern's previous show, will be the new voice of the show. He'll be live in the studio throughout the premiere week, and then will continue to do show voice overs. Stern took plenty of time to harass Takei about recently announcing he is gay, and prompted Takei to talk at length about his first homosexual experience.

• Stern attempted to contact David Lee Roth, his replacement on CBS Radio, to offer advice. When attempts were unsuccessful, Stern plodded ahead, criticizing Roth for not taking negative calls on the air. "If you're that brave, confront the negative phone calls," Stern said. "What he needs to do is not make it easy, and not make it comfortable for himself."

• Though Stern did not use much profanity, he did take advantage of his ability to play X-rated sound bites. He replayed — uncensored — the series of dirty voice mails allegedly left by Insider host Pat O'Brien for a female companion. He played a sketch with David Letterman impersonator "Evil Dave" where Evil Dave was anally violated by a female porn star.

• Stern repeatedly, almost in excess, sang the praises of Sirius radio. "I feel that this is the culmination of a dream for me. (Satellite radio) represents a dream for all broadcasters. When management now holds you by the (testicles) and says there's no place for you — now there's a place to come." Stern claimed his move to Sirius has brought the company nearly 2 million new subscribers. He also said there was a run on the Sirius satellite receivers this weekend and that Sirius was delayed 9.5 hours in activating subscriptions.

• Stern hosted a yawn-worthy, 90-minute-plus press conference featuring national and local press. Among the attendees: Access Hollywood's Maria Menounos, MSNBC's Keith Olbermann and Entertainment Weekly's Gary Sussman. He addressed questions about his family, the FCC and the price of satellite radio ("Only 43 cents a day.")

• In traditional Stern form, he poked fun at himself and made candid personal confessions. Among them: He wears a condom during sex with his girlfriend because he is not good in bed; he sees a therapist four times a week; he practices transcendental yoga; his favorite restaurants are Da Silvano and 66 in New York; he's a big fan of the show Dancing with the Stars.

• The show wrapped with a heated debate on the pros and cons of men shaving their genital region.

© Copyright 2006 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

A great primer on determining (or educated guessing) a stock's value

Step 1: Measure the stock's risk and reward. We can do this by downloading the stock's history back to inception and evaluating its annual gains...

But that's just half the story. You must next evaluate the risk you're taking by annualizing the stock's monthly returns...

Step 2: Examine the stock's price-to-earnings multiple. Many investors examine a stock's potential by comparing its price-to-earnings ratio (P-E) with its P-E range in the past. That is one way to tell if investors have driven the stock up faster than its earnings have grown.

One way to do this is by using BetterInvesting's Stock Selection Guide. We begin by estimating the stock's expected long-term growth... Next, we look at the company's profit trends... pre-tax profit margins... and returns on equity (a measure of management effectiveness)... Last, we compare the stock's forecasted P-E with its range...

Step 3: Calculate the company's value using its forecasted future cash flows. Some investors like to value stocks like bonds, by measuring the worth today of the company's expected future cash flows.

Using the methodology of NewConstructs.com, which provides a website that performs this analysis... economic profit margin (profit after all costs)... long-term revenue growth rate...

Step 4: Check the USA TODAY Stock Meter score. This proprietary measure available at USATODAY.com tells you how aggressive an investment a stock is, based on its financial history...

Copyright © 2006 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

Another Great Character Actor Has Left Us

"Old School's" Blue Dies

By Josh Grossberg

You're our boy, Blue, and we'll miss you.

Patrick Cranshaw, a veteran character who racked up five decades' worth of credits but none more indelible than his turn as elderly frat boy Joseph "Blue" Palasky in the 2003 comedy hit Old School, has died. He was 86.

He died at his home in Fort Worth, Texas, of natural causes last Wednesday, his personal manager, Jeff Ross, told the Los Angeles Times.

Eagle-eyed moviegoers have spotted the thespian's distinct mustachioed mug popping up in dozens of high-profile pictures and TV series over the years.

He played the bank teller in 1967's Bonnie and Clyde; the hobo in 1985's Pee-Wee's Big Adventure; the ancient mail sorter in 1994's The Hudsucker Proxy; the grandpa in 1996's Everyone Says I Love You; the millionaire dog owner in 2000's Best in Show and the demolition derby owner in last summer's Herbie: Fully Loaded. He also appeared as a regular for two years on Alice and had guest stints on such shows as The Dukes of Hazzard, Mork & Mindy, ER, The Drew Carey Show, 7th Heaven, Just Shoot Me and Monk.

But it was Cranshaw's hilarious performance as the decrepit frat brother in Old School opposite Luke Wilson, Will Ferrell and Vince Vaughn that made him a cult icon.

In the film, Blue's most memorable moment comes as he's about to wrestle two topless women. As he glimpses the buxom beauties, he gets so excited he dies of a heart attack. Ferrell's character, emotionally devastated by the loss, later delivers a stirring eulogy at his fallen housemate's funeral, crooning "Dust in the Wind" and crying out dolefully, "You're my boy, Blue!"

That line became immortalized by Old School aficionados, who created Website shrines dedicated to Cranshaw and would shout out the phrase whenever they spotted him in public--capped by a stadium full of baseball fans chanting the line when the Texas Rangers and Los Angeles Angels invited him to a game.

"It was a great experience and an acknowledgment for him," Ross told the Times. "He loved the recognition and would turn back and say, 'I'm your boy, Blue.' "

Born in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, on June 17, 1919, Cranshaw embarked on an acting career after entertaining the troops with the Army Air Forces before World War II. His big-screen résumé also included parts in Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band (1978), Private Eyes (1981), Moving (1988), and Bubble Boy (2001). His final film appearance will come in Air Buddies, a comedy due out later this year.

Cranshaw is survived by three children, Jan Ragland, Joe Cranshaw and Beverly Trautschold; his sister, Billy Vi Gillespie; six grandchildren; and eight great-grandchildren.

Copyright © 2006 E! Online, Inc.

I hope it's not too buggy

CableFree USB Hub

Belkin announces its new CableFree USB Hub, the industry’s first USB Hub that does not require a cable to connect to the computer. This Hub allows people to place their laptop anywhere in the room while still maintaining wireless access to their USB devices, such as printers, scanners, hard drives, and MP3 players. This is the first UWB-enabled product to be introduced in the U.S. market. The CableFree USB Hub’s wireless functionality is enabled by Freescale Semiconductor’s ((NYSE:FSL, FSL.B) Ultra-Wideband technology.

CableFree USB will be on display at the 2006 International CES Show in Las Vegas, NV, January 5–8, at 31247 South Hall and at Macworld Conference & Expo in San Francisco, CA, January 10–13, at 717 South Hall.

Beginning in early spring 2006, Belkin will offer a four-port hub that will enable immediate high-speed wireless connectivity for any USB device without requiring software. The CableFree USB Hub gives desktop computer users the freedom to place their USB devices anywhere in the room without running long cables. Laptop users gain the freedom to roam wirelessly with their laptop around the room while still maintaining access to their stationary USB devices.

Belkin’s CableFree USB product will be compatible with the more than 700 million USB devices estimated to be in the market today. Indeed, according to market research firm In-Stat, the number of USB devices is forecast to increase to 2.1 billion in 2009.

“We have always focused on ease of use when developing our products,” comments Mark Reynoso, Sr. VP of Sales and Marketing for Belkin. “With the proliferation of USB devices and the increasing demand for wireless functionality, it’s important that we not only continue to bring innovative wireless products to the marketplace, but also to bolster them with easy installation. With CableFree USB, you can now get the ease of USB without wires.”

“These CableFree USB products represent innovative technology, but, more importantly, will extend the capabilities of millions of USB products,” says Martin Rofheart, Director of the UWB Operation at Freescale. “With the convenience of Belkin’s Plug-and-Play solution, consumers will not be burdened by software upgrades in order to achieve wireless functionality for their USB devices. Indeed, Belkin is taking a leadership role in bringing true wireless USB to the market, and we are thrilled to work with them on this initiative.”

###