People I Can't Get Enough Of

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">Last night on Facebook, I asked for suggestions as to what to write about for today, and I received a modicum of suggestions, but none better than the one provided by Jayman.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigrp8VZrOyAR4ZY6WuXUk1C-e5atc_6nHswftuao1GfJloIX4s2YykH28ALKqi7K6h8QhixAvIxITxzSisZ52dQ7jIIQvTjp5NBhFISv8Bz-rrv88Lei0XDIhSeNl9-nDhdYXvJSeMpV0/s1600/Katherine+Webb+Hot+Sexy+Nude+Super+Bowl.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigrp8VZrOyAR4ZY6WuXUk1C-e5atc_6nHswftuao1GfJloIX4s2YykH28ALKqi7K6h8QhixAvIxITxzSisZ52dQ7jIIQvTjp5NBhFISv8Bz-rrv88Lei0XDIhSeNl9-nDhdYXvJSeMpV0/s400/Katherine+Webb+Hot+Sexy+Nude+Super+Bowl.jpg" width="311" /></a>After last week of the IWS site trumpeting posts about people and things that Jay and I have had enough of, Jayman thought that perhaps I could write about people and things of which I cannot get enough.<br /><br />Say no more Jayman, and let’s get to it!!<br /><br />First and foremost, and without hesitation…My best friend evah, the uber-lovely Schmoopster.<br /><br />Ahhhhhhh, Schmoop.  I enjoy how she never tires of making fun of me and telling me what an egotistic asshole I am, but…She never fails to impart that fact upon me without love. And well…she may be the only person I have ever known where I can just sit with her, say a nary a word all night, and consider it a good time.  I love her.<br /><br />Of course there is also the aforementioned Jayman. He is one funny fucker, and you people don’t know the half of it.  Oh the things I could tell you, but I won’t, because, well…I like him, and respect him and his love of history, because I am a history FREAK as well.  I like Jayman so much that I overlook his taste for Vienna Sausages.  Man, those are as nasty as Jayman is a sweetheart.  Uuch.<br /><br />How can I do a post about people that I cannot get enough of without mentioning Missy?  She is one hot Miss. Ha.  See what I did there?  Miss is one of my best friends ever and has the uncanny knack of offering up quotes which when taken out of context, are hilarious (see right sidebar).  And well…she’s hot.<br /><br />You know who else I can’t get enough of?  Katherine Webb.  She is so hot and talented.  I found this out the other day when my TV told me so.  She is just so super crazy good looking and knows how to work a microphone.<br /><br />I can’t wait for her insight on the Super Bowl which she will cover for <i>Inside Edition</i>.  I bet she will have it going on, and probably win a Peabody Award like Bill O’Reilly did.  She’s…that…good.<br /><br />Seriously though?<br /><br />I can’t get enough of Jon Meacham.  I love him and hate him at the same time.  He's 43, acts likes he’s 63, and has an IQ of 8,000.  He is my man crush.  I only wish he would add an “h” to the spelling of his name.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9BVBhU-MOvPesxq6770PbkzY2eRxTEuqg1x7xC6PhtxJCYEGsdqXhENUJxKKe3h_6v3gr41JM8cs8QYOIixxr5UXgIGL5ntFkbIxIsS4uBMqVdZFZQuIAMcYGPJ8EFfCDDVtLVDTfpZQ/s1600/Manti+Teo+Imaginary+Girlfriend+Notre+Dame.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9BVBhU-MOvPesxq6770PbkzY2eRxTEuqg1x7xC6PhtxJCYEGsdqXhENUJxKKe3h_6v3gr41JM8cs8QYOIixxr5UXgIGL5ntFkbIxIsS4uBMqVdZFZQuIAMcYGPJ8EFfCDDVtLVDTfpZQ/s400/Manti+Teo+Imaginary+Girlfriend+Notre+Dame.jpg" width="337" /></a>Chrissie Hynde and Dolores O’Riordan.  If someone pulled a Manti Te’o on me and lied to me by saying that those two vixens were coming over for a three way with me, I would have a stroke due to all the blood rushing from my brain down to my naughty bits.  I listen to those two every night on You Tube.<br /><br />SPAM, Johnsonville Brats, and Hamburger Helper, they're not people, but…Love them all. You say it’s not good for me?  Maybe not, but try to tell me that when I am sopping up the residue of each with a heavily buttered Pillsbury Grands biscuit..  Uh-huh, thought so.<br /><br />Eh, there a lot of things of which I can’t get enough, but mainly, I can never have to much friendship, and I have received  a lot of that lately, especially through the recent, <i>"Schmoop Scare of Aught 12."</i>  I like it, and thank you.<br /><br />I can be one sarcastic prick, but really?  I treasure my friends, and while I can be a jerk from time to time even where my friends are involved, well…I love you guys and can't get enough of you.<br /><br /><i>Cheers!!</i><br /><br /><i>Matt-Man</i><br /><br /><i><a href="mailto:mattmaniws@ymail.com">mattmaniws@ymail.com</a></i><br /><i><span style="color: blue;"><a href="https://twitter.com/MattMan_IWS" target="_blank">@MattMan_IWS</a></span></i><br /><i><br /></i><i>Annnnnd...If you missed the IWS Radio Show LIVE on Saturday, you can catch all the angst ridden hilarity right c'here...</i><br /><br /><object classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.adobe.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" height="105" id="143577" name="143577" width="210"><param name="movie" value="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/btrplayer.swf?file=http://www.blogtalkradio.com%2Fplaylist.aspx%3Fshow_id%3D4287877&autostart=false&bufferlength=5&volume=80&corner=rounded&callback=http://www.blogtalkradio.com/flashplayercallback.aspx" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="wmode" value="transparent" /><param name="menu" value="false" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><embed src="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/btrplayer.swf" flashvars="file=http://www.blogtalkradio.com%2Fplaylist.aspx%3Fshow_id%3D4287877&autostart=false&shuffle=false&callback=http://www.blogtalkradio.com/FlashPlayerCallback.aspx&width=210&height=105&volume=80&corner=rounded" width="210" height="105" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" wmode="transparent" menu="false" name="143577" id="143577" allowScriptAccess="always"></embed></object><br /><div style="font-size: 10px; text-align: center; width: 220px;">Listen to <a href="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/">internet radio</a> with <a href="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/im-with-stupid">Im With Stupid</a> on Blog Talk Radio</div></div>

People I Can't Get Enough Of

Last night on Facebook, I asked for suggestions as to what to write about for today, and I received a modicum of suggestions, but none bette...

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Django

<p>Just back from the cinema.  We saw "Django unchained".  It's really good! A total cinematic experience. You are in for a treat if you decide to go see it particularly if you are a Tarantino fan.</p><p>Tomorrow, I have a date to go see "Les mis" with my sister and best friend.  I'll report back how this movie is......<br></p>

Django

Just back from the cinema.  We saw "Django unchained".  It's really good! A total cinematic experience. You are in for a treat...

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Mega: Kim Dotcom, Megaupload Founder, Launches New File-Sharing Site

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #961515; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; font: inherit; line-height: 21px; margin: 0px 3px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span><br /><h1 style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font: inherit; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Kim Dotcom's Mega launch brings privacy to free 50GB cloud drives</h1><br /><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #961515; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold; font: inherit; line-height: 21px; margin: 0px 3px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Summary:</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: italic; line-height: 21px;"> Kim Dotcom, whose MegaUpload cyberlocker service was closed down at the instigation of the US government, has launched a new privacy-oriented service from his New Zealand mansion.</span><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #6c7376; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px;">By Jack Schofield for </span><a href="http://www.zdnet.com/blog/jacks-blog/" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #005399; cursor: pointer; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font: inherit; line-height: 16px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Jack's Blog</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #6c7376; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px;"> | </span><time datetime="2013-01-20" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #6c7376; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font: inherit; line-height: 16px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">January 20, 2013 -- 18:34 GMT (10:34 PST)</time><br /><time datetime="2013-01-20" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #6c7376; font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; font: inherit; line-height: 16px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></time><br /><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">One year to the day after police stormed his New Zealand mansion on January 20, 2012, the self-named Kim Dotcom  launched a new online cyberlocker where each user gets 50GB of free storage. <a href="http://mega.co.nz/" style="border: 0px; color: #005399; cursor: pointer; font: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Mega</a> differs from his previous effort, MegaUpload, in that in enforces encryption. This probably makes it the most privacy-oriented cloud drive that is easily available to both private and corporate users.</div><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/e2HwRM9eBCs" style="border-width: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 620px;" width="620"></iframe><span style="color: #252525; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;"></span><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline;"> <strong style="border: 0px; font: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The Mega launch featured Maori dancers, an "FBI" helicopter and balaclava-clad commandos, among other things.</strong></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Dotcom said Mega had more than half a million sign-ups in the first 14 hours, so it was already a success. However, the site has sometimes been knocked offline.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Mega's file encryption is not so much to protect users as to protect Kim Dotcom and his company. The New Zealand police force's ludicrous overreaction resulted from accusations that MegaUpload was being used to share copyright material such as movies, TV shows and music. With Mega, files are encrypted before they are uploaded, so that Mega staff do not and cannot know what users are uploading and, possibly, sharing.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Encryption also protects users from snooping by internet service companies and governments.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Mega uses symmetric key encryption in the browser. Every file has its own key, and only the uploader knows what it is. Users can share files, but only if they provide downloaders with the key to decrypt the file.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">However, Mega's terms and conditions implicitly recognise that users will upload copyright material such as back-up copies of their music files for personal use. To reduce storage demands, the system says that it will only store a single copy of files that it recognises are not unique. How it knows they are not unique is not explained, nor is the system for handling different keys.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">This idea goes back more than a decade. The failed Streamload service, launched in 1998, also used to store single copies of music and movie files even if they were uploaded by different users. Amazon also stores single copies in its Cloud music service.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Of course, people who use Mega to share copyright files along with their keys will be taking the same risks as users sharing similar files on MegaUpload. But that's not the problem. The issue is whether or not Mega can be shut down if they do.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) have somehow managed to get the US government to take over the huge financial burden of policing copyright, instead of them having to finance it out of their profits. They have, along the way, criminalised American citizens. Whether this approach will succeed remains to be seen, but it will probably help drive file-sharing abroad. Mega isn't registered under a US domain name, because this is now too big a risk.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The New Zealand police action against MegaUpload and other lawsuits prompted many cyberlockers to close down, or limit sharing, perhaps to non-US territories. Some deleted users' files, or would only allow people to download files they had uploaded.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">However, many sites continued, while others appeared to fill the gap, or simply became more widely used. Current cyberlocker offerings include Rapidshare, Depositfiles, Hotfile, Filefactory, Turbobit, Uploaded, Uploading.com, Extabit, ZippyShare, LuckyShare, Rapidgator, Freakshare, Bayfiles, PutLocker, Bitshare and Lumfile. (This is a quick, random selection not a comprehensive list. Sites are very easy to find by searching for copyright files on Google.)</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">There is no doubt that cyberlockers are widely used for business purposes. Their use is not necessarily known about or condoned, but <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/kim-dotcom-theory-on-corporate-cyberlocker-use-supported-by-survey-120616/" style="border: 0px; color: #005399; cursor: pointer; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Kim Dotcom told the TorrentFreak website</a>: "We have hundreds of premium accounts from employees of the companies the RIAA and MPAA represent. In fact, 87% of the Fortune 500 companies have premium accounts with us."</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">TorrentFreak also reported a survey, conducted by SkyDox, about the use of cyberlockers among 4,119 workers at companies in the US and UK. It found that 66 percent of these employees "admitted to using free file-sharing sites for work. Among these 'sharers', 45 percent said their IT departments are aware of their usage of these services."</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">SkyDox offers cyberlocker services aimed at businesses and enterprises, including the NHS. It has a <a href="http://www.skydox.com/blog/skydox-is-now-a-fully-accredited-g-cloud-supplier" style="border: 0px; color: #005399; cursor: pointer; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Framework Agreement for the Provision of G-Cloud Services</a> from the British government's Cabinet Office.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The US government seized 25 petabytes of data from MegaUpload, some of it private data belonging to its own citizens. Most probably kept separate copies or took the wise course of uploading files to more than one cloud service. However, those who didn't have no chance of getting it back.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">According to <a href="http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/06/feds-megaupload-data/" style="border: 0px; color: #005399; cursor: pointer; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Wired</a>, Kyle Goodwin — owner of the <a href="http://ohiosportsnet.tv/" style="border: 0px; color: #005399; cursor: pointer; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">OhioSportsNet</a>, which streams high school sports videos — sued to get his videos back, but the US government refused to help. "<span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The issue is that the process of identifying, copying, and returning Mr Goodwin’s data will be inordinately expensive</span>", it explained.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The US government apparently can't find and deliver a file even if the user has the filename and a link to its previous address. Maybe the FBI should give Kim Dotcom a job.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; color: #252525; font: inherit; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-size: 12px; font: inherit; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="color: #6c7376; font-size: 12px; line-height: 16px;">From: </span><a href="http://www.zdnet.com/" style="font-family: Simsun; line-height: normal;">http://www.zdnet.com</a><span style="color: black; font-family: Simsun; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></div></div>

Mega Megaupload Sharing Site Mega: Kim Dotcom, Megaupload Founder, Launches New File-Sharing Site

Kim Dotcom's Mega launch brings privacy to free 50GB cloud drives Summary:  Kim Dotcom, whose MegaUpload cyberlocker service was closed ...

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UFC on FX: Belfort TKOs Bisping

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><iframe frameborder="0" height="360" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://hub.video.msn.com/embed/b6f580ff-dab3-486f-bccb-f7b77c26f195/?vars=bGlua292ZXJyaWRlMj1odHRwJTNBJTJGJTJGbXNuLmZveHNwb3J0cy5jb20lMkZ2aWRlbyUzRnZpZGVvaWQlM0QlN0IwJTdEJm1rdD1lbi11cyZzeW5kaWNhdGlvbj10YWcmY29uZmlnTmFtZT1zeW5kaWNhdGlvbnBsYXllciZsaW5rYmFjaz1odHRwJTNBJTJGJTJGd3d3LmJpbmcuY29tJTJGdmlkZW9zJmNvbmZpZ0NzaWQ9TVNOVmlkZW8mYnJhbmQ9Zm94c3BvcnRzJmZyPXNoYXJlZW1iZWQtc3luZGljYXRpb24%3D" width="640"> <A href="http://msn.foxsports.com/video?videoid=b6f580ff-dab3-486f-bccb-f7b77c26f195&src=v5:embed:syndication:&from=shareembed-syndication&quot;Story_MP2_UFC&quot;" target="_new" title="Highlights: UFC on FX 7: Belfort - Bisping">Video: Highlights: UFC on FX 7: Belfort - Bisping</A> </iframe><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px;">Vitor Belfort won’t get a title shot in the immediate future.</span><br /><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">His TKO victory of Michael Bisping in the second round of UFC on FX 7 on Saturday centrally made the Brazilian middleweight relevant again, so much so he wants to move up a weight class and take on Jon Jones at April’s UFC 159 — a fight where Chael Sonnen will challenge for the light heavyweight crown.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">“I want to get that belt,” said Beflort, a former UFC champ who lost to Jones via a submission in September. “Take that punk, Chael Sonnen, I don’t even know your name, and get out. (UFC president) Dana (White) and (UFC co-owner) Lorenzo (Fertitta), kick him out. I want to fight Jon Jones. Take that clown away. Go home. Let me fight the champ. Champ vs. champ.”</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;"></div><div class="parentWrapper" style="background-color: white; clear: both; color: #252525; float: right; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; padding: 4px 0px 4px 8px;"><div class="fs-partner-includes" style="border-left-color: rgb(186, 192, 196); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; margin-bottom: 11px; margin-right: -10px; margin-top: 11px; padding-left: 20px; width: 240px;"><a href="http://theultimatefighter.com/" id="inline-num-1 - link-num-1" style="color: #265970; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" title="The Ultimate Fighter"><img src="http://o.static.foxsports.com/content/fscom/img/2013/01/15/011513-UFC-Ultimate-Fighter-Logo-DG-PI_20130115173953541_202_97.JPG" style="border: none; margin-bottom: 16px; outline: none;" /></a><br /><h3 style="color: #1a303a; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase;">THE ULTIMATE FIGHTER</h3>Jon Jones. Chael Sonnen. What more could you want? Season premiereTuesday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on FX.</div></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;"></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">Belfort looked much more impressive against Bisping, who — unlike Belfort — would have gotten a shot at the middleweight titleholder Anderson Silva with a victory. Belfort first stunned the boisterous Bisping late in the first round with a kick.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">While time ran out before he could follow it up in the first, he unleashed a left kick to Bisping’s temple early in the second. The shot dropped Bisping and Belfort followed with a series of fists before the referee stopped the fight a minute, 27 seconds into the second round.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">“You win some. You lose some,” Bisping said. “I am not going away. Trust me.”</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">The KO earned Belfort the $50,000 “Knockout of the Night” bonus and his post-fight comments earned him the ire of Sonnen.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">“Let me be really, really clear and speak directly to you, Vitor,” said Sonnen, a Fuel TV analyst. “You’re telling the world that you want to meet Jesus and I will gladly arrange that travel. First, I’m going to get rid of Jon Jones.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">“Let me be clear: I accept. You called me out twice now.”</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;"></div><div class="parentWrapper" style="background-color: white; clear: both; color: #252525; float: right; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; padding: 4px 0px 4px 8px;"><div class="fs-partner-includes" style="border-left-color: rgb(186, 192, 196); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; margin-bottom: 11px; margin-right: -10px; margin-top: 11px; padding-left: 20px; width: 240px;"><a href="http://msn.foxsports.com/ufc/gallery/ufc-fx-belfort-bisping-fight-images-011913" id="inline-num-2 - link-num-1" style="color: #265970; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" title="UFC on FX 7: Top Shots"><img align="middle" alt="" src="http://o.static.foxsports.com/content/fscom/img/2013/01/19/011913-UFC-Shut-Up-Fight-TV-Pi_20130119171639674_202_97.JPG" style="border: none; margin-bottom: 16px; outline: none;" /></a><br /><h3 style="color: #1a303a; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase;">FIGHT GALLERY</h3>Take a look at the most brutal shots from UFC on FX 7.</div></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;"></div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">The rest of the main card did not disappoint.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">In the opening fight on FX, Khabib Nurmagomedov made UFC fans (and UFC bloggers who didn’t want to have to type his name multiple times) very happy when he made short work of Thiago Tavares. Nurmagomedov caught Tavares with a deft punch, leveling the Brazilian to the canvas. He then pounced with a series of vicious elbows, forcing the fight to be stopped inside of two minutes of the first round.<br /><br />The Brazilian crowd received a boon in the second bout when their countryman Gabriel Gonzaga kept the action rolling, defeating Ben Rothwell in two rounds. Gonzaga showed great versatility for a heavyweight, controlling the striking game and pressuring Rothwell with a series of takedowns. Gonzaga outworked Rothwell, to the delight of the crowd, sinking in a guillotine choke for the finish.<br /><br />And Daniel Sarafian, who had to miss the finale of TUF Brazil due to injury, entered the Octagon and put on a showcase with fellow middleweight C.B. Dollaway that earned "Fight of the Night" honors. With the entire country firmly in his corner, Sarafian came out blazing, delivering combinations and a wicked overhand right that rocked Dollaway early and often.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">It wasn’t until the middle of round two that Dollaway turned the tides, implementing a counter right that opened up his grappling game. With the fight spending more time on the ground, Dollaway dealt damage to Sarafian diminishing his stamina. This led to a gutsy third round where the fighters constantly flopped dominant position, leaving the judges in a quandary. In the end, the judges sided with Dollaway in a split decision that caused some of the loudest booing ever to drown out a post-fight interview.</div><div style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 14px;">From: FOXSports.com’s Eric Pierce<br /></div></div></div>

BOXING FIGHT news SPORT UFC UFC on FX: Belfort TKOs Bisping

<A href="http://msn.foxsports.com/video?videoid=b6f580ff-dab3-486f-bccb-f7b77c26f195&src=v5:embed:syndication:&from=sharee...

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Review: 'Prosecuting Casey Anthony' on Lifetime doesn't convict either

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br /><h2 style="background-color: white; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 15px; font-weight: normal; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px;">Rob Lowe stars as prosecutor Jeff Ashton in Lifetime's 'Prosecuting Casey Anthony,' which offers no compelling evidence of character study or story.</h2><div><img alt=""Prosecuting Casey Anthony"" src="http://www.trbimg.com/img-50f9e5cd/turbine/la-la-et-prosecuting-casey-anthony.2.jpg-20130118/600" /></div><div><span style="background-color: #f2f2f2; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 12px;">Rob Lowe stars in "Prosecuting Casey Anthony." </span><span class="credit" style="background-color: #f2f2f2; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 12px;">(<span class="photographer">Allen Fraser / Lifetime</span>)</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #292727; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 14px;">By Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times Television Critic</span><br /><div class="byline" style="color: #292727; float: left; font-size: 13px; margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px;"><div class="date" style="color: #930000; font-size: 11px; font-style: italic; margin-top: 3px; padding: 0px;"><span class="credit" style="background-color: #f2f2f2; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 12px;"><span class="toolSet" style="background-color: white; display: inline-block; font-size: 14px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-right: -50px; margin-top: 6px; width: 335px;"><span class="dateString" style="display: inline;">January 19, 2013</span><span class="dateTimeSeparator" style="border-left-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; color: white; display: inline; font-size: 10px; letter-spacing: -1px; margin-left: 6px;">, </span><span class="timeString" style="display: inline; text-transform: lowercase;">7:30 a.m.</span></span></span></div></div><span class="credit" style="background-color: #f2f2f2; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', Times, serif; font-size: 12px;"><span class="toolSet" style="background-color: white; display: inline-block; font-size: 14px; margin-bottom: 14px; margin-right: -50px; margin-top: 6px; width: 335px;"><div class="clear" style="clear: both; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"></div></span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;"></span><div id="story-body-text" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.43; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative;"><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;"><br /><span style="line-height: 1.43;"><br /></span><span style="line-height: 1.43;">If you have been yearning to return to the days of the </span><a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/crime-law-justice/crimes/crime-victims/caylee-anthony-PECLB004332.topic" id="PECLB004332" style="color: #666666; line-height: 1.43; text-decoration: none;" title="Caylee Anthony">Caylee Anthony</a><span style="line-height: 1.43;"> case and the waves of tabloid hoo-ha that erupted around it, or simply don't get enough of </span><a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/rob-lowe-PECLB003056.topic" id="PECLB003056" style="color: #666666; line-height: 1.43; text-decoration: none;" title="Rob Lowe">Rob Lowe</a><span style="line-height: 1.43;"> on "Parks & Recreation," </span><a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/elizabeth-mitchell-PECLB0000006309.topic" id="PECLB0000006309" style="color: #666666; line-height: 1.43; text-decoration: none;" title="Elizabeth Mitchell">Elizabeth Mitchell</a><span style="line-height: 1.43;"> on </span><a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/movies/revolution-%28movie%29-ENMV0002631.topic" id="ENMV0002631" style="color: #666666; line-height: 1.43; text-decoration: none;" title="Revolution (movie)">"Revolution"</a><span style="line-height: 1.43;"> or Oscar Nuñez on </span><a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/television/the-office-%28tv-program%29-ENTTV00000045.topic" id="ENTTV00000045" style="color: #666666; line-height: 1.43; text-decoration: none;" title="The Office (tv program)">"The Office"</a><span style="line-height: 1.43;"> — it's like a delegation from NBC — Lifetime has a TV movie for you.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;">"Prosecuting <a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/crime-law-justice/crimes/criminals/casey-anthony-PECLB004341.topic" id="PECLB004341" style="color: #666666; text-decoration: none;" title="Casey Anthony">Casey Anthony</a>," which premieres Saturday, is based on a book called "Imperfect Justice: Prosecuting Casey Anthony," by Jeff Ashton (played by Lowe), who prosecuted Casey Anthony, imperfectly, on a murder charge in the death of her 2-year-old daughter. Ashton is therefore the person we care about and the only one we follow home, not that we learn much about him there, or anywhere.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;">It's no spoiler to point out, as history has recorded and the film points out right off the bat, that Anthony was found not guilty. The defendant, who didn't report her daughter missing for 31 days and was seen during that time after partying around town, was clearly peculiar/damaged/a piece of work; but all the evidence against her was circumstantial and the police and prosecution blundered. Nevertheless, the team — Mitchell and David Richmond-Peck play Ashton's co-counsels — stayed sanguine about a victory right up until the moment it proved to be defeat.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;">The movie tacks all the big facts into place, and if you knew nothing about the case beforehand you would know enough afterward. But it's curiously undramatic, even with frequent lashings of the professionally over-dramatic <a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/economy-business-finance/media-industry/television-industry/hln-%28tv-network%29-ORCRP000017490.topic" id="ORCRP000017490" style="color: #666666; text-decoration: none;" title="HLN (tv network)">HLN</a> hosts Nancy Grace, who dubbed Anthony "Tot Mom," a moniker the prosecution privately adopts, and <a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/jane-velez-mitchell-PECLB00000010068.topic" id="PECLB00000010068" style="color: #666666; text-decoration: none;" title="Jane Velez-Mitchell">Jane Velez-Mitchell</a>, flown in via contemporary clips as a kind of Greek chorus.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;">The tale unrolls in office scenes, press conferences, courtroom scenes, Ashton's house and a variety of places where food is eaten (which includes the office and Ashton's house). The number of scenes staged in coffee shops and diners may have been to achieve visual variety on a low budget — the stars are the big expense in films like this — but having the characters eat is also a cheap way to make them look human as they reel off reams of expository dialogue, breaking every so often to say, "Could I get a coffee please" or "Jeff, you're such a slob."</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;">We learn that this is a big last case for Ashton, who "got the first conviction in the entire world based on DNA evidence," whose boss "doesn't think I'm a team player" and who is "tired of not being able to throw my fast ball," and that he regards defense counsel Jose Baez (Nuñez) as "smarmy." Lowe signals Ashton's shifting mental states by varying the tension in his jaw and brow; clicking his ballpoint pen denotes anxiousness.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;">Only <a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/kevin-dunn-PECLB0000007330.topic" id="PECLB0000007330" style="color: #666666; text-decoration: none;" title="Kevin Dunn">Kevin Dunn</a> as Casey's father, <a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/crime-law-justice/george-anthony-PECLB0000004482.topic" id="PECLB0000004482" style="color: #666666; text-decoration: none;" title="George Anthony">George Anthony,</a> who may have sexually abused Casey as a child — the defense claimed he did, and that it explained everything — gets much emotional material to play, and he is good. Casey (Virginia Welch) herself remains mostly offstage; there are no dramatic re-enactments of either side's version of events.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;">None of this ever threatens to break into an interesting character study or story or examination of ideas. Still, given that Anthony was acquitted — rightly or wrongly, but not arbitrarily and certainly legally — the fact the film does no better a job of convicting her than did the state of Florida, speaks to its integrity, in a way.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;"><span style="line-height: 1.43;">'Prosecuting Casey Anthony'</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;"><strong>Where:</strong> Lifetime</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;"><strong>When:</strong> 8 p.m. Saturday</div><div style="margin-bottom: 10px; margin-top: 10px; padding: 0px;"><strong>Rating:</strong> TV-<a class="taxInlineTagLink" href="http://www.latimes.com/topic/entertainment/movies/pg-rated-movies-ENMV00000264.topic" id="ENMV00000264" style="color: #666666; text-decoration: none;" title="PG Rated Movies">PG</a> (may be unsuitable for young children with advisories for coarse language)<br />From: <a href="http://www.latimes.com/" style="line-height: 1.43;">http://www.latimes.com</a></div></div></span></div></div>

Casey Anthony Review: 'Prosecuting Casey Anthony' on Lifetime doesn't convict either

Rob Lowe stars as prosecutor Jeff Ashton in Lifetime's 'Prosecuting Casey Anthony,' which offers no compelling evidence of chara...

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Was the Late Stan Musial Baseball's Greatest Living Hitter? How About Barry Bonds?

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><img alt="Cardinals Hall of Famer Stan Musial Dead" src="http://a.abcnews.com/images/US/ap_stan_musial_sswm_jt_130120_wg.jpg" /><br /><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 24px;">If last Friday, someone asked “Who is baseball’s greatest living hitter?” odds are that even the game’s most rabid fans wouldn’t have immediately responded “Stan Musial.”</span><br /><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Musial, who died on Saturday at the age of 92, had a long and storied career, and was generally loved by friend and foe alike. But Stan the Man was famous, not for earning more than the President (like Babe Ruth), marrying Marilyn Monroe (like Joe DiMaggio), spitting on fans (like Ted Williams) or going on epic benders (like Mickey Mantle), but for hitting a baseball. And for better or for worse, that fame proved somewhat less enduring than those of the other denizens of baseball’s pantheon.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/T-MkfzSy4p8?feature=player_embedded" style="font-size: small;" width="640"></iframe></div></div><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 24px;">But let’s take a look at Musial’s statistical legacy.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: x-small; line-height: 24px;">Was Musial, when he was alive, baseball’s Greatest Living Player? No. That honor (probably) goes to Willie Mays. In the 2000 edition of Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, Mays ranks third all time, behind Babe Ruth and Honus Wagner, and just ahead of Negro League legend Oscar Charleston. James ranks Musial 10th, behind Ty Cobb, Mickey Mantle, Ted Williams, Walter Johnson and Josh Gibson. Good company, and a look at similar lists generally put Musial just at the bottom of the top 10.</span><br /><br /><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Three further things to note. All the guys in the top 10 besides Mays are dead. And James ranks Musial ahead of Tris Speaker, Hank Aaron (who is alive), Joe DiMaggio, and Lou Gehrig. And James’ list dates back to 2000.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">So how does Musial stack up to Mays? A quick glance at their bottom line batting numbers suggests that Musial was not only a great hitter, but a better hitter than Mays.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Mays had a substantial edge in home runs 660 to 475, and Musial had an edge, large or small, in almost everything else. Old school fans will point to Musial’s .331 career batting average, 29 points ahead of Mays .302.  Modern fans will find an equally big edge in on base percentage ( .417 to .384) and a small one in slugging percentage (.559 to .557)</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">A Sabremetric dive puts Musial ahead in OPS, which combines slugging and on base percentage, (.976 to .941) and in adjusted OPS, which takes into account the fact that Mays played longer into the offense-starved 1960s (159 to 156).  The bottom line: Stan Musial had been baseball’s Greatest Living<em style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Hitter</em>. Maybe (More on this in a moment.)</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">If Musial was a better hitter than Mays, what makes Mays a greater <em style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">player</em>than Musial? Fielding and baserunning. The tools that we have to analyze these facets of the game are less precise than those we apply to hitting, but we’re not trying to parse a narrow gap. Stats that assign “runs” to fielding and baserunning give us a way to compare them. Mays was one of the best centerfielders of all time. Musial was an average left fielder. That’s reflected in their career fielding runs (185 for Mays, which puts him in the top 10 all time, versus 50 for Musial, which means he was a serviceable outfielder.)</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">As far as base running, Mays again has a big lead (77 runs to -2 for Musial.)</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">And if you add it up, the comparison looks like this: Musial has an 83-run edge in hitting, 885 to 802, while Mays has an edge in everything else that amounts to 214 runs. No amount of quibbling over the these metrics closes this gap enough to change the conclusion. Eagle-eyed fans will note that Hank Aaron slots between Mays and Musial in most hitting metrics and it’s likely that with Musial’s passing, he and not Mays becomes Baseball’s Greatest Hitter.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">So far we’ve been spending our time on the bottom line career numbers for these guys, and came to the conclusion that Musial was, by a rather narrow margin, the better hitter.  Here’s where things get messy.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">There’s another living hitter who has a .444 career on base percentage, a slugging average of .608 for an OPS of  1.051, 1129 batting runs, and a runs above replacement total of 1,508 that puts him well ahead of both Mays (1437) and Musial (1231).</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">His name is Barry Bonds.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">We all understand the issues of taking Bonds’s statistics at face value. He played in an era in which many if not most of the top players have admitted to using performance enhancing drugs and there are reasonable suspicions, if not absolute proof, that he did so too. So it’s not unreasonable to put an asterisk next to those totals.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">But what about Musial’s totals? If you scroll up to his seasonal notation, you’ll see that he broke into the majors in 1941. He lost a prime year, 1945, to military service. But he also posted a three-year stretch between 1943 and 1946 in which his<em style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> lowest</em> seasonal batting average was .347. What was special about those years?  As African-Americans, Willie Mays and Hank Aaron and, for that matter, Barry Bonds wouldn’t have been allowed to play.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">because Jackie Robinson had not yet broken the color barrier and major league baseball was still segregated. And indeed, Musial played most of his prime seasons before 1952, winning six of his seven batting titles during an era in which baseball was not yet fully integrated.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Now, of course, there are fundamental differences between using performance-enhancing drugs and playing in pre-integration baseball. But those are questions of ethics, not analysis.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Putting morality aside, it’s clear, that for all his greatness, Stan Musial, like so many of baseball’s all-time greats, enjoyed a very real advantage in compiling those impressive numbers against less than the very best competition.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">How much of an advantage? It’s difficult, if not impossible, to say, except to note that by Bill James’ analysis, two of the top 10 players of all time–Oscar Charleston and Josh Gibson–were barred from major league baseball during parts of Stan Musial’s career.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Was Stan Musial Baseball’s Greatest Living Hitter? Maybe, but perhaps he too merits an asterisk.</span></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">RIP, Donora Greyhound.*</span></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">*An asterisk of a different kind, and a true story:<br />A few years ago, a friend’s young son took a strange, sudden and unexpected interest in Stan Musial. Finally a grown-up asked him why.<br />“Because he’s Jewish like me,” the seven-year old exclaimed with pride.<br />“Stan Musial’s not Jewish,” the grown up said, puzzled.<br />To which the kid replied, “Then why would they call him the Menorah Greyhound?”</span></div><div style="border: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; margin-top: 15px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; word-wrap: break-word;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">From: </span><a href="http://www.forbes.com/">http://www.forbes.com</a></div><br /><br /></div>

baseball SPORT Stan Musial Was the Late Stan Musial Baseball's Greatest Living Hitter? How About Barry Bonds?

If last Friday, someone asked “Who is baseball’s greatest living hitter?” odds are that even the game’s most rabid fans wouldn’t have immedi...

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Draining the hot tub

I need to make a serious reminder to myself to never start draining the hot tub in the middle of Winter........Groan :-(<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoN3kuso9qVpnh_c2imFPexI5h3WB73mL7zVRwHQ36XH3oR_8tVnmCs1ux8MZa9BIgGEUWKsHykRdtSffWreYuJNDtI7de5EPel-j26a8xUXAaxTJ2mIc1IutKmBsifjhJXfHnmY5aLCSj/s1600/20130120_150846.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"> <img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoN3kuso9qVpnh_c2imFPexI5h3WB73mL7zVRwHQ36XH3oR_8tVnmCs1ux8MZa9BIgGEUWKsHykRdtSffWreYuJNDtI7de5EPel-j26a8xUXAaxTJ2mIc1IutKmBsifjhJXfHnmY5aLCSj/s400/20130120_150846.jpg" /> </a> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN8aTQo_9DSohg2rG9_kTq5cRe0uOx1d56GepiEYfTNAbJjqHeD0ZVxg5d2iCvuF5vombxn8iXdw1Hq0pPrZ_UZ7WOPDyH6c8G5AvgvMVeO-a74BNuFPN3DPQQfB8p8XJxM2Iuw2CYqezD/s1600/20130120_150831.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"> <img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN8aTQo_9DSohg2rG9_kTq5cRe0uOx1d56GepiEYfTNAbJjqHeD0ZVxg5d2iCvuF5vombxn8iXdw1Hq0pPrZ_UZ7WOPDyH6c8G5AvgvMVeO-a74BNuFPN3DPQQfB8p8XJxM2Iuw2CYqezD/s400/20130120_150831.jpg" /> </a> </div>

Draining the hot tub

I need to make a serious reminder to myself to never start draining the hot tub in the middle of Winter........Groan :-(

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RUSSLANDS AUßENPOLITIK

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font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style><![endif]--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: DE-AT;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDvPqcoHi98KnYhqpTMGrTa-6PChGlPs8vCFNIuoGpstsZiKzeA1CkEf0Ek2A66T6eB2H1wcZS0TeGiJBZqimMkqLoFsX5RPTZvVvlcRK0vRDtHuLDfXomG1XH_g9oom1GoxC-j5s9qHkJ/s1600/fa309_syria-russia.gi.top.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDvPqcoHi98KnYhqpTMGrTa-6PChGlPs8vCFNIuoGpstsZiKzeA1CkEf0Ek2A66T6eB2H1wcZS0TeGiJBZqimMkqLoFsX5RPTZvVvlcRK0vRDtHuLDfXomG1XH_g9oom1GoxC-j5s9qHkJ/s400/fa309_syria-russia.gi.top.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;"> WARMES WASSER</span></b></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">Die Außenpolitik des Kreml wird seit Zarin Katharina der Großen im 18. Jahrhundert von einer Kardinalregel bestimmt: Um Großmacht zu sein, braucht es Zugang zu einem „warmen Meer“, das im Gegensatz zu den RUSSLAND umgebenden Gewässern ganzjährig schiffbar ist. Es war Hafiz al-Assad, der Vater des amtierenden SYRISCHEN Präsidenten Bashar al-Assad, der dem Kreml in den siebziger Jahren mit dem Marinestützpunkt Tartus im Mittelmeer diesen Zugang verschaffte. <br /><br />Inzwischen ist er die einzige Basis RUSSLANDS außerhalb der ehemaligen SOWJETUNION. Als solche hat sie zwar mehr symbolische als militärische Bedeutung, aber zumindest einen praktischen Nutzen: RUSSISCHE Kriegsschiffe müssen für Nachschubaufnahmen und kleinere Reparaturen nicht zwangsläufig durch den Bosporus ins Schwarze Meer tuckern – auf einer Route, auf der sie im Krisenfall vom Wohlwollen des alten Rivalen und NATO-Mitglieds TÜRKEI abhängig wären.<br /><br />Tartus will sich der Kreml also keinesfalls nehmen lassen. Die Frage für RUSSLAND ist: Wie würde eine Post-Assad-Führung in SYRIEN dazu stehen? Vor allem aber: Wie würde diese Führung aussehen?<br /><br /><span style="color: blue;"><b>KAUKASISCHE KALAMITÄTEN</b></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">Was RUSSLAND in SYRIEN um jeden Preis verhindern möchte, ist eine Machtübernahme durch radikale Sunniten – weniger aus ideologischen Gründen als aus innenpolitischen: Der Kreml fürchtet, dass sich das Land zu einem Tummelplatz islamistischer Gruppen entwickeln könnte, die bis in den Nordkaukasus für Zores sorgen. <br /><br />Das hat unter anderem damit zu tun, dass in SYRIEN nach unterschiedlichen Schätzungen bis zu 100.000 TSCHERKESSEN leben. Ihre Vorfahren stammen aus dem KAUKASUS und wurden Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts vom Zarenreich vertrieben. Nun seien die TSCHERKESSEN zu „Geiseln der Konfrontation geworden“, schreibt Sergej Markedonow, Kaukasus-Experte des renommierten Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington: Sie fordern von der Regierung in Moskau eine Repatriierung in die Heimat ihrer Ahnen. </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: blue;"><b><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">SYRISCHE OPPOSITION VON TERRORISTEN UNTERWANDERT</span></b></span><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;"><br /><br />Das wäre an sich noch kein Problem. Allerdings sieht RUSSLAND die Gefahr, dass in SYRIEN radikalisierte, islamistische Kräfte freigesetzt werden, die Interessen im Nordkaukasus haben und die ohnehin fragile Region weiter destabilisieren könnten. Schon jetzt herrscht in der russischen Öffentlichkeit weitgehend Einigkeit darüber, dass die SYRISCHE Opposition von Terroristen unterwandert ist.<br /><br /><span style="color: blue;"><b>IRANISCHE IRRITATIONEN</b></span></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">Ein weiteres Argument, an Assad festzuhalten, ist aus Sicht des Kreml die IRAN-Frage. Putins Strategen argwöhnen, dass ein Regimewechsel in Damaskus einen Angriff auf Teheran nach sich ziehen könnte. Warum? Weil sich ein SYRIEN, das nicht mehr mit den Mullahs paktiert, auch nicht mehr als Handlanger für iranische Vergeltungsschläge gegen ISRAEL und den Westen hergeben würde – und damit als Gegner wegfiele. </span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">Im IRAN wiederum ist der Kreml vor allem an der Aufrechterhaltung des Status quo interessiert. „Die Theokratie in Teheran inmitten ihrer internationalen Isolation zu unterstützen, verschafft RUSSLAND einen wertvollen Zugang zum IRANISCHEN Energiemarkt, zumindest kurzfristig“, schreibt die Politologin Inna Lazareva von dem in London angesiedelten Think Tank The Henry Jackson Society. „Mehr noch: Wenn sich das Verhältnis zwischen dem Westen und dem IRAN normalisiert und das Ölembargo aufgehoben wird, verliert Moskau seine Dominanz als Energielieferant für EUROPA“, so Lazareva, Autorin der Analyse „Die Bärenfalle: RUSSLANDS selbstzerstörerische Außenpolitik im Nahen Osten“. </span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><span lang="DE-AT" style="color: blue; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">(Ist Russlands Außenpolitik im Nahen Osten wirklich so selbstzerstörerisch?)</span></i><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;"> <br /><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">LIBYEN - GEPLATZTE GESCHÄFTE</span></b></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx4C4NcC2s1pAXYro3OpiHX2IosKuvWbW8x-9XiCgGvBsuFPbgO8rCzeBqpbDN9eJtY8siKzuEGl-6BwaHIY0ooynTsB9KJ6bs7XTCA9dhR4QRRxmfXRSf_mKkJWwsyxrQ1YO6gD1dVeHe/s1600/250px-Libya_Russia_Locator.svg.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="140" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx4C4NcC2s1pAXYro3OpiHX2IosKuvWbW8x-9XiCgGvBsuFPbgO8rCzeBqpbDN9eJtY8siKzuEGl-6BwaHIY0ooynTsB9KJ6bs7XTCA9dhR4QRRxmfXRSf_mKkJWwsyxrQ1YO6gD1dVeHe/s320/250px-Libya_Russia_Locator.svg.png" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">Noch immer sitzt der RUSSISCHEN Regierung ein Schock aus dem Jahr 2011 in den Knochen. Damals hatte sich der Kreml breitschlagen lassen, im UN-Sicherheitsrat die Einrichtung einer Flugverbotszone in LIBYEN zu unterstützen – und musste in der Folge mitansehen, wie die damit verbundene Resolution vom WESTEN als Freibrief für eine Militärintervention ausgelegt wurde. <br /><br />„Damit wurde für RUSSLAND <i><span style="color: blue;">(und CHINA)</span></i>eine rote Linie überschritten“, sagt Gerhard Mangott, Politologie-Professor und RUSSLAND-Experte an der Universität Innsbruck. „Man fühlte sich vom Westen belogen, deshalb wird Putin in der SYRIEN-Frage nun keinen Millimeter nachgeben.“ Dazu kommt die Einschätzung, dass die internationale Gemeinschaft den Fall Assad künftig als Modell für den Umgang mit innerstaatlichen Konflikten heranziehen könnte. Und da will Moskau keinen Präzedenzfall schaffen, der seinen eigenen Interessen zuwiderläuft. <br /><br />Es ist aber nicht nur die Verbitterung über das, was der Kreml als Missachtung der staatlichen Souveränität betrachtet: Der Fall von Muammar al-Gaddafi kostete die RUSSISCHE Wirtschaft auch einen Haufen Geld. 2008 hatte Moskau dem Revolutionsführer einen Schuldennachlass in Höhe von umgerechnet 3,6 Milliarden Euro gewährt. Im Gegenzug dafür erhielt sie umfangreiche Handelsprivilegien – die sich mit dem Umsturz in Luft auflösten. Das Gleiche droht nun auch in SYRIEN. Dem Assad-Regime hatte RUSSLAND 2005 umgerechnet fast acht Milliarden Euro an ausstehenden Krediten erlassen, ebenfalls in der Hoffnung auf Kompensation durch Geschäftsbeziehungen. <br /><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="color: blue;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">PSYCHOLOGISCHE ­PARALLELEN</span></b></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"> </span><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;">RUSSISCHE Politologen gehen aber noch weiter: Sie machen psychologische Gründe mitverantwortlich für die SYRIEN-Politik RUSSLANDS. „Putin sieht viele Parallelen zwischen sich selbst und Assad“, erklärte etwa Stanislaw Belkowski, Präsident des Instituts für nationale Strategie. „Die persönlichen Sympathien und das Gefühl, eine Rolle in Assads Schicksal spielen zu können, zwingen ihn zu seinen Schritten, selbst wenn es keine pragmatischen Gründe für diese Haltung gibt.“<br /><br />Eine „Seelenverwandtschaft auf der Ebene des Unterbewusstseins“ ortete gar der Politologe Alexej Worobjow. Abgesehen davon zielt die Außenpolitik der Putin-Regierung aber auch stark auf Wirkung im Inland ab. „Dies ist kein Kampf um SYRIEN und den IRAN, sondern ein Kampf gegen den WESTEN. Natürlich nur auf verbaler Ebene. An die Bevölkerung wird ein klares Signal geschickt: Wir haben vor niemandem Angst und geben niemandem nach!“, so Worobjow.</span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="DE-AT" style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-size: small;">Source: Profil </span></span></span></div>

RUSSLANDS AUßENPOLITIK

 WARMES WASSER Die Außenpolitik des Kreml wird seit Zarin Katharina der Großen im 18. Jahrhundert von einer Kardinalregel bestimmt: Um Groß...

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Should Therapists Play Cupid? - NYTimes.com

<base href="data:"><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px; color: black; text-align: left; "><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: static; z-index: auto; ">If you are in psychotherapy, there's a good chance your therapist knows more about your inner thoughts and secret desires than anyone else.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">So, if you're looking for a mate, wouldn't your therapist be a more reliable matchmaker than <a title="Online matchmaker" href="http://www.eharmony.com/" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">eHarmony</a> and <a href="http://match.com/" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">Match.com</a> and other sites that rely on impersonal algorithms?</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">The idea that therapists might play Cupid with patients tantalizes patients and therapists. An anecdotal survey of my psychiatrist colleagues suggests that the matchmaking impulse is very common.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">A senior colleague, for example, tells me he was treating a young man who was struggling to find a partner. My colleague said he knew someone who was perfect for his patient and wanted to set them up on a date, but didn't because he was afraid — there were too many ways even the most well-intentioned therapist fix-up could go wrong.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Why? Psychotherapy, especially insight-oriented therapy, is designed to conjure intense feelings — on the part of the patient and therapist. Much of what patients feel toward their therapists, the so-called transference, are unconscious feelings that are redirected from important early figures in their lives — parents, family members and teachers. Your therapist mirrors this phenomenon with his own countertransference.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">One of psychotherapy's aims is to use the patient-therapist relationship to better understand the patient's relationships with others and to remedy problems in the little lab that is the therapeutic connection.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Both parties are under constant temptation to act on their unconscious feelings, rather than analyze and understand them. No matter how smart or experienced the therapist, it's easy to follow those feelings and get your patient — and possibly yourself — in trouble. Strict boundaries between personal and professional behavior are meant to insure against such hazards.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">But temptation lurks. I've had matchmaker fantasies myself. A patient of mine, who was divorced, told me she was reluctant to enter the online dating scene. It felt overwhelming, she said, and it seemed improbable that she would meet a plausible mate.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">An old friend and colleague of mine lost his wife to cancer some years ago and I knew — or thought I knew — that he would hit it off with my patient. I began to wonder how I could discreetly bring them together. Could I invite him for dinner and tell him to meet me in the waiting area outside my office around the time of her appointment? Too chancy. Too obvious.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">I thought maybe I should just ask my patient if she would like to meet my friend. That would involve crossing useful boundaries. And would bring my personal life in conflict with my job as therapist, which, among other things, is to help patients understand themselves and discover how to make their own lives as full and rich as possible. I shouldn't find partners for my patient any more than I should cook her dinner: both are skills she has to develop for herself.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Additionally (and why was I thinking this through so fully?) she might feel coerced into something she really didn't want to do. A therapeutic relationship is by definition unequal; therapists have considerable power, and patients want to please their therapists. My patient might be reluctant to decline.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Worse yet, what if the date went badly? My patient might wonder whether I really understood her at all or whether I was setting her up as a kind of test.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">A colleague told me that when she was in training, her boss, a senior psychiatrist, suggested that she go on a date with one of his patients. She thought it odd, but being curious and open-minded, she agreed.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">They went out for drinks, she said, and her date spent the evening pumping her for information about her boss. My colleague's date seemed less interested in her than in learning more about his therapist.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">My colleague later realized that her boss, who was married, had a crush on her.  She thinks he set up the match so that he might vicariously enjoy the experience of dating her. True or not, it seems the therapist may not have been acting in his patient's best interest.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Freud himself dabbled in therapeutic matchmaking and in fact went so far as to encourage one of his patients to leave his wife and pursue another woman. At Freud's urging, Horace Frink, a psychiatrist Freud analyzed and later nominated to head the New York Psychoanalytic Society, divorced his wife and married Angelika Bijur, one of Dr. Frink's own patients.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Whatever else Freud had in mind, it seems he may have had personal and financial motives for the union between Dr. Frink and Ms. Bijur, who happened to be a wealthy heiress. In a letter to Dr. Frink, Freud said of the proposed marriage, "If matters turn out all right, let us change this imaginary gift into a real contribution to the Psychoanalytic Funds."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">A marriage arranged — and sanctified — by Freud himself! That's a proposition hard to defy. Alas, Dr. Frink experienced depression and psychosis soon after the marriage and divorced Ms. Bijur a few years later. Today such psychiatric meddling would be likely to create a public scandal and a malpractice suit.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: static; z-index: auto; ">Pragmatic psychotherapists continue to wrestle with questions involved in patient fix-ups. The psychologist Clifford N. Lazarus, for example, argues that therapists are in a good position to evaluate personality traits that could make or break a match, and with high-functioning patients, it is ethical to give it a try. He suggests that therapists use informed consent, the same way a psychiatrist discusses the pros and cons of an antidepressant medication before starting treatment. The idea is to inform the patient of the potential benefits (could be a good match) and hazards (rejection; hard feelings toward your therapist, with the potential to wreck the therapeutic relationship) and receive consent. Case closed.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Not quite. This approach skirts the untidy fact of transference and countertransference — the matching sets of powerful and unconscious feelings that patients and therapists have toward each other. You might get your patient to "agree" to any number of contingencies, but there is no bargaining with his unconscious.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">The fact is that consent, no matter how well-informed — or well-intentioned — is insufficient to protect against the possible mischief inherent in therapist-driven matchmaking.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Looking to your therapist to set up a date is as ill-advised as it is to look to <a href="http://Match.com">Match.com</a> for help with depression or an eating disorder. Therapists would be wise to leave matchmaking to Cupid, or his online minions.</p><nyt_author_id style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><div class="authorIdentification" style="margin-bottom: 2.8em; "><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size: 15px !important; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 24px; font-style: italic; ">Richard A. Friedman is a professor of clinical psychiatry and the director of the psycho-pharmacology clinic at the Weill Cornell Medical College.</div></div></nyt_author_id></div><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/20/opinion/sunday/should-therapists-play-cupid.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130120&pagewanted=print">http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/20/opinion/sunday/should-therapists-play-cupid.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130120&pagewanted=print</a><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px; color: black; text-align: left; "><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div>

Should Therapists Play Cupid? - NYTimes.com

If you are in psychotherapy, there's a good chance your therapist knows more about your inner thoughts and secret desires than anyone el...

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