Sunday, May 9, 2010

J.D. Hayworth Wants Apology from Phoenix Suns GM Steve Kerr


J.D. Hayworth, the Arizona conservative challenging Sen. John McCain in the Republican Senate primary, wants an apology from the general manager of the Phoenix Suns over his remarks about Arizona's new immigration law.

"For [Suns General Manager] Steve Kerr to make comparisons with this law with Nazi Germany is beyond the pale," Hayworth said, Arizona radio station KTAR reports. "He should apologize, that has no basis in fact."

The Phoenix Suns basketball team last night wore their "Los Suns" jerseys during Game 2 of the NBA Western Conference semifinals to show solidarity with Latinos protesting Arizona's new immigration law.

The law, which goes into effect in July, requires police officers to question a person about his or her immigration status during a "lawful stop" if there is "reasonable suspicion" that person may be in the country illegally. It also requires immigrants to carry documents verifying their immigration status.
Kerr said it was their "duty" to address the issue, the Arizona Republic reported.
"It's hard to imagine in this country that we have to produce papers," Kerr said. "It rings up images of Nazi Germany. We understand that the intentions of the law are not for that to happen, but you have to be very, very careful."

Hayworth challenged Kerr's understanding of the legislation, KTAR reports.

"In the law are these words: Respecting the civil rights of all persons," he said. "Steve's a smart guy, but I bet he hasn't read the bill."

Outrage over the law has prompted calls for economic boycotts of Arizona, many focusing on Major League Baseball. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer said in an op-ed that the calls for boycotts are misguided.

Jesse Stone: No Remorse – Paradise Police Track Convenience Store Killer!


Jesse Stone: No Remorse [9/8C] is the sixth entry in the CBS series of TV-movies based on the characters created by the late Robert B. Parker – and the first to not be based, in any way, on a Parker novel. It also continues to be an old-fashioned TV-movie franchise in the way if takes its time to get to where its going.
In No Remorse, alcoholic Paradise Police Chief Stone [Tom Selleck] has been placed on suspension and is allowed no contact with the remaining members of the Paradise Police – Acting Chief Luthor "Suitcase" Simpson [Kohl Sudduth] and Officer Rose Gammon [Kathy Baker] – which makes investigating the murder of a convenience store worker very difficult. From time to time, Stone just happens to be somewhere in the vicinity of each and advice and encouragement are offered.
Meanwhile, a tricky case in Boston has Captain Healy [Stephen McHattie] hiring the currently available Stone as a civilian advisor – but the case becomes even trickier when a link is discovered between it and the goings-on in Paradise. This results in Stone consulting old acquaintances Hasty Hathaway [Saul Rubinek] and gangster/boxing promoter Gino Fish [William Sadler].
Although No Remorse isn't based on a Parker novel, it has the feel of Parker's books. Stone's quietly contrary behavior has gotten him in trouble and could result in the entire Paradise Police Department being fired and replaced. Stone remains acerbic and mostly laconic, with his tendency to put police work ahead of the town's tourist trade and/or the petty demands of the town council.
The murders aren't easy to solve, but they are merely the device on which the movie's character explorations are hung. Selleck continues to give an appropriately understated performance as Stone – and continues to show the character's growth [as much through his performance as through his being co-writer of the script]. Sudduth is especially noteworthy here, giving Suitcase's fears of not being up to the task of investigating the homicide a desperation that stops just shy of hysteria – but without ever raising his voice. Jesse Stone regulars McHattie and Sadler provide depth and a bit of dark humor to the proceedings, while Baker gives Gammon even more mother hen aspect in regard to both Suitcase and Stone.
William Devane continues to appear as Stone's therapist and Joe the Dog effortlessly steals every scene he's in as Reggie.
Director Robert Harmon gives the characters plenty of time to show us who they are, and keeps the suspense before picking up the pace for the movie's few action sequences. Like Parker's books, everything rises from the characters – which is why the series of TV-movies has done so well for CBS.
Jesse Stone: No Remorse is one of the better entries in the series, which is saying a lot – the whole series is well above the norm for made-for-TV movies.

Netflix


Something worth watching on Netflix: executive stock sales. In recent months, as Netflix stock nearly doubled to around $100, finance chief Barry McCarthy sharply increased his stock sales, according to Gradient Analytics. Filings show that using a prearranged trading plan, he cashed in about 188,000 options in the first quarter—exercisable at as low as $14.50 a share—compared with only 31,339 in the fourth quarter of last year.
The increased rate of Mr. McCarthy's sales, apparently triggered as the stock hit $65 and then $75, struck something of a discordant note from his comments on the company's earnings conference call last month. At that time, he made clear that the rally hadn't dimmed the company's willingness to repurchase its stock, which it did in the first quarter at an average price of $65. "We have pretty aggressive targets at which we're willing to buy the stock and so far, so good," he said.

Steve Nash Eye


It seems only fitting that some blood ended up getting spilled in the latest Suns-Spurs showdown. This series has been a dogfight for years, and the Suns were finally the bigger dog — the much bigger dog.
The bloodshed came at the hands of a Tim Duncan elbow (his elbows may have their own hands — can’t confirm either way) to the face of Suns point guard Steve Nash with 5:47 to go in the third quarter. The ensuing gash may have conjured thoughts of the alleged Suns-Spurs curse for some, but six stitches later Nash was back on the court looking a little like Sloth from “The Goonies” (see above).
In an incredible show of toughness, Nash returned to the floor for the fourth quarter with the swelling in his right eye consistently increasing. The pirate-esque Nash was just as efficient as a two-eyed Nash, as he contributed 10 points and five assists in the quarter and made the Spurs walk the plank.
“I don’t know how it didn’t keep me on the sidelines,” Nash told reporters after the game. “At first I felt like, ‘Am I being selfish by playing?’ because I couldn’t see a lot.”
Nash had a hand in nine of the Suns’ last 10 baskets in what ended up being a nail-biter in the final minute and finished with 20 points and nine assists. It’s old news that Nash is an aggressive man machine, but the courage and toughness Nash brought to the floor in the fourth quarter is totally unquantifiable. It doesn’t show up in the final box score. But all who saw it will know it contributed to the most important statistic of all: 4-0.
“Steve played well,” Suns coach Alvin Gentry said after the game. “There’s just something about the Spurs and that dog-gone right eye of his. If it’s not his eye it’s his nose–always something on his face.”
After fighting off a hip strain that held him back in Game 6 against the Trail Blazers, Nash turned out to be invaluable against the Spurs, averaging 22 points and 7.8 assists in the sweep. Add on the intangible leadership and experience, and the Spurs had no answer for Captain Canada.
For that matter, almost no one has had an answer for the 36-year-old two-time MVP this season. Nash put together the best statistical season for a point guard over 35 in NBA history. He led the league in assists, started the All-Star game, won the All-Star Skills Challenge, influenced his teammates to eat better, helped foster some of the best chemistry in the NBA and mentored a budding young point guard. What more can you ask for?
“It started in training camp,” Gentry said. “He was just determined. He just said that we’re going to get back where we were and I’m going to see to that. The leadership that he’s brought to our team and what he’s done has been unbelievable.”
With more than a week off from play before the Suns (likely) meet the Lakers in the Western Conference Finals (did ANYONE think they’d be able to read that in October?), Nash’s eye should have plenty of time to heal up.
Nash’s play will be crucial against the Lakers. Though we have seen that the Suns can find a way to win without a major contribution from Nash, this is the top-seeded Lakers we are talking about. But then again, there was plenty of talk about how good the Spurs would be and what a tough series the Suns had ahead. That didn’t prove very founded at all.
For Suns fans, Sunday night’s win couldn’t have been much better. Amare Stoudemire was dominant. Nash put on one of his greatest displays of toughness yet and it all came on the hated Spurs’ home court. The fans must now anxiously await for what the Western Conference Finals have in store and what Nash will do next.

Elena Kagan


EDUCATION: Princeton University, A.B. (history), 1981; Oxford University, M. Phil., 1983; Harvard Law School, J.D., 1986
CLERKSHIPS: Judge Abner Mikva, U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (1986-1987); Justice Thurgood Marshall, United States Supreme Court (1987-1988).
CAREER: Associate, Williams & Connolly LLP (1989-1991); Assistant Professor, Law School, University of Chicago (1991-1995); Professor, Law School, University of Chicago (1995-1997); Associate Counsel to the President, William J. Clinton Administration (1995-1996); Deputy Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, Staff, Domestic Policy Council, Executive Office of the President, William J. Clinton Administration (1997-1999); Dean, Harvard Law School, Harvard University (2003-2009); U.S. solicitor general (2009 to present).
FAMILY: Single
Kagan was born in 1960 in New York City.
Kagan received her bachelor's degree, summa cum laude, from Princeton in 1981. She attended Worcester College, Oxford, as Princeton's Daniel M. Sachs Graduating Fellow, and received an M. Phil. in 1983. She attended Harvard Law School, where she was supervising editor of the Harvard Law Review, and graduated magna cum laude in 1986.
Kagan clerked for Judge Abner Mikva of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit from 1986 to 1987 and then she clerked for Justice Thurgood Marshall of the United States Supreme Court. (Justice Marshall, ascended to the court after serving as solicitor general.) Justice Marshall called her, Kagan once wrote, "to my face and I imagine also behind my back, 'Shorty.' "
Kagan went into private practice in Washington from 1989 until 1991, working as an associate in the Washington, D.C. law firm of Williams & Connolly.
Kagan launched her academic career at the University of Chicago Law School, where she became an assistant professor in 1991 and a tenured professor of law in 1995.
She became associate counsel to Clinton in 1995 and climbed the ladder to deputy assistant to Clinton for domestic policy and deputy director of the Domestic Policy Council in 1997.
Clinton nominated her to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1999, but she never received a confirmation hearing from the Senate Judiciary Committee. Republicans refused to hold a hearing for her nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals in 1999, a seat that went to John Roberts, now chief justice of the Supreme Court.
She became a professor at Harvard Law School since 1999 and the school's dean in 2003. Her academic writings are dense, technical and largely nonideological. Kagan has never served as judge and so has no paper trail of judicial opinions.
She did offer a glimpse of her views in a 2001 article in The Harvard Law Review that considered the "unitary executive" theory. The phrase is sometimes used as shorthand for the Bush administration's assertion that it had broad powers that could not be limited by Congress or the courts. In her article, Kagan addressed an earlier and narrower meaning of the phrase. "I do not espouse the unitarian position," Kagan wrote. "President Clinton's assertion of directive authority over administration, more than President Reagan's assertion of a general supervisory authority, raises serious constitutional questions."
Kagan, whose scholarly interests include administrative law and the First Amendment, is widely credited with bringing harmony and star faculty members to the notoriously dysfunctional Harvard Law School.
Kagan was confirmed as the 45th solicitor general of the United States in March 2009. Thirty-one Republicans voted against her for solicitor general.
The solicitor general is the executive branch's chief lawyer before the high court. As solicitor general, Kagan supervises appellate litigation involving the federal government and presents the government's views to the Supreme Court. Kagan is the first woman to hold the position of solicitor general. Before her nomination as solicitor general, Kagan had never argued a case before the Supreme Court.
She was considered a leading candidate to replace Supreme Court Justice David A. Souter, but President Obama eventually selected Sonia Sotomayor.
Kagan has argued six cases before the Supreme Court in 2010. Kagan argued the high court's most noteworthy case of the current term, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. The Court decided against the government and, in a 5 to 4 decision, said that restrictions on spending by corporations and unions from their general treasuries for or against candidates were unconstitutional.
She has bantered easily with the justices, and she seemed to have a special rapport with Justice Antonin Scalia. Kagan appears popular with the justices, and they seem to appreciate her candor, quick mind and informal style. But she tangles regularly with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who has emerged as her primary antagonist, frequently criticizing her tactical decisions and trying to corner her at oral arguments.
Possible Trouble for Kagan
For nearly a quarter-century, Harvard Law School refused to help the nation's military recruit its students, because the armed services discriminated against openly gay soldiers. But in 2002, the school relented to pressure from the Bush administration and agreed to allow recruiters on campus.
Kagan became dean of the law school in 2003. ''The military policy that we at the law school are overlooking is terribly wrong, terribly wrong in depriving gay men and lesbians of the opportunity to serve their country,'' she said shortly after becoming dean at the law school's first reunion for its gay, lesbian and bisexual alumni. Later, as the issue intensified with protests on campus, she wrote in an e-mail message to students and faculty, ''I abhor the military's discriminatory recruitment policy.''
Her stand against military recruitment at Harvard Law School because of the armed forces' "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy is sure to be a talking point against her. Republicans have signaled that they intend to pounce on Kagan's forceful criticism of the military's policy on gay soldiers -- and her challenge to the law -- if President Obama nominates her to the court.
Kagan made an impassioned effort, as dean of Harvard Law School, to bar military recruiting on campus to protest the law banning openly gay people from serving in the military, which she called "a moral injustice of the first order."
In January 2004 Kagan signed an amicus brief when a coalition of law schools challenged the Solomon Amendment, denying federal funds to schools that barred military recruiters, in an appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, in Philadelphia.
In November 2004, the appeals court ruled, 2 to 1, that Solomon was unconstitutional, saying it required law schools ''to express a message that is incompatible with their educational objectives.''
The day after the ruling, Ms. Kagan -- and several other law school deans -- barred military recruiters from their campuses. In Harvard's case, the recruiters were barred only from the main career office, while Ms. Kagan continued to allow them access to students through the student veterans' group.
But the ban lasted only for the spring semester in 2005. The Pentagon told the university over the summer that it would withhold ''all possible funds'' if the law school continued to bar recruiters from the main placement office. So, after consulting with other university officials, Ms. Kagan said, she lifted the ban.
After doing so, she and 39 other Harvard law professors signedan amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to invalidate Solomon. So did the university.
They all received a dose of reality in March 2006 when the court ruled, 8 to 0, against them.
This incident goes a long way toward explaining the 31 Republican votes against confirming her as solicitor general.
Her résumé lacks the one qualification that every member of the current Supreme Court possesses: past judicial service. It has been almost 40 years since a nominee who had not been a judge was appointed to the Supreme Court; the last two were William H. Rehnquist and Lewis F. Powell Jr., both of whom joined the court in 1972.
Kagan was a paid member of an advisory panel for the embattled investment firm Goldman Sachs, federal financial disclosures show. Kagan was a member of the Research Advisory Council of the Goldman Sachs Global Markets Institute, according to the financial disclosures she filed when President Obama appointed her last year to her current post. Kagan served on the Goldman panel from 2005 through 2008, when she was dean of Harvard Law School, and received a $10,000 stipend for her service in 2008, her disclosure forms show.
The advisory panel met once a year to discuss public policy issues and was not involved in any investment decisions, Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler said. Still, if Kagan is nominated to replace Stevens, senators will scrutinize those ties to Goldman Sachs, said Northwestern University law professor Lee Epstein.
Many liberal critics are unhappy with Kagan's arguments as solicitor general supporting the "state secrets" doctrine, detentions without trial, and other broad Obama claims of executive power to fight terrorism -- some of them similar to the Bush policies that liberals oppose.
"From the perspective of those who have been advocating change from Bush policies, she has been a disappointment," said Tina Foster of the International Justice Network, who argued against Kagan's deputy Neal Katyal over detention policies in an appeal in January.
"She would spell very bad news" if she became a Supreme Court justice, said Vince Warren, executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights, which has long challenged Bush and now Obama detention policies. "We don't see any basis to assume she does not embrace the Bush view of executive power."
Timeline of Kagan's Life
April 28, 1960: Born in New York City.
1981: Graduates with B.A. in history from Princeton University.
1983: Receives M.Phil. from Oxford University's Worcester College.
1986: Graduates from Harvard Law School.
1986-87: Clerks for Judge Abner J. Mikva of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
1987-88: Clerks for Justice Thurgood Marshall of the U.S. Supreme Court.
1988: Works as staff member, Dukakis for President campaign.
1989-91: Works as an associate at Williams & Connolly, a Washington D.C. law firm.
1991-95: Joins the University of Chicago Law School as an assistant professor; becomes a full professor in 1995.
Summer 1993: Works as special counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Ruth Bader Ginsburg's nomination to the Supreme Court.
1995-96: Serves as associate White House counsel to President Bill Clinton.
1997-99: Works as deputy assistant to the president for domestic policy and deputy director of the White House Domestic Policy Council.
1999-2009: Becomes a professor at Harvard Law School. In 2003, named as dean of Harvard Law School.
March 2009 - present: U.S. solicitor general.

Prader Willi Syndrome


May is Prader-Willi Syndrome awareness month and we would like to help spread its awareness. Prader-Willi Syndrome or PWS is an uncommon genetic disorder that can be present since birth. The common symptom is overeating that do not stop even when the person is already full; other symptoms include muscle weakness and behavioral problems. This rare disease and its symptoms are currently observed to be shown by 40 people in Uruguay.
The rare chronic disease is very hard to fight as only little information is known on how to treat and support the patients and their families. This was the case for Maria Ines Fonseca whose daughter was diagnosed with the Prader-Willi Syndrome recently after birth.
Doctors say that the disease has different symptoms that can be observed the same way or same intensity for each case of the Prader-Willi Syndrome. To add with muscle weakness and other disabilities, an insatiable appetite which leads to obesity can be observed on all cases.
The rare disease which is not hereditary records only one case per 15,000 births. It is first observed in 1956 by Swiss Doctors Andrea Prader, Alexis Labhart and Heinrich Willi where the disease got its name. The doctors observed that nine patients are showing the same symptoms of obesity, short stature, muscle weakness, and other physical and intellectual disabilities.