Watch Robert Mathy

BOMBASTIC4000@YAHOO.COM wants to share this video with you:

Personal Message
SOME EDWARD SCISSORHANDSCI FI SOUND DESIGNING STAR WARS E.T. LOOKING ISH

Robert Mathy

Video:
Robert Mathy
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1815813330?bclid=0&bctid=16997013001

Watch Jan Perschy

BOMBASTIC4000@YAHOO.COM wants to share this video with you:

Personal Message
MOTORBIKE KEYBOARD

Jan Perschy

Video:
Jan Perschy
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1815813330?bclid=0&bctid=17062995001

Watch Craig Hanson and Mike Gao

BOMBASTIC4000@YAHOO.COM wants to share this video with you:

Personal Message
COOL.

Craig Hanson and Mike Gao

Video:
Craig Hanson and Mike Gao
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1815813330?bclid=0&bctid=16993807001

Watch Arvid Tomayko-Peters

BOMBASTIC4000@YAHOO.COM wants to share this video with you:

Personal Message
MAD!

Arvid Tomayko-Peters

Video:
Arvid Tomayko-Peters
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1815813330?bclid=0&bctid=16981716001

CNN - Armstrong breaks collarbone in race crash

Sent from bombastic4000@yahoo.com's mobile device from http://www.cnn.com.

Armstrong breaks collarbone in race crash

American cyclist Lance Armstrong suffered a shattering blow in his comeback bid on Monday when he broke his right collarbone after falling on the first stage of a five-day race in northern Spain.

Emerging from a hospital with his arm in a sling, Armstrong said he will return to the United States, where doctors will determined whether he needs surgery.

"I'm miserable," said the record seven-time Tour de France champion. "I just need to relax a couple of days and then make a plan."

Armstrong could be out for three to four weeks said Jacinto Vidarte, spokesman for the Vuelta Ciclista Castilla y Leon race, following a crash that involved a group of 15 to 20 riders some 20 kilometers from the finish.

The injury looks certain to end Armstrong's hopes of challenging for the Giro d'Italia from May 9-31 and must cast big doubts on his plans to chase an eighth Tour crown from July 4-26 in France.

The 37-year-old Armstrong was taken to a hospital by ambulance and was seen pointing to his collarbone, CNN's Al Goodman reported from northern Spain.

Armstrong, who came out of retirement after more than three years to return to competitive cycling with Astana in January, walked to the ambulance unaided, television pictures from the scene showed.

Bartosz Huzarski, a cyclist racing for the Italian team ISD, saw the fall, but said he did not know what had caused it. Only Armstrong appeared to indicate he was hurt, the Polish cyclist said.

The fall took place a on a sunny day on a stretch of two-lane highway, Goodman said, as riders tackled the 104-mile (168-km) opening stage, as Armstrong stepped up his latest return to the sport.

Armstrong's first comeback came in 1998, two years after he was diagnosed with advanced testicular cancer that had spread to his lungs and brain. Doctors gave him a less than 50 percent chance of survival.

He has become a highly visible cancer activist at the head of his Livestrong foundation.

Armstrong, whose Tour triumphs came between 1999-2005, announced in September last year that he would be returning to the saddle.

He launched his comeback in January when he raced in the Tour Down Under in Australia, finishing 29th.

Armstrong then played a key support role as Astana teammate Levi Leipheimer won the Tour of California title in February before finishing 125th in last Saturday's Milan-San Remo in Italy.

He was riding in this week's Castilla and Leon race to continue his bid to reach peak form ahead of the Giro d'Italia and then a crack at an eighth Tour crown.

Armstrong returned to the sport not only to attempt to become the oldest Tour winner, but also to raise awareness about cancer.

"The most important issue is taking the global epidemic of cancer really to a much bigger stage," explained Armstrong, who previously fought a battle with testicular cancer.

"The best way to do that is to race the bike all over the world. So you race in Australia, South Africa, South America, Europe, America -- that is the first priority," added the Texan.

Reuters - U.N. panel says world should ditch dollar

This article was sent to you from bombastic4000@yahoo.com, who uses Reuters Mobile Site to get news and information on the go. To access Reuters on your mobile phone, go to:
http://mobile.reuters.com

U.N. panel says world should ditch dollar

Wednesday, Mar 18, 2009 3:16PM UTC

By Jeremy Gaunt, European Investment Correspondent

LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) - A U.N. panel will next week recommend that the world ditch the dollar as its reserve currency in favor of a shared basket of currencies, a member of the panel said on Wednesday, adding to pressure on the dollar.

Currency specialist Avinash Persaud, a member of the panel of experts, told a Reuters Funds Summit in Luxembourg that the proposal was to create something like the old Ecu, or European currency unit, that was a hard-traded, weighted basket.

Persaud, chairman of consultants Intelligence Capital and a former currency chief at JPMorgan, said the recommendation would be one of a number delivered to the United Nations on March 25 by the U.N. Commission of Experts on International Financial Reform.

"It is a good moment to move to a shared reserve currency," he said.

Central banks hold their reserves in a variety of currencies and gold, but the dollar has dominated as the most convincing store of value -- though its rate has wavered in recent years as the United States ran up huge twin budget and external deficits.

Some analysts said news of the U.N. panel's recommendation extended dollar losses because it fed into concerns about the future of the greenback as the main global reserve currency, raising the chances of central bank sales of dollar holdings.

"Speculation that major central banks would begin rebalancing their FX reserves has risen since the intensification of the dollar's slide between 2002 and mid-2008," CMC Markets said in a note.

Russia is also planning to propose the creation of a new reserve currency, to be issued by international financial institutions, at the April G20 meeting, according to the text of its proposals published on Monday.

It has significantly reduced the dollar's share in its own reserves in recent years.

GOOD TIME

Persaud said that the United States was concerned that holding the reserve currency made it impossible to run policy, while the rest of world was also unhappy with the generally declining dollar.

"There is a moment that can be grasped for change," he said.

"Today the Americans complain that when the world wants to save, it means a deficit. A shared (reserve) would reduce the possibility of global imbalances."

Persaud said the panel had been looking at using something like an expanded Special Drawing Right, originally created by the International Monetary Fund in 1969 but now used mainly as an accounting unit within similar organizations.

The SDR and the old Ecu are essentially combinations of currencies, weighted to a constituent's economic clout, which can be valued against other currencies and indeed against those inside the basket.

Persaud said there were two main reasons why policymakers might consider such a move, one being the current desire for a change from the dollar.

The other reason, he said, was the success of the euro, which incorporated a number of currencies but roughly speaking held on to the stability of the old German deutschemark compared with, say, the Greek drachma.

Persaud has long argued that the dollar would give way to the Chinese yuan as a global reserve currency within decades.

A shared reserve currency might negate this move, he said, but he believed that China would still like to take on the role.

(To read Reuters Global Investing Blog click on http://blogs.reuters.com/globalinvesting; for the MacroScope Blog click on http://blogs.reuters.com/macroscope; for Hedge Fund Hub click on http://blogs.reuters.com/hedgehub)

(editing by Patrick Graham)

Reuters - China's last eunuch spills sex secrets

This article was sent to you from bombastic4000@yahoo.com, who uses Reuters Mobile Site to get news and information on the go. To access Reuters on your mobile phone, go to:
http://mobile.reuters.com

China's last eunuch spills sex secrets

Monday, Mar 16, 2009 2:1PM UTC

By Emma Graham-Harrison

BEIJING (Reuters) - Only two memories brought tears to Sun Yaoting's eyes in old age -- the day his father cut off his genitals, and the day his family threw away the pickled remains that should have made him a whole man again at death.

China's last eunuch was tormented and impoverished in youth, punished in revolutionary China for his role as the "Emperor's slave" but finally feted and valued, largely for outlasting his peers to become a unique relic, a piece of "living history."

He had stories of the tortuous rituals of the Forbidden City, Emperor Pu Yi's last moments there and the troubled puppet court run by the Japanese during the 1930s. He escaped back to the heart of a civil war, became a Communist official and then a target of radical leftists before being finally left in peace.

This turbulent life has been recorded in the "The Last Eunuch of China" by amateur historian Jia Yinghua, who over years of friendship drew out of Sun the secrets that were too painful or intimate to spill to prying journalists or state archivists.

He died in 1996, in an old temple that had become his home, and his biography was finally published in English this year.

It unveils formerly taboo subjects like the sex life of eunuchs and the emperor they served, the agonizing castrations often done at home and also often lethal, and the incontinence and shame that came with the promise of great power.

"He was conflicted over whether to tell the secrets of the emperor," said Jia, adding that Sun preserved a loyalty to the old system because he had dedicated so much of his life to it.

"I was the only person he trusted. He did not even confide in his family, after they threw away his 'treasure,'" Jia added, using traditional eunuchs' slang for their preserved genitals.

They were discarded during the chaotic 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, when having anything from the "old society" could put lives at risk.

"He only cried about two things; when telling me about the castration and about the loss of his 'treasure'," said Jia, who works as an energy bureaucrat, but devotes all his spare time to chronicling the dying days of Imperial China after a childhood enthralled by the eunuchs and princes who were his neighbors.

STERILITY AND POWER

Over years of painstaking research, he has gleaned arcane details about every aspect of palace life, along with secrets about the emperor's sexuality and cruelty that would look at home on the front page of tabloid newspapers.

For centuries in China, the only men from outside the imperial family who were allowed into the Forbidden City's private quarters were castrated ones. They effectively swapped their reproductive organs for a hope of exclusive access to the emperor that made some into rich and influential politicians.

Sun's impoverished family set him on this painful, risky path in hopes that he might one day be able to crush a bullying village landlord who stole their fields and burned their house.

His desperate father performed the castration on the bed of their mud-walled home, with no anesthetic and only oil-soaked paper as a bandage. A goose quill was inserted in Sun's urethra to prevent it getting blocked as the wound healed.

He was unconscious for three days and could barely move for two months. When he finally rose from his bed, history played the first of a series of cruel tricks on him -- he discovered the emperor he hoped to serve had abdicated several weeks earlier.

"He had a very tragic life. He had thought it was worthwhile for his father, but the sacrifice was in vain," Jia said, in a house stacked with old books, newspapers and photos.

"He was very smart and shrewd. If the empire had not fallen there is a high chance he would have become powerful," Jia added.

The young ex-emperor was eventually allowed to stay in the palace and Sun had risen to become an attendant to the empress when the imperial family were unceremoniously booted out of the Forbidden City, ending centuries of tradition and Sun's dreams.

"He was castrated, then the emperor abdicated. He made it into the Forbidden City then Pu Yi was evicted. He followed him north and then the puppet regime collapsed. He felt life had played a joke at his expense," Jia said.

Many eunuchs fled with palace treasures, but Sun took a crop of memories and a nose for political survival that turned out to be better tools for surviving years of civil war and ideological turbulence that followed.

"He never became rich, he never became powerful, but he became very rich in experience and secrets," Jia said.

(Editing by Nick Macfie and Bill Tarrant)

Reuters - Washington Mutual sues FDIC for over $13 billion

This article was sent to you from bombastic4000@yahoo.com, who uses Reuters Mobile Site to get news and information on the go. To access Reuters on your mobile phone, go to:
http://mobile.reuters.com

Washington Mutual sues FDIC for over $13 billion

Saturday, Mar 21, 2009 5:49PM UTC

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Washington Mutual Inc, the failed U.S. savings and loan, has sued the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp for well over $13 billion in connection with the loss of its banking operations, which was acquired by JPMorgan Chase & Co.

In a complaint filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the thrift's former parent accused the FDIC of having on January 23 made a "cryptic disallowance" of its claims, prompting the lawsuit.

It also accused the FDIC of agreeing to an unreasonably low price in arranging the a $1.9 billion sale of the banking business to JPMorgan on September 25, when regulators seized Washington Mutual and appointed the FDIC as receiver.

JPMorgan did not buy the parent holding company, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection the following day.

In its complaint, Washington Mutual seeks to recover as much as $6.5 billion of capital contributions it said it made to its banking unit from December 2007 through the seizure.

Washington Mutual also seeks the return of $4 billion of trust preferred securities it said were wrongfully transferred to the banking unit, and said it may be entitled to as much as $3 billion of tax refunds. It also seeks damages of $177.1 million related to unpaid loans made to the banking unit.

The company also made claims on several other matters that together could add to any recovery. Washington Mutual is seeking a jury trial.

In the January 23 letter, the FDIC said it disallowed Washington Mutual's claims because they lacked documentation or specificity, failed to state grounds to recover, appeared to be made against third parties, or had no legal basis.

FDIC spokesman David Barr said the regulator does not comment on lawsuits.

Seattle-based Washington Mutual failed after mortgage losses soared, and following a 10-day bank run when customers withdrew $16.7 billion of deposits. It had about $307 billion of assets, and remains by far the largest U.S. lender to fail.

The parent is seeking to pay off creditors with amounts it recovers in the Chapter 11 proceedings.

The case is Washington Mutual Inc v. Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, No. 09-00533.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel, additional reporting by Karey Wutkowski in Washington, D.C., Editing by Eric Walsh)

CNN - Three police officers dead in Oakland shootings

Sent from bombastic4000@yahoo.com's mobile device from http://www.cnn.com.

Three police officers dead in Oakland shootings

Three police officers in Oakland, California, were shot and killed Saturday afternoon after a man pulled over for a routine traffic stop opened fire, police said.

The man, a 27-year-old Oakland resident, was later fatally shot in a gun battle with SWAT officers in a nearby apartment complex where he hid.

A fourth officer -- also shot -- remained in critical condition, police said at a late-night news conference.

Authorities discovered the alleged gunman, 27-year-old LaVelle Mixon, had an extensive criminal history. At the time of the shooting, he was in violation of parole for assault with a deadly weapon, police said.

The incident began about 1 p.m. (4 p.m. ET) in east Oakland when two motorcycle officers tried to pull over a car for a "fairly, routine traffic stop," said Dave Kozicki, the deputy police chief.

Immediately afterward, emergency call dispatchers received reports that two officers were down at the scene and needed attention. They had been shot, Kozicki said.

A manhunt was under way for the shooter when an anonymous caller directed authorities to a building on an adjacent street where the gunman was believed to be barricaded, said acting Police Chief Howard Jordan.

The gunman opened fire on SWAT officers who entered the apartment, hitting two more officers before police returned fire, killing the suspect, Jordan said.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said flags at the capitol will fly at half-staff to honor the fallen officers.

"This is a tragic day for law enforcement officers everywhere," he said in a statement. "All four officers dedicated their lives to public safety and selflessly worked to protect the people of Oakland."

CNN - Desperate Japanese head to 'suicide forest'

Sent from bombastic4000@yahoo.com's mobile device from http://www.cnn.com.

Desperate Japanese head to 'suicide forest'

Aokigahara Forest is known for two things in Japan: breathtaking views of Mount Fuji and suicides. Also called the Sea of Trees, this destination for the desperate is a place where the suicidal disappear, often never to be found in the dense forest.

Taro, a 46-year-old man fired from his job at an iron manufacturing company, hoped to fade into the blackness. "My will to live disappeared," said Taro. "I'd lost my identity, so I didn't want to live on this earth. That's why I went there."

Taro, who did not want to be identified fully, was swimming in debt and had been evicted from his company apartment. He lost financial control, which he believes to be the foundation of any stable life, he said. "You need money to survive. If you have a girlfriend, you need money. If you want to get married, you need it for your life. Money is always necessary for your life."

Taro bought a one-way ticket to the forest, west of Tokyo, Japan. When he got there, he slashed his wrists, though the cut wasn't enough to kill him quickly.

He started to wander, he said. He collapsed after days and lay in the bushes, nearly dead from dehydration, starvation and frostbite. He would lose his toes on his right foot from the frostbite. But he didn't lose his life, because a hiker stumbled upon his nearly dead body and raised the alarm.

Taro's story is just one of hundreds logged at Aokigahara Forest every year, a place known throughout Japan as the "suicide forest." The area is home to the highest number of suicides in the entire country.

Japan's suicide rate, already one of the world's highest, has increased with the recent economic downturn.

There were 2,645 suicides recorded in January 2009, a 15 percent increase from the 2,305 for January 2008, according to the Japanese government.

The Japanese government said suicide rates are a priority and pledged to cut the number of suicides by more than 20 percent by 2016. It plans to improve suicide awareness in schools and workplaces. But officials fear the toll will rise with unemployment and bankruptcies, matching suicide spikes in earlier tough economic times.

"Unemployment is leading to this," said Toyoki Yoshida, a suicide and credit counselor.

"Society and the government need to establish immediate countermeasures to prevent suicides. There should be more places where they can come and seek help."

Yoshida and his fellow volunteer, Norio Sawaguchi, posted signs in Aokigahara Forest urging suicidal visitors to call their organization, a credit counseling service. Both men say Japanese society too often turns a cold shoulder to the unemployed and bankrupt, and breeds a culture where suicide is still seen as an honorable option.

Local authorities, saying they are the last resort to stop people from killing themselves in the forest, have posted security cameras at the entrances of the forest.

The goal, said Imasa Watanabe of the Yamanashi Prefectural Government is to track the people who walk into the forest. Watanabe fears more suicidal visitors will arrive in the coming weeks.

"Especially in March, the end of the fiscal year, more suicidal people will come here because of the bad economy," he said. "It's my dream to stop suicides in this forest, but to be honest, it would be difficult to prevent all the cases here."

One year after his suicide attempt, Taro is volunteering with the credit counseling agency that helped him get back on his feet. He's still living in a shelter and looking for a job. He's ashamed, he said, that he still thinks about suicide.

"I try not to think about it, but I can't say never. For now, the will to live is stronger."