Sheryl Crow Takes up Cause of Wild Horses in West

By MARTIN GRIFFITH, Associated Press Writer
Saturday, November 21, 2009
The San Francisco Chronicle


(11-21) 13:02 PST Reno, Nev. (AP) --

Sheryl Crow is joining others in calling on the federal government to halt roundups of wild horses in the West, branding them as inhumane and unnecessary.

The Grammy Award-winning singer has asked President Barack Obama and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to scrap a proposed roundup of 2,500 mustangs in northern Nevada.

"With one voice we are insisting that our government stop managing these beautiful and important animals to extinction," Crow said in a statement released by the Cloud Foundation, a Colorado Springs, Colo.-based horse advocacy group.

Crow, who has adopted a mustang, campaigned for Obama last year. She opposes Salazar's plan to move thousands of wild horses to preserves in the Midwest and East to protect horse herds and the rangelands that support them.

"It's time for all of us to speak up for our wild horses and burros so we do not lose these living legends and inspiring symbols of our freedom in America," she said.

U.S. Bureau of Land Management officials said they plan to remove 11,500 wild horses and burros from the range over each of the next three years because booming numbers of the animals are damaging the range.

The agency has set a target "appropriate management level" of 26,600 of the animals in the wild, about 10,000 below the current level. An additional 32,000 of them are cared for in government-funded holding facilities.

"Wild horses have an important place on the landscape, but we have to balance that with other uses," BLM spokeswoman Celia Boddington said Saturday. "We have to ensure that the long-term health of the landscape is able to support all these multiple uses."

In a letter sent to Obama and Salazar earlier this week, Crow and actors Ed Harris and Wendie Malick, along with Madeleine Pickens, the wife of oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens, and more than 100 other groups questioned the BLM's horse numbers and said there may be only 15,000 mustangs remaining on public lands.

The BLM has received more than 7,000 public comments concerning its plans to remove 2,500 mustangs near Nevada's Black Rock Desert this winter. Nevada is home to about half of all wild horses.

Salazar has said his plan unveiled last month would avoid the slaughter of some of the 69,000 wild horses and burros under federal control to halt the soaring costs of maintaining them.

The seven preserves would hold about 25,000 horses. Many of the horses remaining on the range would be neutered and reproduction in Western herds would be strictly limited.
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BLM wild horse and burro program: http://tinyurl.com/3rb6r7

Cloud Foundation: www.thecloudfoundation.org

Tell Congress to support the Healthy Families Act!

Like 57 million people in the U.S., Desiree is not allowed to earn any paid sick days at her job. So on Tuesday, she testified before a Senate Committee about her family's experience with getting the flu and not having any paid sick days:

"Families like mine need to be able to earn paid sick days – so we don’t have to borrow from our rent money and go deeper into debt every time our kids get sick...having no paid sick days has really hurt our family’s finances and economic stability."

The H1N1 flu shines a light on the problems that working families face every flu season. And leaders are taking notice! White House endorsed the Healthy Families Act, which lets working people earn a minimum number of paid sick days per year. But White House endorsement is only one step toward the Healthy Families Act becoming law. Send a letter now to your members of Congress asking them to support this important piece of legislation, and to work with their colleagues to get it passed as soon as possible.

Most successful pirate was beautiful and tough

By Maggie Koerth
"Mental floss"
CNN.com Living


(Mental Floss) -- You can keep your Bluebeards and your Blackbeards. The most successful pirate of all time controlled a fleet of more than 1,500 ships and upwards of 80,000 sailors -- and she did it all without the help of facial hair.

Tall ships like the La Boudeuse used to face threats from pirates as they sailed around the world.

When a Chinese pirate captain named Cheng married a beautiful prostitute in 1801, he wasn't just getting the girl of his dreams; he was making the best financial investment of his career. His new bride, known to history as Cheng I Sao, or "Wife of Cheng," agreed to the marriage on one condition -- that she would share equally in his power and would be given the opportunity to help him secure more wealth.

Sounded like a deal to Cheng, and for the next six years, the husband and wife teamed up to grow their piracy business along the coast of the South China Sea, as far south as Malaysia. But then, in 1807, Cheng passed away. Instead of stepping aside like a "proper" widow, Cheng I Sao promptly took the reins.

Thinking outside the treasure box

Although clearly ahead of her time, Cheng I Sao was shrewd enough to realize that the pirate masses weren't likely as enlightened. So, her first act as leader was to make her husband's second-in-command, Chang Pao, official captain of the fleet.

While Chang Pao led the men into battle, Cheng I Sao focused her attention on business, military strategy, and the enormous task of governing a growing body of ruffians. In the years following her husband's death, she steadily brought more and more outlaws under the banner of her Red Flag Fleet.

In fact, Cheng I Sao was eventually responsible for nearly all the piracy in the region and her fleet exceeded the size of many countries' navies. She also expanded the scope of the business, branching out from simple attack-and-pillage jobs to protection schemes, blackmail, and extortion. Cheng I Sao's reach also extended to the mainland, where she set up an extensive spy network and developed economic ties with farmers who would supply her men with food.

If Cheng I Sao's business practices were exemplary, then her system of pirate law was nothing short of revolutionary. The code of conduct she wrote for her men prescribed much harsher punishments than previous pirate laws had. A disobeyed order was cause for beheading (as was stealing from the common plunder), and deserters stood to lose their ears.

The not-so-bitter end

Murder, thievery, and intricate crime syndicates will eventually garner the full attention of the law, and Cheng I Sao certainly had the authorities on her tail. But, here again, she proved more successful than her male counterparts.

Cheng I Sao repelled attack after attack by both the Chinese navy and the many Portuguese and British bounty hunters brought in to help capture her. Then, in 1810, the Chinese government tried a different tactic -- they offered her universal pirate amnesty in exchange for peace.

Cheng I Sao jumped at the opportunity and headed for the negotiating table. There, the pirate queen arranged what was, all told, a killer deal. Fewer than 400 of her men received any punishment, and a mere 126 were executed. The remaining pirates got to keep their booty and were offered military jobs.

As for Cheng I Sao, she retired with her loot and her new husband (former righthand man, Chang Pao) and opened a gambling house. She died peacefully in 1844, a 69-year-old grandmother.

For more mental floss articles, visit www.mentalfloss.com

Entire contents of this article copyright, Mental Floss LLC. All rights reserved.

Training for women journalists starts today in Janakpur, Nepal

14-08-2009 (Kathmandu)
UNESCO.ORG News

Nepalese women journalists
© UNESCO 25 women journalists from the Terai region of Nepal will be trained on personal security, human rights, basic journalism skills, and conflict and gender-sensitive journalism. UNESCO and the Nepal Press Institute, which organized this training, hope that it will help women journalists protect themselves and will reduce the amount of violence against them.
UNESCO and the Nepal Press Institute, in a joint collaboration with Sancharika Samua, OHCHR, INHURED International and Article 19, open today in Janakpur the first phase of the four-month training, adressed exclusively to women journalists. It will focus on:
■personal security (14-19 August),

■human rights fundamentals (20 August),

■basic journalism skills (21-25 August) and

■conflict and gender-sensitive journalism (October).
Selected journalists are from very diverse cultural backgrounds and come from several districts within the Terai region: Dhanusha, Saptari, Siraha, Mahottari, Rauthat, Bara, Parsha and Sarlahi.

Female journalists working in some areas of the Terai region often face danger because of their profession. There have been many incidents with female journalists receiving threats because of stories they have written or interviews they have done. The attacks have ranged from intimidation to physical violence and, last January, one of these attacks resulted in a murder. An increasing number of women journalists say there is growing pressure from their families to get out of the profession because of such danger. There is evidence that the number of attacks is increasing and the violence is occurring in more areas of Nepal.

Concerned about the current situation with female media professionals in the Terai region, UNESCO’s Office in Kathmandu and the Nepal Press Institute put together a very innovative training programme divided in two phases, one basic and one advanced, each made up of theoretical and practical modules. Both organizations hope that such training will help women journalists protect themselves and will reduce the amount of violence against them.

The personal security training, which opens the whole programme, will be immediately followed by human right fundamentals and basic journalism skills trainings. These will make the first phase of the programme, after which an important practical module will follow. The participants will spend three weeks in their communities, accompanied by the trainers who will help them apply the skills gained during the first phase of the programme.

The second phase will focus on conflict and gender-sensitive journalism and will also be followed by a three-week practical module, during which the trainees will carry out assignments on the basis of their newly acquired skills, supervised by their trainers.

At the end of the four-month course, the newly formed group of women journalists will be offered internships and/or fellowships within different media houses in the country.

'Three parent babies' take a step closer to reality

Scientists are a step closer to producing a controversial "three parent baby" after they successfully fertilised an egg with two biological mothers.

By Richard Alleyne, Science Correspondent
Published: 7:00AM GMT 12 Nov 2009
Telegraph.co.uk


Researchers used eggs from young donors to repair damaged eggs of older women in order to increase their chances of fertilisation.

They have not yet used the eggs to produce babies, but they have injected them with sperm to produce an early stage embryo in the laboratory.

Gene that 'switches on' ability to speak found by scientists
Millions could be given legal right to see an NHS dentist While the move breathes new life into "old eggs" and could also remove genetic illnesses, it is likely to provoke an ethical storm as critics believe it could lead to hybrid or genetically modified children.

"If we could transfer these constructed new embryos, I believe the success rate would be high," Atsushi Tanaka, the lead author told the New Scientist.

IVF often fails in older women because there are abnormalities in the outside of their eggs, known as cytoplasm, which surrounds the nucleus.

The team at St Mother Hospital in Kitakyushu, Japan, believe one way around the problem would be too implant the healthy nucleus - which contains most of the information to produce a baby - into the cytoplasm of a donor, usually a younger mother.

The team successfully did this in 31 eggs and of these seven formed "early stage embryos" when injected with sperm in a test tube.

Under the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act, this kind of treatment – or any that involves genetically modifying an egg – remains illegal in Britain but the government has put in place a framework to relax the rules if and when science shows it can have positive impact on health.

In August, a team at Oregon National Primate Research Center and Oregon Health & Science University successfully bred monkeys from "fixed" eggs.

They replaced damaged Mitochondria - the power pack of cells - from an egg with those of a donor to produce the healthy offspring.

They believe it is so successful that they could begin human trials if the law allowed it.

In 2001, a furore erupted in the US when mitochondria from young eggs was injected into older women's eggs to improve their quality. Fifteen babies were born at the time using the technique, it was claimed.

A number of universities including a collaboration from Newcastle and Durham Universities claim to have created sperm in the laboratory from human stem cells.

Women Journalists Risk Lives To Shine Light On Conflict, Corruption

October 21, 2009
The Huggington Post
By Adam Taylor


On Monday the International Women's Media Foundation convened at New York's Waldorf Astoria to honor the 2009 winners of the Courage in Journalism Awards.

The awards ceremony was full of many noted names representing western media companies, including Judy Woodruff of The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer and CNN's Christiane Amanpour. What seemed clear, however, was that while the financial troubles facing the western journalism market may be in the spotlight, the exciting and courageous journalism taking part in other parts of the world should not be overlooked.

Three journalists received Courage in Journalism Awards.

International Women's Media Foundation's Courage in Journalism Award winners Iryna Khalip (L) from Belarus, Agnes Taile (C) from Cameroon and 2009 Lifetime Achievement Award winner Israeli Amira Hass (R) at annual awards ceremony October 20, 2009 in the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York.

Agnes Taile from Cameroon was commended for her commitment and dedication to broadcast journalism. Her reporting began to anger the wrong people, often President Paul Biya. In 2006 she was abducted and almost killed. The incident seriously damaged her vocal chords and caused her radio station to cancel her show. Taile was able to recover, and was soon back reporting, heading to Chad in February 2008 to cover the conflict raging there. As she accepted her award, she finished with: "I will share with you an old saying: that which does not kill you will only make you stronger."

Iryna Khalip from Belarus was commended for her work in highlighting the corrupt and undemocratic processes of President Alexander Lukashenko. As Khalip put it, "Dictatorships don't like journalists." Indeed, Khalip has faced strong government opposition, including being beaten at a rally and watching as the free press in Belarus dwindled and was shut down. She now works for the Moscow-based independent paper, Novaya Gazeta, covering Belarus. Novaya Gazeta is banned in Belarus. It is also the newspaper of the 2002 Courage Award winner Anna Politkovskaya, who was murdered for her work in 2006.

One winner who couldn't make it was Iranian journalist Jila Baniyaghoob. Baniyaghoob had been arrested for her role in reporting political unrest and rioting after the Iranian presidential election earlier this year.

The lifetime achievement award went to Amira Hass, a reporter and columnist for Ha'aretz Daily, a newspaper based in Tel Aviv. Hass is one of the few Israeli journalists who ventures frequently to Gaza and the West Bank - in fact she lived in both regions.

The HuffPost talked to Iryna Khalip before the ceremony:

Why did you decide to become a journalist?

First of all I was inspired by the experiences of my father who was a wonderful, excellent journalist - way back in the times of the Soviet Union. Besides, I didn't want to go into a profession that would be too hard, like physics or chemistry, I wanted to do something exciting that wouldn't be too tough! I had no idea that it would be really interesting and really challenging but hard at the same time.

How did you get your career started?

I started my career at the time that the Soviet Union was still around. It was two years prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union, but it was the time of the perestroika. It was a very exciting time to go into journalism rather than propaganda. At first I thought that like my father I would write about theater, film, the arts, and be a critic, a movie critic or something like that. But then Belarus became a dictator state, and I had to start writing about things that are totally different than the arts.

Does writing about these different things bring its own problems into the mix?

Yes, it certainly does, but a person gets used to the idea of danger if you work in the environment of a totalitarianism state. I was arrested four times; they initiated criminal proceedings against me on three occasions. I've been beaten, I've been threatened, I've been intimidated, but this only proves that I'm doing something right.

As a woman, do you face more difficulties in reporting?

The fact that I am a woman does make my life more difficult. For example, certain young women who are arrested at rallies similar to me got raped in the police cells. And in that respect I was lucky. But I understand being a female does create additional difficulties. Now that I have a two-year-old son I have become even more vulnerable because I feel the responsibly for my son's destiny.

What work are you most proud of?

Paradoxically, on the occasions when I was arrested for my investigations I felt very proud as I came up with information that no one else had been aware of. It was a complete investigation with all the full disclosures. It proved that apart from writing short articles I am capable of conducting fully-fledged investigative research. It also meant that the authorities were afraid of what I was doing otherwise no one would have paid attention to me.

The fact that the authorities are afraid shows that a strong press can help change the situation?

Well, actually, strong and free journalism can do a lot - even under a dictatorship. In absence of free newspapers, because all of them had been shut down, we still came up with underground newspapers and publications, like they did in Poland with Solidarity. These papers are printed in underground print shops, volunteers, young people who just take a stack of publications and carry them door to door, put them in mailboxes, distribute them. It's very dangerous but it works.

There are people who are too lazy to look for alternative opinion and alternative news on the Internet but if they go to their mailbox and they pull out an alternative newspaper, they will certainly be sure to read it.

What does it mean to receive this award?

To me it is very important, it means that the United States recognizes my work, they do not think of Belarus as a black spot on the map that should be surrounded by barbed wire and forgotten. It means that there is a belief that Belarus has a future.

Activism
On Monday the International Women's Media Foundation convened at New York's Waldorf Astoria to honor the 2009 winners of the Courage in Journalism Awards. The awards ceremony was full of many noted n...
On Monday the International Women's Media Foundation convened at New York's Waldorf Astoria to honor the 2009 winners of the Courage in Journalism Awards. The awards ceremony was full of many noted n...

Women journalists prevented from leaving Iran

October 10, 2009


Shahrzad News: Three Iranian women journalists have been banned from leaving the country. Their passports were confiscated minutes before they were to board their plane at Tehran’s international airport.

Badrulsadat Mofidi, who is general secretary of Iran’s Union of Journalists was one of the three. She said she was told at the airport that she had been banned from leaving the country a month earlier, following a ruling of the Court of Revolution. It was the first she had heard of their decision. The other two journalists, Farzaneh Roustai and Zahra Ebrahimi, also only learnt of the ban at the departure gate. Farzaneh Roustai won the Journalist of the Year award in 2007, and Zahra Ebrahima is a senior correspondent at the Hamshahri newspaper.