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Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Party pooper!
First, Mayor Bloomberg went after smoking in public places. Then trans-fats, salt and sugary drinks.
Now Bloomberg — known for sipping fine wine and downing a cold beer from time to time — wants to crack down on alcohol sales to curb excessive drinking, according to a provocative planning document obtained by The Post.
The city Health Department’s far-reaching Partnership for a Healthier New York City initiatives proposes to slash the number of establishments in the city that sell booze.
Community “transformation” grants provided under President Obama’s health-care law would help bankroll the effort.
One of the goals listed in the “request for proposal” document to community groups is “reducing alcohol retail outlet (e.g. bar, corner store) density and illegal alcohol,” the document states.
“Talk about a nanny state. Why don’t they just close all the liquor establishments?” quipped Mike Long, a former liquor-store owner in Bay Ridge and head of the state Conservative Party.
“This is absolutely insane. They want to run the retail establishments in New York,” said Long, who likened the effort to the temperance movement of more than a century ago.
Health officials and advocates have also discussed banning liquor advertising seen by millions of straphangers in the transit system. Read on and comment » | Carl Campanile | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
NEW YORK MAGAZINE: Bloomberg’s Health Initiatives Target Alcohol, Too: Booze can now be added to the list of fun things Mayor Bloomberg wants less of in New York City, with public campaigns against smoking, salt, sugar, and trans-fat already underway. The New York Post reports that Bloomberg, although he's "known for sipping fine wine and downing a cold beer from time to time," has plans to limit the sale of alcohol, in addition to advertising and promotion for bars and liquor. Thanks to the Health Department's Healthier New York City initiatives, the so-called nanny state could be drying up some soon. » | Joe Cascarelli | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
MAIL ONLINE: He's outlawed smoking, now Nanny Bloomberg wants to close New York liquor stores to clamp down on drinking » | Hugo Gye | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
My comment:
This little man has a tyrannical nature. Little men often do. He's turning the 'Big Apple' into a city nobody will ever want to go to for a break. – © Mark
This comment also appears here
The former Massachusetts governor trained his sights on President Barack Obama, as party strategists said the contest for a candidate to face him in November’s general election was all but over.
Mr Romney arrived in South Carolina, the next state to vote, 10 points ahead in opinion polls. At the same time he unleashed a barrage of advertising in Florida, site of the fourth contest on Jan 31.
The show of strength came after he became the first Republican presidential challenger since the modern primary system began 35 years ago to win both the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire poll.
“Tonight, we made history,” he told supporters at a rally in Manchester. He promised to oust Mr Obama from the White House and “restore America to the founding principles that made this country great”.
Denouncing Mr Obama as a “failed president”, he added: “Tonight we are asking the good people of South Carolina to join the citizens of New Hampshire and make 2012 the year he runs out of time”. » | Jon Swaine, Manchester | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Scotland may be forced to join the Euro as the price of independence from the United Kingdom, Downing Street warned today.
A spokesman for David Cameron said there were no guarantees that the Scots could keep sterling if they voted against remaining affiliated with the rest of the union.
Mr Cameron’s spokesman said: “Once you start asking the question about independence, one part of that is what currency to have. Would Scotland retain the pound, and if so, how does that work? Or does it join the euro? That’s one part of the independence question.”
Other issues which Downing Street said would need ironing out are shared defence capabilities, the national debt and border security.
A carve up of assets between England and Scotland could leave both countries facing years of legal wrangling. » | James Kirkup, and Simon Johnson | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Related audio »
BBC: The Scottish Secretary Michael Moore has said he hopes the row over the independence referendum can be worked out amicably and would not end up in the courts.
The Scottish government has said it has a mandate to hold the vote in the autumn of 2014 but ministers at Westminster say that would be unlawful under current devolved powers.
They are prepared to give Holyrood the authority to hold a binding vote provided its a single question, is overseen by the Electoral Commission and the minimum voting age is 18.
First Minister Alex Salmond told BBC Good Morning Scotland he thinks Mr Moore is wrong about the voting age. Listen to the audio » | Tuesday, January 11, 2012
THE GUARDIAN: Denver court upholds judge's order that claimed Oklahoma's attempt to ban sharia law was unconstitutional
A proposed constitutional amendment that would ban Oklahoma courts from considering international or Islamic law discriminates against religions, a federal appeals court said on Tuesday, as it gave the right to a Muslim community leader to challenge its constitutionality.
The court in Denver upheld US district judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange's order blocking implementation of the amendment shortly after it was approved by 70% of Oklahoma voters in November 2010.
Muneer Awad, the executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Oklahoma, sued to block the law from taking effect, arguing that the Save Our State Amendment violated his First Amendment rights.
"This is an important reminder that the constitution is the last line of defense against a rising tide of anti-Muslim bigotry in our society, and we are pleased that the appeals court recognised that fact," Awad said. "We are also hopeful that this decision serves as a reminder to politicians wishing to score political points through fear-mongering and bigotry." » | Associated Press | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Gunmen from the radical Islamist sect Boko Haram killed eight people, including four police officers, after opening fire at a beer parlour in northeast Nigeria.
The shootings come as the sect has promised to target Christians in Nigeria's Muslim north, expanding its campaign of assassinations and bombings.
Tuesday night's attack occurred in the town of Potiskum in Yobe state. Local police commissioner Tanko Lawan said the six gunmen began shooting as patrons drank beer, which the local Shariah law technically opposes, though bars remain open for those living there. » | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
THE BALTIMORE SUN: Mitt Romney rolled to an easy victory Tuesday in the New Hampshire primary, taking a broad stride toward capturing the GOP presidential nomination as the contest heads south for a pair of potentially make-or-break contests.
The win, forecast by the television networks from exit polls almost immediately after voting ended, would give Romney a one-two sweep in the early balloting of the 2012 campaign, a first for any Republican apart from a sitting president.
The conservative candidates who stand the best chance to stop him as the race heads to South Carolina – former Pennsylvania Sen.Rick Santorum, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Gov. Rick Perry -- were trailing far back and appeared unlikely to get a significant lift from their performance here.
In polling before Tuesday’s election, Rep. Ron Paul of Texas and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. were vying for second place. Santorum, the Iowa runner-up by a handful of votes, and Gingrich were scrambling to create some sense of momentum for their campaigns. Perry abandoned New Hampshire, staking his future on South Carolina.
Romney starts out leading there, too, but that challenge promises to be much more formidable than New Hampshire which, from the start, was a fight to finish second behind the former Massachusetts governor. Unlike Iowa, where leaders came and went atop the polls, no survey ever showed Romney with less than a sizable, double-digit New Hampshire lead.
In South Carolina, however, Romney won't have what amounted to a home-field advantage -- five Massachusetts presidential hopefuls have won the neighboring Granite State in past elections -- and he will face a much different electorate in the first Southern primary next week.
South Carolina has a large and politically important bloc of evangelical voters. Romney will face resistance among some of those Christian conservatives who are suspicious if not downright hostile toward his Mormon faith. In New Hampshire, just 14% of those who voted Tuesday said being a “true conservative” was the most important thing to them, trailing far behind the economic concerns cited by 6 in 10 voters, according to election day interviews by the TV networks.
Romney is also facing a more assertive pack of runners-up. » | Los Angeles Times Staff Writer | Tuesday, January 10, 2012
THE GUARDIAN: Romney raises $24 million » | AP foreign | Wednesday, January 11, 2012
THE GUARDIAN: Welsh health minister says not removing defective implants could endanger women's health
The Welsh government says it will pay to replace French-made PIP breast implants for women who were treated privately.
Welsh health minister Lesley Griffiths said not replacing the implants could endanger women's health, given some have already ruptured.
The health secretary, Andrew Lansley, will rule out following suit in England when he updates MPs on the scandal today. » | Denis Campbell | Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
THE ATLANTIC: Syria's dictator is following the same path that led Libya's leader to his death
Back in April, an NPR producer wrote up the 11 steps that Middle Eastern dictators take on the path to losing power. Her list, like the many similar lists floating around Arabic-language blogs and social media, drew from the examples of Tunisia's Zine el Abidine ben Ali (fled in January), Egypt's Hosni Mubarak (forced out in February), and Yemen Ali Abdullah Saleh (pressured by the U.S. to resign in early April, a still-ongoing process). The pattern looked indelible, and still does. Here's the list:
1. Shut down the internet» | Max Fisher | Tuesday, January 10, 2012
1. Send thugs (on foot or horseback)
2. Attack and arrest journalists
3. Shoot people
4. Promise to investigate who shot people
5. Do a meaningless political reshuffle
6. Blame Al Jazeera
7. Organise paid demonstrations in favor of your regime
8. Make a condescending speech about how much you love the youth
9. Warn that the country will fall into chaos without you
10. Blame foreign agitators
Related »
BBC: Syria: US condemns Bashar al-Assad 'conspiracy' speech – The US and France have condemned a speech by Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad which blamed an "external conspiracy" for the mass uprising against his rule. ¶ The US state department said President Assad had thrown "responsibility on everybody but back on himself". ¶ France's foreign minister said the speech amounted to "denial of reality". » | Tuesday, January 10, 2012
In his 1998 work Dream Palace of the Arabs, Fouad Ajami wrote, "As the world batters the modern Arab inheritance, the rhetorical need for anti-Zionism grows. But there rises, too, the recognition that it is time for the imagination to steal away from Israel and to look at the Arab reality, to behold its own view of the kind of world the Arabs want for themselves." Whether Ajami realized it or not, these words offer an eerily prescient view--thirteen years ahead of time--of the dynamic behind the Arab Spring and its autumn and winter sequels. In country after country, Arab crowds have taken to the street for a cause more positive and all-embracing than anti-Zionism: the demand for an end to corrupt authoritarian regimes and for a greater say in their own future. What shape that future will take remains to be seen, and many basic questions have yet to be answered. Can democracy blossom overnight in societies that have always been dominated by oppressive force? If democracy does take root, can respect for minority rights survive the tyranny of a poor, ill-schooled and often intolerant majority? Would democratically elected demagogues pose even more of a threat to peace and stability in the Muslim-Arab world than old-line authoritarian regimes and monarchies with a selfish stake in maintaining the status quo and "keeping the lid on"?
Meanwhile, where can one turn for detailed, reliable coverage of what some now call the "Arab Awakening"? For millions of people around the world, including actual participants on the ground and in the streets of the Middle East, the single most important news source for the events still unfolding in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Syria and Bahrain is the English-language channel of the Qatar-based Al Jazeera television-news network. Like it or not, it is no exaggeration to say that Al Jazeera has been the eyes and ears of this crucial news story. More often than not, Al Jazeera correspondents are the first on the scene, and Al Jazeera anchors and interviewers provide the most detailed follow-up, discussion and analysis of breaking events in the Arab world. » | Aram Bakshian Jr. | Tuesday, January 10, 2012
THE INDEPENDENT: Driven by a theology that refuses to grant women equal rights, ultraorthodox Jews have begun to flex their misogynist muscles. But, says Catrina Stewart, a fightback has begun
Less than half a mile away, young Israelis mix in bustling bars in central Jerusalem, anathema to this religious ultraorthodox community that has tried its hardest to hide itself away from the temptations of secular life, and ensure a rigorous separation between men and women.
Ironically, though, it is the ultraorthodox community's efforts to impose its religious values on ordinary Israelis, particularly women, that many fear is undermining Israel's democracy, and which now poses the greatest threat to this community's survival.
When Tanya Rosenblit, a 28-year-old woman from Ashdod, boarded a Jerusalem-bound bus late last year, she caused a stir by refusing to heed the demands of a religious male passenger to move to the back of the bus. Many of the ultraorthodox – known as Haredim – believe that modesty forbids women to sit at the front of the bus with the men, and it is common to see segregated buses with women seated to the rear, often crowded in while seats remain free at the front.
Ms Rosenblit became a minor celebrity in Israel, but her stance was not without consequences, earning her death threats for daring to challenge the religious community.
"The Haredim has always received special treatment in this country and people thought it was okay," she says. "But something has changed... in the sense that they feel they are going to control this country. That's disturbing." » | Catrina Stewart | Tuesday, January 10, 2012
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