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Soon, nearly everyone will have weighed in on Osama bin Laden’s death, what it means for the War on Terror, whether we are safer as a result, or should steel ourselves for retaliation. We will revisit the folly of our invasion of Iraq, as well as the purpose of our protracted mission in Afghanistan.
Though I don’t know enough to declaim authoritatively on these subjects, I do know that I don’t relish the prospect of my daughter growing up in a society where people celebrate a man’s death in the streets just as they do a victory of their favorite baseball team — and as bin Laden’s supporters did when the twin towers fell.
Justice has been done, according to President Obama, a former professor of law and an unusually reflective man, from whom one might have expected a more thoughtful conception of

Digital media technology is storming Washington, Capitol Hill and Congress. The last three years have witnessed a presidential campaign with unprecedented online success; the rapid adoption of social platforms by congressional representatives and their staffs; political events broken, discussed and resolved entirely online; and the growing importance of digital tools for reaching the media and constituents.
Despite the public profile of these developments, little is known about how digital media is changing the internal workings of Capitol Hill. The Emerging Media Research Council decided to address that question by researching existing knowledge and conducting a series of in-depth interviews with Capitol Hill staffers. Our approach was intentionally different from existing surveys that have been conducted on the topic; through interviews we wanted to push back, listen, and understand in the ways that only qualitative research

Is our civil justice system at a breaking point? And, if so, is this why civil litigants, particularly plaintiffs, are opting away from the courthouse venue, simply unable to get to trial before everyone’s hair turns gray (or things become more terminal)?
Good trial lawyers know how to keep a jury focused and interested. They know how to present the evidence skillfully, dramatically, and expeditiously. By contrast, some lawyers over-try their cases, call too many witnesses, make extended and unnecessary arguments, and thereby lose the jury’s interest, as well as the judge’s patience. And there are enough of these lawyers that, if not controlled or properly reined in, can literally bring the system to a grinding

Stumbling further into the quagmire of a national public relations disaster, drastic new measures by the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) officials have turned the “manufactured crisis” over the Ethnic Studies/Mexican American Studies Program into a troubling moral crisis for the city –and the country.
As Tucson school officials appear to unravel daily with increasing controversy, Mexican American Studies (MAS) students and UNIDOS activists are now emerging as the calmest standard-bearers of civil discourse for the community.
In an op-ed today, two MAS students made a simple request: If the TUSD officials are truly interested in dialogue, they should table a controversial resolution that has divided the community.
Instead, in an alarming crackdown on the non-violent UNIDOS student campaign last week that attracted national praise for its celebratory actions and demands for basic democratic involvement in education, the backpedaling TUSD superintendent John Pedicone has shocked the community by hiring costly armed guards to monitor this Tuesday’s rescheduled governing school board vote over a controversial school board resolution to strip the accreditation of the Ethnic Studies Program.
Only months ago, the Chicago-transplanted Pedicone declared the draconian state ban on Ethnic Studies was unconstitutional and a challenge to the law would be “the first hurdle.” In a candidate’s forum last fall, Pedicone even admitted: “If you look at the data, it is hard to argue with the success this program has with a historically under served population.” In fact, a recent TUSD analysis demonstrated the achievements of the MAS program.
In a disturbing provocation this Sunday, Pedicone, who reportedly lives out of the district in the affluent suburb of Oro Valley, published an incendiary op-ed in the Arizona Daily Star newspaper that offensively denigrated student efforts “as pawns,” blamed adults for “abhorrent” behavior, and falsely categorized last week’s widely denounced resolution vote as only a “discussion.”
As Tucson attorney Richard Martinez noted last week in a debate with TUSD board president Mark Stegement, the divisive resolution prematurely subverts an unfinished state audit in disarray, as well as a federal suit challenging the constitutionality of the new state law banning Ethnic Studies. In a quiet but stunning smackdown of Stegemen’s misguided efforts, Martinez framed the TUSD effort as part of a “manufactured crisis.”
This is the simple truth: Compounding the shameless Ethnic Studies witch hunt by extremist state officials, the Democraty Party-led TUSD school administrators have triggered a “moral crisis” over their seeming disconnection to the actual city of Tucson, by rebuffing MAS student and UNIDOS participation, and blatantly disregarding the reality of the district’s majority of Mexican American students and the city’s fervent and deeply rooted Chicano movement

Happy Tuesday everyone, here’s my Top 5 for May 3, 2011 from Len Berman at www.ThatsSports.com.
1. Quick Hits
* Dallas overcomes a 16-point deficit to beat the Lakers 96-94 in game 1. Atlanta wins game 1 in Chicago 103-95, as the road team wins both openers.
* Word is that Chicago’s Derrick Rose, at age 22, is the youngest winner of the NBA MVP award.
* In the NHL, Boston has taken a two games to none lead over Philadelphia with a 3-2 overtime win.
* Researchers announced that former Chicago Bears star Dave Duerson, who committed suicide in February, had developed the same brain disease found in many deceased NFL players. He had shot himself in the chest to preserve his brain for research.
* The NBA Kings will remain in Sacramento at least one more season.

Pakistan's main intelligence agency, the ISI, has said it is embarrassed by its failures on al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.

An ISI official told the BBC the compound in Abbottabad where Bin Laden was killed by US forces on Sunday had been raided in 2003.

But the compound "was not on our radar" since then, the official said.

He gave new details of the raid, saying Bin Laden's young daughter had said she saw her father shot.

Bin Laden, 54, was the founder and leader of al-Qaeda. He is believed to have ordered the attacks on New York and Washington on 11 September 2001, as well as a number of other deadly bombings.
‘Caught by surprise’
The ISI official told the BBC's Owen Bennett-Jones in Islamabad that the compound in Abbottabad, just 100km (62 miles) from the capital, was raided when under construction in 2003.

It was believed an al-Qaeda operative, Abu Faraj al-Libi, was there.

But since then, "the compound was not on our radar, it is an embarrassment for the ISI", the official said. "We're good, but we're not God."

He added: "This one failure should not make us look totally incompetent. Look at our track record. For the last 10 years, we have captured Taliban and al-Qaeda in their hundreds – more than any other countries put together."

The compound is just a few hundred metres from the Pakistan Military Academy – the country's equivalent of West Point or Sandhurst.

The ISI official also gave new or differing accounts of some of the events of Sunday's raid. They included:

• There were 17-18 people in the compound at the time of the attack
• The Americans took away one person still alive, possibly a Bin Laden son
• Those who survived the attack included a wife, a daughter and eight to nine other children, not apparently Bin Laden's; all had their hands tied by the Americans
• The surviving Yemeni wife said they had moved to the compound a few months ago
• Bin Laden's daughter, aged 12 or 13, saw her father shot

The official said it was thought the Americans wanted to take away the surviving women and children but had to abandon the plan when one of the helicopters

Religious people find it very annoying that people don’t need God to be good, as science has now incontestably proved.
For millennia, we’ve been brainwashed into believing that we needed the Almighty to redeem us from an essentially corrupt nature. Left to our own devices, people would quickly devolve into beasts, more violent, tactless, aggressive, and selfish, than we already are.
Today, we know that this isn’t true. With the discovery of mirror neurons by Italian neuroscientist Giaccomo Rizzolatti in the 1990s, we now have physiological proof of why — and how — our species became hard-wired for

That sucking sound you’ve been hearing is Republican presidential hopefuls going down the drain. Professional strength Liquid Plumber couldn’t help now.
Forget October, we just had the May Surprise. And what a surprise, a full 20 months before the 2012 election. No cynical, political manipulation needed, raising terror levels to scare

Six weeks after my mother passed away I was scheduled for a lodge-to-lodge hiking trip through the Rogue River Wilderness in Southern Oregon with five women friends. As our departure date neared, I began equivocating. I was tired, and grieving, but the truth was, I was scared: what would my first Mother’s Day without my mother feel like?
With a healthy dose of encouragement from my husband, I embarked on the trip, hoping that communing with nature for five days would be just the healing I needed.
Our days were graced with flawless weather — sunny and cloudless, with temperatures in the low 70s. The trip consisted of four days of lengthy but moderate hikes through oak forests punctuated by creeks and rushing

President Obama is receiving the well-deserved gratitude of the nation for success in taking out Osama bin Laden. The nation applauds, with less exaltation than exhaling, as if we were holding our breath for the last decade without knowing it.
The president’s judgment and steeliness earn praise across the country. Independent pollster Andrew Kohut says he may reap a long term dividend for being a strong leader. Democratic pollster Peter Hart believes the president captured a larger sense, to a “country that has been

Osama Bin Laden is dead. And Americans are celebrating.
Last night, the crowds cheered and sang before the White House and in Manhattan. And, today, the jingoistic, congratulatory op-eds hit the

“You can never have an impact on society if you have not changed yourself.”
–Nelson Mandela
Arianna Huffington recently said at Urban Zen NYC’s “Conversations on Sustainable Wellness” series, “If there’s one thing the world is starving for, it’s wisdom, and health is connected to wisdom.”
We couldn’t agree with her more, as we need wise and productive change now! The world is in turmoil and, until we can come together in a healthy way, life will be even more challenging than it need be. Amidst the confusion, there is a crucial need to bring business leaders to this same understanding, as they are in a position to make lasting and effective differences. This is the very purpose of LOHAS, or Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability.
As we are all well aware, times have changed. What we were talking about three years ago is now happening: bringing bags to the grocery store, using CFL light bulbs, driving a hybrid

Fewer medical students are entering general internal medicine these days, recent headlines trumpet. But this problem has been going on for some time. And for family medicine (which is the other main specialty that makes up the field of primary care*), the outlook is dismal as well. At my institution, Saint Louis University School of Medicine, the numbers of students choosing family medicine went up this

Largely under the public radar screen, the last decade has seen a legal revolution in corporate freedom of speech. Ironically, private sector whistleblowers now have far stronger rights than government employees to challenge institutional abuses of power that betray the public trust.
The implications are significant from every direction. To illustrate, citizen groups can work more freely with whistleblowers as the public’s eyes and

There are a lot of things I’m proud of in the upcoming June issue of Glamour, but there’s one I want to tell you about now — a report that opened my eyes, pissed me off, but then gave me hope. I believe it will do the same for you. It all comes down to two simple words: tell somebody.
Here’s the backstory. One year ago today, 22-year-old University of Virginia student Yeardley Love was found dead in her apartment; her boyfriend later told police he’d shaken her so hard her head repeatedly hit the

Canada's Conservative party has emerged victorious in the country's general election, a vote that has also resulted in a huge shake-up for the opposition.

In this new topsy-turvy world, the previously third-placed party, the New Democratic Party (NDP), has become the official opposition and the once mighty Liberal Party has been soundly humiliated by its worst-ever showing.

Having led two minority Conservative governments since 2006, Prime Minister Stephen Harper has now earned a majority mandate, having won 167 of the 308 seats in the Canadian parliament.

Although the opinion polls seemed to show the Tories would regain power, the scale of victory came as a surprise to some political observers.

Mr Harper ran a tightly-controlled, disciplined campaign, concentrating largely on his government's record in managing the economy, and promising to lower taxes and tackle the country's debt.

Canada has emerged from a recession as one of the strongest among the G7 group of countries.

One of the party's biggest breakthroughs on election night was cracking metropolitan Canada, particularly the party's sweeping gains in the Liberal stronghold of Toronto and the surrounding area.
Jack Layton is another winner in the election
Ezra Levant, a conservative commentator for the Sun News Network, says the switch of support of visible minorities and new immigrants from the Liberals to the Conservatives is a significant demographic change.

"There's this whole other media in Canada, ethnic newspapers, TV and radio stations in other languages that our parliamentary is just not plugged into. In those media battlefields, the conservative brand is dominant," says Mr Levant.

Mr Harper has pointedly promised however not to open debate on more controversial issues, such as

CDs and books arrive. Every day. Too many for one man to assess. So — not all the time, but some days — I ask my wife to preview the music.
The other day, she was listing to Movits (pronounced: Move-its), which is, according to the publicity sheet, a hip-hop swing jazz

The People vs. George Lucas is a novelty item, but an often entertaining one.
Essentially, director Alexandre Philippe has rounded up a herd of fan boys to talk about Star Wars. And he gives them free rein to vent about how much the first three Star Wars movies meant to them and how deeply creator George Lucas has subsequently wounded and betrayed them: first with his special-edition versions of the original films, then with his trilogy of prequels.
If you’re a fan of the series, then you’re well aware of these indictments of Lucas: that it was arrogant and presumptuous of him to tinker with films that are burned in the brains of people who saw them as children. And it was even worse when he made prequels that, to these grown up Luke Skywalker-lovers, were vastly inferior to the originals.
Some of it is esoteric and

Guernsey, in the English Channel, sits 30 miles from the north coast of France and 70 miles from the south coast of England, self-governing but maintaining its loyalty to the British Crown.
After spending a few days there, I quickly found out that this was a remarkable hiking and walking destination. It had never appeared on my radar before but how, I do not know, as you can be there from London in 45 minutes. Yes, it is very calm and beautiful, has a warmer climate than the UK and once there you will see why many spend most of their time outdoors.
White sandy beaches and bays, turquoise sea. Clifftop walks and inland

When the debate over the fiscal 2012 budget began, the country — or, more accurately, the media — was focused on Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) proposal. Introduced on behalf of the Republican House majority, our colleague’s plan puts the interests of wealthy corporations first by slashing Medicare and Medicaid and spending trillions on a new corporate tax cut.
Indeed, cutting is all it seems to do. The Ryan plan slashes transportation investments in roads, bridges, rail lines, transit systems and airports by $318 billion over the next 10

Vin Diesel film Fast Five has taken $86.2m (£51.9m) in its first three days, the biggest North American box office opener of the year so far.

The fifth movie in the street racing franchise pulled in bigger takings than early estimates, which had stood at $83.6m (£50.3m).

It easily beat the previous best opening set two weeks ago by animation Rio, which took $39.2m (£23.6m).

The film, featuring the voice of Anne Hathaway was at two this week.

It has now taken $103.6m (£65.2m) in its thee weeks since release.

The latest comedy offering from Tyler Perry, the critically-panned Madea's Big Happy Family, fell one place to three, taking $9.9m (£6m) million in its second

Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari has denied that the killing of Osama Bin Laden in his country is a sign of its failure to tackle terrorism.

In an opinion piece in the Washington Post, Mr Zardari said his country was "perhaps the world's greatest victim of terrorism".

Bin Laden was shot dead by US forces in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad. Pakistan was not involved in the raid.

US officials said Bin Laden must have had a support system in Pakistan.

Bin Laden, 54, was the founder and leader of al-Qaeda. He is believed to have ordered the attacks on New York and Washington on 11 September 2001, as well as a number of other deadly bombings.

He was America's most wanted man but had eluded them for more than a decade.

US officials say they are "99.9%" sure that the man they shot and killed in a raid on a secure compound in Abbottabad and later buried at sea was Bin Laden.

They said a video had been made of Bin Laden's burial but have not said yet whether it, or any photographs of Bin Laden's body, will be released.
‘Enormous price’
The compound in Abbottabad is just a few hundred metres from the Pakistan Military Academy, the country's equivalent of West Point or

The battle for the New York Stock Exchange has intensified with the co-bidders saying they will make a hostile takeover bid.

NYSE Euronext has twice rejected an unsolicited approach from Nasdaq and IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) worth about $11.3bn (£6.9bn).

NYSE's board has already accepted a $10.2bn offer from Deutsche Boerse.

But Nasdaq-ICE has said it will now make a formal offer direct to NYSE's shareholders later this month.

The move appears designed to press shareholders in the NYSE to force the board to the negotiating

US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has secured more time for Congress to negotiate a deal to increase the borrowing limit of the US.

Stalemate over the talks means the US risks defaulting on its debts because it will be unable to borrow beyond its $14.3 trillion (£8.6tn) limit.

Mr Geithner had previously said the deadline for a deal was 8 July.

But in a letter to Congress he said that better tax receipts meant the deadline could be extended to 2