Saturday, April 5, 2014


News Clips For The Day



Honey Maid's surprising response to anti-gay backlash – CBS
By Aimee Picchi Money Watch April 4, 2014

As families become more diverse, advertisers are starting to reflect that emerging reality in television commercials. That's not always going over well with some viewers.

Take the hullaballoo over a campaign by Honey Maid, the graham cracker brand owned by Mondelez (MDLZ). Like the crumbly snack crackers themselves, the campaign offered a simple, healthy feel: smiling families holding hands and playing together. But some viewers took issue with the composition of the families, which included biracial and gay families.

After receiving a flood of hateful comments -- such as one viewer who called the campaign "filth" -- Honey Maid came up with a clever response to the backlash. The idea? Take the angry remarks and turn them into a piece of art, forming rolled-up comment printouts into a paper sculpture spelling the word "love."

But the smartest idea was what happened next: Placing the messages from supporters around the sculpture, showing that the positive response was far greater than those from haters.

"What a remarkably positive way to respond to such negative expression," one consumer wrote. Another added, "I am shocked to know you guys received ten times the amount of positive comments as negative comments... this almost makes me happier than your incredible commercial in the first place. Faith in humanity = restored."

Increasingly, marketers are finding that diversity pays by delivering an almost predictable response: a vocal critical minority that gets drowned out by a wave of support from diversity-friendly viewers. At the risk of alienating a small group of consumers, brands are finding this formula can provide a sure-fire way to create engagement with their product.

Mondelez didn't immediately response to a request for comment.

Take General Mills' (GIS) Cheerios. It scored last year with a sweet commercial about a biracial family. After an ugly backlash, the cereal brand was lifted by support from viewers who embraced the ad and its message. The company later brought back the characters for its first-ever Super Bowl spot earlier this year.

In a way, the sharply divided responses to such ads aren't surprising, given that America is itself polarized over social issues. More than half of Americans now support same-sex marriage, up from one-third in 2003, according to a February poll from the Public Religion Research Institute. But 20 percent of respondents said they strongly oppose it.

While it may seem like bad business to alienate even a small slice of potential customers, companies like Mondelez may be betting that supporting diversity is a winning strategy.

One thing is for sure -- that approach tracks with demographic shifts in the U.S. The number of interracial and interethnic, opposite-sex couple households jumped 28 percent from 2000 to 2010, according to the Census Bureau. Meanwhile, over same period the number of same-sex couple households has jumped by more than 80 percent.



Public Religion Research Institute
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) is an American nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to research and education at the intersection of religion, values and public life. Founded in 2009 by Robert P. Jones and Daniel Cox, PRRI research serves as a resource for journalists, opinion leaders, scholars, clergy and members of the general public who wish to gain a better understanding of how Americans’ religious and moral values shape public opinion on a broad array of political, social and economic issues. The PRRI research team conducts both public opinion poll and qualitative research. As a research organization, PRRI does not take positions on, nor does it advocate for, particular policies.

PRRI is a supporting organization of the Transparency Initiative at the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR),[1] and a member of the National Council on Public Polls. PRRI also has ongoing research partnerships with the Brookings Institution,[2] the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs at Georgetown University,[3] and Religion News Service.[4]

Since its founding in 2009, PRRI has conducted a wide range of surveys, tracking American public opinion more broadly, while also focusing on influential groups in society, like white evangelical Protestants, the Tea Party movement, and Millennials (Americans age 18-29). PRRI is perhaps best known for the American Values Survey (AVS), its national, multi-issue survey on religion, values and public policy. The PRRI Research Team conducted the AVS in 2008 and 2010, and began conducting it annually in 2011.[7] The survey measures public opinion on a wide range of issues and the relationship between opinions, values, and religion. In 2008, the survey focused on the faith and political views of young adults in the 2008 presidential election. In 2010, it examined the relationship between the Tea Party and the Christian right, and what this portended for the 2010 election.[8] In 2011, the AVS survey tackled voters’ views about the Mormon faith and economic inequality, an issue that has received increased attention since the advent of the Occupy Wall Street movement.[9]
In addition to the American Values Survey, PRRI also conducts monthly surveys on a wide variety of issues. Most prominently, the PRRI/RNS Religion News Survey is a bimonthly national survey conducted in partnership with Religion News Service. The PRRI/RNS Religion News Survey tracks American attitudes on timely issues that feature prominently in the news, ranging from climate change and evolution to politicians’ sexual and financial misconduct.




I haven't seen the Honey Maid commercial, but I love the Cheerios commercials. The little girl is adorable, and the father and mother are just like any other young and hopeful happily married couple. There is no heavy-handed message – just an appealing family with their Cheerios box. I thought it took courage to make the commercial and that made me more likely to buy Cheerios, which I have always liked anyway.

According to this news article, while interracial opposite-sex households increased by 28 % from 2000 to 2010, same-sex households went up 80%. This surprises me, but I am not unhappy about it. I think it reflects the fact that there are that many gay and lesbian couples in the population who had never before been able to marry, so when they could they exercised their rights quickly. It's also a sign that same sex couples are subject to the same feelings of love and commitment that heterosexual couples are.

I think it is a trend whose time has come, and as long the USA remains the home of the free and the brave, in deed as well as in name, their prevalence in our society will reach its true natural balance and then level off to a plateau. I don't think rigid and politically conservative religious organizations will conquer the march forward of the toleration of differences unless there is a right-wing coup in this country, and I don't think there will be one of those any time soon. There are still enough Democrats to prevent that.






Afghans defy threat of violence, turn out to vote
CBS/AP April 5, 2014

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Afghans flocked to polling stations nationwide on Saturday, defying a threat of violence by the Taliban to cast ballots in what promises to be the nation's first democratic transfer of power. The turnout was so high that some polling centers ran out of ballots.

Independent Election Commission chairman Ahmad Yousuf Nouristani said that preliminary estimates showed 7 million voters, or approximately 58 percent, turned out, the Reuters news agency reported.

The excitement over choosing a new leader for the first time appeared to overwhelm the fear of bloodshed in many areas, as Afghans embarked on a major transition nearly 13 years after the U.S.-led invasion toppled the rule of the Taliban.

President Hamid Karzai, the only leader the country has known since the Islamic movement was ousted, is on his way out, constitutionally barred from a third term. International combat troops are leaving by the end of the year. And Afghans are left largely on their own to face what is likely to be an intensified campaign by the Taliban to regain power, even as authorities face higher public demands to tackle entrenched poverty and corruption.

Men in traditional tunics and loose trousers and women clad in all-encompassing burqas waited in segregated lines at polls under tight security. At a Kandahar hospital-turned-polling station, the men's line stretched from the building, through the courtyard and out into the street. In Helmand province, women pushed, shoved and argued as they pressed forward in a long line.

The vote is the first for Afghans in which the outcome is uncertain. Voters are choosing from a field of eight presidential candidates, as well as selecting provincial council members. With three front-runners in the presidential race, a runoff was widely expected since none is likely to get the majority needed for an outright victory.

"I went to sleep with my mind made up to wake up early and to have my say in the matter of deciding who should be next one to govern my nation," said Saeed Mohammad, a 29-year-old mechanic in the southern city of Kandahar. "I want to be a part of this revolution and I want to fulfill my duty by casting my vote so that we can bring change and show the world that we love democracy."

Hundreds of thousands of Afghan police and soldiers fanned out across the country, searching cars at checkpoints and blocking vehicles from getting close to polling stations. Some voters were searched three times in Kabul, and text messages were blocked in an apparent attempt to prevent candidates from last-minute campaigning.
The Taliban have vowed to disrupt the balloting by targeting polling centers and election workers, and in the past weeks they stepped up attacks in the heart of Kabul to show they are capable of striking even in highly secured areas.

On Saturday, a bomb exploded in a school packed with voters in the Mohammad Agha district of Logar province, wounding two men, one seriously, said local government spokesman Din Mohammad Darwesh.

Rocket attacks and gunbattles forced authorities to close an additional 211 polling centers, raising the total number that weren't opened because of security concerns to 959, Nouristani said. He said in all, 6,212 polling centers were opened on Saturday.
Nouristani also confirmed that some polling centers had run out of ballots but said authorities were addressing the shortfall. They also extended voting by an hour, to 5 p.m. local time to accommodate everybody standing in line.

"We have received complaints about it and we have already sent ballot papers to wherever needed," he said.

Most polling stations closed as planned after nearly 10 hours of voting.
Electoral workers wearing blue vests with the logo of the Independent Election Commission pulled the paper ballots out of boxes and carefully showed them in footage shown live on national television.

Partial results are expected as soon as Sunday.
Karzai cast his ballot at a high school near the presidential palace.
"Today for us, the people of Afghanistan, is a very vital day that will determine our national future. We the people of Afghanistan will elect our provincial council members and our president by our secret votes," he said, his finger stained with the indelible ink being used to prevent people from voting twice.

After nearly 13 years of war, the country is so unstable that the very fact the crucial elections are being held is touted as one of Karzai's few successes. Karzai has been heavily criticized for failing to end the endemic poverty or clean up the government in a country that Transparency International last year ranked among the three most corrupt in the world, alongside Somalia and North Korea.

Mohammad Aleem Azizi, a 57-year-old shopkeeper in Kabul, said he voted to re-elect Karzai in the last election in 2009 but has been disappointed.

"Security deteriorated, insecurity is getting worse day by day," he said. "I want peace and stability in this country. I hope the new president of Afghanistan will be a good person."

Nazia Azizi, a 40-year-old housewife, was first in line at a school in eastern Kabul.
"I have suffered so much from the fighting and I want prosperity and security in Afghanistan. That is why I have come here to cast my vote," she said. "I hope that the votes that we are casting will be counted and that there will be no fraud in this election."

Electoral officials have taken extra measures to prevent fraud after widespread vote-rigging in 2009 marred Karzai's re-election. Strict protocols include bar codes on the ballot boxes delivered by truck and donkey caravans to all 34 provinces and plans to tally the results immediately after the vote closes and post a copy of the results at each center.

The Taliban's bloody campaign is a sign of the stakes of the election. If turnout is high even in dangerous areas and the Afghans are able to hold a successful election, that could undermine the Taliban's appeal.

On Friday, veteran Associated Press photographer Anja Niedringhaus was killed and AP reporter Kathy Gannon was wounded when an Afghan policeman opened fire while the two were sitting in their car in the city of Khost, in eastern Afghanistan. The two were at a security forces base, waiting to move in a convoy of election workers delivering ballots.

There do not appear to be major policy differences toward the West among the front-runners - Abdullah Abdullah, Karzai's top rival in the last election; Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, an academic and former World Bank official; and Zalmai Rassoul, a former foreign minister.

All have promised to sign a security agreement with the United States that will allow thousands of foreign troops to remain in the country to continue training security forces after 2014 - which Karzai has refused to do. The candidates differ on some issues such as the country's border dispute with Pakistan. But all preach against fraud and corruption and vow to improve security.

Women have played a more visible role in this election than in the past as concern is rising that women will lose much of the gains they have made after international forces withdraw, reducing the ability of the U.S. and other Western countries to pressure the government to work for equality.

Mohammad Daoud Sultanzai, one of the presidential candidates, cast his ballot at a high school with his wife at his side- a rare occurrence in a country where male and female voters are segregated and where men rarely appear in public with their wives.
"It is a big honor that I have participated in this process and I ask all Afghan mothers, sisters and daughters to participate in this political process and have an active role in the election," said his wife, Zohra.




Ahmad Yousuf Nouristani said there was a 58% turnout to vote, despite threats from the Taliban. Saeed Mohammad, a 29 year old mechanic, said, “I want to be a part of this revolution and I want to fulfill my duty by casting my vote so that we can bring change and show the world that we love democracy." “The Taliban have vowed to disrupt the balloting by targeting polling centers and election workers,” and have stepped up attacks in Kabul. Nouristani said 959 polling centers were closed due to fear of attacks.

Of all the leading candidates, the article says, “All have promised to sign a security agreement with the United States that will allow thousands of foreign troops to remain in the country to continue training security forces after 2014 - which Karzai has refused to do.” Citizens who are quoted in the article are supporting peace and security, and the high turnout is expected to show a decline of the Taliban's influence as the voters brave the threat of attacks.

Women have played a more visible role in this election, as concern rises for a possible loss of ground in women's rights after the Western forces leave the country. Mohammad Daoud Sultanzai, one of the candidates, had his wife by his side while both cast their ballots, an unusual sight as the lines for voters were segregated by sex, so if he wins the election perhaps women will have a better chance for improvements. His wife Zohra appealed to women to come out and participate in the election.

All the citizens who were quoted in this article sounded enthusiastic and hopeful, stating a desire for peace and stability, with both women and men exercising their right to vote. That, at any rate, doesn't sound like large numbers of people there are under the influence of the Taliban. Watching this scene through the eyes of the reporters reminded me of the long and excited line waiting in 2008 to vote in that election. When Obama won the election, there were large crowds who gathered in Times Square and other places, chanting his name. A rousing win in a major election is a thrilling experience to me. It proves that our country is still strong and the people are behind it.





Video shows meteorite narrowly missed skydiver
CBS News April 4, 2014

When a Norwegian man jumped out of a plane during a skydiving trip in 2012, he wasn't expecting a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see a meteorite up close -- really close.

Anders Helstrup narrowly avoided getting hit by the meteor, which zipped by just a few feet away. In the process, he became the first person ever to capture video footage of a meteorite traveling through the air after its flame has gone out.
According to an interview with NRK.no., the Norwegian public broadcasting company, Helstrup had been wearing a wingsuit and a helmet with two cameras attached. When he deployed his parachute, he realized that something was happening.

"I got the feeling that there was something, but I didn't register what was happening," he told NRK.no.

"When we stopped the film, we could clearly see something that looked like a stone. At first it crossed my mind that it had been packed into a parachute, but it's simply too big for that," Helstrup explained in the interview.

When he showed the video to the Natural History Museum in Oslo, they agreed with his assumption -- it must have been a meteorite. Experts say that the meteorite may have been part of a larger one that may have exploded above Helstrup.

"It can't be anything else. The shape is typical of meteorites -- a fresh fracture surface on one side, while the other side is rounded," geologist Hans Amundsen told the Norwegian news organization.

"It has never happened before that a meteorite has been filmed during dark flight; this is the first time in world history," he added.

Helstrup spent the rest of the summer searching the surrounding forests for the meteorite. The museum helped with calculating and triangulating a search area, but so far it has not been found.

The search for the meteorite has been deterred by the surrounding area containing thick forests, scrub and marshes. But, they are hopeful that with help, they'll find it. They have set up a website to tell others the story, while showing the video as well as still images.

When asked about the probability of filming a meteorite while skydiving, Amundsen could not give a definite answer. "It's certainly much less likely than winning the lottery three times in a row," he said.




I had to clip this story. It's just too fantastic a video – which was shown on CBS news a night or two ago – not to mention. It looks like an ordinary rock falling down from the sky, and it just missed the jumper. He doesn't seem daunted by the happening, but merely enthralled, and has been searching the ground for the meteorite. I hope he finds it. That probably was the thrill of a lifetime.




Common Core Turns Business Leaders Against Oklahoma GOP – NPR
by Claudio Sanchez
April 04, 2014

Mike Neal gets annoyed when he talks about politicians in his state. Just three years ago, when the Common Core State Standards for education were implemented, no one had a problem with them, says Neal, president of the Tulsa, Okla., Regional Chamber of Commerce.

"It's been a really frustrating situation to the business community in Oklahoma in that we've all been on the same page, from the governor, the House, the Senate, school board members," Neal says. "They've all been behind this."
Now, things are different.

"You've got a lot of people just running scared," Neal says.
That's because they're running for re-election, he explains. This spring, Republicans and Democrats have been bombarded by opponents of the standards and told, "if you support Common Core, we're going to beat you, and we'll beat you over this one single issue."

The threat is real. What's not real, Neal says, are the arguments being used to threaten legislators — namely, that it's a federal scheme to tell teachers what to teach, that private groups will mine and profit from test results, and that Common Core will take local control of schools away from Oklahomans. Neal says that's not true.

"Despite what some fringe groups may say, we don't think it takes [local control] away at all," he says.

Jenni White is founder of ROPE, which stands for Restore Oklahoma Public Education, a fervent opponent of the standards.

"This is about people who are concerned about the direction of education in Oklahoma and across the nation today," White says.

White is also a lifetime Republican, a mother of five and a former science teacher. She says ROPE has not threatened elected officials, but it has shown them why the adoption of the new standards was a mistake.

"You're talking about a set of standards that was created completely outside of the state, in which taxpayers had no voice," White says. "So parents have risen up and said, 'Wait a minute. We need to feel like we have some control over the education of our children.' And that has frustrated the Chamber of Commerce, who, really, isn't for parents. They're for businesses."

That argument persuaded Oklahoma state Rep. Jason Nelson to co-author a repeal of Common Core.

"What the bill does is to say that the state cannot cede its discretion or control over our standards or assessments," Nelson says.

But Mike Neal of the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce says a repeal would be a costly step backward.

"We, in this state right now, waste outrageous amounts of money on remediation for students that come out of high school with good grades but they're not ready for higher education," Neal says. "They're not ready to be hired by businesses. ... They're not going to be able to compete."

Neal worries that later this month Oklahoma is likely to become the second state, along with Indiana, to dump the core standards. What happens after that?
"I think that's an excellent question, and it's something that we would like to know the answer to as well," White says.

She says that assuming lawmakers vote to drop the standards, schools will return to the old state standards, which even she concedes weren't great. But still: "We would really prefer to go back to those while we're preparing a really great set of standards," White says.

That, business leaders say, will take schools back to square one, with no guarantees that Oklahoma will end up with standards as good as Common Core.




Jenni White of ROPE complains that the Common Core standards were “created completely outside the state,” and fears the lack of local control in that. Mike Neal of the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce argues that without the Common Core standard the high school is graduating students who not only can't keep up in an institution of higher learning, they can't do well enough to work at a job, either – that even though the students had good grades in their high school courses.

The Republican Party is behind the bill to drop Common Core. I would like to see what aspects of Common Core is considered to be so harmful. I wonder if it is something like public objection to the teaching of evolution in the high schools, or the history of the twentieth century advancements of race relations? I am glad to see that business leaders are stepping forward to debate the issue, because many people in the last fifteen years or so have complained about the lack of education that is being seen in too many cases among graduates.

A poll was conducted within the last two months which showed that a shockingly high proportion of American adults thought that the world is flat (no joke!) and that the sun revolves around the earth. See the following NPR article on that poll. This poll was done by none other than the National Science Foundation. While we are educating people in this country, we should mandate that adults be educated too. It is also of doubtful value for those same parents to be weighing in so heavily on what is taught in the schools if they themselves are frighteningly ignorant.

One sentence in the following article about the NSF poll stands out particularly: “Americans fared better on several of the questions than similar, but older surveys of their Chinese and European counterparts.” Both China and people in the EU were better than the US on the question of evolution. I heard another poll which stated that only 43% of Republicans believe in evolution. Interestingly, that number has changed from 54% just four years ago. That probably means that more white Evangelical Christians have joined the party in that time. 67% of Democrats and 65% of Independents say they believe in evolution. This comes from a CBS article by Lindsey Boerma of December 30, 2013. Boerma's article blamed this change among Republicans on the increased influence of the Tea Party on the ideologies of the Grand Old Party. Maybe it's not so grand anymore.





1 In 4 Americans Thinks The Sun Goes Around The Earth, Survey Says – NPR
by Scott Neuman
February 14, 2014

A quarter of Americans surveyed could not correctly answer that the Earth revolves around the sun and not the other way around, according to a report out Friday from the National Science Foundation.

The survey of 2,200 people in the United States was conducted by the NSF in 2012 and released on Friday at an annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Chicago.

To the question "Does the Earth go around the Sun, or does the Sun go around the Earth," 26 percent of those surveyed answered incorrectly.

In the same survey, just 39 percent answered correctly (true) that "The universe began with a huge explosion" and only 48 percent said "Human beings, as we know them today, developed from earlier species of animals."

Just over half understood that antibiotics are not effective against viruses.
As alarming as some of those deficits in science knowledge might appear, Americans fared better on several of the questions than similar, but older surveys of their Chinese and European counterparts.

Only 66 percent of people in a 2005 European Union poll answered the basic astronomy answer correctly. However, both China and the EU fared significantly better (66 percent and 70 percent, respectively) on the question about human evolution.

In a survey compiled by the National Opinion Research Center from various sources, Americans seemed to generally support science research and expressed the greatest interest in new medical discoveries and local school issues related to science. They were least interested in space exploration, agricultural developments and international and foreign policy issues related to science.