Syrian opposition chief to meet U.S., Russia, and UN

MUNICH (Reuters) - The leader of the Syrian opposition was expected to meet U.S., Russian and U.N. officials on Saturday at a Munich conference which may provide a rare chance to overcome differences on how to end Syria's civil war.

U.S. Vice-President Joe Biden, head of the Syrian National Coalition Moaz Alkhatib, U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov held a round of meetings - but apparently not all at the same table, as the opposition had hoped.

Biden lamented the lack of international agreement - between Washington and Moscow in particular - on how to resolve Syria's crisis. But he said nobody could doubt "the increasingly desperate plight of the Syrian people and the responsibility of the international community to address that plight".

Government forces and rebels clashed again in several areas of Syria including around Damascus but there were no reports of casualties, according to activists and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Biden stressed the need to make the Syrian opposition "more inclusive and cohesive", as dramatized by a challenge on Friday to Alkhatib's authority after he broke ranks to say he would be willing to meet Syrian officials to discuss a transition if political prisoners arrested in the revolt were freed.

The Syrian opposition had raised hopes that there could be three-way or four-way meetings at the Munich Security Conference with the United States, Russia and United Nations on Saturday, but U.N. and Russian officials rushed to play this down.

"Media reports of a meeting in Munich in the format of Lavrov-Biden-Brahimi and Syrian opposition representative Alkhatib do not correspond with reality," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov said.

Russia's Interfax news agency cited a Russian source as saying that Lavrov would meet Alkhatib.

Syrian National Coalition politburo member Sadereddine al Bayanouni from the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, who was part of the Syrian opposition delegation in Munich, told Reuters he would also attend the meeting with Biden.

"We will explain our views to them and see," he said.

Syrian opposition figure Hassan Bali, in Munich as an independent observer, called the meeting with Biden "a big signal from the Americans" that they were upgrading support for the rebels. But there was no immediate word from the U.S. delegation on whether that was the case.

"TYRANT" MUST GO

Brahimi told the conference in the southern German city he was pessimistic about the chances of a quick solution.

"I am much more conscious of the difficulties, of the country being broken down day after day, than I am of a solution," he said, speaking at a panel alongside Alkhatib.

Neither the Syrian people nor the countries of the region were able to find a way to end the conflict, Brahimi said, meaning it was up to "the wider international world" and U.N. Security Council members to overcome their divisions on Syria.

"You are the last appeal," he told the conference.

"Please do your job."

One high-level member of the Syrian opposition coalition told Reuters that Russia may be softening towards a meeting with Alkhatib after he said he was willing to hold talks with the government of President Bashar al-Assad.

A Russian diplomatic source did not rule out a meeting taking place "spontaneously" at the weekend Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe.

If this occurred, it would be the first time the United States and Russia, at loggerheads over whether Assad can have a role in a transitional government, had sat down together with the opposition.

Hassan Bali said such hints at progress might be due to Alkhatib "showing flexibility" regarding Assad and his regime.

But there was no sign at the Munich conference that the U.S. and Russian positions on Assad were getting any closer.

"The persistence of those who say that priority number one is the removal of Assad is the single biggest reason for the continuing tragedy in Syria," said Lavrov.

Biden said the White House was "convinced that President Assad, a tyrant hell-bent on clinging to power, is no longer fit to lead Syrian people and he must go".

Russia, Syria's main arms supplier, has blocked three U.N. Security Council resolutions on the 22-month-old Syrian conflict, which has killed more than 60,000 people.

Lavrov told the Munich conference he believed the biggest threat in Syria was "the possibility that the rebels get hold of the chemical weapons" which he said Assad's government controls.

(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny in Beirut and Myra MacDonald and Alexandra Hudson in Munich; writing by Stephen Brown; editing by Andrew Roche)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/syrian-opposition-chief-meet-u-russia-u-n-105218521.html

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Hong Kong aims at smugglers in bid to stop run on baby formula milk

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong introduced measures on Friday to tackle a shortage of baby milk formula as food-safety-conscious mainland Chinese people flock to the city to stock up on supplies ahead of a Lunar New Year holiday.

The Hong Kong government cut the luggage allowance on trains that connect the city to the mainland to 23 kg (50 lb) from 32 kg (70 lb) and limited the number of cans of milk powder a person can take back into the mainland to two per visit.

It said it would also set up a hot line from Friday evening allowing Hong Kong mothers to place orders for seven brands of infant formula and ensure that orders placed by this weekend are delivered by the new year holiday, which starts on February 10 and runs for a week in China, when most shops are closed.

A series of scandals involving food produced in China, including milk, has sapped the confidence of many mainland consumers, who have flocked to Hong Kong to shop, angering residents of the wealthy city who say the problem has led to shortages and pushed up prices.

"The scandals here definitely have had an effect," said Kevin Der Arslanian, a business analyst at China Market Research Group in Shanghai. "People don't trust necessarily that the product they buy is real or the quality is good."

High import taxes in China have also created a thriving grey market for traders who buy products tax-free in Hong Kong and take them on crowded trains across the border on trolleys, in suitcases or stuffed in their jackets, to resell for a profit.

Hong Kong was guaranteed a degree of autonomy when it returned to China under a deal that ended British rule in 1997. The baby-milk shortage is the latest in a string of issues that have troubled ties between the capitalist city and communist mainland.

Hong Kong people are so frustrated over the baby milk they have turned to U.S. President Barack Obama for help, launching a petition on a White House web site saying babies in the financial center faced malnutrition and their government is failing to solve the problem.

As of Friday evening, the petition had attracted 13,422 signatures since it was launched on Tuesday. It needs to secure 100,000 by February 28 to draw a response from the U.S. government.

Demand for Hong Kong's high quality and regulated infant formula brands shot up in 2008 when a melamine milk powder scandal made nearly 300,000 mainland Chinese children sick.

Cans of infant formula Frisolac Gold 1 were on sale for HK$260 ($33.52) at a pharmacy in Hong Kong's Mongkok district on Friday. It sells for 261 yuan ($41.97) at 360buy.com, an online retailer in China.

Pharmacy owner Charles Mui said he tried not to promote smuggling: "I only sell milk powder to customers who really use the products to feed their babies."

Chinese visitors have also been snapping up milk powder products in Europe and Australia, while the former Portuguese territory of Macau, across the mouth of the Pearl River from Hong Kong, announced a plan on Monday to give city parents priority in buying baby formula.

Recent fears over the quality of chicken in China hit sales at mainland branches of McDonald's and Yum's KFC, and further undermined consumer confidence.

($1 = 7.7555 Hong Kong dollars) ($1 = 6.2188 Chinese yuan)

(Additional reporting by Venus Wu and Stefanie McIntyre; Editing by Anne Marie Roantree and Robert Birsel)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/hong-kong-aims-smugglers-bid-stop-run-baby-164544531.html

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Enlightened, Season 2

Enlightened took a merciful breather this week, heading to Hawaii to see how Levi is handling Open Air, the new-age rehab center where Amy?s new lifestyle was born. His outlook is predictably mixed. But the episode itself was the show at its devastating finest?funny, disturbing, weirdly inspiring, and willing to go on long tangents that end up not feeling like tangents at all. ?

And above all it was a heartfelt showcase for Luke Wilson, who has played Levi as both gentle and aggressively unstable, a product of years of lost dreams and drug abuse with no real desire to turn himself around. He?s an incredibly rich character, even more remarkable for the fact that, as an ostensible male lead, he appears only intermittently. Before Sunday, he hadn?t even been mentioned in the new season at all. ??

Creator Mike White excels at drawing subtle but robust performances from his large cast of actors, even as his 30-minute show?with an inherently time-consuming protagonist?makes them into bit parts. Wilson?s role is larger than that, but he adopts the same minimalist approach as his less-prominent co-stars. We learn about his character mostly through mood, wounded stares, and small gestures. (Levi doesn?t talk much.) White gives Wilson room to breathe, and the result is a revelation, the last thing we would expect from him after a decade spent playing frat-pack man-children and doofus romantic leads. ?

It isn?t just Levi who gets his due, either. Enlightened?s familiar band of misfits trapped in the basement with Amy has moved beyond the types they first seemed meant to satirize. Timm Sharp?s Dougie, the brotacular boss who gets too touchy at bar nights and makes porn jokes in the office, has transformed into a bizarrely touching take on male ego. Sarah Burns made Krista the doe-eye corporate assistant into a surrogate for the audience?s own fraught relationship with Amy. As the show goes on, the glancing but richly textured performances stack up. ?Higher Power? even finds room for two spirit-crushing guest spots for Christopher Abbott and Ashley Hinshaw, who play young addicts so vividly desperate they finally make Levi see the light. ?

With the exception of Diane Ladd, few of the supporting players are especially accomplished actors, most with backgrounds in improv and a handful of supporting credits. And yet they are almost uniformly superb because the series is so uniquely committed to studying everyone in Amy?s orbit. When the camera pans around Abaddon's basement to one broken-down face after another, it can seem too easy, but one by one, White zeroes in on each one of those sorry characters, unearthing human dimensions most series would have left buried.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=ad28ae3be688f10116a7fbbbce3bb2dd

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Building a Business Around Your Core Values

February 1, 2013 Posted by The BVB Team

It?s one thing to know your values as an entrepreneur.

It?s another to take the time to clearly define them, and make sure EVERYTHING you do in your business is aligned.

One of our cherished tribe members, Eyal, describes what this process did for his business?

BVB: What?s working for you these days Eyal?

Eyal: Recently, we went through a process to realign the company around who we truly are, and what we really believe in. So it?s really gone back to basics and being extremely authentic and genuine in how we operate in this world.

It?s this deep truth that we now speak in everything that we do. And we use in everything that we say. It?s making a huge difference.

One example is that we no longer accept clients who are not aligned with these values. We actually turn down clients that don?t fit what we do best and what we know we are.

BVB: How do you determine if a potential client is aligned?

Eyal: We went through a big transition, and we now know that we only want to help companies and entrepreneurs that are here to do something that is improving the world that we live in.

And that was not always the case. In the beginning, we pretty much took any client that came our way.

The difference now is that we are able to help the world through their work.

BVB: Why did you choose to become more selective about your client base?

Eyal: When I started waking up in the morning going to work, and not being super excited about what I am doing, I realized that I couldn?t continue in that way.

That?s literally what happened. It just didn?t feel right anymore. And it started brewing in me for months, and I said ?okay, this just can?t continue.?

So we stopped all of our marketing efforts in those old markets. We stopped using their language. We started using the language that now speaks to us and speaks to the clients we want to be connecting with.

We relaunched the company under a new name, a new brand, everything.

The team stayed the same, the products and services stayed the same, but the face and look and feel had to change to fit who we are now attracting.

BVB: Did the people in your company actually get together to work on recreating your values?

Eyal: We absolutely did that. It started with my looking at my computer and asking myself ?What are my personal core values? What?s extremely important to me?? And writing those down.

Then I took that to my team and that?s when we talked about that.

We don?t call them our core values, we call them our operating principles. Because we believe they need to be a lot more than just a placard on the wall. They need to be what we use to guide every single action that we take in our business.

BVB: Do you have a system in place to make sure that you are operating from those principles?

Eyal: What I do as a business leader is build our values into every single conversation that I have with the team. And I ask them to bring examples of when they used our values.

And here?s an example. We had a client who came to us and really wanted to work with us. They were willing to pay tens of? thousands of dollars to do so. And we were at a point where we really could have used the cash flow. Badly. It was a rough period in the business.

But it was super clear that this person wanted to use our knowledge and skills and apply them in a less than ethical manner, and I ended up saying, ?Look, Sir, I know what you are trying to accomplish, this is not a good fit.? And I turned him away.

The next day, one of my team members came to me and she said ?Do you know how proud I am to work at a place that actually does what they say they are going to do??

She was so proud and she knew what our financial situation was. That day felt really great and it was a reinforcement for how I choose to lead our business.

BVB: What are some results you have seen from this realignment?

Eyal: Over the last year our list size grew by 12 times.

About half of them are from people who do fit these new characteristics. About half are still from the old tribe, but half are from the new tribe.

Another very tangible thing is that every single member of the team now feels a very deep connection with our brand which means that they are eager to share about what we do. So they actually started bringing in new clients.

It?s not part of their job. But they?re so excited to talk about what we do.

Webinars that we do are working really well because only aligned people show up, so we are generating tens of thousands of dollars out of a single webinar.

BVB: Why do you think a value driven model is so increasingly crucial in today?s marketplace?

Eyal: At Spotlight Leadership when we work with leaders, when we train leaders, we talk with them about the art of connection. Anyone can manage, but not everyone can lead. The fundamentals of leadership come from a deep interpersonal connection.

That is exactly what clients crave as well. Deep connection with the people they invest in.

I think it works really well too because it keeps me and my entire team so excited to work with people.

BVB: What advice do you have for people who want to implement a more value driven system into their business?

Eyal: It starts with something really simple. Quiet time and a big flip chart, and some colorful pens.

Just standing in front of that, allowing myself to be creative, and answering the simple question ?When I wake up in the morning, what is really important to me??

And when I close my eyes at night, what is important to me?

That?s it. That?s what gave me all the answers that I needed.

One key element that is really important is that when I knew what was true, I had to make the decision to never look back. I believe in being very flexible in life, but it?s one thing I can no longer be flexible about. So I recommend to people being inflexible about what they tolerate in your life.

BVB: Thanks Eyal, this has been great?

What are your core values as an entrepreneur?

Share in the comments below!

ABOUT THE EXPERT, Eyan Ronen
Founder of Spotlight Leadership, Dr. Eyal Ronen is dedicating his professional life to increasing businessresults and workplace happiness for organizations that are improving the world that we live in. As a Ph.D. in Industrial-Organizational Psychology from the Illinois Institute of Technology, award-winning professor, and internationally recognized speaker, his knowledge of human behavior in the workplace is extraordinary in the fields of hiring, management consulting, and leadership coaching. When he isn?t bringing business results and happiness to the lives of leaders and their teams, he?s bringing happiness to his own life by playing with his two young children, chopping vegetables for his beautiful wife, making a mess in their New Jersey home, and finding peace of mind practicing yoga.

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Source: http://bigvisionbusiness.com/building-a-business-around-your-core-values/

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How Owls Spin Their Heads Without Tearing Arteries

How does a great gray owl do that? Now we know.

Martin Meissner/AP

How does a great gray owl do that? Now we know.

Martin Meissner/AP

The human neck is a delicate stem. Torque it a bit too much, and the carotid and vertebral arteries can rip, causing deadly strokes. People have torn their neck arteries riding roller coasters, doing yoga, going to the chiropractor, being rear-ended in the car ? even leaning back for a beauty-parlor shampoo.

But owls don't have that problem. They can turn their heads 270 degrees, more than twice what a human can safely handle, without any harm. "If a human being was to try to do the same thing, we would dissect our arteries," says Fabian de Kok Mercado.

He wanted to find out why.

Answering that question involved 12 frozen owls and a team of researchers at Johns Hopkins University, where de Kok-Mercado was a graduate student in the Department of Art as Applied to Medicine. Not only did they figure out the secrets of owls' success, de Kok-Mercado's drawings won a first place prize in the National Science Foundation's annual contest for visualizing science.

Click image to see full illustration.

Johns Hopkins/National Science Foundation

Click image to see full illustration.

Johns Hopkins/National Science Foundation

First, de Kok-Mercado had to round up some owls. Because they're a federally protected species, he worked through nature centers. They happened to have a stash of frozen owls that had been killed by collisions with cars and other traumas.

The Hopkins researchers thawed the owls, and injected radio-opaque dye into their vessels while moving their necks in a scanner to track the flow in real time. That's different than a typical necropsy, which can leave scientists guessing how vessels work in real life.

Owls have a few things going for them that humans don't, it turns out. Their neck arteries don't thread through every vertebra. And where the vessels do go through bone, the canal is much wider than it is in humans. Those two features make it less likely that bone will collide with delicate tissue and injure it.

But that doesn't solve another big problem ? having blood flow pinched off, starving the brain. What really surprised the scientists and illustrator is that owls seem to have taken care of, too.

The arteries at the base of the head widen out into reservoirs, unlike typical arteries that narrow the further they go from the heart. The reservoirs make for more blood flow, even if the arteries are pinched elsewhere. And a trigeminal artery connects the front and back of the brain. De Kok-Mercado says: "The blood is going to keep pumping."

In this case, an illustration is worth a lot more than a thousand words, so check out the prize-winning drawings. De Kok-Mercado is now working at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, where he's bringing other mysteries of science to light. "So much of the science is visual," he says.

And humans are left knowing that lacking that special owl anatomy, we'd be best off not sticking our necks out.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/01/31/170758750/how-owls-spin-their-heads-without-tearing-arteries?ft=1&f=1007

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Angelou celebrates black history with Oprah, Keys

WASHINGTON (AP) ? In the midst of talking black history with Grammy-winning singer Alicia Keys, Maya Angelou breaks out singing a hymn a cappella.

The acclaimed poet and author wants to show Keys, a New Yorker, what "lining out," call-and-response singing that is popular in black churches down South, sounds like.

That teaching moment is one of many during Angelou's third annual Black History Month program, "Telling Our Stories," airing on more than 175 public radio stations nationwide throughout February.

Angelou says she is obligated to share her knowledge and experience with younger people like Keys, in a way that is not "preaching" but gives context to the "human truth."

"We owe the truth, not just the facts," she said recently in a phone interview from her home in Winston-Salem, N.C. "I'm celebrating my 84th year on this planet. I've seen many things, I've learned many things. I've certainly been exposed to many things and I've learned something: I owe it to you, to tell you."

Angelou said she is sharing black history in "a way that you get it and don't even know you got it," with songs, poems, jokes and short stories woven throughout interviews with five guests, including Keys, media mogul Oprah Winfrey, singer and actress Jennifer Hudson, diplomat Kofi Annan and actress and playwright Regina Taylor.

Keys talks about growing up in New York's Hell's Kitchen and how the diverse city influenced her sound. The performer, who began studying European classical music at the age of 7, said her influences range from the greats like Ella Fitzgerald, John Coltrane and Nina Simone to chart-topping peers like rappers Nas and Jay-Z.

Winfrey chats with Angelou during the special about their close friendship spanning over two decades, starting the Oprah Winfrey Network and her return to acting in the Lee Daniel's film "The Butler."

"One of the wonderful things about Oprah: She teaches you to keep on stepping," Angelou said. "She had the most powerful and popular program for 25 years and she stepped down and took on a bigger task, starting OWN."

Angelou added, "She teaches the young people: Keep on going, continue and continue with some pizazz, some laughter and some style."

Angelou interviews Hudson, an Oscar and Grammy winner, about her journey from singing in her Chicago church choir to performing at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Norway last year; and Taylor, a Golden Globe-winning actress and playwright who was the first black woman to play Juliet in William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" on Broadway.

This year's special mostly focuses on women in media and entertainment, and heavily uses music to convey history.

"I think music is one of the hero/sheroes of the African-American existence," Angelou said, noting that black history has been preserved through music, via songs on slave ships to Negro hymns passed down in Baptist churches.

The single man spotlighted as a guest on the radio program is Annan, the former secretary-general of the United Nations and Nobel Peace Prize laureate. He talks about climbing the ranks in diplomacy and his mission of public service.

"Mr. Kofi Annan has behaved too fabulously as secretary-general of the United Nations and he's had more than one stint at the job and he has earned a Nobel," she said. "Sometimes we don't know about any African except Nelson Mandela and oft times, we don't know any Afro-American man."

Angelou jokes that next year she will feature all men for the annual special, with rapper Common already in mind.

"Or mostly men, because there are men of such quality ? African-American men ? such riches, such dignity and humor," she said. "They just run through my mind now."

Another man who brings Angelou great pride is Richard Blanco, the youngest, the first Hispanic and the first gay person to recite a poem at a presidential inauguration ? last month at President Barack Obama's second swearing-in. Angelou was the first black woman to recite a poem at an inauguration, President Bill Clinton's in 1993.

"He showed great courage," she said of Blanco, "and it's courage (that) is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently. So I was very pleased with that."

___

Online:

http://mayaangelouonpublicradio.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/angelou-celebrates-black-history-oprah-keys-083304228.html

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Using Personal Loans Responsibly | Money Infant

Many of the other personal finance bloggers deride personal loans as if they are one of the worst moves you could possibly make with your finances. In some ways they are right, but personally I don?t have quite the same level of disdain that others hold for personal loans. I think that in some instances they can actually make perfect sense.

The best example of a good use of personal loans is for those who are starting a new business. I frequently post about side hustles that you can start while still working a full time job, and while many of these are free to start, at some point you will need to make an investment in your side business if you want to grow. The problem with securing financing for a small business is that without a history of sales and profits you simply cannot get financing.

If you have a great idea you might be able to get startup financing from an angel investor or a venture capital firm, but this comes with a serious downside and for most small businesses should be avoided whenever possible. You see, when you go to venture capitalists and angel investors they want a stake in your business. Ultimately, if your business becomes wildly successful, you could be giving away tens of millions of dollars in value for a pittance.

Banks and credit unions are of no help for a small business startup as they typically want a minimum of 2 years of financial statements, proof of cash flow, and many other financial assurances. As a new business owner you have none of these.

Micro lenders are another source of capital for small businesses, however even these new breed of lenders are looking for a minimum of 1 year of financial success before approving any small business loans.

Even the Small Business Administration requires those seeking government assistance from them to use alternative financial resources, including personal assets, before seeking financial assistance.

In the absence of any friends of family who are willing to lend you the money you need to get your business off the ground and/or growing more rapidly your best source of capital will be through a personal loan.

Now, I don?t agree with people who take personal loans to finance vacations, new Jacuzzis, and other extravagant purchases. In the case of taking a personal loan to help grow or start a new business however you are using the money to create a cash generating asset. In this case I believe the risks associated with personal loans are acceptable considering the potential rewards.

If you are planning on going this route you should definitely do some planning before going out and securing a loan. Determine how much you need for your business, what you will be investing the loan funds in, and what the return on your investment will be realistically. Your return should be sufficient to pay back the personal loan in a reasonable amount of time.

When looking to start a new business you are pretty much on your own and your best option for financing your new startup is going to be a personal loan. You can get more attractive rates versus other personal credit accounts, you don?t put your home at risk as you would with a home equity loan, and you have the benefit of set repayment terms. If you can?t get your business off the ground without a small amount of financing (I would say no more than $25,000), then securing a personal loan might be your best move in the long term.

Source: http://www.moneyinfant.com/using-personal-loans-responsibly/

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