Atheist Books Distributed In Florida Schools?

Posted by Phil Ferguson on January 16th, 2013 ? 1 Comment ? Posted in Uncategorized

Press release from American Atheists!

American Atheists again asks for equal rights.? If christians can place their book in public schools, so can we!

ATHEISTS CALLS OUT FLORIDA SCHOOL LEADERSHIP FOR SHOWING RELIGIOUS FAVORITISM

Cranford, NJ-Orange County, Florida school leaders have given approval for members of World Changers of Florida to distribute Bibles by placing them on tables near student lunchrooms on Wednesday, January 16, 2013.

David Silverman, President of American Atheists said, ?Orange County is showing favoritism by allowing the distribution of Bibles in the county high schools. This is an issue of preserving the rights of all students, regardless of their beliefs. ?Silverman continues, ?We will be moving forward to distribute books written by Madalyn Murray O?Hair on atheism in the same manner. Our request will be presented to the school board asking for a specific date when we can place our books in the schools. We expect equal treatment for us; as well as any and all other religions that want to distribute their literature in the same manner.?

This type of passive distribution isn?t a new occurrence in the Orange County Schools. According to the group?s web site, the distribution is an annual practice. An article on the website states, ?We are excited to again be able to distribute Bibles in Collier and Orange county high schools. ?We have given out thousands of Bibles over the last few years and we are working to expand the program to many other school districts.? (Emphasis American Atheists)

The ideal situation is that no outside organizations are allowed to place their material in the public school.? However, if the school does want to allow outside groups place materials in the school then they must allow all outside groups to place material in the schools.? I suggest that all religions be allowed to distribute their books.? Give the kids the information and let them decide.? Just like the creationists say!

Source: http://www.skepticmoney.com/atheist-books-distributed-in-florida-schools/

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News: Amazon Fires Shot at Apple & iTunes with iOS-Targeted MP3 Store

11:53 AM EST, Jan. 17th, 2013 ? Jim Tanous ? News

Shortly after launching its Auto Rip MP3 service, Amazon has taken another shot at Apple by revamping its browser-based music store to improve the browsing and purchasing experience on the iPhone and iPod touch. Customers using the mobile Safari browser on these devices can now easily access and purchase digital music from Amazon and completely circumvent Apple?s iTunes ecosystem.

The Amazon MP3 store now offers a number of advantages over iTunes: prices are often lower, with far more songs priced at $0.69 and many deals for albums under $5 each. The songs are also natively in MP3 format, compatible with iTunes and iDevices and hundreds of other third-party audio players and software applications.

Amazon?s decision to target iOS users via a browser-based store is due to the way Apple structures payments from within iOS apps. Just like app purchases, Apple requires that it receive 30 percent of all revenue generated by in-app purchases, including one-time transactions and subscriptions. As a result, many companies, including Amazon, route their customers to an external website to avoid Apple?s control and authority.

Due to the way Amazon has implemented its cloud-based music service, however, customers who purchase music via the company?s Web store will instantly have access to the content from within the Cloud Player app, without any additional steps.

As mentioned above, the new design is only available on the iPhone and iPod touch. iPad users will still see the standard full-sized web interface that has powered the store since its launch over five years ago.

Although not a native app, our early impressions of Amazon?s MP3 Store on iOS devices is positive. Responsiveness is good and the layout is well-designed for touch input. While many may still prefer to stick with Apple?s ecosystem, those looking for an alternative will likely be pleased by Amazon?s latest move.

Source: http://feeds.macobserver.com/click.phdo?i=b062d98f14367587696b59a95c47d2a3

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Program expands access to Virginia Western Community College - www.roanoke.com

Virginia Western Community College's tuition-assistance program is expanding, making higher education more affordable for more students in the Roanoke Valley.

For the first time, the school's Community College Access Plan will be open to high school graduates from its single largest source of students ? Roanoke County ? as well as those from Botetourt and Craig counties.

And Virginia Western Community College President Robert Sandel has a message for aspiring students: "No excuses. The money is not a barrier."

The program, known as CCAP, is a public-private partnership providing free tuition to current high school students who meet certain requirements. For the first time since its inception five years ago it will be available to students in all localities the community college serves.

Sandel wants local students, all local students, to know if they stay in high school they can make it to the next step: higher education.

"Our region is talking. We're not leaving anyone out," he said. "Everyone gets the same opportunity."

Pilot programs in the three localities will begin in the 2013-14 school year. Officials estimate the expansion will serve about 125 students in Roanoke County, 25 students in Botetourt County and 15 students in Craig County.

CCAP started in Salem with a pilot in 2008 with 64 students and later expanded with pilot programs in Roanoke in 2009 and Franklin County in 2011. Currently, the program has 176 students.

Sandel said he's pleasantly surprised the program was able to grow during the past five years even in such difficult economic times. He said it has been a true community partnership with government and industry.

The Virginia Western Educational Foundation funds CCAP through support from governments, businesses, foundations and individuals. The foundation and localities share the cost for the program.

For instance in Roanoke County, the foundation and the county government will fund the program; the same is true of Craig County; and in Botetourt the foundation and the Botetourt Education Foundation will partner. The cost in Roanoke, Botetourt and Craig counties is $250,000, $50,000 and $14,000 respectively.

Roanoke County Schools Superintendent Lorraine Lange said she's grateful for the support from Virginia Western and the Roanoke County Board of Supervisors, which provided the funding.

"I think a lot of parents who thought their children could never go to college" can see now that they might be able to, she said.

Lange said officials think the program will be successful and expect to expand it as the economy improves.

"Our entire school system is changing. We have a lot of people, especially during the recession, that would not necessarily have enough money for a four-year college," she said.

Sandel said students who attend the college can get the specialized education they need to enter the work force or the education they need to enter a four-year college.

"Money shouldn't be a barrier for any young person to go to college in the Roanoke Valley," he said.

Sandel said students whose families fall within the top 25percent of income usually don't have difficulty affording college, and students whose families fall in the bottom 25percent typically receive aid. But those in the middle, who can't afford college and don't qualify for aid, have trouble, he said.

Said Angela Falconetti, Virginia Western's institutional advancement vice president: "We pick up tuition where financial aid does not."

Falconetti said officials take pride in being able to serve the entire region.

"It's a momentous time," she said.

Source: http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/319082

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Enlightened, Season 2

As Amy?s manic effort to bring down Abaddon kicked in during Enlightened?s season premiere, so did Tyler?s reluctance to get drawn deeper into her game. Amy?s perennial sidekick?even after she rebuffed his fumbling advances?Tyler often seems even more hapless than our ostensible heroine. Amy tries to plunder more private emails of Abaddon?s higher-ups, but he balks, as only Tyler can: ?My aunt died and I just found out I got her timeshare, so I?m going to go to the Bahamas for two weeks a year!?

Tyler?s objections are at once pathetic and hilarious, as so much in Enlightened is. But when he finds out that he will lose his job whether or not he helps Amy, he allows himself to be drawn back into her grandiose, self-centered scheme, apparently because he detects a loneliness in Amy that mirrors his own. ?I don?t know anything else,? he tells her when she asks if he wants to stop feeling invisible. When Amy suggests that Tyler could become Time?s Person of the Year, he shares an eye roll with us, but his lingering stare also betrays a sense of longing that clearly gets his wheels turning.

If there is any real hero in Enlightened, Tyler has to be it. Amy?s enthusiasm for crushing Abaddon arises from a self-professed sense of ?obligation? that?s clearly her own need for self-renewal. She fits the self-righteous profile we often associate with whistleblowers, but Tyler is a complicated figure that may have more in common with whistleblowers in reality: He?s so used to being marginal that the alternative no longer seems appealing to him. He?s exactly the sort of broken-down drone Amy hopes to liberate, a fact that escapes them both. Not only does Tyler supply the means to bring down Abaddon (even with the password, Amy can?t figure out how to print the files), he also seems to embody the soul of the effort?and, crucially, provide an abiding reason they deserve to succeed.

Series co-creator Mike White cast himself in the role almost as an act of pity; he spares other actors the grim duty of playing a guy so broken that he accepts regular humiliation because his employee card helped get him a gym membership. White?a gaunt, pallid writer who occasionally acts?tends to write roles for himself that involve peripheral characters with a detached, sometimes ominous edge (if you haven?t caught his most famous role, in Chuck & Buck, do so immediately). That persona couldn?t be further from the man himself, if his unlikely bid on reality TV with his dad is to be believed, and yet he plays on his naturally eerie screen presence to revealing effect. The performance is so insistently unshowy that it?s easy to overlook the quiet, dutiful compass Tyler has become?both for Amy and for us.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=be1ac9a4ea4e1f7511587e83dab3ec6c

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Cheesecake Factory pasta on list of caloric "food porn"

(Reuters) - A Cheesecake Factory pasta dish with more than 3,000 calories - or more than a day and a half of the recommended caloric intake for an average adult - is among the headliners on this year's Xtreme Eating list of the most unhealthy dishes at U.S. chain restaurants.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer-focused nonprofit group that promotes healthier eating, compiles an annual list of "food porn" to alert consumers to menu items with eye-popping levels of calories, saturated fat, sugar and/or sodium.

"You'd think that the size of their profits depended on their increasing the size of your pants," CSPI Executive Director Michael Jacobson said of the industry's Xtreme Eating winners. The list was released on Wednesday.

CSPI for years has used the "awards" to raise awareness and drum up support for calorie disclosure on restaurant menus - something that larger chains soon will be required to do under the U.S. health reform law.

The Cheesecake Factory's Bistro Shrimp Pasta, made with a butter and cream sauce and topped with battered, fried shrimp, has 3,120 calories and 89 grams of saturated fat and 1,090 milligrams of sodium, said CSPI, which said it confirmed nutritional data with companies on the list.

Cheesecake Factory said that dish has 3,020 calories, 79 grams of saturated fat and 1,076 milligrams of sodium.

Typical adults are advised to consume no more than 20 grams of saturated fat and 1,500 milligrams of sodium per day.

"It's like eating three orders of Olive Garden's Lasagna Classico plus an order of tiramisu for dinner," CSPI said. Some in the food and beverage industries have dubbed the Washington-based group the "food police."

More than one-third of Americans are obese, and about 10 percent of the nation's healthcare bill is tied to obesity-related diseases, such as Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and hypertension, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

The nation's food and beverage industries are under increasing pressure from consumer, health and parents' groups to offer more healthy alternatives.

Restaurant companies say it is their job to give consumers choices. Many, including Cheesecake Factory, have lower-calorie sections on their menus alongside the indulgent offerings.

Cheesecake Factory is known for its ample portions and wide array of cheesecakes - many of which weigh in at around 1,000 calories per slice.

It makes regular showings on the Xtreme Eating list, but since August 2011 has promoted its "SkinnyLicious" menu of entrees with 590 or fewer calories, including salmon rolls and a pear and endive salad.

Jayne Hurley, CSPI's senior nutritionist and an author of this year's Xtreme Eating report, said such lower-calorie items should be recategorized as "normal" rather than "diet."

"It's the steady stream of high-calorie foods that sabotage your diet not just for the day, but for the entire week," Hurley said.

"The Cheesecake Factory has always been about choices. Many of our guests come in and want to celebrate and not be concerned with calories," Donald Evans, the company's chief marketing officer, said in a statement.

Evans also said Cheesecake Factory diners often share their dishes or take home leftovers.

Other Xtreme Eating winners for 2013 include:

- Johnny Rockets' Bacon Cheddar Double Hamburger with 1,770 calories, 50 grams of saturated fat and 2,380 milligrams of sodium. For comparison, three Quarter Pounders with Cheese from McDonald's have 1,570 calories.

- Cheesecake Factory's Crispy Chicken Costoletta with 2,610 calories, 89 grams of saturated fat and 2,720 milligrams of sodium. CSPI said an entire 12-piece bucket of KFC Original Recipe fried chicken has about the same number of calories but less than half the saturated fat. Cheesecake Factory told Reuters that dish has 2,560 calories, 86 grams of saturated fat and 2,767 milligrams of sodium.

- Smoothie King's Peanut Power Plus Grape Smoothie, which includes peanut butter, banana, sugar and grape juice. A 40-ounce, large size of that drink has 1,460 calories and 22 teaspoons of added sugar plus 29 teaspoons of naturally occurring sugar.

The U.S. government's Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommends that women consume no more than six teaspoons of added sugars per day and that men consume no more than nine.

- Chocolate Zuccotto Cake from Maggiano's Little Italy. One slice weighs nearly one pound and has 1,820 calories, 62 grams of saturated fat and 26 teaspoons of added sugar - or 15 Hostess Ho Hos, CSPI said.

(Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles; editing by Ros Krasny, Bob Burgdorfer and Maureen Bavdek)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cheesecake-factory-pasta-list-caloric-food-porn-225517125--sector.html

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Course Change Preceded Oil Tanker-Bay Bridge Scrape

The bar pilot who steered an empty oil tanker into the Bay Bridge on Jan. 7 took a last-second course change and did so in a tricky current, according to reports.

61-year old Guy Kleess was supposed to navigate the 752-foot Overseas Reymar through a bridge opening called "Charlie-Delta," according to the San Jose Mercury News. The openings in the bridge are named for the support towers, which carry an alphabetical designation.

There is still no answer as to why Kleess, at the last second, steered northwest in order to sail through a different opening. When he did so, the tanker clipped the bridge's E tower at 11:18 AM, according to reports.

A condition known as "maximum current" was also in effect thanks to a falling tide, the newspaper reported.

The risky maneuver has been likened to a last-second lane change before a toll plaza on icy roads, according to the newspaper.

Kleess was well-rested, having waited 39 hours in between sailing ships out of the bay, and has passed drug and alcohol screening, the newspaper reported.

A radar beacon owned by CalTrans on the bridge was not working at the time of the accident, according to the newspaper.

Visibility was also down to a quarter mile due to heavy fog.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/50472382/ns/local_news-san_francisco_bay_area_ca/

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Get Relief From Menopause Symptoms | Jackie's Women's Interest ...

Related eBooks

Whenever you?re feeling uncomfortableness from the menopause symptoms, there are a lot of therapies and home remedies that can help you. Fortunately, many women only feel mild symptoms and don?t need treatment to deal with their menopausal signs. However, this isn?t the case for the other women who experience moderate to severe symptoms and require some form of menopause treatment. Read this article to get the ways to relief your menopause symptoms.

Source:Get Relief From Menopause Symptoms

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The Reluctant Rancher (Billionaire Rancher) (BBW)"Luke Tanner and women didn't mix, plain and simple."

Luke Tanner learned early on that no one cared enough to look past his roughhewned appearance and sour attitude to discover what lay beneath the surface - other than his wallet. When Mary Carter hits him up for a loan, he makes her a proposition she can't refuse.

Mary fantasized about Luke Tanner since her first glimpse of the veritable mountain of a man. She knows there's more to Luke than his bank account. Though she tries to hide her feelings, a fire burns between them. Will it end in ashes - or forge a love that would last a lifetime.

EXCERPT:

?Who the hell are you and what are you doing on my land??

The shock of the deep male voice held Mary immobile for several seconds.

She turned slowly, facing the man she had come to see. But if the sound of his voice had shocked her, the sight of the man stunned her. Mary had seen Luke Tanner on several occasions but she had never been this up close and personal. A mountain of a man, she had to look up to see his face. A long way up. With genuine feminine appreciation she realized that Luke Tanner would stand at least six-foot-four in his stocking feet. His shoulders were broad and sturdy, their huge mass emphasized by the flannel-lined denim work jacket he wore. His large size made her, Mary Carter, feel small and dainty.

A patch of dark, curling hair peeked out from the neckline of his blue plaid western shirt and her stomach quivered at the tantalizing glimpse of his permanently sun-darkened chest. Her gaze fell, drinking in the sight of his strong, muscular legs. Whitewashed jeans clung lovingly to every male sinew. Even though his waist could never be called slim, it was in perfect proportion to his size. To Mary, he was a fine looking man.

With great reluctance, she tore her gaze away, taking in the rest of his sun-bronzed features ? his frowning forehead, his beard-roughened jaw, and his crooked nose. Immediately his eyes captured her attention. My goodness, she had never seen such incredible eyes. Green as the mountain grass after the first spring rain and surrounded by lashes a woman would die for.

Mary shivered, more in reaction to this potently virile male than from the cold seeping beneath her coat.

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Source: http://www.jackiesbazaar.com/womensinterests/plus-size/get-relief-from-menopause-symptoms

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