The gathering storm in the Middle East is gaining momentum. War clouds are on the horizon and, as with conditions prior to World War I, all it takes for explosive action to commence is a trigger.
Turkey’s provocative flotilla—often described in Orwellian terms as a humanitarian mission—has set in motion a flurry of diplomatic activity, but if the Iranians send escort vessels for the next round of Turkish ships, it could present a casus belli.
It is also instructive that Syria is playing a dangerous game with both missile deployment and rearming Hezbollah. According to most public accounts, Hezbollah is sitting on 40,000 long-, medium- and short-range missiles and Syrian territory has served as a conduit for military material from Iran since the end of the 2006 Lebanon War.
BP chief's weekend sailing trip stokes anger at oil company
Pictures of Tony Hayward yachting at the Isle of Wight billed as a PR nightmare and insulting to those affected by oil slick
Crew aboard the yacht belonging to BP chief executive Tony Hayward at the Isle of Wight. Photograph: Chris Ison/PA
Images of the beleaguered BP chief executive, Tony Hayward, attending a yacht race on the Isle of Wight, just 48 hours after a hostile interrogation by a US congressional committee on the Gulf Coast oil spill, have provoked sharp criticism on both sides of the Atlantic.
President Barack Obama's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, condemned Hayward's attendance at the event as "part of a long line of PR gaffes and mistakes" on ABC television, adding: "I think that we can all conclude that Tony Hayward is not going to have a second career in PR consulting".
NEW MILFORD -- On Monday, farmer Dean Schultz finished planting corn seeds that will eventually grow and be landscaped into a haunted corn maze.
Since it opened in 2000, the Larson's Farm Market corn maze has become a local tradition.
The corn maze may also be an integral part of saving Schultz's livelihood. He is hoping he can use agritourism, or bringing visitors to the farm, to sustain the business originally started by his grandfather.
Schultz sells sweet corn to a local farmers market and is getting ready to open his own produce stand in a couple of weeks, but his main focus is expanding the agritourism part of the business.
He plans to have two mazes next year and perhaps start a garden where people can pick their own produce.
Schultz tried to start a community supported agriculture program, commonly referred to as a CSA, at the beginning of the season to bring in income. In a CSA, community members buy shares of the crops before the season starts. In return, they are given part of the yield every week during the growing season.
Initial interest was strong, Schultz said. More than 300 people inquired about joining.
"But when it came time to sign on the dotted line, we didn't get enough of a response," Schultz said. Only 40 people made a commitment, so Schultz has had to scrap the CSA idea for now.
"I don't see how anyone could survive on crop sales alone," said Stephen Paproski, who owns the 100-acre Castle Hill Farm in Newtown. "A third of our income comes from agritourism."
Agritourism has been growing for the last 10 years and has become more popular in the past five years, said Jane Eckert, the president of St. Louis-based Eckert Agrimarketing.
Agritourism can include all types of activities, from pick-your-own crops to hunting, Eckert said.
"When people step into our personal properties, they're willing to pay for the experience," Eckert said. "There is a growing category of people who have their weddings or large group picnics on farms. Farms have large spaces that can accommodate large numbers of people."
Castle Hill Farm has a maze, a hay ride, a pumpkin patch and bonfires in the fall. Paproski is a third-generation farmer, but the first who has had to turn to agritourism to survive.
Schultz is also a third-generation farmer. His grandfather owned Larson's Farm, where New Milford High School was built. Schultz now leases land because it is too expensive to buy. He used to farm the cornfields on Junction Road in Brookfield, until that property was sold to the Steiner family for development.
He is hesitant to invest too much money in his current farm, out of fear it will be sold as well.
"This is my last shot, but if this piece goes I'm done for sure," Schultz said.
Contact Vinti Singh at vsingh@newstimes.com or 203-731-3331.
Check out some cool maze art by Yonatan Frimer
Maze of Monkey Illusion - 2009 Optical illusion maze caused by conflicting horizontal and vertical lines.
John Lennon Psychedelic Maze Portrait Imagine All The Mazes
NEW YORK, June 17 (Reuters) - Around the turn of every year, bankers can think of only one thing: the size of their bonuses.
Even beyond bonus season, they run different scenarios and assumptions, trying to calculate their number.
This distracts them so much that the bigger the bonus at stake, the worse the performance, according to behavioral economist Dan Ariely, who lays out his theory in his new book "The Upside of Irrationality" (HarperCollins, $27.99).
"For a long time we trained bankers to think they are the masters of the universe, have unique skills and deserve to be paid these amounts," said Ariely, who also wrote the New York Times bestseller "Predictably Irrational."
"It is going to be hard to convince them that they don't really have unique skills and that the amount they've been paid for the past years is too much."
Ariely's findings come as regulators try to rein in Wall Street's bonus culture after the 2008 financial collapse. The financial industry argues it needs to pay large bonuses to attract and motivate its top employees.
In an experiment in India, Ariely measured the impact of different bonuses on how participants did in a number of tasks that required creativity, concentration and problem-solving.
One of the tasks was Labyrinth, where the participants had to move a small steel ball through a maze avoiding holes. Ariely describes a man he identified as Anoopum, who stood to win the biggest bonus, staring at the steel ball as if it were prey.
"This is very, very important," Anoopum mumbled to himself. "I must succeed." But under the gun, Anoopum's hands trembled uncontrollably, and he failed time after time.
A large bonus was equal to five months of their regular pay, a medium-sized bonus was equivalent to about two weeks pay and a small bonus was a day's pay.
There was little difference in the performance of those receiving the small and medium-sized bonuses, while recipients of large bonuses performed worst.
SHOCK TREATMENT
More than a century ago, an experiment with rats in a maze rigged with electric shocks came to a similar conclusion. Every day, the rats had to learn how to navigate a new maze safely.
When the electric shocks were low, the rats had little incentive to avoid them. At medium intensity they learned their environment more quickly.
But when the shock intensity was very high, it seemed the rats could not focus on anything other than the fear of the shock.
This may provide lessons for regulators who want to change Wall Street's bonus culture, Ariely said. Paying no bonus or smaller bonuses could help fix skewed incentives without loss of talent.
"The reality is, a lot of places are able to attract great quality people without paying them what bankers are paid," Ariely said. "Do you think bankers are inherently smarter than other people? I don't." (Reporting by Kristina Cooke; Editing by Daniel Trotta)
You may print or publish these cartoon mazes at no cost.
Note:
Links to printable versions and the solutions are under each cartoon.
Please attribute to Yonatan Frimer at TeamOfMonkeys.com
Yonatan Frimer is available as a freelance cartoonist, for more info click here.
Maze Cartoon UN Bombing Iran with Sanctions By Yonatan Frimer Cartoon maze of a UN fighter jet dropping bombed marked "Sanctions" on Iran, while he has other with the name of known targets and the pilot says, "If these don't work, then we drop the real ones!" Created by Yonatan Frimer Click here for a printable, hi-res version of this maze Click here for the maze solution.
Cartoon Maze: Not the size of the boat... By Yonatan Frimer Maze cartoon of Bibi Netanyahu and PM Erdogan in the mens room, sizing each other up. Erdogan has a scronful look on his face and defends, "It's not the size of the boat, it's the motion of the ocean" Created by Yonatan Frimer Click here for a printable, hi-res version of this maze Click here for the maze solution.
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To contact the artist, Yonatan Frimer, please email yfrimer@yahoo.com
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I am appalled that Helen Thomas's comments on Israel prevent her from speaking at Walt Whitman High School's commencement ["Helen Thomas bows out of speech," Metro, June 7]. I am also disgusted that Ari Fleischer and Lanny Davis conducted a campaign to punish Ms. Thomas, no doubt as retribution for her outspoken questions when they served in earlier administrations. Freedom of speech, however, is lost to their petty maneuvering.
Most of us would not agree with Ms. Thomas's unfortunate and seemingly uninformed comments about where Jews might live in peace. But she has the right to say what she thinks, and listeners can decide whether she is foolish, biased and out of touch. Had she spoken at Whitman, perhaps she would have retracted, perhaps she would have lamented further . . . or maybe not.
Maze Cartoon for Editorial use on the Economy of Greece. A 747 marked "Economy of Greece" flys while chained to two bags of debt that are carried by the IMF and EU. Created by Yonatan Frimer
Maze Cartoon - Effects of Human Error on Stock Market
Maze cartoon editorial showcasing how stocks are effected by human error, buy having a bull represent stocks and a cowboy wrangling him to represent human error.
Cartoon maze of how the Tea Party started. By Yonatan Frimer
Cartoon maze editorial of a bunch of sheep in a field. One sheep stands up and exclaims, "I will no longer be a follower!" The rest of the flock yells, "Me too!" and the group in the front explaim "If this catches on, we got to get that fox on board."
Turkey's Erdogan bears responsibility in flotilla fiasco
WESTERN GOVERNMENTS have been right to be concerned about Israel's poor judgment and botched execution in the raid against the Free Gaza flotilla. But they ought to be at least as worried about the Turkish government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which since Monday has shown a sympathy toward Islamic militants and a penchant for grotesque demagoguery toward Israel that ought to be unacceptable for a member of NATO.
On the opposite page today, Turkey's ambassador to the United States makes the argument that Israel had no cause to clash with the "European lawmakers, journalists, business leaders and an 86-year-old Holocaust survivor" who were aboard the flotilla. But there...(read full article)
Cartoon Maze: Which Islam is the true one? By Yonatan Frimer Maze cartoon of a muslim preacher at the pulpit exclaiming "Islam is the only true religion." A voice from the crowd asks, "Shi'a or Sunni?" The speaker responds, "INFIDEL!!!" Created by Yonatan Frimer Click here for a printable, hi-res version of this maze Click here for the maze solution.
The division between Sunnis and Shi'a is the largest and oldest in the history of Islam.
The division between Sunnis and Shi'as is the largest and oldest in the history of Islam.
They both agree on the fundamentals of Islam and share the same Holy Book (The Qur'an), but there are differences mostly derived from their different historical experiences, political and social developments, as well as ethnic composition.
Turkey likens Israeli raid on aid ship to 9/11 attacks
By Sheldon Alberts, Washington Correspondent, Canwest News Service
WASHINGTON — Turkey's foreign minister on Tuesday likened Israel's deadly raid on a Gaza-bound aid ship to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, demanded U.S. solidarity and harshly criticized the Obama administration for not issuing a "clear condemnation" of the assault.
Denial of the Armenian Genocide From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Denial of the Armenian Genocide is the assertion that the Armenian Genocide did not occur in the manner or to the extent described by scholarship. The Armenian Genocide is widely acknowledged by genocide scholars to have been one of the first modern, systematic genocides,as many Western sources point to the sheer scale of the death toll as evidence for a systematic, organized plan to eliminate the Armenians.
