No terceiro dia de pânico no Rio, operação policial mata um e prende 11

Por Redação Yahoo! Brasil*

De acordo com a Polícia Militar, um homem morreu em confronto com a polícia e 11 suspeitos foram detidos nas operações policiais que já atingem 18 favelas no Rio e da Baixada Fluminense nesta terça-feira, 23. O suposto traficante foi morto na Favela da Mandela, na zona norte do Rio. Com ele, os agentes apreenderam uma pistola 45.

Foram apreendidas em várias incursões duas granadas e munições para diversos calibres. A polícia também anunciou a apreensão de 50 quilos de maconha e dois mil papelotes de cocaína até o início da tarde desta terça.

O tiroteio entre policiais e traficantes das favelas Merendiba e Vila Cruzeiro durou meia hora e assustou os moradores da Penha, na zona norte. Dois homens foram presos, entre eles um apontado como gerente do tráfico na Merendiba. Um fuzil 762 e drogas também foram apreendidos. Ninguém ficou ferido.

As operações ocorrem nas comunidades Mandela 1, 2 e 3, Varginha, Nova Holanda, Arará, Parque União, Jacarezinho, Cutia, Fallet e Fogueteiro, Encontro, Tuiuti, Barreira do Vasco, Vila Joaniza, Barbante e Vila Cruzeiro.

Na operação desta terça, o Comandante Geral, Coronel Mario Sérgio de Brito Duarte, ainda determinou a Operação Fecha Quartel. Ela conta com cerca de 1.200 policiais militares deslocados do serviço burocrático para o policiamento ostensivo, a fim de aumentar a presença policial nas ruas.

Outra medida adotada foi a criação do Centro de Inteligência montado no 22ºBPM (Maré) para monitoramento de todas as ações, sob a Coordenação da Secretaria de Segurança. E a partir de hoje, mais de 300 novas motos reforçam o patrulhamento da região metropolitana.

CHECK THE VIDEO: http://br.noticias.yahoo.com/s/23112010/48/manchetes-no-terceiro-dia-panico-no.html


Ajuda federal
O ministro da Justiça, Luiz Paulo Barreto, ofereceu ao governo do Rio de Janeiro o envio de efetivos da Polícia Federal (PF), da Força Nacional de Segurança Pública e da Polícia Rodoviária Federal (PRF) para ajudar o Estado a controlar a onda de assaltos e ataques incendiários a veículos promovida pelo crime organizado. "Somos parceiros do governo do Rio no projeto de pacificação das favelas pela via da segurança preventiva e, num momento como este, temos que estar ainda mais unidos", afirmou.

Policiais rodoviários federais já foram acionados para intensificar o patrulhamento nas rodovias, após um pedido feito pelo governador Sérgio Cabral ao Ministério da Justiça. De acordo com o governo do Rio, Cabral também conversou com o presidente Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva sobre o pedido de reforço.

Em Copacabana, onde acontece a convenção esportiva internacional Soccerex com empresários e dirigentes esportivos do mundo todo, a polícia prendeu durante a madrugada de segunda para terça-feira quatro homens acusados de tentar incendiar veículos em ruas do bairro.

O grupo, que contava com dois menores de idade, foi detido com artefatos incendiários caseiros que seriam colocadas sob veículos estacionados, de acordo com a polícia.

Quatro veículos foram incendiados desde a noite de segunda-feira na zona norte da capital, onde os ataques começaram na tarde de domingo também com carros queimados nas ruas.

"Esses ataques incendiários estão sendo orquestrados por uma facção criminosa", informou a Polícia Civil em nota nesta terça. Segundo a polícia, não houve vítimas ou feridos nos ataques contra veículos.

Represálias a UPPs
Uma cabine da Polícia Militar em Del Castilho, na zona norte da cidade, foi alvejada com cerca de 50 tiros, mas ninguém se feriu.

As autoridades de segurança do Estado consideram os ataques uma represália pela implantação das UPPs, as Unidades de Polícia Pacificadora, em favelas da capital fluminense que antes eram controladas pelo crime organizado.

Segundo fontes da Secretaria de Segurança, os suspeitos querem apavorar a população e causar uma sensação de insegurança na cidade, que será o palco principal da Copa do Mundo de 2014 e a sede dos Jogos Olímpicos de 2016.

Para o sociólogo Ignacio Cano, coordenador de diversos estudos sobre a violência no Rio de Janeiro, os ataques podem ter o objetivo de desestabilizar a segurança, mas não tem o mesmo impacto de ações criminosas do passado.
"Na queima de carros parece que realmente há uma intenção de criar um certo pânico, impactar a população, e pode haver uma intenção dos grupos de desestabilizar a situaçãoo da segurança pública", disse à Reuters o professor da Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro.
"Mas, apesar disso, nós já tivemos episódios muito mais graves, como ataques a ônibus, ataques a delegacias, e ordem para fechar o comércio, no final de 2006", afirmou, acrescentnado que dessa vez um grupo menor pode ser o autor dos ataques.
A implantação das UPPs em 15 das centenas de favelas espalhadas pela cidade é considerado o maior avanço na área de segurança pública do Rio de Janeiro nos últimos anos, e a medida foi inclusive citada pelo Comitê Olímpico Internacional como um exemplo de que a cidade será segura para a Olimpíada de 2016.
A Polícia informou que duas pessoas que estavam em um carro na Baixada Fluminense foram mortas a tiros, mas ainda não se sabe quais foram as causas do crime e se ele está relacionado à onda de ataques.
O mais grave dos ataques foi registrado no domingo, quando seis criminosos bloquearam um trecho da Linha Vermelha, onde assaltaram vários motoristas, queimaram dois veículos, roubaram um terceiro e, na fuga, atacaram a tiros uma caminhonete da Força Aérea que passava pelo local.

Com informações das Agências Estado, EFE e Reuters

Ancient Roman bath found in Jerusalem

2010-11-22 18:09


Israeli archaeologists preparing the ground for a new Jewish ritual bath in Jerusalem's Old City say they have made a coincidental discovery: an 1 800 year-old-swimming pool built by the same Roman legion that destroyed the ancient city's hallowed



Jerusalem - Israeli archaeologists have uncovered a 1 800-year-old bathing pool which proves that Aelia Capitolina, the Roman city built after the destruction of Jerusalem, was larger than thought, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) announced on Monday.

The bathing pool, used by the Roman Tenth Legion and dating from the second and third centuries AD, was found by workers during excavations carried out in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, the IAA said.

The excavations revealed several plastered bathtubs in the side of the pool, a pipe used to fill it with water, and a white industrial mosaic on the floor of the pool.

The bathhouse tiles, stamped with the symbols "LEG X FR" - Tenth Legion Fretensis - were found in place and the paw print of a dog which probably belonged to one of the soldiers was impressed on the symbol of the legion on one of the roof tiles.

"The mark of the soldiers of the Tenth Legion, in the form of the stamped impressions on the roof tiles and the in situ mud bricks, bears witness to the fact that they were the builders of the structure," said IAA Excavatiosn Director Ofer Sion.

"It seems that the bathhouse was used by these soldiers who were garrisoned there after suppressing the Bar Kokhba uprising in 135 AD, when the pagan city Aelia Capitolina was established," he said.

Considerably large city

"We know that the Tenth Legion's camp was situated within the limits of what is today the Old City, probably in the region of the Armenian Quarter.

"This assumption is reinforced by the discovery of the bathhouse in the nearby Jewish Quarter which shows that the multitude of soldiers was spread out and that they were also active outside the camp, in other parts of the Old City," he went on.

IAA Jerusalem District Archaeologist Yuval Baruch noted that the until the pool was found, excavations in the Jewish Quarter had uncovered nothing from the Tenth Legion, leading archaeologists to believe that Aelia Capitolina was small and limited in size.

"The new find, together with other discoveries of recent years, shows that the city was considerably larger than what we previously estimated," he said.

"Information about Aelia Capitolina is extremely valuable and can contribute greatly to research on Jerusalem because it was that city that determined the character and general appearance of ancient Jerusalem and as we know it today," he added.

- SAPA

Vatican: Pope Seeks Debate on Condoms, AIDS

Bendict's Remark That Condoms Justifiable in Limited Cases to Reduce HIV Infection Opens a Doctrinal Pandora's Box

(CBS/AP)  Pope Benedict XVI wanted to "kick-start a debate" when he said some condom use may be justified, Vatican insiders say, raising hopes and fears that the church may be starting to back away from its condom ban for its flock of 1 billion Catholics.

Benedict said in an interview that for some people, such as male prostitutes, using condoms could be assuming moral responsibility because the intent was to reduce infection. The pope did not suggest using condoms as birth control, which is banned by the church, or mention the use of condoms by female prostitutes.

Theologians have long been studying the possibility of condoning such limited condom use as a lesser evil. There were reports years ago that the Vatican was considering a document on the subject, but opposition to any change has apparently blocked publication.

One Vatican official said Monday he believes the pope just "decided to do it" and get a debate going.

For the deeply conservative Benedict, it seemed like a bold leap into modernity - and the worst nightmare of many at the Vatican. The pope's comments set off a firestorm among Catholics, politicians and health workers that is certain to reverberate for a long time despite frantic damage control at the Vatican.

In a sign of the tensions within the Vatican, the Holy See's chief spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, rushed out a statement to counter any impression that the church might lift its ban on artificial birth control. Lombardi stressed that the pope's comment neither "reforms or changes" church teaching.

"The reasoning of the pope cannot certainly be defined as a revolutionary turn," he said.

While much of the world hailed Benedict's statement, seeing it as a major step toward lifting the church ban, conservatives were mortified and insist the pontiff was not "justifying" condom use from a theological point of view.

True, Benedict made only a tiny opening, but he stepped where no pope has gone since Pope John Paul II's 1968 encyclical "Humane Vitae" that was supposed to have closed debate on church policy barring Catholics from using condoms and other artificial means of contraception.

The pope chose to make his statement not in an official document but in an interview with a German journalist, Peter Seewald, for the book "Light of the World: The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times." L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, first published excerpts of Benedict's comments on Saturday.

Luigi Accattoli, a veteran Vatican journalist who will be on the Vatican's panel when the book is presented Tuesday, said Benedict had taken a "long awaited" step that only the highest authority of the church could do.

In March 2009 Pope Benedict was criticized for a statement he made while traveling to Cameroon, where UNAIDS states 540,000 people were living with HIV/AIDS in 2007, 39,000 had died, and 300,000 children were orphaned by the disease.

In discussing with reporters the AIDS crisis, Benedict said, "You can't resolve it with the distribution of condoms. On the contrary, it increases the problem."

Since the pontiff's latest remarks were disseminated, health officials have expressed optimism.

This weekend UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibe said, "This is a significant and positive step forward taken by the Vatican today.

"This move recognizes that responsible sexual behavior and the use of condoms have important roles in HIV prevention."

Speaking in Berlin on Monday, the director-general of the World Health organization, Margaret Chan, welcomed the pope's position. "For the first time the use of condoms in special circumstances was endorsed by the Vatican, and this is good news and good beginning for us."

Jon O’Brien, president of the Washington-based Catholics for Choice, called the pope's comments "a marvelous victory for common sense and reason and a major step forward towards recognizing that condom use can play a vital role in reducing the future impact of the HIV pandemic."

Some Catholic believers expressed praise and wariness for the pope's comments, and greeted them as a sign that the church was stepping into the modern debate in the fight against AIDS.

Others cautioned it could open a doctrinal Pandora's box.

Ellen Reik, a 79-year-old retired housewife who attended Mass at Saint Michael Catholic Church in Worthington, Ohio, said if taken out of context, the pope's remarks could renew the debate over the morality of birth control - both as a contraceptive and a means to curb the spread of sexually transmitted diseases.

As she left Mass at St. Kieran Church in the Coconut Grove neighborhood of Miami, Lois Breaux rolled her eyes when asked about the Pope's statements.

"About time - and it wasn't enough," she said. "As a Catholic, they need to recognize this is an epidemic. The church needs to stand up and say what he did, but he should have gone further."

Jean Jasman, an 81-year-old state worker from Montpelier, Vt., called the stance a departure from church doctrine on condom use, "but it's to the betterment of humanity, if we can help prevent the spread of this horrendous disease."

Speaking shortly before Mass began at St. Mary of the Lake Roman Catholic Church in Lakewood, N.J., 42-year-old Jason Randall said he strongly supports the church's position that forbids the use of condoms and other contraceptives.

But he felt the pope's comments show that sometimes exceptions are needed for almost every rule.

"I know it's a cliche to put it this way, but if it helps prevent even one death or one person getting sick, it's worth it," Randall said. "I believe in a loving God, one who does not want people to suffer, whether they be saints or sinners."

"I think that the church needs to realize that sometimes you have to make adjustments with the times, and that saving people's lives and protecting life is ultimately the most important thing," said Josephine Zohny of Brooklyn, N.Y., after leaving Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York.

WATCH THE VIDEO: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/11/22/world/main7079115.shtml
Pope: In Some Cases, Condoms Can Be Morally Justified
In a new book, Pope Benedict said in some limited cases using condoms might be morally justified to prevent spreading diseases like HIV or AIDS. Elaine Quijano reports.

What managers can learn from Somali pirates

Which MBA?

Pirate copy

What managers can learn from Somali pirates

PURVEYORS of management-speak are fond of quoting cod insights from military strategists. According to David James, a professor at Henley Business School, they would do better studying the management styles of some of those the armed forces are fighting, such as Somali pirates. Alongside Paul Kearney, a lieutenant-colonel in the Royal Marines, Professor James has been studying the operations of the pirates, as well as insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq, to see if they have anything to teach legitimate firms.
The threat to life and liberty aside, Somali pirates’ business model is impressive. According to the professor, each raid costs the pirates around $30,000. On average one raid in three is successful. The reward for a triumphant venture, however, can be in the millions.
The organisation behind the pirates would be familiar to many ordinary businesses. For a start, they have a similar backend—including the kind of streamlined logistics and operations controls that would be the envy of most companies. Their success has even prompted one village to open a pirate “stock exchange”, where locals can buy shares in up to 70 maritime companies planning raids.
But Professor James believes that the most important lesson firms can learn is one of strategy. He teaches his MBA class that one reason for the pirates' success is that they avoid “symmetrical” conflict—challenging their targets head on by, for example, lining up against the Western navies patrolling the waters—battles they would surely lose. Instead, they use stealth and surprise, attacking targets at their weakest point. In this way, with only a dozen-or-so sailors, they wrest control of huge assets, in the form of oil tankers.
This is a lesson that serves smaller companies well as they look to take bites out of larger rivals. It might be foolish, for example, for a start-up to take on one of the traditional banks head-to-head—only another large bank could afford the pyrrhic battle that would ensue from it protecting its market. But by picking a small, localised fight a start-up can make an impression before a bank has had time to react. An example, says Professor James, is wonga.com. It has taken market share by attacking banks' inflexible lending policies by offering loans for the exact amount and length of time the customer wants. It processes the loans extremely quickly and customers can even get immediate approval using an iPhone app.
Sometimes such an asymmetrical strike can shift the centre of gravity in an industry. Nintendo, a computer-games firm, was competing, and failing, against two much better-resourced rivals—Sony and Microsoft—in a sector where it seemed the only way to be successful was to win an arms race of processing power and ever more sophisticated technology. Nintendo opened a new avenue of attack based on the idea that consumers would enjoy getting physically involved in video games, using a motion-sensitive controller to control the on-screen action. So, using relatively cheap technology, it invented the Wii, in the process opening up a whole new market for previous non-gamers.
That smaller, nimble competitors make stealth attacks on larger rivals is a well-known phenomenon. Nonetheless, the way that larger companies can defend themselves against attack is a matter of much debate. Professor James says that the key is to quicken decision making. In his analogy, by the time the captain of an oil tanker has spotted the pirates’ inflatables it is too late; big ships take a long time to turn around. Similarly, once a large business has gone through the traditional process of observing an attack, orientating itself, deciding what to do about it and then acting (what Colonel John Boyd, an American military strategist, called an OODA loop) it is too late, the competition is upon it.
To help companies understand the best way to speed up their reaction times, the professor turned to another unpalatable source: insurgents in Afghanistan. Despite stressing that he believes the outcomes of their strategies to be repugnant, he nonetheless says that he admires the management structures that makes them successful.
One of the main lessons he learned, and which he teaches companies on his executive-education programme, Corporate Insurgency, is that insurgent leaders don’t micro-manage. Leaders of such movements are, in Professor James’s words, "brand agnostic"—they allow their brand to be adopted by autonomous local cells with little central control. The mistake big business makes is to try to protect the brand by making decisions from its headquarters; better, he says, to allow local managers to respond quickly to local events.
He even goes as far as to suggest that companies set up “commando” forces; small units which work outside the traditional command structure of the company and which have a level of autonomy—“not holding the long committee meetings, not having the extended approval and budgeting process”. If a big business as a whole cannot act as a small, nimble player, these business units can.

Atrito diplomático entre Pequim e Londres por papoula de papel

Qua, 10 Nov, 10h01



 O primeiro-ministro britânico David Cameron, que visita a China, se recusou nesta quarta-feira a atender...

 PEQUIM (AFP) - O primeiro-ministro britânico David Cameron, que visita a China, se recusou nesta quarta-feira a atender um pedido oficial de Pequim para retirar de sua lapela uma papoula que homanegeia os soldados mortos em combate, flor que evoca para os chineses as guerras do ópio perdidas no século XIX.

Ao contrário da Grã-Bretanha, onde a papoula que tradicionalmente homenageia os mortos pela pátria, as autoridades chinesas consideram a flor um símbolo da humilhação, afirmou uma fonte britânica que pediu anonimato.

"Os chineses nos disseram que seria indecente usar uma papoula por causa das guerras do ópio", completou a fonte, a respeito das batalhas em que a Grã-Bretanha derrotou a China.

"Informamos que a papoula significa muito para nós e que a usaríamos de todos os modos", acrescentou.

Nos países da Commonwealth (Comunidade Britânica) é uma tradição usar na lapela uma papoula de papel em recordação aos soldados mortos e feridos nas guerras. A flor é usada do fim de outubro até 11 de novembro, data do armistício que acabou com a Primeira Guerra Mundial.

As chamadas guerras do ópio envolveram a China do tempo da dinastia Qing, que desejava proibir o comércio do ópio em seu território, a Grã-Bretanha, na primeira delas, e outros países, na segunda.

Cameron se reuniu com o presidente chinês Hu Jintao nesta quarta-feira, último dia de sua visita oficial a China.


DISCOVER THE MEANING OF POPPIES IN EUROPE

The poppies referred to in the poem grew in profusion in Flanders in the disturbed earth of the battlefields and cemeteries where war casualties were buried^[2] and thus became a symbol of Remembrance Day. The poem is often part of Remembrance Day solemnities in Allied countries which contributed troops to World War I, particularly in countries of the British Empire that did so.
The poem "In Flanders Fields" was written after John McCrae witnessed the death, and presided over the funeral, of a friend, Lt. Alexis Helmer. By most accounts it was written in his notebook^[3] and later rejected by McCrae. Ripped out of his notebook, it was rescued by a fellow officer, Francis Alexander Scrimger, and later published in Punch magazine. However, this story is rejected by the editor at the time:

"A legend has already grown up around the publication of "In Flanders Fields" in Punch. The truth is, 'that the poem was offered in the usual way and accepted; that is all.' The usual way of offering a piece to an editor is to put it in an envelope with a postage stamp outside to carry it there, and a stamp inside to carry it back. Nothing else helps.

9 Bathroom Cleaning Problems Solved

 Clever tricks for cleaning your bathroom.

1. "My shower curtain is crawling with mildew"
Wash it with a bleach solution. Shower curtains can be tricky to clean because they are big and cumbersome. Getting rid of mildew, especially during damp weather, can be especially challenging. Here’s a solution that’s quick, easy, and low-cost: Pour 1 gallon (3.7 liters) of warm water and 1⁄2 cup of household bleachinto a plastic bucket. With plastic gloves on, soak a sponge in this cleaning solution, give it a squeeze to avoid drips, and wipe. The mildew will vanish. Rinse using the showerhead.

2. "I’m ready to toss this filthy shower curtain liner"
Toss it in the washer. Don’t throw away your liner just because of mildew and dirt buildup. Extend its life by cleaning it in your washing machine. Set the machine on the gentle cycle with warmwater and 1 cup of regular laundry detergent or 1⁄2 cup of vinegar. Afterward, whirl it in your drier, set on Low Heat or Fluff, for about 20 minutes. Your liner will come out clean and wrinkle-free. Rehang it immediately.

3. "My brass fixtures look dull"
Polish them with baking soda and lemon juice. Don’t rush out to buy an expensive brass cleaner. Save time and money by making a paste with equal amounts of baking soda and lemon juice. Dip an old toothbrush in the mix and lightly scrub the fixtures. Let the solution dry a few minutes and then buff the fixtures with a clean cloth. They’ll look brand new.

4. "The nooks and crannies in my bathroom are hard to clean"
Use an old toothbrush. An old toothbrush is the perfect time-saving bathroom-cleaning tool. For example, you can use it to clean the tracks of your bathtub’s sliding glass doors. Simply spray bathroom cleaner on a paper towel and wrap the towel around the bristle end of the toothbrush. Then scoot the brush along the tracks to dislodge dirt. Or put the little bristles to work on the grime that collects around the rim of a bathroom sink. Once the bristles have loosened the dirt, just mop it up with a damp sponge.

© Polka Dot / Thinkstock

5. "I hate those mineral deposits on my bathroom faucet"
Remove them with white vinegar. No one likes crusty white deposits on a faucet. Try this easy solution: Before you go to bed one night, head to your kitchen for a bottle of white vinegar and three paper towels. Saturate the towels in the white vinegar and wrap them around the faucet like a cocoon. In the morning, remove thetowels. Fill the basin with warm water, plus a squirt of dishwashing liquid. Dip an old toothbrush in the solution and scrub the faucet toremove the final bits of mineral deposit.

6. "I have scum buildup on shower doors."
Use furniture oil to prevent buildup. Cleaning soap scum off a shower door is a tough, time-consuming job. Try using lemon oil furniture polish as a barrier against the scummy buildup. The next time you clean the door, follow up by wiping it with furniture oil on a soft rag. Let the oil sit for two minutes and then polish off the excess with a dry cloth. The furniture polish will leave a slight film of oil that will act as a buffer against future soap scum. Using a shower squeegee (available at discount stores and supermarkets) after every shower will also discourage the buildup.

7. "My glass shower doors are filmy"
Clean them with vinegar, baking soda, and salt. Stubborn mineral buildup on glass shower doors is no competition for a few common household ingredients—white vinegar, baking soda, and salt. Spray vinegar on the door and let it sit for a few minutes. Next, create a paste with equal amounts of baking soda and salt. Use adamp sponge to rub this paste over the door; then rinse well.

8. "My bathroom grout is grungy with mildew"
Spray it with vinegar. Mildew on grout is no match for that miracle household cleaning dynamo called vinegar. Just pour somewhite vinegar into a container, dip in an old toothbrush, and scrub away at the mildew. Or pour the vinegar into a spray bottle, squirt it on the mildew, and let it sit for ten minutes. Rinse with water and apply the old toothbrush if necessary. Bleach is effective in removing mildew from tile grout. Fill a spray bottle with equal parts of household chloride bleach and water. Spray the grout, let it sit a few minutes, and then wipe with a clean white cotton cloth.

9. "Those nonslip bathtub stickers won’t peel off"Loosen them with laundry presoak. You know the ones: They’re shaped like flowers and fish and are stuck on with industrial-strength adhesive. Instead of ruining the smooth surface of your tub trying to scrape them off, follow these simple steps for removing them: Carefully lift corners on each sticker using your fingernail or a plastic scraper. (Metal will scratch most tubs.) Spray the stickers with a good dose of laundry pretreatment product, such as Shout or Spray ’n Wash. Let the stickers soak in the spray for a few hours. This should loosen the stickers and allow you to peel them off. Wipe up any adhesive residue and the laundry spray. Clean and rinse the tub thoroughly.

From Five Minute Fixes

 

Cyberbullying: 5 Things Your Kids Should Know About Their Online Reputation

5 Things Your Kids Should Know About Their Online Reputation,

Just because your child is web savvy doesn't mean they don't need supervision on the Internet.

By Michael Fertik

 

As cyberbullying becomes more and more prevalent in the news and in our children's lives it's important to talk to your kids about their online reputation, especially on social networks, and how it can affect their real lives. Here are 5 basic tips to guide your child as they navigate the Internet:

1. If it’s Online, Consider it Public Information
There’s no way to guarantee that what you post online will stay where you intend it to be viewed. People hack Facebook accounts, friends share private messages, and companies change their privacy policies. Before your child posts a picture, types a wall post, or sends a message, they should consider if what they are sharing is "public information" -- would they want their principal, grandma, or college admissions reviewers to see it? If not, they shouldn't post it.

2. Your Internet Persona Stays With You Forever
The Internet has a very hard time forgetting and is far more like a “permanent tattoo” then we may realize. Today, and even more so in the future, college recruiters look up information about prospective applicants. Fast forward to the day when your child graduates. Hiring managers and recruiters will look at their online reputations before deciding whether to hire. So be wise – Internet mistakes stay around.

3. Practice Good Privacy
Privacy settings aren’t a perfect solution, but they do provide a certain level of protection for social media users. If your child is on a social networking website, make sure he or she knows how to keep updates from public view and max out privacy settings. Sometimes it helps for parents to use the same website, so that you can familiarize yourself with the controls. Additionally, a free tool from ReputationDefender.com, called PrivacyDefender.net, can actually set the privacy settings for you and your child with just two clicks.

4. Your Actions Online Affect Others
Many teens operate under the assumption that anything and everything is okay to share with their online friends. For example, a teen may write, "I wish my Dad would quit his job! He says he hates his job and his boss." While that may seem like an innocuous rant to the teen, if word spread to the father’s boss, that parent might be in trouble. Teens have to learn that what they share online does not only affect them, but that decisions on the Web can have consequences for others.

5. Keep Personal Information Private
One of the cruelest forms of cyberbullying occurs when a bully hijacks another student’s account, locks them out, and then pretends to be the victim. By the time your child has regained control of their account (if ever), their name and reputation could be smeared across the Internet.

To help ensure that your child never has their information stolen, teach the importance of keeping personal information (such as their full birth date, phone number, and address) out of their social networking profile. Additionally, work with your child on creating a strong password that no one else would be able to guess. Some specific tips include using a combination of uppercase and lowercase letters, symbols, and numbers. Another good option is making a mnemonic phrase into a password. For example, “I, John Brown, was born at 5:00 in the AM” becomes “IJBwb@5itAM."

Michael Fertik is the CEO and founder of ReputationDefender.com, a pioneer and global leader in the emerging field of online reputation and privacy management. ReputationDefender helps prevent Internet stalking, identity theft/impersonation and other online threats through its technology, allowing people from professionals to parents the ability to monitor and manage what is said and found online.

From readersdigest.com

Literature: Letter from Moscow

Letter from Moscow

By Scott Horton

At the end of part I of Dead Souls, Nikolai Gogol presents a romantic vision of his country as it hurtles to its destiny:

And you, my Russia–are you not racing like a troika that nothing can overtake? Is the road not smoking beneath your wheels, do the bridges not thunder as you cross them, and is everything not left in the dust, the spectators, struck with the very show of it, stopped with amazement and wondering if you are not some bolt from heaven? What does that awe-inspiring progress of yours foretell?… Whither, then, are you racing, O my Russia? Whither? Answer me! But no answer comes–only the weird sound of your collar-bells.

Gogol it seems has no idea where his country is headed; he sees it careening to the left and right, between reformers and reactionaries, Westernizers and Slavophiles, religious fanatics and nihlists. The keepers of modern Russian history would certainly grant Gogol one thing: it has been a wild ride. The image of the troika, in the sense of a trio, has also recurred in Russian politics.

In the anxious months that followed Stalin’s death in 1953, the government of the Soviet Union in fact fell into the hands of a troika, Vyacheslav Molotov, Lavrentiy Beria, and Georgy Malenkov. Nikita Khrushchev of course emerged as party leader and ultimately outflanked and liquidated Beria, the core of the troika. In the early politics of the Russian Federation there has also been a troika of sorts. The three most powerful political offices of the nation have consistently been the president, the prime minister, and the mayor of Moscow. Ultimate power rests more with the first two, and the power balance between them has always had more to do with personality and craftiness than with the constitution. On the other hand, Boris Yeltsin, the first president of Russia, began his political climb in earnest as the first “mayor” of Moscow in the late Soviet era (actually he was first secretary of the Communist Party’s Moscow City Committee). From 1992 until earlier this month—a term of 18 years—the office was held by Yuri Luzhkov.

A dynamic political figure, Luzhkov drew renown as a “builder.” Under his administration, Moscow experienced an unprecedented building boom—treasures of the Tsarist era were renovated and covered with miles of gold foil, the Cathedral of Christ the Savior (removed by Stalin to make way for a swimming complex) was lovingly restored, public spaces throughout the city were burnished. Building developers generally have loved Luzhkov; NGOs and historic preservationists, not so much. He was guilty of “bulldozing Moscow’s architectural heritage, and replacing it with mock-palaces,” The Guardian wrote. Throughout this period, Luzhkov was the target of insinuations of corruption, especially related to construction contracts, but none of them was ever borne out. His role on the national political stage was, however, wily and effective. Luzhkov’s efforts to launch a political party are generally seen as having triggered Vladimir Putin’s formation of the Yedinaya Rossiya political party which then trounced Luzhkov’s effort in 1999. In a move that says much about the nation’s political culture, Luzhkov then led his party to a combination with Yedinaya Rossiya. Luzhkov was, in the mind of most Kremlin-watchers, the clear potential rival to Putin inside the Russian power structure.

The Moscow Art Theater, where Chekhov’s four masterworks for the stage were premiered. The image of the Seagull appears in the pediment, hence its nickname, the "Seagull Theater."

But of the three horses pulling the Russian troika of state in the last few years, one has clearly been tugging in a different direction: Yuri Luzhkov. He has carefully charted a course to the right of Putin and Medvedev, making a strong appeal to the more xenophobic and chauvinist elements in the Russian political world. This emerged in his tough rhetoric against migrant workers in Moscow, most of whom come from the southern frontier of the former Soviet Union, as well as his continuous gay-baiting. One of the decisive and distinctly liberal policies of the Putin presidency had to do with immigration. He recognized Russia’s need for the skilled and semi-skilled labor of its “near abroad” to fuel the construction industry. When the Russian construction industry sputtered with the global financial downturn at the end of 2008, these policies created an opening for Luzhkov. Difficult as it may be for Americans to understand, in the domestic political sense, Putin has been a liberal—though in the tradition of Pyotr Stolypin, not John Stuart Mill. Putin seeks the creation of a rule-of-law state of sorts, albeit with an autocratic core. And he has promoted a new class of economically privileged professionals and entrepreneurs and the development of a middle class. Luzhkov has a consistent knack for feeling out the space just to Putin’s right as a fertile bed for political rhetoric and propaganda.

The final crack-up came over efforts by the Kremlin to relieve Moscow’s hopeless automotive congestion on the way to and from the prime international airport at Sheremet’yevo by building a new relief highway to St. Petersburg. Luzhkov opposed the routing of the effort. Suddenly the airwaves in Russia were filled with insinuations against him, many of them suggesting that Luzhkov’s opposition to the path of the new motorway was routed in the business interests of his billionaire wife. Luzhkov stood his ground, denounced the attacks as “rubbish” and said he would not be pressured to resign.

Among the followers of Russian politics, it was a classic struggle. President Dmitri Medvedev either had to remove Luzhkov or be viewed himself as weak. He acted in the traditional manner of Russian autocracy, by presidential ukaz. Moscow’s new mayor is Sergei Sobyanin, who was Putin’s chief of staff, a man unlikely to buck the leadership from the Kremlin.

After the Russian Revolution, deposed leaders fled west, a number of them writing their memoirs and taking positions as professors at American colleges. Today, however, exile from the center of power in Russia either means prosecution and imprisonment under challenging conditions in Siberia or flight from the rodina to a comfortable home in a London garden district, and maybe a house or two on the continent as well. Yuri Luzhkov is still testing the political waters in Russia, but he clearly has laid plans for a nest abroad when the time comes. His wife, Yelena Baturina, is reportedly the owner of Witanhurst, the second-largest freestanding residence in London (exceeded only by Buckingham Palace itself), acquired for £50 million in 2008.

• November 9, 2010, 11:00 AM ET

Paul Auster On Book Reviews: ‘I’ve Learned Not to Look’

By Steven Kurutz

Everett Collection

Paul Auster just published his sixteenth novel, “Sunset Park,” which makes him something of an expert on the book publishing process. When we spoke to the Brooklyn-based author recently, we asked if one’s sixteenth book has a different feeling than, say, the fifth. Not really, Auster said. He still cycles through the same post-book emotions: quasi-depression, anxiety, mild dread at stepping away from the writing process in order to promote the book.
One that that has changed, though, is Auster’s relationship to critics. “I’ve learned not to look at reviews,” he said. “Early on I did, I was always curious. You tend to feel very hurt when people attack you and feel indifferent when you get praise. You think, ‘Of course they like it. They should like it.’ I’ve learned that reading one of these attacks is like drinking poison; it goes into your system. You’ll remember the nasty phrases. You can’t get them out of your head. And that doesn’t do you any good as a human being at all to walk around with that sense of rancor or frustration. What can you do?”
The early reviews for “Sunset Park” are mixed, not that Auster has read them.

http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2010/11/09/paul-auster-on-book-reviews-i%e2%80%99ve-learned-not-to-look/

Dilma Rousseff: Brazil's new president is latest female leader in Latin America

La Plaza

News from Latin America and the Caribbean

Dilma Rousseff: Brazil's new president is latest female leader in Latin America

November 1, 2010 | 12:46 pm

Brazilians partied on the beaches of Rio and Brazilian stocks rose with anticipation Monday morning as results from Sunday's runoff election confirmed Dilma Rousseff as the South American nation's first female president.

Rousseff, who has never held elective office, won largely due to her ties to her mentor, outgoing President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, a beloved figure credited with transforming Brazil into a world player. "It's historic," a government worker celebrating Rousseff's win in Brasilia told the Daily Mail. "Brazil elected a factory worker and now a woman. Dilma will be a mother for the Brazilian people."
In her victory speech, Rousseff promised to further attack poverty in Brazil. Making reference to her historic win, she said, "I hope the fathers and mothers of little girls will look at them and say yes, women can."
Here's more coverage in The Times.
Rousseff joins a small but celebrated group of female leaders in Brazil's long history. The last time a woman ruled over Brazil was in the early 19th century, when Princess Maria Leopoldina served briefly as empress consort of the Brazilian empire, and was instrumental in Brazil's declaration of independence from Portugal in 1822. In the final period of the Brazilian monarchy, Princess Isabel, serving as regent, abolished slavery by signing the Ley Aurea in 1888 (link in Spanish).
The abolition of slavery in Brazil triggered the fall of the monarchy.
Brazil became a constitutional republic in 1889. The country witnessed a repressive military dictatorship between 1965 and 1985. It was during this time that Rousseff, daughter of a Bulgarian immigrant and a teacher, became active in Brazil's guerrilla resistance movement.
In this manner she is similar another modern female leader in the Americas. The popular former president of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, was a member of the resistance during the Pinochet dictatorship and was jailed and tortured, as Rousseff was in Brazil.
Three other women currently serve as leaders in Latin America. Laura Chinchilla was inaugurated as the first female president of Costa Rica in May. Weeks later in Trinidad and Tobago, Kamla Persad-Bissessar became the first female prime minister. Argentina is led by Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, its first elected female president.
Brazil hosts the World Cup in 2014 and the Olympic Games in 2016, and is set to become a major oil exporter in the coming years.

-- Daniel Hernandez in Mexico City

Photo: Dilma Rousseff looks up to a television screen during a presidential debate on Oct. 25. Credit: Reuters

Drinking water crisis: A California town fights back

Greenspace

Environmental news from California and beyond

Drinking water crisis: A California town fights back

November 7, 2010 |  2:36 pm

More than a million Californians live in places where tap water isn't reliably safe to drink, and about a third of them are in small, mostly Latino towns such as Seville in the San Joaquin Valley. Many residents of those communities -- some of the state's poorest -- ignore the often contradictory water-quality notices and spend extra money for bottled water for cooking and drinking.

The crisis has spawned a new group of activists, women such as school bus driver Becky Quintana in Seville, who are pressuring politicians to clean up the water. "People -- even some in Seville -- ask me, 'Why don't you move?'" said Quintana, 54. "But ... my father and his generation sweated for our little house. This isn't about me. It's about our kids and grandkids."

A drive through the San Joaquin Valley, the southern stretch of the Central Valley from Bakersfield to Fresno, reveals the food-producing might of California: Fields of citrus, nuts and vegetables are among more than 200 different crops grown here. Agriculture in these parts is a $28-billion-a-year business.

The small towns where many of the field workers live are far from the highways and major cities. Much of the water contamination in those towns comes from harmful levels of nitrates, which enter the groundwater from fertilizers, feedlot runoff and leaky septic tanks. The colorless and odorless nitrates pose a particular health threat to infants because they can cause "blue baby syndrome," a blood-oxygen disorder that can be fatal. The long-term risk for adults is unclear.

Farmers started using nitrogen fertilizer to boost crop production four decades ago, and since then nitrate contamination in the valley has increased fivefold. The California Water Resources Control Board is writing new guidelines for fertilizer use, but it will take years, perhaps decades, before groundwater pollution begins to ease, water experts say.

"I hear people in Hollywood talk about helping people in the Third World get clean water. Well, we need help in our own backyard first," Quintana said.

Susana De Anda, co-director of the Community Water Center, a Visalia organization that helps small towns make their case to the authorities, says California "has clear and consistent policies: Clean water flows toward money and power."

Seville, population 350, covers five square blocks in northeastern Tulare County, a half-hour's drive from the rolling mountains of Sequoia National Park. Pipes that deliver water from the lone well are riddled with leaks, and tall stands of tules sprout from the pooling water.

Two years ago, the town learned that it had a more serious problem: water contaminated by nitrates. Quintana led a contingent to the Tulare County Board of Supervisors last year.The county eventually agreed to run Seville's water system temporarily, while the community applied for state grants to fix it. But a year has passed with no action from the state, local water bills have increased from $20 to $60 a month — and nothing has been done to improve water quality.

Drinking fountains at Stone Corral Elementary School are shut down, and the 137 students use bottled-water dispensers set up in the classrooms -- at a monthly cost to the school of $220. "I could have bought a whole new language arts series for the cost of that water," said Christopher Kemper, the school's superintendent and principal.

A few weeks ago, Quintana helped launch a grass-roots effort in Seville and nearby communities to replace Supervisor Steve Worthley, who has told Seville residents that he believes their water is probably safe to drink and that any nitrates in the water are probably "naturally occurring."

After all precincts had reported on Tuesday, Worthley trailed his challenger by 21 votes."They've tried to sweep us under the table," Quintana said. "But we will not disappear." Read more, and watch a video, about the Central Valley movement for environmental justice and the drinking-water crisis spawned by agricultural runoff.
-- Scott Kraft

Mom Says Rehab Has Changed Lindsay Lohan

Lohan and her father are reportedly working on their troubled relationship.

LOS ANGELES ( KTLA) -- Lindsay Lohan's addiction treatment at the Betty Ford Clinic has been "life changing," according to her mother.

Dina Lohan says the Rancho Mirage clinic is "an amazing place" that has really brought the 24-year-old actress' problems to the surface.

The troubled actress was spotted shopping on Sunday during an approved outing. According to TMZ, Lindsay reunited with her father, Michael Lohan, during the outing and the two spent several hours at a high-end jewelry store.

The two are reportedly trying to repair their relationship.

Lohan's mother says her daughter is a different person.

Superior Court Judge Elden S. Fox sent Lohan back to rehab last month after she failed a drug test in connection with a DUI-related arrest three years ago.

Fox called her an "addict" and ordered her to stay there until Jan. 3.

"You're staying past the New Year's - there's a reason for that," he told her.

This is reportedly the fifth rehab stint for the "Mean Girls" star.

In August, she spent 23 days in a court-ordered rehab program at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center following 14 days in a Los Angeles County jail.

http://www.ktla.com/news/landing/ktla-lindsay-lohan-rehab-progress,0,3891242.story

What about Michael Knight's new book The Typist

Books, arts and culture                        

Prospero

New fiction

Beatifically sordid

Nov 8th 2010, 21:28 by More Intelligent Life, M.Y. | NEW YORK

GAMBLING, prostitutes, bomb craters and black-market transactions: these are the exigencies of a military occupation, or at least of America's occupation of Tokyo in the mid-1940s. Given the sin-rich atmosphere of “The Typist”, a short novel from Michael Knight, it may come as a surprise that the tone is more beatific than vulgar. But then Mr Knight has never shied away from taking the unexpected angle in his fiction.

“The Typist” begins with Francis Vancleave (“Van”), a young Alabama native who joins the army in 1944 and ships out a year and a half before America drops bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Van is relocated to Tokyo to work as a typist soon after the surrender, churning out directives issued by the brass as well as memos on dental hygiene and runaway inflation. While his roommate shacks up with a local girl and mingles with unsavoury types, Van takes orders, avoids trouble and types letters home to his young wife. He’s a decent person placed in circumstances that tend to rough up young men.
This decency provokes Van to send a birthday gift of tin soldiers to the son of his commander, General MacArthur. The General responds by unexpectedly inviting Van to play with the eight-year old Arthur, a pampered and marooned child. The two develop a brotherly relationship, playing wholesomely on an imaginary battlefield. (“You can’t do that—” Arthur says when Van arranges his soldiers in an ambush position. “The Romans always advance in a phalanx.”) The General, pleased that Van is socialising his son, arranges for the play dates to continue, generating both resentment and curiosity among the other enlisted men.

“I learned to type without reading at all," notes Van of his work, "to let information pass directly from my eyes to my fingers without registering in my conscious mind, and this did wonders for my speed and precision.” This is an apt metaphor for a soldier’s life during the occupation. Van’s modus operandi is not a denial of facts so much as a decision to let the facts pass unanalysed, as Tokyo “return[s] to the business of rising from the ashes” around him. Van’s wife notifies him that she has become pregnant by another man; a military tribunal puts the prime minister of Japan in the defendant’s box, and a tragedy occurs which implicates Van and terminates his relationship with the General’s son. Yet Van keeps typing.

“Beatific” is an unusual way to describe a novel whose plot turns on sordid events, but Mr Knight’s prose transforms even cheap booze and poor weather into lovely atmospheric touches. Liquor tastes “like fruit and kerosene” while snowflakes dart “like schools of fish outside the windows”. Even a brothel “didn’t feel as tawdry as it sounds. The windows were lit with paper lanterns and the girls all smelled like ginger.” Mr Knight’s elegant prose recalls the fiction of W.G. Sebald, another author who explored the melancholy postwar consciousness with subtle mastery.

“The Typist” by Michael Knight is published by Atlantic Monthly Press in America and is out now

About Prospero

Named for the hero of Shakespeare's "The Tempest", an expert in the power of books and the arts, this blog features literary insight and cultural commentary from our correspondents, and includes our coverage of the art market.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2010/11/new_fiction

Rihanna has built a shrine to Bob Marley

Nov 10th, 2010 | Showbizz

 

The Only Girl In The World hitmaker Rihanna has filled a huge room in her new Los Angeles mansion with memorabilia, a giant painting of the legendary Jamaican singer, gun-shaped chandeliers and a bar where she can go and relax.

The Barbados-born beauty explained, “The Bob Marley room is my loungey room, so there’s incense burning, there’s a painting on the wall of Bob Marley in black and white, which I love. The rest of the room goes from green into yellow into red, like the Jamaican flag. There’s a little coffee table and these seats that are like big pillows on the floor, so it’s not formal at all. There are lots of Bob Marley books, lyric books. He’s one of my favourite artistes of all time, he really paved the way for every other artiste out of the Caribbean.”
The 22-year-old beauty also admitted she always listens to her own opinions, regardless of what other people think and refuses to let anyone tell her what to do.
She added in an interview with The Sun newspaper, “I think people are afraid to have fun, they’re afraid of what people think of them, that fear hinders them from being who they really are and expressing themselves the way they really want to. Not everyone is going to love your hair red, but if you want to dye your hair red just do it because you want to, you can do whatever you want. You are a rock star. It’s me, 30 years from now I want to look back and say I really enjoyed it, and lived it to the fullest of my expectations, not like a puppet.”

—Bang Showbiz

Google Toolbar reveals personal data

Bloomberg, Nov 9, 2010, 12.58pm IST

SAN FRANCISCO: Google, owner of the world's most popular search engine, was accused in a lawsuit of violating users' privacy rights because its toolbar software allegedly transmits their Internet activity to the company.

The complaint, filed in federal court in San Jose, California, claims Google has misled users who download the software, used to search and browse the Web, to believe they can disable features that transmit personal data to the company. The case, which seeks class-action, or group, status, was filed on behalf of Jason Weber of Brooklyn, New York.

"With products such as Toolbar, Google acquires a great deal of information about users' Internet activities, adding to the already substantial information it acquires by providing a search engine, network advertising, and more," according to the complaint filed November 5.

Users of Google Toolbar "transmit information about themselves and their online activities to Google that they intended to keep private," according to the complaint.

Google, based in Mountain View, California, has said automobiles equipped with cameras to collect photographs for its Street View product captured personal data from unsecured household wireless networks. The Federal Trade Commission last month ended its investigation of the practice after the company said it will improve privacy safeguards.

According to Google's website, Toolbar features can be used without sharing personal information, except for features designed to work with a Google account. It is possible for some data, such as search queries or page addresses, to contain personally identifying information, the company said on its website.

A Google representative didn't immediately return an e-mail seeking comment.

The case is Weber v. Google, 10-05035, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California (San Jose).

Read more: Google Toolbar reveals personal data - The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/news/internet/Google-Toolbar-reveals-personal-data/articleshow/6893992.cms#ixzz14p1PC3k4

What do political parties do when they desperately seek popular support?

Art on the high table

John Lennon: Three films

John Lennon: Three films

Mark Glancy takes a look at the life and creative genius of John Lennon as seen through the eyes of three films.

John Lennon was born during an air raid on Liverpool in 1940, and it could be said his life never quietened. It included a number of family tragedies, his fame in the Beatles, his outspoken political beliefs and his assassination in 1980. To date, filmmakers have been interested mainly in his youth, and the experiences and influences that led him out of Liverpool and on to the world stage. Interestingly, none has followed the usual path of biopics and made a saint of the subject. Lennon may be a creative genius in each of these films, but he is also angry and arrogant.

1. Nowhere Boy
 Dir: Sam Taylor-Wood, UK, 2009. With Aaron Johnson, Kristin Scott Thomas, Anne-Marie Duff, David Threlfall
The opening scene of Nowhere Boy offers a brief but unmistakable reference to the Beatles’ first film, A Hard Day’s Night (1964). The young John Lennon (Aaron Johnson) is seen running along a portico, while on the soundtrack the opening chord of the song, A Hard Day’s Night, gives way to the sound of screaming fans. But Lennon’s carefree dash is just a dream, and it comes to an abrupt halt when the teenager is woken by his stern Aunt Mimi (Kristin Scott Thomas), who scolds him for oversleeping. This is the film’s portrait of Lennon in a nutshell: he runs toward rock music and fame as a means of escaping his troubled upbringing in Mimi’s middle-class, suburban household.
The film spans the years of Lennon’s adolescence and touches on the key moments of his early musical career. He becomes fascinated by rock music, learns to play the guitar, forms a ‘skiffle’ band called the Quarrymen (named for the Quarry Bank school he attended), meets the younger but more musically able Paul McCartney, and, in the ending, heads off to play gigs in Hamburg.
However, there is more emphasis on Lennon’s upbringing than his music, and a litany of family troubles unfolds. At the heart of the tensions is the struggle between the strait-laced Aunt Mimi, who has raised John since he was five years old, and his mother Julia (Anne-Marie Duff), a seemingly carefree woman who lives nearby but allows Mimi to raise her son.
With its family traumas, repressive suburban atmosphere, and John’s teenage angst, Nowhere Boy at times harks back to 1950s melodrama, and especially to the fraught family relations of Rebel Without a Cause. It is a subtler film than that, though, and it steps back from caricaturing either Mimi or Julia. Instead, it suggests that John derived his steely temperament from his aunt and his rebellious hedonism from his mother.
Nowhere Boy also offers an evocative recreation of 1950s Britain, and especially a moment when the country was moving out of austerity and into the cultural upheaval of the 1960s.

But is it accurate?
 The film contends that John was haunted by his childhood, and many of the incidents it depicts – including the disturbing scene where the five-year-old is asked to choose between his estranged parents – are true. But the suggestion that John did not see his mother again until he was a teenager is exaggerated and so, too, is the fight between John and Paul McCartney. At the time the film was released, McCartney allowed that Nowhere Boy “captures the essence” of this period of Lennon’s life, but he also insisted that John never punched him.
Accuracy: 6/10

2. Backbeat

Dir: Iain Softley, UK, 1994. With Stephen Dorff, Sheryl Lee, Ian Hart
Backbeat picks up almost exactly where Nowhere Boy leaves off: in 1960, as the Beatles head off to Hamburg. In this film, Lennon (Ian Hart) is more clearly Liverpudlian in accent and intonation. He is also an edgier, angrier and tougher character, which by most accounts is correct.
Aunt Mimi’s genteel influence is not so apparent here. This is a film made out of Beatles legends. The band plays in the Kaiserkeller, a basement bar in the heart of Hamburg’s red light district, where they alternate on stage with striptease acts. Playing six shows a night for an unruly audience, they churn out rough and ready cover versions of songs by Chuck Berry, Little Richard and Elvis Presley, and they slowly hone their craft.
The dramatic focus is on the triangular relationship between Lennon and his best friend, Stuart Sutcliffe (Stephen Dorff). Sutcliffe was the Beatles’ bass player in these early days, but while in Hamburg he falls in love with the art student and photographer Astrid Kircherr (Sheryl Lee). Kircherr introduces Stuart and John to a more bohemian side of Hamburg, and she also moulds the Beatles’ look, taking stylish photographs of them and replacing their ‘Teddy Boy’ haircuts with ‘mop tops’. Lennon is dismayed, though, when the romance between Stuart and Astrid leads Stuart to give up the band, remain in Hamburg and pursue his own career as a painter.

But is it accurate?
 There are some chronological anomalies here. These are not substantial and serve dramatic purposes. Likewise, the film can be accused of overplaying Sutcliffe’s importance (even at this stage in the Beatles’ history) and underplaying Paul McCartney’s. Yet the tragic ending – Sutcliffe dies of a brain haemorrhage on the very day the other Beatles returned to Hamburg – is not a scriptwriter’s contrivance. Astrid really did break the news of Sutcliffe’s sudden death to John when he arrived at Hamburg airport in April 1962.
Accuracy: 7/10

 3. The Hours and Times
 Dir: Christopher Munch, UK, 1991. With David Angus, Ian Hart
The Hours and Times takes us forward in Lennon’s life by one more step. It is set in April 1963, just after the Beatles scored their first UK hit singles (with Love Me Do and Please Please Me) but before they went to the USA. The story is not about the beginnings of Beatlemania and indeed not a single Beatles song is heard. It is a much smaller film than that, focused tightly on the friendship between Lennon (Ian Hart) and the Beatles’ manager, Brian Epstein (David Angus), and a holiday they took together in Spain that month.
Epstein was gay, and so their holiday prompted gossip and speculation. The film ponders this aspect of their relationship, but it is also more broadly concerned with the grounds for their friendship. Epstein was an accomplished middle-class businessman, cultured and polite, from a closely knit Jewish family. Lennon, on the other hand, is portrayed as unworldly, uncultured and indifferent to the needs of others, including his wife Cynthia (heard on the telephone, but not seen).
As in Backbeat, he is portrayed by Ian Hart, but this film offers an even stormier characterisation of the man. The film suggests that it is the ‘times’ that brings these two very different men together – that is, the breaking down of social barriers in the Sixties – and it also portrays their ‘hours’ together as laden with poignancy. The two men talk about the future, what it may hold for them and how they might be remembered. Of course, both
were to die prematurely (Epstein of a drug overdose in 1967).

But is it accurate?

If there is one Beatles song that should be in the film, it is You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away, which Lennon is rumoured to have written for Epstein. But that might be too definite for a film which begins with the statement “the following film is entirely fictitious” and thus draws attention to its own speculative nature. The slow pace, inconclusive storyline and black and white photography mean that The Hours and Times is unlikely to be a crowd pleaser, but it won rave reviews among fans of independent films, and diehard Lennon fans would not want to miss it.

Accuracy: 5/10

Mark Glancy teaches film history at Queen Mary University of London. He is the author of When Hollywood Loved Britain (Manchester University Press, 1999) and The 39 Steps: A British Film Guide (Tauris, 2003)

http://www.bbchistorymagazine.com/feature/john-lennon-three-films