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What happens when you drop a male rat into a cage with a receptive female rat? First, you see a frenzy of copulation. Then, progressively, the male tires of that particular female. Even if she wants more, he has had enough. However, replace the original female with a fresh one, and the male immediately revives and gallantly struggles to fertilize her.

You can repeat this process with fresh females until he nearly dies of exhaustion.

This is called the Coolidge effect—the automatic response to novel mates. It’s what started you down the road to getting hooked on Internet porn.

Like that lab rat, you have a primitive mechanism in your brain urging you to fertilize the two-dimensional females, males (or whatever) on your screen. (Note: The Coolidge effect also occurs in females. Studies show that, when given the opportunity, human females are just as promiscuous as males.)

Primitive circuits in your brain govern emotions, drives, impulses, and subconscious decision-making. They do their jobs so efficiently that evolution hasn't seen the need to change them much since before humans were humans.

More dopamine, please

For you, rats, and all mammals, the desire and motivation to have sex arises from a neurochemical called dopamine. Dopamine amps up the centerpiece of the primitive part of the brain—the reward circuitry. It’s where we experience cravings and pleasure, and where we get addicted.

The ancient reward circuitry compels you to do things that further your survival and pass on your genes. At the top of our human reward list are food, sex, love, friendship, and novelty. These are called ‘natural reinforcers,’ as contrasted with addictive chemicals.

The evolutionary purpose of dopamine is to motivate you to do what serves your genes. The bigger the squirt the more you want something. No dopamine and you just ignore it. Chocolate cake and ice cream—a big blast. Celery—not so much. Sexual stimulation and orgasm are the biggest natural blast of dopamine available to your reward circuitry. One of dopamine's nicknames is the "molecule of addiction."

Although dopamine may be referred to as the "pleasure molecule," this may not be technically accurate. Dopamine is more the craving for pleasure, or measure of potential value. Although controversial, it appears that the final reward or good feelings arises from opioids. Dopamine is wanting, opioids are liking. Addiction may be thought of as wanting run amok.

Novelty, novelty, more novelty

Dopamine surges for novelty. A new car, just-released movie, the latest gadget…we are all hooked on dopamine. As with everything new the thrill fades away as dopamine plummets.

Here’s how the Coolidge effect works: The rat’s reward circuitry is squirting less and less dopamine with respect to the current female, but produces a big dopamine surge for a new female. Does that sound familiar?

Not surprisingly, rats and humans aren't that different when it comes to response to novel sexual stimuli. For example, when Australian researchers (graph) displayed the same erotic film repeatedly, test subjects' penises and subjective reports both revealed a progressive decrease in sexual arousal. The "same old same old" just gets boring. Habituation indicates declining dopamine.

After 18 viewings—just as the test subjects were nodding off—researchers introduced novel erotica for the 19th and 20th viewings. Bingo! The subjects and their penises sprang to attention. (Yes, women showed similar effects.)

Internet porn is especially enticing to the reward circuitry because novelty is always just a click away. It could be a novel “mate,” unusual scene, strange sexual act, or—you fill in the blank. With multiple tabs open and clicking for hours, you can experience more novel sex partners every ten minutes than our hunter-gatherer ancestors experienced in a lifetime.

What’s a brain to do when it has unlimited access to a superstimulating reward it never evolved to handle? Some brains eventually adapt, which can lead to addiction.

I can't emphasize this enough - Internet porn addiction is not a "sex addiction" - it's an Internet addiction. Although masturbation is often involved, this is an addiction to novel pixels on a screen.

Drugs aren’t the only addictions

It’s common knowledge that dopamine-raising substances, such as alcohol or cocaine, can create addictions. Yet only about 10-15% of humans or rats that use addictive drugs (except nicotine) ever become addicts. Does this mean the rest of us are safe from addiction? When it comes to substance abuse, perhaps yes.

Yet when it comes to unrestricted access to superstimulating versions of natural rewards, such as junk food, or even video games, the answer is no, although certainly not every user gets hooked.

The reason highly stimulating versions of food and sex can hook us—even if we're not otherwise susceptible to addiction—is that our reward circuitry evolved to drive us toward food and sex, not drugs. Today’s high fat/sugar foods (75% of American adults are overweight, 35% obese) and Internet porn (you’re reading this) have the potential to hook even more people than do drugs. These supernormal versions of natural rewards can override our brain’s satiation mechanisms—the “I’m done” feeling—because concentrated calories and fertilization opportunities are your genes’ top priorities.

All addictions lead to the same major brain changes

Recent research reveals that behavioral addictions (food addiction, pathological gambling, video gaming, and Internet addiction) and substance addictions involve the same fundamental mechanisms leading to a collection of shared alterations in brain anatomy and chemistry. These brain changes include:

Desensitization ("A numbed pleasure response"): Among other changes, dopamine and dopamine (D2) receptors decline in the brain's reward circuitry, leaving the addict less sensitive to pleasure, and "hungry" for dopamine-raising activities/substances of all kinds. The addict then tends to neglect interests, stimuli, and behaviors that were once of high personal relevance.
Sensitization ("A super memory of pleasure"): Rewired nerve connections cause the reward circuitry to buzz in response to addiction-related cues or thoughts. This Pavlovian memory makes the addiction more compelling than other activities in the addict's life.
Hypofrontality ("Willpower erodes"): Alterations in frontal-lobe gray matter and white matter correlate to reduced impulse control and the weakened ability to foresee consequences.

Are these the only brain changes? No. Each of these broad-brush indicators reflect multiple subtler addiction-related cellular and chemical alterations—just as the scan of a cancer tumor wouldn't show associated subtler cellular/chemical changes.

Most of the subtler changes can't be assessed in human models due to the invasiveness of the technologies required. However, they have been identified in animal models.

Same master switch for sex/food as for drug addiction: DeltaFosB

The master switch that triggers many of these addiction-related changes is the protein DeltaFosB. Continued over-consumption of natural rewards (sex, sugar, high-fat, aerobic exercise) or chronic administration of virtually any drug of abuse causes DeltaFosB to accumulate in the reward circuitry. It's important to understand that addictive drugs only cause addiction because they magnify or inhibit mechanisms already in place for natural rewards.

DeltaFosB's evolutionary purpose is to motivate us to "get it while the getting is good!" It's a binge mechanism for food and reproduction, which worked well in other times and environments. With the advent of super-normal versions of natural rewards, it makes addictions to junk food and Internet porn as easy as 1-2-3. This is why the American Society of Addiction Medicine unambiguously states that food and sex addictions are true addictions (see below).

Your hijacked binge mechanism: Dopamine activates DeltaFosB

A "binge mechanism" is an evolutionary advantage in situations where survival is furthered by overriding normal satiety. Think of wolves, which need to stow away up to twenty pounds of a single kill at one go. Or our ancestors, who needed to store high-quality calories as a few extra pounds for easy transport to survive hard times. Or mating season, when there's a harem to impregnate. In the past, such opportunities were rare and passed quickly.

Our environments have drastically changed. The Internet offers endless mating opportunities, which your primitive brain perceives as real because you find them so exciting. As any good mammal would, you automatically attempt to spread your genes far and wide, but there’s no end to your mating season.

Click, click, click, masturbate, click, click, click, masturbate, click, click, click. Day in and day out, never taking a break. This can kick your binge mechanism into overdrive. Evolution never prepared your primitive brain for this kind of nonstop stimulation.

Excess consumption (food or sex) is the signal to your primitive brain that you have hit the evolutionary jackpot. With continued daily over-consumption dopamine triggers the accumulation of DeltaFosb, which initiates several brain changes, including sensitization.

Overconsumption → dopamine → DeltaFosB → addiction-related changes

The obvious question is: "How much is too much?" The answer is simple: "Whatever amount of stimulation causes the accumulation of DeltafosB and the corresponding brain changes."

This is why posing such questions as "What is the definition porn?" or "How much porn use constitutes an addiction?" are misleading and irrelevant. The former is like asking whether it's slot machines or blackjack that leads to a gambling addiction. The latter is like asking a food addict how many minutes she spends eating.

The reward circuitry doesn't know what porn is. It only registers levels of stimulation through dopamine spikes. This is physiology, not morality or sexual politics.

Sensitization: A Pavlovian super-memory is formed

Learning, memory, and habits can be summed up in the old, but true, saying - "Nerve cells that fire together, wire together"

The rewiring behind addiction arises partly from overproduction of natural chemicals (delta FosB), and the strengthening the connections between nerve cells, making it easier for them to communicate. This is what happens in all learning. It’s called neuroplasticity. The more intense the experience, the stronger the connections. The stronger the connections, the easier it is for electrical impulses to travel along this new pathway.

If habitual porn viewing has caused addiction-related brain changes, you have forged a rut in your brain. Just as water flows through the path of least resistance, so do impulses, and thus thoughts. As with any skill, the more you practice the easier it is do. Soon it becomes automatic, without any conscious thought. You've formed a deep pornography rut in your brain: a sensitized neural pathway.

Sensitized pathways can be thought of as Pavlovian conditioning on steroids. When activated by thoughts or triggers, sensitized pathways blast the reward circuit, firing up hard-to-ignore cravings.

More pleasure leads to less pleasure (desensitization)

As sensitization and cravings compel you to use porn, overstimulation of the reward circuitry leads to a localized rebellion. The nerve cells bombarded by dopamine say "enough is enough." If someone continues to scream, you cover your ears. When dopamine-sending nerve cells keep pumping out dopamine, the receiving nerve cells cover their "ears" by reducing dopamine (D2) receptors.

The cycle of desensitization mimics other addictions:

bingeing→ cravings→ numbed pleasure response→ cravings→ bingeing escalates→ further decline in dopamine & dopamine receptors→ further desensitization...

And soon you are hooked on porn, because nothing else is anywhere near as interesting to your brain. From your genes’ perspective, it’s the perfect design—to keep you fertilizing frantically—before this "valuable mating opportunity" slips away.

As desensitization numbs you to everyday pleasures, sensitization makes your brain hyper-reactive to anything associated with your porn addiction. Over time, this dual-edged mechanism can have your reward circuitry buzzing at the hint of porn use, but less than enthused when presented with the real deal. Desensitization is not "damage". If your cells wanted, they could rebuild loss dopamine receptors in a few minutes. Rather, desensitization represents a negative feed back system in overdrive.

If these two neuroplastic changes could speak, desensitization would be moaning, "I can't get no satisfaction" (low dopamine signaling), while sensitization would be poking you in the ribs and saying, "Hey buddy, I got just what you need," which happens to be the very thing that caused the desensitization.

A numbed pleasure response (desensitization), combined with a deep pathway leading to short-term relief (sensitization), is the basis of all addictions.

Escalation and rewiring

Developing tolerance (numbed pleasure response) means an addict needs more of his/her "drug" to get the same effect. Heavy porn users sometimes notice that as tolerance builds for their earlier tastes, they move in new directions in their search for intense arousal. Many seek out what shocks them—perhaps because "forbidden" and "fear-producing," plus sexual arousal, offer a bigger brain-chemical kick...at least for a time.

Porn addiction escalation is like running on a hamster wheelSo, it's not unusual to start out your porn career with an image of a famous hottie's fine butt—and months later find you have "progressed" to girls with goats or violent rape scenes. Keep in mind that that when an addict escalates to new genres or longer use he is driven by desensitization. His fundamental sexual orientation has not changed.

The more intense the associated events (orgasm + video), or the more they are repeated, the stronger the wiring. Each experience wires the new tastes into the brain. If your sexual tastes have changed, so has your brain.
Definition of addiction?

Many still believe that only chemicals, not behaviors such as Internet porn, can cause addiction. However, neuroscientists who study the effects of addiction on the brain know differently. Experts in the field define addiction in many ways.

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A TOP European Union official sparked fury yesterday, claiming no contingency plans were being made for a Greek exit from the euro.

Richard Corbett, a senior adviser to EU Council President Herman Van Rompuy, said: “We’re not planning for a Greek exit, nobody is planning for a Greek exit.

“That would not help Greece, it would not help the rest of the European Union and, technically by the way, it’s an extraordinarily difficult thing to do. The idea of planning a Greek exit would risk being a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

EU critic and Tory MP Douglas Carswell said that if Mr Corbett was speaking the truth we “should be genuinely worried”.

He said: “These officials should prepare a safety net for any eventuality.

“If they are not doing so in this case, then they are idiots as well as fools.”

Bank of England Governor Sir Mervyn King confirmed yesterday that plans were being drawn up by the Bank, the Treasury and Financial Services Authority to cope with financial meltdowns such as the break-up of the eurozone. He said the contingency plan had been under discussion “for some time”.

If they are not doing so in this case, then they are idiots as well as fools

Another report last night claimed that millions of drachma banknotes were being printed by a British firm in preparation for Greece leaving the euro and reviving its currency.

A source said the drachmas were printed by De La Rue, the world’s largest banknote provider, and are in storage near Bolton.

It is thought that the pallets will be held in the UK for the moment rather than being sent to Greece, to avoid fuelling speculation.

The plant is on an industrial estate 30 minutes from Manchester Airport so the notes could be airlifted to Athens within a few hours.

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Dear Advice,

The last thing my mom said to me was, “When I was young …” and then she died. I had no idea what she was trying to tell me. Then I found a letter she had written to a friend saying that the man she was in love with is my actual biological father.

My dad and I were in shock with the DNA results and now I have spent countless hours trying to find out who this man is. I can’t ask anyone as they are all dead and my dad said it must have been this guy who was in town for a short time while attending ammunition-inspector school in Savanna, Ill., but didn’t know a name.

I hired an archival researcher and a private investigator but no one can help me. Can you help me? I found out that many people came from all over the U.S. to attend this school and all I need is a list of names from around November 1961. Please, please help me.

Into the Past

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UK government making urgent preparations to cope with the fallout of a possible Greek exit from the single currency

The British government is making urgent preparations to cope with the fallout of a possible Greek exit from the single currency, after the governor of the Bank of England, Sir Mervyn King, warned that Europe was "tearing itself apart".

Reports from Athens that massive sums of money were being spirited out of the country intensified concern in London about the impact of a splintering of the eurozone on a UK economy that is stuck in double-dip recession. One estimate put the cost to the eurozone of Greece making a disorderly exit from the currency at $1tn, 5% of output.

Officials in the United States are also nervously watching the growing crisis: Barack Obama on Wednesday described it as a "headwind" that could threaten the fragile American recovery.

In a speech in Manchester before flying to the United States for a summit of G8 leaders, the British prime minister, David Cameron, will say the eurozone "either has to make up or it is looking at a potential breakup", adding that the choice for Europe's leaders cannot be long delayed.

"Either Europe has a committed, stable, successful eurozone with an effective firewall, well capitalised and regulated banks, a system of fiscal burden sharing, and supportive monetary policy across the eurozone, or we are in uncharted territory which carries huge risks for everybody.

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Spain tumbled into recession and European stock markets and the euro fell Thursday as Greece installed a crisis government to tackle its crippling debt, EU leaders prepared for talks and analysts raised the spectre of a run on eurozone banks.

"Markets are worried about eurozone bank deposit runs and an escalating banking crisis," London-based VTB Capital economist Neil MacKinnon told AFP.

Heavy withdrawals of deposits have been reported in Greece and Spain, and top European Union leaders were to hold a videoconference.

They were initially to discuss an upcoming G8 meeting of industrialised countries but were now faced with a serious deterioration of the situations in Greece and elsewhere across the eurozone.

A caretaker government took office in Athens on Thursday to organise its second election in six weeks after an inconclusive May 6 vote as fears over its possible euro exit rocked Spain and Italy.

The election left Greece in limbo and the new poll on June 17 offers no guarantee of a viable government able to implement an EU-IMF bailout which has divided the country.

The International Monetary Fund announced Thursday that it would hold off on official contacts with Greece until after the June 17 elections.

The IMF, which along with the EU is all that stand between Greece and a disorderly default and eurozone exit, have warned that no new funds will be released from the latest 240-billion euro ($305-billion) bailout if progress on pledged reforms and tough austerity measures falters.

Meanwhile, Europe's single currency nosedived to a now four-month low at $1.2667 before recovering some ground.

"Confidence in European equities (is) quickly depleting, this time after the European Central Bank admitted it had stopped providing liquidity to some Greek banks," noted analyst Craig Erlam at trading group Alpari.

The ECB said Wednesday that it was no longer dealing with some Greek banks via the conventional credit window, Dow Jones Newswires reported, and has restricted the banks to "emergency lending assistance" from Greece's central bank that must be approved from month to month.

"Add this to the long list of other eurozone problems and investors are finding it very difficult to justify taking on the additional risk associated with the eurozone," Erlam said

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Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has a status update for Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin: Stop attempting to dodge your taxes by renouncing your U.S. citizenship or never come to back to the U.S. again.

In September 2011, Saverin relinquished his U.S. citizenship before the company announced its planned initial public offering of stock, which will debut this week. The move was likely a financial one, as he owns an estimated 4 percent of Facebook and stands to make $4 billion when the company goes public. Saverin would reap the benefit of tax savings by becoming a permanent resident of Singapore, which levies no capital gains taxes.

At a news conference this morning, Sens. Schumer and Bob Casey, D-Pa., will unveil the “Ex-PATRIOT” – “Expatriation Prevention by Abolishing Tax-Related Incentives for Offshore Tenancy” – Act to respond directly to Saverin’s move, which they dub a “scheme” that would “help him duck up to $67 million in taxes.”

The senators will call Saverin’s move an “outrage” and will outline their plan to re-impose taxes on expatriates like Saverin even after they flee the United States and take up residence in a foreign country. Their proposal would also impose a mandatory 30 percent tax on the capital gains of anybody who renounces their U.S. citizenship.

The plan would bar individuals like Saverin from ever reentering the United States again.

“Eduardo recently found it more practical to become a resident of Singapore since he plans to live there for an indefinite period of time,” Tom Goodman, Saverin’s spokesman, told Bloomberg News in an email.

Last year 1,700 people renounced their U.S. citizenship.

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Her mother, Elizabeth Weir, is also suing the school for lost income and other expenses.

She said she gave up her chocolate fortune cookie business - which she had expected to make A$450,000 (NZ$583,681) over three years - because her daughter moved from Geelong to live with her in New South Wales.

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The last issue of the SPLC’s Intelligence Report presented a scathing portrait of “a hard-line fringe” of the Men’s Rights Movement (MRM): “women haters whose fury goes well beyond criticism of the family court system, domestic violence laws, and false rape accusations,” whose rage is “directed at all women, not only perceived feminists.”

The article, entitled “Leader’s Suicide Brings Attention to Men’s Rights Movement,” provoked a tremendous response among men’s rights activists (MRAs) and their sympathizers.

“Piggybacking on the two minutes’ hate against Limbaugh,” the National Review Online sarcastically declared, the “clueless commissars at the Southern Policy Law Center” have “found a new arena of hate groups, comparable to neo-Nazis and the skinheads: the ‘manosphere’ of misogynist web sites.” The website In Mala Fide was defiantly proud: “Before, our enemies ignored us. Now, they point their gnarled, disgusting fingers at us, sputtering syllables of disapproval.”

A Voice for Men’s Paul Elam tried on a collegial tone at first. “The goals of SPLC and AVfM are quite similar,” he averred in open letter to the SPLC’s president, Richard Cohen. “We both work to identify groups who seek to oppress others, and inform the public of the inequities they would perpetuate.” But just days later, in a post headlined “Southern Poverty Law Center Linked to Hate Activity,” he changed his tune.

It should be mentioned that the SPLC did not label MRAs as members of a hate movement; nor did our article claim that the grievances they air on their websites – false rape accusations, ruinous divorce settlements and the like – are all without merit. But we did call out specific examples of misogyny and the threat, overt or implicit, of violence.

Thomas James Ball, for example, who was hailed as a martyr on so many men’s rights forums, called for arson attacks on courthouses and police stations. The Norwegian mass killer Anders Breivik wrote extensively about the evils of feminism. We included as much as we did about Register-Her.com because it is so intimidating to its targets, not all of whom are criminals. When Elam accused Vliet Tiptree, a pseudonymous contributor to RadFem Hub, of “calling for extermination of half the human race; the male half, that is,” he offered a cash reward for her real identity. The names and locations of several candidates were publically aired.

Elam and the authors of countless angry posts and letters have demanded to know why the SPLC hasn’t also condemned feminist man-hating (or misandry, to use the MRM’s preferred term).

“You do know that there is a forum out there called ‘RadFem Hub’ that actively advocates infanticide, gender-selective abortion and killing/mutilating men and boys, right?” one letter asked us. “Read the SCUM Manifesto,” another said, “and research the reception it has received over the years, and the regard with which many feminists still hold Valerie Solanas.”

Solanas was the undeniably disturbed woman who shot Andy Warhol in 1968. “Life in this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to women,” her manifesto began, “there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation and destroy the male sex.”

SCUM stands for “Society for Cutting Up Men,” and it is true that Solanas continues to be much-read and quoted in some feminist circles. (“We don’t really cut up men,” the tagline of the Feminazis blog cheekily declares. “Well, unless they deserve it.”)

The existence of hatred on one side of a color, political or gender line hardly justifies its presence on the other. And radical feminists do say hurtful things about men. “[T]reatments can be developed to mitigate the death-drive of men, their hierarchical psychology, their insensitivity to the pain of living creatures, their pleasure in violence and intimidation, their acquisitiveness, their rape and phallic obsessions,” Tiptree wrote in a post on RadFem Hub called Radical Feminism Enters the 21st Century. “[M]y best bet is that what’s wrong with men is that their androgens need genetic modification. I’m serious about this. If we can do it with corn, men ought to be easy.” Few possessors of Y chromosomes could read her words without feeling queasy. But to characterize her essay as a well-developed plan, as Elam and his colleagues do, is not only ridiculous, it is willfully obtuse.

Cathy Brennan owns the domain RadFem Hub. “I don’t hate men,” she told me. “I have a father, I have a brother, I have a son. The war that Paul Elam is waging is in his head. I worry about women and children and the increasing violence in our society.” When I asked her what she thought of Solanas’ “Scum Manifesto,” she laughed. “I view it as A Modest Proposal-type work of literature, a satire. It’s brilliant, but it’s not my personal bible.”

While men’s rights activists fantasize about existential threats to the male sex, real gendercide is being committed against girls in China, India, East Asia, the Caucasus and other parts of the world.

Of course, some radical feminists do hate men, and when MRAs lurk in members-only chat rooms and cherry pick their angriest, most shockingly over-the-top posts to reprint on their own sites, as an MRA “mole” did at a forum called RadFemSpeak (which is not affiliated with RadFem Hub), they commit the same injustice they accuse the SPLC of doing to themselves. No one makes a very favorable impression when they’re spewing bile.

This is a lesson that some MRAs are beginning to learn for themselves. “With all of the kooks inhabiting the manosphere, it was easy for the SPLC to smear anti-feminism,” one MRA site sadly concluded after our article appeared. “The problem is larger than just AVfM. Even rational anti-feminist blogs and organizations like the False Rape Society and SAVE [Stop Abusive and Violent Environments] are being tarnished with the same brush because the MRM ‘leadership’ has failed to deal with the kooks.”

“Women are not feminism. … To equate the two is beyond ignorant,” a thoughtful MRA blogger wrote. “[I]deologically speaking, I have some issues with feminist theory, but honestly, I think it’s a distraction from working on the real issues that face men. … issues like: Homelessness – Men’s Health – Education – Suicides – Homicides – Deaths on the Job – Family Court Inequalities – Child Custody – Criminal Justice System – Incarceration Rates – Prison Rape and Violence – Domestic Violence – Unemployment – Drug and Alcohol Abuse – Military Deaths and Service – Vilification in the Media – Legal Inequalities. This is what the MRM is all about; this is about social justice and equal protection under the law.”

I dare say that if social justice and equal protection under the law were all that the MRM were about, then the SPLC would have had no reason to write about it. If the article inspires more self-criticism in this vein, then perhaps it did the Men’s Rights Movement a service.

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Facebook’s initial public offering will be the largest and perhaps the most highly anticipated Internet deal in history.

Faced with great expectations, however, Facebook is staring down some potentially unnerving obstacles when it comes to key areas of monetization and growth: public distrust and display advertising apathy.

More than half (57 percent) of Facebook users polled said they never click on ads or other sponsored content when they use the site, according to a new AP-CNBC poll. Another 26 percent said they hardly ever engage in such activity. Only 4 percent of users say they often click on ads — results that are only slightly better than the 2-3 percent clickthrough rate some experts consider the benchmark for effective banner ads.

While the company makes money, in part, simply by displaying sponsored content, user clicks are a critical part of an advertiser’s calculus when gauging the effectiveness of those ads and how much they’re willing to pay for them. In the first quarter, Facebook generated 82 percent of its $1.06 billion in revenue from advertising sales. In the company’s online IPO pitch to retail investors, Chief Financial Officer David Ebersman said the company is working to make ads “more relevant, more social, and more engaging” as it looks to grow.

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It's well known that women find sexy, rebellious rogues attractive. Duh. But until now it's not really been clear why women choose to turn that attraction into long-term relationships, when they know they stand a high chance of getting burned. New research, however, reveals that the secret lies in the hormones.

Sure, a woman might choose to mate with an attractive male because evolutionarily it means attractive kids. But that doesn't entirely explain things, as there's more to life than good-looking offspring. Now, research conducted at the University of Texas at San Antonio and published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology suggests that during ovulation hormones affect judgment of parenting potential. Kristina Durante, one of the researchers, explains to Live Science:

"Under the hormonal influence of ovulation, women delude themselves into thinking that the sexy bad boys will become devoted partners and better dads. When looking at the sexy cad through ovulation goggles, Mr. Wrong looked exactly like Mr. Right."

Essentially, during ovulation women are more likely to believe that rogues would make better potential fathers—so they specifically pick sexier men over obviously more dependable men—even if they're jerks.

To establish that, female participants were asked to view online dating profiles of either sexy or reliable men during periods of both high and low fertility. When asked to predict likely paternal contribution from the prospective partners close to ovulation, the women thought the sexy men would contribute most. In other words, that long-term, they'd make better dads.

The researchers backed that up with a second study, where actors played the role of sexy cad or reliable dad, and the result turned out just the same. So, if a woman starts dating an asshole, she will—at least once a month—be under the impression that he'll make a good long-term mate. One interesting aside is the fact that the effects only seem to apply to the individual. Durante explains:

"When asked about what kind of father the sexy bad boy would make if he were to have children with another woman, women were quick to point out the bad boy's shortcomings. But when it came to their own child, ovulating women believed that the charismatic and adventurous cad would be a great father to their kids."

The take-home message from the research? Timing, my friend. Timing is everything. [Journal of Personality and Social Psychology via Live Science]

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women delude themselves

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Tameka Begs Usher Not To Leave Her Homeless

May 15, 2012
By Abena Agyeman-Fisher



How humble we’ve become. After attempting to strip singing-sensation Usher Raymond of his parental rights, now ex-wife Tameka Foster (both pictured) seemingly has only one request: a permanent home for both her and her kids on Usher’s dime, reports TMZ.

For the past few weeks, Usher and Tameka have been battling in court to determine who will have full custodial rights over their children, Usher Terry Raymond V and Naviyd Ely Raymond. As it stands, Usher currently has physical custodial rights, but Tameka challenged his right to custody by making past claims that Usher is a neglectful and irresponsible parent who has consistently failed to ask her permission on key issues, regarding their children.

When that didn’t seem to work, Tameka tried in vain to force the court to make Usher take a drug test.

According to reports, Usher has been granted the right to evict Tameka from the home she lives in Georgia. Coincidentally, Usher owns that home and can sell it at any time just as long as he notifies Tameka 60 days in advance. Since it appears that Usher does indeed plan to sell the home, Tameka is said to now be asking Usher to buy her a permanent home so she isn’t left homeless.

TMZ reports:
We’re told Tameka fears Usher is going to pull the trigger — leaving her buried in legal debt with no place to live — so she’s asking him for a permanent home for her and Usher’s kids.

Has she ever heard the saying, “Don’t bite the hand that feeds you”?

Not surprisingly, Usher has allegedly responded that he will NOT buy her another home and the ball is in his court.

Usher and Tameka married in September of 2007, but almost immediately, their union would spark a backlash from Usher fans who felt that Tameka was a gold digger who was also too old for the young star.

Not surprisingly, Usher filed for divorce from Tameka in 2009. In 2010, Usher told People magazine why the marriage didn’t work:

“We’re two different people,” he says, “and we have two different goals. It just was never going to work out 100 percent.”

Friends close to the couple felt that the marriage was doomed from the get-go:

“They peaked before they even got married. Right after it was over, they started to drift apart. [Usher] just wasn’t ready to settle down, at least not with her.”

Another source said:

“No one I’ve spoken to is surprised. As bad as this is gonna sound, it was never a matter of ‘I wonder if they’ll divorce,’ but more like ‘I wonder WHEN they’ll divorce.’”

Obviously, ever since the divorce, the only thing that binds them are the children. While the ex-couple are said to be tied in mediation talks, it seems that Tameka may be without a home soon.

xhttp://newsone.com/2015539/usher-tameka-divorce/

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When ovulating a woman's hormones influence who she sees as good potential fathers, and they specifically pick sexier men over obviously more dependable men.
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The researchers had women view online dating profiles of either a sexy man or a reliable man during periods of both high and low fertility. Participants were asked to indicate the expected paternal contribution from the men if they had a child together based on how helpful the man would be caring for the baby, shopping for food, cooking and contributing to household chores. Near ovulation women thought that the sexy man would contribute more to these domestic duties. [I suspect that the rationalisation hamster is involved here, rather than an honest assessment. But that rodent clearly is hormone-enhanced]

"Under the hormonal influence of ovulation, women delude themselves into thinking that the sexy bad boys will become devoted partners and better dads," Durante said. "When looking at the sexy cad through ovulation goggles, Mr. Wrong looked exactly like Mr. Right."

The researchers followed up that find with a second study in which women interacted directly with male actors who played the roles of sexy cad and reliable dad once during ovulation and again at low fertility. Again, ovulating women thought that the sexy cad — but not the reliable dad — would contribute more to childcare, but only as her partner (not if he shacked up with another woman).

"When asked about what kind of father the sexy bad boy would make if he were to have children with another woman, women were quick to point out the bad boy's shortcomings," said Durante. "But when it came to their own child, ovulating women believed that the charismatic and adventurous cad would be a great father to their kids."

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ay 13, 2012
So Eager for Grandchildren, They’re Paying the Egg-Freezing Clinic
By ELISSA GOOTMAN

At the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine, a popular destination for women hoping to preserve their fertility by freezing their eggs, Dr. William Schoolcraft, the founder and medical director, has started to notice something different: more of the women are arriving with company.

“I see these patients come in, and they’re with two elderly people, and I’m like, ‘What the hey?’ ” Dr. Schoolcraft said.

The gray-haired entourages, it turns out, are the parents, tagging along to lend support — emotional and often financial — as their daughters turn to the fledgling field of egg freezing to improve their chances of having children later on, when they are ready to start a family.

The technology to freeze a woman’s delicate eggs to be used later, when the eggs being released by her ovaries may no longer be viable, has improved sharply over the past decade. There currently is no single source of data on the number of women who are choosing to freeze their eggs, but doctors in the United States say the practice is slowly growing.

The procedure remains expensive, generally costing between $8,000 and $18,000. And because it offers no guarantees and is still considered experimental by the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, a professional association, it can seem to some like an extravagant gamble.

But it is a gamble that many would-be grandparents are willing to take with their daughters, even if it means navigating a potentially uncomfortable conversation.

“By the time Allison was 35, I felt the clock was tick-tick-ticking,” said Candace Kramer, 61, whose daughter took her up on the suggestion to freeze her eggs — and her offer to pay half the bill. “I viewed it as opening up an opportunity for her.”

Such arrangements are not unusual, said Dr. Daniel Shapiro, the medical director of Reproductive Biology Associates of Atlanta. He estimated that at least three quarters of his center’s egg-freezing patients — more than 100 over the past two years — have parents who paid part or all of the bill.

“I was surprised at first about the parental involvement, but now I expect it to be the case,” said Dr. Shapiro, adding that many patients tell him, “My parents want me to have this as a gift.”

His center, along with an offshoot called My Egg Bank North America, are trying to make it easier, and less uncomfortable, for family members to pay for the procedure, marketing the “Gift of Hope”: a gift certificate and a silver charm bracelet for the recipients.

Rachel Lehmann-Haupt, author of “In Her Own Sweet Time: Unexpected Adventures in Finding Love, Commitment and Motherhood,” described conversations about fertility between women and their parents as “the postmodern, adult birds-and-the-bees talk.”

She added, “There is a very fine line between concern and pressure.”

Gloria Hayes, who lives in Darien, Conn., bit her tongue for months after hearing about egg freezing, hoping that her daughter Jennifer, a restaurateur in Telluride, Colo., would broach the topic herself.

“I just didn’t feel right approaching her about it, because it’s almost a criticism in a way — ‘You’re getting old,’ ” Mrs. Hayes said. When Jennifer finally floated the idea, “I was thrilled,” Mrs. Hayes said. “I thought this could just take a lot of the stress off her.”

Mrs. Hayes and her husband offered to pay for the procedure, but Jennifer Hayes was initially reluctant to accept the money.

“My mom said to me, ‘Do you think we’d rather have this money sitting in an account or have a potential grandchild someday?’ ” she recalled. “When she positioned it that way, it somehow just changed the way I felt.”

“It’s a family decision,” said Ms. Hayes, 36, who now blogs about her experience at RetrieveFreezeRelax.com. “Because you’re talking about your future family. Grandchildren are really important to parents. Everybody wants to experience being a grandparent.”

Susan Lorman raised the idea of egg freezing when her daughter Stephanie, a sales representative in Los Angeles, was over for dinner shortly before her 35th birthday. Stephanie had just broken up with the latest in a string of boyfriends and was in tears, distraught over what-if situations that involved losing her shot at motherhood.

“I thought no, no, no, I’m going to give it one more year,” Stephanie said. But on the eve of her 36th birthday, Stephanie took her mother up on her suggestion and called a fertility doctor, David Tourgeman, whom she had met at the gym.

“It was a gift of love,” Mrs. Lorman said. “I’d had my kids at 22, and here she is, a healthy, beautiful young woman who felt her years were passing her by.”

When Brigitte Adams, a San Francisco marketing consultant, brought up the idea of freezing her eggs to her parents, her father quickly approved. So quickly that, for a moment, Ms. Adams felt stung.

“It was a little degree of shock,” she said. “This is actually real if they’re pushing me towards this,” she recalled thinking at the time.

Ms. Adams, who is 39, said she felt “this incredible calmness” after freezing her eggs. “No longer was I under such pressure that the next guy I dated would be daddy material,” she said.

Her parents not only paid half the cost of the procedure but also invested in Ms. Adams’s new venture: Eggsurance.com, a Web site about egg freezing.

As the technology has evolved, more fertility clinics across the country have begun offering egg freezing to two groups: women preparing to undergo cancer treatment, which can affect fertility, and those seeking to expand their window for childbearing.

The Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, a professional group, has begun collecting data on how many women freeze their eggs, but it is not yet available.

The number of babies born from frozen eggs is not tracked. Some experts put the figure at more than 2,000 worldwide, many from donor eggs.

The American Society for Reproductive Medicine’s experimental label is under review; some fertility professionals say that removing the label could prompt a surge of interest.

Still, there are doctors who caution that egg freezing can provide a false sense of security: What if a patient pays to freeze her eggs at 34, only to discover that she is unable to get pregnant with them in her 40s?

Such risks, though, can seem less weighty to patients when their parents share the cost.

Amy West, 37, a psychologist in Chicago, said that she could have afforded the $7,600 bill to freeze her eggs, but that with her parents paying $5,000, “it somehow didn’t feel like as scary an investment.”

In November, Ms. West’s mother, father and brother flew in from Washington for the egg retrieval, which followed days of hormone injections.

Even Ms. West’s mother, an international environmental and human rights lawyer, whom Ms. West described as “very career oriented” and “not the type to nag,” could not resist a joke after hearing how many of her daughter’s eggs had been successfully frozen.

“I have 26 grandbabies!” she exclaimed.

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The poised, professional crowd, outfitted in black blazers, leather boots, and trendy thick-framed glasses, was composed mostly of women in their mid-20s to mid-30s -- prime Cosmo readers and all there waiting patiently to hear Wu, who typically charges $160 an hour for "private romance counseling," explain their surprising plight: being single women in a country with a startling excess of men.

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The majority of her talk was devoted not to such timeless aphorisms, but to describing a new conundrum in China: the plight of its sheng nu, or "leftover ladies." In popular parlance, sheng nu refers to women above a certain age -- some say 27, others 30 -- who are unmarried and presumably "left over," too old to be desirable. Increasingly, sheng nu are a topic of alternating humor and alarm for Chinese newspaper columnists, TV sitcoms, reality dating shows, and studies by government bodies like the All-China Women's Federation; according to its 2010 survey, more than 90 percent of male respondents agreed that women should marry before age 27 or risk being forever undesired.

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China has far too few women, not too many. This is a country where 118 boys were born for every 100 girls in 2010, and by 2020 the number of men unable to find partners is expected to reach 24 million. So how could any women possibly be left over?

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The upshot is that by the 2020s, an estimated 15 to 20 percent of Chinese men of marriageable age will lack potential brides, according to Jiang Quanbao of Xi'an Jiaotong University. You might think this would create a sense of entitled ease among China's single ladies, but the reality is rather more complicated, as the attentive supplicants to the Spicy Love Doctor attest.

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"Why do sheng nu happen now in China?" Wu asked. After a dramatic pause, she answered her own question: "It is a result of high GDP growth." At this point, several women in the audience fidgeted, wary of an economics sermon, but Wu continued. "In the past, there was no such word as sheng nu. But today women have more wealth and education -- they have better jobs, and higher requirements for men." She reflected: "Now you want to find a man you have deep feelings for who also has a house and a car. You won't all find that."

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"Those who can bear the shortcomings and sufferings of men will get married," she concluded. "Those not, single."

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IN 2006, CHINA'S Cosmopolitan ran the headline, "Welcome to the Age of the Leftover Ladies." One might expect the magazine to exaggerate women's angst to peddle copies, but the notion that marriage is fundamentally changing in China is borne out by the numbers: Women in urban China are marrying later, and the most educated marry latest -- or, increasingly, not at all.

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In 1982, just 5 percent of urban Chinese women ages 25 to 29 were unmarried, according to Wang. By 1995, that percentage had doubled. By 2008, it had nearly tripled.

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Indeed, there's a common joke that there are three genders in China: men, women, and women with Ph.D.s. Men marry women, and women with Ph.D.s don't marry.

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The takeaway: Get worried, and get married. Or, as Fincher wrote for Ms.: "If you want to stand a snowball's chance in hell of ever getting married in this country, don't demand too much from your man."

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As one common Chinese slogan has it, a harmonious family is the cornerstone of a harmonious society. Clearly, Beijing is worried that the inverse is also true.

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Before our meeting, I had asked her to read the recent Atlantic cover story about unmarried American women, "All the Single Ladies," to see whether it resonated. Yes, she told me, pointing especially to this passage: "When Gloria Steinem said, in the 1970s, 'We're becoming the men we wanted to marry,' I doubt even she realized the prescience of her words."

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Edward Klein's new book on Barack Obama, The Amateur: Barack Obama in the White House, is a withering portrayal of a radical adrift, in over his head, drowning in his own incompetency -- while being weighed down by a small circle of "advisers" who are compounding the problem of the Amateur in the White House.

Klein's book begins with a talisman-like quote uttered by Barack Obama when his recently appointed Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner tried to boost Obama's ego by telling him, "Your legacy is going to be preventing the second Great Depression." To which Barack Obama responded, "That's not enough for me."

As all of America knows by now, Obama has aggressively sought to "fundamentally transform" America -- one of the few promises he has kept from the days of 2008. Five trillion dollars of borrowing, ObamaCare passed over the objections of the majority of Americans through legislative legerdemain and special deals made with resistant politicians, failed stimulus, green programs failing left and right as taxpayers are left holding the bag, a recovery that is the most anemic on record, an America that has been sundered by the man who promises to unite us, America weaker abroad and at home -- yes, America has been fundamentally transformed. Mission Accomplished.

But how and why did Obama succeed in such a catastrophic way? That is the question that Klein successfully answers in his extremely readable and enjoyable book, with enough spicy details to satisfy the craving of anyone interested in how President Obama and those closest to him have driven us to the condition we find ourselves in as we approach November.

One of the motifs that runs throughout the book is Barack Obama's sheer level of incompetency. He has the fatal conceit of many politicians: an overweening ego. That may be a prerequisite for politicians and leaders, but when it is unleavened by a willingness to consider the views of others, it becomes a fatal conceit. And Obama has that trait in abundance.

Stories tumble out that reveal a man who believes he is all but omniscient -- unwilling to give any credence to the views of others (especially but not limited to those across the aisle). Experts in management are interviewed who point out that he lacks essential qualities of leadership. Indeed, the book gets its title from an outburst from Bill Clinton, who was trying to encourage Hillary to take on Obama in the Democratic primary of 2012:

Obama doesn't know how to be president. He doesn't know how the world works. He's incompetent. He's...he's...Barack Obama's an amateur.

But Klein does not rest there. He delves into associates from Obama's career in Cook County politics, his stint as a state senator, and his rise to the United States Senate. There is a common pattern: Obama likes to campaign, but once he is elected and actually starts working, his interest flags, and he starts looking for the next "big thing" -- electorally speaking. He had few if any accomplishments or professional standing in any of his previous positions. Even when he served as a lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School, he avoided any encounters with other faculty who enjoyed discussing the law. His reluctance to engage them is revealing in and of itself, suggesting he had a reason for his lack of confidence.

His disdain toward working with others is manifest. He has gained a reputation over the last few years as being cold and distant, refusing to engage, as have other presidents, in the give-and-take of politics, in the social niceties that help grease the wheels in Washington. Liberal Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen recently advised him to read Robert Caro's newest volume on the life of Lyndon Johnson as a primer on how to be president. Johnson, of course, was a master at pulling levers of power, but he also knew how to persuade individual politicians on both sides of the aisle to work with him on legislation. But, of course, LBJ also had the common touch and, having risen from humble beginnings, never considered it beneath him to work with those underneath him. Not so Barack Obama. He complained to foreign leaders that he had to waste time talking with "congressmen from Palookaville." At another time, he switched locales and said he was tired of dealing with people from "Podunk."

His campaign trail comments regarding small-town America as being populated by "bitter" people who cling to guns and Bibles was not a one-off. They are reflective of his views.

But the high and the mighty also come in for the Obama treatment. Klein reveals dismay among former Obama supporters who feel they have been mistreated, maligned, and thrown under the bus. Obama's most generous early donors have been all but ignored; early mentors in the black business community have been sidelined if not completely ditched; people don't hear from him or his staff unless a fundraiser is coming up. But there is more: Caroline Kennedy is angry at the way she and her family were used for campaign purposes in 2008 and then summarily dismissed and stored away like so many movie props have been (the latter is my description).

Even Oprah Winfrey has been stiff-armed by the Obamas. According to the book, Oprah took a big risk in supporting Obama in 2008 and campaigning for Obama in Iowa, being a big boost in his campaign. The ratings for her show weakened significantly (and her new network has been a huge disappointment). But when she has tried to visit the White House, she has been all but treated as persona non grata. Apparently, Michelle Obama is a possessive person who fears the influence Oprah may have over Barack Obama (more on this below). Oprah blames it on Michelle's anti-obesity campaign. She is quoted as saying, "Michelle hates fat people and doesn't want me waddling around the White House." Klein digs up a quotation of Michelle Obama's from a White House source that seems to confirm Oprah's suspicion:

Oprah only wants to cash in using the White House as a backdrop for her show to perk up ratings. Oprah with her yo-yo dieting and huge girth, is a terrible role model. Kids will look at Oprah, who's rich and famous and huge, and figure it's okay to be fat.

Oprah, Caroline Kennedy, Pastor Jeremiah Wright (who merits a chapter), and Obama's former long-time doctor (who feels Obama is distant and lacks feeling, passion, and humanity) all join a long list of people whom the Obamas have used, abused, and then cast aside once they moved into the White House.

A few have survived the winnowing process, of course. There is Michelle, who might be described as the living and real-life descendant of Lady Macbeth. The book provides some history of the early days between Barack and Michelle: marked by some tempests, yet also marked by Michelle's overwhelming push for Barack to win power and wealth. Insiders are reluctant to tangle with the First Lady, and with good reason. Michelle, like her husband, has a proclivity to blame others for her husband's failures. Former Press Secretary Robert Gibbs felt her sting when it was revealed that Michelle had complained about life in the White House to the then-first lady of France, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. Gibbs acted to control the damage by arranging for the Élysée Palace to issue a denial.

But the response did not come quickly enough for Michelle, and she arranged for Valerie Jarrett -- close to the Obamas for years, and who has an omnipresence in the White House that makes the unelected and unconfirmed czar issue seem trivial -- to deliver a stern rebuke to Gibbs, who counter-attacked. Anyone heard from Robert Gibbs lately?

The role of Valerie Jarrett has prompted much speculation. As Edward Klein notes, she has a mouthful of a title -- senior adviser and assistant to the president for intergovernmental affairs and public engagement -- that "doesn't begin to do justice to her unrivaled status in the White House." Valerie Jarrett apparently has a role in most major decisions: she often appears in meetings the president has with major political leaders from Capitol Hill and with foreign leaders as well. She often stays behind to have private discussions with the president. Obama admitted that he ran every decision by her.

That is worrying since, as Klein notes, Jarrett's own career is not one that would prepare her to assume such a prominent role. Hers is no rags-to-riches story that would give her the "chops" to have such a Svengali-like influence over the president of the United States. She was blessed with a wonderful set of advantages -- descended from a highly regarded political family in Chicago. Jarrett was a force to be reckoned with in the Daley administration and then capitalized on her political connections to land a job heading up a real estate company in Chicago where she oversaw, among other developments, properties that under her company's management degenerated into slums. Business leaders are aghast that she has such a powerful role in the White House. A donor is quoted as saying that not only is Valerie Jarrett a liability, but others in the White House concur with his views. Jarrett has butted heads with Rahm Emanuel, who felt that it was wrong to focus on passing ObamaCare when the economy and jobs should have been higher priorities.

Who won that match? Rahm returned to Chicago and became mayor in 2009.

The roles of Michelle Obama and Valerie Jarrett cannot be overstated. They are symptomatic of a larger problem in the White House decision-making process (one that I noted in "How Obama Makes Decisions").

Barack Obama, to a greater extent than any modern president, refuses to listen to the views of others or consult with experts and advisers outside his own tight and constricted circle from Cook County. There are many revelations of his faulty decision making uncovered by Klein. Indeed, one of Jarrett's roles is to shield Obama from dealing with people who don't agree with him or who may say something that deflates his ego.

When Bill Daley (the chief of staff) realized that the contraception and abortifacient mandates of ObamaCare might offend Catholics, he arranged a meeting without Jarrett's knowledge between Obama and New York then-Archbishop Timothy Dolan to deal with an issue that would offend many as violating the principle of religious freedom (as well as Catholic beliefs). Jarrett went to the president and vented her anger.

Anyone seen Bill Daley lately?

On issue after issue, President Obama remains his insular self, refusing to seek counsel or input from others with more experience.

Critics believe he has made a mess of foreign policy precisely because not only does he have a dearth of experience in this area, but because, under our system, foreign policy is one of the few areas where a president enjoys almost unlimited power. Thus, he is free to formulate his own agenda regardless of the views of others and the damage these policies cause.

When pro-Israel Americans met with Obama to discuss his actions toward Israel (that many, including myself, view as being counterproductive) he dismissed the ideas of Abe Foxman, head of the Anti-Defamation League, with the statement "you are absolutely wrong." The president, who has no compunction telling people that they are not only wrong, but "absolutely wrong" in public, needs to start feeling some of the empathy he accuses Republicans of lacking. According to veteran journalist Richard Chesnoff, quoted in the book, "Obama's problem in dealing with the Arab-Israeli conundrum" comes "from his one-man style and his inflated view of his own leadership talents[.] ... [P]erhaps, even more egregiously, he seems to have an exaggerated sense of his own depth of understanding of the Middle East, which is simply not borne out by his background or experience." There may be more to it than that to explain the pressure he has put on our one true ally in the Middle East, Israel. American Thinker published numerous articles in 2008 covering not only Pastor Jeremiah Wright, Junior's views of Israel as an apartheid state, but Obama's associations with anti-Israel Palestinians in Chicago, his own suspect language regarding Israel, and his close relationship with Samantha Power (now playing a key role on his National Security Council), who not only has a long anti-Israel history but also made an anti-Semitic remark that was smothered by the media in 2008. There were good reasons for the Los Angeles Times to run a column during the campaign that "Allies of Palestinians see a friend in Obama."

Readers will thoroughly enjoy Klein's book on Obama. There are substantive issues raised about Obama's leadership abilities that are enhanced with interesting digressions regarding life inside ObamaWorld and how those dynamics effect decisions made from the Oval Office.

Klein concludes the book with doubt that Obama could ever change his approach toward governing and suspicion that his agenda is to impose a vast redistribution scheme upon America that has worked so well in the decaying and disintegrating European Union. He wonders if Republicans are up to the task of pointing out to the public the truth about Obama's agenda, given the overwhelming media bias in favor of Barack Obama.

Klein's book could serve as a roadmap for Republicans.

Ed Lasky is news editor of American Thinker.

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Serena calls male players 'weenies'The Daily

Updated May 14, 2012 10:36 AM ET
MADRID
Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and other men’s tennis players who have complained about the blue clay at the Madrid Open are “weenies,” according to former women’s No. 1 Serena Williams.

Asked about criticism from Djokovic and Nadal over the slippery surface on the Manolo Santana show court, Williams said at a news conference that women were simply tougher than their male counterparts.

“Women are way tougher than men. That’s why we have the babies, you guys could never handle kids,” Williams said after thumping top seed Victoria Azarenka, 6-1, 6-3, to win the Madrid title yesterday. “We ladies don’t complain we just do our best. On the WTA (tour) we are real performers, we are not about going out there and being weenies.”

Dictionary.com lists several definitions of “weenie” including “an insignificant, disliked person” or “a stupid and inept male.”

Djokovic and Nadal have threatened to boycott the Madrid event next year unless the traditional red dirt is reinstated.

Later, Roger Federer rallied to beat Tomas Berdych 3-6, 7-5, 7-5 and win the Madrid Open for a third time.

“It is amazing to win here again,’’ said Federer, who will overtake Nadal as the second-ranked player behind Djokovic. “It has been a tough tournament. Tough to move, but you’ve got to try to make the most of it. Here there was some good tennis and some bad tennis, but you see that in all tournaments.’’

Meanwhile, the red clay courts of the Italian Open in Rome have been heaven for Djokovic after a week on the experimental blue surface in Madrid.

The top-ranked Djokovic was highly critical of the blue clay tested at the Madrid Open, especially after he lost to fellow Serb Janko Tipsarevic in the quarterfinals.

“It feels great,’’ Djokovic said. “After that blue clay, this clay seems like paradise.

“The most basic thing you have in our sport — the most important — is the movement,’’ Djokovic said. “If you cannot be in balance for the ball, and to hit the ball, then everything becomes twice as difficult. That’s the biggest difference. Here you can actually be on the ball and slide well, where there you were slipping and falling down.’’

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Over the weekend it was announced that California’s large $9 billion budget deficit was no longer $9 billion but $16 billion. Whoops. Last week J.P. Morgan Chase, a darling of the Federal Reserve, reported a $2 billion trading loss on “synthetic derivatives” yet still had the audacity to state no further regulation was needed. Whoops. What we have here is a system of phony numbers and massive speculation. This plays into the giant pool of shadow inventory sitting in bank balance sheets while trillions of dollars went to bailout these banks. Even accounting standards were frozen for these speculators. Instead of working to increase transparency and help the overall American taxpayer they instead are using the same leverage to gamble on global stock markets. The system is interconnected and that is why the California budget figures this weekend came as no surprise. What is surprising is the cheerleaders narrowly focused on real estate and pretending the economy around them is completely sound. Do they have ear plugs and blinders on as to what is really transpiring?

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