Owners of Jersey Shore Psychic Arrested on Counterfeit Charges

The owners of Jersey Shore Psychic, a Boardwalk shop which not only offers palm and energy readings, but also t-shirts and other wares, were arrested and charged with possession of counterfeit products following a police raid on Wednesday, according to Capt. Steven Ang of the Ocean City Police Department.

Bobbie Mitchell, 50, of Somers Point and June Mitchell, 31, of Somers Point, were both charged with the possession of over 25 counterfeit products, a police press release said.

The police executed a search warrant after receiving several complaints from customers of the store, who claimed that they had purchased headphones that were not the authentic product as advertised by the packaging, the release said.

The police department seized more than 100 counterfeit products during the investigation, which also included copy righted t-shirts that were allegedly not the authentic product, the release said.

via Owners of Jersey Shore Psychic Arrested on Counterfeit Charges – Ocean City, NJ Patch.

Who will be first with the obvious witty retort?

Radioactive art tackles fall-out for Japan

Click for more photos KEN and Julia Yonetani are adamant their radioactive artworks are safe. They even had scientists from the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation measure the amount of radiation produced by the works in What the Birds Knew.

Yet it’s hard not to feel apprehensive in the presence of installations that glow brightly because of the uranium glass beads used in their creation.

”I guess when you turn on the light and it glows and you’ve been handling it all day you go ‘oh’,” Julia says. ”We got the beads tested just to make sure because when people hear ‘uranium’ they automatically think of danger.”

The couple, who have previously created artworks with salt and sugar, used 50,000 uranium glass beads in USA, a two-metre-wide chandelier that illuminates the ground floor of the 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art in Haymarket. It is the largest of the 30 chandeliers they will create to represent the nuclear-powered nations of the world.

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Upstairs, a six-metre ant made of 10,000 beads stands opposite glowing warning signs that read ”meltdown” and ”radioactive”. The uranium glass came from a US company and wasn’t difficult to import into Australia nor dangerous to use.

Uranium glass is not sufficiently radioactive to pose a health hazard to viewers either, the Yonetanis say. It was widely used in the late 19th-century to make decorative objects such as sugar bowls, cake stands and drinking glasses.

The installations might emit less radiation than a smoke detector or mammogram but they are designed to convey the fear of contamination that Japan has been living with since last year’s Fukushima nuclear disaster.

”We were trying to bring to the viewer the fear of the unknown,” Julia says.

via Radioactive art tackles fall-out for Japan.

The Sikh Shooting: DoJ and FBI Warned of Planned Terror Attack in April

US Attorney James Santelle, who is analyzing the case, stated that he cannot determine if this is a case of domestic terrorism, although reports are claiming it is, justifying the FBI involvement so quickly.

Kurt Weins, resident who lives in an upper flat in a cordoned off area close to the location of the shooting, was told by law enforcement not to speak to the press after they conducted their interview of his summation of the events.

Seven victims died before police arrived on the scene at 10:25 am in Oak Creek. The mainstream media is pointing to this incident being “the second mass shooting in the US in less than a month” while also mentioning that this tragedy could be related to the House of Representatives requesting that FBI monitor hate crimes directed at Sikhs in April; nearly 2 months ago, Attorney General Eric Holder and FBI Director Robert Muller were warned to watch for this exact type of incident.

Naming Sikh-Americans as possible targets for “hate crimes” the letter to Holder and Muller commented on the Sikh’s “distinct identity and common misperceptions with respect to their attire and appearance” saying that this group is often erroneously believed to be “affiliated with extremists and were somehow responsible for the September 11 terrorist attacks.”

It was arbitrarily mentioned in an MSM article that the gunman had a “9/11 tattoo” possibly making the tie between the attack and 9/11 retaliation.

Joseph Crowley, House Representative wrote in a letter to Holder and Muller that: “Numerous reports have documented how those practicing the Sikh religion are often targeted for hate violence because of their religiously-mandated turbans — i.e. because of their Sikh identity, regardless of whether the attacker understands the victim to be Sikh or not.”

via » The Sikh Shooting: DoJ and FBI Warned of Planned Terror Attack in April Alex Jones’ Infowars: There’s a war on for your mind!.

Related from Infowars:

Sikh Shooter a Former Psyop Soldier Linked to FBI’s National Alliance

CBS News reports that Page enlisted in the Army in April 1992 and was given a less-than-honorable discharge in October 1998. He was last stationed in Fort Bragg, N.C., serving in the psychological operations unit.

Psyops are not confined to the military and usually span a number agencies, including the CIA, DIA, NSC, NSA, and SAIC.

In 2002, the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon defined psychological operations as “integrated employment of the core capabilities of electronic warfare, computer network operations, psychological operations, military deception, and operations security, in concert with specified supporting and related capabilities, to influence, disrupt, corrupt or usurp adversarial human and automated decision making while protecting our own. Also called IO.” (emphasis added) (see Joint Publication 1-02: Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms).

Since the alleged shooter, Wade Michael Page, is now characterized as a white supremacist, the Southern Poverty Law Center is leading the information campaign to portray him as a racist skinhead. In addition to fronting a “hate rock band,” the Southern Poverty Law Center “has found that Page also attempted to purchase goods from the neo-Nazi National Alliance, then America’s most important hate group,” according to SPLC propaganda minister Mark Potok. …

 

Tattooed preacher who ‘cures’ cancer by kicking people in the face

An evangelist who kicks followers in the face, claiming his violence will cure them of cancer, is to tour Britain this month – but his proposed visit has provoked outrage and demands that he be banned from entering the country.

Tattooed preacher Todd Bentley, who as a 15-year-old was convicted of a sex attack on a boy aged seven, claims God uses him as an instrument to heal the sick, and is urging the frail to attend his shows.

The former drug user, who is Canadian but based in the United States, even laughs about his ‘healing’ techniques. In one show he treated a man claiming to be suffering from colon cancer by planting his knee hard into the victim’s stomach. The man fell to the floor in agony.

On another occasion, a man was pushed over so forcefully that he lost a tooth.

Burly Mr Bentley, 36, said in one YouTube clip: ‘And I’m thinking why is the power of God not moving? And He said, “Because you haven’t kicked that woman in the face.”

‘And there is this older lady worshipping right in front of the platform and the Holy Spirit spoke to me. The gift of faith comes on me. He said, “Kick her in the face with your biker boot.” I inched closer and I went bam! And just as my boot made contact with her nose, she fell under the power of God.’

Labour MP for Croydon North Malcolm Wicks has urged Home Secretary Theresa May to ban Mr Bentley from the UK. He told her: ‘His visit can do nothing but harm and I would be grateful for any measures you can take.’

Mr Bentley launches his tour at the 400-capacity Croydon Conference Centre in South London with three shows from August 30, before visiting Liverpool, Cwmbran and Co Armagh in September.

Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, the former Bishop of Rochester who now runs a church education charity, said: ‘I think the Home Secretary should make enquiries and see if there is any threat to public order. If the police have any indication that violence will be used against people who may be ill or vulnerable, it will be for her to decide if police should attend.’

Peter May, a prominent Christian GP who served for 25 years on the Church of England’s ruling General Synod, and has investigated spurious faith healers for more than 20 years, said: ‘I’m concerned by Todd Bentley’s methods because a physical injury on any sick person could be very serious. …

via Todd Bentley: MP calls for ban on tattooed preacher who ‘cures’ cancer by kicking people in the face | Mail Online.

Faith is so weird. Some people will perform amazing mental back-flips to justify a previous bad decision, rather than just saying, “Ooh, that was dumb of me.”

Cancer is s group of diseases involving unregulated cell growth. The causes of cancer are 90-95% environmental [link]. In other words, only 5–10% of all cancers are due to an inherited gene defect, so instead of a kick in the face, you need to change your lifestyle and exposure to cancer causing agents.

 

 

Lost da Vinci painting found in Scottish farmhouse?

For years it sat on a farmhouse wall gathering dust.

And when Fiona McLaren redecorated, she didn’t even take the time to cover the apparently worthless painting in a protective sheet, so it got flicked in specks of paint.

However, in an astounding twist it has emerged that the picture is likely to have been the work of master artist Leonardo da Vinci and worth over £100million.

The striking portrait, which shows woman embracing a young child, was nearly assigned to the rubbish tip on several occasions, but facing financial difficulties Ms McLaren, 59, from Scotland decided to take the painting to an expert for a valuation.

Auctioneer Harry Robertson, the director of Sotheby’s in Scotland, gasped when he saw the art 23ins by 28ins work which had hung on a landing and in a bedroom in London for decades, before being transferred to Scotland when Ms McLaren and her mother moved into a farmhouse

‘I showed it to him [Mr Robertson] and he was staggered, speechless save for a sigh of exclamation,’ said Ms McLaren, according to The People.

Mr Robertson took the work to London for further testing by specialists on old masters and next year the painting will be closely inspected by experts at the Hamilton Kerr Institute at the University of Cambridge, where it should be dated conclusively.

The work of art came into the possession of the McLaren family through Fiona’s late father George, a doctor who had received it as a gift from a patient in the 1960s.

When George died in 1979, the painting transferred to her mother who gave it to her daughter as a 40th birthday present.

Da Vinci paintings normally fetch in exces of £100million and a string of art experts have now shown excitement in this particular work.

Former Antiques Roadshow presenter Sebastian Thewes, an ex-director of Christie’s in Scotland said he believed that da Vinci, considered the greatest human mind who has ever lived, had a hand in the painting.

Other experts have stated that the painting is at the very least from the da Vinci school.

Professor Carlo Pedretti from the University of California said he thought it was by a Leonardo da Vinci pupil of a later generation, possibly the 16th century.

Ms McLaren said her father used to call the painting ‘Madonna and Child with John the Baptist, but having spent a decade researching the history of the work, the nurse believes the painting is actually not the Virgin Mary with baby Jesus, but Mary Magdalene and her son.

She thinks the true meaning of the artwork may have been disguised for centuries because such a work would have been considered heretic by the Roman Catholic Church.

The Pope decreed the Virgin Mary should be illustrated in blue whereas Mary Magdalene had to be shown in red attire, as depicted in this painting.

Leonardo, who excelled at not only painting, but also mathematics, engineering, architecture, sculpture, music and science, was known to hide meanings in his works and the fact the woman in the picture is holding a carnation could be a symbol for marriage.

Florida University-based Michael E Abrams said the picture was ‘brimming with sensuality’ with the artist taking a tremendous risk of being burned at the stake for heresy after the Pope was re-established in Rome.

via The lost da Vinci: Is this painting found in Scottish farmhouse one of master’s lost works? | Mail Online.

All presidents bar one are directly descended from a medieval English king

What do Barack Obama, Thomas Jefferson, George W. Bush and the other past U.S. presidents have in common? Besides holding the coveted title of commander-in-chief, it appears that all of them but one are cousins.

The remarkable discovery was made by 12-year-old BridgeAnne d’Avignon, of Salinas, California, who created a ground-breaking family tree that connected 42 of 43 U.S. presidents to one common, and rather unexpected, ancestor: King John of England.

‘They all have the trait of wanting power,’ d’Avignon told the station WFMY.

John’s other claim to fame, or infamy, is that he was depicted as the villain in the Robin Hood tales.

D’Avignon, a seventh-grader at Monte Vista Christian School in Watsonville, started the project in hopes of tracing back her own bloodline in France, but somewhere along the way she decided to take her genealogical quest to the highest level.

In order to create the family tree, the 12-year-old spent months scouring through over 500,000 names in search of the ‘presidential Adam.’

Her 80-year-old grandfather, who has been tracing roots for nearly six decades, helped her make the presidential links.

D’Avignon started with the first U.S. president, George Washington, she traced both the male and female family lines to make the connection.

Prior to d’Avignon’s discovery, genealogists were only able to link 22 families of presidents, likely because they only focused on male bloodlines.

The only former commander-in-chief not linked to King John is the eighth president, Martin Van Buren, who had Dutch roots.

The teen also found out that she is the 18th cousin of President Obama. She even wrote to her new-found relative a letter to share her findings with him.

So far, however, d’Avignon said she received only a generic response from the White House.

via All presidents bar one are directly descended from a medieval English king | Mail Online.

The Another Amazing Spiderman

I just saw the latest spiderman (2012) movie and I enjoyed it. Rhys Ifans (who played Xenophilius Lovegood) in the last Harry Potter movie) was great as the Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde type villain. But really, after seeing it, I have the same reaction as when I first saw the previews… I have no idea why they made this movie.

It was the same basic story with different actors as the last series from 2002, which was to me, pretty flawless. I like the story, scenes and actors better in the 2002 version, so this was just confusing and it waters down the earlier classic. They should have used these new actors in a whole new plot!

Okay, and having Peter Parker not shoot his own webs in this one when he did in the last series was lame.

Hey, let’s make a movie about Superman where he doesn’t really have x-ray vision, but he invents x-ray goggles he has to wear. Thumbs down. Make the new character have powers better than the last one at least. So, I agree with Scott Mendelson’s review in the Huffington Post:

… the Marc Webb-helmed reboot is here, and it fails in fundamental ways despite not being an outright terrible film. It fails by both not being different enough from Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man and not being better than Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man …

By hewing too closely to what came before while mostly failing to be superior and/or notably different, it renders itself needless. In a future time, when I chose to watch a Spider-Man film, I can’t imagine ever choosing this one, which is the greatest tragedy for a number of talented people who have crafted something of no real long-term artistic value. As much as I would prefer to judge the film in a vacuum, I just can’t. The Amazing Spider-Man’s greatest crime is not that its a corporate-mandated reboot, a relatively mediocre one no-less, of a still-vital ongoing franchise.

It’s greatest crime is that it is an unofficial remake of a 10-year-old blockbuster masquerading as a wholly new motion picture while attempting to take credit for what the prior filmmakers got right the first time. …

Curiosity Rover Lands Safely on Mars

NASA’s Curiosity rover has landed on Mars! Its descent-stage retrorockets fired, guiding it to the surface. Nylon cords lowered the rover to the ground in the “sky crane” maneuver. When the spacecraft sensed touchdown, the connecting cords were severed, and the descent stage flew out of the way. The time of day at the landing site is mid-afternoon — about 3 p.m. local Mars time at Gale Crater. The time at JPL’s mission control is about 10:31 p.m. Aug. 5 PDT (early morning EDT).

More: nasa.gov

When can we see new photos from Mars?

If a group of tourists piled out of a transport vehicle onto the surface of Mars, they’d no doubt start snapping pictures wildly. NASA’s Curiosity rover, set to touch down on the Red Planet the evening of Aug. 5 PDT (early morning EDT), will take a more careful approach to capturing its first scenic views.
The car-size rover’s very first images will come from the one-megapixel Hazard-Avoidance cameras (Hazcams) attached to the body of the rover. Once engineers have determined that it is safe to deploy the rover’s Remote Sensing Mast and its high-tech cameras, a process that may take several days, Curiosity will begin to survey its exotic surroundings.
“A set of low-resolution gray scale Hazcam images will be acquired within minutes of landing on the surface,” said Justin Maki of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “Once all of the critical systems have been checked out by the engineering team and the mast is deployed, the rover will image the landing site with higher-resolution cameras.”
Maki led the development of Curiosity’s 12 engineering cameras — eight Hazcams at the front and back of the rover, and four Navigation cameras (Navcams) at the top of the rover’s “look-out” mast. All the engineering cameras acquire black-and-white pictures from left and right stereo “eyes,” which are merged to provide three-dimensional information. Half of the cameras are backups, meaning there’s one set for each of the rover’s A- and B-side redundant computers.
The very first images are likely to arrive more than two hours after landing, due to the timing of NASA’s signal-relaying Odyssey orbiter. They will be captured with the left and right Hazcams at the back and front of the rover, and they will not yet be full-resolution (the two images arriving on Earth first are “thumbnail” copies, which are 64 by 64 pixels in size). The Hazcams are equipped with very wide-angle, fisheye lenses, initially capped with clear dust covers. The covers are designed to protect the cameras from dust that may be kicked up during landing; they are clear just in case they don’t pop off as expected.
These first views will give engineers a good idea of what surrounds Curiosity, as well as its location and tilt. “Ensuring that the rover is on stable ground is important before raising the rover’s mast,” said Mission Manager Jennifer Trosper at JPL. “We are using an entirely new landing system on this mission, so we are proceeding with caution.”
Color pictures from the rover’s Mars Descent Imager, or MARDI, acquired as the rover descends to the Martian surface, will help pinpoint the rover’s location. Initial images from MARDI are expected to be released Aug. 6, the day after landing. These will also be in the form of thumbnails (in the case of the science cameras, thumbnails can vary in size, with the largest being 192 pixels wide by 144 pixels high). One full-resolution image may also be returned at this time.
Additional color views of the planet’s surface are expected the morning of Aug. 7 from the Mars Hand Lens Imager, or MAHLI, one of five devices on the rover’s Inspector Gadget-like arm. The camera is designed to take close-up pictures of rocks and soil, but can also take images out to the horizon. When Curiosity lands and its arm is still stowed, the instrument will be pointed to the side, allowing it to capture an initial color view of the Gale Crater area.
Once Curiosity’s mast is standing tall, the Navcams will begin taking one-megapixel stereo pictures 360 degrees around the rover as well as images of the rover deck. These cameras have medium-angle, 45-degree fields of views and could resolve the equivalent of a golf ball lying 82 feet (25 meters) away. They are designed to survey the landscape fairly quickly, and, not only can they look all around but also up and down. Navigation camera pictures are expected to begin arriving on Earth about three days after landing if the mast is deployed on schedule.
Like the Hazcams, Navcam images are used to obtain three-dimensional information about the Martian terrain. Together, they help the scientists and engineers make decisions about where and how to drive the rover and which rocks to examine with instruments that identify chemical ingredients. “A large part of the surface mission is conducted using the images returned from the cameras,” said Maki.
Also, about three days after landing, the narrower field-of-view Mast Cameras (Mastcams) are expected to start snapping their first shots. These two-megapixel color cameras will reveal the rover’s new home in exquisite detail. Small thumbnail versions of the pictures will be sent down first with an initial high-resolution panorama expected more than a week later….
Via NASA