Men Free Blog

A four-banger in a Camaro! Blasphemy you say? Could be, but what four-pot are we talking about? In this case, the General’s car czar Bob Lutz suggests that the new 2010 Camaro due next February could offer the same 2.0 liter direct-injected engine used in the Saturn Sky Redline, Pontiac Solstice GXP and the SS versions of the Chevy HHR and Cobalt. Before dismissing the turbo-four immediately, consider the top-of-the-line engine options the Camaro offered after the last oil-embargo-driven doomsday. In ‘72, the big block 402 engine offered just 240 horsepower; in ‘73, the Z28 was equipped with a 245-horse 350 and by ‘75 the hottest option underhood made only 155 horses. Ouch. The 2.0 being considered for the Camaro punches out 260 horsepower, and based on our time with the engine, you feel each of them as you run up towards the redline. The next step-up will likely be a version of GM’s 3.6, as offered in the CTS and G8, also making around 260 horsepower.

Other Camaro tidbits mentioned by Lutz: it will be priced higher than the Mustang, as GM sees the Camaro as a higher-end offering. Specifically, Lutz suggests that the Camaro will feature a much better interior than the ‘Stang, along with its inherently better independent rear-suspension arrangement.

Perhaps a bigger question to ponder is how bad will the performance industry be impacted by new fuel efficiency standards along with the ever-tightening emissions regulations. Just so long as carmakers such as GM continue to offer engine options like their 2.0 liter DI four-banger, the performance drop-off won’t be nearly as drastic as it was back in the mid-70s. Thank God for that!
source:autoblog

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Embattled President Pervez Musharraf hailed the start of a “new era of real democracy” in Pakistan and vowed Sunday to support an incoming government led by foes bent on diminishing his powers.
 ”The journey toward democracy and development we started eight years ago is now reaching its destination,” said the former army strongman, who seized power in a 1999 coup. “A new era of real democracy has begun.”

The U.S.-backed leader was speaking at a military parade celebrating Pakistan’s national day. Flatbed trucks rolled past his viewing stand displaying pieces of Pakistan’s nuclear-armed arsenal: camouflage-painted Shaheen missiles about 40 feet long.

Military helicopters swooped past Musharraf flying huge Pakistani flags and spewing decorative, multicolored smoke. Fighter jets flew overhead in formation of a heart.

Musharraf quit the military in November but retains sweeping presidential powers to fire parliament and the prime minister. The parties who defeated his allies in the recent elections are hoping to strip away some of his powers, as well as reverse his decision to purge the courts and review his U.S.-backed terrorism policies.

“I hope the new government can maintain peace and the fast pace of socio-economic development in Pakistan,” Musharraf said Sunday. “And I hope it will also continue our struggle against the curse of terrorism and extremism with the same force.”

On Saturday, the party of slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto named former parliament speaker Yousaf Raza Gilani as its candidate for the country’s next prime minister, after routing Musharraf’s allies to win the most seats in last month’s polls.

Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party is forming a majority coalition with the party of the prime minister ousted in Musharraf’s coup, Nawaz Sharif, which came in second in the elections. Neither group took enough votes to govern alone.

The new administration faces massive challenges, including a wave of Islamic militancy, high inflation and electricity shortages. And a confrontation still looms between Musharraf and Sharif, who has been one of the most vocal in calling for the unpopular president’s resignation or impeachment.

Asked Sunday whether he would work with Musharraf or try to dislodge him, Gilani said, “I will follow the constitution.”

“The crisis our country is passing through is grave,” Gilani told reporters after filing his nomination papers. “All political forces have to work together.”

Gilani was a close aide to Bhutto and spent four years in jail on allegations he abused his authority as speaker during Bhutto’s second term as prime minister in the 1990s. His convictions were overturned and he was freed in 2005. Party spokesman Farhatullah Babar announced the nomination at a news conference Saturday night in the capital, Islamabad.

“Yousaf Raza Gilani is not afraid to lead and he knows the way,” Babar said, reading a statement from Bhutto’s widower, Asif Ali Zardari.

The naming of a candidate for premier was stalled for weeks, fueling speculation that Zardari wanted the job for himself. He now shares control of the party with his and Bhutto’s 19-year-old son.

Zardari, however, cannot become premier because he did not run for a parliamentary seat. But he could contest a by-election and win a seat to qualify as early as this summer. In that case, Gilani would be a stand-in until Zardari could run.

A confirmation vote was scheduled for Monday in parliament, and the prime minister would be sworn in by Musharraf a day later.

Meanwhile, the outgoing ruling party named a close Musharraf ally, Chaudhry Pervez Elahi, as its nominee Sunday, but the move was largely symbolic because the president’s loyalists do not have enough votes to block Gilani from the job.

“We want to show that despite losing or winning, we are taking part in this democratic process,” Elahi told reporters.

The choice of Gilani came as a clear snub to PPP vice chair Makhdoom Amin Fahim, who was long presumed the front-runner after leading Bhutto’s party during her nearly eight years in exile. Still, Fahim said he would not quit the party.

“I have the best wishes for him,” Fahim told The Associated Press just after Gilani’s name was announced.

Bhutto returned to Pakistan last year only to be assassinated in a suicide attack in December. Since then, Zardari has risen to become a key figure in Pakistan’s politics, and he may have considered Fahim a threat to his own political ambitions.

Bhutto’s son, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, was appointed party chairman after his mother died, but his father is running things while the 19-year-old continues his studies at Oxford University.

Source:news.yahoo

What God says about your moneyFaiths usually offer parents very clear direction on child-rearing. Premarital sex, for instance? That’s pretty much a no-no, no matter what deity you worship. Dietary rules can also be pretty straightforward — no pork for Muslims and Jews, no beef for Hindus.

But when it comes to money, the picture is cloudier. What does the Bible or the Koran actually say about money? Does God want us to own a fleet of yachts? Or does he (or she) think suffering and hardship is noble?  Does God want your kid to be rich?

Happily, the consensus among most religious leaders seems to be that the Almighty does not want you to live off food stamps and is quite happy for you to drive a Porsche. But Scriptures say that a portion of your earnings should be returned through gifts to charity and offerings to the church — what some denominations call tithing.

Cantor Erik L. Contzius, of Temple Israel in New Rochelle, N.Y., is trying to instill these lessons in his 6-year-old son. Whenever the boy goes to Hebrew school, Contzius hands him a dollar to put in the tzedakah box for charity.  Thou shalt not hoard your money

“If we teach it at a very young age to give, hopefully it will stick,” Contzius says.

Carolyn Castleberry, a writer in Virginia Beach, Va., talks about this idea in her series of financial-empowerment books for women, based on Biblical principles.

“Proverbs 31 has been held up as a standard,” says Castleberry, a mother of two who also writes a newsletter called “The Proverbs 31 Investor.” The Old Testament passage — which describes a virtuous woman as having a price “above rubies” — is “about a woman who is a businessperson, a wife, she has a family, but she became an investor,” Castleberry explains.  What the Bible teaches

“She knew how to create passive income, she was a real-estate investor — so she was providing for her family and also for generations, so she’s a role model.”

According to Castleberry, the Bible addresses the topic of money more than any other issue — more than 2,000 passages discuss it. The No. 1 rule? “To tithe or give back,” she says, quoting Malachi 3:10: “Bring to me the first of your possessions and I’ll open up the skies of heaven.”

The Bible also admonishes us to be good stewards of money (although here Christianity and Judaism differ from Islam, which forbids interest accrual).

A parable from Matthew discusses a boss who gave his three employees a certain amount of money.

Source:articles.moneycentral.msn

Sure, electronic voting has had its fair share of troubles, but there’s no denying that it’s the wave of the future — and we’re always intrigued by plans like the one being floated in Poland right now that would allow citizens to vote online from their homes, since that seems like a great way to increase participation. Of course, some people are just never going to get it, and it looks like former Polish prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski is the latest Luddite curmudgeon to risk your ire, saying that he’s not exactly thrilled with the idea of a “young person sitting in front of a computer, watching video clips and pornography while sipping a bottle of beer and voting when he feels like it.” Kaczynski went on to say that as a whole, Internet users are “the easiest group to manipulate, to suggest who to vote for” — which probably means that in addition to not using a cell phone or having a bank account (true!), he’s never actually been on the Internet either. Tell you what, Minister: you come in here and successfully manipulate a Mac vs. PC flamewar, maybe we’ll talk. Deal?

source:engadget

We’re not exactly clear on how Gibson’s legal team managed to license all those brand names and guitar designs to Activision for this many Guitar Hero games before realizing that the company maybe-sorta had a patent on the idea, but here we are: Activision filed a lawsuit yesterday asking the US District Court for Central California to invalidate a 1999 Gibson patent on “simulating a musical performance,” because apparently Gibson’s bugging them about it since January. Wait, just January? Seriously, people, you’d have thought this would’ve come up by now. Anyway, Activision says that Gibson is still a “good partner,” just that it “disagrees with the applicability of their patent and would like a legal determination on this.” We’re sure it would. Gibson’s patent apparently involves playing an instrument of some kind along with a pre-recorded concert while wearing what is described as a “3-D headset,” so there seems to be some overlap, but we’ll see what the court says — something tells us explaining Guitar Hero to the judge is going to be relatively amusing.

Update: On reading the patent, Gibson’s system is designed to be used with a “musical instrument” — and no matter what the Guitar Zeros have to say, we don’t think Guitar Hero controllers really qualify. It’ll definitely be interesting to see what the court has to say about that, no? [Thanks, Matt G.]

Disclaimer: Nilay’s a lawyer and a decent Guitar Hero player, but he’s not your lawyer, and none of this is legal advice or analysis.

Read - Article on lawsuit
Read - Gibson patent

source:engadget

You know, we’ll actually be a little sad when the endless legal battle between Nokia and Qualcomm actually comes to an end — but until then, we’re going to revel in all the dirt that comes out of having over a dozen simultaneous lawsuits going worldwide. Nokia now says that it owes Qualcomm nothing for its “early” CDMA patents, because it’s dropped a cool billion dollars into license payments for them over the past 15 years and those deals have expired, so it’s in the clear now. As you might expect, Qualcomm disagrees, and says that if Nokia wants to keep using its tech, it’s got to pay up — that’s on top of the estimated $500 million a year Nokia’s already paying Qualcomm for other patents. Guys, guys, why fight like this? What’s a couple billion a year between friends? Video summary of the entire dispute after the break.

source:engadget.com

WASHINGTON - Three days after the voting ended, the race for Democratic delegates in Super Tuesday’s contests was still too close to call. With nearly 1,600 delegates from Tuesday contests awarded, Sen. Barack Obama led by two delegates Friday night, with 91 delegates still to be awarded. Obama won 796 delegates in Tuesday’s contests, to 794 for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, according to an analysis of voting results by The Associated Press.
 
In the Republican contest, Sen. John McCain had a commanding lead in the race for delegates.

Nearly a third of the outstanding delegates are from Colorado, a state where Obama won the popular vote. California, a state that Clinton carried, had 20 Democratic delegates still to be awarded. Neither state expected to have complete results before next week.

Obama won the popular vote in 13 states Tuesday, while Clinton won in eight states and American Samoa.

In the overall race for the nomination, Clinton has 1,055 delegates, including separately chosen party and elected officials known as superdelegates. Obama has 998.

A total of 2,025 delegates are need to secure the Democratic nomination.

Many delegates were outstanding because some states have been unable to provide all the votes in some congressional districts. The problems arose in states with counties that are split into multiple congressional districts.

The states have provided results in each county. But in some cases, they are still working to assign the votes in the appropriate congressional district.

Those votes are important because both parties award delegates based on statewide votes and on results in individual congressional districts. Democrats award them proportionally, meaning precise counts can be necessary, even when the vote is overwhelmingly in favor of one candidate.

In California, officials were still counting absentee ballots Friday. Officials had estimated that more than 1 million absentee ballots may have been submitted.

In Tuesday’s Republican contests, McCain won 617 delegates to 205 for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who suspended his campaign on Thursday. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee won 155 and Rep. Ron Paul won 10. There are still 36 Republican delegates to be awarded from Tuesday’s contests.

In the overall race for the nomination, McCain leads with 719, to 198 for Huckabee and 14 for Paul. Romney’s suspended campaign still has 298 delegates.

A total of 1,191 delegates are needed to secure the Republican nomination.

The AP tracks the delegate races by projecting the number of national convention delegates won by candidates in each presidential primary or caucus, based on state and national party rules, and by interviewing unpledged delegates to obtain their preferences.

In some states, like Iowa and Nevada, local precinct caucuses are the first stage in the allocation process. The AP uses preferences expressed in those caucuses to project the number of national convention delegates each candidate will have when they are chosen at county, congressional district or state conventions.

source:news.yahoo