Pakistani woman makes history with run in May vote

KHAR, Pakistan (AP) ? A 40-year-old Pakistani housewife has made history by becoming the first woman to run for parliament from the country's northwest tribal region, a highly conservative area that is a haven for Islamist militants.

Badam Zari told The Associated Press on Monday that she will participate in the May 11 election to bring greater attention to problems facing women, which she believes the government has ignored.

"I want to reach the assembly to become a voice for women, especially those living in the tribal areas," Zari said.

Zari is from Bajur, part of Pakistan's semiautonomous tribal region bordering Afghanistan. The area is mostly populated by Pashtun tribesmen who have very conservative views toward women. Most women in the tribal region are uneducated, rarely work outside the home and wear long, flowing clothes that cover most of their skin when they appear in public.

Zari spoke to reporters at a press conference Monday wearing a colorful shawl wrapped around her body and head, with only her eyes showing.

Bajur is one of the many areas in the tribal region where the army has battled Taliban militants, who are waging a bloody insurgency against the government. The militants have a history of using violence to enforce their hard-line views on women.

Last fall, the Taliban in a different part of the northwest shot 15-year-old schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai in the head in an unsuccessful attempt to kill her because she resisted the militants' views and was a strong advocate of girls' education.

Zari, who finished high school and does not have any children, said she filed the paperwork necessary to run for office on Sunday in Khar, the main town in Bajur. She was accompanied by her husband, who she said fully backed her decision to run for a seat in the National Assembly.

"This was a difficult decision, but now I am determined and hopeful society will support me," Zari said.

Men in Bajur and other parts of the tribal region have historically discouraged women to vote, saying they should remain at home, according to local traditions.

Far fewer women vote than men in other parts of Pakistan as well, and females remain underrepresented in the country's politics. But there are examples of Pakistani women holding very powerful political positions in the country, such as the late former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

Zari said she hopes she can convince women to go out to vote. Out of the roughly 186,000 registered voters in her constituency, about 67,000 are women, according to government records.

Under Pakistan's political system, the winning candidate is the one who receives the most votes ? not necessarily a majority ? meaning Zari could be a strong candidate if she can get women to vote for her.

Zari said she has not yet received any threats or been discouraged from locals to run.

"My decision to contest the election will not only give courage to women in general and attract attention to their problems, but also helps negate the wrong impression about our society," Zari said. "This will reflect a true picture of our society, where women get respect."

___

Associated Press writer Zarar Khan contributed to this report from Islamabad.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/pakistani-woman-makes-history-run-may-vote-091852248.html

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Prosecutors' killings rattle former cotton town in Texas

By Chris Francescani

KAUFMAN, Texas (Reuters) - Twin killings of Texas prosecutors in a quaint town where oak trees and two-story brick buildings line the central square have shocked residents, raised questions whether the shootings could be linked, and fueled speculation about the possible role of a white supremacist jail gang.

"We were a quiet little backwater where you could get on your bicycle and ride into the square and feel safe," said Carolyn Long, 69, recalling her childhood in the 1950s when cotton farmers and ranchers would drive into the town's main square on Saturdays to conduct business out of the backs of their trucks.

"At least it used to be like that," she said of the north Texas town of 11,000.

Already stunned by the killing of local prosecutor Mark Hasse on January 31 on the courthouse steps, the town was sent reeling by the slaying on Saturday of Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland and his wife, Cynthia, in their home.

Shell casings were scattered everywhere around the crime scene, the Dallas Morning News reported, citing one law enforcement official. Authorities have ruled out murder-suicide.

The cases remained unsolved.

Authorities have kept quiet about potential suspects, while people in town speculated it was the work of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, a white supremacist jail gang that had recently been under investigation by McLelland's office.

"People are in absolute shock here," said Joe Gibson, 21, the manager at Moon's Fried Chicken Cafeteria.

Kaufman County is generally split between rural towns in the eastern part of the county and more affluent Dallas commuter suburbs in the west, where the McLellands lived. The town of Kaufman lies in the center of the county.

Local, county and state police all overlap in Kaufman, about 30 miles east of Dallas, creating a sense of security that has been shattered.

"We have a strong tradition of law enforcement in this area," said insurance agent Bobby Aga, 68. "The criminal justice system here is something you don't mess with. It's the fabric of our community."

First Assistant District Attorney Brandi Fernandez was named interim district attorney on Monday and will hold the position for 21 days or until Governor Rick Perry appoints a successor. Perry, meanwhile, has raised concern about the public safety.

McLelland had vowed to capture those who killed Hasse, one of his assistants. A former Army veteran who served in the Gulf War and publicly showed little fear of retribution, he was a fixture at the town's Lions Club, where he regularly ate lunch and helped support youth baseball, said Wade Gent, 38, an attorney who knew the couple.

Cynthia McLelland belonged to the Quilt Guild, which met at the "2 Sisters Quilt Shop" on the site of a former drug store built in 1891 in the heart of the town square.

Today, the town's business revolves largely around Falcon Steel, which builds the structures that hold highway signs. It remains a quiet, church-going town where shopkeepers who smoke slip out the back of their stores rather than risk the disapproval of neighbors by lighting up out front.

"There's a church on every corner," said Long, whose family has lived in the area since 1852.

When Hasse was killed, speculation immediately focused on the prison-based gang the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas because that same day the U.S. Justice Department released a statement saying the Kaufman County District Attorney's Office was involved in a racketeering case against the white supremacist group.

In an indictment unsealed in November, the Texas arm of the Aryan Brotherhood was described as a gang responsible for murders, arson, assault and other crimes, and prone to "extreme violence and threats of violence to maintain internal discipline and retaliate against those believed to be cooperating with law enforcement."

The Texas Department of Public Safety identified prison gangs as the second-most significant organized crime threat to the state after Mexican drug cartels.

Gent said there was real concern of further violence in Kaufman.

"If somebody is sending a message," he said, "they're probably not finished."

(Additional reporting by Corrie MacLaggan, Jim Forsyth and Marice Richter; Editing by Daniel Trotta, Paul Thomasch and Leslie Gevirtz)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/killing-texas-district-attorney-wife-seen-targeted-004859469.html

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These Giant Meditating Faces Were Made From Bike Chains

Young-Deok Seo is a Korean artist who works almost exclusively with different kinds of reclaimed chains. His latest project—Meditation—is a series of impressively large faces, deep in thought. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/tAKiSyVAWlI/these-giant-meditating-faces-were-made-from-bike-chains

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Brandon Ambrosino: Resurrection As Metaphor? What the Early Christians Meant When They Said, "Jesus is Lord"

Earlier this week, I wrote a piece about the Christian concept of the resurrection. Does it matter, I asked, if Jesus' resurrection is interpreted metaphorically? My answer was that it matters a great deal, since "a Jesus whose physical body remains in the grave gives me no hope for a physically broken world."

A friend emailed me that I was reading the Gospels wrong, and that the resurrection was best interpreted metaphorically. To relegate the resurrection to a purely physical phenomenon was to read the Easter narrative in the most primitive way, at its lowest common denominator. The Resurrection narratives are given to each of us to interpret and enjoy in our own way -- literally or metaphorically.

The Easter stories, he reminded me, belong to all of us.

And yet before they belonged to us, they belonged to other people -- people who lived and thought and wrote within the first century. It seems to me, then, that if we are to truly understand what the gospel writers are trying to say, we need to contextualize them not first within our own world, but within theirs.

And it must be understood from the outset that their context is fundamentally Jewish.

At the heart of Judaism is a pattern of exile and return, which is summed up in the following passage from Deuteronomy:

When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labor on us, we cried to the Lord, the God of our ancestors; the Lord heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. The Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey.

To commemorate their ancestors' miraculous deliverance from Egyptian slavery, Jews observe Pesach, or Passover. There are many, many layers to the story of the Exodus, but one key phrase that is often repeated in the text concerns God's motive for freeing his people: "And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord." In other words, Israel's God is saying, "I will deliver you, Israel, and the world will know that I am Lord, and Pharaoh is not."

Today, there are many branches of Judaism that see this pattern of exile and return as metaphorical; but for ancient Jews, their hope was that God would deliver Israel from their foreign rulers and create a new Heaven and Earth. Just as God sent Moses to physically deliver their ancestors from Pharaoh, Second Temple Jews prayed that God would send them another prophet like Moses to inaugurate God's kingdom.

But before God could step in as king, he'd first have to overthrow those pagan rulers still enjoying their power. In the first century, the pagan ruling over Israel was Caesar, the divine emperor of Rome. Caesar ruled with the threat of death, which was his greatest and last weapon. And even though Rome was in a relatively peaceful phase at this point, no dissension would be tolerated. Disloyalty meant death -- and Rome had a reputation for killing.

If a messiah were going to overcome Rome, he'd better be able to overcome the physical threat of death -- which is why many Jews were looking for a Messiah to lead them to military victory. It's in this context that various would-be messiahs showed up claiming to be the one to deliver Israel from the hand of her enemies. As was sadly the case, these claimants were found and murdered -- which proved that they were not what they claimed to be. If Rome killed you, then you obviously weren't the Messiah. Crucifixion meant game over for you and your movement.

But with Jesus, the story is different. Jesus is seen as a threat to the political establishment, and is murdered in the attempt to preempt any uprising in his name. And yet it's only after Jesus' murder that his followers come together and begin announcing that Jesus is, in fact, the Messiah they'd been awaiting.

"Jesus is Lord," the disciples flippantly announce, and the overtones aren't lost on anyone who's listening. If Jesus is Lord, then that means Caesar isn't. Now normally Rome would just squash this kind of rebellion by death; but in the case of Jesus, death -- both the threat and the physical state of non-existence -- have been overturned by the Resurrection.

A bodily Resurrection.

And it must be bodily because, after all, a dead Messiah -- no matter how spiritually alive he may be -- is still dead. He's especially dead if he's being experienced as a ghost. In the ancient Mediterranean world, a vision of a recently deceased loved one confirmed that he was dead... not that he was alive.

It's difficult to imagine the disciples saying, "God has warmed our hearts and caused us to experience the metaphorical presence of Jesus, and therefore we know that he's the Messiah!" Unless Jesus' postmortem appearances were experienced in a physical way, his disciples would have assumed that Rome had won again, and that Jesus, regardless of what they hoped, couldn't have been Lord.

For this reason, scholars of all persuasions are forced to seriously consider what happened between the event of Jesus' crucifixion and the event of his proclamation as Lord. As it turns out, the early Christians answer this question in their Easter stories. What convinced them that Jesus was the Messiah was that, unlike other people murdered by Rome, he didn't stay dead.

Now did Jesus bodily rise from the dead? That's not my question here. I'm simply asking, "Did the early Christians believe that Jesus had risen bodily from the dead?" And when we read the Easter stories within their first century political and religious contexts, I think the answer is emphatically, "Yes!"

At the heart of the Easter story is the belief that Jesus is Lord, and Caesar is not. This is always, in the first place, a political claim -- and a physical one.

?

Follow Brandon Ambrosino on Twitter: www.twitter.com/BrandonAmbro

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brandon-ambrosino/resurrection-as-metaphor-what-the-early-christians-meant-when-they-said-jesus-is-lord_b_2988438.html

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Courtney Stodden Wishes You a "Hoppy Easter"

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/04/courtney-stodden-wishes-you-a-hoppy-easter/

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CBS halts replays of basketball player's injury

NEW YORK (AP) ? After two initial replays, CBS stopped showing footage Sunday of Louisville basketball player Kevin Ware breaking his leg during the first half of his team's NCAA men's tournament game against Duke.

The injury during the nationally televised game, and the shocked reaction of Ware's fellow players, called to mind the gruesome broken leg suffered by Washington Redskins quarterback Joe Theismann in a Monday Night football game in 1985. During Sunday's game, Theismann tweeted his best wishes to Ware.

Ware had leaped to try and block a shot by Duke's Tyler Thornton. His leg landed awkwardly, buckled and flopped as he fell to the ground. The first hint that the injury was out of the ordinary came from Thornton, who put his hands to his face and had an anguished look as he ran back on defense.

CBS commentator Clark Kellogg described the injury was "gruesome."

"If you can bear to watch it, take a look but it's a gruesome-looking injury," Kellogg said.

CBS showed the replay twice in slow motion, although not with a close-up of Ware landing. The network also never showed a close-up of the injury.

CBS then concentrated on reaction shots. Three of Ware's teammates were on the ground near the basket. Wayne Blackshear cried, Chane Behanan knelt on his hands and knees and Peyton Silva sat, a hand covering his mouth.

The network aired a close-up of medical officials working on Ware, showing the player only from the face up.

CBS Sports Chairman Sean McManus said that because of the graphic nature of the injury, the network decided not to show it after the original replays. People could quickly find replays on YouTube, anyway.

"We did not zoom in on the injury when he was taken off," McManus said. "We did not try to highlight it. I think we did the right thing."

At halftime, Greg Gumbel noted that CBS would not show the injury. Its highlight package again focused on the reactions, including Louisville coach Rick Pitino wiping away tears. Pitino answered questions from CBS during the game about Ware, noting the injured player was exhorting his teammates to win the regional final. A Louisville spokesman said Ware was "resting comfortably" at Indianapolis' Methodist Hospital.

As is often the case, the coverage quickly became a hot topic on Twitter. Sports writer Jason Whitlock tweeted that "CBS handled this curveball (Ware injury) masterfully."

The network's decision to stop showing the replay only goes so far. Right after the game ended, the CBS affiliate in Phoenix aired the footage of Ware being injured in a local sports report.

Coverage of the injury represented the second difficult call of the day for CBS. Earlier, the network cut away from the dramatic conclusion of the Sony Open men's final, switching to the tipoff of the NCAA tournament game between Michigan and Florida. The network did alert viewers that if the third set between Andy Murray and David Ferrer went to a tiebreaker, it would switch coverage of the Tennis Channel.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cbs-halts-replays-basketball-players-injury-233552593--spt.html

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Porsha Williams Divorce Filing: Pay Me!

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/03/porsha-williams-divorce-filing-pay-me/

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