Off Beat News

Japan recalls arm wrestling game

A Japanese arm wrestling game is being withdrawn from arcades across the country after three players broke their arms, company officials said.

Arm Spirit, which is distributed by Atlus, is to be removed from 150 game emporiums as "a precaution".

"We think that maybe some players get over-excited and twist their arms in an unnatural way," a spokesman said.

An investigation has been launched into the incidents and the machines are being checked for any malfunctions.

"The machine isn't that strong, much less so than a muscular man. Even women should be able to beat it," company spokesman Ayano Sakiyama told AP news agency.

Arm Spirit gamers advance through 10 levels, pitting their strength against a French maid, a drunken martial arts master and a Chihuahua dog before reaching the final challenge - a professional wrestler.

It is not available outside Japan.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/6957339.stm

Western-style barbers get the chop in Iran

Police in Tehran have closed two dozen barber shops and hairdressers in a fortnight in the latest phase of a "morals" crackdown aimed at enforcing Islamic dress codes among young Iranians.

The businesses were shut after being identified as purveyors of decadent "western" culture.

Eleven women's hair-stylists were told to stop trading for offering customers' tattoos. Tattooed eyebrows - in which the hair is shaved and replaced with elaborate patterns - are popular amongst many young Iranian women.

One women's salon was shut when authorities discovered one of its employees was a man, a crime under Iran's Islamic laws.

A further 13 barbers were closed for giving customers excessively eye-catching haircuts and plucking men's eyebrows. Many young Iranian men wear their hair in a gelled-up bouffant that would look outlandish even in some western countries.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,2155716,00.html

Ya'qub,

Video on the subject.

Prime Minister of Israel doesn't trust his own ministers

Israel has banned cabinet ministers on bringing cell phones to cabinet meetings and placed a guard outside the room to check the ministers on arrival.

What a disgrace of a government.

BBC Wednesday, 22 August 2007

Olmert bans mobiles in meetings

Israeli ministers have been told to hand in their mobile phones before weekly cabinet meetings.

The measure is aimed at cutting the number of government leaks which appear in the Israeli press.

In a memo, Cabinet Secretary Oved Yehezkel said mobiles and "other communication devices" would be returned to ministers after meetings.

Local reports say Mr Olmert berated a minister on Sunday for using his phone during a key intelligence briefing.

The unnamed minister was talking on his mobile while the head of the Shin Bet domestic intelligence service, Yuval Diskin, was telling the cabinet about sensitive security issues, according to AFP.

At a news conference after the cabinet meeting, a blackout was imposed on Mr Diskin's briefing.

Mr Olmert's press adviser said it had contained sensitive information "not meant to be exposed to the Israeli public or the Palestinians".

Agency reports suggest it is not unknown for senior Israeli officials to call reporters and leave their mobile phone running during meetings, so journalists can hear what is going on.

Sources from the prime minister's office say the ban on mobiles is one of a series of recommendations from a commission which the cabinet secretary intends to impose strictly.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6958357.stm

Kenyan women plagued by troop of sexist primates

A troop of vervet monkeys is giving Kenyan villagers long days and sleepless nights, destroying crops and causing a food crisis.

And because women are primarily responsible for the farms, they have borne the brunt of the problem, as they try to guard their crops.

They say the monkeys are more afraid of young men than women and children, and the bolder ones throw stones and chase the women from their farms.

Nachu's women have tried wearing their husbands' clothes in an attempt to trick the monkeys into thinking they are men - but this has failed, they say.

"When we come to chase the monkeys away, we are dressed in trousers and hats, so that we look like men," resident Lucy Njeri told the BBC News website

"But the monkeys can tell the difference and they don't run away from us and point at our breasts. They just ignore us and continue to steal the crops."

In addition to stealing their crops, the monkeys also make sexually explicit gestures at the women, they claim.

"The monkeys grab their breasts, and gesture at us while pointing at their private parts. We are afraid that they will sexually harass us," said Mrs Njeri.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6959209.stm

malik

BBC Wednesday, 22 August 2007

Olmert bans mobiles in meetings

Israeli ministers have been told to hand in their mobile phones before weekly cabinet meetings.

The measure is aimed at cutting the number of government leaks which appear in the Israeli press.

In a memo, Cabinet Secretary Oved Yehezkel said mobiles and "other communication devices" would be returned to ministers after meetings.

Local reports say Mr Olmert berated a minister on Sunday for using his phone during a key intelligence briefing.

The unnamed minister was talking on his mobile while the head of the Shin Bet domestic intelligence service, Yuval Diskin, was telling the cabinet about sensitive security issues, according to AFP.

At a news conference after the cabinet meeting, a blackout was imposed on Mr Diskin's briefing.

Mr Olmert's press adviser said it had contained sensitive information "not meant to be exposed to the Israeli public or the Palestinians".

Agency reports suggest it is not unknown for senior Israeli officials to call reporters and leave their mobile phone running during meetings, so journalists can hear what is going on.

Sources from the prime minister's office say the ban on mobiles is one of a series of recommendations from a commission which the cabinet secretary intends to impose strictly.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6958357.stm

Nothing wrong with that at all.

😃 Funny how a senator who pleads guilty to charges of lewd conduct in a male public toilet, apparently for an easy life, regrets the plea at a news conference with his wife, Suzanne, at his side:

[url=http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8RA8QM81&show_article=1]Breitb…]BOISE, Idaho (AP) - Under fire from leaders of his own party, Idaho Sen. Larry Craig on Tuesday said the only thing he had done wrong was to plead guilty after a complaint of lewd conduct in a men's room. He declared, "I am not gay. I never have been gay."

"I did nothing wrong at the Minneapolis airport," he said at a news conference with his wife, Suzanne, at his side.

...

Craig entered his plea several weeks after an undercover police officer in the Minneapolis arrested him and issued a complaint that said the three-term senator had engaged in actions "often used by persons communicating a desire to engage in sexual conduct."

The airport incident occurred June 11. Craig signed his plea papers on Aug. 1, and word of the events surfaced Monday. The senator issued a statement Monday night that said, "In hindsight, I should have pled not guilty."

He repeated that assertion at the Idaho news conference. "In June, I overreacted and made a poor decision," he said. "I chose to plead guilty to a lesser charge in hopes of making it go away."

Craig was at times defiant, at others apologetic.

"Please let me apologize to my family, friends and staff and fellow Idahoans for the cloud placed over Idaho," he said [in an unrelated comment. - Joie de Vivre]...

... Craig, who has voted against gay marriage, finds his political future in doubt in the wake of the charges, which have drawn national attention.

Girl, 3, survives fatal shooting

A three-year-old girl has survived a "targeted" shooting at a house that left three dead and two injured.

Hertfordshire police were called to an incident at a house in Plaw Hatch Close, Bishop's Stortford, on Tuesday.

Two men, aged 33 and 52, and a 17-year-old boy died at the scene. Two women, aged 23 and 54, were injured.

Read More...

Truth is so hard for Kaafirs to swallow.

Freedom of Speech loving America gags their own Professor for telling the truth. Great Satan is full of double standards.

No more freedom for the University teacher, Norman Finkelstein.
God bless him.

Controversial Professor's Class Canceled

August 28, 2007

Chicago DePaul University canceled the one remaining class taught by a controversial professor who has accused some Jews of improperly using the legacy of the Holocaust.

Norman Finkelstein, whose work led to a long-running public feud with Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, says he may respond by committing civil disobedience when classes resume Sept. 5.

Finkelstein, 53, was denied tenure in June after six years on the DePaul faculty, but he was permitted to teach for the one year remaining on his contract.

On Friday, however, the university e-mailed students saying that Finkelstein's sole political science course had been canceled. By Monday, the books for the course had been pulled from the DePaul bookstore's shelves.

Finkelstein's most recent book, "Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History," is largely an attack on Dershowitz's "The Case for Israel."

In it, Finkelstein argues that Israel uses the outcry over perceived anti-Semitism as a weapon to stifle criticism.

Dershowitz, who threatened to sue Finkelstein's publisher for libel, urged DePaul officials to reject Finkelstein's tenure bid in June.

The American Association of University Professors is preparing a letter to the university protesting Finkelstein's treatment as a serious violation of academic ethics, the Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday.

Finkelstein told the newspaper that he planned to wage his own campaign against the administration.

"I intend to go to my office on the first day of classes and, if my way is barred, to engage in civil disobedience," Finkelstein said. "If arrested, I'll go on a hunger strike. If released, I'll do it all over again. I'll fast in jail for as long as it takes."

After he was denied tenure, Finkelstein, a son of Holocaust survivors, posted a letter on his Web site explaining the school officials' reasons, including Finkelstein's "deliberately hurtful" scholarship along, lack of involvement with the school and tendency for public clashes with other scholars.

"In the opinion of those opposing tenure, your unprofessional personal attacks divert the conversation away from consideration of ideas, and polarize and simplify conversations that deserve layered and subtle consideration," school President Dennis Holtschneider wrote in a letter dated June 8. DePaul at the time verified the letter was authentic.

Denise Mattson, the university's associate vice president for public affairs, released a statement saying Finkelstein was on administrative leave with full pay for the academic year.

"Administrative leave relieves professors from their teaching responsibilities. He was informed of the reasons that precipitated this leave last spring," the statement said.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/28/AR20070…

This is how America treats its own citizens, and still claims it is a liberal country.

Malik, this is the OFF BEAT news topic. And why is it so important to hate America? Is indifference not a better stance?

(my previous one made it in because of the oxymoron in the title. People do not survive a fatal shooting.)

Mr and Mrs Renault cannot name daughter Megane

Belgian authorities have decided that it is not a particularly bright idea for a Mr and Mrs Renault to name their daughter Megane, Pravda reports.

Quite where Pravda got wind of this insanity we know not, but psychologists apparently intervened to prevent the Renaults' offspring from suffering a lifetime of misery and despair.

The Megane attempted outrage is the latest in a growing trend for parents to slap their sprogs with bloody silly names. Regular readers will of course recall the cases of "4Real", "Princess Tiaamii", "Metallica", "@" and "Jon Blake Cusack Version 2.0".

The Register

You

Mr and Mrs Renault cannot name daughter Megane

🙂

Because they aren't rich or famous enough. Some can name their kids Pilot Inspektor Riesgraf Lee, Zowie Bowie, Diva Muffin Zappa and Moon Unit Zapper, Paris Hilton, Fifi-Trixabelle Geldoff, Peaches Honeyblossom Geldof and Little Pixie Geldof, Prince Michael Jackson or Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily Hutchence without so much as a drugs bust.

Joie de Vivre

You

Mr and Mrs Renault cannot name daughter Megane

🙂

Because they aren't rich or famous enough. Some can name their kids Pilot Inspektor Riesgraf Lee, Zowie Bowie, Diva Muffin Zappa and Moon Unit Zapper, Paris Hilton, Fifi-Trixabelle Geldoff, Peaches Honeyblossom Geldof and Little Pixie Geldof, Prince Michael Jackson or Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily Hutchence without so much as a drugs bust.

Not many people know that my name before I was a Muslim was 'Umbongo Columbo Fraggle-Rock Bell III'

Did even your parents know you called yourself that?

YouDid even your parents know you called yourself that?

well my dad was called Umbongo Columbo Fraggle-Rock Bell II

my mum is called Twinkle Dinkle (before she got married)

and what?!

😂

[url=http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8RBMFMO0&show_article=1]Breitb…]LOS ANGELES (AP) - David Beckham could miss the rest of the Los Angeles Galaxy's season after being diagnosed with a sprained right knee Thursday.

[list][list]:roll: [/list:u][/list:u]

R'fuah Sh'leima David Beckham.

Monkey attack kills Delhi leader

The deputy mayor of the Indian capital Delhi has died a day after being attacked by a horde of wild monkeys.

SS Bajwa suffered serious head injuries when he fell from the first-floor terrace of his home on Saturday morning trying to fight off the monkeys.

The city has long struggled to counter its plague of monkeys, which invade government complexes and temples, snatch food and scare passers-by.

The High Court ordered the city to find an answer to the problem last year.

Solution elusive

One approach has been to train bands of larger, more ferocious langur monkeys to go after the smaller groups of Rhesus macaques.

The city has also employed monkey catchers to round them up so they can be moved to forests.

But the problem has persisted.

Culling is seen as unacceptable to devout Hindus, who revere the monkeys as a manifestation of the monkey god Hanuman, and often feed them bananas and peanuts.

Urban development around the city has also been blamed for destroying the monkeys' natural habitat.

Mr Bajwa, a member of the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), is survived by his wife and a son, according to the Press Trust of India news agency.

BBC News

Minister detained at US airport

Britain's first Muslim minister, Shahid Malik, says he is "deeply disappointed" that he was detained by airport security officials in America.
The international development minister was stopped and searched at Washington DC's Dulles airport after a series of meetings on tackling terrorism.

Mr Malik, MP for Dewsbury, West Yorks, had his hand luggage checked for explosives when returning to Heathrow.

BBC News

Doctor, doctor: How can you justify a 10% pay increase?
GPs' salaries soar to £110,000 despite promises of more money for patients

http://news.independent.co.uk/health/article3115515.ece

damn why didnt i do medicine lol

Nazdamn why didnt i do medicine lol

Because you wanted to break free of the stereotype.

im nt botherd about the stero type saving lifes is wat im into

Militants free Pakistani troops

Pro-Taleban militants have released more than 200 Pakistani soldiers who were captured near the Afghan border in August, military officials have said.

The soldiers were handed over to tribal elders in South Waziristan, the lawless region where they were being held.

The Pakistani authorities released 28 militants in exchange, reports say.

The soldiers were captured on 30 August, without a shot being fired, as their convoy was taking supplies to remote army camps.

"The soldiers have returned to their camp in South Waziristan," Maj-Gen Waheed Arshad said.

The kidnappers, who are loyal to Taleban commander Baitullah Mehsud, were demanding the release of jailed comrades in return for the soldiers' freedom.

One of the negotiators who secured the soldiers' release told the BBC that the authorities had agreed to release nearly 30 militants - some of them suspected suicide bombers.

A military spokesman only confirmed that the local authorities had released some detained tribesmen

Three of the kidnapped soldiers were killed by militants in September as a warning to the government not to launch a rescue operation.

The BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan, who recently travelled to the militants' camp to meet the captured men, says the capture of the soldiers was a major blow to the Pakistani army which is having to deal with lowering morale among its troops.

Pakistan has tens of thousands of troops in the area, struggling to quell unrest in a region where tribesmen do not recognise the Islamabad government.

The US says the area has become a save haven for al-Qaeda since the 11 September 2001 attacks on New York and Washington.

BBC News

Somebody please tell me... How do you release a suicide bomber?

You
How do you release a suicide bomber?

hairdryer? fan? gust of wind?

pressing his button?

God is back

When Professor Antony Flew, the world's most famous "philosophical atheist", announced in 2004 that he had changed his mind, it caused something of a theological earthquake. The aftershocks were amplified because it was further reported that he was persuaded by intelligent design.

Now he has published a book, There is a God, setting out his new position. He does not pull his punches: Richard Dawkins is engaged in an exercise of "popular mystification", he says. He also now believes that the presumption of proof is on the atheists to make their case.

He deploys a parable to capture something of what's at stake. Consider a satellite phone washed up on the shores of an island and found by a lost tribe. The tribe have had no contact with modern civilisation and have no idea what it is. However, they discover that some combinations of key punches lead to what sound like human voices being heard through the device. The proto-scientists of the tribe get to work on it and find that if they damage the phone in various ways that the voices cease. They conclude that the voices are an epiphenomenon of the phone's mechanism. A debate then ensues between the scientists and the priests of the tribe - the priests arguing that it could be that the phone is communicating with some other place. The scientists are not convinced.

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/mark_vernon/2007/11/god_is_back.html

You
Somebody please tell me... How do you release a suicide bomber?

kick up the back-side.

Seraphim

You
Somebody please tell me... How do you release a suicide bomber?

kick up the back-side.

Erm... I think everyone else got it. A suicide bomber is by definition a person who committed suicide through a bombing. ie Dead. Dee aiiI Eeee Deee. dead.

Mafia's 'Ten Commandments' found

Italian police have found what they say is a "Ten Commandments"-style code of behaviour for Mafia members, at the hideout of a captured Mafia boss.

The list was found during the arrest of Salvatore Lo Piccolo, the reputed new boss of the Sicilian Mafia.

It is thought to have been drawn up as a "guide to being a good mobster".

The Mafia's "Ten Commandments"
1. No-one can present himself directly to another of our friends. There must be a third person to do it.
2. Never look at the wives of friends.
3. Never be seen with cops.
4. Don't go to pubs and clubs.
5. Always being available for Cosa Nostra is a duty - even if your wife's about to give birth.
6. Appointments must absolutely be respected.
7. Wives must be treated with respect.
8. When asked for any information, the answer must be the truth.
9. Money cannot be appropriated if it belongs to others or to other families.
10. People who can't be part of Cosa Nostra: anyone who has a close relative in the police, anyone with a two-timing relative in the family, anyone who behaves badly and doesn't hold to moral values.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7086716.stm

Seems like a respectable organisation.

/fills in application form.

Chess boxing

Chess boxing is a hybrid sport which combines the sport of boxing with games of chess in alternating rounds. Chess boxing fights have been staged since the spring of 2003.

A match between two opponents consists of up to eleven alternating rounds of boxing and chess sessions, starting with a four-minute chess round followed by two minutes of boxing and so on. Between rounds there is a 1 minute pause, during which competitors change their gear. The form of chess played is "speed chess" in which each competitor has a total of twelve minutes for the whole game. Competitors may win by knockout, checkmate, a judge's decision or if their opponent's twelve minutes of chess time elapses. If a contestant doesn't make a move in the chessround, he will be issued a warning by the referee. At the second warning the contestant will be disqualified.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_boxing

Picky woman rejects 150 marriage proposals

A woman in Serbia has turned down more than 150 marriage proposals because she has not met the right man.

Milunka Dabovic got her first proposal at the age of 14 – a full 24 years ago.

'Some men won't take no for an answer,' said Miss Dabovic, who lives at home with her mother in Maskova.

'They even try to get my mother to try to make me accept. But the man I marry needs to be tall, handsome and be a hard worker with a good heart

Metro

Dunno why she was sad enough to keep count? :?